Tj I have seen a photograph of a group of undergraduates, among whom was the late Bishop Creighton, and next to whom stood a man of brilliant gifts, of great scholastic attainments, one who was thought to be about to take a great part in the world, and yet who died a billiard-marker in a low public-house near Wapping, a slave to drink and gambling. So it is, indeed, that sin grows and grows, the deadly cords of habit tighten and tighten, and the soul wanders further and further from God, until perhaps the man even boasts of the sin he has done, of the evil he has taught a boy, gloats over it, as Fagin gloating over the Artful Dodger. And ultimately, indeed, the habits become so formed that he does not even care to try to break them, and the stern decree sent forth in the vision of the Eevelation comes true — " He that is unjust, let him be unjust still ; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still." 2
3. One of the greatest dangers in the formation of evil habit is that the man who is drawn away into sin will not appreciate 1 J, Stalker. 2 L. T. Dodd.
JEREMIAH xiii. 23 65
the deadly seriousness of his situation until the habit has become a most important factor in his whole scheme of life. Coleridge calls attention to the fact that centres or centrepieces of wood are put by builders under an arch of stone while it is in process of construction, till the keystone is put in. Just such is the use that we make of pleasure. The pleasure lasts, perhaps, till the habit is fully formed ; but, that done, the structure may stand eternal. All the pleasure and fascination that appeared at first in the sin disappears, and only the vice-like grip of a wicked habit remains.
T[ A naturalist who has been travelling in South America tells how he was once walking in the forests of the Amazon Eiver collecting bird-skins for mounting. He was threading a forest path, carrying in hand a gun loaded with very fine bird-shot, while his Indian guide followed, carrying a heavier gun charged with buckshot to use in case they should come upon a jaguar. A bird of brilliant plumage flew into a tree which overhung the path, and as he peered into the foliage trying to discern the bird he became aware of something swaying before his eyes and a flashing of prismatic colours producing on him something of the impression of a kaleidoscope. So unobtrusively had this thing come into view that it dawned only slowly on his mind, pre- occupied with the search for the bird, that the object so softly reaching toward him was the head and six feet of the neck and body of an enormous water-boa. From its mouth the forked tongue was shooting and vibrating, and changing lights were flashed from its eyes, bent upon the hunter. With his cocked gun in hand he did not think to use it or to run away, but stood gazing, literally spellbound, as the snake, slipping from the bough on which it lay, advanced its head toward him.
Suddenly he heard his guide shout from behind him. The snake's head drew back with an angry hiss as the Indian crowded past him, raising his gun to his shoulder as he did so, and with the loud crack ! crack ! of the two barrels he seized the hunter with both arms and rushed him away from the place. Then he saw the snake, which had dropped from the tree, writhing and twisting in the path — a monster twenty-eight feet long and of girth in proportion. Its head was shattered by the two charges of buckshot, but the convulsions of the body were enough to show the reptile's enormous strength and give an idea of how the naturalist would have fared if once it had thrown its coils around him. The boa would have done this in a few moments more if he had been left to himself. If the guide had not rushed to his jer.-mal. — 5
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aid, he would have stood still fascinated, and never would have stirred to avoid his fate. The snake had hypnotized him beyond the power of resistance or retreat.1
III.
The Hallowing of Habit.
1. The soul has its habits, which it acquires, even as the body and the mind acquire theirs, by use and practice. The habit of living without God is one which may be learned by any of us if we will. It is one of the easiest of all habits to acquire. Unlike some other habits, it demands of us no exertion and no self-denial ; rather it consists in the refusal and repudiation of both of these. We have only to live at our ease, without care and without effort, and the habit is formed, too often for ever. When it is fully formed, then comes the peace of death, of spiritual death; and the soul that let God alone is at last let alone by God.
T[ When you have for two or three days together forgotten your prayers, has it not become, even in that short time, more easy to neglect, more difficult to resume them ? When you have left God out of sight in your daily life, when you have allowed your- self to think scorn of His commands, when you have become care- less about your language, trifling if not profane in conversation, cold and contemptuous and resentful in your thoughts of others ; when you have thus fallen into an unchristian and irreligious state of mind and life, how soon have you found this state become as it were natural to you ; how much less, day by day, did the idea of living without God alarm you ; how much more tranquil, if not peaceful, did conscience become as you departed further and further in heart from the living God ! 2