PRINCETON, N. J. ^' 
 
 BV 4225 .A6 1886 
 
 SM/. 
 
 Anecdotes illustrative of 
 Old Testament texts 
 
/ 
 
 v 
 
 (ITfie dfTInifal llil)ran>. 
 
 ANECDOTES 
 
 ILLUSTRATIVE OF 
 
 OLD TESTAMENT TEXTS 
 
Qi\]c Clerical Cibrarg. 
 
 TITHIS SEKIES of volumes is ppecially intended 
 J- for tlie clergy and students of all denomina- 
 tions, and is meant to furnish them with stimulus 
 and suggestion in the various departments of ibeir 
 ■work. Amonjrst tlie pulpit thinkers from vvhom 
 these sermon outlines have been drawn are leading 
 men of iilmost every denomination, the subjects 
 treated of being of course practical rather than con- 
 troversial. The best thoughts of the est religious 
 writers of the day are here furnished in a condensed 
 form, and at a moderate price. 
 
 Seven volumes in crown 8vo, cloth, are now ready 
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 JUST REABT—THE NEW VOLUME, 
 
 Anecdotes Illustrative of Old Testament Texts. 
 
 ALSO, NOW BEADY, NEW EDITIONS OF 
 
 1 . Outlines of Sermons on the New Testament. 
 
 2. Outlines of Sermons on the Old Testament. 
 
 3. Outlines of Sermons to Children. 
 
 4. Pulpit Prayers by Eminent Clergymen. 
 
 5. Anecdotes Illustrative of New Testament Texts. 
 
 6. ExDOsitory Sermons on the Old Testament. 
 
 7. Platform and Pulpit Aids. 
 
 Copies sent post-paid on receipt of price, by publishers. 
 
AN ECDOTES 
 
 ILLUSTRATIVE OF 
 
 OLD TESTAMENT TEXTS, 
 
 gtfe fork: 
 A. C. ARMSTRONG & SON, 
 
 714, BROADWAY. 
 
 MDCCCLXXXVl. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 Great pains have been taken in the compilation 
 of this volume to go to original sources, and very 
 many volumes have been examined with the view 
 of making as fresh a collection as possible. But 
 it should be distinctly understood that no originality 
 is claimed for the form of the anecdotes. In most 
 cases this has been taken as it was found. 
 
I. The Power and Comfort of God. Gen. i. i. 
 
 " /// the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" 
 
 When Mr. Simeon, of Cambridge, was on his dying bed, 
 his biographer relates that, " after a short pause, he looked 
 round with one of his bright smiles, and asked, ' What do 
 you think especially gives me comfort at this time } The 
 creation ! Did Jehovah create the world or did I .'' I think 
 He did ; now if He made the world, He can sufficiently 
 take care of ME.' " 
 
 II. Sin Ready to Enter. Gen. iv. 7. ^' Sin lieth at the 
 
 door." 
 
 A YOUNG friend was one day calling upon an old Christian 
 woman, nearly eighty years of age, just waiting for the 
 summons. Said this friend, " Oh, granny, I wish I was as 
 sure of heaven, and as near it, as you are I " With a look 
 of unspeakable emotion, the old woman answered, *' And 
 do you really think the devil cannot find his way up an 
 old woman's garret-stair.-' Oh, if He hadn't said 'None 
 shall pluck them out of My hand,' I would have been away 
 wandering long ago ! " 
 
 III. Sin Crouching at the Door. Gen. iv. 7. "Sin 
 
 liclh at the door" 
 
 A TRAVELLER who had fallen into the hands of some 
 robbers, was murdered by them. In his last moments, 
 seeing some ravens flying over his head, he exclaimed to 
 them, " I call upon you to avenge my death." Three days 
 after, the robbers, going into the neighbouring town, saw 
 some ravens on the roof of the inn where they were carous- 
 ing. One of them said, sneeringly : " I suppose those are 
 
 ]3 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 the ravens come to avenge the death of the traveller we 
 despatched the other day." The servant of the inn, over- 
 hearing these words, ran and repeated them to the magis- 
 trate, who had the robbers taken up, and, on inquiry being 
 made, they were convicted of the murder and hanged. 
 
 IV. Undone. Gen. iv. lo. '■'And He said. What hast 
 
 thou done ? " 
 
 The Rev. Rowland Hill preaching on one occasion from 
 this text, at Cowes, began his sermon as follows : — " In 
 my w^ay to your island, I visited the county jail at Win- 
 chester, and there I saw many who were accused of heavy 
 crimes, but who seemed careless and indifferent, and to 
 have but little sense of their awful situation. But one 
 young man attracted my attention : he kept separate from 
 the rest, and seemed very much troubled. I went up to 
 him and said, 'And what have you done, young man?' 
 * Sir,' said he, deeply affected, ' I have done that which I 
 cannot undo, and which has undone me.' This, my dear 
 friends," said the minister, " is the situation of every one 
 of you. You have each of you done that which has undone 
 you, and which you cannot undo." 
 
 V. My Ministry. Gen. v. 24. ^^ Aiid Enoch walked with 
 
 God : and he was not ; for God took him." 
 
 On the 22nd of February, 1880, Dr. Raleigh preached for 
 the last time. His text was, "And Enoch walked with 
 God : and he was not ; for God took him." Had he 
 known that he would never preach again, he could not 
 have chosen a more appropriate text, or have spoken with 
 more impressiveness and pathos. One of the members of 
 the congregation said, on returning home, " I have heard 
 to-day what I never expect to hear again in this world." 
 Dr. Raleigh was compelled to rest ; weeks passed away, 
 but there was no amendment in his health, and at length 
 he had to be told that there was no hope of his recovery. 
 When he received the intelligence he said, " Then my 
 ministry is ended." There was a pause, and then he 
 added, " My ministr\' ! — it is dearer than my life." On 
 the Tuesday before his death, he was visited by the Rev. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Josliua Harrison, to whom he freely expressed his confi- 
 dence in the glorious work of the Saviour, and said : "In 
 any case I may well be content and thankful. I am not 
 an old man, yet I have lived long and worked hard. I 
 have had, on the whole, a most happy, and I think I may 
 say successful, ministry. God has blessed my work, and 
 has always given me true friends. If I have finished my 
 work, I am ready to go. Indeed, I should have no regrets, 
 but for these dear ones " (his wife and children). When 
 reminded of the prayers which were being offered on his 
 behalf, he replied, " Yes, my people's prayers make me 
 sometimes think I may have a little more work to do, but 
 if not, I shall calmly march up to the Gates." Still trust- 
 ing in Christ, he went "through the gates," April, 1880. 
 In the presence of a sorrowing multitude, his coffin was 
 lowered into a grave in Abney Park Cemetery. 
 
 VI. An Ideal Christian Pastor. Gen. v. 24. ^^ And 
 Enoch walked with GodJ^ 
 
 Oberlin's motto may be summed up in three words, 
 " Walk before God." We have in him the ideal of a 
 Christian and of a pastor. He had holy, vigilant, tender 
 love for souls. When, of an evening, some of his flock 
 were passing in front of his house at Waldersbach, and saw 
 a light burning at a certain window which they well knew, 
 "Hush!" one said to the others, "our pastor is watching 
 for us " ; and so, indeed, this valiant soldier of the cross 
 did watch and wrestle for his people. He prayed by name 
 for each of these souls whom he presented before God, as 
 of old they brought the sick to the Saviour for healing. 
 In common with all generous spirits, Oberlin had hailed 
 with transport the clear, fair morning of revolution ; 
 but when its aspect changed — when the day darkened in 
 crimes and bloodshed — when the Gospel was proscribed in 
 France turned pagan, and the Age of Reason substituted 
 in its place — do you suppose Oberlin was dumb, and spoke 
 no more to his flock of the Gospel and of Christ 'i As- 
 suredly no. This good shepherd, under the needful disguise 
 of president of a club, contrived to retain the right of still 
 feeding his sheep with the Divine word. For example, 
 when the Convention despatched to all the " club presi~ 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 dents" the common motto or text on which they were to 
 speak on each decade, the subject on one occasion was 
 this: — "Ai^ainst tyrants." Oberlin was in no wise em- 
 barrassed - thereby — not he ! " Tyrants," said he to his 
 parishioners, " all good republicans ought to hate ; yes, 
 and to make war on them without truce or intermission. 
 But who are these tyrants.? The King of Prussia or the 
 Emperor 1 No, the real tyrants are the vices, the passions, 
 the evil lusts which war against the soul. Behold in them 
 our worst enemies, with whom peace there must never be." 
 And so, by a happy turn like this, the good Oberlin would 
 soon find his way back to the Gospel he loved, and keep 
 his people alive with the bread of life, of which there was 
 a sore famine in other places. 
 
 VII. Gathering Flowers to Compose Him in 
 the Hour of Death. Gen. v. 24. " Ajid Enoch 
 walked with God: and he was not ; for God took him." 
 
 We know it to be a Scripture fact, that men have " walked 
 with God," in closest intimacy, and that God hath held 
 converse with them, "even as a man converseth with his 
 friend." Such was the case with Enoch, Abraham, Moses, 
 and all that luminous cloud of witnesses so brightly and 
 clearly revealed in the Bible. 
 
 The Church of God, even down to our own time, fur- 
 nishes innumerable witnesses to this truth, which we will 
 establish by the mouth of two of them. 
 
 John Holland was an old Puritan minister, who died 
 two hundred and fifty years ago. Little is known of him, 
 except what relates to his deathbed. Perceiving that he 
 was near his end, he said : " Come, oh come ; death 
 approaches. Let us gather some flowers to comfort this 
 hour." He requested that the eighth chapter of Romans 
 might be read to him. But at every verse he stopped the 
 reading, while he expounded it to the comfort of his soul, 
 and to the joy and wonder of his friends. Having thus 
 continued his meditations above two hours, he suddenly 
 cried out, " Oh, stay your reading. What brightness is 
 this I see? Have you lighted any candles.?" They told 
 him, " No ; it is the sunshine." " Sunshine .? " said he ; 
 nay, my " Saviour's shine ! Now, farewell world — welcome, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 licavcn. The Day-star from on high hath visited my 
 heart. Oil, speak when I am gone, and preach it at my 
 funeral, God dealetJi familiarly zvith man!' In such trans- 
 ports his soul soared toward heaven. His last words, after 
 repeating the declaration that " God doth and will deal 
 familiarly with man," were these: "And now, thou fiery 
 chariot, that earnest down to fetch u[) Elijah, carry me to 
 my hap[)y home. And all ye blessed angels, who attended 
 the soul of Lazarus to bring it to heaven, bear me, oh 
 bear me to the bo.som of my best beloved, Amen ; even so 
 come. Lord Jesus, come quickly 1 " 
 
 Our other present witness is Gilbert Tennent, who was 
 a main instrument, with Whitefield and Edwards, of the 
 great revival in New England, one hundred years ago. In 
 one of his letters to his brother, the holy William lennent, 
 he says, " Brother, shall I tell you an astonishing instance 
 of the glorious grace of the Lord Jesus Christ .-' It is 
 this, that one of the meanest of His servants has had 
 His presence every day, in some degree, for above eleven 
 weeks. Nor is the great, good Master yet gone. Oh, brother, 
 it is heaven upon earth to live near to God ! Verily our 
 comfort does not depend so much upon our outward situa- 
 tion as is generally supposed. No, a Saviour's love is all 
 in all. Oh, this will make any situation sweet, and turn 
 the thickest darkness into day." 
 
 VIII. Quenching the Spirit. Gen. vi. 3. '^ My 
 Spirit shall not always strive with man" 
 
 A PREACHER says " It is long since I was a collegian, 
 either as a senior here, or previously as a member of the 
 lower classes elsewhere. I still remember vividly three 
 young men who went about swearing by the Holy Ghost, 
 which they considered the unpardonable sin. They were 
 already hardened and reckless. One of them, who became 
 a brilliant physician, died in middle age, a suicide ; another 
 of them, still earlier, a drunkard ; the other yet lives, a 
 physician, but with not a sign of religious thought or 
 feeling. This reminiscence has led me to the subject of 
 quenching not the Spirit, as one adapted to young men 
 just laying the foundations of life. 
 
 "In the class of 1840, of which I was a member, were 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 two ministers' sons, of fine minds, but neither of them 
 Christians. During revival services near by this edifice, at 
 about this season of the year, one of them was converted ; 
 but the other held aloof. Under an urgent appeal from 
 his friend he had, however, been touched. He did not 
 quench the Spirit. He became, finally, a minister, and 
 settled at New Rochelle. In the same class was a third 
 member, an avowed infidel. After graduation he banded 
 with others even worse than himself to go by sea to New 
 Orleans, and thence overland into Texas, there to form a 
 predatory band for the commission of all kinds of iniquity. 
 They did not all reach New Orleans. A part went on, 
 but were attacked by disease. This student buried the 
 last one, and was left alone. From Galveston he worked 
 his way home, sick, diseased, and ragged, to his mother's 
 door. He got a httle school at New Rochelle, but was a 
 gambler and misanthrope, resisting long all his classmate's 
 advances and appeals. Touched at length by them, he 
 did not quench the Spirit. He began a higher, a Christian 
 Hfe ; and these three students of this college within these 
 walls nearly fifty years ago, are now all ministers of Christ, 
 living at the West. 
 
 IX. Gen. vi. 5. " Every imagination of the thoughts of his 
 
 heart was only evil coiitinitally." 
 
 Emmanuel refuses even to allow a letter from Diabolus 
 to enter the town of Mansoul. A preacher has well said : 
 " There must be no correspondence whatever. The devil's 
 letters are evil hints and suggestions, and if you entertain 
 them, then you are opening up a correspondence with him. 
 Whenever you get a letter addressed in his hand-writing, 
 with the post-mark of hell on it, destroy it at once." 
 Luther said, " I cannot help unclean birds flying over my 
 head, but 1 can keep them from building and breeding in 
 my hair." So we cannot help evil thoughts crossing our 
 minds, but we can keep them from dwelling there. 
 
 X. The Shut Door. Gen. vii. 16. '' A7id the Lord 
 
 shut him in." 
 
 In the life of the late Hugh Millar, we find the following 
 passage from Mr, Stewart, of Cromarty, whom Millar con- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 sidcrcd one of the very best and ablest of Scotland's 
 niini>tcrs : " Noah did not close the door. There are 
 words that God keeps for Himself. The burden is too 
 heavy for the back of man. To shut that door on a world 
 about to perish would have been too great a responsibility 
 for a son of Adam. Another moment, and another, and 
 another might have been granted by Noah, and the door 
 might never have been shut, and the ship that carried the 
 hfe of the world might have been swamped. And so it is 
 in the ark of salvation. It is not the Church nor the min- 
 ister that shuts or opens the door. These do God's bidding ; 
 they preach righteousness ; they offer salvation, and it is 
 God that shuts and opens the door. Oh, what a sigh and 
 shudder will pass through the listening universe when God 
 will shut the door of the heavenly ark upon the lost!" 
 
 XI. A Quaint Epitaph. Gen. viii. 9. ^^ Btit the dove 
 found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him 
 
 into the ark.'" 
 
 The following quaint epitaph has reference to a little girl 
 buried at the age of five months: " But the dove found no 
 rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into 
 the ark." 
 
 XII. Noah's Prayer. Gen. viii, 20. " And Noah built 
 
 an altar unto the Lord." 
 
 Tradition has preserved the prayer of Noah, and the 
 learned John Gregory gives it to us as he gathered it from 
 the Arabic and Syriac. And assuredly the prayer is a 
 beautiful one, a prayer which might not only have been 
 well oftered up in that floating church, but which may be 
 even a pattern for many prayers. The following is John 
 Gregory's translation from the floating words of the tradi- 
 tional original : " O Lord, excellent art Thou in Thy truth, 
 and there is nothing great in comparison of Thee. Look 
 upon us with the eye of mercy and compassion : deliver us 
 from this deluge of waters and set our feet in a large room. 
 By the sorrows of Adam Thy first-made man, by the blood 
 of Abel Thy holy one, by the righteousness of Seth, in 
 whom Thou art well pleased, number us not among those 
 who have transgressed Thy statutes, but take us unto Thy 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 merciful care, for Thou art our deliverer, and Thine is the 
 praise from all the works of Thy hands for evermore. And 
 the sons of Noah said, Amen, Lord." 
 
 XIII. The Covenant Sign. Gen. ix. 13. '■' I do set 
 
 My bow ui the child, atid it shall be for a token of a covena?tt 
 between Me and the earth." 
 
 The native account of the last martyrdom in Madagascar 
 concludes in ttvese touching words: — "Tlien they prayed, 
 ' O Lord, receive our spirits, for Thy love to tis hath caused 
 this to come to us ; and lay not this sin to their charge.' 
 Thus prayed they as long as they had any life, and then 
 they died — softly, gently ; and there zvas at the time a 
 rainboiv in the heavens which seemed to touch the place of the 
 btirning." 
 
 XIV. One Language. Gen. xi. i. *' The whole earth 
 
 was of one language and of one speech." 
 
 A Hindu and a New Zealander met upon the deck of 
 a missionary ship. They had been converted from their 
 heathenism, and were brothers in Christ ; but they could 
 not speak to each other. They pointed to their Bibles, 
 shook hands, and smiled in each other's faces ; but that 
 was all. At last a happy thought occurred to the Hindu. 
 With sudden joy, he exclaimed: "Halleluia!" The New 
 Zealander, in delight, cried out " Amen ! " These two 
 words, not found in their own heathen tongues, were to 
 them the beginning of " one language and one speech." 
 
 XV. The Confusion of Tongues. Gen. xi. 9. 
 " Therefore is the natne of it called Babel, because the Lord 
 did there confoimd the language of all the earth." 
 
 The late Bishop Selwyn devoted a great part of his time 
 to visiting the Melanesian Isles, and he thus writes home 
 about the difficulty of languages : " Nothing but a special 
 interposition of the Divine Power could have produced 
 such a confusion of tongues as we find here. In islands 
 not larger than the Isle of Wight, we find dialects so 
 distinct that the inhabitants of the various districts hold 
 no communication one with another." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 XVI. True Service must have Soul in it. Gen. 
 
 xii. 5. " And Ahraiii took Sarai his unfe, and Lot his brothet'S 
 son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the 
 souls that they had gotten in Haran." 
 
 A MINISTER makes the following remarks in his sermon : 
 — The want of this age — of all ages is — sou/. Quaint old 
 Matthew Henry points out that Abraham's slaves which 
 he had gotten in Haran are called sottls. In these times 
 servants are called /lands. A world of difference. Hands 
 — four fingers and a thumb to get as much out of as one 
 can, and to put as little into, from the master's standpoint. 
 And from the servants — to pick up as much as they can 
 and to give as little back again. When master and man 
 can find in each other's relationship a soul — a living, earnest, 
 brotherly soul, then only are the work and wages alike 
 right. In least and commonest works we want not liands 
 only but souls. If I hire a man to do my garden and I find 
 him scarcely pla}'ing at the work, for men put their souls 
 into their play, but ' dawdling ' only, tickling the earth 
 with a rake as if he expected it to laugh into flowers, I 
 would sooner fling him his half-crown, and do the work 
 right earnestly myself. So do we value soul, we who see 
 but the outside of men. Think then of Him Whose eyes 
 do look us through — tJie Father of spirits, Whose contact 
 is even with the inner man, the soul. If that sleeps, how 
 poor in His sight, how vain and mocking, is any service 
 that we pretend to render Him. Here all is worse than 
 nothing if there be not reality, heart, earnestness." 
 
 XVII. Magnanimity. Gen. xiii. 9. '■'■ Jf thou wilt take 
 the left hand, then I will go to the right ; or if thou depart to 
 the right hand, then I will go to the left." 
 
 An instance of the practical effectiveness of Mr. Sherman's 
 preaching is narrated thus. In one of his Monday evening 
 lectures to teachers, the subject was the parting of Abraham 
 and Lot : in the course of which he spoke of the mag- 
 nanimity of Abraham, and, as a contrast to it, said that he 
 had just visited a family belonging to the congregation that 
 was rent by discord about the ownership of an old bedstead. 
 It happened that amongst his hearers was a man who had 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 not been in Surrey Chapel for years. He was greatly 
 amused by the illustration. As he left the chapel, he called 
 on an old friend, and told him that he was at the very time 
 arranging the distribution of some property left by a re- 
 lative, amongst which there was an old bedstead, which had 
 been matter of dispute : but the effect of the address upon 
 him was such that the bedstead difficulty was soon amicably 
 settled. 
 
 XVIII. Unconscious Surveillance. Gen. xvi. 13. 
 ^^ A?id she called the name of the Lord that spake unto her, 
 Thou God seest vie." 
 
 Some years since a trio of gentlemen, members of a large 
 mercantile firm, came into the office of the writer, and, 
 under injunctions of profound secrecy, desired the favour 
 of using the window for a few days. The privilege was 
 readily granted, and one of their number was at once in- 
 stalled behind a curtain, where, with a powerful glass, he 
 could rigidly scrutinize every movement of a certain clerk in 
 a large building across the way. The young man, all un- 
 conscious of the vigilant eye constantly upon him, was 
 absorbed in his duties, making entries and receiving money ; 
 and, whatever consciousness of innocence or guilt was 
 carried about with him, the suspicion of a rigid watch upon 
 his actions — every movement closely scanned and weighed 
 by his employers — doubtless had never entered his mind. 
 The surveillance was continued nearly a week when it was 
 abruptly terminated, and the result, whether in discovery of 
 wrong or establishing innocence, I never learned. 
 
 The incident made a profound impression upon me, 
 suesestinsf, with thrilling distinctness, the solemn truth 
 which men are so prone to forget, " Thou God seest me, 
 and enabling me as never before to realize how open before 
 Him are the hearts and ways of men, their desires, volitions, 
 actions ; and that at last He shall bring every work into 
 judgment, whether it be good or whether it be evil, 
 
 XIX. God Makes no Mistakes. Gen. xviii. 25. 
 '■'Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right ? " 
 
 There is here a young man of about thirty, of fine talents 
 and capabilities for active life, but for years a cripple, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. II 
 
 paralytic, and helpless. He would starve, if left alone. A 
 friend was couimiserating his condition, when, with deep 
 earnestness, he exclaimed, as he slowly raised his withered 
 hand, " God makis no mistakes.'^ How noble the sentiment ! 
 '■ Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right ? " This is 
 piety. Only a heart divinely taught could thus speak. 
 
 XX. Protection from evil. Gen. xix. 26. '' But his 
 
 tvife looked back from heJiind him, and she became a pillar of 
 salty 
 
 An evil is never a thing to play with. When God promises 
 His protection against evil, it is understood that we, on 
 our part, shall keep aloof from it as much as possible ; 
 that we shall not, at any rate, ^o recklessly or carelessly 
 into it. 
 
 I can remember an event in my early life. I had come 
 home from school for a holiday. My father had just bought 
 a fine large dog. Of course I was rather afraid of the 
 powerful animal, and as we were going out to walk, I was 
 rather uneasy when I saw that my father was to take the 
 dog along with us. But he bade me relinquish all fear, as 
 he would keep the animal under his own command, and he 
 assured me that the dog would do me no harm if I let him 
 alone. I found that my father spoke the truth, and as I 
 walked on cheerfully by his side I soon lost all dread. But 
 seeing that the animal was peaceful, I became bold and 
 forward, and began to tease him when my father's back 
 was turned. The consequence was, that soon the blood 
 streamed down my hand and my cries filled the air. 
 "You promised me that the dog should not hurt me," I 
 said sobbing. " Yes," was the answer, " but you did not 
 tell me that you were going to torment him. It was 
 understood \\\dX yoii were to let him alone." 
 
 I always look at this scar of mine when I think of God's 
 promises to His children with reference to their protection 
 against evil. It is understood that we shall keep aloof. 
 You know the sad story of Lot's wife. God had promised 
 her a safe escape from the evils of Sodom. But in her 
 recklessness she chose to turn her face towards the burning 
 furnace and the fiery shower. Of course, no protection 
 was promised against such a foolhardiness. When God 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 promises that He will carry our cares for us, it is under- 
 stood that we sliall nut unnecessarily and neglectfully try 
 to increase the burden. If so, we may expect our Father 
 to allow the dog to bite us, that we may learn to behave 
 wisely. 
 
 XXI. A Motto. Gen. xxii. 14. *■' The Lord will provide" 
 
 The celebrated Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork, who rose from 
 a humble station in life to the highest rank, and passed 
 through strange and trying vicissitudes, used these words 
 as his motto, and ordered them to be engraved on his tomb : 
 " God's providence is my inheritance." 
 
 XXII. Three Bad Bargains. Gen. xxv. 34. ''Thus 
 
 Esau despised his birthright.'" 
 
 A Sunday school teacher remarked that he who buys the 
 truth makes a good bargain, I inquired if any scholar 
 recollected an instance in Scripture of a bad bargain. " I 
 do," replied a boy, " Esau sold his birthright for a mess of 
 pottage." A second said, "Judas made a bad bargain 
 when he sold his Lord for thirty pieces of silver." A third 
 boy observed, " Our Lord tells us that he makes a bad 
 bargain who to gain the whole world loses his own soul." 
 
 XXIII. Beautiful Doors. Gen. xxviii. 17. '' The gate 
 
 of /leave ?i." 
 
 Michael Angelo Buonarrotti said of the doors of the 
 Baptistery at Florence, executed by Lorenzo Ghiberti, 
 when asked what he thought of them, " They are so beauti- 
 ful that they might stand at the gates of Paradise." 
 
 XXIV. Give all you Can. Gen. xxviii. 22. "■ And of 
 all that Thou shalt give 7ne, I will surely give the tenth unto 
 Thee." 
 
 The late Bishop Selvvyn used often to quote that motto 
 of John Wesley's, "Save all you can and give all you save," 
 and he did not think that charity began until after a tithe 
 had been paid to God. " Whatever your income," he wrote 
 ouce to his son, " remember that only nine-tenths of it are 
 ' ■ your disposal." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 13 
 
 XXV. ATenthofAll. Gen. xxviii. 22. And of all that 
 Thou shall give me I will surely give the tenth unto 2hee^^ 
 
 " Take it quick, quick," said a merchant, who had promised, 
 like Jacob, to return to the Lord a tenth of all that he 
 should give him, and found that it amounted to so large 
 a sum, that he said, " I cannot give so much," and set aside 
 a smaller amount. Then his conscience smote him, and, 
 coming to himself, he said, " What ! can I be so mean ? 
 Because God has thus blessed me that I have this large 
 profit, shall I now rod Him of his portion ?" And fearing 
 his own selfish nature, he made haste to place it beyond 
 his reach in the treasury of the Lord, coming almost breath- 
 less to the pastor's house, and holding the money in his 
 outstretched hand. 
 
 XXVI. Helping on the Work of God. Gen. xxviii. 
 22. '■'■ Of all that thou shall give me I will surely give the 
 tenth ufito I'hee.^' 
 
 A WIDOW found pardon and peace in her Saviour in her 
 sixty-ninth year. Her gratitude and love overflowed and 
 often refreshed the hearts of Christians of long experience. 
 The house of God became very dear to her, and she was 
 often seen to drop a gift in the church door box though 
 her income was only 2s. 6d. per week. A fall in her 
 seventy-second year prevented her ever coming out again. 
 A little boy being seen to drop something into the box, 
 
 was asked what it was. He said, " It is Mrs. W 's 
 
 penny." He was told to take it back to her, and to say 
 that her good intention was prized, but that her friends 
 could not let her thus reduce her small means, especially 
 as she could not come out to worship. She replied, " Boy, 
 why did you let them see you give it ^ Take it again and 
 put it in when no one sees you." Then weeping she said, 
 " What ! and am I not to be allowed to help in the work of 
 God any more because I can't get out?" 
 
 XXVII. A Christian Boyhood. Gen. xxxix. 2. ''And 
 
 the Lord was ivith Joseph." 
 
 Dr. Harold Schofield, the talented missionary to China, 
 lived a life of singular beauty, purity, and devotion. He 
 
14 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 had that best of all earthly blessings — a good and godly 
 mother. The gracious training of his childish days bore 
 fruit early. " When nine years old he was truly converted 
 to God." The circumstances of his conversion are singularly 
 beautiful, and should encourage Christian parents not only 
 to pray for, but to expect from, their children an early 
 decision for Christ An elder brother, who was away at 
 school, had just found the Saviour, and had written to tell 
 his brother of his new-found joy. After reading the letter, 
 Harold was deeply affected, and a servant noticing his 
 agitation went to his mother to tell her that " Harold was 
 walking up and down the dining-room in great distress of 
 mind." " I sent for him," his mother says, '• and he handed 
 me a letter from his brother, and stood by me in tears to 
 think that he was not saved like him. I spoke simply of 
 the sacrifice of Christ, and I shall never forget the ray of 
 joy that beamed through his tearful eyes and lighted up 
 his whole face as he owned that Christ had saved him too." 
 Who can wonder that the spiritual life which had so 
 gracious a beginning, had so fair a continuance and so 
 glorious a close ! Happy the child who at nine years of 
 age is led to Jesus by a brother's letter and a mother's 
 voice ! 
 
 The gladness of that day, the settled conviction that he 
 was Christ's and Christ his, seems never to have been lost, 
 hardly dimmed in after years. 
 
 At school he soon won the highest place, and began his 
 brilliant series of prize winnings. Here, too, he took his 
 stand as a thorough-going Christian, " His piety was as 
 well-known to all the boys as his diligence ;" and in after 
 years old schoolfellows testified to the blessing received 
 through his earnest religious talk in the play-ground. He 
 was, however, always ready for out-door exercises and 
 holiday excursions, cycling and boating expeditions in 
 which a touch of danger only added to the interest of the 
 enterprise. 
 
 At the University, and at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, 
 he never hesitated to declare himself Christ's servant ; and 
 it was soon recognised by the other students that Scho- 
 field's presence must put an end to everything wrong in 
 word or act 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 15 
 
 XXVIII. Praying First. Gen. xli. 9. ^' I remember my 
 
 faults tliis day." 
 
 Two Christian men " fell out." One heard that the other 
 was talking against hiiji, and he went to him and said. 
 " Will you be kind enough to tell me my faults to my 
 face, that I may profit by your Christian candour and try 
 to get rid of them ? " " Yes, sir," replied the other ; " I will 
 do it." They went aside, and the former said : " Before 
 you commence telling what you think wrong in me, will 
 you please bow down with me and let us pray over it, that 
 my eyes may be opened to see my faults as you will tell 
 them .■* You lead in the prayer." It was done, and when 
 the prayer was over the man who had sought the interview 
 said, " Now proceed with what you have to complain of in 
 me." But the other replied, " After praying over it, it looks 
 so little that it is not worth talking about. The truth is, I 
 feel now that in going around talking against you I have 
 been serving the devil myself, and have need that you pray 
 for me and forgive me the wrong I have done you." 
 
 Here and there in almost every community is a man or 
 woman who might profit by this incident. 
 
 XXIX. Troubles. Gen. xli. 52. " The land of my afflic- 
 
 tion." 
 
 "When in Amsterdam, Holland, last summer," says a 
 traveller, " I was much interested in a visit we made to a 
 place then famous for polishing diamonds. We saw the 
 men engaged in the work. When a diamond is found it is 
 rough and dark like a common pebble. It takes a long 
 time to polish it, and it is very hard work. It is held by 
 means of a piece of metal close to the surface of a large 
 wheel which is kept going round. Fine diamond dust is 
 put on this wheel, nothing else being hard enough to polish 
 the diamond. And this work is kept on for months and 
 sometimes for several years before it is finished. And if a 
 diamond is intended for a king then the greater trouble 
 and time are spent upon it." 
 
 Jesus calls His people His jewels. To fit them for 
 beautifying His crown, they must be polished like dia- 
 monds, and He makes use of the troubles He sends to 
 polish His jewels. 
 
l6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 XXX. A Son's Affection. Gfn. xlv. 3. '' And Joseph 
 said unto his bretJiren, I am Joseph ; doth my father yet live ? " 
 
 The HuCTuenots were persecuted beyond measure in 
 southern France, and were not allowed to meet together 
 for worship. 
 
 On New Year's Day, 1756, the Church at Nimes held 
 a service in the gorge in the desert. The people had 
 scarcely assembled when they were surprised by the 
 soldiers. They flew up the rocks like a scattered flock of 
 goats. Among the more agile was a young man named 
 Jules Fabre. Suddenly he remembered his father, a feeble 
 old man of seventy. He was sure that he could not have 
 escaped. Returning, he found his fears realized ; his father 
 and another man had been captured. He ran up to the 
 soldiers and insisted on their accepting him in place of his 
 father. The old man besought him to go. The altercation 
 had gone on some time, when the young man seized his 
 aged parent round the waist and carried him to a stone, 
 where he gently laid him down, more dead than alive. 
 Jules Fabre then gave himself up as a prisoner, was con- 
 victed of being present at an illegal assembly, and sent to 
 the galleys, where he might have remained for life, had 
 not the peculiarity of the case touched the hearts of some 
 powerful people, and he was released at the end of six 
 years. 
 
 XXXI. The Homesick Mount. Gen. xlvii. 9. " The 
 
 days of the years of my pilgrimage.^' 
 
 We are told that in the neighbourhood of Interlaken there 
 is a prominent point, though not of great height, called the 
 " Heiimvcli Fhihl' which means the Hoviesick Mount. It 
 is so called because it is generally the last spot which the 
 traveller visits before leaving that part of Switzerland, and 
 at a time when his thoughts are turned homeward. It 
 commands a view of the whole valley of Interlaken, with 
 its cultivated fields and pastures and picturesque villages 
 and lakes in the cup of mountain walls, and beyond the 
 Jungfrau and other mountains, which never doff their caps 
 of eternal snow. It is beautiful to look upon, but the 
 heart of the tourist is not there. He is thinking of friends 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES, 17 
 
 and loved ones, and his own country. It is the Homesick 
 Mount. And so they to whom faith makes the invisible 
 most real may have their moments of uplifting, standing 
 on some " Ileimwch Fluh," some Mount of Homesickness, 
 and, while they acknowledge all the beauty, all the glory, 
 all the gladness of the world, their hearts are not here ; 
 this siglit does not enthral them, for their faces are turned 
 toward home. They dwell in the Land of Promise as in 
 a strange country. 
 
 XXXTI. Eternity, and Where it is to be 
 Spent. Gen. xlvii. 29. ^^ A?id the time drew nigh that 
 Israel must die : and he called his S07i Joseph.''' 
 
 A MINISTER was dying, and he called his son, who was a 
 thoughtless lad, to his bedside. " Tom," he said, " will you 
 promise me one thing before I die } I only ask that, when 
 I am. gone, you will go every evening alone for fifteen 
 minutes and say, 'What is eternity.'' and where shall I 
 spend it .■'' " The promise was given, and faithfully kept. 
 At first the lad thought little of the words ; but he went 
 on doing as he had promised, until at last he was not able 
 to face the awful question any longer, and gave himself up 
 to Jesus. 
 
 XXXIII. The Great Pilot is on Board. Gen. 
 xlviii. 21. '■'■And Israel said ujito Joseph, Behold, Idle: but 
 God shall be with you" 
 
 John Owen, two days before he died, thus wrote in a 
 letter to a friend : " I am leaving the ship of the Church in 
 a storm ; but whilst the great Pilot is in it, the loss of a 
 poor under-rower will be inconsiderable." 
 
 XXXIV. The Persecution of the Huguenots. 
 
 ExoD. ii. 23. " The children of Israel sighed by reasofi of the 
 bondage, and they cried, and their cry came tip unto God by 
 reason of the bondage." 
 
 Many otherwise estimable people approved the Huguenot 
 persecution at the time. Thus Madame de Sevigne, one 
 of the most amiable women of the seventeenth century, 
 a most tender mother, an example of virtue, and noted for 
 
 C 
 
l8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 extraordinary good sense, absolutely approved Louis XIV.'s 
 attempt to exterminate Protestantism. In a letter to the 
 Comte de Bussy she writes : " You have doubtless seen the 
 edict by which the king revokes that of Nantes. Nothing 
 can be more admirable than its contents, and no king has 
 done, or ever will do, a more honourable act." To which 
 the count replies : " I admire the conduct of the king in 
 destroying the Huguenots ; the wars which have been 
 waged against them before, and the St. Bartholomews, 
 have multiplied and given vigour to this sect. His majesty 
 has gradually undermined it, and the edict which he has 
 just published, supported by dragoons and Bourdaloue, has 
 been its coup de grace ' (1685). 
 
 To the elegent, refined gentlefolk of the court of Louis 
 XIV., these Huguenots, who dared to claim the right to 
 worship God according to their consciences, were human 
 vermin, to be exterminated by fire and sword. Madame 
 de Sevigne commiserates her nephew, the Marquis de 
 Trousse, who was engaged in the " dreadfully fatiguing" 
 work of shooting down " miserable Huguenots." He beat 
 the country with armed bands, just as modern sportsmen 
 beat the woods for game ; wherever a group of Protestants 
 were found praying or singing hymns, the soldiers fired on 
 them or cut them down. 
 
 XXXV. Egyptian Animal Worship. Exod. viii. 26. 
 '■'■ And Moses said, It is not meet so to do ; for %ve shall sacrifice 
 the abomination of the Egyptians to the Lord our God : lo, 
 shall zve sacrifice the ahoniiiiation of the Egyptians before their 
 eyes, and will they not stone us ? " 
 
 The veneration with which the Egyptians regarded such 
 animals as were the objects of their religious worship might 
 be illustrated by a variety of historical facts. On one 
 occasion a Persian commander saved his army by placing 
 craftily, in the foremost lines of his troops, some dogs, cats, 
 and other sacred animals, at which the foiled Egyptians 
 did not dare to aim an offensive weapon. A Roman in 
 Egypt once killed a cat inadvertently, upon which the 
 people met together, beset his house, and killed the man, 
 in spite of the king and princes, who endeavoured to 
 prevent it. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 19 
 
 XXXVI. The Passover. Kxon. xii. 13. ''And the 
 blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are." 
 
 Epiphanius tells US that the Egyptians used, at this time 
 of the year, to mark their cattle, trees, and one another 
 with red ochre, which they fancied to be a preservative 
 from death ; it probably took its rise from hence. 
 
 XXXVII. A Remedy against Despondence. 
 
 ExoD. xiv. 15. " Speak unto the children of Israel, that they 
 go forjvard." 
 
 " Let me mention," says Sir W. R. Hamilton in one of his 
 letters, "what I think an important secret of experience; 
 namely, that blessed a thing as meditation is, it is action, 
 rather than meditation, which is the appointed remedy, the 
 Divine specific, against despondence ; and that present 
 duties which may at first seem irksome, are part of the 
 medicine wherewith God healeth the sickness of those that 
 are broken in heart." 
 
 XXXVIII. Not slavishly Afraid of his Sins. 
 
 ExoD. XX. 2. "lam the Lord thy God!' 
 
 When Ebenezer Erskine lay on his death-bed, one of his 
 elders said to him, " Sir, you have given us many good 
 advices, may I ask what you are now doing with your own 
 soul ?" "I am just doing with it," he replied, " what I did 
 forty years ago ; I am resting on that word, ' I am the 
 Lord thy God.' " Another friend put the question, " Sir, 
 are you not afraid of your sins ? " " Indeed, no," was his 
 answer; "ever since I knew Christ I have never thought 
 highly of my frames and duties, nor am I slavishly afraid 
 of my sins." At another time he said, " I know that when 
 my soul forsakes this tabernacle of clay it will fly as 
 naturally to my Saviour's bosom as the bird to its beloved 
 nest." 
 
 XXXIX. The Heathen's Reply to the Jesuit. 
 
 ExoD. XX. 4. " Thou shall fiot make unto thee any graven 
 image." 
 
 When the Jesuit missionaries first arrived in the Sandwich 
 Islands, they used many arguments with the natives to 
 
20 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 show that their instructions and those of the Protestant 
 missionaries were ahke. It was on one of these occasions 
 that an old man, who made no pretensions to reh^^ion, 
 replied that the missionaries had taught him about God. 
 " Oh, yes," replied the priests, " Mr. Thurston taught about 
 God, and that was right ; you heard him, and now I wish 
 you to hear me." The old man gravely answered, " But 
 the Bible says I cannot serve two masters." He further 
 objected to their images, when the priests said: " Oh! we do 
 not call this God, and we do not pray to it. It is only 
 a representation, shadow, of God." The old man replied: 
 " Let me see it. Tliat cannot be any representation of 
 God. It is made of brass. If tJiere be any shadoiv or repj'e- 
 setitation of God, it must be in the heart, not in an image." 
 
 XL. Look to Your Pockets. Exod. xx. 7. " T/iou 
 shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." 
 
 Howard the philanthropist was standing in a crowd by 
 the door of a post office, when a man uttered a volley of 
 oaths. " Look to your pockets ! " cried Howard, buttoning 
 up his own tightly. " Always take care of your pockets 
 when you find yourself amongst swearers. He who will 
 take God's name in vain will think little of taking your 
 purse, or doing anything else that is evil." 
 
 XLI. Swearing. Exod. xx. 7. '^ Thou shalt jiot take the 
 name of the Lo?-d thy God in vain ; for the Lord will not hold 
 him guiltless that taketh His name in vai?i." 
 
 It is interesting to know that when St. Paul's Cathedral was 
 in building. Sir Christopher Wren, the architect, caused 
 a printed notice to be affixed to the scaffolding, threaten- 
 ing with instant dismissal any workman guilty of swearing 
 within those sacred precincts. 
 
 XLII. Who Taught you to Swear? Exod. xx. 7. 
 
 " 2'hoii shalt not take the 71a me of the Lord thy God in vain." 
 
 An aged minister was once riding on th.e box-seat of 
 a coach ; the driver, a fine-looking young man, frequently 
 swore at his horses. For some time the minister was 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 21 
 
 silent ; at length he asked in a kind voice : " Will you tell 
 me, my friend, who taught you to swear ? Was it your 
 mother ? " 
 
 A tender point was touched. "My mother? No, sir. 
 Why, my mother is a praying woman I It would break 
 her heart if she heard me swearing," he replied. 
 
 In loving words the aged Christian pleaded with the 
 driver to honour, not only his mother's teachings, but also 
 the commands of his mother's God. 
 
 " I thank you, sir," said the young lad, and during the 
 remainder of the journey not another oath was heard. 
 
 XLIII. The Profanation of the Sabbath. Exod. 
 
 XX. 8. " Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy" 
 
 Blackstone declares somewhere that "a corruption of 
 morals usually follows a profanation of the Sabbath " ; and 
 La Place said just before his death, " I have lived long 
 enough to know what at one time I did not believe, that 
 no society can be upheld without the sentiment of religion." 
 The testimonies of other such men might be quoted in 
 great numbers that, alike on moral, social, economical, and 
 physical grounds, the disregard of the Lord's day is a 
 dangerous evil both to the individual and the communit3^ 
 
 XLIV. The Noblest Work of God. Exod. xx. 12. 
 " Honour thy father and thy 7nothe?:" 
 
 A LITTLE boy hearing a party of gentlemen applauding 
 the sentiment "an honest man is the noblest work of 
 God," boldly said, " No " ; and being asked, " What do you 
 think is the noblest work of God .-"' said, " ]\Iy mother." 
 That boy made a good man. Who can doubt it ? 
 
 XLV. An Emaciated Body. Exod. xx. 13. ''Thou 
 shalt not ki/l." 
 
 It is told of St. Francis of Assisi that, an hour or two 
 before his death, gazing d(n\ii on his poor, emaciated body, 
 he exclaimed regretfully, "' I fear I have ill-treated my 
 brother, the ass ! " 
 
22 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 XLVI. Cursing. Exod. xxi. 17. ''■lie that ciirseth his 
 father, or his mother, shall surely he put to death.'' 
 
 " Curses, like cliickens, always come home to roost." Such 
 is the proverb, and it is a very true saying. The evil 
 wishes and threats which are spoken against another return 
 on the swearer's own head. When an Arab is kicked by his 
 camel, or when the beast refuses to go on, he solemnly 
 curses the camel, at the same time throwing a handful of 
 sand into the air, and most of that sand comes back into 
 the Arab's eyes. So it is with curses. 
 
 XLVII. A Gift which Blindeth the Wise. Exod. 
 xxiii. 8. " Ami thou shall take Jio gift : for the gift blindeth 
 the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous'^ 
 
 It is recorded of Sir Matthew Hale that upon his circuit as 
 a judge he refused to try the cause of a gentleman who 
 had sent him the customary present of venison, until he 
 had paid for it ; for he well understood the spirit of the 
 excellent law in Exodus xxiii. 8. 
 
 XLVIII. The Plan of Strasburg Cathedral. 
 Exod. xxv. 9. " According to all that I show thee, after the 
 paiter7i of the tabertiacle, and the pattern of all the instruments 
 thereof even so shall ye make it." 
 
 There is a beautiful story told of the plan by which 
 Strasburg Cathedral was made. The architect, Erwin von 
 Steinbach, who was given the commission to build it, was 
 greatly troubled lest he should not get his plan sufficiently 
 noble. He had a daughter named Sabine, who was skilful 
 in drawing, and one night after they had wept together 
 over the plans, she said to her father, " Don't despair, God 
 will help us." After she fell asleep she dreamed that a 
 beautiful angel came, and, when she had told her story, said, 
 " You shall make the plan for the minster." The angel 
 and Sabine then set to work, and soon the plan was done. 
 When she awoke she uttered a loud scream, for there was 
 a paper before her covered with wonderful drawing. Her 
 father exclaimed : " Child, it was no dream. The angel 
 really visited you, bringing the inspiration from heaven to 
 help us." He built the cathedral after the plan, and it was 
 so beautiful that the people really believed the story. 
 
OLD TES7AMKNT ANECDOTES. 23 
 
 XLIX. Burning with Pure Oil. Kxod. xxvii. 20. 
 " A?iJ tlioii sha'tt comiiiaiid f/ic children of Israel, that fliey 
 I'li/ig thee pure oil oliTe beaten for the light, to cause the lamp 
 to hum always." 
 
 It is related in the biography of one who lived to become 
 a devoted Christian man, that while he was yet a little boy, 
 the passage read from the Bible in the family on a certain 
 occasion was Exodus xxvii. 20, describing the oil used in 
 the vessels of the tabernacle. The meaning and appli- 
 cation of the verse was explained by other passages from 
 the New Testament. This boy was then but five years old, 
 and it was not supposed that he could understand or feel 
 the slightest interest in a subject considered far beyond his 
 age. The older children left the room after family worship, 
 but the little boy was detained, as usual, to be taught some 
 simple verses of the Bible by his mother, and to pray with 
 her. He kneeled down at length to pray, and in the 
 midst of his prayer, he paused, and exclaimed earnestly, 
 " O my God, make me to burn this day witli///rt' oil I " 
 
 The morning lesson had not been lost upon him ; he 
 had understood its import. " Most evidently," says his 
 biographer, " was this prayer heard and answered through- 
 out the day of his life." 
 
 How appropriate is this petition for the morning offering 
 of every Christian, " Make me to burn this day with pure 
 oil " ! If He who hath all hearts in His keeping vouch- 
 safe a gracious answer to that prayer, the example of the 
 disciple must be one that will glorify the name of Jesus. 
 Such a man will walk with God. No unhallowed fires 
 will be lighted in his bosom. Neither revenge nor hate 
 can burn there. The peace and joy of the believer will 
 fill his soul. 
 
 L. Talent without Sanctity. Exod. xxix. 44. "7 
 %i.iill sanctify also both Aarofi and his sons, to minister to 
 Me in the pries fs office." 
 
 William Grimshaw, of Haworth, administered a severe 
 reproof to a lady with whom one day he was conversing. 
 She had expressed her admiration of a certain minister 
 who was more gifted in talent than in grace. '* Madam," 
 
24 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 said Grimsliaw, " I am glad you never saw the devil." 
 When asked why he made this remark, he said : " Because 
 he has greater talents than all the ministers in the world. 
 I am fearful if you were to see him you would fall in love 
 with him, as you seem to have so high a regard for talent 
 withaut sanctity. Pray do not be led away with the sound 
 of talents. Let the ministry under which Providence has 
 called you never be deserted under the influence of novelty. 
 There dwell, and pray that it may prove to you increasingly 
 edifying, consolatory, and instructive." 
 
 LI. Sabbath Desecration. Exod. xxxi. 13. " Verily 
 
 My sabbaths ye shall keep." 
 
 Mr. Grimshaw's ministry at Haworth was one of ceaseless 
 energy, labour, and prayer. 
 
 On entering upon the charge there, he found little 
 attention paid to the observance of the Lord's day. The 
 church was situated at the extremity of the parish, and it 
 was thought the people from the remoter districts would 
 not come so great a distance to worship, unless they had 
 the further inducement of being able to purchase such 
 stores for their families as were not to be procured nearer 
 their own dwellings. Sabbath had become a busy market- 
 ing day. To check this desecration, he adopted the most 
 vigorous means. It was the custom in that locality for the 
 churchwardens to leave their pew in the course of the 
 morning service, and visit the public-houses, and the usual 
 places of resort for the village idlers, to ascertain whether 
 idlers might be there lurking. Not content with requiring 
 these officers to do their duty, the incumbent was accus- 
 tomed to leave the church himself when the psalm before 
 the sermon was sung, and if any was found wandering 
 in the streets, or lounging in the churchyard, he was 
 driven before him into the house of God. It has been 
 said that in this service the horse-whip was used, and that 
 on some occasions he told the clerk to give out the 119th 
 psalm, that he might have the longer time in which to 
 prosecute his search. i)Ut this is probably a myth or 
 exaggeration. John Newton relates, that as a friend of 
 his was passing a public-house in Haworth on the Lord's 
 day, his attention was attracted towards a number of 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 25 
 
 persons wlio wcic iiialciiif^ their escape from it, some by- 
 jumping out of the lower windows, and others by climbing 
 over a wall. At first he supposed from the hurry of their 
 flight that the house must be on fire ; but on inquiring the 
 reason of the sudden rush, he found that it all arose from 
 their having discovered the near approach of the parson. 
 At another time, a man was passing the village on his way 
 to call the doctor, when his horse lost a shoe. On apply- 
 ing to the blacksmith to have his loss repaired, the reply- 
 was, that unless the minister granted leave it could not be 
 done. Grimshaw, learning that the case required haste, 
 consented that the horse should be shod. 
 
 LII. Moses' Argument. Exod. xxxii. 12. " Where- 
 fore should the Egyptians speak and sa}\ For miscJiief did He 
 bring than out, to slay them iti the mountains, and to consume 
 them from the face of the earth ? Turn from Thy fierce wrath^ 
 and 1 epent of this evil against Thy people." 
 
 The pious Mr. Flavel, on the occasion of his escape to 
 London from the persecution which was raging against the 
 Nonconformists during his settlement at Dartmouth, is 
 said to have made use of a similar argument to this of 
 Moses. Being overtaken on his voyage by a violent 
 storm, in which he and his companions all expected to be 
 drowned, Mr. Flavel called the ship's company together in 
 the cabin to invoke God's mercy and deliverance. Among 
 other arguments he made use of this, that if he and his 
 company perished in that storm the name of God would 
 be blasphemed ; the enemies of religion would say, that, 
 though he escaped their hands on shore, yet Divine 
 vengeance had overtaken him at sea. No sooner was his 
 prayer ended than a person came from the deck crying : 
 " Deliverance ! God is the hearer of prayer I In a moment 
 the wind is come fair west." And so sailing before it, they 
 were brought safely to London. 
 
 LIII. Truthfulness. Exod. xxxii. 24. *^ So they gave it 
 me: then I cast it into the f re, and there came out this calf" 
 
 Henry Venn Ellioi-, the pious Brighton minister, 
 writes thus in late life: "If there is one point more than 
 another in morality concerning which I have been especially 
 
26 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 watchful in my own words, and earnest in teachinf^ my 
 children, it has been strict truth, even to the banishment 
 of ordinary exaggerations." If a child had made some 
 trifling mistake, and said, " I am so very sorry," " Keep 
 your sorrow, my child," he would say, " for a greater 
 occasion." He used to refer to Adam's self-justification, 
 "The woman gave unto me"; to Aaron's, "There came 
 out this calf"; to Saul's, " The people took of the spoil "; 
 as compared with David's earnest, ingenuous " 1 have 
 sinned against the Lord." 
 
 LIV. Christ our Rest-Stone. Exod. xxxiii. 14. 
 " And He said, My jjftsencc shall go tvith thee, and 1 will give 
 thee rest.'" 
 
 In India, where burdens are carried on men's heads and 
 backs, it is customary to provide resting-places for them 
 along the road. Stones are set up along the hot, dusty 
 roads, just the right height for a man to rest his burden 
 upon until he is refreshed and able to go on his way. 
 
 " Ah, sahib," said a native Christian to an English 
 gentleman, " Christ is my rest-stone, Christ is all my 
 hope." 
 
 LV. Leprosy. Lev. xiv, i, 2. ^' And the Lord spake unto 
 Moses, saying, 7 his shall be the law of the leper." 
 
 The crusaders were the means of introducing the leprosy 
 of the East into all the countries bordering the Mediter- 
 ranean Sea, and a feeling of pity, and even of reverence, 
 for these sufferers was widely diffused through Europe at 
 that time. The churchmen of the times encouraged this 
 feeling, and taught that Christ Himself had regarded the 
 lepers with special tenderness, and quoted from the fifty- 
 third of Isaiah a prophecy, in which, as they maintained, 
 the Messiah was foretold under the image of a leper. 
 Francis of Assisi had faith to see and charity to love even 
 in the leprous the imperishable traces of the Divine image. 
 He became an inmate of the lepers' hospital at Assisi, and 
 with his own hands washed and dressed the poor sufferers, 
 and once kissed a leper, who, we are told, instantly became 
 whole. Even they who reject the miracle will revere the 
 lovinukindness. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 27 
 
 LVI. Transferring of Sins. Lev. xvi. 21. ^'' And 
 Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, 
 and confess over him all the iniquities of the childreji of Israel, 
 and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon 
 the head of the goat." 
 
 Charles Simeon, of Cambridge, thus speaks of his attain- 
 ing peace in believing: 
 
 "In passion week," he tells, "as I was reading ' Bishop 
 Wilson on the Lord's Supper,' I met with an expression to 
 this effect, 1 7iat the Jezvs kneiv xvhat they did when they 
 transferred their sin to the head of their offering. The 
 thought rushed into my mind. What ! may I transfer all my 
 guilt to another ? Has God provided an Offering for me, 
 that I may lay my sins on his Head ? Then, God willing, 
 I will not bear them on my own soul one moment longer. 
 Accordingly I sought to lay my sins upon the sacred head 
 of Jesus, and on the Wednesday began to have a hope 
 of mercy ; on the Thursday that hope increased ; on the 
 Friday and Saturday it became more strong ; and on 
 Easter Sunday (April 4) I awoke early with these words 
 upon my heart and lips, 'Jesus Christ is risen to-day! 
 Alleluia ! Alleluia ! ' From that hour peace flowed in rich 
 abundance into my soul." 
 
 LVII. Some Rules for the Christian Life. Lev. 
 
 xviii. 4, 5. " Ye shall do My judgments, and keep My ordi- 
 nances, to tvalk therein : I am the Lord your God. Ye shall 
 therefore keep My statutes, and My Judgments : which if a man 
 do, he shall live in them : I am the Lord." 
 
 Joseph Alleine tells in a letter to a clergyman what 
 were the rules he imposed upon himself in the Christian 
 life and ministry. 
 
 " Never to lie down, but in the name of God : not barely 
 for natural refreshment, but that a Avearied servant of 
 Christ may be recruited and fitted to serve Him better 
 next day. 
 
 " Never to rise up but with this resolution. Well, I will go 
 forth this day in the name of God, and will make religion 
 my business, and spend the day for eternity. 
 
28 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 " Never to enter upon my calling but first thinking, I 
 will do these things as unlo God. 
 
 " Never to sit down to the table, but resolving, I will not 
 eat merely to please my appetite, but to strengthen myself 
 for my Master's work. 
 
 " Never to make a visit but upon some holy design, 
 resolving to leave something of God where I go, and in 
 every company to leave some good savour behind. 
 
 "This is what I have been for some time learning, and 
 am pressing hard after: and if I strive not to walk by these 
 rules, let this paper witness against me." 
 
 LVIII. Honesty of the Huguenots. Lev. xix. 36. 
 '•'' Jtist balances^ just 7veights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall 
 ye have : I am the Lord your God, which brought you out of 
 the land of Egypt." 
 
 The name " Huguenot " has received several explanations, 
 but the most plausible one is suggested by Dr. Baird, 
 that it was derived from a popular hobgoblin, known as 
 "Huguet" or " Le Roy Huguon," to which the super- 
 stitious folk likened the Protestants whom they saw flitting 
 under cover of the darkness to their secret conventicles. 
 
 The testimony to the character of these people, as distin- 
 guished from some of their military and political leaders, 
 is very explicit and honourable. "The Huguenot never 
 swears," was a common saying. Their honesty was also a 
 proverb. The manufacturers called them "a silly sort of 
 people," because the silk which they brought did not have 
 to be re-weighed. They were people of great industry and 
 thrift. Hon. John Jay, who has made a life-long study of 
 the history of the Huguenots in America, says that he 
 " never heard of one of them who asked or received alms " ; 
 nor has he reason to think that, notwithstanding their 
 privations, "any of them came to this country in a destitute 
 condition." Gov. Lovelace wrote to the king of England : 
 " I find some of these people have the breeding of courts, 
 and I cannot conceive how such is acquired." The devout 
 and practical quality of their religion is exemplified by such 
 instances as that which attended the arrival of the party 
 which settled at New Paltz, on the Hudson River. They 
 had no sooner hitched their horses than they gathered in 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 2g 
 
 a group, when Psalm xlvi. was read, and they kneeled 
 together in a prayer of thankfulness and dedication to the 
 Lord, who had led them in the wilderness. 
 
 A single case may be cited as an illustration of the 
 whole. Amadee was a youth of eighteen, living in the 
 province of Pcrigord. His mother, a widow, had twenty- 
 two soldiers quartered upon her during the dragonnades. 
 For the sake of her children she signed a recantation. But 
 because she added " compelled by fear," they were carried 
 off to convents, except Amadee, who escaped, but was 
 arrested on the frontier with a young comrade. Every 
 effort was made to intimidate or seduce this young Chris- 
 tian and Faithful into abjuring their belief A rich and 
 beautiful wife was promised to Amadee if he would become 
 a Papist. An attractive and attracted young Catholic girl 
 even visited him in his cell, and offered herself to him with 
 tears of pity and tenderness. Standing firm even against 
 this allurement, he was condemned to the galleys. 
 
 The labour of the galley-slave is thus described in the 
 memoir which was published of him : " Six men are 
 chained to each bench wholly naked, sitting with one foot 
 on a block of timber, the other resting on the bench before 
 them, holding in their hands an enormous oar fifty feet 
 long. Imagine them lengthening their bodies, their arms 
 stretched out to push the oar over the backs of those 
 before them ; they then plunged the oar into the sea, and 
 fall back into the hollow below, to repeat again and again 
 the same muscular exertion. The fatigue and misery of 
 their labour seems to be without a parallel. They often 
 faint, and are brought to life by the lash ; sometimes they 
 are thrown into the sea, and another takes the place." 
 
 By reason of his intelligence and integrity this young 
 man was offered the position of keeper of the supplies, 
 which exempted him from labour at the oar. But he relin- 
 quished it in favour of another Huguenot, an old and feeble 
 man, and returned to his torture and his vile companions. 
 In an engagement with an English frigate he was the only 
 survivor of eighteen who occupied three benches, and was 
 himself severely mutilated. 
 
 The story of the woes of this noble young confessor as 
 he and his companions were transferred from the galleys 
 of Dunkirk to those of Marseilles : marched across the 
 
30 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 country on foot for three hundred miles with shackles 
 about their necks ; confined in a horrible prison in Paris, 
 so chained in ranks that they could neither stand nor lie 
 down ; in winter chained upon the wharves with neither 
 fire nor blankets ; obliged to exhibit themselves in all sorts 
 of ridiculous attitudes and degrading- antics for the amuse- 
 ment of visitors — all this is too painful to be recapitulated. 
 More fortunate than most of his brethren, Amadee, with 
 a io-Vf otiiers, was released by the intercession of Queen 
 Anne of England, on condition of quitting France. They 
 repaired to Geneva, where they were received with joy and 
 tenderness. 
 
 LIX. The Duty of Charity. Lev. xxv. 35. '■' Atid if 
 
 thy brother be ivaxen poor, and fallen in decay, with thee ; 
 then thou shalt relieve him : yea, though he be a stranger, or 
 a sojourner ; that he may live with thee.'" 
 
 There are eight degrees or steps, says Maimonides, in the 
 duty of charity : 
 
 The first and lowest degree is to give, but with reluc- 
 tance or regret — the gift of the hand, but not of the heart. 
 
 The second is to give cheerfully, but not proportionably 
 to the distress of the sufferer. 
 
 The third is to give cheerfully and proportionably, but 
 not until we are solicited. 
 
 The fourth is to give cheerfully, proportionably, and 
 even unsolicited ; but to put it in the poor man's hand, 
 thereby exciting in him the painful emotion of shame. 
 
 The fifth is to give charity in such a way that the dis- 
 tressed may receive the bounty and know the benefactor, 
 without their being known to him. Such was the conduct 
 of some of our ancestors, who used to tie up money in the 
 hind-corners of their cloaks, so that the poor might take it 
 unperceived. 
 
 The sixth, which rises still higher, is to know the objects 
 of our bounty, but remain unknown to them. Such was 
 the conduct of those who used to convey their charitable 
 gifts into poor people's homes, taking care that their own 
 names should remain unknown. 
 
 The seventh is still more meritorious ; namely, to bestow 
 charity in such a way that the benefactor may not know 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 31 
 
 the relieved objects, nor tliey tlie name of their benefactor : 
 as was done by our charitable forefathers during the exis- 
 tence of the temple ; for there was in the holy building 
 a place, called the Chamber of Silence or Unostentation, 
 wherein the good deposited secretly whatever their generous 
 hearts suggested, and from which the most respectable poor 
 families were maintained with equal secrecy. 
 
 Lastly, the eighth, and most meritorious of all, is to 
 anticipate charity by preventing poverty, to assist the 
 reduced brother before he be forced to hold out his hand 
 for charity. This is the highest step, and the summit 
 of charity's golden ladder. 
 
 LX. Reverencing the Sanctuary. Lev. xxvi. 2. 
 " Ye shall keep My sabbaths, and reverence My sanctuary : 1 
 am the Loriiy 
 
 When Colonel Turner, a gallant cavalier, was hanged for 
 burglary, he told the crowd gathered round the gallows 
 that his mind received great consolation from the thought 
 that he had always taken his hat off when he went into 
 a church. 
 
 LXI. Trivial Hindrances keeping back from 
 Public Worship. Lev. xxvi. 2. " Ye shall keep My 
 sabbaths, and reverence My sanctuary : I am the Lord." 
 
 Of good Archbishop Leigliton it is said, that the Sabbath 
 was his delight ; no slight hindrance could detain him 
 from the house of prayer. Upon one occasion, when he 
 was indisposed, the day being stormy, his friends urged 
 him, on account of his health, not to venture to church. 
 
 " Were the weather fair," was the reply, " I would stay 
 at home ; but since it is otherwise I must go, lest I be 
 thought to countenance by my example the irreligious 
 practice of allowing trivial hindrances to keep me back 
 from public worship." 
 
 LXII. A Boy Martyr. Num. vi. 25, 26. ''The Lord 
 make His face shi7ie upon thee, . . . and give thee peace." 
 
 William Brown was a poor boy martyr in the reign of 
 Queen Mary. He was burnt at Brentwood. " Pray for 
 
32 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 me," he said to the bystanders. One of them replied, " I 
 will pray no more for thee than I will pray for a dog." 
 " Then," said William, " Son of God, shine Thou upon 
 me ! " And lo! at once on a dark, cloudy day, the sun- 
 shine burst forth upon him, and kindled a glory upon 
 his youthful face ; " whereat the people mused, because it 
 was so dark a little time before." Happy are they on 
 whom the Son of God shall thus smile. 
 
 LXIII. How John Williams was Converted. 
 
 Num. X, 29. " Come thou zvilh iis, a?id we will do i/iee good." 
 
 John Williams, the well-known missionary to the South 
 Sea Islands, when loitering about on a Sabbath evening 
 in early life, was persuaded to go and hear a sermon ; by 
 the grace of God, by that sermon he was converted, 
 and became one of the greatest missionaries of modern 
 times. 
 
 LXIV. Building up in their most holy Faith. 
 
 NuM xii. 3. " A^07ii the man Moses was very meek." 
 
 Mr. MoSTYN, one of Wales' early ministers, was remark- 
 ably humble. When he was assistant to another minister, 
 some good people in his hearing ascribing their conversion, 
 under God, to that minister's preaching, he seemed de- 
 jected, as if he were of no use. A sensible countryman 
 present, who had a particular value for his ministry, made 
 this observation for his encouragement: "An ordinary 
 workman may hew down timber, but it must be an ac- 
 complished artist that shall frame it for the building." Mr. 
 Mostyn cheerfully replied, " If I am of any use, I am satis- 
 fied." His preaching was eminently useful to Christians. 
 
 LXV. Aaron's Rod. Num. xvii. 8. ^^ Behold the rod 
 of Aaron for the house of Levitvas budded." 
 
 Mr. Ruskin takes up the legend of St. Christopher, and 
 writes thus : 
 
 " I do not know," he says, " how far the tale of St. 
 Christopher is proposed by the Catholic Church for belief 
 as history, or with interpretation as myth. I could myself 
 much more easily explain it as the gradually enriched and 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 sunset-gilded tradition of a dream and vision seen by a 
 hermit-ferryman, than I can interpret its incidents as S)'m- 
 bolizing any course of facts of spiritual life. Reading it 
 as a myth, I am myself utterly uncertain of the meaning 
 of the king, the hermit, the river, or the oppression felt by 
 the saint in bearing Ilim whose yoke is easy and whose 
 burden is light. But I will hope for the reader's pleasure 
 in being reminded of Tintoret's figure of St. Christopher 
 in paradise (in the Ducal Palace at Venice), bearing the 
 globe of the world, which is surmounted by a cross, and 
 by whose surface a beam of light descending from the 
 enthroned Christ is reflected in a dazzling star. By which 
 1 have always understood Tintoret to mean what Holman 
 Hunt means by his "Light of the World," but with the 
 further lesson that the visitation which was to sanctify 
 our world for us with eternal day would come first through 
 the deepest night, and in the heaviest toil of the occu- 
 pation which was our earthly duty. I think also that 
 Tintoret may have intended to make us feel how greatly 
 the story of St. Christopher had been itself a light to all 
 the Christian, and might be to all the future, world. But 
 none of these lessons by great imaginative interpreters, 
 however probable, guides us to any clear reading of the 
 legend for all men, in the continuous action of it ; nor, if 
 any such could be given, would the application be other 
 than forced and untrustworthy.. At first thought most 
 of us would suppose the river meant human life ; but 
 that river we do not cross, but descend : we are troubled 
 when it is troubled, calm when it is calm. We do not 
 resist its current nor refuse its peace. Again, in memory 
 of more recent fables, we might think of it as the river 
 of death ; but the travellers whom the saint carried over 
 resumed their journey, and he himself, finally fording it, 
 begins his true ministry of the gospel. Take it for some 
 chief time of trouble, and we might perhaps, without much 
 strain, suppose the meaning to be that the man who had 
 sustained others in their chief earthly trials afterwards had 
 Christ for companion in his own ; but this idea would 
 never occur easily and naturally to very simple persons 
 who heard the story ; it is rare that, among the many 
 confused evils of existence, any of us can fix on that which, 
 once traversed, was to be feared no more ; and I should 
 
 D 
 
34 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 be extremely reluctant to offer to my Protestant readers, 
 as the true sense of the loveliest of Catholic legends, the 
 thought that common people were only to have a saint 
 to comfort them in their troubles, while the saint himself 
 had Christ. More and more, as I think over it, I am led 
 to take it for the memory of what really once happened 
 to sowie kindly warden of a river ford, bearing by the 
 grace of natural human feeling comfort afterwards to all 
 who hear of it for ever." 
 
 The legend goes on to relate how the dry fir tree that 
 St. Christopher carried in his hand became green, after his 
 ministry, and was covered with fresh leaves. Mr. Ruskin 
 compares with this the blossoming of the spears of Charle- 
 macrne's knights in the windows of Chartres cathedral, and 
 adds, " It is, I suppose, only by the coincidence of thought 
 which runs through all great literature and legend, that 
 the putting forth of blossom by the rod of Aaron, and 
 of leaf by the staff of St. Christopher, teach the life and 
 beneficence of the sceptres of the just, as the for ever 
 leafless sceptre of Achilles, and the spear whose image 
 was the pine, hewn for ships of battle from the Norwegian 
 hills, show in their own death the power of the kings of 
 death." 
 
 LXVI. Results are in God's Hands. Num. xxi. 
 4. " The soul of the people zvas much discouraged because 
 of the 7vay" 
 
 A DISCOURAGED minister had the following strange dream. 
 He thought he was standing on the top of a great granite 
 rock, trying to break it with a pickaxe. Hour after hour 
 he worked on with no result. At last he said, " It is 
 useless; I will stop." Suddenly a man stood by him and 
 asked: "Were you not allotted this task? and if so, why 
 are you going to abandon it.? " " My work is vain ; I can 
 make no impression on the granite." Then the stranger 
 solemnly replied : "That is nothing to you; your duty is to 
 pick, whether the rock yield or no. The work is yours, 
 the results are in other hands ; work on/' In his dream 
 he saw himself setting himself anew to his labour, and at 
 his first blow the rock flew into hundreds of pieces. This 
 was only a dream, but it proved a valuable and never 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 35 
 
 forgotten lesson to the minister, and a means of comfort 
 and cheer to his soul. 
 
 LXVII. Solid Happiness. Num. xxiii. 10. ^^ Let me 
 lUe t/ie diatli of tlie ri;^/i/coiis, and let my last end be like 
 his!" 
 
 " My first convictions on the subject of religion," says the 
 late Rev. R. Cecil, "were confirmed by observing that really 
 religious persons had some solid happiness among them, 
 which I felt tlie vanities of the world could not give, I 
 shall never forget standing by the bedside of my sick 
 mother. 'Are not you afraid to die .-' ' I asked. 'No.' 
 ' Why does the uncertainty of another state give you no 
 concern?' 'Because God has said: "Fear not. . . 
 When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; 
 and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee." 
 ' Let me die the death of the righteous.' " 
 
 LXVIII. The Bliss of Dying. Num. xxiii. 10. '' T/ie 
 death of the righteous." 
 
 The Rev, Henry Venn, of Huddersfield, and latterly of 
 Yelling, in Huntingdonshire, was so elated at the prospect 
 of death, that it actually proved a stimulus to life Upon 
 one occasion, as he lay on his death-bed, he himself re- 
 marked some bad symptoms, and said to Mr, Pearson, 
 " Surely these are good "symptoms for me" ; to which his 
 medical attendant replied, " Sir, in this state of joyous 
 excitement you cannot die." The joy of dying kept him 
 alive. 
 
 LXIX. Ready to Go. Num. xxiii, 10, *^ Let me die the 
 death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his." 
 
 John Eltas, the great Welsh preacher, had a happy death. 
 It may be said of him in the exquisite lines of Dr, Watts — 
 
 " He stood , but with his starry pinions on, 
 Dressed for the flight, and ready to be gone." 
 
 As he lay on his death-bed he said : " I am as liappy as 
 it is possible for a redeemed man to be, though in pain, 
 in pain. There is not a cloud between me and the face of 
 
36 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 tny God. The blessings and mercies I used to enjoy in 
 my ministry are still flowing freely into my soul. They 
 are more powerful, more lively in their effects on my soul 
 than ever I felt them when I preached them to others." 
 Thus he passed away on June 8th, 1841, to his Saviour 
 and his reward. His body was carried at the head of 
 a funeral procession a mile and a half long, to the grave 
 at Llanfaes, near Beaumaris. 
 
 The Lord God of Elijah is still present in Israel, but 
 the sons of the prophets need a double portion of the 
 Spirit. Let the Churches lift up their cry, " Oh that Thou 
 wouldest rend the heavens, that Thou wouldest come 
 down ! " So shall greater deeds be wrought, and minis- 
 tries given to the Church as powerful and as fruitful as 
 was that of John Elias. 
 
 LXX. The First Telegram in America. Num. 
 
 xxiii. 23. ^'■According to this time it shall be said of Jacob 
 and of Israel^ What hath God wrought ! " 
 
 The first words ever flashed along an electric wire in 
 America were, " What hath God wrought ! " sent by a 
 young girl from Washington to Baltimore. And when 
 man's science subdued the forces of the lightning and 
 the ocean, and the electric cable first flashed its words 
 from hemisphere to hemisphere, almost the first message 
 was, " Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, 
 goodwill toward men." 
 
 LXXI. The Detection of Sin is Certain. Num. 
 
 xxxii. 23. '■'■ Be S2n-e yotir sin will fi7id you out^ 
 
 In the most mysterious manner does the providence of 
 God sometimes expose crime. The singular movements 
 of some domestic animals ; the words written upon the 
 wadding of some discharged gun; the caving in of banks, 
 in the sand of which dead bodies have been buried; and 
 other things as trivial, lead to the detection of criminals 
 who suppose they have concealed all tokens of guilt in the 
 graves of their victims. It is related of an eminent 
 clergyman, that on one occasion, while walking in a grave- 
 yard, he saw the sexton throwing up the bones of a 
 human being. He took the skull in his hands, and on 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 37 
 
 examination saw a nail sticking into the temple. He drew 
 it out, placed it in his pocket, and asked the sexton whose 
 skull it was. On receiving the necessary information, he 
 went to the widow, now an aged woman, and entered into 
 conversation with her. He asked lier of what disease her 
 husband died, and while she was giving an answer drew 
 the nail from his vest, and asked her if she had ever seen 
 it before. -Struck with horror, the wretched woman con- 
 fessed that she had murdered her husband, and that her 
 own hand had driven into his temple that nail. 
 
 LXXII. Good turned to Evil. Deut. xxiv. 24. 
 " For the Lord thy God is a coiisuiinng fire." 
 
 A GLASS inkstand was placed on the table so that the 
 sun's rays fell upon it. Brightly and cheerily, no doubt, 
 they played upon its facets and angles ; but that inkstand 
 affected these beautiful sunbeams in such a way as to 
 extract from them heat in sufficient force to set the table 
 upon which it stood on fire, reducing it, and all it came 
 in contact with, into ashes. What is there more beauti- 
 ful than the sunbeams? How they cheer and cherish 
 and inspire nature all around I yet there are some objects 
 which can convert this thing of beauty and health and life 
 into a consuming fire. So there are moral characters 
 which extract death out of life ; transform the loving, life- 
 giving gospel into an instrument of destruction ; in short, 
 cause the God of love to become to them a consuming 
 fire. 
 
 LXXIII. The Stranger within thy Gates. 
 
 Deut. v. 14. " Thy stranger that is within thj gates." 
 
 A HIGHLY cultivated lawyer relates this incident of his 
 early days. When a thoughtless youth, he wandered away 
 to a distant city. The Sabbath came, and he was alone, 
 with nothing but his own fancy or inclination to guide him 
 in his selection of a place of worship. As he was going 
 along the street, he passed by the door of a Bethel chapel. 
 Hearing the voice of prayer, he turned back and entered. 
 Scarcely was he seated, before the preacher, among the 
 subjects of petition prayed for "the stranger within our 
 gates." He remained till the service was concluded, and 
 
38 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 went to his room in tears. The words of supplication 
 gathered around the word "stranger" rang in his memory. 
 After relating the circumstance the lawyer adds : " In public 
 mini:strations never forget the 'stranger within thy gates.' 
 You will touch some heart, which will vibrate to the 
 appeal." 
 
 LXXIV. The Arithmetic of Heaven. Deut. vi. 4. 
 " The Lord our God is one Lord.''^ 
 
 Daniel Webster had been attending Divine service in 
 the Park-street Church, Boston. It is a staunch, orthodox 
 church, and at that time was not in high favour with the 
 Unitarians. Coming away from church, he was met by 
 a Unitarian gentleman, who said to him, " So you have 
 been to church, where they teach that three times one are 
 one I " Mr. Webster replied with that solemn voice of his, 
 now more intensely solemn than usual, " My friend, you 
 and I do not understand the arithmetic of heaven." 
 
 If any man less than Mr. Webster had made this reply, 
 it might be considered an evasion of the difficulty sug- 
 gested. Mr. Webster had been attending a church where 
 the doctrine of the Trinity is taught. Three Persons in one 
 Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Three in One. 
 No human intellect can comprehend the mode of such 
 existence ; and some there are who reject the truth, 
 because it does not seem to them reasonable that One 
 should be Three, and Three should be One. 
 
 LXXV. Loving God. Deut. vi. 5. '■^ And tJiou shalt 
 love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy 
 soul, and with all thy might" 
 
 Sir David Brewster was an earnest searcher after light. 
 A memorable incident we give in the words of his loving 
 biographer. She is recording a conversation which her 
 father had with her sister-in-law, Mrs. Macpherson, who 
 sa}-s : " I had a long talk with dear papa upon the suffer- 
 ing of Christ, from which we passed on to speaking of the 
 gratitude due to God. . . . We spoke of the possi- 
 bility of feeling any love towards God, and agreed that 
 such a sentiment of love as is possible between man and 
 man was impossible between man and God. 'How can 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 39 
 
 we love Ilim,' he s;i'cl, 'One whom we have not seen? 
 We admire Ilim in Mis works, and trust from the wisdom 
 seen in these that He is wise in all His dealings ; but how 
 can we LOVE Him ? ' " After this conversation, his daughter- 
 in-law, being herself led to understand how alone the love 
 of the unseen Christ can be shed abroad in the heart by 
 the working of the Holy Spirit, felt that she must confess 
 this change in her views and feelings. " He listened most 
 attentively, and when I had finished, took me in his arms, 
 kissed me, and said, in such a child-like manner, ' Go now 
 then, and pray that I may know it too.' " 
 
 LXXVI. A Question for Parents. Deut. vi, 7. 
 
 " A fid thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children^ 
 
 It is related of Ben Ezra, that when yet a child he asked 
 his teacher to be instructed in the law of God ; but he was 
 told that he was yet too young to be taught these sacred 
 mysteries. " But, master," said the boy, " I have been in 
 the burial-ground, and I have measured the graves, and I 
 find some shorter than myself Now if I should be taken 
 away by death before I know the word of God, what will 
 become of me after ? " 
 
 LXXVII. The Haus-Segen. Deut. vi. 9. '' And thou 
 shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates." 
 
 The mountainous region in the south-east of Bavaria is 
 the home of a race of people, simple, pious, and primitive 
 in their habits, even to the present day. It is the common 
 custom of the Bavarian peasants to afiix the " Haus-Segen " 
 to their house doors. This is a paper, with the outline of 
 a heart printed in the centre, and surrounded by a circlet 
 of smaller hearts. Each heart contains a prayer or some 
 sacred verse, and the paper is sometimes decorated with 
 tints of red, blue, and yellow. 
 
 LXXVIII. Scripture Texts. Deut. xi. 18. ''There- 
 fore shall ye lay up these my wo)'ds in your heart and in your 
 soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may 
 be as frontlets bdiceen your eyes." 
 
 Texts of Scripture used to be painted on the doors of 
 the Puritans, and over their fireplaces. Texts used to be 
 
40 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Stamped on kettles and skillets, wrought into garments, 
 and even carved on the wooden cradles. The language of 
 the Bible was with them the language of every-day life. 
 
 LXXIX. Duty of Liberality. Deut. xv. 7. "Thou 
 shall 7iot harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy 
 poor brother." 
 
 Mr. Sherman had the cause of the poor and needy very 
 much at heart. On a Friday morning's service, when his 
 congregation was, as it often was, a scanty one, the subject 
 was Elisha multiplying the poor widow's oil to pay the 
 demands of her creditors. He depicted the need of poor 
 widows, especially of ministers' widows, often left utterly 
 destitute, and mentioned a case just then known to him, 
 where £2^ pounds were needed to apprentice a minister's 
 son ; and with such effect, that the dozen or two people 
 present subscribed ;^i8 before leaving the hall, more than 
 enough to complete the sum required being sent in after- 
 wards. Mr. Sherman was himself a man of great bene- 
 volence. He gave liberally himself. We are told that his 
 house was like the house of the relieving officer, besieged 
 by needy applicants, and a deserving case was never sent 
 'unhelped away. The old people in the almshouses were 
 often gladdened by parcels of tea and sugar or by small 
 presents of money, and he never failed to remember them 
 in his Christmas gifts. 
 
 LXXX. Succour Men in Distress. Deut. xv. ii. 
 " For the poor shall 7iever cease out of the land : therefore 1 
 command thee, saying, Thou shall open thine hand wide unto 
 thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land." 
 
 I WAS very much struck with an old Englishman that I 
 knew, who used to do a great deal of amateur preaching 
 and amateur teaching, visiting jails and poorhouses, who 
 said to me one day, " I make them understand, wherever 
 I go, that I am never going to give them anything." I 
 said to m}'self, " That being the general rule of your minis- 
 tration, I would not give the turn of my hand for all the 
 good that you will do." A man who determines that he 
 will not succour men that are in physical distress, through 
 all the range of his ministration, will not do any good. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 41 
 
 I did not then believe that he did any good ; I do not 
 bchcve it now ; and since he is dead, I do not think he 
 beheves it. 
 
 LXXXI. Moral Training of the Young. Deut. 
 xxxii. 46. " And lie said unto them. Set your hearts unto 
 all the words which I testify amotig you this day, which ye 
 shall covnmijid your children to observe to do, all the words of 
 this law.'" 
 
 The strong feehng which Erasmus always had in regard 
 to the careful moral training of the young appears in his 
 " Manual." " Let parents," he says, " who are Christians, not 
 utter words before their children which give the lie to their 
 faith. Let not the Christian mother indulge in unreason- 
 able grief after bereavement, and let the father beware of 
 praising before his children the man who has made a 
 fortune by doubtful means." 
 
 LXXXII. Venture on Him. Deut. xxxiii. 27. ^'■Under- 
 neath are the evei'lasting armsJ' 
 
 I ONCE saw a lad on the roof of a very high building where 
 several men were at work. He was gazing about with 
 apparent unconcern, when his foot slipped, and he fell. In 
 falling he caught by a rope, and hung suspended in mid 
 air, where he could sustain himself but a short time. He 
 perfectly knew his situation, and expected in a few minutes 
 to be dashed on the stones below. At this moment a kind 
 and powerful man rushed out of the house, and standing 
 beneath him with extended arms called out, " Let go of 
 the rope ; I will catch you." " I can't do it," said the boy, 
 " Let go, and I promise you shall escape unhurt." The 
 boy hesitated for a moment, and then quitting his hold, 
 dropped easily and safely into the arms of his deliverer. 
 Here is a simple act of faith. The poor boy knew his 
 danger ; he saw his deliverer, and heard his voice. He 
 believed him, and letting go every other dependence and 
 hope, he dropped into his arms. 
 
 " Venture on Him, venture freely, 
 Let no other trust intrude ; 
 
 None but Jesus 
 Can do helpless sinners good." 
 
44 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES, 
 
 LXXXIII. A Farewell Scene. Deut. xxxiv. 8. 
 '■'■And the cliildren of Israel wept for Moses in the plain of 
 Moab thirty days." 
 
 Robert Moffat laboured for more than fifty years 
 in South Africa, and chiefly at Kuruman, amongst the 
 Bechwanas. On Sunday, March 20th, 1870, he preached 
 for the last time in the Kuruman church. In all that 
 great congregation there were few of his own contem- 
 poraries left. The older people were for the most part 
 children when he first came among them. With a pathetic 
 grace, he pleaded with those who still remained unbelieving 
 amid the gospel privileges they had now enjoyed for so 
 many years, and he commended to the grace of God those 
 converts who had been his joy and crown. It was an 
 impressive close to an impressive career. On the Friday 
 following the aged missionary and his wife took their 
 departure. As they came out of their house and walked 
 to their wagon, they were beset by crowds of the Bech- 
 wanas, each longing for a hand- shake and another word 
 of farewell ; and as the wagon drove away it was followed 
 by all who could walk, and a long and pitiful wail arose, 
 enough to melt the hardest heart. 
 
 LXXXIV. Ruskin's Bible. Josh. i. 8. '' This book of 
 the laiu shall not depart out of thy mouth ; but thou shall medi- 
 tate therein day and niglitP 
 
 John Ruskin writes thus in his " Outlines of Scenes and 
 Thoughts in my Past Life": "I have just opened my 
 oldest (in use) l^ible ; a small, closely, and very neatly 
 printed volume it is, printed in Edinburgh by Sir D. 
 Hunter, Blain & J. Bruce, in 18 16. Yellow now with age, 
 and flexible, but not unclean, with much use, except that 
 the lowest corners of the pages at I Kings viii., and 
 Deuteronomy xxxii. are worn somewhat thin and dark, 
 the learning of these two chapters having cost me much 
 pains. My mother's list of the chapters with which, thus 
 learned, she established my soul in life, has just fallen out 
 of it. I will take what indulgence the incurious reader can 
 give me for printing the list thus accidentally occurrent. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 43 
 
 Exodus XV., XX. 
 
 2 Samuel i. from seventeenth verse to the end. 
 
 I Kings viii. 
 
 Psahiis xxiii., xxxii., xc, xci., ciii., cxii., cxix., cxxxix. 
 
 Proverbs ii., iii., viii., xii, 
 
 Isaiah Iviii. 
 
 Matthew v., vi., vii. 
 
 Acts xxvi. 
 
 I Corinthians xiii., xv. 
 
 James iv. 
 
 Revelation v., vi. 
 
 " And truly, though I have picked up the elements of 
 a little further knowledge — in mathematics, meteorology, 
 and the like — in after life, and owe not a little to the teach- 
 ing of many people, this maternal installation of my mind 
 in that property of chapters I count very confidently the 
 most precious, and, on the whole, the one essential part of 
 all my education," 
 
 LXXXV. Rahab. Josh. ii. i. '^ And they 7ae?it, and came 
 into a haj-lofs house, named Rahab, and lodged there." 
 
 " Rahab had wrecked her life ; mast was broken, sail was 
 gone, rudder was lost ! She was a helpless, ruined woman. 
 ]kit as sailors have found a mere timber of what was a 
 ship with the compass clinging to it, and pointing away to 
 its northern star, so from amidst the fragments of what 
 was once a woman's life, as they drifted along the streets 
 of Jericho, Rahab's heart was trembling away towards the 
 Star that should come out of Jacob, and the Sceptre that 
 would rise out of Israel." 
 
