157 Sermon Illustrations on Consequences of Sin

A clergyman advised a mother that he had seen her son smoking, only to be repulsed. Two years later, she was glad to ask him to do something for her besotted son; but it was too late. The son died in a few years a drunkard and a suicide.

A Burmese potter, says the legend, became envious of the prosperity of a washerman, and, to ruin him, induced the king to order him to wash one of his black elephants white, that he might be lord of the white elephant. The washerman replied, that, by the rules of his art, he must have a vessel large enough to wash him in. The king ordered the potter to make such a vessel. When made, it was crushed by the first step of the elephant in it. Many trials failed; and the potter was ruined by the very scheme he had intended should crush his enemy.

The bullet that sent death to Pres. Lincoln was a trifling affair, yet it sent mourning into every civilized nation of the globe. A broken rail is insignificant, yet close by it sits Death in greedy anticipation of a bloody feast. A word, a look, an act, a single neglect, may make a life, mar a fortune, ruin a good name, kindle war, or overthrow an empire.

Every man is treasuring up stores for eternity, — the good are laying up treasures in heaven, where moth doth not corrupt; the evil and impenitent are "treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath." What an idea is this! Treasures of wrath! Whatever the impenitent man is doing, he is treasuring up wrath. He may be getting wealth; but he is treasuring up wrath. He may be getting fame; but he is treasuring up wrath. He may be forming pleasing connections; but he is also treasuring up wrath: every day adds something to the heap. Every oath the swearer utters, there is something gone to the heap of wrath. Every lie the liar tells, every licentious act the lewd man commits, adds something to the treasure of wrath. The sinner has a weightier treasure of wrath to-day than he had yesterday; he will have a weightier to-morrow than he has to-day. When he lies down at night, he is richer in vengeance than when he arose in the morning. He is continually deepening and darkening his eternal portion. Every neglected Sabbath increases his store of wrath; every forgotten sermon adds something to the weight of punishment. All the checks of conscience, all the remonstrances of friends, all the advice and prayers of parents, will be taken into the account; and all will tend to increase the treasures of wrath laid up against the day of wrath.

— J. A. James

When stationed in the city of Bath, says Rev. Mr. Towle, I was introduced into the company of an aged man, whom I understood to have been intimate with Mr. Wesley, and once a useful local preacher. We entered into conversation about Mr. Wesley's times, when among other things he observed,—"On one occasion, when Mr. Wesley dined with me, after dinner, as usual, I prepared a little brandy and water. On perceiving this, with an air of surprise he cried,—'What! my brother, what's that?' 'It's brandy,' said I; 'my digestion is so bad, I am obliged to take a little after dinner.' 'How much do you take?' said he, 'let me see.' 'Only about a table-spoonful.' 'Truly,' said he, 'that is not much; but one table-spoonful will soon lose its effect, and then you will take two; from two you will get to a full glass; and that, in like manner, by habituating yourself to it, will lose its effect, and then you will take two glasses, and so on, till in the end, perhaps you will become a drunkard. O my brother, take care what you do!'"

Happy had it been for that man, if he had taken the timely warning of his good friend Wesley. But alas! he trifled with his little drops, until he actually did become a drunkard, ruined his reputation, and at the very time I had an interview with him, he was a poor, old, miserable backslider, apparently within a few steps of the grave.

3. Only those who totally abstain exert a good influence over the Intemperate, or command respect as Christians.

While Dr. Patton was dining in London with a number of the clergy, one of them remarked, after turning off his glass of wine, "I do not think I am called upon to give up my glass of wine because some men, by using it to excess, make beasts of themselves." The Doctor replied, he thought great injustice was done to the beasts by the comparison—that quadrupeds might be taken in once by strong drink, but very rarely the second time. It was left to intelligent man to follow up the habit until overtaken by destruction. He instanced the case of a goat, whose habit was to follow his master to a beer shop, where he would sleep under the table while his master was drinking; on one occasion, either by fair or foul means, one of the waiters made the poor goat drunk on vile beer—but from that time he would, as usual, follow his master to his drinking haunts, but could never again be tempted to enter, but would wait the movement of his master outside the door.

