Your ShelfYour Projects

Signs of the Times, Vol. 13, No. 33.

HE CARETH FOR YOU

Signs of the Times

Aug 25, 1887

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 25, 1887

"HE CARETH FOR YOU."

By Marianne Farningham

How strong and sweet my Father's care! The word, like music in the air, Comes answering to my whispered prayer, "He cares for thee."
The thought great wonder with it brings, My cares are all such little things; But to the truth my glad faith clings, He cares for me.
Yet keep me ever in thy love, Dear Father, watching from above, And let me still thy mercy prove, And care for me.
Cast me not off for all my sin, But make me pure and true within, And teach me how thy smile to win Who carest for me.
Oh, still in summer's golden glow, Or wintry storms of wind and snow, Love me, my Father; let me know Thy care for me!
And I will learn to cast the care Which, like a heavy load, I bear Down at thy feet in lowly prayer, And trust in thee.
For naught can hurt me, shade or shine, Nor evil thing touch me or mine; Since thou, with tenderness divine, Dost care for me.
—Marianne Farningham, in Christian World.

General Articles.

By Ellen G. White

CHRIST AND THE LAW; OR THE RELATIONS OF THE JEW AND GENTILE TO THE LAW.

BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.
At the first advent of Christ into this world, the people were favored with a new and fuller manifestation of the Divine Presence than they had ever enjoyed before. The knowledge of God, and the infinite love and benevolence of his character, were revealed more perfectly; for it pleased the Father that in his well-beloved Son all fullness should dwell. The middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile was broken down, and both were made partakers, not only of the blessings promised under the old covenant, but also the spiritual and heavenly truths revealed through Christ.
The Jewish church, with its rites and ceremonies pointing forward to Christ, was not to be despised. This was a dispensation of glory. In the wilderness, Christ himself, though invisible, was the leader of the armies of Israel; and the power of God was often revealed in a special manner in their behalf. Considering these glorious displays of divine power, Moses thus addresses Israel: "What nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as the Lord our God is in all things that we call upon him for? And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?" How many pass over these words of Moses as though they were meaningless, and continue to heap reproach and derision on divine institutions. How many trample on the divine law, the righteous judgments and statutes which were committed to God's ancient people.
In the mount, when the law was given to Moses, the Coming One was shown to him also. He saw Christ's work, and his mission to earth, when the Son of God should take upon himself humanity, and become a teacher and a guide to the world, and at last give himself a ransom for their sins. When the perfect Offering should be made for the sins of men, the sacrificial offerings typifying the work of the Messiah were to cease. With the advent of Christ, the veil of uncertainty was to be lifted, and a flood of light shed upon the darkened understanding of his people.
As Moses saw the day of Christ, and the new and living way of salvation that was to be opened through his blood, he was captivated and entranced. The praise of God was in his heart, and the divine glory that attended the giving of the law was so strikingly revealed in his countenance when he came down from the mount to walk with Israel, that the brightness was painful. Because of their transgressions, the people were unable to look upon his face, and he wore a veil that he might not terrify them.
It was the light of the glory of the gospel of Christ, who was the foundation of the sacrificial system, that shone in the face of Moses. "But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away; how shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather glorious?" When the reality, the full blaze of midday light, should come, the dim glory which was but an earnest of the latter, should be done away, swallowed up in the greater glory.
"And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished." God was pleased to reveal to Moses the end of the sacrificial offerings at the time of the giving of his law. It was made plain to him that the Angel that stood at the head of the armies of Israel was the great Offering for sin, the foundation of the entire typical system. He saw type reach its antitype. The former was but an earnest of the latter, and in comparison with it was intricate and mysterious, although of great beauty and clearness.
Had the Israelites discerned the gospel light that was opened to Moses, had they been able by faith to look steadfastly to the end of that which was abolished, they could have endured the light which was reflected from the countenance of Moses. "But their minds were blinded; for until this day remaineth the same veil untaken away in the reading of the Old Testament; which veil is done away in Christ." The Jews as a people did not discern that the Messiah whom they rejected, was the Angel who guided their fathers in their travels in the wilderness. To this day the veil is upon their hearts, and its darkness hides from them the good news of salvation through the merits of a crucified Redeemer.
It is no wonder that transgressors of God's law at the present time will get as far from it as possible; for it condemns them. But those who hold that the ten commandments were abolished at the crucifixion of Christ are in a similar deception to that of the Jews. The position that the law of God is rigorous and unbearable casts contempt upon Him who governs the universe in accordance with its holy precepts. A veil is over the hearts of those who hold this view in reading both the Old and the New Testament. The penalty for the least transgression of that law is death, and but for Christ, the sinner's Advocate, it would be summarily visited on every offender. Justice and mercy are blended. Christ and the law stand side by side. The law convicts the transgressor, and Christ pleads in the sinner's behalf.
With the first advent of Christ there was ushered in an era of greater light and glory; but it would indeed be sinful ingratitude to despise and ridicule the lesser light because a fuller and more glorious light had dawned. Those who despise the blessings and glory of the Jewish age are not prepared to be benefited by the preaching of the gospel. The brightness of the Father's glory, and the excellence and perfection of his sacred law, are only understood through the atonement made upon Calvary by his dear Son; but even the atonement loses its significance when the law of God is rejected.
The life of Christ was a most perfect and thorough vindication of his Father's law, and his death attested its immutability. Christ did not, by bearing the sinner's guilt, release man from his obligation to obey the law; for if the law could have been changed or abolished,he need not have come to this world to suffer and die. The very fact that Christ died for its transgressions attests the unchanging character of the Father's law.
The Jews had departed from God, and in their teaching had substituted their own traditions for the divine law. The life and teachings of Christ made plain and distinct the principles of this violated law. The heavenly host understood that the object of his mission was to exalt the Father's law and make it honorable, and to justify its claims by paying with his own life the penalty of its transgression. It was thus that he made reconciliation between God and man. As the great blessings brought within the reach of the human race at the first advent of the Saviour were seen by the angelic visitors, they burst into the glad, triumphant anthem: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men."
The middle wall of partition between the Jew and Gentile was broken down. They were no longer in separate rooms; the unbelieving Gentile has been united with the believing Jew. The Gentile did not crowd the Jews from their original position, but he became a partaker with them of their blessings.
Thus was fulfilled the mission of Christ; and from his own divine lips were heard the words: "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill."
Basel, Switzerland.