 LXXXVI. A Moravian Missionary, Josh. xiii. 2,3- 
 
 " But unto the tribe of Levi Moses gave not any inheritance : 
 the Lord God of Israel was their inheritance, as he said unto 
 them." 
 
 The Moravian missionary, Zeisberger, who laboured for 
 sixty-three years among the Red Indians, never took a 
 penny from the Church for his support. " I am no hireling," 
 he said quietly ; " God set me this work." 
 
 Zeisberger died in extreme old age in an Indian village. 
 
44 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Bishop de Schweinitz, in his history of the Moravian 
 missionary, tells us that, when the hour of his deatli drew 
 nigh, the passing bell' tolled, and his white friends, the 
 Brethren, withdrew and gave way to the Lenape Indians, 
 who gathered around his bed. They sang the hymns in 
 their own tongue, which he had written for them, and on 
 these strains of lofty hope his soul passed. " Then," says 
 the chronicler, '"the red men fell upon their knees, and 
 wept aloud, ir-x they knew that their best friend was gone 
 for ever." 
 
 LXXXVII. A Soldier of Jesus Christ. Josh. 
 
 xxiv. 24. " The Lord our God will we serve, and His voice 
 will we obey" 
 
 The following anecdotes are told of David Sandeman, the 
 devoted missionary : 
 
 "Delighting as he did in vigorous exercise and gymnastic 
 feats, he one day, in a walk with two companions, joined 
 for a few minutes in the amusement of leaping over the 
 stile at one corner of the old Queen's Park. While his 
 companions failed, he cleared the stile so easily and grace- 
 fully as to draw forth the admiration of a dragoon who 
 stood by. When about to walk on Mr. Sandeman turned 
 to the soldier, got him into conversation, and spoke of the 
 perils and honours of a life like his. Then suddenly draw- 
 ing himself up to his full height, he exclaimed with deep 
 feeling : ' There is something far better yet ! It is to be 
 a soldier of Jesus Christ. Are you that ? ' The dragoon 
 looked with wonder on the man of muscle and sinew who 
 could thus speak to his soul, and shook hands at parting, 
 evidently deeply interested. Scenes like these were con- 
 tinually recurring ; but this power of gracefully turning 
 every little event into a means of usefulness could exist 
 only in one whose natural atmosphere was the love of God, 
 and in whose soul there was an uninterrupted gravitation 
 towards his Divine Saviour, 
 
 " One day, in harvest, finding by the roadside a woman 
 cutting grass, he plucked a head of wheat, and told her how 
 a corn of wheat must die before that beaut ilul head could 
 spring up, and that so Christ must needs d.c ere we could 
 be saved. The woman was astonished, and the young 
 missionary went on his way, pra\ing that the Lord might 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 45 
 
 send his word to her heart. So continually did he act 
 upon his fax'ourite text, ' Whose I am, and whom I serve,' 
 that in a brief summer excursion in the west of Scotland, 
 a companion of his journey informs us, that he believes 
 that he must have spoken to not less than five hundred 
 persons in the course of their pedestrian excursion, and 
 that when opportunity occurred he was as direct and ready 
 in addressing the rich as the poor." 
 
 LXXXVIII. Devoutness of Spirit. Jud. v. 16. 
 " Great searchings of heart." 
 
 The great secret of all Sherman's success as a preacher lay 
 in the devoutness of his spirit, and the closeness of his 
 communion with God, and his earnest, humble searching 
 of heart. Here are some of his " resolves," dated Feb. 20th, 
 1841 : 
 
 " I. To rise at seven o'clock every morning, and to spend 
 half an hour with God before breakfast in reading the 
 Scriptures and prayer. 
 
 " 2. To select some portion out of one of the chapters 
 for meditation through the day. 
 
 " 3. To retire some time during the day for prayer, and 
 to give as much time as possible in the evening to this 
 exercise. 
 
 " 4. To pray with my dear wife. 
 
 " 5. To seek specially the salvation of my family by 
 pra) er and correspondence. 
 
 " 6. Not to go where temptations to any of my besetting 
 sins are sure to abound. 
 
 " 7. To plead with God for more conversions amongst the 
 people, and to visit them, and to labour at my sermons more 
 and more. Oh, how wonderful that the people will come 
 and hear me ! O Lord, strengthen me, help me to put these 
 resolves into practice, and never to depart from them. 
 Now help me to plead for grace to perform my vows. Oh, 
 kiss the prodigal, and welcome him to his Father's heart 1 " 
 
 LXXXIX. An African Convert. Ruth ii. 12. 
 " Under whose wings lliou art come to trust. " 
 
 In an article by Robert IV'oiTat, the famed missionary to 
 the Africans, he tells of a young man who accompanied 
 
4.6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 him in a missionary tour. Marelole was clever and intelli- 
 gent and an inquirer, who would soon have been received 
 into Church fellowship. The camp was visited by the well- 
 known African fever, and Marelole was seized, and had a 
 relapse. He became insensible, and lay for two days 
 motionless in a comatose condition, from which no effort 
 could rouse him. On the evening of the second day 
 Moffat was at work repairing a wagon, when he heard 
 some one singing in a clear voice, and on inquiring who 
 was singing to the sick man, was told, " It is himself." He 
 hastened to the spot, and found it even so. The sick man 
 was singing one of the hymns which embodied some of 
 the thrilling parts of Psalm Ixxxiv. Moffat knelt down 
 beside him, and listened with inexpressible feelings of grati- 
 tude. As he sang the last verse he spoke to him ; he was 
 deaf, and his pulse was performing its last beats ; and while 
 the missionary looked at the now motionless lips, the spirit 
 departed to that heavenly Zion about which he had just 
 been singing. 
 
 XC. The Most Unfashionable of all Books. 
 
 I Sam. iii. 4. " The Lord called Samuel : and he ansiuered, 
 Here am /." 
 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds tells us that he was exceedingly 
 mortified when he showed his picture of the prophet 
 Samuel's call to some of the great, because they asked him 
 who Samuel was. One of his friends told him " that he 
 must get somebody to make an oratorio of Samuel, and 
 then it would not be vulgar to confess they knew some- 
 thing of him. I tell him that I hope the poets and painters 
 will at last bring the Bible into fashion, and that people 
 will get to like it from taste, though they are insensible 
 to its spirit, and afraid of its doctrines. I love this great 
 genius for not being ashamed to take his subjects from the 
 most unfashionable of all books." 
 
 XCI. Called of God. i Sam. iii. 4. '' The Lord called 
 Samuel : and he anstvered, Here am /." 
 
 David Zeisberger was a most devoted worker amongst 
 the Red Indians of America, and did a noble work in 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 47 
 
 Christianizing and civilizing these wild tribes. His early 
 history is interesting. 
 
 David Zeisbcrger's forefathers were peasants, the follow- 
 ers of John Huss. When he was five years old his family 
 fled, to escape persecution, to Herrnhut, where Count Zin- 
 zendorf then had gathered the remaining Hussites. David's 
 father and mother were among the Herrnhutters sent by 
 Zinzendorf to Georgia, but the boy was left in Moravia, to 
 be educated by the Church of the Unitas Fratrum. He 
 was a small, delicate lad, with something in his face which 
 attracted the notice of Zinzendorf. He sent the boy to a 
 prosperous community of the Church near Utrecht, where 
 education, as in godly private families of the time, was given 
 through the lash. David went through a steady discipline 
 of work, beatings, and fastings. 
 
 One day a stranger whom he helped, when he was lost 
 in the morasses near the town, gave him two pieces of gold, 
 bidding him keep them and not give them to the com- 
 munity. David's conscience however forced him to give 
 one piece to the Brethren, who immediately charged him 
 with having stolen it, and publicly punished him as a liar 
 and a thief. 
 
 This was the stroke too much. That night David, with 
 another boy named Shober, escaped from the community 
 and set off to America, with no means but the solitary 
 piece of gold which he had kept. It paid their way to 
 London ; there General Oglethorpe met the lads, and, struck 
 by David's sensitive face and singular gravity, procured 
 them a free passage to Savannah. 
 
 In the backwoods of Georgia, Zeisberger at last found 
 his father and mother. * 
 
 He was much impressed by the sight of the poor savages 
 around him, and often pondered the question whether or 
 not he should devote his life to the work of bringing those 
 lost heathen to God. 
 
 Just at this juncture arrived Count Zinzendorf He saw 
 the lad, and detected again the same singular hint of 
 pronise on his face — a prophecy which he could not in- 
 terpret. 
 
 He told the Brethren that the boy must have a chance, 
 and appoip.ted him one of his staff to return with him to 
 JNIoravia. David came with him to Philadelphia, and em- 
 
48 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 barked, with the understanding that a clear road to fortune 
 lay before him in Europe, and that he never was to return 
 to America. 
 
 The ship weighed anchor. Bishop Nitschmann, passing 
 down the decls;, saw the lad, pale and haggard, gazing at 
 the receding shore. 
 
 " Zeisberger," he said, " is it possible that you wish to 
 return ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " But for what reason ? " 
 
 ** That I may learn to know Christ, and teach Him to 
 the Indians," said David, finding speech at last in his ex- 
 tremity. 
 
 " Then if that be your mind, in God's name even now 
 go back ! " 
 
 The ship was brought to, and the boy sent back. After 
 this the Moravians regarded him as Eli did Samuel : he 
 was called of God. His name was entered on the list 
 of the Brethren and their trades, as David Zeisberger, 
 desthiirter Heidenbote. 
 
 The lad at once left the community and went to the 
 lodge of the great sachem of the Mohawks, and there lived 
 and worked to learn thoroughly the habits and language of 
 the Indians. He was adopted into the tribe of the Onon- 
 dagas. 
 
 Thus began the remarkable history of a work which 
 extended over sixty-two years. 
 
 XCII. A Noble Resignation to God's Will. 
 
 I Sam. iii. i8. " // is the Lord: let Him do what seemeth 
 Him good." 
 
 " Do you know this, Master Cameron } " said an exe- 
 cutioner, startling the old Christian in his cell, and showing 
 something in a basket. It was a fair-haired, youthful head, 
 just stricken oft. " I know it, I know it ; my son's, my 
 own dear son's. It is the Lord ; good is the will of the 
 Lord, who cannot wrong me nor mine, but has made good- 
 ness and mercy follow us all our days." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 49 
 
 XCIII. A Man of Prayer, i Sam. xv. 11. " He criai 
 
 unto the Lord all «47//," 
 
 John Welch, of Ayr, was pre-eminently a man of prayer. 
 Whilst minister at I'Lttrick he was boarded in the house of 
 one named Mitchelhill. A son of his landlord, who slept 
 with Welch, used, to tell, in after years, how he would lay 
 a Scot's plaid atove his bedclothes, and would rise and 
 cover himself with it when he went to prayer ; for, from the 
 be<,n'nning of his ministry, "he reckoned the day ill-spent if 
 he stayed not seven or ciy;ht hours in prayer." 
 
 He would, we are told, retire many nights to the church, 
 and spend the whole night in prayer — praying with an 
 audible and sometimes with a loud voice. Once his wife, 
 going at night to his closet, where he had been long at 
 prayer, and fearing he should catch cold, heard him say, 
 " Lord, wilt Thou not grant me Scotland ? " and, after a 
 pause, " Enough, Lord, enough." Once he got such near- 
 ness to the Lord in prayer that he exclaimed, " Hold Thy 
 hand, Lord ; remember Thy servant is a clay vessel, and 
 can hold no more." 
 
 XCIV. Impure Motives in Religious Work. 
 
 I Sam. XV. 22. "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt 
 offerings a?id sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord 1 " 
 
 The traveller from Rome to Gaeta crosses the Maremma. 
 He watches the sun setting over its dim, dismal, and yet 
 majestic fanes ; he sees a white mist rising soft, beautiful, 
 tinged now with the fair glow of sunlight, now with the 
 paler shades of moonlight — a beautiful mist indeed ; but 
 plunge into it, and the mist is poison. Just as fatal are the 
 effects of religious work when engaged in from impure 
 motives. 
 
 XCV. The Intellect and the Heart, i Sam. xvi. 
 7. " For the Lord seeth not as man sceth .• . . . the Lord 
 
 locketh on the hea/'ti" 
 
 On some Church festival, when the morning services were 
 over, Massillon, the great preacher, entertained a party at 
 dinner. A remark made by one of the guests, that it was 
 time that something should be done to turn the holy day 
 
 E 
 
so OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 to edification, induced Massillon to fetch one of his sermons 
 and read it to the company. A lady, by way of expressing 
 admiration, exclaimed that if she had written such a 
 sermon, she would certainly be reckoned among the saints, 
 ** Ah, madame ! " was the old bishop's reply, " it is a long 
 bridge which leads from the intellect to the heart." " Yes, 
 indeed," nmttered an Oratorian of Jansenist proclivities, 
 who happened to be present ; " and there are quite four 
 arches of the bridge already broken down." 
 
 XCVI. The Soothing Power of Music, i Sam. 
 xvi. 23. '■'■ So Saul ivas i-efreshed, and was well, and the evil 
 spirit departed from him." 
 
 This remarkable instance of the power of music over the 
 mind, especially in soothing its perturbations and allaying 
 its disorders, is in conformity with the experience of 
 physicians, and with various intimations whicli may be 
 found in ancient authors. More or less so are those other 
 scriptural instances, which evince the power of music over 
 the moods of even the sanest minds, as in the case of 
 Elisha, who called for the aid of a minstrel to bring his 
 mind into the frame best suited to receive the impulses of 
 the prophetic spirit. One would almost think, that there 
 was some power in ancient music, which has since been 
 lost, or that there existed, amid the simple manners of 
 ancient times, a susceptibility to the influence of sweet and 
 solemn sounds, which has been lost in the multitudinous 
 business and varied pursuits of modern existence. But in 
 truth, the wonderful effects so often described resulted 
 from the concurrence of masterly skill in the minstrel with 
 a peculiar sensibility to the influence of sweet sounds in 
 the patient. And that where this concurrence is found 
 it will still produce the same effect as of old, one or two 
 " modern instances " may be cited to show. 
 
 In the JManoires of the French Royal Academy of 
 Sciences for 1707 are recorded many accounts of diseases, 
 which, having obstinately resisted the remedies prescribed 
 by the most able of the faculty, at length yielded to the 
 powerful impression of harmony. One of these is the 
 case of a person who was seized with fever, which soon 
 threw him into a very violent delirium, almost without any 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 51 
 
 interval, accompanied by bitter cries, by tears, by terrors, 
 and by an almost constant wakefulness. On the third day, 
 a hint that fell from himself suggested the idea of trying 
 the effect of music. Gradually as the strain proceeded his 
 troubled visage relaxed into a most serene expression, his 
 restless eyes became tranquil, his convulsions ceased, and 
 the fever absolutely left him. It is true, that when the 
 music was discontinued his symptoms returned ; but, by 
 frequent repetitions of the experiment, during which the 
 delirium always ceased, the power of the disease was 
 broken, and the habits of a sound mind re-established. Six 
 days sufficed to accomplish the cure. 
 
 XCVII. The Habit of Prayer. i Sam. xxii. 4. «/ 
 
 will call 0)1 the Lord." 
 
 Fei-IX Neff, in speaking on the subject of prayer, has 
 strikingly remarked: "When a pump is frequently used, but 
 little pains are necessary to obtain water ; it tlows out at 
 the first stroke, because the water is high. But if the pump 
 has not been used for a long time, the water gets low, and 
 when it is wanted, you must pump a great while, and the 
 stream comes only after great efforts. And so it is with 
 praj'er; if we are instant in it and faithful to it, every little 
 circumstance awakens the disposition to pray, and desires 
 and words are always ready. But if we neglect prayer, it 
 is difficult for us to pray, for the water in the well gets 
 low." 
 
 The thought is full of suggestions, of counsel, admoni- 
 tion, instruction. TJie Jmuian heart is a leaky vessel ; and 
 in a world like this, the tendency of spirituality, like that of 
 water, is dozvmvard. If we neglect prayer, little by little 
 we soon lose its spirit ; and its spirit declining, its Jiabit 
 is soon laid aside, or retained only in the form ; and as the 
 next step the form itself will soon be given up, the soul 
 becoming prayerless, and the heart and life alike forsaken 
 of God. 
 
 XCVIII. An Emperor's Shame. i Sam. xxiv. 19. 
 
 " For if a ma7i find his enemy, will he let him go well away ? " 
 
 John Huss, in spite of the pledged safe-conduct of the 
 Emperor Sigismund, was thrust into a miserable prison cell, 
 
52 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 where you may still see the stone to which he was chained. 
 In vain in the full council lie made the hot blush of shame 
 burn on the cheek of the emperor by reminding him of 
 his violated word. A hundred years later that blush saved 
 the life of Martin Luther. When Charles V. was urged to 
 seize Luther in spite of his safe-conduct, he replied, " I do 
 not want to blush like Sigismund." 
 
 XCIX. No Fear, no Hope. 2 Sam. iii. 33. "-Died 
 Ab?ier as a fool dieth ? " 
 
 Mr. Robert Owen once visited a gentleman who was a 
 believer. In walking out they came to the gentleman's 
 family grave ; Owen addressing him said : " There is one 
 advantage I have over Christians, I am not afraid to die. 
 Most Christians are afraid to die ; but if some of my 
 busine.ss were settled, I should be perfectly willing to die 
 at any moment." "Well," said his companion, "you say 
 you have no fear in death ; have you any hope in death ?" 
 After a solemn pause he replied, "No /" "Then," replied 
 the gentleman, pointing to an ox standing near, " you are 
 on a level with that brute ; he has fed till he is satisfied, 
 and stands in the shade whisking off the flies, and has 
 neither hope nor fear." 
 
 C. My Trouble. 2 Sam. xii. 19. "Is the child dead? 
 And they said, He is dead." 
 
 " Some of you have especial trouble. God only knows what 
 you go through with. Oh, how many bereavements, how 
 many poverties, how many persecutions, how many mis- 
 representations ! Some of you feel like a poor fisherman 
 who was chided one day because he kept on working, 
 although that very day he buried his child. They came to 
 him and said, ' It is indecent for you to be mending that 
 boat, when this afternoon you buried your child.' And 
 the fisherman looked up and said, ' Sir, it is very easy for 
 you gentlefolks to stay in the house with your handkerchief 
 to your eyes in grief; but, sir, ought I to let the other five 
 children starve because one of them is drowned ? No, sir ; 
 we maun work, we maun work, though our hearts beat lik^ 
 this hammer,' " 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 53 
 
 CI. A Child's Death. 2 Sam. xii. 23. '' I shall go to 
 
 him, but he shall not retiini to w^." 
 
 Robert and IMary Moffat, the famed missionaries of 
 Southern Africa, returned in 1839 to England, for the 
 printing of the New Testament in the Sechwana language, 
 which Moffat had then completed. On board ship, before 
 they left Table Bay, a daughter was born. In a few hours 
 the ship put to sea ; but severe weather set in, and in the 
 midst of the general distress it became apparent to the 
 mother that one of her younger sons was dying. Jamie 
 had never overcome an attack of measles, and three days 
 after the birth of his sister he passed away, at the age of 
 six years. Amidst the storm he lay upon his mother's 
 arm, peacefully talking of the angels who should bear to 
 the heavenly land the spirits of children, and with the 
 words, "Oh that will be joyful, when we meet to part no 
 more ! " on his lips, he fell asleep in Jesus. 
 
 CII. A Father's Lament. 2 Sam. xviii. 33. " O my son 
 Absalom, my son, my son Absalom I would God I had died 
 for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son ! " 
 
 A RUMOUR once reached Andrew Fuller that his wild son 
 Robert, who had been impressed as a sailor on board a 
 man-of-war, had been tried for desertion, and had died 
 under the infliction of a stern sentence. The rumour 
 however was afterwards proved to be false. The father's 
 words about this have condensed into them all the agony 
 of grieved affection, and seem like bitter drops of distilled 
 pain. 
 
 " In former cases my sorrow found vent in tears ; but 
 now I can seldom weep. A kind of morbid heart-sickness 
 preys upon me from day to day. Every object around me 
 reminds me of him ! Ah ! . . .he was wicked, and mine 
 eye was not over him to prevent it ; , . . He was de- 
 tected and tried, and condemned, and I knew it not ; . . . 
 he cried under his agonies, but I heard him not ; . . . 
 he expired, without an eye to pity or a hand to help him ! 
 O Absalom, my son, my son ! would God I had died for 
 thee, my son ! " 
 
54 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 cm. The Sweetest Name. 2 Sam. xxii. 3. ^^ In Him 
 win I fnist : He is my shield, and the liorri of my salvation, 
 my high totuer, and my refuge, my Saviour^ 
 
 The son of Sir James Mackintosh gives some account of 
 the dying words of his father. " I observed that at every 
 mention of the name of Jesus his eyes were unclosed. I 
 said to him at one time, 'Jesus Christ loves you.' He 
 answered slowly, and pausing between each word, 'Jesus 
 Christ — love — the same thing.' He uttered these last 
 words with a sweet smile. After a long silence, he said, 
 'I believe.' We said, in a voice of inquiry, 'In God?' 
 He answered, ' In Jesus.' He spoke but once after this. 
 Upon our inquiry how he felt, he said he was happy" 
 
 CIV. Tried before Trusted. 2 Sam. xxii. 31. ''The 
 word of the Lord is tried." 
 
 A NEW steamboat has to be tried before passengers and 
 freight can be trusted on board. A new railroad has its 
 trial trips before it is thrown open to the public. A few 
 years ago, at the opening of a railroad in Missouri, a train 
 of cars filled with people, many of them gentlemen invited 
 by the directors, set out from St. Louis on a trial trip. On 
 swept the train. The party were in high spirits, when in 
 an instant crash, crash ! Timbers split, joists snapped, 
 one terrible plunge, and down went the cars through a 
 breaking bridge into the river below, a heap of ruins. 
 That bridge was trusted before it had been tried. 
 
 CV. Fulfilling his Mission, i Kings xiii. 8, 9. "//" 
 thou 7vilt give me half thine house, I tvill not go in with thee, 
 neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place : for so 
 was it charged me by the word of the Lord." 
 
 The parish of R , within the bounds of the presbytery 
 
 of Edinburgh, had become vacant, and a presentation had 
 been issued by the noble earl in whom the patronage 
 was vested in favour of an individual who was obnoxious 
 to the people, or, at least, who had not their consent to 
 his becoming their pastor and spiritual instructor. In 
 default of this Dr. Erskine strongly opposed his induction 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 55 
 
 in tlie Church courts. His opposition was however fruit- 
 less ; the necessary forms were ordered to begone throuj^h, 
 and the admission to take place, and, with a refinement 
 of cruelty not unknown in those woeful days, Dr. Erskine 
 himself was appointed to preside at the moderating of the 
 call. This he did, in obedience to his ecclesiastical superiors. 
 With his staff in his hand he walked from Edinburgh to 
 
 R , a distance of eight miles, on the morning of the 
 
 appointed day; not being well acquainted with the place 
 or the road, and immersed in deep thought, he went a con- 
 siderable way beyond the church, and stop[ied only when 
 he thought that he must have made a mistake, and had 
 gone farther than was necessary. Meeting a man coming 
 towards him, and dressed apparently in his Sunday suit, 
 he conjectured that he might be going to the church, and 
 inquired the road thither. The man told the doctor that he 
 had gone a good bit too far, but that he would conduct him 
 back to the church, as he was himself going there. In the 
 door of the porch, and at the entrance to the churchyard, 
 stood the patron peer and some others, who, observing Dr. 
 Erskine to be fatigued, invited him to take some refresh- 
 ment before entering on the duties of the day. This offer 
 he gently declined, and passed directly into the church 
 and to the pul[)it. He went through the services with 
 dignity and calmness, and fulfilled his mission. On re- 
 turning from the church he was again accosted by the 
 patron, who entreated him to rest a while and accept of 
 some refreshment. His calm yet firm and solemn answer 
 was to this effect : " I feel obliged by your politeness, my 
 lord ; but ' if thou wilt give me half thine house, I will not 
 go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water 
 in this place : for so was it charged me by the word of 
 the Lord.' " And the good doctor walked his way back to 
 Edinburgh, without a rest or even a halt. 
 
 CVI. Death of Children, i Kings xiv. 17. ''The 
 
 child died:' 
 
 Many a little child Jesus has called to Him. Little 
 Maggie was very ill of a fever, and the van had been sent 
 to take her away to the infirmary. INIaggie was dressed 
 and ready. "Maggie, it's time for you to go," said her 
 
56 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 mother. " Ye know, mother," said Maggie, " I'll maybe 
 no come back : will the man wait till I sing my hymn ? " 
 Even a hard heart could not have refused, and so the man 
 waited while the little feeble voice sang, — 
 
 *' Here in the body pent, 
 Absent from Him I roam ; 
 Yet nightly pitch my moving tent 
 A day's march nearer home." 
 
 And then they carried the dying child, with joyous thoughts 
 like these filling her young heart, to the infirmary, whence 
 the last stage of the journey from this to the eternal world 
 is often taken. 
 
 CVII. In the Hour of Extremity, i Kings xvii. 6. 
 '■'■And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the mornings 
 a7id bread a?id flesh in the evening ; and he drank of the brook." 
 
 In a Christian home in Poland great poverty had come, 
 and on the day-week the man was obliged to move out of 
 the house with his whole family. That night he knelt, 
 with his family, and prayed to God. While they were 
 kneeling in prayer there was a tap on the window pane. 
 They opened the window, and there was a raven that the 
 family had fed and trained, and it had in its bill a ring all 
 set with precious stones, which was found out to be a ring 
 belonging to the royal family. It was taken up to the 
 king's residence, and for the honesty of the man in bring- 
 ing it back he had a house given to him, and a garden, 
 and a farm. Who was it that sent the raven tapping 
 on the window ? The same God that sent the raven to 
 feed Elijah by the brook Cherith — Christ in the hour of 
 extremity ! 
 
 CVIII. "Standstill." i Kings xvii. 1 8. '' Call my sin 
 to remembrance." 
 
 The son of a pious man enlisted in a regiment of the 
 guards. His father accompanied him to his quarters, 
 exhorted him to remember his daily prayers, and on 
 parting from him spoke as follows : " My son, if our 
 gracious God bring thy sins to remembrance when thou 
 art among strangers, stand still and take off thy hat, for 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 57 
 
 the Lord is about to speak with thee." The youn<]^ man 
 entered the barracks with the best intentions ; at first he 
 was much ridiculed by his comrades on account of his 
 habit of prayer, then he quite left it off and forgot all about 
 it. The first time however that he mounted guard, and 
 had to take off his helmet at evening prayer, his father's 
 words returned to his mind ; he prayed in very deed, and 
 the Holy Spirit brought his sins to his remembrance. 
 This was how the turning-point of his life came about, 
 and the letter that he wrote on the subject to his father 
 occasioned much joy and thankfulness in his old home. 
 
 CIX. Card-Playing, i Kings xviii. 21. "And Elijah 
 came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye betiveen 
 two opinions ? If the Lord be God, folloiv Him : but if Baal, 
 then follow hifn." 
 
 Mr. Romaine was once addressed by a lady, who ex- 
 pressed the great pleasure she had enjoyed under his 
 preaching, and added that she could comply with his 
 requirements, with the exception of one thing. " And 
 what is that, madam .-• " asked Mr. Romaine. "Cards, sir." 
 " You think you could not be happy without them ?" " No, 
 sir; I know I could not." "Then, madam, they are your 
 god, and they must save you." This pointed admonition 
 led to serious reflection, and finally to the abandonment of 
 such unworthy pleasures. 
 
 ex. '♦The Journey is too Great for Thee." 
 
 I Kings xix. 7. " The jotirney is too great for thee," 
 
 This text has been illustrated by ten thousand men. 
 Livingstone consecrated himself to African exploration. 
 He performed two journeys, but the third was too great 
 for him. His health failed. Two of his servants deserted 
 him, and they took with them his medicine chest. "I 
 never dreamed," he wrote, " that I should lose my precious 
 quinine." One of the last entries in his journal was: "I 
 am pale, bloodless, and weak from bleeding profusely ever 
 since March 31st last. An artery gives off a copious 
 stream, and takes away my strength ; oh, how I long to be 
 permitted by the Over-Power to finish my work ! " When 
 
58 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 he could work no longer he was carried on a frame of 
 wood with some grass and a blanket upon it. And when 
 he could endure to be carried no farther, his faithful ser- 
 vants built him a little hut, and in that rude structure he 
 died. He was a great traveller. He contributed much 
 to our knowledge of Central Africa. The coloured races 
 owe him a mighty debt of gratitude. He was one of the 
 bravest of Christian men. But the journey of African 
 exploration was too great for him. 
 
 CXI. A Martyr at the Stake. i Kings xix. 14. 
 ''Slain Thy prpphetsr 
 
 On Huss firmly refusing to retract his opinions unless they 
 were proved from the word of God to be erroneous, he 
 was at length, with horrible solemnity, doomed to perish 
 by fire as an obstinate heretic. On July 6th, 141 5, 
 sentence was formally pronounced upon him ; and, after 
 being stripped of his priestly garments, and subjected to 
 various dreadful indignities, he was handed over to the 
 secular arm for execution. A paper crown, painted over 
 with figures of devils, and bearing the inscription " heresi- 
 arch," was put upon his head. " We thus devote thee to 
 the infernal devils ! " the prelates piously exclaimed ; 
 Avhereupon the martyr replied, " I am glad to wear this 
 crown of ignominy, for the love of Him who wore a crown 
 of thorns." He marched to the stake with wonderful com- 
 posure, as if his heart were glad. A Roman historian who 
 witnessed the scene says that he looked like a man going 
 to a grand banquet. Arriving at the place of execution, 
 Huss fell down on his knees and prayed aloud. Many of 
 the people who heard him said to one another, "What 
 this man has done before we know not ; but now he has 
 offered up most excellent prayers to God." When he had 
 been tied to the stake, the faggots, piled up all round him, 
 were kindled ; and in less than a quarter of an hour John 
 Huss expired amidst smoke and flame, with his last breath 
 committing his soul to the Lord Jesus Christ, who had 
 redeemed him. The ashes of his body were hastily gathered 
 up by the executioners, and cast into the Rhine ; but a 
 good portion of the earth on which he was consumed, con- 
 taining at least some of his remains, was conveyed to his 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 59 
 
 native Bolicmia. where to this chiy he is licid in the hii^hest 
 veneration. The name of John lluss is as dear to the 
 Bohemians as the name of WiUiam Tell is to the Swiss, or 
 the names of WilHam VValhice and Joh'' Knox are to the 
 people of Scothmd. 
 
 CXII. Soul Murder. r Kings xxi. 2 5. *^ Ahab, which 
 did St'// /liinst:// /o wor/z wic/cedness in tlie sig/if of t/ie Lord." 
 
 An American writer says : " When Charles IX. of France 
 was importuned to kill Coligny, he for a long time refused 
 to do so publicly or secretly ; but at last he gave way, 
 and consented in these memorable words, 'Assassinate 
 Admiral Coligny, but leave not a Huguenot alive in 
 France to reproach me.' So came the massacre of St. 
 Bartholomew. When the soul resolves to assassinate some 
 holy motive, when the spirit determines to kill, in the 
 inner realm, Admiral Coligny, it too delays for a while ; 
 and, when it gives way, usually says, 'Assassinate this 
 accuser of mine ; but leave not an accusing accomplice of 
 his in all my kingdom alive to reproach me.' So comes 
 the massacre of the desire to be holy. 
 
 " Emerson quotes the Welsh Triad as saying, ' God 
 Himself cannot procure good for the wicked.' Julius 
 Muller, Dorner, Rothe, Schleiermacher, no less than Plato, 
 Aristotle, and Socrates, assert that, in the nature of things, 
 there can be no blessedness without holiness. Confucius 
 said, ' Heaven means principle.' But what if a soul per- 
 manently loses principle .■' Si vis fiigere a Deo, fnge ad 
 Deicm, is the Latin proverb. If you wish to flee from God, 
 flee to Him. The soul cannot escape from God; and can 
 two walk together unless they are agreed .-* Surely there 
 are a few certainties in religion, or several points clear to 
 exact ethical science in relation to the natural conditions 
 of the peace of the soul." 
 
 CXIII. "Seed Corn." 2 Kings ii. 3. " T/te sojis of i/ie 
 prophets that were at Bet/ieL" 
 
 The great importance of the work done in our educational 
 institutions for young ministers was never more strikingly 
 emphasized than by the missionary Judson, who said, as he 
 
6o OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 was approaching Madison University, "If I had a thousand 
 dollars, do you know what I would do with it?" The 
 person asked supposed he would invest it in foreii,ni 
 missions. "I would put it into such institutions as that," 
 he said, pointing to the colkge buildings. "Planting col- 
 leges, and filling them with studious young men, is planting 
 seed corn for the world." 
 
 CXIV. The Chariot of Fire. 2 Kings ii. 11. '' A?id 
 it came to pass, as they still we/it on, and talked, that, behold, 
 there appeared a chariot of fire ^ and horses of fire, and parted 
 them both asunder I' 
 
 Two little boys were talking together about Elijah's going 
 to heaven in a chariot of fire. 
 
 " I say, Charlie," said George, " but would not you be 
 afraid to ride on such a chariot .'' " 
 
 " Why, no ; I shouldn't be afraid if I knew that the Lord 
 was driving." 
 
 1 hat was what David felt when he said, " What time I 
 am afraid, I will trust in Thee." 
 
 CXV. A French Minister. 2 Kings iv, 34. ^^ And 
 
 he went np, and lay upon the child, and put his mouth upon 
 his fnouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upoti his 
 hands : and he stretched himself upoti the child ; and the flesh 
 of the child waxed ivann." 
 
 BOSSUET, Bourdaloue, and Massillon form a triad, each of 
 whom habitually suggests the other two, so closely linked 
 together have they become in the annals of the Christian 
 pulpit. Of these three illustrious French preachers, it is 
 Massillon who has become most familiar among us. In 
 1717 he preached what is known as the 'Petit Careme," 
 a course of ten lectures addressed to the young king, 
 then nine years old. These lectures had an immense 
 reputation, and were mostly idyllic pictures of the duties of 
 good kings and nobles. When Massillon was a year after- 
 wards received into the Academy, the Abbe Claude Fleury 
 complimented him on having wisely accommodated his 
 teaching to the youth of the king, after the example of the 
 prophet Elisha, who contracted himself to the measure of 
 
ULD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 6l 
 
 the Sluinaiiiniitc's child, placing mouth to mouth, eyes to 
 e}'cs, hands to hands, that he might recall the departed 
 life. 
 
 CXVI. An Early Riser. 2 Kings vi. 15. ''And 
 
 7Cihen the sen'ant of the man of God was risen early" 
 
 For the last fifty years of his life Mr. Romaine regularly 
 rose at five, breakfasted at six, dined at one^ supped at 
 eight, and retired at nine. He took little or no wine, and 
 lived on the plainest food. Romaine's last illness attacked 
 liim on June 6th, 1 795. He had more than once said : 
 " Who can tell — I cannot — how great the love was which 
 provided a Saviour for such a rebel ? What patience, how 
 infinite! to spare me through childhood, through youth, 
 through manhood, when every day, and everything in the 
 day, were calling aloud for vengeance ! " 
 
 CXVII. The Conversion of the Heathen. 2 
 
 Kings vii. 19. " Now, behold, if the Lord should make win- 
 dows in heaven, might stich a thing be ? " 
 
 The opposition Carey met in his desires to Christianize the 
 heathen seem to us wonderful and incredible. Indeed the 
 greater portion of Carey's ministerial friends were them- 
 selves either opposed or doubtful. Mr, Fuller was so 
 startled by the novelty and the magnitude of the proposal, 
 that he described his feelings as resembling those of the 
 unbelieving Israelite, " If the Lord should make windows 
 in heaven, might such things be } " When at a gathering 
 of ministers in Northampton, Carey suggested as a topic 
 for discussion the duty of Christians to attempt the con- 
 version of the heathen, Mr. Ryland, the father of Dr. 
 Ryland, sprang to his feet and said : " Young man, sit 
 down ! When God pleases to convert the heathen, He 
 will do it without your help or mine 1 " 
 
 CXVIII. Heathen Honesty. 2 Kings xii. 15. "For 
 they dealt faithfully." 
 
 At one time Dr. Moffat, the missionary to Africa, wished 
 to send supplies and letters to Dr. Livingstone. Unable 
 
62 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 to complete the trip himself, he committed his charge to 
 natives, the result justifying his confidence in them. 
 
 These supplies had been made up into bundles for 
 carrying on men's shoulders. It afterwards proved that 
 these men faithfully discharged their trust. As privileged 
 persons, carrying the packages of a missionary, they 
 crossed the border country in safety and descended into the 
 valley of the Zambesi, where there were none but their 
 sworn enemies the Makololo, and at last presented them- 
 selves on the south bank of the river at a spot where they 
 could shout across to an island in the river, and announce 
 their errand. Small as their party was, they could get no 
 one to approach them, for treachery was still suspected. 
 They laid their packages on the bank, delivered their mes- 
 sage across the stream, and departed hungry and tired and 
 footsore. The Makololo, finding them really gone, took 
 the bundles they had brought, placed them on an island, 
 and built a roof over them ; and there they were when 
 Livingstone returned, some months afterward, from his 
 journey to St. Paul de Loanda on the west coast, thankful 
 indeed for the letters and supplies which reached him by 
 this strange kind of parcel delivery. 
 
 CXIX. Praying and Working. 2 Kings xx. 5. "/ 
 
 have heard thy prayer, I have seen ihy tears." 
 
 There are many instances on record of special answers to 
 prayer. What shall we make of the instances of prayer in 
 such lives as that of David Nasmith, or of the good men 
 sketched in Mr. Stevenson's " Praying and Working," 
 followed again and again and again by that which they 
 had asked ? The Rauhe Haus at Hamburg, a great 
 Christian reformatory, has such a story as seems mira- 
 culous — as indeed is nothing less. Money came from 
 unknown sources, as it was wanted. Step by step this 
 work of God was built, extended, and sustained, with no 
 exchequer but the never-failing goodness of the Lord. " I 
 believe," says Wichern, its founder and head, "that what- 
 ever Christian household or person trusts the Lord utterly, 
 and allows Him to be the only God and Saviour, although 
 it be out of great faltering and weakness, that person 
 or household shall never want, but shall have all it wants, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 63 
 
 even if it should obtain it throui^h daily need and peril." 
 This is the ex[)eiiciice of a life in which such prayer has 
 been habitually put to the test. A case given by Major 
 Miller, governor of the military prison, Aldershot — than 
 whom we could surely have no safer authority — is quoted 
 in Good Words. 
 
 " One of our prisoners, on being checked at drill by one 
 of the warders, wished that God Almighty would strike the 
 warder dumb. The prisoner on the spot was struck dumb, 
 and did not recover liis speech for seven days. During 
 the period he was deprived of speech he was strictly 
 watched. There was no feigning whatever ; the man was 
 most wretched and alarmed." 
 
 CXX. Sun-dials. 2 Kings xx. ii. '■^And Isaiah the 
 prophet cried icnto tJie Lord : and Be brought tJie sJiadotv ten 
 degrees bac/aoard, by tvliicJi it had gofie doivn in the dial oj 
 Ahaz." 
 
 Whoever is fond of travelling through the villages of old 
 England will notice what innumerable fancies in various 
 places have been associated with the course and flight of 
 the hours. Very frequently the inscriptions on the sun- 
 dials are scriptural, such as, " Watch, for ye know not the 
 hour," or, " Yet a little while is the light with you : walk 
 while ye have the light." There is something very sug- 
 gestive in the motto upon a sun-dial over an old cottage 
 at Bishopthorpe, near York, " Tempus labile," slipping 
 time. Over the porch of East Leake church, in Notting- 
 hamshire, are the words, " Now is yesterday's to-morrow." 
 It must have been in a spirit of hopeful expectancy that 
 such a motto as that famous one of Geneva was chosen, 
 " Post tenebras lux," After darkness light, or that other 
 form of it, " Post tenebras spero lucem," After darkness I 
 hope for light. 
 
 CXXI. True Nobility, i Chron. vi. 49. '' Moses the 
 servant of God." 
 
 When the female martyr Agatha was upbraided because, 
 being descended of an illustrious [parentage, she stooped 
 to mean and humble offices for the relief of her fellow 
 
64 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 believers. " Our nobility," she replied, "lies in this, that we 
 are the servants of Christ." " Inasmuch as ye did it unto 
 one of the least of these My brethren, ye did it unto Me." 
 
 CXXII. Sacred Silence, i Chron. xvii. i6. ^^And 
 David the king came a /id sat before the Lord." 
 
 Time spent in quiet prostration of soul before the Lord 
 is most invigorating". David "sat before the Lord" ; it is 
 a great thing to hold these sacred sittings, the mind being 
 receptive, like an open flower drinking in the sunbeams, or 
 the sensitive photographic plate accepting the image before 
 it. Quietude, which some men cannot abide, because it 
 reveals their inward poverty, is as a palace of cedar to the 
 wise, for along its hallowed courts the King in His beauty 
 deigns to walk. 
 
 " Sacred silence ! thou that art 
 Floodt^rate of the deeper heart, 
 Offspring of a heavenly kind, 
 Frost o' the mouth, and thaw o' the mind." 
 
 CXXIII. The Best Way to get Riches. 2 Chron. 
 
 i. 10. " Give me noiv wisdo/n a/id knowledge, that I may go 
 out and come in before this people : for who can fudge this Thy 
 people, that is so great 1 " 
 
 An old Puritan divine says " that the best and surest way 
 to have any outward mercy is to be content to want it. 
 When men's desires are over-eager after the world, they 
 must have thus much a year, and a house well furnished, 
 and wife and children thus and thus qualified, or else they 
 will not be content. God doth usually, if not constantly, 
 break their wills by denying them, as one would cross a 
 froward child of his stubborn humour; or else puts a sting 
 into them, that a man had been as good he had been 
 without them, as a man would give a thing to a froppish 
 child, but it may be with a knock on his fingers and a 
 frown to boot. The best way to get riches is, out of doubt, 
 to set them lowest in one's desire. Solomon found it so. 
 He did not ask riches, but wisdom and ability to discharge 
 his great trust ; but God was so pleased with his prayer, 
 that He threw in riches into the bargain. If we seek the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 65 
 
 king-dom of God and His rif^hteousness in the first place, 
 and leave other things to Mini, God will never be behind- 
 hand with us. Let our care be to build His house, and let 
 Him alone to build ours." 
 
 CXXIV. The Patience of Unanswered Prayer. 
 
 2 Chron. vi. 40. ^^ Now, my God, let, I beseech Thee, Thine 
 eyes be open, and let Thine ears be aitent unto the prayer thai 
 is viade in this place" 
 
 In a biographical sketch of Miss Fletcher, an earnest 
 Christian worker, the following incident is told. One 
 Sabbath, at forenoon service, Miss Fletcher's eyes and heart 
 were irresistibly drawn towards an old woman, who was 
 evidently pinched with care, and bowed under some load of 
 anxiety. She felt that she ought to give that old woman 
 some money, and mentally resolved to do so if the oppor- 
 tunity presented itself at the evening service. Arrived at 
 home, she found that her pocket-money consisted of one 
 napoleon, and though loath to part with the whole of it, 
 she felt she could neither break it nor leave it behind, but 
 must take it with her to church. This she did, half hoping 
 the old woman would not be among the worshippers. 
 But there she was, with the mute and unconsciou.s, but 
 irresistible appeal as plainly written on her face as ever. 
 On coming out of church Miss Fletcher somehow found 
 herself beside her, and slipped the gold piece into the 
 astonished old woman's hand, and nan off without Wditing 
 for thanks. It afterwards transpired that the poor woman 
 at that very time was in the greatest destitution, and had 
 been rolling her case on the Lord, and had left it with 
 Him in confidence, and this was His answer. 
 
 CXXV. Seeking the Lord earnestly. 2 Chron. 
 XV. 15. '■^ They . . . sought Him 7vith their tiihole desire ; 
 and He was found of them : and the Lord gave them rest." 
 
 During a revival many years ago in Gla'^gow it was 
 customary to hold meetings every night for prayer and 
 conversation with inquirers after peace. One evening a 
 Sunday-school teacher came to make known her case. 
 She had been in distress for weeks. In her trouble she 
 had tried to find relief by change of air and scenery, but 
 
 F 
 
66 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 soon found that this was no medicine for a soul diseased ; 
 and coniin<; back she shut herself up in a room to plead for 
 mercy. Her besetting temptation was a fear lest any one 
 should discover her in the act of prayer ; but after shutting 
 herself up to pray in silence, her feelings became so excited 
 that she literally screamed, and her prayer was heard in 
 the house. At length she poured out her soul in this 
 pathetic strain : " O Jesus, I am told Thou art the burden- 
 bearer. Here is my burden; here I lay it. I will not lift 
 it; I will have nothing more to do with it : do with it what 
 Thou wilt." From that hour she rejoiced in Christ her 
 Saviour. At another meeting one little girl, who had 
 found peace to her own soul, was heard counselling another 
 who was still in darkness, "I say, lassie, do as I did: grip 
 a promise, and hold on to it." 
 
 CXXVI. The Widow's Son. 2 Chron. xx. 21. ''He 
 appointed singers unto the Lord, and that should praise the 
 beauty of holiness." 
 
 One of Queen Victoria's chaplains records the following 
 story : " When I was in the island of Malta I heard a 
 beautiful old legend, of about one thousand years ago, of a 
 monastery on the banks of the Rhone, where it enters the 
 Lake of Geneva. Into that monastery there entered a boy 
 who was 'the only son of his mother, and she was a 
 widow.' It was not with her desire, but not without her 
 consent ; and it became her consolation, morning and 
 evening, to go outside the monastery walls, and, standing 
 under the windows of the chapel, hear her boy's voice 
 singing in the choir ; and day by day this filled her heart 
 with gladness. But one day she went, and could not hear 
 it ; and at last she demanded of the porter at the gate the 
 reason, and was told that her boy was dead. So she 
 thought, ' My last hope in life is gone.' At length, taking 
 heart, she prayed that if it were possible she might hear 
 her boy's voice singing in paradise ; and the legend says 
 that her prayer was granted." 
 
 CXXVII. Humility. 2 Chron. xxxiv. 27. ''Because 
 
 thine heart 7C'as tender, and thou didst humble thyself before God" 
 
 MOLINOS, the Ouietist, in his book, "The Spiritual Guide,*' 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 67 
 
 thus writes : " Encourage thyself to be humble, embracing 
 tribulations as instruments of thy good ; rejoice in con- 
 tempt, and desire that God may be thy holy refuge, 
 comfort, and protection. None, let him be never so great 
 in this world, can be greater than he that is in the eye 
 and favour of God ; and therefore the truly humble man 
 despises whatever there is in the world, even to himself, 
 and puts his trust and repose in God. 
 
 " The truly humble man finds God in all things, so that 
 whatever contempt, injury, or affront comes to him by 
 means of creatures, he receives it with great peace and 
 quiet internal, as sent from the Divine hand, and greatly 
 loves the instrument with which the Lord tries him." 
 
 CXXVIII. Social Intercourse. Ezra vi. 22. '^ The 
 
 Lord had made them joyful." 
 
 Dr. Robert Hall, the distinguished preacher, during the 
 last years of his life at Bristol was in the habit of spending 
 some evenings each week in social intercourse with his 
 people. On these occasions some of the members of his 
 own family occasionally accompanied him ; and if it did 
 not happen that the conversation was particularly lively, 
 these last were apt to complain that the evening had been 
 dull. To this Dr. Hall would reply: "I don't think so. It 
 was very pleasant. I enjoyed it. I enjoy everything." 
 
 CXXIX. Growing Love for the Word of God. 
 
 Ezra vii. 6. ^^ And he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses; 
 which the Lord God of Israel had given." 
 
 The following little anecdote of Dr. Kennicott, who lived 
 at the end of the last century, strikingly proves how 
 much the love of the sacred volume grows with its 
 perusal. During the time that he was employed on his 
 Polyglot Bible it was his wife's constant office, in their 
 daily airings, to read to Dr. Kennicott those different 
 portions of Scrij)ture to which his immediate attention 
 was called. When preparing for their ride, the day after 
 this great work was completed, upon her asking what 
 book she should wtize/ take, " Oh !" exclaimed he, "let us 
 begin the Bible. ' 
 
68 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CXXX. "More Light, Lord." Ezra ix. 8. ''That 
 our God may lightefi our eyes, and give us a little reviving in 
 our bondage." 
 
 Prayer supplies a leverage for the uplifting of ponderous 
 truths. One marvels how the stones of Stonehenge could 
 have been set in their places ; it is even more to be in- 
 quired after whence some men obtained such admirable 
 knowledge of mysterious doctrines : was not prayer the 
 potent machinery which wrought the wonder? Waiting 
 upon God often turns darkness into light. Persevering 
 inquiry at the sacred oracle uplifts the veil, and gives grace 
 to look into the deep things of God. A certain Puritan 
 divine at a debate was observed frequently to write upon 
 the paper before him ; upon others curiously seeking to 
 read his notes, they found nothing upon the page but the 
 words, " More light, Lord," " More light, Lord," repeated 
 scores of times : a most suitable prayer for the student of 
 the word. 
 
 CXXXI. Washington at Prayer. Neh. i. 6. ''Lei 
 Thine ear tioiv be attentive, and Thine eyes open, that Thou 
 may est hear the prayer of Thy servant T 
 
 A GENTLEMAN narrates the following : 
 
 " I received the following anecdote of Washington, about 
 fifty years ago, from the farmer referred to in the narrative. 
 He was a member of the Society of Friends, who, from 
 their peaceable habits, were lukewarm or opposed to the 
 War of Independence. While the army lay in the neigh- 
 bourhood of White Plains, a farmer, whose dwelling was 
 near the camp, one morning at sunrise, while passing a 
 clump of brush, heard a moaning noise. Thinking his ox 
 or his ass had fallen into a pit, he, on approaching the spot, 
 heard the voice of a human being engaged in prayer. He 
 hid in the thicket, and listened, resolved to see the speaker. 
 Having finished his aspirations to heaven, this man of God 
 came forth from his hiding-place. It was George Wash- 
 ington. When the farmer entered his dwelLng, he said to 
 his wife : ' Martha, we must not oppose this movement any 
 more. This work is from the Lord. I In ard the man 
 George Washington send to heaven such prayers for the 
 cause and the country, and I know they will be heard.* 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTj^S. 69 
 
 Thus W'ashinfj^ton rose with the sun and prayed for his 
 country ; fouglit for it by day, and watched for it by 
 night." 
 
 We would add to this, that whilst a student at Princeton 
 we frequently heard a similar testimony from a venerable 
 old man in that vicinity. He stated that he belonged 
 for several months to Washington's bodyguard, and that 
 it was his duty to stand guard from two until five o'clock 
 each morning, and that it was invariably the general's 
 custom to rise at four o'clock, and read the word of God 
 and kneel down and pray in an audible voice for several 
 minutes, after which he commenced the business of the 
 day. He stated moreover that he uniformly reprimanded 
 all profane swearing in those under his authority. The 
 memory of the piety of such a man should be cherished 
 as a rich legacy to the nation of which he was the father. 
 
 CXXXII. Found Off Guard. Neh. iv. 9. ''Never- 
 theless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch 
 against them day and nighty because of them." 
 
 The following illustration from Roman history is sug- 
 gestive. Machaerus was a fortress too impregnable to be 
 taken by all the prowess of Rome. Among its defenders 
 was a young man, whose strong arm had often scattered 
 the assailants, and kept them back till his compatriots had 
 regained their refuge after many a successful sally ; but on 
 one occasion he dallied just outside the gate. An unseen 
 foe, of great strength, who had been lying in wait for such 
 an opportunity, grasped him in his arms and bore him off to 
 the Roman camp. There he was first mercilessly and igno- 
 miniously scourged, full in the view of those by whose side, 
 but an hour before, he had been doing stern battle against 
 the enemies of his country. Then a cross was brought 
 forward, and preparations made to nail him to it. This 
 was more than the defenders of the fortress could bear to 
 witness. They inquired whether no ransom could avail to 
 save their young hero's life. No ; nothing short of the 
 surrender of their place of impregnable strength, in defence 
 of which his and their blond had been shed together. The 
 sacrifice was made, and tin. conditions honourably observed 
 by the Romans. But wliat was the life-long feeling of 
 
70 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 the young Eleazar ? All his patriot spirit crushed, and a 
 sense of sliame ever burning on his cheek tliat no tears of 
 repentance could ever cool. All this from one moment's 
 imprudence. Found off guard did it all. 
 
 CXXXIII. The Bible in Iceland. Neh. viii. 8. ''So 
 they read in the book, hi the hnv of God distinctly ^ 
 
 Dr. Ebenezer Henderson was sent to Iceland by the 
 Bible Society to distribute the Icelandic Scriptures amongst 
 the inhabitants. It was found by Henderson that there 
 was a famine of the word of God in the island, often only 
 one copy of the Scriptures in a whole parish. 
 
 During the course of his first and his two subsequent 
 journeys, he disposed, or arranged for the disposal, by 
 gratuitous distribution or by purchase, of 4,055 Bibles, and 
 6,634 New Testaments, and thousands of tracts, with which 
 the Icelanders might beguile their long winter evenings 
 more profitably than with their national sagas and oft- 
 reiterated traditional tales. The rapture with which his 
 gift of a New Testament was frequently hailed may be 
 gathered from such an incident as the following : 
 
 He had sent, as was his custom, a notice round the 
 neighbourhood where he travelled of the object of his 
 journey. In response, a young man, amongst others, had 
 been despatched by his poor and aged parents to learn 
 the truth of the message they had heard. On receiving 
 a Testament, it was hardly possible for him to contain his 
 joy. As a number of the people had at the time collected 
 around the door of the tent, he caused the young man to 
 read the third chapter of the Gospel of John. He had 
 scarcely begun when the people all sat down or knelt on 
 the grass, and listened with the most devout attention. 
 As he proceeded, the tears began to trickle down their 
 cheeks, and they were all much affected. The scene was 
 doubtless as new to them as it was to Henderson ; and 
 on his remarking, after the young man was done, what 
 important instructions were contained in the Scripture that 
 had been read, they all gave their assent, adding, with a 
 sigh, that these truths were too little attended to. The 
 landlady especially seemed deeply impressed with the 
 truths she had heard, and remained some time after the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 71 
 
 others were c^onc, to'^ethcr with an aged female, who every 
 now and then broke out into exclamations of praise to 
 God for liaving sent "His clear and pure word" among 
 them. " It is impossible," adds Henderson, " for me to 
 describe the pleasure I felt on this occasion. I forgot all 
 the fatigues of travelling over the mountains, and indeed, 
 to enjoy another such evening, I could travel twice the 
 distance. I bless God for having counted me worthy to 
 be employed in this ministry, to dispense His holy word 
 among a people prepared by Him for its reception, and 
 to whom, by the blessing of His Spirit, it shall prove of 
 everlasting benefit." 
 
 CXXXIV. God's Mercies to the Worst of Re- 
 penting Sinners. Neh. ix. 17. "^ God ready to 
 pardon." 
 
 A STORY is told concerning a bold rebel that had made 
 a great party against one of the Roman emperors. A 
 proclamation was therefore sent abroad, that whosoever 
 could bring in the rebel, dead or alive, he should have a 
 great sum of money for his reward. The outlaw, hearing 
 of it, comes, and, presenting himself before the emperor, 
 demands the sum of money proposed. The emperor be- 
 thinks himself that if he should put him to death, the 
 world would be ready to say that he did it to save his 
 money ; and so he freely pardons the rebel, and gives him 
 the money. Here now was light in a dark lantern, mercy 
 in a very heathen. And shall such a one do thus that 
 had but a drop of mercy and compassion in him, and will 
 not Christ do much more that hath all fulness of grace 
 and mercy in Himself .-^ Surely His bowels yearn to the 
 worst of sinners repenting ; let them but come in, and 
 they shall find Him ready to pardon, yea, One that is 
 altogether made up of pardoning mercies. 
 
 CXXXV. The Pithiest Grace, Neh. xii. 31. '*Tu-o 
 great companies 0/ i/iein that gave i/ianks." 
 
 LUTIIER, Melanchthon, and Hugenhagen were close friends. 
 One afternoon the three friends had supper with Came- 
 rarius, and it occurred to Luther to ask who could furnish 
 
72 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 the briefest and pithiest "grace." His own was '^Doniinui 
 Jesus, Sit potiLS et esiis, " May tlie Lord Jesus be our drink 
 and meat " ; and it must have been accepted as both short 
 and suggestive. Nothing can do justice to Bugenhagen's 
 but his bluff Pomeranian : Dit tuid Dat, Drocken tind Natt, 
 gesegne tins Gad, " This and that, dry or wet, bless us, 
 God." Melanchthon's was briefest, and surely pithiest and 
 profoundest of all: Beiiedictns benedicat, "May the blessed 
 One give His blessing"; and the sententious benediction is 
 still familiar in many a college hall. 
 
 CXXXVI. Delusiveness of Earthly Glory. 
 EsTH. V. 13. '■''Yet all this availeth me nothing." 
 
 This is how Wellington wrote about the great victory at 
 Waterloo : " I cannot express the regret and sorrow with 
 which I contemplate the heavy loss I have sustained. 
 Believe me, nothing except a battle lost is so terrible as 
 a battle won. The glory arising from such actions is no 
 consolation to me, and I cannot suggest it has any con- 
 solation to you." 
 
 CXXXVII. Card-playing. Job i. i. ''One that feared 
 
 God, and eschetved evil.'" 
 
 Thomas Scott, rector of Aston Sandford, Buckingham- 
 shire, was in youth exceedingly fond of card-playing ; and 
 after he became a clergyman he occasionally joined in a 
 game, from an idea that too great preciseness might pre- 
 judice his neighbours, and being of opinion that there was 
 no harm in the practice. He says however that he felt it 
 a very awkward transition to remove the card-table, and 
 introduce the Bible and family worship. But his fetters 
 were completely broken in the following manner. Being 
 on a visit to one of his parishioners, a person to whom his 
 ministry had been useful, she said to him : " I have some- 
 thing which I wish to say to you, but I am afraid you will 
 be offended. You know A. B. ; he has lately appeared 
 attentive to religion, and has spoken to me concerning the 
 sacrament ; but last night he, with some others, met to 
 keep Christmas, and they played at cards, drank too much, 
 and in the end quarrelled and raised a riot ; and on 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 73 
 
 remonstrating with him on his conduct, his answer was, 
 'There is no harm in cards; Mr. Scott plays at cards,'" 
 This smote the minister to liis heart, and fixed his resolu- 
 tion never to play at cards again. 
 
 CXXXVIII. A Singular Dream. Job i. 6. ''Now there 
 was a day when the sojis of God came to prese?2t themselves 
 be/ore the Lord, and Satan came also among them." 
 
 John Huss once had a singular dream. He thought that 
 the powers of evil thronged his chapel of Bethlehem to 
 obliterate the pictures of Jesus upon the walls. But angels 
 of light on the other side with swift hands repainted them 
 in colours richer, and in more entrancing beauty. Such arc 
 the powers that contend in the place of our assemblies. But 
 fairer, tenderer, stronger shall the influence of Jesus grow 
 under angel hands. The saints witness its triumphs. The 
 faithful ministry paints Emmanuel with impassioned force 
 and many a loving repetition, till every stone and beam 
 seem eloquent of His story, and the whole place a monu- 
 ment to His incomparable name. 
 
 CXXXIX. Resignation to God's Will. Job i. 21. 
 
 "The Lord gave, atid the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the 
 name of the Lord." 
 
 Rabbi Meir was from home, and during his absence his 
 two sons died. His wife laid them upon the bed, and 
 spread a white covering over their bodies. On her hus- 
 band's return she thus addressed him : " Rabbi, I would 
 fain ask thee one question. A few days ago a person 
 entrusted some jewels to my custody, and now he demands 
 them back again ; should I give him them ? " " This is a 
 question," said Rabbi Meir, " which you should not have 
 thought it necessary to ask. Wouldest thou hesitate or be 
 I'eluctant to restore to every one his own?" " No," she 
 replied; "but yet I thought it best not to restore them 
 without acquainting you therewith." She then led him to 
 the bedside, and took off the covering from the bodies. 
 " Ah ! my sons, the light of mine eyes ; I was your 
 father, but you were my teachers." The mother too wept 
 bitterly. At length she said, " Rabbi, we must not be 
 
74 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 reluctant to restore that which was entrusted to our keep- 
 ing. See, the Lord gave, the Lord has taken away ; and 
 blessed be the name of the Lord." " Blessed be the name 
 of the Lord," echoed Rabbi Meir ; "and blessed be His 
 name for thy sake too !" 
 
 CXL. Resignation. Job i. 21. '■^ The Lord gave, and 
 
 the Lofd hath taken aivay ; blessed be the name of the Lord^ 
 
 In a beautiful letter of resignation, Scott, the famous com- 
 mentator, thus writes of the death of his youngest boy : 
 
 " I have to inform you that it has pleased the Lord who 
 gave also to take away from us our youngest boy. your 
 husband's godson, and thereby to discharge both him and 
 us from our trust. After a lingering and wasting disorder, 
 he was released from this world of sin and sorrow, and I 
 doubt not gained the blessed assembly above, to unite in 
 their song of praise to Him that sitteth on the throne, and 
 to the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed them 
 to God with His blood. He died on September 25th. 
 Nature will heave the anxious sigh, but faith looks within 
 the veil, beholds the happy deliverance, approves, and 
 rejoices ; and I trust we both are enabled to say from our 
 hearts, ' The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away ; 
 blessed be the name of the Lord.' " 
 
 CXLI. Going where All Problems will be 
 Solved. Job V. 9. '■'■Which doeth great things and un- 
 searchable; marvellous things witlioiit number ^ 
 
 When Sir David Brewster lay on his death-bed, he was 
 attended by his friend. Sir James Young Simpson, a man 
 of kindred genius and of kindred Christian hopes. " The 
 like of this I never saw," Sir James Simpson said to Mr. 
 Cousin after he had left the dying chamber. "There is 
 Sir David resting like a little child upon Jesus, and speak- 
 ing as if in a few hours he will get all his problems solved 
 for him." For in that supreme hour of dawning immor- 
 tality his past studies were all associated with the name 
 and person of the Redeemer. " I shall see Jesus," he said, 
 "and that will be grand. I shall see Him who made the 
 worlds," with allusion to those wonderful verses in the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 75 
 
 Epistle to the Hebrews, which had formed the subject of 
 the last sermon he had heard a few weeks before. Thus 
 tracing all to tiie Creator and Redeemer, he felt no incon- 
 gruity, even in these hours, in describing to Sir James 
 Simpson some beautiful phenomena in his favourite science. 
 Reference was made to the privilege he had enjoyed in 
 throwing light upon " the great and marvellous works of 
 God." " Yes," he said ; " I found them to be great and 
 marvellous, and I felt them to be His." 
 
 CXLII. Importunate Prayer. Job vi. 8. "-Oh that I 
 might have my request ; and that God would grant me the 
 thing that I long fori " 
 
 The following answers to prayer are a warning to suppli- 
 ants who utter requests which they feel mnst be answered, 
 without any thought as to whether it be best in God's sight 
 or not. 
 
 A child was very ill, and his father felt that he could not 
 give him up. While others watched he prayed, and with 
 such insistence that he recorded, "About six o'clock my 
 anxiety was in a measure relieved, and in going to the 
 sick room I found that the boy had fallen into a sleep, and 
 from that hour he grew better." And yet, looking back 
 after the lapse of years, it had been better and happier for 
 parents and child, for others also, in later years, if the short 
 life had then ended. 
 
 Again comes the history of a similar case, and one of 
 the parents recorded, " Saved in answer to importunate 
 prayer." The life was saved, but the nature seemed to be 
 changed, and the boy grew to manhood a curse, a sorrow, 
 and a burden to those most nearly connected with him. 
 And yet he was the child of Christian parents, and was 
 brought up as a Christian child. 
 
 CXLIII. Penalty of Reading the Bible. Job xiii. 
 15. " Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." 
 
 In his " History of the Dutch Republic," Mr. Motley tells 
 us of one Titelmann, a blood-red persecutor of the Nether- 
 lands. Upon any pretext would he put to death man, 
 woman, or child. 
 
 There was a poor schoolmaster, Geleyn de Muler, of 
 
76 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Oudennrde. He had been suspected of Bible reading. 
 Titelmann found him and his wife and four children, and 
 told him that death by fire was his fate if he did not 
 recant. 
 
 " Will you give me a trial ? " said Muler. 
 
 " You are my prisoner, and are to answer me and none 
 other," was the reply. Some questions were asked by 
 Titelmann, and then Muler was demanded to recant. He 
 was for some moments speechless. 
 
 " Do you not love your wife and children .'"' 
 
 " God knows," said the schoolmaster, " that were the 
 heavens a pearl, and the earth a globe of gold, and were I 
 the owner of all, most cheerfully would I give them all to 
 live with my family, even though our fare be only bread 
 and water." 
 
 It was enough, Muler was strangled, and his body 
 burned. Such faith in God, how much is it needed in 
 this world ! 
 
 CXLIV. Dying Words of an Unbeliever. Job 
 
 xiv. 14. '"''If a man die, shall he live again V 
 
 The dying words of the late Harriet Martineau were : " I 
 have no reason to believe in another world. I have had 
 enough of life in one, and can see no good reason why 
 Harriet Martineau should be perpetuated." What gloom 
 and sadness! Now listen to St. Paul : "I have fought a 
 good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the 
 faith ; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of 
 righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall 
 give me at that day." Who, in the light of such expe- 
 riences, can refrain from exclaiming, " Let me die the 
 death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his " ? 
 
 CXLV. The Tomb Forgets No One. Job xvi. 22. 
 " When a fetv years are come, then I shall go the way luhence 1 
 shall not retur?i." 
 
 Victor Hugo, when in the depth of severe affliction — the 
 loss of his two sons — wrote the following lines : 
 
 " Patience. They have but gone before. It is just that 
 the evening should come for us all. It is just that all 
 should go up, one after the other, to receive their pay 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 77 
 
 The exempts are such only in appearance. The tomb 
 forjiets no one." 
 
 CXLVI. True Wisdom. Job xxviii. 28. "Behold, the 
 fear of the Lord, that is wisdom ; and to depart from evil is 
 understanding. " 
 
 We are told in history how Edmund Rich, Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, found his love of learninir at Oxford HI-inginCT 
 its troubles. " His Old Testament frowned down upon 
 a love of secular Icarnin;^, from which Edmund found it 
 hard to wean himself." At last in a dream the form of 
 his dead mother floated into the room where the teacher 
 stood amidst his mathematical diagrams. " What are 
 these .'' " she seemed to say ; and seizing Edmund's right 
 hand, she drew on the palm three circles interlaced, each 
 of which bore the name of one of the Persons of the holy 
 Trinity. " Be these thy diagrams henceforth, my son," she 
 cried ; and her figure faded away. And so Edmund Rich 
 learned to put first things first. 
 
 CXLVII. Conscience a Gnawing Worm. Job 
 
 xxxiv. 18. "/i' it ft to say to a king. Thou art wicked? and 
 to princes, Ye a?-e ungodly ? " 
 
 Hugh Latimer was very outspoken to King Henry VHI., 
 feeling that he must tell him his duty. " You that be 
 of the court, and especially ye sworn chaplains," he said 
 long afterwards, " beware of a lesson that a great man 
 taught me at my first coming to court. He told me for 
 good will ; he thought it well. He said to me, ' You must 
 beware, howsoever ye do, that ye contrary not the king ; 
 let him have his sayings ; follow him ; go with him.' 
 Marry 1 out upon such counsel ! Shall I say as he says ? 
 Say your consciejice, or else what a worm shall ye feel gnaw- 
 ing ! What a remorse of conscience shall ye have when ye 
 remember how ye have slacked your duty 1 Yet a prince 
 must be turned not violently, he must be won by a little 
 and a little. He must have his duty told him, but with 
 humbleness, with request of pardon, or else it were a 
 dangerous thing." 
 
78 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CXLVIII. Dr. Ryland and his Hymn. Job xxxv. lo 
 
 " Where is God my Maker, who giveth songs in the night f " 
 
 Dr. Ryland was the author of that beautiful hymn, which 
 he wrote under singular circumstances : 
 
 " O Lord, I would delight in Thee, 
 
 And on Thy care depend ; 
 
 To Thee in every trouble flee, 
 
 My best, my only Friend." 
 
 He was at Bristol Academy, engaged to be married to a 
 young lady whom he fondly loved. She was taken with 
 a dangerous sickness, from which it was feared she would 
 not recover. Filled with anguish, he called to inquire 
 about her, and was told by the servant if he would call in 
 half an hour he would hear the opinion of the doctors, 
 wlio were then holding a consultation on the case. He 
 retired to an empty house, then under repair, sat down on 
 a large stone, and taking a piece of slate wrote thereon 
 that beautiful hymn, which has been the comfort of thou- 
 sands of the tried children of God : 
 
 " When all created streams are dried. 
 Thy fulness is the same : 
 May I with this be satisfied, 
 And glory in Thy name ! 
 
 " No good in creatures can be found 
 But may be found in Thee ; 
 I must have all things, and abound, 
 While God is God to me." 
 
 He called, and received a favourable report. The lady 
 recovered, they were married, and lived most happily toge- 
 ther for seven years, when she was removed by death. 
 Thus out of trial came a song, even as out of the lion came 
 honey. 
 
 CXLIX. The Captive Set Free. Job xxxix. 27. "Both 
 the eagle mount tip at thy command, and make her nest on 
 high?" 
 
 Many years had a noble eagle been confined in such a 
 manner that no one had seen it even attempt to raise a 
 wing. Perfectly subdued, unconscious now of its native 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 79 
 
 power, it remained inactive and apparently contented. 
 But its owner was about to leave for a far country, never 
 to return. He could not take the eagle with him. " I will 
 do one act of kindness before I go," said he, and unloosed 
 the chain from the captive bird. His neighbours and 
 children looked on, with regret that they should see the 
 eagle no more. A moment, and it would be gone for ever ! 
 But no ; the bird walked the usual round, which had been 
 the length of his chain, unconscious that he was free. The 
 gazers looked on in wonder and in pity. The slow rustling 
 of a wing was heard. It was stretched, and then folded. 
 Anon it was stretched to its full expansion, and then folded 
 softly again. Now, slowly and cautiously, the eagle ex- 
 pands both wings, and looks up into the blue sky. One 
 effort to mount, then another, and the wings have found 
 their lost skill ; and upward, higher, and speedier he mounts 
 his way, until lost to view. 
 
 Hast thou, O child of God, been pinioned long to the 
 cares and toils of earth, so that thy wings of faith and love 
 have lost all power to rise ? Once thou couldst soar, and 
 thou mayest soar again. His "grace is sufficient for thee." 
 
 CL. The Wheat and the Chaff. Ps. i. 4. "The 
 ungodly are fwt so : but are like the chaff which the wind 
 driveth away." 
 
 " What is in yonder vessel } " I inquire of a passing 
 stranger. " Chaff," he replies, turning a hasty glance in 
 the direction to which I point, and passes on. His answer 
 is all that you could expect him to give, and yet it is 
 not correct. The vessel was filled with wheat and chaff, 
 mingled together as they were thrashed from the sheaf ; 
 but it has been shaken from side to side for some time, 
 and the wheat has all sunk to the bottom, while the chaff 
 has all risen to the top. In like manner many real, though 
 not perfect Christians, are set down as hypocrites by care- 
 less observers, because the things of the Spirit gravitate 
 downward, lie unseen, while the vanities that perish in the 
 using occupy almost all the visible surface of the life. 
 
 That which is Christlike in Christians should not be 
 small, but large and full-grown ; should not sink out of 
 sight, but stand forth visible to all. 
 
8o OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CLI. Colour-blind. Ps. iv. 6. " Who will show us 
 
 any good V 
 
 There is an optical peculiarity called Daltonism or colour- 
 blindness. It is so common that nearly one in twenty have 
 it. It consists in an inability to distinguish colours. Green 
 is confounded with red. Those who suffer from this defect 
 are unable, so far as the colour is concerned, to distinguish 
 the petals of a rose from its leaves, or the blossom of the 
 scarlet poppy from the unripe corn among which it is grow- 
 ing. The beautiful hues of sunset are a delusion to them ; 
 the faces of their friends wear a strange complexion ; and 
 the fair aspects of nature appear quite different from what 
 they are to others. And yet the eye of the colour-blind 
 seems the same as an ordinary eye. Its structure and 
 appearance look precisely similar. The peculiarity is 
 almost unknown or unrecognised by those who have it ; 
 and being ignorant of its existence themselves, they cannot 
 easily be persuaded to believe it. And so are there not 
 many coming to the Lord's house as His people come, 
 worshipping the Lord as His people worship, making the 
 same profession of religion, and walking in the same ways, 
 presenting no apparent difference between themselves and 
 true Christians, and yet who are colour-blind spiritually ? 
 The whole economy of redemption, the entire scheme of 
 grace, is to them altogether different from what it is to 
 those who know the power of godliness. The things that 
 are spiritually discerned are to them uninteresting and in- 
 comprehensible. The colours of the heavenly landscape 
 are confounded by them, and appear of one uniform dull 
 hue. Christ Himself, who is the chiefest among ten thou- 
 sand and altogether lovely, has no form or comeliness to 
 them that they should desire Him. While the believer 
 utters his rapturous song, " My Beloved is white and ruddy," 
 they say, " What is thy Beloved more than another be- 
 loved .•"' They cannot see the beauties and glories of the 
 world unseen ; and in the very midst of them are crying 
 out, "Who will show us any good ? " 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CLII. Praying for What we Do not Expect. 
 Ps. V. 3. " My voice sJialt Thou hear in the mor/nni^, O 
 Lord ; in the morning will J direct my prayer unto Thee, and 
 will look tip." 
 
 " I WAS once," narrates Daniel Ouorm, " staying with a 
 gentleman who was a very religious kind of man ; and in 
 the morning he began the day with a long family prayer, 
 that we might have a Christ-like spirit, and the mind that 
 was also in Christ Jesus, and that we might have the love 
 of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost 
 given to us. A beautiful prayer it was, and I thought, 
 What a good, kind man you must be ! But about an hour 
 after, I happened to be coming along the farm, and I heard 
 him hallooing and scolding and going on, finding fault 
 with everything. And when I came in the house with him 
 he began again. Nothing was right, and he was, I found, 
 very impatient and quick-tempered. "Tis very provoking 
 to be annoyed in this way, Daniel. I don't know what 
 servants in these times be good for but to worry and vex 
 one with their idle, slovenly ways.' I did not reply for a 
 minute or two. And then I said, ' You must be very 
 much disappointed, sir.' ' How so, Daniel .-* Disappointed?' 
 ' I thought you were expecting to receive a very valuable 
 present this morning, and I see it has not come.' ' Present, 
 Daniel ? ' and he scratched his head, as much as to say, 
 ' Whatever can the man be talking about ? ' 'I certainly 
 heard you speaking of it, sir,' I said quite coolly. * Heard 
 me speak of a valuable present! Why, Daniel, you must 
 be dreaming. I've never thought of such a thing.' ' Per- 
 haps not, but you've talked about it ; and I hoped it would 
 come whilst I was here, for I should dearly love to see it' 
 He was getting angry with me now, so I thought I would 
 explain. ' You know, sir, this morning you prayed for a 
 Christ-like spirit, and the mind that was in Jesus, and the 
 love of God shed abroad in your heart.' ' Oh ! that's what 
 you mean, is it?' and he spoke as if that weren't anything 
 at all. ' Now, sir, wouldn't you be rather surprised if your 
 prayer was to be answered, if you were to feel a nice, 
 gentle, loving kind of spirit coming down upon you, all 
 patient and forgiving and kind ? Why, I believe you 
 would become quite frightened j and you'd come in and 
 
 G 
 
82 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 sit down in a faint, and imagine that you must be going 
 to die, because you felt so heavenly-minded ? ' He did not 
 like it very much, but I dehvered my testimony, and learned 
 a lesson for myself too. We should stare very often if the 
 Lord were to answer our prayer." 
 
 CLIII. A Christian Philosopher. Ps. v. 12. ''For 
 Thou, Lord, wilt Mess tlie righteous ; with favour wilt Thou 
 compass him as 7vith a shield.'''' 
 
 Faraday stands out prominently as a Christian as well as 
 a philosopher. Concerning his standing in science there is 
 no dispute. He takes rank among the first of his con- 
 temporaries. Universities and learned societies were eager 
 to do him honour. 
 
 His religious character appears to have been developed 
 from a very early period. " When an errand-boy, we 
 find him hurrying the delivery of his newspapers on a 
 Sunday morning, so as to get home in time to make 
 himself neat, to go with his parents to chapel ; his letters, 
 when abroad, indicate the same disposition ; yet he did 
 not make any formal profession of his faith till a month 
 after his marriage, when nearly thirty years of age. Of 
 his spiritual history up to that period little is known, but 
 there seem to be grounds for believing that he did not 
 accept the religion of his fathers without a conscientious 
 inquiry into its truth. It would be difficult to conceive of 
 his acting otherwise. But after he joined the Sandemanian 
 Church, his questionings were probably confined to matters 
 of practical duty ; and to those who know him best, nothing 
 could appear stronger than his conviction of the reality of 
 the things he believed. In order to understand the life 
 and character of Faraday, it is necessary to bear in mind 
 that he was a Christian, but that he was a Sandemanian. 
 From his earliest years that religious system stamped its 
 impress deeply on his mind ; it surrounded the blacksmith's 
 son with an atmosphere of unusual purity and refinement ; 
 it developed the usefulness of his nature, and in his after 
 career it fenced his life from the worldliness around, as 
 well as from much that is esteemed as good by other 
 Christian bodies. But his sympathies burst all narrow 
 bounds. Thus the Abb6 Moigno tells us that, at Fara- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 83 
 
 day's request, he one day introduced him to Cardinal 
 Wiseman. Tiic interview was very cordial, and his eminence 
 ditl not hesitate frankly and good-naturedly to ask Faraday 
 if, in his deepest conviction, he believed all the Church of 
 Christ — holy, catholic, and apostolical — was shut up in the 
 little sect in which he bore rule. ' Oh, no,' was the reply ; 
 ' but 1 do believe, from the bottom of my soul, that Christ 
 is with us ! '" 
 
 CLIV. God's Anger Consistent with His Love. 
 
 Ps. vii. II. " Goi/ is angry with tJie wiclied every day." 
 
 Theon was one day reading in the Holy Scriptures when 
 he suddenly closed the book, and looked thoughtful and 
 gloomy. 
 
 Hillel perceived this, and said to the youth : " What 
 aileth thee ? Why is thy countenance troubled ? " 
 
 Theon answered : " In some places the Scriptures speak 
 of the wrath of God, and in others He is called Love. 
 This appears to me strange and inconsistent." 
 
 The teacher calmly replied ; " Should they not speak to 
 man in human language ? Is it not equally strange that 
 they should attribute a human form to the Most High .?" 
 
 " By no means," answered the youth ; "that is figurative, 
 but wrath " 
 
 Hillel interrupted him, and said : " Listen to my story. 
 There lived in Alexandria two fathers, wealthy merchants, 
 who had two sons of the same age, and they sent them to 
 E^esus on business connected with their traffic. Both 
 these young men had been thoroughly instructed in the 
 religion of their fathers. 
 
 " When they had sojourned for some time at Ephesus, 
 they were dazzled by the splendour and treasures of the 
 city, and, yielding to the allurements which beset them, 
 they forsook the path of their fathers, and turned aside to 
 idolatry, and worshipped in the temple of Diana. 
 
 " A friend at Ephesus wrote of this to Cleon, one of the 
 two fathers at Alexandria. When Cleon had read the 
 letter, he was troubled in his heart, and he was wroth with 
 the }-ouths. Thereupon he went to the other father, and 
 told him of the apostasy of their sons, and of his grief 
 thereat 
 
84 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 " But the other father laiiglied, and said, * If business do 
 but prosper with my son, I shall give myself little concern 
 about his religion.' 
 
 " Then Cleon turned from him, and was still more wroth, 
 
 " Now, which of these two fathers," said Hillel to the 
 youth, " dost thou consider as the wiser and the better ? " 
 
 "He who was wroth," answered Theon. 
 
 " And which," asked the preceptor, " was the kinder 
 father ? " 
 
 " He who was wroth," again answered the youth. 
 
 "Was Cleon wroth with his son.''" asked Hillel. 
 
 And Theon replied, "Not with his son, but with his 
 backsliding and apostasy." 
 
 "And what," asked the teacher, "thinkest thou is the 
 cause of such displeasure against evil .-'" 
 
 " The sacred love of truth," answered his disciple. 
 
 " Behold then, my son," said the old man, "if thou canst 
 now think divinely of that which is Divine, the human 
 expression will no longer offend thee." 
 
 CLV. Daniel Webster's Knowledge of the 
 Bible. Ps. viii. i. "C Lord our Lord, how excellent 
 is 2hy name in all the earth ! who hast set Thy glory above 
 the heavens^ 
 
 Though Webster's fame rests chiefly upon his oratorical 
 powers, he was remarkable, too, for his familiarity with the 
 Bible. In fact, his colleagues once nicknamed him, the 
 Bible Concordance of the United States Senate. 
 
 While a mere lad, he read with such power and expres- 
 sion that the passing teamsters, who stopped to water their 
 horses, used to get " Webster's boy " to come out beneath 
 the shade of the trees and read the Bible to them. Those 
 who heard Mr. Webster, in later life, recite passages from 
 the Hebrew prophets and Psalms, say that he held them 
 spellbound, while each passage, even the most familiar, came 
 home to them in a new meaning. One gentleman says 
 that he never received such ideas of the majesty of God 
 and the dignity of man as he did one clear night when Mr. 
 Webster, standing in the open air, recited the eighth 
 Psalm. 
 
 Webster's mother observed another old fashion of New 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 85 
 
 England in training her son. She encouraged him to me- 
 morize such Scriptural passages as impressed him. The 
 boy's retentive memory, and his sensitiveness to Bible 
 metaphors and to the rhythm of the English version, stored 
 his mind with Scripture. On one occasion the teacher 
 of the district school offered a jack-knife to the boy who 
 should recite the greatest number of verses from the Bible. 
 When Webster's turn came, he arose and reeled off so 
 many verses that the master was forced to say, " Enough." 
 It was the mother's training and the boy's delight in the 
 idioms and music of King James's version that made him 
 the " Biblical Concordance of the Senate." 
 
 But these two factors made him more than a " concord- 
 ance." The Hebrew prophets inspired him to eloquent 
 utterances. He listened to them, until their vocabulary 
 and idioms, as expressed in King James's translations, 
 became his mother-tongue. Of his lofty utterances it may 
 be said, as Wordsworth said of Milton's poetry, they are 
 " Hebrew in soul." Therefore they project themselves into 
 the future. 
 
 The young man who would be a writer that shall be 
 read, or an orator whom people w///hear, should study the 
 English Bible. Its singular beauty and great power as 
 literature, the thousand sentiments and associations which 
 use lias attached to it, have made it a mightier force than 
 any other book. 
 
 CLVI. An Infidel and a Little Girl who was 
 Sorry for Him. Ps. viii. 2. '■'■ Otit of the viouth of 
 babes and siuklitigs hast Thou ordained strength, because of 
 Thine enemies, that Thou mightest still the enejny and the 
 avefiger" 
 
 The celebrated Hume was dining at the house of an 
 intimate friend. After dinner the ladies withdrew ; and in 
 the course of conversation, Mr. Hume made some asser- 
 tion, which caused a gentleman present to observe to him, 
 "If you can advance such sentiments as these, you cer- 
 tainly are what the world gives you credit for being, an 
 infidel." A little girl, whom the philosopher had often 
 noticed, and with whom he had become a favourite, by 
 bringing her little presents of toys and sweetmeats, hap- 
 
86 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 pened to be playing about the room unnoticed. She 
 however listened to the conversation, and on hearing the 
 above expression, left the room, went to her mother, and 
 asked her, " Mamma, what is an infidel?" "An infidel, 
 my dear !" replied her mother ; " why should you ask such 
 a question ? An infidel is so awful a character that I 
 scarcely know how to answer you." " Oh ! tell me, 
 mamma," returned the child ; " I must know what an 
 infidel is." Struck with her eagerness, her mother at 
 length replied, " An infidel is one who believes that there 
 is no God, no heaven, no hell, no hereafter." Some days 
 afterwards Hume again visited the house of his friend. 
 On being introduced into the parlour, he found no one 
 there but his favourite little girl ; he went to her and 
 attempted to take her up in his arms, and kiss her as he 
 had been used to do ; but the child shrank with horror 
 from his touch. " My dear," said he, " what is the matter 1 
 do I hurt you?" "No," she replied; " you do not hurt 
 me ; but I cannot kiss you, I cannot play with you." 
 "Why not, my dear.?" "Because you are an infidel." 
 "An infidel! what is that?" "One who believes there is 
 no God, no heaven, no hell, no hereafter." " And are you 
 not very sorry for me, my dear.''" asked the philosopher. 
 "Yes, indeed, I am sorry!" returned the child with 
 solemnity ; " and I pray to God for you." " Do you, 
 indeed } and what do you say ? " "I say, O God, teach 
 this man that Thou art." A striding illustration of the 
 above text. 
 
 CLVII. Not Christianized, but Humanized. 
 
 Ps. X. " The wicked in his pride doth persecute the poor " 
 
 I SAID last year to an old saint of ninety years, " Is the 
 world better or worse than when you knew it first ? " The 
 old man turned thoughtfully to me, and said, " I will not 
 say that, so far as I know it, it has been Christianized ; but 
 I do say that it has been Jnnnanizcd" Brutal sports trained 
 men to count the defenceless as their prey, and made the 
 sight of suffering too familiar a thing to be noticed. Here 
 is a bit of testimony that I have met with from old people 
 in many forms, and which will find its counterpart in Simon's 
 story. A farmer who had hired a little lad began striking 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 87 
 
 him before they were out of the " Cliurch-town." The 
 poor mother came up and pleaded for her son : " O sir, 
 how would you like to see )'Our little ones served like 
 that ? " The man, with an oath, bade her be gone, saying, 
 " 77(j' child is made o' cuse (coarse) clay ; but mine is made 
 of hne." Was not some such sentiment as that general 
 concerning the poor in the early part of the century ? One 
 has even met with it lingering still in more modern dress. 
 To-day, to be poor is a suspicion, almost a crime, with some 
 few people. 
 
