Earlier text: IMMORTALITY; CONSTITUTIONAL OR CONDITIONALIf it had not been for a feather, you might never have heard of Beulah Sharpe. It was just dusk, and two girls were going home from their work in the mill. “I tell you ten dollars a week isn't bad, now is it?” the oldest, a coarse-looking girl, was saying. “I never made that in a week before,” replied her companion. “I hardly know how to spend it.” “Pooh, you goose, I never have any trouble. I'm bound there shan't be a girl in Lincoln, not even Judge Perry's granddaughter, shall have nicer things than I do. Say, I paid eighty dollars for that new black silk of mine.” “True as preachin'. I'm going to have as fine things and good times as anybody, you believe. Do you pay anything for board?” “No; father said when I left school if I'd earn my clothes I might have my board; but I was eighteen last week, and I expect he'll think I might help some.” “You look after the children, that's enough, tell him. See here; I want you to see this.” They had come out on the principal street of their busy little town now, and were in front of the largest milliner shop. Here, in the one square window, every conceivable tint that could be worn from the seven prismatic colors hung in the brilliant light in forms of feather, flower, or ribbon, and in the center and brightest of all was a long blue plume with silvery floating tips, a lovely miracle of art, not nature. “Isn't that a beauty, Beulah Sharpe? And it's just what you want to go with your navy-blue suit. You'll make a sensation for once in your life. I'm going to order a black one. It's only ten dollars.” “Only ten dollars!” echoed Beulah. “No, and it looks good for twenty. Go in and see.” But Beulah hung back. “I'll think of it.” “Pshaw! it'll be gone; get while you can, is my motto.” “I never had anything half so lovely,” hesitating. “Don't stand at that window getting tempted to foolishness, Beulah Sharpe, but come home with me,” said a strong, clear voice behind them. “It's a saving the pence that piles up the pounds in the pocket.” “Why didn't you speak to Joanna too, Betsey?” asked Beulah as they walked on. “There's no use seekin' to draw water from an empty well,” was the reply; “but you've sense, when you bring it to the fore, and ye mind well where it is said in Holy Writ, ‘He that gathereth in summer is a wise son,’ and the other is a fool, mind ye that, Beulah Sharpe.” “Well, good night,” said the girl, running up the stairs to her own home. “Hasn't father come yet, Agnes?” she asked of a slender girl of fourteen. “No; I wish he would, the potatoes are half spoiled now,” was the fretful reply. It was a very plain but not cheerless picture, that little second-story home, with its clean floor, its few pictures on the whitewashed walls, and its petunia in full bloom in the window-seat. The bright fire was very welcome after the evening chill, and the song of the tea-kettle and the aroma of baked potatoes very suggestive after a tin-pail dinner. On the old-fashioned settee a young girl of seven or eight was cutting paper-dolls and stroking the cat. Beyond the stove two doors opened into small bedrooms. “Agnes is tired and cross to-night,” came presently from the young miss on the lounge. “I guess you'd be if you'd done what I have to-day,” spoke the sister quickly. “The washing was dreadful; I never stopped a minute till just now. Everybody does get their clothes so dirty.” Beulah looked at her young sister with a pang of self-reproach.326 At her age she was in school, full of plans of being a teacher, or a great scholar, or even a writer. One never knows what girls may turn out, least of all themselves. Then, two years later, came her mother's long sickness, and Beulah fired by a new ambition went into the factory to earn money. Then the mother died, and now for more than a year the home had been as we see it to-night with the girl housekeeper. It was hard. And just then Mr. Sharpe and Davy, a year older than Agnes, came in, and the family were at home. “Your hand trembles, father,” Beulah said, as he took his second cup of tea from her. “Yes, I'm growing old,” said the father patiently. “Father ought not to work so evenings; it's enough for him to drive nails and plane all day,” said Davy. “I wish you wouldn't, father,” said Beulah. Mr. Sharpe did not reply to that, but after a moment asked, “Did the coal come, Agnes?” “Yes, sir; the man put it in the shed.” “Did he ask for the money?” “Yes, sir; I told him what you said.” There was a little sigh as Mr. Sharpe set back his cup. “The rent man's been here, too,” volunteered Ida. “You gave him that money, Agnes?” “Nine dollars a month seems a good deal to pay for three upstairs rooms,” remarked Davy. “Get me the Bible, Ida,” said her father, as they pushed back from table, “I am late to-night.” For this plain, quiet carpenter never forgot his Lord, in whose footsteps he humbly walked. The reading for that evening concluded with the words, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” And as he finished Mr. Sharpe said, “There's a comfort there for us. I used to hope more than for anything else to get a home for myself and children; but if I never do, and it's not likely I shall now, we are as well off as the Saviour was when on earth, and that's enough for me.” Then followed the