While we dare only come near
the edge, and, balancing ourselves a while, look off, and our head
swims, and our breath catches,--those can tell the story best who have
fallen to the depths with wilder dash than glacier from the top of a
Swiss cliff, and stand, in their agony, looking up for a relief
that comes not, and straining their eyes for a hope that never
dawns--crying, "O God!" "O God!"
It is terrible to see a lion dashing for escape against the sides of
his cage; but a more awful thing it is to behold a man, caged in bad
habit, trying to break out,--blood on the soul, blood on the cage.
Others may throw garlands upon Sin, picturing the overhanging fruits
which drop in her pathway, and make every step graceful as the dance;
but we cannot be honest without presenting it as a giant, black with
the soot of the forges where eternal chains are made, and feet rotting
with disease, and breath foul with plagues, and eyes glaring with woe,
and locks flowing in serpent fangs, and voice from which shall rumble
forth the blasphemies of the damned.
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