Earlier text: LIFE: WHAT IS IT?A REVIEW OF PAINE'S “AGE OF REASON.”
By Alonzo T. Jones
On page 108 Mr. Paine quotes from Jeremiah 37:11–14: “And it came to pass, that when the army of the Chaldeans was broken up from Jerusalem for fear of Pharaoh’s army,” that “Jeremiah went forth out of Jerusalem to go into the land of Benjamin, to separate himself thence in the midst of the people. And when he was in the gate of Benjamin, a captain of the ward was there, whose name was Irijah; . . . and he took Jeremiah the prophet, saying, Thou fallest away to the Chaldeans. Then said Jeremiah, It is false; I fall not away to the Chaldeans.” And he says that Jeremiah, being thus stopped and accused, was, after being examined, committed to prison, on suspicion of being a traitor, where he remained, as stated in the last verse of this chapter, chap. 37:21. “But the next chapter gives an account of the imprisonment of Jeremiah, which has no connection with this account, but ascribes his imprisonment to another circumstance, and for which we must go back to the 21st chapter. It is there stated (verses 1–10) that Zedekiah sent Pashur, the son of Malchiah, and Zephaniah, the son of Masseiah the priest, to Jeremiah to inquire of him concerning Nebuchadnezzar, whose army was then before Jerusalem; and Jeremiah said to them (verses 8, 9), ‘Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I set before you the way of life, and the way of death. He that abideth in this city shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence; but he that goeth out, and falleth to the Chaldeans that besiege you, he shall live, and his life shall be unto him for a prey.’ This interview breaks off abruptly at the 10th verse of the 21st chapter, but the continuation and event is in the first verse of the 38th chapter. “The 38th chapter opens with the words of this conference; then these men say to Zedekiah, ‘Therefore we beseech thee, let this man be put to death; for thus he weakeneth the hands of the men of war that remain in this city, and the hands of all the people, in speaking such words unto them; for this man seeketh not the welfare of this people, but the hurt;’ and in the 6th verse it is said, ‘They then took Jeremiah, and put him in the dungeon of Malchiah.’ “These two accounts are different and contradictory. The one ascribes his imprisonment to his attempt to escape out of the city; the other to his preaching and prophesying in the city; the one to his being seized by the guard at the gate; the other to his being accused before Zedekiah, by the conference.” Now that these two accounts are different I admit, because they relate to different circumstances. But that they are contradictory I deny; for both accounts are necessary to properly explain the manner in which Jeremiah was treated. Let us compare Jer. 37:21, and see if this is not so. Jer. 37:21 says, “Then Zedekiah the king commanded that they should commit Jeremiah into the court of the prison. . . . Thus Jeremiah remained in the court of the prison.” But chap. 38:6 says, “Then they took Jeremiah, and cast him into the dungeon of Malchiah; . . . and they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in the dungeon there was no water, but mire; so Jeremiah sunk in the mire.” Now without the account of chap. 21:1–10 and 38:1–5, the narrative would be contradictory; for then it would have been left so that one verse said that he was in the court of the prison, while the very next verse declared that he was sunk in the mire in the dungeon of Malchiah. So it is readily seen that the words which he declares make the account contradictory, are the very ones that prevent such contradiction. Did not Mr. Paine know this? I believe that he did; but he would not suffer anything to stand as it really is, if there was any possible means of showing it in a false light.245 See again page 111: “In the 34th chapter is a prophecy of Jeremiah to Zedekiah in these words (verse 2), ‘Thus saith the Lord: Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire; and thou shalt not escape out of his hand, but shalt surely be taken, and delivered into his hand; and thine eyes shall behold the eyes of the king of Babylon, and he shall speak with thee mouth to mouth, and thou shalt go to Babylon. Yet hear the word of the Lord, . . . Thou shalt not die by the sword, but thou shalt die in peace; and with the burnings of thy fathers, the former kings which were before thee, so shall they burn odors for thee,’ etc.” “Now, instead of Zedekiah’s beholding the eyes of the king of Babylon, and speaking with him mouth to mouth, etc., . . . the reverse, according to chap. 52:10, was the case. It is there said that ‘the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes;’ then he put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him in chains and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death.” I should like to know how Zedekiah could be brought to the king of Babylon at Riblah, and the king of Babylon give judgment upon him, slay his sons before his eyes, and then put out his eyes, and yet Zedekiah’s eyes not behold the eyes of the king of Babylon. Perhaps he, by his method of reasoning, could discover or invent some way; but I cannot. And it is likewise true that although Zedekiah was carried a prisoner to Babylon, yet he died in peace, and was buried with the burnings of his fathers, and they burned odors for him.” Proof: “When the king was come to Babylon, he kept Zedekiah in prison till he died, and buried him magnificently.”