Review and Herald, Vol. 40, No. 1. (6/18/1872)

Review and Herald

Jun 18, 1872

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 18, 1872

MENTAL CULTURE IN THE PULPIT.

By George I. Butler

BY ELD. GEO. I. BUTLER.

There is a feeling quite prevalent, especially among the common people, that there is great danger of loss of spirituality among ministers if they devote much attention to acquiring a thorough education. And it would be well to inquire whether this is an unreasonable prejudice, or whether it is founded upon facts sufficient to give it a firm basis. This inquiry is the more pertinent for us at the present time, as the subject of having a school, partly denominational at least, for the purpose of giving instruction to those entering the ministry, is under contemplation. If such a school as that which is proposed to be founded at Battle Creek is in danger of destroying our spirituality or injuring us in that direction at all, I should be against it, surely; for I do not think we have any of that to spare now; and I would to God we had a far greater supply.

The question is an important one, and must come before our people prominently, as I fully believe this question of a school is to be a leading one among us very soon; and I fully believe it will be taken up and acted upon with the accustomed good sense and energy of our people. It is therefore proper that those questions which are really involved in the subject should be carefully considered by our people, that they may act understandingly.

I am not one of that number who think there is any necessary good fellowship between ignorance and spirituality. If I was, I should look for my great exemplars of piety among the Digger Indians, the Hottentots, and the tribes of Central Africa, instead of among the enlightened nations of the earth. If I mistake not, the best examples of piety have been found among the latter. It is a noticeable fact that the advent of our divine Lord and the planting of his religion in the earth took place near the Augustine Age, the most celebrated for its light and knowledge of any which the Roman empire ever saw.

The Dark Ages, when papacy reigned supreme, and a cloud of fearful darkness hung over the kingdoms of Europe, and the grossest ignorance prevailed among all classes of people, came the nearest to seeing the utter extinction of true piety and religion of any age since its introduction into the world.

Just as quick as there began to be an awakening of the human mind in the sixteenth century, and men began to think, then it became possible for piety once more to flourish, and the Reformation to become an accomplished fact. Had Martin Luther arisen a century before, he had shared the fate of Huss and other reformers. All the most eminent men of piety and religion in that age were educated men. (Martin Luther could and did translate the Scriptures from the Hebrew and Greek languages. The people never could have had the Bible had not the reformers been men of education.)

The history of our race will show that the men whom God has used to wield the most powerful influence for good of any who have lived in the world, have been men of learning. Moses stands highest of any name in the old dispensation for piety, meekness, and true religion. He was learned in all the knowledge of the Egyptians, the most accomplished nation of ancient times. Who can observe the elevated style with which the prophecy of Isaiah is written without concluding that its author was a man of learning?

The prophet Daniel, to whom God revealed the most wonderful prophecy of the Bible, giving the history of the world for thousands of years in advance, and every fact of whose history proves him to have been a man of the most fervent piety, was thoroughly educated in Babylon, a city illustrious for its schools where astronomy and all the sciences were taught; and he was given the best opportunities that Nebuchadnezzar the Great could furnish.

What man has given us the most important instruction in the Christian age? The apostle Paul, whom we know to have been a most thoroughly educated man. It seems evident that he was chosen for this reason; and we well know that Melancthon, Zwingle, the Wesleys, and others, who have done most to advance true piety in the world, were men of learning. From these considerations, it is evident that God does not prefer ignorance to learning when soliciting agents to do his work, but the reverse. Hence we conclude that the means necessary to give instruction and fit men for usefulness are acceptable to him.

There are two great objects to be obtained by education. The first is an acquaintance with the facts and knowledge connected with science. For instance, in mathematics we become familiar with the principles, the rules and modes of operation by which problems are solved; in grammar, with the nature of words and their connection with each other, and their proper arrangement as established by the best usage; in geography, with the position or relation of the different places and countries on our globe. The facts of science and the knowledge of the principles connected with them are of immense value to an individual in after life, let his occupation be what it may, as he can apply them in all the exigencies that may arise, and accomplish results which he could not possibly bring about otherwise.

