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Development of Character
by Lieut.-Colonel Catherine Bramwell-Booth
From book ‘Training Staff Council Lectures 1925’
 

Forgive me if this lecture seems to be something of a repetition of what has already been said.  You have heard so much; and as all these subjects dovetail one into another, a certain amount of overlapping cannot well be avoided.  And again, this subject is one of the fundamentals of which one can hardly hear too much.

 

I

The Training Officer must be convinced that character is a matter for development, and that alteration in a man for the better is the work of the Holy Spirit.  We believe in miracles!  We should be no good as Training Officers if we did not; and we must see that Officers under our direction are also confirmed in this faith – that it is possible to develop character.  I had thought of beginning by asking, ‘What is character?’  I do not know how one can define it satisfactorily.  Character is not soul.  It is not mind.  Some of the 6cleverest men have no character, or but poor character.  It is not will.  Some strong-willed people have thoroughly bad characters.  What is it?  I do not know.  It is rather interesting to analyse what goes to make man; and it seems to me that character is something we cannot quite explain.  I am afraid I cannot attempt to say anything enlightening about the origin of character, because I am in the dark about it myself except that it is something God has given man, an important quality for his being.  As a Training Officer, I have sometimes felt I would rather have a Cadet who is inferior in gifts yet possessing real character, than one who is capable, but weak in character.  If your people have character, you are likely, it seems to me from my experience, to accomplish more with them in the end than with the brilliant people who lack in this something we are talking about.

 

What we can do for the development of character is likely to be in proportion to our realization of the importance of character as a part of the man.  At any rate, be quite sure we shall not be able to help our people as we want to unless we believe that, whatever a man’s character, God can improve on it, develop it, and turn it into something better than it would be if left to go its own way apart from the influence of the Holy Spirit.

 

An Officer I know very well – one of our leading Officers – told me he was once on a long railway journey, with one other gentleman in the carriage.  He soon began to talk of The Army and its work, and this man said, ‘I’m sorry, but I do not believe as you do.  When one comes to enter the fields of science one is obliged to abandon much that one believed in before.  I do not say there is no God, but I cannot believe there is any Power that is interfering with the development of the human race to-day.  I think we are left to get on as best we can.  There may be a Power somewhere, but, if so, I do not know where: everything is under fixed laws, you cannot change a man, or a dog!’  My comrade (he was a Colonel) turned to him and said, ‘If you knew The Salvation Army you could not think that.  We must believe because we see bad men changed.  How would you account for that?’  The man replied, ‘As a matter of fact, my dear sir, it does not happen; you think they are bad, but they are not really bad; or you think they are good, and they are not really good.  Nothing is really changed!  It is all according to the shape of the brain.  Take yourself, for example, I can see what you are when I look into your face.  I am a phrenologist.’  Then the Colonel said, ‘Be honest, I have been honest with you.  Feel my bumps and see just what I am.  What do you really think I should be?’  The phrenologist felt his head.  He was absolutely nonplussed and said, ‘I must admit if I judged merely from this I should not expect to find you in any way connected with religion.  You lack veneration; I must say you are a most interesting case,’ and he began to question him about how long he had been in The Salvation Army.  I suppose he was trying to find out whether the Colonel was one of the good ones, or one who only seemed to be good!

 

This incident impressed me at the time (I was on Training Work) because it confirmed much that I liked to think; for instance, that our natural limitations have very little to do with what God can make of us if we really give ourselves up to Him.  To remember that, and to teach the Cadets that, is especially helpful in these days when the very people we are trying to help are often tainted with psychological bosh.  There is a lot of talk to-day about a man’s natural tendencies.  We are told a child’s bent must not be changed, he must be allowed to do everything he wants to do, even to falling in the fire!  I do not know quite how far they go.  Some of the Cadets have picked up a bit of it:  they say, ‘Well, of course, that is not my bent,’ or ‘This is my make up,’ or ‘Yes, I know it’s a failing but my father was like it, it’s in our family,’ and settle down to be content with what they are.  We have to come to them with the great fact, new to them, that God can change them.

