Notwithstanding your knowledge of all these things, you, of your own free will and accord, have turned your face from the light of truth and your feet from the pathway of eternal life and infinite joy. You have scorned the counsels of the just, ignored the judgments of the wise, defied the immutable an inexorable penalties of broken laws, and have walked boldly down the broad highway of darkness and death. Your feet are now hovering on the brink of despair, and your eyes are peering over deep down into the blackness of everlasting darkness. And what then? Ah, yes, what then? Then it is you cry out to the Master whose loving admonition you have ignored so often, and you entreat him to save you from the doom you so persistently have invited. You cry for help, but what is the motive that prompts your cry? Is it humility? No. Is it love? No. Is it any motive which could possibly inspire an honest prayer? Alas, no. It is, instead, the lowest and meanest impulse that ever moves the springs of human action--the impulse of Fear. And fear of what? Fear of Justice. Fear of the inevitable penalties which you so deliberately and persistently have invited; penalties which your own conscience recognizes and your reason approves. Fear of the operation of nature’s most beneficent law, the Law of Compensation. Oh, selfish lover! false friend! unworthy student! obdurate sinner! unconscionable outlaw and indefensible miscreant! Where now is all your boasted power? Why do you cringe and writhe in an agony of fear? Why are you here, the helpless plaything of forces under the control of this witless child of earth? Listen, and I will tell you: The Law of Retributive Justice is but a single phase of the great Law of Compensation. That Law is immutable, irrevocable and inexorable. Whosoever invites its judgments must suffer its penalties. Under its inevitable and relentless decree you stand a guilty and condemned Soul. You have violated the most sacred law of your being--the Law of Love. Neither time, place, circumstance, duty nor responsibility has deterred you from your unholy purpose to wreck the happiness and fortunes of a defenseless home. You have betrayed the trust of a faithful friend. You have abused his generous hospitality, and violated the sanctity of his household. You have permitted your own degenerate and selfish desires and passions to override every principle of Equity, Justice and Right. To accomplish an ignoble purpose you have employed all your little knowledge of our noble science in conscious and deliberate violation of a most sacred and binding obligation; and I am come to behold you now, a blackened and perjured Soul, expiating your crimes and suffering a self-invoked and righteous penalty.