TRUE WORKING TOGETHER.

THE want of this age is a spirit of restfulness. Worry and hurry are the spirits that sap the life of the people, and defeat the ends for which they labor. Seed is sown to bear fruit, but the spirit of hurry moves the planter to force the growth, and the fruit is plucked before it reaches maturity. We wear out our nerves and temper in unnecessary worry over things and conditions that cannot be helped, and to which it is the part of wisdom to submit and adjust our inclinations. This does not mean submitting to those conditions that involve unnecessary suffering or disturbance. No man is a hero for submitting to the pangs of toothache when a dentist is available; yet he can show heroic qualities in the way he bears the pain while it is inevitable, and applies remedies for its modification or radical removal. A weak yielding to discomfort, annoyance, trouble, is far more cowardly than brave. A true spirit of submission perceives readily between that which is inevitable and must be borne and that which it is weakness to bear. Laziness is sometimes misnamed submission. God is made a pack-horse, whose burden is made up of the individual's shortsightedness, laziness, and lack of judgment. Many a misfortune is spoken of as "the Lord's will" that is the result of the speaker's errors. It never is "the Lord's will" for a man not to exercise the powers given him for his guidance and preservation both in things material and spiritual.
A church deacon indorsed a note for a man known to be tricky and improvident. The result was the loss of a homestead which had been occupied by his family for three generations. He said: "It is the Lord's will; let him do as seemeth him good." And he sank down into a poverty-stricken old age.
What is said of him who does not care for his own household? Sanitary conditions are neglected, disease and death invade the home, and the infliction is said to come from the hand of the Lord. The first directions given God's chosen people were based on the highest sanitary principles.
Submission to that which is from the hand of the Lord brings rich spiritual fruitage; but submission which has its roots in selfishness and laziness, and covers itself with a hypocritical mantle, is an insult to the Giver of life and light. Said a good woman when asked the secret of her freedom from worry and fret:—
"It is no secret and no great achievement. I simply bear what I cannot avoid, of trial or pain or annoyance, with submission. I submit to nothing that I can remove. I believe that God means we shall make bad things better always, when they can be bettered, and I ask myself, first of all, if an evil or unpleasant thing can be remedied. If it can I bend all my energies to getting it out of the way; if it cannot, I submit to it, and begin, the very moment I accept it, to look for the good in it, and to get the good out of it."
God never meant us to submit to evil that good may come. Christ cursed the tree that bore no fruit for the world's refreshing. Overcome the evil with good, but do not accept it as a part of God's will because we are too lazy or indifferent to fight it.
Much worry and fret are due to anticipating trouble. Says the same writer:—
"It is safe always to hope, but both unsafe and unwise to anticipate evil. To-morrow's torment has no right to thrust its shadow upon the household of to-day, and never will do it unless we open the door. I try to ‘remember that to-day ne’er dawns again,’ and to realize that if I get no gladness in it for myself, and give none to others, the sum of joy ‘that might have been’ on the earth is diminished, which surely is not pleasing unto God. To live in to-day as wisely and heartily as we can is not only the truest religion, but the wisest philosophy and best common sense. The truth is, dear child, that when we refuse to take any burden that does not belong to us, and then take those that are our own to the Burden-bearer, life does not lack the blessedness of rest."
Unnecessary worry and needless hurry kill more people, and limit the energies of more people, than death or ill health. Trust God as a Father of infinite wisdom, love, and care, but do not try to hide your own weakness or sin under a hypocritical spirit of submission. "Rest in the Lord, wait patiently for him," and he will give you rest. Rest implies activities; it is a cessation from labor. Rest in the Lord, because you have labored for and with him. Wait patiently after having done all that conditions require. Work and rest in the fullness of a divine Father's care and love. —Christian Union.

