Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Jun 14, 1883
General Articles.
By Mrs. E. G. White
The First Blow of the Reformation.
BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.
THE year 1517 marked the beginning of a new era for the church and the world. It was a period of great excitement in Germany. To replenish her treasuries, the Roman Church had opened a vast market on earth, and made merchandise of the grace of God. Indulgences was the name given to this merchandise. As the dealer entered a town, one went before him, crying, "The grace of God and of the Holy Father is at your gates." And the people welcomed the blasphemous pretender as if he were God himself come down from Heaven to them.
Tetzel, the leader in this infamous traffic, had been convicted of the basest offenses against society and against the law of God; but having escaped the punishment due to his crimes, he was now employed to further the mercenary and unscrupulous projects of the Romish Church. With shameless effrontery he framed the most glaring falsehoods, and related all manner of marvelous tales to deceive an ignorant, credulous, and superstitious people. Had they possessed the word of God, the unerring detector of sin and Satanic delusions, they could not have been thus deceived. It was to keep them under the control of the papacy, that they might swell the power and wealth of her ambitious leaders, that the Bible had been withheld from them.
Tetzel sets up his traffic in the church, and ascending the pulpit, he with great vehemence extols indulgences as the most precious gifts of God. "Draw near," he cries, "and I will give you letters, duly sealed, by which the sins you hereafter desire to commit shall be all forgiven you." "Even repentance is not indispensable." "But more than all this, indulgences save not only the living but the dead." "The very moment that the money clinks against the bottom of this chest, the soul escapes from purgatory, and flies to Heaven." With such Heaven-daring blasphemy spoke this agent of Satan.
When Simon Magus offered to purchase of the apostles the power to work miracles, Peter answered him, "Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money." But Tetzel's offer was grasped by eager thousands. Gold and silver flowed into his treasury. A salvation that could be bought with money was more easily obtained than that which required repentance, faith and diligent effort to resist and overcome sin. They could sin as they pleased, and money would purchase their pardon.
The doctrine of indulgences had long been opposed by men of learning and piety in the Romish Church, and there were many who had no faith in pretensions so contrary to both reason and revelation. Yet no bishop dared to lift his voice against the fraud and corruption of this iniquitous traffic. The minds of men were becoming disturbed and uneasy, and they eagerly inquired if God would not work through some instrumentality for the purification of his church.
The traffic in indulgences, subversive as it was of the very foundation principles of the gospel, could not fail to arouse determined opposition on the part of Luther. Though still a papist of the straitest sort, he was filled with horror at the blasphemous assumptions of Tetzel and his associates. Many of his own congregation had purchased certificates of pardon, and they soon began to come to Luther confessing their various sins, and expecting absolution, not because they were penitent and wished to reform, but on the ground of the indulgence. Luther refused them absolution, and warned them that unless they should repent, and reform their lives, they must perish in their sins. In great perplexity, they sought out Tetzel, and informed him that Luther, an Augustine monk, had treated his letters with contempt. The friar was filled with rage. He uttered the most terrible curses, caused fires to be lighted in the public square, and declared that he had orders from the pope to burn the heretics who should dare to oppose his most holy indulgences.
Luther now enters boldly upon his work as a champion of the truth, fighting not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, and powers, and spiritual wickedness in high places. His voice is heard from the pulpit, in earnest, solemn warning. He sets before the people the offensive character of sin, and teaches them that it is impossible for man by his own works to lessen its guilt or evade its punishment. Nothing but repentance toward God and faith in Christ can save the sinner. The grace of Christ cannot be purchased. It is a free gift. He counsels the people not to buy the indulgences, but to look in faith to their crucified Redeemer. He relates his own painful experience in vainly seeking by humiliation and penance to secure salvation, and assures his hearers that it was by looking away from himself and believing in Christ that he found peace and joy unspeakable. He urges them to obtain, if possible, a copy of the Bible, and to study it diligently. It is those who do not learn and obey its sacred truths that are deceived by Satan, and left to perish in their iniquity.
