Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 22, 1881
General Articles.
By Ellen G. White
THE GLORY DEPARTED FROM ISRAEL.
BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.
"Samuel grew, and the Lord was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground. And all Israel, from Dan even to Beersheba, knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord." From one extreme of the land to the other, Samuel's claims to the prophetic office were established, and he received further revelations of God's will in the tabernacle at Shiloh.
The messages of warning and reproof to the house of Eli were made known by him to the whole nation. By so doing he hoped to counteract, in some measure, the evil influence of his past neglect. But these warnings were disregarded by the people, as they had been by the priests. The surrounding nations also, who were not ignorant of the iniquities openly practiced in Israel, became still bolder and more determined in their own course of idolatry and crime. They felt no sense of guilt for their sins, as they would have felt had the Israelites preserved their integrity.
Again the Philistines gathered their forces for war. And Israel, without asking counsel from the Lord, without the concurrence of Eli or Samuel, rashly went out to battle. But the hand of God was not with them, and in the first engagement they were defeated, with a loss of four thousand of their number. When the people returned disheartened to their tents, the elders of Israel said, "Wherefore hath the Lord smitten us to-day before the Philistines?" The nation was ripe for the judgments of God, yet so blinded by their unbelief and rebellion that they could not see in their disaster a token of the Lord's displeasure.
Instead of confessing and forsaking the sins that had brought defeat upon them, they now set about devising some other means by which to obtain the victory. Then they thought of the ark of God. What wonders had been wrought when the priests bore it before the people into Jordan! How its waters parted, leaving a safe path for that vast company! They remembered also how it was borne about the city of Jericho seven days in solemn silence, and then as the trumpets pealed, and the people gave a great shout, the massive walls fell flat upon the earth.
The recollection of these glorious triumphs inspired all Israel with fresh hope and courage, and they immediately sent to Shiloh for the ark, "that when it cometh among us," said they, "it may save us out of the hand of our enemies." They did not consider that it was the law of God which alone gave to the ark its sacredness, and that its presence would bring them prosperity only as they obeyed that law. While they talked of the "ark of the covenant of the Lord," they ignored the real significance of the title. A covenant is an agreement between parties, based upon conditions. If Israel would obey the divine law and thus fulfill the conditions of their covenant with God, he would verify his promises to them. But what presumption for them to expect a blessing while they were violating the conditions upon which alone it could be bestowed!
Yet we see a similar blindness and inattention on the part of many at the present day. Having a knowledge of God's law, they are confident and boastful, as though especially favored of Heaven, while they are not from the heart obeying its precepts. God has given to modern Israel warnings, counsel, and reproof, to bring them to repentance and reformation of life. But too often these produce but a momentary impression. The persons warned soon return to their own ways. They flatter themselves that because they have a form of godliness they will be accepted of the Lord, and they go on presumptuously devising and executing plans in accordance with their own finite judgment, and giving little heed to the special manifestations of divine providence. It is one thing to acknowledge the claims of God's law, and quite another thing to render faithful and willing obedience to all its requirements. And let it be remembered that to the obedient alone will the promises of blessing, support, and guidance be fulfilled.
The two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, eagerly acceded to the proposal to bear the ark into the camp. Without the consent of the high priest, they ventured presumptuously into the holy of holies, and took from thence the ark of God. Filled with pride, and elated with the expectation of speedy victory, they bore it to the camp. And the people, beholding, as they thought, the token of Jehovah's presence, "shouted with a great shout, so that the earth rang again."
They overlooked the distinction between the divine presence vouchsafed to an obedient and believing people, and the ark, which was but a symbol of that presence. Hence they confidently looked to the ark for those blessings which God alone could bestow. They saw not the wide contrast between the condition of Israel when the Lord wrought so mightily in their behalf, and their present state.
They were then walking in obedience to God. The ark was borne by holy men in accordance with his express command, and the Captain of the Lord's host went before the repository of his law. Then his arm brought deliverance for them. But they were now following their own plans, in opposition to the divine counsel and authority. The ark was borne by sons of Belial who were doomed to destruction. Yet the people were so infatuated by Satan as to imagine they could induce God to fight for them, when the law under the mercy-seat condemned them to defeat, disaster, and death!
