note in the very outset which continued to vibrate through all his after history. It may be, there are some whose lives have disappointed them-in spring a young fruit-tree full of blossom, in autumn barren and lone amid abundant fruitage. The reason may lie in some call away back in life unobeyed. This is the worm at the root of the gourd, the little rot within the timber, the false step which deflected the lifecourse from the King's highway into a blind alley. It is never too late, let us hasten back to fulfil. Faith enabled him to be obedient (Heb. xi. 8). His obedience finally very complete: "Into the land of Canaan they came," not even fair Damascus stayed them. One man hears the voice of God and follows-straightway the current of history changes. For hundreds of years a roll of names like headstones in a cemetery; yet the moment this man gets hold of God's hand, his life becomes a lesson to the ages. Shall the pen of inspiration only say of you, "And-lived-years, and he died?" Ch. xix. 1. And there came two angels to Sodom. ANGEL WORK IN A BAD TOWN. 1. They went to the place where Lot was. 2. They were content to work for very few. We are in danger of overlooking hand-picked fruit. So far as we can gather, all our Lord's choicest flowers were the result of His personal ministry. He would spend much time and thought to win one solitary woman, her character none too good.—John iv. Christ found work enough in a village to keep Him there thirty years. 3. They told Lot plainly of His danger. 4. They hastened him-the two angels had but four hands, but each hand was full, and each clasped the hand of a procrastinating sinner. Ch. xxii. 1. And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham. GOD'S TEMPTATION.- Why? God tempts (or tries) that you may cling to His word, come what may-that you may cling to the Promiser, whatever form circumstances may take that your faith may grow and abound. He did it also that Abraham might see Christ's day afar off and be glad, that he might get the clue as to the modus operandi of redemption. Had Abraham not been thus tempted, he could not have gained the like fulness of understanding, nor have been brought into the same closeness of relationship to the sympathies and heart of his God. How? By so ordering it as to cause the course of His Providence to run counter for a season to His promise. This feature is very prominent in Gods dealings with Abraham. The land was promised, yet he never possessed a foot. Isaac was the casket of all the promises; yet he had to be given up. Whom? Not the carnal, the graceless, the babes in Christ, but those who can afford to be tempted, those He desires most signally to honour and most abundantly to use. Ch. xxiii. 2. And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan. DEATH OF SARAH.-She had been his partner for seventy or eighty years. She was the only link to the home of his childhood. She alone could sympathise with him when he talked of Terah and Nahor, and of Haran and Ur of the Chaldees. She alone was left of all who thirty years before had shared the hardships of his pilgrimage. As he knelt by her side, what a tide of memories must have rushed over him of their common plans and hopes and fears and joys! This is the first time we read of Abraham weeping. We do not read that he wept when he crossed the Euphrates and left for ever home and kindred. He does not seem to have bedewed his pathway to Mount Moriah with the tears of his heart. ABRAHAM'S CONFESSION.- "A stranger and sojourner." We profess to look for a city, but we take good care to make for ourselves an assured position among the citizens of this world. Abraham would never accept the land as a gift from any but God. Ch. xxiv. 12. I pray Thee, send me good speed this day. Every Christian ought to have a window open towards God at sunrising. When the sunlight of His love pours in, it should touch our lips to a song of praise. If you would walk lightly, therefore, learn to commit your footsteps to the Lord. There are a great many overloads in life. God never built a Christian character for to-day's duties and to-morrow's anxieties. Satan never sends word ahead when he wants to assail you and me; any more than a burglar sends word to you that he will be at your house to-morrow morning for the purpose of relieving you of your silver plate. Every day had its evening. The way in which people spend their evenings generally determines their religious character. McCheyne of Dundee used to seal his letters with this motto, "The night cometh." Do not trouble yourself about dying. Bend your thought upon living; then dying will be simply the winding-up and the going home. Ch. i. 24. And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die: and God will surely visit you. Sixty years had brought great changes. No splendid obsequies were voted for Joseph at public expense. When Jacob died all was bright-when Joseph, all was getting dark. We cannot tell the precise form of these symptoms. Perhaps he had been banished from the councils of Pharaoh; perhaps he was already pining in neglect; perhaps the murmurs of dislike against his people were already rising, as the roar of the breakers against a harbour bar. He addresses his brethren. It is as if he said, "I have done