The True Disciple
This concluding paper the author respectfully inscribes to his more thoughtful readers. He has been frequently toW that his essays are above the comprehension of “working pcoj)le;” but that complaint has seldom come from themselves. Among hard-workers there are many hard-thinkers, and there are thousands whose capacity and education are at least equal to anything contained in the foregoing pages. With an eye to that honorable class, the readers and the thinkers among his industrious fellow-citizens, the author has written most of the bygone numbers; and if some of the following paragraphs are not so plain as they ought to be, he would humbly beg for them the benefit of a second perusal — November 27, 1848.
Ever since the world sinned and woke up to misery, there is one absentee whom all have agreed in deploring. Every age has asked tidings of her from the age that went before, and from the one which came after; and even the most indolent have put forth an effort, and have joined their neighbors in searching for this fugitive. Some
^5ta«. LBNOX AND have dived into the billowy main, and sought her in pearly grottoes and coral caves. And some have bored into the solid rock, and rummaged for her in the mountain roots. And some have risen to where the eagles poise, and have scanned in successive horizons the habitable surface; but all have got the same report. “Where is happiness?” — “Not in me,” cries the leafy grove; “nor in me,” booms the sounding tide; “nor in me,” rumbles gaunt and hollow from the dusky mine. And failing to detect her in life’s by-paths and open ways, her votaries have reared decoys or shrines into which she haply might turn aside. But all of them have failed entirely. Theatres, dancing-saloons, gin-palaces, racingbooths — there is no authentic instance that she ever entered one of them. And though some have fancied that they glimpsed her — “yes, yes,” they whisper, “yonder she passed; and in that hall of science, in that temple of knowledge, in that sweet home, you’ll find her;” by the time you reached it, there was a cJeath’s-head at the door, and a “Mene Tekel” on the wall. “Not in me,” sighed vain philosophy; and “not in me,” re-echoed the worldling’s rifled home.
But where is happiness? Man knows that she is not dead but disappeared; and ever since under the forbidden tree he ate the bitter-sweet and startled her away, he has longed to find that other and enlightening fruit which would reveal her to his eyes again. And this is the boon which the world’s teachers have undertaken to supply. They have come from time to time, seers and sages, Thales, Pythagoras, Zoroaster, Epicurus, Con-fu-tze, and to humanity’s wondering gaze they have held up apples, as they said, fresh gathered from the Tree of Life. But after rushing and jostling round them, and getting at great cost a prize, these all proved naught to the hungry buyer. The golden apples were mere makebelieves; hollow rinds, painted shells filled up with trash or trifles. Some ate, and still their soul had appetite; others ate, and were poisoned.
At last, along the path which a hundred prophecies had carved and smoothed, “the desire of all nations” — the Son of God — appeared. And from the paradise above he fetched the long-lost secret. Himself “the truth;” his every sentence freighted with majesty, and fragrant with heaven’s sanctity; it needed not the frequent miracle to compel the exclamation, “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God.” He did not reason; he revealed. His sayings were not the conjectures of keen sagacity, nor even the recollections of an angel visiter; but they were authoritative words — the insight of Omniscience, the oracle of incarnate Deity. And giving freely to all comers “the apples of gold” from his “basket of silver,” the dim and the famished ate, and with open eyes looking up, in himself they recognised the answer to the ancient query. “What is happiness?” — “Come unto me,” is the Saviour’s reply; “come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give yon rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for T am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” — “Where is happiness?” Here, at the feet of Immanuel. And then, and since, thousands have verified the saying. In the words of Jesus they have discovered the boon for which their understandings longed — conclusive and soul-filling knowledge; and in his person and work they have found the good for which their conscience craved — a savins; and sanctifvins; Power.
