In other words, the channel of soul growth--the only channel that leads to spiritual health, and therefore to "salvation"-- becomes gradually obstructed, with the result that the vital energies of the soul tend either to dissipate themselves and run to waste, or to make new channels for themselves,--channels of degenerative tendency, the end of which is spiritual death.
FOOTNOTES: [1] By "self-satisfaction" I mean satisfaction with the existing system _as a system_.

That strenuous efforts are being made to improve the system, within its own limits, I can well believe.

But the system itself, with the defects and limitations which are of its essence, seems to be regarded as adequate, and even as final, by nearly all who work under it.
[2] 1862 to 1895 A.D.
[3] The _Jewish People in the time of Jesus Christ_, by Dr.
Emil Schuerer.
[4] In its extreme form legalism tends to bring about that ruin of human nature which it starts by postulating; for, by forbidding Man's higher faculties to energise, it necessarily arrests their development, and so makes it possible for the lower faculties to draw to themselves an undue share of the rising sap of Man's life..