"Well," you say, "I have been driven out of that tower; where shall I
go?" Step into this tower of indifference. You say: "If this tower is
attacked, it will be a great while before it is taken." You feel at
ease. But there is an Abimelech, with ruthless assaults, coming on.
Death and his forces are gathering around, and they demand that you
surrender everything, and they clamor for your immortal overthrow, and
they throw their skeleton arms in the windows, and with their iron
fists they beat against the door; and while you are trying to keep
them out you see the torches of judgment kindling, and every forest is
a torch, and every mountain a torch, and every sea a torch; and while
the Alps, the Pyrenees, and Himalayas turn into a live coal, blown
redder and redder by the whirlwind breath of a God omnipotent, what
will become of your refuge of lies?

"But," says some one, "you are engaged in a very mean business,
driving us from tower to tower." Oh, no. I want to tell you of a
Gibraltar that never has been and never will be taken; of a wall that
no satanic assault can scale; of a bulwark that the judgment
earthquakes can not budge. The Bible refers to it when it says: "In
God is thy refuge, and underneath thee are the everlasting arms." Oh,
fling yourself into it! Tread down unceremoniously everything that
intercepts you. Wedge your way there. There are enough hounds of death
and peril after you to make you hurry. Many a man has perished just
outside the tower, with his foot on the step, with his hand on the
latch. Oh, get inside! Not one surplus second have you to spare.
Quick, quick, quick!

Great God, is life such an uncertain thing? If I bear a little too
hard with my right foot on the earth, does it break through into the
grave? Is this world, which swings at the speed of thousands of miles