The Philistines looked upon the ark as the god of the Hebrews. All the mighty works which Jehovah had wrought for Israel, were attributed to its power. As they heard the shouts of joy and triumph at its approach, they said, "What meaneth the noise of this great shout in the camp of the Hebrews?" "And they understood that the ark of the Lord was come into the camp. And the Philistines were afraid, for they said, God is come into the camp. And they said, Woe unto us, who shall deliver us out of the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods that smote the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness."
The Philistines feared for their nation; yet still they trusted to the power of Dagon their god, and sought to strengthen the courage of the people: "Be strong, and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you: quit yourselves like men, and fight." They well knew how bitter was the servitude which Israel had endured when in their power, and the thought of themselves becoming slaves to endure like oppression nerved them with the courage of desperation.
A fierce assault upon Israel resulted in their defeat with great slaughter. Thirty thousand men lay dead upon the field, and the ark of God was taken, the two sons of Eli having fallen while fighting to defend it.
The Lord sorely chastised his people Israel, revealing their hypocrisy and rebuking their presumption, and thus left upon the pages of history the testimony for all future ages, that the iniquities of his professed people will not go unpunished. The greater the knowledge of God's will, the greater the sin of those who disregard it. God is not dependent upon men to cause his name to be feared and honored in the earth. He accepts the labors of those who walk in faithfulness and humility before him, but he will reject all who profess to serve him, and yet follow in the course of the unrighteous. God can carry forward his work in the earth without the co-operation of those who would pervert or disgrace it.
While the army of Israel went out to battle, Eli, blind and old, remained at Shiloh. Seating himself at the gate of the tabernacle he anxiously waited for tidings from the field of conflict, "for his heart trembled for the ark of God." Days of agonizing suspense followed. At last there fell upon his ears a sound of lamentation from the town. Soon a messenger drew near, his clothing rent and dust upon his head, and repeated to the high priest his sad tidings:—
"Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath been also a great slaughter among the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead." Eli could endure all this, terrible as it was, for he had expected it. But when the messenger added, "And the ark of God is taken," a look of unutterable anguish passed over his countenance. The thought that his sin had thus dishonored God, and caused him to withdraw his presence from Israel, was more than he could bear; his strength was gone, he reeled upon his seat and fell, "and his neck brake, and he died."
The wife of Phinehas, notwithstanding the impiety of her husband, was a woman who feared the Lord. The death of her father-in-law and her husband, and above all the terrible tidings that the ark of God was in captivity, caused her death. She felt that now the last hope of Israel was gone, and she named the child, born in this hour of adversity, Ichabod, or inglorious; with her dying breath mournfully repeating the words, "The glory is departed from Israel; for the ark of God is taken."
MOSES.
To his rest on the lonely hills,
To his rest, where no man knows,
By the secret birth of the rills,
And the secret death of the snows;
To the place of the silent rocks,
Where no voice from the earth can come,
But the thunder leaps, and shocks
The heart of the nations dumb;
To the long and desolate stand
On the brink of the ardent slope,
To the thought of the beautiful land,
And the woe of unanswered hope;
To the fallen fate from God
On the life yet young within;
To the sense of the smothering sod,
And the crush of remembered sin;
To the moments that gather the years,
Like clouds on the heaven afar;
To the tumult of terrible fears;
To the flush and the triumph of war;
To the plagues of the darkness and dead,
And the cry of a conquered king;
To the joy of the onward tread,
And the beat of a cageless wing;
To the march of the pillar of cloud,
And the rest of the pillar of fire;
To the song of the jubilant crowd,
And the passionate praise of the lyre;
To the mountain, ascended alone,
And the law, in its thunder given,
And the glimpse of the feet of the throne,
And the light of the shadows of heaven.
To a grave, where no marble above
Can be voiceful of peril and praise,
Where no children can weep out their love,
No widow recall the lost days.
To these—but his step is not weak,
And he moves as one moves to a throne—
Alone with the past on that peak,
With his grief and his glory alone.
—Unknown.
SPIRITUALISM A SATANIC DELUSION.
SPIRITUALISTS DEIFY MORTAL MAN.
