Life, A Frivolous – Charles Spurgeon

SOME individuals appear to have a brain-case which was never properly filled. Like butterflies, they flit from flower to flower, but gather no honey. Look at the life of many in the West End, who pass all their existence in dressing and undressing, distributing bits of cardboard, riding in carriages, bowing and scraping, and eating and drinking. These notable do-nothings remind me of a set of butterflies flitting about a field of poppies. Nor are the poorer districts clear of such beings. Note the many fellows who go loafing from public-house to public-house, lolling and dawdling about from morning until night, as if they had nothing whatever to live for but to talk and booze. I hope that is not the case with any of you; if so, let me remind you that you may live in jest but you will have to die in earnest. You may waste this life in frivolity, but you will have to spend the next in eternal damnation. The moth may play, but the candle burns it, and then it suffers in earnest. You will come to be earnest enough when you wake up and find yourself condemned of God. Oh, if you be a fool, or have been a fool up to this moment, may God sober you, and make you wise to number your days.