sufficiently well to make it unnecessary to follow him farther.  Where is the man’s safety in the light of what we have been considering?  Simply this:  the moment the thought of using for his own purpose funds belonging to others enters his mind, if he is wise he will instantly put the thought from his mind.  If he is a fool he will entertain it.  In the degree in which he entertains it, it will grow upon him; it will become the absorbing thought in his mind; it will finally become master of his will power, and through rapidly succeeding steps, dishonor, shame, degradation, penitentiary, remorse will be his.  It is easy for him to put the thought from his mind when it first enters; but as he entertains it, it grows into such proportions that it becomes more and more difficult for him to put it from his mind; and by and by it becomes practically impossible for him to do it.  The light of the match, which but a little effort of the breath would have extinguished at first, has imparted a flame that is raging through the entire building, and now it is almost, if not quite impossible to conquer it.

Shall we notice another concrete case? a trite case, perhaps, but one in which we can see how habit is formed, and also how the same habit can be unformed.  Here is a young man, he may be the son of poor parents, or he may be the son of rich parents; one in the ordinary ranks of life, or one of high social standing, whatever that means.  He is good-hearted, one of good impulses, generally speaking,—­a good fellow.  He is out with some companions, companions of the same general type.  They are out for a pleasant evening, out for a good time.  They are apt at times to be thoughtless, even careless.  The suggestion is made by one of the company, not that they get drunk, no, not at all; but merely that they go and have something to drink together.  The young man whom we first mentioned, wanting to be genial, scarcely listens to the suggestion that comes to his inner consciousness—­that it will be better for him not to fall in with the others in this.  He does not stop long enough to realize the fact that the greatest strength and nobility of character lies always in taking a firm stand on the side of the right, and allow himself to be influenced by nothing that will weaken this stand.  He goes, therefore, with his companions to the drinking place.  With the same or with other companions this is repeated now and then; and each time it is repeated his power of saying “No” is gradually decreasing.  In this way he has grown a little liking for intoxicants, and takes them perhaps now and then by himself.  He does not dream, or in the slightest degree realize, what way he is tending, until there comes a day when he wakens to the consciousness of the fact that he hasn’t the power nor even the impulse to resist the taste which has gradually grown into a minor form of craving for intoxicants.  Thinking, however, that he will be able to stop when he is really in danger of getting into the drink habit, he goes thoughtlessly and carelessly on.  We will pass over the various intervening steps and come to the time when we find him a confirmed drunkard.  It is simply the same old story told a thousand or even a million times over.