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I. TEMPERANCE IS THE CURB, bringing into subjection all those passions of human nature that tend to voluptuousness, just as patience and meekness check and keep under the fiercer passions or those tending to violence. Christian temperance sets itself in opposition to the drunkard's bowl, and the glutton's banquet, and the revels of the profligate, and the anxious longings of the covetous, and against the immoderate desire of what is net ours, as well as against the undue and immoderate abuse of what is ours. It includes, thus considered, sobriety, and chastity, and moderation — all the varieties of a wise self-discipline, imposed on man's fierce quest of pleasure.

II. LET YOUR KNOWLEDGE, then, said the apostle to the readers of his Epistle, DEFEND ITSELF BY THE COMPANIONSHIP OF TEMPERANCE. Why, it may be asked, should this be selected, and not any other of those clustering graces which go to attest the energy and fruitfulness of the Divine Spirit in the work of his moral renovation? Let it be remembered, then, that in the sin of our first parents, the knowledge which they sought, beyond God and His instructions, was knowledge which brought with it a sin against the holy temperance that had before been the law of Paradise, and the defence of primeval innocence. Was it not then fitting that the victim of the Fall should be perpetually reminded of his need to be on his guard evermore against that dominion of the bodily senses into which the Fall betrayed us? In Satan's school knowledge brought forth intemperance; but it must not be so in Christ's school. Is it not, again, a fact, sustained by the history of the Christian Churches, that even when men enjoy this gospel their knowledge, both in things secular and spiritual, is but too often perverted into a license for casting off the self-control and the serene moderation of Christian principle? Is not a palmy civilisation often found shading a feverish and lawless sensuality? Was it not thus that Solomon — after his wide research, that wrote of plants from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop on the wall, and in consequence of his growing acquaintance and his large converse with heathen society — became in his old age a doting conformist to the lewd idolatry of Ashtaroth?

III. To glance at THE BEARING OF THIS CHRISTIAN GRACE ON THE TEMPERANCE REFORMATION OF OUR TIMES. But we suppose that the best friends of temperance will yet find that, to give it permanence, it needs the broader basis and the deeper root of a religious movement; and that there, as in so many other earthly reforms, the controlling motives — the effectual lever, must rest on some stronger and firmer basis than earthly considerations. Drunkenness is enough to damn a man; but the mere absence of drunkenness is by no means enough to save him.

IV. THE CLAIMS OF THIS CHRISTIAN GRACE, TAKEN IN THE WIDE AND COMPREHENSIVE SENSE WHICH SCRIPTURE ATTACHES TO IT, UPON THE DISCIPLES OF OUR TIMES.

1. It is necessary to true piety. The knowledge and love of God cannot lodge in a heart crowded and dragged downward by debasing and sinful pleasure. If men are Christ's, they are crucified with Him to the flesh and the world.

2. It is necessary to Christian usefulness. The man who would be really and truly useful must have an unselfish sympathy. Now, of this the lovers of pleasure are notoriously destitute. Few things more rapidly bring a seared callousness over the heart than the habitual pursuit of gross and selfish pleasure.

3. It is necessary to national well-being and prosperity.

(W. R. Williams.)

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KJV: And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;

WEB: Yes, and for this very cause adding on your part all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence; and in moral excellence, knowledge;