my best for you, but I am dying; nevertheless God will fill my place." "God will surely visit you." It is somewhat remarkable that in his whole noble life, the most fascinating with one exception in the sacred record, these are the only words that are referred to in the subsequent pages of the Scriptures (Heb. xi. 22). Israel settled in Goshen, and their increase in numbers seemed to make this more unlikely, day by day, to natural vision. Though dwelling among granite temples, solid pyramids, firm-based sphinxes, and filling his place at Pharaoh's court, his dying words open a window into his soul, and betrayed how little he had felt that he belonged to the order of things in the midst of which he had been content to live. What a contrast between the opening and closing words of Genesis! "In the beginning God," "A coffin in Egypt." Is this all? Is all God's work to end in one poor mummy case? Turn the leaf. Exodus, Joshua, Kings, Christ. We do our little work and cease, as the coral insects which perish by myriads on the rising reef. But God's work goes on-His temple rises age after age. In musings like these, unwatched, unknown, what happy hours must have passed! We record them, partly because an interleaved Bible is within the reach of all; and this young man's example proves that beside and beyond all that the commentators teach, the studious will find it good to record for themselves the messages which the Living Word has still for each individual soul. G CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON.' PERSONAL REMINISCENCES. REAT as the mass of literature about Mr. Spurgeon already in existence is there is always room for a book like Mr. Williams'. Charles Haddon Spurgeon was a great man, largehearted, many-sided, and in the opinion of many competent judges the prince of modern preachers. Mr. Williams was a near neighbour, Upton Chapel of which he is the pastor being hard by the great Tabernacle. During the closing years of Mr. Spurgeon's life Mr. Williams enjoyed his most intimate friendship. He had been a favourite pupil at the Pastor's College; he shared Mr. Spurgeon's weekly holiday rambles; he was a constant and welcome visitor at Mr. Spurgeon's home; and he not unfrequently shared Mr. Spurgeon's longer vacation journeys. This being so he had unusual facilities for seeing many sides of the versatile personality of his friend, and he has conferred a public benefit by the way in which these are depicted in his pages. Few can have come into personal contact with the great preacher without being both touched and charmed by his transparent honesty, his glowing piety, and his rich and varied fancy. His own verdict of himself given in response to a threat has been amply justified: "You may write my life across the sky; I have nothing to conceal." Strong in faith, ready in wit, shrewd in counsel, tender in sympathy, all these and much more he was. Often exalted, yet he not unfrequently knew what it was to be in the valley. The other evening I was riding home after a heavy day's work; I felt very wearied and sore depressed, when swiftly and suddenly as a lightning flash that text came to me, "My grace is sufficient for thee." I reached home and looked it up in the original, and at last it came to me in this way. "My grace is sufficient for thee," and I said, "I should think it is, Lord," and burst 1 By the Rev. W. Williams of Upton Chapel. Published by the Religious Tract Society. out laughing. I never fully understood what the holy laughter of Abraham was until then. It seemed to make unbelief so absurd. It was as though some little fish, being very thirsty, was troubled about drinking the river dry, and Father Thames said, "Drink away, little fish, my stream is sufficient for thee." Or it seemed like a little mouse in the granaries of Egypt, after the seven years of plenty, fearing it might die of famine. Joseph might say, "Cheer up, little mouse, my granaries are sufficient for thee." Again, I imagined a man away up yonder on a lofty mountain saying to himself, "I breathe so many cubic feet of air every year, I fear I shall exhaust all the oxygen in the atmosphere;" but the earth might say, "Breathe away, O man, and fill thy lungs ever, my atmosphere is sufficient for thee." Oh, brethren, be great believers! Little faith will bring your souls to heaven, but great faith will bring heaven to your souls." 666 "What are you going to preach from to-morrow?" he once asked me. 'The curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked, but He blesseth the habitation of the just. He gave a deep sigh; his countenance changed even before I had finished the verse, brief as it was; and "What he said in tones of deep solemnity, "Ah, me!" is the matter, sir?" "Don't you know," he replied, "that is the text I had on that terrible night of the accident at the Surrey Music Hall?" I did not know it, but I learned from the mere mention of it how permanent was the effect upon his mind of that awful night's disaster. The summer moods were the more frequent, and if at times the more serious persons were somewhat scandalized by the buoyancy of his spirits, and the frequent sallies of wit, his rejoinder was sufficient excuse they would not blame me if they only knew how many I keep back." 66 "What a