A bold blow had been struck for the Reformation. But Satan was rallying his forces to control the minds of the people and maintain the traffic in the grace of God. He aroused such hatred against Luther that many were ready to silence his opposition, even by taking his life. Thus the great controversy between the Prince of light and the prince of darkness went steadily forward.
About this time the elector Frederic had a dream which made a deep impression upon his mind, and which seemed in a remarkable manner to foreshadow the work of the Reformation. "The feast of All-Saints was at hand, and the elector, having retired to rest, lay musing how he should keep the festival, and was praying for the poor souls in purgatory, and beseeching Divine guidance for himself, his counselors, and his people. Thus engaged, he fell asleep, and dreamed that a monk, a true son of the apostle Paul, was sent to him; and that all the saints accompanied him, for the purpose of testifying that he was divinely commissioned. They asked of the elector, that the monk might be allowed to write something on the church door at Wittenberg. The monk began to write, and the characters were so large and brilliant that they could be read at a great distance; and the pen he used was so long that its extremity reached even to Rome, and wounded the ears of a lion which was crouching there, and shook the triple crown on the pope's head. All the cardinals and princes ran to support it; and, as the dreamer himself joined in the effort to support the pope's crown, he awoke in great alarm, and angry with the monk who had used his pen so awkwardly. Presently he fell asleep again, and his strange dream continued; the disturbed lion began to roar, and Rome and all the surrounding States ran to make inquiry; and the pope demanded that the monk be restrained, and demanded this especially of the elector, as the monk dwelt in his dominions.
"Once more the elector awoke from his dream, besought God to preserve the holy father, the pope, and slept again. And still his strange dream continued, and he saw all the princes of the empire crowding to Rome, and all striving to break the mysterious pen. Yet the more they endeavored to break it, the stiffer it became; and when they asked the monk where he found it, and why it was so strong, he replied that he secured it from one of his old schoolmasters; that it belonged to a Bohemian goose* a hundred years old; and that it was strong because no man could take the pith out of it. Suddenly the dreamer heard an outcry, and lo, a great number of pens had issued from the long pen of the monk!"
The festival of All-Saints was an important day for Wittenberg. The costly relics of the church were then displayed before the people, and a full remission of sin was granted to all who visited the church and made confession. Accordingly on this day the people in great numbers flocked to Wittenberg.
On the 31st of October, the day preceding the festival, a monk went boldly to the church, to which a crowd of worshipers was already repairing, and affixed to the door ninety-five propositions against the doctrine of indulgences. That monk was Martin Luther. He went alone; not one of his most intimate friends knew of his design. As he fastened his theses upon the door of the church, he proclaimed himself ready to defend them the next day at the university itself against all opposers.
These propositions attracted universal attention. They were read and re-read and repeated in every direction. Great excitement was created in the university and in the whole city.
By these theses the doctrine of indulgences was fearlessly opposed. It was shown that the power to grant the pardon of sin, and to remit its penalty, had never been committed to the pope, or to any other man. The whole scheme was a farce, an artifice to extort money by playing upon the superstitions of the people, a device of Satan to destroy the souls of all who should trust to its lying pretensions. It was also clearly shown that the gospel of Christ was the most valuable treasure of the church, and that the grace of God, therein revealed, was freely bestowed upon all who should seek it by repentance and faith.
God was directing the labors of this fearless builder, and the work he wrought was firm and sure. He had faithfully presented the doctrine of grace, which would destroy the assumptions of the pope as a mediator, and lead the people to Christ alone as the sinner's sacrifice and intercessor. Thus was the elector's dream already beginning to be fulfilled. The pen which wrote upon the church door extended to Rome, disturbing the lion in his lair, and266jostling the pope's diadem.
The sin-loving and superstitious multitudes were terrified as the sophistries that had soothed their fears were rudely swept away. Crafty ecclesiastics, interrupted in their hellish work of sanctioning crime, and seeing their gains endangered, were enraged, and rallied to uphold the pope.