 

I was inexperienced when suddenly planted down, a Cadet among a crowd of others.  I had not been to school, nor mixed with many people.  There had been enough of us at home to make ideal companionships within our own circle; and when I was suddenly plunged into the midst of a crowd, I was depressed at my own limitations, and I thought, I shall never rise up to be what I ought to be and want to be, and what the Work requires.  Dear Commissioner Rees helped me.  I do not think he ever lectured on any subject without bringing in at the beginning, or at the end, or before he left the platform, ‘Well, remember! what you are not by nature you can be by grace.’  Do you believe it?  He simply drilled this into us.  We were always hearing it; and could not get away from it.  He used to say it to us again and again, and it has remained with me, ‘What you are not by nature you can be by grace.’  That was of inestimable value to us as Cadets.  You see we felt, ‘that man believes that, whatever our limitations, we can rise above them.  He believes it, whether we can believe it or not!’  That is how the Training Officers ought to make the Cadets feel.  We believe God can change men, and this being so we should strive with all our might to create in the minds of the Cadets a living faith in the possibility of their own development; keep on saying to them as the Lord said when one came to Him in perplexity, ‘If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.’ (Mark ix. 23.)

 

Further, if we are convinced that character is a matter for development, and are striving to create in the minds of the Cadets a living faith for their own development, we shall guard every evidence of growth.  Sometimes evidences of growth of character are expressed very clumsily.  A Cadet may strike out and do a new thing, but do it altogether badly.  Training Officers must be wise enough and quick enough to see behind that lack of skill, for frequently they will find a motive, an impulse which is really a most encouraging sign of development in that character.  Guard carefully against any desire to correct an error, if your correction might at the same time injure a blessed impulse of growth.

 

In training plants, the first years count for much.  For instance, if trees are going to live and develop, it is amazing how much depends on guarding them during the first years.  If the main shoot is broken when the tree is only a few inches high, the tree will be deformed.  For hundreds of years, may be, it will live and try to correct that deformity, but it will never be perfect, never be the same again.  You can go through any wood and see trees which have been injured in their youth.  It is sometimes like that with character: some stultifying influence is brought to bear on it, and that which should have developed into beauty is injured, hurt, shrinks away, and that soul is maimed. 

 

It is very strange how men persist in the colossal error that it is much easier to deal with a man’s spiritual nature than with his physical nature!  The most delicate and rare skill is required from those who seek to help in the development of character.  I think this is especially so for Officers engaged in Training.  Of course, skill is needed in all our dealings with souls, but especially in Training, where we have them in our care day after day.  The younger Officers coming up in Training Work need to ponder this, to be helped by you to face it, so that they may approach their work with care and preparation, and be guarded from making mistakes.  It has been disappointing to find how blunderingly and haphazardly many are prepared to rush in and deal with a soul!

 

We must maintain our faith for those for whom we are working.  It is not enough to begin with faith.  A physician says, ‘While there is life there is hope.’  And I think the Training Officer should feel, ‘While they are Cadets there is hope!’  At any rate, I think it is important that the Cadet should feel it is so.  I have seen an almost blighting effect produced on souls because they have felt an Officer had no faith in them.  And you must remember there is always the danger that we may have misjudged.  It has a blighting effect when a Cadet comes to feel, ‘the Ensign (or Major) has lost faith in me!’  That exhausts the last scrap of faith he might have had for himself.  Up to the last moment, the Cadet should feel, whatever his own discouragements, down-heartedness, and failures may be, ‘At any rate, my Training Officers have faith for me!’

 

Have not some of us been helped by the faith of others?  And have not you heard scores of people say of their trials, darkness, failures, and defeats, ‘This man encouraged me in such and such a way’?  They tell you that the only thing that kept them going and made them able to right the wrong, was that some one believed in them.  With some of the Cadets is it just the same:  ‘The Colonel believed in me,’ ‘The Captain believed in me,’ ‘Somebody had faith for me, and kept on making me feel it!’

 

II

The Training Officer must believe the development of character may be assisted by human instrumentality.  We must not only believe, and make the Cadet believe, that God can change him, but we must believe God will use us to help bring about that change.  The steadfast faith of one heart for another may exercise an immeasurable influence.  I do not think we have learned to understand that fully yet.  It is one of the mysteries of the spiritual world to me, one of the things I wish I saw more clearly.  When I have stopped to think and pray about it, as I have done, I have been frightened.  It has made by inner soul tremble, especially when I have come up to interviews, and have been faced with the thought that perhaps what I say in this next hour may really make a difference to that soul, to its development, to its future.  It is tremendous!  We cannot get away from it; it is happening all the time; we must accept it as we have accepted so much in God’s plan which we do not understand.  Speaking for myself, at any rate, I do not understand it.  I can only say it is so, and I must accept it.  We cannot doubt it, because we have evidence that this is His way of working amongst us, and we have evidence of it in our own experience.  I certainly have in mine.  I look back to people, this one, and that one, and thank God that they ever touched my spirit: they gave me something, did something for me, and made me different from what I should have been if I had not come in touch with them.  I am bound to say I cannot doubt that human beings help to mould each other because my own life and heart would contradict such a doubt.