 CLVIII. Is there no God? Ps. xiv. i. '' The fool 
 Iiaih said in his hearty There is no God." 
 
 Miss Martineau tells, in her Autobiography, that it was 
 an unspeakable relief to her to arrive at the conclusion that 
 there is no God. She went out of her house afterwards, 
 she says, and looked up at the stars with a new sensation. 
 And all the worries of life became less irritating to her on her 
 being assured that she had no one to be ultimately respon- 
 sible to but herself. On the other hand, it would certainly 
 be to make for many this world a waste and howling 
 wilderness, to deprive them of the comfort of believing that 
 a Supreme Mind and Hand have been directing it through 
 the ages. 
 
 CLIX. A Merchant Prince. Ps. xv. 4. ''He thai 
 sweareth to his oivn hurt, and changeth not." 
 
 It has been well said that he who gives to charity only on 
 his death-bed may be said to be " rather liberal with that 
 which is another man's, than of his own, and gives his 
 wealth to the strong robber. Death, in no other sense than 
 the traveller yields his purse to the highwayman." Samuel 
 Fletcher, of Manchester, one of the merchant princes of 
 that city, was one of thosj men whose delight it is to be 
 their own almoners. He commenced business for himself 
 in 181 1, and in a {^w years, by constant honesty, perseve- 
 rance, and self-denial, took his place among the foremost 
 merchants of that great mercantile centre. A striking 
 example of his integrity in business matters is given in the 
 following : — An event of European interest (the battle of 
 Leipsic) caused a revolution in the Manchester market, and 
 
88 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 suddenly and enormously enhanced the value of a certain 
 class of goods, of which Mr. Fletcher had a quantity in 
 stock, but which he had virtually promised to a customer 
 at a lower price, before the news arrived of the battle. An 
 enterprising speculator came in and offered to take the 
 entire stock at the advanced prices, and even to advance 
 on these. Mr. Fletcher told him that the goods were not 
 his to sell. It was in vain that the usual casuistry of 
 interest was used to shake the plain ethics of truth and 
 honesty ; it was in vain to urge that the bargain had not 
 been formally ratified, etc. Mr. Fletcher contented himself 
 with saying that, however vexatious the loss, he had really, 
 if not formally, agreed to part with the goods at the price 
 stipulated, and that "a just man, even though he swears to 
 his own hurt, changeth not." 
 
 CLX. The Christian's Portion. Ps. xvi. 5. ''The 
 Lord is the portion of mine itiheritance and of my ciip.^' 
 
 Excellent was the answer of Basil the Great to the 
 Emperor Valens, who first essayed him with large proffers 
 of honour and riches to draw him from Christ : " Offer 
 these things to children — I regard them not." Then after 
 threatening, he replied : " He who has but a few books and 
 a wretched garment can suffer nothing from confiscation : 
 banishment is nothing to one to whom all places are alike, 
 and torture cannot be inflicted where there is not a body 
 to bear it. Put me to death, and you do me a favour, for 
 you send me earlier to my rest." 
 
 CLXI. It has been tried. Ps. xviii. 30, '■'The word 
 of the Lord is tried" 
 
 Building a bridge across the Niagara River, below the 
 Falls, was once thought to be impossible. The banks are 
 steep and high, the distance across nearly an eighth of a 
 mile, and the river here boils and foams so that no boat 
 can stand the fury of the torrent a moment. Sending piles 
 and building arches, as with other bridges, was quite out 
 of the question. Yet a bridge was built — a wire suspension 
 bridge, so called because it had to be hung by cables driven 
 into huse blocks of granite on each bank. The cables 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 89 
 
 were made of twisted wire. The bridge looked like a 
 spider's thread. 
 
 But would the cables hold ? That had to be tried. How 
 frightened the spectators were when the engineer drove the 
 fu'st carriage across ! A terrible plunge would that be into 
 the raging waters, two hundred and fifty feet underneath. 
 But the bridge stood the trial. Then gales and storms 
 tried it, and it stood. " I am afraid to trust it, it looks so 
 slender," said one of a party, shrinking back, when visiting 
 the Falls a year afterward. " It has been tried," said the 
 guide ; " there is no danger," and we crossed safely. The 
 Bible tells us of something that is tried. " The word of 
 the Lord is tried." Its declarations and promises are tried, 
 and its threatenings also are to be relied on. 
 
 CLXII. God seen in His Works. Ps. xix. i. ''The 
 heavens declare the glory of God ; and the firmament she^veth 
 His handyworkP 
 
 An Arab, a wild son of the desert, one more accustomed 
 to fight than to reason, to plunder a caravan than to argue 
 a cause, was asked by a traveller how he knew that there 
 was a Deity } He fixed his dark eyes with a stare of 
 savage wonder on the man who seemed to doubt the being 
 of God ; and then (as he was wont, when he encountered a 
 foe, to answer spear by spear), he met the question by 
 another : " How do I know whether it was a man or a 
 camel which passed by my tent last night ?" Well spoken, 
 child of the desert ! for not more plainly do the footprints 
 in the sand reveal to thy eye whether it was a man or a 
 camel that passed thy tent in the darkness of the night, 
 than God's works reveal His power and being. 
 
 CLXIII. A Martyr's Legacy to his Children. 
 Ps. xix. 10. " More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than 
 tniiih fine gold. " 
 
 John Penry, the Welsh martyr, was executed at St. 
 Thomas a- Watering, Surrey, as secretly as it could be 
 done, for fear of a popular tumult. He died in the thirty- 
 fourth year of his age, leaving a widow and four daughters, 
 and a great host ot Christians to deplore his untimely end. 
 He had never meddled with politics. His sole ott'ences 
 
go OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 were his ex[:)osures of the glaring abuses of the episcopal 
 clergy in Wales, whereby souls of his countrymen were 
 ruined, and his open confession of Nonconformity towards 
 the close of his life. In a letter written a {^^f^ days before 
 his death, he thus counsels his children : " Although you 
 should be brought up in never so hard service, yet, my dear 
 children, learn to read, that you may be conversant day 
 and night in the Word of the Lord. If your mother be 
 able to keep you together, I doubt not that you shall learn 
 both to write and read by her means. I have left you four 
 Bibles, each of you one, being the sole and only patrimony 
 or dowry that I have for you. I beseech you and charge 
 you not only to keep them, but to read in them day and 
 night ; and before you read, and also in and after reading, 
 be earnest in prayer and meditation, that you may under- 
 stand and perform the good way of your God." 
 
 CLXIV. The "Speaking Leaves." Ps. xix. lo. 
 
 " More to be desired are tJiey than gold, yea, than much fine 
 gold : sweeter also than hofiey and the honeycomb." 
 
 About thirty years ago the people in the South Sea 
 Islands had never seen a book, nor did they know that 
 there was any way of getting or giving knowledge but by 
 speech. Now they know the value of "speaking leaves," 
 as they call tracts and books. Such is their desire for 
 them that they will travel ten miles in a small canoe, in the 
 open sea, to obtain a single copy, for which they offer fruit 
 and native cloth. Many have come thirty or forty miles 
 on land, carrying a burden all the way, that they might 
 buy a book. One of these natives fenced off a plot of 
 ground, planted it with arrow-root, and waited till it was 
 ripe. He then prepared it for use, and getting with it into 
 his canoe, spread its sail to the wind, and steered for a 
 missionary station. After sailing for some miles, a sudden 
 gust of wind filled the little sail, and upset the canoe. The 
 poor fellow soon got his canoe right again, and himself 
 safe in it, but the arrow-root had gone to the bottom of 
 the sea. He turned his canoe round towards home, which 
 he reached with a sad heart. But as soon as he got there, 
 he planted a fresh plot of arrow-root, and w-aited until it 
 was ready ; then he set out once more, sailed again over 
 the open sea, reached the station, and bought a book. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 91 
 
 The next day he was on his return, full of joy that he had 
 got what he liad so long wished to possess. 
 
 CLXV. Happiness of doing Good. Ps. xix. 11. 
 
 " /// keeping of them there is great reward." 
 
 As Henry Mart\'n was on his way to India, he was watch- 
 ful, day and night, for opportunities of doing good to thcjse 
 on board the ship in which he sailed. He was especially 
 attentive to the sick. One day, when the hatches were 
 shut down in consequence of a gale, he went below to visit 
 a sick sailor. As there was perfect darkness below, he was 
 obliged to feel his way. He found the man swinging in 
 his hammock, in darkness, and heat, and damp, without a 
 creature to speak to him, and in a burning fever. " I gave 
 him," says Martyn, " a io-w grapes which had been given to 
 me, to allay his thirst. How great the pleasure of doing 
 good, even to the bodies of men ! " 
 
 Martyn had large experience of the pleasure of doing 
 good. His efforts to do good were unceasing, and they 
 were made at the expense of self-sacrifice. They were thus 
 of a kind to yield him the largest amount of pleasure. 
 
 Have you had experience of the pleasure of doing 
 good ? especially of doing good to the souls of men } 
 There is no pleasure like it. He who labours in simplicity 
 and in godly sincerity to do good, has his reward in a calm 
 and enduring pleasure which no earthly prosperity, no 
 wealth, nor honours can bestow. 
 
 How many seek for happiness from afar, when it can be 
 had in its purest form by doing good to their neighbours ! 
 To do good and communicate forget not, if you would be 
 happy, if you would enjoy the Saviour's smile. 
 
 The manner in which Mr. Martyn became possessed of 
 the grapes which he gave to the sick man is interesting 
 and instructive. 
 
 The ship, after touching at the Cape of Good Hope, 
 sailed thence on the Sabbath. On that day a boat came 
 alongside with fruit ; " but," says Martyn, " I did not think 
 it rigiit to buy any, though I longed to have some to carry 
 to sea." On the day on which he visited the sick man, a 
 passenger who came on board at the Cape, and to whom 
 he had scarcely ever spoken, sent him a plate of fruit, by 
 
92 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 which he was greatly refreshed, and enabled to relieve the 
 sick man. 
 
 It is somewhat remarkable, that this seasonable present 
 came on the very day on which Martyn entered in his 
 common-place book the following sentiment, taken from an 
 author he was reading : " If, from regard to God's Sabbath, 
 I deny myself, He will more than make it up to me." In 
 keeping God's statutes there is great reward." 
 
 CLXVI. Wild Faith. Ps. xix. 13. '' Keep back Thy ser- 
 
 va7it also from presumphious sins." 
 
 John Bunyan says, in one of his many books, " Faith must 
 be always in exercise. Only put not in the place thereof 
 presumption. I have observed that as there are herbs and 
 flowers in our gardens, so there are counterfeits in the field : 
 only they are distinguished from the others by the name 
 of wild ones. Why, there is faith, and wild faith : and wild 
 faith is this presumption. I call it wild faith, because God 
 never placed it in His garden — His Church : 'tis only to be 
 found in His field — the world. I also call it wild faith, 
 because it only grows up and is nourished where other wild 
 notions abound." 
 
 CLXVII. The Traveller's Tree. Ps. xxiii. 5. ''T/um 
 prepares t a table for me in the presence of mine enemies." 
 
 Mr. Eli>IS describes this wonderful tree, which grows in 
 Madagascar, and is so called from its always containing, 
 in the most arid season, a large quantity of pure fresh 
 water, supplying to the traveller the place of wells in the 
 desert. Being somewhat sceptical as to the truth of what 
 he had heard, Mr. Ellis determined to see for himself. 
 Coming to a clump of the trees, one of his bearers struck 
 one. of them with his spear, four or five inches deep, into 
 the thick, firm end of the stalk of the leaf, and on drawing 
 it back, a stream of pure clear water gushed out, about a 
 quart of which was caught, and all drank of it on the spot. 
 It was cool, clear, and perfectly sweet. Such a tree, so 
 valuable to the thirsty traveller, forms no i.ad emblem of 
 the ordinances of grace, prepared for the Loi'd's people in 
 the wilderness of this world. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 93 
 
 CLXVIII. Communion Sunday. Psalm, xxiv. 7. 
 " Lift up your Jieads, O ye ga/es.^' 
 
 The father of the celebrated Principal Carstares was a 
 man of warm devotional character, and suffered severely in 
 the persecution time. Wodrow {Analectic) tells of him : 
 " He was doing duty at the sacrament for a brother minis- 
 ter at Calder. Upon the Sabbath he was very wonderfully 
 assisted in his first prayer, and had a strange gale through 
 all the sermon, and there was a remarkable emotion among 
 the hearers. Singing the 24th Psalm (see vers. 7-10), as 
 he came to the tables, all in the assembly were marvel- 
 lously affected, and glory seemed to fill that house. He 
 served the first table in a kind of rapture, and he called 
 some ministers there to the next, but he was in such a 
 frame that none of them would come and take the work 
 off his hands. He continued at the work with the greatest 
 enlargement, and melting upon himself and all present, 
 that could be, and served fourteen or sixteen tables. A 
 Christian that had been at the table and obliged to come 
 out of the church, pressing to be in again, stood without 
 the door and said he was rapt in the thought of the glory 
 that was in that house for near half an hour, and got leave 
 scarce to think upon any other thing." 
 
 It seems to have been a movement similiar to that which 
 took place at Kirk of Shotts under John Livingstone, and 
 is evidence of the great wave of religious feeling which was 
 then sweeping over Scotland, the tide-mark of which we 
 can best see in Rutherford's " Letters." 
 
 CLXIX. The Wigtown Martyrs. Ps. xxv. 7. "i?^- 
 member not the sins of my youths 
 
 " My sins and faults of youth 
 Do Thou, O Lord, forget ; 
 After Thy mercy think on me. 
 And for Thy goodness great," 
 
 was the beginning of the song of Margaret Wilson as the 
 sea was rising round her at the mouth of the water of 
 Blednoch by Wigtown. Slie was twenty years of age, 
 and along with an elderl\- w oman, Margaret Lachlan, was 
 condemned to be drowned for attend in<z: field and house 
 
94 OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 
 
 conventicles, and for refusing the test. They were tied to 
 stakes within tide-mark where tlie waters of the Solway 
 come up swift and strong. The old woman was put farther 
 in that the sight of her struggles might terrify the younger 
 and lead her to conform, but she was faithful to the 
 death. 
 
 " O do Thou keep my soul ; 
 
 Do Thou deliver me ; 
 And let me never be ashamed 
 
 Because I trust in Thee." 
 
 Desperate efforts have been made to cast discredit on 
 the narratives in Napier's " Life of Claverhouse," and it has 
 been made a test case along with the death of John Brown 
 of Priesthill. The question has been set at rest by the 
 book of Dr. Stewart of Glasserton. The two women are 
 buried in Wigtown churchyard, and descendants of the 
 family to which Margaret Wilson belonged are to be 
 found in the neighbourhood of Glenvernock where she 
 lived. 
 
 CLXX. A Song of Thanksgiving. Ps. xxvi. 8. 
 
 " Lo}-d, I have loved the habitation of Thy /loiese." 
 
 PiNETON of Chambrun, one of the French Huguenots, 
 who after fleeing by night and hiding in woods by day, 
 escaped at length from France in the time of the dragon- 
 nades of Louis XIV., tells that, when he and his com- 
 panions came in sight of Geneva, they burst into tears and 
 sung for thanksgiving from ver. 8 of this Psalm to the 
 end. " Lord, I have loved the habitation of Thy house, and 
 the place where Thine honour dwellcth. . . . My foot 
 standeth in an even place ; in the congregations will I 
 bless the Lord." 
 
 CLXXI. A Psalm of Comfort. Ps. xxvii. 1-14. 
 
 " llie Lord is my light," etc. 
 
 When India was still heaving with the groundswell of the 
 terrible mutiny of 1857, the wife of Sir John Lawrence was 
 called home to her children in England, and had to leave 
 her husband worn out with the anxiety and labour which 
 did so much for the preservation of the Indian Empire, 
 unable to leave his post and surrounded by smouldering 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 95 
 
 embers whicli niij^ht at an\' moment break out ac^ain into 
 flame. She writes : " When the last mornincj^ — J.ituiary 6, 
 1858 — arrived, we had our usual Bible reading, and I can 
 never think of the 27th Psalm, which was the portion we 
 then read to^ijether, without recalling that sad time." In 
 perusing the Psalm one can see what springs of comfort 
 must have opened in every verse from the beginning, " The 
 Lord is my light and my salvation ; whom shall I fear ? " 
 to the close, " Wait on the Lord : be of good courage, 
 and He shall strengthen thine heart : wait, I say, on the 
 Lord." 
 
 CLXXII. A Message from Heaven. Ps. xxvii. 6. 
 '■'■And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies 
 round about me." 
 
 A BOY was brought to Christ when at a pubHc school. It 
 became known among his school-fellows, and one day, 
 when he entered the play-ground, he found them drawn up 
 in a body to meet him ; and as soon as they had him in 
 their midst, they assailed him with laughter and cries of 
 contempt. He was taken completely by surprise ; his face 
 burned with shame and anger, and the ground seemed to 
 be reeling beneath his feet. It was a Monday morning, 
 and the first exercise, after they had entered the school, 
 was to repeat some verses of a psalm. A pupil was called 
 up to repeat them, and as the poor young Christian sat 
 bewildered among his persecutors, the first words which fell 
 on his ears were, — 
 
 " And now even at this present time, 
 Mine head shall lifted be. 
 Above all those that are my foes. 
 And round encompass me," 
 
 They seemed to be sent straight from heaven to him. 
 They completely drove away his agitation, and made him 
 calm and happy. He knew it was his Father saying to 
 him, " Be strong, and of a good courage ; " and sorely did 
 he need this encouragement in his hour of confession. 
 
 CLXXIII. Lapse of Memory. P.s. xxx. 5. '' lVeeJ>- 
 ing may endure for a night, but joy conicth in the morning." 
 
 Dr. LlEFCHILD relates the following anecdote regarding 
 
96 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 this text: — "One Sabbath morning a singular lapse of 
 memory befel me, which I had never before and have never 
 since experienced. When I rose from sleep, I could not 
 recollect any portion of the discourse which I had prepared 
 on the day before, and what was most strange, I could not 
 even remember the text of the prepared sermon. I was 
 perplexed, and walked out before breakfast in Kensington 
 Gardens. While there, a particular text occurred to my 
 mind ; and my thoughts seemed to dwell upon it so much, 
 that I resolved to preach from that, without further attempt- 
 ing to recall what I had prepared — a thing which I had 
 never ventured to do during all my ministry. 
 
 " From this text I preached, and it was, ' Weeping may 
 endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.' I 
 preached with great liberty, and in the course of the sermon 
 I quoted the lines, — 
 
 ' Beware of desperate steps ! the darkest day — 
 Live till to-morrow — will have passed away.' 
 
 " I afterwards learned that a man in despair had that 
 very morning gone to the Serpentine to drown himself in 
 it. For this purpose he had filled his pockets with stones, 
 hoping to sinkatonce. Some passengers, however,disturbed 
 him while on the brink, and he returned to Kensington, 
 intending to drown himself in the dusk of the evening. 
 On passing my chapel, he saw a number of people crowding 
 into it, and he thought he would join them in order to pass 
 away the time. His attention was riveted to the sermon, 
 which seemed to be in part composed for him ; and when 
 he heard me quote the lines alluded to, he resolved to 
 abandon his suicidal intention." 
 
 CLXXIV. A Martyr of the Netherlands. Ps. 
 XXX. 5. " For His anger endiireth hut a mo/ne?it." 
 
 Among those who suffered in the Netherlands during the 
 fierce governorship of Alva was ouq John Hervvin. " In 
 prison," says the chronicler of the time, " he used to recreate 
 himself by singing of psalms, and the people used to flock 
 together to the pi'ison door to hear him. At the place 
 of execution one gave him his hand and comforted him. 
 Then began he to sing the 30th Psalm. A friar interrupted 
 him, but Hcrwin quickly finished his Psalm, many joining 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 97 
 
 with him in '^in!:^inc^ of it. Tlicn he said to the people, ' I 
 am now j^oin^c^ to be saciificed ; follow you mc when God 
 of His L^oodncss shall call you to it' And so he was first 
 strangled and then burnt to ashes." 
 
 Vcr. 5 was among the latest sayings of Dr, John Brown, 
 the commentator, as he repeated it: — " His anger is for a 
 moment ; Mis favour is for a life : weeping may endure 
 for a night, but joy cometh in the morning." 
 
 CLXXV. Closing Words. Ps. xxxi. 5. ''Into Thy 
 
 hands I commit my spirit^ 
 
 This Psalm has furnished closing words to many a life, 
 especially ver. 5. It was one of the seven sa}'ings on the 
 cross, and the last — " Father, into Thy hands I commend 
 My spirit." It was the dying words of Stephen addressed 
 to Christ, " Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." It was the 
 parting word of Luther, and of Knox, of John Huss when 
 he was burned at Constance in 141 5, of Jerome of Prague, 
 of Julian Palmer, one of the noted martyrs in the reign of 
 the English Mary, of Francis Teissier, the first martyr of 
 the " Desert," who ascended the scaffold in 1686 singing 
 it, and of countless others. "The Lord Himself gave the 
 word, and great has been the company of those that 
 published it." No watchword of the Captain of salvation, 
 made perfect through sufferings, has been taken up by so 
 many sons whom He has led to glory through the valley 
 of the shadow of death. 
 
 On a dark morning, December 22, 1666, it was the 
 dying song of Hugh M'Kail — 
 
 " Into Thy hands I do commit 
 My spirit ; for Thou art He, 
 O Thou, Jehovah, God of truth, 
 That hast redeemed me." 
 
 He was among those that came from the west before the 
 fight at Pentland, but, wishful to enter Edinburgh on a 
 mission to friends, he was taken at Braid's Craigs, and after 
 suffering the torture of the boot, was condemned to death 
 (see Ps. xvi., p. 192). " About two of the clock," says the 
 narrative, "he was carried to the scaffold with five others 
 that suffered with him, where he appeared to the conviction 
 of all that formerly knew him with a fairer, better, and 
 
 H 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 more staid countenance than ever they had before observed. 
 Being come to the foot of the ladder, he directed his speech 
 northward to the multitude, saying that ' as his years in 
 the world had been few [he was twenty-six] so his words 
 at that time should not be many.' Having done speaking 
 to the people, who heard him with great attention, he sung 
 a part of the 31st Psalm, and then prayed with such power 
 and fervency as forced many to weep bitterly. Having 
 ended, he gave his cloak and hat from him ; and, when he 
 turned himself and took hold of the ladder to go up, he 
 said with an audible voice, ' I care no more to go up this 
 ladder, and over it, than if I were going home to my 
 father's house.' And as he went up, hearing a great noise 
 among the people, he called down to his fellow-sufferers, 
 ' Friends and fellow-sufferers, be not afraid. Every step 
 of this ladder is a degree nearer heaven.' " His farewell 
 address is known to all acquainted with Scottish history, 
 and is one of the most rapt and seraphic of that fervid 
 time. Death touched his lips with a live coal from the 
 altar above before it closed them on earth. 
 
 CLXXVI. An Extempore Sermon. Ps. xxxi. 23. 
 
 "6> love the Lord, all ye His saints : for the Lord preserveth 
 
 the faithful." 
 The famous William Grimshaw, of Haworth, was on one 
 occasion cited before the Metropolitan. A complaint being 
 lodged against his intrusion into other folds, his grace 
 announced a confirmation service in Grimshaw's church, 
 expressing a desire to have an interview with him. In the 
 course of the conversation, the prelate, after stating the 
 charge of his preaching where he had a mind, added, " And 
 I learn that your discourses are very loose ; that, in fact, 
 you. can and do preach about anything. That I may judge 
 for myself of your doctrine and manner of stating it, I give 
 you notice that I shall expect you to preach before me and 
 the clergy present, in two hours hence, and from the text 
 which I am about to name." The text being named, 
 " Why, my lord," said Grimshaw, " should the congregation 
 be kept out of the sermon for two hours ? Send a clergy- 
 man to read prayers, and I will begin immediately." 
 Prayers being read, Mr. Grimshaw ascended the pulpit, and 
 commenced an extempore pra)er for the archbishop, the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 99 
 
 people, and the young persons about to be confirmed ; and 
 so wrestled with God for His assistance and blessinc^, that 
 the congregation, the clergy, and the prelate were moved 
 to tears. After the sermon, when the clergy were gathered, 
 expecting to hear the archbishop's reproof of Grimshaw's 
 extemporaneous effusions, taking him by the hand, with a 
 tremulous voice and faltering tongue he said, " I would to 
 God that all the clergy in my diocese were like this good 
 man." Grimshaw afterwards observed, " I did expect to 
 be turned out of my parish on that occasion ; but if I had, 
 I would have joined my friend Wesley, taken my saddle- 
 bags, and gone to one of his poorest circuits." 
 
 CLXXVII. The Favourite Psalm of St. Augus- 
 tine. Ps. xxxii. i-ii. 
 
 This was the favourite Psalm of Augustine. With refer- 
 ence to it he says, " Intelligentia prima est ut te noris 
 peccatoreiii" " The beginning of understanding is to know 
 thj-self to be a sinner." 
 
 When Luther was once asked which were the best 
 psalms, he replied, Psalnii Paulini, " the Pauline psalms ; " 
 and being asked to name them he gave the 32nd, 51st, 
 130th, and 143rd. These all belong, it will be observed, to 
 the penitential psalms. Luther's frame of spirit, and his 
 struggle for the truth of justification by faith, naturally 
 disposed him to this view. But the best psalms may be 
 said to be those which at the time we feel to be most 
 needed. The heart feels the way to it in time of danger 
 as David's hand to Goliath's sword. " There is none like 
 that ; give it me ;" and God's word is like the sword at the 
 gate of Eden — " it turns every way." 
 
 Ver. 2 was the spiritual aspiration which Izaak Walton 
 set up for the model of his own life. In closing the life of 
 Bishop Sanderson, he says : " Tis now too late to wish that 
 my life may be like his, for I am in the eighty-fifth year 
 of my age ; but I humbly beseech Almighty God that my 
 death may be, and I as earnestly beg of every reader to 
 say Amen. ' Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord 
 imputeth not iniquity, and ifi whose sp&it there is no 
 guile! " 
 
 This Psalm was also the favourite of Alexander Peden, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 of whom so many stories are told in the south of Scotland. 
 He wandered for years with a life on the edge of death 
 among the moors and mists, and died at last in bed. Men 
 would call it " charmed " ; he would have accounted for it 
 by "snow and vapours fulfilling His Word." When hard 
 pressed by the troopers and brought to a breathless stand, 
 his accustomed prayer was that God would cast the skirt 
 of His cloak over him, and more than once he was saved 
 by the mist. He died without violence, but his persecutors 
 took his body and hung it on a gibbet at Cumnock. There 
 he lies buried, and the place has become God's field. 
 " When the service was ended," says the story of his life, 
 "he and others that were with him lay down in the sheep- 
 house and got some sleep. He rose early, and went up by 
 the burnside and stayed long. When he came in to them 
 he did sing the 32nd Psalm from the 7th verse to the 
 end — 
 
 * Thou art my hiding-place ; Thou shalt 
 From trouble keep me free ; 
 Thou with songs of dehverance 
 About shalt compass me. 
 
 *Ye righteous, in the Lord be glad, 
 In Him do ye rejoice ; 
 All ye that upright are in heart, 
 For joy lift up your voice.' 
 
 When he had ended, he repeated the 7th verse again, and 
 said, ' These and what follow are sweet lines which I got 
 at the burnside this morning, and I will get more to- 
 morrow, and so shall we get daily provision.' " 
 
 CLXXVIII. An early Saint. Ps. xxxiv. 9. '' O fear the 
 Lord, ye His saints : for there is no luajit to them that fear 
 Him." 
 
 When Columba felt that his departure was at hand, he 
 desired to visit the corn-fields, and say farewell to the 
 brothers at work amidst the green ears. Too infirm to 
 walk, he was drawn in a car by oxen. Reaching the 
 workers, he said, " I much wished to fall on sleep on Easter- 
 day ; but then I was fain to wait a little longer, that the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. loi 
 
 glad festival mi;:;ht not be changed into a day of gloom for 
 )-ou." Then among the springing wheat the labourers 
 wept bitterly, for they knew that they should see the 
 beloved familiar face no more ; but with tender, hopeful 
 words, he comforted them ; and, turning towards the East, 
 he blessed the island and all its people. 
 
 On the following Saturday, supported by his faithful 
 friend Diarmid, he proceeded to bless the granary belonging 
 to the community. Seeing two large heaps of corn piled 
 up, he exclaimed, " I rejoice to know that, when I leave 
 them, my children will not suffer from want. To-day is 
 Saturday, which in Holy Writ is called Sabbath, or rest. 
 And truly to me it is Sabbath, for it is the last day of my 
 mortal life. On this very night I shall go the way of my 
 fathers. It is my Lord Jesus who deigns to invite me ; and 
 it is He who has made known that my summons will come 
 to-night." 
 
 Then he began to wend his way to the monastery ; but 
 •wearying with the journey, he rested by the wayside. 
 Before him spread the bright and varied panorama he 
 knew and loved so well. And as he gazed on isles, ocean, 
 and cloud-capped mountain, he broke into the language of 
 prophecy : "This place, apparently small and obscure, shall 
 be largely honoured, not only by the Scottish kings and 
 their people, but also by the chiefs of barbarous nations 
 and their subjects ; and it shall be held in reverence even 
 by the holy men of other Churches." After this he returned 
 to his cell, and occupied himself in his favourite work of 
 transcribing the Psalms. On coming to the thirty-fourth 
 Psalm, ninth verse, " They who fear the Lord shall want 
 no manner of thing that is good," he laid aside his pen for 
 the last time. 
 
 The saint then repaired to the church for vespers. Re- 
 turning to his cell, he lay for some time on his bed with 
 its stone pillow, and proceeded to give his final directions, 
 that Diarmid might communicate them to his disciples : — 
 " Dear children, these are my last words. Live in peace 
 and charity one with another, and God, who strengthens 
 the good and comforts the just, will grant you all that is 
 needful in this life, and will also bestow the everlasting joys 
 which are reserved for all who keep this law." Then he 
 lay in silent communing with the ]\Iaster in whose service 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 he had spent his life ; but in the dim dawn, as the bell 
 rung its first matin chime, with a quick access of the old 
 vigour he arose and entered the church alone. 
 
 The building, as the awe-stricken brethren approached, 
 seemed filled by a dazzling radiance, which, however, 
 passed away before Diarmid reached the spot. Groping 
 in the darkness, the monk called out with tears, " Where 
 art thou, O my father .''" but the kindly voice, once swift 
 to respond, was silent. Prostrate before the altar lay the 
 venerable saint, and Diarmid, placing himself at his side, 
 raised the honoured liead upon his knees. The death scene 
 recalls the past vividly, as might a picture of Rembrandt's. 
 Again we see a crowd of weeping monks, holding their 
 rude lanterns aloft ; and, grouped round the central figures, 
 all eyes are riveted to the beloved face over which the 
 shadow of death is darkly stealing. Then the heavy eyes 
 are opened, and for one moment they rest on the brethren 
 with an expression of love and serenity, and raising the 
 right hand, Columba makes the sign of blessing. A soft 
 sigh escapes his lips, and the apostle of Caledonia enters 
 into his rest ; closing his career in the year of grace 597, 
 and in the seventy-sixth year of his age. 
 
 CLXXIX. God does not Forget His Saints. 
 
 Ps. xxxiv. 10. " The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger : 
 hut they that seek the Lord shall jiot want any good thingl' 
 
 Oliver Hey wood, ejected from Coley Vicarage by the 
 Act of Uniformity, lived on a little stock of savings, until 
 one day he and his children were at starvation point, and 
 with no earthly prospect of another meal. They sang at 
 family prayer — 
 
 " When cruse and barrel both are dry, 
 We still will trust the Lord Most High." 
 
 With empty purse and empty basket, their faithful old 
 servant then set out from the house, and wandered through 
 the streets of Halifax, thinking of the famishing children 
 whom she loved like her own life, and wondering how God 
 would give them this day their daily bread. Returning 
 home, one of the tradespeople of the place, standing at his 
 poor, knew her, called her in, and told her that he was just 
 casting about for a messenger to take a remittance of five 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 103 
 
 £]^uinca,s just sent him from Manchester, for the master. 
 On lior arrival home with money and food, it looked like a 
 miracle, and the father said, when they met at evening 
 pra\'cr — " Tiie Lord hath not forgotten to be gracious. His 
 word is true from the beginning. 'The young lions ;;/rt;/ 
 lack, and suffer hunger : but they that trust the Lord shall 
 not lack any good thing.' " 
 
 CLXXX. The Tongue. Ps. xxxiv. 13. '' Keep thy tongue 
 
 from evil^ and thy lips from speaking guile." 
 
 In Grecian history we read how the Athenians erected to 
 Laena's memory a bronze statue of a lioness without a 
 tongue. She was put to the torture, but would not give 
 the name of her lover, one of the conspirators who had 
 helped to kill Hipparchus. Some say she bit out her 
 tongue, lest she should, in a moment of agony, disclose 
 anything. 
 
 CLXXXI. God's Readiness to Hear and Answer 
 
 Prayer. Ps. xxxiv. 15. " The eyes of the Lord are upon 
 the righteous, and His ears are open unto their cry." 
 
 A MOTHER had been trying to soothe to sleep her sick 
 boy, and the following conversation took place : — 
 
 *' Oh, what if we should both fall asleep, and dear baby 
 alone up in your room .-• " 
 
 " Well, I intend to sleep, and I intend that you should 
 sleep too. If baby does wake up, I'll hear her first cry." 
 
 " Would you .-* How is that ? How do you hear sc 
 quickly ? " 
 
 " Well, dear, I think that verse helps us to know about it, 
 * His ear is ever open to their cry.' I feel that my ear is 
 very open to my baby's cry. God made the mother's 
 heart and the mother's ear, and * He who made the ear, 
 shall He not hear .-• ' Doesn't this help us to know that His 
 ear must be very open to His children's cry ? Think often 
 about this, dear boy, when you are left alone and in pain." 
 
 CLXXXII. Praising God. Ps. xxxv. 28. ''And my 
 tongue shall speak of Thy righteousness and of Thy praise all 
 the day long." 
 
 We are told of Mr. Guthrie, of Fenwick (the author of th§ 
 
I04 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 well-known book "A Saving Interest in Christ"), that he, 
 had a " most gaining way of conversing with people, and 
 would have stolen them off their feet to Christ before ever 
 they were mvare ! " He preached one day on the noble 
 and seraphic exercise of praising God ; and after he had 
 pressed that duty as seriously as he could, he came to 
 answer some objections that might be proposed. Among 
 other things he put this objection: "And ye may praise 
 God that get many mercies from Him ; but what say ye to 
 us that are under many miseries and wants, and get not 
 mercies from Him?" Mr, Guthrie, looking out at the 
 window of the kirk, and seeing very pleasant weather, 
 presently says, "Yes; hast thou nothing to praise God for ? 
 Wilt thou not praise God, man, for good weather to the 
 lambs ? " 
 
 CLXXXIII. Early Years of Wickedness. Ps. 
 
 xxxvi. I. " There is no fear of God before his eyes." 
 
 Thomas Scott, the famous commentator, was very wild 
 in early youth. He says himself, referring to the years 
 spent at school at Scorton, "My own conduct at this period 
 was as immoral as want of money, pride, and fear of 
 temporal consequences, and a natural bashfulness would 
 allow it to be ; except that in one thing I retained a sort 
 of habit of my family, and never learned to swear, or to 
 take the name of God in vain, unless sometimes when 
 provoked to violent passion. There was no fear of God 
 before my eyes.' 
 
 CLXXXIV. Educated Eyes. Ps. xxxvi. 6. " Thy right- 
 eousness is like the great mountains : Thy judgments are a 
 great deep.^' 
 
 When a traveller is fresh among the Alps, he is constantly 
 deceived in his reckoning. One Englishman declared that 
 he could climb the Righi in half an hour, but after several 
 panting hours the summit was still ahead of him ; yet 
 when he made the boast, some of us who stood by were 
 much of his mind — the ascent seemed so easy. This 
 partly accounts for the mistakes men make in estimating 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES, 105 
 
 eternal thinr^s: they have been too used to molehills to be 
 at home with mountains. Only familiarity with the sub- 
 limities of revelation can educate us to a comprehension of 
 their heights and depths. 
 
 CLXXXV. Accumulation of Money. Ps. xxxvii. 16. 
 " A liitle that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of 
 many wicked." 
 
 Many cases of individual conversion under Mr. Sherman's 
 powerful ministry have come to light. One is told of a 
 gentleman who was bent on accumulating money, and who, 
 hearing of the minister's fame, strolled into Sherman's 
 chapel. The text was Ps. xxxvii. 16 : "A little that a 
 righteous man hath is better than the riches of many 
 wicked." He had gathered heaps of money, and supposed 
 that happiness was to be found in its accumulation. The 
 sermon put his thoughts on a new track. He learned a 
 new lesson and went home thoughtful, and began question- 
 ing himself about the employment of his money for doing 
 good to the souls of men. His house afterwards was always 
 open to Mr. Sherman, who witnessed for himself the fruits 
 of piety in this new friend and in his family, and found that 
 home a " Bethel " for Christian devotion and intercourse. 
 On what little pivots do the happiness and salvation of 
 individuals often turn 1 
 
 CLXXXVI. Cruelty to Animals. Ps. xxxvii. 26. ''The 
 
 righteous is ever mercifuV 
 
 One of the many pleasant stories about General Grant 
 shows his kindness to animals. One day, at City Point, he 
 saw a soldier whipping a horse that could not pull a load 
 out of a rut. He went and put his shoulder to the wheel 
 and helped push the cart out, saying to the teamster, "If 
 you would assist your horse instead of beating him, you 
 would get along better." The soldier demanded to know 
 who he was, but the general merely replied that he could 
 find out at headquarters. A more frightened or ashamed 
 man than this soldier when he found who it was that had 
 taught him such a wholesome lesson is not often found. 
 
io5 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CLXXXVII. One Eye Inward. Ps. xxxvii. 31. ''The 
 law of his God is lu his heafi ; none of his steps shall slide" 
 
 Dr. Payson was accustomed to say, that "the Christian 
 should always have, as it were, one eye turned imvard, to 
 keep watch over his feelings and motives ; and thus the 
 work of self-examination would be comparatively easy 
 wl:»^n it was engaged in more formally and deliberately. 
 And it is evident that such a mode of living is not only 
 useful and desirable, but necessary, if a man would be 
 thoroughly acquainted with himself, and furnished against 
 the wiles of Satan and the treachery of his own heart- 
 
 CLXXXVIII. Burdens. Ps. xxxviii. 4. '' For iimie ini- 
 quities are gone over ?}iiiie head : as an heavy burden they are 
 too heavy for me." 
 
 There is a gateway at the entrance of a narrow passage 
 in London, over which is written, " No burdens allowed to 
 pass through." 
 
 " And yet we do pass constantly with ours," said one 
 friend to another, as they turned up this passage out of a 
 more frequented and broader thoroughfare. They carried 
 no visible burdens, but they were like many who, although 
 they have no outward pack upon their shoulders, often 
 stoop inwardly beneath the pressure of a heavy load upon 
 the heart. The worst burdens are those which never meet 
 the eye. 
 
 There is another gate — one which we are invited to 
 enter, and must enter, if we would ever attain to rest and 
 peace, and over which is also inscribed, " No burdens 
 allowed to pass through." This is the strait gate which 
 leads to life ; and by it stands One who opened the narrow 
 way to which it leads, saying to each one of us, " Come 
 unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I 
 will give you rest." 
 
 CLXXXIX. The Use of Wool in the Ears. Ps. 
 xxxviii. 13. "/, as a deaf man, heard not" 
 
 "We are told concerning Bernard of Clairvaux that, after 
 he had given himself up entirely to contemplation and 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 107 
 
 \\alkin;4 with God, he met with a considerable difficulty in 
 tlie visits of those friends who were still in the world. 
 Their conversation broui;;ht back thoughts and feelings 
 connected with the frivolities which he had for ever for- 
 saken ; and on one occasion, alter he had been wearied 
 with the idle chit-chat of his visitors, he found himself 
 unable to raise his heart towards heaven. When he was 
 engaged in the exercise of prayer, he felt that their idle 
 talk Vvas evidently the cause of his losing fellowship with 
 God. He could not well forbid his friends coming, and 
 therefore he prepared himself for their injurious conversa- 
 tion by carefully stopping his ears with little wads of flax. 
 He then buried his head deep in his cowl, and though 
 exposed for an hour to their conversation, he heard nothing, 
 and consequently suffered no injury. He spoke to each of 
 them some few words of edification, and they went their 
 way. We do not suppose that for any great length of 
 time he was much troubled with such visitors, for he must 
 have been an uncommonly uninteresting companion. If 
 people once discover that their clatter is lost upon you, 
 they are not quite so eager to repeat the infliction." 
 
 CXC. Meditation. Ps. xxxix. 3. ^^ While I was musing 
 the fire burned" 
 
 A WRITER of the present day says, " I remember Alma 
 Tadema, the great painter, saying to me that he sat down 
 every day at his easel. Sometimes he began without en- 
 thusiasm, and painted on with little interest. But after an 
 hour or so he surprised himself in a fit of absorption : the 
 fire had kindled within him as he worked. 
 
 CXCI. Brought back from Gates of Death. 
 
 Ps. xxxix. 13. " (9 spare me, that I may recover stretigih, 
 before I go hence, and be no mo re." 
 
 As Columba drew near the close of his laborious life, he 
 devoted more time than before to religious meditation and 
 prayer. According to Adamnan, many marvels announced 
 to the monks that they were soon to lose the good abbot. 
 His lonely cell was illumined nightly by a mysterious 
 lustre, and the voice of the apostle was heard uplifted in 
 
io8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 iinlaiown canticles. There is a glen on the west of the 
 islantl, over whose walls hang wreaths and festoons of the 
 ivy with which the monks wove together the walls of their 
 rude huts, still called the "glen of the temple." This leads 
 to an arable level, known now, as in Columba's time, by 
 the name o{ Machar, or the sandy plain. Out of the midst 
 of this plain rise two green hills. One morning Coluniba 
 said to his attendants, " Let no one follow me to-day ; I 
 would be alone ; " and he withdrew to the solitude of Ma- 
 char. A monk, however, fearing that some accident might 
 befall the aged man, followed at a distance, and climbing a 
 rocky point, he saw Columba on the larger of the two hills, 
 surrounded by a company of angels in white raiment. 
 After the lapse of a thousand years, this eminence is still 
 known as the 'Cnoc Angel — the knoll of the angels. Two 
 of the monks who were admitted into his intimate confi- 
 dence, sitting one day in his cell, saw that he changed 
 countenance ; first, a glow as from excess of joy shone on 
 his face, and then a pallid gloom, as though he were 
 plunged into sorrow. With tender solicitude they asked 
 what ailed him. Still he was silent. They threw them- 
 selves at his feet, and implored him not to conceal from 
 his children the mysteries that had been revealed to him. 
 " Dear children," he replied after a pause, " I would not 
 afflict you. Know then that it is thirty years to-day since 
 I began my pilgrimage in Caledonia. Long have I prayed 
 God that with this thiitieth year my exile might terminate, 
 and I might be recalled to the heavenly country. When 
 you saw me so joyous, it was because I could see the 
 angels who came in quest of my soul. But suddenly they 
 halted, yonder, on that rock across our island strait, as if 
 they would fain approach but were prevented — prevented 
 because the Lord hath given less heed to my fervent prayer 
 than to that of the many Churches which have prayed 
 for me, and have obtained that I should linger in this 
 body four more years. This is the reason of my sorrow. 
 But in four j'cars I shall die without previous illness ; in 
 four years the holy angels will return for me, and I shall 
 take my blissful flight with them towards the Lord." 
 
 That such a vision may have risen in the mind of the 
 aged saint, worn by work and watching, is highly probable. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 109 
 
 CXCII. A Duke's Example. Ps. xl. 3. '' Many shall 
 see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord." 
 
 In a town in Bavaria, there is a little tumble-down church 
 where the duke as often as he came tliat way used to go in 
 and pray. If on coming out of the ciiurch he happened to 
 meet any of the peasants, he loved to converse with them 
 pleasantly. One day he met an old man, and after some 
 talk, asked him whether he could do anything for him. 
 
 The peasant replied, "Noble sir, you cannot do anything 
 better for me than you have already done," 
 
 " How so ? I do not know that I have done anything for 
 you." 
 
 " But I know it," said the man ; " for how can I forget 
 that you saved my son ! He travelled so long in sinful 
 ways, that for long he would have nothing to do with 
 church or prayer. Some time ago he was here, and saw 
 you, noble sir, enter this church. 'I should like to see what 
 he docs there,' said the young man scornfully to himself, 
 and he glided in after you. But when he saw you pray so 
 devoutly, he was so deeply impressed that he also began 
 to pray, and from that moment became a new man. I 
 thank you for it. This is why I said you can do me no 
 greater favour than you have already done." 
 
 CXCIII. A Hymn. Ps. xl. 8. '' I delight to do Thywill, 
 O my God:' 
 
 The late Henry Venn Elliot loved best of his sister Char- 
 lotte's hymns, *' Thy will be done." For himself, he did 
 not care so much for " Just as I am," though he often said 
 he believed " she had done more good by that hymn than 
 he had done in all his ministry." 
 
 CXCIV. Subjection of the Will. Ps. xl. 8. "/ 
 
 delight to do Thy will, O my God." 
 
 There is a memorable passage in the history of St. Francis 
 that may throw light on this subject. The grand rule of 
 the Order which he founded, was implicit submission to 
 the superior. One day a monk proved refractory. He 
 must be subdued. By order of St. Francis, a grave was 
 
no OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 dug deep enough to hold a man ; the monk was put into 
 it ; the brothers began to shovel in the earth ; while their 
 superior standing by looked on stern as deatii. Wiien the 
 mould had reached the monk's knees, St. Francis asked, 
 " Are }'ou dead yet ? Is your will dead ? Do you yield ? " 
 There was no answer ; down in that grave there seemed 
 to stand a man with a will as iron as his own. The signal 
 was given, and the burial went on. Dead to pity and all 
 the weaknesses of humanity, St. Francis stood ready to 
 give the signal that should finish the burial. It was not 
 needed, the iron bent ; he was vanquished ; the funeral 
 was stopped. The poor brother said, " I am dead ! " 
 
 CXCV. The Secret of a Preacher's Success. Ps. 
 
 xl. lo. ** / /lave not hid Thy n'gh/eoiisness within viy heart ; 
 I have dcclaird 27iy failJifiiincss and Thy salvation : I have 
 not concealed Thy lovingkindness and Thy truth from the great 
 congregation.^^ 
 
 One of the secrets of the success of Sherman (who followed 
 Rowland Hill at Surrey Chapel) as a preacher was the 
 studied simplicity of his style, and his homely and forcible 
 illustrations. " The glory of the gospel," he used to say, 
 " is its simplicity. We never think of painting gold or 
 diamonds." Whilst appreciating the value of literary art, 
 he feared some might think " more of the polish than the 
 material." One Sunday morning a learned doctor preached 
 a very eloquent sermon, of which Mr. Sherman was a 
 hearer. When the doctor came into the vestry after he 
 left the pulpit, Mr. Sherman said, "Well, doctor, do you 
 call this preaching the gospel ? " The doctor hesitated 
 and replied ; " Well, I am sure I took a great deal of pains 
 in the composition of my sermon ! " I doubt not," Mr. 
 Sherman replied; "but suppose, doctor, that a poor hungry 
 soul had come into Surrey Chapel this morning, do you 
 think there would have been anything for him to feed 
 upon ? Take my advice, and whenever you have such an 
 opportunity as you had this morning, preach Christ and 
 the plenitude of His grace. I suppose you had not fewer 
 than 2000 hearers. What an opportunity of proclaiming 
 the great salvation ! " 
 
OLD TESTA ME.\r ANECDOTES. Ill 
 
 CXCVI. Sick Rooms. Ps. xli. 3. ''The Lord will 
 stre/igi/ien him upon the bed of languishing : Thou wilt make 
 all his bed in his sickness." 
 
 It has been well said that sick rooms should be like those 
 wayside chapels we see abroad, with the tokens of the 
 Passion within, where tired workers can turn in for a i^w 
 moments and lay down their burthen, and find rest and 
 refreshment of spirits. Beware, lest the wayside chapel be 
 transformed into a drug shop, where an incessant talk of 
 ailments forms only a new call to endurance on the part 
 of those who set foot within them. 
 
 CXCVII. Duty of Hopefulness. Ps. xliii. 5. "Why 
 art Zhou cast doiun, O my soul ? and why art thou disquieted 
 within me ? hope in God : for I shall yet praise Him, who is 
 the health of my countenance, and my God." 
 
 After a great disappointment in early life, Sir William 
 Rowan Hamilton fell into deep despondence, and on one 
 occasion was tempted to commit suicide. He thus writes 
 to a friend : " I have once in my life experienced, in all but 
 its last fatal force, the suicidal impulse. It was, as I full 
 well remember, in the month of February, 1825, and when 
 on my way from Dublin to this Observatory, for Dr. 
 Brinkley had invited me to join a dinner party here. The 
 grief which had recently fallen upon me was one which I 
 feel even yet. I remember the exact spot where I thought 
 for a moment of plunging, for death, into the water. A 
 feeling of personal courage protected me, revolting against 
 the imagined act, as one of cowardice. I would not leave 
 my post ; I felt I had something to do. Alas ! what 
 practical irreligion and real unbelief were shown in that 
 complete and prostrate despondence ! I am now deeply 
 convinced that- along with resignation and heavenly hope, 
 it is a duty to cherish also, if possible, a spirit of hope, 
 though not of anxiety, with respect to this earthly exist- 
 ence, for to a sinful and tremendous depth, at the thought 
 of which I shudder now, I have sounded long ago the 
 abysses of the opposite spirit, and through God's grace 
 emerged." 
 
112 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CXCVIII. The Conversion of Count deGasparin. 
 
 Ps. xlv. 5. " Thine ai-rows are sharp in the heart of the 
 kin^s enemies ; tvherehy the people fall under Thee." 
 
 Adolph Monod, at Lyons, France, one Lord's day was 
 preaching from the text, " God so loved the world," etc. 
 He spoke of Christ as the true God-man, and announced 
 that the next Sabbath he would show how men could be 
 saved by faith in this God-man. But the authorities of 
 this church were opposed to a doctrine so purely evangelical, 
 and informed Monod that if he did not omit the sermon he 
 had announced, they would have him arrested and brought 
 before the Prefect, and dismissed from his office. Monod, 
 notwithstanding, preached his sermon, and the authorities 
 made their complaint. The Prefect demanded the two 
 sermons, and Monod sent them to him. 
 
 The Prefect, Count de Gasparin, was a Catholic. He 
 came home at evening to his wife, and found the sermons. 
 Pie never liked sermons, especially evangelical sermons ; 
 but he was a man who discharged faithfully the duties of 
 his office. It was necessary that the sermons should be 
 read. He came to his wife with the manuscripts in his 
 hand, complaining that he would have to give up the whole 
 evening to this irksome and protracted labour. She offered, 
 as her liusband's worthy helpmeet, to read them with him. 
 They began. With every page they grew more interested. 
 They forgot that it was evening and night. That which 
 at first was an official duty became a service of the heart. 
 They finished the first, and eagerly grasped the second. 
 And what was the result } As a magistrate, Gasparin was 
 forced to deprive Monod of his place, because all the 
 authorities demanded it. But he and his wife became 
 evangelical Christians, living, joyful, and happy believers 
 in Christ. They found that night " the pearl of great 
 price," and it has remained in the family. Their son. 
 Count Agcnor de Gasparin, has long been the head and 
 pillar of the evangelical party in France. 
 
 CXCIX. The V^''orth and Beauty of a SouL Ps. 
 
 xlix. 8. " For the redemption of their soul is precious." 
 
 It is told of St Catherine of Sienna that she set a true 
 value on the individual sotd, however defaced by sin, and 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 113 
 
 exclaimed, of one sunk and degraded, to her Dominican 
 Confessor Raymond, "Oh, father, could you but see the 
 beauty of a rational soul, you would sacrifice your life a 
 hundred times for its salvation. 
 
 CC. The Reconciliation Death. Ps. xlix. 8. "77/^ 
 redemptio]i of their soul is precious." 
 
 The death of Dr. Friedrich Schleiermacher, one of the 
 greatest names of Germany, is worthy of record. Profound 
 as his theological views may appear, and scientific beyond 
 dispute as many deem them, they are in many respects 
 only the gropings of a grand mind, which was self-relying 
 and proud, after that truth which the Spirit of God has 
 often made patent to babes. Upon his deathbed his 
 sufferings were great, and he complained of a violent 
 sensation of burning inwardly. " Dear children," he said, 
 "you should now all of you go from the room, and leave 
 me alone ; I would fain spare you the woful spectacle." 
 The perfect lineaments of death presented themselves ; 
 his eye appeared to have grown dim, — his death-struggle 
 to have been accomplished. At this moment he laid his 
 two forefingers upon his left eye, as he often did when 
 reflecting deeply, and began to speak : " We have the 
 reconciliation-death of Jesus Christ, His body and His 
 blood." While thus engaged, he had raised himself up, 
 his features began to grow animated, his voice became 
 clear and strong, and he said with priestly solemnity, 
 " Are ye one with me in this faith ? " to which his friends 
 replied with aloud "Yea!" " Then let us celebrate the 
 Lord's Supper ! But there can be no talk of the sacristan. 
 Quick, quick ! let no one stumble at matters of form ! " 
 After that which was necessary for the purpose had been 
 fetched (his friends having waited with him, during the 
 interval, in solemn silence), he began, with increasingly 
 radiant features, and eyes in which there had returned a 
 wonderful, indescribable brightness, nay, a sublime glow 
 of affection, with which he looked upon those around him, 
 to utter a few words of prayer and of introduction to the 
 sacred service. After this, addressing in full and aloud, 
 to eacii individual, and last of all to himself, the words of 
 the institution, he first gave the bread and the wine to the 
 
 I 
 
114 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 others who were present, then partook of them himself, 
 and said, " Upon these words of Scripture I abide ; they 
 are the foundation of my faith." After he had pronounced 
 the benediction, his eye first turned once more towards 
 his consort with an expression of perfect love, and then 
 he looked at each individual with affecting and fervent 
 cordiality, utterini^ these words, "Thus are we, and abide 
 in iJiis love and fellowship, one!" He laid himself back 
 upon the pillow. The radiance still rested upon his features. 
 After some minutes he said, " Now, I can hold out here no 
 lon<;er ; " and again, " Give me another position." He was 
 laid upon his side ; he breathed a few times ; life came to 
 a stand. The children had entered the room in the mean- 
 time, and surrounded the bed, kneeling. His eye gradually 
 closed. 
 
 It is amid scenes like these that the life is tested. It 
 is there that men are detected whether they have been 
 gambling regarding their eternity, and staking all on the 
 throw of a die, or giving diligence to make their calling 
 and election sure. Calmly to adjust the position of the 
 body, and as calmly to wait for " the purchased redemp- 
 tion " of the soul — it is thus that we discern between the 
 fine gold and the reprobate silver. 
 
 CCI. What Next! Ps. xlix. 17. " When he dieth he shall 
 carry nothing away : his glory shall not descend after him." 
 
 A PROFESSOR of great reputation for wisdom and piety 
 was once accosted by a student just entering the university 
 of which he was a professor. " My parents have just given 
 me leave to study the law, which is the thing I have been 
 wishing for all my life, and I have now come to this 
 university on account of its great fame, and mean to spare 
 no pains in mastering the subject." While thus he was 
 running on, the professor interrupted him. "Well, and 
 when you have got through your course of studies, what 
 then.?" "Then I shall take my doctor's degree." "And 
 then .-• " answered the doctor. "And then," continued the 
 youth, " I shall have a number of difficult cases to manage, 
 which will increase my fame, and I shall gain a great 
 reputation." "And then.?" repeated the holy man. "Why, 
 then there cannot be a question I shall be promoted to 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 some high office or anotlier ; besides, I shall malce money 
 and grow rich." "And tiien ?" the holy man gently inter- 
 posed. "And then," replied the youth, "I shall live in 
 honour and dignity, and l3e able to look forward to a happy 
 old age," " And then } " was again asked. " And then, 
 and then," said the youth, " I shall die." Here the \\o\v 
 man lifted up his voice and again inquired, " And then ? " 
 The young man could answer no more, but went away 
 sorrowful. 
 
 ecu. "The Cattle on a Thousand Hills." 
 
 Ps. 1. lo. "For every beast of the forest is Aline, and the 
 cattle upon a thousand hillsJ^ 
 
 Mother Johnson (as she was affectionately called) and 
 her husband were real Christians, not ashamed of their 
 Lord, and they took every opportunity which offered to 
 speak a word for their Master. Being in charge of a 
 small side station in the north of Scotland, they came 
 often in contact with Highland drovers on their way to 
 southern markets with their cattle. They used to talk 
 faithfully to such, as they stopped at the cottage for 
 refreshment and rest. By-and-by the husband died, and 
 Mother Johnson went to a northern city, where she lived 
 amongst the poorest — and still laboured for God as a 
 Bible-woman. She was in no society's pay, but she read 
 in her Bible that God would supply all her need, and she 
 believed it. 
 
 One winter's evening, after a long day's work, she arrived 
 at her humble lodging, her feet wet with melting snow, and 
 on taking off her boots which were much worn, she 
 literally talked with the Lord in some such words, "Ye 
 ken, Lord, ye promised to supply all my need when I was 
 on your business." 
 
 " The cattle on a thousand hills are Mine," came in- 
 stantly into her mind. 
 
 " Ah, Lord, I ken naething aboot the cattle," and 
 holding up her boots, she added, " See how holey tlie_v 
 are ; I need a new pair." " The cattle upon a thousand 
 hills are INIine," was once more the answer. 
 
 This went on for some time, until the constant repetition 
 of the apparently inappropriate passage almost annoyed 
 
ii6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 her. Then a stranger came to her door, and knocked — a 
 drover — who said as he came into her poor room, " Mother 
 Johnson, mine had a gude time awa Sooth this year \vi oor 
 cattle, and some of the auld friends sent ye this," placing 
 five pounds in her hands. Then, as she said to a lady 
 visitor, " I kent a' aboot His cattle." 
 
 CCIII. A Pauline Psalm. Ps. li. 1-19. 
 
 This has had a manifold history, open and secret. It is 
 one of the Pauline psalms which delighted Luther. 
 
 It was sung by George Wishart and his friends at the 
 Laird of Ormiston's, in East Lothian, on the night when 
 he was taken prisoner. " After suppar he held comfortable 
 purpose of the death of Goddis chosen childrin, and 
 mirrelie said, ' Methinks that I desire earnestly to sleep ; ' 
 and therewith he said, ' Will we sing a psalm ? ' And so 
 he appointed the 5 ist, which was put in Scotishe meter, and 
 began thus, — 
 
 * Have mercy on me, God of might, 
 
 Of mercy Lord and King ; 
 For Thy mercy is set full right 
 
 Above all earthly thing. 
 Therefore I cry baith day and night, 
 
 And with my hert sail sing ; 
 To Thy mercy with Thee will I go.' " 
 
 The version of the Psalm is by John Wedderburn, of 
 Dundee. 
 
 The Psalm was read to Lady Jane Grey and her husband, 
 Guildford Dudley, when they were executed together, Aug. 
 22nd, 1553, — read to her in Latin, and repeated by her 
 in English. It was read also at Norfolk's execution a few 
 years later ; it was the Miserere or dying psalm of the 
 time. 
 
 When it was read to Henry V. of England as he was 
 dying, the closing words, " Build Thou the walls of Jeru- 
 salem," seemed to fall on his ear as a reproach, and he 
 murmured, " If I had finished the war in France, and 
 established peace, I would have gone to Palestine to rescue 
 the Holy City from the Saracens." 
 
 Crespin, in his "Martyrologie," tells of Pierre Milet, burned 
 in 1550 on the Place Maubert, Paris, with the refinements 
 of cruelty common at the time, that, being hoisted in the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 117 
 
 air, he bc[:^an to sin^ the 51st Psalm, Misericords an pajivre 
 viciciix. When the fire was kindled it cau[^lit the straw 
 which was put under his armpits and burned his hair. But 
 not the less he continued the psalm when his limbs were 
 consumed. 
 
 It was the last prayer of CEcolampadius, the close friend 
 of Zwingli, whose untimely death, in 153 1, agi^ravated a 
 sickness he had, and brought him to his end. He called 
 the ministers of the churches round him, e.\horted them to 
 fidelity and purity of doctrine, prayed earnestly with the 
 words of David in the 51st Psalm, and soon after fell asleep. 
 
 Ver. 18. The first presbytery of the Irish Presbyterian 
 Church was constituted in Carrickfergus by immigrants 
 from Scotland, June loth, 1662. There were five ministers 
 and as many elders. The sermon was from Ps. li. 18, 
 " Do good in Thy good pleasure unto Zion ; build Thou 
 the walls of Jerusalem." Two hundred years afterwards, 
 in 1842, every minister of the Irish Presbyterian Church 
 preached from this same text. There were then above 
 five hundred. 
 
 CCIV. Caught by Guile. Ps. li. 13. " Then will I 
 teach transgressors Thy ways ; and sinners shall be converted 
 unto Thee." 
 
 BiLNEY, who afterwards became a martyr for the truth, fell 
 in love with young Latimer, then a Roman Catholic priest. 
 It was not safe then to preach the Gospel, so he said to 
 Latimer, " I would like you to be my father confessor," 
 and according to the usages of his Church, he dared not 
 refuse. Afterwards Latimer told that when Bilney made 
 his study a confessional, he poured forth such a tale of sin 
 and grace that it gave him " a smell of the grace of God." 
 Thus Latimer was caught by guile, and turned from that 
 day. 
 
 CCV. An Old Hebrew Parable. Ps. li. 17. ''The 
 sacrijices of God are a broken st'irit .- a broken and a contrite 
 heart, O God, Ihoii wilt not despisei" 
 
 An Israelite came to the door of the tabernacle with a 
 lamb for a sin-offering. TJie priest took it from his hands 
 
ii8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 but found it maimed. He called the offerer : " Dost thou 
 not know the law ? " " But, my father, I am poor ! " " Why 
 then didst thou not bring two turtle-doves, as the law 
 allows thee ? " " Nay, my father, but the lamb is more 
 valuable, and I was ashamed to bring so small a sacrifice 
 to our God and before His people." "And dost thou think, 
 my son, that God is pleased with the value of thy offering ? 
 The cattle upon a thousand hills are His. He demands 
 obedience, and a spotless dove is more acceptable than an 
 ox that is blemished. Go and subdue thy pride." The 
 Israelite went his way, sorrowful and ashamed. The peni- 
 tent in the Psalm of David was a part of the service of the 
 temple for that day. A poor penitent came up to worship 
 before the Lord who had just risen from a sick bed. He 
 could now scarcely sustain his tottering limbs. The words 
 of the Psalm were like a cordial to his sinking spirit. One 
 after another brought his sacrifice, and was accepted ; but 
 the penitent had none. At length he drew near the priest, 
 and said, " Last night a poor widow and her children came 
 to me, and I had nothing to give her but the two pigeons 
 which were ready for sacrifice." "Why then art thou come 
 to me, my son t " I heard them sing, " The sacrifices of God 
 are a broken spirit. Will He not accept mine ? God be 
 merciful to me a sinner ! " The old priest was melted, and 
 the tears started in his eye as he raised the poor penitent. 
 He laid his hands on his head : " Blessed be thou, my son! 
 Thine offering is accepted. It is better than thousands of 
 rivers of oil. Jehovah make His face to shine upon thee, 
 and give thee peace !" 
 
 CCVI. The Last Hours of Darnley. Ps. Iv. 4. 
 
 " My heart is sore pained within me." 
 
 Darnley's servants told of the last hours of his life that 
 Mary's words at parting made him feel very uneasy. She 
 left him at the house of the Kirk o' Field (near the site of 
 the present University), and went to Holyrood that night 
 to be present at the marriage of one of her maids of honour. 
 On quitting him she said, " It is a year to-day since David 
 Rizzio died." He could not sleep, and turned to read the 
 lesson of the day, which was the 55 th Psalm. Next morn- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 119 
 
 ing he was found Iving dead in the little garden beside the 
 house. It was Sabbath evening, Feb. Qlh, 1567. 
 
 Some of the verses sound like a knell on a sinful past, 
 and a threatening of doom on the men of blood around. 
 Well for poor Darnley if he got his heart into the closing 
 words of the Psalm ! 
 
 Ver. 4. " My heart is sore pained within me ; and the 
 terrors of death are fallen upon me." 
 
 Ver. 5. " Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, 
 and horror hath overwhelmed me." 
 
 Ver. 23, *' But Thou, O God, shalt bring them down into 
 the pit of destruction : bloody and deceitful men shall not 
 live out half their days ; but I will trust in Thee." 
 
 CCVII. My Wanderings. Ps. Ivi. 8. '' T/wu tellesf my 
 wanderings : put Thou my tears into Thy bottle: are they 
 not in Thy book V 
 
 This verse was frequently in the mouth of Archbishop 
 Ussher, who was driven to and fro through England and 
 Ireland, amid the troubles and changes in Church and 
 State. He was one of the best and most learned men of 
 his time ; born in 1580 in Dublin, he died at Reigate, in 
 England, in 1655, and was a preacher of the gospel for 
 fifty-five years. 
 
 CCVIII. An Exemplary Lady. Ps. Ivi. 8. ''Put Thou 
 my tears into Thy bottle : are they not in Thy book?" 
 
 There is an old MS. of a sermon preached at the funeral 
 of the Lady May Farewell, at Hill Bishops, near Taunton, 
 in 1660, which was delivered by the good old Puritan, Mr. 
 George Newton. The Lady Farewell had been a good 
 friend to him, and he was always welcomed at her home. 
 Part of the discourse runs as follows : — 
 
 " She lived not in pleasure, but in a strict performance 
 (not of the easiest only, but) of the hardest and severest 
 private duties, and in diligent attendance of the publique 
 ordinances in her own and in the neighbour congregations, 
 under which, while some were hardened, she melted, and 
 closely dropt many a silent, secret tear (I speake it upon 
 good assurance), which, though she covered, God observed 
 
I20 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 and received into His bottle. Among many other graces 
 which I have not room to mention, her humility was 
 orient. She had exactly learned Bernard's golden rule, 
 which he illustrates with a simile : ' As he that goes in at 
 a little low door, it matters not how much he stoops, but 
 if he beare himself one inch too high, he is in danger'; 
 so she regarded not how low she stoopt, nor how far she 
 condescended, in doing any office, or in bearing any 
 burthen, wherein she might fulfil the law of love." 
 
 CCIX. Sin against God. Ps. Ivii. 4. '* Against Thee, 
 Thee 07ily have I sinned." 
 
 Scott, the commentator, was bound apprentice to a 
 surgeon at Alford, near Brazloft, after he left school. Here 
 he behaved in such a manner that his master dismissed 
 him at the end of two months, and he returned home in 
 deep disgrace. He says : " Yet I must regard this short 
 season of my apprenticeship as always the choicest mercies 
 of my life. My master, though himself irreligious, first 
 excited in my mind a serious conviction of sin committed 
 against God. Remonstrating with me on my misconduct, 
 he said, ' I ought to recollect that it was not only dis- 
 pleasing to him, but wicked in the sight of God.' This 
 remark proved the primary means of my conversion." 
 
 CCX. A Missionary of the Seventh Century. 
 Ps. Ix. 1-12. 
 
 This was the Psalm sung at the death of Cuthbert, March 
 20th, ^Zy. It was in the order of service. This missionary 
 of tlie seventh century is first heard of as a shepherd 
 boy on the hills of Gala Water, then known as Wedale. 
 Arrested by the religious feeling of the time, he settled 
 first in Melrose under Boisil, who was head of the monastery. 
 He became the apostle of the glens of the south of Scot- 
 land and north of England, and retired first to Lindisfarne, 
 or Holy Island, then from love of solitude, which was 
 a passion of the age, to the lonely, storm-beaten Feme 
 Islands, known to later generations through the heroism 
 of Grace Darling. Numerous legends have gathered round 
 his life, and the wanderings of his body after his death, till 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 121 
 
 it reached its present resting-place in Durham Cathcch-al, 
 The many churclies that bear his name between the Forth 
 and the Tyne arc witnesses to the estimate of his work ; 
 and, in the midst of growings corruption of Christian truth, 
 and the conflicts of contending races, Saxon and Briton, 
 Pict and Scot, he sowed seed which took vital hold, and 
 sprang up in after ages. The account of his death has 
 been given by Bede, who received it from Herefiid, an 
 eye-witness. He had retired to one of the Fcrne Islands, 
 and was known to be dying. A company of his brethren 
 from Lindisfarne came to visit him, but only one was 
 admitted to his death-bed. Meanwhile the others sang 
 the 60th Psalm. When Herefrid came out and announced 
 his death, one of them mounted the high ground above 
 the cell, and held up two lighted torches, one in either 
 hand, a preconcerted signal to their friends in the Ploly 
 Isle that Cuthbert had departed. They were engaged in 
 singing the same Psalm, and the wail was carried with it 
 across the sea. 
 
 It was in the time of Cuthbert that the Pictish kingdom, 
 after a great victory over the Saxons, crossed the Forth, 
 occupied Edinburgh and the Lothians, and so made way 
 for a separate nationality in the North of Britain which 
 became the basis for an independent Scottish Church, the 
 Church of Knox, of Melville, and of the Covenanting 
 struggle. 
 
 The 60th Psalm had a place in one of the incidents of 
 that history. Robert Douglas gave it out when he preached 
 the coronation sermon of Charles II. at Scone, January 1st, 
 165 1, the Marquis of Argyll putting the crown on the head 
 of the ungrateful monarch who afterwards sent him to the 
 scaffold. The text was 2 Kings xi. 12, 17, the sermon 
 very long, and filled with unpalatable and uncourtly truths. 
 The Covenanters, intent on reconciling loyalty with 
 liberty, were the dupes of the frivolous, selfish king ; but 
 there was a word of prophetic insight in the close of the 
 sermon when the preacher quoted Neh. v. 13, which he 
 said had been done before in the East Kirk of Edinburgh 
 at the ratification of the Solemn League and Covenant : 
 "Also I shook my lap, and said, So God shake out every 
 man from His house, and from His labour, that performeth 
 not this promise, even thus be he shaken out, and emptied." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Thirty years of broken pledges and oppression followed, 
 but the threatening was made good. 
 
 The same Psalm had a memorable place in the history 
 of the Secession Church of Scotland. When Ebenezer 
 Erskine, in 1740, was driven from his church, he took his 
 place with an immense multitude below the battlements 
 of Stirling Castle, and sang the first five verses of this 
 Psalm. Looking down on the field where the heroic 
 Wallace gained a decisive victory for his country, the 
 words have in them the ring of battle, — 
 
 "And yet a banner Thou hast oriven 
 To them who Thee do fear ; 
 That it by tliem because of truth 
 Displayed may appear. 
 
 " That Thy beloved people may 
 Delivered be from thrall, 
 Save with the power of Thy right hand, 
 And hear me when I call" 
 
 The Psalm of his friend Wilson of Perth, in the same 
 circumstances, had a quieter tone though scarcely less 
 appropriate : Ps. Iv. 6-% and 12-14. His text was fittingly 
 chosen, Heb. xiii. 13. Both of these leaders were chil- 
 dren of the Covenanters. When the Secession and Relief 
 Churches joined in 1847, in Tanfield Hall, Edinburgh, to 
 form the United Presbyterian Church, the 60th Psalm was 
 again sung, and with it Ps. cxlvii. 1-3, division ending in 
 reconstruction, — 
 
 " God doth build up Jerusalem ; 
 And He it is alone 
 That the dispersed of Israel 
 Doth gather into one." 
 
 CCXI. The Morning Song of the Christian 
 
 Church. Ps. Ixiii. i-ii. 
 
 As early as the third century this was the morning song 
 of the Christian Church. 
 
 Ver. 6, 7. In the life of Theodore Beza it is told that, 
 beginning to be much troubled with want of sleep, he be- 
 guiled the time with holy meditations, and, speaking to 
 his friends of it, used that speech, " When I remember 
 Thee upon my bed, and meditate on Thee in the night 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 123 
 
 watches. Because Thou hast been my help, therefore in 
 the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice." And also Fs. 
 xvi. 7, " My reins also instruct me in the night seasons." 
 
 CCXII. The Lord's Prayer of the Old Testa- 
 ment. Ps. Ixvii. 1-7. 
 
 This Psalm has been called by the ancient expositors "the 
 Old Testament Lord's Prayer." It has, like it, seven divi- 
 sions. The first three and last three are linked by a longer 
 one in the middle, and the third and fifth are in the same 
 words. It is by special distinction the missionary psalm. 
 
 In the year 1644 the Corporation of London invited the 
 Houses of Parliament to a grand banquet, as proof of the 
 union of their cause, and in celebration of their victory. 
 The Westminster Assembly of Divines and the Scottish 
 Commissioners were also invited, and the festival' was after 
 the manner of that of Solomon at the dedication of the 
 temple. Stephen Marshall, a noted preacher of the day, 
 selected for his text the appropriate words i Chron. xii., 
 last three verses ; and the spiritual provision seems to have 
 reached a profusion not thought of in public feasts of our 
 days. Baillie gives a full description of the rejoicings, and 
 tells how the feast ended with the singing of the 67th 
 Psalm, Dr. Burgess reading the line, that all might take 
 part, " a religious precedent," says a chronicler of the time, 
 "worthy to be imitated by all godly Christians in both 
 their public and private meetings." 
 
 CCXIII. The Song of Battles. Ps. Ixviii. 1-35. 
 
 As the sun rose from the German Ocean at the battle of 
 Dunbar, September 3rd, 1650, and as the Scottish army 
 left their strong position on the heights for a miserable 
 defeat in a wretched cause, Cromwell pointed to the sun 
 with the opening words, " Let God arise, let His enemies 
 be scattered." The thanksgiving psalm sung by his army 
 on the field was the 117th, known afterwards among the 
 Puritans as "the Dunbar Psalm." 
 
 The 68th Psalm was known among the Huguenots as 
 " the song of battles," and was raised by them in many a 
 
124 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 bloody and despairing conflict. It often seemed to fail, 
 but in the end, and in the highest sense, it must succeed. 
 
 " Que Dieu se montre seulement 
 Et I'on verra soiidainement 
 
 Abandonner la place, 
 Le camp des ennemis epars, 
 Et ses haineux, de toutes parts 
 
 Fuir devant sa face." 
 
 CCXIV. A Mediaeval Saint. Ps. Ixix. i. *^ Save me ^ 
 O God ; for the waters are come in unto my son/.'^ 
 
 St. Catherine of Sienna, like other mediaeval saints, 
 considered the body as a thing to be crushed. Her 
 austerities were terrible. She deprived herself almost 
 entirely of food, and for many of the last years of her 
 brief life seems to have lived on a iew raw vegetables and 
 the sacred wafer. Three times a day she scourged herself 
 with an iron chain, and she wore a spiked chain round her 
 loins. She denied herself natural sleep, passing the whole 
 night in prayer, till the matin bell of St. Dominic rang 
 out clear in the early dawn, when she would lie down on 
 her bed of planks for an hour's repose, satisfied that her 
 brethren were carrying on the eternal hymn of love and 
 adoration. No wonder that her poor disordered body 
 became the seat of infernal visions, that her whole life 
 became such a mingled web of visions, and realities, of 
 truest service and strangest ecstasies. Like St. Antony, 
 she cried, " Lord, where wert Thou when my heart was so 
 troubled ? " " I was in the midst of thy heart." " Ah, 
 Lord," she replied, " Thou art everlasting Truth, and I 
 humbly bow before Thy word ; but how can I believe that 
 Thou wert in my heart when it was filled with such detest- 
 able thoughts?" Then the Lord asked her, " Did these 
 thoughts give thee pain or pleasure .'* " " An exceeding 
 pain." " Thou wast in woe because I was hidden in the 
 midst of thy heart ; My presence it was which rendered 
 these thoughts insupportable to thee." 
 
 CCXV. "My Psalm." Psalm Ixxi. 1-24. 
 This was in his old age the favourite psalm of the Coven- 
 anter Robert Blair, which he was accustomed to call " my 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 125 
 
 psalm." The Christian Father Origen used to put this 
 same claim to passages of the Bible which came home to 
 him — " this is my Scripture." Robert lilair was one of 
 the most distinguished men of his day for ability, learning, 
 and piety. He had in his early years a successful discus- 
 sion with Dr. John Cameron, famous as a scholar in France 
 and Scotland, professor in Sauniur, and Principal of the 
 University of Glasgow. His life was a very eventful one. 
 He was forced to take refuge from persecution in Ireland, 
 and was one of the chief founders of Presbyterianism there. 
 Still pursued, he was half-way across the Atlantic to seek 
 rest in New England, but was driven back by storm to 
 continue his work. He died in 1666, near Aberdour, in 
 Fife, where he lies buried. 
 
 This was the Psalm asked for on his death-bed by Philip 
 de Morny, known as Plessis de Morny, a man of illustrious 
 family, earnest piety, and chivalrous spirit, who cast in 
 his lot with the Plugucnots, and stood by them in every 
 extremity. Prayer being ended, he desired they would 
 read unto him the 71st Psalm, giving testimony of the 
 infinite pleasure which he took in it, and of the applica- 
 tion he made for his own consolation. He said he was 
 persuaded of an eternal life by the demonstration of the 
 Holy Spirit, more powerful, more clear, and more certain 
 than all the demonstrations of Euclid, repeating two or 
 three times the words of the psalmist — cxvi. 10, "I believed, 
 therefore have I spoken." 
 
 CCXVI. Like Jesus. Ps. Ixxii. 4. ^^ He shall judge the 
 poor of the people, He shall save the children of the needy, aiid 
 shall break in pieces the oppressor" 
 
 Mr. Sherman had an excellent Christian wife, greatly 
 beloved by all who knew her, and especially so by the 
 poor. A lady overheard some poor women speaking of 
 her. " There she is," said one of them, " the dear creature ; 
 she is like Jesus Christ." " How so.?" asked another. " I 
 know she is very good ; but why is she like Jesus Christ } " 
 " Because," was the reply, "she never despises any one, and 
 has always a smile and a kind word for the poor." 
 
126 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCXVII. A Word of Refreshing. Ps. Ixxiii. i. 
 " Truly God is good to Israeiy 
 
 After the defeat of Montcontour, as they were carrying 
 away Coh'gny, nearly suffocated by the blood of three 
 wounds, which was pouring into his closed visor, an old 
 friend of his, who was wounded like himself, and carried 
 beside him, repeated the first words of this Psalm — 
 
 "Si est ce que Dieu est tres doux" — 
 
 " Truly God is good to Israel." The historian adds, 
 "That great captain confessed afterwards that this short 
 word refreshed him, and put him in the way of good 
 thoughts and firm resolutions for the future." 
 
 Ver. 26, " My flesh and my heart faileth," was the last 
 verse on which the thoughts of Charles Wesley rested. 
 When near his death, he called his wife to him and bade 
 her write to his dictation. He died as he had lived. It 
 was the last of 7000 hymns, some of them the finest in the 
 English language, which had flowed from his heart in all 
 the turns and changes of life. 
 
 " In age and feebleness extreme, 
 Who shall a sinful worm redeem ? 
 Jesus, my only hope Thou art, 
 Strength of my failing flesh and heart. 
 O could I catch a smile from Thee, 
 And drop into eternity ! " 
 
 CCXVIII. " Notwithstanding his Talents." Ps. 
 
 Ixxiii. 22. " So foolish was /, and ignorant : I was as a beast 
 before Thee.'" 
 
 On one occasion Sir David Brewster was listening to a 
 brief memoir of a man of science, a medical man, of whom 
 it was said that " notwithstanding his high talents and his 
 great literary and scientific attainments, he received Christ 
 as his Saviour." Brewster interrupted the reader with an 
 exclamation of vehement disapproval. ^' Notzvithstanding 
 his talents ! That disgusts me," he said. " A merit for a 
 man to bow his intellect to the Cross! Why, what can 
 the highest intellect on earth do but bow to God's word 
 and God's mind thankfully } " 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 127 
 
 CCXIX. The Covenanters. Ps. Ixxiv. 10. *'C> God 
 how long shall the adi'ersary reproach ? " 
 
 ** How long, Lord, shall the enemy 
 
 Thus in reproach exclaim ? 
 And shall the adversary thus 
 
 Always blaspheme Thy name ? 
 Thy hand, even Thy ri;^ht hand of might, 
 
 Why dost Thou thus draw back ? 
 O from Thy bosom pluck it out 
 
 For our deliverance sake." 
 
 This Psalm was sung by the Covenanters before the fight 
 at Pentland (Rullion Green), November 28th, 1666. Goaded 
 by oppression, they had come from the west country in 
 arms to present a remonstrance to the Government. They 
 approached Edinburgh in the hope of a hearing, and of 
 support from their friends there ; but a strong force had 
 been collected to overawe them. A minute and interesting 
 account is given by Veitch, in his memoir, of the retreat of 
 the weary, discouraged, and half-armed remnant by Colin- 
 ton, and along the east side of the Pentlands. They were 
 intercepted by General Dalziel, through a pass in the hills 
 near Glencorse, and sang this Psalm before the action. 
 They made a brave resistance, successful at first, but were 
 at last broken. The fugitives were slaughtered with great 
 barbarity, the captured shut up in Greyfriars churchyard, 
 without food or shelter, numbers executed and banished 
 to the plantations. The graves of some of the slain may 
 be seen on the hillside where they fell, and a monument 
 which has faith and truth in its lines if rude in rhyme : — 
 
 ** A cloud of witnesses lie here, 
 
 Who for Christ's interest did appear ; 
 
 And to restore true liberty, 
 , O'erturned then by tyranny, 
 
 These heroes fought with great renown, 
 
 By falling got the martyr's crown." 
 
 CCXX. Made Perfect through Suffering. Ps. 
 
 Ixxiv. 16. " The day is Thine, the night also is ThineP 
 
 Juliana Horatia Ewing, the favourite writer of chil- 
 dren's stories, suffered greatly before her death. She was 
 seldom able in her illness to concentrate her attention on 
 solid works, and for religious exercise chiefly relied on 
 
128 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 what was stored in her memory. She liked to repeat the 
 alternate verses of the Psalms when the others were read 
 to her. After one night of great suffering, in which she 
 had been repeating George Herbert's poem, " The Pulley," 
 she said that the last verse had helped her to realize what 
 the hidden good might be which underlay her pain : — 
 
 " Let him be rich and weaiy : that at least 
 If goodness lead him not, yet weariness 
 May toss him to my breast." 
 
 She had each week a calendar written out, with a text 
 chosen by herself at the top, and as each day passed it 
 was struck through by her pencil. One week she had, " In 
 patience possess ye your souls." For the text of another 
 week she had, " Be strong, and of a good courage," as the 
 words had been said to her by a dear friend to cheer her 
 just before undergoing the trial of an operation. Later 
 still, she chose, — "The day is Thine, the night also is 
 Thine." 
 
 CCXXI, Earth's Dark Places. Ps. Ixxiv. 20. ''The 
 dark places of t lie earth are full of the habitat iofis of cruelty ." 
 
 Infanticide was fearfully common among the Hawaiian 
 islanders before the introduction of Christianity. We are 
 told of an old woman who was seen on the outskirts of a 
 Sunday-school celebration, beating her breast and wailing. 
 A missionary went to her, and said, " What is the matter 
 that you should weep over such a beautiful sight .-* You 
 should be happy to see such a sight, for you can remember 
 when things were very different among our people." And 
 the poor soul cried out in anguish, " Why didn't the mis- 
 sionaries come before "i These hands are stained with the 
 blood of my twelve children, and not one of my flesh to 
 rejoice here to-day ! " And again she wailed, — " Oh, why 
 didn't the missionaries come before ? " 
 
 CCXXII. Religion a Stepping-stone to Worldly 
 Success. Ps. Ixxxiii. 3. " Thy hidden ones.'" 
 
 God has many hidden ones. The following extract from 
 the will of the late distinguished mathematician, Professor 
 De Morgan, will serve to suggest the consoling thought 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 129 
 
 that the Hfc-long faith, which so happily found expression 
 at the end of hfe, may have existed in the case of many 
 other reserved and conscientious persons, wliose Hves were 
 hid with Christ in God, though they died and made no 
 sign : — " I commit my future destiny, with hope derived 
 from experience, to Ahnighty God, who has been through 
 my hfe, and will be hereafter, my Guide and support : to 
 God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom I 
 believe in my heart that God has raised Him from the 
 dead, and whom I have not confessed with my mouth in 
 the sense usually attached to these words, because such 
 confession has been, in my time, the only way up in the 
 world." 
 
 CCXXIII. A Servant Girl at the Scaffold. Ps. 
 
 Ixxxiv. 4-12. " Blessed are they that dzvcll in Ihy house." 
 
 Marion Harvey, a servant girl in Borrowstounncss, 
 twenty years of age, was executed at Edinburgh in 1681, 
 for hearing Donald Cargill, and for helping his escape at 
 South Queensferry. When annoyed by the Bishop on the 
 way to the scaffold, w^ho wished to thrust the prayers of 
 his curate on her and her fellow-sufferer, she said, " Come, 
 Isabel, let us sing the 23rd Psalm," which they did ; and, 
 having come to the scaffold, and sung the 84th Psalm, she 
 said, " I am come here to-day for avowing Christ to be the 
 Head of His Church and King in Zion. Oh seek Him, 
 sirs ; seek Him, and ye shall find Him." 
 
 Isabel Alison, who suffered with her, belonged to Perth, 
 and lived very privately till she was apprehended for 
 having heard Donald Cargill, and for refusing the test. 
 On the scaffold she said, " Farewell all created comforts. 
 Farewell sweet Bible, in which I delighted most, and which 
 has been sweet to me since I came to prison. Farewell 
 Christian acquaintances. Now into Thy hands I commit 
 my spirit. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." Whereupon the 
 hangman threw her over. 
 
 No execution of tiiose cruel times seems to have excited 
 a deeper interest and sympathy throughout the country. 
 Lord Fountainhall, a judge of the time, twice notices their 
 end, and tries to excuse the sentence. In his " Observes,'* 
 he says, "There were hanged at Edinburgh two women of 
 
 K. 
 
I30 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 ordinary rank for their uttering treasonable words and 
 other principles and opinions contrary to all our government. 
 They were of Cameron's faction. At the scaffold, one of 
 them told, so long as she followed and heard the curates, 
 she was a swearer, Sabbath breaker, and with much 
 aversion read the Scriptures, but found much joy upon her 
 spirit since she followed the Conventicle preaching." 
 