—Josephus; Antiquities, book x. chap. viii. sect. 7. And a magnificent burial was nothing less than one accompanied with a grand display of pomp and grandeur, and with great burnings. On page 110 he says: “In the 39th chapter [of Jeremiah] we have another instance of the disordered state of this book; for notwithstanding the siege of the city, by Nebuchadnezzar, has been the subject of several of the preceding chapters, particularly the 37th and 38th, the 39th chapter begins as if not a word had been said upon the subject; and as if the reader was to be informed of every particular respecting it.” “But the instance in the 52d chapter is still more glaring; for though the story has been told over and over again, this chapter still supposes the reader not to know anything of it, for it begins by saying,” etc. Compare with this, the following, from page 127: “But . . . the presumption is, that the books called the Evangelists, and ascribed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, were not written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; and that they are impositions. The disordered state of the history in these four books, the silence of one book upon matters related in the other,” etc. Also on page 90. Mark the inconsistency. He condemns the book of Jeremiah as an imposition, because, as he petulantly exclaims, “the story has been told over and over again;” “as if the reader was to be informed of every particular respecting it;” and then turns around and condemns the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, because they do not tell the “same story over and over,” and because each one does not inform the reader of “every particular.” (On page 90, the books of Kings and Chronicles are condemned for the same reason.) Cannot the reader, whoever he may be, see by this time that Mr. Paine is determined not to be satisfied with anything that is stated in the Bible? And this fact becomes still more apparent as we go on through the New Testament. On page 10 he says: “That such a person as Jesus Christ existed, and that he was crucified, which was the mode of execution at that day, are historical relations strictly within the limits of probability. He preached most excellent morality, and the equality of man.” On page 20 he says: “The first four books, called Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, do not give a history of the life of Jesus Christ, but only detached anecdotes of him. It appears from these books that the whole time of his being a preacher was not more than eighteen months.” Had Mr. Paine understood the Bible, or had he taken the pains to read in John 2:13; 5:1; 6:4, and 11:55, or had he even looked at the chronology in the margin of his Bible, he could not have failed to discover that the time of Christ’s ministry was more than three years. Nor can he make the excuse that this was written in Part First, when he had no Bible; for he repeats it in Part Second, when he had a “Bible and Testament.” See page 124. On page 128 we read: “The story of Herod’s destroying all the children under two years old, belongs altogether to the book of Matthew; not one of the rest mentions anything about it. Had such a circumstance been true, the universality of it must have made it known to all the writers, and the thing would have been too striking to have been omitted by any.” Here, again, he demands that the evangelists shall tell the same story “over and over;” besides, he conveys a false impression when he speaks of “the story of Herod’s destroying all the children under two years old.” There is no such statement in the book of Matthew, nor in all the Bible. Matthew says (chap. 2:16) that Herod “sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof.” But Mr. Paine took good care to leave this out. Again he says, on the same page: “This writer tells us that Jesus escaped this slaughter because Joseph and Mary were warned by an angel to flee with him into Egypt; but he forgot to make any provision for John, who was then under two years of age. John, however, who stayed behind, fared as well as Jesus, who fled; and therefore the story circumstantially belies itself.” What shall we think of the man? Is it utterly impossible for him to reason truthfully? Surely it seems so. Now notice the facts. The record says (Luke 1:39, 40): “And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill country with haste, into a city of Juda; and entered into the house of Zacharias, and saluted Elizabeth.” This city of Judah in the hill country was Hebron (see Joshua 21:9–11); and John was born, and was