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 NEW YORK: 
 
 ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH AND CO. 
 
 38 West Twenty -Third Street. 
 
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 Copyright, 1889, 
 By Anson D. F. Randolph and Co. 
 
 Itfg iilAARY 
 OF SGHESS 
 
 Washington 
 
 Slnibtrsittj Press: 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 
1 
 
 3jn jftcmorfam* 
 
 REV. HENRY W. SMULLER. 
 
 Born at Middletown, Pa., 1808. 
 Died in New York City, 1881. 
 
PREFATORY. 
 
 npHE following simple pages have been written, 
 not with the object of giving publicity to words 
 spoken during many days of quiet, hallowed seclu- 
 sion, but in the hope that through the trust and cheer 
 which they breathe some other lives, drawn near by 
 a common faith and patience, may gain renewed cour- 
 age and comfort. The voice that uttered them is 
 silent ; only its echo still lingers. It lingers in the 
 memory of many who were wont to receive the truth 
 as it fell Sabbath after Sabbath from the now mute 
 lips. It vibrates tenderly in the hearts of the few 
 who were privileged to witness the cheering and 
 supporting power of the same precious truth during 
 nearly four years of patient, submissive service, — 
 the service that is rendered only with folded hands. 
 Of a few only of those last days the present pages 
 bear record. With reverent, loving touch a daugh- 
 ter's hand has laid the scattered leaves together. Of 
 
6 Prefatory. 
 
 the long and useful life of our beloved father only 
 so much has been said as might help to a clearer view 
 of the blessed triumph of heavenly grace in its tran- 
 quil, happy close. 
 
 May the God of peace grant a like sweet and 
 blessed closing to all eyes that rest upon these lines ! 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 I. 
 
 Folded Hands 9 
 
 The Atonement of Christ 13 
 
 II. 
 
 "Thy Will be Done" 18 
 
 The Joy of the Lord 20 
 
 III. 
 
 The Evangel of Beauty 24 
 
 The Father's Care 26 
 
 A Lesson from the Flowers 29 
 
 Light 31 
 
 IV. 
 
 Trusting the Father 34 
 
 Prayer 36 
 
 The Consecrated Little 37 
 
 V. 
 
 The Church . . • 40 
 
 A Sermon at Midnight 44 
 
8 Contents. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The Comfort and Triumph of Faith .... 50 
 
 Leaving All with Him 54 
 
 A Covenant-keeping God $y 
 
 VII. 
 Christian Love 63 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Going Home 68 
 
 In Hope of a Glorious Resurrection ... 73 
 
A GOLDEN SUNSET. 
 
 FOLDED HANDS. 
 
 TO a spirit stirred with love to God and man 
 labor is a delight, enforced rest a weari- 
 ness far more wearing than work. The sailor 
 suffers less fatigue when, with all canvas spread, 
 lie strains hard at the helm and bears the buffet- 
 ings of wind and wave, than when, with thoughts 
 impatient that outsail the laggard bark, he waits, 
 becalmed, upon a lifeless sea. So, too, to the 
 soldier, with a soul on fire for active service, bet- 
 ter the fatigue of the forced march, broken only 
 by the hurried halt, better the sleepless bivouac 
 or the dangers of the field, than the dull dead- 
 lock of prolonged camp-life, or the exhausted 
 falling out by the way, leaving others to press 
 forward to victory. Yet often does the Cap- 
 tain of our salvation bid one and another of His 
 tried and trusted followers leave the ranks, and 
 
jo A Golden Sunset. 
 
 resting for a while before the final furlough 
 comes, serve Him 
 
 (i Only by patient standing still, 
 And waiting on the Master's will." 
 
 To our beloved father this order from the ever- 
 wise Captain came on Friday night, March 29, 
 1878. In it we could not fail to recognize not 
 alone the wisdom but likewise the great loving- 
 kindness which He displays in His dealings 
 toward His own. All premonitions, which might 
 have served to create alarm and in some meas- 
 ure impair the joy and usefulness of the last 
 days of active service, were withheld. But in 
 His own time He sent His silent messenger to 
 touch the hidden springs of nervous force ; and 
 the active body that had so long moved obedient 
 to the mandates of busy brain and kindly heart, 
 heard and obeyed the higher behest. The skil- 
 ful hand forgot its cunning, and the strong arm 
 that had ever been so lovingly stretched forth to 
 uplift the fallen or support the weak, itself fell, 
 weak and powerless to labor more. But then 
 came a time of perhaps more effective usefulness 
 than that unselfish life had ever known ; a time 
 of prayer, fervent, effectual ; a time of high and 
 heavenly communings, of holy, happy converse 
 with dear friends, who went forth from that 
 Bethel-room feeling almost that their eyes had 
 
Folded Hands. i / 
 
 rested upon the face of an angel ; a time when 
 
 physical infirmity seemed to find its precious 
 
 compensation in soul-uplifting thoughts ; when 
 the spirit, strong in His strength, could bear 
 
 with sweet and patient composure the weakn 
 of the body, "amid whose ruins," as one truly said, 
 44 it sat so long triumphant, radiant with its im- 
 mortal glory." To use a little further the beau- 
 tiful memorial words spoken in a church of our 
 father's planting, by one who held hallowed con- 
 verse with him during those last days : " All 
 things, in his mind, had inward meaning, min- 
 istered to the spiritual, and were clothed with 
 exquisite beauty. The words that fell like pearls 
 from his lips we utter with reverent affection. 
 They reveal to us the spirituality of his mind, 
 its versatility, its command of wide knowledge, 
 its picturesqueness, its breathing spirit of love 
 to God and man." 
 
 That such a mind, with such resources of 
 thought, should suffer little depression when 
 suddenly thrown back upon itself is perhaps not 
 unnatural ; but the daily drawing from the well 
 of truth, the daily delving in the mines of knowl- 
 edge, which induced such habits of thought, were 
 no happy accidents, but the labor of a lifetime. 
 
 As we attempt now to set down in order a 
 few of these scattered thoughts, they bring back 
 again with almost painful reality the beauty and 
 
12 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 serenity of the living presence ; the sweetness of 
 the voice that spoke them; the light, "with less 
 of earth in it than heaven," that beamed from 
 the kindling eye, and the almost unearthly ra- 
 diance that shone around the forehead, silver- 
 crowned, where now has been set the " crown of 
 pure gold." 
 
 Dear Friend, whose eyes rest upon these 
 words, will you enter with us this quiet Bethel- 
 room, into which the spring sunshine is now 
 bringing its cheering, health-giving brightness, 
 while within beams the brighter and more 
 blessed light of the Sun of Righteousness, ris- 
 ing each day unclouded, " with healing in His 
 wings " ? It may be that you are weary or 
 lonely, cut off from the world and its activities, 
 learning the great lesson of patience in much 
 tribulation, being made ready, it may be, to 
 "teach in song" what you now are "learn- 
 ing in suffering." Then let us lead you by the 
 hand into this gentle presence ; be one, for a 
 few days, of the little home circle that was hon- 
 ored, as is many another to-day, by having an 
 angel in its midst ; and if you shall gain aught 
 of hope or confidence, any word of comfort or 
 of cheer, thank not the lips that uttered nor the 
 pen that so imperfectly copied, but the Master 
 who communes to-day as of old with His disci- 
 ples in the quiet " upper room." 
 
The Atonement of On ist. i > 
 
 THE ATONEMENT OF CHRIST. 
 
 The period of extreme prostration which 
 
 followed the first severe attack of disease has 
 passed away ; and returning strength brings 
 with it constant thoughts of the work so sud- 
 denly laid aside, — of the sermon that was in 
 process of preparation for the approaching 
 Sabbath, and of hopes — never to be realized, 
 but which had, nevertheless, their cheering 
 and beneficial effect — that the loved work 
 may soon be resumed, the sermon completed. 
 " I so much wanted," said our father, " to talk 
 to the people about Naaman the Syrian. We 
 follow his example and we pass through his 
 experience. The Abana of our own resolution 
 and the Pharpar of our personal morality are 
 not enough. We wrap our morality as a robe 
 about us, and we think it will cover us ; but it 
 is not enough. We must be covered by the 
 robe of Christ's innocence ; and not alone by 
 the robe of innocence, but of expiation. At 
 her coronation Victoria wore a robe of white 
 satin, but it was shot with a thread of gold. A 
 shuttle armed with fine spun gold was thrown 
 occasionally across the web, so that throughout 
 the robe gleamed here and there the glitter- 
 ing thread. So our robe must have running 
 through it the scarlet thread of Christ's blood. 
 
14 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 The shuttle of the law must be armed with the 
 scarlet thread of Christ's expiation, His atone- 
 ment, and thrown by the hand of Divine justice 
 across the web of His spotless innocence, that, 
 covered by that robe, we may be saved. " 
 
 Most precious at all times was the thought of 
 Christ's atonement, His cleansing blood. " You 
 will find," says Dwight L. Moody, in one of 
 his addresses on " The Blood," " that all those 
 hymns that have the scarlet thread in them will 
 live. They will be sung on and on as long as 
 the church lives on earth. I tell you w r hy those 
 hymns are so precious ; it is because they tell us 
 about the blood." So precious to every saved 
 soul is ever this central gem in the cluster of 
 Christian truth. As the dew unto Hermon, as 
 the pure, refreshing snow from Mount Lebanon 
 to the thirst-stricken traveller on the plain, — 
 ever fresh, ever new, ever wonderful, came to 
 our dear father the thought of the exhibition of 
 the heavenly Fathers love in the face of Jesus 
 Christ. Would that all those, blindly walking 
 in the light of their own wisdom, who stumble 
 at the atonement of Christ, might have seen the 
 heavenly light that rested radiant upon that 
 saintly face, as again and again the last long 
 stage of the journey to the Celestial City was 
 cheered by sweet discourse upon this precious 
 truth. 
 
Atonement of Christ. / 5 
 
 "What a wonderful announcement ! ' was the 
 
 exclamation one morning, as the leaf <>t" daily 
 readings was turned to the text: "For God so 
 
 loved the world, that lie gave His only be- 
 gotten Son, that whosoever bclieveth in Ilim 
 should not perish, but have everlasting life," — 
 u What a wonderful announcement to a world 
 of lost sinners ! " and as though for the first time, 
 the words, familiar from childhood, were read 
 with tears of grateful joy. And then, as so 
 often with our dear father, the thought pictured 
 itself before his mind, and he added : " How 
 terrible the doom, how complete the redemp- 
 tion ! It is as though a mighty storm-cloud 
 were to gather over the Pacific, and the dread 
 bolt should fall ; but only to be quenched in 
 the great deep of the boundless waters. So 
 the bolt that would have crushed us to eternal 
 destruction leaped, all instinct with the life of 
 justice and in the white heat of divine purity, 
 from the folds of Jehovah's mantle, and fell upon 
 the heart of Christ, to be quenched forever 
 in the great deep of His infinite love." 
 