But there is a second result of education which is not less important. It teaches men to think. There are many people in our world who do not seem to know what brains are for; at least, they never use them much. They do not seem to know how to think. They cannot set the thinking machinery into operation. Instead of the intellect being alive and awake and keenly alert to everything around it in which they should have an interest, they go along as in a dozy state, aroused, perhaps, from time to time to learn they have blundered here, or been neglectful there, and made trouble for themselves or somebody else, which might have been saved had their thoughts been in active employ.

Education is designed to partially remedy this by arousing the intellect and setting it to work. We all know it is a law of nature of universal application that exercise gives strength. The arm of the blacksmith and the strength of the athlete are familiar examples of physical law. The intellectual power of a Webster or Choate are just as good illustrations of mental law. In order that there may be strength, exercise is of absolute necessity. In many instances, those who pass for men of great talent do not possess greater natural ability than others, but they have become familiar with subjects of discussion, and above all, their minds have become disciplined by study. Their brains have been set to work, and they have learned to work; and when a subject comes up for consideration, the mind knows how to take up its salient points and give it that examination which it seems to deserve, and consequently they have something to say about it; while another man of equal natural ability may sit by, and those things never occur to him, simply because he had trained his muscles to work, but never his brain.

These facts are indisputable. From time to time, individuals, by some sudden turn of circumstances, are snatched from a field of physical labor and placed where the mind is called into action principally, and all their old neighbors and friends are surprised that they possess so much intellectual power. It is simply because their minds are set to work.

Now the school is just the thing to work this change. It makes people acquainted with many facts of great importance for them to know, and it gives them mental discipline which is of exceeding importance to those who must use their minds. That this discipline can be obtained in other ways than by attending high schools I will not dispute. Individuals here and there of great energy of character and with a clear understanding to see the bearing of such matters may set to work and accomplish the desired result by themselves. But they will have to surmount obstacles that most will never surmount. Many, unless they place themselves under circumstances where they feel a special influence brought to bear upon them, will never set themselves to the work. Their minds have been mainly devoted to other pursuits. They have not yet acquired a taste for mental exercise. There are so many things calling for their time and labor that they never set themselves at it. Even when they would be very glad had they knowledge of the facts alone to be acquired by study and in a measure see its importance, yet they never get started by themselves to take hold of the work. Now if a proper place was prepared where such surroundings could be secured as would tend to help them in this direction where they were weak, a taste for study would be developed that might result in great benefit to themselves and to others. No man of sense will dispute the fact that mental discipline and study gives great strength to the mind. This is too plain to deny. It cannot possibly be refuted.

The question then very forcibly presents itself to our people, Is it best to present ourselves to God for a place in the ministry, the highest and noblest work he has committed to man, our minds dwarfed by lack of mental culture, and unprepared to do the greatest amount of good for lack of study and exercise? Or to present them in a condition to labor successfully, in a preparation to accomplish as great and good a work as their strength will naturally permit? Shall we present a lame and sickly offering to him, or our full strength and vigor?

It cannot be a question with us as to the importance of every one who enters the ministry being in a condition to do the greatest amount of good possible for him to do. This is a solemn duty. If this be so, shall our young men be obliged to seek this where they will be exposed to influences and society more or less detrimental to them in other directions, and where that instruction most needed to fit them for preaching the present truth cannot be obtained? This question can admit of but one answer; and this shows the importance of our people having a school under their own control, where those who desire such instruction may receive it.

The peculiar circumstances existing in connection with the special work in which our people are engaged demands at our hands nothing less than the establishment of such a school. This work contemplates nothing short of warning the people of the world of the dangers before them, and setting forth that unpopular truth which we believe is calculated to save them from destruction. It is a great work, and one that will require experience, mental training, and great energy, to accomplish.

A thorough understanding of the truth is absolutely necessary on the part of those who will go forth to battle in this warfare. This is to be no holiday work. It has already come to this, that those who go abroad to teach this truth in communities where a hearing can be obtained have to meet the combined talent and learning of the strongest ministers within a radius of many miles. Trained champions of many a debate are sent for sometimes at a distance of hundreds of miles away to bolster up the tottering structure of error against the assaults of truth. It is no small thing to meet this array of influence, learning, and ability, supported as it is by wealth, popularity, and social station, and above all by the “rulers of the darkness of this world, and wicked spirits in heavenly places.” Were it not that truth is always more consistent and more easily defended than error, it would be impossible. But as it is, those who represent the truth need to avail themselves of all legitimate means to make the contest successful for the right. They want the benefit of mental culture, and a knowledge of those facts which may be obtained by study alone, to assist them. And while it is evident they must have also God’s help, yet we have no reason to expect God will do for us that which we should do for ourselves. He will not supernaturally instruct us in those things which we could easily obtain by natural means. If we lay idly by and do not use the means he has placed in our hands, we have no reason to expect he will work a miracle to supply our deficiency.