wooden lot of ministers Upton has had!" he "There was once playfully remarked to Mr. Williams. Mr. Cole, and Bigwood, and Branch, and Barker; but they were all good men and true." He said of Mr. Moody that he was the only man who could say the word Mesopotamia in two syllables. He told one man his conscience must be a new one, for he never seemed to use it. He once introduced a man of rather short stature, who made up for any lack of height by the rotundity of his frame, to the meeting at which he was to speak, as "this terrestrial ball," greatly to did not see him play many games in later years. For I observed the other day a marine store notice, "Fifty During the baptismal regeneration controversy he once Nightingale dane Bear. Bear Feb 5. Рев Bear. Joves have hearcht the amusement of the gentleman himself as well as the people. Dr. Wayland, from America, came to see Mr. Spurgeon one Saturday. The Doctor was thus greeted: "Hullo! Dr. Wayland, glad to see you. Are you the author of Wayland's Moral Science?" "No," replied the Doctor, “the author of Wayland's Moral Science was the author of me." The two men bubbled over with fun, and soon found each other's company specially congenial. Years ago I now and again played a game of bowls with him. I remember him saying, "This is the game the old Puritans liked. It was from it they got the term 'bias of the will,' and a bias it has, and no mistake." I . It was Mr. Spurgeon's habit to make the Wednesday, if possible, a day of relaxation. His favourite method of spending it was in a quiet drive through the lovely Surrey lanes, or in an occasional ramble along the banks of the Mole, on the Wandle, a climb to the top of Hindhead or Leith Hill, or a visit to places like Beddington Church and Worton House. He knew the country thoroughly; trees were to him old familiar friends, rural ways delighted him, and not a few of his noblest sermons were suggested by the incidents of these weekly rambles. One of his most highly favoured haunts was Okewood Church, two miles from the village of Ockley. On June 4th, 1876, he preached one of his greatest sermons, based upon the text Mark i. 45: They came to Him from every quarter." In the sermon itself Mr. Spurgeon thus describes how it came into his mind : "Seeking rest and health last week, I scated myself for a little while near a very rustic church which stands embowered in a wood, and as I sat there I moralised upon the various paths which led up to the church porch. Each pathway through the grass came from a different quarter, but they all led to one point. As I stood there, this reflection crossed me: even thus men come to Christ from all quarters of the compass, but, if indeed saved, they all come to Him. There is a path yonder which rises from a little valley. The little church stands on the hillside, there is a brook at the bottom, and worshippers who come from the public road must cross the rustic bridge and then ascend the hill. Such comers rise at every step they take. Full many burdened ones come to Christ from the deep places of self-abasement; they know their sinfulness, and feel it; their selfconsciousness has almost driven them to despair; they are down very low, and every step they take to Christ is a step upwards. "Through the church-yard there was another path, and it ran up-hill from where I stood, and therefore every one who came that way descended to the church 1 ... door. These may represent those who think much of themselves. . . . Every step these good people take towards Christ is downward: they think less of themselves, and sill less. . . . The two paths I have mentioned were supplemented by a third, which led through a thick and tangled wood; a narrow way wound between the oak trees and the dense underwood, and I noticed that it led over a boggy place, through which stepping-stones had been carefully placed for the traveller, that he might not sink in the mire. Many a seeker has found his way to Jesus by a similar path." Mr. Williams being a near neighbour of the Pastor's College and himself an old student very often went to hear Mr. Spurgeon give his Friday afternoon talk to the men. Here he was often at his very best. He loved the work, he loved the men, he was absolutely at his ease, and of his brightest, keenest and choicest sayings, Mr. Williams has garnered a great store. The talks naturally for the most part bore upon preaching, pastoral work and ministerial preparation. One is tempted to say as the echoes of the talks are caught, “ Happy the men who were able, to sit at the feet of such a master!" These talks came at the end of a week of hard work, and Mr. Spurgeon often deliberately set himself to make them as racy and inspiring as possible. Here are a few examples. Here is a riddle for you. If Paul was the least of all saints, what are you? Young ministers are generally despised by those who wish they were young themselves. "Why did the eunuch go on his way rejoicing?" asked the teacher. "Because Philip had done a-preaching, sir," said the Loy. Every sermon should be the man in flower. I regard modern thought as a totally new cult, having no more relation to the Gospel than the mists of the morning to the everlasting hills. Don't preach too long. I should say, if you are earnest and