St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-03-03
MINNEAPOLIS.
THE INEVITABLE PENALTY.
Rev. M. ID. Shutter breaches on
the Consequences of Wrong

Rev. M. ID. Shutter breaches on
the Consequences of Wrong
doing.
Rev. Marion d. Shutter spoke at tile
Church of the Redeemer yesterday
morning on 1.-The Inevitable Penalty
He said: a.
Penalty is as real as transgression,
and goes with il hand in hand-ansin-
dissolu3le brotherhood. White the
bells Of superstition have vanished,
the hells that are constantly formed by
such dark builders as evil passions, evil
thoughts. evil conduct, evil character,
remain. Retribution is solemn and
impressive fact. We discern more
clearly than ever how. in the structure
of the human soul and body, in the con-
stitution of society and the laws OF ma
ture, the old warning in written In new
characters: Whatsoever man sowethl
that shall he also reap"
The penalty that comes through the
operation of these laws is certain.
1t is not arbitrarily inflicted, nor
can it be arbitrarily set aside.
Do not misunderstood me. Hope
is not excluded. | do not despair in the
grand OutcOme of any one. Over the
darkest abyss of sin and suffering l see
a rainbow bend its arch of triumph.
But my hope is based not upon the i'm
munity from suffering which the leger-
domain of vicariOuS sacrifice offers, but
largely upon the very fact of suffering
itself. Every man must reap the har-
vest of his own sowing. There Is no
escape. Every man shall suffer for
what he himself has done, and as long
as he sins shall he suffer. And this
| penalty does not wait. 1t begins at once.
1t is here and now, not only inevitable.
but present! Every evil thought or
deed has sentence against it speedily
executed in the character. Our man
hood and womanhood suffer loss. One
cannot do mean thing or think a base
thought without becoming like the
thing he thinks or does. Hewho cheats
is cheating himself worse than
all others. The thief steals
from himself; the liar turns
himself into living lie; the prof
ligate is his own victim. The man who
attempts to injure his neighbor only
succeeds in injuring himshlf. The
wrong he does his own soul is ten
times more severe and lasting than any
evil he can Infict! Wrote st. Bernard:
Nothing can work me damage except
y
about with me, and never am real SUI
ferer but by my own fault"
We are sometimes blinded and con
fused by the fact that we see no out
ward signs of penalty. That those who
du evil seem not to be moved by any
pang of suffering, and even prosper.
While the processes of retribution go on
continuously they do at length bring
crises that reveal the wrong doer and
to others the inevitable tendency of
even the smallest deviation from right
eousness. The eyes of justice are not
bandaged. Nothing has clearer or surer
vision. Ii men will flatter themselves
that they can escape God, let them
know they cannot escape Nature. Who
runs in her debt will find the utter
most farthing eXacted.
RetriDutiOn is continuous. but the
blow comes in the fearful revelation Of
what has been going On within. We
have INDUCED wrong thought-not
very harmful, we SuppoSed-and wake
to find it has grown into an evil passion.
We INDUCED little dislike-we wake
to find il full-groWn hatred. We said
little something bitter and malicious
now and then we wake to tind that the
tongue of scOld or fault finder or SIAN
derer is detiling our mouths. The worst
punishment of miserable life is in be-
ing what it is. Conscience makes keen
the SenSe eff personal degradation with
the feelings Of grief, shame, remOrse,
anguish of spirit. Conscience, too,
forces upon the spirit the wrongs done
to others. the suffering of innocent
hearts, rights disregarded, feet led
astray, happiness turned to bitterness.
Conscience may at times he silenced,
but never dethroned. 1t may desist
from the rod, but only to prepare for
more terrible strokes. If we sin. we
must suffer. The longer we go on III sin
the more of life and joy and usefulness
shall we lose; the longer and more diff
cult shall we find the pathway that
leads upward to purity and peace. And,
though believe that the pathway will
never be impossible, yet it seems folly
and absurdity for any soul deliberately
to choose the road that winds through
all the horrors of moral degradation. the
flames of conscience