Luther's theses challenged discussion; but not one dared to accept the challenge. By the grace of God, the blow struck by the monk of Wittenberg shook the very foundation of the papacy, stunned and terrified its supporters, and awakened thousands from the slumber of error and superstition. The questions which he proposed in his theses had in a few days spread throughout Germany, and in a few weeks they had sounded throughout Christendom. Many devoted Romanists, who had seen and lamented the terrible iniquity prevailing in the church, but had not known how to arrest its progress, read the propositions with great joy, recognizing in them the voice of God. They felt that the Lord had graciously set his hand to arrest the rapidly swelling tide of corruption that was issuing from the see of Rome. Princes and magistrates secretly rejoiced that a check was to be put upon the arrogant power from which there was no appeal.
Yet there were some who doubted and feared. The prior of Luther's order, frightened by Tetzel, came to the Reformer in great alarm, saying, "Pray do not bring disgrace upon your order." Luther had great respect for this man, and was deeply affected by his words, but rallying he replied, "Dear father, if the thing is not of God, it will come to naught. If it is, let it go forward."
But the Reformer had more bitter accusers to meet. Some charged him with acting hastily and from impulse. Others accused him of presumption, declaring that he was not directed of God, but was acting from pride and forwardness. "Who does not know," he responds, "that we can seldom advance a new idea without an appearance of pride, and without being accused of seeking quarrels? Why were Christ and all the martyrs put to death? Because they appeared proud despisers of the wisdom of the times in which they lived, and because they brought forward new truths without having first consulted the oracles of the old opinions."
Again he declares: "What I am doing will not be effected by the prudence of man; but by the counsel of God. If the work is of God, who shall stop it? If it is not, who can forward it? Not my will, not theirs, not ours; but thy will, thine, holy Father who art in Heaven!"
Luther had been urged on by the Spirit of God to begin his work; but he was not to carry it forward without severe conflicts. The reproaches of his enemies, their misrepresentation of his purposes, and their unjust and malicious reflections upon his character and motives, came in upon him like an overwhelming flood; and they were not without effect. He had felt confident that the leaders in the church, and the philosophers of the nation, would gladly unite with him in efforts for reform. Words of encouragement from those in high position had inspired him with joy and hope. Already in anticipation he saw a brighter day dawning for the church. But encouragement had turned to reproach and condemnation. Many of the dignitaries both of the church and of the State were convicted of the truthfulness of Luther's theses; but they soon saw that the acceptance of these truths would involve great changes. To enlighten and reform the people would be virtually to undermine the papal authority, to stop millions of streams now flowing into her treasury, and thus greatly curtail the extravagance and luxury of the Romish leaders. Furthermore, to teach the people to think and act as responsible beings, looking to Christ alone for salvation, would overthrow the pontiff's throne, and eventually destroy their own authority. For this reason they refused the knowledge tendered them of God, and arrayed themselves against Christ and the truth by their opposition to the man whom he had sent to enlighten them.
MY REFUGE.
By Ellen L. Goveh
[These lines were written by Ellen L. Goveh, a Brahmin of the highest caste, adopted daughter of Rev. W. T. Stone, of Bradford, England.]
In the secret of his presence how my soul delights to hide,
Oh how precious are the lessons which I learn at Jesus' side!
Earthly cares can never vex me, neither trials lay me low,
For when Satan comes to tempt me, to the "secret place"
I go.
When my soul is faint and thirsty, 'neath the shadow of His wing
There is cool and pleasant shelter, and a fresh and crystal spring;
And my Saviour rests beside me, as we hold communion sweet;
If I tried, I could not utter what he says when thus we meet.
Only this I know: I tell him all my doubts and griefs and fears;
Oh how patiently he listens, and my drooping soul he cheers.
Do you think he ne'er reproves me? What a false friend he would be,
If he never told me of the sins which he must surely see.
Do you think that I could love him half so well as I ought
If he did not tell me plainly of each sinful word and thought?
No! he is so very faithful, and that makes me trust him more:
For I know that he does love me, though he wounds me very sore.
Would you like to know the sweetness of the secret of the Lord?
Go and hide beneath his shadow; this shall then be your reward;
And whene'er you leave the silence of that happy meeting-place,
You must mind and bear the image of your Master in your face.