simple prayer, and Mr. Sharpe, taking his hat, went off to “extra hours.” Agnes and Ida washed the dishes and went to bed. Beulah sat down by the lamp to mend a rent Ida had made in playing tag that day. Davy was already there busy with slate and pencil, for he studied every evening. “Did you notice what father said after reading to-night?” she asked at last. “Yes,” answered Davy; “poor father.” “Why?” said Beulah quickly. “I'm afraid he's working too hard. See how thin and stooping he's grown. I tell you times are hard on a man this year. Wages are low and money close.” “Davy, I earned ten dollars last week.” “Whew!” whistled the boy. “I wish I could. I'd stop his work evenings. I don't believe he'll live a year at this rate.” “You don't mean that, Davy!” “I just do; see how he coughs nights.” “How much does he earn by extra hours?” “About two dollars a week.” “I'll pay him that if he will give it up.” Again silence on Beulah's part, slate and pencil on the boy's. Suddenly a start. “How much did they say that coal bill was?” “Here's the money; run and pay it, will you?” “That I will,” and boy and bill were off together, the former back in a few minutes with a receipt. “Good for sore eyes,” he said, spreading it on the table. “I'll keep it for father's, then,” said his sister. Again silence as before, and again Beulah: “Davy, do you suppose father feels so disappointed that he has not made that home he wanted?” “Of course, terrible. Father means a thing, you know, when he says it.” A longer silence this time. “Davy, we'll get the home for him.” The boy dropped his pencil. “How?” “I don't know, we'll do it. No more gewgaws for me. My father's of more account than feathers. We'll do it, see if we don't.” “Hurrah for you!” shouted the boy under his breath; “but three dollars a week isn't very steep, and a fellow's clothes do wear out so, and I eat an awful sight.” “Never mind,” said Beulah, “eat away, it'll come.” And that was the foundation of the new home. Every house has to have a foundation lower than the stone and mason-work. Sometimes it is a full pocket; here it was good-will and love for the father, and best of all, I think, the prayer for help that went up from the side of Beulah's bed and that told in simple faith just what was wanted. Joanna was highly offended to find that the coveted plume might hang in the window for all Beulah's purse, and her temper was not helped a few days later by seeing it on the dainty head of Judge Perry's daughter, and by Betsey's remark that it looked rather better coming out of those gates than a factory alley. Another Monday Beulah and her ten dollars brought changes to the little home. Mr. Sharpe took his two dollars and a week-old paper and sat down with a very happy face for the evening. A stout Biddy had helped in the wash for three shillings. And then Beulah took an old stocking and tied up seven dollars in it, and Davy his quarter, and Agnes, who had been let into the wonderful secret, her five cents earned by some coarse trimming, and the whole was hidden away for a nest-egg. But it was wonderful what an interest in real estate began to be felt by these prospective holders. Davy was a grocer's boy, and in his frequent journeys about town became inspector in general of every square rod in the village limits, and as Beulah was out at four o'clock on Saturdays she almost always had to take a walk to inspect some place where he had found the welcome placard “For Sale.” Sometimes the two girls got into an empty house and examined every closet and speculated on possibilities with the zest of regular house-hunters. And regularly every month a snug addition was written down in their savings-bank book; for the stocking soon ceased to serve in that capacity. At last the year came around, and in high glee they counted up two hundred and fifty-odd dollars as their result. Of course if they could have put in as much every week as that first week it would have been more, but Beulah found as Davy that even the plainest clothes would wear out, and then that coal-bill experiment proved too pleasant not to be repeated sometimes. “But I'm promoted now a dollar a week,” said Davy, “so that you may expect great things of me.” “But you're that much longer,” said Agnes looking him over with a critical eye. “And so you are afraid it will take it all to fill me up, are you?” asked her brother good-naturedly, and the conference broke up in a laugh. “Seems to me you have lots of intimacies now-a-days,” was injured Ida's remark. Of Joanna, Beulah didn't see much now. “She's getting too shabby for me,” the former was heard to remark. “I want my friends up to times.” Another winter of work and saving, but when the birds began to set up their establishments in the spring-time, and the house-cleaning fever took possession of the matrons, those planners of ours began to bestir themselves in earnest. “I do hope we shall have a down-stairs to our new house,” pouted Agnes one morning from a journey to empty a pail. “And a bay-window,” dreamed Beulah out loud. “What?” said the practical sister. “Oh, I was only looking ahead,” answered the other laughing. “But after all a window isn't as large as a house, and if we can get one why not the other? Anyway it looks well in my picture.” “Don't you think we had better buy land and let