quick and strong such influences may easily prove, independent of all intention or desire on our part, or even in spite of our deliberate wishes or hopes. One man is careless or irreligious, and his weaker neighbours catch the infection of his example; another indulges in some bad habits of language or conduct, or he is addicted to some low taste, or he lives by some low standard, and this or that companion is drawn down to his level; and so the evil of his life takes fresh root in another life, and it gets into the air, and it is impossible to predict the limit of its influence.
Or, on the other hand, one man is intellectual or refined in his tastes, and by merely living in a society he creates an atmosphere of intellect or of refinement around him; or, it may be, he is earnest and courageous, and others are drawn to admire and imitate, and so he proves a centre of courage and earnestness. Such is the solidarity of your life, as men call it, and there is no escape from it, or from the responsibilities which it lays upon you.
As the tree is known by its fruits, as men do not gather grapes of thorns, as the same fountain does not send forth sweet water and bitter, so we have to remember, when we think of the tides of unconscious influence that are continually streaming out from us, that they are wholesome, or the reverse, according to the character of our secret and separate life.
Through them any one of us may become to his neighbour or his friend a savour of life unto life, or of death unto death.
There are sure to be many in such a congregation as this who have visions of the good they hope to do; and there is a spirit of native generosity in almost all which makes them shrink from the thought of doing harm to another soul.
Well, then, in this thought of your influence, conscious and unconscious, your first and constant prayer will surely be: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.”
The effective servant of God is always the
man who has been prepared and purified by the vision of God in his own soul.
If, then, we desire to contribute some good to our society and no evil, we must take care to keep our hearts open to the cleansing influences of the spirit of holiness, so that no habit of sin shall cast its dark shadow around us, or vitiate that atmosphere which is inseparable from our personal life.