CHAPTER VII.
Criminal Behavior.
Section I.Inconstancy and Seduction.
In nineteen cases out of twenty, of illicit conduct, there is perhaps, no seduction at all; the passion, the absence of virtue, and the crime, being all mutual. But there are cases of a very different description. Where a young man goes coolly and deliberately to work, first to gain and rivet the affections of a young lady, then to take advantage of those affections to accomplish that which he knows must be her ruin, and plunge her into misery for life;—when a young man does this, I say he must be either a selfish and unfeeling brute, unworthy of the name of man, or he must have a heart little inferior, in point of obduracy, to that of the murderer. Let young women, however, be aware; let them bewellaware, that few, indeed, are the cases in which this apology can possibly avail them. Their character is not solely theirs, but belongs, in part, to their family and kindred. They may, in the case contemplated, be objects of compassion with the world; but what contrition, what repentance, what remorse, what that even the tenderest benevolence can suggest, is to heal the wounded hearts of humbled, disgraced, but still affectionate parents, brethren, and sisters?
In the progress of an intimate acquaintance, should it be discovered that there are certain traits of character in one of the parties, which both are fully convinced will be a source of unhappiness, through life, theremaybe no special impropriety in separating. And yet even then I would say, avoid haste. Better consider for an hour than repent for a year, or for life. But let it be remembered, that before measures of this kind are even hinted at, there must be a full conviction of their necessity, and the mutual and hearty concurrence of both parties. Any steps of this kind, the reasons for which are not fully understood on both sides, and mutually satisfactory, as well as easily explicable to those friends who have a right to inquire on the subject, are criminal;—nay more; they are brutal.
I have alluded toindirectpromises of marriage, because I conceive that the frequent opinion among young men that nothing is binding but a direct promise, in so many words, is not only erroneous, but highly dishonorable to those who hold it. The strongest pledges are frequently given without the interchange of words. Actions speak louder than words; and there is an attachment sometimes formed, and a confidence reposed, which would be, in effect, weakened by formalities. The man who would break a silent engagement, merely because it is a silent one, especially when he has taken a course of conduct which he knew would be likely to result in such engagement, and which perhaps he even designed, is deserving of the public contempt. He is even a monster unfit to live in decent society.
But there are such monsters on the earth's surface. There are individuals to be found, who boast of their inhuman depredations on those whom it ought to be their highest happiness to protect and aid, rather than injure. They can witness, almost without emotion, the heavings of a bosom rent with pangs which themselves have inflicted. They can behold their unoffending victim, as unmoved as one who views a philosophical experiment;—not expiring, it is true, but despoiled of what is vastly dearer to her than life—her reputation. They can witness all this, I say, without emotion, and without a single compunction of conscience. And yet they go on, sometimes with apparent prosperity and inward peace. At any rate, theylive. No lightning blasts them; no volcano pours over them its floods of lava; no earthquake engulfs them. They are permitted to fill up the measure of their wickedness. Perhaps they riot in ease, and become bloated with luxury. But let this description of beings—men I am almost afraid to call them—remember that punishment, though long deferred, cannot be always evaded. A day of retribution must and will arrive. For though they may not be visited by what a portion of the community call special 'judgments,' yet their punishment is not the less certain. The wretch who can commit the crime to which I have referred, against a fellow being, and sport with those promises, which, whether direct or indirect, are of all things earthly among the most sacred, will not, unless he repents, rest here. He will go on from step to step in wickedness. He will harden himself against every sensibility to the woes of others, till he becomes a fiend accursed, and whether on this side of the grave, or the other, cannot but be completely miserable. A single sin may not always break in upon habits of virtue so as to ruin an individual at once; but the vices go in gangs, or companies. One admitted and indulged, and the whole gang soon follow. And misery must follow sin, at a distance more or less near, as inevitably as a stone falls to the ground, or the needle points to the pole.
Some young men reason thus with themselves. If doubts about the future have already risen—if my affections already begin to waver at times—what is not to be expected after marriage? And is it not better to separate, even without a mutual concurrence, than to make others, perhaps many others, unhappy for life?
In reply, I would observe, in the first place, that though this is the usual reason which is assigned in such cases, it is not generally the true one. The fact is, the imagination is suffered to wander where it ought not; and the affections are not guarded and restrained, and confined to their proper object. And if there be a diminution of attachment, it is not owing to any change in others, but in ourselves. If our affection has become less ardent, let us look within, for the cause. Shall others suffer for our own fault?
But, secondly, we may do much to control the affections, even after they have begun to wander. We still seek the happiness of the object of our choice, more, perhaps, than that of any other individual. Then let us make it our constant study to promote it. It is a law of our natures, as irrevocable as that of the attraction of gravitation, that doing good to others produces love to them. And for myself I do not believe the affections of a young mancandiminish towards one whose happiness he is constantly studying to promote by every means in his power, admitting there is no obvious change in her character. So that no young person of principle ought ever to anticipate any such result.
Nor has a man any right tosportwith the affections of a young woman, in any way whatever. Vanity is generally the tempter in this case; a desire to be regarded as being admired by the women; a very despicable species of vanity, but frequently greatly mischievous, notwithstanding. You do not, indeed, actually, in so many words, promise to marry; but the general tenor of your language and deportment has that meaning; you know that your meaning is so understood; and if you have not such meaning; if you be fixed by some previous engagement with, or greater liking for another; if you know you are here sowing the seeds of disappointment; and if you persevere, in spite of the admonitions of conscience, you are guilty of deliberate deception, injustice and cruelty. You make to God an ungrateful return for those endowments which have enabled you to achieve this inglorious and unmanly triumph; and if, as is frequently the case, yougloryin such triumph, you may have person, riches, talents to excite envy; but every just and humane man will abhor your heart.
The most direct injury against the spiritual nature of a fellow being is, by leading him into vice. I have heard one young man, who was entrusted six days in the week to form the immortal minds and hearts of a score or two of his fellow beings, deliberately boast of the number of the other sex he had misled. What can be more base? And must not a terrible retribution await such Heaven daring miscreants? Whether they accomplish their purposes by solicitation, by imposing on the judgment, or by powerful compulsion, the wrong is the same, or at least of the same nature; and nothing but timely and hearty repentance can save a wretch of this description from punishment, either here or hereafter.