BORROWED CAPITAL.

By Methodist Recorder

A GREAT many men are trying to get rich on borrowed capital. They have little or no money of their own, but they think that by using other people's money they can amass a fortune. Sometimes they succeed, but more frequently they fail, involving themselves and others in trouble. A man had better be content with comparatively little, that he can call his own, than to possess a great deal that belongs to others. There are other men who do not borrow money, but they borrow brains, and attempt to build up a reputation by appropriating to their own use the fruit of other men's labors, who have used their brains to advantage. Borrowing brains is worse than borrowing money.
A man may use another man's money so as to increase it, but he cannot use another man's brains with equal success. The more he depends on other men's brains, the more feeble and helpless he becomes. A man had better use his own brains, and by that means develop and strengthen his mind, and acquire an honest reputation, although comparatively humble, to which he knows he is justly entitled, than to build up a great reputation on other men's labors, being conscious all the time that he himself is a fraud. But some men, if it were possible, would borrow grace to enable them to enter Heaven. The foolish virgins tried to borrow oil to get into the marriage feast; but they did not succeed. A great many people are imitating their example, and making no preparation for Heaven; but by associating with the people of God, they hope by some means to slip into the kingdom at last, although they have never had a particle of grace in their hearts. Pretense and shams will not succeed in anything. If there is anything worth having, try to secure it as your own, so that, like Mary's good part, it may not be taken from you.
—Methodist Recorder.

GOD'S LAW IN HUMAN SOCIETY.

