"Yea, they are grasped with death, and hell; and death, and hell, and the devil, and all that have been seized therewith, must stand before the throne of God, and be judged according to their works, from whence they must go into the place prepared for them, even a lake of fire and brimstone, which is endless torment." (Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 28:19-23.) It is evident from the foregoing and from the following, that captivity to the devil shall extend into the eternities as the state of those who have failed to establish their status as citizens in the Kingdom of freedom: "For behold, if ye have procrastinated the day of your repentance, even until death, behold, ye have become subjected to the spirit of the devil, and he doth seal you his; therefore, the Spirit of the Lord hath withdrawn from you, and hath no place in you, and the devil hath all power over you; and this is the final state of the wicked." (Alma 34:35.) -- 102 -- WHAT DOTH IT PROFIT A MAN? Worldly Gain--Eternal Loss "FOR what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Mark 8:36-37). These are questions put by the Teacher of teachers. They are related; we may consider them as one. Simple, like unto all the Master's teachings--for high precept and profound philosophy are embodied in the interrogatory--the question is searching, peremptory, challenging. Who that hears or reads can brush it aside? Compelling in its incisive brevity, it is of haunting directness. Once considered, even cursorily, it will not down; once admitted to the inner consciousness, it will not out. The baubles of earth are set over against the priceless jewels of heaven; the fleeting things of mortality are put in contrast with the enduring verities of eternity. Granted that this is a material world, and that experience in material affairs is a pervading and indispensable element in the curriculum of life's school, it is no less truly a fact that earth-life is neither the beginning nor the end of individual existence and progression. Material belongings, relative wealth or poverty, physical environment--the things on which we are prone to set our hearts and anchor our aspirations, the things for which we sweat and strive, ofttimes at the sacrifice of happiness and to the forfeiture of real success--these after all are but externals, the worth of which in the reckoning to come shall be counted in terms of the use we have made of them. Is the plow more than the field to be furrowed, or the sickle than the ripened grain? Can gold stay the hunger pangs better than the nourishing food that the money may buy?