This great work of warning the world is before us. There are many men among us possessed of sufficient natural ability to do a good work in preaching the truth to others. But their early life has been spent following the plow, or in the carpenter’s trade, or in some other avocation, where the mind has not been called into active employ. They have not had mental discipline. Now for such a one to step right out in the field of contest to cope with such as I have mentioned above, is a very great step. They have no acquaintance with the proper manner of presenting the truth. They are really unprepared to do justice to these subjects of discussion. They have little knowledge of the difficulties they will have to contend with. They have not the array of facts at their command which those have who have been trained to the work. Their first efforts seem weak to themselves and to others. They find difficulties and strange surroundings for which they are wholly unprepared; and it is no wonder that many fail, become discouraged, while others of a certain turn of mind, getting a view of these difficulties in advance, never dare make the effort lest they shall disgrace themselves or the cause.

The truth is, we need something to bridge over this gulf and give these souls who would be glad to work for the cause a chance to enter the work properly and with suitable instruction and proper mental discipline, that they may have a fair chance of success. I do not believe our people have less natural talent or moral courage than the average of other people, but the reverse; yet it is undoubtedly true that most of them are from the common walks of life, the farmers and mechanics of our land who have not had proper chances for mental culture, and whose main attention has been devoted to physical labor and material interests. With many of these men, attention to proper instruction and education would be a great improvement. Our people should be well informed in all good things. The taste needs refining and elevating, and no better

commencement can be made than in providing proper educational facilities. And above all should our ministers set the example in this direction.

Some will think time is too short to attend to such matters. But, if I mistake not, many of those who will raise this objection will not think time too short to lay up the “almighty dollar” for a rainy day. For one, I should much prefer being found improving the mind, elevating the taste, and cultivating the intellect, and thus fitting myself for usefulness here, and placing myself in a position to benefit my fellow-men when Christ comes, than merely caring for the material interests around me. I think Christ would be full as apt to say to the former class, “Well done, good and faithful servant” as to the latter. For my part, I am about out of patience with this objection against doing anything worthy in itself, because time is so short. That is just the kind of work I want to be engaged in when time closes.

One great reason why our people must have such a school, and that soon, is that time is too short to go on as we are now going, and not make greater efforts to send forth men who are qualified to teach their fellows the way of escape from the plagues of God’s wrath. Will those who have been praying and fasting for God to send out men to labor, be willing to help answer their own prayers by contributing of their means to establish suitable facilities for instructing men properly for this work, when a proper call is made upon them? We shall see.

In concluding this article I would express my hearty confidence that knowledge is every way preferable to ignorance, and that our danger as a people does not lie in having the intellect awakened by study and exercise till the understanding is capable of taking broad and intelligent views of all the truth, but rather the contrary in becoming bigoted and notional. All truth is ennobling, elevating, and refining. And while I have no faith in that kind of progress which would break down the barriers of religion and morality established by God in his word, yet I would ever realize that the truth of God has a great work to do. Its “field is the world,” and our views should be such as will adapt us to do that work intelligently. And as the ministry is a leading agency designed of God to act a prominent part in it, it should be intelligent and refined, that it may always cast the right kind of influence. To bring about this end, proper means should be supplied by our people. This duty is one that must soon press itself upon us. May we be able to discern our duties as they present themselves and discharge them faithfully.

Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, June 4, 1872.

SABBATH EVENING.

Chafed and worn with worldly care, Sweetly, Lord, my heart prepare; Bid this inward tempest cease; Jesus, come and whisper peace! Hush the whirlwind of my will, With thyself my spirit fill; End in calm this busy week, Let the Sabbath gently break.

Sever, Lord, these earthly ties: Fain my soul to thee would rise, Disentangle me from time, Lift me to a purer clime; Let me cast away my load, Let me now draw nigh to God; Gently, loving Jesus, speak, End in calm this busy week.