"WHO changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator." Rom. 1:25.
"Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." Rom. 1:21-23.
In a Spiritualist work by A. J. Davis, entitled, "The Educator," pp. 303, 526, we find the following:—
"This being called God exists, organically, in the form of the being called man. . . . Man is God's embodiment—his highest, divinest outer elaboration. God, then, is man, and man is God."
About six thousand years ago, Satan, the father of lies, said, "Ye shall be as gods," and now we see Spiritualists preaching the same old lie. They take the side of the devil every time.
In the last National Convention of Spiritualists at Chicago, Ill., Mr. Pope said:—
"I am further convinced by my inspiration that whereas the devil, in the garden of Eden, declared if man, in his compound condition of Adam and Eve, would disobey the prohibition against eating of the tree which was adapted to his tastes and his conditions, he should become as God, knowing good from evil, that voice has gone on until, in the latter days, we hear it repeating, 'Ye are gods.' We know that this divinity in humanity, that this God is manifest in the flesh. . . . When we know that we are gods, and that we have the power, we shall advance to that position in which we shall become judges."
Judge Edmonds says:—
"The soul is a god of itself."—Spiritualism, vol. i, p. 10.
THEY DESPISE THE BIBLE.
Almost the first thing the spirits do with their converts is to destroy their confidence in the Bible. Why is this? Evidently because the Bible so fully advertises and warns against Satan's latter-day deceptions. Because the Bible is against the spirits, the spirits are against the Bible.
One spirit said, "The book of Genesis is the skin of the old serpent. . . . There are three hundred lies in that book alone."
Dr. Hare says: "The Old Testament does not impart a knowledge of immortality, without which religion were worthless. The notions derived from the gospel are vague, disgusting, inaccurate, and difficult to believe." Spir. Sci. Dem., p. 209.
In the testimony of a spirit, given in the Banner of Light, Nov. 23, 1861, it is said:—
"Many times before we have said that we cannot place implicit confidence in that which we find between the lids of the Bible."
A spirit, claiming to be Rev. John Moore, says:—
"My friend asks, 'Do you believe the Bible?' I answer, No; I do not. I cannot believe one word of it as the word of God."
A spirit who claims to be Timothy M. Baker, says:—
"I've got folks in Montpelier, and . . . I want them to get my sister where I can talk to her straight as I do to you, and I'll knock her God and Bible all to nothing."
THEY JUSTIFY SIN AND CRIME.
In the Crucible of April 22, 1871, Mr. S. C. Huddleson justifies the transgression of mother Eve:—
"She has been of more benefit to humanity than any other person that ever existed, God not excepted; for it appears to be his intention to keep man in shameful ignorance? Just imagine for a moment what a pitiable set of blind, naked, idiotic babies we would have been if mother Eve had obeyed God's command."
A. B. Child says:—
"The divine use of the ten commandments is in their violation, not in their observance."—Better Views, pp. 28, 29, 128.
The following paragraph is from a discourse, reported in the Banner of Light, from J. S. Loveland, once a Methodist minister:—
"With God there is no crime; with man there is. Crime does not displease God, but it does man. God is in the darkest crime as in the highest possible holiness. He is equally pleased in either case. Both harmonize equally with his attributes—they are only different sides of the same Deity."
It is claimed that Spiritualism is a better guide for human conduct than the Bible! Strange guide indeed! It is always pointing the wrong way. It can only be a guide in the sense, that it is tolerably safe to go exactly opposite to what it teaches!
THEY ARE AT WAR WITH MARRIAGE.
Spiritualists openly war against the marriage institution, and advocate the doctrine of "affinities" and "free love."
A leading Spiritualist writer, in a letter to the N. Y. Herald, says:—
"All advancing Spiritualists—though few may have the courage to confess it—repudiate marriage in its legal sense, and believe in the doctrine of affinities."
