porting. They ought to have carriages and horses,
mansions and pictures, with all the luxuries of affluence--at least
so they think--and, being destitute of the resources requisite to
maintain such state, they become adepts in those arts which qualify
for the penitentiary. Others have such confidence in the strength of
their virtue, such commanding arrogance of integrity, that, like a
captain who underestimates the force of an enemy and overrates his
own, they neglect to place a picket-guard on the outskirts of their
moral camp, and in such an hour as they think not they are surprized
and lost. Even possessors of religion are not always clear of this
folly, or safe from its perils. They "think more highly of themselves
than they ought to think"; they come to regard themselves as specially
favored of heaven; they talk of the Almighty in a free and easy
manner, and of Jesus Christ as tho He were not the Judge at all. When
they pray, it is with a familiarity bordering on irreverence, and
when they deal with sacred themes it is with a lightness that breeds
contempt. When they recount the marvels which they have wrought in
the name of Christ, it is hardly-possible for them to hide their
self-complacency; for, while they profess to give Him the glory, the
manner of their speech shows that they are taking it to themselves.
They are like the disciples, who were as proud of their prowess in
casting out devils as children are with their beautiful toys, and
they are as much in need of the Savior's warning: "I beheld Satan, as
lightning, fall from heaven." And because they have failed to give
heed unto it, they have oftentimes followed the Evil One in his
downward course, and in a moment have made shipwreck of their faith.

"As sails, full spread, and bellying with the wind,
Drop, suddenly collapsed, if the mast split;
So to the ground down dropped the cruel fiend";

and earthward have the unsaintly saints of God as swiftly sped, when
they have fostered the pride which changed angels into demons.

"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!" What
more pitiable spectacle than the ruin of an angel! We have seen the
forsaken halls of time-worn and dilapidated castles, have stood in
the unroofed palaces of ancient princes, and have gazed on the
moss-covered and ivy-decked towers of perishing churches, and the
sight of them has tilled our hearts with melancholy, as we thought
of what had been, and of the ch