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Where party spirit is rife, as it was in the Corinthian Church, there is always danger of hatred, envying, and jealousy. The rebuke to these dispositions, administered by the apostle, is founded upon the deepest principles of Christianity. The Church is not a club which each member joins for his own advantage and convenience, but a body in which each member is incorporated for mutual cooperation in common subjection to the Divine Head.

I. THERE MUST NEEDS BE, IN RELIGIOUS AS IN CIVIL SOCIETY, DIFFERENT POSITIONS CORRESPONDING TO VARYING GIFTS AND SERVICES. As the body needs all its members, they must occupy their appointed positions for which they are severally fitted and to which they are severally called. It is so in the Church of God; and, according to the office filled, the duties performed, will be the position occupied in the regard and esteem of men.

II. THOSE IN INFERIOR POSITIONS SHOULD REMEMBER THAT INFERIORITY IN THE VIEW OF MEN IS NOT NECESSARILY SUCH IN THE SIGHT OF GOD. That there is a scale of excellence cannot be questioned, but that God's graduation agrees with man's is not to be for a moment supposed. He judgeth not as man judgeth. Not always do those who fill most space in men's eyes stand first in the view of God.

III. AN ENVIOUS SPIRIT IS PRODUCTIVE OF THE UTMOST MISERY TO HIM WHO CHERISHES IT. All painters and poets who have dealt with the subject have agreed in depicting envy as consumed and tortured with wretchedness. The envious man cannot enjoy his own blessings or exercise his own powers, for the sight or thought of what he deems the choicer blessings or the rarer powers of his neighbour.

IV. ON THE OTHER HAND, A CONTENTED SPIRIT IS PRODUCTIVE OF TRUE HAPPINESS. When "the sun of sweet content" has risen in the eyes, the light is upon every feature. A holy and calm conviction that his lot is ordered by Divine wisdom gives a deep peace, an abiding cheerfulness, to a good man's life. If one were to have regard only to his own happiness, he would do well to beware of discontent.

V. IT IS TO BE REMEMBERED THAT AN APPARENTLY LOWLY SERVICE MAY BE IMPORTANT AND EVEN ESSENTIAL. The foot has not so complex a structure, has not the same adaptation to a varied service, as the hand; yet, with no power of locomotion, the man would be crippled and pitiable, notwithstanding the marvellous manual mechanism of which he is master. The ear does not afford the same range of knowledge, perhaps not the same gradation of pleasure, as the eye; but the man who loses hearing is shut out from many of the joys and very much of the information which this life affords. And in the Church of Christ, what work has been done by the lowly, the feeble, the illiterate! and in how many cases do they put to shame the gifted and the eminent!

VI. IF THE TRUST BE SMALLER, THE RESPONSIBILITY WILL BE LESS. Instead of looking up to the great, the learned, the eloquent, and sighing because we have not their gifts, let us be grateful that we have not their account to render. To whom much is given, of him will much be required. - T.

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KJV: If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?

WEB: If the foot would say, "Because I'm not the hand, I'm not part of the body," it is not therefore not part of the body.