IT had been an unusually busy day with Mr. Archer, of Archer, Ames & Co. As a rule, he, as senior member of a wealthy firm, was spared most of the business details, and his life, though by no means an idle one, was not crowded with care; but as he climbed the steps of his brownstone mansion, at the same time feeling for his pass-key, there was a worried look upon his face which did not escape his wife's eyes.
"I have not seen you look so tired in a long time. Has anything happened?" she asked, as soon as the servants had left them alone.
"Yes, I have decided to turn off one of our clerks. He has not been with us long—not over a year; but it is not the first time one of our fellows has disgraced himself, and it has upset me. Then they've elected me as one of the trustees of that new Home for Disabled Clerks, and I had to attend a meeting to-day. The fact of the matter is I can't think how such a fine fellow as Clark could have done it."
"Done what, dear?"
"Oh, didn't I tell you? Come to the office drunk. Not a little under the influence of liquor, but drunk."
"And he was always steady?"
"Perfectly so, since I met him. He came well recommended, and gave good satisfaction; so good that we were thinking of raising his salary."
"How old a man is he?"
"Anywhere between thirty and forty."
"Married?"
"I don't know—yes, come to think of it, he is, for he lost a child awhile ago."
Mrs. Archer had her own notions of the relations between employers and employed, but her husband, when she hinted at them, always told her they were most unbusinesslike. "Never let business and charity interfere," he would say. "I am always glad to aid any good cause, to help any struggling man or woman, but it must be outside of business. My clerks are mere machines to me; if they run well, I retain them; if not, they go."
Yet, being a warm-hearted man, Mr. Archer was not quite consistent, and it grieved him deeply to turn away a clerk in disgrace. "A quick fellow. Such a good correspondent! Isn't one in the office writes a hand like him!" he kept muttering, as he sat sipping his coffee and peeling fruit for his wife.
The front door-bell rang just as Mr. Archer was refusing a second cup of coffee, and John announced, "A lady on business, sir."
"Ask her name, John; I am tired, and unless it is something important I shall see no one."
"Mrs. Clark, and she dislikes troubling you, but the matter is important."
"His wife!" exclaimed Mrs. Archer, while her husband frowned almost angrily. "Let her come in here, dear. She may not have come to tease you, only to explain. Don't send her off without a hearing. Do you mind my being in the next room while you see her?"
"No, indeed; and if you were not so soft-hearted, I would engage you to come in at the right moment to send her off. I can't stand a woman's tears." Then stepping to the door, Mr. Archer added, "Show the lady in here, John."
A moment more, and a young woman came in. Her dress was most severely simple, but it was such as only a lady would have devised, and her manner, though nervous, was of one accustomed to move among cultivated people.
"I beg pardon, Mr. Archer, for calling at this hour, but I could not wait through a long night."
The voice was so sweet and low, and the eyes that were raised to his so full of patient endurance and quiet determination, that Mr. Archer said to himself, "Confound the fellow! How could he do it with such a wife?" But he was not a man of ready speech, and, though feeling more kindly to his guest, did not say a word to help her on.
"My husband will not explain matters to you; he thinks you might fancy he was excusing himself, and he and I both know that no man has any real excuse, though"—her voice broke a little, but she recovered herself, and began again.
"I will tell you the exact truth—the story of our married life, and though I hardly hope it will make any difference to us, it may be the means of your saving others; at least, I have felt impelled to come and tell it. We were very happy the first year or two; but my husband, through the failure of the firm he was with, lost his position. He was offered another clerkship, but a relative of mine was willing to take him into business as a partner, and it was tempting—he accepted. This relative was unmarried; and after six months, tiring of the business, he sold out; and as affairs had been carelessly arranged with my husband, he was again cast loose without any means of support. I believe that he then began to drink—not much, but I never suspected it; but enough to 'give him courage,' as he said afterward.
"I will not weary you with an account of the next three years. It was in the panic times, and better men than he had nothing to do. He was often from morning to night without food, and when a friend would ask him to step in and take a drink, I cannot wonder that he, little suspecting danger, would accept. As he has said since, many a friend will offer a man a glass, but not one in ten will ask him to lunch. The habit of drinking grew upon him, till when he did get a position he could not keep it. He sank very low. Not that he drank hard, but liquor made him unfit for business, and affected him very quickly. He had been out of business six months when a friend of ours told him that he could get him a position in your office if he would solemnly swear not to touch liquor. He had been so steady for some months that I felt sure, with encouragement, he would be a changed man.
