15231 
 
 ust A Minute! 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 FRO]« 
 
 Miss Augustalirilliams 
 and 
 Mr s.j.R. Tastier 
 
arV15231 
 Just a minute! 
 
 Cornell University Library 
 
 3 1924 031 229 135 
 olin.anx 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924031229135 
 
JUST A MINUTE! 
 
 MOMENT - READINGS ON SCRIPTURE 
 PASSAGES, FROM THE WRITINGS OF 
 
 CHARLES FREDERIC GOSS, D.D. 
 
 COMPILED BY MARY T. N1TZKY 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 THE SUNDAY SCHOOL TIMES CO. 
 1905 
 
Copyright 1904 
 
 BY 
 
 The Sunday School Times Co 
 
Just a Minute! 
 
 (Sybfe David •was sitting between 
 the two gates (2 Sam. 18 : 24). 
 
 \1 7HAT was he doing ? Waiting, — that 
 was all. He had done everything that 
 lay in his power, —armed the last soldier, per- 
 fected the last plan, given the last command. 
 And now there remained nothing but to sit 
 quietly and helplessly between the gates and 
 wait while the great events transpired beyond 
 the reach of eye or ear or hand. Ah ! but that 
 is a thousand times harder than action, or 
 even passion. What is more terrible than just 
 waiting ? If you have not acquired the art of 
 patient waiting, you had better learn it at 
 once ; for you will have to sit much of your 
 lifetime between the gates, waiting helplessly 
 while the forces you have set in operation 
 slowly work out their inevitable results. The 
 merchant must sit between the gates, and wait 
 for the people to whom he has. sold his goods 
 to earn the money to pay. The author must 
 sit between the gates, and wait for the pub- 
 lishers to accept or reject his manuscript. 
 The sailor's wife must sit between the gates, 
 l 
 
and wait for the winds to blow her husband's 
 vessel home. We all reach a point where we 
 can do no more, and then — we must just wait. 
 Alas ! " we usually learn to wait only when we 
 have no longer anything to wait for. ' ' Adopt 
 the pace of nature ; her secret is patience. 
 "Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper 
 sprinkle cool patience." Are you sitting be- 
 tween the gates waiting ? Do it with the 
 noble dignity of a David. If the messenger 
 is to bring you sorrow, receive it with sub- 
 mission. 
 
 Wrought great wonders (Acts 6:8). 
 
 T DO not say that to "love and help men 
 and God " will enable you sooner or later 
 to heal the sick and raise the dead. I do not 
 say that to "love and help men and God" 
 will even make you work great signs and won- 
 ders among the people, like those done by 
 Whitefield, Wesley, and Moody. But this I 
 will say, that, in that little circle where God 
 has placed you, the "grace and power" of a 
 blameless life of love and helpfulness will work 
 wonders beautiful enough for any man. Is it 
 no ' ' miracle ' ' to lift the burdens from the 
 shoulders of your old father and mother ? to 
 soothe the heartaches of some unfortunate 
 brother or sister? to bring joy and hope to 
 
the soul of a sorrowing neighbor ? If I had 
 my choice, to be a wonder-worker on a great 
 scale but fail as a son or brother, or to be a 
 good son or brother and fail as a wonder- 
 worker, I wouldn't hesitate a minute. 
 
 Fulfil thy ministry (2 Tim. 4:5). 
 
 /COMPLETENESS in character is only a 
 ^** little more beautiful than completeness 
 of effort. In fact, it is generally the result of 
 such effort. A life filled full of service ! Can 
 anything be grander ? I wonder why the man 
 who coined the word "fulfil" couldn't have 
 made it just plain, simple ' ' filfull " ! I love 
 to see an honest dairyman fill a quart cup full 
 with milk. He makes it run over. It is very dis- 
 gusting to see people overflowing with flattery, 
 affectation, or the like, but what do you think 
 of the man who comes up like a bucket out of 
 your grandfather's well, full to the brim, and 
 spilling over at every turn of the windlass? 
 I know people whose every day is pressed 
 down and running over with devotion, good- 
 ness, generosity, love. Fill your life up to 
 the brim. It will hold as much as the bed of 
 the ocean. Who can measure the contents of 
 a life like D. L. Moody's, running over at the 
 brim like a perennial fountain? Once, after 
 3 
 
traveling a whole day without a drop of water, 
 I came to an abandoned Texas farmhouse, 
 and let a bucket down into a well a hundred 
 feet deep, and heard it strike a dirt bottom. 
 No wonder the farmer abandoned the ac- 
 cursed spot. And there are lives like this. 
 Is it any wonder that people abandon them ? 
 
 5b Jonathan made a covenant tutth the 
 house of David (/ Sam. 20 : IS). 
 
 TTOW large a figure such promises cut in 
 *■ ■*■ human life. Civilization could not go 
 forward without them. They enter into all 
 human relationships. The child promises the 
 parent that it ' ' will be good. ' ' Lovers prom- 
 ise each other to be faithful unto death. Men 
 promise to pay debts and to deliver goods. 
 Governments promise each other to maintain 
 peace or to unite in war. Without a high 
 sense of their obligations, business would go 
 to pieces, and society disintegrate. There is 
 little to hope for in the life of a boy or girl 
 who will not keep their word. Your word of 
 honor ought to be as sacred as a most solemn 
 oath. It must be as good as a witnessed bond. 
 Bad promises are better broken than kept ; but 
 good ones must be fulfilled at the cost of prop- 
 erty and life. Who doubts that either one 
 4 
 
of those magnificent young Jews would rather 
 have died than broken that covenant ! 
 
 Sk 
 
 (According as each hath recefbed 
 a. gift (/ Pet. 4 : W). 
 
 '"THANK God for that word "according" ! 
 * There is one thing that human nature 
 never does, which the divine nature never 
 fails to do, — and that is, to preserve true 
 ratios. God suits the back to the burden, and 
 the burden to the back. From him to whom 
 much hath been given, much shall be required; 
 from him who hath little, little. God never 
 demands a ten-talent dividend from a one- 
 talent man. On that wisdom and justice I 
 pillow my head and heart. But the exaction 
 will be "according to the gift;" and oh, 
 when we see ourselves as God sees us, how 
 pitiful, how contemptible, shall we seem ! 
 
 For I knolv my transgressions; and my 
 sin is ever before me (Psa.. 51 : 3). 
 
 ]Y[0 MORTAL man can endure the per- 
 manent consciousness of a great sin 
 without either penitence, moral ruin, or men- 
 tal collapse. It is a fearful dilemma. I be- 
 lieve in teaching children to look their sins in 
 5 
 
the face. Harrow their consciences. Make 
 them realize their guilt. If you smooth over 
 their vices and extenuate their faults you ruin 
 them. There is hope for Little Bill if he looks 
 pale in the face and black around the eyes 
 until he confesses the lie he has told. If he 
 cannot shake off the memory of it, if it pur- 
 sues him like a shadow, if it is ever before 
 him, night and day, thank God and take cour- 
 age. He will come out all right. It is the 
 boys who can kill birds and not dream about 
 them nights that I despair of. It was the tor- 
 ment of an irrepressible vision of his guilt that 
 drove David at last to penitence. 
 
 Encourage the fainthearted (/ Thess. 5 : 14). 
 
 I'VE had my share of life's pleasures, and 
 want to testify as to which is the sweetest 
 of them all. It's "putting heart" into people 
 who have lost it. The saddest sight that 
 Nature holds up to God is a boy or girl who 
 has "lost heart." Poor, dispirited, hopeless 
 little folks ! What can any one do without 
 "heart"? Not to be able to put your 
 " heart " into a task is to be certain of failure. 
 It is almost as fatal to be only "half-hearted." 
 But how terrible to lose heart entirely ! And 
 yet in every group of children you are liable 
 6 
 
to find some timid, shrinking creature who has 
 already lost the "courage of life." How 
 beautiful it is to "hearten him up, ' ' — to breathe 
 hope into his empty spirit ! And how easy it 
 is — often. Sometimes a single kind word will 
 do it, sometimes even a smile of encourage- 
 ment. You can do a thousand times as much 
 for child or man by putting heart into his 
 bosom as you can by putting either learning 
 into his head or money into his pockets. 
 
 St. 
 
 Hawing therefore obtained the help 
 thai is from God (Acts 26 : 22). 
 
 "THE help that is from God. There are 
 many kinds of help, — the help of money, 
 the help of friendship, the help of health, the 
 help of knowledge, the help of experience. 
 But there is also the help that is from God. 
 It is a very peculiar and wonderful help in- 
 deed. It is a help that people do not believe 
 in until they are in extremity. They want to 
 help themselves, or have some human being 
 help them, until all else has failed. And then 
 they cast themselves on God. No little boy 
 ever believed that the water in the old mill- 
 pond would hold him up until it actually did 
 so. He will grab at a board, or a compan- 
 ion's leg, or at a straw for support, but never 
 7 
 
lay himself out flat on his back on the bosom 
 of the water. The little skeptic ! I have been 
 trying for two years to teach Little Bill that 
 the water is anxious to "help" him to swim, 
 and he is still positively convinced that it is 
 trying to drown him. It is only after men 
 have cast themselves, in some deep despera- 
 tion, into the "everlasting arms," that they 
 discover their helping and holding power. 
 They are the only safe refuge for the sufferer 
 and the sinner. 
 
 cMinistering as of the strength tMch 
 God supptieth (/ Pet. 4 : It). 
 
 IT IS both bad morals and puerile philoso- 
 phy to forget that strength and wisdom 
 and virtue, and life itself, proceed from God. 
 Do you think it does no harm to the son 
 of a millionaire to spend his father's fortune 
 as if it were his very own, and he had earned 
 it with his hands ? It generates egotism. It 
 fosters pride. It darkens the intellect. It 
 degrades the conscience. You never saw the 
 son of a rich man who forgot that he was using 
 the money that his father supplied, who was 
 not either a fool or a knave. You never saw, 
 and you never will see, men who forget that 
 God supplies their strength, their wisdom, 
 their virtue, and their life, who are not in 
 8 
 
some way mentally or morally unsound. The 
 sea must not forget the rivers, nor the rivers 
 the clouds. The fruits must not forget the 
 seed, nor the seed the flower. Man, thou art 
 nothing but a derivative ! Make the best 
 of it! 
 
 Thanks be to God, ivho fffveth us the 'bictory 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ ( / Cor. 15 : 57). 
 
 " WICTORY ! " That is the battle-cry of 
 our holy religion. ' ' Victory ' ' over 
 sorrow, over sin, over death, through our Lord 
 Jesus Christ. Happiness (in the long run) 
 will return from the battle with sorrow chained 
 to the axle of its chariot ; righteousness, with 
 sin ; life, with death. Therefore smile at de- 
 feat, yes, laugh at disaster, exult at death. If 
 death grins at life in the autumn, life laughs at 
 death in the spring. The grave grinned hid- 
 eously at life when they laid the dead Saviour 
 in its cold embrace. But after three days life 
 laughed, for the victor tore himself from its 
 arms. Yes, he has brought life and immortal- 
 ity to light. We see it now. It is life, not 
 death, that rules the universe. This is the 
 supreme power. Its final triumph is assured. 
 Victory is written on its banners. The contest 
 for supremacy is long and terrible, but the 
 issue is certain. Listen to Victor Hugo : 
 9 
 
"When I go down to the grave, I can say, 
 like so many others, 'I have finished my day's 
 work, ' but I cannot say, ' I have finished my 
 life. ' My work will begin again next morning. 
 My tomb is not a blind alley, it is a thorough- 
 fare ; it closes with the twilight to open with 
 the dawn. It would not be worth while to 
 live at all, were we to die entirely. That 
 which alleviates labor and sanctifies toil is to 
 have constantly before us the vision of a better 
 world appearing through the darkness of this 
 life. ' ' Isn' t that the cry of victory ? 
 
 & 
 
 The times of ignorance . . . God overlooked; but 
 no=iv he commandeth men that they should 
 all everywhere repent (Acts 17 : 30). 
 
 TTHERE is no greater difference between 
 any two other things in life than "then" 
 and ' ' now. ' ' The responsibilities of yester- 
 day cannot measure those of to-day. ' ' Then ' ' 
 the opportunities, the knowledge, the power, 
 was so much less than "now." Yesterday 
 you were a child, to-day you are a youth ; 
 yesterday you were a youth, to-day you are a 
 man. "Then" we could excuse, and even 
 wink at, your carelessness and irresponsibility; 
 "now" we shake our heads, and frown and 
 condemn. Last Sunday I found a half-grown 
 10 
 
youngster hiding in the hallway after Sunday- 
 school had begun. "What's the matter?" 
 I asked. "I've got on my first long pants, 
 and I don't dare go in," he replied. He 
 had passed an epoch. He'll never be a 
 knickerbocker boy again. He is a long-pants 
 boy now, and will be so forevermore. Father, 
 mother, brother, sister, teacher, friends, will 
 expect and demand more of him than before. 
 His knickerbocker peccadillos will no longer 
 be "overlooked" or "winked at." Life was 
 one thing then, it's another thing now. There 
 is the same difference between a boy in knick- 
 erbockers and long pants as between a bird in 
 a nest with a mother brooding over it and in 
 a meadow with a hawk hovering above it. 
 
 If he commit iniquity, I l&ilt chasten him 
 'with the rod of men (2 Sam. 7 : 14). 
 
 T T UMANITY has not yet outgrown the rod- 
 11 it whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth. ' ' 
 Every rational human being instinctively de- 
 spises a professed moral system in which ini- 
 quity is not followed by the lash. Thieves 
 would not dare to live in communities where 
 theft went unpunished. What could hinder 
 them from being stolen from? Ah ! It always 
 seems so strange to me that these sentimental 
 1 1 
 
parents who shrink from inflicting pain on dis- 
 obedient and wayward children are not afraid 
 of being despised for their weakness (as they 
 are morally certain to be) by the young repro- 
 bates whom they weakly spare. When Little 
 Bill faces his father (hair-brush in hand), he 
 has such a feeling of awe as when Moses saw 
 God in the burning bush. He beholds the 
 whole moral government incarnate in that 
 single human personality. Do you mean to 
 tell me he does not respect and love it ? 
 
 'David inquired of Jehovah {2 Sam. 2 : I). 
 
 \ \ 7HAT makes us do what we do ? Some- 
 * times it is sheer, blind impulse. We 
 do not stop to question or debate. How 
 would you like to be constituted so that you 
 could do so always, and never have to regret 
 it ? Wouldn' t that turn life into a holiday ! 
 It is coming to forks in the road, and having 
 to choose through investigation and reflection, 
 that makes existence a tragedy. The instant 
 we stop to "inquire" we suffer. Profound 
 mysteries and uncertainties confront us. Of 
 whom shall we ask the way ? By what method 
 shall we conduct the search ? Sometimes peo- 
 ple have consulted the leaves on the floors of 
 caves, or the entrails of sacrificial animals, or 
 
 12 
 
the flight of birds, or the position of the stars, 
 or the grounds in their teacups. Dunces ! 
 But "David inquired of Jehovah." Strange 
 as it may seem, there is no way so sure to find 
 the pathway of life as to make a silence in the 
 heart and consult the divine Oracle who dwells 
 there. Other guides assist us, — history, 
 science, experience, friends. But often, when 
 all else has failed, we find that strange way of 
 inquiring directly of Jehovah, and out of the 
 unknown he speaks. Nothing is so wonder- 
 ful as this. A flash of light breaks up out of 
 unilluminated darkness. Vague feelings in- 
 stantly crystallize into clear convictions. A wis- 
 dom deeper than our own utters an augury or 
 pronounces a decree, and we feel that it is 
 ex cathedra. It is the voice, not of the soul 
 itself, but of the God within the soul. And, 
 after all, that is the true method of attaining 
 wisdom. This is not to scorn or reject other 
 methods. It is to supplement them by the 
 final method. 
 
 & 
 
 Go thy tuay for this time (Acts 24 1 25). 
 
 f~\F THIS present moment only are you 
 ^^ sure. No man ever fully grasped that 
 thought without being shaken by it. Now is 
 the accepted time ; now is the • day of salva- 
 tion. Nothing is more fatal than the habit of 
 13 
 
procrastination. "Indulge in procrastination, 
 and in time you will come to this, — that, be- 
 cause a thing ought to be done, therefore you 
 cannot do it. " " Let' s take the instant by 
 the forward top, for we are old [some of us, 
 alas ! or getting so], and on our quickest de- 
 crees the inaudible and noiseless foot of Time 
 steals ere we can effect them." And yet 
 "there is, by God's grace, an immeasurable 
 distance between late and too late." 
 
 & 
 
 So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armor- 
 bearer, and all his men, that same day 
 together (/ Sam. 31 : 6). 
 
 IF WE could only suffer alone ! If only 
 A these Sauls did not have to drag others 
 into ruin with them ! But who ever heard of 
 a man who fell, as an apple falls from a tree, 
 alone ? Our lives are indissolubly linked with 
 other lives. When we drop, we pull them 
 with us. Sometimes we pull them into sor- 
 row only. But what sorrow ! Do you think 
 a boy can be discharged by his employer, or 
 disgraced in his school, or sentenced to the 
 penitentiary, and not involve his parents and 
 his friends in his pain ? And sometimes we 
 drag them into our sins. How few sins we 
 commit alone ! Almost every one of them 
 14 
 
requires a confederate. These sinful Sauls 
 must have their armor-bearers, and down goes 
 the whole company with the leader. ' ' Saul 
 died, and his three sons, and his armorbearer, 
 and all his men." 
 
 St 
 
 Ye once toalked according to the coarse 
 of this 'world (Eph. 2:2). 
 
 \17HICH, by the way, is the gait of most of 
 * * the people ^ou meet. They set their 
 pace to that of the procession in which they 
 are walking, and it is "according to the course 
 of this world. ' ' They do not seem to realize 
 that there is any other world or any other 
 pace. The children who are reared down in 
 the Alleghany mountain valleys do not know 
 that people anywhere move at a different pace 
 from that of the mountaineers around them. 
 The little pickaninnies down in the "Black 
 Belt ' ' do not dream that there is any other gait 
 than that of the trifling people who are the only 
 ones they have ever seen. Put them down in 
 New York or Chicago, and the streets look 
 like a race-course, and all the people seem on 
 a run. Well, there's another " world " than 
 this we live in. Its inhabitants walk in a 
 swifter, nobler "course." What you need to 
 do, my little man, is to catch their gait. It's 
 too hot a pace for loafers and sinners. You 
 IS 
 
must lay off every weight and the sin that doth 
 so easily beset you, and run with a sublime 
 patience the race that is set before you, if you 
 keep the gait of goal-winners like Paul. 
 
 I cheerfully make my defence {Ads 24 : 10). 
 