there, fifteen miles from Bethlehem, when Herod slew the children. Therefore, before that slaughter could have reached John, it would have had to sweep a compass of thirty miles in diameter, embracing twenty-nine cities and towns, and among them Jerusalem itself, which was only six miles from Bethlehem. If Mr. Paine’s statement were true, he might well speak of the “universality of the slaughter.” Call this the “age of reason!” A lunatic could do better. On page 136 he says: “The whole space of time, from the crucifixion to what is called the ascension, is but a few days, apparently not more than three or four.” If Thomas Paine had ever read the first three verses of the Book of Acts, he would have found these words (Acts 1:3): “To whom also he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days.” Therefore we are again left to the conclusion, either that he never read the first three verses of the Book of Acts, or that he glozed the record. On page 148, he says of Paul’s words in 1 Cor. 15:41: “‘There is [says he] one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars.’ And what then? Nothing, except that he says that ‘one star differeth from another star in glory,’ instead of distance. All this is nothing better than the jargon of a conjurer, who picks up phrases he does not understand.” Now we wish to inquire, Is Mr. Paine’s position true, that one star differeth from another star in distance only? or is Paul’s position true, that “one star differeth from another star in glory?” This question shall be answered by that science which Mr. Paine professed to know something about,—astronomy. “We have already noticed that the stars are of various colors. Sirius is white, Antares is red, and Capella yellow; while Lyra has a blue tint, and Castor a green one. In the pure, transparent atmosphere of tropical regions, the colors are far more brilliant. There, oftentimes, the nocturnal sky is a blaze of jewels, the stars glittering with the green of the emerald, the blue of the amethyst, and the red of the topaz. In our latitudes, there are no stars visible to the naked eye which are decidedly blue or green. [So it is true that one differeth from another in glory.] In the double and multiple stars, every color is presented in all its richness and beauty. We also find combinations of colors complementary to each other. Here is a green star with a blood-red companion; here an orange and blue sun; there a yellow and a purple one. The triple star Andromeda, is formed of an orange-red sun and two others of an emerald green. Every tint that blooms in the flowers of summer flames out in the stars at night. ‘The rainbow flowers of the footstool and the starry flowers of the throne,’ proclaim their common Author; while rainbow, flower, and star alike evince the same divine love of the beautiful.”—Steele’s Fourteen Weeks in Astronomy. So just as surely as one flower differs from another in beauty, “one star differeth from another star in glory.” And just so surely did the apostle Paul perfectly understand what Thomas Paine knew nothing at all about. On page 150 he says: “Should the Bible and Testament hereafter fall, it is not I that have been the occasion.” As I agreed with Mr. Paine in the first statement quoted, so also I agree with him in this, the last. For surely, if the Bible should ever fall, it will never be because the weak arguments, the shallow reasonings, and the shameless frauds, of Paine’s “Age of Reason” have ever been the slightest occasion. But that is not what he meant by this statement. He actually thought that the Bible would surely fall; and we can hardly repress a smile at the supreme self-conceit of the poor man. Would that he might have peace; but “there is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.” Dear reader, have you been standing in doubt of the truth of the Bible? Let me beseech you in the words of the Lord, “Come now, and let us reason together.” Oh! hear the call; take up the Bible; read it; study it; reason upon it. Love darkness no longer. Accept the Bible, even with the readiness with which you have been wont to accept the “Age of Reason.” Accept it in faith, asking, “What is truth?” and when you know the truth, receive it in the love of it. “We pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God,” that you may be saved. “For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.” Eccl. 12:14. Mr. Paine expected the Bible to fall. He himself has fallen, and moldered back to mother earth; while the Book that he thought he had destroyed stands yet, its glorious rays enlightening many a benighted soul with the blessed hope of everlasting life and eternal glory. “The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but THE WORD OF OUR GOD SHALL STAND FOREVER.” Isa. 40:8. Faith and Courage in Personal Rebuke
—It requires more faith and courage to say two words face to face with one single sinner than from the pulpit to rebuke two or three thousand persons who are ready to listen to everything on condition of forgetting all.—Bossuet. WHAT WE BELIEVE OF MAN.