"He was accepted by the firm just about a year ago. I remember so well my anxiety that night; for our friend had told us that the last correspondent had eighteen a year, and I felt that if he could be raised above real anxiety, he would be so much safer. He came home very happy, for he was accepted. His salary was one thousand dollars; but he felt sure, if he did his best, he would soon have it increased. He was very happy and hopeful, and though I knew that we had debts that must be paid at once, and that we could no longer live with our relatives, I tried to keep up a brave heart."
"I am sure you did," Mr. Archer said, involuntarily, and his kind tones encouraged the wife to go on with her story.
"You see my husband was always so generous when he had money—so hopeful that he would have more—that though he brought me all his salary, only paying for his monthly commutation ticket, and reserving ten cents a day for his lunch, I found it a very hard matter to pay rent and keep the house on his salary, besides trying to pay the debts that now began to trouble him. We had four children"—the mother's voice would break in spite of her strong will, but she kept the tears back—"perhaps you know that we buried our little six-year-old a year ago? The eldest had to be sent to a good school, for our children will have a better position by and by, and must be fitted for it. Still, even though we had great anxiety and struggles, if we had been fortunate in choosing our home in a healthy place, I think all might have been well. Unfortunately, we were tempted by the cheap rents to hire in a little village in Jersey. They assured us chills were unknown there, but at the end of three months we were all ill. The doctor's bills and the quinine crushed us, Mr. Archer.
"My husband went to business, time and again, sick with malarial fever. He gave entire satisfaction, for more work was piled upon him—he wrote such a good hand; but no hint was given of raising his salary. He says it is a mere matter of business—that the firm never knows how many children a man has, nor whether he can live on his salary. If he can't, they can get one who can.
"At last the fever got such a hold of our little Robbie, that he died. I had lost all fear of my husband's drinking, for he had gone again and again to business distressed and half sick, and had not tasted a drop; so I thought him cured. But he told me to-day that ever since Robbie went he has been tempted. He has felt so discouraged, so hopeless. This morning an old comrade met him. He was weak and depressed—he had given up hope of getting out of debt and educating his children properly, and he took the offered drink!"
Here the poor tired wife burst into tears. In a moment Mrs. Archer was by her side, soothing her with loving words, and promising a hundred possible things, talking between whiles to her husband, who sat conscience-stricken, unable to defend himself against her indignation.
"This is what comes of keeping business and benevolence apart. This comes of looking upon your employes as mere machines. If the poor fellow had been in one of the institutions you uphold, his family would have been helped, and he would have been carefully guarded and guided. But here is a man who tries to retrieve himself; who, run down, and living in an unhealthy atmosphere, needed for his salvation an adequate income, and you hardly knew he was a married man! Henry, Henry! who was it asked God scornfully, 'Am I my brother's keeper?'"
By this time Mrs. Clark had grown composed, and was listening in undisguised astonishment, and even horror, to her new champion. She had had the same thoughts, but such things could not be said.
"Oh, Mrs. Archer," she said hurriedly, "my husband has said again and again there is not a firm in the city that is more noted for its large donations—"
"Donations!" put in Mrs. Archer, impatiently.
"And if a clerk is ill, his place is kept for him, and his salary goes on."
"To be sure it does; that is mere decent treatment. Every well-to-do house does that, my dear Mrs. Clark. What I complain of is that so many men and women who are good and kind and generous, like Mr. Archer, yet employ men and women without taking any interest in their lives, without feeling that, as children of a common Father, as fellow-pilgrims to a better home, we must take a warm personal interest in those whom we employ.
"How many ladies know the private history of their servants, take an interest in the mother in the old country, or the brother who has been a little wild, but is trying to mend, and who ought to be invited to Mary's warm kitchen, evenings, and so kept from bad companions? And with gentlemen it is even worse; for their clerks are educated gentlemen like themselves, sometimes better educated than themselves; and yet the heads of a firm seldom or ever care whether their clerks are able to educate their children, or can afford to save a delicate wife by giving her change of air and rest from anxiety."
"It is very true," said Mr. Archer, slowly; "and for my part, whatever Ames or Hancock may think of it, things must be looked after down at the office. I will see your husband myself, to-morrow," he added, taking Mrs. Clark's hand in his, "and I ask you to forgive a fellow-sinner—a fellow-Christian. Let Clark be at his desk as usual, and now that we do know one of our clerk's wives, we mean to keep up the acquaintance, don't we, wife?"
