to my parents, I owe them everything, and it will be a shame if I do not honor and obey them" The truth rather is, that the filial affec Living Close to God, almighty arm is ever within reach. Brother, if you or I ever lose Christ, The Seeds of Character. If you ask what we gain by living it is not because He has driven us close to God, I would answer that away, or hidden Himself from us; it tion governs the child unconsciously. we gain fresh supplies of strength. is because we have been drawn away Because it loves, it chooses, con- The strength of yesterday will not from him.-The Rev. T. L. Cuyler, stantly, the very things which its pa- suffice for to-day, any more than in " New York Evangelist.” rents choose for it. And so obedi- yesterday's food will sustain me if I ence is not a yoke, service is not a neglect to eat my breakfast this burden, and the loving child is not morning. God means that we shall They tell us that in Scotland is a duty's slave. be kept in constant dependence, battlefield on which the natives of And thus it is with a genuine therefore he metes out "strength the soil and the Saxons once met in Christian life. It is an exalted pa- equal to the day." The manna must terrible conflict. No monument triotism, an experience of filial love, fall fresh every morning. Lord, give marks the scene of the bloody fight. a loyal attachment, kindling to an us day by day our daily bread. No All over the field grows the beautiardor of enthusiasm, for a Prince Christian can live on an old experi- ful Scotch heather, except in one and Saviour whom we have en-ence or an old promise made to God throned in our hearts. The Christian man not only says, "Let Thy will, not mine, be done," but also, "Let Thy will AND MINE be one;" and in this oneness of purpose, this communion of soul, this perpetual choosing of Christ, as a bride chooses perpetually her husband and lord, he finds the grandest realizations of life and the surest pledge of immortality. spot. There a little blue flower grows abundantly. No flowers like them are to be found for many a league around. Why are they there? The reason is this: Just in the spot where they grow the bodies of the slain were buried, and the earth was saturated with the blood and the re in years gone by, or on the divine Security depends upon living close to Jesus. The soldier who keeps in the ranks on the march, and behind the ramparts during the assault, is seeds of these flowers were there before. As soon as the blood touched them, they sprang up. They developed. And every blue flower on Culloden's field, as it bends to the THERE is a touch of tenderness, a commonly safe; the stragglers are mountain breeze, is a memorial of melting of compassion, a yearning apt to be picked up by the enemy. the brave warriors who dyed that of sympathy which is not taught by To this latter class in our churches heathery sod with their crimson gore. art, which is never learned from belong the casualities and the dis- So it is with character. The seeds books, which is not the gift of gen- graceful desertions which so often of action lie deep beneath the surius, and which cannot be acquired in shock and shame us. Among this face-the seeds of heroism and the the schools, but which comes inevit- class of backsliders are the ready seeds of crime. Good and evil germs ably with the glowing realizations victims of the tempter-the men who lie latent in the heart. For a lifeof Christian experience. betray pecuniary trusts, and the time they may remain unknown and weak-kneed time-servers who suc- unrecognized; perhaps never are decumb in times of hard pressure, and veloped in this lower world. The those deserters who slip away from seeds of the blue flowers at Culloden. God's worship through broken Sab- would, probably, have lain there unbaths, and all the votaries of self-detected to this day, but for the trickindulgence, who are mostly found in ling about them of human blood. the haunts of 66 "Vanity Fair." That called them forth. So the Drifting away from God they blood of Christ will cause the good fall into the hands of the adversary. seed in the human heart to spring Need a Christian ever slip or stumble? up, and bear beautiful flowers.-Dr. Need he ever walk in the dark, or T. L. Cuyler. lose the roll of his assurance? No, We never know through what divine mysteries of compensation the great Father of the universe may be carrying out His sublime plan; but the words, "God is love," ought to contain to every doubting soul the solution of all things.-Mrs. Mulock. In the moment that I shall waver, strengthen me; restrain me when the malignant thought arises; and while the yet unuttered words are ready not if he lives close to Christ, so I WOULD rather believe all the to issue from my lips, set Thou thy close that the Shepherd's eye is ever fables in the Talmud and the Koran bridle there, and govern my rebel- on him, and the light of Christ's coun- than that this universal frame is lious faculty. tenance illumines his path, and the without a mind.