By W. H. Ebert
Having contemplated man in the light of philosophy and reason, tracing him through his existence here, and seeing that his career, whatever it may be, ends at last in death, we turn from his grave, and ask, Is it possible for him to live again? If so, how? Upon what may we base a hope? Nature fails us; reason fails us; and hope fails us. However much we may love life and desire to live again beyond the grave, we cannot hope so to live, without having some proper foundation upon which to base that hope. Nature furnishes no such foundation. Nothing less than a miracle repeated in each individual case, can bring the dead to life again. This ever has been, and ever will be, a miraculous act. Can it be done? Will it be done? There is nothing seen or known in man’s nature that denies the possibility of a resurrection; but many considerations unite in declaring that man may live again. Man never could have originated himself; he is the result of some superior, efficient cause, and that power, or cause, is to him a miraculous one. The origin of his present life is a mystery of which he knows but little. He is born; he lives; but he does not understand how he lives. The phenomena of life are all above his actual comprehension. How life is the result of organized matter, he cannot fully know; but he sees that such is the case. He believes it; he knows it. And he sees, believes, and knows that these bodies die, dissolve into their original elements, and that life is ended. Yes, indeed! He has been once begotten and once born, has once lived and once died. And now unless he can be born again to life, he cannot live again. The power that first gave body and life could most certainly restore them again. But will this be done? What authority have we for believing it will be accomplished? Philosophy furnishes no proof that such a miracle will be wrought. We turn to the Bible—a book divine. In it we find a revelation from Heaven to man. God, the Creator of man, has made known to him his origin, his history, his duties, and his destiny. In the absence of this information, all that he knows on these subjects is the uncertainties of philosophical speculation. The Bible is man’s intellectual telescope, through which he sees the distant future. By it he may explore the beauties and grandeur of a refined and purified world. In the distance, and beyond the shores of mortality, he sees it restored to its Eden state. He learns that he is offered a citizenship in the earth made new, not in its present degenerate condition, not in a state of rebellion against God and his laws. Immortality is offered to him, and to all mankind, upon the same conditions. He is made to see that the present life and the present world were forfeited by the rebellion of the first parents of our race; that death was threatened them, on conditions. Gen. 2:17. And because of disobedience they, and all their posterity became doomed to die, and return to dust again. Gen. 3:19. Being no longer permitted to partake of the fruits of the “tree of life” (Gen. 3:24), corruption commenced upon man, and the seal of death was put upon him. It remains upon him. All was wrapped in death and gloom. The sentence was written, and stood unrepealed and unrepeatable: “Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” Friends consigned their loved ones to graves from which they could have seen no way of escape, had not God revealed unto the world that the dead should be made to live again. Luke 20:37; 24:27, 44, 46. God made the revelation through the prophets that the dead should be raised up; that man, though he had forfeited his first life, and could not be saved from death, would be redeemed from that death to a second existence. Raised again from the dead! A miraculous proposition! This would require as much, and the same, power as it first took to create man. The proposition that God would re-organize and bring to life again man’s dead and decomposed body, required proof adequate to its wonderful nature. Man could not have this hope without believing the proposition. He could not believe it without sufficient testimony. God did not ask him to do so. Sufficient proof was given him. The Father sent his Son Jesus Christ, who both declared, explained, and demonstrated to men that they should be raised from the dead; and that they should, in their second state of existence, or life, be held accountable only for their own actions in this life; that such second life should be an everlasting one, or eternal, if the uses which had been made of life here should have been such as to warrant it. And that then those who should have refused to conform to what is lawful and right should die a second time, and remain eternally destroyed. Christ raised the dead. John 5:25. Many did hear his voice and come forth from the dead. The world wondered at the miraculous demonstration of his power. But it was yet more wonderful to be told that all mankind should, in some future time, hear that same voice, and come forth, and that, too, to a Judgment, wherein each was to receive his doom,—either eternal life or eternal death. John 5:29. Rom. 2:6, 7; 2 Thess. 