"Indeed we do! But Mrs. Clark has come all the way from Jersey, and I don't believe she's dined!"
There was a ringing of bells and hurried orders, and soon Mrs. Clark was seated between her new friends, who had to play at eating a second dinner to keep her in countenance. Then Mr. Archer, tired as he was, decided he would go out to the little Jersey home that very night, and have a talk with Mr. Clark. Mrs. Archer could see by the happy look in the wife's eyes that that was just what she most wanted. So the carriage was ordered, and soon the brave woman who had mounted those steps two hours before with such fear, was running lightly down, sure that she was carrying a true friend to her husband, who would help him to lead a new life.
What passed between the wealthy merchant and his wife that night is only known to them; but there were mutual confessions; both felt111Christ (see Deut. 18 and Acts 3:22), said he would "raise them up a prophet" like unto Moses. Let us see what God said to them by Moses, and what they did. In Deut. 18:11, the Lord, through Moses, forbade their consulting with familiar spirits. In Lev. 20:27, they were told that a man or woman that had a familiar spirit should be put to death. It is clear, from an examination of the case of Saul, as recorded in 1 Sam. 28:8, that in consulting with familiar spirits they professed to consult with the dead. By comparing a few texts we shall see what the Lord charged them with when they dealt with familiar spirits. In Num. 25:1-3 we read, "And Israel abode in Shittim, and the people began to commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab, and they called the people unto the sacrifices of THEIR gods; and the people did eat; and bowed down to their gods. And Israel joined himself unto Baal-peor; and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel." Concerning this we read still further in Ps. 106:28, "They joined themselves also unto Baal-peor and ate the sacrifices of the dead." In Deut. 32:16, 17, we read of their course: "They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger. They sacrificed unto devils, and not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not." Comparing these testimonies we see that the gods to which these sacrifices were offered, were deified dead men; and the people were confirmed in worshiping these dead heroes because they received such wonderful responses, so perfectly characteristic of the men. But though they supposed themselves receiving responses from the souls of these dead warriors to whom they thus sacrificed as gods, St. Paul tells us who really received this worship, and of course, who returned the response. Thus he says, "But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God; and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils." 1 Cor. 10:20. They worshiped dead men only in name. In reality they were worshiping the devil. It seems from the Old Testament testimony that these devils were a snare unto them, and were continually leading them astray. They were warned to have nothing to do with them lest they should be led astray; yet our friend says they were warned of nothing outside of themselves. "No occult influence."
In the record of the case of Job, we have a plain statement that "Satan went forth and smote Job with boils." The record speaks of Satan as a real being as plainly as it does of Job, or his friends, or the "sons of God." To say that Satan here is only some evil passion, we might say with as much propriety that the sons of God were only good thoughts that came into the mind of Job and his three friends. We might go a step further—as some do—and say that "Job and his three friends never existed in reality," that it is "only an allegory in which persons are represented as figuring, bearing trials, etc., to illustrate the subject of patience."
It seems that this case taxes Mr. R.'s Satan theory somewhat, especially when it comes to telling who smote Job with boils. He says:—
"But who was the adversary, it may be asked, who proved such a terror to Job, against whom he exerted such power? All the answer that can be made is, that there is no information as to who he was in particular. His title would show that he was inimical to the interests of Job, and probably the sons of God in general—a wicked, overbearing lord, whose envy and malice were only equal to the dominion he seems to have exercised."
Wonderful, that an earthly lord had power to smite Job with boils from the crown of his head to the sole of his feet. Strange that these matters should so puzzle Job's three friends that they should think it a direct visitation of God upon him, when, as Mr. R. has discovered, it was only some overbearing earthly lord who had done all this. Perhaps he would tell us it was some of the descendants of this same lord that constituted the "Satan" who had bound down a woman for eighteen years with her head to her feet so that she could not lift herself up until Christ loosed this bond from her. See Luke 13:16. It is evident in each of these cases that the Satan is recognized as a being who has power to afflict the bodies of men, if permitted thus to do. In many cases when Christ was on earth, we read that the devil was cast out.
Of this use of language Mr. R. says,—
"The Grecian theory that madness, epileptic disorders, and obstructions of the senses (as distinct from ordinary diseases), were attributable to demoniacal possessions, had stamped itself upon the language of the time of Christ. Its use by all classes did not involve the acceptance of the pagan belief."