-Francis Bacon. The Curse of the Novel. THE Indian Witness says two events of peculiar importance occurred in India in one week recently. One was the arrival of a member of Parliament who had come from England to labor for the deliverance of India from the curse of rum. The sionate interest. The story is read, have a solid and connected treasury, and still another, and the craze for which will furnish food for thought The grinding out of novels goes the new and the unread remains as and become the foundation for other steadily on. The amount of time unsatisfied as before. Who is the and larger courses of reading. Let and labor occupied in writing novels, better for reading "Middlemarch," the new novel go by. It will soon in printing them, and last of all, in its grave padding of Jewish lore, or die. Have the pluck to say, when reading them, is simply enormous. a single one of Anthony Trollope's one pertly asks, "Have you read Their character changes with the score of thin stories? Does one Rider Haggard's 'She' and 'King temper and the conditions of the know any more after reading these Solomon's Mines,'" and and similiar time which produces them. The books? Is his nature purer? Is the dross, "No, and I don't intend to read most useful which our century has world any better field for him to them. I am in search of better produced are the historical romances think and work in? Does he love books."-Rev. J. M. Buckley, D. D. of Walter Scott. Perhaps the next his fellows more fervently for are those of Thackeray. The many reading these fictions of match-maktales of Dickens have won a large ing, social disguises and scheming place in the affections or two gener- searchers for hearts and gold? ations, but their terrible prolixity The thirst for reading can be well makes the reading of them a sad loss satisfied by better books than the of time, however eager one may be current novel. History may seem to learn the secrets of the darkest dry at first to one who has been stratum of London life. In the wandering into fiction; but by a other was the advent of sixty cases latest novels there is no improvement little mastery of one's self, and by of Scotch whisky consigned to his but the reverse. "Robert Elsmere," selecting authors who have added excellency, the new viceroy, who which is just now in many hands, the imaginative element to historic was on his way to rule over the and acquires a certain importance description, the study of history can country. The government contends because of the kinship of the author- soon become as fascinating as any against the greatest curse under the ess with the Arnold family, is one of work of fiction. To a sound taste sun with one hand, and strengthens the most unwholesome books of the no work can be of more transcendant its grip on the country with the last twenty-five years; for it is the interest than Macaulay's "History other. Governments will not deal dark story of a minister of the Gos- of England," or Motley's magnificent with rum as it deserves until they pel losing his faith, making sad his Histories, or Parkman's "Episodes are forced to do so by the growing devout and evangelical wife, and in American Colonial History." intelligence and conscience of the dying in Algiers, leaving nothing but Biography to a well cultivated people. the seeds of a free-thinking brother- mind has all the charm of romance hood in London. Black's "Princess without its emptiness and wild exIn all our doubts we shall have a of Thule," which appeared some citement. Stanley's "Life of Thomas resolution from heaven, or some of years ago, was a good picture of Arnold" is worth a dozen of "Tom its ministers, if we have recourse Hebridean life; but all his later Brown at Oxford," and all the sea thither for a guide, and be not hasty works seem to be chips fallen during stories of Clark Russel and the in our discourses, or inconsiderate in his more serious hewing. The fact fictions of Florence Marryatt and our purposes, or rash in judgment.— is, the present typical novel is poor Mrs. Oliphant. Trevelyan's "Life Jeremy Taylor. stuff, to say the most of it. of Macaulay," and the "Life and Letters of Carlyle," by Froude and other editors are of permanent value and of richest interest. THREE things to delight in: Frankness, freedom and beauty. Three things to wish for: Health, friends, and a cheerful spirit. Three things to avoid: Idleness, loquacity, and flippant jesting. We claim, therefore, that the vast amount of time occupied in reading novels is wasted. The return which comes to the reader is a certain exTo cure one's self of devotion to citement of the sympathies, a wear the novel, there are needed no little upon the affections, and now and effort of the will and a wise planning then a dark disappointment. But of courses in serious reading. Mark the novel reader pushes out of one out a historical group for consecutive fiction into another. Nothing satis- study. Consult a wise literary friend The intoxication is akin to and see where it can be amended. gambling, horse-racing, or any other Throw in biography and traveler's vice. The new creation of a favorite side lights, and follow up the plan Thy children may be fruitful unto teller of stories is awaited with pas- thoroughly. In due time one will God. fies. GRANT me more confidence in Thy love, O Father, and enable me to realize that with Thy blessing, the