The Soul's Destruction Through Sensual Sin

He that doeth it destroyeth his own soul.—The injury of the soul:

Lovely as maiden purity is, crowned with benedictions by Christ, we must learn its excellence and fear its loss through the stern picture of impurity and shameless sin. In these proverbs of purity, the wise man personifies wisdom's rival standing in earth's great thoroughfares, bidding simple youth to shameful pleasures along the broad and crowded way. This is no allegorical fancy but drawn from reality, from everyday life—no mistake in outline, no exaggeration in colouring.

The power of sin lies in its pleasure. Sin, which brings death to the soul, is yet sweet to taste. The more we sin, the more perverted becomes our taste, the more clamorous for further indulgence. Yet these stolen waters of sinful pleasure become bitter indeed. The sensualist's peril grows from simple ignorance: sin naturally brings temporal and physical suffering, but the pleasures of sensuality are preludes to misery words refuse to paint.

Even innocent conversation becomes defiling to the sensualist, turned into the foul channel of base thought. The mind and conscience of the impure are defiled. The mental faculties of the depraved lose forever the power of discerning that which is excellent, lovely, and true. The deep things of Elohim are no subjects for the lover of sensual sin.

Sensuality prevents us from exercising mental powers with freedom and profit, wasting and enfeebling those powers themselves. The sensualist must choose between intellect and mental imbecility. "If any man defile the temple of God, which is our body, him will God destroy." This avenging work is well-nigh accomplished here on earth: body, spirit, and soul—all is impure.