Note 2 — ISAIAH. (continued 7)

Oftentimes a ruling sin will have power little by little to colour the whole life with its own tints; to assimilate everything there to itself, as in ever-widening circles to absorb all into its own vortex, being as it were a gulf, a maelstrom, into which all that was better and nobler in the man is irresistibly attracted and drawn, and is there swallowed up, and for ever disappears.—Trench.

See also the Outline: The Tow and the Spark, pp. 69–71.