Page:The Praises of Amida, 1907.djvu/42

 should like to do. Try as we will, we cannot alter the changes of the seasons: indeed, to come down from great things to small, we can not make our friends do what we would have them do, we cannot force our brothers and sisters to fashion themselves to our tastes, nor guide our parents, wives, and children, to conform in all things to our ways. Nay, we cannot even absolutely control our own bodies or regulate our own hearts. We will say nothing about exercising influence over others; we cannot, with all our efforts, drag ourselves away from sin, or force ourselves into the paths of virtue: the perverse tendency of our human nature impels us to do the evil that we would not, and to leave undone the good that we fain would do. And this is not the only ill that flesh is heir to: birth, age, disease, and death, press upon all with an impartial severity which there is no mitigating and no avoiding. We may wear the red garb of the convict or not, it makes no difference: all alike receive the sentence of death. One day, without any warning, and without