 T T IS a first-class law of life never to be put 
 1 on the defensive, — if you can possibly 
 help it. Be aggressive, attack the enemy, do 
 not be driven into a corner. When his pupil 
 complained to the old fencing-master that his 
 sword was too short to enable him to make an 
 attack, he said, ' ' Take a step forward ! take 
 a step forward ! ' ' And yet there are times in 
 every man's life when he has to explain his 
 conduct. Circumstances conspire to put him 
 in a bad light, as they did Paul. But how few 
 people there are, comparatively, who can 
 ' ' cheerfully ' ' make their defense ! We have not 
 said or done all that we are charged with, but 
 a little word or a trivial deed has compromised 
 us. We are embarrassed, we are confused, we 
 suffer torture. It is torture ! What sensations 
 those must be that a politician has to suffer 
 when his enemies get hot upon the trail of 
 some indiscretion or sin ! Many a man has 
 been held back from accepting a nomination 
 or an office by that shudder that follows his 
 16 
 
remembrance of a still undiscovered crime. 
 "Suppose they should dig it up," he says, and 
 the cold sweat starts on his forehead. Be sure 
 of this : it is only the honest man who can make 
 his defense "cheerfully." If, like the great 
 Apostle, he has a conscience void of offense 
 toward God and man, he can look his defam- 
 ers and persecutors in the face with a tranquil 
 courage. 
 
 & 
 
 The sacrifices of God are a 
 broken spirit (Psa. 51 : 17). 
 
 '"THERE are broken spirits and broken 
 * spirits. Do not misunderstand God. 
 It is not a soul emptied of all hope and pur- 
 pose, willing to be trampled under foot by 
 every trouble and thwarted by every obstacle 
 of life, that God loves. Like your heart, and 
 mine, the heart of the Infinite One thrills at 
 indomitable courage, at a spirit that the com- 
 bined misfortunes of all time cannot make 
 quail. If God can despise any one, it is the 
 man who surrenders, and grovels and whines 
 before the adversities of life. But there is a 
 second kind of broken spirit. The world 
 despises it as much as the first. Nothing can 
 make this stupid world see the difference; 
 but nothing can blind God to it. There is 
 no other moment in its whole existence when 
 17 
 
a human soul is so beautiful and so lovable 
 as in the moment of contrition. There are 
 hearts on earth that can harden themselves 
 against penitence and contrition, but there 
 are none in heaven. Dives in tears, the tears 
 of penitence, would have found as warm a 
 welcome among the angels as Lazarus appear- 
 ing in the bosom of Abraham. The key to 
 Paradise is a tear. But it is a tear of peni- 
 tence, not weakness. 
 
 When I have a convenient season, 
 I Ivill call thee unto me (Acts 24 : 25). 
 
 T~\ID you ever find a really convenient sea- 
 *~~^ son for doing a disagreeable task? I 
 have hunted for such seasons, but in vain. 
 There are almost horribly convenient seasons 
 for doing all sorts of meannesses. There 
 seem to me to be always about two thousand 
 agreeable and easy moments in every hour for 
 acts of genuine devilment on my part. But 
 one has to hunt through about two years to 
 find one single second in which it seems as if 
 all nature had conspired to make it easy and 
 pleasant to confess a sin or right a wrong. 
 Other things come, but convenient seasons for 
 penitence — never ! This present instant is 
 the best one that ever will arrive. 
 18 
 
'Sat abide thou in the things <which 
 thou hast learned (2 Tim. 3 : 14). 
 
 '"THE thoughts that we receive from noble 
 men and women ought to become a 
 habitation for our souls. As a matter of fact, 
 every man's ideas are a more real dwelling- 
 place than his own home. I consciously 
 retire into mine a thousand times a day. 
 Sometimes I go into this structure of thoughts 
 (that I have woven as a bird does its nest) 
 for quiet, sometimes for consolation, and 
 sometimes to shut the gates and make a fight, 
 like an old baron in his castle. There are 
 temptations to leave the old abode, of course. 
 There is a wild impulse in every heart to run 
 away from home at times. We get tired of 
 seeing the same old furniture, and the stupid 
 patterns on the wall. We see other houses 
 finer than our own. It is so with our thought- 
 houses. They seem weak, inadequate, and 
 dreary. We sigh for other and looser and 
 more dazzling ideas of existence. But ' ' stay, 
 stay at home, my heart, and rest: home-keeping 
 hearts are happiest. ' ' Only we must let our 
 houses grow with our growth, like a snail's or 
 an oyster's. Do not build them too rigid and 
 inflexible, or they will burst. Say what you 
 will, nothing is better about our thought- 
 houses than the "assurance that comes from 
 knowing of whom we have received them." 
 19 
 
Thoughts that sheltered Jesus Christ, Paul, 
 Martin Luther, and my parents, are good 
 enough for me. 
 
 St 
 
 'Behold, I tell you a. mystery (1 Cor. 15 : SI). 
 
 T TNDOUBTEDLY the resurrection of the 
 ^ body and the immortality of the soul 
 are "mysteries." And, because they are, 
 thoughtless people reject them. Now, if this 
 is a good reason, let us reject everything. 
 For, at last, everything is an insoluble mys- 
 tery. When we want to express our idea of 
 the absolute simplicity of an idea, we say, 
 ' ' It is as plain as two sticks. ' ' But nothing 
 can be more mysterious than those very sticks. 
 Once they were living trees, and you can no 
 more understand what that life was than you 
 can understand infinity and eternity. Mystery 
 hovers over all things here below. All are 
 shrouded in a veil. " Every grain of sand is 
 a mystery; so is every daisy in summer, and so 
 is every snowflake in winter. But upwards 
 and downwards and all around us science and 
 speculation pass into mystery at last. ' ' The 
 presence of mystery is no ground for unbelief, 
 it is rather a reason for faith. The common- 
 est facts and laws of nature, the daily provi- 
 dences of life, are as full of incomprehensible- 
 ness as the deepest doctrines of religion. A 
 20 
 
religion without mystery would be as repugnant 
 as a seed without life or a body without a soul. 
 There is no religion without mystery. God 
 himself is the great secret of nature. To me 
 the beating of my heart, the expansion and 
 contraction of my lungs, the ceaseless flow of 
 thought in my brain, are as staggering as the 
 resurrection of my body after death. It is 
 these very mysteries that are the fuel of faith. 
 
 &Cpw therefore let your hands be strong, 
 and be ye 'batiant; for Saul your 
 lord is dead (2 Sam. 2:7). 
 
 "THERE seems to be a "therefore" to 
 * everything. How tired we grow of these 
 " therefores ' ' ! How imperative and implaca- 
 ble they are ! ' ' Saul is dead, a new king is 
 on the throne, and ' therefore ' you must be 
 strong and valiant." You are rich, and 
 "therefore" you must be benevolent. You 
 are poor, and "therefore" you must be 
 economical. You are a master, and ' ' there- 
 fore ' ' you must be considerate. You are a 
 servant, and "therefore" you must be faith- 
 ful. You are a teacher, and "therefore " you 
 must be held accountable. You are a pupil, and 
 " therefore " you must be respectful. " Every 
 why hath a wherefore," and every circum- 
 21 
 
stance a "therefore." New duties are in- 
 volved in new situations, just as plants are 
 involved in seeds, and seeds in flowers. Little 
 Bill, yesterday you were in kilts, and "there- 
 fore ' ' you had a right to play from morning 
 till night. To-day you are in knickerbockers, 
 and " therefore " you must go to school and 
 study. To-morrow you will be in trousers, 
 and "therefore" must begin to be a man, 
 and bear ' ' the white man' s burden. ' ' The 
 whole moral system lies in that word ' ' there- 
 fore. ' ' The possession of power, or virtue, or 
 knowledge, involves responsibility in its use. 
 You can no more sever the latter from the 
 former than you can detach a quality from a 
 substance. 
 
 cMigkt become such as I am, 
 except these bonds {Ads 26 : 29). 
 
 I T TAKES a profound conviction that one is 
 right to sustain one in that wish. Could 
 you wish that your dear friends were such as 
 you are ? Are your convictions and ideas and 
 faiths so sweet and satisfying that you could 
 say, as Paul did, "I wish that you might be- 
 come such as I am " ? If not, of course you 
 have no power in the advocacy of your phi- 
 losophy of life. Get right with yourself, get 
 right with your fellow-men, get right with God, 
 
get a clear conscience, get a happy heart, and 
 then you will also get persuasive power. A 
 captain who knows that his boat leaks, puts up 
 a weak-kneed plea for passengers. It is not 
 an easy thing for a father to urge his boys to 
 be such as he is, if he chews tobacco and 
 drinks beer. 
 
 lender to all their dues {Rom. 13 : 7). 
 
 DERHAPS no man ever yet realized the 
 *■ extent of his obligations. Your obliga- 
 tions are not limited by your appreciation of 
 them. They are limited only by your powers 
 to do good. It is the duty of every tallow 
 dip and of every electric light to throw its 
 beams as far as it can. We know all about 
 the obligations others owe to us. How exact- 
 ing we are of those courtesies and duties ! 
 pitifully and contemptibly so, I think. How 
 little our Saviour had to say about our 
 ' ' rights, ' ' and how much about our ' ' obliga- 
 tions. " He did not demand his "pound 
 of flesh ' ' from his creditors, but gave his 
 whole body to his debtors. However much 
 one may sympathize with the wage-earners in 
 their clamorous demands for their "rights," 
 it makes him sick at heart to hear so little 
 from their lips about their "duties." Chris- 
 tianity is a steady and determined will to give 
 23 
 
to others what belongs to them, not to exact 
 from them what belongs to us. Good neigh- 
 borliness does not consist in the determination 
 to keep your neighbor's hens out of your 
 garden, but to keep yours out of his. Duties 
 are reciprocal, — oh, yes ! But we have no 
 need of a gospel to teach us to exact our ob- 
 ligations, but only to fulfil them! 
 
 St 
 
 (Against thee, thee only, hame 
 I sinned (Psa. 51 : 4). 
 
 T DO not myself know just what sin is against 
 God — alone. All the sins that I know, 
 besides being against God, are also against 
 some other person or our own selves. But it 
 is easy to understand how, in some impas- 
 sioned moment of clarified vision, all con- 
 sciousness of any other wrong is swallowed up 
 in that of wrong against God. Mark you, 
 though, that it takes moral natures of the 
 highest order to attain this knowledge, the 
 products of the most thorough spiritual 
 education. What insight, imagination, illumi- 
 nation, are required to trace the effect of our 
 sins on the heart of God! It is like being told 
 that the waves from a pebble break on the 
 farthest shore of ocean. Both waves and sins 
 seem dissipated and lost before reaching their 
 «4 
 
destination. And yet, as every telephone 
 message passes through the central station, 
 every evil deed and word and thought passes 
 through the heart of God. Every wire runs 
 into his bosom. Little Bill, you are listening 
 to me incredulously. You do not see how 
 your evil deeds can sadden the heart of God. 
 Well, you did not see how they could sadden 
 mine until you saw me break down and weep, 
 the other day. Why should I care what you 
 do ? Why should a pang shoot through my 
 heart ? I do not know, but it does. And it 
 is no more wonderful that this pain strikes 
 through the heart of your other Father. 
 
 Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of 
 God. ... And God smote him there 
 for his error (2 Sam. 6 : 6,7). 
 
 ""THERE is a skeptical distrust of God's abil- 
 ity to carry his church over the rough 
 places in the journey that results in immeasur- 
 able harm ; for, in trying to keep it from fall- 
 ing by the way, men stretch forth their hands 
 to deeds of actual impiety. In this present 
 period many a good man, troubled and scared 
 by the prospect of the church' s overthrow, has 
 tried to prop it up with sensational preaching, 
 or questionable methods of business, or alien 
 
 25 
 
institutions. All such things are extraneous. 
 They become a hindrance and drag to the 
 progress of the kingdom. There is a sense in 
 which the church of Christ cannot prosper 
 without the support of the hand of every child 
 of God, but there is also a sense in which it 
 will go forward on its way as surely as the 
 revolving earth itself, — which we ride on, and 
 cannot sustain by lifting nor hasten by push- 
 ing. Perhaps a good motto for the church of 
 this age would be, ' ' Impious Uzzahs, hands 
 off!" 
 
 Inquired %ho he <wa.s, and tuhat 
 he had done {Acts 21 : 33). 
 
 OOONER or later we shall all of us have to 
 *-^ answer that twofold question, "Who are 
 you, and what have you done ? ' ' What have 
 you done ? This is what the world insists on 
 knowing. It is not enough that you are some- 
 thing, you must do something. Society wants 
 the man who has sung a song, or written a 
 book, or explored a country, or organized a 
 crusade, or who can do it. In the business 
 world or in politics it is just the same. What 
 work have you done ? What word have you 
 uttered ? The world needs work done. It 
 judges men, not by their profession, but by 
 their accomplishment. And a great thing it is 
 26 
 
to have done something, — won a battle, built 
 a bridge, organized a Sunday-school, cleared 
 a farm, dug a well or even a ditch. How can 
 any one bear to think of dying without having 
 made his mark on the earth somewhere, — 
 having, as it were, written his autograph in 
 nature' s album in some task that can never be 
 erased ? Then comes the other question, 
 " Who are you ? " A thousandfold more im- 
 portant in God's sight than the other one, for 
 he ' ' looks not upon the outward appearance, 
 but on the heart." Many a man that has 
 done the greatest deeds in history has no more 
 value in the eyes of God than a puff of smoke, 
 while many a quiet, gentle soul, that has 
 patiently spent its life in bed, is cherished in 
 the heart of the Eternal as a saint. 
 
 For Jehovah Ivitl not forsake his 
 oeople (/ Sam. 12 : 22). 
 
 |\T OT so long as there is a single purpose in 
 * the heart of man for him to hold on to! 
 I think, myself, that the grip of God on the 
 human soul is like the grip of gravity on mat- 
 ter, — not an atom of which ever gets away. It 
 is ground to imponderable powder ; burnt into 
 impalpable smoke ; melted into invisible 
 vapor ; it is tossed about and hidden and 
 27 
 
transformed ; but it never gets away from the 
 grip of gravity. Samuel seemed to feel that 
 way about the souls of men, and I do too. 
 God will never forsake them. So don't get 
 discouraged and let go your hold of him who 
 never lets go his hold of you ! Neither do 
 your true friends ever forsake you. You for- 
 sake them, — that is the trouble. You may 
 not believe it, but there are more people in 
 the world like this good old Samuel than you 
 know anything about. 
 
 'But lighting upon a place nohere ttuo 
 seas met, they ran the vessel 
 aground (Acts 27 : 41). 
 
 ""THIS is what the doctors call " heroic treat- 
 ment." But nobody can deny that, in 
 many of life's most significant ventures, the 
 only way to save the crew is to scuttle the ship 
 or run it on to the shore. Many a man is be- 
 ing dragged down to financial ruin by a bad 
 business location which he hasn't the courage 
 to desert. Perhaps the waters of a river run 
 into his cellar ; perhaps the business center of 
 the city has moved. He hangs on and on, in 
 hope of changes that never come, and finally 
 goes down under the ruin. He had better 
 have run his vessel aground, and begun life 
 28 
 
over again. Perhaps he has engaged in a 
 business whose immorality he did not perceive 
 at first, — as so many get into saloon-keeping 
 or distilling when they are young and ignorant. 
 At last his conscience has been enlightened, 
 and he clearly perceives that his business will 
 wreck him morally. But the question of bread 
 and butter for his family paralyzes him when 
 he tries to forsake it. He holds on and holds 
 on, day after day, year after year, until he has 
 grown hardened or discouraged, and the good 
 dies out of his soul. How much better it 
 would have been to have run the vessel 
 aground in the place where those two seas 
 of good and evil met ! It's a last resort, a 
 desperate remedy, but it's often the only one. 
 So slip your cable, unship your helm, run your 
 vessel on the rocks; then go and cut down 
 trees and build a better one. 
 
 cAnd alt went to be taxed {Lake 2 : 3). 
 
 CVERY living thing is taxed, and all willing 
 ^ workers overtaxed. The baby over- 
 taxes its mother ; the growing brood of chil- 
 dren, the father ; his parish, the preacher ; 
 his business, the merchant ; his patients, the 
 doctor ; his land, the farmer. Well, that is, all 
 right. It is these high assessments that make 
 29 
 
life worth while. You were never so much of 
 a man as when you thought yourself overtaxed. 
 We do our hardest pulling under the lash. It 
 was better for Joseph to pay more taxes than 
 he wanted to, and to a government that he 
 did not like, than not to pay any at all. 
 
 because of the hope of Israel I am bound 
 frith this chain (Acts 28 : 20). 
 
 EVERYBODY in this world is bound with a 
 •^ chain. None are at perfect liberty. We 
 envy the rich their independence. They seem 
 to be able to move about the world with the free- 
 dom of the birds, and to do whatever they take 
 a notion to. Do not deceive yourselves. They 
 too are bound with chains. Some earthly 
 limitation is on them all. Their chains are a 
 little longer than yours, perhaps, but they come 
 to the ends of them all the same. Some of 
 them are sick, some of them are sad, and some 
 of them are silly, — with a chain bound round 
 their brains, which is enough sight worse than 
 a manacle on one's leg. No, no ! You are 
 not the only one who bears about your ball 
 and chain. I've got mine. But let me tell 
 you this : It's one thing to be bound with 
 chains for " the hope of Israel," or some other 
 great and sacred cause. Fathers are bound 
 30 
 
with chains for the hope of their families, 
 mothers for the hope of a little sick baby, 
 ministers for their churches, patriots for their 
 country. They are held down to their tasks 
 like slaves. They cannot leave their little cell. 
 But "the hope," "the hope," "the hope," 
 sustains them day and night. It' s quite another 
 thing to be bound with the chain of a vile 
 companion or a vicious habit. On the prai- 
 ries, the cowboys stake their horses to a post. 
 It is not only to have them ready to mount in 
 the morning, but to keep them from being 
 stolen by Indians or eaten by wolves. You 
 had better be thankful to God for "staking 
 you out." 
 
 Jehdbah, the God of Israel, be 
 Witness [I Sam. 20 : 12). 
 
 '"THERE is nothing more overestimated than 
 secrecy. How few deeds are ever done 
 without a witness ! We do not know that we 
 are observed, because our deeds are not im- 
 portant enough to be commented on. But 
 let any one of them, for some unexpected 
 reason, be endowed with significance, and 
 witnesses seem to spring out of the ground ! 
 Walls have ears ; stones, eyes ! Vibrations 
 seem to have been solidified in the air, 
 footsteps petrified in drifting sands, ripples 
 3 1 
 
frozen on unstable water. Voices are heard 
 on every hand, crying, " I saw you. I saw 
 you ! ' ' Do not presume on secrecy. Nature 
 is as full of eyes as a peacock' s tail. And be- 
 sides, "There is an eye that never sleeps 
 beneath the wing of night." " All things are 
 naked and laid open before the eyes of him 
 with whom we have to do." Jonathan was 
 right. God is witness, — witness of your 
 friendships, of your hatreds, of your jeal- 
 ousies ; witness of your deeds and words and 
 thoughts. Truer than the truth " I see my- 
 self," is the truth "God sees me." 
 
 Sa.ii) his face as it had been the 
 face of an angel (Acts 6 : 15). 
 