'Some tempers,' says Burgh, (for nothing can be more in point than his own words) 'are so impotently ductile, that they can refuse nothing to repeated solicitation. Whoever takes the advantage of such persons is guilty of the lowest baseness. Yet nothing is more common than for the debauched part of our sex to show their heroism by a poor triumph, over weak, easy, thoughtless woman!—Nothing is more frequent than to hear them boast of the ruin of that virtue, of which they ought to have been the defenders. "Poor fool! she loved me, and therefore could refuse me nothing."—Base coward! Dost thou boast of thy conquest over one, who, by thy own confession, was disabled for resistance,—disabled by her affection for thy worthless self! Does affection deserve such a return Is superior understanding, or rather deeper craft, to be used against thoughtless simplicity, and its shameful success to be boasted of? Dost thou pride thyself that thou hast had art enough to decoy the harmless lamb to thy hand, that thou mightest shed its blood?'
And yet there are such monsters as Burgh alludes to. There are just such beings scattered up and down even the fairest portions of the world we live in, to mar its beauty. We may hope, for the honor of human nature, they are few. He who can bring himself to believe their number to be as great as one in a thousand, may well be disposed to blush
'And hang his head, to own himself a man.'
'And hang his head, to own himself a man.'
'And hang his head, to own himself a man.'
I have sometimes wished these beings—menthey are not—wouldreflect, if it were but for one short moment. They will not deny the excellency of the golden rule, of doing to others as they wish others to do by themselves. I say they will not deny it, in theory; why then should they despise it in practice?
Let themthinka moment. Let them imagine themselves in the place of the injured party. Could this point be gained; could they be induced to reflect long enough to see the enormity of their guilt as it really is, or as the Father in heaven may be supposed to see it, there might be hope in their case. Or if they find it difficult to view themselves as the injured, let them suppose, rather, a sister or a daughter. What seducer is so lost to all natural affection as not to have his whole soul revolt at the bare thought of having a beloved daughter experience the treatment which he has inflicted? Yet the being whom he has ruined had brothers or parents; and those brothers had a sister; and those parents a daughter!
Section II.Licentiousness.
I wish it were in my power to finish my remarks in this place, without feeling that I had made an important omission. But such is the tendency of human nature, especially in the case of the young and ardent, to turn the most valuable blessings conferred on man into curses,—and poison, at their very sources, the purest streams of human felicity,—that it will be necessary to advert briefly but plainly to some of the most frequent forms of youthful irregularity.
Large cities and thinly settled places are theextremesof social life. Here, of course, vice will be found in its worst forms. It is more difficult to say which extreme is worst, amongan equal number of individuals; but probably the city; for in the country, vice is oftener solitary, and less frequently social; while in the city it is not onlysocialbut alsosolitary.
A well informed gentleman from New Orleans, of whose own virtue by the way, I have not thehighestconfidence, expressed, lately the strongest apprehension that the whole race of young men in our cities, of the present generation, will be ruined. Others have assured me that in the more northern cities, the prospect is little, if any, more favorable.
It is to be regretted that legislators have not found out the means of abolishing those haunts in cities which might be appropriately termed schools of licentiousness, and thus diminishing an aggregate of temptation already sufficiently large. But the vices, like their votaries, go in companies. Until, therefore, the various haunts of intemperance in eating and drinking, and of gambling and stage-playing, can be broken up, it may be considered vain to hope for the disappearance of those sties of pollution which are their almost inevitable results. We might as well think of drying up the channel of a mighty river, while the fountains which feed it continue to flow as usual.
There is now in Pennsylvania,—it seems unnecessary to name the place—a man thirty-five years old, with all the infirmities of 'three score and ten.' Yet his premature old age, his bending and tottering form, wrinkled face, and hoary head, might be traced to solitary and sociallicentiousness.
This man is not alone. There are thousands in every city who are going the same road; some with slow and cautious steps, others with a fearful rapidity. Thousands of youth on whom high expectations have been placed, are already on the highway that will probably lead down to disease and premature death.
Could the multitude of once active, sprightly, and promising young men, whose souls detested open vice, and who, without dreaming of danger, only found their way occasionally to a lottery office, and still more rarely to the theatre or the gambling house, until led on step by step they ventured down those avenues which lead to the chambers of death, from which few ever return, and none uninjured;—could the multitudes of such beings, which in the United States alone, (though admitted to be the paradise of the world,) have gone down to infamy through licentiousness, be presented to our view, at once, how would it strike us with horror! Their very numbers would astonish us, but how much more their appearance! I am supposing them to appear as they went to the graves, in their bloated and disfigured faces, their emaciated and tottering frames, bending at thirty years of age under the appearance of three or four score; diseased externally and internally; and positively disgusting,—not only to the eye, but to some of the other senses.
One such monster is enough to fill the soul of those who are but moderately virtuous with horror; what then would be the effect of beholding thousands? In view of such a scene, is there a young man in the world, who would not form the strongest resolution not to enter upon a road which ends in wo so remediless?
But it should be remembered that these thousands were once the friends—the children, the brothers,—yes, sometimes thenearerrelatives ofotherthousands. They had parents, sisters, brothers; sometimes (would it were not true) wives and infants. Suppose the young man whom temptation solicits, were not only to behold the wretched thousands already mentioned, but the many more thousands of dear relatives mourning their loss;—not by death, for that were tolerable—but by an everlasting destruction from the presence of all purity or excellence. Would he not shrink back from the door which he was about to enter, ashamed and aghast, and resolve in the strength of his Creator, never more to indulge a thought of a crime so disastrous in its consequences?
And let every one remember that the army of ruined immortals which have been here presented to the imagination, is by no means a mere fancy sketch. There is a day to come which will disclose a scene of which I have given but a faint picture. For though the thousands who have thus destroyed their own bodies and souls, with their agonized friends and relatives, are scattered among several millions of their fellow citizens, and, for a time, not a few of them elude the public gaze, yet their existence is much a reality, as if they were assembled in one place.
'All this,' it may be said, 'I have often heard, and it may be true. But it does not apply to me. I am in no danger. You speak of a path, I have never entered; or if I have ever done so, I have no idea of returning to it, habitually. I know my own strength; how far to go, and when and where to stop.'
But is there one of all the miserable, in the future world, who did not once think the same? Is there one among the thousands who have thus ruined themselves and those who had been as dear to them as themselves, that did not once feel a proud consciousness that he 'knew his own strength?' Yet now where is he?
Beware, then. Take not the first step. Nay, indulge not for an instant, thethoughtof a first step. Here you are safe. Every where else is danger. Take one step, and the next is more easy; the temptation harder to resist.