You will surely lose the blessing and the fullness of your joy,
If you let dark clouds distress you, and your inward peace destroy.
You may always be abiding, if you will rest at Jesus' side;
In the secret of his presence you may every moment hide.
Dr. Hopkins on Evolution.
By Mark Hopkins
[The Rev. Mark Hopkins, D. D., LL.D., Ex-President of Williams College, is delivering a course of lectures in Princeton Seminary, in the first of which he discusses evolution. The following is the substance of this lecture.]
THE grandest description ever given of man is in the first chapter of Genesis. We see there implied the sonship of man and the fatherhood of God. This sonship is truly apprehended only in Christ. Man was not formed in the image of a god, but of God, the God of the first chapter of Genesis, the Creator of the heavens and the earth. In man as created by him and in his image we have a being worthy of redemption. We have herein a congruity essential to the unity of the Scriptures. We care little whether you take creation in the higher or lower sense of the term. In looking at the marvelous distribution of oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, and their nice adjustments in quantity and quality, we cannot repress the conviction, “He weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance.” We think we are safe in supposing that matter had its origin in time, rather than that it existed from eternity. Do you deny the fact of man’s original creation? Did man come to be man by creation? or evolution? or what is the same thing, by a process of development? Evolution and development imply involution and envelopment. Mr. Tyndall assumes the existence of matter in the sun in a nebulous state. There were shut up in matter certain potentialities, certain forces. Man was developed upward from below. If it be admitted that in certain aspects the language of the Bible favors evolution, it is no less true that it represents God as a personal God commanding those processes. But in making man there is no affinity with evolution. Was he created by God, or was he evoked by forces inherent in matter? We take Genesis.
The author of Genesis proclaims the unity of God; monotheism. Was this an inference drawn from the unity of his works? That unity could not then have been known. There was no science to help man to this conclusion. Indeed, as he looked at earth, air, and water, and their deep commotions, he might naturally have inferred the very opposite. Whence this idea of man’s creation in the image of God, and with dominion over every living thing? Nature must have been established when man was created. And how, but through revelation, was he to get an idea of chaos? Evolution does not account for the origin of anything. It assumes the existence of nebulous matter. It puts itself on the same plane with the author of Genesis. How was the matter there? To the brutes and to many persons most things seem a mere matter of course. They are surprised merely at what is new. But to wonder belongs not to a being evolved from an ape. And wonder increases instead of diminishing by reason of familiarity. The future life under a different form is not stranger than the present life under its present form. A personal God is no stranger than a personal self. Existence of all kinds is wonderful. Evolution has no advantages. The one assumption is not worse than the other; the assumption of matter, the assumption of God. Evolution requires new assumptions all the time. Let us concede to nebulous matter an existence. Whence life? Whence organism? Tyndall speaks of an organism sensitive all over. Whence organs? Why, the organs have been differentiated. Differentiated by what? By differentiation. This surely ought to be satisfactory. The eye was formed. This formation began by rays of light falling on pigment cells vaguely sensitive all over. What of propagation? of the sexual relations? How were two individuals of different sexes to reach the same stage of development, and at the same time?
Whence the upward tendency? This involves a law which enters into the whole construction. The survival of the fittest cannot account for it. The lower orders were the most ancient. Man did not survive. He came. And he came naked, weaponless, relatively feeble, surrounded by savage beasts, and least fitted to survive. Their idea of the survival of the fittest is the survival of the strongest. Sow wheat and Canada thistles together, and which will survive? Which is fittest? The ground brings forth fruits, seeds, thorns, thistles. It is only by the sweat of the brow that the survival of the fittest for man is secured. Why do not lions, tigers, and wolves dominate the more useful animals for man? Why, but in that law by which the weaker animals are made more numerous and prolific?
Evolution cannot account for the movement upwards. Darwin’s theory of the origin of species is supposed to give support to evolution. (1) It may do so if there be a propagation of one species for another. The variety of pigeons is great: but no pigeon has ever been changed to an eagle. (2) The change must be from lower to higher. Species often degenerate. Men degenerate. Here is evolution downwards.
