On that last point I must dilate a little; on the point of Considerateness. I remember a conversation a few years ago with one of our college servants, an excellent Christian woman, truly exemplary in every duty. She was speaking of one of my dear student friends now labouring for the Lord in a distant and difficult mission-field, and giving him--after his departure from us--a tribute of most disinterested praise: "Ah, Sir, he _was_ a consistent gentleman!" And then she instanced some of my friend's consistencies; and I observed that they all reduced themselves to one word--Considerateness. He was always taking trouble, and always saving trouble. He was always finding out how a little thought for others can save them much needless labour. The things in question were not heroic. The thoughtfulness for others concerned only such matters as the bath, and the shoes, and the clothes, and some small details of hospitality. But they meant a very great deal for the hard-worked caretaker, and they were to her a means of quite distinct "edification," upbuilding, in the assurance that Christ and the Gospel are indeed practical realities. I break no confidence when I add, by the way, that my friend had not always been thus "a consistent gentleman." But the Lord had found him, and he had found the Lord, in the midst of his University life; and he had learnt most deeply and effectually, at the feet of Jesus, the consistency of Considerateness.
I do press this aspect of our daily walk with all earnestness on my younger Brethren. I press it on them at least _to think about it_ with painstaking attention. No Christian man, as such, means for one moment to be selfish. But lack of attention does in very many cases indeed allow the real Christian to contract, or to continue, selfish habits. Many good men quite fail to realize how selfish, practically, it is to be unpunctual. You have your understood mealtimes in your lodging. It may not be always possible to keep strictly to them; the exigencies of work may make it honestly necessary now and again to be out of time. But let nothing less than duty do so for you. The breakfast kept standing because you are not up when you should be may very likely mean much needless trouble and much domestic disarrangement. Guests often brought in without any notice may mean the same.