he flesh they
sow, and of the flesh they shall reap corruption. Of old it was
written--"The wages of sin are death;" and that, like all God's words, is
a Gospel and good news to poor human beings. For if the wages of sin
were not death, what end could there be to sin, and therefore to misery?

But while such men exist, how shall a man escape them? How shall he
defend himself from them? Not by craft and falsehood, not by angry
replies, not by fighting them with their own weapons. The honest man is
no match for them with those. The man who has a conscience is no match
for the man who has none. The man who has no conscience does what he
wills; everything is fair to him in war; and there--in his
unscrupulousness--lies his evil strength. The man who has a conscience
dares not do what he likes. His scruples--in plain words, his fear of
God--hamper him, and put him at a disadvantage, which will always defeat
him, as often as he borrows the devil's tools to do God's work withal.

He must give up those weapons, as David threw off Saul's armour, when he
went to fight the giant. It was strong enough, doubt not: but he could
not go in it, he said; he was not accustomed to it. He would take
simpler weapons, to which he was accustomed; and fight his battle with
them, trusting not in armour, but in the name of the living God.

In the name of the living God. That is the only sure weapon, and the
only sure defence. In that David trusted, when he went to fight the
giant. In that he trusted, when he was hid in the cave. And because he
trusted in God, he prayed to God. He spoke to God. Remember that, and
understand how much it means. David, the simple yeoman's son, the
outlaw, the wanderer, despised and rejected by men, one who was no
scholar either, who very probably could neither read nor write, and knew
neither sciences nor arts, save how to play, in some simple way, upon his
harp--this man found out that, however oppressed, miserable, ignorant he
was in many respects, he had a right to speak face to face with the
Almighty and Infinite God, who had made heaven and earth. He found out
that that great God cared for him, protected him, and would be true to
him, if only he would be true to God and to himself. What a discovery
was that! Worth all the wealth and power, ay, worth all the learning and
science in the world.--To have found the pearl of great price, the secret
of all secrets; I, David, may speak to God.

Ah