And so with
thy soul, thy character, thy humanity. God does not break his laws
to punish its sins. The laws themselves punish; every fresh wrong
deed, and wrong thought, and wrong desire of thine sets thee more
and more out of tune with those immutable and eternal laws of the
Moral Universe, which have their root in the absolute and necessary
character of God himself. All things that he has ordained; the laws
of the human body, the laws of the human soul, the laws of society,
the laws of all heaven and earth are arrayed against thee; for thou
hast arrayed thyself against them. They have not excommunicated
thee: thou hast, single-handed, excommunicated thyself. In thine
own self-will, thou hast set thyself to try thy strength against God
and his whole universe. Dost thou fancy that he needs to interfere
with the working of that universe, to punish such a worm as thee?
No more than the great mill engine need stop, and the overseer of it
interfere with the machinery, if the drunken or careless workman
should entangle himself among the wheels. The wheels move on, doing
their duty, spinning cloth for the use of man: but the workman who
should have worked with them, is entangled among them. He is out of
his place; and slowly, but irresistibly, they are grinding him to
powder, as the whole universe is grinding thee.
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