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posts of your purity. The world is full of maxims which demonstrate the truth of this. "If a woman hesitates, she is lost;" "C'est le premier pas qui coute;" and this sentiment is multiplied into all languages, held by all nations. Such is the universal sentiment of mankind, and all history shows that the more innocent a girl may be, at heart, the more sure is she to fall if she surrender the advance guards of her honor. The philosophy of the affair is plain. No pure-minded girl would permit the slightest familiarity unless strongly impelled to do so by sentiments of love. This could not exist without its component element of passion. Latent, undeveloped it may be, but the spark is there, and if once developed, it is uncontrollable in direct proportion to the strength of love and confidence. The thought that you are deliberately surrendering yourself to the power of any man, is so startling that, if you believed it, you would be well-nigh exempt from danger; for you would certainly guard the fortress with a vigilance that no strategy could surprise.
The danger, then, consists in the indulgence of pleasures which seem pure and innocent in themselves, but which alas! are the poisoned arrows which destroy the very power of resistance. In point of fact, however, it makes but little difference whether the mere physical virginity be lost or not, if the maidenly purity of heart be gone; if all degrees of sensuality, save the mere physical consummation, have been tasted. The Biblical instructions on this subject are literal truth, be sure of it, and no sophistry can change the obvious meaning of Divine revelation. Remember that you have actually committed the sins which you have willfully entertained, desired, and cherished in your hearts. Repent of them in secret humiliation, and sin no more. Obsta principiis (resist all beginnings).
