A while ago the omnibus on its way from Gray’s Inn Road to
Islington (England) had to traverse a narrow and dangerous piece
of roadway--a sharp, slippery declivity called “The Devil’s
Slide.” How terrible, indeed, is the devil’s slide! How tempting
it is!--a short cut, a very short cut, to fame, wealth, power,
pleasure. How graduated and smooth it is! What a specious name
it often has! Strangely enough, that declivity in London was
called “Mount Pleasant”; and the downward roads of life often
are known by charming names. But enter on that slide, and you
soon attain a startling velocity; sooner or later you arrive
at an ignominious doom. Let no man think himself safe. The
circles of crime dipping to very murky depths of hell are not
far from any one of us. (Text.)--W. L. WATKINSON, “The
Transfigured Sackcloth.”
(954)