work of the feeblest and weakest of What Converted Him. Admiral Farragut, one of the naval heroes in the late war, tells this story of his boyhood. It would be well for all boys to learn, before the habit becomes fixed, that there is nothing manly in imitating the vices of older people. one fact? Only one. Ten years Three thousand six hunfifty facts are not a small Every day a little self-denial. The thing that is difficult to do today will be an easy thing to do three hundred and sixty days hence, if each day it shall have been repeated. What power of self-mastery shall he enjoy who, looking to God for grace, seeks every day to practice the grace he prays for? When I was ten vears old I was with my father on board a man-ofwar. I had some qualities that, I thought, made a man of me. I could swear like an old salt, could drink as stiff a glass of grog as if I We live for the good of others, if Every day a little helpfulness. had doubled Cape Horn, and could our living be in any sense a true living. It is not in great deeds of great at cards, and fond of gaming kindness only that the blessing is in every shape. dinner one day my father turned everybody out of the cabin, locked smoke like a locomotive. I was WISE AND OTHERWISE. Dicky's Bath. BY G. PELTON, IN THE PANSY. And then a little dash! And then, O how he sings! AS TO BREATHING.-A boy 14 years old, recently imported from Kentucky, handed the following in as a composition on "Breathing." The instruction was, "Tell all you can about breathing." He said: "Breath is made of air. We breathe with our lungs, our lights, our liver and At the close of found. In "little deeds of kindness," kidneys. If it wasn't for our breath we would die when we slept. Our breath keeps the life a-going through the nose when we are asleep. Boys they get out doors. Boys in a room that stay in a room all day should not breathe. They should wait till make bad unwholesome air. They make carbonicide Carbonicide is poisoner than mad dogs. A heap of soldiers was in a black hole in India, and a carbonicide got in that there hole, and killed nearly every one afore morning. Girls kills the breath with corosits that squeeze the diaGirls can't holler or run like the door, and said to me, "David, what do you mean to be?" "I mean to follow the sea." "Follow the sea! Yes, to be a poor, miserable, drunken sailor before the mast; be kicked and cuffed about the world, and die in some fever hospital in a foreign land. No, David; no boy ever trod the quarter-deck with such principles as repeated every day, we find true Our Church Home. The Religious Newspaper. 2. The religious newspaper in the gram. you have and such habits as you home aids in solving the Sabbath boys because their diagram is exhibit. You'll have to change your whole course of life if you ever be come a man." problem. If I a girl I had ruther be a boy, so I can run 3. The religious denominational and holler, and run and have a great newspaper attaches the people more closely to their own church. Scriptures. doctrines of My father left me and went on big diagram.-Washington Star. deck. I was stunned by the rebuke, Dr. J., late of the "Granite City," and overwhelmed with mortification. 4. The religious newspaper was a man of pawky humor, and one "A poor, miserable drunken sailor strengthens the the people in the of the most inveterate "beggars" for before the mast. Be kicked and fundamental the charitable purposes who ever got up a subscription list. He called one cuffed about the world, and die in 5. The religious newspaper makes Aberdeen whom he had successfully morning on a wealthy merchant in some fever hospital. That is to be the pastor's work more effective by canvassed on more than one occasion, my fate," thought I. "I'll change increasing the intelligence of his and having recounted the misformy life, and change it at once. I'll never utter another oath; I will hearers, by making them acquainted tunes of a widow whose husband had never drink another drop of intoxi- with the philanthropic and mission- been killed by a fall from the cliff, cating liquor; I will never gamble." ary enterprises of the day, and by "Well, doctor," said the merchant, I have kept these three vows ever giving them information respecting "I'll give you the sum you ask for on since. Shortly after I had made churches near and far.-The Watch- one condition, namely, that you althem I became a Christian. That low me to inscribe on your tombstone the words, 'And it came to pass that the beggar died."" "Willingly," replied the doctor, with a laugh, "but you must add the rest of act was the turning point in my destiny.-Exchange. man. It may be said that the hardest thing in the world is to do just right Every Day a Little. one's self; and the easiest thing in Every day a little knowledge. the world is to see where others fall One fact in a day. How small is short of doing just right.