THE POISON BUSH by Eliot

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Jan 6, 1881

THE POISON BUSH.

By Eliot

At a Sabbath-school anniversary in Brooklyn some years ago, Rev. Dr. Hodge related the following interesting fact. During a visit he made to the Bahama Islands, a shower of rain unexpectedly fell. Such an occurrance is very rare at the Islands except during the rainy season, and is regarded with great dread by the natives, who as rapidly as possible seek the nearest shelter.

On this occasion, a little colored boy was caught in the shower at a distance from home, and having no place to go for protection, crept under a bush that was near. Its foliage, however, was not dense enough to keep him from the rain, and he was wet by the water trickling through the leaves. Unfortunately for him the bush was a poison bush, and the water falling on the leaves caused the poison to strike into his little limbs, so that in a short time he was dead.

After the shower, he was found and carried to his home. Dr. Hodge was requested to attend his funeral. The circumstance of his singular death excited his curiosity, and he wished to learn something more about the fatal poison bush. An aged negro told him that it grew abundantly upon the island, but that by its side there always grew another bush which was its antidote; and that if the little boy had known it, and had rubbed himself with the leaves of the healing bush, the poison could have done him no harm.

What an illustration is this of the sad fate of those who have been poisoned by sin, and know not how to escape from its dreadful consequences. But for this fatal poison there is a sure remedy, provided by the same God who placed the antidote beside the poison bush. The cross of Christ is the tree of life. Let the suffering and the dying come to that and they shall be saved, for "its leaves are for the healing of the nations."