 At^another time, in talking of the disappoint- 
 ments, the deficiencies of life, he was led to 
 speak of the broken life of Christ. " Life is 
 deficient ; there is a sense of incompleteness, a 
 sense of want ; for, even if our plans be pros- 
 pered, death stands ever at the door. We wish 
 
1 6 A Golden Sunset, 
 
 our life to be every way perfect, well-rounded, 
 symmetrical; a unit, entire, complete. God wills, 
 if our lives are to be useful lives, that they shall 
 be broken. We eat the broken bread of Christ's 
 body, we drink the poured-out wine of His 
 blood. The bread must be broken before we 
 can partake. The ground must be broken and 
 torn asunder before the seed can be planted. 
 The grain must be crushed before it can be 
 used, and the bread broken before it is eaten. 
 Christ's life was a broken life, broken for us. 
 His countenance was marred, marred for us. 
 It was a perfect life, but it was a broken life. 
 The apostle in the Hebrews speaks of the high- 
 priest gone within the veil. The veil hung there, 
 an obstruction ; the priest and the people were 
 outside, and how could the veil be opened ? 
 Why, by the sprinkling of blood. When the 
 priest's hand sprinkled the blood, the veil was 
 opened. The threshold must be sprinkled 
 thick with blood. Christ's body is the veil ; 
 we are a priesthood. Through His blood we 
 enter the Holy Place. We cannot set aside 
 the atonement of Christ. He must be an ex- 
 ample or a sacrifice. If He is only an example, 
 that can be no comfort to us ; for it is an ex- 
 ample which it is impossible for us to follow. 
 But the body was broken, the threshold 
 sprinkled with blood, that our feet may pass 
 
Atonement of Christ. 17 
 
 Over it. Christ was broken on the wheel of 
 eternal justice to atone for our sin. We cannot 
 be saved without that blood. 'Without shedding 
 of blood there is no remission of sin.' Christ 
 did not come merely to set us an example, and 
 His death was not a mere accident. For 'by 
 the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of 
 God' He was sacrificed, 'whom ye have taken 
 and with wicked hands have slain.' Those who 
 hold that false belief put manifestation in the 
 place of expiation. They talk of Christ's ex- 
 ample leading us upward to a higher plane, etc. 
 No ; instead it leads us downward to humble 
 repentance, and so upward. We are sinners, 
 and the blood of Christ cleanseth us. It is an 
 old error, substituting the religion of taste for 
 the religion of merit. It must be one or the 
 other. Cain and Abel afford us examples of 
 the two. Cain preferred the religion of taste, 
 the aesthetic religion ; he offered to God beauti- 
 ful fruits, perfect and fair. Abel slew the lamb, 
 and said thereby : ' I am a sinner. I lay my 
 sins on the head of this sacrifice, and Thou 
 acceptest it and sparest me.' Cain's conduct 
 soon manifested the powerlessness of his re- 
 ligion on the depraved heart." 
 
II. 
 
 11 THY WILL BE DONE." 
 
 AS time passed, and days and months of in- 
 activity rolled by, the patience and child- 
 like submission of our loved one to the Father's 
 will were remarkable, — a beautiful example not 
 to be forgotten. An old friend and brother in 
 the ministry said of him : " He is preaching now 
 the grandest sermon of his life." For so kindly 
 and bountifully did the Master bestow the grace 
 of patience in the day of need. When the saintly 
 Hewitson lay dying he said to a friend who stood 
 near, witnessing his intense sufferings : " This is 
 one of the rough places on the road, but then it 's 
 the right road." On one occasion some sympa- 
 thetic words were spoken to our father upon his 
 helplessness and long confinement to his room. 
 " Yes," said he, " I am weak and weary ; " and 
 then, looking up with an expression of child-like 
 content, — "but there is one saving clause about 
 me, I am on the high-road to glory. ... It is a 
 pity," he said again, " if I cannot submit to my 
 heavenly Father's discipline for a year. I want 
 to feel like the Apostle Paul, — content in what- 
 
"Thv Will Be Done: 1 19 
 
 soever state I am. I am very undeserving of the 
 
 Lord's great goodness; 91 and then, to one who 
 
 h;nl known his patience under trial: "Oh, ) 
 
 I ain undeserving. The Lord has been very 
 merciful in taking away my quick, impatient 
 temper and making me patient. I consider that 
 jreat triumph of grace." At another time he 
 said : " I love to leave all with Him. I love to 
 think that my health is not in my own hand." 
 And then he spoke of one whom he knew many 
 years ago, Captain Cotton, an aged relative of 
 dear friends of his early manhood. " When I 
 knew Uncle Cotton," said he, " he was a very 
 old man. He had served, when hardly more 
 than a lad, under General Putnam in the War of 
 the Revolution, and he sometimes applied his 
 early lessons in military discipline to later expe- 
 riences of the Christian warfare. At one time 
 he was about to visit his sister, but, just as he 
 left his door to enter the carriage, by some mis- 
 step he dislocated his ankle. One of his rela- 
 tives, an energetic business man, rather inclined 
 to be restive and impatient of restraint or inter- 
 ference, went to him and found him lying calmly 
 in bed, with the doctors working over the injured 
 foot. ' Uncle Cotton,' said he, ' I '11 give you 
 fifty dollars if you will tell me the secret of your 
 quiet cheerfulness.' ' I can give you the secret 
 for nothing,' said Uncle Cotton. 'In the old 
 
20 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 war days we learned our discipline from Baron 
 Steuben's "Blue Book;" and the first rule of 
 that book was this : " The first duty of the sol- 
 dier is obedience to his superior." Now (so 
 many years ago), I enlisted in another army, 
 under a Captain infinitely wise and worthy of 
 obedience. To-day I thought to go and visit 
 my sister; would have been glad to go; but the 
 order comes to lie down and suffer, and I should 
 be a sorry soldier if I were to rebel against 
 my Captain's commands.' Patience," added our 
 father, " is the undying soul of heroism. Faith 
 is a single act, patience is a series of acts to- 
 ward an object ; it is prolonged faith. * Let 
 patience have her perfect work.'" / And, truly, 
 though but mortal, and subject, as are all, to a 
 life of human limitations, our father indeed 
 seemed nearly to have attained the Divine stand- 
 ard of perfection in patience and quiet, unques- 
 tioning submission, — to the praiseof God's grace, 
 who made him what he was. 
 
 THE JOY OF THE LORD. 
 
 It is true that, in this regard, somewhat may 
 be attributed to natural temperament, to a bright 
 and cheerful disposition, for which also we must 
 render thanks to the loving Father, who bestows 
 upon some of His children, in common with the 
 
The Joy of the Lord* 21 
 
 flowers, the instinct of turning ever toward the 
 sunlight. Our lather often quoted the te 
 "The joy of the \a)i\\ is your strength." " De- 
 spair/ 9 said he, "is no motive to action. Hope 
 
 is an everlasting motive to action. How much 
 more effectively we might labor for our Lord if 
 we would but trust Him more simply, and take 
 to ourselves the great comfort and joy of His 
 salvation ! How much of happiness even this 
 world affords for those who take the simple 
 pleasures that it offers free to all ! The world 
 is dying in the midst of its calculation. Indi- 
 viduals are laying plans for happiness, trying 
 to cipher out problems and equations for happi- 
 ness, when, if they would only take things sim- 
 ply, they would find happiness ready to their 
 hand. And it is the same in religion. In this 
 world there is often much in our circumstances 
 to depress us, but we may cheer ourselves greatly 
 by looking for the little comforts about us, and 
 being content to accept them. I always like to 
 take a little sunshine, if there is only a little. 
 Try to find the sunshine if you can get only a 
 little at a time. If you want to gather gold 
 don't expect to find it in nuggets, but follow up 
 the gulches ; follow up the fine sand that will 
 lead at last to the hard quartz diggings. If you 
 want happiness, take it in fine sand, and you will 
 come at last to the hard quartz. Follow up the 
 gulches." 
 
22 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 This helpful habit of searching for the sun- 
 shine is not always so easily acquired by those 
 who possess tempers less cheerful, hearts natu- 
 rally less happy. But of our dear father we might 
 truly say, as said John Wesley of his beloved 
 mother "God never blessed a human creature 
 with a more cheerful disposition, a more gener- 
 ous spirit, a sweeter temper, or a tenderer heart." 
 In the days of our father's childhood was mani- 
 fested the same quiet trust and cheerful confi- 
 dence which in such large degree characterized 
 his later years. During a time of illness, his 
 mother — herself one of those who might truly 
 be called " strong in the faith " — on going to 
 his bedside to inquire whether he wanted any- 
 thing, received the answer: ; 'No, Mamma, I only 
 want to be left alone with my Saviour." To us 
 it seems a beautiful example — perhaps not un- 
 fitting to notice here — of the faith which fol- 
 lows the line of the covenant from generation to 
 generation, that when our little sainted sister — 
 then a child not quite six years of age — was 
 nearing death, she replied to the question: "Are 
 you sleeping? " "No, Mamma, I was only pray- 
 ing." This childlike simplicity of faith seemed 
 never to forsake our dear father. On one oc- 
 casion one said to him : " You have kept your 
 child-heart all through. It is a beautiful thing 
 to see the simplicity and submissiveness of child- 
 
The Joy of the Lord* 2 \ 
 
 hood coupled with the wisdom and strength of 
 
 riper years. That is a perpetuity of youth which 
 the nectar of the gods could not bestow." M Ah !" 
 replied our father, " how those ancieuts were work- 
 ing at great thoughts ; blind giants in the mill 
 of truth. We are made children again, but how ? 
 Not by the child of Zeus, but by the Son of God. 
 They came as near the truth as they could with- 
 out the revelation of Christ. But perhaps if 
 Plato and Socrates had lived to the coming of 
 Christ they would not have received Him more 
 than did the Jews. He was to the Greeks fool- 
 ishness. What the child of Zeus could not do, 
 the Son of God hath done." 
 
III. 
 
 THE EVANGEL OF BEAUTY. 
 