He quotes a case in illustration to show that Christ apparently recognizes the god of the Philistines. "If I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out?" (Matt. 12:27.) He says:—
"Now Beelzebub signifies the god of flies, a god worshiped by the Philistines of Ekron (2 Kings 1:6), and Christ, in using the name, takes no pains to dwell upon the fact that Beelzebub was a heathen fiction, but seems rather to assume, for the sake of argument, that Beelzebub was a reality; it was a mere accommodation to the language of his opponents."
If this last statement be correct, and Christ was merely accommodating himself to the language of his opponents, let us be sure that we know what that language was. It is true that in the days of Ahaziah and Elijah, Baalzebub signified the god of flies, but in the lapse of years, words undergo a change; for instance, at the time of the English settlement of the American colonies, the Indians in trying to pronounce the French word for English—Anglais—called it yankees. So in the origin of the word it meant the English people. Now the English apply it to a citizen of the United States, while in the United States, yankee is only applied to the New Englanders where the name originated. So at Ekron, in the days of Elijah, Baalzebub meant the Philistines' god whom they claimed busied himself driving flies away from their sacrifices and their temples. In the days of Christ the name did not apply to the Philistines' god, but the Jews had applied this name to the chief of devils, of whose personal existence they spake when using the word.
I am not prepared to accept the position that the writers of the New Testament, divinely inspired to perform their work, mixed the sentiments of heathenism with their writings; should I thus teach, I fear I should weaken the force of New Testament authority.
DID YOU THINK TO PRAY?
ERE you left your room this morning,
Did you think to pray?
In the name of Christ our Saviour,
Did you sue for loving favor,
As a shield to-day?
When you met with great temptations,
Did you think to pray?
By his dying love and merit,
Did you claim the Holy Spirit,
As your guide and stay?
When your heart was filled with anger,
Did you think to pray?
Did you plead for grace, my brother,
That you might forgive another
Who had crossed your way?
Oh, how praying rests the weary!
Prayer will change the night to day;
So, when life seems dark and dreary,
Don't forget to pray.
The Home Circle.
By Charles Francis Richardson
LOVE.
If suddenly upon the street
My gracious Saviour I should meet,
And he should say, " As I love thee,
What love hast thou to offer me?"
Then what could this poor heart of mine
Dare offer to that heart divine?
His eye would pierce my outward show,
His thought my inmost thought would know;
And if I said, "I love thee, Lord,"
He would not heed my spoken word,
Because my daily life would tell
If verily I loved him well.
If on the day or in the place
Wherein he met me face to face,
My life could show some kindness done,
Some purpose formed, some work begun
For his dear sake, then it were meet
Love's gift to lay at Jesus' feet.
—Charles Francis Richardson.
SPIRITUAL ROOT-PRUNING.
By Examiner; Chronicle
THERE is an operation in husbandry known as "root-pruning," which consists in cutting away a portion of the roots with the object of promoting fruitfulness in unproductive trees. By this process, judiciously applied, thrifty trees whose vigorous fullness of life has hitherto been employed in the production of needless wood and leaves can be made to yield abundant crops.
Something analogous to this seems often to be required in the world of Christian experience. Many Christians whose lives are miserably barren of spiritual results have vitality enough; but their energy is all directed into secular channels. Even if they manage to devote a little of their valuable time to church affairs, their efforts are strictly confined to what may be called the machinery of religion, to the exclusion of the spiritual labors in which it is at once their duty and their privilege to share.
The trouble with Christians in this unfruitful condition is that they have too strong a hold upon the world. Their affections, reversing the apostle's injunction, are set, not on things above, but upon things on the earth. There may be, it is true, very little in their lives to which, considered by itself, serious objection could be made. They may be devoted to science, art, literature, or honorable money-making,—all legitimate objects of pursuit for Christians as well as others. But the mistake they make is in not estimating these things at their true value. The first place is given them in the affections.
What such Christians need is a thorough root-pruning—a loosening of their tenacious grip upon the soil of that worldliness whose rank juices are producing only a barren growth in their lives. The Master desires that his children shall bear "much fruit." He wishes, as his own words so frequently assure us, that his people should fairly estimate the relative importance of spiritual and secular things, and that the world should not be allowed to so engross the mind and heart that no place can be found for the higher claims of God and a perishing race.
