RULES FOR MORAL WARFARE.
By T. L. Cuyler
A SIMPLE "yes" or an emphatic "no" may cost you a fortune—may cost you a troop of friends—may cost you your political promotion—may cost you your character—may cost you your soul! How many a public man has had his whole career decided by his course in some trying emergency, or on some one great question of right. He is led up into the mount of temptation, where some gigantic iniquity bids him bow down and worship it, and promises in return "all the world and the glory thereof." From that mount of trial he comes down a hero or a fool. The die is cast. If he has honored justice and truth, then justice and truth will honor him; if not, his bones will be left blanching on the road to a promotion he can147never reach. That was a hard struggle for Nathaniel Ripley Cobb, of Boston, when he decided to accumulate no more than fifty thousand dollars during his life, and to give all the surplus to the treasury of the Lord. But after the noble resolution was once taken, selfishness was a conquered lust in that man's breast forever. He had come off more than conqueror. How many a minister of Christ has been charged upon and overcome by this accursed spirit of "worldly wisdom"? He was put to the decisive test, not in Nero's judgment-hall, or before Agrippa's tribunal; not before a Popish inquisitor, or in sight of Smithfield's fire of martyrdom; but in his quiet study, when some timid friend counseled a treacherous silence in his pulpit on some vital question of right, his "yes" or his "no," will either call from his Master the precious benediction, "Well done, good and faithful servant," or else the fearful anathema, "Ye were ashamed of me and my truth, and of thee will I be ashamed before my Father and his holy angels." We all have our moral Marengoes and our Waterloos, where we win or lose the crown of Christian character. When these decisive conflicts come on between our conscience on the one hand, and some selfish schemes or Satanic iniquity on the other, then try to remember a few simple rules of moral war: 1. Never change your position in sight of an enemy. This was a fatal policy to the allies at Austerlitz. It has cost many a disgraceful defeat in spiritual warfare. 2. Never place on guard a doubtful or a questionable principle. Your sentinel will be sure to betray you. 3. Never abandon the high ground of right for the low lands of expediency. Before you are aware, you will be swamped in the bottomless morass of ruin. 4. Get your moral armor from God's word; and "put on the whole armor." An exposed spot in character may admit the fatal weapon of the foe. Ahab was wounded through the joints of his harness. Do not mind blows in the face. Heroes are wounded in the face; cowards in the back. 5. But whether wounded by foes or deserted by friends, never surrender. It is said that not one of the old Imperial Guard survived the wreck of Waterloo. Towards the sunset of that long, bloody day, when the surviving remnant of the Guards was summoned to lay down their arms, the scarred veterans of fifty victorious fights cried out, "The old guards can die, but they never learned to surrender!" The glorious Captain of our salvation could die for us, but he could not desert us. Blessed is he who is found faithful! He shall wear the crown of amaranth in the paradise of God.—T. L. Cuyler.