 THROUGHOUT the long summer days, 
 as our father was able to sit at his open 
 window, and enjoy thus a little of the outside 
 world, he received with touching gratitude 
 these tokens of his Father's care, and taught 
 many beautiful lessons from the book of Nature, 
 which he had always loved right well. " There 
 is," he said, " no sweeter or more powerful 
 evangel to me of late, than the beauty that God 
 has permitted to remain in the world. The 
 grass is just as soft and green as when the 
 hand of the Creator first spread its velvet soft- 
 ness over earth, and sprinkled it with diamond 
 dews of Paradise. The rose is just as sweet as 
 when Eve wound its fragrant spray in her 
 dark hair, and," he added, — for he had little 
 sympathy with those gloomy natures that seem 
 to court trouble and seek after grievances, — 
 " and if there is a thorn you are not obliged 
 to prick yourself on it." 
 
 The cool air of the early morning was to him 
 each day a new delight and cause for gratitude ; 
 
The Evangel of Beauty. 
 
 and with the morning mists, the incense of 
 thanksgiving rose heavenward from the altar 
 
 of his heart. " None," said he, "but an infinil 
 beneficent Being would compound an atmos- 
 phere like this for such sinful creatures as we 
 are." Again he said: "All intelligent minds 
 
 love to produce skilful and beautiful things. 
 How must God have enjoyed creating this 
 beautiful world! saying: * Now I will form a 
 flower,' and 'Now I will fashion a tree.' 'And 
 God saw that it was good,' or rather, ' And God 
 saw it for very good.' He looked upon it and 
 blessed it." 
 
 Just outside the window stood a fine old 
 acacia-tree, which afforded our invalid much de- 
 light, and the text for many a sweet sermon. 
 " Thank God," he would exclaim, " for the beau- 
 tiful trees ! They are the expression of His great 
 loving-kindness. How sweetly those fronded 
 leaves fan the cool air in at my window ! They 
 teach me lessons of God's loving care. I prayed 
 Him to bless me in sickness and in health. That 
 prayer was known to Him in the eternity of His 
 counsel ; and He arranged circumstances so that 
 that tree should be planted there years before 
 the prayer was made. The placing of it was 
 a matter of choice, it may have been a matter 
 of dispute; but it was planted there to be the 
 answer to the prayer when it should be made. 
 
26 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 We see thus the juxtaposition of the Divine 
 providence and the Divine purpose." 
 
 THE FATHER'S CARE. 
 
 Flowers, too, were to our father the silent 
 messengers of loving care. In health he had 
 delighted to study them, and they brought joy 
 and brightness into his sick-room. A bouquet 
 brought him by a friend he received as a part 
 of the kind providence for that day. " I will 
 not,'' he said, " admit anything in the explana- 
 tion of the universe that will interfere with God 
 as my personal Guardian, Counsellor, Director, 
 and Friend. It is true He is good to all, but 
 I like to individualize it. He is my personal 
 God, my personal Friend. * The Lord is good 
 to all, and His loving-kindness is over all His 
 works/ And so we must come to Him. ' Who- 
 soever cometh to Him must come believing that 
 He is, and that He is the rewarder of all them 
 that diligently seek Him.' But I like to individ- 
 ualize it. He loves me, and gave Himself for 
 me> to redeem me. David individualizes it. 
 With what particular parental care has He 
 watched over His children in all ages. The 
 world is disputing endlessly about providence, 
 whether it be general or particular, or both ; 
 but one such fact as the story of Joseph is 
 
Father's Care, 
 
 worth more to the solution of the question, and 
 infinitely more to the Faith and comfort of the 
 
 believer, than a thousand tomes of such spe 
 lative disputations. I asked my Father to care 
 for me and bless me to-day. These beautiful 
 flowers are a part of that tender care. God 
 located the fact alongside the prayer. This is 
 His teaching with regard to asking and receiv- 
 ing. ' Is any sick among you ? let him send 
 for the elders,' etc. I do not doubt His power 
 to bestow upon me the very blessing His in- 
 finite wisdom sees best ; prayer is the use of 
 proper means." 
 
 " You have preached a sermon," said our 
 friend, " on my little bunch of flowers." 
 
 11 Well, my Master did so on a single lily, and 
 the prophet did so on a poor withered leaf. 'We 
 all do fade as a leaf/ The flowers, yes, and 
 even the weeds, have preached many a sermon 
 to me. During the early summer of my first 
 year in the ministry, I saw, day after day, just 
 at the edge of the path leading to my cottage 
 boarding-place, a little shepherd's purse, or sort 
 of pepper-grass. It grew almost in the path, 
 where it was in constant danger of being trod- 
 den under foot, and I often wondered, in a sort 
 of sympathizing way, why it grew there. But 
 quite early in the season, I one day saw some 
 young birds picking out the seeds that had 
 
28 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 ripened early in this arid spot, and I then under- 
 stood the wisdom that had placed the little plant 
 where constant treading should make the ground 
 hard and hot, and result in the early ripening of 
 the seeds, before others were ready, that those 
 little birds might have food. In Ohio, when I 
 was on my mission, I noticed the tall weeds that 
 grew in a black ash swamp, and I wondered why 
 they were permitted to grow there, to sow the 
 country with weeds. But one winter day I saw 
 a flock of wild turkeys feeding there, picking the 
 seeds from these weeds. If they had not grown 
 so tall and strong the snow would have beaten 
 them down, but in that rank soil they grew, and 
 were the turkeys' food. God cares for the birds. 
 You may sometimes see the little ants tugging 
 away at a big weed and drawing the head of it 
 down into their house at great pains and trouble ; 
 but on it you will see the aphides, which are the 
 ant's cows, and they will milk these little insects 
 in the winter. They will pat the aphides on the 
 back, and they will exude a drop of honey. The 
 ants are not the only creatures who know how to 
 pat other people on the back to get their honey." 
 At another time our father said : " There is 
 nothing common in this great sheet of the world 
 that God has let down to us ; there is nothing 
 common nor unclean. I think I have taught 
 you that the common world, the world that is 
 
A Lesson from the I : l>>. 29 
 
 trodden under foot, is a beautiful world. What 
 beautiful bouquets we have gathered just along 
 the common country pathways ! Even the plain 
 
 brown sorrel was like finest moss. I do love the 
 anemones, — delicate wind-flowers, — the hepati- 
 ! and little twistfoot, the ferns and violets and 
 roses. I would like them every one to grow 
 upon my grave ; and the pure white sanguina- 
 ria. Sometimes, in the spring, I have seen the 
 first green leaf coming up through the mould, and 
 I have felt like kneeling down and kissing it. It 
 talked to me, and I felt like taking it in my arms 
 and talking to it." 
 
 A LESSON FROM THE FLOWERS. 
 
 So well known was our father's love of flowers 
 that they were often brought to his pulpit ; and 
 more than once their beauty so impressed him 
 he was fain to pause before preaching, to thank 
 the unknown hand that placed them there, say- 
 ing : " They are God's own beautiful children, 
 and they speak to us of His love and tender- 
 ness." Talking of the mission he believed these 
 beautiful things of earth were designed to ac- 
 complish, he said : " Much may be done for the 
 world in these simple ways. You cannot know 
 what good may be brought about through the 
 evangel of a single flower. Do not be selfish 
 
jo A Golden Sunset. 
 
 with these beautiful blessings. Plant some of 
 your choicest flowers along by the fence, close 
 to the dusty highway, so that the weary, way- 
 worn traveller, even the tiresome, treacherous 
 tramp, pausing at your beautiful gate, may catch 
 the precious fragrance of your flowers and be re- 
 freshed. Go out thus with your flowers into the 
 highways and hedges. And go out yourself as 
 the fragrance goes. Carry the sweet odor of 
 Christian love out into the dusty thoroughfares, 
 into the highways and hedges. And these may be 
 very near you. Topographically Baxter Street 
 is not very far from the Fifth Avenue, but mor- 
 ally they may be heaven-wide apart. And if you 
 are a Christian you will go out thus. You can- 
 not fence in fragrance. Fragrance is God's free 
 child ; it will out on the wings of the wind. And 
 if you have the spirit of Christ you cannot help 
 showing it. A rose cannot help having a per- 
 fume ; it has a perfume because it is a rose. 
 So a Christian cannot help doing good. This 
 resolving and re-resolving to exert an influence 
 for good is all nonsense ; if a person is a Chris- 
 tian all that will follow naturally. All you have 
 to do is to be a Christian ; all the rest will come. 
 A bouquet of flowers may have some of disagree- 
 able odors, but if a pink is there you will find 
 it, and it will be a delightful pink notwithstand- 
 ing the disagreeable odors all about it." 
 
v. v 
 
 These simple and oft unappreciated ] 
 were to our lather among the sweetest pleasures 
 of life ; and of such pleasures, he sometimes said, 
 
 he had " taken his share," — surely with gi 
 tude and joy. "I do not believe," he said, "that 
 God is glorified when we spurn His gifts. Every 
 good gift and every perfect gift comcth down 
 from Him. My God is in them all. They are 
 handed down in His hand, and if I reject them I 
 reject a gift. It is not refusing a proposition, it 
 is rejecting God in His kindest manifestations." 
 
 LIGHT. 
 
 Truly the good gifts of God were not wasted 
 upon our dear one. The lovely light of morning 
 seemed to waken a new light in his beautiful 
 face, as though a sun were rising there ; and so 
 it was when we sang our " Gold'ne Abend " hymn, 
 an old evening praise-song of Switzerland, the 
 land of his forefathers, which he loved, for asso- 
 ciation's sake, to sing in the German. As he 
 sat at his western window and sang the beauti- 
 ful words of praise, the glory of the sunset 
 seemed to rest like a halo on his silver hair ; 
 and so fully did he enter into the glory and 
 beauty before him, he appeared himself to be 
 a part of the sunset, and personally to partake 
 of the nature of the scene. 
 
^2 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 " Gold'ne Abendsonne, 
 Wie bist Du so schon ! 
 Nie kann ohne Wonne 
 Deinen Glanz ich sehn. 
 
 " Schon in zarter Jugend 
 Sah ich gern nach Dir, 
 Und der Trieb zur Tugend 
 Gliihte mehr in mir. 
 
 " Wenn ich so am Abend, 
 Staunend vor Dir stand, 
 Und an Dir mich lobend 
 Meiner Schopfer's Hand. 
 
 " Doch von Dir, O Sonne ! 
 Wend ich meinen Blick, 
 Mit noch hohrer Wonne 
 Auf mich selbst zuriick. 
 
