Sympathy for the Perishing.
By Dr. Guthrie
DURING a heavy storm off the coast of Spain, a dismantled merchantman was observed by a British frigate, drifting before the gale. Every eye and glass were upon her, and a canvas shelter on the deck almost level with the sea, suggested the idea that there yet might be life on board. With all his faults no man is more alive to humanity than the rough and hardy mariner; and so the order instantly sounds to put the ship about, and presently a boat puts off, with instructions to bear down upon the wreck. Away after that drifting hulk go these gallant men, through the swell of a roaring sea; they reach it—they shout—and now a strange object rolls out of that canvas screen against the lee shroud of a broken mast. Hauled into the boat it proves to be the trunk of a man, bent head and knees together, so dried and shrivelled, as to be hardly felt within the ample clothes, and so light that a mere boy lifted it on board. It is laid on the deck: in horror and pity the crew gather round it; it shows signs of life; they draw nearer; it moves, and then mutters—in a deep, sepulchral voice—"There is another man." Saved himself, the first use the saved one made of speech, was to seek to save another. Oh! learn that blessed lesson; be daily practicing it. And so long as in our homes, among our friends in this wreck of a world which is drifting down to ruin, there lives an unconverted one, there is "another man," let us go to that man and plead for Christ, go to Christ and plead for that man; the cry, "Lord save me, I perish," changed into one as welcome to a Saviour's ear, "Lord, save them, they perish."