To the great question, What is happiness? Jesus is the embodied answer — at once the teacher and the lesson. The question had been asked for ages, and some hundred solutions had been proposed. And in the outset of his ministry the Saviour took it up, and gave the final answer. What is happiness? ‘’Happy are the humble. Happy are the contrite. Happy are the meek. Happy are they who hunger after righteousness. Happy are the merciful, the pure in heart, the peace-makers, the men persecuted for righteousness.”* In
* The reader could not do better than go carefully over the Sermon on the Mount. He will find it in the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of Matthew. We have known of repeated instances where persons received their first prepossession for Christianity from that matchless effusion of incarnate goodness. The following passage occurs in Sir James Mackintosh’s Indian Journal: “I have just glanced over Jeremy Taylor on the Beatitudes. The selection is made in the most sublime spirit of virtue. Of their transcendent excellence I can find no words to express my admiration and reverence. ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.’ — ‘Put on, my beloved, a the elect of God, bowels of mercy.’ At last the divine speaker rises to the summit of moral sublimity. ‘Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.’ For a moment, O teacher blessed, I taste the unspeakable delight of feeling myself to be better. I feel, as in the days of my youth, that hunger and thirst after righteousness, which long habits of infirmity, and the low concerns of the world, have contributed to extinguish.” — Life ii., 125. At the moment when he wrote these words, we fear that this fine intellect was skeptical. It was far otherwise at last. His daughter says, telling of his latter hours, “I said to him, ‘Jesus Christ loves you;’ he answered slowly, and, pausing between each word, Jesus Christ — love — the same thing.’ He uttered these last words with a most sweet smile. After a long silence he said, ‘I believe — .’ We said, in a voice of inquiry, ‘in God?’ He answered, ’ in Jesus.’ He spoke but once more after this. U^on our inquiry how he felt, he said he was ’ happy.’”
Other words, he declared that happiness is goodness. A holy nature is a happy one. But was not that a blank and confounding announcement? To tell the wicked people all around him — the fierce, and quarrelsome, and licentious spirits who thronged the mountain side, “Blessed are the merciful, the pure, the peaceful;” was not that to lay a gravestone on their hopes? Was it not saying to his auditors, “Happiness is goodness, and so it never can be yours?” And had the teaching of Jesus ended there, he would have left mankind in gloomy possession of a glorious truth; he would have left it a wiser but a sadder world. But in the minds of such as felt themselves guilty and unholy, that announcement raised two other questions. Will God pardon the past? And if he should, how are we to get those holy dispositions which are so essential to blessedness? And at sundry times, and in divers places, he answered both these questions. “Will God pardon (he past?” — “Yes; for God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” That is, “accept my atonement, and you shall not die for your own sin. Employ me as your Mediator, and eternal life is your own. Believe and be forgiven.” Again. “Supposing sin is pardoned, how are holy dispositions to be created and fostered in this wicked heart of mine?” — “Jesus stood and cried, If any man thirst (for holiness) let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water. This spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.” That is, “Come to me as disciples, and be filled with the Holy Ghost. Believe on me, and find pure water welling through your nature’s bitter soil. Believe, and be filled with holy desires and dispositions.” So that, in its entireness, Christ’s doctrine came to this — “A new and holy nature is blessedness. Believe in me, and your nature will be new and holy, and you yourself be blessed.”
We have said that Cbrist was not only the great Teacber, but ibe great Lesson. Perhaps this will be plainer if we take another grand question. Tbe world asks, Wbat is happiness? But that can only be answered by meeting another inquiry — Wbat is God? Is be just, and good, and true? And bow is be disposed toward sinners of our race? Is be placable? Is he propitious? Or is be stern and vindictive, and determined to destroy us? Or is be altogelber indifferent to our weal or wo? Among tbougbtful men these queries had been often mooted, and doubtless the first disciples of Jesus bad often mused and pondered over them; and at last, when he was about to leave them, one put the question express. Tbe Master bad told them that the time was come, and that he must now return to the Father; and feeling that the opportunity must not be lost, Philip exclaimed,” Lord, show us the
Father, and it siifficeth us.” “That is the very thing for which our hearts are breaking: we know not the living God. Show us the Father, and fill the great gap in our knowledge — the mighty chasm in our comfort.” And Jesus answered,” Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath
SEEN ME, hath SEEN THE FaTHER.”
