"
And it all happened. By seeing first the Kingdom of God, all these
things were added unto him.
Boys, banish forever from your minds the idea that religion is
SUBTRACTION. It does not tell us to give things up, but rather
gives us something so much better that they give themselves up.
When you see a boy on the street whipping a top, you know, perhaps,
that you could not make that boy happier than by giving him a top,
a whip, and half an hour to whip it. But next birthday, when he
looks back he says,
"What a goose I was last year to be delighted with a top. What I
want now is a baseball bat."
Then when he becomes an old man, he does not care in the least for
a baseball bat; he wants rest, and a snug fireside and a newspaper
every day. He wonders how he could ever have taken up his thoughts
with baseball bats and whipping-tops.
Now, when a boy becomes a Christian, he grows out of the evil
things one by one--that is to say, if they are really evil--which
he used to set his heart upon; (of course I do not mean baseball
bats, for they are not evils); and so instead of telling people to
give up things, we are safer to tell them to "seek first the Kingdom
of God," and then they will get new things and better things, and
The old things will drop off
of themselves.
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