Draw the curtain of repose, While my weary eyelids close; Seal my spirit while I rest, Give me dreamings pure and blest; Raise me with a cheerful heart; Holy Ghost thyself impart; Then the Sabbath day will be, Heaven brought down to earth and me.

The Methodist Book Concern.

The investigation relative to the management of the Methodist Book Concern has at length terminated in the complete vindication of Dr. Lanahan, who brought the charges against it. The following we take from the Methodist:—

The confidence we have always expressed that Dr. Lanahan would receive an ample vindication has been justified. On Thursday, May 30, the Special Committee on the Book Concern made a report embracing the following points: (1) That repeated frauds have been practiced upon the Book Concern. (2) That these frauds are found in the manufacturing department, and are located chiefly, if not wholly, in the bindery. (3) That these frauds were perpetrated for a series of years, and that the losses sustained thereby have been very considerable. (4) That the business methods of this department were formerly such as to afford opportunities for frauds and peculations by subordinates. (5) That there has been in former years a great lack of system in the business transactions of the House, and a great deal of confusion and careless bookkeeping. (6) That the purchasing of paper through Mr. J. F. Porter was a decided business impropriety. (7) That the transaction of the Book Concern with Brown, Brothers & Co., was an unauthorized use of its credit. The Committee also state that there is no evidence to show that any agent or assistant agent has been interested in the frauds, and that they had no evidence before them tending to show that the “exhibits” made to the General Conference should be different from what they are.

This report was on Friday, May 31, unanimously adopted. On the same day, Dr. Lanahan declining a re-election, Rev. Dr. Nelson, of the Wyoming Conference, and J. M. Phillips, a layman of Cincinnati, were elected Agents. On Saturday, June 1, a resolution was adopted by the Conference re-imbursing Dr. Lanahan for the expenses incurred by him in making his investigations.

Thus the end which we have confidently anticipated has been reached, but what a fearful price it has cost! For maintaining the positions which the General Conference has affirmed, Dr. Lanahan has endured an amount of persecution which would have crushed a man of less firmness. He has been suspended and nearly driven from office; he has been arraigned as a slanderer of the Church and the Book Concern, but to-day he stands before the world as having rendered a most signal service to Methodism, by rescuing its good name from reproach. Fraud and dishonesty are bad enough; but the covering up of fraud and dishonesty by the Church authorities would have been fatal to the moral power of Methodism in all future time. Not the Book Concern only, the Church itself was on its trial before the world. That we have safely passed this trial has been due largely to the invincible courage of Dr. Lanahan. Though suffering to a degree which can hardly be described, he has persevered, and his perseverance has at last been crowned with triumph.

The case had grown to be one of more than denominational importance. It involved the question of the management of religious trusts. All the churches have become interested auditors of the debate which had been carried on without intermission for nearly three years. The secular press demanded justice with a unanimity which proved the general sense that a great wrong had been suffered to go unredressed. That a Christian Church should seem to cover up iniquity and crush honesty was felt to be so contrary to the precepts of Christ that the sensibilities of the whole American people were touched. Most happily the Church has been relieved of such an imputation and cleared of reproach. Its highest judiciary has decided without fear or favor, and has emphatically declared its estimate of the value of the labors of its faithful servant.

It is cheering to think that the heroic spirit has not yet died out of Methodism. John Lanahan would have gone to the stake for his convictions, and would have been burned rather than surrender a single one of them. As it was, he was almost made a martyr. Thanks to God, the trial is past, and the right has triumphed. From this day forth, the Methodist Book Concern will recognize its amenability to the public conscience, and will make haste to give answer whenever its conduct is challenged.

Tax on Words.

WHAT a pity there is not a tax upon words! What an income the Queen would get from it! But, alas! talking pays no toll. And if lies paid double, the government might pay off the National Debt; but who could collect the money? Common fame is a common liar. Hearsay is half lies! A tale never loses in telling. As a snow-ball grows by rolling, so does a story. They who talk much lie much. If men only said what was true, what a peaceful world we should see! Silence seldom makes mischief, but talking is a plague to the parish. Silence is wisdom, and, by this rule, wise men and women are scarce. Still waters are the deepest; but the shallowest brooks brawl the most; this shows how plentiful fools must be. An open mouth shows an empty head. If the chest had gold or silver in it, it would not always stand wide open. Talking comes by nature, but it needs a good deal of training to learn to be quiet; yet regard for truth should put a bit in every honest man's mouth, and a bridle upon every good woman's tongue.

