Letter IX.--"Give us this day our daily bread." Yes, but we must work

for it. "The man that will not work, neither shall he eat." A cardinal point with Ruskin: "But if you do" (_i.e._, wish for God's kingdom), "you must do more than pray for it, you must work for it" ("Crown of Wild Olive," p. 56).

And the clergyman has to teach (Letter IX. goes on) what that work is and how it is to be done; and the life, to which their teaching should lead, is one "moderate in its self-indulgence, wide in its offices of temporal ministry to the poor," in the absence of which, prayer for harvest is mere blasphemy. For the spiritual bread is the first thing, and a clergyman's first message, "Choose ye this day whom ye will serve."