 A N UGLY statue or painting must be 
 **■ always ugly, but there was never a living 
 countenance so hideous that an inner light of 
 love might not transfigure it. The homeliest 
 are sometimes the most beautiful when a reli- 
 gious light shines through the features like the 
 flames of candles through cathedral windows. 
 " Her face is like the milky-way i' the sky, — 
 a meeting of gentle lights without a name," 
 said Sir John Suckling of one of his heroines. 
 How many nameless gentle lights meet and 
 glow in faces like Stephen's ! I have seen 
 32 
 
lights beam in the faces of some I know that 
 was not the molten matter of any sun, but 
 a scintillation from the burning heart of God 
 himself, — a light divine and inextinguishable. 
 
 St. 
 
 tAnd game him fsfoor in the sight 
 of the keeper (Gen. 39 : 21). 
 
 \17'E SOON enough find that there are cruel 
 and relentless forces working against us, 
 throwing us into pits and prisons. What we 
 need is to believe in the forces that are work- 
 ing for us, giving us the kindness and favor of 
 men, and the benefit of the powers of nature. 
 When the wind blows your ship backward, 
 do not think everything is against you. Re- 
 member that the engine is for you, the rudder 
 is for you, the buoyancy of the water is for 
 you, and a thousand other things. While you 
 are pegging away at your task (misunderstood, 
 abused, despised), there is a good friend or 
 two saying kind words behind your back. 
 Some one is planning a "rise." Did you 
 ever stop to think of all the forces that were 
 working "out of the sight" of such men as 
 Washington and Lincoln to push them forward 
 and upward? There are more for us than 
 against us. And, at any rate, if the Lord be 
 for us, who can (successfully) be against us ? 
 33 
 
You and God can defy the universe. Be- 
 lieve in the unseen good more than the un- 
 seen evil. 
 
 'Being moved -with jealousy {Acts 17 1 5). 
 
 "\17E CALL the "feelings" of our souls 
 * " emotions, ' ' because they move us. 
 
 They are steam in the boilers of these human 
 engines. They furnish driving power. Noth- 
 ing is more certain than that emotions will 
 move us — to something, to either good or 
 bad. Beware, then, of jealousy. Do not 
 flatter yourself that it will lie dormant in your 
 heart. It is a fierce and terrible energy. It 
 is like a keg of powder waiting for a spark. 
 It will drive you to some dark and desperate 
 deed, as it did those Jews. Jealousy is a fire; 
 extinguish it. It is a snake ; scotch it. 
 
 The Lord hath need of them (Matt. 21 : 3). 
 
 T F WE could have two divinely inspired apos- 
 ties appear to us and say, "The Lord 
 hath need of this, and the Lord hath need of 
 that, and the Lord hath need of the other," 
 the most difficult element of duty-doing would 
 vanish. There are not a few people in the 
 world who find it much harder to know what 
 34 
 
they ought to give up than to give up what 
 they know they ought to. Life, however, 
 must not be made too easy for us. We must 
 learn by experience and insight to know 
 what our Lord demands. Our fathers and 
 mothers and teachers will not always live 
 to tell us. And we must learn, also, that 
 it is none the less true that the Lord hath 
 need of many things that we possess, and 
 can perform, when he does not appear to us 
 himself, nor even send an apostle. God's 
 needs are manifested through the needs of 
 others. All real helplessness is a "sight 
 draft ' ' from the Lord upon every man to 
 whom it is presented. 
 
 His mother kept all these sayings 
 in her heart {Luke 2 s 51). 
 
 ""THERE is as much difference between 
 keeping sacred words in the head and 
 the heart as between hanging seed-corn in the 
 kitchen and planting it in the ground, or be- 
 tween keeping coal in the scuttle and putting 
 it in the grate. You may keep the multiplica- 
 tion-table in your head, but the Golden Rule 
 must be cherished in the heart. When we 
 commit things to memory, they may do us as 
 little good as the documents do the tin box to 
 35 
 
which we commit them in the safety deposit 
 vaults. But the last words your father said to 
 you, or the prattle from the lips of your little 
 child, went straight to your heart, and there 
 they abode and blessed you, coming up fresh, 
 beautiful, and inspiring day after day and 
 year after year. Isn't it a beautiful mystery? 
 Oh, learn the divine art of committing sayings 
 to your heart ! 
 
 & 
 
 I <will not let thee go, except 
 thou bless me {Gen. 32 : 26), 
 
 T F WE should wrestle in that spirit with every 
 incident and every accident, every person 
 and every object, every angel and every devil, 
 we meet in life, we would learn a wonderful 
 secret, and it would be, that in each there is a 
 sublime lesson and an eternal benediction. 
 Try it ! You are now facing some great dis- 
 aster. Grapple with it, analyze it, turn it in- 
 side out, ransack its secret, hunt for its con- 
 cealed meaning. Say to it, as you seize it by 
 the throat, "If it takes me ten years, or for- 
 ever, I will not let you go until I see the part 
 you were sent to play in my life. ' ' You will 
 find it. It will disclose itself at last. As surely 
 as there is fire in every flint, there is blessing 
 in every experience. There are some in which 
 there are curses, and terrible ones at that. 
 36 
 
But even those, if a man grapples them as 
 Jacob did, may be made to yield some blessing. 
 
 Go, and do thou likewise {Luke 10 1 37). 
 
 T T IS very astonishing to know how many 
 people can admire a good deed without 
 feeling any disposition to try and imitate it. 
 There is always some reason why they could 
 not possibly do it. It would be so much 
 harder for them. ' ' It did not cost the person 
 who did it any effort, — don't you know?" 
 For shame ! Good deeds do not come easy 
 for any one. If you don't say to yourself, 
 when you see a good deed, ' ' I will do that 
 myself when I get a chance, ' ' there is some- 
 thing wrong with your machinery, and you had 
 better have it repaired. 
 
 St. 
 
 He entered into a boat. ... And he 
 spake to them {Matt. 13 : 2, 3). 
 
 A NY place was a good enough pulpit for Jesus 
 ^^ Christ. If there was a synagogue within 
 reach, he went there. If not, he preached 
 from the top of a hill, or a curbstone, or a 
 fishing-boat. Men and boys and girls who are 
 dead in earnest always find a weapon or an 
 37 
 
instrument, and, if not, they make one. When 
 Samson found himself without a sword, he 
 snatched up the jawbone of an ass. A ram's 
 horn was good enough for Joshua, and a lamp 
 and pitcher for Gideon. "Give me a lever 
 long enough, and a fulcrum strong enough, 
 and I will move the world ! ' ' said the old 
 philosopher. If a little friend of mine had 
 been there, he would have said : " Get your 
 own lever. Don't wait for some one else 
 to find it. Any old thing will do, — if you are 
 stout enough. Don't you know yet that it is 
 not the gun, but the man behind it? '' Some 
 one saw the sword of Scandenberg, and said, 
 "That is not much of a sword," and one of 
 the hero's old companions said, "You ought to 
 have seen the arm that wielded it ! " Some 
 sermons are better from a stump than others 
 from a carved oak pulpit. 
 
 Separate me Barnabas and Saul (Acts 13 : 2). 
 
 OOONER or later every individual gets sifted 
 out of the crowd. A man is a unit, not 
 a part of a mass. An apple lies down at the 
 bottom of a barrel, lost in the pile, but by and 
 by its turn comes to be taken out and peeled 
 and eaten, — all alone. A little boy at first 
 cannot distinguish his own identity. He is 
 38 
 
swallowed up in the unity of the family; then 
 he is detached, and sent to school. Now he is 
 a part of a throng of happy youngsters ; but 
 suddenly he is wrenched out of these relation- 
 ships, and stuck behind a counter, or into an 
 elevator, or into a street-car, and at last he is 
 an individual! And so the process of separation 
 goes on. We are sifted, culled out, selected, 
 set apart. It is serious business, this "tread- 
 ing the wine-press of life ' ' alone. But God 
 has called us to our own work, and not to an- 
 other's. All hail the day, then, when he comes 
 and takes us, and says, ' ' Stand here ! Go 
 there !" 
 
 Forasmuch as God hath showed thee 
 all this, there is none so discreet 
 and •wise (Gen. 41 : 39). 
 
 A S THERE is a beauty in character which 
 ^^ God' s originating spirit alone can account 
 for, so there is a wisdom of the soul which can 
 only be explained by his indwelling light. 
 There is a knowledge, there is a wisdom, there 
 is a discretion, which can be acquired by ex- 
 perience and education. But the world has 
 always insisted that there is another sort of in- 
 sight which cannot. Humanity has traced it 
 to "inspiration," to a sudden flash of light 
 shot into the soul by the God of all truth. 
 39 
 
At any rate, it is certain that the greatest 
 scholars sometimes lack it, while it is often 
 seen scintillating from the souls of the igno- 
 rant ; and it is the verdict of all the past ages 
 that ' ' spiritual things ' ' are ' ' spiritually dis- 
 cerned," and that " holy men " have spoken 
 "as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 
 If you wish to know bird lore, you dwell 
 among the birds ; if that of animals, with ani- 
 mals ; if that of children, with children ; if 
 that of sages, with sages. That which is their 
 essence penetrates you. And those who, wish- 
 ing to know the mind of God, spend much 
 time in his presence, are penetrated by his 
 spirit and filled with his wisdom. 
 
 Who ate and drank toith him after he 
 rose from the dead (Acts 10 : 41). 
 
 F ET us make an honest effort to bring this 
 marvelous fact home to ourselves. There 
 were men who ate and drank with Jesus Christ 
 after he had risen from the grave. I once saw 
 a man who had seen Napoleon Bonaparte. 
 He was old and poor and ignorant, but when 
 I looked into his eyes, and said to myself, 
 "Those eyes have actually beheld the greatest 
 genius of war the world has ever produced," 
 I felt almost giddy, it made the life of that 
 40 
 
prodigy seem so awfully real. It is the sense 
 of reality that we need in thinking of Christ. 
 There is a way of quietly bringing this fact 
 ' ' that men ate and drank with him ' ' home to 
 the heart, so as to almost stop its beating with 
 wonder. It is not a myth. It is not a 
 baseless legend. No, a thousand times no ! 
 He lived, he loved, he died, he rose ! 
 
 & 
 
 <And Jacob <went on his 'may, and the 
 angels of God met him (Gen. 32 : I). 
 
 OOMETHING like that will happen to every 
 *^ man who goes on his own way, — not on 
 the path marked out for Napoleon or Wash- 
 ington, but for him, plain John Smith. Not 
 on the way chosen by himself against the will 
 of God, but chosen by God's will for him, — 
 the strait, narrow, individual path to the goal 
 of his own personal life. Yes, on that path 
 God's good angels will meet him ! There he 
 will encounter the angels of his household, — 
 his wife and little children. There he will find 
 his true friends. There he will meet his joys 
 and his sorrows, his failures and his triumphs, 
 his losses and his gains. There he will catch 
 more than passing glimpses of the divine pres- 
 ence that hovers about him always. Nothing 
 is so sweet, nothing so satisfying, as to be in 
 4i 
 
the "way" your feet were made to travel. 
 Do not leave it for an instant. 
 
 & 
 
 I send you forth as lambs in the 
 midst of ivotves (Luke 10 : 3). 
 
 ■"THERE may be more kinds of animals in 
 the human race than just lambs and 
 wolves ; but these two varieties predomi- 
 nate. I think it is probably right to try to 
 be something else, but, if you are shut up 
 to the choice, be a lamb every time. Be 
 bitten rather than bite. Oh ! I know quite 
 well that is not the kind of advice you will 
 hear in "Wall Street," but I stick to it. 
 Die rather than wrong or rob any one. 
 Patience, gentleness, love, — these are the 
 powers that will save the world. The lambs 
 will "win out " in the long run. I am one of 
 those who think that sometimes the wolves 
 have to be hung up by the heels. I rather 
 think that it may be all right to offer a reward 
 for their scalps. Saloon-keepers must be 
 brought up with a sharp turn. Robbers must 
 be shut up in the "pen." Murderers must 
 be electrocuted. But, after all, it is the lamb, 
 and not the lion, who is to win in the fight 
 against the wolves. It is more often by being 
 eaten than by eating that we bring men to 
 42 
 
their senses. We must suffer injustice, if we 
 want to help save the world. It is " heaping 
 coals of fire on heads ' ' that restores brains to 
 reason. Kill men with kindness. It was the 
 unresisting submission of Jesus that at last 
 broke the heart of humanity. 
 
 'Blessed are the pure in heart {Matt. 4 : 8). 
 
 COME things can be seen through the brain, 
 ^ but others only through the heart. Sup- 
 pose you had no heart. Do you think you 
 could see your mother ? Do you think you 
 see her with the same faculty with which you 
 see the multiplication-table or the rule for 
 cube root ? I do not. If you should come 
 home from school some day with your temper 
 all roused, and your heart so full of mad that 
 you could scarcely speak, you would not see 
 your mother at all. You might look at her, 
 but you would not really behold her. You 
 could not even see the baby. The little thing 
 that crawls up to you, and that you feel like 
 slapping, would not really be the baby. It 
 would be something else. The real baby would 
 be invisible to you until you got over being 
 mad. That is why we say, "I was so mad I 
 could not see." Something really blinds the 
 43 
 
eye of the soul. When the anger all runs out 
 of your heart, then you can see again, just as 
 when the frost melts from the window-pane. 
 No man ever saw God when he was mad. 
 No man ever saw God when his heart was 
 full of vanity, or envy, or impurity. He sees 
 something vast, awful, ugly, and repellent, 
 but it is not God. 
 
 <And he dreamed, and behold, 
 a ladder [Gen. 28 : 12). 
 
 1VT OTHING could be more true or more 
 beautiful. Just as every road in the 
 Roman Empire led to Rome, every line erected 
 on earth runs straight to heaven. Any sun- 
 beam, followed to the end, will lead us to its 
 effulgent source. Just as any little Roman lad 
 could step out of his door and strike the high- 
 way with absolute certainty of reaching the 
 palace of the Csesar ; just as his eye may travel 
 on the sunbeam from his own bright eye to the 
 sun, he can find the foot of a ladder on the 
 spot where he stands that will lead him straight 
 to heaven and God. You do not have to go 
 to Jerusalem or Mecca or Rome to find the 
 first round of it. Try it now. Be very still a 
 moment. Close your eyes in order to con- 
 centrate your thought. Now lift that thought 
 44 
 
to God. Straight as the sunbeam's track, 
 swift as its flight, you are in the divine pres- 
 ence. God has a telephone in the heart of 
 every one, and you need not call a central 
 office to reach him. How like the angels go- 
 ing back and forth are our thoughts and his ! 
 
 A. 
 
 Every tree therefore thai bringeth 
 not forth good fruit {Luke 3 : 9). 
 
 ""THAT is a solemn and momentous hour 
 when this conception of life bursts into 
 the sluggish, selfish soul of a man. To every 
 earnest man it comes. He hears a voice say- 
 ing to him : " The hour has struck when thou 
 must stand forth and show what is in thee. 
 Reveal thyself. Thou canst no longer skulk in 
 the rear. Draw thy sword ! Show thy hand ! 
 Bear fruit ! If there is anything in thee, go 
 forward and upward ; if not, descend, retreat. 
 Make place for better men. You have sat in 
 that professor's chair, or stood in that pulpit, 
 or edited that paper, or headed that party, 
 long enough without getting anything done. 
 Step down, laggard ! ' ' When these thoughts 
 thundered in the soul of John, he left the 
 desert for the haunts of men. This is the 
 trumpet call we need. More men need to be 
 aroused than comforted. 
 45 
 
If ye then, being Ml, know h&w to 
 ghie good gifts {Matt. 7 : 11). 
 
 A LL the love and generosity and bountiful- 
 ness of a father's or a mother's heart 
 comes from God as surely as all the luster and 
 glory of a diamond or a dew-drop come from 
 the sun. If they are kind, it is only because 
 God is kind. If you trust them, that is the 
 reason for trusting him who made them. But 
 do not forget that love sometimes reveals itself 
 by withholding as well as by bestowing. The 
 eagle shows her love as much by not giving 
 her young ones a fresh rabbit every hour or 
 two as by giving it. Perhaps more ! Perhaps 
 I would rather give my boy ten dollars than 
 see him get down into a ditch and dig it out. 
 But I should show my love more by letting 
 him earn it for himself. 
 
 He *k>as mdbed 1vith compassion (Luke JO : 33). 
 
 \ 1 THAT kind of compassion is it which does 
 not move a man ? What kind of a 
 mainspring would it be in a watch which did 
 not move the hands? What kind of steam 
 would it be in a boiler which did not move 
 the piston-rods ? All the great emotions of 
 the soul are "motor powers." But in some 
 souls these emotions are about like a little 
 46 
 
trickle of sap running out of a maple-tree try- 
 ing to turn the water-wheel of a great big mill. 
 You say you feel compassion ? Well, why 
 doesn' t it drive your feet and hands ? Feet, 
 hands, heart, head, — everything, ought to 
 commence to jump and whir (just as things do 
 when the motorman turns on the current), if 
 the compassion is genuine. Compassion is a 
 motor power or nothing. Don' t ever say you 
 are a kind man unless your kindness moves you. 
 
 What God hath cleansed, make not 
 thou common (Acts 11 : 9). 
 
 T T ERE lies one of those holy mysteries of 
 ■*■ ■*• the spiritual world, which I, for one, 
 approach with the same wonder and reverence 
 as the blooming of a century-plant, the break- 
 ing of the egg-shells when the birds come forth 
 into life, the birth of a little child. The in- 
 stant that a man obeys a divine command, that 
 moment the duty ceases to be irksome. What 
 a transforming touch hath this sublime virtue, 
 obedience ! The dark and sombre tasks of life 
 are flooded with light ; the arduous and repul- 
 sive ones are made easy and sweet ; drudgery 
 becomes beatitude, the common becomes both 
 clean and holy, by a divine magic. I wish I 
 could cram into a single word my profound 
 47 
 
conviction that the most common things of life 
 are the most sacred. The tasks we most in- 
 dignantly spurn, — these possess, in a superla- 
 tive degree, that holy, blessed element. Dirt 
 is as sacred as sunlight, — is it not? In what 
 respect does the digging of a sewer, to drain 
 off the poisons which threaten human life, fall 
 so far below, in dignity and sublimity, the 
 writing of a book or painting of a picture ? 
 The "commonness" is in the mind that 
 scorns. 
 
 Thou shalt not kill {Exod. 20 : IS). 
 
 CVERY moral obligation rests back finally 
 upon the principle that life is sacred. All 
 life has a certain celestial character, and never 
 ought to be taken without some great and good 
 reason. The lowest forms are the least sacred, 
 the highest the most sacred. Even the life of 
 a weed, of a mosquito, of a snake, ought not 
 to be taken without reason. The increasing 
 sense of this sacredness is one of the great 
 hopes of the modern world. Boys are getting 
 more incapable of killing birds and squirrels 
 than they used to be, thank God ! The most 
 sacred thing in the world (because the noblest 
 form of life) is a human being. To rob it of 
 its life is the consummation of evil. And now 
 listen to this : Murder is the logic of all vice. 
 48 
 
If you do not wish to be a murderer, do not 
 cherish any vice. Ambition, avarice, lust, 
 jealousy, bitterness, — there is not one of them 
 that has not led to innumerable murders. 
 Give them full scope in your heart, and sooner 
 or later you will find them hurling you in some 
 uncontrollable passion against a fellow-creature. 
 What a mysterious tendency ! Who can ex- 
 plain that infernal gravitation of every vice 
 toward murder ? Little Bill, if you don' t con- 
 trol that temper, you (yes, you, dear, sweet 
 little Bill ! ) may get so mad some day as to 
 kill a man. 
 
 hieing sent forth by the Holy 
 Spirit {Acts 13 : 4). 
 