 CCXXIV. The Brothers De Witt. Ps. Ixxxvi. 7. 
 " Iti the day of ?ny trouble I will call upon T/iee." 
 
 The Word of God has been the comfort of very many in 
 the prospect of sufferings and death. We are told of the 
 brothers De Witt, the renowned Dutch statesmen, that 
 when their assassins found them, the brothers heard them 
 approach without alarm. Cornelius de Witt, broken down 
 by the agonies of torture, was lying on his bed, and John 
 was seated before a table reading the Bible to his brother, 
 to strengthen him against the fear of death and the an- 
 guish of the last hour of life. 
 
 CCXXV. Deliverance from Evil. Ps. Ixxxvi. 13. 
 " For great is Thy mercy toivard me : and Ihou hast delivered 
 my soul fro7n the lowest hell." 
 
 The late J. H. Evans, of St. John's Chapel, London, was 
 in early youth a student of Wadham College, Oxford. 
 This College was notorious as gay and dissolute, and the 
 men there sought every means to destroy young Evans. 
 Speaking after the manner of men, their success was 
 certain; but God did not leave him to himself Conscience 
 was not silent, and in the midst of the most hilarious 
 scenes, it told him that this was not true happiness ; and 
 he has been heard to tell in after life, that when the last 
 reveller of the jovial party had left, he has often looked 
 round on the vacant seats and empty glasses, laid his head 
 upon the table, and wept bitterly. A great check applied 
 to him to keep him from open sin was the power of a 
 mother's love. Once, led on by designing companions, he 
 was induced to enter a place of peculiar temptation ; but 
 the thought of his mother's distress darted into his mind, 
 and filled him with indescribable awe. He rushed from 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 131 
 
 the house, and neither raillery nor entreaty could ever lead 
 him again into similar temptation. In late life he spent 
 some hours in Oxford, and went over his old College, and 
 sitting in Wadham Gardens, he dwelt on the scenes he had 
 passed through, and at length, with deep emotion, repeated 
 the text, "Great is Thy mercy towards me : and Thou hast 
 delivered my soul from the lowest hell." 
 
 CCXXVI. Never be too Tired to Pray. Ps. Ixxxviii 9. 
 "Lord, I have called daily np07i Thee, I have stretched out my 
 hands unto Thee." 
 
 A Mussulman, when on a journey, was joined by a 
 Hindu, and the two marched on together till darkness 
 overtook them. Passing the night at some halting-place, 
 they resumed their journey on the morrow, travelled in 
 company till t4ie day wore away, and again halted for the 
 night. The Hindu, as was his custom, said his prayers, 
 then took his meal, and lay down to rest. In the early 
 morning he arose, washed his hands and face, performed 
 his devotions, and was ready to start. But he had not 
 seen his companion the Mussulman engaged in any act of 
 devotion for the two days they had been together, and at 
 this he wondered greatly. Wishful to ascertain the truth 
 of the matter, he waited for a third night, and watched 
 him closely, but saw and heard nothing of the Mussulman's 
 prayers. 
 
 At length, addressing his fellow-traveller, he said : " Oh, 
 Mussulman, what kind of conduct is this of yours .-' Do 
 you not worship God day or night .'"' 
 
 The Moor answered, " Yes, it is binding on Mussulmans 
 to worship God five times a day." 
 
 "Then," said the Hindu, " what sort of Mussulman are 
 you ? For three days I have not seen you say your 
 prayers." 
 
 " What can I do .? " answered the Moor. " I am march- 
 ing along all day, and am so tired that I cannot pray." 
 
 " But," asked the Hindu, " are you too tired to eat twice 
 a day .'' If you are too weary to serve God, your Maker 
 and Provider, I am afraid to journey in your company. 
 To look in the face of a man like you in the early morning, 
 will bring some calamity or other upon me. For whoever 
 
132 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 is too listless to serve God, will sooner or later be visited 
 by some misfortune." 
 
 Was not this heathen Hindu traveller wiser than many 
 who bear the Christian name ? Let us learn from him that 
 we must never be too tired to pray. 
 
 CCXXVII. "I have called Thee Father." Ps. Ixxxix. 
 
 26. " He shall cry unto Me, Thou art my Fat lie r, my God, 
 and the Rock of my Salvation^ 
 
 John Woolman, on an errand of mercy, was struck down 
 by the plague, and he suffered protracted agonies. 
 
 " In my great misery," he cried on the third day, " I 
 remember that I have called Thee Father!' After that he 
 had great stillness and peace. Some of his descendants 
 still preserve a manuscript record, kept by the godly 
 friends who nursed him, of his prayers and broken words 
 as he passed through the last days of torture. They are 
 simple and tender as a child talking to a father in the 
 dark. The weak body yielded at last, and John Woolman 
 was " at home." 
 
 CCXXVIII, God the Father Almighty. Ps. Ixxxix. 
 26. " Thou art my Father, my God, and the Rock of my 
 Salvation." 
 
 Luther was one day catechising some country people in 
 a village in Saxony. When one of the men had repeated 
 these words, " I believe in God the Father Almighty," 
 Luther asked him what was the meaning of "Almighty." 
 The countryman honestly replied, "I do not know." "Nor 
 do I know," said the catechist ; " nor do all the learned 
 men in the world know. However, you may safely believe 
 that God is your Father, and fhat He is both able and 
 willing to save and protect yourself and all your neighbours. 
 Almighty God is the lovely Father of mankind." 
 
 CCXXIX. "An Hour or two sooner to Bed." 
 
 Ps. xc. 1 2. " So teach us to munber our days, that we may 
 apply our hearts unto wisdom.'^ 
 
 The following is a letter from Robert Leighton to his 
 brother-in-law, Edward Lightmaker, a " word of comfort ' 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 133 
 
 on tlic death of a dear son ; and it reveals the warmth and 
 tenderness of the saintly man. When his brother-in-law 
 died, Lcighton said, as he returned from his funeral, " Fain 
 would I have thrown myself into the grave with him." 
 
 " I am glad of your health and recovery of your little 
 ones ; but indeed it was a sharp stroke of a pen that told 
 me your pretty Johnny was dead ; and I felt it truly more 
 than, to my remembrance, I did the deatli of any child in 
 my lifetime. Sweet thing, and is he so quickly laid to 
 sleep.'' Happy he! Though we shall have no more the 
 pleasure of his lisping and laughing, he shall have no more 
 the pain of crying, nor of being sick, nor of dying ; and 
 hath wholly escaped the trouble of schooling and all the 
 sufferings of boys, and the riper and deeper griefs of riper 
 years ; this poor life being all along nothing but a linked 
 chain of many sorrows and many deaths. Tell my dear 
 sister she is now much more akin to the other world ; and 
 this will quickly be passed to us all. John is but gone an 
 Jiour or two sooner to bed, as children use to do, and we 
 are undressing to follow. And the more we put off the 
 love of this present world and all things superfluous be- 
 forehand, we shall have the less to do when we lie down." 
 
 CCXXX. Hidden and Safe. Ps. xci. i. ''He that 
 dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide wider 
 the shadow of the Almighty" 
 
 One morning a teacher went, as usual, to the schoolroom, 
 and found many vacant seats. Two little scholars lay at 
 their homes cold in death, and others were very sick. A 
 fatal disease had entered the village, and the few children 
 present that morning at school gathered around the 
 teacher, and said, " Oh, what shall we do ? Do you think 
 we shall be sick, and die too?" 
 
 She gently touched the bell as a signal for silence, and 
 observed, " Children, you are all afraid of this terrible 
 disease. You mourn for the death of our dear little 
 friends ; and you fear that you may be taken also. I only 
 know of one way of escape, and that is to hidey 
 
 The children were bewildered, and the teacher went on : 
 " I will read to you about this hiding-place," and read 
 Psalm xci. : " He that dwelleth in the secret place of the 
 
134 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." 
 All were hushed and composed by the sweet words of 
 the Psalmist, and the morning lessons went on as usual. 
 
 At noon a dear little girl sidled up to the desk and said, 
 " Teacher, are you not afraid of the diphtheria ? " 
 
 " No, my child," she answered. 
 
 " Well, wouldn't you be if you thought you would be 
 sick and die .'* " 
 
 " No, my dear, I trust not." 
 
 Looking at the teacher for a moment with wondering 
 eyes, her face lighted, as she said, " Oh, I know ! you are 
 hidden under God's wings. What a nice place to hide ! " 
 
 Yes, this is the only true hiding-place for old, for young, 
 for rich, for poor — for all. 
 
 Do any of you know of a safer or a better .-• 
 
 CCXXXI. The Lord a Sanctuary. Ps. xci. 2. ''Iwiil 
 say of the Lord, He is my refuge.^' 
 
 A HEATHEN could say, when a bird (feared by a hawk) 
 flew into his bosom, " I will not betray thee unto thine 
 enemy, seeing thou comest for sanctuary unto me." How 
 much less will God yield up a soul unto its enemy, when 
 it takes sanctuary in His Name, saying, " Lord, I am 
 hunted with such a temptation, dogged with such a lust ; 
 either Thou must pardon it, or I am damned ; mortify it, 
 or I shall be a slave to it ; take me into the bosom of Thy 
 love, for Christ's sake ; castle me in the arms of Thy ever- 
 lasting strength ; it is in Thy power to save me from, or 
 give me up into, the hands of my enemy ; I have no con- 
 fidence in myself or any other ; into Thy hands I commit 
 my cause, my life, and rely on Thee." This dependence 
 of a soul undoubtedly will awaken the almighty power of 
 God for such a one's defence : He hath sworn the greatest 
 oath that can come out of His blessed lips, even by 
 Himself, that such as "flee for refuge" to hope in Him 
 shall have "strong consolation." 
 
 CCXXXII. Heavenwards. Ps. xci. 15. ^'He shall call upo7i 
 Me, and I will ansiver Jam : I ivill be with him in trouble : 1 
 will deliver him, and hotiour him." 
 
 A PLEASURE party, made up of a family and some friends, 
 
OLD TESTAMEr^T ANECDOTES. 135 
 
 put out in a small boat to an island a little distance off. 
 After stayin£^ awhile there, they all put out a short distance 
 seaward, with the exception of one lady and the boatman's 
 little boy. A sudden dense fog shortly afterwards fell, 
 and the boat tried in vain to make its way back to the 
 island. After beating about for hours, they were almost 
 despairing, when they thought they heard the faint echoes 
 of a childish voice calling something. Listening intently, 
 the father's quick ear recognised the voice of his boy 
 calling, " Steer this way, father ; steer this way." Guided 
 by the sound of the voice, the father soon locked his boy 
 in his arms, and the whole party rejoiced in deliverance 
 from their peril. 
 
 A father and mother, whilst visiting friends in England, 
 heard of the death of their only daughter, in New York. 
 Bitter indeed was the cup, and yet amid the fogs of afflic- 
 tion and bereavement the voice of the angel-child calls 
 from the battlements of the jasper walls, " Steer this way, 
 father ; steer this way." And following the well-known 
 voice, they expect to lay down the oars of life, and embrace 
 their child on the shores of that glorious land where storms 
 never rise and foes never fall. " 
 
 CCXXXIII. A Prophecy Fulfilled. Ps. xciv. 2. ''Lift 
 up Thyself Thou Judge of the earth : render a reward to the 
 proud." 
 
 Mr. Norman, a Nonconformist minister, was brought 
 before Judge Foster for trial at Taunton Castle. Joseph 
 Alleine was tried at the same time and place. The judge 
 treated him very roughly, and poured unmeasured contempt 
 on other Nonconformist ministers. Mr. Norman " with 
 great gravity told him that their learned education in the 
 university, and holy calling in the ministry, not stained 
 with any unworthy actic-n, merited good words from his 
 lordship, and better usage from the world." This simply 
 enraged the judge, and after another tempest of invective, 
 the prisoner said, " Sir, you must ere long appear before a 
 greater Judge, to give an account of your actions, and for 
 your railing on me, the servant of that great Judge." 
 
 Perhaps Mr. Norman saw the shadow of coming death 
 on the poor old judge's face ; but when the judge died 
 
136 OLD TESTAMENT AhECDOTES. 
 
 suddenly a month afterwards, people remembered these 
 words, and called it a prophecy. 
 
 CCXXXIV. Silence. Ps. xciv. 17. '' My soul had almost 
 dtoelt ill silence.''' 
 
 Henry Perreyoe, in a letter to a friend, describes with 
 astonishment the life of the Bernardine Sisters, whom he 
 had visited in their convent, a life unequalled for the rigour 
 of its discipline, even in the Church of Rome. The 
 Bernardines give their time to the direction of fallen 
 women who have repented, and whose highest reward is 
 to become Bernardines themselves at last. They live 
 amongst the dreary deserts of sand that stretch along 
 the southern coasts of France, like the first anchorites in 
 the deserts of Africa. They eat black bread, drink water, 
 and never speak — never. A sister of Chartreux may speak 
 once in every week, a Bernardine is silent as the dead. 
 
 CCXXXV. Neptune's Cup. Ps. xcv. 5. '' The sea is 
 His, cfnd He made it, and His hands formed the dry la?id." 
 
 The Rev. Joseph Cook, in one of his lectures, spoke of 
 the difficulty of believing in a world without a directing 
 Mind, and used the following beautiful illustration : — 
 
 "Almost imperceptible creatures in the sea build in the 
 Indian Ocean a goblet. It is called 'Neptune's cup.' 
 Sometimes it has a height of six feet and a breadth of 
 three. It is erected solely by myriads of polypi. They 
 have no consultation with each other. Each works in 
 a separate cell ; each is as much cut off from communica- 
 tion with every other as an inmate of a cell in the wards 
 of Charlestown prison yonder is from his associates. They 
 build the stem to the proper height, and then they begin 
 to widen it. Everything proceeds according to a plan. 
 Is the plan theirs, or does it belong to a Power above 
 them, and that acts through them .^ As these isolated 
 creatures build Neptune's cup, so the bioplasts, isolated 
 from each other in the living tissues which they produce, 
 build the rose and the violet and all flowers, the pome- 
 granate and the cedar, the oak and palm and all trees, the 
 eagle and all birds, the lion and all animals, the human 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 137 
 
 brain and all men. Neptune's cup alone strikes us dumb. 
 But what shall we say of the mystic structures built by 
 the bioplasts .-• There is the cup ; it is a fact ; and the eye 
 is another Neptune's cup ; and the hand another Neptune's 
 cup ; and all this universe is another Neptune's cup : and 
 out of such cups I, for one, drink the glad wine of Theism !" 
 
 CCXXXVI. Deadness of Heart. Ps. xcv. 7, 8. 
 " To-day if ye will hear His voice, harden not your heart." 
 
 An intelligent and excellent minister was once called to 
 visit a man then, on his deathbed, who had been for many 
 years engaged in the African slave-trade. He had been a 
 commander of a swift and successful ship, but had been 
 often compelled to throw his poor captives to the sharks 
 and the sea to save his vessel from the cruisers, or to 
 lighten it in the storm ; and had passed through the various 
 terrible scenes incident to the prosecution of that infamous 
 traffic. And now he was dying, in the full maturity of his 
 powers, and in the midst, if we remember rightly, of 
 pecuniary prosperity and social comfort. The m'inister 
 spoke to him of repentance. "Repentance!" was his 
 reply, " I cannot repent ! You have seen many sorts of 
 men, sir, and perhaps you think you have seen the most 
 wicked and desperate among them. But I tell you that 
 you do not know anything about an African slave-trader. 
 His heart is dead. Why, sir, I know perfectly well — I 
 understand it fully — that I shall die in spite of everything ; 
 and I know that I shall go to hell. There is no possible 
 salvation for me. It is perfectly impossible but that I shall 
 be damned. And yet it don't move me in the least. I 
 am just as indifferent to it as ever I was in my life." And 
 so he died, with despair perfected into insensibility and 
 DEATH, the very fires of Divine wrath, as they flashed 
 U[)on his face, not starting a sigh or a pulse of emotion. 
 His heart was " DEAD ! " 
 
 It is fearful to think that in all sin lies the tendency to 
 just such spiritual death. When it is ripened and finished, 
 it brings it forth, one sin leading to another, and that to 
 another, and these to others, and moral insensibility com- 
 ing in upon the soul, and all crimes becoming possible to 
 it, and perfect despair, and the deadness of all affection 
 
138 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 and hope at last engulfing it — a deadness to be terribly 
 consummated and rewarded hereafter, amid the gloom of 
 the future, and beneath the punishments of God. There is 
 an old fable of a man who fell asleep in a Grecian cavern ; 
 and the drops from above continually falling upon him, 
 turned him, particle by particle, into coldness and rock ; 
 and though the soul still lived, it could not use or move 
 the body. And so the influences of little sins, dropping on 
 us continually, the influences even of the mere worldliness 
 that is all about and over us, except they be resisted, 
 will at last petrify the spirit. They harden it to all but 
 the consciousness of loss, and the agony of remorse. They 
 may leave it sensible of duty, aware of doom, but unable 
 to flee from it. 
 
 CCXXXVII. The Pilgrim Fathers. Ps. c. i. ''Make 
 
 a joyful fioise unto the Lonl, all ye lands." 
 
 Let us look into the magic mirror of the past, and see the 
 harbour of Cape Cod on the morning of the nth of No- 
 vember, in the year of our Lord 1620, as described to us in 
 the simple words of the Pilgrims : "A pleasant bay, circled 
 round, except the entrance, \fhich is about four miles over 
 from land to land, compassed about to the very sea with 
 oaks, pines, junipers, sassafras, and other sweet weeds. It 
 is a harbour wherein a thousand sail of ship may safely 
 ride." 
 
 That small, unknown ship was the Mayjlozvcr : those 
 men and women who crowded her decks were that little 
 handful of God's own wheat which had been flailed by 
 adversity, tossed and winnowed till every husk of earthly 
 selfishness and self-will had been beaten away from them 
 and left only pure seed, fit for the planting of a new world. 
 It was old Master Cotton Mather who said of them, " The 
 Lord sifted three countries to find seed wherewith to plant 
 America." 
 
 Hark now the hearty cry of the sailors, as with a plash 
 and a cheer the anchor goes down, just in the deep water 
 inside of Long Point ! and then, says their journal : " Being 
 now passed the vast ocean and sea of troubles, before their 
 preparation unto further proceedings as to seek out a place 
 for habitation, they fell down on their knees and blessed 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 139 
 
 the Lord, the God of heaven, who had brouc^ht them over 
 the vast and furious ocean, and dch'vered them from all 
 perils and miseries thereof." 
 
 Let us draw nigh and mingle with this singular act 
 of worship. Elder Brewster, with his well-worn Geneva 
 Bible in hand, leads the thanksgiving in words which, 
 though thousands of years old, seem as if written for the 
 occasion of that hour. 
 
 As yet, the treasures of sacred song which are the liturgy 
 of modern Christians had not arisen in the Church. There 
 was no Watts and no Wesley in the day of the Pilgrims ; 
 they brought with them in each family, as the most precious 
 of earthly possessions, a thick volume containing, first, the 
 Book of Common Prayer, with the Psalter appointed to be 
 read in churches ; second, the whole Bible in the Geneva 
 translation, which was tlie basis on which our present 
 English translation was made ; and third, the Psalms of 
 David, in metre, by Sternhold and Hopkins, with the 
 music notes of the tunes adapted to singing. Therefore it 
 was that our little band were able to lift up their voices 
 together in song, and that the noble tones of Old Hundred 
 for the first time floated over the silent bay and mingled 
 with the sound of winds and waters, consecrating the 
 American shores. 
 
 " All people that on earth do dwell, 
 
 Sing to the Lord with cheerful voice, 
 Him serve with fear, His praise forth tell ; 
 Come ye before Him and rejoice. 
 
 The Lord, ye know, is God indeed ; 
 
 Without our aid He did us make ; 
 We are His flock, He doth us feed. 
 
 And for His sheep He doth us take. 
 
 O enter then His gates with praise, 
 Approach with joy His courts unto : 
 
 Praise, laud, and bless His name always, 
 For it is seemly so to do. 
 
 For why ? The Lord our God is good, 
 
 His mercy is for ever sure ; 
 His truth at all times hrmiy stood, 
 
 And shall from age to age endure." 
 
 This grand h)'mn rose and swelled and vibrated In the 
 still November air ; while in between its pauses came the 
 
140 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 warble of birds, the scream of the jay, the hoarse call of 
 hawk and eagle, going on with their forest ways all un- 
 mindful of the new era which had been ushered in with 
 those solemn sounds. 
 
 CCXXXVIII. Signs of Death. Ps. cii. 20. ''To hear 
 
 , the groaning of the prisoner." 
 
 A MAN was in great distress about his soul ; he thought he 
 was lost, could never be saved, and he was in despair. He 
 set off to a good old Christian who lived in the town, and 
 told him all his heart, and finished with these words: 
 " Now, David, I'm dead — quite dead." " Well, Jamie," said 
 the old man, " go away home and pray. Ye're no dead yet. 
 No, no ; there's nae groans comes frae the grave." 
 
 Groans over deadness and coldness felt are not alto- 
 gether signs of death. 
 
 CCXXXIX. A Martyr for Christ. Ps. ciii. i. " Bless 
 the Lord, O viy soul : and all that is within me, bless His 
 holy name." 
 
 During the persecution in the reign of Queen Mary, one 
 of the martyrs was fastened with a chain to a post in the 
 Smithfield Market of London, and when the wood piled 
 about him was lighted, and the fire burning his clothes and 
 frizzling his flesh, he cried, " Bless the Lord, O my soul : 
 and all that is within me, bless His holy name." 
 
 CCXL. Blessing the Lord in the Depth 
 
 of Sorrow. Ps. ciii. i. "Bless the Lord, O my soul : 
 and all that is within me, bless ILis holy name." 
 
 The value and beauty of family worship in the time of be- 
 reavement are illustrated by an incident in the life of the 
 Rev. J. A. James, which has almost a touch of the sublime. 
 It was his custom to read at family prayer on Saturday 
 evening the hundred and third psalm. On the Saturday 
 of the week in which Mrs. James died, he hesitated, with 
 the open Bible in his hand, before he began to read ; but, 
 after a moment's silence, he looked up and said, " Not- 
 withstanding what has happened this week, I see no reason 
 for departing from our usual custom of reading the hundred 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 141 
 
 and tliird psalm — 'Bless the Lord, O my soul: and all that 
 is within me, bless His iioly name.'" What must be the 
 effect upon a household of such a scene ! What a picture 
 is thus presented of holy resignation and thankfulness — 
 the greatest sufferer recognising, as the head of the family, 
 the hand that has smitten his home and made it desolate, 
 and in the depth of his sorrow blessing the name of the 
 Lord ! 
 
 CCXLI. Grace should Permeate the Entire 
 Man. Ps. ciii. i. "^// that is within me, bless His holy 
 jiaine." 
 
 In the camphor tree every part is impregnated with the 
 precious perfume ; from the highest twig to the lowest 
 root the powerful gum will exude. Thus grace should 
 permeate our whole nature, and be seen in every faculty, 
 every word, every act, and even every desire. If it be "in 
 us and abound," it will be so. An unsanctified part of our 
 frame must surely be like a dead branch, deforming and 
 injuring the tree. " Bless the Lord, O my soul : and all 
 that is ivithin me, bless His holy name." When praise is 
 truly spiritual, it pervades the whole man. 
 
 CCXLII. Old Age. Ps. ciii. 5. " Who satisfieth thy mouth 
 with good things ; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle'si" 
 
 John Foster has a stirring passage in one of his sermons 
 on old age : — 
 
 " The old age of the wise and good resembles the winter 
 in one of its most favourable circumstances, that the former 
 seasons improved have laid in a valuable store ; and they 
 have to bless God that disposed and enabled them to do 
 so. But the most striking pcjint in the comparison, after 
 all, is one of unlikoicss. Their winter has no spring to 
 follow it — in this world. It is to close, not by an insensible 
 progression into summer season, but by a termination 
 absolute, abrupt, and final ; a consideration which should 
 shake and rouse the most inveterate insensibility of 
 thoughtless old age. But the servants of God will say : 
 * That is well ! ' They would not make a gradation into 
 a spring of moral existence if it could be put in their 
 
142 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 choice. Their winter, they say, is quite the right time for 
 a great transition. It was in nature's winter (or toward 
 that season) that their Lord came to the earth ; it was in 
 the winter that He died for their redemption ; and the 
 winter of their Hfe is the right time for them to die, tliat 
 their redemption may be finished. And there is eternal 
 spring before them ! What will tJiey not be contemplating 
 of beauty and glory, while those who have yet many days 
 on earth are seeing returning springs and summers .■' " 
 
 CCXLIII. A Lover of the Psalms. Ps. civ. 34. 
 " My j}ieditatio7i of Him shall be sweet." 
 
 Thomas A Kempis was supremely happy in his convent 
 life. He spent much time in striving to soar above the 
 things of sense into communion with God ; and this not 
 without the occasional application to his flesh of the scourge. 
 He could not have survived, however, to the great age of 
 ninety-one, if his bodily mortifications had been fanatical 
 and excessive. The Holy Scripture was much in use by 
 him, and he transcribed it from beginning to end, in four 
 beautifully written volumes, which were long preserved 
 in the monastery, as a memorial of his pious diligence. 
 Especially did he love the Psalms, and join in chanting 
 them with all his heart. His fellow monks, accordingly, 
 perpetrated a miserable joke upon him, which is preserved, 
 by honest Franciscus, to the honour certainly of Thomas 
 a Kempis, and to the letting in of a curious light on 
 the character and tastes of his companions at Mount 
 St. Agnes, which were plainly of an earthlier sort. " He 
 is as fond of the Psahnsl' they said, "as if they were 
 sahnonl' which, as Brother Franciscus adds within brackets 
 for the information of the ignorant reader, " is a most 
 delicate kind of fish ! " Brother Franciscus says that 
 there existed in his time a portrait of Thomas a Kempis, 
 almost wholly eff"aced from the canvas, but with this 
 characteristic inscription legible still, " Everywhere have I 
 sought rest but nowhere have I found it, unless in solitude 
 and books {in Hoexkens ende Boexkens^" He found it 
 there, because in his solitude and among his books, he 
 found and communed with the Lord, in whom he rested, 
 on whom he meditated, and of whom he wrote. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 143 
 
 CCXLIV. A Patriot. Ps. cv. 26. ''He sent Moses hh 
 
 servant^ 
 Pkesicnting a noble contrast to the proverb lonc^ common 
 in \Vc\\y, Dolce far niente,''\t\s sweet to indulge in idle- 
 ness," the old Roman sang, Duke et deconini pro patria 
 inori, "It is sweet and graceful to die for one's country;" 
 and one of these old Romans is said, when it was only by such 
 a sacrifice that Rome could be spared, to have rode out of 
 its gates full armed in sight of weeping thousands, and 
 taking brave farewell of brothers, friends, and countrymen, to 
 have spurred his steed into the gulf that closed its mon- 
 strous jaws on horse and rider. The lofty patriotism of 
 the poet may be only the sentimentalism of song, and the 
 hero of the gulf only such a fable as adorns traditionary 
 lore. But Moses was a patriot of that type. 
 
 How we extolled the conduct of the Americans in China, 
 when, though not bound to mingle in the bloody fray, 
 they felt it impossible to look on, mere spectators, where 
 our flag was flying, and our guns were flashing, and our 
 men were falling amid the smoke of battle ! " Blood is 
 thicker than water I " It was in such another act that 
 Moses' patriotism first burst out into flame. Neither his 
 rank as the adopted son of Pharaoh's daughter and probable 
 successor to her father's throne, nor his education as a 
 prince of Egypt, nor the pride, and pomp, and pleasures 
 of a palace had made him ashamed of his race, or in- 
 different to their cruel sufferings. In the words of St. Paul, 
 " By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to 
 be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter ; choosing rather 
 to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy 
 the pleasures of sin for a season ; esteeming the reproach 
 of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt. 
 
 CCXLV. A Besieged Town. Ps. cvii. i. Ogive 
 thanks u7ito the Lord^ Jar He is good : for His mercy endureih 
 for ever." 
 
 In the year 1642 Taunton was besieged by the Royalist 
 forces. It was defended by heroic steadfastness by Robert 
 Blake. When food had risen to twenty times its market- 
 value, when many of the inhabitants had died of starvation, 
 when half the streets had been burnt down by a storm of 
 
144 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 rockets and mortars, the defenders still held their ground, 
 and Blake announced to the besiegers his grim resolve 
 not to surrender "until he had eaten his boots." At last, in 
 July, 1645, the besiegers were obliged to withdraw. Many- 
 sermons were preached on the occasion of the anniversary 
 of the town's deliverance. In one preached before Par- 
 liament, the preacher said : — 
 
 " O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is gracious : and His mercy 
 
 endureth for ever : 
 Who remembered us at Naseby, for His mercy endureth forever; 
 Who remembered us in Pembrokeshire, for His mercy endureth for 
 
 ever ; 
 Who remembered us at Taunton, for His mercy endureth for ever." 
 
 CCXLVI. The Pale Horse. Ps. cvii. 18. They draw 
 near v7ito the gates of deaths 
 
 The following is a closing passage of a sermon on death 
 by Dawson. The preacher has been speaking of those to 
 whom the blow of the rider on the pale horse brings no 
 terror. The Christian sees his Father's servant on his 
 Father's pale horse, and he knows he has been sent for to 
 come home. And he closed his sermon with this passage : 
 " I well remember the time when the pale horse and his 
 rider approached Sammy Hick, ' the village blacksmith.' 
 He was nearer to him than I thought him to be. I was 
 with him on the Wednesday, and he died upon the Monday. 
 The pale horse overtook him on the Monday. There was 
 a young man said on Sunday night (he did not sleep with 
 him, but watched with him) that such a night he did not 
 expect to see again. They were singing and praising God ; 
 and he said the place seemed filled with the glory of God. 
 The pale horse and his rider approached, and poor 
 Sammy's speech began to falter and his breath to fail. 
 But, glory be to God, he was not afraid of seeing the pale 
 horse at all. No ; it was joy, and peace, and love. Two or 
 three neighbours came in, and thought they would sing 
 him over the river. And when all the power of language 
 failed, 
 
 'Joy beaming through his eyes did break, 
 And meant the thanks he could not speak.' 
 
 They saw his eyes sparkle ; they saw the joy of his soul 
 
OLD I'ESIAMKNT ANECDOTES. 
 
 as he went along, and the thanks he could not speak. 
 And just before he took his last step out of time into 
 glory, tiie poor soldier waved his hand, crying, "Victory! 
 victory ! 
 
 ) )( 
 
 CCXLVII. The little Ships and the great Sea. 
 
 Ps. cvii. 23. '■'■Tlh-y that go down to t/ie sea iti ships, that do 
 business in great icaters." 
 
 The following is tiie prayer of the Breton fishers : " Mon 
 Dieu, protegez moi — mon navire est si petit, et votre mer 
 est si grande " (My God, protect me — my ship is so little, 
 and Your sea is so great.) 
 
 O God ! my ship is small, Thy sea so wide, 
 
 How shall I sail across in bark so frail ? 
 
 What may my oars ai^ainst its waves avail, ««• 
 
 Or can I ever reach the farther side, 
 
 If any shore bound that unmeasured tide? 
 
 O endless waves ! O feeble quivering sail ! 
 
 O great Eternity ! I faint and fail, 
 
 And dare not go, and may not here abide : 
 
 My bark drives on, whither I do not know. 
 
 My God ! remember me, that 1 am dust — 
 
 The way is too far for me, when I go ; 
 
 Yet will I leave the land and trembling trust. 
 
 Thou who ciidst walk on stormy Galilee, 
 
 Let me not sink in Thine unfathomed sea ! 
 
 CCXLVIII. Timely Succour. Ps. cvii. 43. « Whoso 
 is 7vise, and will observe these things, even they shall wider- 
 stand the lovingkindness of the Lord." 
 
 ScOTT, the commentator, suffered from frequent attacks 
 of illness, and after one long and dangerous sickness, 
 which had occasioned heavy additional expenses, he found 
 himself in debt to the amount of ;i^io. His wife, though 
 seldom distrusting Providence, lamented this exceedingly. 
 His answer was the following : "Now observe if the Lord 
 do not, in some way, send us an additional supply to meet 
 this expense, which it was not in our power to avoid." He 
 goes on to relate how, in the afternoon of the same day, 
 when visiting his people, Mr. Higgins called at his house, 
 and left a paper, which, he said, would entitle me to ^10 
 from the sum of money left for the relief of poor clergy- 
 men. This relief he had never before received. " Whoso 
 
 L 
 
146 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 is wise will ponder these things, and they shall understand 
 the lovingkindness of the Lord." 
 
 CCXLIX. The iigth Psalm. Ps. cxix. 
 
 John Ruskin says that of all the pieces of the Bible 
 which his mother taught him, that which cost him most to 
 learn, and which was to his child's mind chiefly repulsive — 
 the 1 19th Psalm — has now become of all the most precious 
 to him, in its overflowing and glorious passion of love for 
 the law of God. 
 
 CCL. Don't use a Crooked Ruler. Ps. cxix. 9. 
 
 " Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way 1 by taking 
 heed thereto according to Thy word.^^ 
 
 " The Bible is so strict and old-fashioned," said a young 
 man to a grey-haired friend, who was advising him to 
 study God's Word if he would learn how to live. " There 
 are plenty of books written now-a-days that are moral 
 enough in their teaching, and do not bind one down as the 
 Bible." 
 
 The old merchant turned to his desk, and took out two 
 rulers, one of which was slightly bent. With each of 
 these he ruled a line, and silently handed the ruled paper 
 to his companion. 
 
 " Well," said the lad, " what do you mean? " 
 " One line is not straight and true, is it ? When you 
 mark out your path in life do not take a crooked ruler ! " 
 
 CCLI. Hiding the Bible in the Heart. Ps. cxix. 
 II. " Thy word have I hid in my heart, that T tnight not 
 sin against Thee." 
 
 The late excellent Rev. Dr. James W. Alexander was, 
 in many respects, a model Christian man and minister. 
 One important secret of it lay in some of his habits. One 
 of these was that of taking, every morning, a verse or 
 passage from the Bible for his meditation during the day, 
 and with the view, he said, of having his entire life filled 
 with its spirit and influence. David said to God: "Thy 
 word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against 
 Thee." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ASECDOTES. 147 
 
 CCLII. Pulpit Reflectors. Ps. cxix. 46. "/ tvill 
 speak of Thy testimonies also before ki/igs^ and will not be 
 ashamed." 
 
 The eminent Lyman Beecher used to say that the reason 
 why his ministry was so blessed to the salvation of men, 
 was that he had so many pulpit reflectors in the Christians 
 who lived out and di (fused in every practical way the 
 gospel which he proclaimed. A light placed alone scatters 
 its beams on every hand, but a number of well-placed 
 reflectors can concentrate and reflect its rays, and cause 
 them to reach places where the direct rays of light would 
 never go ; so these pulpit reflectors, these Christians who 
 take the gospel up in their lives, and who talk it, and act 
 it, and live it from day to day, multiply the preacher's 
 usefulness a hundredfold, and carry down into the deep 
 and hidden corners, where sin and darkness lurk, those 
 beams of light which, without their aid, would never reach 
 the souls that sit in the shadow of death. 
 
 We need more pulpit reflectors. Let the ministers of 
 the gospel preach with all fidelity, and then let the 
 Christians on every hand take up the words of life which 
 he proclaims, and reflect and re-echo them, and bear them 
 to the souls which walk in darkness, and yet long to 
 behold God's marvellous light, even the light of the know- 
 ledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ. 
 
 CCLIII. About to Migrate. Ps. cxix. 54. ^'- The 
 house of my pilgrimaged 
 
 We are told that the late authoress Juliana Horatia 
 Ewing had hung over her hearth the motto: " Ut migra- 
 turus habita" (As one about to migrate), to temper her 
 joys in the comforts of home, and to remind her that 
 " here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to 
 come." 
 
 CCLIV. The Decision of a Moment. Ps. cxix. 
 
 59. "/ thought oil jny 7vays, and turned my feet unto Thy 
 testimonies" 
 
 At an unlooked-for moment we may decide the whole 
 course of our lives settling the question of for Christ or 
 
148 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 against Christ. A yoiin<T- man in Oakland, Cal, was 
 walking with a friend. " Lci's go to a saloon," said the 
 friend. Just then the young man looked up and saw on 
 a sign, "Young Men's Christian Association." "No, I'll 
 go up here," was the reply. " Oh, you baby ! " sneered 
 his companion ; but he went up, and that step led to his 
 giving himself to God and entering on the Christian life. 
 But how about him who kept on his way in the life of 
 sin ? 
 
 CCLV. The Mellowing Power of Affliction. 
 
 Ps. cxix. 83. " For I am become like a bottle i?i the smoke.'" 
 
 It was a custom of the ancients to hang skins of wine 
 in the smoke of a fire to refine and mellow it by the 
 warmth, and so the sooner to bring it to perfection. So 
 the Psalm i.st says " that is what God has put me in the 
 furnace of trial for, to refine me." 
 
 CCLVI. Persecution. Ps. cxix. 86. ^^ They persecute 
 me 7urojigfiilly ; help Thou inc." 
 
 The pious Romaine, the well-known author of the 
 •' Triumph of Faith," suffered much for the truth's sake. 
 What a picture is presented of the solitary witness of 
 the truth, when we are told that, in his own Church of St. 
 Dunstan's at Aberford, he had often to preach by the light 
 of a single candle, whicJi he held in his hand, as the church- 
 wardenswould neither light the church nor suffer it to be 
 lighted ! 
 
 CCLVII. "The Fulness of the Scriptures." 
 
 Ps. cxix. 97. " 6> ho7V love I Thy law / it is my meditation 
 all the day. " 
 
 " I ADORE the fulness of the Scriptures," was the exclama- 
 tion of Tertullian, — "in which posture of holy admira- 
 tion," said Dr. Owen, " I desire my mind may be found 
 while I am in this world." 
 
 " What do I not owe to the Lord," writes Henry 
 Martyn, " for permitting me to take a part in the transla- 
 tion of His word .'' Never did I see such wonders, and 
 wisdom, and love, in the blessed book, as since I have 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 149 
 
 been obliged to study every expression ; and it is a de- 
 lightful rcflf.-ction, that death cannot deprive us of the 
 pleasure of studying its mysteries." 
 
 Tiic same testimony was given by a kindred spirit 
 emi)loyed in the same work. Shortly before his death, 
 Dr. Buchanan, giving to a friend some details of his 
 laborious revisions of his Syriac Testament, suddenly 
 stopped, and burst into tears. On recovering himself he 
 said, " I am not ill, but I was completely overcome with 
 the recollection of the delight which I have enjoyed in this 
 exercise. At first I was disposed to shrink from the task 
 as irksome, and apprehended that I should find even the 
 Scriptures pall by the frequency of this critical examina- 
 tion. But so far from it, every fresh perusal seemed to 
 throw fresh light on the word of God, and to convey 
 additional joy and consolation to my mind." " How 
 delightful," observes his biographer, "is the contemplation 
 of a servant of Christ thus devoutly engaged in his 
 heavenly Master's work, almost to the very moment of 
 his transition to the Divine source of light and truth 
 itself!" 
 
 CCLVIII. A Heathen Convert and his Bible. 
 
 Ps. cxix. 97. " 6> hoiv love 1 Thy law.'" 
 
 An aged convert from heathenism, a native of one of the 
 Ilervey Islands, some years ago received as a present a 
 copy of the Bible. A {c\v pages or chapters only had 
 been given him before this, and he was greatly pleased in 
 becoming the owner of the volume. After receiving it, he 
 said, " My brethren and sisters, this is my resolve : The 
 dust shall never cover my new Bible ; the moth shall 
 never eat it ; the mildew shall not rot it. My light I My 
 
 joy!" 
 
 CCLIX. A Surety, Ps. cxix. 122. ^' Be surety for Thy 
 servant for goody 
 
 For many months James Sherman, who became the famed 
 minister of Surrey Chapel, Lontion, was in great darkness, 
 inquiring and seeking after God. He says, " Day by day 
 I read the Scriptures, to see if God spake to me by His 
 promise, but no promise brought me relief." But after 
 
ISO OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 twelve months of wrestling and seeking, the day of 
 deliverance came. Mr. King, of Doncaster, came to 
 preach at Tottenham Court-road Chapel, and Sherman 
 went to hear him. "All the way," he says, "I watered 
 the pavement with my tears, and sent up my cries to 
 Heaven. I heard him with emotion and some pleasure, 
 yet my faith did not seem sufficiently strong to bring 
 home to myself the blessing. I bent my steps homeward, 
 but, as I was crossing from Bedford Street to Montague 
 Place, I seemed to hear a voice saying to me, ' I am thy 
 surety.' I turned round involuntarily, half imagining that 
 some one was speaking to me. After a moment's pause, I 
 said to myself, ' It is the voice of my Saviour.' And a 
 flood of light was poured into the prison-house of my poor 
 soul, and at once converted it into the temple of God." 
 
 CCLX. Dissatisfied with Myself. Ps. cxix. 130. 
 
 " The entrance of Thy words giveth light." 
 
 One of the neatest of the neat compliments for which Louis 
 XIV. was famous was addressed to Massillon, the famous 
 Court preacher : " Father," said the King, " I have listened 
 in my chapel to many great preachers, and I have been 
 very well satisfied with them ; but as often as I hear you, 
 I am very ill-satisfied with myself." 
 
 CCLXI. A Japanese Convert. Ps. cxix. 130. "The 
 
 entrance of Thy words giveth light." 
 
 Six Japanese girls were sent over to America to be 
 educated. One of them took a situation as governess in 
 a family, where she read the English Bible. She wrote 
 under deep conviction to her father, urging him to procure 
 a copy of the Bible and read it. He, thinking it was a 
 whim of his child, dismissed the subject from his mind, 
 and destroyed the letter. This was ten years ago. Some 
 seven years later he went as Commissioner for Japan to 
 the Austrian Exhibition. There he saw the Bible Stand, 
 and was impressed with wonder that so much should be 
 made of any single book, and that it should be thought 
 worth translating into so many languages. He purchased 
 a copy in Chinese, and read it with curiosity. Curiosity 
 deepened into interest, and by degrees he became convinced 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 151 
 
 of the truth of all the Book tau.!:;ht. In his journey through 
 Europe he made his own observations of the three pre- 
 vailing forms of Christianity — the Romish, Greek, and 
 Protestant faiths. He was satisfied that the last of these 
 came nearest to the teaching and spirit of the Book itself 
 On his return to Yeddo he applied to the American 
 missionaries for baptism. Hearing of the step he had 
 taken, his daughter wrote to him from America to suggest 
 that, as he had the means at his disposal, he should pur- 
 chase a heathen temple for purposes of Christian worship. 
 He did so, and in the temple thus purchased the Christian 
 missionaries now meet for worship. 
 
 CCLXII. A Peacemaker. Ps. cxx. 7. '^ I ain for peace!' 
 
 It is said of the late Henry Venn Elliot, of Brighton, that 
 he did everything heartily and with all his strength. He 
 vi^as very firm. Twice he put a stop to men fighting in the 
 streets, thrusting himself between the combatants and 
 saying, "If you want to fight, fight me," and he rebuked 
 the crowds for encouraging the fights, " You call yourselves 
 Christians," he said, " and yet delight to see your fellow- 
 creatures fighting like wild beasts ! Do you not know your 
 bodies were made for God's service ? " The mob dispersed 
 at once. The home circle would never have known it 
 from himself but spots of blood on his shirt betrayed 
 the affair, 
 
 CCLXIII. Home, Sweet Home! Ps, cxxii. 2. ''Our 
 
 feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem " 
 
 One night on the banks of the Potomac, as the Confederate 
 and the Union armies lay opposite each other, the Union 
 bands played, "The Star-spangled Banner," "E[ail, Colum- 
 bia!" and other Union songs; and the Confederates in 
 contest played " Dixie," and other pieces of their side. It 
 seemed that each would play the other down. By-and-by 
 a band struck up " Home, Sweet Home!" Ihe conflict 
 ceased. The bands on the other side struck up, "Home, 
 Sweet Home ! " and voices from opposite sides of the river 
 joined the chorus, " There is no place like home." 
 
152 OLD TESTAMENT AiYECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXIV. Durie's Psalm. Ps. cxxiv. i-8. 
 This is known in Scotland, in its second version and with 
 its bold marching melody, as Diiries Psahn. James Mel- 
 ville, in his diary — date 1582 — gives, in his own quaint way, 
 an account of the incident which gave rise to the name. 
 John Durie had been banished from his pulpit and from 
 Edinburgh for his boldness of speech in criticising some of 
 the acts of James VI., but the feeling in his favour was so 
 strong that his sentence had to be reversed. The tune 
 and the man can be best understood by giving James Mel- 
 ville's own words, spelling and all : " Within io.^ days after 
 the petition of the nobility, Jhon Durie gat leave to ga 
 haim to his ain flock of Edinbrugh : at whase returning 
 there was a great concours of the haill toun, wha met him 
 at the Nether Bow ; and going up the street, with bare 
 heads and loud voices, sang to the praise of God, and testi- 
 fying of great joy and consolation, the 124 Psalm — 'Now 
 Israel may say, and that trevvly' — , till heaven and earth 
 resoundit. This noise, when the Due (of Lennox) being 
 in the toun, heard, and ludging in the Hiegate looked out 
 and saw, he rave his beard for anger, and hasted him off the 
 toun." John Durie was a minister of mark in his time, 
 and very popular with the citizens of Edinburgh. He was 
 fearless and devout — a man of the people, and also a man 
 of God ; and the description of him is so graphic that it is 
 worth giving: "Jhone Durie was of small literature, but 
 had seen and marked the warks of God in the first Refor- 
 mation, and been a doer baith with toung and hand. He 
 had been a diligent hearer of Mr. Knox, and observer of 
 all his ways. He conceived the grounds of matters weil, 
 and could utter them fully and manfully with a mighty 
 spirit, voice, and action. The special gift I marked in him 
 was holiness, and a daily, careful, continual walking with 
 God in meditation and prayer. He was a verie gude 
 fallow, and took delyt as his special comfort to have his 
 table and house filled with the best men. These he would 
 gladly hear, with them confer and talk, professing he was 
 but a buik-bearer, and would fain learn of them ; and 
 getting the ground and light of knowledge in any gude 
 point, then would he rejoice in God, praise and pray there- 
 upon, and urge it with a clear and forcible exhortation in 
 assembly and pulpit." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 153 
 
 The learned and pious Dr. Tholuck, of Halle, used to tell 
 an anecdote of the deatii-bed of his father-in-law. He had 
 been once a Roman Catholic, and as it happens .that, 
 though the mind may have been entirely emancipated, 
 sometimes the fear of dying without priestly absolution 
 returns, his son-in-law asked him if he had any such feel- 
 ing. He expressed his confidence in the great High 
 Priest, and, giving his hand a wave of triumph, said, — 
 
 " Strick ist entzwei, und wir sind frei." 
 
 The words are from Luther's version of this psalm, made in 
 1525, corresponding to — 
 
 " Broke are their nets, and thus escaped we." 
 
 The biographer of M'Cheyne, giving an account of his 
 death, says : " Next day he continued, sunk in body and 
 mind, till about the time when his people met for their 
 usual evening prayer-meeting, when he requested to be 
 left alone for half an hour. When his servant entered the 
 room again, he exclaimed with a joyful voice, ' My soul is 
 escaped as a bird out of the snare of his fowler ; the snare 
 is broken, and I am escaped.' His countenance, as he said 
 this, bespoke inward peace ; and ever after he was observed 
 to be happy." 
 
 Ver. 8. With this verse the French Protestant Church 
 always begins its public worship — words which well become 
 the children of the Huguenots. 
 
 CCLXV. Interposition of Providence. Ps. cxxiv. 2. 
 "7/" it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when men 
 rose up against us : then they had swallowed us up quick, when 
 their wrath was kindled against us." 
 
 On one occasion, the Prince Conde and Admiral Coligny 
 — the leaders of the Huguenot party — had been driven 
 from their homes by their opponents, who had attempted 
 cruelly to massacre them ; they took to flight accordingly, 
 with their helpers and terrified families. " The Prince of 
 Conde set out silently," says Matthieu, an eye-witness of 
 the events he narrates, " but his situation touched all hearts 
 with pity when they saw the first prince ,of the blood 
 getting forward in the intensest heat, with his wife on the 
 
154 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 point of giving birth to a child, and three h'ttle children 
 borne after them, followed by the now motherless family of 
 Coligny, of whom only one was able to walk. The wife of 
 D'Antelot, too, was there with her little girl only two years 
 old, and several other ladies. The only escort for this 
 troop of helpless women and children was one hundred 
 and fifty soldiers, headed by two brave and affectionate 
 fathers. 
 
 " They journeyed on as rapidly as possible, for their only 
 hope of safety lay in crossing the Loire before they could 
 be overtaken, and then seeking shelter in Rochelle ; but 
 the whole country was filled with hostile troops, and the 
 bridges over the Loire were already occupied. They 
 therefore determined to attempt a ford not commonly 
 known, and arrived at it when the river, usually broad 
 and furious, was so far diminished by the long drought 
 that they crossed without difficulty, the prince carrying his 
 youngest infant on his arm, clasped to his bosom. 
 
 " Scarcely had they reached the southern bank, when, 
 turning round, they discovered the cavalry of their enemies 
 in full pursuit, crowding rapidly upon the opposite side. 
 
 " An event now happened certainly very remarkable. 
 Without any apparent cause, a sudden swell of waters came 
 foaming and rushing down the stream, and in an instant 
 filling the channel, rendered the ford impassable, and the 
 defenceless company were thus rescued from the jaws of 
 their destroyer. 
 
 " Can we wonder that men taught to rest upon Provi- 
 dence, and to discern the Almighty hand in the events of 
 their agitated lives, should have regarded this as a signal 
 interposition in their favour, and an undoubted sign that 
 His arm was extended for their protection ? " 
 
 CCLXVI. Almost drowned. Ps. cxxiv. 4. ** Then the 
 
 waters had overwhelmed us." 
 
 The following anecdote relates to one of Mr. Wesley's 
 early visits into Cornwall : "I was born," says old Peter 
 Martin, "at Helstone, and baptized on the 12th of May, 
 1742. My wife is 94 years old ; our united ages amount 
 to 191 years. I have been sexton of this parish, Helstone, 
 65 years. I remember Mr. Wesley well. I first heard him 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 155 
 
 preach in the street near our market-house 74 years ago. 
 I have also seen him at Redruth, and had an adventure 
 with him while I was ostler at the London Inn, then kept 
 by Henry Pembcrthy. Mr. Wesley came there one day 
 in a carriage driven by his own servant, who, being un- 
 acquainted with the road farther westward than Redruth, 
 he obtained my master's leave for me to drive him to St. 
 Ives. We set out, and on our arrival at Hayle we found 
 the sands between that place and St. Ives, over which we 
 had to pass, overflown by the rising tide. On reaching the 
 water's edge, I hesitated to proceed, and advised Mr. Wesley 
 of the danger of crossing ; and a captain of a vessel, seeing 
 us stopping, came up and endeavoured to dissuade us from 
 an undertaking so full of peril, but without effect. Mr. 
 Wesley was resolved to go on ; he said he had to preach 
 at St. Ives at a certain hour, and that he must fulfil his 
 appointment, and looking out of the carriage window, he 
 called loudly to me, 'Take the sea! take sea!' In a 
 moment I dashed into the waves and was quickly involved 
 in a world of waters. The horses were now swimming, and 
 the carriage became overwhelmed with the tide, as its 
 hinder wheels became not unfrequently merged into the 
 deep pits and hollows in the sands. I struggled hard to 
 maintain my seat in the saddle, while the poor affrighted 
 animals were snorting and rearing in the most terrific 
 manner, and furiously plunging the opposing waves. At 
 this awful crisis I heard Mr. Wesley's voice. With diffi- 
 culty I turned my head towards the carriage, and saw his 
 long, white locks dripping the salt sea down the rugged 
 furrows of his venerable countenance. He was looking 
 calmly forth from the windows, undisturbed by the tumul- 
 tuous war of the surrounding waters, or by the danger of 
 his perilous situation. He hailed me by a tolerably loud 
 voice, and asked, ' What is your name, driver ? ' I 
 answered, ' Peter.' ' Peter,' said Mr. Wesley, — ' Peter, fear 
 not ; you shall not sink.' With vigorous spurring and 
 wliipi)ing I again urged on the flagging horses, and at last 
 got safely over ; but it was a miracle, as I shall always say. 
 We continued our journey, and reached St. Ives without 
 further hindrance." 
 
156 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXVII. A Favourite Song of Scottish Refor- 
 mation. Ps. cxxv. 1-5. 
 
 This psalm used to be sung frequently in early Scottish 
 Reformation times. The tune which accompanied it was 
 " St. Andrew." It was often sung, too, by the French 
 Protestants, when hiding from the Dragonnades of Louis 
 XIV., and fleeing to the frontiers for escape. Every verse, 
 every word seems made for such emergencies. 
 
 CCLXVIII. A Sudden Death. Ps. cxxvi. 5. ''They 
 that sow in tears shall reap in joy T 
 
 This was a favourite verse of Philip Henry, who used to 
 say that weeping should not hinder sowing. His death 
 was in accordance with it, It took place suddenly on the 
 morning of a fast for public danger, when he was to have 
 preached. Some wished to defer the service, but this text 
 was quoted for going forward with it. His son Matthew 
 Henry spoke from 2 Kings xiii. 20 : " And Elisha died, 
 . . . and the bands of the Moabites invaded the land." 
 
 CCLXIX. A Chosen Psalm of Catherine de 
 Medici. Ps. cxxviii. 
 
 Along with Psalms vi. and cxlii., this was chosen for her- 
 self by Catherine de Medici. She could scarcely have 
 selected any more unsuitable. 
 
 CCLXX. PhiHp Henry. Ps. cxxviii. 2. '' Blessed is 
 every one tliat fcarcth the Lord: that walketh in LLis ways. 
 For thoii shall eat the labours of thine hands ; happy shall 
 thou be, and it shall be well 7uith thce.^' 
 
 When Philip Henry was settled at Worth en burj^', he 
 sought the hand of the only daughter and heiress of Mr. 
 Matthews, of Broad Oak. The father demurred, saying 
 that though Mr. Henry was an excellent preacher and a 
 gentleman, yet he did not know from whence he came. 
 "True," said the daughter; "but I know where he is 
 going, and I should like to go with him." Mr. Henry 
 records in his diary, long after, the happiness of the union, 
 which was soon after consummated: — "April 26, i86a 
 
OLD TESTA MENT ANECDOTES. 157 
 
 This day we have been married twenty years, in which 
 time we have received of the Lord twenty thousand 
 mercies — to God be glory ! " Sometimes he writes — " We 
 have been so long married, and never reconciled, i.e. there 
 never was any occasion for it." His advice to his children, 
 with respect to their marriage, was — "Please God, and 
 please yourselves, and you will please me ; " and his usual 
 compliment to his newly-married friends — "Others wish 
 you all happiness. I wish you all holiness, and then there 
 is no doubt but you will have all happiness." 
 
 CCLXXI. A Psalm Beloved by Luther. Ps. cxx.x. 
 
 By a curious unfitness, this Psalm with xxxii, was the 
 choice of Diana of Poitiers ; and yet may there not be 
 a sense of deep fitness which comes at moments to the 
 souls of the most frivolous ? We can understand better 
 Luther's love of it, with Psalm H. These Psalms are the 
 nearest approach in the Old Testament to the 8th chapter 
 of the Romans. One of his great psalm-hymns which 
 penetrated to the inmost heart of the German people was 
 formed on this 130th. If the 46th furnished the major, 
 this gives the minor key in the songs of the Reformation 
 of Germany : — 
 
 " Alls tJcfer Noth schrei ich Z7i Dtr." 
 " Lord, from the depths to Thee I cry." 
 
 It was written in 1524, and has its own history. On 
 the 6th of May of the year in which it was made, a poor 
 old weaver sang it through the streets of Magdeburg and 
 offered it for sale at a price that suited the poorest. He 
 was cast into prison by the burgomaster, but 200 citizens 
 marched to the Town Hall, and would not leave till he 
 was freed. "So mightily grew the word of the Lord, and 
 prevailed." And Psalms and music were chosen weapons 
 of the time. " The ransomed of the Lord returned, and 
 came to Zion with songs." This prayer-psalm had its 
 comforting power on the singer. When Luther, during 
 the Augsburg Diet, was at the Castle of Coburg, and had 
 to suffer much from inward and outward trials, he fell into 
 a swoon. When he awoke from it, he said, " Come, and in 
 defiance of the devil, let us sing the Psalm, 'Lord, from 
 the depths to Thee I cry ; ' let us sing it in full chorus and 
 
158 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 extol and praise God." In the first days of the Reform 
 it was frequently employed as a funeral song. It was sung 
 at the interment of the great friend and protector of Luther, 
 Frederick the Wise, in 1525. When the body of Luther 
 was on its way from Eisleben, where he died, to Witten- 
 berg, where he lies buried, it rested for a night, Feb. 20th, 
 1546, in the church in Halle of which Justus Jonas, the 
 bosom friend of Luther, was pastor [Liehfraitenk'irche). 
 This Psalm was given out by Jonas, and sung by the thou- 
 sands who thronged and wept round Luther's coffin. 
 
 Dr. John Owen gives an account of the way in which he 
 was led to write his commentary, or rather series of dis- 
 courses, on this Psalm. " Mr. Richard Davis," he says, 
 "who afterwards became pastor of a church in Rowel, 
 Northamptonshire, being under religious impressions, 
 sought a conference with me. I put the question to him, 
 
 * Young man, pray, in what naanner do you think to go to 
 God?' 'Through the Mediator, sir,' Mr. Davis answered. 
 
 * That is easily said,' I replied, ' but I assure you, it is 
 another thing to go to God through the Mediator than 
 many who make use of the expression are aware of I 
 myself preached Christ some years, when I had but very 
 little, if any, experimental acquaintance with access to 
 God through Christ ; until the Lord was pleased to visit 
 me with sore affliction, whereby I was brought to the 
 mouth of the grave, and under which my soul was oppressed 
 with horror and darkness : but God graciously relieved my 
 spirit by a powerful application of Psalm cxxx. 4 : " But 
 there is forgiveness with Thee, that Thou mayest be 
 feared," from whence I received special instruction, peace 
 and comfort in drawing near to God through the Mediator, 
 and preached thereupon immediately after my recovery.' " 
 This is no doubt the reason why nearly three- fourths of 
 Owen's treatise is occupied with this verse. 
 
 It was the 130th Psalm, sung in St. Paul's, May, 1738, 
 and heard by John Wesley with deep emotion, which pre- 
 pared him for the truth of justification by faith, which he 
 embraced shortly afterwards through reading Luther on 
 the Galatians. His conversations with Peter Bohlen, of 
 the Moravian Brethren, also aided him greatly, and helped 
 to preserve him from the mystic Arminianism of Lazv's 
 Serious Call, to which he was at one time inclined. So far 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 159 
 
 as we can see, Wesley's strength and that of the world-wide 
 movement which has come from him would have failed in 
 the birth, but for this decision. It is interesting, also, to 
 mark the glimpses we get of souls touching one another 
 age after age through the hidden life which springs from 
 the Word of God, — David, Paul, Luther, Owen, Zinzendorf, 
 Wesley, moving and being moved by the secret currents 
 of that same spirit of which we hear the sound, but cannot 
 tell whence it comes or whither it goes. When the veil is 
 lifted that is spread over all nations, it will be as pleasant 
 to trace the intertwining of the roots of the tree of life, as 
 to look on its blossoms and admire its fruit. 
 
 Ver. 6. Jonathan Edwards, in his Journal, says, " In 
 Sept., 1725, was taken ill at Newhaven ; and endeavoured 
 to go home to Windsor ; was so ill at the North Village 
 that I could go no further, where I lay sick for about a 
 quarter of a year. And in this sickness, God was pleased 
 to visit me again with the sweet influences of His Spirit. 
 My mind was greatly engaged there on divine pleasant 
 contemplations and longings of soul. I observed that 
 those who watched with me would often be loolcing out for 
 the morning, and seemed to wish for it ; which brought to 
 my mind the words of the Psalmist's, which my soul with 
 sweetness made its own language": 'My soul waiteth for 
 the Lord more than they that watch for the morning.' 
 And when the light of the morning came, and the beams 
 of the sun came in at the windows, it refreshed my soul 
 from one morning to another. It seemed to me to be 
 some image of the sweet light of God's glory." 
 
 CCLXXII. A Song of Christian Assemblies. 
 
 Ps. cxxxiii. 
 
 This Psalm has opened and closed many a Christian 
 assembly, but has not \ot found its way to the inmost 
 heart of the Church of Christ. In 1638, it was sung at the 
 termination of the famous Assembly held in Glasgow, of 
 which Alexander Henderson was Moderator. That meet- 
 ing was the tide-mark of thesecond Reformation — a bright 
 morning that was soon obscured by clouds and storm, but 
 it opened a day which is still advancing. 
 
l6o OLD TESTAMENT .lAECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXXIII. "Let us with a Gladsome Mind." 
 
 Ps. cxxxvi. 
 
 This Psalm was the foundation of John Milton's " Let us 
 with a gladsome mind " — written when he was fifteen — the 
 only one of his psalms which has found a responsive note 
 in the son^s of tlic Church, thouj^di no one felt more than 
 he did the hei-^dit of the Psalmist's great argument! 
 
 "Their songs, 
 Thin sown with aught of profit or delight, 
 Will far be found unworthy to compare 
 With Sion's songs to all true tastes excelling, — 
 Where God is praised aright, and godlike men, 
 The Holiest of holies, and Ills saints,— 
 Such are from God inspired." 
 
 Paradise Reg., iv. 
 
 CCLXXIV. A Patriotic Psalm. Ps. cxxxvii. 
 
 This Psalm has struck the key to many a song of the love 
 of country. 
 
 "Yes ! I may love the music of strange tongues, 
 And mould my heart anew to take tlie stamp 
 Of foreign friendships in a foreign land ; 
 But to my parched roof's mouth let cleave this tongue, 
 My fancy fade into a yellow leaf, 
 And this oft-pausing heart forget to throb, 
 If Scotland ! thee and thine, it e'er forget." 
 
 Grahame. 
 
 The Abbe Curci, a great Oriental scholar, and author of 
 a translation of the Old Testament into Italian, one of the 
 few clergymen who have taken the side of Italy and free- 
 dom against the Pope, lectured to an immense assembly in 
 Rome (18S3), and expressed his special love to the 137th 
 Psalm. He said it was the first and grandest patriotic 
 song which was ever written — linking God and country 
 together. Camoens, the national poet of Portugal, has 
 paraphrased the 137th Psalm in a sonnet as the Psalm of 
 " pious, patriotic memory." 
 
 It may be considered, in a higher point of view, as the 
 spring of the Jerusalem songs, which, in all ages of the 
 Church, looked away from a state of exile to the final 
 home : — 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. l6l 
 
 " For thee, O dear, dear country, 
 
 Mine eyes their vi^Mls keep ; 
 For very love, beliolclinf,^ 
 
 Thy happy name, they weep : 
 E'en now, by faith, I see thee. 
 
 E'en now thy walls discern ; 
 To thee my tliouLjlUs are kindled, 
 
 And strive, and pant, and yearn." 
 
 CCLXXV. A Distressed Church. Ps. cxxxvii. 3, 
 
 4. " They that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sitig 
 us one of the snugs of Zion. How shall we sing the Lord's 
 song in a strange land 1 " 
 
 It has often been said that the first Nonconformists were 
 a glotimy generation. '* But," asks one of their advocates, 
 " is it fair to ruin us, and then reproach us for not being 
 merry? They that wasted us required of us luirth. . . . 
 But how shall we sing the Lord's songs in a strange land 
 and what other songs can we sing ? Shall we set the Five- 
 Mile Acts to music, and make merry with our sorrows?" 
 Some degree of gloom was natural. One poor woman 
 exclaimed to a Nonconformist minister, " I wonder how 
 any one can laugh when God's Church is in such dis- 
 tress." 
 
 CCLXXVI. The Lord's Song. Ps. cxxxvii. 4. *'The 
 Zord's song in a strajige land." 
 
 In one of his recent letters from Shanghai, Archdeacon 
 Moule describes an incident of his journey to Hangchow 
 which shows Christian ideas are spreading. He was 
 awakened, so he tells us, early on a Sunday morning as he 
 lay in his boat hearing the )^ounger boatman in his song, 
 sung to beguile the toil of paddling, repeat the words, 
 " Jesus is our best Friend : I love thee, my Saviour." The 
 lad, when questioned, said he had never been in a 
 Christian church or school himself, but had learned the 
 words from a friend. Round Shanghai one may often 
 hear snatches of prayer and hynms chanted by the boat- 
 men at their work. Often those who sing have no idea of 
 the true meaning of the words, but the hymns of the new 
 faith upon heathen lips prophesy and promise a glorious 
 victory. 
 
 M 
 
1 62 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXXVII. In God's Hands. Ps. cxxxix. 12. ''The 
 
 darkness and the li;^lit arc hollt atilw to Thee." 
 
 Irkn/i^,US Prime mentions the follovvinLj incident in one 
 of his If'tters : — 
 
 " When I was about forty years old, and sittincj^ at my 
 work in the office in New York, a stranijer entered, and 
 without introduction or ev^en mentioninii; his name, said to 
 me : ' I have come in to see you whom I know very well, 
 though you do not know me. About forty years ago I was 
 going up the Hudson River on a sloop, for in those days 
 there were no steamboats or railroads. When we were in 
 Tai)pan Sea we were overtaken by a violent storm, and 
 the passengers, of whom there were several on board, were 
 greatly alarmed lest we should be capsized. In the midst 
 of the e.xcitement a young and beautiful woman stood in 
 the midst of us and said : " In God's hands we are as safe 
 on the water as on the land." Those words calmed the 
 excitciuent, and we waited in hope till the storm abated. 
 The lovely woman who thus proved our comforter in 
 danger, afterward became your mother ! Her words have 
 been my motto all the years since. I have watched your 
 life and marked every step you have taken, always keeping 
 in mind the lesson I learned from the lips that taught your 
 infant lips to pray.' 
 
 " Having said these pleasant words, the stranger left me, 
 and I have never to my knowledge seen him or heard from 
 him since. I asked my mother about it, and she remem- 
 bered the time, the voyage, the storm, the excitement, but 
 her own composure was so habitual that it was not mem- 
 orable." 
 
 CCLXXVIII. The Evening Song. Ps. cxli. 
 
 This Psalm was the evening song of the early Christian 
 Church. 
 
 CCLXXIX. Watching the Lips. Ps. cxli. 3. ''Set 
 a watch, O Lord, before my mouth : keep the door of my lips. 
 
 The old Greeks tell us a story about the death of Hercules, 
 That strong hero had shot his enemy Nessus, with a pois- 
 oned arrow, and the garment of the slain man was all 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 1G3 
 
 stained with poisoned blood. Before lie died, Ncssiis gave 
 his clothing to the wife of Hercules, telling her that it 
 would make her husband love her always. It came to pass 
 after a time that she gave the fatal garment to her husb.uid, 
 and no sooner had he put it on, than the poison seized 
 upon him ; and when in his agony he tried to tear it off, it 
 clung the closer, and so he died killed by his own poison. 
 So it is with the man who clothes himself with the garnicnt 
 of cursing or bad talk, it clings to him and poisons him, soul 
 and body. 
 
 CCLXXX. Fear of Death Overcome. Ps. cxliii. 
 
 Thoimas Bilney, burned in the reign of Henry VHI., 
 had, at first, fear of death, but he rose above it, and his 
 behaviour at the stake made a great impression on the 
 people : " He made his private prayer with such earnest 
 elevation of his eyes and hands to heaven, and in so good 
 and quiet behaviour, that he seemed not to consider the 
 terror of his death ; and ended at last his private prayers 
 with the Psalm beginning, 'Hear my prayer, O Lord ! con- 
 sider my desire I ' And the next verse he repeated in deep 
 meditation thrice : ' And enter not into judgment with Thy 
 servant, for in Thy sight shall no man living be justified.' 
 And so, finishing that Psalm, he ended his prayers." 
 
 CCLXXXI. An Irish Bishop. Ps. cxliv. 
 
 From this Psalm, being the Psalm for the day, Bishop 
 Bedell preached, Jan. 30th, 1642, in the midst of the Irish 
 Rebellion, and died a few days afterwards. He was one 
 of the best men of his time — humble, devout, self-sacrific- 
 ing. The Bible which, with great labour, he got translated 
 into the Irish language, was for a long time the one chiefly 
 in use among the Scottish Highlanders; it was not till 
 the beginning of the present century that it found much 
 entrance into Ireland. All classes of the Irish had a great 
 regard for him. His last sermon was preached in the 
 house of a converted priest, to which he was allowed to 
 retire from Castle Oughterard, County Cavan, wliere he 
 had been kept a prisoner. He lies in a corner of Kilmore 
 Churchyard, close to a large sycamore tree which he him- 
 self had planted. 
 
i64 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXXXII. The Te Deum of the Old Testament. 
 
 Ps. cxlv. 
 
 The tradition about the Te Daim is that it was sung by 
 Ambrose and Augustine, through a kind of inspiration — 
 in 3S7 — when they met at Milan, and when Augustine was 
 baptized by Ambrose. The truth in this is that this hymn, 
 which has been sung in so many countries and through so 
 many centuries, had its commencement in a responsive 
 Christian song which Ambrose introduced from the Eastern 
 into the Western Church. It was a morning psalm of praise, 
 and began, " Every day will I bless Thee, and praise Tliy 
 name for ever and ever." This 145th Psalm may be looked 
 on, therefore, as having in it the germ of the wide-spread 
 Christian hymn, and as being itself the Te Deum of the 
 Old Testament. The Jews were accustomed to say that 
 he who could pray this Psalm from the heart three times 
 daily was preparing himself best for the praise of the 
 world to come. 
 
 CCLXXXIII. Christ's Everlasting Kingdom. Ps. 
 
 cxlv. 13. " TJiy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom^ 
 
 Voltaire said, " In twenty years Christianity will be no 
 more. My single hand shall destroy the edifice it took 
 twelve apostles to rear." Some years after his death, his 
 very printing press was employed in printing New Testa- 
 ments, and thus spreading abroad the Gospel. Gibbon, 
 who, "with solemn sneer," devoted his gorgeous history to 
 sarcasm upon Christ and His followers, his estate is now in 
 the hands of one who devotes large sums to the propaga- 
 tion of the very truth Gibbon laboured to sap. 
 
 CCLXXXIV. A Good Man of the Olden Time. 
 , Ps. cxlvi. 
 
 In 1574 died David Home of VVedderburn, a gentleman of 
 good account in Berwickshire, and father of David Home 
 of Godscroft, author of the " History of tlie House of 
 Douglas." He died in the 50th year of his age, of con- 
 sumption, being the first of his family for i long period 
 who had died a natural death — all the rest had lost their 
 lives in the defence of their country. He was a man re- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 165 
 
 markable for piety and probity, candour and integrity. 
 He had the Psalms, and especially some short sentences 
 of them, always in his mouth, such as, " It is better to trust 
 in the Lord than in the princes of the earth," " Our hope 
 ought to be placed in God alone." He delighted particu- 
 larly in the 146th Psalm, and sung it, playing on the harp, 
 with the most sincere and unaffected devotion. 
 
 CCLXXXV. The Dairyman's Daughter. Ps. 
 
 cxlviii. 8. " Wind and storm ftdfilliiig llis Word." 
 
 Among the voices of God's providence are the howling 
 storm and the roaring sea. A pious chaplain, detained by 
 contrary winds at the Isle of Wight over the Sunday, 
 preached that day in one of the churches of the island. 
 In the congregation there was a thoughtless girl who had 
 come to show her fine clothes. The word of God arrested 
 her, and she was converted. The story of her conversion 
 is the narrative of the " Dairj'man's Daughter," which has 
 gone all round the world, and the fruit of the sermon is a 
 hundredfold. 
 
 CCLXXXVI. A Pulpit Beggar. Ps. cxlviii. 17. ''Who 
 can sta?id before His cold 1 " 
 
 The successor of Rowland Hill at Surrey Chapel was the 
 famous James Sherman. Mr. Sherman was one of the most 
 skilful and successful of pulpit-beggars. Give him a good 
 cause, and he never failed to get money. At a Fiiday 
 morning service, on one occasion, it was most bitterly 
 cold, and very few people were present. The intensity of 
 the cold had suggested his text — Psalm cxlviii. 17 : " Who 
 can stand before His cold ?" In the course of his remarks, 
 he alluded to the pitiable condition of the poor immediately 
 around the chapel ; and reminded his audience that if, in 
 their comfortable homes, and so warmly clothed, they felt 
 it so difficult to " stand before His cold," what must it be 
 with the homeless and the half-naked .■' The appeal was 
 so pertinent and so resistless that a considerable contribu- 
 tion was offered on the spot ! Measures were devised for 
 the relief of the poor, a brewhouse was turned into a soup- 
 kitchen, and for months eiicctual relief was afforded to 
 thousands. 
 
l66 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCLXXXVII. Three Lessons for Children. Prov, 
 
 i. 8. " And forsake not the law of tliy iiiotlicr. 
 
 John Ruskin, in countinfj up the blc.s-;injj.s of his child- 
 hood, reckoned these three for first good — I'cacc : he liad 
 been taugiit the meaning of peace in thought, act, and 
 word ; had never heard father's or mother's voice once 
 raised in any dispute, nor seen an angry glance in the eyes 
 of cither, nor had ever seen a moment's trouble or disorder 
 in any household matter. Next to this he estimates obedi- 
 ence — he obeyed word or lifted finger of father or mother 
 as a ship her helm, without an idea of resistance. And 
 lastly Faith — nothing was ever promised him that was not 
 given ; nothing ever threatened him that was not indicted, 
 and nothing ever told him that was not true. 
 
 CCLXXXVIII. Unconscious Danger, Prov. i. 27. 
 " IV/ien your destruction coineth as a whirlwind." 
 
 There is an account of the defeat, forty years ago, of the 
 troops of a distinguished general in Italy. Having taken 
 their stand near Terni, where the waters of the river Velino 
 rush down an almost perpendicular precipice of three 
 hundred feet, and thence toss and foam along through 
 groves of orange and olive trees toward the Tiber, into 
 which it soon empties, they attempted, when pressed by 
 the Austrians, to make their escape over a bridge which 
 spanned the stream just above the falls. In the hurry of 
 the moment, and all unconscious of the insufficient strength 
 of the structure, they rushed upon it in such numbers that 
 it suddenly gave way, and precipitated hundreds of the 
 shrieking and now despairing men into the rapid current 
 below. There was no resisting such a tide when once on 
 its bosom. With frightful velocity they were borne along 
 toward the roaring cataract and the terrific gulf whence 
 clouds of impenetrable mist never ceased to rise. A mo- 
 ment more, and they made the awful plunge into the 
 fathomless abyss, from which, amid the roar of the waters, 
 no cry of horror could be heard, no bodies, or even frag- 
 ments of bodies, could ever be rescued. The peril was 
 wholly unsuspected, but none the less real, and ending in 
 a " destruction " none the less "swift." 
 
 May we not see in this the picture of a great throng of 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 167 
 
 immortal men in respect to their uwrnl end ? It sccnis 
 generally to be assumed that, in our relations to eternit)', 
 there is no danger except that of which we are distinctly 
 conscious, — which we see, or hear, or feel. But there can- 
 not be a greater delusion. It would be equally rational 
 for the blind man, who wanders among pit-falls, or on the 
 trembling brink of some frightful prccii)icc, to infer that 
 there is no danger because he sees none. Insensibility to 
 danger is, in fact, one of the most startling characteristics 
 of the sinner's condition by nature, just as insensibility in 
 a mortal disease is one of the most alarming symptoms of 
 the disease itself. 
 
 CCLXXXIX. A Providential Escape. Prov. ii. 8. 
 
 " He prescrvcth the way of His saints.'" 
 
 Mr. J. IliliP.S, a Methodist preacher, had once a provi- 
 dential escape, which he tells as follows : — " When I was 
 stationed in Swansea, in the year 1836, I was appointed 
 delegate to the District Meeting held at St, Ive.s, Corn- 
 wall. One Captain Gribblc offered me a passage in his 
 vessel. I accepted the offer, and said, ' VVhen are you 
 going out } ' He replied, ' We have got our cargo, and 
 shall go to-morrow if the wind is fair.' I went to the 
 dock on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday ; the wind 
 was still against him. He then advised me to take the 
 packet to Bristol, as he said it was quite uncertain when 
 he should be able to go to sea. I took the packet on the 
 Thursday morning. We had a very rough passage. 
 Through mercy we arrived safe in Bristol next morning. I 
 took coach for Exeter. A very heavy snow fell that day. 
 (It was on Good Friday; the district meetings were held 
 in April.) Saturday, took coach for Haylc. On our way, 
 in going up a certain hill, the horses ran back into a ditch 
 and upset the coach. It was fortunate that there was a 
 deal of snow, so that no one was hurt. I arrived at Haylc 
 between one and two o'clock on Sunday morning. I then 
 walked to St. Ives, a distance of five miles. I went to 
 Mr. Driffield's. When he saw me he said, ' Is Joseph yet 
 alive.''' I answered, 'Yes.' He further said, 'We were 
 informed you were coming with a sailing vessel, and it 
 appears she is lost, for some of the wreck is come on shore 
 
i68 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 We have gone through the stationing, and left you without 
 a station.' I was given to understand that on the morning 
 I left for Bristol the vessel went out. The wind was fair, 
 but after being two hours at sea, all went to the bottom, 
 captain and crew." 
 
 CCXC. A Good Man's Diary. Prov. ii. 20. 
 
 " Walk in the way of good tne/i, and keep the paths of the 
 righteous^ 
 
 From an examination of Edwards' diary, we can account, 
 humanly speaking, for his eminence as a Christian. Take 
 these extracts for example : — 
 
 ^'Resolved, — Never to lose one moment of time, but to 
 improve it in the most profitable way I possibly can. 
 
 " Resolved, — To live with all my might while I do live. 
 
 ^^ Resolved, — To live so at all times, as I think best in 
 my most devout frames, and when I have the clearest 
 notions of the things of the gospel and another world. 
 
 " Resolved, — To study the Scriptures so steadily, con- 
 stantly, and frequently, as that I may find, and plainly 
 perceive, myself to grow in the knowledge of the same. 
 
 " Resolved, — To ask myself at the end of every day, 
 week, month, and year, wherein I could possibly in any 
 respect have done better. 
 
 ^'Resolved, — Never to give over, nor in the least to 
 slacken my fight with my corruption, however unsuccessful 
 I may be. 
 
 " Resolved, — After afflictions, to inquire what I am the 
 better for them ; what good I have got by them ; and what 
 I might have got by them. 
 
 " 1 think it a very good way to examine dreams every 
 morning when I awake ; what are the nature, circum- 
 stances, principles, and ends of my imaginary actions and 
 passions in them, in order to discern what are my pre- 
 vailing inclinations, etc. 
 
 " How it comes about I know not, but I have remarked 
 it hitherto, that at these times when I have read the 
 Scriptures most, I have evermore been most lively and in 
 the best frame. 
 
 " Determined, when I am indisposed to prayer, always 
 to premeditate what to pray for, and that it is better that 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 169 
 
 the prayer should be of almost any shortness than that my 
 mind should be almost continually off from what I say. 
 
 " I have loved the doctrines of the f^ospel ; they have 
 been to my soul like green pastures. The way of salva- 
 tion by Christ has appeared in a general way glorious and 
 excellent, most pleasant and most beautiful. It has often 
 seemed to me that it would in a great measure spoil heaven 
 to receive it in anj- other way. 
 
 " There are very few requests that are proper for an im- 
 penitent man that are not also, in some sense, proper for 
 the godly. 
 
 " Though God has forgiven and forgotten your past 
 sins, yet do not forget them yourself ; often remember 
 what a wretched bond-slave you were in the land of Egypt. 
 
 "One new discovery of the glory of Christ's face will do 
 more toward scattering clouds of darkness in one minute 
 than examining old experience, by the best marks that 
 can be given through a whole year." 
 
 CCXCI. Giving a Tenth to the Lord. Prov. 
 iii. 9. " Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the 
 first fruits of all thine iticrease" 
 
 Mrs. Isabella Graham had received ;^i,ooo unexpec- 
 tedly, and, true to the godly habit which she had main- 
 tained through days of affluence and days of straitness, 
 she put ;;^ioo at once into the bag, which had never 
 received so large a sum before. The circumstance was 
 never mentioned by her ; but after her death this entry 
 was found in her diary : " Quick, quick, before my heart 
 gets hard." 
 
 CCXCII. In the Far Country. Prov. iv. 14. 
 
 " Enter not into the path of the wicked, and go fiot in the 
 way of evil men r 
 
 The following is a strange incident in the early life of 
 John Welch, who became one of the saintliestof Scotland's 
 Reformed pastors. When a youth, he was sent to the 
 grammar-school, probably at Dumfries ; but so deeply 
 fixed had his early unsettled habits become, that he proved 
 insubordinate, and running away from school, joined him- 
 
I70 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 self to some robbers, whom he accompanied on their moss- 
 trooping expeditions to the English border. 
 
 It is strange to find one afterwards so eminent for grace 
 in such a connection. The bold fiery spirit he then evinced 
 continued through life, but softened by deep communion 
 with his Master, and turned into other and better channels. 
 His youthful dreams of freedom and plenty, as is usual in 
 parallel cases, came to a speedy conclusion. The expe- 
 ditions, so far as he was concerned, were barren of success, 
 and his clothes were at length worn to rags. The rough 
 camp- life, with its exposure to all weathers, involuntary 
 fastings, and sudden alarms, did not prove so agreeable in 
 reality and in prospect, and like his prototype, the prodigal 
 of the parable, he began to turn relenting and longing 
 thoughts to his father's house. Indeed, he appears really 
 to have been visited in that far country of famine by power- 
 ful workings of the Spirit of God. It seems that while he 
 came to himself, he began to turn towards God as well as 
 his father's house. It was the critical turning-point, the 
 Hercules' choice, that sooner or later, and in some form, 
 comes to every youth. Young Welch made a sudden 
 and decided resolve, really, we think, through the grace of 
 God, whom he had previously despised. He escaped from 
 his robber-companions for good and all, and set out with 
 all speed for his father's house. But the elder Welch was 
 not a man to be trifled with, and that his son well knew, 
 and the difficulty of facing him grew more formidable the 
 nearer he came to his house. At length, arrived at the 
 town of Dumfries, that lay on his way, he betook himself 
 to the house of his aunt, Agnes Fors\th, to whom he com- 
 municated his sad plight. There he sta}'ed for some days, 
 not daring to return home. Meantime his father arrived 
 on business in Dumfries, and having called on his cousin, 
 Mrs. Forsyth, they sat and talked a while. At length she 
 said, " Have you ever heard any news of your son John t " 
 
 ** O cruel woman ! " exclaimed the father with a burst 
 of sorrow, " how can you name him to me ? The first 
 news I expect to hear of him is that he is hanged for a 
 thief" 
 
 " Many a profligate boy," she answered, "has become a 
 virtuous man." 
 
 But the father refused all the comfort she continued to 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 17 r 
 
 give, and at length suspecting something, he asked wliethcr 
 she knew his lost son was yet alive. 
 
 She answered. Yes, he was, and she hoped he should 
 prove a better man than he was a boy ; and with that she 
 called upon him to come to his father. He came with 
 every mark of heartfelt grief; and weeping, he kneeled 
 and besought his father for Christ's sake to pardon his 
 misbehaviour, and engaged to become a new man. His 
 father, however, received him with reproaches and threats ; 
 but at length, through the importunate mediation of his 
 cousin, and his own paternal relenting feelings, he was 
 persuaded to receive him back to favour. 
 
 CCXCIII. Running from Sin. Prov. iv. 15. ^^ Avoid 
 it, pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away." 
 
 A LITTLE girl, in the days when the conversion of children 
 was not the subject of as much prayer as now, applied for 
 membership in a Baptist Church. " Were you a sinner," 
 asked an old deacon, " before this change of which you 
 now speak?" "Yes, sir," she replied. "Well, are you 
 now a sinner!" "Yes, sir; I feel I am a greater sinner 
 than ever." " Then what change is there in you .-' " " I 
 don't quite know how to explain it," she said ; " but I 
 used to be a sinner running after sin, and now I hope I 
 am a sinner running from sin." They received her, and 
 for years she was a bright and shining light, and now she 
 lives where there is no sin to run from. 
 
 CCXCIV. A Contrast. Prov. i v. 18. " The path of the 
 just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto 
 the perfect day." 
 
 William Wilberforce, in his old age, meeting one of 
 the companions of his youth whom he had not seen for 
 many years, went up to him and said, "You and I, my 
 lord, were well acquainted formerly." "Ah, Mr. Wilber- 
 force!" he replied, cordiall}' ; and then added, "you and I 
 are a great many years older now." "Yes, we are." re- 
 turned the aged disciple of Christ ; " and for my part I can 
 truly say that I do not regret it." " Don't you!" exclaimed 
 the nobleman, with an eager and almost incredulous voice, 
 and a look of wondering dejection. 
 
172 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 How affecting and characteristic the contrast. The aged 
 Christian cheerful, the aged nobleman sad ; the heaven- 
 born child of God hopeful, the high-born cliild of earth 
 desponding ; the one gladdened by the bright and brighten- 
 ing glory of his faith and love, the other dismayed to find 
 light after light going out, and darkness thickening around ; 
 the one rejoicing in the hope of being ever with the Lord, 
 the other trembling at the very thought of the world to 
 come. 
 
 CCXCV. Boys' Temptations. Prov. iv. 27. ''Re- 
 move thy foot fro7n evil." 
 
 Fuller was only a boy of sixteen when he became known 
 as a professed follower of Jesus Christ. The temptations, 
 therefore, which assailed him at the outset, were boys' 
 temptations. For example, as the spring of 1770 came on, 
 the young people of the town met as usual in the evenings 
 for youthful exercises ; and on the occasion of a wake or a 
 feast, there were special "on-goings." In these the young 
 disciple had formerly taken his part. Now, however, he 
 shunned them as injurious to his spiritual "interests;" 
 and he tells us, that to avoid being drawn into them, or 
 being harassed by even the sound of them reaching his 
 ears, he began a practice which he continued with great 
 peace and comfort for several years. " Whenever a feast 
 or holiday occurred, instead of sitting at home by myself, 
 I went to a neighbouring village to visit some Christian 
 friend, and returned when all was over. By this step I 
 was delivered from those mental participations in folly 
 which had given me so much uneasiness. Thus the seasons 
 of temptation became to me times of refresliing from the 
 presence of the Lord." This was, indeed, being more than 
 a conqueror — turning what might have been an occasion 
 of sin into a means of grace. It was a walking in the 
 Spirit, that he might not be seduced into fulfilling the lusts 
 of the flesh. 
 