Do you call this preaching? Be it so then. I feel, and deeply too, that your immortal minds, those gems which were created to sparkle and shine in the firmament of heaven, are in danger of having their lustre for ever tarnished, and their brightness everlastingly hid beneath a thicker darkness than that which once covered the land of Egypt.
C. S. was educated by New England parents, in one of the most flourishing of New England villages. He was all that anxious friends could hope or desire; all that a happy community could love and esteem. As he rose to manhood he evinced a full share of 'Yankee' activity and enterprise. Some of the youth in the neighborhood were traders to the southern States, and C. concluded to try his fortune among the rest.
He was furnished with two excellent horses and a wagon, and every thing necessary to ensure success. His theatre of action was the low country of Virginia and North Carolina, and his head-quarters, N——, whither he used to return after an excursion of a month or six week, to spend a few days in that dissipated village.
Young C. gradually yielded to the temptations which the place afforded. First, he engaged in occasional 'drinking bouts,' next in gaming; lastly, he frequented a house of ill fame. This was about the year 1819.
At the end of the year 1820, I saw him, but—now changed! The eye that once beamed with health, and vigor, and cheerfulness, was now dimmed and flattened. The countenance which once shone with love and good-will to man, was pale and suspicious, or occasionally suffused with stagnant, and sickly, and crimson streams. The teeth, which were once as white as ivory, were now blackened by the use of poisonous medicine, given to counteract a still more poisonous and loathsome disease. The frame, which had once been as erect as the stately cedar of Lebanon, was, at the early age of thirty, beginning to bend as with years. The voice, which once spoke forth the sentiments of a soul of comparative purity, now not unfrequently gave vent to the licentious song, the impure jest, and the most shocking oaths, and heaven-daring impiety and blasphemy. The hands which were once like the spirit within, were now not unfrequently joined in the dance, with the vilest of the vile!
I looked, too, at his external circumstances Once he had friends whom he loved to see, and from whom he was glad to hear. Now it was a matter of indifference both to him and them whether they ever saw each other. The hopes of parents, and especially of 'her that bare him' were laid in the dust; and to the neighborhood of which he had once been the pride and the ornament, he was fast becoming as if he had never been.
He had travelled first with two horses, next with one; afterward on foot with a choice assortment of jewelry and other pedlar's wares; now his assortment was reduced to a mere handful. He could purchase to the value of a few dollars, take a short excursion, earn a small sum, and return—not to a respectable house, as once,—but to the lowest of resorts, to expend it.
Here, in 1821, I last saw him; a fair candidate for the worst contagious diseases which occasionally infest that region, and a pretty sure victim to the first severe attack. Or if he should even escape these, with the certainty before him of a very short existence, at best.
This is substantially the history of many a young man whose soul was once as spotless as that of C. S. Would that young men knew their strength, and their dignity; and would put forth but half the energy that God has given them. Then they would never approach the confines of those regions of dissipation, for when they have once entered them, the soul and the body are often ruined forever.
There are in every city hundreds of young men—I regret to say it,—who should heed this warning voice.Nowthey are happily situated, beloved, respected. They are engaged in useful and respectable avocations, and looking forward to brighter and better scenes. Let them beware lest there should be causes in operation, calculated to sap the foundations of the castle which fancy's eye has builded, (and which might even be realized); and lest their morning sun, which is now going forth in splendor, be not shrouded in darkness ere it has yet attained its meridian height.
Every city affords places and means of amusement, at once rational, satisfying, and improving. Such are collections of curiosities, natural and artificial, lectures on science, debating clubs, lyceums, &c. Then the libraries which abound, afford a source of never ending amusement and instruction. Let these suffice. At least, 'touch not, handle not' that which an accumulated and often sorrowful experience has shown to be accursed.
Neither resort tosolitaryvice. If this practice should not injure your system immediately, it will in the end. I am sorry to be obliged to advert to this subject; but I know there is occasion. Youth, especially those who lead a confined life, seek occasional excitement. Such sometimes resort to this lowest,—I may say most destructive of practices. Such is the constitution of things, as the Author of Nature has established it, that if every other vicious act were to escape its merited punishment in this world, the one in question could not. Whatever its votaries may think, it never fails, in a single instance, to injure them, personally; and consequently their posterity, should any succeed them.
It is not indeed true that the foregoing vices do of themselves, produce all this mischiefdirectly; but as Dr. Paley has well said,criminal intercourse'corrupts anddepraves the mindmore than any single vice whatsoever.' It gradually benumbs the conscience, and leads on, step by step, to those blacker vices at which the youth would once have shuddered.
But debasing as this vice is, it is scarcely more so than solitary gratification. The former is not always at hand; is attended, it may be, with expense; and with more or less danger of exposure. But the latter is practicable whenever temptation or rather imagination solicits, and appears to the morbid eye of sense, to be attended with no hazard. Alas! what a sad mistake is made here! It is a fact well established by medical men, that every error on this point is injurious; and that the constitution is often more surely or more effectually impaired by causes which do not appear to injure it in the least, than by occasional and heavier shocks, which rouse it to a reaction. The one case may be compared to dailytippling, the other to thoseperiodicaldrunken frolics, which, having an interval of weeks or months between them, give the system time to recover, in part, (butin part only) from the violence it had sustained.
I wish to put the younger portion of my readers upon their guard against a set of wretches who take pains to initiate youth, while yet almost children, into the practice of the vice to which I have here adverted. Domestics—where the young are too familiar with them—havebeen known to be thus ungrateful to their employers. There are, however, people of several classes, who do not hesitate to mislead, in this manner.
But the misfortune is, that this book will not be apt to fall into the hands of those to whomtheseremarks apply, till the ruinous habit is already formed. And then it is that counsel sometimes comes too late. Should these pages meet the eye of any who have been misled, let them remember that they have begun a career which multitudes repent bitterly; and from which few are apt to return. But there have been instances of reform; therefore none ought to despair. 'What man has done, man may do.'
They should first set before their minds the nature of the practice, and the evils to which it exposes. But here comes the difficulty. Whatareits legitimate evils? They know indeed that the written laws of God condemn it; but the punishment which those laws threaten, appears to be remote and uncertain. Or if not, they are apt to regard it as the punishment ofexcess, merely.They, prudent souls, would not, for the world, plunge into excess. Besides, 'theyinjure none butthemselves,' they tell us.