Evolution is essentially atheistic. It does not account for the origin of man.
Herbert Spencer admits the power of the unknown and the unknowable as the agency by which evolution is brought about. If he maintains that this power is inherent in matter, then he is an evolutionist; but if separate from matter, then he is not an evolutionist. There are as great differences among evolutionists as among theologians. Professor Fiske ranks among his ablest disciples. He speaks of the unknowable; but he knows it to be, and that it is independent of matter. To this power there is no limit in time or space. All the phenomena of the universe are referable to this infinite and eternal power. It is the author of the moral law. To holiness it gives the divine sanction; to sin the divine condemnation. It is an infinite and eternal being, capable of effort (and enormous effort too) through the ages. Evolution knows that this power is not a person, that it has no self-consciousness, that it does not contrive; it knows naught of the unknowable, nor of the dogmas handed down by priests. And that is what they style scientific knowledge. When they introduce the terms sins, holiness, moral law, we recognize the livery of Heaven to clothe evolution in.
Now some evolutionists attempt to reconcile science and religion. The phantom of hostility (say they) between religion and science must be exorcised now and forever. What does this amount to? By religion do they mean Christianity? No. Is eternal life embraced in (their) science? No. It is unknown and unknowable. The unknowableness is that we cannot find out him whom we call “Our Father;” that he is not a person. They deny to him every attribute of Father. He cannot work miracles, he cannot make a revelation; cannot answer prayer; is not to be worshiped, nor to be loved. Evolution can consort with Christianity only by destroying it. In fact evolution is reconciled with no religion which recognizes a personal God.
Scripture statement: Man was created. Is there more mystery connected with this statement than with the declarations of evolution? A matured man stands before me, one of full stature and perfect in form. Twenty-six years ago where was the material out of which he was made? His carbon perhaps lay in the rocks, and his oxygen and nitrogen were floating over the Himalayas. We simply say, “He grew.” Custom blinds us. No one wonders. Evolution says that man is evolved, when not one particle of matter in him was in the original. Is it any more strange to bring together these particles instantly than in twenty-six years? What great distinction is there between evolution and growth? Look at a field the first of April and then the first of July. Whence the four tons of clover on it? Yes; we know all about it. “It grew.” Life and organization did not always exist. There must have been a beginning. We gain nothing philosophically by these fine-spun theories of “science falsely so called.”
Even thus it stands: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”
“BE
Before Honor Is Humility
“BEFORE honor is humility.”
Strong Foundations.
A story is told of Lepaux, a member of the French Directory, that with much thought and study he had invented a new religion, to be called "Theophilanthropy," a kind of organized Rousseauism, and that, being disappointed in its not being readily approved and adopted, he complained to Talleyrand of the difficulty he found in introducing it.
"I am not surprised," said Talleyrand, at the difficulty you find in your effort. It is no easy matter to introduce a new religion. But there is one thing I would advise you to do, and then, perhaps, you might succeed."
"What is it? what is it?" asked the other with eagerness.
"It is this," said Talleyrand, "go and be crucified, and then be buried, and then rise again on the third day, and then go working miracles, raising the dead, and healing all manner of diseases, and casting out devils, and then it is possible that you might accomplish your end!" And the philosopher, crestfallen and confounded, went away silent.
The anecdote shows, in a fresh and striking light, how firm the foundation on which Christianity and the faith of the Christian rest. "Ransack all history," says an able writer, "and you cannot find a single event more satisfactorily and clearly proved than the resurrection of Christ from the dead." And says another, a distinguished jurist, "If human evidence ever has proved, or ever can prove anything, then the miracles of Christ are proved beyond a shadow of a doubt." And yet the miracles and resurrection of Christ prove his divinity; and as Napoleon said, 'His divinity once admitted, Christianity appears with the precision and clearness of algebra; it has the connection and unity of a science."