Dr. Child, on marriage and religion, says:—
"The present laws of marriage, that now give birth to regrets and sorrows unnumbered, to prostitution, with its long train of curses and agonies, will be abandoned for a holier, purer, diviner revelation that will ere long be given to the people. . . . A religion more spiritual will be discovered and acknowledged . . . resting upon no uncertain outside standard of rectitude, upon no dogma of another, no purity of earthly life, no glory of earthly perfection. . . . This religion is simply desire. With every one, desire is spontaneous and sincere, pure and holy; no matter what the desire is, whether it be called good or bad, it is the natural, God-given religion of the soul."—Christ and the People, pp. 27-29.
At a Spiritual convention, held in Ravenna, Ohio, July 4 and 5, 1858, a Mrs. Lewis said:—
"To confine her to love one man was an abridgment of her rights. Although she had one husband in Cleveland, she considered herself married to the whole human race. All men were her husbands, and she had an undying love for them. What business is it to the world whether one man is the father of my children, or ten men are?"
Mrs. V. C. Woodhull, who was re-elected President of the National Association of Spiritualists in America, is reported by the N. Y. Herald as follows:—
"Yes! I am a free-lover! I believe I have an inalienable right to change my husband every day if I like. I trust I am understood, for I mean what I say, and nothing else. I claim that freedom means to be free."
Judge Tilden, of Cleveland, Ohio, and the reporter, inquired of Mrs. Woodhull if the Herald reported her correctly, and she replied, "Yes; I said those words, and meant what I said."
Dr. Potter, who has had a long experience in Spiritualism, thus speaks of its nature and tendency:—
"Parting husbands and wives is one of the notorious tendencies of Spiritualism. . . . When one of the most eloquent trance speakers left her husband, he came out and stated that he knew sixty cases of media leaving companions. We heard one of the most popular impressional speakers say to a large audience that she was compelled by spirits to secede from a husband with whom she was living very happily. We lately heard a very intellectual, eloquent, and popular normal speaker say, in an eloquent address to a large convention of Spiritualists, that 'he would to God it had parted twenty where it had parted one.' In short, wherever we go, we find this tendency in Spiritualism."
"After years of careful investigation, we are compelled, much against our inclination, to admit that more than one-half of our traveling media, speakers, and prominent Spiritualists, are guilty of immoral and licentious practices that have justly provoked the abhorrence of all right thinking people."—Spiritualism as it Is, pp. 10, 11, 20.
SUBLIMITY (?) OF SPIRITUALISM.
Spiritualists have much to say about the "beauties" of their "sublime philosophy," and loudly rant against the Bible, as containing absurd and ridiculous things. We should suppose, from their talk, that the visions and doctrines of Spiritualism were a perfect model of dignity and sublimity. Let us judge them by their fruits.
Dr. Gridley describes the sufferings inflicted by the spirits upon a medium sixty years of age in Southampton, Massachusetts.
"These spirits would pinch and pound him, twitch him up and throw him down, yell and blaspheme, and use the most obscene language that mortal can conceive; they would declare that they were Christ in one breath and devils in the next; they would tie him head to foot a long time together, in a most excruciating posture; declare they would wring his d——d neck off because he doubted them or refused obedience."—Astounding Facts from the Spirit World, pp. 253, 254.
Judge Edmonds is taken away in vision and shown some of the beauties (?) of their heaven. Among other things he sees an "old-fashioned" house, stairway, rag carpet, and a new-fashioned saw-mill! He also saw an old lady, in an old-fashioned cap, busy churning. After an interesting visit with the old lady he left and thus describes his departure:—
"We turned to take our leave, for it was time for me to go. The matron invited me to call on her again, and she would, she said, give me a drink of buttermilk"!!!—Spiritualism, vol. ii. pp. 135-144.
The judge also describes a "dark, gloomy country" that "looked as if the air was full of that black sand, and a smoke, as if from bituminous coal, was all over it." After describing a "dirty-looking hovel," and "two men fighting," he gives the following:—
"I observed what seemed to be a full-grown boy, who had caught a dog, had split open his tail and put a stick in it, merely to enjoy the sport of seeing his suffering. He then turned the dog loose, and stood enjoying the scene. The attention of the owner of the dog was drawn to the cries, and, discovering the cause, he beat the boy, who being as cowardly as he was cruel, fled, but was pursued, and beaten, and kicked far up the road."—Ibid., pp., 181, 182.