1:7–10. It was thus that Christ taught; and, to confirm all that he had said, and all that the prophets had foretold of him, he submitted to death; not only that he might thus become a sacrifice for the sins of the world, but that his resurrection by the Spirit of his Father, might furnish, to the utmost, all the proof that could be needed, that the proposition of a resurrection of the dead was true; and that all men might have an assurance that they, too, would be, at some time, by the same power, raised from the dead. Yes; Christ died; Luke 24:5–7, 27–44, 46; and the facts, that he died, was buried, and raised again from the dead on the third day, became the great cardinal points of the gospel of Christ. 1 Cor. 15:3, 4. This makes the testimony as full as it could be made to man, with his limited faculties, that there will be a resurrection of the dead. The same “all” of mankind that died in Adam, shall be made alive in Christ. 1 Cor. 15:22. Christ so taught when he was here. John 5:28, 29. This will take place in the resurrection, when all shall be quickened into life again. A miracle will be wrought in each individual case. All will be raised to life; some, to die again; and some, to receive an eternal existence, in a world of glory and beauty. We believe that man will live again. The foundation upon which to rest such a hope is a good one. It is not laid in man’s wisdom, but in the word and power of God. Man never even originated such a thought. That man could and would live again, was never taught by any philosopher in any age, until he had borrowed the idea from God’s revelation of it to man. While the true foundation upon which it was promised was soon lost sight of by an idolatrous and heathenish set of philosophers, the idea of life became incorporated into all their important traditions and superstitions. And they now are made to teach that man has an immortality of his own nature, dwelling in him; that it cannot die, and that he does not really die, and does not, therefore, need a resurrection to live again. And this was the teaching of the devil through the serpent, by the influence of which, sin entered into the world. Gen. 3:5. And so it remains to-day, one of the greatest deceiving falsehoods, preventing mankind from accepting salvation upon the terms of the gospel, by which life and immortality are brought to light by the resurrection of the dead. 2 Tim. 1:10. We believe that man will live again, by the same power that first created him,—the power of God,—manifested in the resurrection of the dead. Mrs. Martin's Mistake.
By J. B. T. Marsh
A GENTLE ripple of admiration passed over the faces of the ladies in the village missionary-meeting as Mrs. Mayhew sat down. Her essay on “The Macedonian Call from Africa,” was felicitous in its adjectives, fresh in its information, almost rapturous in its devout enthusiasm. The society took a pardonable pride in Mrs. Mayhew’s talent. Mrs. Brown thought the paper ought to be read at the approaching annual meeting of the “Board.” Miss Spencer wished it could be printed for general circulation. As for Mrs. Mayhew, she was appropriately modest; if the paper had any value, it was because her soul had been deeply stirred by the thought of the wide doors that were opening in pagan lands for the heralds of the gospel. There was nothing that made our petty every-day affairs seem so petty as an adequate conception of the grandeur of this glorious missionary campaign to conquer the heathen world for Christ. Poor Mrs. Martin, sitting on a back seat in the lecture-room, listened to the essay and the comments that followed with a humbling sense of her own incapacity and short-comings. Mr. Mayhew was absorbed in his banking business; but he took a husbandly satisfaction in his wife’s prominence in church activities, and encouraged her to lead the list of the monthly contributors to the support of the society’s Bible-reader in Bulgaria. Having no literary gifts himself, it was pleasant to think that he shone with a sort of reflected light in the papers which his wife read, now and then, before the Temperance League and Missionary Society. To pay well for it seemed as much a matter of course as to respond cheerfully to the assessment which his political party made upon him for the honor of nominal membership on the Central Committee. Mr. Martin, on the other hand, was making but a meager living from his shop;—neighbors said he had too many scruples and too little faculty to hold his own with his sharp rivals;—and while Mrs. Mayhew gave a dollar a week to the Bible-reader, Mrs. Martin could give but half a dime. Mrs. Mayhew was one of the officers, too, of the State Society; and her name was always to be found in the somewhat effusive newspaper reports of the annual meeting, where her talents found a pleasant field