As much as if he had said, “Our nature is identical; our will is one. All that you need ever know of God is manifest in me. You wonder if God is holy, and just, and true: have you not seen me? You wonder if God is kind, and good, and loving: have I been so long time with you, and yet have you not known me? You wonder if God be gracious and ready to forgive: did I scruple in receiving you?” And so, my dear friends, it is life eternal to know the only true God: and you will know him if you know Jesus, whom he has sent. The Son is the express image of the Father; and if you would have confidence toward God, you must lake the Lord Jesus as your theology. Do not think that the Father is less compassionate, less condescending, less forgiving, than the tSon. Do not think of him as less mindful of you, or less loving. Do not think of him as less willing for your salvation than the Redeemer who died on Calvary; or less ready to hear and answer prayer than that Iniei’cessor in whose name your prayers ascend. He that hath seen the Son hath seen the Father; and if you would escape false terror, and ignorant surmisings, and idolatrous illusions, think of Jesus when you think of God.
In order to be truly happy, you must have some sufficient end in living. And this, again, has moved much controversy. What is the object to which an immortal nature may devote itself most worthily? Which is the highest good? And some have answered, truth. They have consecrated their days and nights to learning, and have lived and labored for the true.
And others have maintained that the very crown of excellence is beauty; and in painting, or verse, or music, they have yearned and struggled toward their fair and ever-soaring ideal. And others averring that GOODNESS is the truest joy — that moral rectitude is the topmost apex and converging goal to which all intelligence should tend and travel — they have resolved to spend and be spent for this, and have lived and died the devotees of virtue. But if you, my friends, understand the gospel, you have found the true philosophy; if you know Christ, you have learned the supreme FELICITY. In the Alpha and Omega — in the all-inclusive Excellence — in Immanuel, you possess at once the good, the true, the beautiful: the good, for he is the Holy One of God; — the true, for he is the Amen — the truth-speaking and truth-im bodying I Am; — the beautiful, for — himself the perfection of beauty — to one vision of his infinite mind his Omnipotence said, “Let it be,” and in this fair universe you behold the result. Yes, it is a blessed thing to have a life rightly directed and worthily bestowed; not to live for a phantom, but for something real; not to live for something insufficient or subordinate, but for a high and glorious end; not to live for something alien or irrelevant, but for an object which claims and can requite your service. Live to Christ, and then you live to highest purpose. Live to Christ, and then you live to him who loved you, and gave himself for you. Live to Christ, and then you have a patron, beneath whose smile you may dive into the deepest truth, and soar into the highest beauty. Live to Christ, and then you have an Almighty Friend, into whose arms you may consign your worldly calling and your dearest friends; and, after he has “put his hands upon them and blessed them,” may receive them back, no longer stolen joys, but hallowed loans, and mercies bright with a Redeemer’s benison. Live to Christ, and then your soul is joined to that fountain of unfailing strength, which gives at once the zest and power of goodness. If you would servo your family, your country, your friends, live to Jesus Christ. If you would have your existence raised to its highest level, and your faculties drawn forth to their fullest exercise, with you let it “to live” be “Christ.” And if you would begin betimes that devout and benignant life which Heaven prolongs and perfects, learn from Jesus how to live.
For it is in the living Saviour that we must learn the great life-lesson. Jesus was divine, but he was also human. He dwelt among us not only to show us what God is, but what we should be. He left to his people an example that they should follow his steps; and the best idea of a Christian is “one in whom the life of Jesus is once .more manifest.” We greatly needed such a pattern. We did not want so much one who should give us new rules and directions how to live, as one who should himself be a noble specimen. And Jesus was that specimen. In books, and especially in the inspired writings, holy character had been minutely described, and the rule of conduct had been carefully laid down. But what others taught, Jesus did and Jesus was. Before his appearing, too, there had been some splendid instances of isolated excellence — virtues blazing, by ones and twos, from dark and defective natures; but reabsorbing into his illustrious excellence all these scattered beams, the character of .Jesus exhibited no defect nor dimness. Without a spot he shone, the Sun of Righteousness — without eclipse or obscuration, “the Light of the world” — a livino- Decaloffue, where each command was inscribed in letters of brightness on tablets of love.
