Besides sins of the mind there are others which are sins of the flesh. Some there are who are tempted to indulge the flesh by mere idleness and sluggishness. Others, again, are naturally inclined to gratify their appetite for much or nice food, and probably spend more time and money in providing and enjoying it than is justifiable and right. Others, once more, are tempted more to sins of impurity, perhaps chiefly in thought, perhaps also in word and deed.
How can I help feeling that such sins are both debasing and degrading? They, if they are indulged in, render the mind less vigorous than otherwise it might be. They tend naturally to weaken the health, to mar the reputation, and to destroy the happiness, of those who habitually yield to them. Habits of this kind are so easily formed that to be guilty of these sins at all is a long step towards contracting such habits. Apart, therefore, from questions of right and wrong, the rule, that I should “keep my body in temperance, soberness, and chastity,” is one which common sense, and our natural instinct of self-preservation, might have dictated.
Besides this, “they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.” Those who cling to such sins as these can have no part nor lot with Him. To resist temptations to such sins may be hard, but every temptation successfully resisted is weakened, while every sin yielded to acquires thereby additional power. Many a drunkard and many a passionately angry man knows how true this is. If they had been wise at first they might have been free now.
They may yet again be free, for with God nothing is impossible; but still not without a desperate, and probably a prolonged struggle. If I have, then, any regard for myself, I shall begin now, through the grace of God, “to mortify the deeds of the body.”
Prayer
Cleanse me, O Lord Jesu Christ, in Thy precious blood, I beseech Thee, and help me to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil, that I may always follow Thee, and glorify Thy Name. Amen.
The Cathedral Close 
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