Would it were true that they injured none butthemselves! Would there were no generations yet unborn to suffer by inheriting feeble constitutions, or actual disease, from their progenitors!
Suppose, however, they really injured nobody but themselves. Have they a right to do even this? They will not maintain, for one moment, that they have a right to take away their own life. By what right, then, do they allow themselves to shorten it, or diminish its happiness while it lasts?
Here the question recurs again:Doessolitary gratification actually shorten life, or diminish its happiness?
The very fact that the laws of God forbid it, is an affirmative answer to this question. For nothing is more obvious than that all other vices which that law condemns, stand in the way of our present happiness, as well as the happiness of futurity. Is this alone an exception to the general rule?
But I need not make my appeal to this kind of authority. You rely on human testimony. You believe a thousand things which yourselves never saw or heard.Whydo you believe them,exceptupon testimony—I mean given either verbally, or, what is the same thing, in books?
Now if the accumulated testimony of medical writers from the days of Galen, and Celsus, and Hippocrates, to the present hour, could have any weight with you, it would settle the point at once. I have collected, briefly, the results of medical testimony on this subject, in the next chapter; but if you will take my statements for the present, I will assure you that Ihave before medocuments enough to fill half a volume like this, from those who have studied deeply these subjects, whose united language is, that the practice in question, indulged inany degree, is destructive to body and mind; and that although, in vigorous young men, no striking evil may for some time appear, yet the punishment can no more beevaded, except by early death, than the motion of the earth can be hindered. And all this, too, without taking into consideration the terrors of a judgment to come.
But why, then, some may ask, are animal propensities given us, if they are not to be indulged? The appropriate reply is, theyareto be indulged; but it is only in accordance with the laws of God; never otherwise. And the wisdom of these laws, did they not rest on other and better proof, is amply confirmed by that great body of medical experience already mentioned. God has delegated to man, a sort ofsubcreativepower to perpetuate his own race. Such a wonderful work required a wonderful apparatus. And such is furnished. The texture of the organs for this purpose is of the most tender and delicate kind, scarcely equalled by that of the eye, and quite as readily injured; and this fact ought to be known, and considered. But instead of leaving to human choice or caprice the execution of the power thus delegated, the great Creator has made it a matter ofduty; and has connected with the lawful discharge of that duty, as with all others,enjoyment. But when this enjoyment is sought in any way, not in accordance with the laws prescribed by reason and revelation, we diminish (whatever giddy youth may suppose,) the sum total of our own happiness. Now this is not the cold speculation of age, or monkish austerity. It is sober matter of fact.
It is said that young men are sometimes in circumstances which forbid their conforming to these laws, were they disposed to do so.
Not so often however, as is commonly supposed. Marriage is not such a mountain of difficulty as many imagine. This I have already attempted to show. One circumstance to be considered, in connection with this subject, is, that in any society, the more there is of criminal indulgence, whether secret or social, the more strongly are excuses for neglecting matrimony urged. Every step which a young man takes in forbidden paths, affords him a plea in behalf of the next. The farther he goes, the less the probability of his returning to the ways of purity, or entering those of domestic felicity.
People in such places as London and Paris, marry much later in life, upon the average, than in country places. And is not the cause obvious? And is not the same cause beginning to produce similar effects in our own American cities?
But suppose celibacy in some cases, tobeunavoidable, can a life of continence, in the fullest sense of the term, be favorable tohealth? This question is answered by those to whose writings I have already referred, in the affirmative. But it is also answered by facts, though from the nature of the case these facts are not always easy of access. We have good reason to believe that Sir Isaac Newton and Dr. Fothergill, never for once in their lives deviated from the strict laws of rectitude on this point. And we have no evidence that they were sufferers for their rigid course of virtue. The former certainly enjoyed a measure of health and reached an age, to which few, in any circumstances, attain; and the latter led an active and useful life to nearly three-score and ten. There are living examples of the same purity of character, but they cannot, of course, be mentioned in this work.
Several erroneous views in regard to the animal economy which have led to the very general opinion that a life of celibacy—strictly so, I mean—cannot be a life of health, might here be exposed, did either the limits or the nature of the work permit. It is not that a state of celibacy—entirely so, I always mean—is positivelyinjurious; but that a state of matrimony is moreuseful; and, as a general rule, attended withmore happiness.
It is most ardently to be hoped, that the day is not far distant when every young man will study the laws and functions of the human frame for himself. This would do more towards promoting individual purity and public happiness, than all the reasoning in the world can accomplish without it. Men, old or young, must see for themselves how 'fearfully' as well as 'wonderfully' they are made, before they can have a thorough and abiding conviction of the nature ofdisobedience, or of the penalties that attend, as well as follow it. And in proportion, as the subject is studied and understood, may we not hope celibacy will become less frequent, and marriage—honorable, and, if you please,earlymarriage—be more highly estimated?
This work is not addressed to parents; but should it be read by any who have sons, at an age, and in circumstances, which expose them to temptation, and in a way which will be very apt to secure their fall, let them beware.[14]
Still, the matter must be finally decided by the young themselves. They, in short, must determine the question whether they will rise in the scale of being, through every period of their existence, or sink lower and lower in the depths of degradation and wo. They must be, after all, the arbiters of their own fate. No influences, human or divine, will everforcethem to happiness.
The remainder of this section will be devoted to remarks on the causes which operate to form licentious feelings and habits in the young. My limits, however, will permit me to do little more than mention them. And if some of them might be addressed with more force to parents than to young men, let it be remembered that the youngmay beparents, and if they cannot recall the past, and correct the errors in their own education, they can, at least, hope to prevent the same errors in the education of others.
1. FALSE DELICACY.
Too much of real delicacy can never be inculcated; but in our early management, we seem to implant thefalse, instead of the true. The language we use, in answering the curious questions of children, often leads to erroneous associations of ideas; and it is much better to be silent. By the falsehoods which we think it necessary to tell, we often excite still greater curiosity, instead of satisfying that which already exists. I will not undertake to decide what ought to be done; butsilence, I am certain, would be far better than falsehood.
There is another error, which is laid deeper still, because it begins earlier. I refer to the half Mohammedan practice of separating the two sexes at school. This practice, I am aware has strong advocates; but it seems to me they cannot have watched closely the early operations of their own minds, and observed how curiosity was awakened, and wanton imaginations fostered by distance, and apparent and needless reserve.
