Chapter 4 A SERMON.

The next day was Sunday. It came to the earth, as it comes always, with kindly, hallowed hands full of blessings, but found not everywhere hearts and minds open to receive them. Carice Bergan, to be sure, knelt in her accustomed place, in the little church of her fathers, with a face which might almost have rivalled that of an angel in its bright peacefulness, and with all the windows of her soul plainly open to the heavenly sunshine. Bergan Arling, too, conscious that each one of these holy days had its own special gift or grace for him, its own kind and measure of spiritual food, which he could ill afford to lose, knelt in his proper place, and reverently lent his full, rich voice to swell the solemn flow of common prayer, or the harmonious burst of choral praise. And Mrs. Lyte, in her widow's weeds, looking upward in spirit, to the long peace of Paradise, and the shining faces of the redeemed, was glad to believe in "the communion of saints," and rejoiced in the day that was both a foretaste and a promise of the "life everlasting." Even Astra Lyte, though suffering from a vague and nameless depression,—a burden of which, as yet, she felt only the weight and chill, without comprehending, or daring to try to comprehend, whence it came or what it meant,—was sensible of a dim delight, and possibly a latent helpfulness, in the sweet and solemn influences of the day and the place. Here and there, moreover, a soul bowed under the weight of recent affliction, or shaken with the terrors of a newly-awakened conscience, was both awed and glad to be able to give itself audible expression in words so fit and forcible as those of the Confession and the Litany, and thankful if it might pick up so much as a crumb of pardon and peace from the Master's bountiful table.

But, to Doctor Remy, paying an unwilling tribute to public opinion by showing himself at church, on this morning, after many weeks of absence, and leaving it to be inferred that, but for his professional duties, he would be seen there regularly; to Miss Ferrars, mingling solemn words of confession and penitence with frivolous thoughts of dress and gossip; to Dick Causton, slinking shame-facedly into the rear pew, to listen to the conclusion of the sweet, old, familiar hymn, the first sounds of which had fallen enticingly upon his ear, as he was staggering up the street;—to these, and many others like them, doubtless, Sunday brought only present irksomeness and future condemnation.

The hymn being finished, Mr. Islay ascended the pulpit, and, laying his manuscript open before him, looked round on the crowded congregation, with serious, almost melancholy, eyes. Perhaps he sought, amid those upturned faces, for some sign of human sympathy, to lighten a little his heavy sense of responsibility; perhaps he wondered to which of these souls his words were now to prove a savor of life unto life, and to which, a savor of death unto death. Deep and clear, and full of a solemn music, his voice broke the silence.

"In the fifth, chapter of Proverbs, and in the twenty-second verse, it is written:

'HE SHALL BE HOLDEN WITH THE CORDS OF HIS SINS.'"


Three faces were at once alive with interest. Doctor Remy, indeed, gave a slight and almost imperceptible start, as if his intellect not only, but his memory or his conscience, had felt an awakening touch. Bergan Arling merely fixed his eyes more intently on the speaker, with the aspect of a man who was glad to find that the coming discourse was likely to link into, and carry on, some previous train of thought. As for Dick Causton, the word "Proverbs" was sufficient to command his earnest, and even critical, attention. He believed that he knew a good deal about proverbs himself; he had made a lifelong study of their characteristics and principles of interpretation; he had often declared those of Solomon—such as were strictly proverbs—to be of the best; he would stay and hear what a tyro like Mr. Islay had to say about this particular one.

This, briefly, was what the clergyman said.

"Many texts are like rosebuds. They have a simple form, and an obvious signification. But if you steep them in the dew of meditation and the sunshine of faith, they begin to unfold meaning after meaning, as the rosebud petal after petal; and in the centre there is a golden heart,—the gracious blessing of God on the fervent and prayerful spirit, and the inquiring and teachable mind. Let us pray that the text which we are considering, may prove such an one to each of us.

"A man's sin is sure to find him out. It may have been committed in secret, muffled thickly with caution, and finally buried deep under time and distance and circumstance; it may remain hidden for years; it may have been forgotten, except for an occasional dark moment, by the sinner himself; yet, some time, some day, what seems to be a chance, but is truly a providence, lifts the veil, and takes hold of the clue,—or death throws the lurid light of his inverted torch over the dark transaction,—and the liar, the thief, the adulterer, the murderer, or whatever may be the miserable man's miserable name, is brought to the bar either of human or divine justice. And there is no escape. The bands of his iniquity are around him; they bind him hand and foot; he is holden with the cords of his sins.

"This is perhaps the first and most obvious meaning of the text. It assures us that, 'though punishment be lame, it arrives.' It warns us not to make cords which are certain to be used, some day, for our own binding.

"But men are apt to think lightly of a remote evil. The present monopolizes their fears, as it does their labors. Moreover (they say), there are dozens of little, everyday sins, which entail no such fearful consequences. Let us see how our text bears upon these points.