 CCXCVI. The Wild Huntsman. Prov. v. 22. "His 
 own iniquities shall take the wicked hiffisc/f, and he shall be 
 holden with the cords of his sins. 
 
 The Germans have an ancient mythical legend which, 
 with its fearful imagery, teaches an impressive lesson. A 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 173 
 
 nobleman, with horse and hounds, sets forth on the Sab- 
 bath for a hunting excursion. The church bells, sounding 
 out on the air their invitations to worship, call him in vain, 
 as he passes. On his right a shadowy rider, on a white 
 horse, attending him, pleads with him to desist from his 
 madness ; while on the left a black-visaged companion, 
 bestriding a black steed, urges on the chase. So on he 
 dashes, over highway and field, trampling down harvests 
 and flocks, scoffing at the cries of the husbandman, till 
 invading the sacred seclusion of a holy man, he is doomed 
 to continue the Jiunt for ever. Then suddenly the glare of 
 an unearthly light flashes on field and grove. The lieavens 
 darken with storm-clouds overhead, and the earth opens 
 beneath. Demon fingers reach up from below toward the 
 terrified rider ; while howling hell-hounds spring from 
 yawning abysses to pursue him. So, with ghastly face, 
 ever turned backwai'ri in horror, amidst curses resounding 
 through all the air, he rides from age to age, the race of 
 death. 
 
 It is but a feeble and shadowy image of the meaning of 
 those words of Biblical forewarning: "His own iniquity 
 shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden in 
 the cords of his sins." How often an infatuated worldling 
 is startled for a moment, half resolved to break from the 
 bondage of sin ; then, yielding to the old fascination again, 
 he rushes on, and *' the last state of that man is worse than 
 the first." 
 
 CCXCVII. The Fatal Grasp. Prov. vi. 15. "Wilhout 
 remedy, suddaily shall he be broken" 
 
 Travellers who visit the Falls of Niagara are directed 
 to a spot on the margin of the precipice over the boiling 
 current below, where a gay young lady a few years since 
 lost her life. She was delighted with the wonders of the 
 unrivalled scene ; and ambitious to pluck a flower from a clifi" 
 where no human hand had before ventured, as a memorial 
 of her own daring, she leant over the verge and caught 
 a glimpse of the surging waters far down the battlement of 
 rocks, while fear for a moment held her motionless. But 
 there hung the lovely blossom upon which her heart was 
 fixed, and her arm was outstretched to grasp the beautiful 
 flower. The turf yielded to her pressure, and with a shriek 
 
174 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 she descended like a fallen star to the rocky shore, and 
 was borne away gasping in deatli. 
 
 Every hour life's sands are sliding from beneath in- 
 cautious feet ; and, with sin's fatal flower in the unconscious 
 hand, the trifler goes to his doom. 
 
 CCXCVIII. The Ochre Spring. Prov. vi, 27, 28. ''Can 
 a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned 1 
 Can one go upon hot coals, and his feet not be burned ?" 
 
 On the moors of Yorkshire there is a stream of water, 
 which goes by the name of the " Ochre Spring." It rises 
 high up in the hills, and runs on bright and sparkling for 
 a short distance, when it suddenly becomes a dark and 
 muddy yellow. What is the reason of this ? Why, it has 
 been passing through a bed of ochre, and so it flows on 
 for miles, thick and sluggish, useless and unpleasant. The 
 world is full of such " beds of ochre." Fairs and races, 
 sinful companions, bad books — all such things are just like 
 beds of ochre ; connection with them is pollution. 
 
 CCXCIX. Purity of Character. Prov. vii. i. ''My 
 son, keep my words, atid lay up my com?nandme/its 7vith thee." 
 
 There grows a bloom and beauty, over the beauty of the 
 plum and apricot, more exquisite than the fruit itself — a 
 soft, delicate flush that overspreads its blushing cheek. 
 Now, if you strike your hand" over that, it is gone for ever ; 
 for it never grows but once. The flower that hangs in the 
 morning impearled with dew, arrayed as a queenly woman 
 never was arrayed with jewels : once shake it so that the 
 beads roll off, and you may sprinkle water over it as you 
 please, yet it can never be made again what it was when 
 the dew fell silently on it from heaven. On a frosty morn- 
 ing you may see panes of glass covered with landscapes — 
 mountains, lakes, and trees, blended in a beautiful, fan- 
 tastic picture. Now, lay your hand upon the glass, and by 
 a scratch of your finger, or by the warmth of your palm, 
 all the delicate tracery will be obliterated. So there is in 
 youth a beauty and purity of character which, when once 
 touched and defiled, can never be restored — a fringe more 
 delicate than frostwork, and which, when torn and broken, 
 will never be re-embroidered. He who has spotted and 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 173 
 
 soiled his garments in youtli, though he may seek to make 
 them wliite ap^ain, can never wholly do it, even were he to 
 wash them with his tears. When a young man leaves his 
 father's house, with the blessing of a mother's tears still 
 wet upon his brow, if he once lose that early purity of 
 character, it is a spot that he can never make whole again. 
 Such is the consequence of crime. Its effects cannot be 
 eradicated ; it can only be forgiven. 
 
 CCC. A Young Man Void of Understanding. 
 
 Prov. vii. 7. '■'■ 1 discerned among the youths a young man 
 void of understanding. 
 
 The late Rev. Dr. Bedell, father of Bishop Bedell, of Ohio, 
 was a very excellent Episcopal preacher in the city of 
 Philadelphia. He was full of love for Christ and the souls 
 of men, and under his preaching many were turned to 
 righteousness who are now stars in his crown of rejoicing. 
 As the crowd in his church one evening were waiting for 
 the sermon, and the glowing-hearted minister stood in the 
 holy place ready to begin, a young stranger entered the 
 door of the church just in time to catch the words of this 
 text. He was a wild, thoughtless, wicked youth, who had 
 been invited to go and hear Dr. Bedell. But he had re- 
 fused, with the profane remark that he would not go to 
 church to hear Jesus Christ himself. This evening he was 
 walking by the church, and an impulse, sudden and irre- 
 sistible, urged him in. As he stood inside of the door. Dr. 
 Bedell announced as his text, " I discerned among the 
 youths a young man void of understanding." 
 
 The text was a sermon. It was the word of God, 
 sharper than a two-edged sword. It discerned the thoughts 
 and intents of his heart. The Spirit of God sent it home 
 to his conscience. He had been an unbeliever and despiser 
 of the gospel ; but the eyes of his mind were opened. He 
 had been a profligate ; his sins were set in order before 
 him. He was struck through as with a dart, when the 
 folly and madness of his past life were revealed m the light 
 of the gospel. The faithful preacher unfolded the exceed- 
 ing foolishness of a life of sensual pleasure, idleness, 
 frivolity, and the inevitable end of such a career. It is 
 recorded of this young man that he became a regular 
 
176 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 attendant on the ministry of Dr. Bedell, a member of his 
 Church, and a useful Christian. 
 
 CCCI. A Pious Son. Prov. viii. 17. "/ love them 
 that love Me ; and those that seek Me early shall find Me." 
 
 This incident is found in the life of Reginald Heber, Lord 
 Bishop of Calcutta. " One day when Reginald was at the 
 age of fourteen, his mother missed her ' Companion to the 
 Altar.' Search was made for it among all the servants, but 
 it was nowhere to be found. After three weeks' fruitless 
 inquiry, it was given up as lost, till at length she happened 
 to mention it to Reginald, who immediately brought it to 
 her, saying it had deeply interested him ; and he begged 
 permission to accompany his mother to the altar when the 
 sacrament was next administered. Penetrated with grati- 
 tude to God for giving her so pious a son, Mrs. fleber 
 burst into tears of joy as she cheerfully assented to his 
 request. 
 
 CCCII. A Successful Life. Prov. x. 7. ^^ The memory 
 of the just is blessed.^' 
 
 Early in life the late Earl Cairns' interest in spiritual 
 things began, and his love for the Bible and the means 
 of grace. There was all through his life a gradual 
 growth in grace, " going and growing " " from strength to 
 strength ; " " the path of the just is as the shining light, 
 that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." When 
 a little boy, he wrote for the Church Missionary Gleaner. 
 One treatise on Psalm xiv. was considered very remarkable, 
 in which he went into details on the spiritual meaning of 
 the verses. When twenty-three he always rose at four 
 a.m., in order to give time to God's Word and prayer 
 before his legal work at six. For years after his marriage 
 he conducted family prayers at 7.45 a.m. His invariable 
 rule was to rise one hour and a half before that time to 
 read the Bible and pray. This early rising continued 
 during his busy life at the Bar, and in the House of 
 Commons, though often not more than two hours in bed. 
 What a lesson this is to us all ! Surely this was the secret 
 of his successful life, that he would allow nothing to come 
 between him and God, and would not lose the quiet time 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 177 
 
 alone with his Father in the early morning. His Hfe \va« 
 a life of prayer and dependence upon God. Ikfore any 
 work which required more than the usual effort and wisdom 
 he spent time in special prajcr. He never went to a 
 Cabinet Council or spoke on any important matter without 
 first waiting upon God in private and earnest prayer. 
 
 In his dying hours he showed the power which the Gospel 
 exercised upon his soul. He conversed with those around 
 him up to the last moment almost, in a calm and peaceful 
 tone, indicating the depth of his trust in Christ as his 
 Saviour. 
 
 CCCIII. Acorn Shells. Prov. x. 4. ''The hand of the 
 diligent niaketh richJ' 
 
 On many parts of our coasts, between high- water and low- 
 water marks, the rocks and stones are to be found encrusted 
 all over with a peculiar little shell-fish. It has no power, 
 like the limpet and other such creatures, to move about 
 from place to place in search of food, at least in this the 
 perfect stage of its existence ; but wherever it first settles 
 and begins to grow, there it must remain rooted to the spot. 
 But like every other living thing, it waits not in vain upon 
 God, who, in accordance with the nature and habits He 
 has given it, sends it also its meat in due season. 
 
 When the tide is out and the rocks are left dry, the 
 little acorn shell is closed and motionless ; but when the 
 advancing water begins to wash over it, immediately the 
 jointed shell is opened, and rapidly and regularly the little 
 creature casts forth its silver net into the tide, seeking 
 diligently to gather the provision which the open and 
 liberal hand of the great Creator brings within the reach of 
 the tiniest of His creatures. 
 
 It is a beautiful sight on a calm summer day, to look 
 down through the still, clear water, on the side of a rock 
 covered with acorn shells, at the busy little hands waving 
 and grasping in all directions with the utmost grace and 
 agility. 
 
 CCCIV. Waiting upon God. Prov. xi. 18. ''To him 
 that soiveth righteousness, shall be a sure reivard." 
 
 A Christian minister was holding a revival meeting in 
 
 N 
 
178 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Edinburgh several years ago, when the president of an 
 infidel society came into the place and tried not only to 
 ridicule what was going on, but to prevent persons coming 
 forward to ask prayer. The minister went up to the man 
 and said, " Are you a Christian ? " He replied, " No, I am 
 not." "Do you want to be a Christian.''" The man 
 gruffly answered, " No, I do not." The minister was 
 touched, and affectionately said, " Well, shall we kneel down 
 and pray together?" The man exclaimed, "What is the 
 good? I do not believe in prayer!" The minister gently 
 replied, " Well, but allow me to kneel down and pray for 
 you." "You may do so if you like, but it will be of no 
 benefit, for I do not believe in it." The minister knelt 
 down and prayed, and after prayer the infidel president 
 said, " I do not feel any different." The minister replied 
 as he left him, " Ah, wait a while ! God sometimes takes 
 His own time." 
 
 Two years afterwards the minister met the same man, 
 who exclaimed, " You see, I am just the same ; I am not 
 different; your prayer was no use!" The minister said, 
 " Ah, my friend, we will still wait upon God ! " Well, some 
 time afterwards, the president of the infidel society was 
 convinced of his error, and entered a religious meeting, and 
 when it was asked, " Does any person present desire our 
 prayers .^ " he stood up, and in heart-broken tones desired 
 them to pray to God for his soul. The same day he gave 
 his heart to God, and became a devout and exemplary 
 Christian. 
 
 CCCV. Dynamite. Prov. xi. 19. "• He that ^ursueth 
 
 evil pursueth it to his otvn death." 
 
 An American minister, towards the close of his sermon, 
 introduced a very powerful and dramatic illustration. 
 "Down by Hell Gate" (in allusion to some well-known 
 place where certain blasting was to be carried out), "the 
 rock is tunnelled, and deep under the solid masses over 
 which men walk with such careless security, there are now 
 laid trains of explosive powder. All seems so safe and 
 firm outwardly, it is hardly possible to imagine that those 
 solid masses will ever be shaken ; but the time will come 
 when a tiny spark will fire the whok train, and the moun- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 179 
 
 tain will be in a moment rent in the air and torn to atoms. 
 There are men," he said, looking round — and a kind of 
 shudder went through the assembly — " there are men here 
 who are tunnelled, mined ; their time will come, not to-day 
 or to-morrow, not for months or years perhaps, but it will 
 come; in a moment, from an unforeseen quarter, a trifling 
 incident, their reputations will be blown to atoms, and what 
 they have sown they will reap — -just that. There is no 
 dynamite like men's lusts and passions." 
 
 CCCVI. No Deaths from Benevolence. Prov. 
 
 xi. 24. " There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth ; and 
 there is that witholdcth more than is meet, but it tendeth to 
 poverty." 
 
 An eminent layman, in making a platform missionary 
 speech said, " I have heard of Churches starving out from 
 a saving spirit ; but I have never heard of one dying of 
 benevolence. And if I could hear of one such, I would 
 make a pilgrimage to it, by night, and in that quiet solitude, 
 with the moon shining and the aged elm waving, I would 
 put my hands on the moss-clad ruins, and gazing on the 
 venerable scene would say, " Blessed are the dead w^ho die 
 in the Lord." 
 
 CCCVII. A Small Offering. Prov. xi. 24. ''There is 
 that witholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poi'erty." 
 
 Dr. Hall tells the story of a Scotchman who sung most 
 piously the hymn, — 
 
 " Were the whole reahn of nature mine, 
 That were a present far too small," 
 
 and all through the singing was fumbling in his pocket 
 to make sure of the smallest piece of silver for the con- 
 tribution-box. 
 
 CCCVIII. The Widow and the Sovereign. Prov. 
 xi. 24. " There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth." 
 
 At a missionary meeting held soon after the accession of 
 our present Queen, one of the speakers related an anecdote 
 concerning the Duchess of Kent and her royal daughter, 
 
l8o OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 which well illustrates how comfort and profit may attend 
 giving liberally to the Lord. About fifty }'ears ago there 
 was a lighthouse on the southern coast, which was kept by 
 a certain godly widow, who, not knowing how otherwise 
 to aid the missionary cause, resolved that during the 
 summer season she would place in the box the total of one 
 day's gratuities received from visitors. Among the callers 
 on a particular day was a lady attired as a widow accom- 
 panied by a little girl ; and it appears that the two widows, 
 drawn together as it were by common sympathy, conversed 
 on their bereavements, tears mingling with their words. 
 On leaving, the lady left a sovereign with her humble 
 friend, and that day was the one set apart for placing all 
 receipts into the missionary-box ! The widow was thrown 
 into a state of perplexity, poverty seeming to plead on the 
 one hand, while her pledged word confronted her on the 
 other. After thinking about the thing for some time, she 
 put half a crown in the box ; but on retiring to rest, found 
 conscience sufficiently lively to deprive her of sleep. To 
 obtain relief, she now rose, took back the silver and sur- 
 rendered the gold, after which rest returned to her eyelids, 
 and in the morning she felt comforted and refreshed. The 
 matt^ occasioned no further trouble, but a i^w days after- 
 wards the widow received a franked letter containing ;!^20 
 from the elder lady above mentioned, and £'^ from the 
 younger; the first turning out to have been the Duchess 
 of Kent, and the other the Princess Victoria, who now 
 occupies the British throne. 
 
 CCCIX. How to Win Souls. Prov. xi. 30. ''He 
 
 that wiimdh souls is wise." 
 
 Two clergymen were settled in their youth in contiguous 
 parishes. The congregation of the one had become very 
 much broken and scattered, while that of the other remained 
 large and strong. At a ministerial gathering, Dr. A. said 
 to Dr. B., " Brother, how has it happened that while I have 
 laboured as diligently as you have, and preached better 
 sermons, and more of them, my parish has been scattered 
 to the winds, and yours remains strong and unbroken .'' " 
 Dr. B. facetiously replied, " Oh, I'll tell you, brother. 
 When you go fishing, you just get a great rough pole for a 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 handle, to which you attach a large cod line and a great 
 hook, and twice as much bait as the fish can swallow. 
 With these you dash up to the brook and throw in your 
 hook with, ' There, bite, you dogs ! ' Thus you scare away 
 all the fish. When I go fishing, I get a little switching 
 pole, a small line, and just such a hook and bait as the fish 
 can swallow. Then I creep up to the brook and gently 
 slip them in, and I twitch them out till my basket is full." 
 
 Said the poet Cowper in a letter to Rev. J. Newton, 
 " No man was ever scolded out of his sins. The heart, 
 corrupt as it is, and because it is so, grows angry if it be 
 not treated with some management and good manners, and 
 scolds again." 
 
 CCCX. Kindness to Animals. Prov. xii. lo. *^ A 
 ru^hteous man rej;ai'deth the life of his beast ; but the tender 
 mercies of the ivicked are cruel .^^ 
 
 Francis of Assisi was a passionate lover of nature. Each 
 living thing was a brother or sister to him in a sense where 
 almost ceased to be figurative. Birds, insects, fishes wich 
 his friends and even his congregations ; doves were his 
 especial favourites. He gathered them into his convents, 
 and taught them to eat out of his hand, and laid them in 
 his bosom. " My dear sisters," he exclaimed to some 
 starlings who chattered round him as he preached, " you 
 have talked long enough : it is my turn now. Listen to 
 the word of your Creator, and be quiet !" His biographer, 
 Bonaventura, gives the very sermon addressed by the Saint 
 to this audience. " My little sisters," it began, "you should 
 love and praise the Author of your beings who has clothed 
 you with plumage and given you wings to fly when you^ 
 will. You were the first created of all animals ; you sow 
 not, neither do you reap. Without any care of your own 
 He gives you all. Therefore give praise to your bountiful 
 Creator ! 
 
 The well-known instinct by which animals discover and 
 attach themselves to their rational friends was exhibited 
 whenever Francis came abroad. The leveret did not seek 
 to escape his notice. The half-frozen bees crawled to him 
 in winter time to be fed. A lamb followed him even into 
 the city of Rome. The wild falcon wheeled and fluttered 
 round him. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCXI. A Wise Father. Prov. xiii. i. "■A wise son 
 heareth his father's instrieciio?i." 
 
 Mr. Haweis, in "Winged Words," counsels fathers to 
 make friends of their children, and relates this anecdote : 
 " A young man said to me the other day, ' Father's old- 
 fashioned ; he doesn't know how money's made now. In 
 his day people went slow in order not to lose. Now we 
 go fast and win.' 
 
 " ' So,' I said, ' I am glad to hear that ; but are you quite 
 sure ?' and the young fellow laughed and went away. 
 Some weeks after I met the father; he said, 'John has 
 lost me ;£'i,ooo.' 'How is that.''' 'He has had his 
 lesson, but I have had to pay for it,' said the father. ' He 
 thought he knew better than I did, and could make money 
 fast : " Give me a thousand, and I will turn it over in a 
 week, father." " My dear boy," I said, " I saw through 
 this scheme twenty years ago ! " But John would not be 
 convinced. So I thought — well, I can afford to lose;^i,ooo, 
 and the lesson may be worth more than that to John. So 
 I gave him the money, and said, "John, you will lose it." 
 A week later he comes to me : " Father, it's gone ! all 
 gone !" and he sits down and breaks out sobbing. He 
 thought I should be very angry, but I only said, " I'm 
 right glad to hear it," and I said no more. John has learnt 
 his lesson, and is not going to speculate any more.' " 
 
 CCCXII. Slow to Wrath. Prov. xiv. 29. "He that is 
 slotv to wrath is of great understanding : but he that is hasty 
 of spirit exalteth folly." 
 
 *'GiACOMO Benincasa, the father of that fairest of pre- 
 Reformation Saints, St. Catherine of Sienna, was a just 
 and upright man, ruling his spirit in the fear of God, and 
 with a temper as even as a calm. If he saw any of his 
 household vexed and jarred, he would say cheerfully, 
 ' Now then, don't put yourself out, or give way to unkind- 
 ness, and God will bless you." And once when brought to 
 the brink of ruin by an enemy, he still preserved his sweet- 
 ness of spirit, and would calm his wife's complaints by 
 saying, " I.et him alone, dear ; let him alone, and God will 
 bless you, and show him his error," 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 183 
 
 CCCXIII. Impatience. Prov. xiv. 29. '■'■He tJiat is slow 
 to unatJi is of i:;reat understa/iding : but he that is hasty of 
 spirit exa/tc'th folly." 
 
 Rev. Thomas Scott, having gone on board a packet on 
 one occasion when it did not sail at all punctually to the 
 time which had been named, sat down to read in the 
 cabin. A gentleman who had expressed much impatience 
 and displeasure at the delay, at length addressed himself 
 to him, observing that his quietness was quite provoking ; 
 that he seemed ready to put up with an}thing. His reply 
 was : " Sir, I dare say I shall get to the end of our voyage 
 just as soon as you will !" 
 
 CCCXIV. A Soft Answer. Prov. xv. i. '■^ A soft ansiver 
 tiirneth away wrath ; but grievous words stir up anger." 
 
 A Little Sister of the Poor, who went about begging for 
 money and broken food and cast-off clothing for the needy, 
 one day asked help from one who was rich and by position 
 at least a gentleman. He had a great dislike to being 
 asked for alms, and after roughly refusing her, at last even 
 struck the Sister. She only said gently, " That was for 
 myself; now won't you give me something for my poor.''" 
 And the man was so ashamed of himself that he gave her 
 a liberal subscription. 
 
 CCCXV. The Painted Eye. Prov. xv. 3. ''The eyes of 
 the Lord are iii every place beholding the evil and the good." 
 
 Some years ago there lived in an old-fashioned square on 
 the " south side " of Edinburgh, a widow lady, who, in 
 order to eke out her slender means of subsistence, let part 
 of her house to lodgers. Her husband, who had been a 
 portrait-painter of some note, had but lately died, and left 
 her a nicely-furnished house, though but little means to 
 support it. 
 
 A few sketches of his art still remained, and among 
 others which she highly valued was a beautifully-painted 
 eye. At the period in which the painter lived, it was not 
 an uncommon thing among a few eccentric persons to 
 
1 84 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 have one of their eyes copied, and presented to a friend 
 as a token of affection. 
 
 The painting in question was a remark-able production ; 
 the eye being so exquisitely painted, that to an imaginative 
 beholder it seemed to reflect his own feelings, and to re- 
 spond to them in sorrow or in joy ; to flash with anger, 
 or beam with tenderness. 
 
 In course of time it happened that a young man, sadly 
 given to evil courses, became the tenant of the widow's 
 parlour where hung the painted eye. A year or two 
 previously he had left his distant home to attend the uni- 
 versity, where he was now studying for the medical pro- 
 fession. The parting counsel of his father had been, to 
 remember at all times, and under all circumstances, that 
 the eye of God was upon him. He promised, and at first 
 sincerely intended to let this thought regulate his conduct ; 
 but trusting to his own strength, and meeting with com- 
 panions whose love of pleasure and sinful ways too well 
 suited the natural corruption of his unrenewed heart, he 
 plunged recklessly into excess of riot, and almost succeeded 
 in banishing from his mind the recollection that there was 
 a God above, to whom all his ways were known. Judge, 
 then, of his discomfiture and annoyance to see an eye 
 gazing at him from the wall of his new chamber ! He 
 tried, but in vain, to hide from its view by sitting with his 
 back towards that part of the room. But the conscious- 
 ness that it was there, that it was fixed upon him, so 
 disturbed his mind that he could not rest. Remorse and 
 terror seized upon him, and with a desperate effort he 
 rushed to the picture and turned its face to the wall ! 
 
 The good widow, little surmising that a picture she so 
 highly valued could be in anyway distasteful to her lodger, 
 duly turned it round again ; and much she wondered when 
 the curious accident occurred again and again ; for the 
 unfortunate youth tried in vain to bear the sight of the 
 eye, which now seemed to flash with anger, or again, to 
 gaze upon him with tender reproach. He could not bear 
 it. But he hardened his heart, and finally quitted his 
 lodging. 
 
 How is it with thee ^ Does the remembrance that 
 God's eye is ever upon tl:ee rejoice thy heart and influence 
 thy conduct in everything ? Art thou working as under 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 185 
 
 the eye of thy Master, who sceth in secret, and will reward 
 thee openly ? 
 
 CCCXVI. A Word in a Railway Carriage. Prov. 
 XV. 23. " A word spoken m due season^ how good is it f 
 
 A RETIRED naval officer was once travelling by rail in 
 Lancashire. When the train stopped at some station, a 
 number of cattle-dealers and drovers entered the carriage. 
 They were all excited, and it was soon evident tiiat one 
 of the company was being made a laughing-stock by the 
 rest, and at last he was irritated, and uttered some oaths. 
 The officer put his hand on his shoulder, and said, " Sir, 
 you must not swear." The man looked at him and said, 
 "And pray who made you, sir, a conductor over this 
 carriage?" " No one," replied the officer ; " but I am your 
 friend, and you will say so before night." " Indeed I 
 won't," retorted the an<^ry man ; " there's many a bad one 
 that goes to meetings." "Too true," replied the ofncer, 
 " but there's never a swearer that goes to heaven." This 
 caused deep thought, and little more was said ; but when 
 the train stopped, the man, much softened, took the ofncer 
 by the hand, and with real feeling said, " I don't like ye 
 the less for what ye said to me." 
 
 CCCXVII. The Word in Season. Prov. xv. 23. "^ 
 
 word spoken ui due season, how good is it !" 
 
 A Pennsylvania family, which need not be named, con- 
 sisted of father, mother, and two little girls — the elder, Ida, 
 in her ninth year, and Katie, a little over six. The mother 
 had found an interest in Christ four or five months before. 
 Being advised by her pastor to institute family prayer with 
 her two children, she did so every evening. The children 
 usually prayed as well as the mother, and soon satisfied 
 their friends that they had met a spiritual change. Little 
 Katie became deeply interested in her father, and one 
 evening, when about to engage in family devotion, entreated 
 him to come and kneel with them in prayer. He genily 
 replied, " No, Katie ; I will lie here on the lounge, and you 
 can pray for me." And they did pray, each in her own 
 simple way, " Lord, help papa, and make him a good man." 
 Shortly after that, when at the table, little Katie said, 
 
iS6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 " Papa, you must pray before you eat ;" but he replied, 
 " Katie, dear, I don't know how to pray." Then she went 
 to him, and putting his hands together in the chikiish 
 form, told him to pray, "Our Father who art in heaven." 
 By this time he was pretty well broken down, as most any 
 father would have been. He soon became deeply in earnest 
 in seeking Christ, and one day while he was praying, Katie 
 came, and putting her arms around his neck said, " Papa, 
 can't you love Jesus.?" One night the father, not being 
 able to sleep, went downstairs to pray. This movement 
 awakened Katie, and she followed him, and putting her 
 arms around his neck, prayed for him most tenderly. With 
 the aid of so loving and faithful a helper, he soon realized 
 a change. He found his Saviour, and openly united with 
 the Church. Who can estimate the joy of that household, 
 and what an illustration it furnishes of the reward which 
 comes from saying the " Word in season " ! 
 
 CCCXVIII. Greedy of Gain. Prov. xv. 27. ''He that 
 
 is greedy of gain troubleth his 07mi house." 
 
 A YOUNG man once picked up a sovereign lying in the 
 road. Ever afterwards, as he walked along, he kept his 
 eye steadfastly on the ground, in hopes of finding another. 
 And, in the course of his long life, he did pick up at 
 different times a good amount of gold and silver. But all 
 these days, as he was looking for them, he saw not that 
 the heaven was bright above him, and nature was beautiful 
 around. He never once allowed his eye to look up from 
 the mud and filth in which he sought the treasure ; and, 
 when he died a rich old man, he only knew this fair earth 
 of ours as a dirty road to pick up money as we walk along. 
 
 CCCXIX. Preaching and Praying. Prov. xv. 29. 
 " He heareth the prayer of the righteous.'" 
 
 There is a legend to this effect : A certain preacher, 
 whose sermons converted men by scores, received a reve- 
 lation from heaven that not one of the conversions was 
 owing to his talents or eloquence, but all to the prayers 
 of an illiterate lay brother, who sat on the pulpit steps, 
 pleading all the time for the success of the sermon. It 
 may, in the all-revealing day, be so with us. We may 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 187 
 
 discover, after having laboured lonf^ and wearily in 
 preaching, that all the honour bclonc^s to another builder, 
 whose prayers were gold, silver, and precious stones, 
 while our sermonisings being apart from prayer, were but 
 hay and stubble. 
 
 CCCXX. A Last Farewell. Prov. xv. 33. ''Before 
 /lo/wiir is liuiiiilityP 
 
 On the occasion of a Welsh minister's death, Mr. Matthew 
 Henry preached the funeral sermon, and thus describes 
 the heavenly frame in which he closed his life on earth : 
 " His solemn farewell to his children and pu[)ils, the good 
 counsel he gave them, the blessing with which he blessed 
 them, and the testimony he bore with his dying lips to 
 the good wa)'s of God wherein he had walked, I hope 
 they will never forget, and that particularly we should re- 
 member and practise the last thing he recommended — 
 humility. ' It is,' said he, * one of the brightest orna- 
 ments of a young minister to be humble.' The words of 
 God, which he had made his songs in the house of his 
 pilgrimage, were his delightful entertainment when his 
 tabernacle was in taking down." 
 
 CCCXXI. A Bishop's Veneration for White- 
 field. Prov. xvi. 7. " JVhen a man's rvays please the Lord, 
 Me viaketh eve?i his enemies to be at peace with him.'' 
 
 The Countess of Huntingdon was converted through the 
 means of her sister, Lady Margaret Hastings, who herself 
 had been converted through the preaching of the lay 
 Methodists. 
 
 The Countess sent a messnge to the Wesleys, avowing 
 her great change, and identifying herself with their 
 religious movements. Her husband, the Earl of Hunt- 
 ingdon, an excellent and pious man, was concerned at tliis, 
 and recommended her to converse with Dr. Benson, Bishop 
 of Gloucester, his former tutor. The Bishop cautioned her 
 against "Evangelical Methodism;" but the Countess 
 pressed him so hard with the Articles and Homilies of his 
 own Church, that at length he got angry, and abruptly 
 left her, expressing his regret that he had ever laid hands 
 upon George Whitefield, to whom he attributed this 
 
iS8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 change. " My Lord," she replied, " mark my words : 
 when you come upon your dying bed, that will be one of 
 the few ordinations you will reflect upon with compla- 
 cency." The prediction was singularly verified ; for when 
 near his death, the Bisliop sent ten guineas to Whitefield, 
 as an expression of his great veneration for his character 
 and work, with a request to be remembered by him in his 
 prayers. 
 
 CCCXXII. An Enemy turned into a Friend. Prov. 
 
 xvi. 7. " When a man's 7vays please the Lord, LLe makcth 
 even his enemies to be at peace with him." 
 
 During Luther's journey, a noble knight of the vicinity, 
 learning that he was to tarry at a certain place, and 
 yearning for the honours and emoluments that would 
 accrue could he be safely caught up and transported to 
 Rome, resolved to hazard the attempt. He ordered his 
 armed retinue to prepare hastily, for there was no time to 
 be lost, the aspiring noble being urged and commended 
 to the task by his confessor, who assured him that he 
 would be doing a good work, and would save many souls. 
 He set out at early dawn, making his way along the 
 picturesque Berg-Strasse, or mountain road, that skirts the 
 forest of the Odenvvald, between Darmstadt and Heidel- 
 berg. Arriving at the gates of Miltenberg in the evening, 
 he found the city illuminated, and the town itself full of 
 people, who had come thither to hear and see Luther. 
 
 More indignant than ever was the noble knight ; indig- 
 nation grew to rage when, arriving at his hotel, the host 
 greeted him, "Well, well, Sir Count, has Luther brought 
 you here too? Pity you are too late. You should have 
 heard him. The people cannot cease praising him." In 
 no mood tor eulogy, the knight sought the privacy of his 
 room. Awakened in the morning by the matin bell of 
 the chapel, sleep had assuaged his ire, and his thoughts 
 were at home, where he had left an infant daughter at the 
 point of death. As he drew aside his curtain, he saw the 
 flicker of a candle in the window opposite, and waiting a 
 moment heard a deep, manly voice utter tliC words, " In 
 the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 
 Ghost. Amen." He heard the voice further continuing 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 in a stronf]f, fervent petition for the whole Christian Church, 
 and tlie victory of the holy gospel over sin and the world. 
 
 Bcin<T a devout man, his interest was aroused, and 
 donninij his armour, he inquired of the landlord who that 
 earnest man was that he heard across the street. " That 
 earnest man," responded the landlord, " is the arch heretic 
 Luther himself. Has your grace a message for him ? " 
 "Ay," said the knight, "but I will deliver it with my own 
 lips," and with a dubious shake of the head he crossed 
 the street, entered the house, and in a moment stood 
 before the object of his search. Luther instinctively rose 
 from his chair, surprised and not a little disconcerted by 
 the sudden appearance of a stalwart armed knight, perhaps 
 having an unpleasant suspicion of his errand. "What is 
 the object of this visit.''" inquired Luther. Twice and 
 thrice he repeated his question before received a reply. 
 At length the knight, having recovered somewhat from 
 the spell upon him, said, " Sir, you are far better than L 
 God forgive me for intending to harm you. I came here 
 to make you a prisoner ; you have made a prisoner of me 
 instead. It is impossible for a man to pray as you pray 
 to be an enemy of the holy Church, a heretic." " God be 
 praised," said Luther, now relieved from his suspicions ; 
 ' it is His word and Spirit that has subdued you, not mine, 
 though I may have been chosen to bring His word to honour 
 in Christendom. Go now your way, therefore, in peace, my 
 lord. He that hath begun a good work in you will per- 
 form it to Christ's coming. If it be God's will, you shall 
 yet behold miracles ; how the Lord will break many swords 
 like yours, and cut the spear in sunder, as He has to-day." 
 Convinced and confirmed, the knight lost no time in 
 making his way homeward, attended by his retinue, now 
 still more curious to know tlie object of this hasty expedi- 
 tion. Arriving at the bedside of his daughter, he found her 
 now convalescent and out of danger, and falling on his 
 knees he thanked God for all tjiat had happened. A few 
 years later, when Luther confessed his faith before Charles 
 v., among the assembled nobles who stood on Luther's 
 side was this knight, who had once thought to overthrow 
 and destroy him. 
 
Igo OLD TESTAMENT AhECDOTES. 
 
 CCCXXIII. A Kind Tone of Voice. Prov. xvi. 24. 
 " Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, sivcet to the soul, and 
 health to the bones.''' 
 
 The law of kindness may be violated in the tones of the 
 voice. " Not so much what my mother said to me, as the 
 way she said it," was once remarked by a despairing young 
 man, who had sadly strayed from the precepts of the 
 parental roof " Oh," said he, as the tears coursed down his 
 cheeks, "the way my mother said that last thing to me !" 
 Whitefield says, " I carefully sought out those acceptable 
 tones that were like a spell upon the heart, even when the 
 words were unremembered." So wonderfully modulated 
 was Whitefield's voice, that Garrick said "he could make 
 men either laugh or cry by pronouncing the word Mesopo- 
 tamia." 
 
 " Mother," said a little girl, " I like our preacher when he 
 comes to see us, but I don't like to hear him preach." On 
 being asked why, she said, " His preaching sounded like 
 scolding all the time." 
 
 CCCXXIV. The Ways of Death. Prov. xvi. 25. 
 " There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end 
 thereof are the ways of death." 
 
 On the Lake of Geneva there stands a gloomy castle, where 
 prisoners used to be confined, and in it there was a dark 
 dungeon, with a dreadful staircase called the " oitblieltes.'" 
 Sometimes the keeper went to a poor prisoner, and told 
 him that now he was to obtain his life and liberty, and 
 requested him to follow him. The prisoner went along 
 thankful and glad, with visions of home and happiness. 
 He reached the staircase, and was told to go down, step by 
 step, in the darkness, that he might reach the castle gate, 
 and so be free. Alas ! it was a broken stair. A few steps 
 down into the darkness, and the next step he took he 
 found no footing, but fell down fifty or sixty feet, to be 
 dashed to pieces amongst rocks, and then to have his 
 mangled body buried in the lake. 
 
 CCCXXV. Christian Forbearance. Prov. xvi. 32. 
 " He that is sloiv to anger is better than the migbty." 
 
 In Mungo Park's relation of his travels in Africa, he gives 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 191 
 
 a striking example of the good effects of Christian forbear- 
 ance, even among uncivilized men. He says after having 
 passed through the greatest distresses, he arrived at the 
 village of Song, where the people refused to receive him 
 within the gate, though the country was infested with 
 lions. Here Mungo Park with much difficulty collected 
 grass for his horse, and lay down under a tree near the 
 g.ite ; but being aroused by the roar of a lion, he climbed 
 the tree for safety. The inhabitants, who having believed 
 him to be a Moor, would not admit him, notwithstanding 
 the danger that threatened him, till midnight, when, 
 convinced of their error, they opened the gate, declaring 
 that no Moor ever waited long at the gate of any city 
 without cursing all the inhabitants. 
 
 CCCXXVI. A Good Wife is from the Lord. 
 
 Prov. xix. 4. '•'■A p?-udent wife is from the Lord." 
 
 Solomon says, a prudent or good wife is from the Lord, 
 and not a few have experienced the truth of his assertion. 
 One reason why so many fail to get good wives is, that 
 they do not ask the Lord for them. They follow their 
 own impulses, or the suggestions of interest, and do not 
 ask counsel of God and commit their way unto Him. In 
 the most important of all earthly matters they take 
 counsel of their feelings, and lean to their own understand- 
 ings. 
 
 Thomas Shepherd, the first pastor of Cambridge, and 
 one of the most godly and useful of the New England 
 fathers, acted in accordance with Solomon's doctrine. 
 '• Now, about this time, I had a great desire to change my 
 estate by marriage ; and I had been praying three years 
 before, that the Lord would carry me to such a place where 
 I might have a meet yoke-fellow." 
 
 He was at length invited to take up his abode with Sir 
 Richard Dai ley, where his labours were blessed to the 
 conversion of most of the members of the family, one of 
 whom in due time became his yoke-fellow. "And when 
 He had fitted a wife for me," says Mr. S., *' He then gave 
 me her, who was a most sweet, humble woman, full of 
 Christ, and a very discerning Christian, a wife who was 
 most incomparably loving to me, and every way amiable 
 
192 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 and holy, and endued with a very sweet spirit of prayer. 
 And thus the Lord answered my desires." 
 
 Men may smile at the guileless simplicity with which 
 he tells his story, but they would do well to imitate his 
 example. 
 
 CCCXXVII. Slothful Habits, Prov. xix. 15. ''Sloth- 
 fulness casteth into a deep sleepy and an idle soul shall suffer 
 hunger.'^ 
 
 The following is an anecdote of a venerated servant of 
 God — Charles Simeon : When I was an undergraduate, I 
 remember hearing a friend of his relate this anecdote of 
 him : " We were sitting," he said, "in his room at college, 
 three or four of us round his table. Dinner finished, we 
 entered into conversation. Charles Simeon led with that 
 wonderful power of conversation which so distinguished him. 
 Turning round to one of us, he said, ' Will you have a nut 
 to crack ? ' Thinking, for the moment, he referred to the 
 fruit lying on the table, some indefinite reply was made, 
 when he remarked with a smile, ' Oh, you do not under- 
 stand ; I want you to crack a spiritual nut. The nut is a 
 very small one ; it is a single word ; you will find it in the 
 third chapter of Philippians. I will read the passage to you, 
 and will you point out the emphatic word in the verse, 
 ' Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded : 
 and if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall re- 
 veal even this unto you.' They all agreed that ' thus' was 
 the nut, the emphatic word, when he replied, ' Well, which 
 of you can crack it t ' One said one thing, and another 
 said another. At last he replied, * It seems to me to have 
 a threefold kernel ; let me try and crack the nut, and give 
 you the kernel. As I read the whole chapter, I find 
 three prominent thoughts running through it, and they 
 are all summed up in that little word ' tJins.' Here are the 
 three — ' No lofty thoughts, no worldly ambition, no slothful 
 habits. That is the kernel,' he says. Then he struck out 
 into a strain of conversation upon the subject, becoming 
 more and more energetic as he enlarged upon it, until he 
 came at last to the words, ' no slothful habits,' when he 
 sprang to his feet with the energy that characterised the 
 good old man, and ran round the room, as he said, ' Why, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 193 
 
 the Apostle talks about running-, not creeping, or trifling. 
 Some of us go creeping to iieaven, and the wonder is that 
 we ever get there. St. Paul speaks of himself as pressing 
 towards the mark. When a man is running a race he 
 strains his every nerve to win it. Some of us fancy we 
 are to be carried into the kingdom of glory, but if we 
 would win the crown, we must throw all our energies into 
 the race. It is not enough to accept this doctrine, and the 
 theory, but let us remember that God has given us natural 
 powers, in order that we may employ them ; and only as we 
 employ them, can we expect to win the prize.'" 
 
 CCCXXVIII. A Loan to the Lord. Prov. xix. 17. 
 
 ^'■Ile that hath pity upon the poor kndeth Jitito the Lord, arid 
 that which he hath given will He pay him again." 
 
 A POOR man with an empty purse came one day to Michael 
 Feneberg, the godly pastor of Seeg, in Bavaria, and begged 
 three crowns, that he might finish his journey. It was all 
 the money Feneberg had, but as he besought him so 
 earnestly in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus he 
 gave it. Immediately after he found himself in great 
 outward need, and seeing no way of relief, he prayed, 
 sa}'ing : " Lord, I lent Thee three crowns ; Thou hast not 
 yet returned them, and Thou knowest how I need them. 
 Lord, I pray Thee, give them back." The same day a 
 messenger brought a money-letter, which Gossner, his as- 
 sistant, reached over to Feneberg, saying : " Here, father, 
 is what you expended." The letter contained two hundred 
 thalers, or about one hundred and fifty dollars, which the 
 poor traveller had begged from a rich man for the Vicar ; 
 and the childlike old man, in joyful amazement, cried out : 
 " Ah, dear Lord, one dare ask nothing of Thee, for straight- 
 way Thou makest one feel so much ashamed." 
 
 CCCXXIX. Can you Trust the Security? Prov. 
 xix. 17. "He that hath pity on the poor Icndeth Ufito the 
 Lord ; and that which he hath given will He pay him again." 
 
 It is said that Dean Swift was once called to preach on 
 behalf of a public charity, and having taken the above as 
 his text, he closed the book, and said, " Now, if you can 
 
 O 
 
194 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 trust the security, doivn ivitJi your dust. The collection will 
 be made." 
 
 CCCXXX. Children's Help. Prov. xx. ii. ''Even a 
 child is known by Ids doings, whether his work be pure, and 
 whetlicr it be right.''' 
 
 There was a terrible storm one cold winter's night, a few 
 years ago, and a ship was wrecked just opposite a fishing 
 village in the north. The crew got into a boat and rowed 
 for the shore. They were not a dozen yards from the 
 beach, when their boat grounded on a sand-bar, and stuck 
 fast. The fishermen ran down to help them, and the 
 sailors flung them a rope, and told them to pull with all 
 their might. The fishermen did so ; but, though they 
 were very fine fellows, they could not manage it. Then 
 their wives said, "Let us take hold, and pull too." But 
 though the women strained every nerve, the boat did not 
 move ! At last the children asked to join in ; and those 
 who could, got hold of the rope, and the rest got hold of 
 their fathers' smocks and their mothers' gowns, and then 
 came the " long pull ! and the strong pull ! and the pull ALL 
 TOGETIJER !" and the thing was done! the boat shot over 
 the sand-bar, and the poor shipwrecked sailors were 
 saved ! 
 
 The childrefi's tveight made all the difference in the pull I 
 
 CCCXXXI. George Fox and his False Accusers. 
 
 Prov. xx. 22. " Say not thou, I will recovipe7ise evil; but ivait 
 on the Lord, and He shall save thee." 
 
 After being imprisoned for twenty weeks, the faithful 
 servant of Christ, George Fox, was released in 1660. He 
 thus speaks of his false accuser in his journal: "Thus I 
 was set at liberty by the king's command, the Lord's 
 power having wonderfully wrought for the clearing of my 
 innocency, and Porter, who committed me, not daring to 
 appear to make good the charge he had falsely suggested 
 against me. Terror took hold of Justice Porter, for he was 
 afraid I would take the advantage of the law against him 
 for my wrong imprisonment, and thereby undo him, his 
 wife and children. And, indeed, I was put on to make him 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 195 
 
 and the rest examples ; but I said I should leave them to 
 the Lord : if the Lord did forgive them, I should not 
 trouble myself with them." 
 
 CCCXXXII. Sabbath School Instruction. Prov. 
 xxii. 6. " Train up a child in the way he should go : and 
 when he is old, he ivill not depart from it." 
 
 " Sabbatii-SCIIOOL instruction, although good as far as it 
 gc es, does not supply adequate moral education for the 
 juvenile hordes which infest the streets of our large cities. 
 The interval between Sabbath and Sabbath is too wide. 
 It is like spreading a net with meshes seven inches wide 
 instead of one, before a shoal of herrings. By the great 
 gap of the week the little Arabs easily slip through, in 
 spite of the stout string which you extend across their 
 path on the Sabbath evening. Ply the work by all means, 
 and ply it hopefully. Labour for the Lord in that depart- 
 ment will not be lost. Saving truth is thereby deposited 
 in many minds, which the Spirit of God will make fruitful 
 in a future day. Ply the work of Sabbath schools, but let 
 not the existence and abundance of these efforts deceive 
 us into the belief that the work is adequately done. The 
 Sabbath school cannot train up a child. The six days' 
 training at home, if it be evil, will, in the battle of life, 
 carry it over the one day's teaching in the school, however 
 good it may be," 
 
 CCCXXXIII. Knowing the Scriptures from a 
 Child. Pro v. xxii. 6. '■^ Train up a child in the way he 
 should go." 
 
 John Ruskin, in his " Praeterita," describes his daily 
 Bible lessons which his mother taught him. He says : 
 " I have next with deep gratitude to chronicle what I owed 
 to my mother for the resolutely consistent lessons which 
 so exercised me in the Scriptures as to make every word 
 of them familiar to my ear in habitual music ; yet in that 
 familiarity reverenced, as transcending all thought, and 
 ordaining all conduct. This she effected, not by her own 
 sayings or personal authorit}-, but simply by compelling 
 me to read the book thoroughly for myself. As soon as 
 
196 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 I was able to read with fluency, she began a course of 
 Bible work with me, which never ceased till I went to 
 Oxford. She read alternate verses with me, watching, 
 it first, every intonation of my voice, and correcting the 
 false ones, till she made me understand the verse, if within 
 my reach, rightly and energetically. It might be beyond 
 me altogether ; that she did not care about ; but she made 
 sure that, as soon as I got hold of it at all, I should get 
 hold of it by the right end. If a name was hard, the better 
 the exercise in pronunciation ; if a chapter was tiresome, 
 the better lesson in patience ; if loathsome, the better lesson 
 in faith that there was some use in its being so outspoken.. 
 After our chapters (from two to three a day, according to 
 their length, the first thing after breakfast, and no interrup- 
 tion from servants allowed — none from visitors, who either 
 joined in the reading, or had to stay upstairs — and none 
 from any visitings or excursions, except real travelling), 
 I had to learn a few verses by heart, or repeat, to make sure 
 I had not lost, something of what was already known ; and 
 with the chapters thus gradually possessed from the first 
 word to the last, I had to learn the whole body of the 
 fine old Scottish paraphrases, which are good, melodious, 
 and forceful verse, and to which, together with the Bible 
 itself, I owe the first cultivation of my ear in sound." 
 
 CCCXXXIV. The Robber's Bible. Prov. xxii. 6. 
 " Tram up a child in the way he should go : and 71' hen he is 
 old, he 7vill 7iot depart from it." 
 
 There was a strange auction in one of the deep, inaccessible 
 dells of the Black Forest, about a century ago. It was in 
 the dead of night. The place was lighted by torches, which 
 cast a ghastly glare through the darkness of the abyss. 
 Savage-looking men, armed to the teeth, were sitting in 
 a circle, while one stood in the midst, holding up articles 
 for sale. It was a gang of brigands, who that evening had 
 robbed a stage-coach. According to their custom, they 
 were engaged in selling the stolen articles among them- 
 selves. After a good many pieces of dress and travelling- 
 bags had been disposed of, and while the glass and the 
 bottle were going from hand to hand, and each member 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 197 
 
 of the company vied with his neii;hl)our in making un- 
 seemly jokes and setting the assembly in a roar, a New 
 Testament was held up last of all. The man who acted as 
 auctioneer introduced this " article" with some blasphemous 
 remarks, which made the cavern resound with laughter. 
 One of the company suggested jokingly that he should 
 read a chapter for their edification. This was unanimously 
 ap{)lauded, and the auctioneer, turning up a page at ran- 
 dom, began reading in a voice of mock-devotion. While 
 the company were greatly amused at this sacrilegious scoff- 
 ing, it was not observed that one of them, a middle-aged 
 man, who was one of the oldest members of the gang, and 
 used to be foremost both in their crimes and in their de- 
 bauchery, became silent, and clasping his hands on his 
 knees, was absorbed in deep thought. The passage which 
 the auctioneer read was the same which that man's father 
 had read thirty years ago at family worship on the morn- 
 ing of the day when he, to escape the hands of the police, 
 fled from the parental dwelling, never to return again. At 
 the sound of the words, which he remembered so well, the 
 happy family circle of which he had been a member, rose 
 to his fancy. In his imagination he saw them all seated 
 round the breakfast-table, which was crowned with the 
 blessings of a new day. He saw his venerable old father 
 sitting with the open Bible reading the chapter that was to 
 prepare them for prayer. He saw his kind, tender-hearted 
 mother sitting by his father's side, attentively listening to 
 the Word of God. He saw himself, with his brothers and 
 sisters, joining in the devotional exercise, which entreated 
 for them the guidance, protection, and blessing of God 
 during the day. He saw it all as clearly before his mind 
 as if it had happened that morning. Since leaving home, 
 he had never opened a Bible, never offered up a prayer, 
 never heard a single word that reminded him of God and 
 eternity. But now, at this moment, it was as if his soul 
 awoke out of a long sleep of thirty years — as if the snow 
 of a long, long winter melted away on a sudden at the 
 sound of that well-known Bible word ; and all the words 
 which his good father had spoken to him from his child- 
 hood, and all the lessons, admonitions, and prayers of his 
 pious mother — which then were scornfully given to the 
 winds — now came flying back to his memory, as the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 winter crop bursts forth through the snow when the vernal 
 sun unshackles the fields, and causes the hidden life to rise 
 from its long dreary grave. Perfectly absorbed in those 
 hallowed recollections, he forgot all that was round him, 
 heard nothing of all the scoffing, laughing, and blaspheming 
 that was passing in his presence, until, on a sudden, he was 
 awaked out of his reverie by a rude tap on the shoulder, 
 which was accompanied by the question, "Now, old dreamer, 
 what will you give for that book ? You need it more than 
 any one of us, for you are undoubtedly the biggest sinner 
 under the firmament." " So I am," he answered, struck to 
 the very bottom of his heart by the truth which he recog- 
 nised in that rough joke. " Give me the book. I will 
 pay its full price." The next day the brigands dispersed 
 through the neighbourhood to turn their bargains into 
 money. The man who bought the bible went also on his 
 errand ; but he directed his steps to no receiving-house. He 
 repaired to a lonely place, where he spent the whole day 
 and night in the agonies of unspeakable remorse, and but 
 for the consoling words which his Bible held out to him, he 
 would certainly have made away with himself But God 
 had mercy upon that repenting sinner, and sent a message 
 of peace and reconciliation to his heart. The next day, on 
 entering a village where he resolved to speak to a minister, 
 he heard that the gang was overtaken the night before by 
 a detachment of soldiers, and taken to prison. His resolu- 
 tion was confirmed now all the more. He told the minister 
 the whole of his life's story, and requested him to direct 
 him to the police office, where he gave himself up to the 
 hands of justice. This proof of the sincerity of his repent- 
 ance saved his life. His comrades were all put to death, 
 but he obtained a reprieve from the Grand Duke, to whom 
 his story was reported. After an imprisonment of some 
 years, he was set free on account of his exemplary conduct. 
 A Christian nobleman took him into his service, and he 
 proved a blessing to his master's household, till he died 
 in peace, praising Jesus Christ who came into the world 
 to save sinners, of whom he confessed himself to be the 
 chief. 
 
OLl^ TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 19c; 
 
 CCCXXXV. Rebuking a King. Prov. xxii. 11. ''For 
 
 the grace of his lips the king sliall be his ft ie/id." 
 
 Tin: timidity which hesitates to rebulcc profanity was once 
 shamed by a king who liad been himself rebuked for pro- 
 fanity. Riding along the highway in disguise, and seeing 
 a soldier at an inn, he stopped and asked him to drink ale 
 with him. On an oath which the king uttered while they 
 were drinking, the soldier remarked, " I am sorry to hear 
 young gentlemen swear." 
 
 His majesty took no notice of it, but swore again. 
 
 The soldier immediately said, "I'll pay part of the ale, 
 if you please, and go ; for I so hate swearing that, if you 
 were the king himself, I should tell you of it." 
 
 " Should you indeed .-' " asked the king. 
 
 " I should," was the emphatic reply of his subject. 
 
 Not long after, the king gave him an opportunity to be 
 "as good as his word." Having invited some lords to 
 dine with him, he sent for the soldier, and bade him to 
 stand near him, in order to serve him if he was needed. 
 Presently the king, not now in disguise, uttered an oath ; 
 And deferentially the soldier immediately said, " Should 
 not my lord and king fear an oath ^ " 
 
 Looking at the heroic soldier, and then at his company 
 of obsequious noblemen, the king severely remarked : 
 " There, my lords, is an honest man. He can respectfully 
 remind me of the great sin of swearing ; but you can sit 
 here and let me stain my soul by swearing, and not so 
 much as tell me of it ! " 
 
 CCCXXXVI. A Drunkard's Child. Prov. xxiii. 21. 
 
 " The drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty!'^ 
 
 A Sunday-school teacher handed to her scholars little 
 slips of paper on which was printed the question, " What 
 have I to be thankful for } " Among the replies that were 
 given on the following Sunday was the following pathetic 
 sentence, written by a little girl who had learned by bitter 
 processes the painful truths it told : " I am thankful there 
 are no public-houses in heaven." 
 
OLD TESTA M EXT AAECDOTES. 
 
 CCCXXXVII. One who Delighted to Honour his 
 Parents. Prov. xxiii. 24, 25. "■ lie that begeftelh a wise 
 child shall have Joy of him. Thy father and thy mother shall 
 be glad, and she that bare thee shall rejoice." 
 
 A PLEASING incident is told of the late Henry Favvcett, 
 Postmaster-General. He was very much attached to his 
 old home, and he had been in the habit of writing a weekly 
 letter to his parents. He happened one day to ask his 
 sister what gave them most pleasure? She replied, "Your 
 letters." From that time, though overwhelmed with official 
 and parliamentary work, he wrote twice, instead of once 
 a week. These letters are homely and affectionate, and 
 everywhere imply that constant desire to give pleasure, 
 which is more significant than the strongest professions of 
 love. 
 
 CCCXXXVIII. Calvin's Motto. Prov. xxiii. 26. ''My 
 son, give me thy heart.^' 
 
 Calvin's seal had engraven on it a hand holding a burn- 
 ing heart, with the motto, " I give Thee all ; I keep back 
 nothing for myself ! " 
 
 CCCXXXIX. For Teachers and Parents. Prov. 
 xxiv, 10. '^ If thou faint in the day of adversity, iky strength 
 is small." 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Tyng, speaking of Sunday-school teachers 
 who " get tired " and leave their classes, says : " Everybody 
 gets tired except the devil ; he is a bishop that is never 
 out of his diocese." There is as much truth as blunt force 
 in the remark. It is worth keeping in mind on entering 
 the Christian campaign. 
 
 CCCXL. The Helping Hand. Prov. xxiv. 11. "7/ 
 thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death, and 
 those that are ready to be slain." 
 
 These words which follow speak more loudly to us because 
 they come from Bishop Simpson, one who was himself an 
 illustration of what he commends : 
 
 " I shall never forget the feelings I had once when climb- 
 
OLD TESTAM/uXT ANECDOTES. 201 
 
 ing one of the pyramids of Egypt. When half-way up, my 
 strenjjth failin*::, I feared I should never be able to reach 
 the summit or get back again. I well remember the help 
 given, by Arab hands, drawing me on farther; and the 
 step I could not quite make m}'self, because too great for 
 my wearied frame, the little help given me — sometimes 
 more and sometimes less — enabled me to go up, step by- 
 step, step by step, until at last I reached the top, and 
 breathed the pure air, and had a grand outlook from that 
 lofty hei'^ht. 
 
 " And so, in life's journey, we are climbing. We are feeble. 
 Every one of us, now and then, needs a little help ; and, if 
 we have risen a step higher than some other, let us reach 
 down for our brother's hand, and help him to stand beside 
 us. And thus, joined hand in hand, we shall go on con- 
 quering, step by step, until the glorious eminence shall be 
 gained. Oh, how many need help in this world — poor 
 afflicted ones ; poor sorrowing ones ; poor tempted ones, 
 who have been overcome, who have been struggling, not 
 quite able to get up the step ; trying, falling ; trying, 
 falling; trying, desponding; hoping, almost despairing! 
 Oh, give such a one help, a little kindly aid, and the step 
 may be taken, and another step may then be taken ; and, 
 instead of dying in wretchedness at the base, he may, by a 
 brother's hand, be raised to safety, and finally to glory. 
 
 CCCXLI. An Evangelist. Prov. xxv. ii. "A word 
 fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver. ^^ 
 
 Dr. Talmage says, " How few Christian people there are 
 who understand how to fasten the truths of God and religion 
 to the souls of men, Truman Osborne, one of the evan- 
 gelists who went through this country some years ago, had 
 a wonderful art in the right direction. He came to my 
 father's house one day, and while we were all seated in 
 the room, he said : ' Mr, Talmage, are all your children 
 Christians } ' Father said : ' Yes, all but De Witt' Then 
 Truman Osborne looked down into the fire-place, and 
 began to tell a story of a storm that came on the moun- 
 tains, and all the sheep were in the fold : but there was 
 one lamb outside that perished in the storm. Had he 
 looked me in the eye, I shoiild have been angered when 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 he told that story ; but he looked into the fire-place, and 
 it was so pathetically and beautifully done that I never 
 found any peace until I was sure I was inside the fold, 
 where the other sheep are." 
 
 CCCXLII. Balaam's Ass. Prov. xxvi. 5. "■'■Ans^ver a 
 fool according to /lis fol/y." 
 
 " Do you really believe that an ass ever spoke to Balaam ? " 
 queried a man who prided himself on his intellect. Coleridge, 
 to whom the question was put, reflected : " My friend, I 
 have no doubt whatever that the story is true. I have 
 been spoken to in the same way myself" The man of the 
 inquiring mind retired for meditation. 
 
 He was answered according to his folly, which is often 
 as good a form of reply as such quibblers deserve. Much 
 of the beauty of the answer lay in the courtesy which said 
 so little but meant so much. A hard word becomes all 
 the harder by being softly spoken. To have called the 
 man an ass would have shown great weakness, and betrayed 
 warm temper, but Coleridge worded his remark well, and 
 left the hearer to find out the sting for himself Here is 
 a lesson of practical common-sense which those who deal 
 with sceptics would do well to learn. 
 
 CCCXLIII. Seeking the Society of Christians. 
 
 Prov. xxvii. 9. '''■ Ointment a7id perfume rejoice the heart ; so 
 doth the sweetness of a maris frietid by hearty counsel." 
 
 " Ane stick '11 never burn ! Put more wood on the fire, 
 laddie; ane stick '11 never burn!" my old Scotch grand- 
 father used to say to his boys. Sometimes, when the fire 
 in the heart burns low, and love to the Saviour grows faint, 
 it would glow warm and bright again if it could only touch 
 another stick. We are weak and imperfect. A hundred 
 things — health, digestion, anxieties, little frets and cares — 
 hinder our soul's progress. The spirit cannot soar, for the 
 flesh constantly keeps it down. There is a true life begun 
 in us, but it flickers like a candle in the wind. 
 
 What we need, next to earnest prayer to God and 
 communion with Christ, is communion with each other. 
 "Where two or three are gathered together," the heart 
 
OLD TESl'AMI.X r AMiCDOTIiS. 203 
 
 burns ; love kindles to a fervent heat. Friends, let us 
 frequent the society of those who are fellow-pilgrims with 
 us to Canaan's happy land. *' Ane stick '11 never burn " as 
 a great, generous pile will be sure to. 
 
 CCCXLIV. Trust Not in Vain. Prov. xxviii. 25. ''He 
 that putleth his trust i/i the Lord shall be made fat.''' 
 
 DURINC} the commercial panic of 1837, there lived in the 
 
 city of VV ton an earnest Ciiristian worker. He had a 
 
 large family, but was not rich in this world's goods. The 
 denomination of which he was a member had for several 
 years been struggling to complete their house of worship. 
 He being an example unto the brethren, had made large 
 contributions, and ere he was aware had given several 
 thousand dollars to finish the church. Clouds of business 
 depression were now gathering thick, and the storm of ruin 
 was ready to break forth. About this time he bought and 
 shipped a valuable cargo to a wealthy gentleman in New 
 York. Several weeks after he was surprised by the cashier 
 of the bank hastily entering his place of business, saying 
 in an excited manner : " Sir ! that New York man has 
 failed, and the draft for the cargo has been returned, pro- 
 tested. Things are growing darker all the time; no one can 
 tell what the end may be." The cashier was astonished to 
 see how self-possessed he remained He forgot that it had 
 been written of the upright man, " He shall not be afraid 
 of evil tidings: his heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord" 
 But it was a great blow to him. What could be done .-' 
 The draft was for thousands of dollars. The bank could 
 grant no favours, and was bound to have the money. 
 Collections were out of the question. Real estate would 
 not bring one-fourth of its value. Ruin stared him in the 
 face. There was no escape. It took a firm eye and a 
 brave heart to stand in his home among his little ones and 
 see the grim spectres of poverty and want overshadowing 
 them. 
 
 1 hirty days of grace were granted, but they were days 
 of torture and almost despair. His refuge was in prayer. 
 The last day came. The family were assembled as usual 
 at the Throne of Grace. He poured out his soul unto God. 
 As Hezekiah of old spread out the letter of the wicked 
 
204 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Kin^T of Bab\'lon before the Lord, and prayed over it, so 
 did he state his case to the Almighty. He arose comforted. 
 Resignation had come. Yes, I can be poor. Yes, I can 
 walk where God leads me. Yes, I can go to the bank 
 to-day and make myself a pauper, sign away house, home, 
 and all. God is still mine, my family are still mine— the 
 promises in God's word are not changed ; heaven shall be 
 mine. I trust God for the future. 
 
 He dressed carefully, so as to go through his sad duties 
 decently, and sat down to wait until the bank opened. 
 While sitting there, three letters were brought in. He 
 opened the first. Could his eyes deceive him ? It con- 
 tained a draft for $i,ooo, sent by a brother in New 
 England. The next letter was from a New York bank, 
 authorizing him to draw on it for any amount sufficient to 
 tide him over his difficulties. The third letter was from 
 the man to whom the cargo had been sent, telling him to 
 draw again for the full amount, and the draft would be 
 honoured. The tears of thanksgiving streamed down his 
 cheeks. " Now do I know that there is a God in Israel : I 
 was brought low, and He helped me." 
 
 When he reached the bank, the directors were in session 
 discussing his case. They arose as he entered. The 
 president, taking his hand, said : " Sir, we feel very sorry 
 for you in your great misfortune. You have our deepest 
 sympathy. We only wish we could help you." 
 
 " Gentlemen," he replied, " I am very much obliged to 
 you for your kindness and sympathy. But I am all right," 
 and forthwith cast the drafts on the table. Then there 
 were hearty hand-shakings and congratulations. That 
 which, according to human eyesight, came so near being 
 his ruin, gave him thenceforth unbounded credit, and laid 
 the foundation of a large fortune. 
 
 He was strong, active, cheerful at the age of eighty-four, 
 increased in goods, full of }'ears, still trusting in God, 
 waiting, like Abraham, to be gathered unto his people. 
 " Trust in the Lord, and do good ; and He shall bring it tc 
 pass." 
 
OLD TESTAMENr ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCXLV. A Wise Decision. Prov. xxx. 8, 9. ''Give 
 vie neither poverty nor riches ; feed me with food co7ivenient for 
 vie: Lest I be full and deny Thee, and say. Who is the Lord? 
 or lest L be poor, and steal, and take the fiame of my God iti 
 vain." 
 
 We have a quaint love-letter of Joseph Allcine's, written 
 in 1655 to Mistress Theodosia, his future wife. It is full 
 of beautiful godliness and manliness. In it he speaks of 
 accepting a charge at Taunton, where the encouragements 
 in point of maintenance were small. These are some of 
 the principles upon which he went : — 
 
 " First, I lay this for a foundation, that a man's life con- 
 sistcth not in the abundance of the things that he possesseth. 
 It was accounted a wise prayer that Agur put up of old, 
 that he might only be fed with food convenient for him. 
 And certain it is, that where men have least of the world, 
 they esteem it least, and live more by faith and in depend- 
 ence upon God, casting their care and burden upon Him. 
 The Holy Ghost seems to make it a privilege to be brought 
 to a necessity of living by faith, as I think I have formerly 
 hinted thee, out of Deuteronomy xi. 10, ii, where Canaan 
 is preferred before Egypt, in regard to its dependence upon 
 God for the former and latter rain, which in Egjpt they 
 could live without, and have supplies from the river. And 
 ccrtainl}' could we that are unexperienced, but feel the thorns 
 of those cares and troubles that there are in gathering and 
 keeping much, and the danger when riches increase of 
 setting our hearts upon them, we should prize the happi- 
 ness of a middle condition much before it. 
 
 " Secondly, I take this for an undoubted truth, that a 
 dram of grace is better than a talent of wealth. 'Tis a 
 strange thing to see how Christians generally do judge so 
 carnally of things, looking to the things that are seen and 
 temporal, and not the things that will stick by us to eternity. 
 What is it worth a year? Is the maintenance certain and 
 sure, and what changes are there like to be 1 These are 
 the questions we commonly ask first. Yet — What good 
 am I like to do ? What good am I like to get ? These 
 should be the main interrogatories." 
 
2c6 OLD TESTAMENT ANE( DOTES. 
 
 CCCXLVI. Ingratitude to Parents. Prov. xxx. 17. 
 
 " l^ie eye that viocketh at his father^ . . . the ravens of the 
 valley shall pick it out." 
 
 Tins is a terrible denunciation aj^ainst ingratitude to 
 ix'vicnts, and even in the present day is sometimes virtually 
 fulfilled. 
 
 Some years ago, an Irish gentleman who was an exten- 
 sive contractor on our public works, was reduced to poverty 
 by the profligacy and dishonesty of an ungrateful son. 
 The old man lost his wife ; and to fill up the cup of his 
 sorrow, he lost his sight. Thus poor, friendless, blind, for- 
 saken, he found an asylum in the Franklin County Alms- 
 house, Pennsylvania. 
 
 Whilst there, his wicked and ungrateful son travelled 
 that way. He was informed of his father's situation and 
 desire to see him ; but he refused to see the kind father he 
 had ruined. Notice the result. That very day this son 
 was overtaken by a storm, and took a severe cold that 
 resulted in the destruction of his eyes. He lay in Gettys- 
 burg in a critical state, until his funds were exhausted, and 
 those who had him in charge took him to the Franklin 
 County Alms-house. His father having died the day before, 
 he was put in the same room and occupied the same bed, 
 and in a short time followed his neglected and heart-broken 
 father to the judgment-seat of Christ. 
 
 CCCXLVII. Value of a Christian Mother. Prov. 
 xxxi. I. His another taught him. 
 
 The Bishop of Carlisle thus bears testimony to the value 
 of a real Christian mother, at a meeting of mothers and 
 daughters. Dr. Harry Goodwin said : — 
 
 " I am one of those who lost their mothers at a very 
 early age. I was very little over six years old when my 
 dear mother was suddenly taken from me. I mention my 
 age that I may put before you the effect which my mother's 
 teaching had upon me, and the tender age at which it 
 ceased, and I think we may draw from it some useful 
 lessons. Now, then, when I look back to the teaching 
 of my mother, what do I think of it .-' I say deliberately, 
 and without any amount of exaggeration, that though I 
 have since that time been at school, been under tutors, 
 
OLD TESTAMEX^T ANECDOTES. 207 
 
 been at college, and bad all the experience of life, I do 
 not hclicvc that all the lessons that I have received .since 
 that time put together amount in value and in importance 
 to the lessons which I learned from my mother before I 
 was seven years old. What did she teach me ? She did 
 not put me through the fifth or the sixth standard — we 
 had not any standards in those days — but she taught me 
 a great many things which were better than standards. 
 
 " I will tell you one of the first lessons she taught me. 
 She taught me always to speak the truth : and the lesson 
 she gave me concerning truth has never been lost upon me. 
 She always brought me up in the feeling that what was to 
 be spoken was to be the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth ; that there was to be no evasion, that everything 
 was to be stated simply and honestl}', exactly as it occurred ; 
 and I will tell you how she enforced that lesson — she always 
 spoke truth to me. I never caught her in any kind of 
 deceit ; I always knew that what she said to me she meant. 
 I was always sure that if she told me she was going to 
 do a thing, she would do it, and no amount of coaxing or 
 persuasion would lead her to change her mind. Absolute 
 truth, absolute in the smallest matters — that was her prac- 
 tice, and that was the lesson that she impressed upon me. 
 
 " Then she taught me to say my prayers. I have «s 
 vivid a recollection now, at a distance of sixty years, as 
 I had at the time, of the manner in which she made me 
 kneel down at her knees, and with her hand upon my head, 
 taught me the simple prayers which are suitable for child- 
 hood. I remember how, when I rose up from my knees, 
 she would talk to me about some simple matter suitable 
 to my childish days. Those early lessons of prayer have 
 never been lost to me ; and I remember afterwards, when 
 I was at school, and when I was submitted to all the 
 temptations and the difficulties to which boys at school 
 are submitted ; when I was sleeping in a room with boys 
 about me who did not pray, and who laughed at those 
 who did, I remember well how the thought of my dear 
 mother was like a guardian angel over me, and how she 
 kept me from the evil which these boys would fain have 
 pressed upon me. Then, again, she enforced upon mc full 
 and complete obedience. It was never enforced with a 
 threat ; there was no unkindness, on arbitrariness in the 
 
2o8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 command ; .but I was never allowed to ask any reasons. 
 I felt perfectly certain of the wisdom which dictated the 
 command, and I was always tauglit to obey, and I learned 
 to obey. Then, lastly, I was taught by her, and by practice 
 more than words, to keep my temper. She taught me to 
 do that by keeping her own." 
 
 CCCXLVIII. A Devoted W^ife. Prov. xxxi. ii, 12. 
 
 '■''The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he 
 shall have no need of spoil. She tail I do him good a7id not evil 
 all the days of her life." 
 
 The late Robert Moffat had a most noble and devoted 
 wife in Mary Moffat, who laboured with him in Southern 
 Africa unweariedly. She watched over her husband's 
 health and comfort most anxiously for more than fifty 
 years, and she used to say that it was a great satisfaction 
 to her to provide for the temporal wants of a servant of 
 Christ in the mission-field, and she felt, what was true, 
 that he never would have been the missionary he was but 
 for her care of him. The Home Secretary of the London 
 Missionary Society says : " I shall never forget what took 
 place in my official room at the Mission House soon after 
 their return from Africa. While talking over their past 
 Id'bours, Mrs. Moffat, looking fondly at her husband first, 
 turned to me and said, ' Robert can never say that / 
 hindered him in his work! ' 
 
 " ' No, indeed,' replied Dr. Moffat ; ' but I can tell you 
 she has often sent me away from house and home for 
 months together for evangelizing work, and in my absence 
 has managed the station as well or better than I could 
 have done it myself.'" 
 
 Even on the very shore of the dark river she would not 
 rest imtil assured that his wants were being attended to. 
 
 Her husband's first exclamation on finding her really 
 gone was, " For forty-three years I have had her to pray 
 for me." 
 
 CCCXLIX. One of the Virtuous Women. Prov. 
 xxxi. 20. " She stretcheth out her hand to the poor : yea, she 
 reacheth forth her hands to the needy. '^ 
 
 Hannah More did a great deal at the close of last 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 209 
 
 century for the elevation and instruction of the poor rural 
 population round her home at Bath. She was the means 
 of startini^ a number of schools in the country districts, 
 where the people were very ignorant and wicked ; and she 
 wrote incessantly simple religious tracts and other literature, 
 which she distributed far and near. 
 
 But in all she was very humble, speaking of herself 
 thus : " God is sometimes pleased to work by the most 
 unworthy instruments. I suppose to take away every 
 shadow of doubt that it is His own doing. It always 
 gives me the idea of a great author writing with a very 
 bad pen." 
 
 CCCL. Labour and Sorrow. Eccles. i. 2. '■'■Vanity 
 of vanities, saith the Preacher." 
 
 Goethe, the greatest of German poets, whose long life 
 was one success, said : " They have called me a child of 
 fortune, nor have I any wish to complain of the course of 
 my life. Yet it has been nothing but labour and sorrow; 
 and I may truly say, that in seventy-five years I have not 
 had four weeks of true comfort. It was the constant 
 rolling of a stone that was always to be lifted anew." 
 
 CCCLI. An Eloquent Preacher. Eccles. i. 2. 
 " Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities ; 
 all is vanity. ^^ 
 
 One night, young Bossuet, who possessed in such an 
 eminent degree the power of eloquent speech, had gone 
 to the brilliant salon of Rambouillet. There were 
 gathered in that famous drawing-room some of the most 
 illustrious of the French nobility, ladies and gentlemen 
 representing the wit, the learning, and the cleverness of 
 Paris. In the course of the evening, the Marquis de Fen- 
 quieres referred to this young man as one about to enter 
 upon an ecclesiastical career, and who, from what he had 
 heard, seemed destined to be a great preacher. Suddenly 
 some one suggested that he might interest the company 
 by preaching a sermon. It would be a new diversion, and 
 all the more delightful if the sermon were preached im- 
 promptu. Texts were written shaken up in a bag, and 
 
 P 
 
mo OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 one of the illustrious ladies was to draw one out, and hand 
 it to the preacher. The room was arranged, the text was 
 drawn, and one of the ladies handed it to the youthful 
 abbe. He was to have a quarter of an hour in which to 
 think over the subject, but as tlie slip was handed to 
 him he waived that privilege. How strangely the words 
 struck on the assembly as the grave young preacher 
 read, " Vanity of vanities ! all is vanity ! " At first some 
 were inclined to laugh, but ere long the feelings of the 
 assembly were swayed in another direction. The fervour, 
 the boldness, the brilliance of that extemporaneous utter- 
 ance astonished all ears and affected all hearts. The 
 sermon was long, and, as will be guessed from the occasion, 
 there is no report of it ; but at its close the Due d'Enghien 
 pressed forward to grasp the preacher's hand, and to in- 
 quire who he was, and whence he came. He came from 
 Uijon, and, unknown till that night, Bossuet forthwith took 
 his -place as " a bright particular star " in the religious 
 firmament of France. 
 
 CCCLII. Worldly Honour. Eccles. i. 2. "Vanity 
 
 of vaiiities, saith the FreacherJ" 
 
 One cannot read the posthumous memoirs of Chateau- 
 briand, without being struck with the illusive nature of 
 worldly honours and pleasures. Contemporary applause 
 was not wanting to cheer the craving spirit of this scholar 
 and statesman. The author of the " Genius of Christianity " 
 and the ambassador of France at the Court of London 
 could not complain that honour was denied him. He says, 
 " I know not in history a reputation that would tempt me : 
 and were it necessary to stoop to pick up from my feet and 
 for my own advantage the greatest glory the world could 
 offer, I would not give myself the trouble." 
 
 CCCLIII. The Courtier and the Christian. 
 
 Ecci.ES. i. 14 '■'■Behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit." 
 
 " I HAVK recently read Solomon with a kind of sympa- 
 thetic feeling. I have been as wicked and as vain, though 
 not as wise, as he (is that so i") ; but I feel the truth of his 
 reflection, 'All is vanity and vexation of spirit.'" So said, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 211 
 
 at the last, tlic most brilliant wit, the most accom[)lishe(l 
 gentleman, the most cultivated speaker and the most 
 classic scholar of the luigiish nobility in the eighteenth 
 century — Philip Dormer Stanhope, I'^arl of Chesterfield. 
 
 " By the grace of Ciod I am what I am ; nothing in 
 myself, all in Christ." So said, at the last, a genial old 
 man, whose bones rest in Westminster Abbey, whose 
 services humanity will never forget, who could walk fyom 
 Gore House to the Parliament Mouses, repeating to him- 
 self the ninety-first psalm, and then by a persuasive 
 eloquence, chastened by pure taste and enriched by classic 
 allusion, hold the members of the House of Commons 
 entranced while he depicted the horrors of the slave trade — 
 William Wilberforce. 
 
 CCCLIV. A Hasty Temper. Eccles. vii. 9. ''Be not 
 hasty in thy spirit to be angry : for anger resteth in the bosom 
 of fools." 
 
 La Fontaine, chaplain of the Prussian Army, once 
 preached a very earnest and eloquent sermon on the sin 
 and folly of yielding to a hasty temper. The next day he 
 was accosted by a major of the regiment with the words : 
 
 "Well, sir! I think you made use of the prerogatives of 
 your office to give me some very sharp hits yesterday." 
 
 " I certainly thought of you while I was preparing the 
 sermon," was the answer; "but I had no intention of being 
 personal or sharp." 
 
 " Well, it is of no use," said the major ; " I have a hasty 
 temper, and I cannot help it, and I cannot control it ; it is 
 impossible." 
 
 And, still adhering to this opinion, after some further 
 conversation he went his way. 
 
 The next Sabbath, La Fontaine preached upon self- 
 deception, and the vain excuses which men are wont to 
 make. 
 
 "Why," said he, "a man will declare that it is im- 
 possible to control his temper, when he very well knows 
 that were the provocation to happen in the presence of 
 his sovereign, he not only could, but would, control him- 
 self entirely. And yet he dares to say that the continual 
 
212^ OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 presence of the King of kings and Lord of lords impose 
 upon him neither restraint nor fear! " 
 
 CCCLV. How to Die Manfully. Eccles. viii. 12. 
 " Though a sinner do evil an hiindi-ed times, and his days be. 
 prolonged, yet surely I knoiv that it shall be well with them 
 that fear God, which fear before Him" 
 
 Dr. John Godman was an eminent anatomist and natu- 
 rahst, who, dying at the early age of thirty-one, had 
 aheady made himself distinguished through the country. 
 
 For the greater part of his life he was avowedly an 
 infidel of the French school, rejecting the Bible, and blind 
 to the wonderful proofs, furnished by his profession, of 
 the existence, power, .and wisdom of God. But while 
 lecturing, only three years before his death, to his medical 
 class, he was called to the sick-bed, and, as it proved, 
 the dying-bed of one of his students who was a Christian. 
 Visiting this young man repeatedly, and witnessing his 
 joyous anticipations of heaven, and his triumph over death, 
 he saw what, as a sceptic, he was unable to comprehend. 
 His philosophy could not explain it. He turned to the 
 Bible, and there the secret was unfolded. There he found 
 that Christ was the Conqueror of death, and that to the 
 believer in Him its sting is taken away. 
 
 Now Dr. Godman turned to the study of the Scriptures, 
 and soon found joy and peace in believing ; so that, when 
 he finished his course, commending his little family to the 
 Father of the fatherless and the widow's God and portion, 
 with uplifted eyes and a beaming countenance he resigned 
 his spirit to the Redeemer, and sweetly fell asleep in 
 Jesus. 
 
 Before this, however, in the last sickness of his friend 
 Dr. Judson, — who, though a brother of the devoted mis- 
 sionary, was an open infidel, — Dr. Godman addressed to 
 him a letter, which was the means of his conversion. 
 " Philosophy," he says in that letter still extant, " is a fool, 
 and pride, a madman. Many persons die with what is 
 called manly firnmess ; they put on as smooth a face as 
 they can, to compose on the spectators, and die firmly. 
 But this is all deception. The true state of their minds 
 at the very time, in nine cases out of ten, is worse than the 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 213 
 
 most horrible imaginings of hell itself. But the man who 
 dies as a man ought to die, is the humble-minded believing 
 Christian. He does not die manfully (in the world's sense 
 of that term), but he rests lovingly and reverently on 
 Jesus. 
 
 Dr. Judson also, pointed by this letter to the only 
 Saviour, died in the faith ; and through the testimony of 
 his death, one other at least was pointed to the cross of 
 Christ, and led to rest all his hopes upon it. 
 
 CCCLVI. Entering the Vineyard at the 
 eleventh Hour. Eccles. ix. 4. " For to kim that is 
 ioined to all the living there is hope." 
 
 An old man of eighty-one had heard in his early youth 
 the celebrated Mr. Flavel preach. Instead of pronouncing 
 the blessing at the close, Mr. Flavel had said, "I cannot 
 bless you ! How can I bless those who do not love the 
 Lord Jesus ? If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 let him be accursed!" The solemn sentence came into 
 the old man's remembrance in America, and at the eleventh 
 hour he entered the vineyard. 
 
 CCCLVII. Do it Well. Eccles. ix. to. " Whatsoet'er 
 thy hand fin deth to do, do it with thy ?night." 
 
 What ^ Everything honest that you attempt to do at 
 all! 
 
 A noble saying is recorded of a member of our British 
 House of Commons, who by his own industry and perse- 
 verance had won his way to that high position. A proud 
 scion of the aristocracy one day taunted him with his 
 humble origin, saying, " I remember when you blacked 
 my father's boots." " Well, sir," was the noble response, 
 " did I not do it ivcll ? " 
 
 CCCLVIII. Perseverance. Eccles. ix. 10. " JVhat- 
 soever thy hand findeth to do, do it mith thy inigJit ; for then 
 is no work, tior device, no/ know/edge, ?ior 7Visdom, in the 
 grave, whither thou goest." 
 
 Cyrus Field, in giving his account of the Atlantic 
 
214 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES, 
 
 telegraph, says, " It has been a long- and hard struggle — 
 nearly thirteen years of anxious watching and ceaseless 
 toil. Often has my heart been ready to sink. Many times, 
 when wandering in the forests of Newfoundland in the 
 pelting rain, or on the deck of ships on dark, stormy 
 nights, alone, far from home, I have almost accused myselt 
 ot madness and folly to sacrifice the peace of my family, 
 and all the hopes of life, for what might prove, after all, 
 but a dream. I have seen my companions one after 
 another fall by my side, and feared I, too, might not live 
 to see the end. And yet one hope has led me on ; and I 
 have prayed that I might not taste of death till this work 
 was accomplished. That prayer is answered ; and now, 
 beyond all acknowledgments to men is the feeling of grati- 
 tude to Almighty God." 
 
 CCCLIX. Courage in Helping the Wrong Doer. 
 
 EccLES. ix. ID. " Whatsoever thy hatid findeth to do, do h 
 with thy might." 
 
 David King, then a student gouig to Edinburgh Univer- 
 sity, had taken his passage from Montrose to Leith in a 
 small coasting vessel. " He had gone down to the quay to 
 embark, but the appearance of the passengers, and the 
 filth and bad smells everywhere so disgusted him, that he 
 was hesitating whether he should sail after all, when a man 
 of respectable appearance accosted him, and pointing to 
 a repulsive-looking character who was getting on board 
 at that moment, said ; ' That is a criminal flying from 
 justice ; and if, as I believe, you are studying for the 
 ministry, you may have an opportunity of doing some good 
 during the voyage.' The man indicated seemed a thorough 
 scoundrel, who could be rough and scornful if interfered 
 with ; and the idea of being in the same dirty cabin with , 
 him, perhaps for days, was so utterly repugnant to the 
 nervous and sensitive lad, that he left the vessel and went 
 home. When he told his parents the circumstances, his 
 father, after a little consideration, said : ' Well, I will not 
 urge you ; but in passing through life you will have need 
 of' moral courage, and it might be for your future good 
 to show some nerve now.' Tliese words sent him back 
 to the vessel, and he went on board with a failing heart. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 215 
 
 Scarcely were they out at sea when the man bec,'an to 
 swear violently, took whisky out of his box, and, having 
 drunk plentifully himself, handed it about to the sailors. 
 The passengers became alarmed, the captain was appealed 
 to, and under his authority the baggage of the offender 
 was searched, all the spirits taken away, and severe 
 measures threatened, if he caused further trouble. By this 
 means the disturbance was ended, and the fears of the 
 passengers calmed. But though all was quiet, the young 
 student could find no repose; and urged by his conscience, 
 which upbraided him with a neglect of duty, he rose at 
 dead of night and sought the wretched runaway. On the 
 deck of the little vessel he found him, and there, out at sea 
 in darkness and solitude, the man was in a changed mood, 
 and he received his visitor with a degree of courtesy. 
 This was an opportunity not to be lost, and King began 
 a serious conversation with him. After some earnest talk, 
 he asked if any one had ever expostulated with him in 
 such a manner before. ' No,' he answered ; ' but I am not 
 so ignorant as you might think. I have read a good many 
 tracts, and most of them tell of sudden conversions, so that 
 I have had an idea I might be converted suddenly some 
 day myself ' And what if this be the day ? ' said the 
 youth. ' " Now is the accepted time, now is the day of 
 salvation." If nobody has spoken with you in this manner 
 before, perhaps nobody may again.' During the remainder 
 of the passage the man was quiet, thoughtful, obliging, and 
 at parting he testified deep gratitude to young King for his 
 remonstrances, and expressed the hope of being thenceforth 
 a changed character." 
 
