Who, then, are the people who know what being confounded means; who are afraid, and terribly afraid, of being brought to shame and confusion efface?

I should say, all human beings in proportion as they are truly human beings, are not brutal; in proportion, that is, as they are good or have the capacity of goodness in them; that is, in proportion as the Spirit of God is working in them, giving them the tender heart, the quick feelings, the earnestness, the modesty, the conscientiousness, the reverence for the good opinion of their fellow-men, which is the beginning of eternal life.  Do you not see it in the young?  Modesty, bashfulness, shame-facedness—­as the good old English word was—­that is the very beginning of all goodness in boys and girls.  It is the very material out of which all other goodness is made; and those who laugh at, or torment, young people for being modest and bashful, are doing the devil’s work, and putting themselves under the curse which God, by the mouth of Solomon the wise, pronounced against the scorners who love scorning, and the fools who hate knowledge.

This is the rule with dumb animals likewise.  The more intelligent, the more high-bred they are, the more they are capable of feeling shame; and the more they are liable to be confounded, to lose their heads, and become frantic with doubt and fear.  Who that has watched dogs does not know that the cleverer they are, the more they are capable of being actually ashamed of themselves, as human beings are, or ought to be?  Who that has trained horses does not know that the stupid horse is never vicious, never takes fright?  The failing which high-bred horses have of becoming utterly unmanageable, not so much from bodily fear, as from being confounded, not knowing what people want them to do—­that is the very sign, the very effect, of their superior organization:  and more shame to those who ill-use such horses.  If God, my friends, dealt with us as cruelly and as clumsily as too many men deal with their horses, He would not be long in driving us mad with terror and shame and confusion.  But He remembers our frame; He knoweth whereof we are made, and remembereth that we are but dust:  else the spirit would fail before Him, and the souls which He hath made.  And to Him we can cry, even when we know that we have made fools of ourselves—­Father who made me, Christ who died for me, Holy Spirit who teachest me, have patience with my stupidity and my ignorance.  Lord, in thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded.

But some will tell us—­It is a sign of weakness to feel shame.  Why should you care for the opinion of your fellow-men?  If you are doing right, what matter what they say of you?

Yes, my friends, if you are doing right.  But if you are not doing right—­What then?

If you have only been fancying that you are doing right, and suspect suddenly that you have been very likely doing wrong—­What then?