 " Schuf uns ja doch Beide 
 Eines Schopfer's Hand, 
 Dich im Strahlenkleide, 
 Mich im Staubgewand." 
 
 " Oh, how delightful it is," he exclaimed one 
 evening, " to come down to the evening of life 
 and have the sun shine brightly ! It is heavenly, 
 after a life of care, and some troubles and dis- 
 appointments, of course, to have such a quiet 
 and happy close. The sun shines brightly at 
 the sunset of my life, and I shall have to get 
 beyond those golden bars for anything better 
 or more beautiful than this. After a while, 
 when I am going home, I would like you all to 
 
Light. ?? 
 
 id about my bed, and sing our good-night 
 
 hymn of praise. 
 
 11 It was not so unnatural that the Syrian 
 shepherds should adore the glorious orbs of 
 light. The Gospel sanctifies this. 'The Lord 
 I is a sun and shield;' 'The Lamb is the 
 light thereof ; ' ' The entrance of Thy words 
 giveth light.' Philosophers say that all the 
 world needs is more light ; but what the world 
 needs is life. ' In Him was life ; and the life 
 was the light of men.' Life, then light ; life, 
 then light, — that is the order. A blind man 
 cannot enjoy a beautiful landscape, not though 
 you brought the light of a thousand suns to 
 illumine it. But let the surgeon with his 
 little needle push down the cataract that covers 
 the pupil, and he is filled with delight. Now 
 his eye is alive ; it needed life, not increased 
 light." 
 
 At another time he said : " Yes, I do love the 
 sunlight. I don't like darkness, — intellectual, 
 moral, physical, nor any kind of darkness. God 
 is light; 'in Him is no darkness at all.' Light 
 is to me the universal symbol of all that is good. 
 It is used as the symbol of intelligence. The 
 highest view is glory. 'There shall be no 
 night there.' " 
 
IV. 
 
 TRUSTING THE FATHER. 
 
 RECEIVING the good things of life as from 
 a Father's bountiful hand, the eye of our 
 dear father seemed turned ever upward, as the 
 eye of a trustful child to the face of a kind and 
 loving parent. How much of the joy and com- 
 fort that comes like sunshine into such lives of 
 prayer may be missed by the formal or infre- 
 quent performance of that duty which should, of 
 all duties, be a delight ! We faint for lack of the 
 heavenly manna so near at hand, only because 
 we fail to gather it fresh each day. " You can- 
 not," said our father one morning, " ask God for 
 daily bread once a year." One Sabbath evening 
 in March, after a time of quiet rest, he said : 
 " I had a good hour of worship on my bed this 
 afternoon ; I was with my people." " Did you 
 preach?" asked one. " No, I prayed, — prayed 
 for the minister, whoever he might be. Oh, how 
 I love to appeal to God as my covenant God. 
 He is mine ; I know Him. I love to say to 
 Him : *I am Thy servant, and the son of Thy 
 handmaid,' and go back to the faith of my 
 
Trusting the Fatbei . ?s 
 
 fathers. It is so easy for me, you know, to 
 back through generation after generation, through 
 the line of the Swiss Reformation; and from thai 
 
 I , i back to the faith of Abraham. That is wh 
 
 I belong; that is the company with which I mus- 
 ter ; and I believe, when the roll is called for the 
 last time on the great mustering day, I shall be 
 there. 
 
 u I love," he said again, " to commit myself to 
 God in prayer, and then go quietly to sleep ; to 
 say my prayer as I did when a child, and have 
 Him lay His hand on my hot eyes and soothe 
 me to rest." Never, throughout his life, did he 
 close his eyes at night without having repeated 
 that precious little prayer, learned at his mother's 
 knee : " Now I lay me down to sleep ;" and al- 
 ways ended by saying, in truly childlike spirit, 
 
 II God bless me and make me a good man." 
 
 How restful, how blessed, such a spirit of quiet, 
 unquestioning trust ! It is not the spirit of indo- 
 lence nor of apathy ; it was not so with our dear 
 one. "We must not," he said, "allow our sub- 
 mission to interfere with our faith, nor our faith 
 to degenerate into presumption." And again, 
 in talking on the same subject: "We must not 
 interpret submission into indifference, nor de- 
 sire into discontent." With him all labor was 
 prayer ; it was in itself an appeal for help. No 
 work could be begun in which dependence upon 
 
36 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 the Divine Helper was not recognized, the Di- 
 vine assistance invoked. " Prayer hinders no 
 work," yet we sometimes permit our work to 
 hinder our prayers. To a prayerful spirit op- 
 portunities are ever present. " During the last 
 year of my studies," said our father one day, " I 
 took an agency for the Missionary Society. In 
 travelling from place to place I had no closet for 
 prayer ; but sometimes in the woods I found a 
 fallen tree with the roots upturned, and into this 
 place the dry leaves had blown. I have brushed 
 the snow away and knelt down there and prayed. 
 And I have had sweet communion with God in 
 those places." 
 
 PRAYER. 
 
 Memory brings up at this moment a time of 
 removal, years ago, to a parish in which, from 
 various causes, the weekly meeting for prayer 
 had not been regularly maintained. Our 
 father's prompt decision was thus expressed to 
 his people : " I cannot preach to a church that 
 cannot sustain a prayer-meeting. " And from 
 that day to the present the evening incense has 
 not failed to ascend from that altar, nor the 
 blessing to descend upon the people. A few 
 months since, on paying a visit to that dear 
 church home, and chancing to glance over, in 
 the house of one of its members, a book of 
 
The Consecrated Little. ?7 
 
 family memoirs, the following words appeared : 
 
 "The degree and amount of real religion in any 
 
 church can generally be ascertained from the 
 spirit which reigns in these little assemblies 
 where the express object had in view is to call 
 on God." Such were the words of the saintly 
 Dr. Gilbert R. Livingston, — "his estimates and 
 wishes concerning prayer-meetings, as he com- 
 municated them to those who sustained them in 
 his church, when he supposed himself very near 
 death." If the spirit which reigns in these as- 
 semblies, — in our own hearts, — be that of earn- 
 est consecration, of desire for God's glory, the 
 blessing is assured. 
 
 In speaking on this subject in connection with 
 revivals, our father one day said: " Preaching and 
 prayer are the means, we must supply the condi- 
 tions ; God will take care of the results. God's 
 glory is the great aim. Christ in the Temple 
 prayed : * Father, glorify Thy name.' When we 
 get there a voice will come from heaven : * I 
 have both glorified it and will glorify it again.' 
 God does not want our noisy prayers, but our 
 heart's consecration." 
 
 THE CONSECRATED LITTLE. 
 
 At times wc all seem to realize, we who are 
 striving to follow the gracious Master, the im- 
 portance of this matter of personal consecra- 
 
38 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 * 
 tion, — of devoting all that we have and are 
 
 unreservedly to Him ; and yet how easy it is 
 for us, particularly when cut off, by any cause, 
 from the activities of life, to lose sight, in some 
 degree, of individual responsibility ; and to lose, 
 in consequence, much of happiness to ourselves, 
 and of helpfulness to others. " The interest on 
 our talent would be so small that we excuse 
 ourselves with the reflection that it is not worth 
 while." 
 
 In talking on the use of small opportunity 
 and talent " for His sake," our father said : " A 
 drop of dew is a small thing. You may say 
 that you are small and unimportant, and can do 
 nothing, But look at the drop of dew in the 
 morning light. The sun shines upon it, and as 
 you look through it you see all the rainbow- 
 colors. The dewdrop is small, but it can hold 
 the sun. And what does God say ? * I will be 
 as the dew unto Israel.' Such a simple thing 
 as a drop of dew ; yet God says He will be as 
 the dew, — so simple in itself, yet possessed of 
 silent potency that works marvels. And we, 
 though we may be very little and very simple, 
 may reflect the image of God, as the dewdrop 
 reflects the sun. Are we hidden away, unseen, 
 useless ? Think of a little pool, hidden deep 
 beneath the thick foliage of the valley. No eye 
 sees it ; but a single ray of sunlight steals 
 
The Consecrated Little* jg 
 
 through the shade, and kisses off a light vapor 
 
 from its surface. The vapor rises and floats 
 about all day in lower air, if you please; but in 
 the cool evening it descends, a single drop of 
 dew, upon the petals of a lovely rose that stands, 
 it may be, upon the window-sill of a poor, sick 
 woman. She is too poor and insignificant to 
 command the attentions of the great, and this 
 rose which she has planted with her own hand 
 is her only comforter ; it is her last friend. As 
 she wakens in the morning and catches the 
 fragrance of her flower, her heart is comforted ; 
 and she sinks sweetly to rest on the arm of 
 God, through the gentle ministry of her little 
 rose, that is breathing out its breath of fragrant 
 gratitude for the drop of dew that slipped into 
 its heart. ,, 
 
V. 
 
 THE CHURCH. 
 
 AT another time we were talking of the dan- 
 ger of looking upon our own part in the 
 work of the Church as too insignificant to be of 
 value, forgetting that if His glory is the aim, no 
 work can be insignificant. 
 
 " It is," said our father, "like the wheels of a 
 clock. When each wheel turns round in its 
 own place, joining hands with the wheel near- 
 est it on this side, and another wheel on that 
 side taking hold in its place, everything runs 
 smoothly, and the time is told on the face. 
 Clock-makers understand the relations of these 
 wheels to each other, but the wheels know 
 nothing about it, — yet the result is, telling 
 time on the face of the clock. If individuals 
 do their duty faithfully, develop themselves 
 according to the laws of truth and right, the 
 result will be an harmonious movement on the 
 surface of society. But suppose some wheel 
 should say : ' Here I have been turning round 
 on this old pivot long enough. I 'm going up 
 there on the face, to turn those hands around 
 
The Church. ji 
 
 and do something. 1 Nothing would be accom 
 plished. Every one on his own pivot So, if 
 every church-member docs the work that lies 
 
 nearest, harmonious]}' joining hands with the one- 
 next him, the time will be told. The same thing 
 illustrates the relations of the different denomi- 
 nations. Let the Presbyterian work here, the 
 Baptist there, the Methodist in the other place, 
 each on its own pivot, and all unitedly, and the 
 time will be told. God will be glorified." 
 