 CCCLX. The Worm at the Root. Eccles. ix. 18. 
 " One sinner destroycth much good." 
 
 A GENTLEMAN had two beautiful young mountain ash trees 
 in his garden, which he tended very carefully from season 
 to season. As might have been expected, tlie twin trees 
 repaid his labour in their rapid growth and beauty of form. 
 After a while, from some mysterious cause, one of the trees 
 stopped growing. The other continued to spread out its 
 branches and leaves, and seemed to wax taller and hand- 
 somer every day ; but this one resisted all the combined 
 
2i6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 influences of the season, rich dressings, and carefnl atten- 
 dance. In vain the proprietor loosened the soil around its 
 roots, again and again. In vain the sweet rains watered it, 
 and the kind sun shone. At last the owner determined to 
 make a thorough examination of its roots, and throwing up 
 the earth, he carefully scraped them with his knife and 
 washed them with water, whereupon, just at the bottom of 
 the trunk, he discovered three or four little holes, and after 
 some skilful probing, brought to light the mischievous 
 worker in the shape of a borer-worm. This removed, the 
 gentleman hoped the best for his tree. But it never grew 
 any more. He was obliged to cut it down. 
 
 '' One sinner destroyeth much good," and he is tenfold 
 the more destructive if he can conceal his depravity until 
 he has done all the harm he wishes. So we sometimes see 
 the choicest advantages of education and religion lavished 
 upon a boy or young man without any effect. He grows 
 morally worse instead of better. Watch closely for a 
 while, and it is but too likely you'll find a wicked associate 
 in the secret of it. Thank God if that borer-worm has not 
 sapped his virtue beyond recovery. 
 
 CCCLXI. Saved by a Newspaper Scrap. Eccles. 
 xi. I. " Cast thy bread upon the waters : for thou shaltfind it 
 after many days" 
 
 Mr. Spurgeon tells the following interesting fact : " Our 
 son Tom, in a letter written to his mother from Auckland, 
 New Zealand, enclosed a portion torn off an old Australian 
 paper, concerning which he sends the following interesting 
 particulars : — 
 
 " ' This scrap of newspaper has been given me by a town 
 missionary here, who regards it as a very precious relic. 
 It came to him from a man who died in the hospital, and 
 bequeathed it to his visitor as a great treasure. It is a 
 portion of the Melbourne Argus, and of father's sermon 
 (" Loving Advice for Anxious Seekers," No. 735). 
 
 " ' The man found it on the floor of a hut in Australia, 
 and was brought by its perusal to a knowledge of the truth 
 as it is in Jesus. He kept it carefully while he lived (for it 
 was discoloured and torn when he found it), and on his 
 death-bed he gave it to the missionary as the only treasure 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 217 
 
 he had to leave behind him. I thought dear father might 
 like to have it in his book ; if not, send it back to me, that 
 I may return it to its owner, who says he often feels en- 
 couraged by glancing at it. It was his desire, however, 
 that I should send it home, that the dear preacher might 
 be encouraged." 
 
 CCCLXII. The Power of a Hymn. Eccles. xi. i. 
 " Cast thy bread upon the waters : for thou shalt find it after 
 many days." 
 
 Probably few modern hymns have wandered more widely 
 over the world, been pasted into more scrap-books, or 
 comforted more invalids than the one of Phoebe Gary's, 
 beginning, "One sweetly solemn thought." She composed 
 it in a little third-story bedroom after coming from church 
 one Sabbath morning in 1852. The following incident, 
 taken from Mrs. Mary Clemmer's life of the Gary sisters, 
 shows how it influenced two tempted and erring men on 
 the other side of the globe to lead better lives. The old 
 man spoken of became an earnest working Ghristian, while 
 " Harry " renounced gambling and its attendant vices : — 
 
 A gentleman in China, entrusted with packages for a 
 young man from his friends in the United States, learned 
 that he would probably be found in a certain gambling 
 house. He went thither, but not seeing the young man, 
 sat down and waited, in the hope that he might come in. 
 The place was a bedlam of noises, men getting angry over 
 their cards, and frequently coming to blows. Near him sat 
 two men — one young, the other forty years of age. They 
 were betting and drinking in a terrible way, the older one 
 giving utterance continuallyto the foulest profanity. Two 
 games had been finished, the young man losing each time. 
 The third game, with fresh bottles of brandy, had just 
 begun, and the young man sat lazily back in his chair 
 while the oldest shuflled his cards. The man was a long 
 lime dealing the cards, and the young man, looking care- 
 lessly about the room, began to hum a tune. He went on, 
 till at length he began to sing the hymn of Phoebe Gary, 
 above quoted. "The words," sa\ s the writer of the story, 
 " repeated in such a vile place, at first made me shudder. 
 A Sabbath-school hymn in a gambling den ! But while 
 
2i8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 the young man sang, the elder stopped dealing the cards, 
 stared at the singer a moment, and, throwing the cards on 
 the floor, exclaimed, ' Harry, where did you learn that 
 tune?' 
 
 " ' What tune ? ' 
 
 " ' Why, that one you've been singing,* 
 
 " The young man said he did not know what he had 
 been singing, when the elder repeated the words, with tears 
 in his eyes, and the young man said he had learned them 
 in a Sunday-school in America. 
 
 "'Come,' said the elder, getting up; 'come, Harry; 
 here's what I won from you ; go and use it for some good 
 purpose. As for me, as God sees me, I have played my 
 last game, and drank my last bottle. I have misled you, 
 Harry,'and I am sorry. Give me your hand, my boy, and 
 say that for old America's sake, if for no other, you will 
 quit this infernal business.' " 
 
 CCCLXIII. Family Worship. Eccles. xi. 6. '' In the 
 
 morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine 
 hand." 
 
 The following is one of the most interesting circumstances 
 in the life of the late John Ryland, Baptist minister at 
 Northampton : — 
 
 Being on a journey, he was overtaken by a violent 
 storm, and compelled to take shelter in the first inn he 
 came to. The people of the house treated him with great 
 kindness. When the hour of rest approached, the stranger 
 appeared uneasy, and looked up every time the door 
 opened, as if expecting something essential to his comfort. 
 His host informed him that his chamber was prepared 
 whenever he chose to retire. 
 
 " But," said he, " you have not had your family to- 
 gether." 
 
 " I don't know what you mean," said the landlord. 
 
 " To read and pray with them," replied the guest. 
 
 The landlord confessed that he never thought of doing 
 such a thing. 
 
 "Then, sir," said Mr. Ryland, " I must beg you to order 
 my horse immediately: I had rather brave the storm than 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 219 
 
 venture to sleep in a house where there is no prayer. Whc 
 can tell what may befal us before morning?" 
 
 Tiie landlord remonstrated with him, and said he had 
 no objection to call his family together, but he should not 
 know what to do when they came. Mr. Ryland then pro- 
 posed to conduct family worship, to which all consented. 
 
 When he rose from his knees, almost every individual 
 present was bathed in tears, and the inquiry was awakened 
 in every heart, " What must I do to be saved ? " This 
 day was indeed the beginning of days to that family, and 
 they became the means of diffusing a knowledge of the 
 Gospel in a neighbourhood which had been before pro- 
 verbially dark and destitute. 
 
 CCCLXIV. Resistance to Melancholy. Eccles. 
 xi. 7. " Truly the light is sweet, a7ui a pleasant thing it is 
 for the eyes to behold the sun." 
 
 Dante condemns to the Stygian marsh those who had 
 been sad under the blessed sunlight. " Sad were we in the 
 sweet air that is gladdened by the sun, bearing sluggish 
 smoke in our hearts ; now lie we sadly here in the black 
 ooze." 
 
 CCCLXV. Reverencing Conscience. Eccles. 
 xi. 9. ^^ But know thou that for all these things God will 
 bring thee into judgment.'^ 
 
 An ancient Persian fabulist tells the story of a king, who, 
 having hanged his general because he had lost a battle, 
 resolved in his rage to kill the widow and children of the 
 unfortunate officer also. The whole country was in distress 
 because of this cruel and unjust resolution, and numerous 
 petitions were sent in. But all was in vain. The despot 
 grew the more implacable the more his sense of humanity 
 was appealed to. One day the king's chief counsellor 
 threw himself at the feet of his master, and asked for 
 justice. He was accompanied by his daughter, a woman 
 of unparalleled beauty. " Ruler of the world," he said, 
 "your physician, seeing that my daughter surpasses his 
 daughter in beauty, as the sun surpasses the moon in glory, 
 has in a fit of jealousy deformed my child bv throwing a 
 caustic fluid over her face." Having said these words, he 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 unveiled his daughter's head. An ugly black spot was 
 exposed, which monstrously disfigured the otherwise beau- 
 tiful countenance of the poor girl. 
 
 The king, roused to anger by the sight, immediately sent 
 for his physician. 
 
 " Why have you done this to the woman } " he asked. 
 
 The physician gave no reply. 
 
 " By the sun and all his hosts," cried the king, '* with 
 thy head shalt thou pay for this oftence ! " 
 
 He beckoned to the captain of the guard, who at once 
 stepped forward to execute the verdict. But the physician 
 produced a sponge from his bosom, and, dipping it into a 
 basin of water, with one stroke thoroughly washed awa}- 
 the black spot. 
 
 " What is this } " asked the king, in a voice of glad 
 surprise. 
 
 "Ruler of the world," the counsellor answered, "you 
 have sentenced my friend the physician to death because 
 he only disfigured a girl's face by a stain which could be 
 washed off easily, but what sentence will the eternal Judge 
 have to pass upon you, if you cast such a stain upon your 
 conscience as you purpose — a stain which all the water of 
 the ocean cannot wash away.''" 
 
 The king, deeply struck by this question, abandoned his 
 cruel intention, and sent the widow and children of the 
 deceased general home, enriched with tokens of his princely 
 munificence. 
 
 This fable, in spirit like many other passages in the 
 writings of the heathen authors, confirms the truth of the 
 observation, that reverence for a pure conscience is~ so 
 deeply implanted in our nature, that even sin, with all its 
 destructive effect upon man's moral sense, has not been 
 able altogether to destroy it. 
 
 CCCLXVI. Conspicuous for exceeding Sin. 
 
 EcCLES. xi. 9. "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth ; afid 
 let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and loalk in 
 the ways of thifie heart, and in the sight of thifie eyes : but 
 knoiu thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into 
 judgment y 
 
 About a century ago, there flourished in the city of 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Glasgow a club of young men, which, from the extreme 
 profligacy of its members, and the licentiousness of their 
 orgies, was commonly called the Hell Club. Besides their 
 other meetings, it was- their custom to hold one great 
 annual gathering, at which each tried to surpass the other 
 in extravagance of riot ; and on these occasions one young 
 man — who, gifted with brilliant talents and a handsome 
 person, had at one time raised hopes which he had sub- 
 sequently destroyed — was ever conspicuous for his exceed- 
 ing sin. 
 
 On retiring to rest after one of these annual festivals, he 
 had the following dream : — He fancied that he was mounted 
 upon a favourite black horse, and was riding homeward in 
 the dusk, when a stranger, whom the gloom prevented him 
 from seeing distinctly, seized his horse's rein, saying, " You 
 must go with me." 
 
 "And who are you ?" exclaimed the young man with an 
 oath, as he struggled to free himself. 
 
 " That you will see presently," returned the other, in a 
 tone which thrilled such an unaccountable terror through 
 even his reckless breast that, plunging his spurs into his 
 horse, he attempted to fly, but in vain ; however fast the 
 animal flew, the stranger was still at his side, till at length, 
 in his desperate efforts to escape, the rider was thrown, 
 but instead of being dashed to the ground, he found himself 
 falling — falling — falling still, as if sinking into the bowels 
 of the earth. 
 
 " Where am I ? Where are you taking me to } " he 
 gasped out. 
 
 " To hell," replied the stranger, while interminable echoes 
 repeated the fearful sound, " To hell ! to hell 1 to hell ! " 
 
 On coming to a standstill, he found himself at the 
 entrance of a splendid building. Instead, however, of the 
 expected cries and groans and lamentations, nothing was 
 heard but sounds of music and rejoicing. On entering, he 
 soon perceived that he was amongst old acquaintances, 
 whom he knew to be dead, and all of them he observed 
 were following the pursuits which had most engrossed them 
 on earth. Approaching one of these — a lady whom he had 
 known as an inveterate gambler — he asked her to cease 
 awhile from play, and to introduce him to the pleasures of 
 a place which seemed so very unlike what he expected. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 But, with a cry of agony, she answered that there was no 
 rest in hell ; that they must for ever toil on in those very 
 pleasures and pursuits to which they had abandoned them- 
 selves while on earth. In the midst of the terror which 
 this inspired, his conductor returned, and on his earnest 
 entreaty restored him again to earth, leaving him, however, 
 with the words, " Remember ! in a year and a day we meet 
 again ! " 
 
 At this crisis of his dream the sleeper awoke, feverish 
 and ill ; and, either from the effects of the dream, or from 
 his previous excess, he was for several days seriously 
 unwell. During this period he had time for grave re- 
 flection, which ended in a resolution to abandon the club 
 and his licentious companions altogether. 
 
 After getting well, however, his companions, to whom he 
 told the reason of his leaving them, soon contrived to make 
 him ashamed of his good resolutions. He resumed his 
 former course of life, and when the next annual meeting 
 came round, he was, as usual, the most reckless of all the 
 guests. 
 
 On rising to make the customary speech, the president 
 observed, " This being leap-year, it is a year and a day since 
 our last anniversary." The words struck on the young 
 man's ear like a knell ; but ashamed to expose himself to 
 the jeers of his companions, he sat out the night, drowning 
 fearful thoughts in wine and revelry. Then, in the gloom 
 of a winter's morning, he mounted his horse to ride home. 
 
 Some hours afterwards the horse was found quietly 
 grazing by the roadside, whilst a few yards off lay the 
 corpse of his master. 
 
 CCCLXVII. A Soldier's Bible. Eccles. xi. 9. 
 " Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer 
 thee in the days of thy youth ; a/id walk in the ways of thy 
 heart, and in the sight of thine eyes : but know thou, that for 
 all these things God will bring thee into judgment." 
 
 It was customary in Cromwell's time for his soldiers to 
 carry each a Bible in his pocket ; among others, a profligate 
 young man, who was ordered out to attack some fortress. 
 During the engagement a bullet had perforated his Bible, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 and gone so far as to rest opposite the above text. These 
 words, so appropriate to his case, powerfully affected his 
 mind, and pro\cd, by the blessing of God, the means of 
 his conversion. He used to observe, that the Bible had 
 been the happy means of saving both his soul and his 
 body. 
 
 CCCLXVIII. The Day of Affliction. Eccles. xii. 3. 
 " In the day 7vhcn the keepers of the house shall tremble, and 
 the strong 7nen shall bow themselves''' 
 
 It is told of the saintly Joseph Alleine, that in his last 
 illness he suddenly lost the use of all his limbs. Looking 
 at his dead hands, he said, " The Lord gave, and the Lord 
 hath taken away, and blessed be the name of the Lord." 
 Some of his old friends having gathered round him, he said 
 to them, " I have lived a sweet life by the promises, and 
 I hope, through grace, can die by a promise. It is the 
 promises of God, which are everlasting, that will stand by 
 us. Nothing but God in them will stead us in a day of 
 affliction." 
 
 CCCLXIX. The Grave. Eccles. xii. 5. '' Man goelh to 
 his long home." 
 
 A Welsh pastor reaching his house after following his 
 wife to the grave, said, " I have seen my grave to-day, but 
 having seen Calvary long ago, I am not afraid of it" 
 
 CCCLXX. Nearly Home. Eccles. xii. 5. ''Man 
 goeth to his long hojne." 
 
 "Almost well, and nearly at ho7ne" said the dying Baxter, 
 when asked how he was by a friend. A martyr, when ap- 
 proaching the stake, being questioned as to how he felt, 
 answered, " Never better ; for now I know that I am almost 
 at home." Then looking over the meadows between him 
 and the place where he was to be immediate'}' burnt, he 
 said, " Only two more stiles to get over, and 1 am at my 
 Father's house." " Dying," said the Rev. S. Medley, " is 
 sweet work, sweet work ; home ! home ! " Another on his 
 death-bed said, " I am going home as fast as I can, and I 
 bless God that / have a good home to go to." 
 
224 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCLXXI. Retribution. Eccles. xii. 14. ''For God 
 shall br'uig every work into jud\:;ment with every secret thing, 
 whether it be good, or whether it be evil.'" 
 
 The doctrine of retribution is held by the Moslems in its 
 most rigid form — more rigid, indeed, than in the Christian 
 system ; for there is no atonement for sin. The judgment 
 is inexorable ; it is absolute and eternal. Before their 
 eyes ever stands the Day of Judgment — the Dies Irae — 
 when all men shall appear before God to receive their 
 doom. 
 
 But in that last day, when unbelievers shall be destroyed, 
 the followers of the Prophet shall be saved. They can go 
 to the tribunal of their Maker without trembling. One 
 day riding outside the walls of Constantinople, we ap- 
 proached a cemetery just as a funeral procession drew 
 near, bearing the form of the dead. We stopped to witness 
 the scene. The mourners gathered around the place where 
 the body was laid, and then the ulema approached the 
 grave, and began an address to the dead, telling her (it was 
 a woman) not to be afraid when the angel came to call her 
 to judgment, but to appear before the bar of the Almighty, 
 and answer without fear, for that no follower of the Prophet 
 should perish. 
 
 CCCLXXII. A Malarial Atmosphere. Song of 
 Sol. i. 6. " Mine own vineyard have I not kej>t." 
 
 Malarias are dangerous because they do not address 
 themselves to any sense. We can put up lightning-rods 
 to ward off thunder-bolts, but no man can put up rods 
 that will protect him from a poisonous atmosphere. The 
 sweetest and most beauteous days in New Orleans are 
 those in which death strikes most terribly in times of 
 pestilence. It cannot be detected by sight or by touch, 
 and that is what makes it so dreadful. Now we are walk- 
 ing in a malarial atmosphere continually — not one that 
 attacks the body, but one that infects the soul. There are 
 in the atmosphere of the world silent corrupting forces of 
 which men are quite unconscious — pride, vanity, the love 
 of money, greed, rivalries, and various other noxious ele- 
 ments, and nothing but the inward spiritual vigilance will 
 make man a match for these things. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 225 
 
 CCCLXXIII. Beware of the Ivy Green. Song of 
 Sol. ii. 15. " Take us the foxes, the lillle foxes that spoil the 
 vines." 
 In the gardens of Hampton Court you will see many trees 
 entirely vanquished and well nigh stran£:^led by huge coils 
 of ivy, which are wound about tliem like the snakes around 
 the unhappy Laocoon ; there is no untwisting the folds, 
 they are too giantlike, and fast fixed, and every hour the 
 rootlets of the climber are sucking the life out of the un- 
 happy tree. Yet there was a day when the ivy was a tiny 
 aspirant, only asking a little aid in climbing ; had it been 
 denied then the tree had never become its victim, but by 
 degrees the humble weakling grew in strength and arro- 
 gance, and at last it assumed the mastery, and the tall tree 
 became the prey of the creeping, insinuating destroyer. 
 The moral is too obvious. Sorrowfully do we remember 
 many noble characters which have been ruined little and 
 little by insinuating habits. Drink has been the ivy in 
 many cases. Reader, see to it, lest some slowly advancing 
 sin overpower you : men who are murdered by slow poison- 
 ing die just as surely as those who take arsenic. 
 
 CCCLXXIV. Early and Late with God. Song of 
 Sol. iii. 2. *■'■ I will seek him whom my soul loveth." 
 
 Alleine once wrote to a dear friend, "Though I am 
 apt to be unsettled and quickly set off the hinges, yet, 
 methinks, I am like a bird out of the nest, I am never 
 quiet till I am in my old way of communion with God ; 
 like the needle in the compass, that is restless till it be 
 turned towards the pole. I can say, through grace, with 
 the Church, ' With my soul have I desired thee in the 
 night, and with my spirit within me have I sought thee 
 early.' My heart is early and late with God ; 'tis the 
 business and delight of my life to seek him." 
 
 CCCLXXV. The Legend of St. Marguerite. 
 
 Song of Sol. iv. 16. ""Blow upon my garden, that the 
 
 spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his 
 
 garden, and eat his pleasant fruits." 
 
 The peasantry of the Litoral tell a singular legend to 
 
 the first founder of the Abbey, They say that when St, 
 
 Q 
 
226 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Honorat arrived on the island shore he was accompanied 
 by his sister, St. Marguerite, who had a number of nuns as 
 her companions. The mind of her brother, however, was not 
 satisfied at seeing the island thus occupied by the female 
 portion of the community ; and yet he did not know what 
 to do. The two islands at that distant period formed but 
 one. However, he thought much upon it, and at last he 
 proposed to his sister that she and her companions should 
 betake themselves to the farthest shore, near where the 
 fortress of St. Marguerite now stands, and that he and 
 his monks would retain the abbey. Still he did not feel 
 happy about it ; and at last, after a restless night, during 
 which loud peals of thunder reverberated among the 
 mountains, and lightning flashes played along the snow- 
 girt peaks of the Alps, and the tall pines were torn up by 
 the roots, and the fierce waves moaned around the abbey 
 shore, when St. Honorat went forth at dawn, he saw to 
 his amazement that a deep, broad channel now intervened 
 between the islands — the island having been rent in twain. 
 
 For a time St. Honorat was content. He used to pay 
 a visit occasionally to his sister ; and as he dearly loved 
 strawberries, he chiefly then, when this fruit was in season, 
 went to his sister's isle, where, in the sunny shelter of this, 
 the warmest spot of the Litoral, the fruit used to grow 
 abundantly. At last his over-scrupulous mind began to 
 question whether it was even right for him to visit the 
 island at all. Many a restless night the saint passed, his 
 mind oscillating between affection for his sister and the 
 overstrained dictates of a morbid mind. 
 
 When St. Marguerite, who had no such manner of 
 scruples, perceived that her brother came not as often 
 as before, she reasoned with him, and at last he agreed 
 still to continue his visits as long as the strawberries 
 should bear fruit, but for the rest of the year he deter- 
 mined never to visit St. Marguerite. And now his sister 
 dispatched messengers to all the countries round, and 
 charged them to biing back the earliest and the latest 
 flowering strawberry plants that they could find. In fact, 
 she managed it so well that one quarter of the island 
 became an immense strawberry bed. . . . 
 
 Many an anxious hour was spent by St. Marguerite on 
 her own island, as she superintended the work of straw- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 berry plantinf^ in the sunniest spots of the myrtle-shaded 
 shore. St. Uonorat had now been a long time without 
 paying her a visit. And as she paced along the margin 
 of the blue waters, and gazed towards the white crests of 
 the maritime Alps that towered far inland, and marked 
 the grey gnarled olive trees, that like a woodland sea 
 extended beneath the nearer heights of Pezou, Grand 
 Pine, and the crest on which Mougins lifts his walls, many 
 a time she grieved that her brother should have listened 
 to the too rigid suggestions of an ascetic mind, when she 
 had rejoiced in listening to the holy counsels and loving 
 admonitions which flowed from his lips. 
 
 The winter passed away — the spring came on — the 
 mistral came blowing fiercely from his caverns in the 
 Esterelles ; and at last a messenger announced to Honorat 
 that the season for strawberries had arrived. Gladly he 
 passed over to see Marguerite, and to pick the fruit. The 
 next day he came again ; a week passed, and still he 
 came ; a month was over, and still more strawberries. 
 Three months passed, and lo ! daily a fresh supply of rich 
 fruit was witnessed. Half a year passed, and yet the 
 strawberries came on without cessation, and at last 
 December saw some coming freshly in ; and when 
 Honorat witnessed spring again bringing its ripe fruit, 
 he was constrained to tell Marguerite that such a won- 
 drous plenty of strawberries was a plain manifestation 
 that he was wrong in coming to the decision of only 
 visiting her rarely, and that henceforth he would come 
 to see her, without let or hindrance, from day to day. 
 
 We may preserve fellowship with our Lord Jesus by 
 cultivating those sweet graces which he loves. If we 
 would bring forth the flowers of holiness all the year 
 round, we might see His face every day Are we as 
 earnest to use means to detain him, as Marguerite to win 
 her brother's company? It is to be feared not. Let us 
 henceforth be more anxious to obtain daily, hourly fellow- 
 ship with our Lord. 
 
 CCCLXXVI. Seeing no Beauty in Christ. Song 
 OF Sol. v. 9. " What is thy beloved more than another 
 beloved ? " 
 
 CORREGGIO has a picture of St. Catherine of Sienna's 
 
228 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 mystical marriage. This mediaeval saint had a vision, in 
 which she saw the Saviour approach and place on her 
 hand a ring-, in which blazed a diamond of unearthly 
 purity and beauty, with which He espoused her to Him- 
 self. The jewel ever burned with a splendid radiance to 
 her eye, though invisible to all others. 
 
 CCCLXXVII. Light. Song of Sol. vi. lo. ''Fair as 
 the moon, clear as the sun." 
 
 Light has always been a favourite symbol of seats of 
 learning. " Dominus illuminatio Mea " is blazoned on the 
 arms of Oxford. Cambridge writes, " Hunc lucem et 
 pocula sacra." In the Song of Solomon, the lover names 
 the beloved " Fair as the moon, clear as the sun." 
 
 CCCLXXVIII. An Irish Bishop. Isa. i. 25. "/7f//// 
 purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin." 
 
 " Yet Thou my shield and glory art, 
 Th' uplifter of mine head. 
 I cry'd. and, from His holy hill, 
 The Lord me answer made. 
 
 " I laid me down and slept, I wak'd ; 
 For God sustained me. 
 I will not fear though thousands ten 
 Set round against me be." 
 
 This was the text from which Bishop Bedell preached to 
 his fellow-prisoners in the time of the Irish rebellion in 
 1642, when he and the Protestants of the district were 
 shut up in hold, and in danger of death at any moment. 
 He was one of the best bishops who ever lived in Ireland, 
 and had his example been more general the Reformation 
 would have made much greater progress in the country. 
 He learned the Irish language, had the Bible translated 
 into it, was assiduous in Christian work, and was filled 
 with the spirit of meekness and self-sacrifice. So much 
 did he commend himself that, when he died in the midst 
 of these troubles, the Irish did him uncommon honour 
 at his burial, fired a volley at his interment, and cried 
 Requiescat in pace ultiuins Anglormn. He lived from 
 1570 to 1642. He had a deep feeling of sin, and as the 
 word Bedel in Hebrew signifies tin, he took for his motto 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Isa. 1*. 25, " I will purely purge thy dross and take away 
 all thy (bedel) tin." 
 
 CCCLXXIX. The Last Hour. Isa. ii. ii. '' The lofty 
 looks of man shall be humbled, atid the hajighliness of men 
 shall be bowed dozvn, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in 
 that day:' 
 
 A MINISTER named Mr. Winstanley was the means of 
 comforting and edifying the great Dr. Johnson on his 
 death-bed. In a letter to a friend, Hannah More, alluding 
 to this, says: "I cannot conclude without remarking what 
 honour God has hereby put upon the doctrine of faith in a 
 crucified Saviour. The man whose intellectual powers had 
 awed all around him, was in his turn made to tremble 
 when the period arrived at which all knowledge appears 
 useless, and vanishes away, except the knowledge of the 
 true God, and of Jesus Christ, whom He has sent. Effec- 
 tually to attain this knowledge, this giant in literature 
 must become a little child. The man looked up to as a 
 prodigy of wisdom must become a fool that he might be 
 wise." 
 
 What a comment is this upon that word : "The loftiness 
 of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men 
 shall be made low, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in 
 that day " ! 
 
 CCCLXXX. Living in the Lives of Others. Isa. 
 vi. 8. " Whom shall I send, and ivho will go for us ? 2hen 
 said L, Here am L ; send me." 
 
 Being sick with the pleurisy, John Woolman was brought 
 so near to the gates of death that he forgot his ov/n name. 
 " Being then desirous to know who I was," he writes, " I 
 saw a mass of matter, of a dull, gloomy colour, between the 
 south and the east, and was informed that this mass was 
 human beings in as great misery as they could be and live ; 
 and that I was mixed in with them, and henceforth might 
 not consider myself as a distinct and separate being. In 
 that state I heard a pure and melodious voice, more soft 
 and harmonious than any voice I had heard with my ears 
 before, and I believed that it was the voice of an angel 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 who spoke to the other angels. The words were, JoJin 
 Woolmaii is dead. Yet, knowing that I was alive in the 
 body, I greatly wondered what that heavenly voice could 
 mean." 
 
 He tells us then, with the simplicity and power of 
 Bunyan, how the mystery was opened to him ; how that 
 John Woolman was to live only henceforth in the lives of 
 these others — most wretched ones. 
 
 The vision lifted his whole life. It was thereafter a per- 
 petual unconscious self-sacrifice. Every action in it, it is 
 true, shows the effect of his lack of education and of the 
 ignorance that surrounded him. The water of life flowed 
 through a narrow pipe. But it was a pure rill. 
 
 CCCLXXXI. The Conscience. Isa. viii. 20. ''To 
 the latv and to the testimony.^ 
 
 The late Dr. Guthrie thus speaks in one of his sermons : — 
 "According to an Eastern tale, a great magician presented 
 his prince with a ring. The gift was of inestimable value, 
 not for the diamonds and rubies and pearls that gemmed 
 it, but for a rare and mystic property in the metal. It 
 sat easily enough in ordinary circumstances ; but so soon 
 as its wearer formed a bad thought or wish, designed or 
 committed a bad action, the ring became a monitor. 
 Suddenly contracting, it pressed painfully on his finger, 
 warning him of sin. Such a ring is not the peculiar pro- 
 perty of kings — all, the poorest of us, those that wear none 
 other, possess and wear it — for the ring of the fable is just 
 that conscience, which is the voice of God within us ; which 
 is His law written, not on Sinai's granite tables, but on the 
 fleshy tablets of the heart ; and which, enthroned in every 
 bosom, commends us when we do right, and condemns us 
 when we do wrong. But conscience, as an expression of 
 the law or will and mind of God, is not now to be de- 
 pended on. True to its office in Eden, it was shattered 
 and overturned by the Fall ; and now lies, as I have seen 
 a sun-dial in the neglected garden of an old, desolate, 
 ruined castle, thrown from its pedestal, prostrate on the 
 ground, and covered by tall, rank weeds. 
 
 So far as doctrines and duties are concerned, not con- 
 science, but the Book of Revelation, is our one only sure 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 23! 
 
 and safe directory. "Search the Scriptures," says our 
 Lord, "for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they 
 are they which testify of Mc." " To the law and to the 
 testimony," says another, " if they speak not according to 
 these, there is no truth in them." 
 
 CCCLXXXII. Is God here? Isa. xi. 6. ''And a Halt 
 child shall lead them." 
 
 A YOUNG man had been extremely profane, and thought 
 little of the matter. After his marriage to a high-minded, 
 lovely wife, the habit appeared to him in a different light, 
 and he made spasmodic efforts to conquer it. But not 
 until some years had passed did he become victor, when 
 the glowing evil was set before him, b}^ a little incident, in 
 its real and shocking sinfulness. 
 
 One Sunday morning, standing before the mirror shav- 
 ing, the razor slipped, inflicting a slight wound. True to 
 his fixed habit, he ejaculated the single word " God I " and 
 was not a little amazed and chagrined to see reflected in 
 the mirror the pretty picture of his little three-year-old 
 daughter, as laying her dolly hastily down she sprang from 
 her seat on the floor, exclaiming as she looked eagerly and 
 expectantly about the room, " Is Dod here } " 
 
 Pale and ashamed, and at a loss for a better answer, he 
 simply said " Why .'* " 
 
 " 'Cause I thought He was when I heard you speak to 
 Him." 
 
 Then noticing the sober look on his face and the tears 
 of shame in his eyes as he gazed down into the innocent, 
 radiant face, she patted him lovingly on the hand, exclaim- 
 ing assuringly, " Call Him again, papa, and I dess He'll 
 surely come." 
 
 Oh, how every syllable of the child's trusting words cut 
 to his heart I The still, small voice was heard at last. 
 Catching the wondering child up in his arms, he knelt 
 down, and for the first time in his life implored of God for- 
 giveness for past offences and guidance for all his future 
 life, thanking Him in fervent spirit that he had not " surely 
 come " before in answer to some of his awful blasphemies. 
 Surely " a little child shall lead them." 
 
232 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCLXXXIII. Exalting God. Isa. xxv. i. '' O Lord, 
 
 Thou art my God : I will exalt 7/ue." 
 
 " Dr. BelI-AMY made God big," said an old negro to Dr. 
 Backus, his successor. 
 
 He is no true Christian who does not exalt Christ. 
 A minister, whose congregation had long deplored the 
 cold and dry style of his preaching, found one Sunday 
 morning, on entering the pulpit, a slip of paper on the 
 cushion with the words in John xii. 21 written on it : " Sir, 
 zve tvoiild see Jesus." His conscience supplied the applica- 
 tion of the text, and after much thought and self-examina- 
 tion he resolved, with God's help, to preach Christ more 
 clearly ; and next Sunday he took for his text John xx. 20 : 
 " Then were the disciples glad when they saiv ihe Lord!' 
 
 CCCLXXXIV. The Divine Fatherland. Isa. xxv. 8. 
 " He will swallow up death in victory ; and the Lord God 
 will wipe away tears from off all faces." 
 
 An American minister thus speaks in one of his sermons : 
 " When the regiments of the British army are on foreign 
 stations the bands are forbidden to play ' Sweet Home,' 
 lest the beautiful tune, with its touching associations, 
 should make the men saddened and disheartened. But no 
 such effect is produced in the Christian soul by singing 
 to him of heaven. On the contrary, it gives him joy, and 
 contentment, and strength, and consolation. For this pur- 
 pose I have spoken of it now to you. Is it a comfort .-' 
 That will depend on whether or not you are a child of 
 God. Hark 1 amid the darkness the clock strikes out, 
 with booming sound, the long midnight hour, and as it is 
 heard by the watchman on his weary beat, he rejoices that 
 he is so much nearer the time of his release at the day 
 dawn. But as it falls on the ears of the condemned 
 criminal in his cheerless cell, it sends a shiver through his 
 frame, for he is an hour nearer his execution on the morn. 
 How is it with you and the ringing out of the old year, in 
 this regard ? Does it fill you with gladness or with dread } 
 Oh, if with dread, let me urge you at once to break away 
 from sin, and enter into the family of God, so that your 
 terror may be turned into joy. They tell that in the armies 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 233 
 
 of the first Napoleon, wlien the ^ Ranz dcs vacJies' was 
 played by the regimental bands, some Swiss soldiers, under 
 the influence of the old home tune, were sure to desert 
 before the morning. Child of God, I have tried to move 
 your heart by awaking within you the associations of your 
 divine fatherland. I have sung to you the Christian home- 
 song ; and if you have enlisted into any army of sin, or 
 shame, or cruelty, or wrong, may the effect upon you be, 
 to cause you to desert at once and hasten back to your 
 Father's embrace." 
 
 CCCLXXXV. Our Last Hour. Isa. xxvi. 3, ''Thou 
 wilt keep him i7t perfect peace whose ?ni?id is stayed on Thee." 
 
 In a lecture on "The Trinity: a Practical Truth," Joseph 
 Cook speaks thus of the late Charles Kingsley : — " In 1875, 
 Charles Kingsley, having bidden adieu to Westminster 
 Abbey and Windsor Castle, lay dying ; and, with the 
 breath of eternity on his cheeks, the central thought of 
 this modern man was that 'only in faith and love to the 
 Incarnate God our Saviour can the cleverest, as well as 
 the simplest, find the peace of God which passeth all 
 understanding.' 'In this faith,' says his wife, 'he had 
 lived ; and as he had lived, so he died — humble, confident, 
 unbewildered.' In the night he was heard murmuring : 
 ' No more fighting ; no more fighting.' Then followed 
 intense, earnest prayers, which were his habit when alone. 
 His warfare was accomplished ; he had fought the good 
 fight ; and on one of his last nights on earth his daughter 
 heard him exclaim: 'How beautiful God is!' The last 
 morning, at five o'clock, just after his eldest daughter and 
 his physician, who had sat up all night, had left him, and 
 he thought himself alone, he was heard, in a clear voice, 
 repeating the words of the Burial Service : ' Thou knowest, 
 O Lord, the secrets of our hearts ; shut not Thy merciful 
 ears to our prayer ; but spare us, O Lord most holy, O 
 God most mighty, O holy, merciful Saviour, Tiiou most 
 worthy Judge Eternal, suffer us not, at our last hour, from 
 any pains of death, to fall from Thee.' He turned on his 
 side after this, and never spoke again." 
 
234 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCLXXXVI. I will Remember Thee. Isa. 
 xxvi. 8. " The desire of oiir soul is to Thy name, and to the 
 rcine^nbrance of Tlieer 
 
 Dr. Jessup, the Syrian missionary, says that when his 
 father, long a Vice-President of the American Board of 
 Missions, had been twice paralyzed, his memory gone, and 
 even his own house no longer recognised, he was at home 
 when he got into his church, or remembered the Missionary 
 lioard, and wrote a letter to its representatives, full of the 
 spirit of missions. He could conduct family prayers as 
 well as ever, and was perfectly sound in mind and memory 
 as to the Redeemer's kingdom. It was like the disinte- 
 grated quartz falling away from the pure gold. 
 
 CCCLXXXVII. Strong Drink. Isa. xxviii. 7. ''But 
 
 they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink 
 are out of the way." 
 
 A TREE in South America, called the Judas Tree, has 
 beautiful scarlet blossoms, but it has a deadly opiate. The 
 insects are charmed with it. But under and all around 
 this tree there are millions of dead carcases lying. 
 
 CCCLXXXVIII. Erring through Strong Drink. 
 
 Isa. xxviii. 7. " The priest and the prophet have erred through 
 strong drink." 
 
 Mr. J. W. KiRTON, author of " Buy your own Cherries," 
 etc., tells a painful story of a clergyman of the Church of 
 England — a man of such power that he filled every seat 
 and aisle with a congregation, and wherever he preached 
 cleared out the chapels and churches for miles round. 
 Souls were converted, and a blessed influence rested on 
 the town. By-and-by a whisper got abroad that he was 
 fond of drink, and ultimately it proved to be too true. 
 He was seen staggering in the streets ; the bishop instituted 
 inquiries, and the case turned out so bad that the clergy- 
 man's gown was taken from him, and he was deprived of 
 his living. All restraint seemed then removed. He wan- 
 dered about the town, sold his library, and spent the money 
 in drink amongst the worst characters in the town where 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 235 
 
 he had preached the gospel for years. His plate followed, 
 then his furniture, and ultimately he marched to the work- 
 house and asked for admission. He was received, and 
 week after week he went with the other paupers into the 
 very church where he used to preach. His friends tof)k 
 compassion upon him, took him out of the workhouse, put 
 him into a cottage, and started him as a schoolmaster ; 
 but he eventually " broke out " again, spent all he had in 
 drink, had another attack of delirnun tremens, and was 
 taken, a hopeless maniac, to the county lunatic asylum. 
 
 CCCLXXXIX. God's Searching. Isa. xxviii. 10. 
 '■'■ For precept must be upon precept, preapt upon precept ; line 
 upon line, line upon line ; here a little, and there a little." 
 
 Perpora, the great Italian music master, kept one of his 
 pupils learning the same lesson for three years. The pupil 
 began to murmur, but the master was firm. Four, five, 
 six years passed, and yet he was still at the same, until at 
 last, when he began to fear he might, after all, be just at 
 the beginning, the great teacher set him free with the 
 words, " Go, my son, for thou hast nothing more to learn," 
 and he found himself the first singer of Italy. So God 
 keeps teaching us the same lesson over and over again — 
 our utter nothingness, our complete helplessness, and our 
 perfect sinfulness. 
 
 CCCXC. Jargon without Knowledge. Isa. xxix. 
 
 13. " This people draw tiear Me with their mouth, and 
 with their lips do honour Me, but have removed their heart 
 far from Me." 
 
 Mr. Spurgeon says : " I heard two persons on the Wen- 
 gern Alp talking by the hour together of the names of 
 lerns; not a word about their characteristics, uses, or habits, 
 but a medley of crack-jaw titles, and nothing more. They 
 evidently felt that they were ventilating their botany, and 
 kept each other in countenance by alternate volleys of non- 
 sense. They were about as sensible as those doctrinalists 
 who for ever talk over the technicalities of religion, but 
 know nothing by experience of its spirit and power. Are 
 we not all too apt to amuse ourselves after the same 
 fashion ? He who knows mere Linnaean names, but has 
 
236 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 never seen a flower, is as reliable in botany, as he is in 
 theology who can descant upon supra-lapsarianism, but 
 has never known the love of Christ in his heart. 
 
 True religion's more than doctrine, 
 Something must be known and felt." 
 
 CCCXCI. Sanctify My Name. Isa. xxix. 23. ''They 
 shall sanctijy My Name, and sanctify the Holy One of Jacob y 
 and shall fear the God of Israel y 
 
 Mr. Baxter says : " Some holy Nonconformists I have 
 known that would rarely mention God, but with their hats 
 put off, or bowing down their iieads, and it hath often 
 affected me more than a sermon." 
 
 CCCXCII. The Fear of Hell peoples Heaven. 
 
 Isa. XXX. 33. *■ For Tophet is ordained of old.'^ 
 
 There is a legend that the devil once put on a monk's 
 hood, and went into the pulpit and preached hell and its 
 terrors. As he knew his subject so well, he sent all his 
 congregation into transports of terror, ready to say they 
 believed anything, or to confess or promise anything, so 
 that only they might escape such horror and despair. 
 And when he returned from his mission, his friends bitterly 
 reproached him, and said, "What have you done.? Don't 
 you know that men say, 'The fear of hell peoples heaven'.^ 
 You have ruined and undone your own kingdom." But 
 he replied, " Never fear : I know what I am doing. The 
 heaven which the fear of hell peoples is one of my own 
 devising (for its roots are in selfishness), and the more men 
 seek that, the better for me ! Since thus shall they never 
 know that love of God, which is the one thing that utterly 
 defeats and thwarts me." 
 
 CCCXCIII. The Covert from the Tempest. Isa. 
 
 xxxii. 2. ''And a man shall be as an hidin^-f lace from the 
 wind, and a covert from the tempest." 
 
 You remember, perhaps, the incident — on the St. Bernard 
 mountain — of the freezing traveller who was just settling 
 down into the snow-drifts, despairing and half dead. The 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 237 
 
 whirling snovv-nurrics were fast weavin;^ the white shroud 
 around his dying form. Just as he is about sinking into 
 the nunib insensibihty, he hears the distant cry of another 
 traveller who, like himself, is perishing in the storm. He 
 rouses up. He makes a sturdy effort to reach his com- 
 panion in suffering— finds him — chafes him — lifts him on 
 his feet, and' supports his trembling steps onward towards 
 the welcome light of the Hospice that now glimmers 
 tiirough the driving snow. The effort warms his own 
 freezing frame into life again, and in trying to save another, 
 he saves himself. Join hands with some friend who is yet 
 out of Christ, and together struggle on towards the blessed 
 " covert from the tempest." 
 
 CCCXCIV. Beyond the River. Isa. xxxiii. 17. 
 " Thine eyes shall see the King in His beauty : they shall 
 behold the land that is very far off.'' 
 
 Our Father is leading us home : and the more rough and 
 rugged the road near its close, the more we relish the 
 greensward beyond the grave. Could we look upwards 
 with a steadier and more ardent eye, we should scarce feel 
 the fluctuations of this changeable scene. When a man 
 feels dizzy, in riding through a torrent, by looking down 
 on the stream, the best way to restore his head to calmness 
 is to fix his eye on the stationary objects on the other side 
 of the river. 
 
 CCCXCV. Begin at the Beginning. Isa. xxxiii. 
 22. "For the Lord is oiir Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, 
 the Lord is our King ; He will save us." 
 
 Dr. Duncan, of the New College, Edinburgh, in conver- 
 sation once with a lady, addressed these remarkable words 
 to her : — " It's a grand thing to begin at the beginning, — 
 to begin with the Lord as our Maker, and to learn who 
 and what He is, Jehovah, I Am ; and then to learn of Him 
 as the Lawgiver; and then to meet Him as a Judge, and 
 to be reconciled to His holy law, — to hear Him pronounce 
 the curse that we deserve, and to say Amen to it; and then 
 to lie at His feet, confessin;.; that hell is our due, and, \y'\wg 
 there, to take at His own hand, Christ, instead of hell, — 
 
238 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Christ free, instead of hell deserved. That's just salvation, 
 and no way but that will do for you or me. Try to get it 
 fresh on your conscience every day, that hell is your desert, 
 and that you take Christ instead." 
 
 CCCXCVI. Loyalty. Isa. xxxiii. 22. ^' For the Lord 
 is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King ; 
 He will save us.'" 
 
 Three centuries ago the Spaniards were besieging the 
 little town of St. Quentin, on the frontiers of France. Its 
 ramparts were in ruins, fever and famine were decimating 
 its defenders, treason was gliding among its terrified popu- 
 lation. One day the Spaniards shot over the walls a 
 shower of arrows, to which were attached little slips of 
 parchment, promising the inhabitants that if they would 
 surrender, their lives and property should be spared. 
 Now, the governor of the town was the great leader of 
 the Huguenots, Gasparci de Coligni. As his sole answer 
 he took a piece of parchment, tied it to a javelin, wrote on 
 it the two words Regent Jiabemiis — "We have a king" — 
 and hurled it back into the camp of the enemy. There 
 was his sole answer to all their threats and all their seduc- 
 tions. Now that was true loyalty — loyalty in imminent 
 peril, loyalty ready to sacrifice all. But who was that 
 king for whom, amidst sword and flame, amid fever and 
 famine, Coligni was defending those breached and battered 
 walls.'' It was the weak and miserable Henry H. of 
 France, whose son, Charles IX., was afterwards guilty of 
 the murder of Coligni and the infamies of St. Bartholomew. 
 Have you a king } Is Christ your King ? Ah, if He 
 be, He is not a feeble, corrupt, false, treacherous man like 
 Coligni's master, but a King who loves you, who died for 
 you, who pleads with you even now on the right hand of 
 the Majesty on High. Are you loyal to Him as Coligni 
 was to the wretched Henry II.? Are you loyal at all — 
 much more, would you be loyal to Christ, even unto death ? 
 If so, what will you do for Him t That is the test 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 239 
 
 CCCXCVII. Story of a Jerusalem Child. Isa. xl. 11 
 "He shall gather the lambs with His arm." 
 
 Miss Fletcher tells the story of the death of a dear little 
 child called Naglie, who died in Jerusalem not long before 
 her own death : " I heard the touching account of her 
 death from her mother, a young Christian, who had learned 
 to love Jesus in Miss Arnott's School at Jaffa. Naglie was 
 only two years and a half old when she died, but she was 
 a strange child. She and her brother loved each other like 
 two doves. Often she said, ' I do not want to stay here ; 
 I want to go to my dear Jesus,' On Sunday she went to 
 church, but did not seem well. She came home and lay in 
 her little bed, with eyes fixed, but they were looking at 
 Jesus. Once or twice she said, * I want to lie in my cold 
 bed,' meaning the grave. She asked her father to sing to 
 her. Then she said, * It is Jesus, father, my dear Jesus, 
 who has come to take me.' She looked up ; she saw what 
 v.'e saw not, and smiling, said, " There, He is at the foot of 
 my bed ; He calls me to come.' Then all was over. She 
 was but six hours ill. Naglie ever loved the pictures best 
 at school which showed tlic dear Jesus. One day when 
 her mother put flowers in her hair, she said, ' Mother, Jesus 
 had thorns on His head, and not flowers.* " 
 
 CCCXCVIII. "The Lambs in His Arms." Isa. 
 xl, 1 1. "He shall gather the lambs 'with His arm, and carry 
 them in His bosom." 
 
 In a Chinese Christian family at Amoy, a little boy, the 
 youngest of three children, on asking his father to allow 
 him to be baptized, was told that he was too young; that 
 he might fall back if he made a profession when he was 
 only a little boy. To this he made the touching reply, 
 "Jesus has promised to carry the lambs in His arms. I 
 am only a little boy ; it will be easier for Jesus to carry 
 me," This logic of the heart was too much for the father. 
 He took him with him, and the dear child was ere long 
 baptized. The whole family, of which this child is the 
 youngest member — the father, mother, and three sons — are 
 all members of the Mission Church at Amoy. 
 
240 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCXCIX. God's Infinity. Isa. xl. 26. '' Lift up your 
 eyes on high, ufid behold who hath created these things, that 
 brirrgeth out their host by numbers : Lie calleth them all by 
 names by the greatness of His might." 
 
 Jean Paul Richter says, "God called up from dreams 
 a man into the vestibule of heaven, saying, ' Come thou 
 hither, and see the glory of My house.' And to the 
 servants that stood around His throne He said, 'Take him 
 and undress him from his robes of flesh ; cleanse his 
 vision, and put a new breath into his nostrils ; arm him 
 with wings for flight, only touch not with any change his 
 human heart — the heart that weeps and trembles.' It 
 was done, and with a mighty angel for his guide, the man 
 stood ready for his infinite voyage : and from the terraces 
 of heaven, without sound or farewell, they wheeled away 
 into endless space. Then came eternities of twilight that 
 revealed but were not revealed. To the right hand and to 
 the left, toward mighty constellations, depth was swallowed 
 up in height insurmountable, height was swallowed up in 
 depth unfathomable. Suddenly, as thus they rode from 
 infinite to infinite ; suddenly, as they tilted over abyssmal 
 worlds, a mighty cry arose — that systems more mysterious, 
 worlds more billowy, other heights and other depths were 
 nearing at hand. Then the man sighed, stopped, shud- 
 dered and wept. His overladen heart uttered itself in 
 tears ; and he said, ' Angel, I will go no farther. For the 
 spirit of man aches under this infinity. Insufferable is the 
 glory of God's house. Let me lie down in the grave, that I 
 may find rest from the persecutions of the infinite; for end 
 I see there is none.' And from all the listening stars that 
 shone around issued one choral chant, ' Even so it is : 
 Angel, thou knowest that it is : end there is none that ever 
 yet we heard of The Angel demanded : ' And is this the 
 sorrow that kills you .? ' But his voice answered that he 
 might answer himself Then the Angel threw up his 
 glorious hands to the heaven of heavens, saying, * End is 
 there none to the universe of God. Lo ! also there is no 
 beginning.'" 
 
 Merc mfinity frightens the spirit : it is only from the 
 teachings of revelation and Christ as the manifested wis- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 241 
 
 dom, power, and love of God, that the infinity of the Divine 
 Being becomes a friend and not a fear to man. 
 
 CCCCII. A Bruised Reed. Isa. xlii. 3. ''A bruised 
 reed shall he not break." 
 
 In one of his sermons, Mr. William Birch says, " I remem- 
 ber some years ago, while riding over one of the deserts of 
 northern Africa, meeting with a company of Arab travellers, 
 and dining with them in the primitive way of sitting on 
 the sand. After dinner one of the men brought out his 
 pipes to play. These pipes were two reeds, something 
 like the tin whistles on which boys sometimes play, but 
 made of cane. The man put the end of the reeds in his 
 mouth and played Arab tunes with them, the music thus 
 produced being soft and tremulous. When he had finished 
 playing, he placed the reeds on the ground, and a horse 
 happening to tread on one, it was injured. I at once 
 thought of the passage of Scripture, referring to Christ, 
 which says — 'A bruised reed shall He not break,' and I 
 wondered for a moment what this Arab would do. He 
 took up the reed, and though it was bruised he did not 
 throw it away, but sat down on the ground, and for proba- 
 bly half an hour tried gently and patiently to straighten 
 and repair it, so that he might be able to use it again for 
 his cheering tunes, as it was the only instrument of music 
 in that little caravan." 
 
 CCCCIII. The Praying Light-Keeper. Isa. xlii. 10. 
 " Sifig unto the Lord a new song, and His praise from the end 
 of the earthy ye that go doivn to the sea." 
 
 We were fog-bound in Penobscot Bay, and made harbour 
 at Eagle Island. Just as the sun was setting we went on 
 shore, and, walking toward the lighthouse, were attracted 
 by the voice of some one in prayer. It was an impressive 
 scene. Before us stretched out the broad Atlantic ; the 
 gathering shades of evening deepened the solitude. In the 
 light above us was the keeper, where he had just lighted 
 his lamp. His face was turned toward the sea ; his long 
 hair and beard were whitened with the snows of many 
 winters. His arms were outstretched and his voice alone 
 broke the silence, as he besought the Almighty, in the 
 
 R 
 
242 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 hollow of whose hands the seas are held, to protect the 
 sailor, and to forgive his sins. 
 
 "Them prayers will go higher than the light," said our 
 skipper, and all of us felt that we had come into the near 
 presence of God, on that lonely island far at sea. 
 
 Who can measure the Divine Providence that shines 
 out from the lighthouse on Eagle Island, because of that 
 praying lighthouse-keeper ? 
 
 CCCCIV. A Death Song. Isa. xliii. 2. " When thou 
 passest ihrovgh the waters I will be with thee.'" 
 
 A COASTING vessel once struck on the rocks in a gale in 
 the British Channel. The captain and crew took to the 
 boats and were lost. They might have been saved had 
 they remained on board, for a huge wave carried the vessel 
 up among the rocks, where the ebbing tide left her high 
 and dry. In the captain's cabin a hymn-book was found 
 lying on the table ; it was open at a particular page, and 
 the pencil still lay in it which had marked the favourite 
 lines of the sailor when just entering the jaws of death. 
 While the hurricane was howling outside, the captain had 
 drawn his pencil beside these glorious words of cheer : — 
 
 " Jesu, lover of my soul, 
 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly, 
 While the billows fiear fne roll, 
 
 While the tempest still is high. 
 Hide me, O my Saviour, hide, 
 
 Till the storm of life is past ! 
 Safe into the haven guide, 
 
 O receive my soul at last ! " 
 
 Blessed death-song ! 
 
 CCCCV. To Die is Gain. Isa. xliii. 2. ''When thou 
 passest through the waters, I will be with thee" 
 
 The testimony of John Rogers, of Bridport, was one of the 
 many beautiful death-beds of which we have heard. The 
 night before he died he said, " I am going home." Putting 
 out his arm, and beckoning and smiling, he said, " Coming, 
 coming." Early next md^'ning he asked for his favourite 
 testament, and, placing it close lo his heart, he said, " I am 
 dying, resting on Jesus : nothing remains but the death- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 243 
 
 struggle. Christ is my all in all." The passage was 
 repeated to him, "Yea, though I walk through tlic valley 
 of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil : for Thou art 
 with me." He said, "And He will be with me to the end." 
 Then he gently fell asleep. 
 
 CCCCVI. Fear Not. Isa. xliii. 2. '^ When thou passesl 
 tlirougJi thc7vaters^ I will be with thee; a?id through the rivers, 
 they shall tiot overflow thee.''^ 
 
 Among the few remains of Sir John Franklin that were 
 found far up in the Polar regions, there was a leaf of the 
 " Student's Manual," by Dr. John Todd, the only relic of a 
 book. From the way in which the leaf was turned down, 
 the following portion of a dialogue was prominent: "Are 
 you not afraid to die?" "No." "No! Why does the 
 uncertainty of another state give you no concern '^ " 
 " Because God has said to me : * Fear not. When thou 
 passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and througli 
 the rivers, they shall not overflow thee.' " This leaf is 
 preserved in the Museum of Greenwich Hospital, among 
 the relics of Sir John Franklin. 
 
 CCCCVII. Sinning against Light. Isa. xliii. 8. 
 
 " Bring forth the blind people that have ejes." 
 
 Carlyle quotes out of the Koran a story of the dwellers 
 by the Dead Sea, to whom Moses was sent. They sniffed 
 and sneered at Moses ; saw no comeliness in Moses ; and 
 so he withdrew. But Nature and her rigorous veracities 
 did not withdraw. When next we find the dwellers by the 
 Dead Sea, they, according to the Koran, are all changed 
 into apes. " By not using their souls, they lost them." 
 "And now," continues Carlyle, "their only employment is 
 to sit there and look out into the smokiest, dreariest, most 
 undecipherable sort of universe. Only once in seven days 
 they do remember that they once had souls. Hast thou 
 never, O traveller! fallen in with parties of this tribe.? 
 Methinks they have grown somewhat numerous in our 
 day." 
 
 The old Greek proverb was that the avenging deities are 
 shod with wool ; but the wool grows on the eyelids that 
 
244 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 refuse the light. " Whom the gods would destroy, they 
 first make mad;" but the insanity arises from judicial 
 blindness. 
 
 Jeremy Taylor says that whoever sins against light 
 kisses the lips of a blazing cannon. 
 
 CCCCVIII. Times of Blessing. Isa. xliv. 3. ''For 
 I will pour water upon him that is thirsty^ and foods upon the 
 dry ground. " 
 
 During Mr. Sherman's ministry in Reading, his flock was 
 visited by remarkable " times of refreshing," which can 
 never be forgotten. He says himself: " One Whit-Sunday 
 morning, I was preaching from Isa. xliv. 3-5, ' For I will 
 pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the 
 dry ground,' and as if to illustrate it, the Spirit of the 
 Lord came like a flood over the parched souls of the con- 
 gregation, and all became sensible that there was something 
 more than human argument convincing the judgment. 
 The congregation was melted to tears, and one poor back- 
 slider, on whom my hopes had long rested, unable to 
 restrain himself, when I cried out, ' Who will " subscribe 
 with his hand to the Lord " to-day ? ' cried out, ' I will.' 
 The congregation caught the infection, and hands seemed 
 involuntarily stretched out, as if ready to sign their names. 
 It pleased God to move eighty-one souls, most of them 
 young, to devote themselves to His service that day." 
 
 CCCCIX. Sin Blotted Out. Isa. xliv. 22. '' I have 
 blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions." 
 
 An illustration which effectively shows the " blotting out " 
 of sin, is that of Charlotte Elizabeth's Happy Mute, " who 
 dreamed that he died and stood before the judgment-seat, 
 and the books were opened." And when he saw beneath 
 his name a long, dark catalogue of sins, he was ready to 
 sink with terror. But Jesus cast on him a gracious look, 
 and saying with unspeakable tenderness, "John!" lifted 
 the pierced hand from which oozed drops of blood, and 
 passed it over the black record. John's sins were all 
 " blotted out," and there was only now the mark of the 
 blood. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 245 
 
 CCCCX. Need of a Saviour. Isa. xlv. 21, 22. ''A 
 just God and a Saviour ; there is none beside Me. Look unto 
 Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth." 
 
 In a letter to Mr. Aubrey De Vere, Sir VV. R. Hamilton 
 says : " Without any appreciable or expressible change in 
 my religious views, I feel that there has been for some time 
 back a decided improvement in my religious habits, tastes, 
 and feelings : the sum and substance of which seems to be, 
 that I feel more than before my Jieed of a Saviour, of The 
 Saviour." 
 
 CCCCXI. Not till they are Rooted. Isa. xlviii. 10. 
 '^Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen 
 thee in the furnace of affliction." 
 
 I WENT into the kitchen the other day with a bit of black 
 velvet in my hand and a whole pall of black in my heart. 
 
 All the morning I had been brooding, brooding over my 
 loneliness, shutting out all the light, and looking only at 
 the darkness. A year before, I had lost my precious baby; 
 and though God had blessed me in a thousand ways, had 
 surrounded me with love and comfort, the withdrawal of 
 this special joy had blighted everything. 
 
 All the year I had tried with varying success to lift my- 
 self to such a state of trust that I could joyfully think of 
 my darling as far more tenderly cared for than he could be 
 with me — far more safe than in this world of temptation. 
 There had been many hours, many of them, when I attained 
 at least calmness ; but on the morning on which I speak, 
 the whole sky was black, with not even a star to call my 
 look upward. 
 
 I stood at the ironing-table, renewing my velvet, when 
 one of the girls began taking in some sickly-looking plants 
 that she was trying to cultivate in pots. 
 
 " I take them in every day," she said, " when the sun 
 gets up." 
 
 " An' sure, isn't the sun good for them ? " said the other 
 girl. 
 
 " Not till they get rooted," was the reply, in a tone of 
 surprise at the ignorance displa}ed by the question. 
 
 " Not till they get rooted," said I over and over to my- 
 
246 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 self, as I went upstairs. That sentence answers all my 
 questions. God is too good and wise to give us sunshine 
 in too great measure till we get rooted — He knows that we 
 should soon wither and die. So He sets us where the light 
 is shaded to our need ; He gives our root the moisture of 
 tears, and when we grow strong through reaching after the 
 Divine, little by little He gives us more sun. 
 
 " Not till they get rooted." 
 
 Well, I knew that before my baby died I had given the 
 world far too much of my heart. I had been swayed hither 
 and thither by those who were not my rightful guides. I 
 had been content with low standards and frivolous pursuits. 
 I had been far from a healthy, genuine growth. Evidently 
 the sun had withered, instead of strengthening me. I was 
 not rooted. 
 
 To be rooted is the first essential of a healthy growth. 
 Till the root has firm hold of the soil, till it is able to 
 choose and absorb that which it needs from all surround- 
 ing elements, the life cannot increase — there can be neither 
 flower nor fruit. The soul cannot safely bear much sun- 
 shine till it is rooted in God. Till then it must have 
 shadow, or be wasted and sickly. Let me then lift up my 
 thought constantly to the Divine realm, the summer land 
 of the soul, for help and guidance. Let me make God my 
 own, and then all that He possesses will be mine also. Let 
 me through obedience enter into love, so shall I find all 
 that I have lost. 
 
 CCCCXII. The Furnace of Affliction. Isa. xlviii. 
 lo. '■'■ I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction.^' 
 
 The late Professor George Wilson thus quaintly expresses 
 the various effects of affliction in a letter to his friend, 
 Daniel Macmillan : "The furnace of affliction puffs away 
 some men in black smoke, and hardens others into useless 
 slags, and melts a {q.\v into clear glass. May it refine us 
 into gold seven times purified, ready to be fashioned into 
 vessels for the Master's use." And like the effect of afflic- 
 tion is that of the habitual prospect of death. In a letter 
 to the same friend, in 1848, he says, "I have been reading 
 lately, with great sadness, the Memorials of Charles Lamb, 
 and the Life of Keats. There is something in the noble 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 247 
 
 brotherly love of Charles to brighten, and hallow, and 
 relieve the former ; but Keats's death-bed is the blackness 
 of midnight, unmitigated by one ray of light. God keep 
 you and me from such a death-bed ! VVe may have 
 physical agonies as great to endure. It is the common 
 lot. I feel that our heavenly Father can better choose for 
 us than we can for ourselves, of what we should die ; but I 
 pray our blessed Lord and Master to be with us in our last 
 fight with the last enemy, and to give us the victory. If 
 He does, what shall pain be but like other bitter medicines, 
 the preparative for the unbroken health of an endless life.-*" 
 
 CCCCXIII. "Time Enough." Isa. xlviii. 18. '' O that 
 thou hadst hearkened to My command/nents" 
 
 A YOUNG man, about eighteen, was anxious about his 
 soul. He had strong convictions of sin, and of the danger 
 of his lost condition. The word of God had reached his 
 conscience, and he was persuaded that he must repent and 
 seek the Lord, or he could not be saved. The Spirit of 
 God was striving with him, but he would not yield ; there 
 was "time enough," — it was not a convenient season. He 
 was taking a new situation where there were many ungodly 
 men, and he dare not confess Christ, so he purposed to 
 wait awhile, and say nothing about religion until the way 
 was easier. From that time he fell back ; he gave it all 
 up ; he became as careless and unconcerned as ever ; he 
 forsook the house of God, and went right back to the 
 world. 
 
 But the Lord was merciful to him, and did not leave 
 him without fresh calls. About the age of five-and-thirty 
 he had again many serious impressions. He began to 
 inquire and to pray, and seemed on the very threshold of 
 the kingdom. He truly wished to become a Christian and 
 follow Christ the rest of his life, but the old temptation 
 came back in a new form. He had reached the prime of 
 life, but he was again led to delay further. He was now 
 taking a business for himself, and he was assured that it 
 could not be carried on without Sunday trading ; the 
 customers would be supplied on that day, or go else- 
 where. 
 
 Unhappily he yielded to the snare. He made up his 
 
248 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 mind to turn to God, but not now. A few months or 
 years could not make much difference, he thought ; so he 
 again put off the matter. He could not decide yet — it was 
 too great a sacrifice to give up all for Christ. Alas, again 
 he quenched and grieved the Spirit, and became hardened 
 in his unbelief and sin ! Business prospered with him, and 
 he was content to live without God. Many years passed 
 by, and he thought nothing of the great eternity to which 
 he was fast hastening. 
 
 By-and-by old age crept on him, and his latter end was 
 rapidly approaching. At the age of seventy-two he was 
 brought low and compelled to look death in the face ; but 
 now the hope of peace and salvation seemed very far off. 
 There was nothing but a certain fearful looking for of 
 judgment and fiery indignation. A faithful minister of 
 Christ visited him from time to time, but the word of 
 promise and pardon seemed to find no entrance. To the 
 very last the servant of the Lord was by his side, hoping 
 against hope, telling him that Christ was able to save to 
 the uttermost, and reminding him of the dying thief, and 
 urging him to accept mercy ; but there was no response. 
 There seemed a barrier in the way : darkness and despair 
 shut out the view of the merciful and long-suffering 
 Saviour. At last he raised himself in the bed, and three 
 times raising up his hands he exclaimed, " I'm lost ! I'm 
 lost ! Tm lost ! " So saying, he fell back on his pillow and 
 expired. Such an end tells its own tale. Such was the issue 
 of all the man's purposes and resolutions ; such was the 
 result of delay in deciding for Christ. 
 
 CCCCXIV. The Infidel and the Missionary. 
 ISA. xlviii. 22. " There is no peace ^ saith the Lord, unto the 
 wicked.** 
 
 A MISSIONARY party shipped for Suez in a vessel whose 
 captain was a notorious infidel, blasphemer, and drunkard. 
 " If you can convert that captain," those who knew him 
 said, " we will believe." The captain himself rubbed his 
 hands in glee at the prospect of putting down the mis- 
 soniaries. All approaches to him were met by blasphemy 
 and infidel argument. " Had he read the Bible .-* " "Yes, 
 knew it through and through, and it was all bosh ! " Afte? 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 249 
 
 a fruitless interview of two hours, Mr. Stucld remarl-ccd as 
 a close to the conversation : " Well, all I have to sa\' is, I 
 have a peace which the world cannot give." The man 
 seemed struck by the remark, grew serious, and said : " We 
 are all seeking that, but we never find it." " You can have 
 it by simple trust in the Lord Jesus Christ," was the reply. 
 The captain then opened his heart, and revealed its secret 
 of unrest. After separating from the young missionary, 
 he went down and shut himself in his cabin. The next 
 that was seen of him was his writing a letter home, asking 
 forgiveness for having left his family rudely and without a 
 word. He gave his heart to Christ, and became completely 
 changed, and all the crew marvelled greatly. 
 
 CCCCXV. What shall we give to Jesus? Isa. 
 
 xlix. 16. '■'■His arm brought salvatmi^^ 
 
 A LITTLE girl named Mary Ann Day, a native of Ulceby, 
 in Lincolnshire, fell from the Magna Charta steamer into 
 New Holland harbour. A brave man named John Eller- 
 thorpe, " sprang in after her and brought her ashore, though 
 at a great risk of his own life. The noise of the paddle 
 wheels, the screams of the child's mother, and the con- 
 fusion and shouts of the passengers, made it a very exciting 
 scene, but it was soon over, and the little girl having got 
 some dry clothes on, her mother brought her to John, and 
 said to her, ' Now, what will you give this gentleman for 
 saving your life?' when she held out her little chin, and 
 with a full heart said, '/^ kiss! John Ellerthorpe, in telling 
 the tale, said, *I felt myself well paid for the trouble, and 
 had a greater sense of delight and higher satisfaction when 
 that grateful child kissed me, than I did when my fellow- 
 townsmen presented me with one hundred and thirty 
 guineas.' " 
 
 Believing reader, you and I were originally passengers 
 on board the ship Innocence, and, falling overboard through 
 sin, were in danger of being drowned in the deep of Divine 
 wrath ; but at the moment when all refuge failed, and no 
 eye pitied, and no arm was outstretched to save, " God 
 laid help upon one that was mighty," and the Lord of life 
 and glory Himself became our deliverer. 
 
250 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 "With pitying eyes the Prince of peace 
 Beheld our helpless grief; 
 He saw, and oh ! amazing love, 
 He sprang to our relief." 
 
 "Emptying Himself" of His former glory, and with the 
 cry " Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God," He plunged 
 into the dark and dreadful waters of death, determining to 
 rescue the unworthy object of His wonderful compassion, 
 not at the mere risk of losing His life, but in the certain 
 knowledge that it must be sacrificed. Then was He heard 
 to say, " Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of Thy 
 waterspouts : all Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over 
 Me." 
 
 But in dying He overcame death. In sacrificing Him- 
 self He saved us — and to the deep and infinite joy of His 
 Father and ours, and amid the acclamations of angels, 
 " He drew us out of many (great) waters." " He delivered 
 us because He delighted in us." 
 
 " Oh, for this love let rocks and hills 
 Their lasting silence break, 
 And all harmonious human tongues 
 The Saviour's praises speak." 
 
 But what shall we give to Him who " saved us " at such 
 a cost ? 
 
 The little girl gave her deliverer a kiss — doubtless, it was 
 the best way in which she could express her thankfulness ; 
 what shall we give " Jesus who delivered us from the wrath 
 to come .'' " Have we " no kiss " that He will accept and 
 count precious — no kiss oi gratitude f 
 
 CCCCXVI. The Liberty of the Captives of Sin. 
 IsA. xlix. 24. " Shall the prey be taken from the ?inghty, or 
 the lawful captive delivered i " 
 
 John Elias was one of Wales' greatest preachers. On 
 one occasion the text was Isaiah xlix. 24 : "Shall the prey 
 be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered .'' " 
 " Satan," exclaimed he in a very peculiar manner, " what 
 do you say, * Shall the prey be taken from the mighty.?'" 
 ""No, never, never; I will increase the darkness of their 
 minds, the hardness of their hearts, the lusts of their souls, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 251 
 
 the strength of their chains ; and my liolds shall be made 
 stronger. The captives sliall never be delivered. I utterly 
 despise the puny efforts of ministers." 
 
 " Gabriel, messenger of the Most High God," exclaimed 
 the preacher in a different tone, looking upwards, "'Shall 
 the prey be taken from the mighty ? ' what dost thou 
 say?" "Ah! I apprehend not: I have been hovering 
 these two days over this vast assembly hearing the word 
 of God, expecting to see some chains broken, some prisoners 
 liberated ; but now the opportunity is near over, and the 
 multitudes are on the point of separating. Ah ! there is 
 no sign of one being converted, and I shall not have to 
 convey the glad tidings of one sinner repenting of his sins 
 to the heavenly world." 
 
 Then turning to the preachers he asked, " What think 
 you, ministers of the living God, 'Shall the prey be taken 
 from the mighty .-' ' " " ' Alas, who hath believed our report, 
 and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed .''' ' We 
 have laboured in vain, and spent our strength for nought.' 
 The Lord seemeth to hide His face from us ; His arm is 
 not stretched out. Oh I we fear there is but little hope ot 
 the captives being liberated." 
 
 " Zion, * Shall the prey be taken from the mighty } ' 
 What do you say ? " " ' Ah, the Lord hath forsaken me, 
 and my Lord hath forgotten me.' I am left alone, and 
 am childless ; so that my enemies say, ' This is Zion, whom 
 no man seeketh after.' Oh, I am afraid none shall be 
 delivered." 
 
 " Praying Christians, what do you think, ' Shall the prey 
 be taken from the mighty?' 'Lord God, Thoii knowest : 
 high is Thy hand, and strong is Thy right hand.' O that 
 Thou wouldst put forth Thy strength and overcome 1 Let 
 the sighing of the prisoners come before Thee : according 
 to the greatness of Thy power preserve Thou those that 
 are appointed to die. Though I am nearly weary in crying, 
 yet I have a slender hope that the year of jubilee is at 
 hand." 
 
 Then looking up seriously, as if about to speak to the 
 Almighty, he asked, "And what is the mind of the Lord 
 respecting these captives } ' Thus saith the Lord, even 
 the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the 
 prey of the terrible shall be delivered.' O delightful ! 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 there is now no doubt or hesitation respecting the hberty 
 of the captives : it is positively declared they shaU be 
 dehvered, they shall be saved. Yes, ' the ransomed of the 
 Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and ever- 
 lasting joy upon their heads,' " 
 
 CCCCXVII. A Chain of Precious Books. Isa. 1. 4. 
 
 " Tlie Lord God hath gii'en me the tongue of the learned, that 
 I should linow how to speak a word in season to him that is 
 
 7aeary." 
 
 Years ago an old Puritan doctor, Sibbes, wrote a book 
 called the " Bruised Reed," which fell just at the right time 
 into the hands of Richard Baxter, and brought him under 
 the influence of the enlightening power of the Spirit of God ; 
 and then Baxter's ministry was like the sun in his strength, 
 and he wrote a book called "The Call to the Unconverted," 
 which continued to speak long after Baxter himself had 
 ceased to speak with human tongue. That " Call to the 
 Unconverted " went preaching on until it got into the 
 hands of Philip Doddridge (prepared by his pious mother's 
 teaching from the Dutch tiles of a mantel-piece with very 
 quaint Scriptural stories), and it was the means of enlight- 
 ening him to a broader knowledge, and a richer faith, and 
 a deeper experience of the things of God. 
 
 And then Doddridge wrote a book called " The Rise 
 and Progress of Religion in the Soul," which, just at a 
 critical period in his history, fell into the hands of William 
 Wilberforce, who wrote a book called " Practical Chris- 
 tianity," which, far down in the sunny Isle of Wight, fired 
 the heart of a clergyman, who has attained, perhaps, in 
 connection with the Tract Society, the broadest and widest 
 reputation of all — for who has not heard of Legh Rich- 
 mond .'' He wrote the simple annal of a Methodist girl, 
 and published it under the title of " The Dairyman's 
 Daughter ; " and I should like to know into how many 
 languages that has been translated, and been made of God 
 a power for the spread of truth. 
 
 The same book on " Practical Christianity " went right 
 'down into a secluded parish in Scotland, and it found there 
 a young clergyman who was preaching a Gospel that he 
 did not know, and it instructed him in the way of God 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 253 
 
 more perfectly, and he came forth a champion vah'ant for 
 the truth upon the earth until all Scotland ranc,^ with the 
 eloquence of Thomas Chalmers. Look at it. Not a flaw 
 in the chain. Richard Sibbes, Richard Baxter, Philip 
 Doddridt^e, William Wilberforce, Legh Richmond, Thomas 
 Chalmers. 
 
 CCCCXVIII. Blocking up the Broad Way. 
 ISA. lii. 7. '''■ IIoiv bcaiiiiftd upon i/ie vwniitains are the feet 0/ 
 him that hringetli good tidings^ tliat puhlishetli. peaceP 
 
 One of the most eminent of Methodist lay preachers was 
 William Dawson. His personal piety was deep and un- 
 affected, and his gifts of address were marvellous. 
 
 Set free from secular labour towards the close of his life, 
 to give one-half of each year to the advocacy of the mission 
 cause, Dawson had from the first showed an extraordinary 
 power of moving men's sympathy for the cause of missions, 
 and of unbuttoning their pockets. He would roll up the 
 slip of paper on which a notice or a resolution had been 
 written, and using it as a telescope, describe what he saw. 
 And just before sitting down, he would once more apply 
 his telescope to his eye, and say, " I see a good collection." 
 And a good collection there would be. 
 
 Little did deputies sent from some place where he was 
 less known, conceive the power of the man they found 
 hedging and ditching with his own hands, and who accom- 
 panied them as soon as he had time to change his working 
 clothes for a suit of decent .black. On one occasion he 
 described the aim of missions to be, " to block up the 
 broad way, to cover it with verdure, to prevent even the 
 keen eye of the recording angel from seeing so much as 
 the print of a human foot upon it." 
 
 Dawson died, after a lifetime of as constant labour as 
 probably any man ever lived, in the town of Leeds, in 1841 ; 
 and a great multitude followed his mortal remains to the 
 grave. 
 
 CCCCXIX. Newton and Jay. Isa. lii. 10. '' All the 
 
 ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God^ 
 
 A FEW years since, Mr. Jay was invited to preach before 
 the Baptist Missionary Society in London, with several 
 
254 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 of the founders of which he was well acquainted. The 
 sermon was a fine illustration of piety and of fraternal love. 
 He beautifully sketched the origin of the missionary spirit, 
 and the difficulties it had to encounter. He stated that he 
 himself, then a comparative youth, had some doubts as to 
 whether the time was come for the evangelization of the 
 earth, and at length he determined to call and converse 
 on the subject with the venerable John Newton. The 
 aged apostolic clergyman received his younger brother 
 with ardent affection, and requested him to detail the 
 peculiar difficulties which oppressed his mind. Mr. Jay 
 did this at considerable length, especially insisting on the 
 manifold obstacles which idolatry and human depravity, in 
 all their various forms, presented to the extension of the 
 gospel. When he had ceased, the venerable clergyman 
 slowly laid down his pipe, gathered up his form to an erect 
 posture, and looking his junior brother full in the face, said, 
 in a most emphatic tone, " My brother, I have never 
 doubted the power of God to convert the heathen world 
 since he converted me!" "Never from that period," said 
 the preacher, " have I had a doubt on the subject. Facts, 
 too, have proved the fulfilment of Divine prophecies, and 
 have gone so far to accomplish the Divine oath." 
 
 CCCCXX. Three Links. Isa. liii. i. " Who hath 
 
 believed our report ? " 
 
 William Carter in a sermon to the outcasts of London, 
 said : " Hear what Jesus declares : * Verily, verily, I say 
 unto you, he that heareth My word, and believeth on Him 
 that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into 
 condemnation, but is passed from death unto life.' Here, 
 my friends, there are three links in the blessed chain of truth 
 — hearing, believing, and having. The devil always tries to 
 cut these links off, and give three links of his own forging, 
 viz. doing, praying, feeling." 
 
 This item was copied into a religious weekly newspaper 
 in this country, and was there read by a gentleman, when 
 after three weeks of waiting for the feeling of a change in 
 his heart, he had given up all hope, and concluded that 
 there was no salvation for him. God's way of salvation at 
 once seemed plain, and the gentleman was soon a happy 
 Christian. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 255 
 
 CCCCXXI. Belief in the Atonement. Isa. liii. 6. 
 " llie Lord hath laid on Iliin the inujuitv of us al/." 
 
 Dora Grkenwell beautifully says, "Belief in that one 
 g[reat doctrine of the Atonement is to me like the blue 
 flower of the German legends ; long sought and hidden, but 
 when found, admitting into every guarded treasure, which, 
 without the possession of it, would have been closed up." 
 
 CCCCXXII. Attempting Great Things for God. 
 Isa. liv. 2, 3. " Enlarge the place of thy te?it, and let them 
 stretch forth the curtains of thy habitations : spa?-e not, lengthen 
 thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes." 
 
 On the 30th of May, 1792, William Carey, the future mis- 
 sionary, was appointed to preach at an Association in 
 Nottingham. His sermon on this occasion has become 
 historical. The building in which it was preached is still 
 in existence, though diverted to quite a different purpose. 
 The text on which the discourse was founded was Isaiah 
 liv. 2, 3 : " Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them 
 stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations : spare not, 
 lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes ; for thou 
 shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left; and 
 thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and make the desolate 
 cities to be inhabited." The preacher observed that the 
 Church is here addressed as a desolate widow, dwelling in 
 a small tent by herself ; that the command to enlarge her 
 tent implied that there should be an enlargement of her 
 family ; that to account for so unexpected and marvellous 
 a change, she was told, "Thy Maker is thy Husband," and 
 that at a future day He would be called " the God of the 
 whole earth." He then proceeded to establish and illus- 
 trate the two great principles involved in the text, and that 
 have since become " household words " throughout the 
 Christian world in reference to the missionary enterprise — 
 I. Expect great tilings from God; H. Attempt great things 
 for God. In this sermon the thought and feeling of years 
 were concentrated. The effect which it produced was 
 electrical. Dr. Ryland, who was present, said, " If all the 
 people had lifted up their voices and wept, as the cliildren 
 of Israel did at Bochim, I should not have wondered at the 
 
256 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 effect : it would only have seemed proportionate to the 
 cause ; so clearly did he prove the criminality of our 
 supineness in the cause of God." 
 
 CCCCXXIII. Comforted of God. Isa. liv. 5. ''Thy 
 
 Maker is thine HjisbandT 
 
 An eminent ph\-sician, who, in visiting the sick, sought to 
 administer to the soul as well as to the bod)\ one day 
 called upon a poor widow, whom, on a previous visit, he had 
 found in great darkness of mind. She was now in a happy 
 frame, and, on asking her what had been the means of her 
 comfort, she said it had been these words in Isaiah liv. 5 
 — " Thy Maker is thine Husband ; the Lord of Hosts is His 
 Name." On asking her what she had felt in these words 
 to cheer her, her answer was : " I've been thinking that 
 if that be true, I should be beginning to live up to His 
 income." 
 
 CCCCXXIV. A Bitter Cup. Isa. liv. 11. "(9 thou 
 afflicted, tossed with tempest afid not coinfo?-ted, behold, I will 
 lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with 
 sapphires" 
 
 It is delightful to sit down beside a child of God who has 
 in his hand a bitter cup of trial. Jesus has turned the 
 bitterness into such a blessing that he " tastes the love " of 
 Jesus in every drop. 
 
 I love to hear old Richard Baxter exclaim, after a life of 
 constant suffering, " O my God ! I thank Thee for a bodily 
 discipline of eight-and-fifty years." 
 
 I love to sit down by Harlan Page and hear him say, 
 " A bed of pain is a precious place, when we have the 
 presence of Christ. God does not send one unnecessary 
 affliction. Lord ! I thank Thee for suffering. I deserve it. 
 1 deserve death eternal. Let me not complain nor dictate. 
 I commit myself to Thee, O Saviour, and to Thy infinite 
 love. I stop my mouth, and lie low beside Thee ! " So 
 God built up that blood-built soul faster than disease was 
 pulling down the frail tenement in which it dwelt. And 
 through the rents heaven's glory shone in with rapturous 
 radiance ! 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 25-/ 
 
 CCCCXXV. Children in Prison. Jsa. liv. 13. 
 " Thy children shall be taught of the Lord." 
 
 An interesting circumstance occurred lately in Finland. 
 Some cliildren from seven to nine years of age were so 
 brought under the sensible influence of the Spirit of God, 
 convincing them of their sins, that, on their going to or 
 from school, they retired into the woods, and there put up 
 their prayers to the Lord, with many tears. By degrees 
 their number increased. The parents of some of them 
 found them thus engaged, and with rebukes and stripes 
 dispersed them ; but the parents of others, who had 
 noticed the increased sobriety and good behaviour of their 
 children, encouraged them to meet together in their houses, 
 and not to go out into the woods. The children did so ; 
 and some of these parents, observing their reh'gious ten- 
 derness, and hearing their solemn prayers to the Lord, the 
 Redeemer, and Saviour of sinners, felt themselves strong 
 convictions of sin. They joined their children in their 
 devotions, and a great reform took place in that part of 
 the country. This e.x cited the angry feelings of the priest, 
 who was a bad man and a drunkard. He went to the 
 magistrate to enter his complaints against both children 
 and parents. The prosecution issued in their all being 
 sent to prison. 
 
 They had seen some months in confinement, when the 
 Prince Alexander Galitzin heard that children were in 
 prison on account of religion. He thought it so strange 
 an occurrence that he sent confidential persons to inquire 
 into it. They found so much religious sensibiUty and 
 tenderness in the children, that they were greatly surprised, 
 especially at the simplicity with which they related how 
 they had been brought under trouble because of their sin- 
 ful hearts, and how they had felt that they must pray to 
 the Lord Jesus Christ, who alone could forgive them and 
 enable them to live in a state of acceptance before God. 
 Being inquired of if their parents or others had not put 
 them on doing this, they said that so far from that, 
 they were afraid that their parents or any one else should 
 know how it was with them, that they retired privately in 
 the woods to pray and cry with tears unto the Lord. The 
 parents also stated that the children had been the instru- 
 
 S 
 
258 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 merits of bringing^ them to a sense of their sinful lives, and 
 to seek the Lord that He might give them a new heart, 
 and pour forth His Spirit upon them. Moreover, it was 
 found that the conduct of these people and children had 
 been such during their imprisonment as to comport with 
 their Christian profession. The prince ordered their re- 
 lease, and had the priest and the magistrates severely re- 
 primanded and removed from their offices. The emperor 
 having heard of all this, and of the great sufferings to 
 which these families were reduced in consequence of their 
 long imprisonment, which took place just before harvest, 
 ordered that all their losses should be liberally made up 
 to them, making ample provision, also, for their present 
 support. 
 
 CCCCXXVI. Hearing, not Reading. Isa. Iv. 3. 
 
 '■'■ hicline yotir ear, and come unto Me; hear, and your soul 
 shall live^ 
 
 A POOR man being on his death-bed, asked that the fifty- 
 fifth chapter of Isaiah should be read to him. Though weak, 
 and faint, and full of pain, yet when he heard the words, 
 " Incline your ear, and come unto Me ; hear, and your 
 soul shall live," he gathered up his strength to say, "What 
 a mercy, sir, that it is not ' Read, and your soul shall live ; ' 
 for if it had been, I could not have been saved, for you 
 know I am no scholar ! But blessed be God, it is ' Hear, 
 and your soul shall live ; ' I have heard, and believed, and 
 trust I shall be saved." 
 