And on this strong foundation it is that Christianity and the Christian faith rest. And how absolutely immovable that foundation is, how absolutely convincing the evidence from this source, we hardly realize until, like Talleyrand, we call on the objector himself to be crucified, and himself to work miracles, as Christ did throughout Jerusalem and all Judea, in the presence of thousands and tens of thousands, both enemies and friends.
It is a most assuring as well as comforting thought, that this external evidence from without can never be shaken while human testimony has value or meaning. And when we add to this the internal evidence—the fact that thousands and millions of Christians have felt, in their own experience, that the gospel is true, just as the hungry man knows when he is fed, or the thirsty when he has drank; just as we know the existence of the sun because we see its light and feel its heat—then the foundation on which as Christians we rest, stands doubly sure to the soul. Heaven and earth may pass away, but God's word and all that rests upon it shall abide forever.—American Messenger.
Justice under Romanism.
By Editor
On the occasion of the one-hundredth anniversary of the death of Voltaire, Victor Hugo delivered an oration in which he gave the following instances to show how justice was administered under papal rule, in the days of Voltaire:—
“At Toulouse, October 13, 1761, there was found in a lower story of a house, a young man hanged. The crowd gathered, the clergy fulminated, the magistracy investigated. It was a suicide; they made of it an assassination. In what interest? In the interest of religion. And who was accused? The father. He was a Huguenot, and he wished to hinder his son from becoming a Catholic. There was here a moral monstrosity and a material impossibility; no matter! This father had killed his son; this old man had hanged this young man. Justice travailed and this was the result. On the month of March, 1762, a man with white hair, Jean Calas, was conducted to a public place, stripped naked, stretched upon a wheel, the members bound upon it, the head hanging. Three men are there upon a scaffold, a magistrate named David, charged to superintend the punishment, a priest to hold the crucifix, and the executioner with a bar of iron in his hand. The patient, stupefied and terrible, regards not the priest and looks at the executioner. The executioner lifts the bar of iron, and breaks one of his arms. The victim groans and swoons. The magistrate comes forward; they make the condemned inhale salts; he returns to life. Then another stroke of the bar; another groan. Calas loses consciousness; they revive him, and the executioner begins again; and, as each limb before being broken in two places receives two blows, that makes eight punishments. After the eighth swooning the priest offers him the crucifix to kiss; Calas turns away his head, and the executioner gives him the coup de grace; that is to say, crushes in his chest with the thick end of the bar of iron. So died Jean Calas.
“That lasted two hours. After his death, the evidence of the suicide came to light. But an assassination had been committed. By whom? By the judges. [Great sensation. Applause.]
“Another fact. After the old man, the young man. Three years later, in 1765, at Abbeville, the day after a night of storm and high wind, there was found upon the pavement of a bridge an old crucifix of worm-eaten wood, which for three centuries had been fastened to the parapet. Who had thrown down this crucifix? Who committed this sacrilege? It is not known. Perhaps a passer-by. Perhaps the wind. Who is the guilty one? The bishop of Amiens launches a monitoire. Note what a monitoire was: it was an order to the faithful, on pain of hell, to declare what they knew or believed they knew of such or such a fact; a murderous injunction, when addressed by fanaticism to ignorance. The monitoire of the Bishop of Amiens does its work; the town gossip assumes the character of the crime charged. Justice discovers, or believes it discovers, that on the night when the crucifix was thrown down, two men, two officers, one named La Barre, the other d'Etallonde, passed over the bridge of Abbeville, that they were drunk, and that they sang a guard-room song. The tribunal was the Seneschalcy of Abbeville. The Seneschalcy of Abbeville was equivalent to the court of the Capitouls of Toulouse. It was not less just. Two orders for arrest were issued. D'Etallonde escaped, La Barre was taken. Him they delivered to judicial examination. He denied having crossed the bridge; he confessed to having sung the song. The Seneschalcy of Abbeville condemned him; he appealed to the Parliament of Paris. He was conducted to Paris; the sentence was found good and confirmed. He was conducted back to Abbeville in chains. I abridge. The monstrous hour arrives. They begin by subjecting the Chevalier de La Barre to the torture, ordinary and extraordinary, to make him reveal his accomplice. Accomplices in what? In having crossed a bridge and sung a song? During the torture one of his knees was broken; his confessor, on hearing the bones crack, fainted away. The next day, June 5, 1766, La Barre was drawn to the great square of Abbeville, where flamed a penitential fire; the sentence was read to La Barre; then they cut off one of his hands; then they tore out his tongue with iron pincers; then, in mercy, his head was cut off and thrown into the fire. So died the Chevalier de La Barre. He was nineteen years of age. [Long and profound sensation.]”
