Читать книгу Young Men; In Business онлайн

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I have read somewhere of an eagle in the Far West. Soaring with steady wing, he saw far below him the grand scenes of American nature, clothed in the first snows of early winter. As he rose higher towards the blue heaven, his keen eye saw floating on the distant river, whose margin was already frost-bound, the carcass of a huge buffalo. He paused in his upward flight; descended to settle and revel on this feast of corruption. He was borne calmly down the stream towards the fall and the rapids which lay below. Gorged with his foul meal, with drooping wing and dormant energies, he slept on the fœtid mass, and amid the oozing putrefaction. The blood, stiffened by the frost, bound his feet to the remains of the carcass; and onwards was he borne until the roar of the cataract thundered on his ear. He struggled for liberty; his powers had been enfeebled with satiety; his drooping wings were bound to the frozen blood; his wild cries awoke the echoes; he made frantic efforts to throw off his horrid companion; looked up to the blue heaven he had abandoned. It was too late: hurried over the rapid, he was sucked into the boiling cataract, and dashed to destruction on the rocks beneath. How does such an illustration find its analogy in human life! “His own iniquity,” saith the Scripture, “shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.” There is a deep and awful mystery in the downward progress of souls, when he who once was the master of sin becomes the “slave of sin.” Alas, there are scores of men in every neighborhood who would give all they have to begin life again. There was a time when they never intended to be vicious; but step by step they lowered themselves. Shame, truth, self-respect died. The lower elements of their nature first were freely indulged, then became importunate, then exacting, then domineering, then uncontrollable.