 

There are many ways of assisting in the development of the character of those entrusted to our care.  We should do all we can to inspire them.  Hold up an ideal before them until it becomes a thing they desire, something for which their own hearts reach out with longing.

 

Desire!  Oh, if we could only get it really burning in their hearts!  Then we could almost fold our hands and let the Holy Spirit and the soul go their way, for that soul’s development would be assured.  We have a part in the kindling, the stirring up, the creating of desire.  If desire for spiritual light, life and love be strong enough, that desire is to be fulfilled.  This is the Lord’s promise: ‘What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.’

 

We may assist in the development of character by inculcating the laws that belong to growth.  Do not be afraid of repetition.  When I was in the Training Garrison I was greatly impressed by going through the Gospels and noticing for myself all the occasions on which it is clearly stated, or implied, that the Lord said the same thing over again, or did the same thing over again.  ‘And, as He was wont, He taught them again.’  (Mark x. 1.)  And then how often the parables came back to the same lesson!  This encouraged my own heart and made me feel ‘no matter how often I have to go over essentials, I will go over them until I feel they are really in the Cadets’ minds.’  This repetition is necessary to the inculcating of the laws of character.  We cannot too often insist upon such foundation laws of progress as:

1.     Sincerity.  A man’s character cannot be developed for good if he is not sincere, no matter what you do for him, or he does for himself, or how splendid may be all the machinery for helping him.  For the development of character in the right direction, sincerity is absolutely essential; and natural gifts have nothing to do with this.  Help the Cadets to get away from themselves, and make them understand sincerity.  Some, alas, do not understand what it is to have a true heart!  It is a difficult matter to deal with; but sincerity is essential to any soul aspiring to progress in the way of God.  Deal with it from every aspect, so that, whether they accept the law for themselves or not, no Cadets can be in doubt as to the meaning and importance of sincerity.

 

2.     Perseverance.  We must make plain, by continual repetition if necessary, the part which perseverance plays in progress.  It is wonderful how often the natural laws are a tangible representation of the spiritual.  Personally I believe this is part of God’s plan to enlighten us, that we may know Him, His nature and His will for us, to a marvellous extent by studying His work.  I think this is written large over God’s creation – if we want to attain, it is decreed that we must do it by perseverance in work.

 

Here again Commissioner Reed helped me.  There were two things he emphasized.  One, ‘What you are not by nature you can be by grace’; the other (and I think he used to bring it in somehow every day), ‘You must work!’  In his illustrations, talks, and lectures, he would say, ‘You are no good if you cannot work.  My dear boy, if you cannot work, you had better clear out!’  He emphasized it so much that he almost made us feel it didn’t matter what work we did so long as we worked!  He used to tell us about his weaknesses and shortcomings, and then add, ‘But I worked!  I got up early in the morning and I went to work.  I had to work when I was a Cadet; I had to work when I was a Lieutenant; and now I am a Commissioner I work!  If you do not want to work you will not get anywhere.’  He rubbed it in with all his might.  Perhaps some of us worked too hard; but I think it was erring on the right side.

 

3.     The Mastery of Self.  I am but mentioning a few foundation laws necessary to the development of character.  No high development of man in any direction, spiritual, mental, or physical, is possible without a governing of himself and his faculties.  The man who sets out to be an acrobat has to govern his body, and master those physical powers which are his, that he may excel.  He has to exercise his muscles until they are under such perfect control that each is brought into submission.  In like manner, a man who wants to excel in the field of mental activity has to subdue his thoughts that he may properly use his mind.  Equally, a man of character must be master of his impulses.

