And who is the Holy Spirit? The Spirit of holiness. And what is
holiness? What are the fruits of holiness? For, as the Lord told
the Pharisees on this very occasion, the tree is known by its fruit.
What says St. Paul? The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance. Those
who do not show these fruits have not God's Spirit in them. Those
who are hard, unloving, proud, quarrelsome, peevish, suspicious,
ready to impute bad motives to their neighbours, have not God's
Spirit in them. Those who do show these fruits; who are gentle,
forgiving, kind-hearted, ready to do good to others, and believe good
of others, have God's Spirit in them. For these are good fruits,
which, as our Lord tells us, can only spring from a good root. Those
who have the fruit must have the root, let their doctrines be what
they may. Those who have not the fruit cannot have the root, let
their doctrines be what they may.
That is the plain truth; and it is high time for preachers to
proclaim it boldly, and take the consequences from the Scribes and
Pharisees of this generation. That is the plain truth. Let
doctrines be what they will, the tree is known by its fruit. The man
who does wrong things is bad, and the man who does right things is
good.
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