Notice in passing what a hint there is of the toil and trouble that men
are so willing to take in a wrong course. Hatching and spinning both
suggest protracted, sedulous labour. And then the issue of it all
is--_nothing_.
Take the plainest illustrations of this truth first--the breach of
common laws of morality, the indulgence, for instance, in dissipation.
A man gets a certain coarse delight out of it, but what does he get
besides? A weakened body, a tyrannous craving, ruined prospects,
oftenest poverty and shame, the loss of self-respect and love; of moral
excellences, of tastes for what is better. He is not a beast, and he
cannot live for pure animalism without injuring himself.
Then take actual breaches of human laws. How seldom these 'pay,' even
in the lowest sense. Thieves are always poor. The same experience of
futility dogs all coarse and palpable breaches of morality. It is
always true that 'He that breaketh a hedge, a serpent shall bite him.'
The reasons are not far to seek. This is, on the whole, God's world, a
world of retribution. Things are, on the whole, on the side of
goodness. God is in the world, and that is an element not to be left
out in the calculation. Society is on the side of goodness to a large
extent. The constitution of a man's own soul, which God made, works in
the same direction. Young men who are trembling on the verge of
youthful yieldings to passion, are tempted to fancy that they can sow
sin and not reap suffering or harm. Would that they settled it in their
thoughts that he who fires a fuse must expect an explosion!
But the same rule applies to every godless form of life. Take our
Manchester temptation, money or success in business. Take ambition.
Take culture, literary fame. Take love and friendship. What do they all
come to, if godless? I do not point to the many failures, but suppose
success: would that make you a happy man? If you won what you wanted,
would it be enough? What 'garments' for your conscience, for your sense
of sin, for your infinite longings would success in any godless course
provide? You would have what you wanted, and what would it bring with
it? Cares and troubles and swift satiety, and not seldom incapacity to
enjoy what you had won with so much toil. If you gained the prize, you
would find clinging to it something that you did not bargain for, and
that took most of the dazzle away from it.