By A. E. Dunning

Disraeli, pleading for his race, once wrote, "The life and property of England are protected by the laws of Sinai." The sentence suggests more truth than its words can convey. The decalogue is so thoroughly woven into the texture of our language, thought, and life, that we cannot conceive of government or society without it. No government can perfectly enforce its commands, for no human court can try men's intentions. Yet these tables of granite are the foundation of all our statutes, and from them, as the source, spring all our bulky records of law and precedent. By them, at the last day, as the statute-book of the righteous Judge who looks on the heart, every man will receive according to his deeds.
The first table, as it is called, defines our duty toward God; the second, our duties toward men. But every obligation of man to men is a duty toward God, and no one can perfectly serve men who does not fulfill every duty to God. The two tables are one; "the second is like unto" the first. So it is an unimportant question whether the fifth commandment belongs to the second table or the first. It has been aptly compared to a door in the stone dwellings still found in the land of Bashan, hewn out of the solid rock, where door, partition, and hinge are a single stone, opening from one apartment to another. It belongs to both, and both are one. On the one hand, no one can be true to his heavenly Father who does not obey and love father and mother, since they together represent God to the child. Nor can anyone be a good citizen who is not first an obedient son or daughter. On the other hand, the unspoken command to parents is not less plain. If they stand in the place of God to their children, interpreting his fatherly relation to them, it is their duty to treat their children so as to deserve "honor." Thus the ten commandments declare:—
1. The right of God to our supreme love, worship, and service.
2. The right of the home to faithful obedience of children to their parents; to wisdom and love of parents in training their children.
3. The sacredness of human life. It is the breath, or spirit, of God quickening the image or representation of himself which he has created. To injure it wantonly is to profane him who created it. This law forbids murder, suicide, cruel treatment, and unrighteous anger towards others. Security of person is the first condition of society. This shows the limitations of the law. Man's life is precious because of what man is. So the law of Moses made death the penalty of certain crimes. So our statutes provide for taking the lives of those who wantonly destroy human life. Sowe have the right to self-protection, even if it requires the taking of life. Under the divine law neither rights nor duties conflict.
But these limits must be jealously guarded. It is the person made in God's image who is sacred. To destroy it, whether it is just begun and yet unborn, or in its full maturity, is an awful crime. To destroy life suddenly or gradually, by act or intention, is to make one's self the enemy of man, and to call down the vengeance of God. The Spirit of obedience to the sixth commandment is true reverence for man.
4. The sacredness of marriage. It was the divine intention that one man and one woman should live together throughout life (Matt. 19:4-6). This intention, after the first pair fell into sin, could not be realized except by degrees. Therefore God permitted men to live by rules which were not the final declaration of his will, but which were suited to the condition of men at that time (Matt. 19:7, 8). But there is a divine idea to be realized in marriage, which is necessary to the exaltation of human society into the kingdom of God; as there is a divine idea in the relation between parents and children, and in the unfolding of every human life. Therefore marriage is sacred. To violate its sanctity is to strike at the root of all that is valuable in society. This law forbids the husband or the wife to give or allow to others the peculiar love and service which each owes to the other because of their marriage vows. By implication, also, it forbids to the unmarried as well as the married all irreverent treatment of one's own body, or indulgence in thoughts inconsistent with pure married life. As disobedience to this law is the grossest sin, so willing and constant harmony with it opens the way to the noblest, sweetest joys possible on earth.
5. The sacredness of property rights. The sanctity of person declared in the law of God extends to the things which belong to that person. The eighth commandment forbids us, except in the case of gifts, to take the property of another without giving him in return a fair equivalent. It includes in its prohibition every unjust advantage which men take of other men to get hold of their property, or withhold what is their due. It condemns gambling of every sort, giving or taking unfair prices for goods or service, withholding just taxes, and all misuse of trusts. The New Testament rendering of the eighth commandment is, "Owe no man anything, save to love one another."
6. The sacredness of reputation. The happiness and influence of each one depends largely on the general confidence of society in him. To rob one of any portion of it which is his due is to destroy wantonly his choicest possessions. The ninth commandment forbids every form of misrepresentation which will injure another; and, since there is hardly any form of falsehood which does not directly or indirectly harm others than ourselves, it forbids by implication all untruthfulness, whether by word or act or look. The New Testament interpretation of this commandment is, "Putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor; for we are members one of another."
7. The sacredness of the persons, property, or reputations of others must not be violated in our thoughts. The tenth commandment forbids all desires to possess that which we cannot attain without doing wrong to another. That is covetousness. All sin is trespass on the rights of God or men. Every wrong done to men dishonors God, in whose image and for whose glory they were made. Therefore the apostle says, "All the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."
The unity of the law of God is plain to anyone who interprets it as based on the sacredness of God. Man is his creature; to invade his rights in any way, whether of person, of family, of property, or of reputation, is to strike at the sacredness of God. All sin begins in desire. So every desire cherished to wrong another is an act of enmity to God. As the whole law is fulfilled through a controlling spirit of love to men, so the whole law is broken by a single cherished wish to gain anything by wronging another.
The announcement of the ten commandments by the voice of God was accompanied by the most impressive, awe-inspiring manifestations of the Divine Presence that we can conceive. In the bleak solitudes of Sinai the voice ceased amid thunderings and lightnings and the mighty sound of the trumpet from the smoking mountain. The people were so terrified that they recoiled and retreated from the place. Yet Moses assured them that God was not displaying his power to frighten them, but to test them, and to inspire that reverential fear of him which would hold them back from breaking his law. Such fear in the sense of God's presence is the strongest safeguard against temptation.
God has given these commandments to men with the intention that men shall obey them, and not merely that they may be sorry that they do not keep them. Upon the disobedient he has pronounced awful penalties; to the obedient he has promised glorious rewards. The new covenant does not destroy the law, but promises help to keep it perfectly. When it is written on the hearts of men, that is, revealed in their instincts and affections, then will the image of God shine gloriously in them, and heaven will have begun on earth.—A. E. Dunning, D. D., in Congregationalist.