 CCCCXXVII. Trust the Promises. Isa. Iv. 3. 
 " The sure mercies of David" 
 
 Last winter a man crossed the Mississippi on the ice, and, 
 fearing it was too thin, began to crawl on his hands and 
 knees in great terror ; but when he gained the opposite 
 shore, all worn out, another man drove past him gaily, 
 sitting upon a sled loaded with pig-iron. That is just the 
 way most Christians go up to the heavenly Canaan, trem- 
 bling at every step lest the promises shall break under 
 their feet, when really they are secure enough for us to 
 hold our heads and sing with confidence as we march to 
 the better land. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES, 259 
 
 CCCCXXVIII. Joy and Peace -n Dying. Isa. Iv. 
 12. '■'For ye sliall go out with joy, and be led forth ivith peace.' 
 
 Lady Lush's deathbed was characterized by the joy- 
 fuhiess of a Christian about to enter the gh)rious presence 
 of the Lord. Dr. Landels, in his memorial sermon, 
 said : "Amidst all her bodily sufferings, her inward peace 
 never failed. The Lord was with her all through, and 
 never withdrew from her for a moment the light of His 
 countenance. 'The Lord is with you, dear,' whispered 
 the voice of affection. 'Yes, He is never absent,' was 
 the calm, glad response. And again, ' Is it peace, clear } ' 
 to which she replied, ' Peace does not express it — it is 
 joy.'" 
 
 CCCCXXIX. The Close of Life. Isa. Ivii. 15. 
 
 " Eternity." 
 
 Albert Barnes, in his sermon on " Life at Threescore," 
 illustrates the magnitude of eternal things as he approaches 
 the end of life, compared with those which ordinarily occupy 
 the attention of mankind, by the following figure: — • 
 
 " The earth, as it moves in its orbit from year to year, 
 maintains its distance of ninety-five millions of miles from 
 the sun ; and the sun, except when seen through a hazy 
 atmosphere, at its rising or its setting, seems at all times 
 to be of the same magnitude — to human view an object 
 always small, as compared with our own world. But 
 suppose the earth should leave its orbit, and make its way 
 in a direct line towards the sun. How soon would the sun 
 seem to enlarge its dimensions ! How vast and bright 
 would it become ! How soon would it fill the whole field 
 of vision, and all on the earth dwindle to nothing ! So 
 human life now appears to me. In earlier years, eternit}' 
 appeared distant and small in importance. But at the 
 period of life which I have now reached, it seems to me as 
 if the earth had left the orbit of its annual movement, and 
 were making a rapid and direct flight to the sun. The 
 objects of eternit)', towards which I am moving, rapidly 
 enlarge themselves. They have become overpoweringly 
 bright and grand. They fill the whole field of vision, and 
 the earth, with all which is the common object of human 
 ambition and pursuit, is vanishing away ! " 
 
26o OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 
 
 CCCCXXX. A Great God and a Little God. 
 
 IsA. Ivii. 15. " For thus saith the high atid lofty One that in- 
 habiteth eternity, wlwse name is Holy ; I dwell in the high 
 and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble 
 spirit:' 
 
 Collins, the freethinker, met a plain country man going 
 to church. He asked him where he was going. "To 
 church, sir." "What todotliere?" "To worship God." 
 " Pray, whether is your God, a great or a Httle God ? " " He 
 is both, sir." " How can He be both ? " " He is so great, sir, 
 that the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him, and so 
 httle that He can dwell in my heart." Collins declared that 
 this simple answer from the country man had more effect 
 upon his mind than all the volumes which learned doctors 
 had written against him. 
 
 CCCCXXXI. An Arctic Explorer and Sabbath 
 Keeping. Isa. Iviii. 13. '■'■ Jf thou turn away thy foot 
 from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day ; and 
 call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable ; and 
 shall hotiour Him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine 
 own pleasure, nor speaking thine own wo?-ds." 
 
 Dr. Scoresby, of Arctic fame, was a devoted Christian, and 
 not ashamed of the gospel of Christ amid the pursuits and 
 honours of science. 
 
 It was in the year 1820 that he introduced on board of 
 his ship the regulation as to no fishing on the Sabbath, to 
 the successful working of which he long after published an 
 emphatic testimony. He always kept up the habit of 
 reading prayers and sermons on board ship, and one of his 
 own prayers, offered in name of the whole ship's company, 
 on setting out on a voyage, has been preserved in his 
 biography, and is singularly rich, and humble, and full of 
 unction. We may notice that, during his stay in Edin- 
 burgh, on one occasion, he made the acquaintance of Sir 
 Walter Scott, and, being invited to meet a party at his 
 house on the Sabbath Day, wrote in reply — " I fear I can- 
 not have the honour of waiting upon you on Sunday at 
 dinner; agreeably to the arrangement you were so kind and 
 polite as to propose. For some years, indeed, I have 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 2C1 
 
 declined visitinfr on that day of the week ; though I readily 
 and honestly acknowled'^e that in this instance the priva- 
 tion is greater than on any occasion that ever before 
 occurred." 
 
 CCCCXXXII. Keeping the Sabbath Holy. Isa. 
 Iviii. 13. " If thou tiirnaiuay thy foot ftvm the Sabbath, from 
 doing thy pleasure on My holy day ; and call the Sabbath a de- 
 lii^ht, the holy of the Lord, honourable ; and shall honour Hun, 
 not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure.'^ 
 
 Mr. Powell was an eminent Welsh minister who was 
 born in 161 7. He was a vain and thoughtless youth, and 
 a ringleader among his associates in foil)' and wickedness, 
 but the Spirit of God graciously arrested him in his sinful 
 career. As he was, on one Lord's Day, standing and look- 
 ing at a number of people breaking the Sabbath by divers 
 games, one of the Puritans passed by and addressed him: 
 "Doth it become you, sir, that are a scholar, to break the 
 Lord's Day thus.-*" To which he replied, like the scoffers 
 in Malachi : " Wherein do I break it ? You see me only 
 stand by; I do not play at all." "But you find your 
 own pleasure herein by looking on, and this God forbids 
 in His holy Word." 
 
 So he opened his Bible, and read those words in Isaiah 
 Iviii. 13, particularly noting that expression, " Not finding 
 thine own pleasure on My holy day." He resolved there 
 and then never to transgress in that way again, and God 
 enabled him to stand to his resolution. 
 
 CCCCXXXIII. God's Power to Save. Isa. lix. i. 
 " Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it catinot save ; 
 neither His ear heavy, that it cannot hear." 
 
 Dr. Krapf was a missionary to the Wanica people, and 
 was often much cast down by their blindness and ignorance. 
 On one occasion, being very despondent about their con- 
 dition, he went out and loolced up to the starry heavens, 
 and he found all his misgivings scattered by that text 
 flashing into mind : " Who is gone into heaven, and is 
 on the right hand of G< d , angels and authorities and 
 powers being subject to li.ui." He meditated much on 
 
262 OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 
 
 these glorious words, and thouglit, " Need I despair of these 
 poor Wanicas ? Can I doubt His power ? for was not my 
 own heart as hard and bUnd as theirs, and can He not 
 convert them too ? " 
 
 CCCCXXXIV. Light in the World. Isa. Ix. i. 
 
 "Arise, s/iine ; for thy light is come." 
 
 There is a little church on a lonely hillside where they 
 have neither gas nor lamps, and yet on darkest nights 
 they hold Divine service. Each worshipper, coming a 
 great distance from village or moorland home, brings with 
 him a taper and lights it from the one supplied and 
 carried by the minister of the little church. The building 
 is thronged, and the scene is said to be " most brilliant ! " 
 Let each one of our lives be but a little taper — lighted from 
 the Life of Christ, and carrying His flame — and we shall 
 help to fill this great temple of human need and human 
 sin with the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. 
 
 CCCCXXXV. Christ's Kingdom is Growing. 
 Isa. Ix. 2. "For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, 
 and gross darkness the people : but the Lord shall arise upon 
 thee, aiid His glory shall be seefi upon thee." 
 
 At a Church Missionary meeting the Bishop of Moo- 
 sonee, furnishing proofs of the growing civilization of the 
 Indians, said : — 
 
 " I am here to speak of the conversion of men to God 
 through the work of the missionaries, and I can tell you 
 of men who evidence by their lives that they have been 
 born again of the Holy Spirit of God. While speaking 
 some time ago to an Indian, I said to him, ' My friend, I 
 should be glad if you would give me a picture of the 
 Indians as they were before they received Christianity.' 
 I took down the man's words in reply from his own lips, 
 and they were these : — ' Before we were Christians we were 
 very, very wicked ; we knew nothing save the devil and 
 the devil's works. We lied, we stealed, we conjured ; we 
 thought we could prophesy. The Indians robbed men of 
 other tribes ; the Indians robbed each other. Their lives 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 263 
 
 were xcxy ; very wicked.* They were indeed wicked. Let 
 me mention a case in point : — 
 
 " A few years before I went to the country there was a 
 post belonging to the Hudson Ikiy Company, fifty miles 
 distant from Moose. A gentleman lived there with his 
 wife and children, and some servants, and he thought they 
 were living in perfect security. The Indians came to the 
 place regularly to trade, and he appeared never to have 
 suspected that they would rise against him and take his 
 wife. He had charge of a large store, where there were 
 things that gladdened the Indian's heart; there was plenty 
 of tea, plenty of sugar, plenty of guns, plenty of ammu- 
 nition. The Indians determined that they would attack 
 that place, and rob the store of all that it contained. And 
 one day they rose against the master and his family, and 
 his servants, and killed every one of them, with the 
 exception of the youngest servant, who fled to Moose 
 factory, which he reached with great difficulty, having 
 been pursued for many miles on his way. The murderers 
 were afterwards pursued and captured. One of them was 
 asked, ' How could you dare to act in such a way towards 
 people who had always shown you the greatest kindness .'' ' 
 He said, 'We were instigated to it by our conjurers ; they 
 told us to do it' The conjurers were asked how they 
 dared to give such advice to the people, and they said, 
 ' Our Moneto ' (that is, spirit) ' told us to do it. He told 
 us to attack the store, and not respect the lives of those 
 who had charge of it — the lives of the father, the mother, 
 the children, or the servants.' These Indians had no feel- 
 ings of hostility towards the people at that post, but they 
 paid attention to their sorcerers and conjurers, and they 
 thought, perhaps, that they were doing their duty. How 
 is it with the missionaries and their families now .-' They 
 live in those regions in the greatest imaginable security. 
 The most precious treasure which I have in this world is 
 my wife and children, and I should not feel the slightest 
 anxiety in entrusting them to the charge of these Indians. 
 I should be sure they would be well and kindly treated, 
 and that they would be protected day and night. That is, 
 I think, saying a good deal." 
 
264 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES 
 
 CCCCXXXVI. Gone into the World of Light. 
 ISA. Ix. 19, ^'- The Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting 
 light." 
 
 Never since the great minstrel of the border was borne 
 from Abbotsford to Dr}burgh Abbey has the valley of 
 the Tweed been so moved as when the sage of Allerly, 
 Sir David Brewster, was carried to his tomb in the old 
 abbey of Melrose, amidst sorrowing crowds of friends 
 and neighbours, and representatives from the seats of 
 learning and science. There he rests till the resurrection 
 morn, and the stone that marks the spot where he lies 
 bears the simple and appropriate words — " The Lord is 
 MY Light." 
 
 CCCCXXXVII. An Inscription of a Tombstone. 
 
 ISA. Ix. 20. " Thy sun shall no more go down: for the Lord 
 shall be thine everlasting light, a?id the days of thy mourning 
 shall be ended" 
 
 Of all the inscriptions in the necropolis of Glasgow, none 
 strikes a visitor so much as the texts of Scripture inscribed 
 on the monument of Dr. Beattie, who died in his fortieth 
 year. One gives the mortal side : "Thy sun shall go down 
 while it is yet day ; " the other turns the medal, and we 
 read the inscription, full of immortalit)'- : " Thy sun shall 
 no more go down : for the Lord God shall be thine ever- 
 lasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be 
 ended." 
 
 CCCCXXXVIII. Captives. Isa. Ixi. i. ^' To proclaim 
 liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them 
 that are bound" 
 
 A BAND of Algerian pirates had taken many prisoners, 
 who were chained to the oars to row their masters. 
 Suddenly ships of war were seen in the distance, and 
 the captives knew there was hope. But their masters 
 came on deck. " Pull for your lives," cried they. The 
 whip was laid on, and the poor captives were forced to 
 pull, and thus, by their own efforts, to fly from their 
 rescuers. So Satan is a hard taskmaster, and when 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 265 
 
 Jesus comes to the soul, and it is about to yield, Satan 
 places all sorts of snares for it. 
 
 CCCCXXXIX. Dancing for Joy. Tsa. hi. 10. "/ 
 will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in 
 my Go:L" 
 
 A Ri.MiMSCENCE of the late Professor (Rabbi) Duncrwi 
 is incidentally given by Dr. Bonar. "One day he said 
 to me, and said it sorrowfully, in one of our many walks, 
 * I was as nearly an atheist as I believe it possible for 
 a man to be,' — implying that, from his own experience, 
 he was inclined to conclude that there never was such 
 a being as an out-and-out atheist. His dread of his own 
 doubtings was seen strikingly in what he said to a friend, 
 regarding the breaking of the light : ' When first I saw 
 there could be a GOD, / danced for joy! It was when 
 walking out alone that this light broke. It was on ' the 
 Brig o' Dee' that he 'danced for joy.' " 
 
 CCCCXL. Christ Covering the Sinner. Isa. Ixi. 
 10. " He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness." 
 
 An American citizen had been condemned in a Spanish 
 court, and was to die ; but the consul interposed, and 
 declared that the Spanish authorities had no power to 
 put him to death. Being determined to save him, he 
 was wrapped round in the flags — the stars and stripes. 
 " Now fire, if you dare," he said. " If you do, you defy 
 the great nation represented by these flags." There stood 
 the man, and before him the soldiers ; and yet he was 
 invulnerable, as though in a coat of mail. So is the sinner, 
 wrapped round by the blood-red robe of Christ. 
 
 CCCCXLI. God's Constant and Personal 
 Supervision of His People. Isa. Ixiii. 13. 
 " That led them as an horse in the wilderness, that they 
 should not stumble." 
 
 The following is an incident of travel in which light is 
 thrown upon a beautiful expression of Isaiah, "That led 
 
266 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 them as an horse in the wilderness, that they should not 
 stumble," of which the commentators give many dis- 
 tracting representations. Two English gentlemen were 
 conveying their horses across the wilderness to be used 
 in Palestine. The journey lasted for more tiian six weeks, 
 and during all that time these horses were only occasionally 
 mounted ; they were led by hand almost every step of the 
 way, being watched over with particular care by special 
 attendants, that they might take no harm from the some- 
 what rude ordeal to which their owners thought it well 
 to expose them. And when I saw those two horses led 
 thus carefully through the rocky desert, and marked how 
 carefully the guides picked out the easiest tracks for them, 
 and paid continual attention to their food, and to their 
 health, and to the state of their hoofs, which were sorely 
 tried by the hard and burning soil on which they trod, I 
 could neither help recalling this passage in Isaiah, nor 
 recognising in the picture an illustration of the prophet's 
 idea. 
 
 Each master would take the bridle of his steed upon his 
 arm, and would walk beside him, encouraging him with 
 kindly words. Especially when the track led over one of 
 the frightful passes of the Sinaitic region, where a sort of 
 staircase of slippery rock leads up or down on the edge 
 of a yawning ravine, the master would be sure to give his 
 personal aid in guidmg his terrified favourite safely over so 
 perilous a place. I can fancy I see the picturesque group 
 at this moment ; the skilful Arab groom and the affec- 
 tionate English master busied in restraining the snorting, 
 rearing creature whose reluctance taxed all their patience 
 and gentle force. One time they would cover his eyes, 
 that he might not see all the danger that lay in front of 
 him ; at another time they would urge him forward with 
 mingled caresses and blows ; sometimes they would stoop 
 down to plant his feet in the securest spots, and when 
 safe ground was reached at length, they would lavish a 
 thousand endearments upon him, as though he had verily 
 done something worthy of reward and praise, instead of 
 owing all his success to the wisdom and care of his anxious 
 guides. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 267 
 
 CCCCXLII. What must Heaven be? Isa. Ixv. 17. 
 "For, behold, I create new heavens and a fiew eai/h." 
 
 HaJI HagOP was an Armenian convert to Christianity, 
 and in the increasinj:^ infirmities of old age he longed to 
 depart and be with Clirist. Taking a book from beneath 
 his cushion, he said to a missionary, " Next to my Bible, 
 this is precious to my soul ; I am now reading it through 
 for the third time." It was a worn copy of Baxter's 
 "Saints' Rest" in Armenian. When told that the "Saint" 
 wrote the book when sick and with heaven full in view, 
 he was greatly interested, and said, " I shall meet him 
 there, and will tell him how it has comforted me in my 
 pilgrimage." He then gave the visitor an account of what 
 some one had told him of the wonders of American cities 
 — of the broad, clean streets, the churches, the khans 
 (hotels) like palaces, etc. He added, " It was wonderful, 
 and as I listened, I thought after this manner: 'What must 
 heaven be ? ' If he should tell all this to a poor Koord, 
 who had never seen or heard of anything better than his 
 hole in the ground, what idea would he get } Just none at 
 all: you might as well describe the light to a blind man. 
 And then I said to myself, ' So little can / understand of 
 heaven ; but thanks be to God, through the blood of His 
 dear Son, I shall one day see and know it all for myself.'" 
 
 CCCCXLIII, The Corruption of Sin. Jer. vi. 14. 
 " They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of My people 
 slightly:' 
 
 Like snow-drift when it has levelled the churchyard 
 mounds, and glistening in the winter sun, lies so pure and 
 fair and beautiful above the dead who fester and rot below, 
 a very plausible profession, wearing the look of innocence, 
 may conceal from human eyes the foulest heart-corruption. 
 
 CCCCXLIV. Entreating Sinners to come to 
 Jesus. Jer. ix. i. "(?// that my head were waters, a/id 
 mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and ?ught 
 for the slain of the daughter of my people I " 
 
 One of Mr. Sherman's members writes thus of his ministry : 
 " This I can testify, that his sermons sent us home to our 
 closets, and made us careful to harrow in the good seed of 
 
268 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 the Word before the birds of the air had time to rob us of 
 it." There is an anecdote tuld of a careless Sabbat h- 
 breaker who stumbled into his chapel one Sunday evening, 
 when he was engaged in prayer. He took his stand in the 
 aisle, and seeing the tears rolling down the minister's cheeks 
 and falling" on the book as he was pleading for the con- 
 version of sinners, he was aroused, and said to himself: 
 " This man is evidently in earnest ; there must be some- 
 thing in the condition of sinners that I do not understand." 
 He remained, was instructed and converted, and became a 
 useful and steady member of the congregation. 
 
 CCCCXLV. The Handwriting of God. Jer. x. 
 12. ^' He hath made the earth by His foiver, Be hath es- 
 tabhshed the world by His wisdom, and hath stretched out the 
 heavens by His discretion." 
 
 Thomas Carlyle, having on one occasion spoken of the 
 First Epistle to the Corinthians as being part of a Bible 
 about the Divine authority of which many wise and good 
 men have been doubtful, went on to say, " at any rate, we 
 are sure that in the rocks and seas and stars we have the 
 authentic handwriting of the Most High." 
 
 CCCCXLVI. Christ not Needed. Jer. xii. 5. ''Hou 
 wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan i " 
 
 A PROMINENT business man thus expressed himself to a 
 Christian minister: "I am interested in Church matters, 
 and always glad to see ministers when they call. But I 
 have thought the subject over long and carefully, and have 
 come to the deliberate decision that I have no need of 
 Jesus." A single week had not passed before that man was 
 taken sick. His disease was accompanied with such in- 
 flammation of the throat as forbade his speaking at all. 
 This enforced silence continued until the hour of death, 
 when he was enabled to utter simply this one despairing 
 whisper : " Who shall carry me over the river f " 
 
 CCCCXLVII. The Weeping Intercessor. Jer. xiii. 
 17. " Bt^t if ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret 
 places for your pride" 
 
 There is a distinct connection between importunate agon- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 269 
 
 izinp^ and true success, even as between the travail and the 
 birth, llie sowing in tears and the rea[jing in joy. " How 
 is it that your seed comes up so soon ? " said one gardener 
 to anotlier. " Because I steep it," was the reply. We must 
 steep all our teachmgs in tears, " when none but God is 
 nigh," and their giowth will surprise and delight us. Could 
 any one wonder at Brainerd's success, when his diary con- 
 tains such notes as this? — " Lord's Day, April 25th. — Tliis 
 morning spent about two hours in sacred duties, and was 
 enabled more than ordinarily to agonize for immortal 
 souls ; though it was early in the morning, and the sun 
 scarcely shone at all, yet my body was quite wet with 
 sweat." The secret of Luther's power lay in the same 
 direction. Theodorus said of him : " I overheard him in 
 prayer, but with what life and spirit did he pray ! It was 
 with so much reverence, as if he were speaking to God, yet 
 with so much confidence, as if he were speaking to his 
 friend." 
 
 CCCCXLVIII. A Barren Tree. Jer. xv. 15. "Take 
 me 7tot away in Thy longs i/ffering." 
 
 Thomas Scott, the commentator, tells the following in- 
 cident : "A poor man, most dangerously ill, of whose 
 religious state I entertained some hopes, seemed to me in 
 the agonies of death. I sat by his bed for a long time, 
 expecting to see him expire ; but at length he awoke as 
 from a sleep, and noticed me. I said, ' You are extremely 
 ill.' He replied, ' Yes, but I shall not die this time.' I 
 asked the ground of this strange confidence, saying that I 
 was persuaded he would not recover. To this he answered, 
 ' I have just dreamed that you, with a very venerable-look- 
 ing person, came to me. He ask-ed you what you thought 
 of me. "What kind of tree is it? Is there any fruit.-*" 
 You said, " No ; but there are blossoms ! " " Well then, 
 I will spare it a little longer I " ' This dream so exactly 
 met my ideas as to the man's state of mind, and the event 
 so answered his confidence by recoveryj that I could not 
 but think there was something peculiar in it. I have since 
 learned that after many backslidings the man became a 
 decidedly religious character — and his case furnishes a 
 most striking instance of the longsufifering and tender 
 mercy of our God ! " 
 
270 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCCXLIX. A Subject neither Studied nor 
 Understood. Jer. xv. i6, 17. "' Thy 7vord was unto 
 me the Joy and rejoicing of mine heart : for I am called by Thy 
 7iame, O Lord God of hosts. I sat not in the assembly of the 
 mockers." 
 
 Sir Isaac Newton set out in life an unbeliever; but 
 on a careful examination of the evidences of Christianity, 
 he found reason to change his opinion. Wlien the cele- 
 brated Dr. Edmund Halley was talking infidelity before 
 him, Sir Isaac Newton addressed him thus : " I am always 
 glad to hear you when you speak about astronomy, or 
 other parts of the mathematics, because that is a subject 
 you have studied and well understand ; but you should 
 not talk of Christianity, for you have not studied it. I 
 have, and am certain you know nothing of the matter." 
 This was a just reproof, and well suited to present-day 
 infidels. 
 
 CCCCL. Nero. Jer. xvii. 9. ^'^ The heart is deceitful above 
 all things, and desperately wicked : who can know it ? " 
 
 The beginning of Nero's reign was marked by acts of the 
 greatest kindness and condescension, — by affability, com- 
 plaisance, and popularity. The object of his administra- 
 tion seemed to be the good of his people ; and when he 
 was desired to sign his name to a list of malefactors that 
 were to be executed, he exclaimed, "/ wish to Heaven I 
 C07ild not zvrite ! " He was an enemy to flattery ; and when 
 the senate had liberally commended the wisdom of his 
 government, Nero desired them to keep their praises till 
 he deserved them. Yet this was the wretch who assassi- 
 nated his mother, who set fire to Rome, and destroyed mul- 
 titudes of men, women, and children, and threw the odium 
 of that dreadful action upon the Christians. The cruelties 
 he exercised towards them were beyond description, while 
 he seemed to be the only one who enjoyed the tragical 
 spectacle. 
 
 CCCCLI. Columba and His Ministry. Jer. xxiii. 4. 
 
 '•'■ I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them." 
 
 On Zona, Columba built his monastery and cell, rudely 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 271 
 
 constructed and thatched with reeds. Round his dwelh'ng 
 rose the wattle huts inhabited by his followers ; and here 
 the little band, headed by their chief, devoted the time to 
 evangelizing pursuits. 
 
 Occasionally assisting in the agricultural occupations 
 of the brethren, in studying Holy Scripture and transcrib- 
 ing passages of the sacred text for the use of the com- 
 munity, Columba passed the first days of sojourn at lona ; 
 but in no long time wounded, dark souls, crying for the 
 light, — craving peace beyond all else, — began to flock to 
 the island sanctuary, and numerous wayfarers gathered 
 about the missionary's dwelling. 
 
 Adamnan, Columba's ecclesiastical biographer, thus 
 records a dialogue that took placa between the evangelist 
 and one of the wanderers who had found his way to lona. 
 
 Being informed one day that a stranger from Ireland had 
 arrived, Columba hastened to the hospitiuni to welcome 
 him and inquire into his history. The new-comer in- 
 formed him that it was his desire, in exile, and bound 
 by monastic vows, to repent of his misdeeds. To test his 
 sincerity, Columba drew a dismal picture of the austerities 
 and obligations of the island-life. 
 
 " I am prepared," was the reply, "to undergo the hum- 
 blest and most galling conditions that can be imposed." 
 
 He then made his confession, and on bended knee vowed 
 that he would endure whatsoever penance he was com- 
 manded. 
 
 " It is well," said Columba. " Now rise and begone. 
 Thou must first labour and repent in the neighbouring isle 
 of Tiree for seven years, after which I will see thee again." 
 
 "But," said the penitent, "how can I expiate a perjury 
 of which I have not yet spoken ? Before I left my coun- 
 try, I slew a man. I was placed in fetters and about to 
 suffer death as the penalty of my offence, when a wealthy 
 kinsman paid the ransom demanded for my life. Out of 
 gratitude I swore to serve him all my days ; but after a 
 short time of servitude I deserted him, and here I am not- 
 withstanding my vow." 
 
 Upon hearing this confession, Columba decided that, 
 until the seven years of probation had expired, the penitent 
 should not be admitted to communion. At the end of the 
 term, Columba admitted the penitent into the Church, and 
 
272 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 sent him back to Ireland (bearing an ivory-handled sword 
 as his ransom) to his kinsman and former master. 
 
 The kinsman, however, refused to take the ransom, deem- 
 ing himself unworthy ; but without fee or reward he par- 
 doned and released the returned exile. The freed man 
 remained in Ireland until the death of his parents, and 
 ultimately returned to lona as to home, bringing with him 
 the ivory-handled sword, which had severed the chains of 
 slavery. 
 
 This incident points to the influence wielded by Col- 
 umba over men's souls, and also demonstrates the pre- 
 cautions he used to prevent the unworthy sharing in 
 Church membership, or gaining premature admission into 
 the brotherhood. 
 
 And vigilance was needed, by reason of the number of 
 applicants ; for as Columba and his disciples meditated in 
 the quiet of their cells, or cheerily carried on the work of 
 ploughing, sowing, and reaping, the shouts of new-comers 
 daily reached their ears from the shore of Mull. Then the 
 boats were launched to ferry the unbidden but welcome 
 guests across the strait ; and having obtained the aid they 
 had journeyed weary miles to seek, the pilgrims returned 
 home with glowing hearts to make known the glad tidings 
 learned at the island-mission, while others remained to be 
 in due time admitted into the community, or to be sent 
 forth to strive and suffer as evangelists. 
 
 CCCCLII. A Seasonable Rebuke. Jer. xxvi. 3. ''If 
 so be they will hearken, and turn every man frofu his evil 
 wayT 
 
 It is related, in the " Life of Mrs. Savage," an excellent 
 sister of Matthew Henry, that when some respectable pious 
 gentlemen were one Sabbath evening assembled together, 
 they unhappily engaged in conversation unsuitable to the 
 day. Betty Parsons, a good old woman, overhearing them, 
 said : " Sirs, you are making work for repentance." This 
 short and seasonable rebuke restrained them, and turned 
 their conversation into a different and better channel. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 273 
 
 CCCCLIII. Concentration of Heart. Jer. xxix. 13. 
 
 " And ye shall seek Me, and find Me, when ye shall search for 
 
 Me with all your hearth 
 A BROKEN heart is a great blessing, when it is broken 
 by contrition for sin ; but a divided lieart is often a fatal 
 disease. 
 
 One secret of success in life is concentration ; and many 
 of our young men find it out too late. The founder of the 
 Vanderbilt family bent his whole powers upon money- 
 making, and left the richest family on the Continent. Sir 
 Isaac Newton's famous explanation of his splendid success 
 was, " I intend my whole mind upon it." Prof Joseph 
 Henry, of Washington, our great Christian scientist, used 
 to say : "I have no faith in universal geniuses : my rule is 
 to train all my guns on one point until I make a breach." 
 In these days of hot competition there is no room on the 
 street for any man who puts only a fraction of himself 
 into his business. 
 
 CCCCLIV. Pliny's Myrtle and Christ's Cross. 
 
 Jer. XXX. 17. ^'- For I will restore health unto thee, and 1 
 
 will heal thee of thy woujuls, saith the Lord.''' 
 The heathen naturalist, Pliny, tells of a peculiarly fragrant 
 myrtle-tree which grew in great abundance in his own time, 
 and which he represents as possessing a strange and even 
 miraculous virtue. A spray cut from it and carried in the 
 hand could so continuously sustain the body that weariness 
 was impossible, while it exercised such an exhilarating 
 potency over the mind that no feeling approaching the 
 sense of discouragement or despondency could ever be ex- 
 perienced. That fabled tree was a fitting emblem of the 
 efficacy of grace in healing all the soul's diseases, and, in 
 its ultimate result, delivering the body also from every 
 malady which may now afflict or oppress it, raising it up 
 on the resurrection-day in the likeness and loveliness of 
 the glorious body of the Son of God. 
 
 CCCCLV. Restoration of Israel. Jer- xxxii. 37. 
 " Behold, L 7vill gather them out of all countries, ivhither I 
 have driven them in Mine aJiger, and in Aly fury, and /;; 
 great ttirath ; a?id I will bring them again u/ito this place." 
 
 In the year 1808 a gentleman was riding with Mr. Lewis 
 
 T 
 
274 OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 
 
 Way through a fine park in Devonshire. " Do you know,'' 
 said the gentleman to Mr. Way, " that tliese oaks have 
 rather a strange condition attached to tliem? A lady, who 
 formerly owned this park, stipulated in her will that these 
 trees should not be cut down until Jerusalem should. again 
 be in possession of Israel ; and they are growing still." 
 Mr. Way's interest was roused by this story, and the idea 
 of the Jews' restoration took hold of his mind ; and, shortly 
 afterwards, he was the means of forming the London 
 Society of the Jews. 
 
 CCCCLVI. Process of Wine-Making. Jer, xlviii. 
 II. " Moab hath /lot been emptied from vessel to vesseL" 
 
 In a foreign land we were once witness to the process of 
 wine-making. A series of tuns were ranged in order, and 
 into one of these the expressed liquid was poured, when 
 the process of fermentation was to begin. It began in the 
 first of the series of tuns, and, after some time, the liquid 
 was drawn off to another, and another, leaving a sediment 
 in each ; and the process was prolonged till the desired 
 degree of purity was secured. At each successive stage, 
 the refinement becomes more and more obvious to an ex- 
 perienced eye, while the wine becomes better and more 
 costly ; and that is the Scriptural emblem for the pro- 
 moting of holiness in the soul. 
 
 CCCCLVII. A Storm at Sea. Jer. xlix. 23. '' There is 
 
 sorrow on the sea ; it cannot be quiet." 
 
 On one occasion, Dr. Macfarlane dined with Mr. Spur- 
 geon at the house of Mr. Boustead, and, during the 
 course of the evening, Mr. Spurgeon mentioned a very 
 striking coincidence. His brother was married to a daugh- 
 ter of Field-Marshal Sir J. B , whose son was captain 
 
 of the great turret-ship Captain, which went down in the 
 
 storm of the evening of September 7th, 1870. Lady B 
 
 told Mr. Spurgeon that she had been deeply impressed 
 with her reading on that night in his "Evening by Evening," 
 from these words in Jeremiah xlix. 23 : " There is sorrow 
 on the sea ; it cannot be quiet." The meditation begins 
 thus : " Little know we what sorrow may be upon the sea 
 at this moment. We are safe in our quiet chamber, but 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 275 
 
 far away on the salt sea, the hurricane may be cruelly 
 seeking for the Hves of men." 
 
 CCCCLVIII. The "Ninety and Nine." Ji.r. 1. 6. 
 " i\ry people hath been lost sheep." 
 
 A WRITER describes a scene which he once saw that 
 bnnight our Lord's parable of the " ninety and nine ' 
 before his eyes : — 
 
 "On the Aletsch Glacier I saw a strange, a beautiful 
 sight — the parable of the ' ninety and nine' reacted to the 
 letter. One day we were making our way with ice-axe 
 and alpenstock down the glacier, when we observed a flock 
 of sheep following their shepherds over the intricate wind- 
 ings between crevasses, and so passing from the pastures 
 on one side of the glai:ier to the pastures on the other. 
 The flock had numbered two hundred, all told. But on 
 the way one sheep had got lost. One of the shepherds, in 
 his German patois, appealed to us if we had seen it. For- 
 tunately, one of the party had a field-glass. With its aid 
 we discovered the lost sheep far up amid a tangle of brush- 
 wood on the rocky mountain-side. It was beautiful to see 
 how the shepherd, without a word, left his hundred and 
 ninety-nine sheep out on the glacier waste (knowing they 
 would stand there perfectly still and safe), and went clam- 
 bering back after the lost sheep until he found it. And he 
 actually put it on his shoulder and 'returned rejoicing.'" 
 
 CCCCLIX. God Unwilling to Afflict. Lam. iii. 
 2)T)- " J^or He doth not afflict willitigly nor grieve the children 
 of men.''' 
 
 Sir William Rowan Hamilton, in writing to a friend 
 about the common feeling that when prosperity is great, 
 chastisement must be due, says : " The ancients had much 
 of this feeling, and partly from it they drew their idea of 
 the goddess Nemesis, a mysterious power of whom one 
 function was to chastise the too prosperous among men. 
 To appease this imagined jealousy or envy of some 
 divinity, a king (I think Polzerates of Samos) is reported 
 to have been advised, by one of the wise men of Greece, 
 to inflict on himself some voluntary suftering. The king 
 accordingly threw into the sea a ring of great cost, and 
 
276 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 one which he otherwise valued. The ring was the next 
 day presented to him by his cook, who had found it in 
 the stomach of a fish ; on hearing which, the wise man 
 withdrew himself from the king's society, thinking that 
 one whose prosperity had been hitherto so uninterrupted 
 must be destined for some signal and vindictive visitation 
 of adversity. But this is not a Christian feeling. Our 
 God indeed chasten eth those whom He lovcth, but not 
 because He grudges them prosperity. Let us commit 
 ourselves to His hands without fear that He will visit us 
 with affliction for its own sake, or because we are happy 
 now." 
 
 CCCCLX. Insensibility to Daily Mercies. 
 
 Lam. iii. 22. " The Lord's mercies " 
 
 As the Dead Sea drinks in the river Jordan, and is never 
 the sweeter, and the ocean all other rivers, and is never the 
 fresher, so we are apt to receive daily mercies from God, 
 and still remain insensible of them, unthankful for them. 
 
 CCCCLXI. God Fulfilling His Threatenings. 
 
 Lam. v. 18. " Because of the mountain of Zion, which is 
 desolate, the foxes walk upo?i it." 
 
 It is said that two rabbis, when coming near Jerusalem, 
 saw a fox running up the hill of Zion. The oldest of the 
 two men began to weep at the sight, but Rabbi Eliezar 
 laughed. "Wherefore dost thou mourn.''" he said. "I 
 mourn because I see fulfilled before mine eyes that was 
 written in Lamentations : ' Because of the mountain of 
 Zion, which is desolate, the foxes fall upon it." " And that 
 is the reason of my laughter," repeated Rabbi Eliezar, " for 
 when I see with mine own eyes that God is fulfilling His 
 threatenings to the letter, I have in it a sure pledge that 
 not one of His promises shall fail, for He is more willing 
 to be gracious than to chastise." 
 
 CCCCLXII. A Quaker Tailor. Ezek. i. 3. ''The 
 word of the Lord came expressly utito Ezckiel the priest." 
 
 John Woolman was the son of a poor farmer near the 
 village of Mount Holly in New Jersey. He was first 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES 277 
 
 apprenticed, as a cliild, to a baker, then to a tailor. A 
 tailor he remained throui^h life. He was not a scholar ; 
 he was a man neither of exceptional intellectual force nor 
 of personal magnetism ; he taught no new creed, said and 
 did nothing to startle the world. Yet the little Quaker 
 tailor was a power while living, and is still a power in the 
 world, although he has been dead more than a century. 
 
 What was his secret .-' It was a simple matter enough. 
 When he was a boy of seven, sitting alone by the roadside, 
 one day, he read the words: "And I beheld a pure river 
 of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the 
 throne of God." They moved him as only children can be 
 moved. The idea of this pure water of life flowing from 
 God wholly possessed him as he grew older. It was Truth. 
 In his journal, Truth always means God. While at his 
 school, or at work in his shop, the thought persistently 
 came to him— if he could make of himself a conduit 
 through which this water of life should pass to men ; stifle 
 all his own wishes and traits, obliterate his own character 
 if necessary, and stand ready and passive for God to use ! 
 
 The only point wherein John Woolman differed from 
 other men was that he succeeded in doing this. In great 
 actions, and in the least, he waited to feel the "divine 
 drawing " in his mind before he moved. It was the story 
 of the Hebrew prophets over again. 
 
 CCCCLXIII. Christmas Evans on Preaching. 
 EzEK. iii. 1 7. " Son of 7na?i, I have inade thee a watchman 
 unto the house of Israel : therefore hear the word at My mouth, 
 and give them ivarning from iMe." 
 
 Christmas Evans makes the following remarks on 
 preaching : " I want preachers to read all they can, and 
 make use of ideas which fall like the manna of old ; but 
 let them take them home to grind, and boil, and bake in 
 the mill of prayer and the heated pot of reflection ; then 
 place them like the twelve loaves of shewbread on the 
 golden table of the ministry before the worshippers and 
 holy priesthood. I want the entire word to be preached, 
 because it is given of God ; but with such connections as 
 exist in the Solar System, or in the human body, which, 
 if disconnected, the life and efl'ect depart. The sun is ' the 
 
27S OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 world's life and a globe of fire.' Were a husbandman who 
 tilled and cultivated the earth for its products to hold 
 a sackcloth towards the sun, he would be esteemed an 
 ignorant owl in our sight. Were a surgeon to amputate a 
 limb, a hand or leg from the body, so that the connection 
 with the great artery of the heart be broken, and then 
 endeavour to make the blood circulate through the severed 
 limb, to quicken and to warm it, we should only say, ' Re- 
 unite the limb to the body that the blood may pervade it 
 in its course, or else as soon as you like, bury it in the 
 earth.' Many preachers, I understand, have more interest 
 in preaching about the earth's being stricken and punished 
 with drought last year than about Jesus being struck on 
 the cross all red with His blood ! Christ's sacrifice and the 
 Holy Spirit's grace occupy the place of the central sun 
 and of the heart's blood in the Christian system as those 
 do in their own systems. I have observed that an un- 
 evangelical style like that described has latterly crept in 
 amongst all denominations in Wales in preaching duties. 
 What good has preaching the dead cross ever done .'* Are 
 the churches more heavenly, industrious, and striving .'' 
 or are they more unspiritual, insipid, and lethargic .'' 
 Here is gun, here is leaden bullet, here is flint, here is 
 touch-hole, here is finger, but where is the powder } The 
 ball will never start without that. He is the mover of the 
 whole, ' Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.' 
 I. Let us, then, preach the whole truth evangelically. 2. 
 Faithfully, for souls are in danger. 3. Plainly and clearly, 
 since heaps of our hearers know less than we imagine. 
 4. Afifectionately, fervently, and winningly ! for the flame 
 of Calvary's love is intense, and should cause a glow in 
 the pulpit, melting everything to its own consistency, and 
 joining man to God by the cross, to be one spirit for ever 
 and for ever." 
 
 CCCCLXIV. Black, Cold, Hard. Ezek. xi. 19. 
 
 ^^ I will take the stony heart out of their Jlesh." 
 
 Theodore Monod made use of a beautiful illustration at 
 the last Dublin convention. He said : " If a piece of iron 
 could speak, what would it say .'' It would say, ' I am 
 black, I am cold, I am hard.' Perfectly true. But put 
 
OLD TESTAMENT AAECDOTES. 279 
 
 that piece of iron into a furnace and wait a while, and 
 what would it say? — 'The blackness is gone, and the cold- 
 ness is gone, and the hardness is gone' — it has passed into 
 a new experience. But if that piece of iron could speak, 
 surely it would not glory in itself, because the fire and the 
 iron arc two distinct things that remain distinct to the last. 
 If it could glory, it would glory in the fire, and that in itself 
 — in the fire that kept it a bright, molten mass. So in 
 myself. I am black, I am cold, and I am hard ; but if the 
 Lord takes possession of my soul, if I am filled with love, 
 if His Spirit fills my being, the blackness will go, and the 
 coldness will go, and the hardness will go, and yet the 
 glory docs not belong to me, but to the Lord who keeps 
 me in a sense of His love." 
 
 CCCCLXV. The Evil Heart of UnbeHef. Ezek. 
 xi. 19. " / will take the stony heart out of their flesh." 
 
 An old friend of Sir W. Rowan Hamilton's wrote him 
 after a long silence, and took occasion to express interest 
 in his inner life, and specially in his spiritual state, and 
 the following is an extract from his correspondence on the 
 subject: "]\Iy struggles and alternations in the spiritual 
 life have not been between belief and doubt, but between 
 warmth and coldness. My intellect has never ceased to 
 embrace Christianity with satisfactory and complete con- 
 viction : it is the evil heart of unbelief which has, too often, 
 departed from the living God." 
 
 CCCCLXVI. '« I was Born so." Ezek. xi. 19. "/will 
 put a neiv spirit within you ; and I will take the stony heart 
 out of their flesh, and will give thejn an heart of flesh.'' 
 
 Bishop Hall says, that the last Cardinal ever .seen in 
 England, when a skilful astrologer pretended to tell him 
 something of the future from a calculation of his nativity, 
 said : " Such, perhaps, I was born ; but since that time I 
 have been born again, and my second nativity has crossed 
 my first." And on this remark of the Cardinal, Bishop 
 Hall observes, "The power of nature is a good plea for 
 those that acknowledge nothing above nature ; but for a 
 Christian to excuse his intemperateness by his natural 
 inclination, and to say, ' I was born so,' is an apology 
 worse than the fault." Right, most worthy bishop, right 
 
28o OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 for j'ou. and well for good people of all degrees to bear in 
 mnid this sober bit of truth. " I was born so," is the 
 standing and all-sufficient excuse which thousands of Chris- 
 tians make to themselves for those infirmities of character 
 of which they are conscious, but which they do not care to 
 correct. One finds secret pleasure in the indulgence of a 
 passion that God cannot approve, and he persuades himself 
 it is not so very wrong, because it is so natural to him. 
 Again, he has faults which render him unhappy oftentimes, 
 and very disagreeable to his neighbours, but he makes no 
 effort to reform them, on the same plea : " I was born so, 
 and cannot help it." He is morose in his temper ; he 
 knows it ; but he says it is his way, it is natural to him, 
 and it is useless to try and be otherwise. He has a quick 
 way of speaking his mind, regardless of the feelings of 
 others, and quite careless of times, places, and persons ; 
 and when the fault is hinted to him, he says, " Oh, that's 
 my way." So it is, and a very bad way ; and because it is 
 your way, you ought to change it. 
 
 CCCCLXVII. The Forest-guarded Highway. 
 
 EzEK. xviii. 4. " The soul that shineth, it shall die." 
 
 A TRAVELLER relates that, when passing through an 
 Austrian town, his attention was directed to a forest on a 
 slope near the road, and he was told that death was the 
 penalty of cutting down 07ie of those trees. He was in- 
 credulous until he was further informed that they were the 
 protection of the city, breaking the force of the descending 
 avalanche, which, without this natural barrier, would sweep 
 over the quiet home of thousands. When a Russian army 
 was marching there, and began to cut away the defence for 
 fuel, the inhabitants besought them to take their dwellings 
 instead, which was done. 
 
 Such, he well thought, are the sanctions of God's moral 
 lazv. On the integrity and support of that law depends 
 the safety of the universe. " The soul that sinneth, it shall 
 die," is a merciful proclamation. " He that offends in one 
 point is guilty of all," is equally just and benevolent. In 
 this view, to every sinner out of Christ, God must be "a 
 consuming fire." To transgress once is to lay the axe at 
 the root of the tree which represents the security and peace 
 of every loyal soul in the wide dominions of the Almighty. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 281 
 
 CCCCLXVIII. "Jesus Opposers." Ezek. xxii. 29. 
 '* The people of the land have used oppression." 
 
 The story of the triumphs of the Gospel in Japan 
 are most interesting, but there are still many "Jesus 
 opjiosers." 
 
 For some time past there has been strong opposition to 
 Christianity on the part of certain people calling them- 
 selves the " Yaso Taiji," or "Jesus opposers." They have 
 been lecturing all over the country, and have drawn large 
 crowds of people to hear what they had to say. Some of 
 the speakers are renegade Greeks and Catholics, who said, 
 " We have tried this religion, and have found it a decep- 
 tion and fraud. It is a subtle and wicked scheme to get 
 possession of the country. As Christ taught His followers 
 to love one another, so if any Christian nation makes war 
 upon Japan, the Japanese Christians would not fight, but 
 yield at once to their enemies." 
 
 Of course such persons have never been sincere Chris- 
 tians, and have doubtless professed to be in the hope of, 
 gain. 
 
 A Christian physician recently went to Yokosuka, and 
 when his belief was made known, his companions said he 
 must renounce his religion or become an outcast from their 
 society. He was much troubled, and shut himself up for 
 two days in order that he might give himself to the study 
 of the Bible and prayer. He then said to his friends: 
 " Let come what will, I shall not deny my Master," and he 
 went about his duties with a firm trust in God. He has 
 continued to live as a Christian, and to his great joy his 
 companions do not oppose as he expected, but some of 
 them are now attending reiigious services, and are ap- 
 parently sincere inquirers. The influence of his exemplary 
 character and joyful life has been to lead those who 
 once opposed to seek for the same precious hope and 
 experience. 
 
 CCCCLXIX. Hearing your Funeral Sermon. 
 Ezek. xxiv, 17. '■'Forbear to cry, make no viourning for the 
 dead." 
 
 The eulogiums which one often hears and reads of living 
 personages, calls up the experience of an eccentric charac- 
 
282 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 tcr. who had always insisted that every man ought to hear 
 his own funeral sermon, since it concerned Jiiui more than 
 anybody else ! So when he was very ill, and sure in his 
 own mind that he was "elected to die," he sent his wife to 
 the old minister, who kindly complied with the novel re- 
 quest. When he had prepared the sermon, he came with 
 all gravity to read it to the sick man. "I never was much 
 given to being proud, or sot up," said the old man (who 
 lived to tell the story), " but that sermon almost did the 
 business for me — to think of the church crowded with 
 people, and me lying there in my coffin, and the minister 
 looking down from the pulpit and saying all that for an 
 hour ! Why, I almost backslode 1 I came mighty nigh 
 falling from grace! I tell you, if there's anything that'll 
 make a man proud and sot up, it's hearing his own funeral 
 sermon." 
 
 CCCCLXX. A Mighty Noise. Ezek. xxvi. 13. 
 " And I will cause the tioise of thy songs to cease.^' 
 
 " The singing of an army, to beguile the weary march, do 
 you not remember it, old soldiers, with hairs just turning 
 grey ? It is an ascertained fact of acoustics that the sur- 
 face of a plain trembles with the sound and the air fairly 
 rocks with such melodious concussion. When Xenophon's 
 army first caught sight of the Euxine, after an exhaustive 
 march of suffering, they cried out, ' TJialatta, thalatta ! ' 
 * The sea, the sea ! ' and birds fell dead from the mighty 
 shout. So fish are killed by the thunder of heavy ordnance. 
 I remember, at the first 'Peace Jubilee' in Boston, that 
 the singing of so vast a chorus, with accompaniments, 
 wrought me to the pitch of wildness ; my nerves turned 
 tyrants, and I fled the building, lest I died." 
 
 CCCCLXXI. Groaning, but not Grumbling. Ezek. 
 XXX. 24. " He shall groan before him tvith the groanings of a 
 deadly wounded tnan." 
 
 "A RELIGIOUS commander being shot in battle, when the 
 wound was searched and the bullet cut out, some standing 
 by pitying his pain, he replied, ' Though I groan, yet I 
 bless God I do not grumble.' God allows His people to 
 groan, though not to grumble." 
 
OLD TESTAMEAT ANECDOTES. $83 
 
 CCCCLXXII. The Dumb Bell. Ezek. xxxiii. 22. 
 " And my mouth was opened, and I was no mo?-e dumhy 
 
 Mr. Gatty, in his book on " Bells," gives the following 
 anecdote, on the credit of Cardinal Baronius : " When 
 Charles II., King of France, A.D. 615, was at Sen.s, in Bur- 
 gundy, he heard a bell in the church of St. Stephen, the 
 sound of which pleased him so much that he ordered it to 
 be transported to Paris. The Bishop of Sens, however, was 
 greatly displeased at this, and the bell so S}'mpathised with 
 him that it turned dumb on the road and lost all its sound. 
 When the king heard of this, he commanded that the bell 
 should be carried back to its old quarters, when, strange to 
 relate, as it approached the town, it recovered its original 
 tone, and began to ring so as to be heard at Sens, whilst 
 yet about four leagues distant from it." 
 
 The true preacher grows silent if forced to any other 
 service than his Lord's. If he attempts to speak on any 
 other topic than that which concerns his Lord and the 
 Gospel, he misses his former force ; he is not at home, he 
 is glad to end his speech and sit down. Our bell is dumb 
 if it does not ring out for Jesus. The world would soon 
 dismiss us if it had hired us to be its orator, for our heart 
 is elsewhere, and only upon the one dear, familiar flieme 
 can we be eloquent. 
 
 CCCCLXXIIL Charlotte Elliot's Hymn. Ezek. 
 xxxiii. 32. " y^ 7'ery lovely song" 
 
 Some fifty years ago, that eminent minister, Caesar Malan 
 of Geneva, was a guest of the Elliots, a well-to-do family 
 in the West End of London. 
 
 One evening, in conversation with the daughter, Charlotte, 
 he wished to know if she was a Christian. The young lady 
 resented his question, and told him that religion was a 
 matter which she did not wish to discuss. Mr. Malan 
 replied, with his usual sweetness of manner, that he would 
 not pursue the subject then if it displeased her, but he 
 would pray that she might " give her heart to Christ, and 
 become a useful worker for Him." 
 
 Several days afterwards the young lady apologised for 
 her abrupt treatment of the minister, and confessed that 
 his question and his parting remark had troubled her. 
 
284 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 " But I do not know how to find Christ," she said, " I 
 want you to help me." 
 
 " Come to Www J7ist as you are" said Mr. Malan. 
 
 He h'ttle thought that one day that simple reply would 
 be repeated in song by the whole Christian world. 
 
 Further advice resulted in opening the young lady's 
 mind to spiritual light, and her life of devout activity and 
 faith began. She possessed literary gifts, and having 
 assumed the charge of the Yearly Remembrancer on the 
 death of its editor, she inserted several original poems 
 (without her name) in making up her first number. One 
 of the poems was : — 
 
 "Just as I am, without one plea. 
 But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
 And that Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, 
 O Lamb of God, I come ! " 
 The words of Pastor Malan, realized in her own experience, 
 were of course the writer's inspiration. 
 
 Beginning thus its public history in the columns of an 
 unpretending religious magazine, the little anonymous 
 hymn, with its sweet counsel to troubled minds, found its 
 way into devout persons' scrap-books, then into religious 
 circles and chapel assemblies, and finally into the hymnals 
 of the " Church universal." Some time after its publication 
 a philanthropic lady, struck by its beauty and spiritual 
 value, had it printed on a leaflet, and sent for circulation 
 through the cities and towns of the kingdom ; and in con- 
 nection with this an incident at an English watering-place 
 seems to have first revealed its authorship to the world. 
 Miss Elliot, being in feeble health, was staying at Torquay, 
 in Devonshire, under the care of an eminent physician. 
 One day the doctor, who was an earnest Christian man, 
 placed one of those floating leaflets in his patient's hands, 
 saying he felt sure she would like it. The surprise and 
 pleasure were mutual when she recognised her own hymn, 
 and he discovered that she was its author. 
 
 CCCCLXXIV. Among the Flock. Ezek. xxxiv. 12. 
 " As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is 
 amo?ig his sheep that are scattered. ' 
 
 The late Irenaeus Prime gives the following account of his 
 father's visiting among his flock : — 
 
 " As soon as my father arrived at any house in his 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 285 
 
 scattered and extended parish, all the ordinary cares of the 
 family were suspended, and the whole time of every mem- 
 ber given to him. On his first induction to this people, it 
 was the custom of the good woman of the house to begin 
 to fly about when the minister came, to fix up the best 
 parlour, and get ready some warm biscuit for tea, or a pair 
 of chickens for dinner, if he came before noon, and thus all 
 her time was spent, like that of Martha, in much serving. 
 Mr. Prime soon put an end to that mode of entertainment, 
 by informing his people from the pulpit, that when he 
 came to see them at their houses, it was not to be feasted, 
 but to feed their souls, and the souls of their children ; 
 and, therefore, if they wished to please him, they would do 
 as Mary did, sit still and listen. This hint, after sundry 
 repetitions, had the desired effect, and he was able to enjoy 
 the whole time of his visit in those great duties which he 
 felt to be of unspeakable importance to the spiritual welfare 
 of the family. The heads of the household were first con- 
 versed with freely on the progress which they were making 
 in personal religion ; if they had doubts, and fears, or any 
 other difficulties about which they needed direction, they 
 were encouraged to make them known, and from the stores 
 of his well-furnished mind, and the richer treasures of a 
 deeply spiritual experience and great familiarity with the 
 Word of God, he was able to impart just that counsel 
 which their trials seemed to require. If they were back- 
 ward in their performance of any of the acknowledged 
 duties of Christian life, if the worship of God in the family 
 was not faithfully attended to, if they were at variance with 
 any of their neighbours, or slack in the discharge of their 
 obligations to their fellow-men, he would in all kindness, 
 but with skilful decision, as their soul's physician, give 
 them those prescriptions without which it was impossible 
 for their souls to thrive. Such fidelity and freedom on his 
 part, so far from alienating their affections, did but endear 
 him to them the more, as they saw his affectionate interest 
 in their soul's concerns, and felt the power and truth of the 
 admonitions which he gave. And then these admonitions 
 were often blessed of God to tlie great comfort and edifi- 
 cation of the people, who thus found in their own happy 
 experience the ineffable \';iliie of a faithful pastor, whom 
 they loved even when he came to wound. 
 
286 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 "The children were called in, and were examined, as I 
 have hinted, in the catechism, in which they were regularly 
 instructed by their parents. The doctrines therein con- 
 tained were familiarly explained, and the young were 
 most earnestly persuaded to give their hearts to the 
 Saviour, while yet in the morning of their days. As the 
 congregation was widely extended, Mr. Prime would give 
 notice on the Sabbath, that during the week on a certain 
 day, he would visit in such a neighbourhood, and at three 
 o'clock in the afternoon he wished the families in that 
 vicinity to assemble at a house named, for religious con- 
 versation and prayer. And those were good meetings, 
 you may be sure ; the farmer^s house in which it was held 
 would be filled with parents and children, the halls and the 
 staircase crowded ; a little stand, with a Bible and Psalm- 
 book, would be set for the minister at some point from 
 which his voice could easily be heard over all the house, 
 and such prayers and such appeals would be then and 
 there made as the Spirit of God delights to attend and 
 bless. How many tears did the children shed in those 
 meetings ! not alarmed by terrible words of coming wrath, 
 but melted with the pathos of gospel love, and moved by 
 the strong appeals of that holy man. Impressions, I know, 
 were made at those meetings that eternity will only 
 brighten and deepen, as the memory of those solemn, yet 
 happy hours, mingles with the joy of immortal bliss. 
 
 " The efitects of this ministry were, as might be expected, 
 immediate and permanent. The Word of the Lord had 
 free course and was glorified. The young grew up to 
 manhood with strong attachments to the faith of their 
 fathers, the members of the Church were steadfast in their 
 adherence to the truth as they had received it, and it was 
 rare to see a man in the community who was not a pro- 
 fessor of religion. The institutions of the Gospel com- 
 manded the respect and reverence of the whole people. 
 Impiety was scarcely known in the town, so deep-settled 
 and wide-spread was this regard for the truths of God's 
 Word and the ordinances of His house." 
 
 CCCCLXXV. The Root. Ezek. xxxiv. 29. '' I will 
 
 raise up for them a plant of renown." 
 A SON of one of the priests of Mysore, who had been 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 287 
 
 aroused, by reacHnj^ a tract, to deep anxiety about the salva- 
 tion of lu's soul, travelled nearly two hundred miles to visit 
 a missionary to inquire about the truth. On one occasion 
 he was much interested in reading Bunyan's " Pilgrim's 
 Progress." He said several times to the missionary, that 
 it was better than the Bible. The missionary pointed to 
 the scene before them and said, " Do you see that beautiful 
 mango tree there .-* " " Yes," was the reply. " Don't you see 
 its beautiful fruit, eat it, and enjoy its sweetness .-• " " Yes." 
 "And where would that tree be if there was no root to it ?" 
 " Oh," said the man, " now I see what you mean ! The 
 Bible is the root, and all the other good books in the world 
 are produced from it." 
 
 The lesson was a timely one, nor should we ever forget, 
 while enjoying the sweetness of some work which the 
 Christian press sends forth, that the Bible is the root from 
 which it springs. Plant that blessed root in any soul, 
 and by-and-by the sweet fruit of Christian literature will 
 appear. Fail to plant the Bible, and we shall look in vain 
 for all the sweet and refreshing fruits. 
 
 CCCCLXXVI. The Power of a Living Bible. 
 
 EzEK. xxxvi. 27. " And I will put My Spirit within you, 
 and cause you to walk in My statutes." 
 
 Nowhere is it more true than in the Christian life that 
 actions speak louder than words. A young man had 
 become an infidel, and would no longer read the printed 
 Bible, but he could not help seeing the fruits of faith in the 
 life of another. 
 
 In his father's house a young lady resided, who was a 
 relative of the family. Her fretful temper made all around 
 her uncomfortable. She was sent to a boarding-school, 
 and was absent some time. While there she became a 
 true and earnest Christian. On her return she was so 
 changed that all who knew her wondered and rejoiced. 
 She was patient and cheerful, kind, unselfish, and charitable. 
 The lips that used to be always uttering cross and bitter 
 words now spoke nothing but sweet, gentle, loving words. 
 Her infidel cousin George was greatly surprised at this. 
 He watched her closely for some time, till he was thoroughly 
 satisfied that it was a real change that had taken place in 
 his young cousin. Then he asked her what had caused 
 
288 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 this great change. She told him it was the grace of God 
 which had made her a Christian and had changed her 
 heart. 
 
 He said to himself, "I don't believe that God has any- 
 thing to do with it, though she thinks He had. But it is 
 a wonderful change that has taken place in her, and I 
 should like to be as good as she is. I zvill be so." Then 
 he formed a set of good resolutions. He tried to control 
 his tongue and his temper, and kept a strict watch over 
 himself. He was all the time doing and saying what he 
 did not wish to do and say. And, as he failed time after 
 time, he would turn and study his good cousin's example. 
 He would read this living Bible, and said to himself, "How 
 does it happen that she, who has not as much knowledge 
 or as much strength of character as I have, can do what I 
 can't do } She must have some help that I don't know of. 
 It must be as she says, the help of God. I will seek that 
 help." He went into his chamber and prayed to that God 
 whose very existence he had denied. He prayed earnestly. 
 God heard him, helped him, and he became a Christian. 
 
 CCCCLXXVII. Human Thought and Heavenly- 
 Light. Dan. ii. 22. "ZT^ revealeth the deep a?id secret 
 tilings : lie kfwit'cth what is in the darkness., and the light 
 dwelldh -tvith Him" 
 Shortly before his death, St. Thomas Aquinas fell into 
 a state of profound and rapturous contemplation, and on 
 coming to himself, he did not sit down to his desk, nor 
 would he dictate anything, although he was still engaged 
 on part of his famous " Summary." 
 
 Even his nearest friends, who knew him intimately, 
 could not account for this. At last his secretary said, 
 " My father, why hast thou cast on one side so great a 
 work which thou didst begin for the glory of God and the 
 illumination of the world } " All St. Thomas Aquinas 
 replied was, " Non possum," — "I cannot write any more." 
 Being constantly implored to continue writing, the saint 
 ever made the same reply, " I cannot, for everything that 
 I have written appears to me as simply rubbish." 
 
 So in proportion to the clearness of vision must ever 
 seem the noblest reaches of human thought, compared with 
 the heavenly light, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 289 
 
 CCCCLXXVIII. Able to Deliver. Dan. iii. 17. 
 '• Our God who in we serve is able to deliver." 
 
 A BOAT was once seen driving on along the rapid that 
 hurries to the Falls of Niagara. To the horror of some 
 that watched it from the shore, they saw one aboard, and 
 asleep. They ran, they shouted, they cried. The sleeper 
 woke, and at one wild glance took in all his danger. Yet 
 what won't a man do for his life ! To seize the oars, to 
 pull her head round to the shore, was the work of an 
 instant. With death in the thunders of the cataract 
 roaring loud and louder in his ear, how he pulled ! It was 
 cruel to waken him ; there was no hope, unless God had 
 sent down the eagle that was sailing overhead to bear him 
 away upon her wings ; the wild waters shot him like an 
 arrow to the brink. As near hell as that, you may be 
 saved — plucked from the very brink of ruin. 
 
 CCCCLXXIX. In the Furnace. Dan. iii. 25. ''He 
 answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, tvalking in the 
 midst of tJie fire, and tJiey have no hurt; and the form of the 
 fourth is like the Son of God.''' 
 
 Blandina was one of the early Christian martyrs at Lyons, 
 in the year 177 A.D. They roasted her on a red-hot iron 
 chair, put her in a net, and exposed her to the horns of the 
 wildest oxen ; whirled her in instruments of torture till her 
 senses were lost, and then plunged her into flames ; and 
 day after day did that, while she apparently experienced 
 little pain, calling out at every interval when her strength 
 came back : " I am a believer in the Father, the Son, and 
 the Holy Ghost, one God, who is with me. There is no 
 evil done among us. I am a Christian." And so she 
 passed hence, but speaks to us as one yet living. 
 
 CCCCLXXX. "Near Christ, near the Fire." 
 Dan. iii. 25. " Lo, I see four men loose, ivalking in the 
 midst of the fire, and they have tio hurt; and tlie form of the 
 fourtJi is like the Son of God." 
 
 A PREACHER has said, speaking on the subject of the good 
 effects of trial, " If it be true, according to a fine sa}-ing 
 
 U 
 
290 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 current in the Apostolic Church, that to be 'near Christ' 
 is to be 'near the fire,' it is also true that to be /« the 
 fire is to be with Christ ; and if we are in the furnace with 
 the Son of man, the fire will not consume, but purge and 
 refine." 
 
 CCCCLXXXI. An Old Martyr for Christ. Dan. 
 
 iii. 21. " T/icn these men ivere bound in their coats, their hosen, 
 and their hats, and their other garments, and were cast into 
 the midst of the burning fiery furnace." 
 
 Rawlins White, an old martyr, was very decrepid, and 
 for years he had been bowed almost double, and could 
 hardly walk ; but he was condemned to death, and on his 
 way to the stake, we are told, the bonds of his body seemed 
 to break, and he roused himself up as straight and exu- 
 berant as an athlete, and walked to the fire singing victory 
 over the flames. Ah, it was the joy of dying for Jesus that 
 straightened his body, and roused his soul! 
 
 CCCCLXXXII. An Innovation. Dan. iii. 22. "The 
 King's commandment was urgent" 
 
 John Wesley received many of his most remarkable traits 
 from his mother. He had the same regard for order and 
 authority, and yet the same readiness to follow up an 
 opportunity in defiance of all precedent. 
 
 Mrs. Wesley, loving order and sticking by formal rule 
 as she did, could act a very bold and independent part 
 once she was certain that conscience spoke clear in her 
 breast. When the rector was away on one of his more 
 lengthened absences at Convocation, she had gathered her 
 children and the servants together to read and converse 
 with them on the Sunday afternoon. The neighbours 
 soon heard of it, and many of them wished to join the 
 circle at the rectory. The numbers mcreased, till at last 
 not a few had to go away from want of space. The rector 
 had been advised of the innovation by the curate, and 
 wrote to his wife that her conduct was singular, and 
 counselled greater prudence. But the wife was able to give 
 a reason for her course : — 
 
 " I cannot conceive why any should reflect on you be- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 291 
 
 cause your wife endeavours to draw people to church, and 
 to restrain them from profaning the Lord's Day, by reading 
 to them and other persuasions. For my part, I value no 
 censure on this account. I have long since shook hands 
 with the world, and I heartily wish I had never given them 
 more occasion to speak against me. As to its looking 
 particular, I grant it does. And so does almost everything 
 that is serious, or that may any way advance the glory of 
 God or the salvation of souls, if it be performed out of a 
 pulpit, or in the way of common conversation ; because in 
 our corrupt age the utmost care and diligence has been 
 used to banish all discourse of God, or spiritual concerns, 
 out of society, as if religion were never to appear out of the 
 closet, and we were to be ashamed of nothing so much as 
 of confessing ourselves to be Christians. 
 
 " As for the proposal of letting some other person read, 
 alas ! you don't consider what a people these are. I don't 
 think one man among them could read a sermon without 
 spelling a good part of it. Nor has any of our family a. 
 voice strong enough to be heard by such a number of 
 people. 
 
 "But there is one thing about which I am much dis- 
 satisfied ; that is, their being present at family prayers. I 
 don't speak of any concern I am under, merely because so 
 many are present. For those w^ho have the honour of 
 speaking to the great and holy God need not be ashamed 
 to speak before the whole world ; but because of my sex I 
 doubt if it is proper for me to present the prayers of the 
 people to God. Last Sunday I would fain have dismissed 
 them before prayers ; but they begged so earnestly to stay, 
 I durst not deny them." 
 
 After having stated all her reasons in justification of the 
 course she had taken, she wound up with these character- 
 istic words : " If you do, after all, think fit to dissolve this 
 assembly, do not tell me you desire me to do it, for that 
 will not satisfy my conscience ; but send me your positive 
 coninmtid, in such full and express terms as may absolve 
 me from guilt and punishment for neglecting the op- 
 portunity of doing good, when you and I shall appear 
 before the great and awful tribunal of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
292 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCCLXXXIII. Suggestions to the Sick. Dan. 
 vi. 35. "ZT^ doefh according to His will in the army of heaven, 
 and among the inhabitants of the earth : and fione can stay Hi:, 
 ha?td, or say laito Him, What doest Thou ? " 
 
 Ellice Hopkins tells the following story in speaking of 
 some practical suggestions to the sick. " We deal with 
 the sick too exclusively religiously, or, as I would rather 
 say, too narrowly, since God is the God of all consolation. 
 We say to them, with sinking heart and tears in our eyes, 
 ' It is God's will, and you must bear your burden ' ; but we 
 forget the ropes and pulleys and levers which might, with 
 a little contrivance on our part, help to lift it — all the 
 helps to bearing it — which may be also in God's will. As 
 an instance of what I mean, I may take the case of one 
 my father loved almost as a son. As a young man, with 
 splendid abilities and a brilliant career just opening before 
 him, he was suddenly shot stone blind, not through any 
 carelessness on the part of him who did it, but owing to his 
 being, in the eagerness of a sportsman, a little out of the 
 proper line. His life thus suddenly plunged into darkness, 
 for days he remained completely prostrate. Doubtless 
 those around him spoke to him of the love of God and 
 submission to His will ; but it seemed impossible to raise 
 him up out of the darkness within and without that had 
 fallen upon him. The first thing that roused him was a 
 letter from my father. I had often wondered what it was 
 in that letter that succeeded when all else failed, and many 
 years after it came into my hands, having been carefully 
 preserved in the family. It too spoke of submission to the 
 will of God, but the main part of the letter was taken up 
 in carefully pointing out all that great powers of mind, even 
 with the drawback of blindness, could accomplish, the 
 branches of sdience which required, for further development, 
 the abstract thought to which blindness would be favour- 
 able ; the lines of political life to which it would be no 
 impediment. Submission to God's will was enforced, but the 
 helps to realizing it as a loving will at the same time care- 
 fully suggested. He to whom that letter was addressed is 
 now one of our leading men." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 293 
 
 CCCCLXXXIV. Touching God in Prayer. Dan. 
 vi. 10. " He kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and 
 prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime." 
 
 There is an old story of mythology about a giant, named 
 Antffius, who was born by the earth. In order to keep 
 alive, this giant was obliged to touch the earth as often as 
 once in five minutes, and every time he thus came in con- 
 tact with the earth he became twice as strong as before. 
 The Christian resembles Antaeus. In order to be a living 
 Christian, he must often approach his heavenly Father in 
 prayer ; and every time he thus approaches, he becomes 
 stronger and more able to resist the wiles and assaults of 
 the adversary. 
 
 CCCCLXXXV. Religion a Thing for Every 
 Day. Dan. vi. 20. " Thy God, whom thou servest con- 
 tinually." 
 
 Henry Ward Beecher, speaking of taking religion 
 into the week, says : " The tides come twice a day in New 
 York harbour, but they only come once in seven days in 
 God's harbour of the sanctuary. They rise on Sunday, 
 but ebb on Monday, and are down and out all the week. 
 Men write over their store door, ' Business is business,' 
 and over the church door, ' Religion is religion ' ; and they 
 say to religion, ' Never come in here,' and to business, 
 ' Never go in there. Let us have no secular things in 
 the pulpit. Here we want repose, and sedatives and 
 healing balm ; we have enough of knives and probes and 
 lancets in the week. Here let us have poetry ; we want 
 to sing hymns and to hear about heaven.' God's law is 
 not allowed to go into the week. If the merchant spies it 
 in the store, he throws it over the counter. If it is found 
 in the street, the multitudes pursue it, pelting it with stones, 
 as if it were a wolf escaped from a menagerie, and shouting, 
 ' Back with you ! you have got out of Sunday.' There is 
 no religion in all this. It is mere sentimentalism. Re- 
 ligion belongs to every day. High in an ancient belfry 
 there is a clock, and once a week the old sexton winds it 
 up ; but it has neither dial-plate nor hands. The pen- 
 dulum swings, and there it goes ticking, ticking, day in, day 
 
294 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 out, unnoticed and useless. What the old clock is in its 
 dark chamber, keeping time to itself, but never showing it, 
 that is the mere sentimentality of religion, high above life, in 
 the region of airy thought, perched up in the top of Sunday, 
 but without dial or point to let the people know what 
 o'clock it is, of time or eternity 1 " 
 
 CCCCLXXXVI. The Light of Eternity. Dan. 
 
 xii. 2. " And viany of them that sleep in the dust of the 
 earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and sotne to shame 
 and everlasting contempt." 
 
 Michael Angelo once went into the studio of a young 
 artist who had just executed a statue to stand in the public 
 square. Angelo saw its grave defects, and pointed them 
 out to his young friend. The exultant artist did not appre- 
 ciate the criticism of his work, and supposed the greater 
 man to be moved with envy. So he told him, in the dim 
 obscurity of his workshop he could not see the defects 
 which were so apparent to the aged critic, and in passion 
 sneered at the opinion given. "Well," said Angelo, not 
 the least disturbed, " the light of the public square will 
 test it." 
 
 " The light of the public square will test it." Ah, yes ! 
 The light of the public square is to test every human life. 
 Eternal blaze shall pour upon it, and defects unseen by 
 the poorer light of earth will grow to ghastly deformities. 
 The light of the public square will test it ! 
 
 CCCCLXXXVII. "Some to Everlasting Life." 
 
 Dan. xii. 2. " And many of them that sleep in the dust of 
 the earth shall aivake, some to everlasting life, and some to 
 shame and everlasting coJitempt." 
 
 There is an Eastern story of the "Amreeta water of 
 Immortality," which, when drunk by the impure, ran 
 through their veins in the liquid fire of unspeakable agony ; 
 but, when drunk by the pure, this water spread through 
 their whole being the glow of eternal life and peace. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 295 
 
 CCCCLXXXVIII. An Awakening. Dan. xii. 2. 
 
 '■'■And many of iJwm that sleep in t/te dust of the earth shall 
 a7vake, some to everlasting life, atid some to shatne and ever- 
 lasting contempt." 
 
 A YOUNG somnambulist got out of her garret window 
 upon the roof and, in the sight of a silent and trembling 
 crowd, walked up and down the giddy height, dreaming 
 perhaps of a coming festival, for she kept smiling and mur- 
 muring her gay songs. They were powerless to help her, 
 and held their breath in very horror as she sometimes 
 approached the edge. Suddenly a little candle was lit in 
 an opposite window and flashed upon her eyes. She woke, 
 and there was a scream and a deadly fall. It had killed 
 her! 
 
 CCCCLXXXIX. God's Care of His People. 
 Hos. ii. 18, "And in that day I will make a covenant Jor 
 them with the beasts of the field." 
 
 John Hughes was a most holy, devoted man, and greatly 
 beloved, and his name is held in honour wherever he was 
 known. As superintendent minister of a circuit, he had 
 to visit three congregations, administer the Lord's Supper 
 in each, and return to preach in the evening at Wre.xham. 
 He left in good time in the morning. When not far on 
 his journey he saw a large, fierce-looking dog following 
 him. But neither stones nor scolding would make it go 
 away. When he had gone into the pulpit he saw the dog 
 lie down quietly by the side of it. So it did to the second 
 and third chapels. On Mr. Hughes' return home he was 
 waylaid by two men, who demanded his purse. Mr. 
 Hughes felt he could not contend with the two powerful 
 men, but on whistling the dog was at once at his side, and 
 furiously attacked the would-be robbers. They took to 
 their heels, and Mr. Hughes walked on unmoksted till he 
 reached town, when the dog left him, and he saw it no 
 more. Mr. Hughes never spoke of this incident but in a 
 spirit of astonishment and gratitude. 
 
296 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCCXC. A Personal God. Hos. v. 15. "/« their 
 affliction they will seek Me early." 
 
 A LEADER of thought in Germany, famous as a poet, famous 
 as a man of letters, who had through his long literary 
 career fought against the idea of a personal God, when 
 poor in purse, paralytic in body, and in his last week of life, 
 wrote thus to one of his old class-mates, and under its style 
 of banter there is a pathetic minor tone of earnest feeling : — 
 " A religious reaction has set in upon me for some time. 
 God knows whether the morphine or the poultices have 
 anything to do with it. It is so. I believe in a personal 
 God. To this we come when we are sick to death and 
 broken down. Do not make a crime of it. If the German 
 people accept the personal king of Prussia in their need, 
 why should not I accept a personal God .'' My friend, here 
 is a great truth. When health is used up, money used up, 
 and sound senses used up, Christianity begins." 
 
 CCCCXCI. Go on, Go on. Hos.vi. 3. '' Then shall we 
 
 know, if we follow on to know the Lord." 
 
 Arago says, in his Autobiography, that his master in 
 mathematics was a word or two of advice which he found 
 in the binding of one of his text-books. Puzzled and dis- 
 couraged by the difficulties he met with in liis early studies, 
 he was almost ready to give over the pursuit. Some words 
 which he found on the waste leaf used to stiffen the cover 
 of his paper-bound text-book caught his eye and interested 
 him. " Impelled," he says, " by an indefinable curiosity, I 
 dampened the cover of the book and carefully unrolled the 
 leaf to see what was on the other side. It proved to be a 
 .short letter from D'Alembert to a }oung person disheart- 
 ened like myself by the difficulties of mathematical study, 
 and who had written to him for counsel. ' Go on, sir, go 
 on,' was the counsel which D'Alembert gave him. ' The 
 difficulties you meet will resolve themselves as you advance. 
 Proceed, and light will dawn and shine with increasing 
 clearness on your path.' 
 
 " That maxim," says Arago, " was my greatest master in 
 mathematics." Following out those simple words, " Go on, 
 sir, go on," made him the first astronomical mathematician 
 of his age. What Christians it would make of us I what 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 297 
 
 heroes of faith ! what sages in holy wisdom should we be- 
 come, just by acting out that maxim, Go on, go on ! 
 
 CCCCXCII. Prayers Set Aside with Physic 
 Bottles. Hos. vi. 4. " Yoiir }:;oodness is as the morning 
 cloud, and as the early de7v it goeth away." 
 
 "A COUPLE of men, in a crazy craft, being caught in a squall, 
 betook themselves, one to praying to the Virgin, and the 
 other to poling toward the shore. Soon the latter touched 
 bottom, and turning to his devout comrade, said : ' What's 
 the use of praying when you can touch the bottom with 
 the pole ? ' So say multitudes by their conduct, who would 
 not, for the world, say anything so ludicrous by word. The 
 only difference is, that they are not half so truthful in ex- 
 pressing themselves as bold unbelievers are, but their piety 
 is of no higher type. Such persons act towards the Divine 
 Helper as they do towards their physician — turn to him 
 when they can find no possibility of helping themselves. 
 Many have no use for ministers — unless it may be to ridi- 
 cule them and their work — until they are smitten with 
 disease; and when their cases become too desperate for the 
 skill of the doctor, they send post-haste for the minister, 
 and without reference to either time or convenience, he 
 must come. As they have never had any use for him be- 
 fore, so much the more necessary that he should be at their 
 call now, to pray them up on their feet again. 
 
 " We had occasion to rebuke one of this kind, whose stock 
 of wit consisted in low sneers at ministers and their work. 
 Not long after he became very sick. The doctors said he 
 would die. He sent for us ('because,' he said, 'we had 
 been faithful in our rebuke,') to administer to his spiritual 
 wants, which could be summed up in one sentence — he did 
 not want to burn. He made great promises ; one that he 
 would give five hundred dollars to our Church — though he 
 did not say so, the inference was clear — if we either got 
 him well or in heaven. Unaccountable to tell, he got well. 
 Our prayers were not so refreshing with returning health. 
 They were set aside with the physic bottles. Soon he 
 avoided us. He never spoke of the five hundred dollars ; 
 he would neither pay nor pray, since he could ' touch the 
 bottom with the pole,' At last we asked him for the 
 
298 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 money he had promised the Church. He became angry, 
 and compromised on one hundred dollars. 
 
 "A father came to a Young Men's Christian Association 
 in great distress, with a request that prayer should be offered 
 for his son, who was lying dangerously ill. It was a sur- 
 prise to learn that the father did not profess to be a Chris- 
 tian, and great hopes were entertained that he would be. 
 He came to church several evenings, and his son recovered. 
 But he has never been heard of since. * What is the use 
 of praying when you can touch the bottom with the pole .'"' 
 
 CCCCXCIII. A Choice of Three Sins. Hos. xiii. 2. 
 
 '■''And now they sin fnore and more." 
 
 There is a story which tells of a man who had the choice 
 of three sins he would commit — drunkenness, adultery, or 
 murder. He chose drunkenness as being apparently the 
 least ; but when intoxicated he committed both the other 
 sins, and so became guilty of all three. One sin leads to 
 another, and is like the letting in of water. 
 
 CCCCXCIV. Death a Bed to the Weary. Hos. 
 xiii. 14. '''■I will ransom them from the power of the grave." 
 
 The martyr Renwick had a weakly constitution at the 
 best, and his incessant labours, aggravated as they were 
 by exposure and sleepless anxiety, ere long wore him out, 
 so that even his undaunted spirit was sometimes wrapped 
 in gloomy clouds. His letters, as time went on, expressed 
 an increasing sense of weariness, but continued to be 
 brightened by beams of heavenly faith and hope. 
 
 In 1687 he writes to Sir Robert Hamilton : — "My busi- 
 ness was never so weighty, so multiplied, and so ill to be 
 guided, to my apprehension, as it has been this year, and 
 my body was never so frail. Excessive travel, night wan- 
 derings, unseasonable sleep and diet, and frequent preach- 
 ing in all seasons of weather, especially in the night, have 
 so debilitated me that I am often incapable for any work. 
 I find myself greatly weakened inwardly, so that I some- 
 times fall into fits of swooning and fainting. I take seldom 
 any meat or drink, but it fights with my stomach ; and for 
 strong drink I can take almost none of it. When I use 
 means for my recovery, I find it some ways effectual ; but 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 299 
 
 my desire to the work, and the necessity and importunity 
 of peoi:)lc, prompt me to do more than my natural strength 
 will well allow, and to undertake such toilsome business 
 as casts my body presently down again. I mention not 
 this through any anxiety, quarrelling, or discontent, but to 
 show you my condition in this respect. I may say that, 
 under all my frailties and distempers, I find great peace 
 and sweetness in reflecting upon the occasion thereof. It 
 is a part of my glory and joy to bear such infirmities, con- 
 tracted through my poor and small labour in my Master's 
 vineyard." 
 
 No wonder that, when the sentence of death came, it 
 raised no perturbation in Renwick's soul. Life had no 
 attraction for him, death had no terror ; the only comforts 
 that had sustained his soul for five long years were beams 
 of heavenly light sent down into the darkness out of that 
 world into which death would immediately introduce him. 
 His patient continuance in his overwhelming labours suffi- 
 ciently declared his willingness to abide in the flesh if such 
 were the Master's will, but we can well believe that he was 
 willing rather to depart and to be with Christ. " I go," he 
 wrote to the same correspondent, on the eve of his execu- 
 tion, " I GO TO YOUR God and my God. Death to me 
 
 IS AS A BED to THE WEARY." 
 
 CCCCXCV. When does a Tree Grow? Hos. 
 
 xiv. 5. "/«//// be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as 
 the lily:' 
 
 A short time ago a gentleman was preaching in the 
 open air ; his subject was " Growth in Grace." At the 
 close of the meeting a man approached him and said : "Our 
 minister has been preaching some excellent sermons on 
 that subject, and I have been trying to grow in grace this 
 long time, but I find I never can succeed." The preacher, 
 pointing to a tree, said, " Do you see that tree.-'" "Yes," 
 was the wondering reply. " Well, it had to be planted 
 before it could grow. In like manner you must be rooted 
 and grounded in Christ before you can begin to grow." 
 The man understood his meaning, and went away to find 
 Christ ; and soon he was rooted in Christ, and brought 
 forth fruit to His praise. 
 
300 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 CCCCXCVI. Growth. Hos. xiv. 6. ''His branches 
 shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his 
 stnell as Lebanon. " 
 
 Have you ever noticed that the trees nearest the Hght at 
 the edge of the wood have larger branches than those in 
 the interior of the forest, and the same tree will throw out 
 a long branch toward the light, and a short one toward the 
 obscurity of the forest. Just so a man grows towards the 
 light to which he turns. According to the direction in 
 which he turns with supreme affection, he grows. 
 
 CCCCXCVII. Critical Times in Life. Joel iii. 14. 
 
 " Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision.''^ 
 
 It has been well said that in every life there is a turning- 
 point, as in a fever, a turning-point that brings either 
 life or death. Napoleon said : " In every battle there are 
 ten minutes on which hangs the fate of nations." Hun- 
 dreds of soul's battles are fought and won in a few minutes. 
 Unspeakably solemn are the silence and quickness with 
 which these spiritual battles are fought. 
 
 CCCCXCVIII. Two Rivers. Amos iii. 3. " Can two 
 walk together, except they be agreed 7 " 
 
 The Rhone, as it issues from the lake of Geneva and 
 rushes on its arrowy flight, is the most beautiful of rivers 
 — green as an emerald, yet as clear as clearest glass ; so 
 that the pebbles on the bottom, where it is twelve feet 
 deep, are as distinctly seen as if they were lying at one's 
 feet. 
 
 The Arve — a river of about the same size, and flowing 
 for some distance nearly parallel with the Rhine and but 
 a little way from it — is a dirty stream, carrying with it the 
 wash of the mountains and the mud of the valley. 
 
 About two miles below Geneva these two rivers unite, 
 and flow together toward the sea. But, though joined in 
 one channel, they are still for several miles almost as 
 distinct as when they occupied their separate beds. The 
 beautiful Rhone keeps its green clearness on its own side 
 of the channel, while the Arve flows as turbid as ever, from 
 the middle to the farther shore. 
 
 So two discordant characters, thrown together by cir- 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 301 
 
 cuinstanccs, often maintain each its own peculiarities ; and 
 neither is the wicked sanctified by the just, nor the righteous 
 contaminated by the unfortunate association. In many a 
 family the godless husband goes his own worldly way, 
 while the pious wife lives only nearer the Cross because 
 she cannot enter into her husband's heart. 
 
 But, some miles below the junction, the river rushes into 
 a chasm beneath a mountain. When it issues on the farther 
 side it is one river— called the Rhone, but in character the 
 Arve. The emerald lost, the purity gone, it is just a com- 
 mon river after the common pattern — opaque and muddy 
 from shore to shore. 
 
 So, often — so, generally — "evil communications corrupt 
 good manners." 
 
 A few days ago, I went with friends to the junction, to 
 see the famous uniting without commingling of waters. 
 The rivers were both unusually low within their banks, and 
 to our surprise the Arve was very nearly or quite as clear 
 as the Rhone. They met and were not to be distinguished 
 in their common channel. My friends, who had been 
 there very often, assured me that they had never seen it 
 so before, that to them it was a phenomenon as strange as 
 the ordinary appearance would have been to me. 
 
 Ah ! It was not the first time that a muddy character 
 has appeared temporarily as clear and fair as the purest. 
 Even Satan sometimes appears as an angel of light. It 
 will not always do to judge by present appearances. Wait 
 until the rains come. " When affliction or persecution 
 ariseth, immediately they are offended." It must be a sad 
 character, indeed, which is not amiable when its possesser 
 has his own way. And it must be a very bad man who 
 cannot conduct himself respectably for a little while, — 
 especially if he have his own purpose to serve in so doing. 
 Let those who may be tempted to decide hastily in regard 
 to a life-long companionship remember that even the Arve 
 is not always muddy. 
 
 CCCCXCIX. Minds like Sieves. Joel iii. 12, 13. 
 " Let the healheii be wakened. Put ye in the sickle, for the 
 harvest is ripe." 
 