of activity. But Mrs. Martin had never even attended an annual meeting. And while Mrs. Mayhew stirred every one up to new zeal by her fervent essays, a short and stumbling prayer was the most that Mrs. Martin had ever been able to contribute to the exercises of the semi-monthly missionary-meeting. It was this comparison of Mrs. Mayhew’s abilities and opportunities with her own, as she sat there on the back seat, that made Mrs. Martin feel that any aspirations of her own toward active Christian usefulness were almost absurd. There was nothing elating to Mrs. Martin in the hour that was all elixir to Mrs. Mayhew. Reaching home, however, Mrs. Mayhew found need of all the tonic there was in the exhilarating atmosphere of the missionary-meeting, to prepare her for an unexpected complication in her domestic affairs. The widow Way, whose eldest daughter, Eliza, had been for some time Mrs. Mayhew’s efficient right247 hand in housework, had met with a serious hurt. Eliza had been sent for at once, as the only one who could be looked to, to stand in the wide gap of work and care. She was waiting, her eyes red with weeping, for Mrs. Mayhew’s permission to go. Mrs. Mayhew was “tried.” Dr. Traley, the eloquent missionary from India, was to occupy their pulpit the next Sunday, and she had planned to detain him for a select tea-party at her house on Monday evening. Young Campbell’s wife was only too glad to come over for a day’s work any time, it was true; but no one rose to the supreme demands of Mrs. Mayhew’s ideal for such an occasion as Eliza did. She felt as if Mrs. Way’s accident was little better than a deliberate disregard of her comfort. In her momentary impatience she told Eliza that she should think the boys could wait on her mother and do the housework—anyhow she didn’t see how she could spare her now; but if Eliza was determined to go, she could not keep her place open for her, if Mary Gowan, who was looking for work last week, chose to take it. Poor Eliza! this was the last straw. Her heart ached for the hard-worked mother, lying at home in painful helplessness. She must go to her, of course. But the thought of losing her own wages for several weeks was none the less a trial to her; for Eliza was studiously saving every penny she could earn, and carrying a light heart under all the exactions of Mrs. Mayhew’s service, since John, the hard-working, manly carpenter, who had loved her so long, was sure that his little cottage would be ready for a housekeeper next year. How many times she had spent, in imagination, every dollar of her next twelve months’ wages, how well she knew just how far it would all go in house-furnishing! And now to lose not only her wages for some weeks to come, as she must at the best, but to lose her situation altogether, was doubly hard. She choked down, though, the appeal that it was in her heart to make that the place might somehow be reserved a little while for her. Long as she had lived with Mrs. Mayhew, and liberal as her wages had always been, she had never felt encouraged to carry to her any of her woman confidences, and had never looked to her for counsel or sympathy in her trouble. Mrs. Mayhew was not stony-hearted; but she was too busy in broader fields of benevolence to explore the lives that were lived in her kitchen. So with what courage and cheer she could rally from her own buffeted heart, Eliza went back to the fatherless family,—to nurse the dispirited mother; to care for the younger brothers, who were none the more tractable that they had not been under a father’s eye for several years; to do the washing which had so long been the chief reliance for the support of the family. But the hill was very steep, and her load was very heavy. She chafed sorely, sometimes, under her burden. She cried herself to sleep at night, and started in the morning with the shivering consciousness of the dread presence of trouble, even before she had waked enough to define it in her thought. Mrs. Mayhew met her one day on the street. “Good morning, Eliza,” she said. “Is your father about well? No, it was your mother that was hurt, wasn’t it?” And then, without waiting for an answer, she added the hope that Eliza would return to her old place soon, for Mary Gowan wasn’t suiting her very well—and then went on her way. For some reason Mrs. Mayhew’s well-meant words, even when coupled with the promise of her old situation again, carried no special comfort in them. They did not come from the deep place in one heart, and they could not find the deep place in the other. But there was one woman whose commonplace, neighborly kindness was to Eliza like cold water to a thirsty soul. Mrs. Martin lived on the other side of the town, but heard of Mrs. Way’s accident from the doctor as he was driving by the next day, the fact being that the kind-hearted physician really drove down there for the sake of telling her. She came over that afternoon—some cookies in her pocket for the children—to cheer up the sufferer, and