The decline and downward fall of the soul

The grand defect of the "natural consequences" of depravity in this life is, that in great measure it is unconsciously incurred, the natural consequences of the downward fall of the soul is they do not operate as punishments, so they awaken no shame of demerit; rather, it is a gradual blunting of moral sensibility, the fading of noble enthusiasms, the frosting over of generous affections , the deterioration and decay of the will, which appall and sadden the observers, but are unfelt by the degenerate himself; and his loss, thought little less then infinite, is in the form of unknown privation, not of redeeming pain. 

It is the essence of guilty declension to administer its own anesthetics;  subtilely beginning by making the soul the depository of all the desires and habits to which I chiefly cling. 

Have I shut myself in some nest of selfishness, and become the willing dupe of vain excuse for neglected duty, and stifled compassion, and omitted sacrifice? At last to see, when it's too late, all that I might have been and done." 

James Martineau.