If we must talk, at least let us be free from slander, let us not blister our tongues with backbiting. Slander may be sport to tale-bearers, but it is death to those whom they abuse. We can commit murder with the tongue as well as with the hand. The worst evil you can do a man is to injure his character; as a Quaker said to his dog, “I'll not beat thee, nor abuse thee, but I'll give thee an ill name.” All are not thieves that dogs bark at, but they are generally treated as if they were; for the most part believe that where there is smoke there is fire, and what everybody says must be true. Let us then be careful that we do not hurt our neighbor in so tender a point as his character, for it is hard to get dirt off if it is once thrown on; and when a man is once in people's bad books, he is hardly ever quite out of them. If we would be sure not to speak amiss, it might be as well to speak as little as possible; for if all men's sins were divided into two bundles, half of them would be sins of the tongue. “If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.”

Gossips of both genders, give up the shameful trade of tale-bearing; don't be the devil's bellows any longer, to blow up the fire of strife. Leave off setting people by the ears. If you do not cut a bit off your tongues, at least season them with the salt of grace. Praise God more and blame neighbors less. Any goose can cackle, any fly can find out a sore place, any empty barrel can give forth sounds, any briar can tear a man's flesh. No flies go down your throat if you keep your mouth shut, and no evil speaking will come up. Think much, but say little; be quick at work and slow at talk; and, above all, ask the great Lord to set a watch over your lips.—John Ploughman.

Where Laborers Are To Come From.

FROM a sermon by T. De Witt Talmage, in the Methodist, we take the following in regard to who should labor in God’s cause, and how they can prepare themselves for the work. The suggestions ought to be immediately acted upon by many S. D. Adventists:—

II. Again: I learn from the Methodist Church that, without passing through theological seminaries, men may have great success in presenting the gospel. I believe in theological seminaries; but they are to the Church just what West Point is to the State. What would you have done in the last war if you had had no soldiers except those who had been at West Point? The men who came from that institution controlled and marshaled the troops all over the land. The use of a theological seminary in this or in any other country is to send out men more thoroughly drilled, who are able to organize and marshal the great mass of Christian soldiery. Let Paul go up to Athens and preach, and send plain Matthew down among the fishing boats. Paul knew more in one hour than did Peter in his whole lifetime; but I think that Peter preached a more appropriate sermon on the day of Pentecost than Paul could have preached. Have you been so long under the delusion, and are you now under the delusion, that the few men who are ministers of the gospel are going to take this world for Christ? That the ten or fifteen men who every year come out of New-Brunswick Seminary, or the twenty or thirty that every year come out of Princeton, or Andover, or Yale, will do all the work? No! No! You might as well have expected a few quartermasters in the Northern army to conquer the Southern confederacy.

You go into a factory, and you say: “What is the matter here? The factory is almost silent. There are only three wheels going, while you have five hundred wheels.” “Oh!” says the owner of the factory, “we are short of hands. We ought to have five hundred men here, but we have only three men at present.” That is just the state of things in the Church of God this day. We have grand and abundant machinery, but we have not men enough to run it. Now, in the Methodist Church, it has been the policy to set many to preaching without long delay. Though it has had theological seminaries doing an important work, it has not depended upon a few men who have been secluded for seven or eight years in learned institutions, but has sent hundreds and thousands of men from the work-shops, and factories, and stores, to preach Jesus Christ; and the very moment they began to study, they began to preach. I wish it were so in all the churches. I wish it were now so in that Church as much as once it was. We who are standing in the pulpits of this country begin to feel now like the English did at Lucknow before the Highlanders came up: we must either have recruits or surrender.

Go to preaching this gospel. How shall you learn to preach? Just as the carpenter learns how to be a carpenter. Does he sit down and study books about tools, about hammers, and axes? Oh! no. He goes to boring with the bit, and smoothing with the plane, and smiting with the hammer, and striking with the adz; and in this way he gets to be a carpenter. So, the way to learn how to preach this gospel is to preach it.

