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Catching Fish—A Fable

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 16, 1873

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 43, No. 1.

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Catching Fish—A Fable.

By A. Smith

Two boys went fishing. Standing side by side upon the same log, one carefully dropped in his well-baited hook and awaited “a bite;” but his fellow threw in his hook, unbaited, set his pole, and began to play in the water. “You can’t catch fish without baiting your hook,” said his companion; “and, besides, you so agitate the water that you frighten the fish away even from my well-baited hook.”
“As to baiting my hook,” he replied, “it is some trouble to do it; and, besides, if the fish are particularly interested to bite, they will do so without so much bother on my part; and as to my disturbing the water, I like the pleasure too well to desist for the sake of catching fish, or accommodating your notions of propriety.”
“I must leave you then,” said his companion, “and fish elsewhere, or I cannot catch any fish.”
MORAL. He who would succeed in winning souls, must not only use tact and skill, but must occupy a position above, or withdrawn from the influence of, unstable professors of religion. A. SMITH.