2. LICENTIOUS BOOKS, PICTURES, &C.
This unnatural reserve, and the still more unnatural falsehoods already mentioned, prepare the youthful mind for the reception of any thing which has the semblance of information on the points to which curiosity is directed. And now comes the danger. The world abounds in impure publications, which almost all children, (boys especially,) at sometime or other, contrive to get hold of, in spite of parental vigilance. If these books contained truth, and nothing but truth, their clandestine circulation would do less mischief. But they generally impart very little information which is really valuable; on the contrary they contain much falsehood; especially when they profess to instruct on certain important subjects. Let me repeat it then, they cannot be relied on; and in the language of another book, on another subject; 'He that trusteth' to them, 'is a fool.'
The same remarks might be extended, and with even more justice, to licentious paintings and engravings, which circulate in various ways. And I am sorry to include in this charge not a few which are publicly exhibited for sale, in the windows of our shops. You may sometimes find obscene pictures under cover of a watch-case or snuff box. In short, there would often seem to be a general combination of human and infernal efforts to render the juvenile thoughts and affections impure; and not a few parents themselves enter into the horrible league.
On this subject Dr. Dwight remarks; 'The numbers of the poet, the delightful melody of song, the fascination of the chisel, and the spell of the pencil, have been all volunteered in the service of Satan for the moral destruction of unhappy man. To finish this work of malignity the stage has lent all its splendid apparatus of mischief; the shop has been converted into a show-box of temptations; and its owner into a pander of iniquity.' And in another place; 'Genius, in every age, and in every country, has, to a great extent, prostituted its elevated powers for the deplorable purpose of seducing thoughtless minds tothis sin.' Are these remarks too sweeping? In my own opinion, not at all. Let him, who doubts, take a careful survey of the whole of this dangerous ground.
3. OBSCENE AND IMPROPER SONGS.
The prostitution of the melody of song, mentioned by Dr. Dwight, reminds me of another serious evil. Many persons, and even not a few intelligent parents, seem to think that a loose or immoral song cannot much injure their children, especially if they express their disapprobation of it afterwards. As if the language of the tongue could give the lie to the language of the heart, already written, and often deeply, in the eye and countenance. For it is notorious that a considerable proportion of parents tolerate songs containing very improper sentiments, and hear them with obvious interest, how much soever they may wish their children to have a better and purer taste. The common 'love songs' are little better than those already mentioned.
It is painful to think what errors on this subject are sometimes tolerated even by decent society. I knew a schoolmaster who did not hesitate to join occasional parties, (embracing, among others, professedly Christian parents,) for the purpose of spending his long winter evenings, in hearing songs from a very immoral individual, not a few of which were adapted to the most corrupt taste, and unfit to be heard in good society. Yet the community in which he taught was deemed a religious community; and the teacher himself prayed in his school, morning and evening! Others I have known to conduct even worse, though perhaps not quite so openly.
I mention these things, not to reproach teachers,—for I think their moral character, in this country, generally, far better than their intellectual,—but as a specimen of perversion in the public sentiment; and also as a hint to all who have the care of the young. Pupils at school, cannot fail to make correct inferences from such facts as the foregoing.
4. DOUBLE ENTENDRES.[15]
By this is meant seeminglydecent speeches, with double meanings. I mention these because they prevail, in some parts of the country, to a most alarming degree; and because parents seem to regard them as perfectly harmless. Shall I say—to show the extent of the evil—that they are sometimes heard from both parents? Now no serious observer of human life and conduct can doubt that by every species of impure language, whether in the form of hints, innuendoes, double entendres, or plainer speech, impure thoughts are awakened, a licentious imagination inflamed, and licentious purposes formed, which would otherwise never have existed. Of all such things an inspired writer has long ago said—and the language is still applicable;—'Let them not be so much as named among you.'
I have been in families where these loose insinuations, and coarse innuendoes were so common, that the presence of respectable company scarcely operated as a restraint upon the unbridled tongues, even of the parents! Many of these things had been repeated so often, and under such circumstances that the children, at a very early age, perfectly understood their meaning and import. Yet had these very same children asked for direct information, at this time, on the subjects which had been rendered familiar to them thus incidentally, the parents would have startled; and would undoubtedly have repeated to them part of a string of falsehoods, with which they had been in the habit of attempting to 'cover up' these matters; though with the effect, in the end, of rendering the children only so much the more curious and inquisitive.
But this is not all. The filling of the juvenile mind, long before nature brings the body to maturity, with impure imaginations, not only preoccupies the ground which is greatly needed for something else, and fills it with shoots of a noxious growth, but actually induces, if I may so say, aprecocious maturity. What I mean, is, that there arises a morbid or diseased state of action of the vessels of the sexual system, which paves the way for premature physical developement, and greatly increases the danger of youthful irregularity.
5. EVENING PARTIES.
One prolific source of licentious feeling and action may be found, I think, in evening parties, especially when protracted to a late hour. It has always appeared to me that the injury to health which either directly or indirectly grows out of evening parties, was a sufficient objection to their recurrence, especially when the assembly is crowded, the room greatly heated, or when music and dancing are the accompaniments. Not a few young ladies, who after perspiring freely at the latter exercise, go out into the damp night air, in a thin dress, contract consumption; and both sexes are very much exposed, in this way, to colds, rheumatisms, and fevers.
But the great danger, after all, is to reputation and morals. Think of a group of one hundred young ladies and gentlemen assembling at evening, and under cover of the darkness, joining in conclave, and heating themselves with exercise and refreshments of an exciting nature, such as coffee, tea, wine, &c, and in some parts of our country with diluted distilled spirit; and 'keeping up the steam,' as it is sometimes called, till twelve or one o'clock, and frequently during the greater part of the night. For what kind and degree ofvice, do not such scenes prepare those who are concerned in them?
Nothing which is here said is intended to be levelled against dancing, in itself considered; but only against such a use, or ratherabuseof it as is made to inflame and feed impure imaginations and bad passions. On the subject of dancing as an amusement, I have already spoken in another part of the work.
I have often wondered why the strange opinion has come to prevail, especially among the industrious yeomanry of the interior of our country, that it is economical to turn night into day, in this manner. Because they cannot very well spare their sons or apprentices in the daytime, as they suppose, they suffer them to go abroad in the evening, and perhaps to be out all night, when it may justly be questioned whether the loss of energy which they sustain does not result in a loss of effort during one or two subsequent days, at least equal to the waste of a whole afternoon. I am fully convinced, on my own part, that he who should give up to his son or hired laborer an afternoon, would actually lose a less amount of labor, taking the week together, than he who should only give up for this purpose the hours which nature intended should be spent in sleep.