 Often, as our dear father talked of these things, 
 and of the possibilities open to earnest Christian 
 endeavor, it seemed a grand thing to be able to 
 aid, even in the least, the execution of the Lord's 
 great plan ; to be a part of His Church, and so of 
 the power that moves the world. In talking of 
 the relation of the Church to the world on one oc- 
 casion he said : " ' Thy way, O God, is in the sanc- 
 tuary.' As is the Church, so is the world. The 
 whole destiny of the world is wrapped up in the 
 Church. The course which God pursues in re- 
 gard to the Church determines destiny. The 
 Church is determinative of the world." And 
 carrying out the same thought: " The way of 
 Egypt is in the Nile-gauge. The tide-gauge of 
 the Nile shows how high the waters have risen, 
 so that persons observing year after year know 
 by experience how much land is submerged and 
 how much wheat there will be. That tide-gauge 
 
42 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 is the Church. How high is the tide-mark of 
 spirituality in the Church ? Go into the prayer- 
 meeting and ask : How much of spirituality, of 
 earnest consecration, is there in it ? You need 
 not go paddling about to see how other people 
 are doing. Go into your own heart and ask, 
 How much of the grace of God is there in 
 me ? . . . What the Church wants is to come 
 to the single desire for God's glory. When 
 Christ approaches the last hour and contem- 
 plates, the great struggle before Him ; when He 
 is to take upon Himself the sins of the world, 
 and looks for some support, — he says : * What 
 shall I say ? Father, save me from this hour ' ? 
 Shall He say that ? ' Nay, but for this hour 
 came I into the world.' And He looked about 
 for something to rest upon, and He said : ' Father, 
 glorify Thy name.' Then the answer came quick 
 from heaven : ' I have both glorified it and will 
 glorify it again.' When the Church comes there, 
 then the answer will come straightway from 
 above." What an answer of peace passing all 
 understanding, and of joy unutterable, will it be 
 to the spirit that thus prays ! What an answer 
 of power over all the weakness and depression 
 within and about us, lifting us far above and 
 away from the bitterness of present trial and 
 struggle ! Says De Pressense : " ' My will, not 
 Thine, be done,' turned Paradise into a desert. 
 
The Cburcb. ./ > 
 
 4 Thy will, not mine, be done, 1 turned the desert 
 into .i Paradise, and made Gethsemane the gate 
 of Heaven." 
 
 How often, during those days of patient wait- 
 in-, our dear father's thoughts turned toward the 
 Church, which he loved to call " the right hand of 
 the divine Omnipotence in the regeneration of 
 men! " He delighted to dwell upon her pros- 
 pects and to read in all the events of the time the 
 working out of God's great thoughts of mercy 
 toward the world. " All these events," he would 
 say, "and opening up of old countries are just 
 what is prophesied. He shall overturn and over- 
 turn and overturn, ' till He whose right it is shall 
 come ; and He shall give the kingdom unto 
 Him.' All these events are like a column of fig- 
 ures, and they foot up, — millennium. God alone 
 holds the key of history. We can understand 
 it only when we let Him unlock its mysteries, 
 and see the unfolding of His plan in all." 
 
 "The Church," said our father again, "is the 
 great object of the universe. When God made 
 the drawing of the universe the Church lay on 
 the tablet before Him. As the builder carries 
 his tablet as he works, so God carries the Church 
 before Him. That etching was made with the 
 intense fire of His infinite love that burnt the 
 plan of the Church into the palm of His hand. 
 1 Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms 
 
44 ^ Golden Sunset. 
 
 of my hands ; thy walls are continually before 
 me. 
 
 Loving, as he did, the Church and his life labor 
 as one of her ministers, it is hardly strange that 
 the greatest trial of this long time of inactivity 
 was inability to preach. The very gratitude with 
 which he received the Heavenly Father's bless- 
 ings, temporal and spiritual, made him long to 
 tell abroad His gracious goodness ; made him 
 long sometimes for the praises of Heaven and 
 for its companionships, that he might speak and 
 understand more perfectly the Lord's great love 
 to men. So much were these thoughts in his 
 mind that the occurrences of every-day life were 
 constantly calling forth expressions of them. 
 
 A SERMON AT MIDNIGHT. 
 
 On an April night, about midnight, we were 
 roused from sleep by a severe thunder-storm. 
 Across the darkness flashed the lightning, 
 sudden and vivid, and thunder rolled through 
 the heavens with a voice that seemed doubly 
 loud and full of awe, — as is always the case in 
 early spring, to ears grown unaccustomed to 
 such sounds by the long winter's silence. To 
 our father it was the text for a sermon which 
 he preached to us by night, even as the Master 
 preached to the ruler, when, perchance, the 
 
A Sermon at Midnight. 4^ 
 
 night winds, moving overhead among the tr< 
 of the garden, may have furnished the text, 
 
 11 We are very near to God," said our father, 
 11 at a time like this ; and we should always 
 pray to Him, We arc so powerless against an 
 enemy so subtle. We should pray God to pro- 
 tect all hie. There is a great deal of innocent 
 life exposed at such a time: the birds in their 
 nests and the squirrels among the branches. 
 The birds are very much exposed ; it is true 
 their feathers are a natural defence against the 
 lightning, but this does the young in the nest 
 no good. They are without feathers, and their 
 investiture would rather invite the danger. We 
 should pray God to guide this subtle element 
 to the accomplishment of His purposes in the 
 purification of the atmosphere, and that He 
 would protect all exposed life against it : the 
 cattle lying under the trees, the horses and 
 cows and sheep that are so useful to us. This 
 is the relation man sustains to the lower ani- 
 mals. They cannot pray for themselves, ex- 
 cept as their helplessness is a mute appeal for 
 protection, and we ought to pray for their 
 safety." 
 
 And so our precious father talked to us, as 
 was his wont, in this simple way, and we were 
 pleased to call it " preaching," and " our 
 church," while the thunder rang our bell, and 
 
46 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 electricity lighted our great chandelier. As 
 the tumult of the storm grew less, and the soft 
 sound of the rain was heard, our father said : 
 " Hear how He cares for us. He supplied the 
 conditions of the atmosphere that justified the 
 rain falling. What a great commotion to intro- 
 duce such a gentle whisper as that ! " And as 
 we talked of God's goodness and tender care, 
 one spoke of the gratitude with which those 
 blessings were received. " I do love God," he 
 answered ; " I love to talk about His goodness 
 to me. I want every one to hear it. Oh, what 
 will be the joy of recounting amid the heavenly 
 host the goodness of my gracious God, and of 
 hearing from angelic lips the methods of His 
 wonderful working throughout all the cycles 
 before I was born ! What then will be the joy 
 of feeling that I am connected, in my experi- 
 ence, with God's great purposes of goodness 
 and love away back to all eternity! Alleluia! 
 Amen ! Alleluia ! Now I go back to the cove- 
 nant with Abraham, and that will be known 
 there ; but then I shall go back to what I can- 
 not see here, — the eternal covenant of God 
 through all the history of the covenant. I 
 want it all ; it is all mine in Christ Jesus, and 
 I will have it all. God comes down through 
 the ages in the execution of His mighty pur- 
 poses, and the universe trembles beneath His 
 
A Sermon at Midnight. 47 
 
 tread. In I lis care of every order of beings, 
 
 His purpose flows a stream of mercy and 
 blessing. That flood crosses the path of the 
 oldest archangel before the throne. It crosses 
 the path of man, and of the lower animals, — 
 the beasts and birds and fishes and insects, — 
 of every creature and of inanimate things. 
 The trees clap their hands and the birds in the 
 branches sing His praise. The oxen low, and 
 the lion roareth for his prey, and God feedeth 
 them. And then comes the reflex of all this 
 goodness and blessing. ' It is more blessed to 
 give than to receive/ God's goodness flows, a 
 mighty stream of blessing, around the circuit of 
 the earth, and breaks, a great wave, at the foot 
 of His throne. What a happy being God must 
 be! The overflowing river of His great benefi- 
 cence, that blesses all the universe, returns and 
 pours itself, a ceaseless river of joy, into the 
 heart of God. Do you wonder that I love to 
 preach these things ? Do you wonder that I 
 love to preach, or that I long for it, when I can 
 commune with Christians, and see the tears 
 glistening in their eyes and coursing down 
 their cheeks? I believe it does them good to 
 talk to them on these great themes. I believe 
 it counteracts the narrowing influences that 
 surround them, and lifts them up to the throne 
 of God Himself. You must not forget these 
 
48 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 things. You must think about them. These 
 thoughts are my daily food." 
 
 Being cut off thus from the service of the 
 Father's house, and longing to participate per- 
 sonally in its worship, it afforded our patient 
 invalid true happiness when he knew that an 
 Easter hymn which he had translated from the 
 German of Riickert had been set to music, and 
 used in the Easter service of the church. " I 
 thank the Father," he said, "that He has per- 
 mitted me to contribute, even in this little way, 
 toward the service of His house." The transla- 
 tion, as published, is as follows : — 
 
 " From Easter morning's leafy wold 
 The lark mounts up on dewy wings, 
 And floating o'er the quiet fold, 
 
 This song she to the shepherds sings : 
 Awake, the darkness flies! 
 The new day breaks 
 The might of night. 
 Awake, ye lambs, to meet the light, 
 From the moist turf arise ! 
 
 " Our Easter Lamb repaired our loss, 
 Did our inheritance restore, 
 When, bleeding on the shameful cross, 
 The guilt of all His flock He bore; 
 The conquerer claims his meed ! 
 The robber grave 
 Its prey relieves ; 
 
 And now upon the greenest leaves 
 His gentle flock may feed. 
 
A Sermon at Midnight. 49 
 
 1 The tree Of life, with forfeit fruit, 
 
 Stood leafless, withering in its doom; 
 
 The Lamb's fresh Mood shall bathe its root, — 
 
 Like Sharon's rose it then shall bloom. 
 The wrath is borne away ; 
 ( )ur Shepherd, see ! 
 HlS flock I Ie leads 
 To pasture on the verdant meads 
 Of an eternal day." 
 
VI. 
 
 THE COMFORT AND TRIUMPH OF FAITH. 
 