The folly and danger of anger is seen in the conduct of Alexander. Clitus was a person whom Alexander held very dear, as being the son of his nurse, and one who had been educated together with himself. He had saved the life of Alexander at the battle near the river Granicus, and by him was made Prefect of a province. But he could not flatter. At a feast with the king, when both were doubtless affected by wine, Clitus spoke in high terms of the actions of Philip, preferring them to those of his son. Alexander, transported with anger, seized a javelin and slew him on the spot. But when he became sober and his passion cooled, he was with difficulty restrained from killing himself, for that fault which his sudden fury had led him to commit. He seemed smitten with remorse for the murder, and inconsolable for the loss of his friend.

BOUGHT SPORT.—A few years since, at a place near Penzance, some men and boys, accompanied by two young women, having fastened a bullock's horn to the tail of a dog, turned the affrighted animal loose, and followed it with brutal exultations. The dog, pursued by its savage tormentors, ran down a road called Trereife Lane, when meeting a cart drawn by two horses, laden with coals, the horses took fright; the driver, who was sitting on the shafts of the cart, was thrown off, and the wheels passing over his head, he was killed on the spot. The persons who had occasioned this melancholy accident immediately suspended their chase of the dog, and the young women, on coming up, found that the lad, who had been killed by their mischievous frolic, was their brother!

It is related of Demetrius, (surnamed the Conqueror of cities,) that having received a marked and undoubted provocation, he laid siege to the city of Athens. The inhabitants made a desperate resistance; but were at last obliged to surrender, in consequence of great scarcity of provisions. Demetrius then ordered them nouncement of the result of his speculation, and literally yelled aloud. It was awful! After a few seconds he returned to his place. His last stake was lost! He twice drew his handkerchief across his forehead, but he uttered not a word. Presently he asked for a glass of eau-sucre, and having swallowed it, he slowly walked away. The next morning his servant found him sitting in an arm chair, with his sword thrust to the very hilt, sticking in his throat.

### 183. Miscellaneous.

The following inscription is to be seen in the market-place at Devizes (Eng.);—"The mayor and corporation of Devizes avail themselves of the stability of this building to transmit to future times the record of an awful event, which occurred in this market-place, in the year 1753, hoping that such a record may serve as a salutary warning against the danger of impiously invoking the Divine vengeance, or of calling on the holy name of God, to conceal the devices of falsehood and fraud. On Thursday, the 25th of January, 1753, Ruth Pierce, of Pottern, in this county, agreed with three other women to buy a sack of wheat in the market, each paying her due proportion towards the same. One of these women, in collecting the several quotas of money, discovered a deficiency, and demanded of Ruth Pierce the sum which was wanting to make good the amount. Ruth Pierce protested that she had paid her share, and said, she wished she might drop down dead, if she had not. She rashly repeated this awful wish, when, to the consternation of the surrounding multitude, she instantly fell down and expired, having the money concealed in her hand."

A town missionary, in Birmingham, attended a misguided infidel on his death-bed, and the system of Socialism being referred to, the dying man exclaimed, "Call it not Socialism; call it Devilism! for it has made me more like a devil than a man. I got into company, which led me to Socialism and to drinking. I rejected the Bible, denied the Savior, and persuaded myself that there was no hereafter; and as the result, I acted the part of a bad father and a bad husband. I have the testimony of my master, that I was a steady and respectable man until I listened to the Owenites; but, since that time, I have become a vagabond, and those who formerly knew me have shunned me in the streets. The system of the Owenite is worse than that of Paine." Such was the testimony of a dying victim of Socialism.

A respectable gentleman at Edinburgh related a most affecting fact, which we will briefly repeat. A religious lady at Edinburgh was sent to visit a woman who was dying, in consequence of disease brought on by intemperance. The woman had formerly been in the habit of washing in the lady's family, and when she came to the dying woman, she remonstrated with her on the folly and wickedness of her conduct, in giving way to so dreadful a sin as that of intemperance. The dying woman said, "You have been the author of my intemperance." "What did you say?" with pious horror, exclaimed the lady; "I the author of your intemperance!" "Yes, ma'am, I never drank whisky till I came to wash in your family: you gave me some, and told me it would do me good. I felt invigorated, and you gave it me again. When I was at other houses not so hospitable as yours, I purchased a little, and by and by I found my way to the spirit shop, and thought it was necessary to carry me through my hard work; and, by little and little, I became what you now see me." Conceive what this lady felt.