But—I repeat it—the moral evil outweighs all other considerations. It needs not an experience of thirty years, nor even of twenty, to convince even a careless observer that no small number of our youth of both sexes, have, through the influence of late evening parties, gone down to the chambers of drunkenness and debauchery; and, with the young man mentioned by Solomon, descended through them to those of death and hell.
It may be worth while for those sober minded and, otherwise, judicious Christians, who are in the habit of attending fashionable parties at late hours, and taking their 'refreshments,' to consider whether they may not be a means of keeping up, by their example, those more vulgar assemblies, with all their grossness, which I have been describing. Is it not obvious that what thewine, and the fruit, and the oysters, are to the more refined and Christian circles, wine and fermented liquors may be to the more blunt sensibilities of body and mind, in youthful circles of another description? But if so, where rests the guilt? Or shall we bless the fountains, while we curse the stream they form?
Section III.Diseases of Licentiousness.
The importance of this and the foregoing section will be differently estimated by different individuals. They were not inserted, however, without consideration, nor without the approbation of persons who enjoy a large measure of public confidence. The young ought at least to know, briefly, to what a formidable host of maladies secret vice is exposed.
1.Insanity.The records of hospitals show that insanity, from solitary indulgence, is common. Tissot, Esquirol, Eberle, and others, give ample testimony on this point. The latter, from a careful examination of the facts, assures us that in Paris the proportion of insane persons whose diseases may be traced to the source in question, isonein fromfifty-onetofifty-eight, in thelower classes. In the higher classes it isoneintwenty-three. In the insane Hospital of Massachusetts—I have it from authority which I cannot question,—the proportion is at least one in three or four. At present there are about twenty cases of the kind alluded to.
2.Chorea Sancti Viti; orSt. Vitus's dance. This strange disease, in which the muscles of the body are not always at the command of the patient, and in which the head, the arms, the legs, and indeed every part which is made for muscular motion often jerks about in a very singular manner, is sometimes produced in the same way. Insanity and this disease are occasionally combined. I have known one young man in this terrible condition, and have read authentic accounts of others.
3.Epilepsy.Epileptic orfalling sickness fits, as they are sometimes denominated, are another very common scourge of secret vice. How much they are to be dreaded almost every one can judge; for there are few who have not seen those who are afflicted with them. They usually weaken the mind, and sometimes entirely destroy it. I knew one epileptic individual who used to dread them more than death; and would gladly have preferred the latter.
4.Idiotism.Epilepsy, as I have already intimated, often runs on to idiotism; but sometimes the miserable young man becomes an idiot, without the intervention of any other obvious disease.
5.ParalysisorPalsy, is no uncommon punishment of this transgression. There are, however, several forms of this disease. Sometimes, a slight numbness of a single toe or finger is the first symptom of its approach; but at others a whole hand, arm, or leg is affected. In the present case, the first attacks are not very violent, as if to give the offender opportunity to return to the path of rectitude. Few, however, take the hint and return, till the chains of their slavery are riveted, and their health destroyed by this or some other form of disease. I have seen dissipated young men who complained of the numbness of a finger or two and the corresponding portion of the hand and wrist, who probably did not themselves suspect the cause; but I never knew the disorder permanently removed, except by a removal of the cause which produced it.
6.Apoplexy.This has occasionally happened; though more rarely.
7.Blindness, in some of its forms, especially of that form usually calledgutta serena, should also be added to our dark catalogue. Indeed a weakness of sight is among the first symptoms that supervene on these occasions.
8.Hypochondria.This is as much a disease by itself as the small pox, though many regard it otherwise. The mind is diseased, and the individual has many imaginary sufferings, it is true; but the imagination would not be thus unnaturally awake, if there were no accompanying disturbance in the bodily functions. Hypochondria, in its more aggravated forms, is a very common result of secret vice.
9.Phthisis, or consumption, is still more frequently produced by the cause we are considering, than any other disease I have mentioned. And we know well the history of this disease; that, though slow in its progress, the event is certain. In this climate, it is one of the most destructive scourges of our race. If the ordinary diseases slay their thousands, consumption slays its tens of thousands. Its approach is gradual, and often unsuspected; and the decline to the grave sometimes unattended by any considerable suffering. Is it not madness to expose ourselves to its attacks for the shortlived gratifications of a moment?
There is indeed a peculiar form of this disease which, in the case in question, is more commonly produced than any other. It is called, in the language of physicians,tabes dorsalis, ordorsalconsumption; because it is supposed to arise from thedorsalportion of the spinal marrow. This disease sometimes, it is true, attacks young married people, especially where they gobeyondthe bounds which the Author of nature intended; and it is occasionally produced by other causes entirely different; causes, too, which it would be difficult, if not impossible to prevent. Generally, however, it is produced bysolitary vice.
The most striking symptom of this disease is described as being a 'sensation of ants, crawling from the head down along the spine;' but this sensation is not always felt, for sometimes in its stead there is, rather, a very great weakness of the small part of the back, attended with pain. This is accompanied with emaciation, and occasionally, though not always, with an irregular appetite. Indeed, persons affected with this disease generally have a good appetite. There is usually little fever, or at most only a slight heat and thirst towards evening, with occasional flushings of the face; and still more rarely, profuse perspirations in the latter part of the night. But the latter symptom belongs more properly to common consumption. The sight, as I have already mentioned, grows dim; they have pains in the head and sometimes ringing in the ears, and a loss of memory. Finally, the legs become weak, the kidneys and stomach suffer, and many other difficulties arise which I cannot mention in this work, followed often by an acute fever; and unless the abominable practice which produced all the mischief is abandoned, death follows. But when many of the symptoms which I have mentioned, are really fastened upon an individual, he has sustained an injury which can never be wholly repaired. All he can hope is to prolong his days, and lengthen out his life—often a distressing one. A few well authenticated examples of persons who debased themselves by secret vice, will, I hope, satisfy those who doubt the evils of this practice.
One young man thus expressed his sufferings to his physician. 'My very great debility renders the performance of every motion difficult. That of my legs is often so great, that I can scarcely stand erect; and I fear to leave my chamber. Digestion is so imperfect that the food passes unchanged, three or four hours after it has been taken into the stomach. I am oppressed with phlegm, the presence of which causes pain; and the expectoration, exhaustion. This is a brief history of my miseries. Each day brings with it an increase of all my woes. Nor do I believe that any human creature ever suffered more. Without a special interposition of Divine Providence, I cannot support so painful an existence.'