Behold him — how devout. There was one thing which made the Man of sorrows still the Man of joys. He could not lose the sense of the Father’s love. There spread constantly round him that melodious baptism which first issued from the excellent glory, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” In the strength of this assurance, he journeyed day by day, and found it meat and drink to do his Father’s will. And when the toilsome day was done, and he pensively eyed the fox leavino; his lair and the bird wendino: home to her eyry, though his worn body knew no couch, his happy spirit sought its home in the bosom of its God. The Father loved him, and that love was the rod and staff of pilgrim Messiah. It led him in the paths of righteousness, and comforted him in the valley of death-shadow; and as soon as in his darkest night he waved its transforming wand, Gethsemane lit up green pasture, and Kedron spread out still water.
And so, dear reader, do you enter into the Saviour’s joy. In becoming his disciple, he says, “My peace I give unto you.” That same peace which was his constant portion here below, he bought for sinners with his blood. And nothing can you do to the Redeemer more joyful, and to the Fallier more glorifying, and to your own soul more hallowing, that when in the surety’s name you claim the peace of God. Love Jesus, and the Father himself will love you; and instead of skulking through life a culprit or a convict, “accepted in the Beloved,” you may lift up the eye of a dear and trustful child. If you would have your affections fixed to God, the cord of his own love must fasten them. If you would be strong for work or trial, the joy of the Lord must be your strength. If you would possess a deep and genuine holiness, the very God of peace must be your sanctifier. And if, when times are dark — when the world looks gloomy, or shadows from the sepulchre are creeping round you — if you would still have brightness on your onward path, learn to look up to God in Christ as your own God for ever and for ever.
And see him — so pure of purpose. Placed before you is a casket of gold, and you are asked to guess what it contains; and looking at its exquisite tracery and costly material, you think of a blazing diamond or a monarch’s signet-ring. Guess? You can not guess. They open it, and reveal a spider, a scorpion, or a spinningworm! And surveying a human soul, you view the finest casket in this world. Made on a heavenly pattern, with powers so capacious, and feelings so susceptible, in order to be worthily occupied, it would need to be filled with some lofty purpose, some pure and noble motive. My reader, you have got that casket. What have you put in it? What is the thing which chiefly occupies your thoughts? Your great pursuit and pleasure? What impels you to exertion? Is it money? Is it popularity and praise? Is it dress? Is it dainty food? Is it some fierce and evil passion? Is it envy? Is it resentment? Is it selfishness? Is it the wish to achieve your own personal ease and comfort? Is it something so paltry that you are ashamed to call it the business of life? — somelliing so baleful that it degrades and destroys the heart which hides it? Viewed in his world-ward aspect, the Saviour’s one motive was philanthropy. His life-long business was to do good to the bodies and the souls of those around him. To pluck brands from the burning, to instruct the ignorant, to reclaim the vicious, to restore the fallen, to convert the soul, to lighten the burden of wo, to heal disease, to banish misery, to bind up the broken heart — this was his daily calling, this was his continuous pursuit. *’ I must do cures to-day and to-morrow, and the third day I shall be glorified.’* Nicodemus did not come so late but that he was glad to see him, and the Samaritan woman did not find him so exhausted, but the hope of saving her soul made him forgetful of fatigue. And so pure was this passion, so irrespective of accidental circumstances, or of the present attractiveness of its objects, that the leper and the lunatic, the blind beggar and the howling demoniac, Malchus in the act of arresting him, and the very men who slew him, all came in for an ungrudging share. His last prayer was intercession; his last business was beneficence. “Father, forgive them;” — “Woman, behold thy son; Disciple, behold thy mother;” and having prayed for his murderers and provided for Mary a home, from the contiguous cross he bore with him to Paradise, as love’s last trophy, the spirit of the ransomed thief. Reader, let the mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus. Seek to have your bosom filled with pure kindness and holy compassion — a compassion various as is human sorrow — a kindness which shall still be flowing while life itself is ebbing. Cease to be selfish. Learn the blessedness of doing good. Even you can contribute to that great work — the making of a bad world better. Is there no acquaintance over whom you have influence? None whom you might reclaim from a bad habit? None whom you might induce to read some useful book, or attend the house of God? Are there no poor children whom you might collect on a sabbath afternoon, and teach them a Bible lesson? Is there no sick neighbor to whom you might carry a little comfort — something nice to tempt his listless palate? No invalid friend whom you might cheer with an hour of your company, or to whom you might read or say something for the good of his soul ‘? At all events, you can be doing good at home. You can minister to the wants of some aged parent. You can sooth the grief of some bereaved relation. You can lend a helping hand, and lighten their labors who have got too much to do. With a firm but fatherly control, you can guide your children in wisdom’s ways. And you can diffuse throughout your dwelling that
sweetest music — cheerful and approving words; that brightest light — the clear shining of a cordial countenance. And when God in his Providence sends favorable opportunities, with self-denied and prayerful affection, you may be the means of stamping on some immortal mind a truth or lesson as enduring as that mind itself.