THE VICTORY.

ONE of the most eloquent passages ever indicted by any pen, or spoken by any lips, is that of the great apostle to the Gentiles, in concluding his statement of the doctrine of the resurrection. Having presented the doctrine he triumphantly exclaims: "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."
Yes, thanks, ten thousand thanks, be to God that poor, feeble, sinful, mortal humanity may obtain a complete victory over death and the grave through our Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God that sin, which derives its strength from the law, and is thereby made "the sting of death," may be pardoned by the God of grace, and will be, in the case of every sinner who seeks this pardon through Christ. Thanks be to God that though we are sinners, and justly condemned by his law, we can make our peace with him, and have him for our friend in life's "last alarms." Thanks be to God that, though our bodies are mortal and must molder in the grave, the resurrection morn sheds a light upon that dark and dismal abode that enables us to say:
"O grave, where is thy victory?" Thanks be to God that, in the case of the Christian, the victory of death and the grave is only apparent not real. Thanks be to God that Jesus has said to this dying world: "I am the resurrection, and the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die." Thanks be to God that Jesus hath brought life and immortality to light. O! how dark is this life to a thoughtful man, except as he is illumined by light from the upper world! How grateful is this light to a soul profoundly at work on the problem of existence here, and the greater problem of existence hereafter!—Independent.

CONSECRATION.

CONSECRATION is the act of separating from a common to a sacred use, or of devoting a person or thing to the service and worship of God. The vessels of the temple and the priests among the Israelites were consecrated or devoted to God and his service. Christians, also, by profession, are consecrated to God, and Paul speaks of vessels "sanctified, and meet for the Master's use, and prepared unto every good work."
Entire conversion embraces three things—being, doing, suffering. We must be willing to be, to do, and to suffer all that God requires. This embraces friends, reputation, property, and time. It covers body, mind, and soul. These are to be used when, where, as God requires, and only as he requires. When the people of Collotia were about to surrender to Rome, the question was asked, "Do you deliver up yourselves, the Collotine people, your city, your fields, your water, your bounds, your temples, your utensils, all things that are yours, both human and divine, into the hands of the Roman people?" And when they replied, "We deliver up all," they were received. This incident affords a striking illustration of our entire consecration to God.
And the measure of our consecration is the measure of our work. This is manifest, for the work expresses and confesses the motive, whether it be love or duty. What is the difference between prison labor and that done outside the walls? Critical judges of artisan work declare that they can tell instantly the work of a bondman from that of a freeman. The motive appears in every stitch. It would be strange if Christian work did not follow the same rule. Our Lord gives the principle when he says, "If ye love me, keep my commandments." And Peter and John testified to it when they rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for the name of Jesus. So also the early Christians took joyfully the spoiling of their goods; they renounced the very avocation in which they were skilled, they counted not their lives dear unto themselves. There was no limit to their consecration, and its freeness and fullness evidenced the spontaneity of their love.
So every Christian workman in the measure of his enthusiasm and energy determines in what degree he is controlled by the love of Christ. And it is not a wrong judgment of our fellow-Christians to declare that listless lives, consecration which is spasmodic and dependent upon pressure or excitement, are not the expressions of Christly motive. Duty may do for a day, but love alone can govern a life. And if we are weary in well doing, would it not be well for us to question our works as to their motive, to trace up their narrowing streams of influence, and see from what fountain they spring?
We must remember ever the parable of our Lord, and that searching saying, "Ye did itnot unto Me." If we are laboring these months and years as galley-slaves, driven by the scourge of duty, and not constrained by the love of Christ, it is no wonder that we fail and are weary. If we have been counting our charities as so many compensations for our sins, our life must indeed be joyless. Our successful efforts are crowns of thankfulness we cast at Jesus's feet. They are our heart's way of telling to all men how precious his complete salvation is to us.—Illustrated Christian Weekly.

