Page:The Works of Samuel Johnson ... A journey to the Hebrides. The vision of Theodore, the hermit of Teneriffe. The fountains. Prayers and meditations. Sermons.v. 10-11. Parliamentary debates.pdf/343

 part of that time which is already, perhaps, almost at an end.

But the time not only grows every day shorter, but the work to be performed in it more difficult; every hour, in which repentance is delayed, produces something new to be repented of. Habits grow stronger by long continuance, and passions more violent by indulgence. Vice, by repeated acts, becomes almost natural; and pleasures, by frequent enjoyment, captivate the mind almost beyond resistance.

If avarice has been the predominant passion, and wealth has been accumulated by extortion and rapacity, repentance is not to be postponed. Acquisitions, long enjoyed, are with great difficulty quitted; with so great difficulty, that we seldom, very seldom, meet with true repentance in those whom the desire of riches has betrayed to wickedness. Men who could willingly resign the luxuries and sensual pleasures of a large fortune, cannot consent to live without the grandeur and the homage. And they who would leave all, cannot bear the reproach which they apprehend from such an acknowledgement of wrong.

Thus are men withheld from repentance, and, consequently, debarred from eternal felicity; but these reasons, being founded in temporal interests, acquire every day greater strength to mislead us, though not greater efficacy to justify us. A man may, by fondly indulging a false notion, voluntarily forget that it is false, but can never make it true. We must banish every false argument, every known delusion from our minds, before our passions can operate in its favour; and forsake what we know must be forsaken, before we have endeared it to ourselves by long possession. Repentance is always difficult, and the difficulty grows still greater by delay. But let those who have hitherto neglected this great duty, remember, that it is yet in their power, and that they cannot perish everlastingly but by their own choice! Let them, therefore endeavour to redeem the time lost, and repair their negligence by vigilance and ardour! "Let the wicked