-S.S. Times. asked for a check on her behalf. the verse: 'and was carried by an- GENERAL MENTION. The Art of Reading and BY THE REV. J. P. SANDLANDS, M. A., IN WORD-GROUPING. We by the principle of word-grouping It rationale is very clear. We have only to name, describe, the application of these principles. This has been, let us hope, carefully The object of the present paper done with this principle of wordwill be to learn how to apply the grouping. We ought now to leave principle. In another paper, devoted it to operate of itself. It is, howto this same subject, we shall explain ever, not always easy to make things some of its advantages. clear by writing, so it may not be The first thing to do is to dispense inadvisable to illustrate the way in with the stops. "Fling away ambi- which the principle may be emtion," was Wolsey's advice to Crom- ployed. I will, therefore, apply it well. My advice is, "Fling away practically to the exhortation in the the stops." Here, I know, I shall Prayer-book: The principle of word-grouping is very important. It is, perhaps, in some respects, the most important of all our principles. My readers may here possibly interpose that a similar observation has been made respecting other principles. This is true. Every principle-and we are deal- occasion more than surprise. I can "Dearly-beloved brethren-the ing with principles-is in its way all imagine that some of my readers Scripture moveth us-in sundry important. It is of course difficult, will almost stand aghast at this places-to acknowledge-and conwhen we compare these things one piece of advice. Yet, with a per- fess-our manifold sins-and wickedwith another, to say which should fect knowledge of what I am saying, ness-and that we-should not disreceive most attention. In treating I give it calmly and dispassionately; semble-nor clothe them-before them singly and apart the import- but I must explain a little. the face-of Almighty God-our ance of the one under consideration Stops have served their purpose heavenly Father-but confess them comes more prominently into view. very well. When we were children with an humble-lowly-penitent This explains how it comes about we were duly taught their respect--and obedient heart-to the end— that, for the time being at least, we ive uses: "Count one when you that we may obtain-forgivenessseem to exaggerate the importance come to a comma, two when you of the same-by His infinite goodof the one in hand. The proper come to a semicolon," etc., etc.; and ness-and mercy- And-although thing to say is that, when we think all this we have been very careful we ought-at all times-humbly of the whole and dispassionately to do. Now we are no longer chil- to acknowledge our sins-before weigh the relative value of each, dren, but men, and must put away God-yet ought we-most chieflyit is difficult to say which plays childish things. We must use stops so to do-when we assemble-and the most important part. The only for the purpose for which they meet together-to render thanksbetter plan is to give to each, in its were designed. Stops are the wri- for the great benefits-that we have turn, all the attention possible, We ter's tools; they are not the reader's. received-at His hands-to set forth must be good in every particular- The writer uses them to make his -His most worthy praise-to hear make all-round men—and avoid cre- meaning clear, to convey his sense-His most holy word-and to ask ating abortions. accurately. Stops are grammatical those things-which are requisite We may safely say of word-group- points. To regard them in any and necessary-as well for the ing that too much cannot easily be other light is to misuse them. The body-as the soul- Wherefore-I made of it. The effect of its appli- reader's object is to convey the pray-and beseech you-as many as cation is always and at once percep- meaning which he has clearly appre--are here present-to accompany tible. It revolutionizes, as at a hended. His mode or method of me—with a pure heart—and humble stroke, the character of the reading; conveying that meaning is, as is voice-unto the throne--of the and all this not for the worse, but obvious, very different from the for the better. writer's. He uses stops to apprehend, not to convey, the meaning of what is written. It is the province of the principle of word-grouping to aid the speaker in making clear to others what is clear in his own mind. The process is by no means complicated; it is simple. It involves, it is true, a little labor. By the stops he ascertains the sense of a writer; It has been already explained that the principle of word-grouping lies in the fact that the reader should know, and know distinctly and accurately, which words cover which ideas. This is only possible under proper conditions. These conditions the principle of word-grouping supplies. heavenly grace-saying after me." An examination of the way in which we have applied the principle in this particular case will serve to illustrate what has been said above; the application of it is, to a very great extent, arbitrary. Another reader, seeing it differently, would not group off the words exactly in the same way. It will also further appear that the result, notwithstand ing, will not be in any case very leaves are of parchment, and on dwelleth righteousness," he was fordifferent. The effect will always be every page are written two columns ever at peace. Beautiful, grandly better if we recognize the principle of sacred truth. At the head of beautiful, as