 THERE are, undoubtedly, many of God's 
 chastened ones who have received, to- 
 day are receiving, His blessings with the same 
 childlike gratitude which our dear father dis- 
 played ; who have borne His loving discipline 
 with a like quiet, unquestioning submission. It 
 is not for anything remarkable in themselves that 
 we now recall and record the sweet and simple 
 words that were daily uttered in our hearirg ; 
 but that the sound of them still vibrates in lov- 
 ing hearts, and that the echo of them may, per- 
 chance, waken some more cheerful strain in other 
 hearts weighed down by present trial or sorrow. 
 Oftentimes these expressions of gratitude would 
 break forth as from a full heart at morning or 
 evening worship. " Oh, what a rich heritage is 
 mine ! " said our father one morning ; " what a 
 rich heritage in the love and all the innumera- 
 ble blessings that surround me, — covenant bless- 
 ings. And God gives us Himself, the best of all 
 His gifts. The next best is a grateful heart to 
 receive." And again at morning prayer : " How 
 
The Comfort and Triumph oj / : <n'/b. ji 
 
 sweetly didst Thou lay Thy hand Oil our tired 
 :a and say, ' Sleep.' I Tow kindly didst Thou 
 SOOthe the jaded nervous system, these disturb- 
 ances of the body, 'and there was a great calm.' 
 How gently dost Thou breathe upon us in the 
 cool morning air," etc., drawing near to the 
 Father in simple, childlike gratitude, in prayer 
 that sounded like song. And at night he said 
 to us : " What a precious thing it is to thank 
 God each night for the kindness He has shown 
 me, and for the sweet and beautiful ministries 
 by which those kindnesses have been brought 
 to me." And : " I think as I lie down on my 
 pillow, Oh, what a blessed thing it is to rest. I 
 am as one whom his mother comforteth. We 
 sometimes need comfort, and then the Lord does 
 not promise to lead us nor to defend us from our 
 enemies, but to comfort us. Any one who has a 
 mother, and knows what it is to have her com- 
 fort when it is needed, will know what the Lord 
 would be to us. He bids us rest on His bosom, 
 He gently strokes our foreheads, and says that 
 we must be good children. How beautiful that 
 the Lord compares Himself to a tender mother ! 
 1 Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord 
 pitieth them that fear Him.' 'As one whom his 
 mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.' Our 
 father pities, but our mother comforts us. I take 
 the words for just what they mean, — 'As one 
 
52 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 whom his mother comforteth.' " At another time 
 he said : " I feel at ease, I have no anxiety. I 
 do not feel assurance in this world's good, but 
 in Him my soul rests. Every night I say my 
 text, ' Gottes Briinnlein hat Wassers die fulle/ 
 [' The river of God is full of water ' (Psalm lxv. 9), 
 — a text which had been handed down as an heir- 
 loom in his mothers family] ; and that means," 
 he added, " that the resources of providence and 
 of grace are bank-full at all times. God's re- 
 sources are inexhaustible. Look again at the 
 text: 'My God shall supply all your need ac- 
 cording to the riches of His glory in Christ 
 Jesus.' See how rich is the measure of sup- 
 ply ; how great is His glory, His brightness, 
 His beauty as seen in Christ Jesus. He will 
 give no meagre supply ; there is no stint, not a 
 crumb here and there, but ' according to the 
 riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.' " 
 
 Sweet and comforting was His trust in His 
 almighty Friend ; yet, oh, how different from 
 the self-complacency which (as his good old 
 Elder Diedrick used to say) is sometimes sub- 
 stituted for the peace of God ! Far from pos- 
 sessing a spirit of self-complacency, our good 
 father's humility was deep and sincere. One 
 May morning comes to mind, when he looked 
 up at the card on the wall and read the texts : 
 " ' And this is His commandment, that we should 
 
/ ( omfort and Triumph oj Faith* 
 
 believe on the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, 
 and love one another. 1 (l John iii. 23.) ' Unto 
 you therefore which believe He is precious. 1 
 
 (1 Peter ii. 7.) 'That Christ may dwell in your 
 hearts by faith.' (Hph. iii. 17.) 'Believe on the 
 Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.' 
 Oh, what a card that is ! " he exclaimed. 
 44 What information that is for a world of 
 sinners! It is overwhelming! What news that 
 is for a poor man who feels he is a lost sinner ! 
 What an announcement that last text contains : 
 ' Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou 
 shalt be saved/ It is worth being set in dia- 
 monds. What a lesson for the Church : ' And 
 love one another.' Believe in the same Lord, 
 and love as brethren. Faith has its manifesta- 
 tion in love, just as dew has its manifestation, 
 not as dew but as fruit. ' Unto you which be- 
 lieve He is precious.' * Precious ' means ' valu- 
 able;' just as a jewel is precious because it is 
 valuable. Jesus is precious, He is valuable, to 
 us. How priceless is the treasure of His love, 
 when all other love and comfort fail us ! I re- 
 member at this moment a poor soldier lying in 
 the hospital mortally wounded, to whom I was 
 called in the days of my chaplaincy. I talked and 
 prayed with him, and to test him, that I might 
 feel assured concerning him, I asked : 'Is it 
 not strange that God should allow you to be so 
 
54 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 injured ? ' The soldier looked up and said : 
 1 He doeth all things well.' I asked : ' Can you 
 rest entirely on Jesus ? Can you fold your hands 
 and go quietly to sleep in Jesus, trusting all to 
 Him ? ' With sweet restfulness of voice and ex- 
 pression the man answered, * Yes ; ' and I folded 
 his hands quietly and left him for the night. 
 The next morning I went in to inquire about 
 him. ' He is gone/ said the officer in charge. 
 1 He lay perfectly quiet after you left him. I 
 went up after a while to see if he wanted any- 
 thing, and he lay there so still, just as you left 
 him, with his hands folded over his breast. I 
 spoke to him, but he did not answer, and I 
 found that he was gone.' " 
 
 How blessed a thing it is for all who can, as 
 that poor wounded soldier did, each night " lay 
 them down in peace and sleep," knowing that 
 He alone, whether here or yonder, makes them 
 to " dwell in safety " ! 
 
 LEAVING ALL WITH HIM. 
 
 " I am sometimes reminded," said our father 
 one day, when talking of leaving all with Him, 
 — "I am sometimes reminded of good Josiah 
 Bissell. When he was growing old, after years of 
 loving labor for the Master, he was one evening 
 at a meeting at w r hich the Christian hope was 
 
Leaving All with Him. 
 talked o(. An old man present remarked that 
 
 he did not know that he had any hope left, he 
 had followed the Master at so great a distance. 
 
 Another spoke in the same dejected tone, and 
 Still another ; until it appeared there were a sad 
 number of rather uncertain hopes among them. 
 Finally Mr. Bissell arose. 'Oh, my brethren,' 
 said he, ' I don't know anything about my hope. 
 I gave that to Christ a good many years ago, 
 and promised to do His work ; and I am trying 
 to do it, and have not thought much about my 
 hope. But I guess when I come to the end I 
 shall find He has kept it safely for me.' " 
 
 On one occasion one spoke with gratitude to 
 our father of the example of unquestioning faith 
 and resignation, which was not without influ- 
 ence. " My faith," replied our father, "has been 
 much to me. Sometimes when the foundations 
 have seemed *to be removed, and everything 
 appeared to be going to destruction, I have felt 
 calm and happy. I seemed to stand upon a 
 rock that could not be moved." Often he 
 talked of this faith founded upon the purpose 
 of God, His eternal purpose. "It is not," he 
 said, " founded upon the sand, but rests down 
 upon the bed-rock of Deity, the granite of God- 
 head." u It is always safe," he would say, "al- 
 ways victorious, to trust in the Lord. He can 
 conquer by many or by few. He can work by 
 
56 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 means, or without means, or contrary to means. 
 It matters not how formidable may be the op- 
 posing force, ' one with God is always a majority/ 
 Oh, how much comes from a little of God's 
 work, and how little from much of our own ! " 
 
 One evening in July, as the hour for rest drew 
 near, a refreshing breeze sprang up. " I hope," 
 said one to our father, " that you may have a 
 restful sleep, as last night," " The Lord sent 
 me the sleep," he answered ; " perhaps He will 
 send it to me to-night. It all comes from Him. 
 He makes all my bed in my sickness. ' I will 
 never leave thee nor forsake thee/ — that is my 
 pillow. ' He will cover thee with His feathers, 
 and under His wings shalt thou trust/ — that is 
 my cover. * Underneath are the everlasting 
 arms/ — that is my bed. That is a good bed. 
 * So He giveth His beloved sleep/ " These words 
 from Isaiah liv. 8 were read to him : " With 
 everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee." 
 " Those are wonderful words," said he. " I would 
 like to preach from them sometime. Mercy is 
 a law term, — showing mercy to transgressors, 
 pardoning guilt, and all that, — but not so, God 
 says, not so will I have mercy ; but with ever- 
 lasting kindness." On the other hand, a ser- 
 mon was reported to him on the text, " Neither 
 do I condemn thee," in which he felt that sin 
 was too lightly treated. " This is the rule," said 
 
A Covenant-Keeping God. 5*7 
 
 he. "A great many circumstances may plead in 
 mitigation o( damages (punishment), but none 
 in justification of crime. 4 He that knew his 
 Master's will and did it not shall be beaten with 
 many stripes ; but he that knew not his Master's 
 will, though he did many things worthy of stripes, 
 shall be beaten with few stripes.' " 
 
 Thus it had been throughout our dear father's 
 life. His denunciation of sin, his reproof of 
 wrong-doing, had been fearless and faithful ; 
 while his love for the sinner, his patience in up- 
 lifting and striving to uphold the fallen, seemed 
 tireless ; and his faith in a covenant-keeping God 
 seemed ever and all sufficient to strengthen his 
 heart in the labor of love. Truly the God of the 
 covenant did stay his heart and uphold his hand 
 in many a difficult undertaking during that long 
 life. 
 
 A COVENANT-KEEPING GOD. 
 
 In the preparation of these few and simple 
 pages the object has been to make them, as far 
 as possible, a record of the words, the thoughts 
 upon God's word, which were given our dear 
 father during the eventime of life ; and to omit, 
 as far as might be, those personal experiences 
 which might possess less of interest or helpful- 
 ness for a stranger. But the setting down of 
 
 o o 
 
 these thoughts upon God's faithfulness and cov- 
 
58 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 enant mercies has brought to mind one of the 
 early recollections of our father's life, which it 
 might not, perhaps, be amiss to relate here; for, 
 after all, human experience is much the same the 
 world over, and the truth is ever the same ; so 
 the story of trust in one life — long since passed 
 to the heavenly triumph — may inspire greater 
 confidence in some other life passing through 
 the present conflict. 
 