How many of the highest geniuses have passed away from the intellectual firmament, consumed like the burning stars of which astronomers tell us! And how? By the baleful fires of intemperance and lust. Says a distinguished divine, "A story of genius in ruins rises on my mind." In one of the older colleges in Massachusetts, some 20 or 25 years since, there was seen a youth of the highest promise, bearing an honored name, and concentrating in his own intellect the moral power of two generations of his ancestors. He was a prodigy of learning. While others of his class were slowly plodding through the daily tasks in Xenophon, he would be reading the Greek tragedians com more. He seized a language almost by intuition, and his heart entered into the heart of antiquity, as he read the language of the old and buried nations Called upon by the officers of the college to read dissertations in the chape upon abstruse and difficult subjects, he was accustomed to read them from blank papers, pouring forth spontaneous bursts of argument that thrilled while they convinced, and charmed while they persuaded. With Euclid, Newton, and La Place, he seemed as familiar as with Homer and Eschylus, and he levied large tribute from the lore of every nation under heaven. His person was faultless; his hair like the raven's wing; his eye like the eagle's. By an anomaly in American colleges, he demanded and received his first and second degrees from his Alma Mater on the same day, and on the same evening he was joined in the holy bands of wedlock with one of the most charming nymphs in the vale that embossing the college. His course was still onward and upward. His profession, the law, led him to the highest office of advocacy in the state. He was Attorney General at an age when most students are admitted to the bar. Suddenly, when as yet no one knew the cause, he resigned his high appointment, giving no reasons. He was a secret drunkard! Too high was his sense of honor, and the importance of his station, to intrust himself longer with the destinies of society. I turn with horror from the years of degradation that followed. He sunk like a mighty ship in mid ocean, not without many a lurch, many a sign of righting once more to plough the proud seas that were destined to entomb him forever. Long since his lovely wife had quitted the home which his vices had made wretched; she had returned to her parents to grieve and to die. But though her husband bowed over her grave, and wept bitterly on the head of the sweet boy she left behind her, he was not permanently affected by the shock. The most distinguished men for talent and piety in the United States wept and prayed over him; and at times he would get the better of the demon that ruled him, and again put forth his gigantic powers. The greatest effort he put forth during this period was the successful advocacy of an important case before the Supreme Court of the United States. Marshall, the patriarch of American judges, gazed with wonder on the barrister, as burst upon burst of eloquence and argument followed. Geo. W. Briggs, the member of Congress from Massachusetts, seeing his splendid portrait hanging in a conspicuous place at Washington, inquired whose likeness it was; and one of the highest authorities answered—that is the portrait of Talcott, the most brilliant genius—the most talented man in the United States. In his last spasm of temperance he wrote, The Trial and Condemnation of Alcohol: a popular tract, clothed with the forms and phraseology of a criminal court. But after a fatiguing argument before a court in the city of New York, he was over-persuaded by an advocate to take a glass of beer; and he complied. It was his last sober moment, till he was in the agonies of death. As the fabled Phoenix is said to rise from the ashes of its parents, one of the most lovely, eloquent advocates of temperance in the state of New-York was the son of this ruined genius; the little one over whom he wept at the grave of his wife.

A gentleman traveling in Essex, Eng., called at the house of a friend, where he met with a young minister who was just going to preach in the neighborhood. The lady of the house offered him a glass of spirits before he entered upon his work, which he accepted. An elderly man, who was present, thus addressed him:—"My young friend, let me offer you a word of advice respecting the use of liquors. There was a time when I was as acceptable a preacher as you now may be; but by too frequently accepting of the well-designed favors of my friends, I contracted a habit of drinking, so that now I never go to bed sober if I can get liquor. I am, indeed, just as miserable as a creature can be on this side of hell!" About two years after this, the traveler had occasion to call again at the same house, and made inquiry concerning the unhappy old man, when he was informed that he had been some time dead. I was stated that, towards the close of his life, he had not drank to the same excess as formerly; but it was only because he could not obtain spirituous liquors.