Amherst, in Spiritual Telegraph, No. 182, declares that he has "seen mediums rolling on the floor, uttering grunts like swine; giving vent to the most hideous yells; and at times beating their bodies and tearing their hair like lunatics."
They have communications, and unmistakable identifications from "woodchucks," the "dog Pip," and "Balaam's ass."
A. J. Davis says the evil spirits are the "diakka," and W. F. Jamieson, in Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, calls the diakka "a troop of devils," and then quotes Judge Carter: "There is one thing clear, that these diakka or fantastic or mixed spirits, are very numerous and abundant, and take any and every opportunity to obtrude themselves."
Hudson Tuttle, one of their leading writers, refers to a "communication through a noted medium from his dog Pip,' to Gerald Massey, the said Pip 'licking the slate,' and writing with a good degree of intelligence," and adds, "Mr. Davis would say that 'Pip,' was a 'diakka,' and to-morrow he will communicate as George Washington, Theodore Parker, or Balaam's ass. This diakka is flesh, fish, or fowl, as you may desire."
NOT YET.
A DISCHARGED prisoner had been helped by some Christian people to good employment, and was frequently urged by them to give himself to Christ. "No," he said, "not yet; the world must see that I am a reformed man before I can be a good Christian." But the fascinations of the city and the influences of pleasure proved too mighty for him, and he not only ceased attending the house of God, but in every way possible sought for a long time to avoid meeting his Christian friends and benefactors. One Saturday evening he went to the young people's prayer-meeting. The Spirit of God touched many hearts, and the young man's among the rest. After the meeting a gentleman, who relates the incident, said to him: "God calls you to-night, my brother. Will you give up now and wait no longer?" His lips trembled as he said: "The time hasn't quite come yet," and walked away. On the following Tuesday he was dying. The gentleman who had previously spoken to him being hastily summoned, found the young man pale and gasping for breath. He asked him: "The soul, Armstrong—the soul; is it safe?" He could only shake his head and look imploringly into his friend's face who said, "It is not too late now; remember the dying thief; put your whole trust in Jesus now." He shook his head and then his lips moved. He whispered hoarsely, "Do you think I would give him the dregs of my life?" They were his last words.—Selected.
Stars Seen in the Night
It is not in the bright day, but only in the solemn night, that other worlds are to be seen shining in the long, long distances.
DON'T BEGIN TO DOUBT.
THE beginning of doubt is the time of danger. The first doubts are the ones to be put down and crushed out. Thus Prof. Heman Lincoln says :—
The history of our age is full of admonitions. Theodore Parker entered on his public ministry with a strong faith in the inspiration of the Bible and in the miraculous birth and character of Jesus Christ. He began to doubt, first, the inspiration of the sacred writers at all times; then their inspiration beyond the best men of other ages; then the infallible inspiration even of Jesus; and finally the miraculous work and character of Christ. The doubts of universal inspiration led the way to general unbelief. Frederick Robertson was traveling rapidly on the same road, held back only by his fervid and reverent love for Christ, when an early death saved him from an utter wreck of faith.
The two great questions of our day are : Have we a divine Bible? and, Have we a divine Saviour? If the Bible be divine only in its origin, and subject to all human limitations in the utterance of revealed truths, it is no adequate authority or guide for men. And if the Saviour were divine only in his mission, and had in his person no essential deity, he is not an adequate Redeemer for a lost race. When Theodore Parker lost faith in his miraculous birth, he said very naturally : "I think a careful study of the Gospels will force us to the conclusion that he was sometimes mistaken. When he was a boy, I suppose he stumbled in learning to walk, miscalled the letters in learning to read, got wrong conclusions in his thoughts. When he reached the age of thirty, he must have made mistakes in his intellectual processes and in his moral and religious processes." Mr. Parker was consistent in his logic. If Jesus were not divine, he was liable, like other men, to mistakes of judgment ; and if the Bible be not divine, it partakes of human infirmities. If God did not guard its authors from communicating untruths in secular matters, the inference is quick and almost inevitable that he did not guard them from misapprehension in religious matters.
POVERTY AS A DISCIPLINE.
