was taken, not to the safety
vault, but distributed among gamblers and evil persons. And our heavy
sorrow is increased when we read in our commercial reports that last
year 625 men went astray as embezzlers, robbing the people in
forty-five states of $25,234,112. The time seems to have come for this
nation to sit down in sackcloth and ashes.

To all good men comes the reflection that either this immorality must
cease its ravages, or this nation will be irretrievably disgraced.
Were it possible to search out these unhappy men, some of them wearing
the convict's garb, and some wandering as fugitives in foreign lands,
henceforth to be men "without a country," and question each for the
cause of his deep disgrace, from all would come this shameful
confession: "I loved evil and hated the law of God." Not one could
confess to passionate, enthusiastic devotion to the divine laws. But
every tree not rooted goes down before the storm, and every ship
unanchored midst the rocks will go to pieces when the wind rises.
Would that we could to-day cause the laws of God to stand forth as
sharply defined as mountain peaks before the eyes of all young men;
would that we could also kindle in each a passionate love and loyal
affection for these holy laws. If the youth of to-day are to be the
leaders of to-morrow, and are ever to have power to stir their
fellows, to correct abuses, revolutionize society, or organize
history, they must, with the enthusiasm of love, ally themselves with
God and His law, clothing that law with flesh until it becomes
visible, clothing it with voice until it becomes eloquent, thrilling
it with power until it becomes triumphant. Only love fulfills law!

Most of all does man need the enthusiasm of love toward his God and
Saviour. In the olden time Plato expressed a wish to have the moral
law become a living personage, that beholding, mankind might stand
amazed and entranced at her beauty. The philosopher felt that
abstractions were too cold to kindle the soul's enthusiasm. As
planets are removed from the sun, their light and heat lessen; their
flowers fade; their fruits lack luster; their summers shorten. Thus
Neptune stands in the midst of perpetual ice and winter, without tree
or bird or human voice. But as our earth approaches the direct rays of
the sun, its beauty increases, its harvests grow heavy.

As if to fulfill Plato's desire, Jesus Christ drew near to our world,
not to chill man's heart, but to strengt