 

We must help the Cadets in the development of character by giving them room to exercise the qualities we are seeking to develop.  In this connexion you must not ignore nor despise small things.  Ordinary hum-drum experiences may be used for the development of the highest and rarest gifts.  The spirit of unselfishness can be truly exhibited in an ordinary rough-and-tumble day as in the moment when a man lays down his life for another.  We must make the Cadets realize this, and help them to exercise the qualities of which we speak to them, and towards which they are reaching out.  Let us use their relationships with each other to help them.  A Cadet who is selfish and disagreeable amongst her comrades will act selfishly in her duties to souls.  A selfish person will not willingly carry the burden in the work of God; he may come in for the glory where he can, but he will be likely to shirk the burden and shirk the work.

 

The Officers dealing with Cadets should make them feel that the qualities they need as leaders may be exercised at the Cadets’ meal table, and in the dormitory, and on the march, and in the Corps, just as much as anywhere else.  We should also use the Cadet’s attitude toward his Officers.  If you want a man to develop in right spirit, and in the character which is going to make him the man we want in the future, let him show those qualities as a Cadet towards his superiors.  People who resent being told things, what a nuisance they are!  They must be approached so carefully, and the moment they are corrected they are all bristly and upset!  That sort of spirit ought to be dealt with in the Cadets; they must have opportunity for exercising the right kind of spirit towards their Sergeants and Officers.

 

Then Cadets should have opportunity to exercise themselves in voluntary works and discipline.  I perhaps feel more strongly on this than many feel.  I hope I did not make a mistake, but I set a high value on what the Cadet did of his own accord, and I think we should make more opportunity for voluntary work.  There is a tendency in that direction here at Clapton.  We do not decide so much as formerly what Cadets shall do in their Field work and in the Meetings.  We do not say so often as formerly, ‘This Cadet will speak or pray, or this one lead and fish.’  We say, ‘Here is the Meeting; every one do what you can.’  We leave the door open so that we may know those whose own hearts push them to action.  When, without being actually called upon, they are drawn out in testimony, we find the people who have it in them – it is the voluntary testimony that is valuable.

 

I feel also that we ought to give the Cadets ample opportunity for voluntary works of self-discipline.  I found it helped me considerably, and I know it has helped scores of other I have come into contact with, to impose some yoke on themselves.  Apart altogether from the value of what they do, this self-discipline does something for their own character.  I have said sometimes to Cadets, ‘Will you for the next month, whatever happens, whatever you feel, get up one half-hour earlier to read and pray and study?’  I have proved that, apart from the benefit derived from the study (I do not say the reading and study does not do good, I am sure it does), that grip on themselves, that making themselves do it, adds something to character which is of infinite value.  The Bible says, ‘It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.’  Well, I think by putting a yoke on himself in his youth he has certainly gone a long way towards being a man fit to impose a yoke on others.

 

There should be opportunity for the Cadet to do more than is expected of him.  God save us and protect us from Officers who cannot do more than they are supposed to do!  Why, The Army would never be what it is, we should never be sitting here, if our leaders and comrades and the saints who have gone before us has not done more than anyone expected them to do!  In the past they did not wait to know whether this particular department was supposed to do this or that.  The need imposed the responsibility to meet it if possible.

 

One of our failures in the development of our present-day young people and Officers is that, in spite of all we do, we turn out too many who are merely prepared to go through the daily task; so many hours visiting, and so much time for this and that; Officers who say, ‘What things I am supposed to do I have done, I am a faithful servant,’ and go to bed in peace!  This is not enough!  When you think of the countries where our Officers are working, do you think it is enough?  It is not enough!  The Salvation Army needs people who, when they have done all that is required of them, will still say, ‘I am an unworthy servant.  What more can I do?’

 

Let us give the Cadets room to exercise this spirit while in Training.  If every moment of the day is taken up, and every duty told off, and it takes the whole of the Cadet’s strength to do what they are supposed to do (and you must have mercy on the limitations of human strength), then with the best will in the world they cannot do more than they are expected to do.  Let us, whist still telling them to go so far, see that they shall always have strength – if they have the heart – to go farther.  In this matter, and indeed in all that has to do with the development of character, the small Training Garrisons have an immense advantage over the larger.  I know that in the smaller Garrisons you have fewer Officers; but the smaller your company, the finer your opportunity to make men and women of character.