 THERE are times in the lives of men like 
 Paul and Savonarola, like Moody and 
 Lincoln, when the sense of being flung forth 
 by the mighty hand of God upon their mission 
 is like that of an arrow' s feeling the thrust of 
 the bow-string, or the cannon-ball the impact 
 of the powder. When Livingstone plunged 
 into the heart of the Dark Continent, he felt 
 himself thus sent forth by the Holy Ghost ; 
 and there isn't one of us, from the oldest man 
 to the youngest child, that may not live so 
 conscientiously, so earnestly, as to feel that 
 Holy Spirit speeding us on our way. Just you 
 49 
 
do to-day (to the last point of accuracy) ex- 
 actly what you ought to do, and you will feel 
 like a ship under full sail, — joyous, bounding, 
 exultant. 
 
 Let me cast out the mote out 
 of thine eye! {Matt. 7 : 4.) 
 
 (~\F COURSE, there have to be critics in 
 ^^^ human society, just as there have to be 
 fly-papers and rat-traps in houses. But sharp- 
 ening the eye to look abroad blunts it for look- 
 ing at home. The "watch " on the masthead 
 sees other vessels, but not his own. Do not 
 be a critic unless you are called to it by some 
 spiritual necessity, and even then you will 
 need to pray twice as often and as hard as any 
 other person in the world. 
 
 A 
 
 What doth hinder me to be 
 baptized? (Acts 8 : 36.) 
 
 M OTHING ! There is no hindrance to the 
 performance of duty, outside of one's 
 own soul. Believe that. If a duty is impos- 
 sible, it is not a duty. God never puts a man 
 in a situation where he cannot fulfil the behests 
 of his conscience. Trust him for always put- 
 ting water within reach of the man who feels 
 that he must be baptized. The hindrances to 
 5° 
 
the divine life are always and only in the soul 
 itself. Do not blame your dereliction in duty 
 on other people or on Providence. What is it 
 that hinders you from confessing Christ ? Your 
 pride, your cowardice, your selfishness, — 
 nothing else. Do not be deceived. Face the 
 music. "If you are not satisfied with the 
 face you see in the mirror, do not blame or 
 break the glass." 
 
 & 
 
 cAnd Abram ivas very rich in cattle, in 
 silver, and in gold (Gen. 13 : 2). 
 
 IT E WAS rich in other and better things, or 
 *■ *■ that would have been little to his credic 
 or his profit. They are but the means, and 
 not the end, of life ; the instruments, and not 
 the objects. Of what value are they to the 
 man who has not the noble purpose to use 
 them for good, and the fine sensibilities to ap- 
 preciate their true meaning? Of what use 
 would it be to an engine to be rich in wheels 
 and 'cranks and pistons, if it had no steam ? 
 Of what use would it be to a ship to be rich in 
 sails and masts and ropes, if it had no rudder ? 
 The frightful danger in the accumulation of 
 cattle and silver and gold is that the man will 
 be swamped under them. "I want money 
 for what it will buy," says one. "Do not 
 imagine I am toiling and sacrificing merely 
 
 5 1 
 
for a big bank account. It is because, in my 
 world, commercial supremacy is the measure 
 of success, and I want to make my life a suc- 
 cess," says another. That is all right, if you 
 don' t lose sight of it. But the love of cattle and 
 silver and gold themselves is a fearful under- 
 tow that drags the soul out into the ocean of 
 avarice and drowns it there. Beware of the 
 undertow ! 
 
 The Toord of God came unto John (Luke 3 : 2). 
 
 A ND, it may be fearlessly asserted, it has 
 **■ come to every man ! This is as certain as 
 that air and water rush into vacant spaces, — for 
 God is everywhere. The sea-shell may not be 
 conscious of the continuous roar within it, nor 
 the soul of the ceaselessly resounding voice of 
 God. Some people never hear the birds sing, 
 but there are others who never miss a note, 
 whether the fierce scream of the hawk or the 
 gentle twitter of the sparrows. Mrs. Lordly 
 behind the thick walls of her palace does not 
 hear the merry whistle of little Jack Thimble- 
 rigger, but his widowed mother in the vine- 
 clad cottage catches the first faint note as he 
 rounds the corner a block away. You may 
 not hear the voice of God, but it is sounding in 
 your ears as clearly as in those of Samuel or of 
 John. 
 
 ; '5* 
 
Who can forgive sins bat one, even 
 God? {Mark 2: 7). 
 
 IV T O ONE. They were right. Only he can 
 *■ " forgive a sin against whom the sin has 
 been committed. When Ben Brown's little 
 friend accidentally killed Ben' s bantam rooster, 
 he was afraid to confess it, and so he went to 
 Ted Somers, and asked him to forgive him. 
 Ted said he would, and tried to, but some- 
 how he couldn' t. Of course. You might as 
 well feed a chicken, and expect a kitten to 
 get fat. Your father cannot forgive you for 
 being saucy to your mother, and the grocer 
 cannot forgive you for running away from 
 school. If you have sinned against God, he 
 can forgive you, and no one else can. The 
 people were right. This was exactly what 
 Jesus was always teaching. But he always 
 asserted that he could forgive sins because he 
 was God manifest in the flesh. 
 
 They therefore thai <were scattered abroad went 
 about preaching the toord (Acts 8 : 4). 
 
 ""THE mothers must often push the birdlings 
 out of the nest in order to teach them to 
 fly. In spite of the beauty and glory of the 
 gospel, in spite of the natural impulse of the 
 soul to communicate its joys and its discovery 
 to other men, it is a fair question whether the 
 S3 
 
religion of Jesus would ever have gotten be- 
 yond Palestine if it had not been for its perse- 
 cutors. It is so easy to stay in the warm nest. 
 But a cruel hand flung the birds far forth, and 
 away they went singing. It is lack of an in- 
 come that has scattered the younger sons of 
 English noblemen over the earth. It is pov- 
 erty that has scattered the peasants and lazza- 
 roni of Europe broadcast over the New World. 
 Persecution drove the Puritans and the Hugue- 
 nots to America. "Let me stay here in the 
 bin ! " cries the wheat to the farmer. " Not 
 much ! ' ' cries the farmer to the wheat as he 
 flings it into the furrow. Thank God our 
 modern missionaries are going without being 
 driven ! But how they are scattered ! — from 
 China to Japan and Corea, from India to Cey- 
 lon and Africa. We shall have a harvest that 
 shall make the reapers shout some day. 
 
 The tandtha.tl'toitlsho'k) thee {Gen. 12 : I). 
 
 T~\0 NOT be afraid that you cannot find 
 *~^ your place in the world ! It has been, 
 or is now being, prepared for you. God will 
 show it to you if you live simply, candidly, 
 teachably, and go forward. Sometimes he 
 shows it to your instinct. You know be- 
 forehand what you ought to do and be, and 
 54 
 
the minute you find your place it fits you. 
 Sometimes you have to be jammed into it, 
 because you won't go of your own accord ! 
 Sometimes he shows it by accident, some- 
 times by necessity ; but he shows it ! There 
 will be "signs." You will find the burden 
 fitted for your back, the work cut out for your 
 hand. Do not hold back. Do not miss the 
 place assigned you. Do not try to fill an- 
 other. Go to the spot on the sentry-beat, or 
 the firing-line, or the sutler's camp, or wher- 
 ever God shows you your place, and stand 
 there like a man ! It is the only spot on 
 earth where you can feel an absolute assurance 
 and peace. 
 
 & 
 
 For behold, he prayeth [Acts 9 s 11). 
 
 A FTER all, that is the mood of spiritual 
 ^^ receptivity. When the soul opens to 
 emit its penitential sighs, the smallest aperture 
 is wide enough for God's blessing to enter. 
 It is the open furrow for the falling seed. 
 More blessings worth the having and keeping 
 have come to men in the attitude of prayer 
 than in any other. I may not be able to tell 
 you how to put your hard heart and stub- 
 born soul into that state, but I can offer you 
 the solemn assurance that when it is said of 
 you in heaven, "Behold, he prayeth," help 
 55 
 
will be sent you on the instant, — not what help 
 you sought, perhaps* but just the help you 
 need. 
 
 & 
 
 Was not our heart burning 
 Ivithin us ? {Luke 24 : 32.) 
 
 r^O WHEREVER anything makes your 
 ^~* heart " burn " like that. Join yourself to 
 any person that kindles up those flames in 
 your bosom. What these icy hearts of ours 
 need is to be set on fire. Nothing will make 
 them burn like contact with heroes and 
 heroic deeds. Get close to Moses, Elijah, 
 Paul, Savonarola, Luther, Lincoln, — above 
 all, to Jesus Christ. He has made more 
 hearts "burn" than all the rest together. 
 
 c4t even, . . . and in the morning, . . .ye shall 
 see the glory of Jehdbah (Exod. 16 : 6, 7). 
 
 Yf ES, and that glory is as visible to-day as 
 *■ then. If you do not see it in the dew 
 that sparkles on the grass at daybreak, and in 
 the clouds that glow with opalescent light when 
 the sun goes down, you would not have seen 
 it in the divided Jordan, the bitter waters 
 sweetened by the tree, nor in the falling of 
 the manna, and the quails. This glory is 
 56 
 
always in the eye of the beholder. There is 
 as much of the glory of God in the fish caught 
 from a lake, or the kernel of grain raised in a 
 field, or the loaf of bread baked in the oven, 
 as in the miraculous food that fell from heaven. 
 In every drop of water there is the majesty of 
 an ocean, in every star the beauty of a uni- 
 verse, in every child the grandeur of humanity. 
 To the reverent mind the glory of God is seen 
 as clearly in feeding a raven or clothing a lily 
 as in satisfying the hunger or hiding the 
 nakedness of an army. 
 
 Ifepentance and remission (Luke 24 : 47) 
 
 ""THOSE three words contain a mystery and 
 glory of which I, for one, never tire. 
 The second follows the first by a sort of auto- 
 matic movement. If you can get a mind to 
 repent, remission follows just as sure as sound 
 follows shooting a cannon, or light the striking 
 of a flint and steel. Don' t you bother about 
 the remission — you just repent! Just as 
 you sow seed and let God bring forth the 
 plant, you have only to hate your sin, and 
 turn from it, and he will bestow the pardon. 
 This beautiful mystery, this marvelous bit of 
 spiritual mechanism, is what Christ came to 
 disclose to us. Forgiving love is the essence 
 57 
 
of God's nature. He can no more with- 
 hold forgiveness to a penitent than a mother 
 can withhold a kiss from the infant lips that 
 are lifted to hers. To pardon is an irrepres- 
 sible divine instinct. God pardons in the 
 heavens as Christ pardoned on the cross. 
 
 <And be thou a. blessing (Gen. 12 : 2). 
 
 A BOUT three times a day, each one of us 
 might profitably pause to ask, "Am I 
 really a blessing to my friends ? ' ' Think of the 
 millions who are positive curses to their loved 
 ones ! And they are so often unconscious 
 of it ! Some of us are neither one thing nor 
 another. It doesn't make much difference 
 whether we live or die. But now and then 
 we find some one who is a positive and un- 
 mitigated blessing ! Sometimes it is an obedi- 
 ent little child ; sometimes a noble youth ; 
 sometimes a great-hearted man or woman in 
 middle life ; sometimes an old grandfather or 
 grandmother. They radiate light and heat. 
 They shed joy and peace. Every one is hap- 
 pier and better the minute they appear. The 
 canary sings more sweetly; the horse strikes 
 a better gait ; the household affairs go more 
 smoothly. Whatever else you are, or are not, 
 try to be a blessing ! You can be this even 
 58 
 
if you are poor, even if you are lame, even 
 if you are blind. Nothing can prevent you 
 from being a blessing but your own self ! 
 
 'But in every nation he that feareth 
 him, and ivorketh righteousness, is 
 acceptable to him (Acts 10 : 35). 
 
 '"THIS verse is the bed-rock of God's moral 
 system. Before this statement all fine- 
 spun systems of theological ethics go down like 
 cobwebs before a whirlwind. Goodness is 
 goodness in earth or heaven. Righteousness 
 is simply rightness, and God can no more help 
 loving it than you can help admiring beauty. 
 It is "acceptable" to him. It "finds" him. 
 It thrills him. There are not two kinds of 
 righteousness, any more than there are two 
 kinds of straight lines. Do right. God will 
 not reject your deed, whoever you are. 
 Courage, tenderness, unselfishness, truthful- 
 ness, purity, — these are as beautiful in the 
 negro or the Chinaman as in the white man. 
 When done because that divine sense of duty 
 welling up from the deeps of the soul impels 
 them, they have a virtue and beauty that are 
 irresistible. They are permeated with the 
 essence of religion. All true morality is at 
 least unconscious religion. 
 59 
 
Slaw of heart to believe (Luke 24 : 25). 
 
 T HAD rather be slow of wit than of heart. 
 Some people do not comprehend an argu- 
 ment until the question is a dead issue. Some 
 do not see a joke until others have had 
 their laugh and forgotten it. Sorry for them ? 
 Of course ! But it' s not a thousandth part as 
 bad as to have a snail-moving heart, slow to 
 respond to love, slow to perceive goodness, 
 slow to accept the divine. Some people's 
 sympathies move like molasses. I like to see 
 them explode like powder. I like to see them 
 catch hold of evidences of God's love and 
 goodness just as burrs seize upon sheep's 
 wool. 
 
 Showing the coats and garments nuhich 
 Dorcas made (Acts 9 s 39). 
 
 "\17HAT have you got to "show" for your 
 " * life ? What will your friends have to 
 " show " when you are dead ? Many a man 
 and woman lives through the whole cycle of 
 life's glad, sad seventy years, and, after van- 
 ishing, "leaves not a wrack behind." If 
 their "works do follow them," they follow so 
 close and swift as to disappear with the doer. 
 It's easy enough to flatter ourselves in hours 
 of vanity that we are of inestimable value to 
 6o 
 
the world, but sit down with your conscience, 
 and ask yourself, ' ' What would my friends 
 have to ' show ' if I should die to-night ? ' ' 
 What have you done ? Think of all that 
 has been spent and wasted to produce some 
 of the unproductive wretches who live and 
 die on earth. What toil and tears of par- 
 ents and teachers and friends, what tons of 
 good bread and beef, what miles of rich and 
 valuable clothing, have been wasted on 
 them ! And now they are gone, and their 
 most charitable friends are empty- handed ; 
 there is nothing to "show" for them. It 
 was something to be able to hold up those 
 little coats and garments, and say, "She did 
 this." 
 
 Thus it becometh us to fulfil all 
 righteousness (Matt. 3 : 15). 
 
 T N A door-yard an empty 'well, in a kitchen 
 1 an empty larder, in a drawer an empty 
 pocket-book, in a nursery an empty crib, in a 
 workshop empty hands, in a bosom an empty 
 heart ; or, a hive full of honey, a tree full of fruit, 
 a grove full of singing birds, a house full of 
 children and music, a mind full of knowledge, 
 a heart full of love, and hands full of good 
 works! Which do you like the better, emptiness 
 6i 
 
or fulness? It is time to stop "fiddling" 
 with life, "scratching" the surface of the 
 field, "dabbling" with a profession, "tri- 
 fling" with religion. What we need is "to 
 go the whole figure," "fulfil our ministry." 
 Test truth, goodness, charity, duty, righteous- 
 ness, to the very utmost. Let's see what 
 there is in a life crowded full of struggle, faith, 
 hope, love, and endeavor. 
 
 cAnd they turned to the Lord (Acts 9 s 35). 
 
 T_J OW easily and instinctively men ' ' turn to 
 the Lord ' ' in great extremities and 
 great opportunities ! Watch a crowd of peo- 
 ple when the life-saving service is trying to 
 rescue a man from shipwreck. They " turn 
 to God, ' ' as weather-vanes turn to the wind. 
 You can hear muttered prayers on every side. 
 And in great revivals, when the love of 
 heaven is unburdening guilty consciences and 
 cheering saddened hearts, how the multitude 
 ' ' turns to the Lord " ! At such times men 
 know that God is everything, — the great mag- 
 netic center and soul of the universe ; the 
 source of life, of joy, of hope. Only turn. 
 "Turn ye ! Turn ye, for why will ye die ? " 
 If you were God, would you not feel as he 
 does, — that the sweetest thing on earth would 
 62 
 
be the turning of human hearts to you, as 
 the flowers turn to the sun, every hour and 
 moment of its shining ? 
 
 & 
 
 Thou hast nothing to dra.no ivith (John 4 : It). 
 
 A Y, THERE is the rub ! The world, like a 
 ** bountiful well, is full of good things, but 
 the problem is how to get them. The well is 
 deep, and so many people do not have the 
 rope of money or brains or purpose with which 
 to draw. I am not much of a political econo- 
 mist. The whole present system may be 
 wrong, and need righting, — I don't know. 
 But there is one very simple way of getting 
 things into better shape than they are now. 
 Those of us who have ropes can lend them to 
 those who have not. A helping hand is the 
 longest rope in the world, and will reach the 
 bottom of wells so deep that nothing else can 
 touch them. 
 
 A 
 
 cAnd I ivtU Mess thee (Gen. 12 : 2). 
 
 \A 7HETHER you believe it or not, every 
 * * man that is born into the world may 
 attain beatitude. Life may become a felicity. 
 Perhaps not one in a thousand really finds it 
 so ; but this is because they do not "get the 
 63 
 
hang of it." I solemnly affirm that I have 
 never passed a single day of life at the close of 
 which I could have honestly said, ' ' Peace and 
 felicity would have been impossible to-day." 
 And I have had my share of hard ones, too. 
 Nor do I believe that you could. The most 
 terrible calamities contain secret blessings, as 
 the hardest shells contain hidden nuts. There 
 is "blessing" in life as surely as there is life 
 in sunlight. It is in the nature of God to 
 " bless." The trouble lies in our inability or 
 unwillingness to accept. How few people 
 know how to receive favors gracefully ! Fewer 
 still know how to be blessed. It is a fine art. 
 
 For Godtoas taith Mm {Acts 10 : 38). 
 
 A ND he is with every one who goes about do- 
 ing good. Has that thought no splendors ? 
 Think of it ! After you trace a good deed (a 
 truly good deed) back through all its subtle, 
 delicate, and often hidden, impulses, you come 
 at last to God. What is it that prompts men 
 and women to those marvels of patience, of 
 devotion, of self-immolation, that starts the 
 blood in our veins and brings the tears to our 
 eyes ? You say patriotism, love of offspring, 
 sense of duty, and a thousand other things. 
 But this is like answering the question, What 
 6.4 
 
moves the wheels of an engine ? by saying, 
 " The piston rods." Back of everything else 
 is steam. To me it is no more clear that it is 
 sunlight which paints every flower and ripens 
 every fruit than that it is the impact of God's 
 own presence on the soul that produces all 
 good deeds, pure thoughts, and loving words. 
 
