a time when they never intended to be vicious; but step by step they lowered themselves. Shame, truth, self-respect died. The lower elements of their nature first were freely indulged, then became importunate, then exacting, then domineering, then uncontrollable. Dear young man, the pride of a mother, the hope of a father, with an intensity of yearning love I conjure you to pause ere you go into the way of sinners. If your feet have turned aside, retrace, I beseech you, your steps. Your strong “I will” now, may, through God’s mercy, turn you from the pit of infamy. But soon weaker will be your will, dimmer your sense of moral beauty, more desperate your passions, till at length you will feel bound, and then find yourself borne over the rapids a lost and helpless wreck. But our view of life demands other considerations than those that relate to time and personal dishonor. It is a grand thing to live. A thousand times have I blessed God for this great gift of life. But it is serious also. Life has its _responsibilities_. Influence, like all things else, is imperishable. Nothing perishes. The leaves of autumn do not perish; they enrich the earth. The fuel of our fires sends curling upwards its light smoke, which bears its properties for other uses. The broken fragments of the mountains, through torrent and tempest, nourish plants and renovate the earth. Not an act you perform, not a word you speak, can wholly perish. It was probably this that Jesus Christ meant when he spoke of the idle words for which we shall give account at the day of judgment; that is, our words which go from us as light as air may be making others better or worse, and carrying forward their consequences to the judgment. Sin is imperishable. Sin, like the soul, has immortality stamped on it: when once done, _it cannot be undone_. Even a saved man’s sins are imperishable in the consequences. David, the king of Israel, sinned; alas, how pitilessly! He repented, and poured out a psalm of contrition that has ever since been the liturgy of humbled souls, and every verse of which seems vocal with a groan; but he could not undo the sin. In his own days the enemies of truth blasphemed through him, and since that time, in every generation, wicked men have encouraged themselves in wickedness because of that great crime, and the atheist has barbed his arrow in the blood of that murder. Voltaire, when he came to die, longed that his blasphemies against Christ should be expunged from his writings. Ah, he wished what was impossible. His errors led to all the horrors of the French Revolution, and have shattered the peace of thousands since. A drunkard may obtain forgiveness; but his example may have taught his own son to brutalize himself. A young man may turn away from the evil courses he followed; but he may leave the silly youth whom he first tempted to go floating down to the bottomless pit.