father build?” asked Davy. “No; there must be a roof of some kind, and then he can fix all he likes, but he must have one moment in his life of whole enjoyment.” “Even if he has to tear down his roof the next,” said Davy laughing. “What business talents you women possess,” but after all he felt just the same. And every day the prayer from Beulah's bedside grew more earnest and fuller of faith. And with the last of summer came another good answer. Their mother's father, who lived in a distant State, had died in the spring, and now there came to Davy, who was his namesake, a check for one hundred and fifty dollars, the result of a small investment made at his birth. “What will you do with it, Davy?” asked his father. “Leave it in the savings-bank until I can use it,” answered the boy, with a smile for his sisters. The first week of fall brought, as usual, a vacation in the mill for repairs. “Now we must look,” said Beulah. “I believe I have found it, girls,” said Davy dropping in, “the old Kent house is to be had for seven hundred and fifty dollars.” Beulah sank into a chair as if struck. Everybody in L—— knew the old story-and-a-half brown house standing just at the edge of the village, on a sunny slope whose grass bore the earliest tint of green in the spring, and played in the flickering leaf-shadows of summer, and caught the last smile of autumnal warmth, where a venerable spinster had lived and died alone. Now the heir was a wealthy man many miles away, and the tiny house under its two sheltering elms had only a market value for him. He wanted to dispose of it, and as Davy's employer was also a justice, it had been left in his hands, and before sunset the next day the bargain was made, seven hundred paid in cash, the rest by note, and the deed made out in Mr. Sharpe's name, and all this time not a whisper reached the ears of the new owner. “How shall we surprise him?” asked Agnes. To their joy they found that the next week he would be out in the country at work on a school-house, and they laid their plans accordingly. Tuesday morning he was off, promising to return on Thursday eve, and fifteen minutes later the three girls were on their way with pail and cloth and broom to the new home. Oh, how delightful it looked in that fair September morning, with its sheltering elms locking their branches over the low roof, its broad, white door-stone in front, its tiny garden at the back, and at the sides six or eight apple-trees bending under their weight of luscious fruit, old-fashioned pound-sweets and seek-no-farther, and the like. “I can't believe it,” said Beulah, fitting the key. “It's just like a fairy story,” said Ida, hopping on one foot. But she changed her mind before night about that. There was the tiny entry with a square front room on each side, into whose south windows a wealth of sunlight was pouring now, revealing dust and cobwebs in abundance. The one at the right was the kitchen, and over its west window a Virginia creeper hung full of purple fruit, and there was a side-door here too, under an apple-tree, with a path leading down to the spring. There was a little pantry and two bedrooms also, and upstairs was simply divided into two parts under the roof. “How he will enjoy finishing this up,” said Beulah. As for themselves they made a busy day of it with soap and sand, and the next morning a wagon and Davy were on hand, and Ida was supremely happy in the fact of “moving.” That fitting and settling was not exactly as if there had been carpets to fit and mirrors to carry by hand. They were quite through by dark, and back, on the second-story door was tacked a note to “Isaac Sharpe, Esq.,” inviting him to tea in the old Kent cottage. Time fails to tell of the light bread, and white curtains, and countless steps of the next day. Evening came at last. The table was ready, from the stove came unusually savory odors, and at last, just as everybody was giving him up, the little gate opened, and the four flew out the door together and overwhelmed their father with chatter, but not a word of explanation. While he washed, the girls hurried on the supper, and they sat down. The “thanks” were offered, and then Ida cried,— “Father, look under your plate.” Mr. Sharpe did so, but found only a long, folded paper. However he put on his spectacles “to see,” and slowly read out the deed making over to him all interest in the late Kent property, and it was paid for. “Children, what—” he began, and then he broke down, and the spectacles had to come off and a handkerchief take their place, and then again they all talked at once and laughed and cried, and might have forgotten their supper entirely if Davy had not been along, who of course, being a boy, never had a slip of memory on that subject. “And Jim Baker is moving again to-day as well as me,” the father said later on, “but, poor man, I'm afraid there'll never be such a surprise in store for him as for me to-night. Thank God for my children, and thank him too that to-night I can also say ‘my home.’” “And Davy,” Beulah said afterward, “I verily believe that if Betsey had not found me that night longing after that feather, and set me to thinking, this happy day might never have come to any of us,” and in her heart she said “Thank God!” also.— Christian Weekly. THE GRAND PURPOSE OF THE BIBLE.