THE WRONG BOOK.
Our Episcopal friends, among other good deeds at the Convention, consecrated a bishop for the Indians and other rough settlers of the very far West; apropos of which may be told the following: A Methodist minister having many years ago been sent as missionary to the same rather tough-hearted people, found an old, very old Indian, who could read, to whom he gave a copy of the New Testament. After the noble red man had read it through, he expressed a wish to be baptized. The missionary accordingly procured a bowl of water, and was about to baptize him, when the noble red man asked, "What you going to do with that?"
"Baptize you," replied the clergyman.
"No deep enough for Indian: take 'em to river."
The missionary explained that "that is not our practice;" to which the noble red person replied:—
"You give me wrong book, then; me read 'em through."
The ceremony was postponed.—Exchange.
REAL RELIGION.
By S. F. Post
A RELIGION that comes to stay is something more than an adventure. It knows there are shoals and quicksands and dangerous breakers to be shunned. It knows that, if port is to be made at last, there must be a steadfast strife with rocks, and waves, and winds. The mere adventurer meets the exigency and looks no further. The true sailor expects the gale and is ready for the tempest; for he knows full well that gale and tempest will come with sweep and roar, until he reaches the desired haven, where storms are hushed and billows break no more. His ocean home is his school. He learns through doing. And so it is in every department of true and genuine life—we learn through doing. It must be the same in religious life. What is called conversion is only enlistment. It is enrolling for services. It is getting ready for drill. A disciple is only a scholar. A scholar is only a learner. We learn through doing. This is the true system of learning. "If any man will do his will he shall know of the doctrine," says the divine Teacher. Even so it is.—S. F. Post.
The Great Themes of Revelation
By S. Graves
The pulpit to be strong must deal largely in the great themes of revelation. Too many pulpits in our day seem to spend their strength upon what we might call the side issues of the gospel, and seldom touch those great, inspiring and commanding themes which lift themselves from the pages of the Bible like the white peaks of the Alps, belittleing all the low-lying, out-lying ranges at their feet. Sin, holiness, regeneration, retribution, judgment, heaven, hell, the resurrection of the dead, the coming of Christ; there is a mighty, massive, compelling power in these themes when handled with the earnestness which they deserve, that no man, no congregation, can fail to feel. And no pulpit can be strong that does not buttress itself with those eternal, awe inspiring verities.—Rev. S. Graves.
An Impossible Choice.
A teacher had been relating to his class the story of the rich man and Lazarus; when he asked: "Now, which would you rather be, boys, the rich man or Lazarus?"
One boy replied: "I will be the rich man while I live, and Lazarus when I die."
And is that not what multitudes are trying to do? All want to die the death of the righteous, after having lived the life of Dives.
Awake to Praise, Not Censure
REMEMBER the good old rabbi, who was awakened by one of his twelve sons saying, "Behold! my eleven brothers lie sleeping, and I am the only one who wakens to praise and pray." "Son," said the wise father, "you had better be asleep too, than awake to censure your brothers:" No fault can be as bad as the feeling which is quick to see and speak of other people's faults.
SIGNS OF THE END.
By Bible Banner
PERHAPS no age in the Christian era has been so badly cursed with the spirit of compromise as our own. Satan seems to have abandoned the idea of crushing out the church by persecution: he now seeks to court her favor, and thus secure by flattery what he could not gain by force. The most plausible arguments are employed to induce the people of God to give up their positive testimony against popular sins. The arch enemy has no serious objection to the multiplication of churches, provided he is allowed to dictate the policy on which they are to be run. His mightiest energies are exerted to form a peaceful alliance between the church and the world. If he can succeed in dazzling the church with worldly blandishments, decking her with worldly vanities, and setting her on a chase after worldly pleasures, he is abundantly satisfied.
Oh, when shall we have in this favored land a revival of religion so radical and scriptural as to cure the churches of their pride and their pleasure-taking propensities? Considerable effort is made every winter, in almost every community, to arouse the people to a sense of their imperiled condition. Special meetings are held, special sermons are preached, and not unfrequently special "revivalists" are employed to add the weight of their influence in converting sinners from the error of their ways. That some good results from these various efforts we are glad to believe; but the joy of gratitude is too often mingled with sadness, as the spirit of revival seems to be so easily and so soon supplanted by the spirit of revelry. What is the trouble? Can we never get the old gospel plow in deep enough to break up the "fallow ground?" Must we continue the yearly process of skimming over the surface, and, as the result, reap more noxious weeds than grain?