interesting, that, whatever you are preaching about, you should preach about forty minutes. Some sermons remind me of the sailor who was told to pull a rope on board; he pulled, and pulled, until he was tired, and then declared that he believed "the end of this 'ere rope is cut off." Make Christ the diamond setting of every sermon. Take out of your sermons all that will divert fresh supplies is ever proceeding. Only a few days ago one order alone was received for one hundred thousand copies. In addition to this a fresh sermon is issued each week, the demand for which is as great and keen as ever. This success was due in the first instance to the way in which the Spirit of Christ ruled in his heart and in his mind. It was due further to the way in which he was able to put into every sermon the whole weight of his past experiences and the rich treasures of his life's reading. Marvellous stories are told of the way in which he delivered magnificent pulpit discourses with apparently little or no direct preparation. The explanation, of course, is that his whole life was a constant training for his highest and noblest work-the proclamation of the good tidings of salvation. Here is a striking illustration of this view of his work and with it we must reluctantly bring this to a close: paper I heard him one Thursday evening on the text, "Before Him shall be gathered all nations; and He shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divided his sheep from the goats." The sermon is printed in Vol. xxi. Let the reader turn to it, and read the marvellous description of the gathering of the nations to the Judgment Seat. I give a few sentences to excite his interest. "The dead of Egypt shall rise from their beds of spices, or from the earth with which their dust had mingled. The tens of thousands shall be there over whom Xerxes wept when he remembered how soon they would pass away. The Greek and the Persian they shall rise, and the Romans too, and all the hordes of Huns and Goths that swarmed like bees from the Northern hives. They all passed into the unknown land; but they are not lost, they shall each answer to the muster roll in the great day of the Lord." One might almost fancy each sentence had been written out, and the whole sermon learned by heart, so beautifully are its sentences balanced, and so strong is the sermon as a whole. Yet I was told that he had been driven up with other work, and had but a few minutes in which to prepare this sermon, I have the original outline. It is written (see p. 49) on a small envelope. HOMESPUN HOMILIES. ON BEING GOOD. N EEDFUL things are all simple things. After months of complicated social existence in some town, labouring to provide (that we and others may afterwards enjoy) the thousand and one requirements of our ultra-civilisation, it is refreshing to escape to the clear air, and solitude, the small bare rooms, the plain food, the elementary pleasures of country or sea-side life. So in our mental environment. From the yearly growing clamour of books and teachers, each dealing with some phase of thought, or subtle subdivision of a question; stating, that they may demolish, difficulties that had not before occurred to their troubled audience; what rest it is for the wearied soul to escape, if it may, to that simple teaching and primitive religion, which we all associate with early life. And just as physicians may and do wisely prescribe for overstrung nerves and overworked brains, a return to the early hours and simple food of nursery days, in the hope of regaining tranquillity of mind and unconscious health, may we not reasonably hope to heal the throbbing fever of modern thought by submitting to become as little children, in our relation to our Father? Happy those early days, as Vaughan wrote in The Retreate: "Before I taught my tongue to wound My Conscience with a sinful sound, * Or taught my soul to fancy aught All the duty of the child is comprised (and is by him fully understood) in the command to be good. Even the youngest capable of speech, knows instinctively when he has been "good" or "naughty," recognises the impulses to either, and feels at peace or troubled according as he has been good or not. The words are so elementary and simple they neither require, nor are capable of, explanation. I offer this simple rule of conduct to the perplexed, as one might offer a drink of spring water to the invalid who seeks some tonic more powerful than the last. Try this. Cease trying to account for the world as we find it, to hold the scales between heredity and environment, to discover analogies to natural law in the spiritual world. Milton's serene angel warns Adam of the fruitlessness of such speculations in the eighth book of "Paradise Lost," in words which it may be wise to quote in full to a generation foo busy over the newest books to find time for Milton. The mind must learn, he said, "That not to know at large of things remote So the very simpleness of trying to be good is restful to the soul. "To be good is all," wrote the world-worn Omar, "the rest avails not." "Thou art good, and doest good; teach me Thy statutes," prayed David. "Let people's tongues and actions be as they will," said Marcus Aurelius, that man so honest with himself, "my business is |