Conscience is a clock which, in one man, strikes aloud and gives warning; in another, the hand points silently to the figure, but strikes not. Meantime, hours pass away, and death hastens, and after death comes judgment.

Conscience is louder in some people than in others, and volume is not the same as accuracy. One person is warned early and clearly; another has the same mechanism working silently, so nothing announces itself and the hours pass unmarked. The quiet kind is the more dangerous, not because such people are worse, but because they have to check deliberately what others are simply told.

Do not rely on feeling bad as your alarm. Once a week, look back over what you did and ask plainly whether any of it needs putting right, then put one thing right while it is still small.