There appears to be a set purpose on the part of many members in our churches—and those, too, who strangely assume to be the only "evangelical" churches in the country—to run these institutions on a worldly-policy basis. They seem willing, if not anxious, to lower the Christian standard to the level of those who are confessedly the enemies of God. A few earnest souls enter their protest against the persistent attempt to form a partnership between Christ and Belial, but their pleadings are either hushed or ignored, and policy proves to be mightier than piety. The prayer-meeting is too often a dry and poorly attended affair, but the place of festivity rings with the joyous shouts of the interested throng. Something is wrong.
Satan himself chuckles in triumph when he beholds consecrated temples of worship turned into scenes of feasting, hilarity, gambling, and worldly traffic. More or less of these foolish and piety-killing performances almost invariably accompany church fairs and festivals. But it is not on this account alone that they are to be condemned. They are wrong in principle. God's people are called to a higher and holier work. They are to renounce the world, deny themselves, and be zealous of good works. Real Christians are expected to support the Lord's cause from the love they bear to it, without any necessity for an appeal to the stomach. When the professed followers of God project a splendid spree, of course the fashion-following and pleasure-loving will gladly pay their money to participate in the fun; but the more thoughtful of the unconverted that are enticed to such places, will retire from the scene with the solemn and perhaps ineffaceable impression that Christianity is a humbug! Alas for the cause of Christ when it falls into the hands of such representatives!
It was long ages ago predicted that in the last days "perilous times" should come. One indication of such times was to be the fact, that those "having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof," would be "lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God." Judged by this test of inspiration, where are we to-day? Instead of the church converting the world, is it not terribly true that the world is converting the church? The moral aspect is truly alarming. It is high time for the church to disavow all allegiance to Belial, and to swear eternal fealty to Christ.
—Bible Banner
EUROPE AT THE REFORMATION.
By M. A. Davis
BY M. A. DAVIS.
IN every country of Europe, besides the local government represented by the king or emperor, there was a foreign government acknowledging the authority of the Pope, whose power was, for hundreds of years, above that of the king. The pretended object of the papal power was to secure the moral well-being of the people; the real object was to obtain large revenues, and give support to a vast body of officers,—Pope, cardinals, priests, monks, and friars, who lived in idleness on the fruits of the toil of the laborers. It was at one time actually found that the sum annually drawn from England by the court of Rome was three times that which went into the coffers of the king.
In order rightly to appreciate the influence of the Reformation upon the world, let us see what was the state of Europe just previous to that time, after being for one thousand years under the exclusive control of the Catholic church. A modern writer has drawn a vivid and truthful picture of that period.
The surface of the continent was for the most part covered with pathless forests; here and there it was dotted with monasteries and towns. In the lowlands and along the river courses were fens, sometimes hundreds of miles in extent, exhaling their pestiferous miasms, and spreading ague far and wide.
In all directions the roads were almost impassable for a large portion of the year. A common means of transportation was in clumsy carts drawn by oxen, going at the most but three or four miles an hour. Where boat conveyance along rivers could not be had, pack-horses and mules were resorted to for the transportation of merchandise. These restraints upon intercommunication tended powerfully to increase the general benighted condition. Journeys by individuals could not be undertaken without much risk, for there was scarcely a moor or a forest that had not its highwaymen.
The houses of the peasantry were built of stones put together without mortar; the roofs were of turf; a stiffened cowhide served for a door. Their food consisted of the coarsest vegetable products, sometimes even of the bark of trees. In some places they were unacquainted with bread.
In Paris and London the houses were of wood, daubed with clay and thatched with straw or reeds. They had no windows, and, until the invention of the saw-mill, very few had wooden floors. The luxury of a carpet was unknown; some straw, scattered in the room, supplied its place. There were no chimneys; the smoke of the ill-fed, cheerless fire escaped through a hole in the roof. The streets had no sewers; they were without pavements or lamps. No attempt was made at drainage, but the putrefying rubbish and the garbage was simply thrown out of the door.
Personal cleanliness was utterly unknown; even great officers of state swarmed with vermin. The citizen clothed himself with leather, a garment which, with its ever-accumulating filth, might last for many years. Dens of physical and moral pollution, wisps of straw twisted round the limbs to keep off the cold, the ague-stricken patient with no help except shrine cure, was it strange that in a thousand years the population of Europe had not doubled?