 

Officers and Sergeants should be one with you.  And let me say in passing, teach our young Officers to let the Cadets help themselves.  It is an old-fashioned difficulty.  It is far easier to do things for people than to leave them to do things for themselves, and one of the snares of Training Work is that very often the love, zeal, faith, and desire in the hearts of the Officers push them on to do for the Cadets what the Cadets ought to be left to do for themselves; and we must teach the younger Officers that part of the skill they must acquire in dealing with souls is not only to know when to help, but also when not to help; the one needs quite as able a mind and heart as the other.

 

We may assist in their development by helping the Cadets to find out for themselves about themselves.  After all, it is only what a man does for himself than can develop him, and that is why it is so important to encourage voluntary effort on the part of the Cadet even in the simplest things, in their public work, and in the use of their time.  It is what they do for themselves that will help them.  Cadets must be helped to know themselves and find out what is in them, and then helped to deal with their weaknesses, if their character is to develop as we desire.

 

The Cadets must be armed against dangers in themselves.  Are there any other dangers?  I do not know whether you agree with me, but I am tempted to say that there are no dangers really worth calling dangers to a man’s soul and spirit apart from the danger which exists in himself!  My experience in dealing with Cadets individually led me to feel this, and the longer I was at it the more firmly I became convinced of the falsity of the argument that environment makes the man.  The exceptions were too many!  I have met some who are strong in the belief that environment has a great deal to do with character.  I must say I think that if Training Garrison Officers would take trouble to look behind the scenes they would come to the conclusion that environment has very little to do with deciding a man’s character.  I have studied the Cadets from this standpoint; and, in the majority of cases, I have been compelled to the conclusions that environment has had quite a different effect from what I should have expected.

 

Failures, in my opinion, are caused by the inherent weaknesses in a person’s character rather than by his circumstances, and these weaknesses are what we should teach the Cadets to discover in themselves.  All have some weaknesses.  The strongest character has its weakness.  No one is without a weak spot in character, and we must show the Cadets that their very strength often involves weakness.  Take, for example, the will, one of the finest assets in character building.  We say that the strong-willed people are the people to make leaders; and it is true that a strong will is an asset towards making a fine character.  But we have all had experience, also, of how a strong will can cause havoc and disaster!  When strong will remains self-will, the strong-willed person becomes one of the most heart-breaking of all.  When we have to deal with him we look at what we saw in him of good, the capacity and the promise, and we see how because of self-will his whole life has gone to smash.  His strength was also his weakness!

 

I do not think it hurts the Cadets to tell them we think God has given them this or that quality and to mention their good qualities.  The Cadet is sometimes tremendously astonished, had never thought there was anything good about that tendency, and when you sit down and tell him that you feel he is gifted it helps him to a certain self-respect which is good for human nature.  Then you can go on to show him how to turn these gifts to good account and to warn him how they may become a danger.

 

Show the Cadets also that they must deal with failure in themselves, and that weakness and failure left uncorrected will ruin the finest character.  If you are going to show the Cadets how to build a good character, you cannot allow them to tolerate weaknesses and little failures side by side with strength.  Failures and weaknesses must be mastered, corrected, turned out if necessary and, if possible, lost.  Many weaknesses cannot altogether be banished; they remain and have to be mastered.

 

Teach them, further, that all gifts and talents should be servants.  Help the Cadet to deal with himself by showing him that his gifts and talents ought to be his servants, and that servants must not rule the master.  If you can make him understand this it will help him.  Show him how the gifts God has given can be rightly used.  As an illustration, take the gift of quick judgment.  I do not know whether you have much trouble with your young people, but in our country we sometimes have difficulty because of their quickness to judge and criticize; at any rate, I found this a difficulty, and because of it many Cadets close the door to blessing.

 

It is not exactly cynicism, but a certain fashion of picking holes, finding fault, turning up their noses at this and that and the other.  Sometimes it does an immense amount of harm, especially when people influence each other.  I have found it a help to some of them when I have said, ‘I notice you are rather critical.’  Generally these people are proud of their critical minds, and they have replied, ‘Perhaps I am,’ expecting me to condemn them.  But, instead of that, I have often said, ‘Have you thanked God for this gift?’  ‘No, not exactly!’  ‘Well, it is a gift – a great gift.  If you are thinking of being a leader of men, that discernment and clear mind which enables you to judge quickly ranks, perhaps, as one of the highest qualities you will need in order to be a good leader.’  Then I have talked about the abuse of the critical faculty: how some who have this faculty have let it run away with them so that they cannot go to a Meeting without being led away from the subject of the Meeting to criticize this and that.  I have tried to show that this is the master in bondage to the servant, and that the spirit of criticism which has, perhaps, often led them into condemnation, can be so governed, mastered, and trained as to be one of the greatest help to them.