 We have sinned, because toe h£be spoken 
 against Jehovah (Num. 21 : 7). 
 
 \ \ 7HAT a happy world it would be if repent- 
 v ' ance always followed sin instantly ! 
 Suppose that wrong-doing invariably produced 
 a feeling of contrition, just as over- work pro- 
 duces fatigue, or over-eating nausea. It always 
 does when the heart has been made right by 
 the love of God in Christ. Without that won- 
 derful alteration in the soul the effect of sin is 
 strangely different. It may produce shame 
 and guilt and fear, but always and everywhere 
 it only makes us weaker and wickeder. Take 
 the sin of "speaking against Jehovah." The 
 first oath terrifies the little boy. He trembles. 
 He is afraid that the trees heard it, and will 
 whisper it to his father ; that the stars heard 
 it, and will tell it to God. But nothing terri- 
 ble happens, and he tries it again. This time 
 he experiences a wild pleasure in his courage. 
 65 
 
After a while he can swear every time he wants 
 to without fear, and soon must swear, whether 
 he wants to or not. With every oath he grows 
 coarser and more insensible. By and by he 
 glories in his shame. Don't hope that sin will 
 cure itself. Clocks don't wind themselves up 
 by running down, and neither do men. Evil is 
 not in the heart like water in a basin or money 
 in your purse. You cannot empty it by pour- 
 ing it out or spending it. It is in your life, 
 like the muscles in the arm of a blacksmith, to 
 get bigger and stronger with use. 
 
 & 
 
 Well done, good and faithful 
 seftant (Matt. 25 : 23). 
 
 ""THE approbation of those we love and re- 
 spect is the most substantial reward of 
 life. It is better than possession of the treas- 
 ures we accumulate or the influence we ac- 
 quire. The smile on the lips of mother, sister, 
 or wife ; the hand-shake of father, brother, 
 friend; the spoken or unspoken "well done," 
 — what can be sweeter than this ? Wait ! 
 Perhaps consciousness of the ability to do it 
 again is the best of all. It is not the talents, 
 but the power to gain more, that is the noblest 
 fruit of life's endeavor. Is it not worth the 
 struggle ? To know that in any sphere of ex- 
 66 
 
istence to which we may be translated we have 
 acquired the power to do our duty ! 
 
 cAs the Spirit gafoe them utterance {Acts 2:4). 
 
 \\ THAT beautiful words must those have 
 been, thus prompted by the Spirit ! I 
 have occasionally heard such, coming like the 
 richest music, lingering upon the ear in soft- 
 ened echoes, returning to memory long after- 
 wards like the murmur of a distant hymn. Do 
 not believe that such words are spoken without 
 some hard and even terrible preparation. 
 Nothing comes out of the mouth in speech 
 that has not in some way gone in by hard labor 
 through some avenue of the intelligence. Such 
 eloqent speeches as those disciples made, are 
 not "chucked" into the mind by the Spirit 
 of God like ready-made cartridges into a 
 Winchester rifle ! It is true that there come 
 great inspirational moments when thought 
 flashes from the lips of great orators in lan- 
 guage that surprises even themselves, but 
 those thoughts were distilled in solemn hours 
 when they burned the midnight oil, or trod 
 the wine-press alone in some great and illu- 
 minating experience. When I was a college 
 boy, I used to wonder why I could not de- 
 bate as well as the other fellows. I found 
 67 
 
out at last that, while I was playing ball, 
 they were ransacking the library ! What 
 came out of these men at Pentecost had, in 
 my firm belief, been put into them in those 
 long days of humble study when they "com- 
 panied with Jesus ' ' in his hard travail. 
 
 St 
 
 Only be strong and very 
 courageous {Josh. I t 7). 
 
 ""THE hardest task I ever tackle is trying to 
 A be brave when I'm scared. It's a good 
 deal like trying to be hot when you're cold. 
 But even that is not impossible. There are 
 a great many ways to get hot when you are 
 cold. You can kindle a fire, and, if there 
 isn't any wood, you can run. And if you are 
 too stiff to run, you may be able to find some- 
 body to thump you on the back, and keep your 
 blood going that way. And it is the same 
 with people who are scared. There are a 
 thousand ways to get your heart back. And 
 the best one I know is to " turn not to the 
 right hand nor the left. " In the vast majority 
 of cases people are scared because they either 
 know or suspect they are in the wrong. Get 
 right. Get back into the "way," and your 
 "grit" will return. Courage is the assurance 
 of divine approval. 
 
 68 
 
•Serf their eyes *te>ere holden that they 
 should not hndfo him (Luke 24 : 16). 
 
 |VJ OT ' ' holden ' ' by any outside pressure. 
 
 1 All spiritually blinded eyes are ' ' holden ' ' 
 from the inside. It is not surgical operation 
 and magnifying glasses that improve the vision 
 of the soul. It is the steady and persistent 
 use of the inner eye itself. If you should stand 
 for twenty years trying to see through a two- 
 inch plank, you could not do it. The eye in 
 all that time would not add a fraction of a de- 
 gree to its penetrating power. But, so far as 
 I know, there is not a spiritual mystery pre- 
 sented to the soul into which it cannot pene- 
 trate farther at the second glance than the 
 first. If you do not recognize God in Christ 
 to-day, you may to-morrow, by fixing your 
 gaze steadily upon him. 
 
 Saul laid 'waste the church {Ads 8:3). 
 
 T T OW easy it is to tear down the work that 
 ■*■ others have patiently done ! In every 
 great city there are professional "wreckers." 
 The builder begins at the bottom; the wreckers 
 begin at the top. He builds up, they pull 
 down. How easy it is to be a destroyer : 
 Dynamite is the only instrument, anarchy the 
 only motive, needed. I do not say that there 
 69 
 
are no structures erected by human society 
 that ought not to come down. It requires a 
 very noble courage, sometimes, to "lay waste" 
 the works of those who have gone before us. 
 But it is the most solemn, serious, dangerous 
 business in the world. I'll give you the best 
 rule there is : Never destroy a hope, or a cus- 
 tom, or an institution, of human life, until you 
 have a better thing to put in its place. Don't 
 stop people's making candles until you give 
 them petroleum. Don' t smash their kerosene- 
 oil lamps until you get their gas-pipes laid. 
 Don't tear out their gas-pipes until you have 
 strung their electric wires. 
 
 & 
 
 cAnd Jehovah hearkened to the voice 
 of Israel {Num. 21 : 3). 
 
 \A/E CANNOT say that God accepts every 
 * " foolish challenge, or takes every man 
 at his lightest word, but he may be counted on 
 as being most awfully faithful to people who 
 put him to these solemn tests. If you are in 
 desperate earnest, if you mean what you say, if 
 you are prepared to stand by it at all cost, then 
 try him. There is some principle in nature (I 
 prefer to say in the heart of God) that accepts 
 the challenge of a man who pledges his life to 
 virtue and usefulness on condition that God 
 70 
 
will fit him for them. If you don' t believe it, 
 try it. It comes pretty close to being a law of 
 life that God gives us cities as fast as we are 
 able to rule them wisely, and talents as fast as 
 we are able to use them profitably. 
 
 cAs / iuas tuith Moses, so I will 
 be 'with thee (Josh. 1:5). 
 
 'T'HERE lies one of the most tremendous in- 
 spirations of life. No man has to per- 
 form any painful task or travel any lonely way 
 as an absolute "novitiate." Some one has 
 always gone before him. He may, if he will, 
 see indubitable proof that God will care for 
 him in the fact that he has been with his pre- 
 decessors. Does your experience in life seem 
 perfectly unique ? You are mistaken. Mil- 
 lions have traveled the same road before, and 
 God has been with them. When Columbus 
 put out on the limitless ocean, from whose 
 distant horizon every other mariner had turned 
 back in horror, even he could not say that he 
 was alone and single in his adventure. Ten 
 thousand other mariners had made attempts 
 as daring, in one way or another. There is 
 no experience of life that is new. Millions 
 have gone through what you are having to 
 endure, and God was with them. Have you 
 7i 
 
lost your fortune ? Are you going blind ? 
 Are you about to die ? Well, good friend, 
 look about you. See the trials of your pre- 
 decessors. God was with them. Why not 
 with you? 
 
 cAnd the pillar of cloud removed from 
 before them, and stood behind 
 them {Exod. 14 t 19). 
 
 TN ALL the imagery and symbolism of 
 ■*■ human life nothing has ever surpassed 
 that of the "pillar of cloud and fire." The 
 most cultivated imaginations in China, Persia, 
 India, Egypt, and Greece, fell short of this sub- 
 lime conception. Some of the readers of this 
 marvelous story may doubt, or even disbelieve, 
 that there was an actual mist of fire or dew 
 thus shifting about these wandering slaves. 
 Well, beware, good friend, of losing the 
 majesty, beauty, and import of this immortal 
 symbol. Do not let your incredulity or skep- 
 ticism blind you to a conception of life sub- 
 lime beyond exaggeration. There was never 
 yet man or nation born into this world who 
 was not accompanied and guarded thus mys- 
 teriously. Through all these glad, sad, sev- 
 enty years, something (we may not know 
 exactly what) goes shiningly before us in the 
 darkness, and pilots us on our way. And 
 72 
 
when the day dawns it retires behind us, and 
 stands between us and our adversaries. 
 Whether you call it God or nature, there it 
 is. You may refuse to see it or to believe in 
 it. No matter ; it never leaves you. While 
 you live, this invisible light leads you, this in- 
 visible cloud defends you. Nothing can de- 
 stroy you until the time appointed. Now, 
 who cannot see that the difference in the 
 spiritual lives of men lies in the perceiving, or 
 not perceiving, these sublime ministrations ? 
 The man who is blind to them is nevertheless 
 attended by them, but stumbles wretchedly 
 along his way. The man who is alive to 
 them, and through such marvelous imagery 
 and symbolism brings them within the range 
 of his vision, travels onward with song and 
 gladness. 
 
 / die ; bat God t»ili surely 
 •visit you (Gen. SO : 24). 
 
 TPHERE you have the ultimate consolation 
 * of all reformers and philanthropists. 
 Men think of themselves (and others think of 
 them) that the objects of compassion who lean 
 upon them for support, or the institutions 
 which stand in their benefactions, cannot get 
 along without them. No ; men die, but God 
 abides. Props fall out from under buildings, 
 73 
 
and piers from bridges, but gravity never loses 
 its energy. It is gravity, and not props or piers, 
 that does the business. It is God, and not 
 individuals, or even institutions, that keeps 
 human society in order. The greatest Joseph 
 or Washington or Lincoln is only a medium 
 through which the divine power operates. 
 They die, but God continues his ceaseless 
 ministrations. The nurses depart, the Great 
 Physician continues his visits. 
 
 cAnd suddenly there came from 
 heaven (Acts 2 : 2). 
 
 O UDDEN things seem disconnected and iso- 
 **■* lated, but they are not. They are the 
 results of long trains of antecedent circum- 
 stances. It only takes a second for the light- 
 ning to flash, but think how long it has taken 
 to gather. The French Revolution seemed to 
 boil over in an instant, but it had been seeth- 
 ing for centuries. This outburst of the divine 
 life, of the Holy Spirit, had been preceded by 
 ages of toil and suffering of the heroes and 
 martyrs of Israel, by the life and death of 
 Jesus, by the silent brooding of the spirits in 
 the hearts of men. There have to be ages of 
 splitting and drying and laying the kindling- 
 wood. Then comes the fire — suddenly. It 
 74 
 
would be more pleasant to live when the fire 
 of a revival bursts forth, but perhaps more 
 useful to live when its materials are being gath- 
 ered. 
 
 & 
 
 cAll the house of Israel lamented 
 after Jehovah (/ Sam. 7 : 2). 
 
 'PHIS fact discloses a law. It is a principle 
 of mortal life that, however well humanity 
 has gotten along without God, for a time, 
 it sooner or later turns toward him with con- 
 scious need and passionate desire. This feel- 
 ing first manifests itself in vague and inarticu- 
 late longings, then in bitter lamentations. 
 Vegetation may endure a few days without 
 sunlight, but not forever, and its need is re- 
 vealed in drooping leaves and withering stalks. 
 The dependence of the souls of men on God 
 is no less vital. It is no less vital than that of 
 little children on their parents, who, if left 
 in their nurseries, may play contentedly 
 for a few moments. Then comes that first 
 uneasy flash of consciousness that they are 
 alone ; then the timidity ; then the fear ; then 
 the agony ; then the loud outcry. It is this 
 same emotional experience through which we 
 "grown-ups" must pass when we discover 
 that we too are playing alone in God's great 
 universe. 
 
 75 
 
Whither thou goest, I 'will go (Ruth I : 16). 
 
 DERHAPS, if it were possible to see through 
 what self-denial a genuine friendship 
 must lead us, none would ever be formed. 
 Few of us can tolerate the logic of love, which 
 is, "Where thou goest, lodgest, sufferest, 
 diest, I will be as near thee as thy shadow." 
 To secure and bestow such friendship is to 
 fulfil the highest function of life. Do you 
 want such a friend ? Make yourself necessary 
 to somebody. As sure as there must be foot- 
 holds or trellises or bark on trees for climbing 
 plants and vines, there must be something in 
 you for friendship to attach itself to. Love 
 can live upon itself alone, but friendship must 
 feed on worthiness. Therefore, the way to 
 secure a friend is to be one. "He that hath 
 friends must show himself friendly. " "A true 
 friend is one soul in two bodies, " said Aristotle. 
 
 He that is but little in the kingdom of God 
 is greater than he (Luke 7 : 28). 
 
 A FTER all, it is not great talents, great in- 
 *^ tellect, great power, great genius, that 
 God most loves. It is those gentle and noble 
 characteristics inspired by a sense of duty to 
 men and to God. Many a servant in a palace 
 has been greater than the king upon his 
 76 
 
throne, many a soldier in the ranks greater 
 than the general on his horse. Many a pupil 
 trembling under the eye of the great professor 
 has been finer, nobler, grander, than his in- 
 structor. Specific gravity varies with the ele- 
 ments. Some things that are very heavy in 
 air are very light in water. Some things that 
 are very small on earth are very large in 
 heaven. 
 
 St 
 
 He that overcometh shall inherit 
 these things {Rev. 21 : 7). 
 
 "THE conquering life, — let us live it. There 
 are no absolutely insuperable obstacles 
 along the pathway. If there are chasms, there 
 is also a way to bridge them. If there are 
 lions, there is also a way to slay them. Is there 
 a mountain ? Well, when God puts a moun- 
 tain in your path, it is an intimation that there 
 is a place for you on its summit. It is safe to 
 say that the great masses of mankind go down 
 to the grave with a consciousness of defeat. 
 They have been thwarted in their plans, 
 deceived in others and in themselves. For 
 this there are two reasons : In the first place, 
 they have struggled for impossible ends, — 
 like gaining happiness through wrong-doing. 
 In the second place, they do not appreciate 
 that certain kinds of failure are the most sub- 
 77 
 
lime successes. Christ failed, judged from 
 their view-point. The life of a man who 
 keeps pure and sweet and hopeful is a mag- 
 nificent success, and ought to fill him with 
 irrepressible joy, even though he dies in the 
 poorhouse. 
 
 "Peace be tmto you {John 20 : 19). 
 
 HPHE whole longing of our Lord's life may 
 be almost summed up in those words. 
 Always and everywhere he was impelled by a 
 ceaseless desire to bring peace to harassed 
 men, peace between nations, peace between 
 neighbors, peace in the soul itself. That was 
 his passion. ' ' O troubled hearts, receive this 
 gift of peace ! ' ' What a passion ! How wide 
 the contrast to ours ! And how pathetic that 
 a man so full of peace, so eager to bestow it 
 upon others, should have been the wholly in- 
 nocent cause of so much strife ! It was not 
 his fault. It is not the fault of the sun that 
 dead bodies decay at the touch of its beams. 
 Nor is it the fault of love that its presence 
 arouses and maddens the hearts of the wicked. 
 But the longing of Christ will yet be satisfied. 
 His love will conquer. Peace will be the uni- 
 versal condition of existence. Calm confi- 
 dence, unbroken repose of mind. — this is the 
 78 
 
ultimate attainment of human life in its di- 
 vinely guided struggles upward. 
 
 Whose heart the Lord opened (Acts 16 : 14). 
 
 TT'S wonderful to see God open a human 
 *■ heart. There is no other power that can 
 do it. See the rain open a bud, the frost open 
 a burr, a locksmith open a safe. Outside 
 pressure has to be brought to bear on closed 
 hearts, and so God comes with the frost of 
 sorrow, the dew of a new joy, or he winds his 
 way through the intricacies of the wards of the 
 lock by an argument, or an epigram, or a pang 
 of conscience. One after another yields as he 
 stands there knocking. His providence and 
 grace are mighty hammers. They sometimes 
 shatter the hardest hearts, and sometimes melt 
 them. 
 
 cdnd the children of Israel set 
 forward (Nam. 10 : 12). 
 
 " CET forward!" Keep that motto in 
 **-* mind. All true progress is onward 
 and upward. If you are on the wrong track, 
 don' t ' ' lay down ! ' ' Turn squarely round, and 
 get out headforemost. Nulla vestigia retrorsa, 
 — that is, "Never a step backward." Don't 
 79 
 
get into the wrong road. Stop and look for 
 the signs ; ask questions. Make a little sure 
 progress every day. " Get a move on you." 
 "Keep making headway." What did you 
 accomplish last year ? Nothing ? That' s 
 awful ! ' ' Get ahead ;" put a little money in 
 the bank ; add another friend to your list ; 
 earn a "raise" in your salary; conquer an- 
 other bad habit ; acquire another virtue ; set 
 up a tall stake to mark your last year' s accom- 
 plishment, and don't rest a minute until you 
 "go it one better." 
 
 & 
 
 Forgive (Gen. 50 t IT). 
 
 ""THOSE mental processes by which "for- 
 giveness ' ' is formed in the soul are the 
 most beautiful in the world. What instinctive 
 admiration we have for a soul that manu- 
 factures forgiveness ! It is wonderful to go 
 into a mill, and see them take old dirty rags, 
 wash them, chop them up, soak them to a 
 pulp, and then roll them out into great sheets 
 of snow-white paper. It is wonderful to see a 
 great river receive the turbid waters of drains 
 and sewers, roll them about, tumble them to- 
 gether, throw them up to air and sunlight, and, 
 fifty miles after they have carried them past 
 one great city, give them to another clear as 
 
 80 
 
crystal and fit to drink. But this is nothing 
 compared to seeing minds like those of Joseph 
 and Jesus receive into themselves curses, in- 
 justice, insult, evil, and by that marvelous 
 alchemy of love give them out in the form of 
 kindness, sympathy, and forgiveness. I know 
 such hearts. It makes no difference what you 
 throw in to their wheels, nothing comes out 
 but gentleness. 
 
