(1) A religious man feels that he is where he is, and he is what he is, not for his own sake so much as for the sake of others. He is here to help and bless the world. The great discovery of Christianity was this, that human life might be made better, sweeter, more wholesome; in the words of Scripture, that the world might be saved. And as Christians we should rejoice in the besetting duties of life, in its unremitting calls and claims upon us. Not to rejoice in this life of ours is to be weary. We are weary when we feel our duties to be dry ; when we feel the claims of Christian love and brotherhood troublesome and against the grain. We are weary when we are indolent at the summons of faith or hope or love. We are weary in those hours when we do not like to think how much sorrow and how much need there is in the world and round about us, and that we might do some- thing to reduce the bulk of human misery.
^ In weariness we seek to reduce our exertions to the lowest possible point. Weary men soon find out how little they may do, the least they may do. Eetrenching our liberalities, we are feeling charity irksome ; resigning one office after another with ingenious pleas, we are becoming weary in service. Ever striving to bring our Christian life down to the lowest standard is proof positive of decaying conviction and enthusiasm. The whole-hearted man asks, " How much can I be, give, do ? " The weary man asks, " How little ? " In weariness men magnify trifles. Dr. Living- ^ A. L. Moore, From, Advent to Advent, 95.
452 WEARINESS IN WELL-DOING
stone tells that the Africans are sometimes affiicted by a singular disorder which causes them in passing over a straw to lift up their feet as if they were passing over the trunk of a tree. Weariness is a similar malady ; it makes great efiforts to overcome trifling and imaginary obstructions. The grasshopper is a burden. Weariness is seriously offended by the veriest trifles, by a word, or a look, or by the lack of a word or look which really means nothing.^
f What does The Slough of Despond mean in the allegory ? Christian himself answers, tracing his misadventure to fear. It is the despondency of reaction which, if it become permanent, may deepen into religious monomania. It is to some extent physical, the result of overstrained nerves, so that " the change of weather" mentioned may be taken quite literally. A clear air and a sunny day are great aids to faith, and there are many, like Robertson of Brighton, whose fight with depression is brought on by rainy seasons. Thus it is not only sharp conviction of sin that we have here, but a state of hopelessness and weariness of spirit whose causes are very composite. All the evil side of life flows into it. Every sinful memory and unbelieving thought increases it. Bunyan's reticence adds to his power here as elsewhere, for by not defining it more particularly he leaves each reader with a general symbol which he can fill in with the details of his own experience. Dr. Whyte reminds us that Christians are partly responsible for this slough. The Christian life is sometimes described in such a way as to make one think that there is no use trying ; and there are many, like Widow Pascoe in Dan'l Quorm, who express a melancholy resignation in such phrases as "trusting Him where they cannot trace Him." These are the chronic folk of the slough, who dwell so near its banks as to be spiritually bronchitic with its exhalations. This is bad enough ; but when despondency comes to be regarded as a virtue, and happy faith in God as presumption, then the slough has become a place of sin as well as of misery. Humility, doubt- less, is derived from humus ; but as the quality of a living soul it must mean on the ground, not in it. Nor does it mean grovelling either, but standing on the ground. The voice Ezekiel heard still calls to all men, " Son of man, stand upon thy feet." *
(2) Over and above those demands for our love and sympathy which our religion makes, there is the fundamental requirement of God that we ourselves be pure and holy in our own inward
* W. K Watkinson, Studies in Ohristia/n Character, L 75
* John Kelman, The Road, i. 20.
GAL. VI. 9 453
parts. That is another region in which weariness always threatens us. We may know what it is to be impatient of the regular duties of the religious life — to feel public worship an interference with our natural indolence, and so to think less of public worship, and to imagine some other way of spending the Sabbath would be better, because we would like some other way — as if we had not to suspect our likes rather than be guided by them. Then, to speak of more intimate things, we may know what it is to hurry through our prayers, feeling a certain irksomeness in what — if we were as we should be — is " the great love the Father hath bestowed upon us " to call Him Father, and to apeak to Him as ehUdren. We may know what it is to put off the facing of private moral questions ; we may know what it is to resent the perpetual demand for goodness, for seriousness, for self-examination, for religion, for restraint and abstinence and prayer.