[The transgressors] dream of a flowery path; but they make to themselves a hard way; perhaps pleasing them at first, as the spell to fasten them to the end. 'Wicked men live under a hard taskmaster' (Caryl). 'I was held before conversion not with an iron chain, but with the obstinacy of my own will" (Augustine). The philosophical infidel bears the same testimony--'I began to fancy myself in a most deplorable condition, environed with the deepest darkness on every side." Voltaire, judging of course from his own heart, pronounce--"In man is more wretchedness than in all other animals put together. Man loves life, yet knows he must die." "I wish"--concludes the wretched witness for his Master--"I had never been born." The worldly infidel adds his seal to the record. Col. Gardiner declared, that in his course of wickedness, he had often envied the existence of a dog. Wretch indeed must he be, who cannot endure to commune with himself, and to whose peace it is necessary that he should rid himself of every thought of God and his soul!
Bridges continues,
In every shape and form, the service of this merciless tyrant is a hard way. Men fight their way to hell, as they do to heaven--"through much tribulation."
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