 Cleanse your conscience (Heb. 9 : 14). 
 
 """TO THAT great business Jesus gave his life. 
 Not to inventing machinery to lighten 
 labor, not to discovering laws to explain the 
 mysteries of nature, not to devising new insti- 
 tutions to remodel civil government, but to 
 cleansing consciences, to teaching men how to 
 throw off the burden of guilt, how to live at peace 
 with themselves, their neighbors, God. This 
 is the noblest business in the world. There 
 are no two different feelings more analogous 
 than, on coming in from toil tired, hot, and 
 dirty, to plunge into a bath, and emerge 
 rested, cool, and clean ; and, going to God 
 with the heart full of filthy and wicked 
 thoughts, and rising from the knees penitent, 
 forgiven, restored to terms of confidence and 
 love. To be a teacher of that art, — is it not 
 sublime ? 
 
 81 
 
Let us return into Egypt (Num. 14 : 4). 
 
 \17HAT? Back to slavery? Never! It is 
 ' * better to die with one's feet on the soil 
 of liberty, and have for one's last breath the 
 sweet air of freedom. When the Spanish mes- 
 sengers found Pizarro and his companions half 
 starved and sick, and commanded them to 
 abandon their foolhardy expedition to Peru, 
 the old adventurer drew a line in the sand 
 with the point of his sword, and told the cow- 
 ards to return, but bade every hero to cross it 
 with him. They crossed to a man. If you 
 have started out to live the "divine" life, — 
 the life of purity, of peace, of unselfishness, — 
 don' t turn back, though death and hell should 
 seem to stand in your way. 
 
 <And Jacob's <wett ivas there (John 4 : 6). 
 
 ]\T O OBJECT in nature is more beautiful or 
 * ™ more useful than a water source. To 
 dig a well, to open a path to a spring, to pipe 
 a stream to a fountain, — these are among the 
 most noble deeds of human life. Some people 
 are like wells, and have much in them that is 
 useful to their fellows, but it can only be got- 
 ten at with a long rope like that at Jacob's 
 well. Some are like those water-soaked fields 
 82 
 
on Western prairies, where the horses find 
 drink by stamping with their hard hoofs. 
 Some are like generous springs with water 
 trickling quietly over their green lips. Some 
 are like great copious fountains flinging the 
 sparkling flood high into air. Some are as 
 dry as an abandoned well in Texas, down 
 into which I once let a bucket with a rope one 
 hundred feet long, only to dip up mud ! What- 
 ever else you are, don't be a dry well ! 
 
 St 
 
 cAnd they could not answer again 
 unto these things {Luke 14 : 6). 
 
 ""THERE are two unanswerable arguments, — 
 absolute truthfulness of word and abso- 
 lute beauty of deed. Men abuse us, condemn 
 us, suspect us, defy us, but there is something 
 about a truth told with eyes wide open, and a 
 beautiful deed done with a heart full of love, 
 that silences and convicts. Your enemies may 
 rage and froth at the mouth, they may burn 
 you at the stake or hang you on a gibbet, but 
 their words of condemnation die in their 
 throats. Truth and goodness — these were the 
 weapons with which Christ won his victories. 
 And they are as mighty to-day as ever. Recall 
 the calm assurance and the exalted happiness 
 that came to you when you stood up fearlessly 
 83 
 
and told the truth, or courageously and did the 
 right, and then acknowledge to yourself that 
 ' ' a boy is a fool who ever hesitates an instant. ' ' 
 
 God is no respecter of persons (Ads 10 : 34). 
 
 DEFORE what earthly tribunal do men 
 *~^ stand solely on their merits ? In the judg- 
 ment of what individual do the mere accesso- 
 ries of life, the superficial elements, count for 
 nothing ? In spite of ourselves, we base our 
 estimate of character on wealth, money, cul- 
 ture, manners, dress ! Ninety-nine out every 
 hundred of us give ' ' the benefit of the doubt ' ' 
 to a woman in a tailor-made suit or a man in a 
 ' ' swallow-tail ' ' coat. Who does not blush 
 at the superficiality, the partiality, of his own 
 judgment of men ? Who would not be glad 
 to live in a social circle or do business in a 
 community where nothing but intrinsic worth 
 counted ? Fancy the thrill that would shoot 
 through the hearts of honest laboring men, 
 who have all their lives seen people shrink 
 away from their dirty clothes and calloused 
 hands, when they felt that at last their neigh- 
 bors had taken them at their true worth, and 
 that they were now standing on the simple 
 platform of manhood ! Your day is coming, 
 my dear fellow, and it will be when you stand 
 before God. He is no respecter of persons. 
 84 
 
cAstonished at his teaching {Mark I : 22). 
 
 (~\F COURSE, they were, and still are, at 
 ^-^ the teaching of any man who goes 
 straight to the heart of things as he did. For 
 he was as direct in his teachings as in his do- 
 ings. Jesus was always looking for the ' ' heart ' ' 
 of the thing. His mind went straight to the 
 mark. He swept away all the mists in an in- 
 stant, and made his hearers see just what he 
 saw. Now and then we meet a man who talks 
 about things so simply that we say, ' ' Why in 
 the world didn't I say that myself? It lay on 
 the very surface, and yet I overlooked it." 
 Benjamin Franklin and Abraham Lincoln had 
 a way of thus seeing and saying what every 
 one else overlooked in the realm of scientific 
 and practical affairs. Some men are gifted 
 with this power at birth, but any one can ac- 
 quire something of it if he will only believe 
 that the "heart" of the subject is the thing 
 to look for. 
 
 & 
 
 Howbett the people thai diuett in the 
 land are strong {Num. 13 : 28). 
 
 r\F COURSE ! Was it ever otherwise ? 
 ^-^ All great prizes are at the top, and not 
 the bottom, of the ladder ; behind barred 
 doors, not open ones. The children of Anak 
 guard every treasure worth the love of man, 
 85 
 
Take the pearl, which lies at the bottom of the 
 sea. Take liberty, which is not a donation, 
 but an achievement ; not granted by an easy 
 vote of a legislature, but attained by infinite 
 toil and suffering. Take God, who conceals 
 himself beyond the discovery of every eye but 
 the one which will not take "No" for an 
 answer. ' ' Raise the stone and there thou 
 shalt find me, cleave the wood and there am 
 I." Lift! Cleave! "I will make the sal- 
 vation of my soul my life work," said Jona- 
 than Edwards. I say this : An easy life is 
 always a bad one. A Canaan without con- 
 quest is (ninety-nine times out of a hundred) 
 either a curse or a calamity. 
 
 Go . . . tell John the things 'which ye 
 have seen and heard (Luke 7 : 22). 
 
 ""THE fishes leave no trail in the sea, and the 
 * birds leave no trail in the air, but every 
 living thing that creeps or crawls or runs across 
 the surface of the earth leaves the marks of its 
 passage behind it. The lion leaves his foot- 
 prints and the carcasses of his victims. The 
 snail leaves a slimy wake, and, if our eyes were 
 sharp enough, we could see the marks of the 
 feet of the crickets and the grasshoppers. And 
 so men leave their marks, — the conqueror in 
 86 
 
desolated provinces, the statesmen in benefi- 
 cent laws, the artist in great pictures, the archi- 
 tect in noble buildings. The marks which 
 Jesus left behind him were happy homes and 
 hearts. You could trace him from Nazareth 
 to Jerusalem, and from Jerusalem to Caper- 
 naum, by the people whom he had healed of 
 their diseases and lifted out of their sins. 
 These trails cannot be covered up. What are 
 you leaving behind you ? 
 
 & 
 
 Is less than all seeds ; but . . . becometh 
 a tree (Matt. 13 : 32). 
 
 1VFEVER, never, never despise a thing be- 
 *■ cause it is small. I can still remember 
 the vague feeling of wonder in my heart when, 
 as a child, I said over those little old-fashioned 
 lines : 
 
 " Little drops of water, little grains of sand, 
 Make the mighty ocean and the pleasant land." 
 
 It always seemed to me that it ought to have 
 been just the reverse. I know better now, and I 
 take off my hat to all little bits of things, — 
 little brooks, little eggs, little microbes, little 
 boys, and little girls, not because they are 
 little, but because of what is tucked away out 
 of sight in their littleness. When some one 
 87 
 
disparaged a boy because he was little, Daniel 
 Webster said, "It is out of just such things 
 that men are made." The littlest, puniest 
 child in that class of yours may some time sit 
 in a presidential chair or judge angels. Be 
 careful how you treat him. 
 
 cAnd halving given thanks (John 6 1 II). 
 
 C VEN if gratitude were not a duty, we should 
 still try to cultivate it, just for the pleas- 
 ure it excites in the soul. The sensations which 
 we feel when gratitude wells from the heart 
 are almost perfect bliss. They are what a 
 rose would feel if it were conscious of its own 
 perfume, or a spring of the pure water gurgling 
 up out of its depths. To me ingratitude is 
 repulsive and horrible. Did you ever watch 
 the keepers feed the tigers in a museum ? It 
 is the absence of gratitude that makes the 
 sight horrible. All the eye of the tiger says is 
 "More, more, more!" And I have seen 
 men eat in the same way. How much better 
 than an animal is the man who does not feel 
 gratitude for his daily bread and all his other 
 mercies ! How different is the light in the 
 eye of a tiger from that in the eye of a sick 
 soldier when a Sister of Charity gives him a 
 draught of cold water ! That light is gratitude, 
 88 
 
a light more beautiful than that of the evening 
 star. Are you cultivating it in yourself? 
 
 & 
 
 Ifemember the sa.bba.th day, to 
 keep H holy (Exod. 20 : 8). 
 
 V^OU can judge a man's intellectual, moral, 
 and spiritual attainments by the use he 
 makes of his Sabbaths. If they bore him, it is 
 as certain that he has not achieved true cul- 
 ture, as it is if he is bored by literature and art. 
 If he devotes them to idleness or pleasure, it 
 is like letting a pianola stand closed, or using 
 it to play rag-time music. I should be more 
 ashamed not to know how to make my Sabbath 
 days a supreme joy and blessing than not to 
 know how to spend a thousand dollars to my 
 own advantage. Men need to bathe their, 
 souls in Sabbath peace and quiet as they need 
 to bathe their bodies in pure water. It takes 
 time to be holy. Men can no more be holy 
 without quiet hours of exposing themselves to 
 the influence of the divine Spirit than an apple 
 can get mellow without weeks of hanging in 
 the sun. You may be able to keep honest 
 and industrious and faithful by being ever- 
 lastingly on the hop, skip, and jump, but holy 
 (calm, serene, tranquil, at rest in moral equi- 
 librium) you will never be without your hours 
 89 
 
and days of meditation and worship. Men are 
 not polished into holiness by being eternally 
 rolled along the shore of the ocean of life, like 
 pebbles. Don't try to keep Sunday holy, but 
 your self. 
 
 & 
 
 He that loveth his neighbor hath 
 fulfilled the la.<w {Rom. 13 : 10). 
 
 \^ES, love is a "short cut" to the goal of 
 duty. Do you want to be happy ? 
 Learn how to love. Do you want to meet 
 every obligation of life ? Learn how to love. 
 Everything goes easy to the lover. From 
 what mysterious herb hath God extracted this 
 strange potency by which pain is made pleasure, 
 and the most disagreeable drudgery of life a lux- 
 ury ? If you never learn any other lesson, learn 
 how to love. This is not so easy. It is easy 
 enough to love what you do love, but how are 
 you going to love what you don' t love ? Ay, 
 there's the rub ! What ! love disagreeable, 
 offensive, unlovely people ? To be sure ! 
 There is certain to be something good and 
 sweet in the worst of them. And besides 
 there is that strange and wonderful love of 
 "benevolence" — the power of the soul to 
 wish the worst people well, which, if it is 
 aroused, develops into a love as pure as the 
 love of God. It's hard to get it started, but 
 90 
 
the capacity is in you, so rouse it up ! When 
 you can control your affections, and love whom 
 you ought to love, that strangely beautiful and 
 wonderful feeling will fulfil all the duties of life, 
 as electricity seems likely to do all the work of 
 the world. Yes, love is the ' ' short cut ' ' to 
 the goal of duty. 
 
 cAnd he could not be hid {Murk 7 : 24). 
 
 /""ENIUSof any kind is like fire. Amidst 
 ^-* the combustible elements of human life 
 it will burn itself out into view. There will be 
 many a young fellow who will need to be told 
 this, for there are thousands of them who are 
 already getting embittered at the lack of 
 "recognition." I do not say that merely 
 potential genius — genius which exists latent 
 — will always be discovered ; but I do say 
 that genius which is alive, active, efficient, 
 actually accomplishing things for the enjoy- 
 ment or betterment of mankind, can no more 
 be concealed than fire. The world will not 
 dig you out of your hole, as boys dig out wood- 
 chucks, if you merely have the undeveloped 
 capacity to do things. But if you are actually 
 singing a song, or writing a poem, or preach- 
 ing a sermon, or building a house, or paint- 
 ing a picture, or shoeing a horse, in such a 
 way as to give pleasure or profit to men, they 
 9 1 
 
will find you, even if you are down in a well. 
 If you do not get recognition, ten chances to 
 one it is because you don' t play your part to 
 the satisfaction of the audience. 
 
 & 
 
 He leadeth me beside still waters {Psa.. 23 s 2). 
 
 "THE soul of man, in one respect at least, 
 shares the twofold necessity of water, — 
 agitation and repose. There are times when 
 we need to be shaken up by the fury of the 
 rapids, and others when we need to be spread 
 out in the calm stillness of the lake. To the 
 young, all repose is stagnation. They love to 
 launch their barks on stormy seas. But there 
 comes a time when the soul longs for still 
 waters — "waters of rest." The final meas- 
 urement of life values discloses the ineffable 
 worth of stillness and quiet. There is no 
 power like that of silence and repose. The 
 heart that is to be filled to the brim with holy 
 joy must be still. Energy resides in tranquil- 
 lity. The stars and the sun rise in silence, 
 and so do great events. Bees work in silence, 
 and so do thoughts. Trees grow in aphony and 
 muteness, so also do characters. But rest and 
 peace are not products of external conditions. 
 The soul may be tempest-tossed on the most 
 stagnant sea, and yet as calm as heaven 
 92 
 
even amidst the breakers. " Diogenes found 
 more rest in his tub than Alexander on his 
 throne. " " Weariness can snore upon the 
 flint when rusty sloth finds the down pillow 
 hard." All true peace and rest and quietness 
 are the gifts of God through the consciousness 
 of his presence. 
 
 He <was rmxch perplexed (Mark 6 1 20). 
 
 ""THERE is a fearful fascination about both 
 evil and good. We are drawn towards 
 both, as men are drawn to the edges of preci- 
 pices and the tops of mountains. We are 
 pulled both ways like iron filings between pow- 
 erful magnets. They ' ' turn our heads. ' ' We 
 are ' ' perplexed. ' ' Herod halted and hesi- 
 tated between John and his boon companions. 
 When Herodias sang, he thought there was 
 nothing else in the whole world worth his 
 while. But when John transfixed him with his 
 deep-set eye, and thrilled him with the very 
 eloquence of heaven, it seemed to him as if he 
 could throw away his scepter and his crown 
 without a struggle to adopt the beautiful life 
 that he described. And when neither of them 
 were with him, when he was all alone, when 
 silence brooded around him, then he did not 
 know what to do, for he was tormented with a 
 93 
 
desire for both. But he had to choose at last, 
 and so do we all. We may put it off and put 
 it off, but finally we shall be compelled to de- 
 cide. You cannot always halt between the 
 two sets of companions who are trying to claim 
 you for their own. One of them will get you 
 at last. You had better decide before it is 
 decided for you by some terrible mistake you 
 stumble into. 
 
 This is of a, truth the prophet that cometh 
 into the 'world (John 6 : 14). 
 
 TT CAME out at last, — the real truth about 
 this wonderful being. Be sure of this, — 
 the secret nature of every one of us will 
 sooner or later be revealed. Our Lord's 
 prophetic gifts "revealed themselves." All 
 real talents are like fire, — they burn out into 
 view. If you have a gift, do not be afraid 
 that it will never be discovered. Do not go 
 around thrusting it into other people's faces. 
 Do not be bragging of it, describing it, calling 
 attention to it. If you have the capacity to 
 stand at the head of your class, or run the 
 business in which you are now only an errand 
 boy, it will leak out. The boss or the super- 
 intendent will see it creeping out of every little 
 deed you do. 
 
 94 
 
They were moved tuith 
 indignation (Matt. 21 i 15). 
 
 ~\/Qi\J can judge a man always and every- 
 where by what angers him. What is it 
 that makes you maddest ? Is it injustice ? Is 
 it impurity ? Is it vice of any kind ? That is 
 a noble feeling that flames with a sudden pas- 
 sion at any meanness and at any wrong. 
 But these men (shame upon them!) were 
 angered by innocence, by the recognition of 
 virtue, by the triumph of holiness. If your 
 heart swells with bitterness because of the 
 prosperity of some one who is innocent and 
 good, be sure that it is the abode of an evil 
 spirit, and needs cleansing. 
 
 He that loveth his life loseth it (John 12 : 25). 
 
 TF YOU get strong, and then try to keep 
 your strength without using it, you will 
 find that every muscle grows flabby, soft, and 
 weak. If you get power, and try to keep it 
 without exercising it, it will do you as much 
 good as steam will do a boiler with no wheels 
 to turn. If you get money, and try to enjoy 
 it without spending it, or giving it away, any 
 pleasure you derive from it will make you 
 selfish, mean, and low. Nature works auto- 
 matically in this field. When my furnace gets 
 95 
 
too hot, a damper closes, and the draft shuts 
 off. Nature operates the machinery of your 
 heart in the same way. If you get a certain 
 amount of this world's goods, and do not 
 divide with others, the damper closes, the 
 sensibility to happiness ceases, the power to 
 enjoy cools. 
 
 & 
 
 If thou ivitt indeed deliver, . . . then I 
 tuitL utterly destroy {Num. 21 : 2). 
 
 1 T IS a perilous experiment to offer condi- 
 tions to God, for the case looks so differ- 
 ent when the conditions are met ! Many a 
 mother has promised to dedicate a baby to 
 God (if he would only give her one) who has 
 forgotten the promise in the selfish sweetness 
 of its love. Many a man has sworn to give 
 his fortune to benevolence (if God would per- 
 mit him to make it) who, when he has ac-; 
 quired it, could not resist its fascinations. 
 Many a boy has vowed himself to the ministry 
 (if God would give him an education) who 
 afterward could not resist the temptation to 
 use it for his own aggrandizement. And yet a 
 pledge like this is solemn beyond words. 
 Have you sworn ? Fulfil ! You may affirm 
 that circumstances have altered, and excuse 
 yourself in a thousand ways. The solemn fact 
 remains that a promise made to the invisible 
 96 
 
God has a million fold more sacredness than 
 to an earthly friend. I'll lose my guess if 
 these words do not fall under the eye of some 
 one whose life has been perverted or thwarted 
 by failing to stick to a pledge. You know 
 how true they are ! 
 