By J. G. Holland
WE often hear it said of a man that he has had great advantages. We have meant by this simply the advantages which wealth could buy—university training, travel, high society, unlimited books, etc. It is not often that we hear poverty spoken of as an advantage, yet we believe it to be demonstrably true, that, of all the advantages which come to any young man, this is the greatest. The young man who is saved from the effort of making his own way in the world, and the necessity of establishing his own position, is denied the most powerful stimulus to labor and development. The young men who are coming every year out of the colleges and the professional schools of the country, and starting into active life, will win success or sink into failure, mainly in accordance with the amount of stimulus under which their education has been acquired. If they have been obliged to labor until they have learned the value of money; if they have been forced into close economies, and learned, also, how difficult it is to keep it; if they have grown up with the consciousness upon them that everything they hope for in the world must be won by their own unaided force and industry; if they have acquired thrifty habits and self-helpfulness and self trust—they enter life with great and most assuring advantages. No amount of wealth given to a young man can possibly give him so good a prospect of a true success as poverty that has secured such advantages as these.
Twice within the easy memory of this generation, a man who started at the lowest extreme of the social scale, has risen to be the President of the United States. Abraham Lincoln rose from his nest of leaves in a Western log-cabin, to be twice the elected ruler of the nation, at a most momentous period of the national history, traversing in the passage every degree of the social scale. The poor frontiersman's child, the flat-boatman, the day-laborer, the indigent student, the humble country lawyer, the politician, the stump-speaker, the legislator, the statesman, the President, and chief of one of the greatest armies the world has ever seen—who believes for a moment that, had he been rich at the start, he would have ended where he did? It was the discipline of poverty that made him what he was. It gave him a profound sympathy with the people, most of whom are engaged in a struggle with poverty from the cradle to the grave. It stimulated and trained his powers to their highest development, and it helped him to form those habits of industry and economy that are essential to the best success.
James A. Garfield, whom we have just laid in the tomb with tears of affectionate reverence, was another instance of the beneficial influences of poverty. He rose from as low a place as Lincoln, and took even a higher flight than he. The most brilliant man who ever occupied the presidential chair, and rapidly becoming the most admired and best beloved ruler in the world, he was mourned when, in realizing one of the many coincidences that existed between his life and that of Lincoln, he was murdered by an assassin, as man was never mourned before. His marvelous accomplishments and powers won for him the respect of the great, and his sympathy with the humble drew to him the hearts of the world.—J. G. Holland.
THOUGHT IT MADE NO DIFFERENCE.
`That tenon does not fit the mortise by a quarter of an inch,' said an employer to a young carpenter who had just begun to work for him.
`I thought that for a garden gate you would not be particular, and it would make no difference,' answered the young man.
But it did make a difference. It made just the difference between the young man having a steady summer job at good wages, and having his time unoccupied upon his hands. The employer found no further fault; but when the gate was finished, he paid the maker, without a word, and dismissed him.
The next day there was another man in his place. He happened to be a man who thought it did make a difference how everything was done; he always did his best, and he kept his situation till the end of the season.
So it happens. Frequently some little thing which was not expected to attract attention is noticed by some one to whom the excellence of the work has commended itself, and the man who has made painstaking the rule of all his labor, is surprised by a sudden and unlooked-for accession of good fortune. He has been brought into notice by some unconsidered trifle, which was well done, merely because it was his habit to do everything as well as possible.
On the other hand, many a man who is lamenting his ill-fortune, and doesn't know what to attribute it to, owes it to some such carelessness in the way of doing his work as that which doomed the young carpenter to a summer of profitless idleness. Men are by no means always told by what particular act they are judged; but any good performance is always liable to make, and any bad performance is always liable to mar, a fortune.
EXAGGERATION.
SOME habits are so unconsciously practiced that a movement to mend them is the only way to detect them. The beam in one's own eye is less noticed than the mote in another person's eye.
A family while at the breakfast table one morning pledged to observe the strictest veracity for that day. A member of the family tells the "consequences."
As a first-fruit of the resolve, we asked the one who suggested it:--
"What made you so late at breakfast this morning?"
She hesitated, began with "Because I couldn't"—and then, true to her compact, said, "The truth is, I was lazy and didn't hurry, or I might have been down long ago."
Presently one of them remarked that she had been very cold, adding "I never was so cold in my life."
