Words that Do not Wear Out.
By E. R. Dewey
THE words of man will seldom bear repetition. What interests you when first heard, when often heard, wearies you, and you wonder how it was that people could become so infatuated as to quote such feeble words which, by repetition, lose all their power. The words of Jesus are the very opposite of this; they seem ever to possess a new beauty, they are always appropriate whether in health or sickness, in active life, or at the death-bed. They are of the true metal which no change of time will ever tarnish. “You may ring the changes upon them, and never exhaust their music; you may think of them, consider them, by day and by night; you may, as it were, put them into a mortar and beat them with the pestle of contemplation, and there will be a fragrance and a perfume all the more discoverable when you have bruised them, and brought them down to the very lowest point of criticism.” What comfort does the aged disciple draw from the words of Jesus. The learned man can nowhere find such good counsel; and, still, they are so simple, and the meaning is so plain, that even the most unlearned can understand them. They ever have a purifying influence when instilled into the minds of children. It can most truly be said of them that they are “like apples of gold in pictures of silver.” The Rev. C. H. Spurgeon says, “I remember being in the Island of Lido, off Venice, listening to the music of the bells, thinking how charming it was—perhaps no melody could be sweeter; but, on returning to the city on the same day, the bells there ringing seemed to drive one mad; there was no sweetness, apparently, in any one; distance had lent enchantment to the sound. And so with the word of man. At a distance, it rings out melody only; but take it to pieces and find out each quality, each separate thought, and you find nothing but dissonance. It is never so with the great words of Jesus. You can hear them ring very far when you are a sinner, alone on the mountain wilds, and they still ring of hope; and you can afterward listen to each distinct word, each separate silver bell, and, among all, say of each separate one: ‘I never thought there was anything so inexpressibly sweet as this, outside of Heaven.’ The best of all is that these precious words will never wear out; for Jesus said, ‘Though heaven and earth shall pass away, yet my words shall never pass away.’”