No careful reader of its pages will fail to perceive that although it contains history, poetry, laws, prophecies, precepts, doctrines, and promises, yet all seem to crystallize around one grand central truth. As the various branches of a tree are supported by one trunk, so all parts of the Bible grow out of and depend upon the all-pervading truth, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. To this center all converges, from it all radiates. It is the sun of the entire system. Children's Tact: Grandmother's Bear Story
—Children have more tact than they get credit for. When her grandmother had told the six-year-old a long yarn about a fabulous bear that used to go around the country eating up all the children who disobeyed their parents, the bright child looked into the wrinkled face and said, “Grandma, were there any bears of that kind around when you were a girl?” And when the old lady assured her that bears of that kind were a recent invention, she simply replied, “I thought there could n't have been any, or I should n't have had any grandmother.” On another occasion of equal importance,327 when asked whether she believed what she was told, she naively replied, “No; I think it is the biggest mistake I ever heard.” AXIOMS AND ADVICE RELATIVE TO REVIEWS.
Repetition is the road to remembrance. Each truth remembered is better than forty forgotten. Vague statements leave fleeting impressions. Inept illustration impedes instruction. Entertainment is only a handmaid to edification. Wisdom walks not with verbosity. Want of study tends to poverty of style. Imperfect preparation begets inattentive hearers. Short lessons make long memories. Easy questions secure prompt answers. Loving words always find willing ears. Yearning hearts meet quick opportunities. Attach due importance to the review. Leave the husks and secure the meat. Weave all the lessons into one web. Ask nothing of your school you will not do yourself. Yield yourself to the lead of the Spirit. Seek to make the review short, simple, and searching. Review weekly as a preparation for quarterly review. Employ blackboard and chart only as aids, not ends. Vary your plans, and avoid monotony. Invite the co-operation of your teachers. Endeavor to present the truth with simplicity. Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God. WHAT SHALL WE LEAVE OUT?
By Evangeline Bell
Who has ever found a day long enough in which to accomplish all that he desired to do? We may rise early and toil late; yet the close of each day finds unaccomplished much that we would fain have done. As the poet says,— “Labor with what zeal we will,
Something still remains undone;
Something uncompleted still
Waits the rising of the sun.”