The sheriff, says an old man, took out his watch, and said, "If you have any thing to say, speak now, for you have only five minutes to live." The young man burst into tears, and said—"I have to die. I had only one little brother, and he had beautiful blue eyes, and flaxen hair, and I loved him; but one day I got drunk, for the first time in my life, and coming home, I found my little brother gathering strawberries in the garden, and I became angry with him without a cause, and killed him, at one blow, with a rake. I did not know any thing about it until the next morning, when I awoke from sleep, and found myself tied and guarded, and was told that when my little brother was found, his hair was clotted with his blood and brains, and he was dead. Whisky has done this. It has ruined me. I never was drunk but once. I have only one more word to say, and then I am going to my final Judge. I say it to young people. Never, NEVER! NEVER!! touch any thing that can intoxicate!" As he pronounced these words, he sprang from the box and was launched into an awful eternity.

A company of young men in New Orleans, once assembled around the wine table, for the purpose of enjoying the "feast of reason and the flow of soul." One of the party, who was a mere novice in drinking, while flushed with wine, in an unguarded moment made use of expressions at which one of this social party of friends took exceptions, an altercation ensued, and the offended party gave a peremptory challenge to the young man above alluded to. According to a custom handed down to us from the Goths, Huns, Vandals and Teutones, called the code of honor, he was induced to accept. In the morning, when reason had resumed her seat, he found himself in a dreadful situation—duty would have prompted him not to have gone to what is miscalled the "field of honor," but a morbid state of public opinion prompted him to meet his challenger, who was a practised duelist: they met, and this young man fell a victim to a ruthless custom at the first fire. He was borne home mortally wounded to his widowed mother—for he was her only son—and died the following day.

Hardened men were struck mute with grief, and shed tears at his untimely fate; and if men so unused to feel could thus be moved, what must have been the anguish of a mother, when she saw her son borne home in the agonies of death, and who had left her in all the buoyancy of youth, to join in a party of professed friends!!

He was the only prop and stay of her declining years. All her hopes and affections were centred in him, and as she gazed upon his manly form during a brief struggle with the "King of Terrors," it seemed as if her heart would break.

The lonely widow followed to the silent tomb the victim of a barbarous custom, who met his death by going to partake of a social glass at a WINE PARTY.

A writer in the Vermont Chronicle relates the following as a fact that he learned from good authority: "I wish I was dead," said a little boy one day to his mother. "Why?" asked his kind mother. "Why, the boys all pester me so about father, and I don't want to go again, in the night, to the store after him." His mother talked to him, but thought he did not feel in earnest about it. But one day, when she had returned from a visit, she inquired for the children, and found all but this boy. She looked, she called, but no answer. She went to the barn as it was just growing dark. She opened the door, and there, in one corner, was her little sensitive boy hanging by the neck. She burst into tears. "Oh my son, my son, is it you?"

She felt his cold hands, and he was dead. And at the funeral, his father promised to drink no more rum: "I have for ever done." A long time he kept his promise. One day, however, Deacon P. was in the store; and Deacon P. was a good man; he drank but little. He asked for some brandy. And while he drank it, he saw that same man who had been a drunkard looking at him; and he saw too that he was very uneasy; he walked about; he sat down. Again he would go to the door as if going away. He was in silent thought. At length he went to the counter and asked for a little brandy: "I may drink a little as well as Deacon P." He did drink, and became a confirmed drunkard again.

# 234. Fatal Accidents, Untimely and Awful Deaths.

This ship, carrying 36 men, sailed from Aberdeen, in Scotland, on a fine morning in May, with the fairest prospect of good weather and a prosperous voyage. About 11 o'clock the wind arose from the east, and swept over the sea with overwhelming violence. In about an hour she was seen standing in, but under such a press of sail as, considering the gale, astonished all on shore. But on she came, now bounding on the top of the sea, and then almost ingulled in the foaming cavern. The harbor of Aberdeen is exposed to the east, and formed by a pier on one side, and a breakwater on the other, and so narrow at the entrance as not to admit two large ships abreast. All saw that something was wrong on board. One attempt was made to shorten sail, but the ship was then within a cable's length of the shore, and urged on with an impetuosity which no human power could withstand. The wives and families of the men who were thus hastening to death had assembled near the pier; but all stood in silent horror, broke in a moment by the cry, "she's lost!" as the vessel, lashed on by the tempest, passed to the outer side of the breakwater, and struck with awful violence between two black rugged rocks. The cries of the victims were most horrible. The dreadful crisis had come, and they were lost indeed. A few brave men on shore endeavored to man the life boat, and take it round the breakwater, but it was unavailing. One heavy sea rolling over the wreck for a moment concealed her, and when the people looked again she was gone! Her crew and timbers were hurled against the rocks, and with the exception of one man, who was washed up and lodged on a projecting edge, none escaped of the 36 who had that morning left the shore in health and spirits. From the man who was saved, the melancholy truth was learnt that the crew were all intoxicated, and could not manage the vessel.

