September 27

The way of transgressors is hard. (Proverbs 13:15)

Do you mean to say that God is a hard master? that it is a hard thing to serve God, that Satan is an easy master, and that it is easier to serve him than God? God a hard master? ‘If I read my Bible right, I read that the way of transgressors is hard. It is the devil who is the hard master.

If you doubt it, young man, look at the convict in the prison, right in the bloom of manhood, right in the prime of life. He has been there for ten years, and must remain for ten years more—twenty years taken out of his life; and when he comes out of that miserable cell, he comes out a branded felon! Do you think that man will tell you that the way of the transgressor has been easy ?

Go ask the poor drunkard, the man who is bound hand and foot, the slave of the infernal cup, who is hastening onward to a drunkard’s hell. Ask him if he has found the way of the transgressor easy. "Easy?" he will cry; "easy? The way of the transgressor is hard, and gets harder and harder every day!"

Go ask the libertine and the worldling, go ask the gambler and the blasphemer, take the most faithful follower of the devil and put the questions to him; with one voice they will all tell you that the service has been hard.