Days make up our lives; and so it is that from almost every life something is crowded out,—much that we must sadly leave undone; and we comfort ourselves with the thought that one cannot do everything, and go on our way. Since this is true, it becomes very important what things we leave out. Some writer has said, “The things which are crowded out of a life are the test of that life;” and in its broadest sense, is not this true? As a rule, we manage in some way to find time for those things for which we care most. We may flatter ourselves into the belief that we are obliged to omit such and such duties; but if we put the question honestly and fairly to our own conscience, must we not all admit that we do find time for many unimportant, and I had almost said, foolish, things, which crowd out those of vastly greater importance? While a few give almost their whole time, strength, and energy to the accomplishment of good in the world, the many excuse themselves for their habitual or total neglect of the finer and better work of life, by declaring that they have no time to devote to it. Others, say they, may read the world’s best books, or store their minds with useful knowledge; others may engage in various kinds of missionary labor,—visit the sick, care for the needy, comfort the weary and discouraged, raise up the fallen; others may work for the church and the Sabbath-school; others may be home missionaries if they will; but for all such good works they have no time. The daily routine of life is, for them, so constant and pressing that they cannot think of adding to it those other tasks which they would greatly like to undertake, but for want of time. Now, it is proved by the whole experience of the world, in whatsoever department of labor, that the best work does not come from those who have nothing else to do, and whose whole time is free to devote to a single purpose. It is simply impossible in this work-day world for a person to declare that he will do but one thing, and, failing to give his whole time to that, he will do nothing. It is doubtless true that every one should have a plan in life,—a leading ambition, an overmastering purpose; but it is not true that he should sacrifice everything to it. The world’s best laborers,—those who have had the highest purpose in life, who have achieved the noblest work, and have made the truest success, whether in religion, politics, literature, or philanthropy,—have been men and women who have not spent their God-given moments in bemoaning a lack of time, and the difficulties in their way, but who have done whatever thing was duty; and though busy with humdrum toils, or otherwise hindered, made success by taking what little time they had for higher labors, instead of refusing to take it because it was little. Take literature, for instance,—a pursuit which seemingly, more than any other, requires the undivided time and ability of its servants. The intellectual history of the world shows that the majority of its writers have been men employed in pursuits which must not only have taken a large share of their time, but also have made large demands upon their mental forces. To mention renowned American authors, we find that Longfellow, Lowell, Holmes, and others have filled professors’ chairs for many long years; Bryant, Whittier, Aldrich, Bayard Taylor, have done much of their best writing in hours after their routine of newspaper work had been performed; Hawthorne, Irving, Bancroft, and others have filled responsible positions of public trust. By using the odds and ends of time,—that which others devote to pleasure-seeking,—these men have enriched our literature by productions which every day are making thousands better and happier, in foreign lands as well as in our own, and which, for breadth of learning, purity of expression, and refinement of taste, have rarely been excelled. Others have labored through great physical infirmities. Think of Milton, the grand old hero, whose name will live through all time, and, we may hope, throughout eternity! The work upon which his fame chiefly rests was accomplished after he had become totally blind. Says Mr. Shaw, “There is no spectacle in the history of literature more touching and sublime than Milton, blind, poor, persecuted, and alone, ‘fallen upon evil days and evil tongues, in darkness, and with dangers compassed round,’ retiring into obscurity to compose those immortal epics, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained.” There, too, was Alexander Pope, whose life, as he himself expresses it, was “that long disease.” Crippled, deformed, and almost helpless, he was a passionate student; and though we cannot enter into the keen, satirical spirit which pervades many of his writings, we must still admit that his was no idle life. And there is our own Prescott, the historian, who lost his sight by the careless toss of a crust of bread in the college dining-hall. By this misfortune he was compelled, after completing his course at college, to relinquish his cherished design of following the profession of law, and travel abroad in search of medical relief. Though disappointed in this, and obliged to give up the hope of having his sight restored, he did not give up the hope of benefiting the world. Ten years of the most systematic and persevering study prepared him for his work as historian, and though experiencing intense pain from his eyes, and obliged to depend on the friendly service of other eyes, “his industry never flagged, his courage never faltered; his spirits never sank under the burden imposed upon them.” His work lies before the world; it needs no comment. Says an eminent American critic, “The character of Prescott was of singular worth. With a profound modesty, it united a remarkable self-denial and lofty perseverance in duty. Possessed of wealth, with a deprivation of sight so nearly entire that it might have seemed to justify any self-indulgence, with elegant tastes, which are apt to draw men from earnest labors, he yet devoted his life to one of the most onerous departments of literary research.” So we might multiply examples. Thus it is, not only in literature, but in every department of good and helpful work, that those who have succeeded have not usually been those who could give their undivided time and strength to one thing; but ofttimes those who, loving that work, and giving to it but the remnants of their time, have done what they could. There is often more in the spirit in which one labors than in the amount of time given. There is a great deal in having the heart in the work. Some way, it does not seem nearly so hard to find time for those things we love to do. They are not so apt to get crowded out. How often we find time for things which were better undone, and leave out those things which afterward we would give anything to have the privilege of doing. Oh, the pain and bitter tears which these things we allow to be crowded out sometimes cost us! We can see when it is too late; but we cannot go back,—we cannot undo the past, but from it only learn lessons for the future. Let us be sure that in our eagerness to excel, we do not leave out of our lives those things which in the great day shall prove to have been the most important.