Then, too, observe bow simple and bow genuine was his character! how free from extremeness or reserve! “The vSon of man came eating and drinking.” He wore the common dress of the country. He spoke the common language. So far as they were innocent, he fell in with all the common usages of the people around him. And some were annoyed at this. They wished that be would make himself singular. They would have liked him to keep more aloof. Like his predecessor, John the Baptist, they would have preferred that he bad dwelt in the desert, and fasted, and worn a hairy mantle or some peculiar garb. They could have wished to see him issue on the world from some dim cloister, and in stately speech give forth his mystic oracle, and once more vanish from the view. But they fancied that they knew all about him — his birthplace, his parentage, his habits; and so long as he lived this open and explicit life they could not surround him with an odor of sanctity. They were too gross to perceive how much of Heaven he carried into Cana’s feast, and with what a god-like purpose he went to be the guest of Matthew or Zaccheus. They forgot how much nobler is the piety which hallows common life, than the demureness which flies away from it. And they did not know that he was doing all this on purpose. He meant his example to be a pattern to common people, and therefore he frequented the ordinary resorts, and lived the familiar life of men. But though he might now be seen in the market-place or under the temple-piazza, surrounded with people from the shops and stalls; and though you might this afternoon meet him amidst lawyers and courtiers, in the house of Simon the Pharisee; and though you might overtake him next morning seated under a wayside tree, and discoursing freely to his peasant-followers; and though on all these occasions there was no assumption, no reserve, no artifice, there was, at the same time, no weakness, no sanction to vice or folly. There was all the refinement of a most delicate benevolence, and all the majesty of a nature separate from sin. His every movement was innocence; his every utterance was purity. His character was like the sunbeam, visiting without degradation the poorest hovel, and contracting no stain from the evils which it failed to extinguish.
Reader, you are living in that world in which the Lord Jesus chose for a season to reside. If your piety be sound and strong enough, common life will not make you carnal. Have grace in your heart. Live under the eye of God. Live in the name of Jesus. Take your Master for your model. Pray and labor to be in the world as its sinless Visiter was. And if God should give you the spirit of true discipleship, there will be a beautiful completeness in your character. You will not need to study your appearance, nor to be nervous about people’s opinions; for by its self-
sustaining sincerity, your conduct will sooner or later achieve its own vindication, and in her child shall Wisdom be justified. In your common talk there will be no scurrility nor scandal; nothing false, nothing unseemly, nothing base nor vile. In your ordinary acting, there will be no crooks nor crotchets; nothing shabby or unfair; nothing cruel or oppressive; nothing for which conscience can not render a good reason. But those who knelt with you at family prayer will recognise the same man when they meet you in the mart or the work-room; and those who last saw you in the festive circle will not be startled when they find themselves beside you at the communion-table.
If this sketch be plain enough, you will perceive that it is to three things that the mission of Jesus Christ owes its main importance: —
He is the manifestation of God.
He is the Mediator between God and
man.
And he is the model to his redeemed and regenerate people.
He is God manifest. No man hath seen the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son hath revealed him. He that hath seen Jesus hath seen the Father. He is the express image of the Father; and as embodying all the perfections and dispositions of the invisible Godhead, Jesus is to our race the one theology.