 In the days of our father's boyhood, in his 
 native village in Pennsylvania, — as throughout 
 many parts of the country at that time, — vital 
 godliness was at a low ebb ; the old Lutheran 
 churches having become formal and cold, and 
 even her preachers lifeless and worldly. His 
 mother's house was the rendezvous of those 
 faithful and fearless ministers of Christ who 
 went about doing good, preaching from place to 
 place, striving to stir up the sleeping churches, 
 and enduring toil and privation, sometimes even 
 persecution and peril. The Rev. John Wein- 
 brenner, the Rev. Jacob Gruber, and other holy 
 and heroic men labored patiently and were blessed 
 with mighty outpourings of the Spirit. 
 
 It seems not improbable that the inspiring ex- 
 ample and frequent companionship of these ear- 
 nest servants of Christ may have exerted some 
 influence in the forming of our father's early de- 
 termination to enter the ministry. The former 
 
A Covenant-Keeping God. 
 
 of those two godly men would take the little 
 
 Christian lad with him on his joumeyings, as 
 Paul took Timothy, encouraging him to prayer 
 
 and exhortation ; and thus began the first child- 
 ish efforts, acceptable and blessed, to labor pub- 
 licly for the Master. But still farther back we 
 may trace the influences brought to bear upon 
 our father's life, and God's faithfulness in hear- 
 ing and answering the prayers of his great- 
 grandfather. This pious man had brought with 
 him, from his Swiss home in old Basle, the faith 
 and zeal of his fathers, who had fought in the 
 battles of the Reformation ; and the Lord blessed 
 his labor of love in striving to teach the old 
 faith in its simplicity and purity in the new land. 
 Among those who traced the beginning of their 
 Christian life to his labors was a lady to whom 
 the Master saw fit to send many trials ; but who 
 amid all her troubles and perplexities possessed 
 a calm, courageous heart that sang its song 
 through all the night-time of her trial. Near 
 her lived an infidel neighbor, a gentleman of 
 great learning, the brother of an eminent French 
 scientist, wise in the wisdom of this world, but 
 blindly sceptical as to all religious truth. This 
 gentleman, M. Reaumur, knowing good Mrs. F. 
 and something of her trials, used to marvel at her 
 calm content and cheerfulness. He knew that 
 he had little to trouble him, and yet he was not 
 
60 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 happy. He began to question himself as to the 
 difference between his neighbor's spirit and his 
 own, and finally was brought to say to himself : 
 " It must be because Mrs. F. believes the Bible, 
 and I do not. I will read that book and see 
 what there is in it." He read, and it was not 
 long ere he sought his pious neighbor for coun- 
 sel and guidance. He became an earnest Chris- 
 tian, and joined the labors of the minority of 
 zealous Christian workers about him. " Often," 
 said our father, " I have been led as a child 
 by my mother, to prayer-meetings in good M. 
 Reaumur's house. He afterward went to Swit- 
 zerland, and became a minister to the Swiss peo- 
 ple, and did great good. So, after all," our father 
 continued, " great-grandfather's influence for good 
 went back to Switzerland. I well remember how, 
 when Mrs. F. and a few of her neighbors would 
 meet together for prayer, and all about her would 
 be mourning the sad state of religion in the place, 
 she would say : ' God is not dead ; the covenant 
 is not broken ; ' and turning to my mother she 
 would say : ' Why, Susie, don't you know that 
 your father's prayers have all got to be an- 
 swered ? He prayed for his neighbors, and for 
 every soul in Middletown, and his prayers must 
 all be answered. It may not come in my time ; 
 but I believe that God will pour out His Spirit 
 on this place, and that there will not be room 
 
A Covenant-Keeping God. 61 
 
 enough in the churches to hold us, and we will 
 have to go out to Slade's woods to find space 
 
 for all who will come.' 
 
 11 True enough, it did come, and in her time, 
 too ; for John Weinbrenner came to Middle- 
 town from Harrisburg, and his coming was 
 followed by a great revival. God poured out 
 His Spirit, until the church was too small to 
 contain the crowds that gathered daily. And 
 they did go out to the woods, and arrange a 
 place near a spring ; and hundreds gathered 
 from the town and surrounding country, and 
 a mighty work was done there. I went out, 
 and I shall never forget the impression made 
 upon me, child though I was, when I saw good 
 Mrs. F. seated beneath a tree, the sunlight 
 shining through the leaves making the shadows 
 come and go on her dear old face, her lips mov- 
 ing in silent prayer, and the tears coursing 
 down her cheeks. I could not stand the sight, 
 for I remembered the words of the godly old 
 lady, and I ran as fast as I could to get away 
 by myself in the wood, and weep alone. 
 
 11 Mrs. F. always prophesied that I would 
 preach when I became a man. She lived to be 
 very old, and at the time of her death I was in 
 Wheeling, Va. She had not seen me for a 
 number of years ; but a short time before she 
 died, she turned to her son and said : ' Tell 
 
62 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 Henry I believe he will preach.' - Henry 
 who ? ' asked her son. * Why, Henry Smuller. 
 I have always believed it, from the time he was 
 led, a little lad, to our prayer-meetings, and read 
 the Bible to the people. I have had sweet 
 Christian communion with him as a child, and 
 I believe he will preach/ It affected me much 
 to know that this godly old lady remembered 
 me even down to the grave, and I recollect 
 how I went, a young man, leaving the hurry 
 of business behind me, out to Crescent Hill, to 
 pray and weep there over the letter that brought 
 her last message to me. And I believe she was 
 permitted to look down from her high place, 
 when I preached for the first time in the old 
 home church in Middletown, with my saintly 
 mother and the venerable John Weinbrenner 
 sitting, silver-crowned, before me." 
 
VII. 
 
 CHRISTIAN LOVE. 
 
 LOOKING back now to the blessed days 
 when our dear father was yet with us, no 
 time seems more hallowed, more thronged with 
 sweet and sacred recollections, than do the 
 quiet Sabbath afternoons, when, like the happy 
 household of Obed-edom, we worshipped the 
 Lord beneath our own roof, and His presence 
 was manifest among us. 
 
 One Sabbath afternoon, after repeating the 
 Creed, our father spoke to us of the " commu- 
 nion of saints." " Communion," said he, " is 
 having all things in common. ' Communion of 
 saints ' reminds us that all things are common 
 to all God's children ; there is no distinction 
 made. They have communion, it is true, in 
 the sense of fellowship, but this means having 
 all things in common. Oh, what has Christian- 
 ity not done for the world ! A season of Chris- 
 tian communion such as this seems almost like 
 the vestibule of heaven." 
 
 Then our dear father spoke of the quiet, 
 happy hours he spent in his bed, for God was 
 
64 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 with him. " Such sweet communion, " said he, 
 " makes one strong to do and dare. It is by 
 close and constant communion with our Master 
 that we gain true inspiration in Christian work, 
 and the warm, tender love that we need if we 
 would labor successfully." 
 
 " I have just been listening," said one of the 
 circle about him, " to a sermon on the text, ' By 
 this shall all men know that ye are my disciples 
 if ye have love one to another/ in which it was 
 said that we are to judge by the outward mani- 
 festations what is the true character of a man." 
 
 " But we must be careful," said our father, 
 " how we apply that rule, lest we misjudge. As 
 is the sum of all the phenomena, such is the 
 thing. What are the phenomena of an orange ? 
 Color, form, texture, certain acids, pulp, — all 
 these taken together are an orange. We may 
 not judge a man by a few manifestations, nor 
 by the same manifestation under different ch- 
 cumstances ; hence it is very difficult to form 
 a correct estimate of a man's character. God 
 says : ' Man looketh on the outward appear- 
 ance, but the Lord looketh on the heart/ 
 While we see a few of the outward phenomena, 
 God has a direct view of the heart. He sees 
 the internal, quintescent characteristics. By 
 this men know that we are His disciples. But 
 why is this made the test ? Why is love to the 
 
Christian I 6} 
 
 brethren made the test of discipleship ? Be 
 Cause the characteristic that God is known by 
 
 is love. God is love; He is a God of love 
 Why not then love everything? Why love one 
 
 another, the diseiples ? Because they were 
 hated ; the world hated them because they 
 loved Christ. So to love them, simply because 
 they loved Christ, without regard to their social 
 condition or popularity, was the strongest test 
 that could be laid down." 
 
 At another time, in speaking of love one to 
 another, he said : " You need never be afraid 
 of loving too much. I have seen morbid Chris- 
 tians who feared to love those nearest them with 
 their whole hearts, lest they should seem to be 
 defrauding God. Every legitimate love inten- 
 sifies every other legitimate love. Love of a 
 child does not diminish one's love for a wife, a 
 sister, a brother. We do not love God less for 
 loving well our earthly objects of affection. 
 ' There is that scattereth and yet increaseth.' 
 Multiplying objects educates, calls forth love, 
 amplifies it. All these objects taken together 
 may be considered the compound object of 
 love. God possesses all the qualities of love in 
 its absolute perfection and fulness. Not to love 
 God is a sin against God and a sin against 
 nature, since it denies the true influence of all 
 legitimate subordinate objects of love, which is 
 
 5 
 
66 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 to lead us upward to the very essence of love. 
 The highest law of human nature in the uni- 
 verse is the law of Christ. He is humanity's 
 perfection. 
 
 " Never be afraid that you will love this poor, 
 sinful, dying world too well, or that you will 
 labor too hard for it. What the world needs is 
 a personal friendship ; to feel our hearts beating 
 against theirs, — the wicked and abandoned, — 
 as we feel God's heart beating against ours. 
 This is the gospel, the evangel, that must save 
 the world. The Prophet raised the dead child 
 by placing mouth to mouth, part to part. My 
 sympathy with this world has paid well; not 
 because the world has always paid, but because 
 God has been my paymaster. When we work 
 for Him, He is the paymaster. Man is never 
 so much like Him as when working for the 
 poor and destitute and abandoned. It is well to 
 let our beneficence flow through the regular 
 channels ; but it is not enough that we distribute 
 our gifts by the hands of others, and work 
 through great institutions. The world needs 
 personal contact. It is thus that God comes 
 to us. The Lord said to Moses : ' I will send 
 my angel before thee.' But Moses replied : ' If 
 Thou go not with me, carry us not up hence.' 
 Moses wanted the personal presence of God. 
 What the world wants is love. God comes to 
 
Christian Love. 67 
 
 us not by law, not by grace only, but by per- 
 sonal presence; not by angelic messengei 
 
 He is a personal friend. ' I drew them with 
 the cords of a man, with the bands of love.' 
 (Ilosea xi. 4.) Always have a warm hand-clasp 
 of sympathy and help for the suffering, the 
 sorrowing, the downfallen. Begin on the work 
 that lies nearest you, and you will soon find the 
 labor and the love of it increasing. When you 
 set your hands to work, your heart will gener- 
 ate the momentum ; your own spiritual life will 
 be promoted ; and your influence over others 
 greatly increased. They will receive your 
 spiritual advice much more kindly when they 
 realize that your religion is not a mere dogma, 
 but a life. That is teaching as our blessed 
 Lord taught. 
 