Benedict Arnold, the traitor who attempted to betray his country, was a rum-seller and a drunkard. Three of the most important defeats of the American army, during the Revolution, were sustained by men who died drunkards. Had a sober crew been on board the Chesapeake, the brave Lawrence would never have had to say to his men, "Don't give up the ship."

The Rev. John Owen, the eloquent advocate of the Bible Society, after advertising, in a sermon to the young, to the peaceful death of a little girl, mentions the awful end of a youth who had been seduced from the paths of virtue by wicked associates.

Scarcely, says he, had the turf been spread over the mortal remains of this young disciple, when the ground was opened to receive another of our youth, who, awful to relate, had raised his arm, and that with too fatal success, against the precious, the invaluable deposit of his own life. This deluded youth had received the benefit of a Christian education in one of our schools of gratuitous instruction; and, like the happy subject who preceded him into eternity, had been carefully lectured in the house of God on matters which concerned his salvation. But a removal from school to employment was to him, as it unhappily is to too many of our youth, the signal for renouncing his attendance upon the ordinances of religion. The consequence was such as might naturally be apprehended. He fell into the snare of evil company, and became licentious, profligate, and abandoned. Diseased, disgraced, despondent, without any cordial from religious hope, any support in Christian resignation, he yielded to the temptation of the destroyer, and completed the measure of his sin, his misery, and his dishonor, by an act of deliberate suicide.

### 247. LOVE, E

A Russian merchant, who was so immensely rich that on one occasion he lent the Empress Catharine the Second a million of rubles, used to live in a small, obscure room at St. Petersburg, with scarcely any fire, furniture, or attendants, though his house was larger than many palaces. He buried his money in casks in the cellar, and was so great a miser that he barely allowed himself the common necessaries of life. He placed his principal security in a large dog of singular fierceness, which used to protect the premises by barking nearly the whole of the night. At length the dog died; when the master, either impelled by his avarice from buying another dog, or fearing that he might not meet with one that he could so well depend on, adopted the singular method of performing the canine service himself, by going his rounds every evening, and barking as well and as loud as he could, in imitation of his faithful sentinel.

A quarrel having arisen between two brothers and a man named Gowrie, the emissaries of Gowrie entered the house of the brothers, in their absence, and carried off forty rupees. On their return, they were informed of the theft by their mother. They immediately led her out to an adjacent rivulet, and one of them severed his mother's head from her body, with the professed view, as entertained by both parent and sons, that the mother's spirit, excited by the beating of a drum during forty days, might for ever haunt, torment, and pursue to death Gowrie and the others concerned with him. The last words pronounced by the mother were, that she would blast Gowrie and those connected with him. Nor is this a solitary case of desperate revenge.