Another thus writes; 'Were I not restrained bysentimentsofreligion,[16]I should ere this have put an end to my existence; which is the more insupportable as it is caused by myself.'
'I cannot walk two hundred paces,' says another 'without resting myself; my feebleness is extreme; I have constant pains in every part of the body, but particularly in the shoulders and chest. My appetite is good, but this is a misfortune, since what I eat causes pains in my stomach, and is vomited up. If I read a page or two, my eyes are filled with tears and become painful:—I often sigh involuntarily.'
A fourth says; 'I rest badly at night, and am much troubled with dreams. The lower part of my back is weak, my eyes are often painful, and my eyelids swelled and red. I have an almost constant cold; and an oppression at the stomach. In short, I had rather be laid in the silent tomb, and encounter that dreadful uncertainty,hereafter, than remain in my present unhappy and degraded situation.'
The reader should remember that the persons whose miseries are here described, were generally sufferers fromhypochondria. They had not advanced to the still more horrid stages of palsy, apoplexy, epilepsy, idiotism, St. Vitus's dance, blindness, or insanity. But they had gone so far, that another step in the same path, might have rendered a return impossible.
The reader will spare me the pain of presenting, in detail, any more of these horrid cases. I write foryoung men, the strength—the bone, muscle, sinew, and nerve—of our beloved country. I write for those who,—though some of them may have erred—are glad to be advised, and if they deem the advice good, are anxious to follow it. I write, too, in vain, if it be not for young men who will resolve on reformation, when they believe that their present and future happiness is at stake. And, lastly, I have not read correctly the pages in the book of human nature if I do not write for those who can, with God's help, keep every good resolution.
There are a few publications to which those who are awake to the importance of this subject, might safely be directed. One or two will be mentioned presently. It is true that their authors have, in some instances, given us the details of such cases of disease as occur but rarely. Still, what has happened, in this respect, may happen again. And as no moderate drinker of fermented or spirituous liquors can ever know, with certainty, that if he continues his habit, he may not finally arrive at confirmed drunkenness, and the worst diseases which attend it, so no person who departs but once from rectitude in the matter before us, has any assurance that he shall not sooner or later suffer all the evils which they so faithfully describe.
When a young man, who is pursuing an unhappy course of solitary vice, threatened as we have seen by the severest penalties earth or heaven can impose,—begins to perceive a loss or irregularity of his appetite; acute pains in his stomach, especially during digestion, and constant vomitings;—when to this is added a weakness of the lungs, often attended by a dry cough, hoarse weak voice, and hurried or difficult breathing after using considerable exertion, with a general relaxation of the nervous system;—when these appearances, or symptoms, as physicians call them, take place—let himbeware! for punishment of a severer kind cannot be distant.
I hope I shall have no reader to whom these remarks apply; but should it be otherwise, happy will it be for him if he takes the alarm, and walks not another step in the downward road to certain and terrible retribution. Happiest, however, is he who has never erred from the first; and who reads these pages as he reads of those awful scenes in nature,—the devastations of the lightning, the deluge, the tornado, the earthquake, and the volcano; as things to be lamented, and their horrors if possible mitigated or averted, but with which he has little personal concern.
Sympathizing, however, with his fellow beings—for thoughfallen, they still belong to the same family—should any reader who sees this work, wish to examine the subject still more intimately, I recommend to him a Lecture to Young Men, lately published in Providence. I would also refer him, to Rees' Cyclopedia, art.Physical Education.
The article last referred to is so excellent, that I have decided on introducing, in this place, the closing paragraph. The writer had been treating the subject, much in the manner I have done, only at greater length, and had enumerated the diseases to which it leads, at the same time insisting on the importance of informing the young, in a proper manner, of their danger, wherever the urgency of the case required it. After quoting numerous passages of Scripture, which, in speaking of impurity, evidently include this practice, and denouncing it in severe terms, he closes with the following striking remarks.
'There can be no doubt that God has forbidden it by the usual course of providence. Its moral effects, in destroying the purity of the mind, in swallowing up its best affections, and perverting its sensibilities into this depraved channel, are among its most injurious consequences; and are what render it so peculiarly difficult to eradicate the evil. In proportion as the habit strengthens the difficulty of breaking it, of course, increases; and while the tendency of the feelings to this point increases, the vigor of the mind to effect the conquest of the habit gradually lessens.
'We would tell him (the misguided young man) that whatever might be said in newspapers respecting the power of medicine in such cases, nothing could be done without absolute self-control; and that no medicine whatever could retrieve the mischiefs which the want of it had caused: and that the longer the practice was continued, the greater would be the bodily and mental evils it would inevitably occasion.
'We would then advise him to avoid all situations in which he found his propensities excited; and especially, as far as possible, all in which they had been gratified; to check the thoughts and images which excited them; to shun those associates, or at least that conversation, and those books, which have the same effect; to avoid all stimulating food and liquor; to sleep cool on a hard bed; to rise early, and at once; and to go to bed when likely to fall asleep at once; to let his mind be constantly occupied, though not exerted to excess; and to let his bodily powers be actively employed, every day, to a degree which will make a hard bed the place of sound repose.
'Above all, we would urge him to impress his mind (at times when the mere thought of it would not do him harm) with a feeling of horror at the practice; to dwell upon its sinfulness and most injurious effects; and to cultivate, by every possible means, an habitual sense of the constant presence of a holy and heart-searching God, and a lively conviction of the awful effects of his displeasure.'
I should be sorry to leave an impression on any mind that other forms of licentiousness are innocent, or that they entail no evils on the constitution. I have endeavored to strike most forcibly, it is true, at solitary vice; but it was for this plain reason, that few of the young seem to regard it as any crime at all. Some even consider it indispensable to health. This belief I have endeavored to shake; with how much success, eternity only can determine.
Of the guilt of those forms of irregularity, in whichmorethan one individual and sex arenecessarilyconcerned, many of the young are already apprized. At least they are generally acquainted with the more prominent evils which result from what they call excess. Still if followed in what they deem moderation, and with certain precautions which could be named, not a few are ready to believe, at least in the moment of temptation, that there is no great harm in following their inclinations.