Yonder is a man who ought to be preaching the gospel. He has not been ordained, and never will be. He could not be, perhaps. It may be that he has not brains enough, or time enough, or money enough. But he is ordained of God. Let him preach. Here is another. He may not, perhaps, be able to round his sentences, or make elegant allusions, or fine quotations; and yet he may be able to save a soul from death, and hide a multitude of sins. Oh! for five thousand Moodys to come out from Chicago; and five thousand George H. Stuarts to come out from Philadelphia; and five thousand Henry F. Durants to come out from Boston, and preach this glorious gospel, waiting for no other ordination except that which comes from the hand of the Lord Almighty. The most eminent Christian layman in the city of New York said to me two weeks ago: “Mr. Talmage, if the masses of Christians do not go to work, and we continue to depend on the regular ministry in New York, we must go under.”

We want lay colleges established; lay colleges in which men can study three minutes if they can study no longer, or three months, or one year, or three years, gathering up just such preparation as they can, and going forth to preach Jesus Christ to the people.

Then and Now.

[HERE is an article from the Christian Union, which every Seventh-day Adventist can appreciate. It compares, and justly too, the religious teachers of Christ’s time with those of our time. Who can fail to see the similarity? D. M. C.]

There is a strong disposition in men of intellectual culture to associate with their own class, and keep aloof from the uneducated multitude. It is the natural impulse of like seeking like. The disposition is not confined to those to whom culture is only a means of selfish enjoyment. Men who to an intellectual habit of mind add moral earnestness, and aim at noble ends, are largely controlled by the same instinct. It is very noticeable among many ministers. They live in their studies, among books, and in intellectual society, until their whole habit of mind and their very language differs from that of the mass of the community. The same thing holds good to a great extent of the whole class of literary and cultivated people.

A man who works by ideas may even feel himself necessitated to do this. Can one whose power lies in aptitude for thought be serviceable among those who hardly know how to think? Must not a man to whom abstractions are more real than things seen, be content to address himself to an audience, “fit, but few”?

It is worth while to look at the practice, in this respect, of Jesus. Humanly speaking, he was of transcendent genius. To him, the whole world was instinct with higher meanings than other men saw. The sacred literature of his people opened to him depths that no other had pierced. His thoughts took a sweep of marvelous height and depth and breadth. To no other man was ever the mere outside of life of so little account. And he conceived a purpose transcending the boldest flight of any other imagination. Other philosophers had tried to solve the problem of human existence. Other statesmen had founded nations, and even national religions. But the work he gave himself was not merely to answer the question as to man’s nature; but to practically meet the highest wants of that nature; to found, not a school of thinkers, not a nation, but a kingdom, which should in its progress embrace all nations, and provide for all schools of thought. He was to inaugurate a revolution, compared with which the revolutions wrought by Plato and Bacon in the realm of thought, or by Julius Cæsar in the world’s political system, were insignificant. For this immeasurable work he had but the space of three years. Within that time, he was to give firm foothold to these new principles, and prepare his followers to carry on the work.

Being a man of such ideas and purposes, he lived almost wholly among the common people. He spoke their language. Most of his public addresses were made to them. His intimate associates were chosen from them. With the educated class, he had comparatively little contact. Through his whole career, he was emphatically a man of the common people.

We must consider what was this educated class and what was the common people. In the former were the priests, the regular ministers of the true religion; the scribes, the men of letters; the Pharisees, the most respectable and orthodox part of the community; the Sadducees, acute, skeptical thinkers. Besides these, there came up to Jerusalem yearly representatives of the outside world, men like Paul, familiar with Greek literature and thought, men versed in the fertile philosophies of Alexandria. Jesus had easy access to scholars equipped with the world’s highest learning, trained under the intellectual culture of the Hebrews and the Greeks.

But he began his ministry and chiefly carried it on among a wholly different class. His first act was to choose as his intimate associates and disciples some fishermen and peasants of Galilee. In these rough, uncultivated men, he implanted the ideas which were to outshine the philosophy of Plato, the truths that Moses and Isaiah had not reached. In his daily life, he associated himself with the plain, unlettered class. He addressed them in most of his discourses. His language was that of common life; his illustrations were drawn from experiences and feelings common to all men.