 

Then I think you should help the Cadets to believe that all weakness can be made a means of grace.  I hope that is not putting it too strongly.  I think God’s dealings and records in the Bible give us a right to say that, when it is not the Lord’s will to take away a weakness, He will make it a means of grace.  I have known people absolutely under bondage through fear of other people, and have seen that weakness taken right away; but sometimes a soul will pray not only three times, as Paul prayed, but far more often, and yet a particular weakness is not removed, because it is God’s purpose to let it remain; but, with a recognition of His will, there comes a promise:  ‘My grace is sufficient for thee: for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’  We want to make the Cadets understand that if they have a weakness which it seems part of God’s will shall remain, they can bless God because that weakness in them is going to be, throughout their future, a means of grace: something that will make them better because it will keep them in close touch with God, or keep them more humble, or more tender.

 

 

III

Every Cadet should be convinced that development is essential to spiritual health.  Root and ground them in this belief:  Salvation and Sanctification are the preparation for development, just as the preparing of the ground and the putting in of the seed are the first steps towards a bringing forth of fruit.

 

Spiritual growth is a token of Holiness.  Holiness has been called spiritual health.  ‘Where there is growth, there is life’; this is very clearly one of God’s messages to us in the natural world, where I think we can say growth and life are almost synonymous terms.  I have often asked myself: Is not the fact that we keep on growing one of the inward, silent tokens of immortality?  I am growing older, but the older I am, the more I see how many things I have to learn, and how much there is I wish I knew.  My desire to know is getting stronger and stronger.  May I not conclude that this is one of God’s silent whispers to me, telling that He has much to do for me yet, and that this little life is a mere nothing, so far as its capacity to satisfy my spirit is concerned.  But this is in passing.  Let the Cadets understand they must go on developing.

 

It is a heart-breaking truth that Officers backslide!  Some I have had to deal with in bitter anguish of spirit.  The awfulness of seeing people who have walked with God, tasted the joys of the Spirit, engaged in the service for souls and won other souls, turned back into sin – even into gross sin!  I have said to myself: ‘Why is it?  How can this thing be?  How can it be?’  Doesn’t it sometimes come to you as a blow?  It has to me.  Perhaps I have not seen the comrades concerned in the interval, and have suddenly heard of some awful thing happening, some black cloud having descended, and they have gone out of sight!  I have felt if only I could speak to them and say, ‘I cannot believe it.  It cannot be you!  You could not have done that, not the you I knew – how could you?’  Alas, for the dull answer of fact!

 

Sometimes I have looked at the Cadets when they have some near to the commissioning, during the crowded days before they must go marching out; looked at them and felt that they were Cadets for the last time!  I have said to myself, ‘I shall never have the right in the same way to take them aside and say, heart to heart and face to face, what I want to say, and what God gives me to say.’  Looking at them in a body for the last time, I have asked myself, ‘Who among them shall be lost?  Who?’  As I have looked into their faces I have felt it cannot be that one, or this one; and, looking at them one after another, I have been unable to think it of any.  And yet I always knew (and you always know) that within so many years there will be empty places.  I do not mean the blanks caused by sickness, or death, or circumstances which may turn people away but which they cannot control.  I mean those blanks which come because of souls stepping back into sin and wrong-doing.

 

Why is it?  Why is it?  God’s will is higher than our will.  If we would keep them in the way of purity, Holiness, and right-doing, how much more would their Heavenly Father keep them in His way.  Why do they step out of the way?  I think one of the reasons is that they have not really grasped this truth of God’s law, which cannot and will not change, that if they do not grow, if their spiritual life does not develop, if their character is not getting better, they are in that place of danger where at any moment the Tempter may step in and destroy them.  They are like the tree that, ceasing to grow, begins to rot; when the wind blows, down it comes.  But the rotting, the period of cessation of growth , had begun weeks or months, if not years, before the storm, before the crash.

 

Let us warn the young Officers we send out of the perils of the way.  Let us get them to carry this lesson with them:  I must advance.  If I stop growing I shall come to grief.  So God will build up characters that will be like Him.  ‘It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him.’  May it be so with these souls He has given us!

 

 

 

 

   

 

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