Death in Life by Charles Kingsley

Romans viii. 12, 13. Brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to / live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: / but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye / shall live.

Does it seem strange to you that St. Paul should warn you, that you / are not debtors to your own flesh? It is not strange, when you come / to understand him; certainly not unnecessary: for as in his time, / so now, most people do live as if they were debtors to their own / flesh, as if their great duty, their one duty in life, was to please / their own bodies, and brains, and tempers, and fancies, and / feelings. Poor people have not much time to indulge their brains; / and no time at all, happily for them, to indulge their fancies and / feelings, as rich people do when they grow idle, and dainty, and / luxurious. But still, too many of them live as if they were debtors / to their own flesh; as if their own bodies and their own tempers / were the masters of them, and ought to be their masters. Young men, / for instance, how often they do things in secret of which it is a / shame even to speak, just because it is pleasant. Young women, how / often do they sell themselves and their own modesty, just for the / pleasure of being flattered and courted, and of getting a few fine / clothes. How often do men, just for the pleasure of drink, besot / their souls and bodies, madden their tempers, neglect their / families, make themselves every Saturday night, and often half the / week, too, lower than the beasts which perish. And then, when a / clergyman complains of them, they think him unreasonable; and by so / thinking, show that he is right, and St. Paul right: for if I say / to you, My dear young people (and I do say it), if you give way to / filthy living and filthy talking, and to drunkenness, and to vanity / about fine clothes, you will surely die -- do you not say in your / hearts, 'How unreasonable: how hard on us! If we can enjoy / ourselves a little, why should we not? It is our right, and do it / we will; and if it is wrong, it ought not to be wrong. ' Why, what / is that but saying, that you ought to do just what your body likes: / that you are debtors to your flesh; and that your flesh, and not / God's law, is your master. So again, when people grow older, / perhaps they are more prudent about bad living, and more careful of / their money: but still they live after the flesh. One man sets his / heart on making money, and cares for nothing but that; breaks God's / law for that, as if that was the thing to which he was a debtor, / bound by some law which he could not avoid to scrape and scrape / money together for ever. Another (and how often we see that) is a / slave to his own pride and temper, which are just as much bred in / his flesh: if he has been injured by any one, if he has taken a / dislike against any one, he cannot forget and forgive: the man may / be upright and kindly on many other points; prudent, too, and sober, / and thoroughly master of himself on most matters; and yet you will / find that when he gets on that one point, he is not master of / himself; for his flesh is master of him: he may be a strong-minded, / shrewd man upon most matters but just that one point: some old / quarrel, or grudge, or suspicion, is, as we say, his weak point: / and if you touch on that, the man's eye will kindle, and his face / redden, and his lip tremble, and he will show that he is not master / of himself: but that he is over-mastered by his fleshly passion, by / the suspiciousness, or revengefulness, or touchiness, which every / dumb animal has as well as he, which is not part of his man's / nature, not part of God's image in him, but which is like the beasts / which perish.