 St 
 
 Wherefore didst thou doubt? (Matt. 14 : 31.) 
 
 " \17HEN he saw the wind boisterous." 
 " " Well, that is the way with most of 
 us. It is easy to be brave when there is no 
 danger. I too am a fine sailor when I can see 
 my face in the water from the upper deck. 
 It is the whistle of the wind in the cordage, 
 the wild plunge of the vessel down into the 
 trough of the waves, that takes the nerve out 
 of me. Do you know what all fear is ? All 
 fear is unfaith. You can no more be afraid 
 when your heart is full of confidence than you 
 can be hungry when your stomach is full of 
 food. There are no two things so much alike, 
 and so unlike, as courage and temerity, and as 
 faith and presumption. In their incipient 
 stages you have to tie a pink ribbon around 
 faith to tell it from presumption, just as the 
 mothers of twins do around the finger of one 
 of the babies to tell it from the other. But 
 when they are full grown the difference is an- 
 97 
 
tipodal. Presumption believes that it can do 
 anything it wants to do ; Faith believes that it 
 can do anything that it ought to do. It is a 
 shame and a sin to doubt that you can acom- 
 plish anything that is your duty. Plunge into 
 water, dash through fire, defy frost, if a duty 
 lies on the other side. You may burn, you 
 may drown, you may freeze, but nothing can 
 harm you. Do you understand that ? If you 
 do, you know the secret of life. 
 
 Choose you this day "cohotn ye 
 tuill serve (Josh. 24 : 15). 
 
 ■yo TRAIN the mind to a swift, free, in- 
 telligent, and right choice between the 
 alternatives of existence is to me the sum and 
 substance of our business of life. This busi- 
 ness is not to think profoundly, nor to act 
 bravely, so much as to choose wisely, for upon 
 right choice all else depends. Never leave an 
 important matter to accident. Never "flip a 
 cent," nor "cut a pack of cards," nor consult 
 a fortune-teller, nor let others choose for you. 
 How the mind shrinks back from the pain o\ 
 decision ! No matter, — force it on. Make 
 it "take a decision," as a good fox-hunter 
 compels a reluctant horse to " take " a ditch 
 or a fence. Don' t be a straw in a current, a 
 98 
 
leaf in a wind, a boy in a crowd. "Choose 
 her or lose her ' ' is the stern mandate that 
 God has written over the door of fortune, and 
 also eternal life. "Choose me or lose me" 
 he has also inscribed over the portal of his 
 own palace. 
 
 St 
 
 Jesus therefore, being tvearied (Jonn 4:6). 
 
 A ND so the "divine man" also suffered 
 ^^ fatigue. Well, without it, he would never 
 have known the sweetness of rest, and no more 
 would you and I. But full of blessings as 
 hours of fatigue may be, they are dangerous 
 too, and we must look out for the perils of 
 physical prostration. It is through the shadows 
 of these hours that the assassins of hope and 
 joy steal upon us. Most people do not know 
 what is the matter with them when they are 
 tired. They think that the whole world is out 
 of joint, while the real trouble is in their own 
 joints ! I have seen men who always thought 
 that the voices of their children were twice as 
 loud, the coffee three times as weak, and the 
 bread four times as heavy, at night as in the 
 morning. I wonder they never learn that 
 tired eyes and ears see and hear double. Be- 
 ware of the ' ' tired hours, ' ' Little Bill ! 
 Things are never anywhere near so dark and 
 bad as they seem to you when you come home 
 99 
 
from a football game with your nose all bloody, 
 your arms all bruised, and your legs and back 
 aching so that you can hardly sit up at the 
 table. Jesus was just as tired as you are, and, 
 no doubt, things looked just as dark some- 
 times ; but he was never cross, and he always 
 knew that, when he got rested, they would look 
 brighter. 
 
 & 
 
 Thou preparest a table before me in the 
 presence of mine enemies (Psa. 23 : 5). 
 
 LJERE is a swift, brilliant, fleeting glimpse 
 *■ *■ of another method of God' s providence. 
 It is not his idea of the education of men 
 never to give them sight and fight of their 
 enemies. He does not take them to solitary 
 and safe retreats to feed them. He spreads 
 their tables in the very presence of their foes 
 to give them nerve. There was once a general 
 who educated his horses to tranquillity amidst 
 confusion and danger by putting their oats on 
 the heads of the drums and having the drummers 
 beat them while the trembling animals were 
 feeding. Victory is inscribed on the banners 
 of the army that is able to take its rations in 
 the presence of an enemy. The man who can 
 eat and sleep in the face of disaster will never 
 know final defeat. 
 
 ioo 
 
When they 'mere fully amake, they 
 sam> his glory (Luke 9 : 32). 
 
 T T IS only when we are wide awake that we 
 *■ see the real glories of life. How different 
 the world and life itself looks to those who are 
 half asleep ! Did you ever notice the differ- 
 ence in the faces of the people when they start 
 for town in the morning, and come home at 
 night ? At night the people are all hunched 
 over, cross, dispirited, and gloomy. In the 
 morning every man thinks he is going to make 
 a hundred dollars before sunset ! How differ- 
 ent the country looks to you after you have 
 been fishing all day, and have a five-mile walk 
 to get home, from what it did when you set 
 out; fresh from a long night's sleep, in the 
 morning ! It is just as beautiful in the even- 
 ing light as in the morning, but it doesn' t look 
 so. You are half asleep, and cross. Every- 
 thing seems ugly and gloomy. Judge life by 
 the morning hours. 
 
 Every one that believeth on him shall 
 receive remission of sins (Acts 10 s 43). 
 
 T PUT all other mysteries of the visible or 
 *■ invisible world second to that of the re- 
 mission of sin through confession and pardon. 
 It is wonderful to see light dispel darkness, to 
 see water cleanse the soil of our garments, 
 
 101 
 
magnetism attract iron filings, electricity pro- 
 pel cars, Rontgen rays pierce solid iron, Mar- 
 coni receive a message across the ocean without 
 wires ! We are so fashioned that when we 
 open our minds to the full force of these mys- 
 teries we are moved to awe. But I am moved 
 more deeply still when I see a little child with 
 a guilty conscience creep into its mother's 
 arms, confess its sin, and feel the pain and an- 
 guish die away at her words of pardon ; and to 
 see a man whose life has been base and vile 
 prostrate himself before God in agony, pour 
 out his soul in penitence, and suddenly be- 
 come so conscious of forgiving love as to rise 
 in a hushed and awful gladness, — this is the 
 greatest marvel of existence. 
 
 / shall not ivant {Psa.. 23 : I). 
 
 TJOW to hold that sublime faith in provi- 
 dence consistently with a sense of per- 
 sonal responsibility for daily bread and clothing, 
 is a psychological as well as a religious prob- 
 lem. To live tranquilly, like a sheep in a 
 green meadow by a still running brook, and 
 also like a man with grocers' and butchers' 
 and shoemakers' bills to be met at the first of 
 the month, is no child's play. To have strug- 
 gled heroically until one is fifty without a 
 
dollar in the bank to show for it ; to realize 
 that one's " productive period " will terminate 
 in a decade, and yet to look forward with a 
 sublime faith that we " shall not want," while 
 life gets harder every day and each gray hair 
 and wrinkle shuts another door against us, — 
 this is a sublime achievement. But let us re- 
 member that our necessities never equal our 
 wants ; that it is our imaginary wants which 
 are so numerous, while our real wants are very 
 few, and that hundreds of us would have never 
 known want at all if we had not first known 
 waste. And let us remember also that it is 
 easy to exaggerate the importance of all our 
 own fuming and fussing to supply our daily re- 
 current needs. For, after all, it is God's sun 
 and rain, his wind and steam, his heart and 
 arm, that really keep us from need. 
 
 For am I in the place of God? {Gen. 50 : 19.) 
 
 \ 7ENGEANCE is the prerogative of God. 
 "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith 
 the Lord. ' ' Nothing is more presumptuous, 
 nothing more dangerous, nothing more cer- 
 tain to ' ' work backward, " to " blow out at 
 the breech," than the effort to stand in the 
 place of God when it comes to the matter of 
 ''righting wrongs." Society has to restrain, 
 103 
 
but not "vindicate." Only God knows ex- 
 actly what retribution to mete out to wrong 
 doers. But there is a way in which we may 
 try to stand " in the place of God." It is by 
 doing good. And there is no other joy so 
 profound as the feeling, " I am doing God' s 
 work, I am standing in the place of God," — 
 to this poor little orphan boy, to this widow 
 and her fatherless children, to this poor con- 
 vict who has just come out of prison, to this 
 traveler who has fallen among thieves, to this 
 prodigal who has come to himself. Every 
 true-hearted man or woman knows by some 
 sweet experience what it is to have that deep 
 and almost awful feeling, as if one were the 
 good God himself, when protecting some poor 
 child of misfortune. 
 
 & 
 
 He restoreth my soul (Psa. 23 : 3). 
 
 RESTORATION maybe said to be thekey- 
 A ^ word to the philosophy of the Bible. 
 That great book is saturated with the ideas of 
 rejuvenation, regeneration, and recovery. 
 "Repent ye therefore and turn again that 
 your sins may be blotted out, that so there 
 may come seasons of refreshing from the pres- 
 ence of the Lord, and that he may send the 
 Christ who hath been appointed for you, even 
 Jesus, whom the heaven must receive until the 
 104 
 
time of the restoration (American Revision) of 
 all things." Without attempting to fathom 
 the exact meaning of these words, you may 
 safely enough grasp with whole-hearted enthu- 
 siasm the general idea of a vast and inimitably 
 recuperative 'power in nature, a tendency to 
 return from unstable to stable equilibrium, 
 from miscarriage and frustration to fruition and 
 victory, from death to life, from sin to right- 
 eousness. Growth, and not decay, is the law 
 of the universe. Restoration, and not de- 
 struction, is the aim of God in this vast scheme 
 of existence. Enumerate (if you only could) 
 the times in which God has built you up from 
 the ground. Reflect on the experiences in 
 which he has set you on your feet, wiped your 
 tears, reanimated your hopes, and from these 
 perceive his method of the moral government 
 of mankind. 
 
 Went e^ery year to Jerusalem at the 
 feast of the passomer {Luke 2 : 4t). 
 
 lVTOT every fifth, or third, or every other 
 year, but every year ! With the steadi- 
 ness of the swing of the planets, and the 
 changing phases of the moon, these faithful, 
 consecrated Jewish people went to the house 
 of God, and performed the sacred tasks of life. 
 It is comparatively easy to do what we have to 
 105 
 
do, and go where we have to go, but the su- 
 preme test of a man is not so much in the dis- 
 charge of obligatory as of voluntary and self- 
 appointed tasks. When a man goes to the 
 store six days in a week because he must, 
 and stays at home from church on Sunday be- 
 cause he can, there is a screw loose in him, 
 and he'd better tighten it. God give us fewer 
 brilliant, erratic, now-and-then men, but more 
 faithful, steady, persistent, every-year-at-the- 
 feast men, — men that go, rain or shine, thick 
 or thin, snow or sun. A man is not half a 
 man who does not do some things with his 
 teeth clenched and his face set like a flint. 
 
 Wherefore criest thou unto me? speak unto 
 the children of Israel, that they go 
 forward {Exod. i4 : IS). 
 
 rNO NOT imagine that any one principle of 
 '~ J life interprets the whole of it. Some 
 one has just said comfortably to himself, " If 
 all there is to life is just standing still and see- 
 ing God do the business, I can manage pretty 
 easily." But listen. There comes a time 
 when this won't do. You cannot do much, 
 but what you can do you must do. Where- 
 fore do you stand there mumbling your use- 
 less prayers to God ? Go forward. Draw 
 1 06 
 
your sword. Open your furrow. Launch 
 your ship. This thing awaiting your activity 
 will not be done for you by God or man. 
 Millions of sunbeams, forces of irresistible 
 magnitude, spirits innumerable, are all around 
 you, but not one of them will lift a finger to 
 do that task. It is yours, not theirs. God 
 will smite the Egyptians with plagues, he will 
 roll back the waters pf the Jordan, he will take 
 off the wheels of the Egyptian chariots, but if 
 you do not get a move on you, and go for- 
 ward, God will not stir a single muscle in your 
 leg. There are multitudes of fortunes being 
 lost and lives being wrecked because men won't 
 ' ' go forward. ' ' 
 
 He that is faithful in a. <vety little is 
 faithful also in much (Luke 16 : 10). 
 
 \17E GAIN self-confidence and the confi- 
 " * dence of others by the discharge of 
 little trusts. What we do with them is a sign 
 of what we shall do with others. A little spark 
 is as hot as a big conflagration, and a little 
 drop of water is as wet as a big flood. What 
 a little chap does with his pennies is a pretty 
 good sign of what he will do with his dollars. 
 God trains us on littles. It was Corporal 
 Tommie' s handling his ' ' squad ' ' well that 
 made the colonel think he would make a good 
 io£ 
 
captain. It was handling his " company" well 
 that made the general think he would make a 
 good Colonel, and so on away up to the top 
 of the ladder. 
 
 I fell at his feet as one dead (Rib. I : 17). 
 
 OURELY life, death, the universe, God, are 
 overpowering ; if one sees the true terror 
 or the sublime beauty of existence, it is enough 
 to strike him dumb or dead. To live amidst 
 all these dangers and responsibilities and op- 
 portunities, to know that one is moving resist- 
 lessly forward into the eternities and infinities, 
 that he is absolutely certain to see God face to 
 face, that he will behold heaven or hell with his 
 own eyes, is fearful ! But God says, ' ' Fear 
 not." Live in trust. Exist in hope. Go 
 forward. Yes, let us go forward. We are as 
 safe in his hands as a drop of water in an 
 ocean. 
 
 & 
 
 The good things to come (Heb. 9 : If). 
 
 ""THE good things (yes, the best things) are 
 * all "to come." The golden age of the 
 world is not in the past, but the future. The 
 richest blessings of the individual life are not 
 in infancy and youth, but in maturity and old 
 age ; not in this present life, but in the one to 
 108 
 
which this is only the vestibule. You get away 
 from Christ and his apostles in proportion as 
 you live in the past, or in proportion as you 
 distrust the future. To-morrow must be better 
 than to-day, or, at any rate, next year than 
 this. "The best is yet to be," and yet (mind 
 this) this great law fulfils itself only to those 
 who love the best, who believe in the best, and 
 who seek the best. The physical eye only 
 perceives the light or darkness which exists. 
 The eye of the soul creates its own darkness 
 and light ! 
 
 St 
 
 'Receive ye the Holy Spirit {John 20 : 22). 
 
 ""TO DOUBT the possibility of receiving the 
 gift bestowed upon those apostles is to 
 question the deepest experience of life. Let 
 others tell you "how" you may receive it. 
 Let me tell you that it is possible. A new 
 spirit really takes possession of men. Call it 
 by what name you will, cherish what theory 
 you may about it, only believe in it, and strive 
 to attain it ! There is a gate that can be 
 opened to the stream of spiritual power that 
 washes against your soul. There is a door 
 through which the divine spirit can enter. 
 Thereby men become stronger, purer, holier ! 
 Stephen received it ; Saul of Tarsus did ; so 
 did Luther, Chalmers, Moody, and millions of 
 109 
 
others. Do not measure yourselves by what 
 strength you now possess. The soul is as ca- 
 pable of receiving an outside force into itself 
 as is the electric engine. 
 
 This book of the la.10 shall not depart 
 out of thy mouth (Josh. I : 8). 
 
 T T WOULD be a grand thing to know intel- 
 lectually all the ethical and spiritual prin- 
 ciples in the world, but it would be far better 
 to know a few of them if they were always in 
 your heart and mouth. Suppose a man sim- 
 ply knew the Ten Commandments and the 
 Beatitudes, but never for an instant lost con- 
 sciousness of them, do you think that he would 
 go far astray ? Life is fearfully intricate. No 
 man could ever know too much to meet all the 
 emergencies that might arise in being king, 
 president, or emperor. But every day im- 
 presses me anew with the fact that with the 
 two simple laws of Jesus "in his heart and in 
 his mouth," any man could pass safely through 
 life in this world, and probably through the life 
 of any other universe, without so much as 
 stubbing a toe. It is ignorance of the laws of 
 being, it is having to play the game of life 
 without knowing its rules, that makes barbar- 
 ism so dreadful. 
 
 no 
 
He toas passing through (Luke 17 : tl). 
 
 *\1 7HAT a rare and beautiful nature it is 
 which never loses a chance to do good 
 even when it is " passing through ' ' ! Many 
 of us do a few good deeds by making plans a 
 good ways ahead, and become so absorbed in 
 what we are aiming at that we never think of 
 anything that happens on the way or while we 
 are "passing through." Like a cannon-ball 
 we pass by everything else, and go straight to 
 the mark, well satisfied if we hit that. Jesus 
 seemed to be alive to everything which hap- 
 pened on the way. Many of his most beauti- 
 ful deeds were what you might call mere 
 "asides," like helping Lazarus and the Sa- 
 maritan woman. 
 
 cAnd Saul <mas consenting unto 
 his death (Acts 8 : I). 
 
 T ITTLE BILL came home the other night 
 *-" with his eyes sticking out of his head, 
 and stuttered almost unintelligibly as he told 
 his father how Tom Titmouse had broken into 
 his mother's pantry and stolen dried plums. 
 "Turn your pockets inside out, Little Bill," 
 said his father, — and they were full of plums. 
 "My son," he asked sternly, "don't you 
 know that the partaker is as bad as the thief? " 
 in 
 
"No," said Little Bill in blank amazement. 
 And he really didn' t ! Saul of Tarsus found 
 it out to his sorrow when his spiritual eyes 
 were opened. Oh, how little it takes to "give 
 consent" to evil! Holding other men's 
 clothes does it. Holding our tongues does 
 it. Keeping a secret does it. Sometimes an 
 approving smile does it. We have been guilty 
 a thousand times, when we ought to have 
 spoken out, repudiated, spurned, denounced, 
 some evil deed, and did not do it. 
 
 The <wot>d of Jehovah tuas precious 
 in those days (1 Sam. 3 : I). 
 
 ""THAT is a terrible infirmity in human nature 
 that identifies preciousness with rareness. 
 In reality the most common things are the 
 most sacred. It is only in imagination that 
 the rare possess such worth. Air, earth, and 
 water are of infinitely more importance than 
 emeralds, pearls, and rubies. If we should 
 find a deposit of diamonds that made them 
 as plenty as gravel, we should use them for 
 roads without reluctance. When copies of 
 the Bible were so few that they were chained 
 to pillars in churches, people almost worshiped 
 them like idols. But now, when they exist 
 by millions, they value them as little as news- 
 
papers. For one, I have deliberately set ray- 
 self the task of appreciating the common things 
 of life. I am trying to give their true value to 
 daisies, buttercups, robins, dogs, and horses. 
 I don' t want to despise geniuses like Paderew- 
 ski and Tennyson and Browning ; but I want 
 to love and appreciate common people. I 
 want to feel that it is not only the thought, 
 the emotion, the vision, that visits me on in- 
 frequent and rare occasions, but those that 
 haunt my common hours, that I ought to 
 cherish as divine. 
 