lend a hand for an hour in any service she could render. She had no lack of work, good woman, at home; but she found time to drop in one day and piece down a pair of trousers for little Bennie; to come another and cut out the new coat that was the despair of Eliza’s small skill at tailoring; to send one of her children over occasionally with a last week’s paper borrowed of a neighbor; to sit now and then in the early evening for a while by the bed-ridden woman, so that Eliza could have an airing for an hour or two in a quiet walk with the young carpenter. It was worth everything to Eliza to have such a sympathetic, sister-like friend with whom she could talk over her household perplexities, to whom she could confide all the little precious nothings of her affairs, on whose shoulder she could cry a little when things had gone harder with her than usual. And it was worth more to her than she knew till years afterward to get so near a Christian woman’s heart, and see, underneath all mere profession, its generous purpose of personal helpfulness, and its loving, joyful faithfulness to humble, every-day ministries. She had never before seen just that side of the religious life, in just that setting. It touched her heart and won her into something of its own beautiful likeness. From it came, by-and-by, a family altar in the carpenter’s cottage, and a family life that shed gracious influences through the community. Even the rattle-headed, fatherless little boys, who seemed to shed the religious appeals and rebukes of all other people with such impartial nonchalance, were wound about with some subtle influence from this friend in family need who never once in set fashion “talked religion” to them, and years afterward they recognized its stimulus and restraint. But of all this Mrs. Martin suspected nothing. Year by year she never read the reports of “the annual meeting” without a little pang from the thought that her usefulness was so small as compared with Mrs. Mayhew’s. Perhaps she is not the only humble soul, in these days of “Christian activities,” that makes a similar mistake.—J. B. T. Marsh, in Christian Weekly. Earnestness and True Greatness
By Peter Bayne
—Without earnestness no man is really great, or does really great things. He may be the cleverest of men; he may be brilliant, entertaining, popular; but he will want weight. No soul-moving picture was ever painted that had not in it depth of shadow.— Peter Bayne. LONELINESS,
By Eliza H. Morton
WITHOUT, the storm is raging drear,
O homesick heart within!
Without, the world is cold and chill,
Oh, traces sad of sin! Alas! man often proves untrue,
And frailty dwells below;
The beauty that we see in dreams,
We waking never know. The heart oft yearns for human love
With longings tender, strong,
And finds the aching void unfilled,
The way still lonely, long. The loveliness we might have gleaned
Along life’s rugged way,
Is past and gone, and bitterness
Comes with the fleeting day. The storm without has spent its power;
O heart, why thus so sad?
In Gilead, lo! there’s healing balm,
And mourners may be glad. Above, there’s endless joy and bliss,
The changeless is to come;
“Eternity ne’er sheds its leaves,”
O glorious, sun-bright home! THE SPRING QUARTER.
By William C. White
As we enter a new quarter, it will be profitable for each Sabbath-school worker to review carefully the work of the last three months, and note the degree of progress and improvement that has been made. Study carefully the weak points in the work, search out the cause of the failure, and then decide to make that point a special study, and by earnest effort to become particularly successful on that very point. Nothing short of steady and continual improvement should satisfy the Bible student. Besides a steady improvement in the methods of the school, we should aim at a large increase of membership, and the establishment of many new schools during the spring quarter. Now that the winter is past, all of the old members who have been kept away by bad roads and their distance from the school, should join the school for summer work. A committee may be appointed by each school to look up all the Sabbath-keepers in reach of the schools, and encourage them to attend. The whole school should be active and earnest in the work of bringing in new scholars. Visit your neighbors, tell them about your school, give the Instructor to their children, and invite them to visit your school. Whenever visitors come, meet them cordially, make them at home, give them a place in your best class, and then furnish them with the lesson for next Sabbath, and urge them to come again. The children especially should receive attention at this time of the year. Many children of our neighbors and friends who would not come in the winter, can be induced to attend during the summer. The very little ones should be gathered in; many who were too young to attend last summer may be brought in and formed into infant classes. CLASSIFICATION AND LESSONS.