 * From scheme and creed the life goes out, 
 
 The saintly fact survives ; 
 The blessed Master none can doubt, 
 Revealed in holy lives.' 
 
 "There is but one way of living thus for 
 others : that is, by giving ourselves entirely, 
 unreservedly, to Him who gave His life for us, 
 for all. It is simply ' come ' and ' go.' ' Come ' 
 to Christ, then ■ Go,' preach His gospel ; and 
 when that work is done, He will say ' Come ' 
 again, to the mansions He has gone to prepare." 
 
VIII. 
 
 GOING HOME. 
 
 73EAUTIFUL mansions were, we knew, 
 -U being fitted up for our beloved father, 
 and to him the thought of going thither was 
 full only of brightness and of joy. 
 
 " To those who truly conquer, as he conquered in the 
 strife, 
 Life is but the way of dying ; Death is but the gate of 
 Life." 
 
 Not that the thought of parting was painless, 
 nor that the ties of human love were gradually 
 loosened with the loosening of the silver cord of 
 life. It was not so. Strong in affection, as in 
 faith, the power that so upheld him was of grace 
 alone. Clinging with a fondness that, if it were 
 possible, seemed intensified with time, especially 
 to her who through the years had been nearest 
 and dearest, — a fondness that at times could not 
 but dwell upon the sweet and comforting sug- 
 gestion, surely heaven-sent, of going home to- 
 gether, — still he tried with tender, gentle care, 
 to lead us to look forward to "the one event 
 that comes to all." To him it was but " to de- 
 
Going Home. <> > 
 
 part and to be with Christ." With what g] 
 ness he looked forward to that future glory! It 
 was his golden theme, and still his words ring 
 on in memory like the echo of a triumph-song. 
 
 " 4 Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and 
 it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but 
 we know that . . . we shall be like Him, for we 
 Shall see Him as he is.' Here we have the pres- 
 ent condition and the future prospects of the 
 sons of God ; the fact and the future of the gos- 
 pel. In our present condition as sons of God we 
 have freedom from condemnation, 'for there is 
 now no condemnation to them that are in Christ 
 Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the 
 spirit.' We are legally free ; but more than this, 
 our hearts are changed, so that we are made like 
 God, — like Him in our motives and dispositions, 
 in our characters. ' We are the sons of God, 
 and if sons, then heirs, joint heirs with Jesus 
 Christ.' Sanctification is a slow process ; we be- 
 come more and more like God, ' but it doth not 
 yet appear what we shall be.' Now we know 
 Him by faith. Faith is the appreciating and 
 appropriating organ of the mind. Now we be- 
 come assimilated to Him by apprehending, ap- 
 preciating, and appropriating Him. Then it shall 
 be all appropriation. We grow to be like the 
 people we are most with. It is not imitation ; 
 we may be unconscious of it. We assimilate by 
 
yo A Golden Sunset. 
 
 contact, and there are different degrees of con- 
 tact. The highest degree of contact is conscious 
 presence. Here we see Christ through the me- 
 dium of the truth, and we grow like Him as we 
 contemplate Him in the truth. But how much 
 more rapidly shall we become like Christ there, 
 when we see Him not through any medium, but 
 face to face ! Here we see as in a glass darkly. 
 We can see in a mirror a face reflected there, 
 though we cannot see the face itself. Now we 
 look down into the mirror of His word and see 
 Christ from above reflected there. But after a 
 while the mirror will be dashed, the book will be 
 closed, and we shall turn and see Him face to 
 face. No more the dim reflection, but the Di- 
 vine Person. Oh, for one look upon the face of 
 the living Christ ! Here we are in the camera 
 obscura, the dark chamber of the flesh, and Christ 
 the sun shining in upon us His image is daguerro- 
 typed upon us faintly ; but when we are brought 
 out into the full sunlight of His presence, the 
 likeness will be brought out sharp and clear." 
 
 Another text he used to repeat until it seemed 
 sometimes as though he were already joining in 
 the praises of that glory to which he hastened : 
 " ' Now unto Him that is able to keep you from 
 falling, and to present you faultless before the 
 presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to 
 the only wise God, our Saviour, be glory and 
 
( ! nng Home* 7/ 
 
 majesty, dominion and power, both now and for- 
 ever, Amen. 1 That," said our father, "is my 
 great text;" and he repeated the words: "'Be- 
 fore the presence of His glory with exceeding 
 
 joy.' Some persons say : 4 His glorious pres- 
 ence/ and it does mean that, but it is the pres- 
 ence of His glory ; " and he raised his hand 
 before his face, as if a great and glorious light 
 were shining upon him, — too great and dazzling 
 to be looked upon. 
 
 As he sat thus, as one of his brethren in the 
 ministry said of him, " facing death," with a fear- 
 less look forward, a loving hand held tenderly 
 out to those at his side, and a heart full of help- 
 ful thoughts that might serve to support them in 
 the day of their sorrow ; a ready interest in all 
 that passed about and in the world at large, — 
 one could not help longing — 
 
 "for a congregated world to behold that dying saint. 
 
 As the aloe is green and well-liking till the last best sum- 
 mer of its age, 
 
 And then hangeth out its golden bells to mingle glory 
 with corruption, — 
 
 Such was the end of this righteous man." 
 
 And whence came all this heavenly peace ? 
 Not from trust in his own righteousness. None 
 can find peace in such repose. Only Christ can 
 give the perfect peace that passeth understand- 
 ing. Only simple unquestioning trust in His 
 
j 2 A Golden Sunset. 
 
 righteousness, His power and willingness to save, 
 can bring such calm into the soul. So our dear 
 father trusted Him, believing he should conquer 
 through his Lord, not asking when nor how. 
 " God says I shall triumph," said he. " How I 
 cannot tell till the time comes; but I believe it. 
 I rest on His word and I shall conquer." 
 
 And the triumph came in the silent night. 
 To us who watched beside him it was only the 
 gentle falling asleep of a weary one who gladly 
 lies down to rest. But we knew that songs of 
 triumph too fine for our dull ears to catch were 
 ringing on the midnight air ; that through the 
 darkness that surrounded us, burst on his sight 
 the glorious dawning of the endless day. 
 
 " ' Servant of God ! well done ; 
 Rest from thy loved employ ; 
 The battle fought, the victory won, 
 Enter thy Master's joy.' 
 The voice at midnight came ; 
 He started up to hear, 
 A mortal arrow pierced his frame, 
 He fell — but felt no fear. 
 
 "Tranquil amidst alarms, 
 It found him on the field, 
 A veteran slumbering on his arms, 
 Beneath his red-cross shield : 
 His sword was in his hand, 
 Still warm with recent fight, 
 Ready that moment, at command, 
 Through rock and steel to smite. 
 
/// Hope of a Glorious Resurrection* /> 
 
 44 At midnight came the cry, 
 * To meet thy < rod, pi 1 \'.\> 
 He woke, and caught the Captain's 1 
 Then, strong in faith and prayer, 
 His spirit, with a bound, 
 Burst its encumbering clay ; 
 His tent .it sunrise, on the ground, 
 A darkened ruin lay. 
 
 " The pains of death are past, 
 Labor and sorrow cease, 
 And, life's long warfare closed at last, 
 His soul is found in peace. 
 ' Soldier of Christ ! well done ; 
 Praise be thy new employ ; 
 And while eternal ages run, 
 Rest in thy Saviour's joy.' " 
 
 IN HOPE OF A GLORIOUS RESURRECTION. 
 
 In the bright sunlight of an October morning 
 he was laid to rest, as he had wished, sur- 
 rounded by those, loved and loving, whose foot- 
 steps he had long before led in the heavenly 
 way. " I do not want," he had said, " that there 
 should be anything gloomy about my death. 
 I want the sun to shine down into my grave, 
 while I take it to my arms and say, ' Now I 
 will lie down in you and rest — a little while.' " 
 And the sunlight fell, and the glowing maple 
 leaves, glorious too in their death, seemed to 
 carry the gold of the sunshine with them as 
 they fell, down to that quiet resting-place. 
 
J4 ^ Golden Sunset. 
 
 At a memorial service a few days later a 
 brother minister said : " It would be most sad to 
 see so much brightness lost to earth as in the 
 closing of the beautiful life that has just gone 
 out among us, if we might not look, by faith, 
 over the dim border-land, into the glory yonder. 
 I looked last night upon a glorious sunset, and 
 one who stood beside me said, ' What a pity to 
 see all that glory go out in darkness ! ' ' Yes/ 
 said another, ' if it were not for to-morrow ! ' " 
 
 For that glorious to-morrow let us wait with 
 patient — if with longing — hearts, while we 
 strive to fulfil, with faithful hands, the duty of . 
 to-day. " God buries His workmen, but car- 
 ries on His work/' The words are worthy to 
 be engraved upon the white marble tablet in 
 Westminster that bears the sculptured faces of 
 John and Charles Wesley, and those faithful 
 workers were worthy the motto. Labor, that 
 sovereign solace of sorrow, is always left to us. 
 And hope is left ; hope in the changeless word 
 that has sustained God's dying children through- 
 out the ages is always left, the blessed heritage 
 of His own. His truth outlives a dying world. 
 "If we were all in our graves," said Matthew 
 Henry, " our religion would still be found in our 
 Bible, pure and complete." The one worthy labor 
 of life is the spreading abroad of that glorious 
 truth ; telling to the world about us the story 
 
In Hope oj a Glorious Resurrection* y^ 
 
 iA salvation through the cross of Christ ; bi 
 
 ing to men in their ex t rem est need the help 
 
 and comfort of their Lord's great love for them, 
 for all. 
 
 May we who have read and heard these latest 
 words of one who long loved and labored, look- 
 ing up to his source of strength and inspiration, 
 go forward with renewed courage and consecra- 
 tion in the service of the blessed Master. Is it 
 but the silent service of suffering, the patient 
 service of waiting for our Lord ? He will come. 
 His glorious appearing hastens. May that hope 
 cheer us in sorrow and trial, gild for us at last 
 the dark portals, be our u Goldene Abend 
 Sonne," our " Golden Sunset." 
 
 THE END. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS * 
 
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