gradually lose their strength and activity: for it is a universal law, that, whatever is endowed with life loses its vital force just in the degree that exercise, or freedom of action, is denied it. Let your arm, or any other bodily member, remain inactive for a great length of time, and see how weak and puny it becomes. It will cost you an effort, and even give you pain, to move it at last. But let the arm be vigorously exercised every day for a few months, and see what muscular power will be developed in that limb. The same is true of the dispositions and faculties of the mind, whether good or bad. These, as well as the bodily organs, gain strength by habitual exercise, and lose strength by habitual and long-continued rest. This will help us to understand why the hereditary evils of children in the other world do not get the mastery, and consequently do not cast them down to hell. They remain quiescent, and therefore do not prompt to the commission of actual sins. And the principal reason of this is, because the children there are so wisely instructed and governed by the angels, that their hereditary evils are never called into active exercise. The sphere of angelic love and wisdom with which they are encompassed, exerts a restraining influence upon the evil tendencies of their nature, at the same time that it quickens into life and action every good and innocent affection. It is this encompassing sphere of love in which they are embosomed, that keeps their hereditary evils in a quiescent state, and prevents their ever becoming actual sins.