The infant and children’s classes should be furnished with the small book, “Bible Lessons for Little Ones.” Those who can read, and those whose parents will teach them the lesson at home, will find but little difficulty in learning a lesson each week; but for those who cannot read, and who are not taught at home, one-half of a lesson is usually enough, and this should be taught to them by the teacher. Those children who have thoroughly mastered the first book should be furnished with the new book just completed for them, called, “Bible Lessons for Little Ones, No. 2.” This contains fifty-two lessons upon Bible history, from the birth of Moses to the time of Joshua. It is bound in flexible cloth, and can be obtained of the tract societies, or from the offices of publication, for 15 cents a copy. In many schools there are children studying the lessons printed in the Instructor, that cannot understand them, because they are too young, or do not get the assistance which they need at home. Such children should join the classes studying these little books. New scholars between the ages of fourteen and twenty should usually be classified in one of those divisions studying the lessons on history printed in the Instructor. These lessons will be of the greatest interest, and to the person not thoroughly posted in Bible history, of the greatest importance; for a good knowledge of Bible history is indispensable to a correct understanding of the prophecies. It is contemplated in the plan of these lessons to notice briefly the remaining historical events of the Old Testament, and then, after tracing the history of the Jews through the intervening period, to enter upon the study of the New Testament. We should therefore advise the majority of those studying the historical lessons given in the Instructor, to continue without change. But there are, in some schools, a number of adults who are well qualified to study the prophecies, but who did not commence with the division when it took up the lessons, and therefore joined the history, or youths’ division, rather than to begin the study of prophecy when the class was in the middle of a long and difficult subject. For the use of such persons, and for new schools that may be organized, we have bound the lessons on prophecy for 1879, in a neat pamphlet, called, “Lessons on Prophecy, for Bible Classes.” Price 10 cents. We recommend all schools that contemplate making changes, to weigh the matter carefully, and change only where there are real advantages to be gained; but if changes are necessary, make them as soon as possible, so that all new classes may begin the new books, on, or soon after, the first Sabbath in the quarter. Then if each school which fails to begin the first Sabbath in the quarter, will make up lost time by some extra study, there will be many classes studying the same lesson each Sabbath, and whenever these classes meet at camp-meeting or quarterly-meeting, they will be prepared to work together. “The Bible is so strict and old-fashioned!” said a young man to a gray-haired friend who was advising him to study God’s word, if he would learn how to live. “There are plenty of books written nowadays that are moral enough in their teaching, and don’t bind one down as the Bible does.” The old merchant turned to his desk and took out two rulers, one of which was slightly bent. With each of these he ruled a line, and silently handed the ruled paper to his companion. “Well,” said the lad, “what do you mean?” “One line is not straight and true, is it? When you mark out your path in life, don’t use a crooked ruler!” —Churchman. Meditating Upon Divine Truth Brings Sweetness to the Soul
—It is not hastily but seriously reading and meditating upon holy and heavenly truths that makes them prove sweet and profitable to the soul. It is not the bee’s touching on the flowers that gathers honey, but her abiding for a time upon them, and drawing out the sweet. It is not he who reads most, but he who meditates most, on divine truth, that will prove the choicest, wisest, strongest Christian. Instructing Children in Bible Principles at Home
—Our children need to be thoroughly instructed in right principles. Youth is the best time to form character, and the Bible is the best text-book for this purpose. An hour each day, or a few hours during the week, spent in conversation with them on Bible topics, will go far in developing their minds for the active duties of life. They should be prepared for the trials of life as well as for its pleasures.