by Charles Fillmore •

(Texts from the Revised Version.)'

Lesson 3. July 21.

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS-DUTIES TOWARD MEN. Exodus 20:12-17.

12. Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee.

16.

17.

Thou shalt not steal.

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Leviticus 19:18.

GOLDEN TEXT

Duties toward men and duties toward God go hand in hand. If men but knew it they could eliminate nine-tenths of their study and efforts to fulfill this law of righteousness, by establishing, first, a right relation between the individual and God.

Honor God and as the day follows the night you. will honor your father. Think of the loving Father always with you, and your mother will never complain of your ingratitude or lack of loving obedience.

God is the life of all that lives. Whoever slays the temple of that life, with the thought that he is destroying life, is trying to kill God. "Who lives by the sword shall die by the sword." A destructive thought produces destruction in the one who generates it. "Thou shalt not kill," covers every phase of manifest life. If you want long life, protect the life about you in all its forms. Do not have anything to do with destructive thoughts in mind or in form. This carried to the ultimate will make you an abstainer from all food that has been wantonly killed.

It is the thought that counts. The destructive thought that goes out with the slaying of animals, and the terror and fear of death that invisibly vibrates through the flesh, is what makes the eating of killed things dangerous.. Thus man is bound to protect life in order to protect himself. You may not be cruel enough to kill even an oyster, but the accumulated filth of that little scavenger of the sea will protest in your stomach and help along your nervousness.

Everybody knows the effect of adultery in its mortal sense, and never has a race been found so degraded as to ignore this innate law. It is implanted in the innermost recesses of the human mind, and woe be unto him who transgresses it. It was not necessary to write a scripture to call men's attention to the mortal law it is the spiritual law that needs attention. It is the adulteration of Truth that makes possible the sense adulteration. The mixing of the Absolute and the relative, without proper discrimination and classification, is adultery. Judas was an adulterer in that he did not see the spiritual character of the Christ, but mixed it with temporal authority and commercialism.

Thus adultery is a very widespread sin, and the best of us, in our present understanding of the Law of Being, are not able to distinguish between the Absolute plane of consciousness and the relative. Jesus illustrated this by asking those without sin to cast the first stone at the guilty woman, and not one responded. Like he forgave this woman, the Lord forgives us our ignorant shortcomings, but the command, "Sin no more," is still ringing in our ears. Every sin brings its penalty.

Theodore Parker said that if the good deacons who confessed their sins in prayer-meeting told the truth they ought to be sent to state prison. there is slight difference between the prison and those free on the streets.

The fact is, men in state

The human

thought back of commercialism leads right up to stealing. Stealing is taking that which does not belong to you. Under the Divine Law, which is the only law, man has the right to use everything, but to possess nothing. Thus all claim of ownership is stealing in the sight of God. It is stealing to strive to get anything without giving an equivalent. getting of money a dominant object will eventually steal to satisfy it. proposition, "I am going to do the will of God," and your own will come to you.

I.

Lesson 4. July 28.

If you make the in your life you Start with the

THE GOLDEN CALF-Exodus 32:1-8, 30-35.

And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, that shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him.

2. And Aaron said unto them, Break off the golden rings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me.

3. And all the people brake off the golden rings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron.

4. And he received it at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, and made it a molten calf: and they said, These are thy gods, O Israel, that brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

5. And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, Tomorrow shall be a feast to Jehovah.

6. And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.

7. And Jehovah spake unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, that thou broughtest up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves:

8. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed unto it, and said, These are thy gods, O Israel, that brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

30. And it came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto Jehovah; peradventure I shall make atonement for your sin.

31. And Moses returned unto Jehovah, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. 32. Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written. And Jehovah said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.

33.