Speak While I Am Alive to Hear

By Margaret J. Preston

WHAT use for the rope, if it be not flung Till the swimmer’s grasp to the rock has clung? What help in a comrade’s bugle-blast When the peril of Alpine heights is past? What need that the spurring pæan roll When the runner is safe beyond the goal? What worth is eulogy’s blandest breath When whispered in ears that are hushed in death? No! no! if you have but a word of cheer, Speak it while I am alive to hear! —Margaret J. Preston.

PERSONAL POPULARITY.

It is a good thing to be well spoken of by one’s neighbors, and it is always pleasant to hear that one is most loved where he is best known; and yet popularity is not always a sign of real merit. Some men have a way of ingratiating themselves into the favor of others when in fact they are worthy of but little esteem. Some men, too, are popular because they say, “Yes, yes,” to everybody. They raise no antagonisms. They never resist the tide. They go as they are carried. They propose nothing; they oppose nothing. They are mere bubbles that float on the surface. They glitter and dance about, and seem to be something, but they are nothing. These walking negatives, these human minus quantities, enjoy a certain kind of popularity. They are in nobody’s way. Nobody speaks ill of them. They are nobody’s target. There is not enough stuff in them to make a target of. They have no demerits, it is true, but it is because there is nothing there for a demerit to stick to.
Men of pronounced character are always the object of somebody’s criticism. They think for themselves, and they say what they think. They have convictions and they have the courage of them. If a craze has overtaken the community in which they live, they have the boldness to rebuke it. How can they be otherwise than unpopular? True, it is a kind of superficial unpopularity, for deep down in the public mind and heart is a consciousness that such men are, after all, the safest and the most to be trusted; and in time of real danger and trouble, their counsel is sought when the noisy ones who hurrah with the multitude are forgotten. Still, taking the world as it moves on day by day, the thoughtless crowd will not speak well of a man who rebukes their follies and checks their waywardness.
But neither popularity nor unpopularity is a test of merit. The judgment of men is not always righteous judgment. The judgment of God is infallible. Conformity to his word is the true and only test of merit. The man whose life is in accord with the word of God ought to be popular, if he is not; and he whose life is not in such accord ought not to be popular, if he is.
It sometimes happens that a man’s neighbors, and those who are nearest to him and know most about him, are the most unsuitable of all persons to form an estimate of him. The most unpopular man that ever lived in this world was our Lord Jesus Christ. “He came unto his own, and his own received him not.” John 1:11. “Neither did his brethren believe in him.” John 7:5. The very people among whom he lived cried out, “Away with him, away with him!” and they took him out and hanged him on a tree, nailing him to the cross, amid the shouts and jeers of the multitude.
Unpopular as he was we should walk in his footsteps and take the consequences. He once said, “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you.” John 15:18. And again he said, “It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his Lord.” Matt. 10:25. It is well to seek the good opinion of our neighbors and so to act as to secure it, but not if it requires us to deflect from the line of right. When the apostle speaks of being “all things to all men,” he means just what we have said. Be conciliating to all; be rude to none; please everybody, if possible; but be sure to please God first. A man who will do this will have opposition. With all his tact Paul had enemies, and plenty of them, and he was beaten with stripes five times, and stoned and left for dead. Our Lord said, “Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.” Luke 6:26.
On the whole, a man’s personal popularity with reference to his personal interests, is a thing about which he need give himself no great concern. Let him fear God and keep his commandments, and the good Lord will be sure to give him as much favor in the sight of those with whom he has to do as will be best for him.—Christian Index.

A SUMMER SERMON.