The educated class was, as a whole, hostile to him. But he did not begin by trying to win them, nor does it appear that he ever looked especially to them for support, or was disappointed at their hostility. From the first, and throughout, he sought and found his listeners and adherents chiefly among the ignorant, the uncultivated, the unrefined. The “multitude,” among whom he chiefly labored, were as unaccustomed to deep thought, as unsusceptible to spiritual truth, as the mass of men always are.

And it may be doubted whether the educated class was more unreceptive of truth than the educated class usually is. The Pharisees were not so totally different from our Doctors of Divinity. The Sadducees might find something of a counterpart in our educated skeptics. Priests, Levites, lawyers, scribes, students of Greek philosophy, partook largely of the qualities that usually attach to the ministerial and scholarly character.

In a word, the educated and uneducated classes in the time of Christ differed much as the same classes always do; each had its own strength and its own weakness. And in this state of things, the greatest idealist, the man of amplest intellectual and spiritual nature that ever lived, made his daily companionship with the uneducated, and wrought chiefly through them the greatest work the world ever knew.

For those who live in the realm of moral ideas, and who would use them in the service of mankind, there is a lesson in this fact, the meaning of which is not easily or soon exhausted.

The Joy of Forgetting Self

He who forgets himself will reap the greatest joy.

Detached Thoughts.

By Bettie Coombs

It is a great thing to live. We may well ask ourselves for what purpose we were created. Is it to waste the precious time God in his mercy has given us in decorating these poor, frail and decaying bodies, and reveling amid scenes of festivity and mirth? Observe a company of fashionable ladies together, and about all that is discussed is the fashions and other foolish topics of the day. Religion is not mentioned once. It may well be said, “Pride hath budded.”

Oh! that the world could realize their real lost condition in spending such unprofitable lives. Verily this is not our legitimate work upon earth. Each of us has a work to do, which if we fail to perform, the sin of omission will lie at our door, and though another may have brought the desired result, yet it cannot remove the guilt of that sin from our soul.

Whatever our past life has been, it cannot be recalled. We should not give up in despondency and vain regrets, but strive to improve each passing moment. We may talk of what we are going to do in the future, the present alone is ours; for death may steal upon us ere we are aware, touch us with his icy fingers and lay us away in the silent tomb; and each day that our life is spared we should see something done for the good of the cause and spread of God’s holy truth.

Sin hath made desolate the beautiful world fresh from the hand of the Creator, and brought death, misery and degradation upon the whole human race; and now we should try to make amends, so far as we can, for the past, in living lives of holiness to God, that we may be inhabitants of the bright, sinless world above.

How few of us estimate the love God has for his people in “giving his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him might not perish, but have everlasting life.” We read his love for us in the story of the cross; we see it in the Man of Sorrows who was acquainted with grief as he hangs upon the accursed tree, bleeding and dying for lost and ruined man; we hear it in that dying groan which rent the rocks and shook the earth, when he bore our sins in his own body on the shameful tree; and oh! the saints will see it with glorified eyes in the bliss-inspiring scenery of the New Jerusalem.

How many bright and beautiful things cluster around the world, Heaven. Here our pleasures fail, our joys wither, our hopes die, our prospects, even the most beautiful and bright, are overcast by the shadows of disappointment. There our joys shall never wither, our pleasures never fail, nor hope deferred make sick the heart. In Heaven’s pure day there shall be no death or sickness, tears shall never flow; sorrow and care will be unknown. The flowers of Eden will bloom on eternally. There the rainbow fades not, and its light will repose in golden glory on the bowers of Paradise.

There are sights of beauty for the eye, and sounds of sweetest melody for the ear; while over all is spread the charm of unfading loveliness. There the saint will wear a massy crown, and dwell in stately palaces. Through the streets of the New Jerusalem will incessantly flow a river of gladness upon whose banks the happy inmates dwell, while their grateful aspirations ever rise, and their ceaseless hallelujahs ever roll.

“That clime is not like this dull clime of ours; All, all is brightness there; A sweeter influence breathes around its flowers, And a far milder air. That sky is not like this sad sky of ours, Tinged with earth’s change and care; No shadow dims, no rain-cloud lowers— No broken sunshine there, One everlasting stretch of azure pours Its stainless splendor o’er those sinless shores.”

BETTIE COOMBS.

Hardin Co., Ky.

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