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DUTY AND KINDNESS

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International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 4, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 42.

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DUTY AND KINDNESS.

THERE was an angry frown on the countenance of Deacon Jonas Browning. There were tears on the sad face of his wife.
“He shall be sent to sea!” said Deacon Browning sternly.
There was a pleading look in the eyes of Mrs. Browning, as she lifted them to the iron face of her husband. But no words passed her lips.
“He shall be sent to sea! It is my last hope.”
“Philip is very young, Jonas,” said Mrs. Browning.
“Not too young for evil, and, therefore, not too young for the discipline needed to eradicate evil. He shall go to sea! Captain Ellis sails in the Fanny Williams on next Monday. I will call upon him this very day.”
“Isn’t the Fanny Williams a whaler?” The lips of Mrs. Browning quivered and her voice had a choking sound.
“Yes,” was firmly answered.
“I wouldn’t send him away in a whaler, Jonas. Remember he is very young, not thirteen till April.”
“Young or old, Mary, he’s got to go,” said the stern deacon, who was a believer in the gospel of the law. He was no weak advocate of moral suasion, as it is familiarly termed. He went in for law, and was a strict constructionist. Implicit obedience was the statute for him, and deviations therefrom met the never withheld penalty.
Mrs. Browning entered into no argument with her husband, for she knew that would be useless. She had never succeeded in changing his purpose by argument in her life. And so she bent her eyes meekly to the floor again, while the tears crept over her face, and fell in large, bright drops upon the carpet. Deacon Browning saw the tears but they did not move him. He was tear proof.
Philip, the offending member of the Browning family, was a bright, active, restless boy, who, from the start, had been a rebel against unreasonable authority, and as a matter of course, not unfrequently against authority both just and reasonable. Punishment had only hardened him, increasing instead of diminishing his power of endurance. The particular offense for which he was now in disgrace was, it must be owned, rather a serious one. He had, in company with three other boys of his age, known as the greatest reprobates in the village, rifled a choice plum tree belonging to a neighbor, of all the fruit it contained, and then killed a favorite dog, which, happening to discover them at their work, attempted to drive them from the garden. The neighbor had complained to Deacon Browning, accompanying his complaint with a threat to have Philip arrested for stealing.
“If you don’t do something with that boy of yours,” he added with considerable feeling, “he’ll end his days in the State prison or on the gallows.”
Hard words were these for the ears of Deacon Browning—hard words, and with a prophetic conviction in them. He had not a very creative imagination, but in this instance the prediction of his angry neighbor conjured up in his mind the image of a prison and a gallows, causing a shudder to pass along his nerves and the cold perspiration to start upon his forehead. From that moment the resolution of Deacon Browning was taken.
The boy was on the brink of ruin, and must be saved at all hazards. As to the means of doing this it never entered into the heart of Deacon Browning to conceive of any other than involved harsh discipline. The Canaanite was in the land and must be driven out with fire and sword. With him the word duty had a stern signification. He had always tried to do his duty, moving steadily onward in the path of life, and crushing down all vanities and evils that sprang up by the way, under a heel shod with iron.
“He shall be sent to sea.” That was the last desperate remedy. In his mind, as in the minds of many like him some years ago, a ship was the great school of reform; and when a boy was deemed incorrigible, he was sent off to sea, usually to have his evil inclinations hardened into permanent qualities.
When Deacon Browning met his son Philip, after receiving the intelligence of his great offense, it was with a stern, angry repulsion. He did not see the look of appeal, the sigh of repentance, the plea for mercy, that was in his tearful eyes. A single word of kindness would have broken up the great deep of the boy’s heart, and, impelled by the warmer impulses inherited from his mother, he would have flung himself weeping into his father’s arms. But Deacon Browning had separated duty from kindness. The one was a stern corrector of evil, the other a smiling approver of good.
From his home to the wharf, where the Fanny Williams lay all equipped for sea, Deacon Browning bent his steps. Captain Ellis, a rough, hard man, was on board. After listening to the father’s story and requests, he said, bluntly:—
“If you put your boy on board the Fanny Williams, he’ll have to bend or break, that is certain. Take my advice, and give the matter a second thought. He’ll have a dog’s life of it in a whaler. It is my opinion that your
lad hasn’t stuff enough in him for this experiment.”
“I’ll risk it,” replied the deacon, “he’s got too much stuff in him to stay at home, that’s the trouble. The bend or break system is the only one in which I have any faith.”
“As you like, Deacon. I want another boy, and yours will answer, I guess.”
“When do you sail?” he inquired.
“On Monday.”
“Very well, I’ll bring the boy down tomorrow.”
The thing was settled; the deacon did not feel altogether comfortable in mind. Philip was young for such an experiment, as the mother had urged. And how very opportunely a leaf in the book of his memory was turned on which was written the story of a poor boy’s wrongs and sufferings at sea. Many years ago his heart had grown sick over the record. He tried to look away from the page, but could not. It seemed to hold his eye by a kind of fascination.
Still he did not relent. Duty required him to go steadily forward, and execute his purpose. There was no other hope for the boy.
“Philip!” It was thus he announced his determination. “I am going to send you to sea with Captain Ellis. It’s my last hope. Steadily bent, as you are, on evil, I can no longer suffer you to remain at home. The boy who begins with robbing his neighbor’s garden is in great danger of ending his career upon the gallows. To save you, if possible, from a fate like this, I now send you to sea.”
Very sternly, very harshly, almost angrily, was this said. Not the smallest impression did it seem to make upon the boy, who stood with his eyes cast down, an image of stubborn self-will and persistent rebellion.
(Concluded next week)