 'Pea.ce be to this house (Lake 10 : 5). 
 
 \K 7HAT a crime it is to introduce an element 
 * * of discord into a human habitation ! 
 It is a divine art always to bring peace with us. 
 We shall not do it without the most exquisite 
 care and skill. Homes are full of explosives. 
 The scratch of a cross word is like the touch 
 of a match to a powder-mine. We do not 
 know how we are rubbing people the wrong 
 way unless we watch them closely. We may 
 be innocent of any intention to make trouble, 
 and yet be making it all the time. We had 
 better "examine" ourselves if people grow 
 silent when we come around, or if they leave 
 the room. 
 
 "3 
 
He entered, as his custom ivas, into the 
 synagogue on the sabbath day (Luke 4 : 16). 
 
 C OCIETY is full of people who repudiate or 
 K -^ ignore the obligation of church attend- 
 ance, and yet insist on retaining the name and 
 privileges of the disciples of Jesus Christ. To 
 me this is incomprehensible, unless the obli- 
 gation on " the disciple to be as his master " 
 has been annulled. If the great Head of our 
 system of life and worship felt the need and 
 maintained the habit of ' ' entering the syna- 
 gogue on the sabbath day, ' ' by what principle 
 of reasoning can his professed followers escape 
 this obligation ? "As his custom was. ' ' How 
 the sense of the bane and blessing of ' ' habit ' ' 
 deepens in us with increasing years ! Of all 
 evils there is nothing comparable to a bad 
 habit ; but of all beatitudes there is nothing 
 so admirable as a good one. Force yourselves 
 into doing good things until you do them 
 either unconsciously or without disinclination. 
 You can succeed at last, and when that end is 
 attained you will have saved yourself infinite 
 trouble. What can be more terrible than 
 having to debate a duty every time its per- 
 formance is called for ? Settle it for good and 
 all. Drive yourself into doing it until it is 
 harder to leave it undone. I can't remember 
 having seriously debated with myself a dozen 
 times in my life whether I should go ' ' into the 
 114 
 
synagogue on the sabbath day ' ' or not. It 
 never occurs to me to raise the question. My 
 parents got me so thoroughly into the church- 
 going habit when I was a child that my legs 
 would carry my head to church in spite of it- 
 self. Some people will say, "That's slavery, 
 and the man is a victim." Well, let them. 
 Those same people would condemn the habit 
 of a mother's bathing her baby daily, or a 
 man's kissing his wife every morning when he 
 started for his store. 
 
 <A11 the congregation . . . 'were 
 •with him (J Kings 8 : 5). 
 
 \ 1 7HAT could he have done unless they had 
 * been ' ' with him ' ' ? Any leader is in- 
 vincible when thus surrounded. But what 
 can a general do on the field of battle with his 
 army asleep in the barracks? What can a 
 minister do with his congregation playing on 
 the golf-links ? What can a teacher do with 
 his class in the woods gathering chestnuts ? 
 Sometimes it is the leader's fault if he cannot 
 keep his followers "with him." But, unless 
 I misread the symptoms of our modern social 
 infirmities, there are times when multitudes of 
 congregations have been stampeded by the 
 devils of worldliness. There is this curious 
 phenomenon, — that the greatest and wisest 
 "5 
 
leaders in church and Sunday-school are hav- 
 ing about as hard work to keep the people 
 "with them" as the least and feeblest. It's 
 an inviolable maxim that the minister is help- 
 less if the congregation does not "stand by." 
 
 <And there artseth a great storm 
 of wind {Mark 4 : 37). 
 
 T~\0 NOT think for a moment that the pres- 
 *^ ence of Jesus Christ in the ship of your 
 life will keep the storms from blowing. There 
 are moments of religious excitement when 
 preachers and teachers lay the reins on the 
 necks of their thought-horses and get run 
 away with. We sometimes paint very rosy 
 pictures of the voyage of life " with Jesus at 
 the helm." We are so anxious to get our 
 friends to embark that we call a very stormy 
 ocean a quiet inland lake, and represent the 
 happy voyagers as lolling on the decks and 
 sailing on an even keel. That may be your 
 way of getting to the desired haven, but it has 
 not been mine. I have heard the wind howl 
 through the rigging, and seen it split the sails. 
 I have felt the waves wash over the gunwales. 
 I have been hoisted by them until my ship has 
 hit the clouds, and gone down into their 
 troughs until the keel has scraped the bottom. 
 ji6 
 
And I cannot yet say that I hope I'll never 
 see another storm. I had almost as soon 
 navigate a glue-pot as an ocean that never 
 broke into white-caps. How should we value 
 the haven without the tempest ? The disci- 
 ples never would have heard the "Peace, be 
 still, ' ' without the ' ■' great storm of wind. ' ' 
 
 & 
 
 For thus it becometh us to fulfil 
 all righteousness {€Matt. 3 : IS). 
 
 " T ET us perform this deed [distasteful, 
 perhaps, to both of them, — to John, 
 because of his conscious unworthiness, and to 
 Jesus on account of its publicity] to meet the 
 claims of a law above our own desires or 
 wills." There is such a law for you and for 
 me. There is an eternal fitness in things to 
 which we must subordinate all individual 
 preferences. The great stream of events is 
 flowing in the channel of righteousness toward 
 the goal of holiness. Within those banks we 
 must order the course of our lives. Nothing 
 is so sublime or satisfying as to do a thing 
 simply because it is right ! The less you 
 know about the why and wherefore of that 
 Tightness, the more profound is the joy of 
 obedience. To go to death against all other 
 inclinations but those of the soul towards duty, 
 117 
 
to go in the dark, to go contrary to all ap- 
 parent reason, evidence, and even common- 
 sense (as a fireman rushes into a burning 
 building to save a deformed and dying child), 
 — this, in spite of all argument to the contrary, 
 fills a human soul with its greatest ecstasy. 
 Whatever is right, do it, — do it all, do it to 
 the last hair's-breadth. Fulfil all righteous- 
 ness. Do not put a few stingy and regretful 
 acts into the cup, but fill it full to the brim. 
 
 c4s for me, it ivas in my heart to 
 build a. house (I Chron. 28: 2). 
 
 LJOW much there is in every heart that 
 never gets incorporated into word or 
 deed ! And did you ever notice how men 
 minimize the moral significance of their unreal- 
 ized evil thoughts, and maximize the moral 
 significance of their unrealized good thoughts? 
 If it is "in a man's heart" to lie or steal or 
 blaspheme or kill, he thinks but little less of 
 himself, so long as his emotions did not become 
 actions. But let a man have the most fleeting 
 and sterile inclination to give a dollar to a 
 cause, or lend a helpful hand to a beggar, or 
 found a hospital for the sick, or build a church 
 for the masses, and he actually thinks he is as 
 good as if he had done it. It was in Little 
 118 
 
Bill's heart to help his mama. A look of 
 beatific self-satisfaction was on his face as he 
 asked her, with all the air of a young courtier, 
 " Can't I do something else? " when he had 
 finished a trifling task. But when she said, 
 "Yes, dear; you can clean the cellar," he 
 humped his shoulders and looked like a thun- 
 der-cloud. It really wasn't in his heart. It 
 was only "in his eye." It's very hard to 
 tell what's in your heart from what is only "in 
 your eye." 
 
 We tooutd that thou shoatdest do for as 
 'tohatsoe'ber tec shall ask {Mark 10 : 35). 
 
 CVEN the best of them could not get rid 
 •^ of the desire for personal aggrandize- 
 ment. It was not the reform of evils, but the 
 advancement of self, that animated them. 
 They restrained these feelings as long as they 
 could, but they finally burnt out into sight. 
 "Grant unto us that we may sit, one on thy 
 right hand, and one on thy left hand, in thy 
 glory. ' ' Well, how much better are we ? We 
 are less frank, but are we any less selfish? 
 Who of us loses sight of the preferment, pres- 
 tige, and recognition that come through re- 
 ligious and charitable work ? There is a story 
 of two colored men in Washington who were 
 appointed a committee to pick out a candidate 
 "9 
 
for an important political office. After a while 
 one of them came back into the meeting, and 
 asked for an extension of time. " Mr. Chair- 
 man," he said very solemnly, "the committee 
 is divided. Mr. Johnson, he's for hisself, and 
 I'm for myself, and we're having hard work to 
 get together ! " If we could get at the bot- 
 tom facts of the failure of many benevolent 
 enterprises, they could be summed up in this 
 naive confession of the colored man, — "he's 
 for hisself, and I'm for myself." 
 
 & 
 
 And I <witl establish his kingdom for ever, if he be 
 constant to do my commandments and 
 mine ordinances, as at this day 
 (/ Chron. 28 s 7). 
 
 \1 7HAT we want in manhood is not to spurt 
 v " like a geyser, but to flow like a water- 
 fall. It is all right to see a man do his task 
 "to-day," but we want to know if he did it 
 yesterday and will do it to-morrow. He must 
 have, not the spasmodic pull of a man drawing 
 corks from bottles, but the eternal pull of 
 gravity holding planets. If it were only cer- 
 tain that every Sunday-school teacher and 
 scholar who was in his place on "this" day 
 would be in his place next Sunday and next 
 year! "Were man but constant, he were 
 120 
 
perfect," said Shakespeare. And, speaking 
 sadly after studying human nature through a 
 long lifetime, Confucius lamented: "A good 
 man it is not mine to see. Could I see a man 
 possessed of constancy, that would satisfy me." 
 Most of us have only the constancy of the 
 leech, which lets go at the instant when he has 
 sucked all the blood he can hold. One some- 
 times longs for men with the constancy of the 
 bull-dog, which hangs on just for the sake of 
 not letting go. 
 
 eA man hairing a. 'withered 
 hand {8Ma.tt. 12 : 10). 
 
 ]\T OT being a physician, I will not attempt 
 to diagnose the trouble with this poor 
 fellow. But the profession of the ministry has 
 brought me into contact with many another 
 withered hand (and, for that matter, withered 
 head and withered heart), which I understand 
 quite perfectly. No fact in nature is more 
 familiar, and no law more demonstrable, than 
 that of the withering up of all disused faculties 
 or organs. It is known to science as atrophy. 
 After a while nothing is left of a disused fac- 
 ulty or organ but a vestige. Vestigial remains 
 are mere tombstones, the pale memorials of 
 powers that have now ceased to be. I know 
 a rich man (many such) who has a withered 
 121 
 
hand. He ceased to stretch it out to help his 
 fellows, and now it is only a ' ' vestigial re- 
 main." He cannot use it when he tries. I 
 know a woman (oh, multitudes !) who has a 
 withered heart. She would not open it to the 
 sorrows of others, and it has dried up until it 
 rattles around in her breast like a pea in a pod. 
 I know a boy (the woods are full of them) 
 whose brain is withering up like a leaf on an 
 August day. He won't study, and he has 
 already got to a point where he can't think. 
 Instead of the convolutions of his brain unfold- 
 ing, they are continually contracting upon 
 themselves. If he only knew the terror of it, 
 the last thing on earth a fellow would want to 
 become would be a "vestigial remain." 
 
 They found him in the temple {Luke 2: 46). 
 
 A ND a very good place it was to be found 
 **• in. Where would you be most likely to 
 be found if your friends should hunt for you ? 
 When Little Bill " turns up missing" we can 
 almost invariably locate him in a little ravine 
 back of the church, ' ' building a shanty ' ' out 
 of some old bricks and boards. There is a 
 natural gravitation in every one of us toward 
 some favorite occupation and locality. Every 
 man goes " to his own place " — like Dives and 
 
 122 
 
Lazarus. Some mothers always have to hunt 
 for their boys on the street corners, or in the 
 candy store where there is a slot machine. 
 How many broken-hearted wives there are 
 who make their way by a trained instinct to 
 some saloon, when their husbands have to be 
 hunted up at midnight ! Some have to follow 
 them to the gambling hell. When you come 
 to think about it, it's a pretty sharp test of 
 character to ask a man's friends where he'd be 
 most likely to be found. 
 
 SMake his paths straight (Matt. 3: 3). 
 
 "TWO of life's noblest occupations are those 
 A of the "pathfinder" and the "road- 
 builder." To discover a route through an 
 impenetrable wilderness, and to construct a 
 highway of granite rocks or steel rails for com- 
 merce and for travel, — both are very great. 
 But it is still grander to break through a wil- 
 derness of superstitions and mysteries, and lay 
 a straight and broad highway to God. Abra- 
 ham and Moses were road-builders in this 
 sense, and so was John the Baptist. He 
 opened the path over which Jesus walked, and 
 which he widened to a great world highway up 
 to heaven. And he broke it "straight. " No 
 crooked, winding, sinuous, serpentine paths 
 123 
 
for him. He believed that men must go to 
 God as the crow flies, or not at all. One of 
 the tsars of Russia wanted a railroad construc- 
 ted from St. Petersburg to Moscow. The 
 engineers brought him a map with a line zig- 
 zagging everywhere. " Why have you made 
 it crooked ? " he asked. "To avoid hills and 
 valleys," they replied. "Build it this way," 
 he said, laying a rule across the map and 
 drawing a pencil along its edge. That is the 
 way to build the pathway of a man's life. 
 Make it straight, my boy ! 
 
 cAnd they feared as they entered 
 into the cloud (Luke 9 : 34). 
 
 \"\7HAT a strange influence darkness and 
 shadow have over us all ! I was never 
 so scared in my life as when the Mt. Vesuvius 
 elevator car shot right into a big black cloud. 
 Wendell Phillips is authority for saying that 
 ' ' when geese enter a barn door they duck 
 their heads, for fear of hitting the top sill." 
 I know it is hard for us not to duck and crouch 
 when we enter darkness of any kind, and espe- 
 cially a cloud of sorrow. The whole discipline 
 of life is to teach us how to enter every kind 
 of darkness without a tremor. Do not be 
 afraid of the night. Do not be afraid of a 
 124 
 
thunder-cloud. Do not be afraid of a misfor- 
 tune or a sorrow. Don't crouch. Don't 
 tremble. Walk right into it with your head 
 up. God is as near you in the dark as he is in 
 the light. And this is the only real source of 
 safety. You think you can take care of your- 
 self in the daylight. You are mistaken. If 
 God should withdraw from you a single mo- 
 ment, it would be like withdrawing the air 
 from under the bird. It is because his eye 
 never slumbers nor sleeps, because his ever- 
 lasting arms are everlastingly beneath us, that 
 we are ever safe. 
 
 The running of the foremost is tike the 
 running of Ahimaaz (2 Sam. 18 : 27), 
 
 CO, THEN, a man's personality reveals it- 
 *"^ self in his gait when he is miles away, — 
 does it ? Well, it ought to be a good gait, if 
 it is so conspicuous and so distinguishable. 
 Little Bill, "toed out," swung his hands like 
 a pair of signboards in the wind, and carried 
 his head bent far forward and low down like a 
 Cayuse pony in a blizzard. Unfortunately he 
 could not see himself, and the scoldings he 
 had to take before he straightened up were — 
 well, a few. How wonderful it is that you can 
 tell a man by his gait at a mile' s distance, or 
 by his footfall on the pavement when he turns 
 
 135 
 
a corner on a dark night ! Self-revelation is 
 the law of life. You cannot hide yourself, 
 Little Bill. What you are will disclose itself 
 to those who are nigh, and even to those that 
 are afar off. By and by your teacher will be 
 able to tell your slovenly writing, and your 
 employer your careless working, just by the 
 look of your job. This morning's paper says 
 that the police have been able to say, with 
 complete assurance, that certain recent bur- 
 glaries were done by a famous criminal known 
 as " Slick Dick," just from their neatness and 
 despatch. You had better not trifle with the 
 matter of your personal identity, and you had 
 better get a good gait. 
 
 Sit 
 
 We toiled all night, And took 
 nothing (Luke 5: 5). 
 
 O IMON was too good a fisherman to complain 
 *^ about his " luck. " He had put in bad 
 nights before, and knew he would have to do 
 it again and often. Fishing is an art, but 
 many a time "it goes by favor." There were 
 times when even Isaak Walton could not get a 
 bite. There are bad days for trout, and bad 
 nights for eels. No, no ! the genuine fisher- 
 man is not disheartened by bootless hours on 
 the lake. And the genuine hero is not dis- 
 heartened by bootless days and weeks and 
 126 
 
months, or even years, of human endeavor. 
 There are poor ' ' times and seasons ' ' in every 
 business. One good year out of two or three 
 is about all we may expect. But the tide 
 turns. It's not all ebb. There is a flood as 
 well. The greatest trouble with the most of 
 us lies in the loss of faith in the pond. Go 
 back again and again. Try a frog if the fish 
 won't bite at a fly, and do not even disdain a 
 worm. The ocean of life can never be fished 
 out. A fruitless night betokens a fruitful day. 
 
 Give thy servant therefore an 
 understanding heart to judge 
 thy people (/ Kings 3: 9). 
 
 T N SPITE of a thousand nameless despots, 
 there was never an age in human history 
 when so many governors and presidents, 
 princes and kings, emperors and monarchs, 
 were praying that prayer of Solomon. The 
 progress of the kingdom of God has taught the 
 crowned heads of the civilized world that final 
 lesson of royal wisdom, — that the people do 
 not exist for the ruler, but the ruler for the 
 people. It is this great lesson that has so- 
 bered the souls of these men who are "dressed 
 in a little brief authority." "A crown's 
 enough to ripen any brain. ' ' On his death- 
 bed Pericles said that he regarded it as his best 
 127 
 
title to an honored memory "that he had 
 never caused an Athenian to put on mourn- 
 ing." Men like President Roosevelt, Em- 
 peror William, the Tsar of all the Russias, and 
 the new head of the Roman Catholic Church, 
 whatever mistakes they make, and whatever 
 personal ambitions they may have, are finding 
 it impossible to forget that the destinies of 
 millions of people are hanging on their lightest 
 Word. Power which used to make kings 
 drunk now makes them sober. The promise 
 of better days for the world lies in the fact that 
 in so many royal closets the potentates of earth 
 are praying the prayer of Solomon, " Give thy 
 servant an understanding heart to judge this 
 people. ' ' 
 
 We are not able to go up against the 
 people; for they are stronger 
 than "me {Num. 13 : 31). 
 
 \ 1 7HAT if they were stronger ? Beat them 
 * ' with your wits. What if they were 
 wiser ? Beat them with your strength. I be- 
 lieve it is a divine law to "take a fellow bigger 
 than your own size," to "aim at a higher 
 mark than you can hit." If you never try to 
 do things that you seem incapable of, you will 
 accomplish no more than a mummy. The 
 more I comprehend the magnitude and beauty 
 128 
 
of the very simplest tasks of life, the more I 
 feel my incapacity. One gets to shrink before 
 them ; but he must never get to slink before 
 them. Tackle any task that Providence im- 
 poses, and any son of Anak that opposes. 
 Believe in God, and believe in your own self 
 as his instrument. 
 
 129