By Editor

THESE words of the apostle, dear brethren, should come home to everyone with peculiar force: “Quit you like men,—be strong.” Let us ask first, How are you to gain strength? I answer, By exercise. You want a strong arm? Exercise your arm. The blacksmith shop supplies a large part of the pugilists of the country: continual exercise with the sledge hammer gives the brawny arm before whose knocks few can stand. You want strong legs? Exercise them. Walk. Still walk. Walk more. Keep on walking. The professional pedestrians have legs as tough as lignum vitæ; their tissues are like iron, and their sinews like steel; it has all come of exercise. You want strength,—to be known as strong men, to be strong men? Exercise that which gives strength. Exercise your will, and thus strengthen your determination and your courage; never occupy a compromising position. Be not one thing to your friends, and another to your mere acquaintances. Don’t live on the fence—a good place for chickens to roost on, but a poor place for a man: the Malagasians do better in finding their houses, like the turkeys, in the tree-branches.
A great many of you, dear brethren, it is to be feared, think after this fashion: “I would like to take such and such a position on a certain question; but it takes a strong man to do that.” It does take a stronger man, dear brother, than you are, but a man need not be a moral Samson to simply take up with his convictions and hold fast to them. There is the temperance question; there are doctrinal questions; there are questions of Christian faith and practice; there are sociological questions,—questions concerning society and the family life: on all these there are about as many divergent opinions as there are leaves in this month of August. But yet, dear brethren, that should not prevent you from holding fast to your opinions, and fearlessly avowing them.
Two great misconceptions, it is to be feared, beloved brethren, are made in this matter—one is that the public are not strong enough to receive your views; the other is that you are not strong enough to declare them. The first is not true, though the second doubtless is. But it is a great mistake to suppose that you can get strong by waiting for strength to come. To be sure, there were once some of whom the prophet tells us “their strength was to sit still.” But they were Egyptians—foes to Israel; and it is to be feared there are too many of these sedentary folk in the Christian camp to-day, and it stands without denial that they do not form the effective moral power of a community.
The wisest and truest thing for any and all of you to do, dear brethren, is to declare unequivocally and unyieldingly your position on the issues of to-day. Where you are convinced state your convictions; where you are in doubt say so: we are not speaking of utterances from the pulpit so much as of the every-day utterances to friends and neighbors. This is the manly way and the Bible way. But all things are not expedient. Then avow the expediency; only see to it that your reputation has not its omnipresent double which presents you as holding one position to some, and a very different position to others. Dear brethren, we want to see this principle of perfect independence of thought, clear purpose, and intelligent conviction brought home more and more in the family, in the church, in the school, in the college. Beyond question, beloved, a great deal of harm is done by parents seeking to shape their boys into chips of the old block. The same error is made by college professors sometimes in trying to force down the students’ throats peculiar views on the leading sociological questions of the day. It is better to exhibit both sides; better to challenge opinion. And let us say, most of the college students, most of you, beloved brethren, most of the people of this country, live in small communities. The tendencies of these, it must be confessed, is narrowing, and at times depressing. It is not possible for all to get on the higher plane of observation which a knowledge of the world brings through travel and change of residence.
But it is possible for you all, beloved, to follow the advice of the great seventeenth-century thinker,—get opinion from all sides, ponder, consider, decide; it is possible for both parent and professor to so instruct that the judicial as well as the receptive faculties shall be strengthened. What is wanted, dear friends, is the many-sided intelligence which gives opportunity for the best judgment, together with the courage which enables everyone to maintain and assert an opinion when once formed. The world despises trimmers and fence dwellers. It has a contempt for the man who carries his opinions about wrapped, like the photographer’s sensitive negatives, in dark clothes, so that they shall not see the light of day.
The men of clear, pronounced views courageously adhered to are the strong men. And they are strong not because they were born strong—they were very likely born as weak as the weakest of you, dear brethren—but because in due time, with the progress of years, increasing in wisdom as well as stature, they were led to cultivate the will. Brought to entertain clean-cut opinion, they were enabled to maintain that conviction in the face of the world. The men who are afraid of saying something that will occasion the expressed dissent of their fellow-men, as some of you are, and who keep their own convictions carefully concealed, as some of you do, beloved brethren, are not they who follow the apostle’s injunction, “Quit you like men,—be strong.” Owing to the warm weather the last hymn will be omitted. Receive the benediction.—Christian at Work.

Life Is a Book

By Talmage

OUR life is a book. Our years are the chapters. Our months are the paragraphs. Our days are the sentences. Our doubts are the interrogation points. Our imitation of others, the question marks. Our attempt at display, a dash. Death, the period. Eternity, the peroration.—Talmage.
Continue reading: ACQUAINTED WITH GRIEF