"Sin is not a simple, but a complex, thing. It is a cord twisted of many threads, and some of them begin very far back. A man is seldom taken in the toils of a sudden, single temptation, or bound with the cords of an utterly unimagined and unpremeditated sin. He has made the way and work easy to each of them, by yielding to preliminary temptations, and carelessly allowing the binding of preparatory sins. He is holden with the cords of the evil thought to the unhallowed desire and the foul gratification. He is holden with the cords of that seemingly venial sin to this final burden of guilt and shame, by that unbridled passion to this startling, terrible crime. The slender cord draws the stout one after it: at sight of that, the man may start and shrink, but he is already half-bound, and his resistance is feeble. Having taken the first step, he is committed to the second; having admitted the premise, he is bound to the logical conclusion. Here, as before, he is holden with the cords of his sins.

"Moreover, there are few things stronger, for good or ill, than habit. And every sin, however small, may begin an evil habit, and is sure to confirm one. Round and round goes the slender cord, till it binds as strongly as a chain of iron. One part after another yields to the subtle, stealing influence; first, the will succumbs; then, the reason; finally, the conscience. Day by day, good ceases to attract, and evil to repel. Day by day, the right becomes more difficult, and the wrong easier. The habit soon becomes fixed; the man is firmly bound. To the side of evil, and the service of Satan, he is holden with the cords of his sins.

"Again: If thought be the spring of action, action is also the spring of thought. If it be true that, 'as a man thinks, he is,' so it is true that as he is, he thinks. Thought is by turns cause and effect. If a man's sins are the result of his evil thoughts, so his evil and erroneous thoughts are sometimes the result of his sins. He cannot long continue to think right if he act wrong. After breaking the Sabbath awhile, he ceases to think of it as a holy day. After committing murder, he ceases to regard life as sacred. Violating human law, it becomes a terror instead of a protection. Defying the Divine law, he soon denies its authority. Sin distorts his views, as well as his life. The truths of religion lose their clearness to his mind with their power to influence his action. Doubts, scepticism, infidelity, find an open door, and an easy road, to his heart. If a man would keep fast hold of his Christian faith, let him take care to order his actions, as far as possible, in conformity to its precepts. But, on the other hand, let him give free rein to his appetites and ambitions,—yea, even to the commission of absolute crime,—if he wishes to become a mocker and an infidel, without love of God or man, without correct views of time or clear ones of eternity. For, to all these things, he will be sure to be holden with the cords of his sins.

"Finally; All men love liberty. But sin, though it may seem, at first, to be the wildest liberty, soon proves to be the narrowest bondage. The sinner is the slave of appetites, of habits, of thoughts, that are hard task-masters; and the wages of which are every kind of death. For there are many kinds,—social, political, moral, before the final, everlasting death;—and one, or all, of these, he is sure to taste, as the reward of his faithful service of Satan. His health is undermined, or his reputation destroyed; his fortune is dissipated, or his gold corroded in the using; he is shaken with the terrors of conscience, or hardened into the semblance of stone; he is without adequate consolation in the day of trouble, and without strengthening hope in the day of death; but his slavery is abject and absolute. He neither will nor can escape. He is holden with the cords of his sins.

"Thus you will see, beloved, that our text has a word of solemn warning for the present, as well as for the future. The holding of sin is to be dreaded in life, not less than at death. One sin holds fast to another. Single sins twist together into the strong cord of habitual sin. The sinful act draws after it evil thoughts and loose opinions. Sin is a continual, daily bondage, as well as a final retribution.

"Beware then, oh, ye young! how you bind yourselves with cords of sinful thoughts, or habits, or opinions, or passions, to the exclusion of that blessed liberty which is in Christ Jesus. Beware, oh, ye adults! how you go on adding sin to sin, and cord to cord, till you are bound hand and foot, thought and will, body and soul; and are finally cast down to perdition, in bonds of your own industrious forging—holden with the cords of your sins!

"But,—do you say?—we are all sinners, we are all 'holden,' how are we to break from the cords of our sins? Go to Christ. At His feet, all bonds are broken, all slavery ends. He leads captivity captive, and His service is perfect freedom. He is our righteousness, and the man that trusteth in Him, shall no more be holden with the cords of His sins."

Such was the substance of the sermon. But in the delivery, there was a warmth and an earnestness, a happiness of expression and illustration, and a deep solemnity, that held the congregation spell-bound with interest, to the end!

Perhaps no one had listened more attentively, or humbly, than Bergan Arling. So recently had he felt the irksome holding of the cords of his sins! And he would still, no doubt, be holden to their consequences, all the days of his life, if not to their guilt.

As for Doctor Remy, there was an unusual pallor in his face, when he rose, at the singing of the last hymn. But it was quickly gone; he came out of the church with much of his usual cold, composed demeanor. His sins had held him too long to loosen their stricture at one transient quake of conscience.

Dick Causton had listened for some time with marked attention, and apparent approval. Then, a kind of haze had slowly bedimmed his sight and beclouded his brain. When the congregation came down the aisles, he was fast asleep, with his head drooping heavily on his breast. If anything could have added to the effect of the sermon, this sight ought to have done so. Most certainly, poor Dick was "holden with the cords of his sins."

When the church was empty, he was shaken rudely by the sexton, and turned out, muttering caustic proverbs by way of retaliation.