In the famine of 1030, human flesh was cooked and sold; and in that of 1258, fifteen thousand persons died of hunger in London alone. In the invasion of the plague, the deaths were so numerous that the living could hardly bury the dead.
The nobles were devoted to gluttony and sensual pleasure. Drinking day and night was the general pursuit. The common people were a prey to the more powerful. The baronial castles were dens of robbers. The deepest ignorance everywhere prevailed; religion was little more than a degrading superstition. Century after century passed away, and left the peasantry but little better than the cattle in the fields.
We have now seen what the Roman Catholic power did for the people. Let us glance for a moment at what it did for itself. When we think of the stately monastery, an embodiment of luxury, with its closely mown lawns, its gardens and bowers, its fountains and many murmuring streams, we must connect it, not with the ague-stricken peasant dying without help in the fens, but with the abbot, his ambling palfrey, his hawk and hounds, his well-stocked cellar and larder.
When we survey, as we still may, the magnificent churches and cathedrals of those times, miracles of architectural skill, when in imagination we restore the transcendently imposing services of which they were once the scene, the dim religious light streaming in through the many-colored windows, the sounds of voices seeming scarcely inferior in their melody to those of Heaven, the priests in their sacred vestments, and, above all, the prostrate worshipers listening to litanies and prayers in a foreign and unknown language, we shall justly conclude that all this was not for the sake of the worshipers, but for the glory of the great, the overshadowing authority of Rome.
WHICH IS THE SEVENTH DAY?
By R. F. Cottrell
BY ELD. R. F. COTTRELL.
THERE are many persons who are free to admit that the seventh day is the only weekly Sabbath of the Bible, and who say they ought to keep it, if they could know which day of the week is truly the seventh. Such persons are deceived in regard to themselves. If they will only set to work in earnest to find the true seventh day, they will discover that the difficulty is not so great to find the seventh day, as it is to find it in their hearts to keep it. But for the benefit of those who desire to know the true Sabbath of the Lord, that they may keep it, I will endeavor in a brief way to make it plain.
God's providence is over all the world. His providence and his requirements must be in harmony. If therefore his commandment requires us to keep the seventh day in the order of the creation week, his providence will certainly put it in our power to find the day. Did you ever think that this excuse was an impeachment of the wisdom and justice of the Almighty? It is a serious thing, in order to excuse ourselves from doing what he has commanded, to say that his providence has put it out of our power. This is not his character. As long as his law requires us to keep the seventh day, so long we can find that day, if we will.
When the Son of God was on earth, he recognized and observed the day that the Jews were then keeping, as the true Sabbath. He knew. Since that time both Jews and Christians have been agreed in the numbering of the days of the week. The Jews, the world over are agreed that Saturday is the true seventh day, and Christians agree with them in this; for the mass of them keep Sunday as the first day, because it is the day of the resurrection of Christ. The few Christians who profess to keep the seventh day are agreed with both. While so many have been, from week to week, keeping one of the seven days as a Sabbath, it is utterly impossible that all should lose the reckoning and still all be agreed from first to last, unless God should work a miracle to make it so. If he has done so, he has not only not cared to preserve a knowledge of the day he requires us to keep, but has wrought a miracle to mislead us, while he still commands us to keep the seventh day holy. Is this the character of the God you worship? Such is not our God.
THE MORAL LAW.
DR. ADAM CLARKE thus speaks of Scripture. To say that Christ's personal righteousness is imputed to every true believer, is not scriptural; to say that he has fulfilled all righteousness for us, or in our stead, if by this is meant the fulfillment of all moral duties, is neither scriptural nor true; that he has died in our stead, is a great, glorious and scriptural truth; that there is no redemption but through his blood is asserted beyond all contradiction in the oracles of God. But there are a multitude of duties which the moral law requires, which Christ never fulfilled in our stead, and never could. He has fulfilled none of these duties for us, but he furnishes grace to every true believer to fulfill them to God's glory, the edification of his neighbor, and his own eternal profit. The salvation which we receive from God's free mercy, through Christ, binds us to live in a strict conformity to the moral law; that law which prescribes our manners, and the spirit by which they should be regulated, and in which they should be performed.
The Essentials of Human Happiness
The grand essentials to human happiness are something to do, something to hope for, and something to love.