was this magnificent and apply it. I hope this is obvious. every page, as well as the beginning transcription, it was not all that was The reader should at first, in prac- of every chapter, the initial is beau- needed to secure the divine acceptticing, keep the groups a good dis- fully expressed by a large letter in ance. An easier path is opened to tance the farther the better-apart. colored inks, and within its compass us, the whisperings of infinite love He will then bring them gradually is portrayed some figure or charac- come falling upon our hearts. "I closer and closer together, till the ter illustrative of the chapter which am the way, the truth, and the life." break be perceptible only in his own follows. Not a stain or erasure is The narrow way is open, the pearly mind. "Ares est celare artem." He seen upon a single page; amid the gates of heaven are ajar, and we who must never allow the audience to long record of Bible truth the words will may enter in, assured of the perceive that the principle is at of Jehovah and the teachings of joys and rewards which are promised work. Jesus seem more strikingly grand hereafter to the chosen people of and beautiful from the purity of the God.-Illustrated Christian Weekly. page, the beauty of their transcription. If I may, in concluding this short article, I would strongly counsel all public readers, and others, too, to proceed at once to make use of this principle. No reader should ever read a single passage in public without actually applying it after the manner indicated above. It means, I SHALL never forget the lesson Five years were exhausted in this taught by the story of the old man who was planting trees, and who toilsome work, and the result was a production unequaled in the handi- was asked by a young man, "What craft of art, and unexcelled in all is the use of you spending your the works of literature. The book strength in planting trees; you will has its own keeping; within a glass never live to see them grow up?" receptacle its pages lie open for "Ah! true," replied the old man, "but when I was young there were inspection, and when one more curious than another ventures to lift those that planted trees, and I am the lid of the case, it is only to find sitting under their shadow and as is obvious, a great deal of labor, and this for a long time. It does not mean labor forever. When the principle is well-fixed in the mind, it will operate of itself. It means labor, but not labor that will go that every page is spotless and every eating their fruit, and I am doing without its reward. None of us, we make all the difference. letter perfect. the same, that those who come presume, like to discharge our duties A beautiful legend is connected after me may sit under the shadow of these trees, eat their fruit, and inefficiently. Most of us, on the with this book; that long years ago, contrary, desire to do good work. in the fifteenth century, one who bless the hand that planted them." Here, then, we have a principle had immured himself in monastic In this temperance movement we which, if well applied, will help to life for certain great sins which he are working so that the men who thought himself to have committed, come after us may live under other sought by prayers and this system conditions than we are doing. We of penance to propitiate the divine hope that, by the blessing of God, we are doing something for the future. There is to be a future Five years of patient, unremitting Scotland, a future England, a future toil were given to the task. Day dawn and night darkness found him world, and we want to do something ever and devotedly at his work, un- life purer and happier for those who I hope to show, in a future paper, if all be well, the advantages of the application of this principle. This I shall do somewhat in detail. In the meantime let me express a wish that the advice given above may accomplish its fullest aim. favor. that shall make the conditions of come after us, and we believe that til at last the final page was written, The Romance of a Rare Book. the last word inscribed. He lifted the page and kissed it, and, closing nothing that we do now can fail of In the Congressional library at the leaves, turn from his labors for doing some good. We believe that He who guides the stars in their Washington there is one book which, rest. The day was passing into courses, and who does not suffer a amid the myriad tomes of bibliothe- darkness when he lay down to sleep. celebrated gathering, commands and weary and heavy laden; his spirit cal lore that adorn the walls of the It was the peaceful repose of the receives the attention and admira- was exhaled, and the morning tion of those who pass through its brought no awakening. The silver spacious aisles. It is a Bible. To cord was loosed, the golden bowl describe it literally, it is of size was broken, and in the golden streets about fifteen by twelve inches; its of that new and better life "wherein labor in vain or spend our strength sparrow to fall to the ground withfor naught.-Dr. Dawson Burns. out His notice, will not suffer us to The British government has established a protectorate over the Cook Islands in the Pacific ocean. |