# 274. Cannibalism.

Jarvis Mutcham was pay-sergeant in a regiment, where he was so highly esteemed as a steady and accurate man, that he was permitted opportunity to embezzle a considerable part of the money lodged in his hands for the pay of soldiers, bounty of recruits, then a large sum, and other charges, which fell within his duty. He was summoned to join his regiment from a town where he had been on the recruiting service, and this, perhaps, under some shade of suspicion. Mutcham perceived discovery was at hand, and would have deserted, had it not been for the presence of a little drummer lad, who was the only one of his party appointed to attend him. In the desperation of his crime, he resolved to murder the poor boy, and avail himself of some balance of money to make his escape. He meditated this wickedness the more readily, that the drummer, he thought, had been put as a spy on him. He perpetrated his crime, and, changing his dress after the deed was done, made a long walk across the country to an inn on the Portsmouth road, where he halted, and went to bed, desiring to be called when the first Portsmouth coach came. The waiter summoned him accordingly; but long after remembered, that when he shook the guest by the shoulder, his first words as he awoke were, "I did not kill him." Mutcham went to the seaport by the coach, and instantly entered as an able-bodied landsman or marine, I know not which. His sobriety and attention to duty gained him the same good opinion of the officers, in his new service, which he had enjoyed in the army. He was afloat for several years, and behaved remarkably well in several actions. At length, the vessel came into Plymouth, was paid off, and some of the crew, among whom was Jarvis Mutcham, were dismissed as too old for service. He and another seaman resolved to walk to town, and took the route by Salisbury. It was when within two or three miles of that celebrated city, that they were overtaken by a tempest, so sudden, and accompanied with such vivid lightning, and thunder so fearfully loud, that the obdurate conscience of the old sinner began to be awakened. He expressed more terror than seemed natural for one who was familiar with the war of clements, and began to look and talk so wildly, that his companion became aware that something more than usual was the matter. At length, Mutcham complained to his companion that the stones rose from the road and flew after him. He desired the man to walk on the other side of the road of the highway, to see if they would follow him when he was alone. The sailor complied, and Jarvis Mutcham complained that the stones still flew after him, and did not pursue the other. "But what is worse," he added, coming up to his companion, and whispering, with a tone of mystery and fear, "who is that little drummer boy, and what business has he to follow us so closely?" "I can see no one," answered the seaman. "What! not see that little boy with the bloody pantaloons!" exclaimed the secret murderer, so much to the terror of his comrade, that he conjured him, if he had any thing on his mind to make a clear conscience, as far as confession could do it. The criminal fetched a deep groan, and declared he was unable longer to endure the life he had led for years. He then confessed the murder of the drummer; and added, that as a considerable reward had been offered, he wished his companion to deliver him up to the magistrates of Salisbury, as he would desire a shipmate to profit by his fate, which he was now convinced was inevitable. Having overcome his friend's objections to this mode of proceeding, Jarvis Mutcham was surrendered to justice accordingly, and made a full confession of his guilt. But before the trial the love of life returned. The prisoner denied his confession, and pleaded not guilty. By this time full evidence had been procured from other quarters. Witnesses appeared from his former regiment to prove his identity with the murderer and deserter, and the waiter remembered the ominous words which he had spoken, when he awoke him to join the Portsmouth coach. Jarvis Mutcham was found guilty, and executed. When his last chance of life was over, he returned to his confession, and with his dying breath averred, and

289. M

BED.—A young lady, about twenty years of age, had been born to a rich inheritance, and was the only child of parents who were exceedingly fond of her. Nothing was spared to complete her education, as a lady of fashion. As she grew up she answered all her mother's hopes in making a display in the fashionable world. But the hour of sickness came—it was a dreadful hour, for it was the termination of all her hopes. The minister was called in. He talked of death, judgment, and eternity. She had never heard such language addressed to her, and she trembled. In her dying hour, she called for some of her fine clothes. When they were brought, she looked up to her mother, and said, "These have ruined me. You never told me I must die. You taught me that my errand into this world was to be gay and dressy, and to enjoy the vanities of life. What could you mean? You knew I must die and go to judgment. You never told me to read the Bible, or to go to church, unless to make a display of some new finery. Mother, you have ruined me. Take them away, and keep them as a remembrance of your sin, and my sad end." She died in a few moments after.

# 338. Profanity Sinful.

A gentleman in England, who was in the habit, for more than twenty years, of daily visiting convicts, states that, almost universally, when brought to a sense of their condition, they lamented their neglect of the Sabbath, and pointed to their violation of it as the principal cause of their ruin. That prepared them for, and led them on, step by step, to the commission of other crimes, and finally to the commission of that which brought them to the prison, and often to the gallows. He has letters almost innumerable, he says, from others, proving the same thing, and that they considered the violation of the Sabbath the great cause of their ruin. He has attended three hundred and fifty at the place of execution, when they were put to death for their crimes. And nine out of ten who were brought to a sense of their condition attributed the greater part of their departure from God to their neglect of the Sabbath.