Now in regard to what constitutes excess, every one who is not moved by Christian principle, will of necessity, have his own standard, just as it is in regard to solitary vice, or the use of ardent spirits. And herein consists a part of the guilt. And it is not till this conviction of our constant tendency to establish an incorrect standard for ourselves, and to go, in the end, to the greatest lengths and depths and heights of guilt, can be well established in our minds, that we shall ever be induced to avoid the first steps in that road which may end in destruction; and to take as the only place of safety, the high ground of total abstinence.
But although the young are not wholly destitute of a sense of the evils of what they call excess, and of the shame of what is well known to be its frequent and formidable results,—so far as themselves are concerned,—yet they seem wholly ignorant of any considerable danger short of this. For so far are they from admitting that the force of conscience is weakened by every repeated known and wilful transgression, many think, (as I have already stated) promiscuous intercourse, where no matrimonial rights are invaded, if it be so managed as to exempt the parties immediately concerned from all immediate suffering both moral and physical, can scarcely be called a transgression, at all.
I wish it were practicable to extend these remarks far enough to show, as plain as noon-day light can make it, that every criminal act of this kind—I mean every instance of irregularity—not only produces evil to society generally, in the present generation, but also inflicts evil on those that follow. For to say nothing of those horrid cases where the infants of licentious parents not only inherit vicious dispositions, but ruined bodies—even to a degree, that in some instances excludes a possibility of the child's surviving many days;—there are other forms of disease often entailed on the young which as certainly consign the sufferer to an early grave, though the passage thither may be more tedious and lingering.
How must it wring the heart of a feeling young parent to see his first born child, which for any thing he knows, might have been possessed of a sound and vigorous body, like other children, enter the world with incipient scrofula, diseased joints or bones, and eruptive diseases, in some of their worst forms? Must not the sight sink him to the very dust? And would he not give worlds—had he worlds to give—to reverse those irreversible but inscrutable decrees of Heaven, which visit the sins of parents upon their descendants—'unto the third and fourth generation?'
But how easy is it, by timely reflection, and fixed moral principle, to prevent much of that disease which 'worlds' cannot wholly cure, when it is once inflicted!
I hazard nothing in saying, then—and I might appeal to the whole medical profession to sustain me in my assertion—that no person whose system ever suffers, once, from those forms of disease which approach nearest to the character of special judgments of Heaven on sin or shame, can be sure of ever wholly recovering from their effects on his own person; and what is still worse, can ever be sure of being the parent of a child whose constitution shall be wholly untainted with disease, of one kind or another.
This matter is not often understood by the community generally; especially by the young. I might tell them of the diseased eyesight; the ulcerated—perhaps deformed—nose and ears, and neck; the discoloration, decay, and loss of teeth; the destruction of the palate, and the fearful inroads of disease on many other soft parts of the body; besides the softening and ulceration and decay and eventual destruction of the bones; and to crown all, the awfully offensive breath and perspiration; and I might entreat them to abstain, in the fear of God, from those abuses of the constitution which not unfrequently bring down upon them such severe forms of punishment.
A thorough knowledge of the human system and the laws to which all organized bodies are subjected, would, in this respect, do much in behalf of mankind; for such would be the change of public sentiment, that the sensual could not hold up their heads so boldly, as they now do, in the face of it. Happy for mankind when the vicious shall be obliged, universally, to pass in review before this enlightened tribunal!
Young men ought to study physiology. It is indeed to be regretted that there are so few books on this subject adapted to popular use. But in addition to those recommended at page 346, there are portions of several works which may be read with advantage by the young. Such are some of the more intelligible parts of Richerand's Physiology, as at page 38 of the edition with Dr. Chapman's notes; and of the 'Outlines of Physiology,' and the 'Anatomical Class Book,' two works recently issued in Boston. It must, however, be confessed, that none of these works are sufficiently divested of technicalities, to be well adapted, as a whole, to the general reader. Physiology is one of those fountains at which it is somewhat dangerous to 'taste,' unless we 'drink deep;' on account of the tendency of superficial knowledge to empiricism. Still, I am fully of the opinion that even superficial knowledge, on this long neglected topic, is less dangerous both to the individual and to the community, than entire ignorance.
And after all, the best guides would beparents. When will Heaven confer such favors upon us? When will parents become parents indeed? When will one father or mother in a hundred, exercise the true parental prerogative, and point out to those whom God has given them, as circumstances may from time to time demand, the most dangerous rocks and whirlpools to which, in the voyage of life, they are exposed? When will every thing else be done for the young rather than that which ought never to be left undone?
Say not, young reader, that I am wandering. You may be a father. God grant that if you are, you may also act the parent. Let me beg you to resolve, and if necessary re-resolve. And not only resolve, but act. If you are ready to pronounce me enthusiastic on this subject, let me beg you to suspend your judgment till the responsibilities and the duties and the anxieties of a parent thicken round you.
It is painful to see—every where—the most unquestionable evidence that this department of education is unheeded. Do you ask how the evidence is obtained? I answer by asking you how the physician can discover,—as undoubtedly he can,—the progress of the drinker of spirituous liquors, by his eye, his features, his breath, nay his very perspiration. And do you think that the sons or daughters of sensuality, in any of its forms, and at any of its stages, can escape his observation?
But of what use is his knowledge, if he may not communicate it? What person would endure disclosures of this kind respecting himself or his nearest, perhaps his dearest and most valued friends? No! the physician's lips must be sealed, and his tongue dumb; and the young must go down to their graves, rather than permit him to make any effort to save them, lest offence should be given!
The subject is, however, gaining a hold on the community, for which none of us can be too thankful. I am acquainted with more than one parent, who is a parent indeed; for there is no more reserve on these subjects, than any other. The sons do not hesitate to ask parental counsel and seek parental aid, in every known path of temptation. Heaven grant that such instances may be speedily multiplied. A greater work of reform can scarcely be desired or anticipated.
But I must draw to a close. Oh that the young 'wise,' and that they would 'consider!' 'There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is death.'
There is, then, but one course for the young. Let them do that which they know to be right, and avoid not only that which they are sure is wrong, but that also of which they havedoubts. Let them do this, moreover, in the fear and love of God. In the language of a great statesman of the United States to his nephew, a little before his death, let me exhort you, to 'Give up property,give up every thing—give up even life itself, rather than presume to do an immoral act.' Let me remind you too, of the declaration of that Wisdom which is Infinite;—'He that sinneth against God, destroyeth his own soul.'