"You might be her disgrace, and the cause of her afflictions, while you shed for her your heart's blood." "I don't understand you," said the boy thoughtfully.
"Perhaps Korah and his company thought themselves patriots when they rebelled against the power of Moses and Aaron.

They doubtless moved the people by cunning speeches about their own short-lived honor; yet they brought destruction on themselves and a plague upon Israel.

There is nothing more plain in the Bible than God's great regard to the righteousness or wickedness of _individual_ men.

Suppose that there had been found ten righteous men in Sodom, for whose sake that wicked city would have been spared its awful doom.

Humble and obscure they might have been; but would not they, who brought such a blessing down on the neighborhood where they dwelt, be worthy of the name of patriots?
My son, if you were willing to lay down your life for your country, and yet were guilty of the foul sin of swearing, and taught all around you to blaspheme, would you not be laying up wrath against your native land, though you fought with the bravery of an Alexander?
These are times to think on these things, my boy, if we really love our country.