We have always had a feeling of sympathy for Voltaire this far: in opposing Christianity he opposed it as it was presented to him in the Roman Catholic Church. Could he be blamed for this? But he was to be blamed for speaking of the Bible as he did, actuated by his prejudices, and saying things which were not true. But in the last great day it will be found that the papal church—a monstrous travesty on Christianity and justice—is responsible for a large share of the infidelity which has cursed the earth during this dispensation. EDITOR SIGNS.
Aim at Your Best Every Time.
By C. H. Spurgeon
SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS was one of the most distinguished painters of his day; and in answer to the inquiry, how he attained to such excellence, he replied, "By observing one simple rule, viz., to make each painting the best." Depend upon it that the same thing is true in the service of God. He who wishes to preach well should endeavor each time to preach his best. The audience may be small, and the hearers illiterate; but the best possible sermon will not be thrown away upon them. It may be that the minister is invited to make one among several speakers at a tea-meeting. Never let him talk mere nonsense to fill up the time, as so many have done in days past; but let him use the occasion as an opportunity for quietly uttering most important truths. It is for the preacher's own good that he should never descend into mere dribble. Beyond all expectations, he may be accomplishing a great work, when his only idea is that he is doing a little one as well as he can. Our firm opinion is that we often accomplish most when the occasion appears to be the least favorable.
Well do we remember a young man who was called to preach on a certain week-day morning, at the anniversary of a village chapel. He was somewhat surprised to find that only eight persons were present in a spacious edifice; but he gave himself up, heart and soul, to the service as thoroughly as if eight thousand had been gathered together. It was the time of refreshing to the eight, and to the preacher himself, and so nine were benefited! What was the result? In the evening the audience filled the place; the rumor of the morning sermon had been industriously spread by the villagers, the scantiness of the audience being a factor in the singularity of the news; and every available person was mustered to cheer the poor young man who was such a singular preacher. What was far better, there were memorials of good having been accomplished in the salvation of souls. A brother minister, who was present in the morning because he was the preacher of the afternoon, remarked that if it had been his lot to conduct that morning service the slender congregation would have taken all the life out of him, but that he saw the wisdom of always doing one's best under all sorts of circumstances, for it would be sure to lead up to something larger by and by. Let every young speaker think of this, and throw all his energies into a discourse in a cottage to a dozen old ladies. It is an old saying that when the farrier's name is up, he need not take care how he makes his horse-shoes; but it is a gross and wicked falsehood; for the more a man has succeeded, the more it is incumbent upon him to do better, and still better, that his reputation may not become a falsehood, and that younger men may not find in his example an excuse for trifling. He who can do best should still do his best; the best of the best is no better than our God deserves.
Perhaps there is no greater evil under the sun than "a great sermon," which people speak of as "quite an intellectual treat;" and yet, in another sense, every sermon should be great, and every address should be solid. The toleration of slight work in the service of God shows a want of reverence for his holy name. If Dr. Johnson was right in his proverbial saying, that "Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well," with what emphasis should we accept the sentence if the work is to be done for the Lord of hosts. How dare we offer to him that which costs us nothing? How dare we think that any workmanship which has been performed in a slovenly manner is fit to present before the infinitely glorious One? A high respect for the Lord God should be the leading motive for holy carefulness in every service, but next to this, self-respect ought to urge us to thoroughness. Let us do nothing unworthy of servants of the Lord Jesus. We treat ourselves with contempt when we perform inferior work; we ought not to condescend to such drudgery.—C. H. Spurgeon.
Do Not Punish for Your Own Faults
Never punish your child for a fault to which you are addicted yourself.