An inquiring look caused the last speaker to modify her statement instantly with "Oh, I don't think it was so cold after all."
A third remark to the effect that "Miss So-and-so was the homeliest girl in the city," was recalled as soon as made, the speaker being compelled to own that Miss So-and-so was only rather plain, instead of being excessively homely.
So it went on throughout the day, causing much merriment, which was good-naturedly accepted by the subjects, and giving rise to constant corrections in the interest of truth.
One thing became more and more surprising, however, to each of us, and that was the amount of cutting down which our most careless statements demanded under this new law.—Youth's Companion.
OUR GUIDE.
By Dr. Maclaren
Moses sought to secure Hobab for a guide because he was a native of the desert, and had traveled all over it. His experience was his qualification. We have a brother who has himself traveled every foot of the road by which we have to go, and his footsteps have marked out with blood a track for us to follow, and have trodden a footpath through the else pathless waste. He knows "how to encamp in this wilderness," for he himself has "tabernacled among us," and by experience has learned the weariness of the journey and the perils of the wilderness.
His life is our pattern. Our marching orders are brief and simple: follow your leader, and plant your feet in his footprints.
That is the sum of all ethics, and the vade mecum for practical life. However diverse our duties and circumstances are, the principles which come out in the divine record of that fair life and wondrous death, will fit with equal closeness to us all; and so divine and all-comprehensive is it that it abides as the sufficient pattern for every class, for every stage, for every variety of character, for every era, and every land, till the end, and beyond the end.
Our poor, weak hearts long for a brother's hand to hold us up, for a brother's voice to whisper a word of cheer, for a brother's example to animate as well as to instruct. An abstract law of right is but a cold guide, like the stars that shine, keen in the polar winter. It is hard even to find in the bare thought of an unseen God guiding us by his unseen Spirit within and his unseen Providence without, the solidity and the warmth which we need. Therefore we have mercifully received God manifest in the flesh, a Brother to be our guide and the Captain of our salvation.
To him then transfer all those feelings of confidence and affection too often lavished on men. The noblest use for the precious ointment of love, which the poorest of us bears in the alabaster-box of the heart, is to break it on his head.
Thus loving and following him, we shall be set free from undue dependence on human helpers whilst they are with us, from eagerness to secure them, from dread of losing them, from despair when they depart. Perplexities will disappear. Duty will become plain. Life will not be a weary march through an unknown land where we have to choose our path by our own poor wisdom, and death is often the penalty of a blunder. All our duty and joy lie in the one command: "Follow me;" and if we only ask him to be with us "instead of eyes," and accept his gentle leading, we shall not walk in darkness, but may plunge into thickest night and the most unknown land, assured that he will "lead us by a right way to the city of habitation."
MINISTERIAL LAZINESS
By Thomas De Witt Talmage
OFTEN empties the churches of auditors. Hearers who are intelligent through reading newspapers, and by active association in business circles, will not on the Sabbath sit and listen to platitudes. Hearers will not come to sermons which have in them no facts, no information, no stirring power, no adaptation, no fire. The pew will not listen to the pulpit unless, at least on the subject that day under discussion, the pulpit knows more than the pew. Ministerial laziness has cleared out many churches. Such ministers saunter around from parlor to parlor under the name of pastoral visitation, and go gadding about through the village or the city on errands of complete nothingness, and wrap their brains around a cigar and smoke them up, and then on Saturday afternoon put a few crude thoughts together, and on Sunday morning wonder that the theme of Christ and him crucified does not bring a large audience.—Talmage.
Our Need of God
It is good for a man to be checked, disappointed, crossed, made to feel his own ignorance, weakness, folly—made to feel his need of God—to feel that in spite of all his cunning and self-confidence he is no better off in this world than a lost child in a dark forest, unless he has a Father in heaven who loves him with an eternal love; and a Holy Spirit in heaven who will give him a right judgment in all things; and a Saviour in Heaven who can be touched with the feeling of his infirmities.—Sel.
Explaining Away Our Duty
By Bishop Butler
THAT which is called considering what is our duty in a particular case is very often nothing but endeavoring to explain it away.—Bishop Butler.