 A SIMPLE Hindoo woman went to receive her weekly 
 
302 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 Bible lesson, when the lady missionary found that she had 
 remembered but little of what she had taught her the week 
 before. Being discouraged, she said, " It seems no use 
 teaching you anything ; you forget all I tell you. Your 
 mind is just like a sieve : as fast as I pour water in, it runs 
 out again." 
 
 The woman looked up at the lady missionary and said, 
 " Yes, it is very true ; my mind is just like a sieve. I am 
 very sorry I forget so much ; but then, you know, when 
 you pour clean water into a sieve, though it all runs out 
 again, yet it makes the sieve clean. I am sorry I have 
 forgotten so much of what you told me last week ; but 
 what you did tell me made my mind clean, and I have 
 come again to-day." 
 
 The missionaries at home and abroad go on pouring 
 water into these sieves ; and tliough it runs away and 
 seems to be unprofitably spilled upon the ground, yet the 
 private, the domestic, the public, and the national life of 
 the people is the cleaner for it. 
 
 D. Honouring the Sabbath. Amos viii, 5. ^'When 
 will the nerv moon be gone, that we may sell corn ? and the 
 Sabbath, that we may set forth wheat i " 
 
 In 1633 the town of Taunton had a good Puritan pastor 
 in Mr, George Newton. He was the great light of its 
 Puritanism, and was Vicar of St. Mary Magdalene. 
 Though naturally timid, " strength was made perfect in 
 weakness," and he was not timid in the assertion of his 
 principles, and soon became a noted "gospeller." When 
 the " Book of Sports " came out by order of Council, and 
 was commanded to be read in all the churches, Mr. Newton 
 read it, but said immediately to his congregation, " These 
 are the commandments of men." He then read the 
 twentieth chapter of the book of Exodus, saying, " These 
 are the command m.ents of God ; but whereas in this case 
 the laws of God and the laws of men are at variance, 
 choose ye which ye will obey." Thus he took the side of 
 the Sabbath against the profane decrees of the king. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 303 
 
 DI. The Cry from the Depths. Jonah ii. 2. *'/ 
 crie(/ by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and He heard 
 me ; out of the belly of hell cried I, and Thotc heardest my 
 voice." 
 
 "You want nothing more than this cry. If you cry to God 
 out of the depths, you will cry yourself out of them. Here 
 is a man at the foot of a cliff that rises beetling like a 
 black wall behind him, the sea in front, the clear upright 
 rock at his back, not a foothold for a mouse between the 
 tide at the foot and the grass at the top there. There is 
 only one thing he can do. Shout ! Perchance somebody 
 will hear him, and a rope may come dangling down in 
 front, and, if he has nerve, he may shut his eyes and make 
 a jump and catch it. There is no way for you up out of 
 the depths but to cry ; and that will bring the rope down." 
 
 DII. The Celestial Fauna. Micah v. 2. ''Though 
 
 thou be little among the thousands ofjudah." 
 
 Mr. SpuRGEON says : " You can buy complete sets of all 
 the flowers of the Alpine district at the hotel near the foot 
 of the Rosenlaui glacier, very neatly pressed and enclosed 
 in cases. Some of the flowers are very common, but they 
 must be included, or the fauna would not be completely 
 represented. The botanist is as careful to see that the 
 common ones are there, as he is to note that the rarer 
 specimens are not excluded. Our blessed Lord will be 
 sure to make a perfect collection of all the flowers of His 
 field, and even the ordinary, believer, the every-day worker, 
 the common convert, will not be forgotten. To Jesus' eye 
 there is beauty in all His plants, and each one is needed to 
 perfect the fauna of Paradise. May I be found among 
 His flowers, if only as one out of myriad daisies, who with 
 sweet simplicity shall look up and wonder at His love for 
 ever." 
 
 Dili. Practical Christian Teaching. MicAHvi.8. 
 " He hath shoived thee, O man, what is good ; and what doth 
 the Lord requit e of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, 
 and to walk humbly 7i'itk thy God ? " 
 
 "Don't you think our minister soars very high, sir?" was 
 
304 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 once asked of the great Robert Hall by an admiring 
 hearer concerning a minister then residing near Bristol. 
 "Soars hii^h, sir!" exclaimed Hall, with his usual vehe- 
 mence. " Not at all, sir ! What you call high, sir, is simply 
 a foggy atmosphere in which he invariably envelops him- 
 self.'' 
 
 DI V. A Law Text. Micah vi. 8. " What doth the Lord 
 rcijiiire of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk 
 humbly witli thy GodV^ 
 
 The following anecdote is told of the Rev. John Brown, 
 D.D., of Haddington, as illustrating the freedom of his 
 pulpit style from any such doctrinal aberrations as had 
 been by some apprehended. A venerable old man in a 
 congregation not far from his native place had heard the 
 whole Brown family preach through their successive genera- 
 tions. He went a long day's journey to hear another of 
 the race. Being a great enemy of legal doctrine, he was 
 somewhat startled when the text was announced. This 
 was Micah vi. 8, being, in truth, the subject of one of Mr. 
 Brown's Presbytery exercises, " What doth the Lord re- 
 quire of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to 
 walk humbly with thy God t " He sat deeply interested 
 both in the speaker and in the development of the doc- 
 trine ; and when all was ended, burst into tears, which he 
 continued shedding for a good while. At length he spoke, 
 " If there was a law text in all the Bible, it was that ; but 
 he has preached the sound gospel, for law doctrine was 
 never in his blood." 
 
 DV. Where is your God? ]\riCAH vii. 8, 9. 
 "• Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy : when I fall, I shall 
 arise ; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light latto 
 me. I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have 
 sinned against Liivi, until He plead my cause, and execute 
 judgment for me J' 
 
 A Nonconformist minister, ^Ir. Norman, had been con- 
 demned to lie in Ilchester gaol for preaching. On his way 
 thither the officers stopped to rest at the sheriff's house. 
 Lady Warre, the sheriff's wife, came to look at the prisoner, 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 305 
 
 and to insult him with cruel words, saying, " Where is your 
 God now, Mr. Norman?" "Madam," he replied, "have 
 you a Bible in the house ? " " Yes ; we are not so heathenish 
 as to be without a Bible." On getting it into his hands, he 
 turned to Micah and read the words, " Rejoice not against 
 me, O mine enemy : when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit 
 in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me. I will bear 
 the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against 
 Him, until He plead my cause, and execute judgment for 
 me : He will bring me forth to the light, and I shall behold 
 His righteousness. 77ien she that is mine enemy shall see 
 it, and shame shall cover her which said nnto me, Where 
 is the Lord thy God } mine eyes shall behold her : now 
 shall she be trodden down as the mire of the streets." 
 The lady retired silenced, and the dealings of God with 
 her family soon made this warning to be noted and 
 remembered. 
 
 DVI. A Funeral Sermon. Nahum i. 3, ^^ The Lord 
 is slow to a?iger, and great in power, and will ?iot at all acquit 
 the ivicked : the Lord hath His way in the whirlivind and in 
 the storm, and the clouds are the dust of His feet!' 
 
 Massillon, one of the famous divines of France, was called 
 to preach the funeral sermon of the departed king. The 
 vast cathedral was crowded. The reigning king, the royal 
 family, the flower of the French nobility, and the members 
 of the chamber were there. The solemn service was in- 
 toned. The organ reverberated its awful and impressive 
 sound. The incense pervaded the atmosphere. The 
 priests retired to their seats. The preacher ascended the 
 pulpit. Massillon arose and stood amid that vast assem- 
 blage rigid and pale as a statue. A deathlike silence 
 reigned as he stood there saying naught. His gleaming 
 eye alone indicated self-possession. Solemnly he surveyed 
 them all. Now his eye rested on the emblazoned banners 
 and drooping ensigns — now on the glittering coronets of 
 the nobles — now on the royal family, then on the king, 
 until at length he fixed his gaze upon the coffin. Minutes 
 passed. Some thought he was struck dumb before that 
 august assemblage. At last he slowly raised his hand and 
 
 U 
 
3o6 OLD TE^TAMEAT ANECDOTES. 
 
 turned his glance upon the king, saying, with infinite 
 solemnity, "TheKK IS NOTHING GREAT BUT GOD." 
 
 DVII. Peace on Earth. Nahum i. 15. '' Behold upon 
 the }iioiaitains the feet of him thai bringeth good tidings, that 
 piibiisheth peace /" 
 " At the close of the last war with Great Britain," says 
 an American writer, " the prospects of our nation were 
 shrouded in gloom. Our harbours were blockaded. Com- 
 munication coastwise between our ports was cut off. Our 
 immense annual products were mouldering in our ware- 
 houses. Our currency was reduced to irredeemable paper. 
 Differences of political opinion were embittering the peace 
 of many households. No one could predict when the con- 
 test would terminate, or discover the means by which it 
 could much longer be protracted. It happened that one 
 afternoon in February a ship was discovered in the offing, 
 which was supposed to be a cartel, bringing home our 
 commissioners at Ghent from their unsuccessful mission. 
 The sun had set gloomily before any intelligence from the 
 vessel had reached the city. Expectation became pain- 
 fully intense as the hours of darkness drew on. At length 
 a boat reached the wharf, announcing the fact that a treaty 
 of peace had been signed, and was waiting for nothing but 
 the action of our Government to become a law. The men 
 on whose ears these words first fell rushed in breathless 
 haste into the city to repeat them to their friends, shouting 
 as they ran through the streets, ' Peace ! Peace ! Peace ! ' 
 Every one who heard the sound repeated it. From house 
 to house, from street to street, the news spread with elec- 
 tric rapidity. The whole city was in commotion. Men 
 bearing lighted torches were flying to and fro, shouting, 
 ' Peace ! Peace ! Peace ! ' When the. rapture had partially 
 subsided, one idea occupied every mind. But few men 
 slept that night. In groups they were gathered in the 
 streets, and by the fireside, beguiling the hours of midnight 
 by reminding each other that the agony of war was over, 
 and that a worn-out and distracted country was about to 
 enter again upon its wonted career of prosperity. Thus, 
 every one becoming a herald, the news soon reached every 
 man, woman, and child in the city, and filled their hearts 
 with joy." 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 307 
 
 DVIII. Vigilance. Hab. ii. i. "/ will stand upon my 
 jvatch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see zvhat 
 He will say unto 7ne." 
 
 Nearly two centuries ac^o about a thousand of the Vau- 
 dois, who had taken refuge in Switzerland — all that re- 
 mained from the many thousands who, by the cruel decree 
 of Louis XIV. of France, had been exterminated — came 
 to a secret, sworn, and invincible determination to make 
 their way through all difficulties, and repossess themselves 
 of their homes in the Cottian Alps. Their valour, their 
 heroism, their contempt of danger, and the constancy and 
 skill with which they met and surmounted all difficulties 
 have never been surpassed in the history of any people. 
 Opposed by armies of more than ten times their number, 
 threading their way over mighty mountains on which lay 
 deep snows, along paths in which alone the chamois or the 
 Alpine mountaineer could keep a footing, travelling through 
 rain and storm, taking no prisoners, but putting to death 
 all who fell into their hands, wresting the very weapons 
 with which they fought from the hands of their enemies, 
 purchasing or conquering their subsistence as they went, 
 seizing bridges in the face of foes who greatly outnumbered 
 them, changing their route a dozen times, to avoid dangers 
 too great to be met without utter annihilation by their 
 little beleaguered and travel-worn band, their eyes were at 
 last delighted with the sight of the familiar mountain peaks 
 that told them they were once more near home. God 
 rewarded such constancy and devotion, and brought them 
 to their dearly loved homes among the mountains, never- 
 more, let us believe, to be thence driven. " Eternal vigil- 
 ance is the price of liberty," and the success that crowned 
 their almost superhuman efforts was the reward of a zvatch- 
 fuhiess that waited during years of silent preparation, and 
 that, once they had started, for six long days and nights, 
 gave neither sleep nor slumber to the eyes of their leader. 
 Watch ! The grim determination that had possessed them 
 as a passion made watching as natural as to breathe. 
 Relax their vigilance .'' Not for one moment. Miss one 
 golden opportunity for success? Never. Be caught in 
 any snare, though in the very midst of powerful, malicious, 
 and outnumbering foes.-' Impossible. "/ have a work to 
 
3o8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 do," said the Saviour, " and Jiow am I straitened till it be 
 accomplished !" Such seemed the spirit that animated 
 them and compelled them to ''watch." Shall we do less to 
 gain our heavenly home ? 
 
 DIX. The Castle of St. Andrew. Hab. ii. 4. 
 
 " The just shall live by his faith." 
 
 Preaching in London on the subject of Faith, the late 
 Dr. Guthrie of Edinburgh said : " We were visiting that 
 old castle of St. Andrew, out of which Hamilton and 
 Wishart, our first Scotch martyrs, came to die for God's 
 truth at the stake. Groping our way along a tortuous 
 passage, we descended by some steps into an inner prison, 
 and then, by a beam of light that streamed through a 
 loophole of the massive wall, we saw an opening in the 
 rocky floor. It looked like a draw-well. Candles lighted 
 and let down showed a shaft descending into the bowels of 
 the rock, where, widening out like the neck of a bottle, it 
 formed a dark, damp, dreary dungeon. A dreadful dun- 
 geon. It was called, and fitly called, an oubliette, or place 
 of forgetfulness, because those that black mouth swallowed 
 up were ever after lost to life, to light, to liberty and 
 friends, as much as they that ' in the grave forgotten lie.' 
 'There,' said John Knox, speaking of this very place, 
 'many of God's children suffered death, pining away 
 slowly, till their life lapped out like the tide on the shore, 
 or was suddenly destroyed by the blow of the assassin.' 
 Such were the bloody days and deeds of popery. As our 
 fancy called up these martyrs, the words sprang to our 
 memory, ' They walked by faith and not by sight.' " 
 
 DX. Deliverance Coming Too Late. Hab, ii. 15. 
 
 " Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink/" 
 
 The late William Arnot relates the following story in one 
 of his discourses: "A few years ago, a sloop laden with 
 coals was beached on the shore of the Solvvay, near Wig- 
 ton, on the Scottish coast, in order that her cargo might be 
 carted away during ebb tide. While the vessel lay high 
 and dry on the sand, some men were sent in beneath her 
 to effect some necessary repairs. While the work was 
 going on, some person outside observed the hull heeling 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 309 
 
 slowly over to one side, and gave the alarm to the work- 
 men. All escaped but one. The ship in leaning over 
 caut^ht his limbs before he had time to creep out, and 
 locked them fast between the hull and sand. The man 
 lived and spoke, and took counsel with his neighbours, but 
 remained pinioned to the spot. All hands went to work. 
 They tried first by lightening the ship of her cargo, but 
 this method proved too slow; they tried by digging in 
 the sand, but this method also failed ; they tried by at- 
 taching hawsers to the ship's mast, and setting a great 
 number of men to pull, but their united efforts failed to 
 heel her over to the other side. The men were not able 
 to liberate their comrade. In their abortive efforts a 
 precious hour — tlie precious hour, for there was but one — 
 had been lost, and now the tide of the Solway came rush- 
 ing in like a racehorse. All that were free fled before it, 
 and left their imprisoned companion to his fate. The sea 
 soon slackened the grip of the ship's side, and set the 
 captive free ; but before it lifted off his burden it had 
 quenched his life. The water drowned him, and then let 
 him go. Deliverance came too late, and his lifeless body 
 was washed up in the surf. 
 
 "Calamities greater in extent frequently occur among our 
 seamen, but I do not remember one that was so excruciating 
 in its nature, and cut so keenly into the people's heart. The 
 living man saw the tide approaching, but could not get out 
 of its way ; felt the water wetting his hair — felt it cold, 
 covering his brow, and yet must needs lie still — lay still 
 till it stiflxl him ; and this with the whole town turned out 
 on the beach, spectators. I suppose there was no dry eye 
 in Wigton during that awful hour. I suppose there were 
 few who slept deeply on the following night. It is right 
 that man should be shaken in the depths of his being by 
 witnessing a brother so miserably perishing. 
 
 " We must not deceive ourselves. We see multitudes 
 caught as fast between their own appetites and the fiery 
 flood which these appetites feed on — caught and held till a 
 tide, mightier than that of the Solway, comes up with its 
 awful rescue. They cannot wrench themselves away. It 
 is better in such a case to lose a limb, and save the life ; 
 but, alas ! neither the man who perished in the waters of 
 the Solway, nor the men who perish by drink, have 
 
3IO OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 strength, even though they had the will, to tear off the 
 limb in order to save the life. When physical disease and 
 moral depravity clasp and close in upon each other, the 
 soul is overlaid and quenched between. Although the 
 prisoner were willing to part with the right arm, he cannot 
 get it severed. It holds him till the tide rise, and he dies. 
 " With an earnestness equal to that displayed by the 
 neighbours at Wigton, and with a skill superior, we might 
 save our brother. We could, if we would. By the power 
 of love in all the earlier stages, and by the power of Law, 
 if the madness proceed to extremities, the community 
 should arise in its might, and rescue the man from him- 
 self." 
 
 DXI. God's Praise. Hab. iii. 3. ^^ His glory covered the 
 heavens, a7id the earth was full of His praise." 
 
 It is said that once when Sir Michael Costa was having a 
 rehearsal with a vast array of performers and hundreds of 
 voices, as the mighty chorus rang out with thunder of the 
 organ and roll of drums and ringing horns and cymbals 
 clashing, some one man far away up in some corner, who 
 played the piccolo, said within himself, " In all this din it 
 matters not what I do," and so he ceased to play. Sud- 
 denly the great conductor stopped, flung up his hands, and 
 all was still — and then he cried aloud, " Where is the 
 piccolo ? " The quick ear missed it, and all was spoilt 
 because it failed to take its part. O my soul, do thy part 
 with all thy might ! Little thou mayest be, insignificant 
 and hidden, and yet God seeks thy praise. He listens for 
 it, and all the music of His great universe is made richer 
 and sweeter because I give Him thanks. 
 
 DXII. Seeking Peace for Ten Years. Zeph. ii. 3. 
 " Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the ea?'th." 
 
 A YOUNG woman in Burmah felt a great wish to learn to 
 read, that she might study the sacred books of her country. 
 After some trouble she was able to read them, and for ten 
 long years she tried to find in their pages the peace for 
 which she longed ; but she could not obtain it. One 
 day a friend brought her a Christian tract, which pointed 
 out the only way of rest for a sinner. After some time 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 311 
 
 she heard where the missionary who wrote tlie tract lived 
 She soon went in search of him, and when siie found him, 
 she was further taught in the truth of God's Word. For 
 some years she lived as a Christian, and then died in the 
 faith. In her last hours she was happy in the thought that 
 she should soon meet her pious teachers who had gone 
 before her to heaven. " But first of all," she said, " I shall 
 hasten to where my Saviour sits, and fall down and adore 
 Him for His great love in sending me those who could 
 lead me in the path to glory." 
 
 DXIII. A Melancholy Man. Zeph. iii. 16. "/« that 
 day it shall be said to Jerusalem, Fear thou not : a?td to Zioii, 
 Let not thine hands be slack. The Lord thy God in the midst of 
 thee is mighty ; He will save. He will rejoice over thee with joy." 
 
 LUTIIER, at Wittenberg, seeing a very melancholy man, 
 said to him : " Ah ! human creature, what dost thou ? 
 Hast thou nothing else in hand but to think of thy sins, on 
 death, and damnation .-* Turn thine eyes quickly away, 
 and look hither to this man Christ, of whom it is written : 
 ' He was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin 
 Mary, suffered, died, buried, descended into hell, the third 
 day arose again from the dead, and ascended up into 
 heaven,' etc. Dost think all this was done to no end .'' 
 Comfort thyself against death and sin ; be not afraid, nor 
 faint, for thou hast no cause ; Christ suffered death for 
 thee, and prevailed for thy comfort and defence, and for 
 that cause He sits at the right hand of God, His heavenly 
 Father, to deliver thee." 
 
 DXIV. An Arrow Shot at a Venture. Zech. ii. 4. 
 " And said unto him. Run, speak to this young man" 
 
 One Saturday night an earnest minister of Christ studied 
 his sermon, as usual, with prayer, but felt oppressed. In 
 the morning he said, " I cannot preach this ; I do not feel 
 the Lord present with me." His wife said, " Pray, ' Get 
 thee behind me, Satan.' " He did, but entered the pulpit 
 with a heavy heart. Service commenced. The time came 
 for the text. He said, " My friends, I cannot tell what 
 oppresses me, but I cannot preach the sermon I have 
 
312 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 prepared. Let us pray." At the close he opened the 
 Book at the place Zecliariah ii. 4, and read, " Run, speak 
 to this young man," and he was led to speak with a mighty 
 power. He went home still oppressed, unable to account 
 for the strange feeling. Years after he went to a meeting 
 at a neighbouring parish. A young man sought him, and 
 said, " I am a stranger to you ; you are not to me." He 
 replied, " You are mistaken ; I have not to my knowledge 
 ever spoken to you." " Oh, yes you have, sir. Do you 
 not remember preaching some years ago from the words, 
 ' Run, speak to this young man ' } I am that young man. 
 I entered the chapel to annoy you and others, but the 
 hand of God arrested me. The arrow sped home, and 
 here I am, a living monument of God's mercy, and a 
 minister of that same Gospel." 
 
 DXV. Satan's Master Argument. Zech. iii. i. 
 " And Satan standing at his right hand to resist him" 
 
 JOMN BUNYAN wrote a book entitled, " The Jerusalem 
 Sinner Saved ; or. Good News for the Vilest of Men — being 
 a Help for Despairing Souls." In it he thus writes : " It is 
 because Christ shows mercy to the vilest that Satan rages 
 so strongly; and as he can do nothing with Christ, he assails 
 Christ's people. He holds our hands while the world 
 buffets us ; he puts bearskins upon us, and then sets the 
 dogs at us. He bcdaubeth us with his own foam, and 
 then tempts us to believe that that bedaubing comes from 
 ourselves. Let the tempted think much on Christ's mercy ; 
 for the tempted, wherever he dwells, always thinks himself 
 the biggest sinner. This is Satan's master argument. I 
 say this is his maul, his club, his masterpiece ; he doth 
 with this as some do with their most enchanting songs — 
 sing them everywhere." 
 
 DXVI. Early Prayer Used of God. Zech. iii. 2. 
 " Is not this a brand plucked from the burni?ig?" 
 
 About 1812 a very wicked man, a most dreadful drunkard, 
 a bad and cruel husband and father, was living in the town 
 of Frome, Somerset. One Saturday night, going home at 
 midnight, he stumbled into a doorway, a kind of porch, on 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 313 
 
 Catherine Hill, as he was finding his way to his miserable 
 home, fell fast asleep, and did not wake till four o'clock on 
 the Sabbath morning, when he was aroused by the voice 
 of prayer. It was the custom of the good man of the 
 house to rise early, and come down to a small parlour 
 next the street-door to hold communion with God. that he 
 might not disturb the family. The poor drunkard had by 
 this time become sober ; the good man's words pierced his 
 soul, he was deeply convicted of sin, and at length found 
 mercy, and became a wonder to all that knew him. He 
 used to be pointed out to me as a miracle of mercy when 
 I was young. It was indeed a wonder of grace that the 
 man who was the terror of the town should become a 
 Christian. Is not this a brand plucked out of the burning? 
 
 DXVII. "Baksheesh." Zech. iv. 7. '' Grace, grace." 
 
 A LADY missionary in Armenia was sitting by the bedside 
 of a woman who had been a bitter opposer of the Gospel, 
 but her heart had now been softened by sickness, and for 
 the first time she listened to the good news from heaven. 
 As the lady tried to explain to her the only way of salva- 
 tion, she answered, "Ah, yes ; you, who have done so many 
 good works, will be saved ; God will not look on me I 
 On some texts being quoted, showing that it is all free 
 grace, an assistant teacher, Maranos, whispered, " If you 
 say ' baksheesh,' she will understand you better." " Bak- 
 sheesh ! " — that common and tiresome word in the mouth 
 of every beggar who solicits alms with outstretched hands 
 and whining voice — this "baksheesh" conveyed to that 
 untaught mind the meaning of the "grace of God which 
 bringeth salvation " in the " unspeakable gift " of His Son. 
 
 DXVIII. "I'll not Submit to It." Zech. vii, 11, 12. 
 
 '■'•But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, 
 and stopped their ears, that they should 7iot hear. Yea, they 
 made their hearts as an adaniaiit stone." 
 
 This is the conclusion to which E C came on her 
 
 death-bed, when the offer of free salvation, for the sake of 
 Jesus, was pressed upon her. She was an intelligent young 
 woman — had been religiously brought up ; and whilst in 
 
314 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 health she was in all respects dutiful and exemplary. But 
 she had not been " born again." She had never seen that 
 in the sight of God her own goodness was a worthless 
 thing. She had never " submitted herself to the righteous- 
 ness of God." 
 
 The seeds of consumption were in her constitution. 
 Whilst still young she was laid upon a bed of sickness. 
 She became intensely anxious about her eternal state. 
 Her minister was sent for. He tried to open up to her 
 God's way of saving sinners, for the sake of Jesus. But 
 still her mind continued dark, and her heart unhappy. 
 He saw her often, and on each occasion commended Jesus 
 to her as a Saviour, and His perfect obedience and death 
 in the room of sinners as being all that her case could 
 need. 
 
 One day when he called, he found her sitting up in bed, 
 supported by pillows, with a look of eager, excited interest 
 upon her face. After a few words of salutation, she said, 
 " Is this what you mean, sir, as the way of salvation, which 
 you have been explaining to me : that Christ's obedience 
 is to gain acceptance for me, as if it had been my own 
 obedience : and that all that I have done is to be washed 
 away through the sufferings which He endured for sinners 
 on the cross 1 " " Yes," said the minister; " that is just it : 
 accept Jesus, and rely on Him alone for salvation, and in 
 that moment His sufferings will answer to God for ALL 
 that you have done — for it is ALL sinful ; and His perfect 
 obedience will be counted yours. Then God will deal with 
 you as if you had never sinned, but had rendered that 
 obedience yourself" "Do you mean," eagerly asked the 
 d}-ing girl, "that / may be saved just in the same way 
 and on the same terms as the most wicked person in the 
 town .'' " "Yes," answered the minister; "I just mean 
 that." A look of disappointment and dissatisfaction 
 settled upon her countenance. She sat in silence for a 
 little, and then said, very firmly and decidedly, " Well, 
 then, I'll not submit to it." Her anxiety vanished from 
 that hour. From that day forward she refused to converse 
 on the subject of religion. Shortly afterwards she died, 
 in settled, resolute indifference. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 315 
 
 DXIX. The Difficult Duty of Prayer. Zech. viii. 
 21. '^ And the iiihabilants of 07ie city sliall go to another, 
 saying. Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord, and to seek 
 the Loj-d of hosts : I will go also." 
 
 A Christian brother who had fallen into darkness and 
 discouragement was staying at the same house with Dr. 
 Finney one night. He was lamenting his condition, and 
 Dr. Finney, after listening to his narrative, turned to him 
 with his pecuHar, earnest look, and, with a voice that sent 
 a thrill through his soul, said, " You don't pray ! that is 
 what's the matter with you. Pray — pray four times as 
 much as ever you did in your life, and you will come out." 
 He immediately went down to the parlour, and taking a 
 Bible he made a serious business of it, stirring up his soul 
 to God as did Daniel, and thus he spent the night. It 
 was not in vain. As the morning dawned he felt the light 
 of the Sun of righteousness shine upon his soul. His 
 captivity was broken, and ever since he has felt that the 
 greatest difficulty in the way of men's being emancipated 
 from their bondage is that they " don't pray." " Pray 
 without ceasing." " Men ought always to pray, and not 
 to faint." 
 
 DXX. Good Counsel. Zech. x. 12. "And I will 
 strengthen them in the Lord ; and they shall walk up a7id dozvn 
 in His name, saith the Lord." 
 
 The late Duchess of Gordon wrote a letter, a few days 
 before her death, to a young girl whom she had befriended, 
 giving her good counsel, and she concluded thus : " In our 
 weakness His strength is found ; and so long as we think 
 ourselves strong in wisdom, purpose, or power, we shall be 
 sure, sooner or later, to find our wisdom folly, our purpose 
 a cobweb, and our power utter helplessness. Therefore my 
 best wish for you is that you may cast all your care on 
 Him who careth for His people, and as my favourite hymn 
 says, — 
 
 Lay down in His strong hand, 
 
 So shall the work be done, 
 For who can work so wondrously 
 
 As the Almighty One V" 
 
3i6 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 DXXI. A Shepherd Pastor. Zech. xi. 4. ^' Thus 
 
 saith the Lord my God, Feed the flock P 
 
 When the Act of Uniformity was passed, in 1662, about 
 two thousand ministers took their stations in the ranks of 
 Nonconformity ; many, with their families, had to exchanf^e 
 a h'fe of competency for a Hfe of toil, some adopting the 
 callings of farm-labourers. The lady of a county squire 
 was dangerously ill ; the clergyman was sent for, but 
 returned a message that "he was going out hunting, and 
 would come after the hunt was over." " Sir," said one of 
 the servants to the afflicted husband, "our shepherd can 
 pray very well ; we have often heard him pray in the 
 fields." The shepherd was immediately summoned to the 
 bedside of the sufferer, and prayed with such fervour that 
 when he rose from his knees the squire said, " You must 
 tell me who and what you are." Upon which the shepherd 
 told him his story, that he was one of the ministers ejected 
 from the Church, and that having nothing left he was now 
 content to submit to the honest and painful employment of 
 keeping sheep. This man was Peter Luce, of Blagmore 
 College, Oxford, and had been noted as a Hebraist in 
 better days. 
 
 DXXII. Flowers of Memory. Zech. xii. 10. ^^ As 
 
 one inoiirneth for his only son" 
 
 An investigator of pedigrees was searching in a midland 
 county of England for any traces that might still be found 
 of an old family of the district. He went to the records 
 of the church, but their name was not there, it had perished. 
 He repaired to the supposed site of their ancient hall. 
 Not a stone remained to tell its place. Disappointed in 
 these attempts, he accosted an aged peasant : " Do you 
 know anything of the Findernes ? " 
 
 " Findernes } " was the reply. " We have no Findernes 
 here, but we have Findernes' flowers." 
 
 Here was a clue. The old man led the way to a field 
 where there were traces of an ancient terrace. 
 
 " There," said he, pointing to a bank of garden-flowers 
 grown wild, " there are Findernes' flowers, brought by Sir 
 Geoffrey from the Holy Land, and, do what v/e will, they 
 will never die," 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 317 
 
 There are those that can go back, ten, twenty, forty 
 years, and recall the time when a child was taken from 
 them. It has left no record in the annals of the world : 
 no more mark than the shining pebble that is thrown into 
 the river, when the waters close over it for ever. Is there, 
 then, no trace to be found beneath the heavens of that 
 loved one .<* Go, ask the mother bereaved so long ago. 
 There, in the old garden of a heart overgrown with many 
 experiences, and shaded with many a sombre spray of ivy 
 and many a weeping branch of Cyprus, flourish still the old 
 memories of that cherished child. His winsome ways, 
 his pleasant prattle, his sunny smile, his look of love, are 
 all remembered still. These flowers of memory bloom as 
 fresh as on the day after the little one was gathered home. 
 The snows of winter may have fallen thick upon that 
 mother's head, but touch the old chord, and it will vibrate 
 true and tender as ever. Encourage her to speak upon 
 this theme, and she will pour forth her recollections of her 
 lost one, and will narrate to you the incidents of his sick- 
 ness and his death with a minuteness and detail that will 
 astonish any one who has not had or lost a child. We 
 lately met a mother whose boy was taken from her more 
 than thirty years ago, who told us, as the tear rose to her 
 eye, that when she is looking after the affairs of her 
 household, she sometimes comes upon his toys, and never 
 without a flood of tenderest memories filling her heart. 
 
 DXXIII. The Uses of Affliction. Mal. iii. 3. ''And 
 He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver : and He shall 
 purify the sons of Levi, and purge thcni as gold and silver, that 
 they may offer unto the Lord an offer ijig in righteousness." 
 
 When Mr. Cecil went to college, he had much to bear, 
 both from severe conflicts in his own mind, and also from 
 insulting treatment at the hands of his profligate and un- 
 godly companions. Not yet accustomed to the yoke, these 
 things troubled him more than they would have done 
 afterwards, and he went to walk one day, under their 
 influence, very heavy and sad in heart. The Ph}-sic Gar- 
 dens was the scene which he chose for meditation and 
 relief ; and here he observed a very fine pomegranate tree, 
 cut almost through the stem, near the root. Struck with 
 
3i8 OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 this singular sight, he asked the gardener for an explana- 
 tion. " Sir," said the man, " this tree used to shoot so 
 strong, that it bore nothing but leaves. I was therefore 
 obliged to cut it in this manner ; and zvhen it zvas almost 
 cut through, tlicn it began to bear ple^tty of fruit" The 
 answer produced a deep impression upon Mr. Cecil's mind, 
 and he went back to his rooms comforted and instructed. 
 It was then he received his first lesson in the usefulness of 
 trial. 
 
 DXXIV. True Courage. Mal. iii. 5. '' And I zvill covie 
 near to you to judgment ; and 1 7vill be a sivift zaitness against 
 the sorcerers, and against the adulterers." 
 
 The boldness of Latimer in rebuking even the king's 
 majesty himself, for conscience' sake, is shown in a well- 
 known anecdote. At the time of Henry's neglect of Queen 
 Anne Boleyn, and his undisguised preference for Jane 
 Seymour, the bishops brought, according to custom, their 
 New Year's gifts to court. "Some," says the old chronicler. 
 " did gratify the king with gold, some with silver, some 
 with a purse full of money ; some one thing, some another. 
 But Master Latimer, being Bishop of Worcester, then 
 among the rest presented a New Testament for his gift, 
 with a napkin having this motto upon it, ' Fornicatores et 
 Adulteres jiidicabit Dominiis' — 'Whoremongers and adul- 
 terers God will judge.' " 
 
 DXXV. "I must Give before I can Pray." Mal. 
 
 iii. 10. " Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there 
 may be meat in Mine house, and prove Me now hereivith, saith 
 the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the tvitidotvs of heaven, 
 and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room 
 enough to receive it." 
 
 The venerable Dr. Sewall, of Maine, once entered a meet- 
 ing in behalf of foreign missions just as the collectors of 
 the contributions were resuming their seats. The chairman 
 of the meeting requested him to lead in prayer. The old 
 gentleman stood hesitatingly, as if he had not heard the 
 request. It was repeated in a louder voice, but there was 
 no response. It was observed, however, that Dr. Sewall 
 was fumbling in his pockets, and presently he produced a 
 
OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 319 
 
 piece of money, which he deposited in the contribution 
 box. The chairman, thinking he had not been under- 
 stood, said loudly, " I didn't ask you to give, Dr. Sewall, I 
 asked you to pray." " Oh yes," he replied, " I heard you, 
 but I cant pray till I have given sojnethiiig." 
 
 DXXVI. The Luxury of Doing Good. Mal. iii. 
 10. 'Wiring ye all the tithes into the storehouse^ that there may 
 be meat in Aline house, and prove Me noiv hereivith, saith the 
 Lord of hosts, if / will not open you the windoics of heaven, 
 and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room efiough 
 to receive it." 
 
 The language of Malachi iii. 10 is often used in prayer by 
 those who are not aware that it is rather a challenge than 
 a promise — " Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of 
 hosts." We naturally ask whether God does " open the 
 windows of heaven and pour down blessing " upon the 
 faithful givers of tithes. Instances are not wanting among 
 ourselves to supply the answer. No workers in our day 
 have enjoyed larger blessing than George Miiller and 
 Charles Spurgeon, both of whom have, from the beginning 
 of their work, put the sacred rule into practice with believ- 
 ing and humble hearts. Years ago Mr. Spurgeon said : " I 
 knew a lad in Christ once who adopted the principle of 
 giving a tenth to God. When he won a money prize for 
 an essay on a religious subject, he felt that he could not 
 give less than one-fifth of it. He has never since been able 
 to deny himself the pleasure of having a fifth to give. 
 God has wonderfully blessed that lad, and increased his 
 means and his enjoyment of that luxury of luxuries — the 
 luxury of doing good." 
 
 DXXVII. Days of Proscription and Persecu- 
 tion. Mal. iii. 16. '' Then they that feared the Lord spake 
 often one to afwther : and the Lord hearkened, and heard it." 
 
 In the memoirs of Hannah More, there is mention made 
 of her grandfather, who married into a family zealous for 
 Nonconformity. Tliey boarded a minister in their house, 
 and at midnight pious worshippers went with stealthy 
 steps to hear the words of inspiration from the minister's 
 lips, while Mr. More, with a drawn sword, guarded the 
 
33P OLD TESTAMENT ANECDOTES. 
 
 entrance from violent or profane intrusion. Mrs, More 
 was also a pious woman, and used to tell her younger 
 relatives, when they complained of the long distance to 
 church, that they would have known how to value Gospel 
 privileges had they lived, like her, in the days of proscrip- 
 tion and persecution. 
 
 DXXVIII. A Poor Highland Woman. Mal. iv. 2. 
 " But luUo yon that fear My name shall the Sun of righteous- 
 ness arise 7vith healing in His wings." 
 
 A POOR Highland woman, unable to read or write, was yet 
 a close observer of nature, and noted how the frail petals of 
 the flax or lint-bell unfolded in the sunshine and closed 
 when his rays were withdrawn. She was very ignorant, 
 her one power being to accept and love the blessings of 
 God, from the " inestimable gift " of His Son to that of the 
 least flower that bloomed in her path. On application to 
 her minister to be admitted to the Lord's Supper, she 
 showed such utter ignorance of the doctrines of the Church, 
 that she was deemed totally unfit to become a communi- 
 cant. He conveyed this to her as kindly as he could, and 
 she replied, " Aweel, sir, aweel ; but I ken ae thing : as the 
 lint-bell opens to the sun, so does my heart to the Lord 
 Jesus ! " Here was seed of the Lord's own planting. The 
 Second Adam had been busy in this garden dressing it 
 and keeping it 
 
 DXXIX. Our Evidences. Mal. iv. 2. '' The Sun of 
 
 righteousness." 
 
 The Rev. J. H. Evans, of St. John's Chapel, London, on 
 his deathbed sent a message to his people, that he felt his 
 sins and deservings more than ever, but that he stood ac- 
 cepted in the Beloved, notwithstanding all. " In Jesus I 
 stand ; Jesus is a panacea." He used to say, " When we 
 look for our evidences, they hide their heads like lilies of 
 the valley, and we are distressed because we cannot find 
 them ; but if we look at Christ, the sun arises and they 
 spring up afresh." 
 
INDEX OF SUBJECTS. 
 
 Aaron's Rod, 32. 
 Able to Deliver, 289. 
 Acorn Shells, 177. 
 Affection, A Son's, 16, 
 Affliction, The Day of, 223. 
 Affliction, The Furnace of, 246. 
 Afifliction, The Mellowing Power 
 
 of, 148. 
 Affliction, The Uses of, 317. 
 Animals, Cruelty to, 105. 
 Animals, Kindness to, 181. 
 Answer, A Soft, 183. 
 Arrow Shot at a Venture, An, 
 
 311- 
 
 Atmosphere, A Malarial, 224. 
 Atonement, Belief in the, 255. 
 Attempting Great Things for 
 
 God, 255. 
 Awakening, An, 295. 
 
 " Baksheesh," 313. 
 
 Balaam's Ass, 202. 
 
 Bargains, Three Bad, 12. 
 
 Banen Tree, A, 269. 
 
 Bed, An Hour or two sooner to, 
 
 132. 
 Beggar, A Pulpit, 165. 
 Begin at the Beginning, 237. 
 Benevolence, No Deaths from, 
 
 179- 
 Besieged Town, A, 143. 
 Beware of the Ivy Green, 225. 
 Bible, A Soldier's, 222. 
 Bible in Iceland, The, 70. 
 Bible in the Heart, hiding the, 
 
 146. 
 Bible, Penalty of Reading the, 
 
 75- 
 Bible, Ruskin's, 42. 
 Bible, The Power of a Living, 287. 
 
 Bible, The Robber's, 196. 
 Bishop, An Irish, 163. 
 Bishop's Veneration for White- 
 field, A, 187. 
 Bitter Cup, A, 256. 
 Black, Cold, Hard, 278. 
 Blessing, Times of, 244. 
 Blocking up the Broad Way, 
 
 253. 
 Body, An Emaciated, 21. 
 Books, A Ciiain of Precious, 252. 
 Books, The Most Unfashionable 
 
 of all, 46. 
 Born So, I was, 279. 
 Boyhood, A Christian, 13, 
 Boys' Temptations, 172. 
 Bruised Reed, A, 241. 
 Building up in their most holy 
 
 Faith, 32. 
 Burdens, 106. 
 Burning with Pure Oil, 23. 
 
 Called of God, 46. 
 
 Calvin's Motto, 200. 
 
 Captive Set Free, The, 78. 
 
 Captives, 264. 
 
 Card-playing, 72. 
 
 Castle of St. Andrew, The, 308. 
 
 Cathedral, The Plan of Stras- 
 
 burg, 22. 
 Cattle on a Thousand Hills, The, 
 
 115. 
 Caught by Guile, 117. 
 Chariot of Fire, The, 60. 
 Charity, The Duty of, 30. 
 Child, A Drunkard's, 199. 
 Child, Knowing the Scriptures 
 
 from a, 195. 
 Child, Story of a Jerusalem, 239, 
 Children in Prison, 257. 
 
 3a| y 
 
323 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Children, Three Lessons for, i68. 
 Children's Help, 194. 
 Christ Covering the Sinner, 265. 
 Christ, Near the Fire, Near, 289. 
 Christ Not Needed, 268. 
 Christ our Rest-Stone, 26. 
 Christ, Seeing No Beauty in, 227. 
 Christian Forbearance, 190. 
 Christian Life, Some Rules for 
 
 the, 27. 
 Christian Pastor, An Ideal, 3. 
 Christian Philosopher, A, 82. 
 Christianized, but Humanized, 
 
 Not, 86. 
 Christian's Portion, The, 88. 
 Christians, Seeking the Society 
 
 of, 202. 
 Christ's Everlasting Kingdom, 
 
 164. 
 Christ's Kingdom is Growing, 
 
 262. 
 Church, A Distressed, 161. 
 Closing Words, 97. 
 Colour-Blind, 80. 
 Columba and his Ministry, 270. 
 Com fori, A Psalm of, 94. 
 Comforted of God, 256. 
 Communion Sunday, 93. 
 Concentration of Heart, 273. 
 Conscience a Gnawing Worm, 'j']. 
 Conscience, Reverencing, 219. 
 Conscience, The, 230. 
 Contrast, A, 171. 
 Conversion of Count de Gasparin, 
 
 The, 112. 
 Convert, An African, 45. 
 Converted, How John Williams 
 
 was, 32. 
 Counsel, Good, 315. 
 Courage in Helping the Wrong 
 
 Doer, 214. 
 Courage, True, 318. 
 Courtier and the Christian, The, 
 
 210. 
 Covenant Sign, The, 8. 
 Covenanters, The, 127. 
 Cruelty to Animals, 105. 
 Cry from the Depths, The, 303. 
 Cursing, 22. 
 
 Dairyman's Daughter, The, 165. 
 
 Dancing for Joy, 265. 
 
 Danger, Unconscious, 166. 
 
 Deadness of Heart, 137. 
 
 Death a Bed to the Weary, 298. 
 
 Death, A Child's, 53. 
 
 Death, A Sudden, 156. 
 
 Death, Brought Back from the 
 
 Gates of, 107. 
 Death of Children, 55. 
 Death Overcome, Fear of, 163. 
 Death, Signs of, 140. 
 Death Song, A, 242. 
 Death, The Reconciliation, 113. 
 Death, The Ways of, 190. 
 Deaths from Benevolence, No, 
 
 179. 
 Decision, A Wise, 205. 
 Decision of a Moment, The, 147. 
 Deliverance Coming Too Late, 
 
 308. 
 Deliverance from Evil, 130. 
 Despondence, A Remedy against, 
 
 19. 
 Detection of Sin is Certam, The, 
 
 36. 
 Devil's Letters, The, 6. 
 Devoutness of Spirit, 45. 
 De Witt, The Brothers, 130. 
 Diary, A Good Man's, 168. 
 Die is Gain, To, 242. 
 Die Manfully, How to, 212. 
 Dissatisfied with Myself, 150. 
 Distress, Succour Men in, 40. 
 Do it Well, 213. 
 Door, The Shut, 6. 
 Doors, Beautiful, 12. 
 Dream, A Singular, 73. 
 Drink, Erring through Strong, 
 
 234- 
 Drink, Strong, 234. 
 Drowned, Almost, 154. 
 Duke's Example, A, 109. 
 Dumb Bell, The, 283. _ 
 Dying, Joy and Peace in, 259. 
 Dying, The Bliss of, 35. 
 Dying Words of an Unbeliever, 
 
 76. 
 Dynamite, 178. 
 
 Early Riser, An, 61. 
 
 flarly Years of Wickedness, 104 
 
INDEX. 
 
 323 
 
 Ears, The Use of Wool in the, 
 
 106. 
 Earth's Dark Places, 128. 
 Educated Eyes, 104. 
 Egyptian Animal VVorship, 18. 
 Emperor's Shame, An, 51. 
 Enemy 'l"urned into a Friend, 
 
 An, 188. 
 Enterini; the Vineyard at the 
 
 Eleventh Hour, 213. 
 Entreating Sinners to Come to 
 
 Jesus, 267. 
 Epitaph, A Quaint, 7. 
 Escape, A Providential, 167. 
 Eternity and Where it is to be 
 
 Spent, 17. 
 Eternity, The Light of, 294. 
 Evangelist, An, 201. 
 Evidences, Our, 320. 
 Exemplary Lady, An, 119. 
 Extremity, In tiie Hour of, 56. 
 Eye Inward, One, 106. 
 Eye, The Painted, 183. 
 Eyes, Educated, 104. 
 
 Faith, Wild, 92. 
 
 Family Worship, 218. 
 
 Far Country, In the, 169. 
 
 Farewell, A Last, 187. 
 
 Farewell Scene, A, 42. 
 
 Father, A Wise, 182. 
 
 Father, I have called Thee, 132. 
 
 Fatherland, The Divine, 232. 
 
 Fauna, The Celestial, 303. 
 
 Fear Not, 243. 
 
 Fear of Death Overcome, 163. 
 
 Flock, Among the, 284. 
 
 Flowers of Memory, 316. 
 
 Found Off Guard, 69. 
 
 Fox and his False Accusers, 
 
 George, 194. 
 Fulfilling his Mission, 54. 
 Furnace, In the, 289. 
 Funeral Sermon, A, 305. 
 Funeral Sermon, Hearing your, 
 
 281. 
 
 Gathering Flowers to Compose in 
 the Hour of Death, 4. 
 
 Gift which Blindeth the Wise, A, 
 22. 
 
 Give all you Can, 12. 
 
 Give before I can Pray, I Must, 
 
 318. 
 Giving a Tenth to the Lord, 169. 
 Gladsome Mind, Let us with a, 
 
 160. 
 Glory, Delusiveness of Earthly, 
 
 72. 
 Go on, Go on, 296. 
 God, A Personal, 296 
 God, and a Little God, A Great, 
 
 260. 
 God does not Forget His Saints, 
 
 102. 
 God, Early and Late with, 225. 
 God, Exalting, 232. 
 God Fulfilling His Threatenings, 
 
 276. 
 God Here ? Is, 231. 
 God ? Is there no, 87. 
 God Makes no Mistakes, 10. 
 God Seen in His Works, 89. 
 God the Father Almighty, 132. 
 God, The Handwriting of, 268. 
 God, The Power and Comfort of, i. 
 God Unwilling to Afflict, 275. 
 God ? Where is your, 304. 
 God's Anger Consistent with His 
 
 Love, %-^. 
 God's Constant and Personal Su- 
 pervision of His People, 265. 
 God's Hands, In, 162, 
 God's Infinity, 240. 
 God's Mercies to the Worst of 
 
 Repenting Sinners, 71. 
 God's Power to Save, 261. 
 God's Praise, 310. 
 God's Readiness to Hear and 
 
 Answer Prayer, 103. 
 God's Searching, 235. 
 Going where All Problems will be 
 
 Solved, 74. 
 Good Man of the Olden Time, A, 
 
 164. 
 Good, The Luxury of Doing, 319. 
 Good Turned to Evil, 37. 
 Grace should Permeate the En- 
 tire Man, 141. 
 Grace, The Pithiest, 71. 
 Grasp, The Fatal, 173. 
 Grave, The, 223. 
 
324 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Greedy of Gnin, i86. 
 
 Groaning but not Grumbling, 2S2. 
 
 Growth, 300. 
 
 Hand, The Helping, 200. 
 Hands, In God's, 162. 
 Happiness of doing Good, 91. 
 Hasty Temper, A, 211. 
 Haus-Segen, The, 39. 
 Hearing, not Reading, 258. 
 Heart of Unbelief, The Evil, 279. 
 Heathen Convert and his Bible, 
 
 A, 149. 
 Heathen Honesty, 61. 
 Heathen, The Conversion of the, 
 
 61. 
 Heathen's Reply to the Jesuit, 
 
 A, 19. 
 Heaven, A Message from, 95. 
 Heaven be ? Wliat must, 267. 
 Heaven, The Arithmetic of, 38. 
 Heavenwards, 134. 
 Hell peoples Heaven, The Fear 
 
 of, 236. 
 Henry, Pliilip, 156. 
 Hidden and Safe, 133. 
 Highway, The Forest- Guarded, 
 
 280. 
 Home, Nearly, 223. 
 Home, Sweet Home, 151. 
 Homesick Mount, The, 16. 
 Honesty of the Huguenots, 28. 
 Honour, Worldly, 210. 
 Hopelulness, Duty of, ill. 
 Horse, The Pale, 144. 
 Hour, Our Last, 233. 
 Huguenots, The Persecution of 
 
 the, 17. 
 Human Thought and Heavenly 
 
 Light, 2S8. 
 Humility, 66. 
 
 Huntsman, The Wild, 172. 
 Hymn, A, 109. 
 
 Hymn, Charlotte Elliot's, 2S3. 
 Hymn, Dr. Kyland and his, "jZ. 
 Hymn, The Power of a, 217. 
 
 ril not Submit to It, 313. 
 Impatience, 183. 
 
 Inhdel and a Little Girl who 
 was Sorry for Him, An, 85. 
 
 Infidel and the Missionary, The, 
 
 248. 
 Innovation, An, 290. 
 Intellect and the Heart, The, 49. 
 Intercessor, The Weeping, 268. 
 Israel, Restoration of, 273. 
 
 Japanese Convert, A, 150. 
 
 Jesus, Like, 125. 
 
 Jesus Opposers, 281. 
 
 Jesus.-" What shall we Give to, 
 
 249. 
 Journey is too Great for Thee, 
 
 The, 57. 
 
 Kind Tone of Voice, A, 190, 
 Kindness to Animals, 181, 
 Knowledge, Jargon without, 235. 
 Knowledge of the Bible, Daniel 
 Webstei-'s, 84. 
 
 Labour and Sorrow, 209. 
 
 Lambs in His Arms, The, 239. 
 
 Lament, A Father's, 53. 
 
 Language, One, 8. 
 
 Last Hour, The, 229. 
 
 Last Hours of Darnley, The, 1 18. 
 
 Legend of St. Marguerite, The, 
 225. 
 
 Leprosy, 26. 
 
 Lessons for Children, Three, 166. 
 
 Liberality, Duty of, 40. 
 
 Liberty to the Cnptivesof Sin,250. 
 
 Life, A Successful, 176. 
 
 Life, Critical Times in, 300. 
 
 Life, Some to Everlasting, 294. 
 
 Life, The Close of, 259. 
 
 Light, 228. 
 
 Light, Gone into the World of, 
 264. 
 
 Light in the World, 262, 
 
 Lips, Watching the, 162. 
 
 Living in the Lives of Others, 
 229. 
 
 Loan to the Lord, A, 193. 
 
 Lord's Prayer of the Old Testa- 
 ment, The, 123. 
 
 Loving God, 38. 
 
 Loyalty, 238. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 325 
 
 Magnanimity, 9. 
 
 Martyr, A Boy, 3r. 
 
 Martyr, An Old, 290. 
 
 Martyr at the Stake, A, 58. 
 
 Martyr for Christ, A, 140. 
 
 Martyr of the Netherlands, A, 96, 
 
 Martyr's Legacy to his Children, 
 A, 89. 
 
 Martyrs, The Wigtown, 93 
 
 Meditation, 107. 
 
 Melancholy Man, A, 311. 
 
 Melancholy, Resistance to, 219. 
 
 Memory, Lapse of, 95. 
 
 Merchant Prince, A, 87. 
 
 Mercies, Daily Insensibility to, 
 276. 
 
 Migrate, About to, 147. 
 
 Minds like Sieves, 301. 
 
 Minister, A French, 60. 
 
 Missionary, A Moravian, 43. 
 
 Missionary of the Seventh Cen- 
 tury, A, 120. 
 
 Money, Accumulation of, 105. 
 
 More Light, Lord, 68. 
 
 Morning Song of the Christian 
 Church. The, 122. 
 
 Moses' Argument, 25. 
 
 Mother, Value of a Christian, 206. 
 ^ ( A, 12 
 
 Motto, A fiishop's, 228 
 
 Music, The Soothing Power of, 
 50. 
 
 My Ministry, 2. 
 
 Name, The Sweetest, 54. 
 Neptune's Cup, 136. 
 Nero, 270. 
 
 Newton and Jay, 253. 
 Ninety-and-Nine, The, 275. 
 No Fear, No Hope, 52. 
 Noah's Prayer, 7. 
 Noise, A Mighty, 282, 
 
 Ochre Spring, The, 174. 
 Offering, A Small, 179. 
 Old Age, 141. 
 
 Parable, An Old Hebrew, 117, 
 Parents, A Question for, 39. 
 Parents, Ingratitude to, 206. 
 
 Parents, One who Delighted to 
 
 Honour his, 200. 
 Passover, The, 19. 
 Pastor, A vShepherd, 316. 
 Patriot, A, 143. 
 Peace on Earth, 306. 
 Peacemaker, A, 151. 
 People, God's Care of His, 295. 
 Persecution, 148. 
 Persecution, Days of Proscription 
 
 and, 319. 
 Perseverance, 213. 
 Pilgrim Fathers, The, 138. 
 Pilot is on Board, The Great, 17 
 Pious Son, A, 176. 
 Playing Cards, 57. 
 Pliny's Myrtle and Christ's Cross, 
 
 273- 
 Pockets, Look to Your, 20. 
 Praising God, 103. 
 Pray, Never be too Tired to, 131. 
 Prayer, A Man of, 49. 
 Prayer, God's Readiness to Hear 
 
 and Answer, 103. 
 Prayer, Importunate, 75. 
 Prayer, The Difficult Duty of, 
 
 315- 
 
 Prayer, The Habit of, 51. 
 
 Prayer, The Patience of Un- 
 answered, 65. 
 
 Prayer, Touching God in, 293. '^ 
 
 Prayer Used of God, Early, 312 
 
 Prayer, Washington at, 68. 
 
 Prayers set Aside with Physic 
 Bottles, 297. 
 
 Praying and VVorking, 62. 
 
 Praying First, 15. 
 
 Praying for What we Do not Ex- 
 pect, 81. 
 
 Praying Light-Keeper, The, 241 
 
 Preacher, An Eloquent, 209. 
 
 Preaching and Praying, 186. 
 
 Preaching, Christmas Evans on, 
 277. 
 
 Prophecy Fulfilled, A, 135. 
 
 Protection from Evil, 11. 
 
 Providence, Interposition of, 153. 
 
 Psalm, A Patriotic, 160. 
 
 Psalm, A Pauline, 116. 
 
 Psalm Beloved by Luther, A, 157, 
 
 Psalm, Durie's, 152. 
 
326 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Psalm, My, 124. 
 
 Psalm of Catherine de Medici, 
 A Chosen, 157. 
 
 Psalm of St. Augustine, The 
 Favourite, 99. 
 
 Psalm, The 119th, 146. 
 
 Psahns, A Lover of the, 142. 
 
 Public Worship, Trivial Hin- 
 drances keeping back from, 
 
 31- 
 Pulpit Beggar, A, 165. 
 Pulpit Rcllectors, 147. 
 Purity of Character, 174. 
 
 Quaker Tailor, A, 276. 
 Quenching the Spirit, 5. 
 
 Rahab, 43. 
 
 Railway Carriage, A Word in a, 
 
 185. 
 Ready to Go, 35. 
 Rebuke, A Seasonable, 272. 
 Rebuking a King, 199. 
 Refreshing, A Word of, 126. 
 Religion, A Stepping-stone to 
 
 Worldly Success, 128. 
 Religion a Thing for Every Day, 
 
 293- 
 Religious Work, Impure Motives 
 
 in, 49. 
 Remember Thee, I will, 234, 
 Resignation, 74. 
 Resignation to God's Will, 73. 
 Resignation to God's Will, A 
 
 Noble, 48. 
 Results are in God's Hands, 34. 
 Retribution, 224. 
 Riches, The Best Way to get, 
 
 64. 
 River, Beyond the, 237. 
 Rivers, Two, 300. 
 Root, The, 286. 
 Root, The Worm at the, 215. 
 Rooted, Not till they are, 245. 
 Ruler, Don't use a Crooked, 146. 
 Running from Sin, 171. 
 
 Sabbath Desecration, 24. 
 Sabbath Holy, Keeping the, 261. 
 Sabbath, Honouring the, 302. 
 
 Sabbath Keeping, An Arctic Ex- 
 plorer and, 260. 
 Sabbath School Instruction, 195. 
 Sabbath, The Profanation of the, 
 
 21. 
 Sacred Silence, 64. 
 Saint, An Early, 100. 
 Saint, A Mediaeval, 124. 
 Saints, God does not Forget His, 
 
 102. 
 Sanctify My Name, 236. 
 Sanctuary, Reverencing the, 31. 
 Sanctuary, The Lord a, 134. 
 Satan's Master Argument, 312. 
 Saved by a Newspaper Scrap, 
 
 216. 
 Saviour, Need of a, 245. 
 Scaffold, A Servant Girl at the, 
 
 129. 
 Scottish Reformation, A Favourite 
 
 Song of the, 156. 
 Scripture Texts, 39. 
 Scriptures, The Fulness of the, 
 
 148. 
 Security? Can you Trust the, 
 
 193- 
 Seed- Corn, 59. 
 Seeking Peace for Ten Years, 
 
 310. 
 Seeking the Lord earnestly, 65. 
 Sermon, An Extempore, 98. 
 Service Must Have Soul in it, 
 
 True, 9. 
 Ships and the Great Sea, The 
 
 Little, 145. 
 Sick Rooms, in. 
 Sick, Suggestions to the, 292. 
 Silence, 136. 
 Sin against God, 120. 
 Sin Blotted Out, 244. 
 Sin, Conspicuous for Exceeding, 
 
 220, 
 Sin Crouching at the Door, 1. 
 Sin Ready to Enter, i. 
 Sin, Running from, 171. 
 Sin, The Certain Detection of, 36. 
 Sin, The Corruption of, 267. 
 Sinning against Light, 243. 
 Sins, A Choice of Three, 298. 
 Sins, Not slavishly Afraid of his. 
 
 19. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 327 
 
 Slothful Habits, 192. 
 
 Slow to Wrath, 182. 
 
 Social Intercourse, 67. 
 
 Soldier of Jesus Christ, A, 44. 
 
 Solid Happiness, 35. 
 
 Son, A Pious, 176. 
 
 Song of Battles, The, 123. 
 
 Song of Christian Assemblies, A, 
 
 159. 
 Song, 1 he Evening, 162. 
 Song, The Lord's, i6i. 
 Sorrow, Blessing the Lord in the 
 
 Depth of, 140. 
 Soul Murder, 59. 
 Soul, The Worth and Beauty of 
 
 a, 112. 
 Souls, How to Win, 180. 
 Speaking Leaves, 90. 
 Spring, Tiie Ochre, 174. 
 Stand Still, 56. 
 Storm at Sea, A, 274. 
 Stranger within thy Gates, The, 
 
 .37- 
 Subject neither Studied nor 
 
 Understood, A, 270. 
 Subjection of the Will, 109. 
 Success, The Secret of a 
 
 Preacher's, no. 
 Successful Life, A, 176. 
 Suffering, Made Perfect through, 
 
 127. 
 Sun-dials, 63. 
 Surety, A, 149. 
 
 Surveillance, Unconscious, 10. 
 Swear ? Who taught you to, 20. 
 Swearing, 20. 
 
 Talent without Sanctity, 23. 
 Talents, Notwithstanding his, 
 
 126. 
 Te Deum of the Old Testament, 
 
 The, 164. 
 Teachers and Parents, For, 200. 
 Teaching, Practical Christian, 
 
 303- 
 Telegram in America, The First, 
 
 36. 
 Tempest, The Covert from the, 
 
 236. 
 Temptations, Boys', 172. 
 Tenth of All, A, 13. 
 
 Text, A Law, 304. 
 
 Thanksgiving, A Song of, 94. 
 
 Three Links, 254. 
 
 Time Enough, 247. 
 
 Timely Succour, 145. 
 
 Tomb Forgets No One, The, 76. 
 
 Tombstone, An Inscription of a, 
 
 264. 
 Tongue, The, 103. 
 Tongues, The Confusion of, 8. 
 Transferring of Sins, 27. 
 Tree Giow ? When does a, 299. 
 Tree, The Traveller's, 92. 
 Tried before Trusted, 54. 
 Tried, It has been, 88. 
 Trouble, My, 52. 
 Troubles, 15. 
 True Nobility, 63. 
 Trust Not in Vam, 203. 
 Trust the Promises, 258. 
 Truthfulness, 25. 
 
 Undone, 2. 
 
 Venture on Him, 41. 
 
 Vigilance, 307. 
 
 Voice, A Kind Tone of, 190. 
 
 Waiting upon God, 177. 
 Wanderings, My, 119. 
 Watching the Lips, 162. 
 Ways of Death, The, 190. 
 What Next? 114. 
 W^heat and the Chaff, The, 79. 
 Widow and the Sovereign, The, 
 
 179- 
 Widow's Son, The, 66. 
 Wife, A Devoted, 208. 
 Wife is from the Lord, A Good, 
 
 Will, Subjection of the, 109. 
 Wine-Making, The Process of, 
 
 274. 
 Wisdom, True, ']']. 
 W'oman, A Poor Highland, 320. 
 Women, One of the Virtuous, 
 
 208. 
 Word in a Railway Carriage, A, 
 
 185. 
 Word in Season, A, 185. 
 
328 
 
 INDEX, 
 
 Word of God, Growing Love for 
 
 the, 67. 
 Work of God, Helpin;^ on the, 13. 
 Work of God, The Noblest, 21. 
 Worth and Beauty of a Soul, The, 
 
 112. 
 
 Wrath, Slow to, 182. 
 
 Young Man Void of Understand- 
 ing, A, 175. 
 
 Young, Moral Training of the, 
 41. 
 
INDEX OF TEXTS. 
 
 Gei 
 
 TESIS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 f. 1 ... 
 
 I 
 
 iv, 7 ... 
 
 1,2 
 
 iv. lo 
 
 2 
 
 V. 24 ... . 
 
 2,3,4 
 
 vi. 3 ••• 
 » 5 - 
 vii. 16 
 
 5 
 
 6 
 
 6 
 
 viii. 9 
 
 7 
 
 » 20 
 ix. 13 
 xi. I ... 
 
 8 
 
 8 
 
 8 
 
 „ 9 - 
 
 8 
 
 xii. 5 ... 
 
 9 
 
 xiii. 9 
 
 9 
 
 xvi. 13 
 
 10 
 
 xviii. 25 
 
 10 
 
 xix. 26 
 
 11 
 
 xxii. 14 
 
 12 
 
 XXV. 34 
 
 12 
 
 xxviii. 17 
 
 12 
 
 
 12,13 
 
 xxxix. 2 
 
 13 
 
 xli. 9 ... 
 
 15 
 
 ,. 52 
 
 15 
 
 xlv. 3... 
 
 16 
 
 xlvii. 9 
 
 16 
 
 ,.29 
 
 17 
 
 xlviii. 21 
 
 17 
 
 Ex 
 
 ODUS. 
 
 ii. 23 ... 
 viii. 26 
 
 17 
 
 18 
 
 xii. 13 
 
 19 
 
 xiv. 15 
 
 19 
 
 x\. 2 ... 
 
 19 
 
 v4 ... 
 
 i9| 
 
 »7 ••• 
 
 20, 2l| 
 
 
 PACE 
 
 
 PACK 
 
 XX. 8 
 
 21 
 
 xi. 18 
 
 . 39 
 
 „ 12 
 
 21 
 
 XV. 7 
 
 . 40 
 
 » 13 
 
 21 
 
 „ II 
 
 . 41 
 
 xxi. 17 
 
 22 
 
 xxiv. 24 
 
 . 37 
 
 xxiii. 8 
 
 22 
 
 xxxii. 46 
 
 . 41 
 
 XXV. 9 
 
 22 
 
 xxxiii. 27 
 
 . 41 
 
 xxvii. 20 ... 
 
 ... 23 
 
 xxxi v. 8 
 
 . 42 
 
 xxix. 44 ... 
 
 ... 23 
 
 
 
 xxxi. 13 
 
 ... 24 
 
 Joshua. 
 
 
 xxxii. 12 ... 
 
 ... 25 
 
 i. 8 
 
 . 42 
 43 
 
 xxxii. 24 ... 
 
 ... 25 
 
 ii. I 
 
 xxxiii. 14 ... 
 
 ... 26 
 
 xiii. 33 
 
 . 43 
 
 
 
 xxiv. 24 
 
 . 44 
 
 Leviti 
 
 cus. 
 
 
 
 xiv. I, 2 ... 
 
 ... 26 
 
 Judges. 
 
 
 xvi. 21 
 
 ... 27 
 
 V. 16 
 
 • 45 
 
 xviii. 4, 5 ... 
 
 ... 27 
 
 
 
 xix. 36 
 
 ... 28 
 
 Ruth. 
 
 
 XXV. 35 
 
 ... 30 
 
 ii. 12 
 
 45 
 
 xxvi. 2 
 
 ... 31 
 
 I Samuei 
 
 
 NUMBI 
 
 :rs. 
 
 
 46,47 
 
 
 
 iii. 4 
 
 vi. 25, 26 ... 
 
 ... 31 
 
 iii. 18 
 
 . 48 
 
 x. 29 
 
 ... 32 
 
 XV. II 
 
 . 49 
 
 xii. 3 
 
 ... 32 
 
 » 22 
 
 • 49 
 
 xvii. 8 
 
 ... 32 
 
 xvi. 7 
 
 . 49 
 
 xxi. 4 
 
 ... 34 
 
 „ 23 .. .. 
 
 . 50 
 
 xxiii. 10 ... 
 
 ... 35 
 
 xxii. 4 
 
 . 51 
 
 ». 23 ... 
 
 ... 36 
 
 .\xiv. 19 
 
 51 
 
 xx.xii. 23 ... 
 
 ... 36 
 
 2 SAMUE] 
 
 
 Deutero 
 
 NOMY. 
 
 iii- 33 
 
 • 52 
 
 V. 17 
 
 - 37 
 
 xii. 19 
 
 . 52 
 
 vi»4 
 
 ... 38 
 
 „ 23 
 
 • 53 
 
 „ 5 
 
 ... 38 
 
 xvin. 33 
 
 • 53 
 
 „ 7 
 
 ... 39 
 
 xxii. 3 
 
 • 54 
 
 >, 9 
 
 — 39 
 
 » 31 
 
 • 54 
 
 339 
 
330 
 
 INDEX OF TEXTS. 
 
 I 
 
 Kings. 
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 
 PAG a 
 
 
 
 'ACE 
 
 i. 6 
 
 .. 73 
 
 xxxvii. 31 ... 
 
 ... 106 
 
 xiii. 8, 9 
 
 
 S4 
 
 „ 21 
 
 73>74 
 
 xxxvi ii. 4 ... 
 
 ... 106 
 
 xiv. \y 
 
 
 
 55 
 
 V. 9 
 
 . 74 
 
 „ I3-. 
 
 ... 106 
 
 xvii. 6 
 
 
 56 
 
 vi. 8 
 
 . 7S 
 
 xxxix. 3 ... 
 
 ... 107 
 
 „ i8 
 
 
 5^5 
 
 xiii. 15 ... . 
 
 ' 75 
 
 „ 13 ... 
 
 ... 107 
 
 xviii. 21 
 
 
 57 
 
 xiv. 14 ... . 
 
 . 76 
 
 xl 3 
 
 ... 109 
 
 xix. 7... 
 
 
 
 57 
 
 xvi. 22 
 
 . 76 
 
 „ 8 
 
 ... 109 
 
 xix. 14 
 
 
 58 
 
 xxviii. 28 ... . 
 
 . 77 
 
 ,. 10 
 
 ... iio 
 
 xxi. 25 
 
 
 59 
 
 xxxiv. 18 ... . 
 
 . 77 
 
 xii. 3 
 
 ... Ill 
 
 
 
 
 XXXV. 10 ... . 
 
 . 78 
 
 xliii. S 
 
 ... Ill 
 
 2 
 
 Kings. 
 
 
 xxxix. 27 ... . 
 
 . 78 
 
 xiv. 5 
 
 ... 112 
 
 ii. 3 ••• 
 
 
 59 
 
 
 
 xlix. 8 
 
 ... 113 
 
 » II •■• 
 
 
 60 
 
 Psalms. 
 
 
 » 17 ... 
 1. 10 
 
 ... 114 
 
 iv- 34 
 
 
 
 60 
 
 
 
 ... 115 
 
 vi. 15... 
 vii. 19 
 xii. 15 
 XX. 5 ... 
 „ II 
 
 
 61 
 
 i-4 
 
 . 79 
 
 Ii. 1-19 ... 
 
 ... 116 
 
 
 61 
 
 iv. 6 
 
 . 80 
 
 „ 13 
 
 ... 117 
 
 
 61 
 
 V- 3 
 
 81 
 
 „ 17 
 
 ... 117 
 
 
 62 
 
 r 12 
 
 82 
 
 Iv. 4 
 
 ... 118 
 
 
 63 
 
 vii. II ... . 
 viii. I 
 
 . 84 
 
 Ivi. 8 
 
 Ivii. 4 
 
 ... 119 
 ... 120 
 
 I Chronicles 
 
 
 » 2 
 
 . 85 
 
 Ix. 1-12 ... 
 
 ... 120 
 
 
 
 
 X 
 
 86 
 
 Ixiii. i-ii ... 
 
 ... 122 
 
 vi. 49... 
 
 
 63 
 
 xiv. I 
 
 . 87 
 
 Ixvii. 1-7 ... 
 
 ... 123 
 
 xvii. 16 
 
 
 64 
 
 XV. 4 
 
 . 87 
 
 Ixviii. 1-35 
 
 ... 123 
 
 2 Chronicles 
 
 
 xvi. 5 
 
 . Z2, 
 
 Ixix. I 
 
 ... 124 
 
 
 
 
 xviii. 30 
 
 88 
 
 Ixxi. 1-24 ... 
 
 ... 124 
 
 i. 10 ... 
 
 
 64 
 
 xix. I 
 
 . 89 
 
 Ixxii. 4 
 
 ... 125 
 
 vi. 40... 
 
 
 65 
 
 „ 10 ... 
 
 89,90 
 
 Ixxiii. I 
 
 ... 126 
 
 XV. 15 
 
 
 65 
 
 ,, II 
 
 • 91 
 
 „ 22 ... 
 
 ... 126 
 
 XX 21 
 
 
 66 
 
 » . 13 
 
 . 92 
 
 Ixxiv. 10 ... 
 
 ... 127 
 
 xxxiv. 27 
 
 
 66 
 
 xxiii. 5 
 
 . 92 
 
 „ 16 ... 
 
 ... 127 
 
 
 
 
 xxiv. 7 
 
 • 93 
 
 „ .20 ... 
 
 ... 128 
 
 
 Ezra. 
 
 
 XXV. 7 
 
 • 93 
 
 Ixxxiii. 3 ... 
 
 ... 128 
 
 vi. 22... 
 
 ... ••. 
 
 67 
 
 xxvi. 8 
 
 . 94 
 
 Ixxxiv. 4-12 
 
 ... 129 
 
 vii. 6 ... 
 
 
 
 67 
 
 xxvii. I-14 
 
 . 94 
 
 Ixxxvi. 7 ... 
 
 ... 130 
 
 ix. 8 ... 
 
 
 68 
 
 xxvii. 6 
 
 . 95 
 
 „ ...13 ... 
 
 ... 130 
 
 
 
 
 XXX. 5 
 
 • 95 
 
 Ixxxviii. 9 ... 
 
 ... 131 
 
 Nehemiah. 
 
 
 XXX. 5 
 
 . 96 
 
 Ixxxix. 26 ... 
 
 ... 132 
 
 i. 6 ... 
 iv. 9 ... 
 viii. 8... 
 
 
 68 
 69 
 70 
 
 xxxi. 5 
 
 . 97 
 
 XC. 12 
 
 ... 132 
 
 
 xxxi 23 
 
 xxxii. i-ll 
 xxxiv. 9 
 
 . 98 
 . 99 
 . 100 
 
 .xci. I 
 „ 2 
 „ IS 
 
 ... 133 
 
 ... 134 
 ... 134 
 
 ix. 17... 
 
 
 71 
 
 „ 10 
 
 . 102 
 
 xciv. 2 
 
 ... 135 
 
 xii. 31 
 
 
 71 
 
 » 13 
 
 . 103 
 
 „ 17 ... 
 
 ... 136 
 
 Esther. 
 
 
 » 15 
 
 . 103 
 
 xcv. 5 
 
 ... 136 
 
 
 
 
 xxxv. 28 
 
 . 103 
 
 » 7,8 ... 
 
 ... 137 
 
 V. 13 ... 
 
 
 
 72 
 
 xxxvi. I 
 
 . 1,04 
 
 c. 1 
 
 ... 138 
 
 
 
 
 „ 6 
 
 . 104 
 
 cii. 20 
 
 ... 140 
 
 
 Job, 
 
 
 xxxvii. 16 
 
 . los 
 
 ciii. I 
 
 140, 141 
 
 i. I ... 
 
 
 
 72 
 
 » 26 
 
 . 105 1 
 
 » 5 
 
 ... 141 
 
INDEX OF TEXTS. 
 
 331 
 
 
 PACE 
 
 
 
 PACK 
 
 ECCLESIASTES 
 
 
 CIV. 34 
 
 142 
 
 iv. 14 
 
 
 
 169 
 
 
 
 PACK 
 
 cv. 26 
 
 143 
 
 „ 15 
 
 
 
 171 
 
 i. 2 ... . 
 
 .. 209, 
 
 210 
 
 cvii. I 
 
 143 
 
 „ 18 
 
 
 
 171 
 
 ,,.14 •.. . 
 
 
 
 210 
 
 „ 18 
 
 144 
 
 V 27 
 
 
 172 
 
 vii. 9 ... . 
 
 
 
 211 
 
 » 23 
 
 145 
 
 V. 22 ... 
 
 
 
 172 
 
 viii. 12 
 
 
 212 
 
 » 43 
 
 145 
 
 vi. 15 
 
 
 
 173 
 
 ix. 4 ... . 
 
 
 
 213 
 
 cxix 
 
 146 
 
 ., 27, 28 
 
 
 
 174 
 
 „ 10 
 
 .. 213, 
 
 214 
 
 » 9 
 
 146 
 
 vii. I ... 
 
 
 
 174 
 
 ,. 18 . 
 
 
 215 
 
 » II 
 
 146 
 
 ,, 7 ••• 
 
 
 
 175 
 
 xi. I ... . 
 
 .. 216, 
 
 217 
 
 „ 46 
 
 147 
 
 viii. 17 
 
 
 176 
 
 „6 ... . 
 
 
 
 218 
 
 » 54 
 
 147 
 
 X. 7 ... 
 
 
 
 176 
 
 „7 ... . 
 
 
 
 219 
 
 » 59 
 
 147 
 
 „ 4 ••• 
 
 
 
 177 
 
 „9 ... 219,220, 
 
 222 
 
 ,, 83 
 
 148 
 
 xi. 18 
 
 
 
 177 
 
 xii. 3... . 
 
 
 
 223 
 
 ,, 86 
 
 148 
 
 „ 19 
 
 
 
 178 
 
 „ 5... . 
 
 
 
 223 
 
 „ 97 ... 148, 
 
 149 
 
 „ 24 
 
 ... 179, 
 
 I So 
 
 „ 14 . 
 
 
 
 224 
 
 » 122 
 
 149 
 
 ,,.30 
 
 
 
 180 
 
 
 
 
 » 130 
 
 150 
 
 xii. 30 
 
 
 181 
 
 Song of 
 
 Solomon. 
 
 cxx. 7 
 
 15' 
 
 xiii. I 
 
 
 182 
 
 
 
 
 cxxii. 2 
 
 151 
 
 xiv. 29 
 
 '.'.. 18-, 
 
 183 
 
 ii. 15... . 
 
 
 225 
 
 cxxiv. 1-8 
 
 153 
 
 154 
 
 XV. i. ... 
 
 
 183 
 
 iii. 2 ... . 
 iv. 16 
 V. 9 ... . 
 vi. lo... . 
 
 
 225 
 
 » 2 
 
 » 4 
 
 cxxv. 1-5 
 
 » 3 -. 
 •,, 23 
 „ 27 
 
 ■.".■ i"85, 
 
 183 
 186 
 186 
 
 
 225 
 227 
 228 
 
 cxxvi. 5 
 
 156 
 
 » 29 
 
 
 186 
 
 
 
 
 cxxviii 
 
 156 
 
 ,.Zl 
 
 ••• ... 
 
 187 
 
 Isaiah. 
 
 
 » 2 
 
 156 
 
 xvi. 7 
 
 ... i87, 
 
 188 
 
 i. 25 ... , 
 
 
 
 228 
 
 cxxx 
 
 157 
 
 „ 24 
 
 
 
 190 
 
 ii. II ... 
 
 
 229 
 
 cxxxiii 
 
 159 
 
 „ 25 
 
 
 
 190 
 
 vi. 8 ... 
 
 
 
 229 
 
 cxxxvi 
 
 160 
 
 » 32 
 
 
 
 190 
 
 viii. 20 
 
 
 
 230 
 
 cxxxvii 
 
 160 
 
 xix. 4 
 
 
 
 191 
 
 xi. 6 ... 
 
 .. ... 
 
 231 
 
 3,4 ... 
 
 161 
 
 ., 15 
 
 
 
 192 
 
 XXV. I 
 
 
 
 232 
 
 4 
 
 161 
 
 » 17 
 
 ... 193, 
 
 194 
 
 „ 8 
 
 
 
 232 
 
 cxxxix. 12 
 
 162 
 
 XX. II 
 
 
 
 194 
 
 xxvi. 3 
 
 ., ... 
 
 233 
 
 cxli 
 
 162 
 
 „ 22 
 
 
 194 
 
 » 8 
 
 .. ... 
 
 234 
 
 »..3 
 
 162 
 
 xxii. 6 
 
 195, 196 
 
 197, 
 
 xxviii. 7 
 
 
 
 234 
 
 cxliii. 
 
 163 
 
 
 198 
 
 
 „ 10 
 
 
 
 235 
 
 cxliv. 
 
 163 
 
 "... " 
 
 
 
 199 
 
 xxix. 13 
 
 .. ... 
 
 235 
 
 cxlv 
 
 164 
 
 xxiii. 21 
 
 
 199 
 
 „ 23 
 
 
 
 236 
 
 „ 13 
 
 164 
 
 » 24, 
 
 25 ... 
 
 200 
 
 XXX. 33 
 
 
 
 236 
 
 cxivi 
 
 164 
 
 „ 26 
 
 
 
 2CX3 
 
 xxxii. 2 
 
 
 
 236 
 
 cxlviii. 8 
 
 165 
 
 xxiv. 10 
 
 
 
 200 
 
 xxxiii. 17 
 
 
 
 237 
 
 „ 17 
 
 165 
 
 :, II 
 
 
 
 200 
 
 „ 22 
 
 ... 237 
 
 238 
 
 
 
 XXV. II 
 
 
 
 201 
 
 xl. II... 
 
 
 
 239 
 
 Proverbs. 
 
 
 xxvi. 5 
 
 
 
 202 
 
 „ 26 
 xlii. 3 
 
 
 
 240 
 
 
 
 xxvii. 9 
 
 
 
 202 
 
 
 
 241 
 
 i. 8 
 
 166 
 
 xxviii. 25 
 
 
 
 203 
 
 „ 10 
 
 
 
 241 
 
 ,,27 
 
 166 
 
 XXX. 8, 9 
 
 
 
 205 
 
 xliii. 2 
 
 .. 242 
 
 243 
 
 ii. 8 
 
 167 
 
 „ 17 
 
 
 206 
 
 „ 8 
 
 
 243 
 
 ,,20 
 
 1 68 
 
 xxxi. I 
 
 
 
 206 
 
 1 xliv. 3 
 
 
 
 244 
 
 iii. 9 ... 
 
 169 
 
 » II, 
 
 12 
 
 208 
 
 1 » 22 
 
 
 
 244 
 
332 
 
 INDEX OF TEXTS. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 xlv. 21, 22... 
 
 ... 245 
 
 xlviii. ID ... 
 
 245, 246 
 
 „ i8 ... 
 
 ... 247 
 
 „ 22 ... 
 
 ... 248 
 
 xlix. i6 
 
 ... 249 
 
 „ 24 ... 
 
 ... 250 
 
 1.4 
 
 ... 252 
 
 lii- 7 
 
 ... 253 
 
 n lo 
 
 ... 253 
 
 liii. I 
 
 ... 254 
 
 „ 6 
 
 ... 255 
 
 hv. 2, 3 ... 
 
 ... 255 
 
 » 5 
 
 ... 256 
 
 „ II 
 
 ... 256 
 
 » 13 
 
 ... 257 
 
 Iv. 3 
 
 ... 258 
 
 V 12 
 
 ... 259 
 
 Ivii. 15 
 
 259, 260 
 
 Iviii. 13 ... 
 
 2tO, 261 
 
 lix. I 
 
 ... 261 
 
 Ix. I 
 
 ... 262 
 
 „ 2 
 
 ... 262 
 
 » 19 
 
 ... 264 
 
 „ 20 
 
 ... 264 
 
 Ixi. I 
 
 ... 264 
 
 „ 10 
 
 ... 265 
 
 Ixiii. 13 ... 
 
 ... 265 
 
 Ixv. 17 
 
 ... 267 
 
 Jeremiah. 
 
 vi. 14 
 
 ... 267 
 
 X. I 
 
 ... 267 
 
 X. 12 
 
 ... 268 
 
 xii. 5 
 
 ... 268 
 
 xiii. 17 
 
 ... 268 
 
 XV. 15 
 
 ... 269 
 
 „ 16, 17 ... 
 
 ... 270 
 
 xvii. 9 
 
 ... 270 
 
 xxiii. 4 
 
 ... 270 
 
 XX vi. 3 
 
 ... 272 
 
 xxix. 13 ... 
 
 ... 273 
 
 XXX. 17 
 
 ... 273 
 
 xxxii. 37 .. 
 
 ... 273 
 
 xlviii. II ... 
 
 ... 274 
 
 xlix. 23 
 
 ... 274 
 
 1. 6 
 
 ... 275 
 
 Lamentations. 
 
 "1. 33 
 
 275 
 276 
 276 
 
 EZEKIEL. 
 
 '.3 
 
 276 
 
 iii. 17 
 
 277 
 
 xi. 19 ... 278, 
 
 279 
 
 xviii. 4 
 
 280 
 
 xxii. 29 
 
 281 
 
 xxiv. 17 
 
 281 
 
 xxvi. 13 
 
 282 
 
 XXX. 24 
 
 282 
 
 xxxiii. 22 
 
 283 
 
 » 32 
 
 283 
 
 xxxiv. 12 
 
 2S4 
 
 ». 29 
 
 2S6 
 
 XXX vi. 27 
 
 287 
 
 Daniel. 
 
 
 ii. 22 
 
 288 
 
 iii. 17 
 
 289 
 
 ,, 25 
 
 289 
 
 » 21 
 
 290 
 
 „ 22 
 
 290 
 
 'V. 35 
 
 292 
 
 vi. 10 
 
 293 
 
 » 20 
 
 293 
 
 xii. 2 294 
 
 .295 
 
 HOSEA. 
 
 
 ii. 18 
 
 295 
 
 V. 15 
 
 296 
 
 vi. 3 
 
 296 
 
 V 4 
 
 297 
 
 xiii. 2 
 
 298 
 
 xiii. 14 
 
 298 
 
 xiv. 5 
 
 299 
 
 „ 6 
 
 300 
 
 Joel. 
 
 
 iii. 12, 13 
 
 301 
 
 » 14 
 
 300 
 
 Amos. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 iii. 3 300 
 
 viii. 5 302 
 
 Jonah. 
 ii. 2 303 
 
 Micah. 
 
 V. 2 303 
 
 vi. 8 303, 304 
 
 vii. 8-10 304 
 
 Nahum. 
 
 i. 3 305 
 
 „ 15 306 
 
 Habakkuk. 
 
 ii. I 307 
 
 »4 308 
 
 ,,15 308 
 
 iii. 3 309 
 
 Zephaniah. 
 
 ii. 3 309 
 
 iii. 16 311 
 
 Zechariah. 
 
 11. 
 iii. 
 
 4 ... 
 I ... 
 
 . 11 
 iv. 
 vii 
 
 2 ... 
 
 7 .- 
 . II, 12 
 
 viii. 21 
 
 X. 
 
 12 
 
 XI. 
 
 xii 
 
 4 ..• 
 . 10 
 
 
 Ma] 
 
 iii. 
 )> 
 
 5> 
 
 )> 
 
 iv. 
 
 3 ... 
 5 ... 
 10 ... 
 16... 
 2 ... 
 
 311 
 312 
 
 312 
 313 
 313 
 
 3'5 
 315 
 316 
 316 
 
 ... 317 
 ... 318 
 318,319 
 ... 319 
 ... 320 
 
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 300 OUTLINES OF SERMONS ON THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
 
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 Archbishop Tait. 
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 Dean Vaughan. 
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 Rev. Dr. J. T. DuRYEA. 
 
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 OUTLINES OF SERMONS ON THE OLD TESTAMENT. 
 
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 Dean E. H. Plumptre, 
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 Anecdotes IllnstratiYe of New Testament Texts. 
 
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Date Due 
 
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