He is also Mediator. His cross is the meeting-place betwixt God and the sinner. His blood is the sacrifice which makes it a righteous thing in God to cancel guilt, and receive the returning transgressor. His gospel is the white flag, the truce-proclaiming banner, which announces Jehovah’s amnesty, and says to every rebel, Be reconciled to a reconciling God. His merit is the censer which perfumes the sinner’s prayer, and makes it prevalent with a holy God. His intercession is that secret influence within the veil, which secures for his Church and its believing members the gift of the Holy Ghost. His love is the balm of life; his presence the antidote of death; his glory, seen and shared, the joy of heaven. So that, as the source and consummation of all our greatest blessings, Jesus is the Supreme Felicity.
And he is the pattern of his believing people. All that was human in his earthly walk is for our example, that we should follow his steps. And with such a transforming agent promised as is the Holy Ghost, and with such a pattern propounded as the perfect Saviour, there is no limit to the excellence, inward and outward, after which the followers of Jesus should aspire. To be “like him” is the privilege of a perfect world; — but how gloriously near to that likeness even now his loving people may attain, the Bible nowhere limits. But the believer, whose character is strong without hardness, and gentle without weakness — who is consumed with the zeal of God, and who still glows with good will to man — who is spiritual but not sanctimonious, diligent and withal devout, vigorous in action and patient in endurance, — that consistent disciple bears the visible lineaments of the Elder Brother. And as supplying our world with the first and onlyinstance of excellence fully developed and perfectly proportioned — goodness in its entireness, and each grace in its intensity — the life of Jesus is the great text-book of ethics — the grand lesson in practical piety.
You also perceive that Christianity, or the knowledge of Christ, is “the most excellent of all the sciences.” Some knowledge is entertaining, and some is useful; but this knowledge is essential. Without it you can not gain peace of conscience, nor that refinement and elevation of character which itself is happiness; and without it you can not secure a blissful immortality. And of all the sciences which treat the great question of human happiness, this alone is solid; for this alone is constructed from facts and confirmed by experience. Some theories are popular from age to age, but they are human compilations, and, like snow-statues reared in spring, the influence is already working which will melt them again. And other theories gleam before the fancy passing fair, and as they can not be caught, they can neither be confuted nor confirmed. Like the aurora, they flicker and amuse, but they can not be employed for practical purposes; you can not collect and retain them to light your chamber or your streets. But Christianity is as practical as it is sublime; and while it has truths which surpass the loftiest intellect, it has applications which suit the lowliest purposes. And it has a distinction peculiar to itself, one which should recommend it now, even as it will endear it on a dying day; it is the only revelation. God was in it at the first — God is in it still. Hearkening to other teachers, you may learn truth and falsehood together; but srtting at the feet of Jesus, you can learn no error there. Listening to his words, you hear the voice of God, and nothing will need to be unlearned in eternity which you have once acquired from him.
In the old schools of philosophy, it was usual for the pupils to bring a present to their teacher at the commencement of each term. And on one of these occasions, when his disciples, one by one, were going up with their gifts to Socrates, a poor youth hung back, and there was something like a blush upon his cheek, and something like a tear in his eye, for silver and gold he had none. But when all the rest had gone forward and presented their offering, he flung himself at the feet of the sage, and cried, •’ O Socrates, I give thee myself.” And this is the offering which the Lord Jesus asks of you. Give him yourself. Rise, take up the cross, and follow him. In modesty and affection, become his disciple, and he will not only make you welcome to his lessons, but he will make you a sharer in his heavenly life. He will give you the Holy Spirit. That divine Enliglitener will open your understanding to receive the Saviour’s doctrine, and will fill your soul with truth’s vitality. And do not despond because of what you at present are. “This man receiveth sinners;” and in receiving you, he will make you a “new creature.” Arise, he callelh you. Become his disciple; and, like John, imbibing sanctity from the bosom where he laid his listening ear — like Thomas, lingering near his person, but carrying in his heart a stony doubi, a stubborn misgiving, till, in the flash of overwhelming evidence, that doubt, that misgiving, was fused into faith and weeping wonder — like Paul, who, in every pulse of his intensified existence, felt the life of Jesus throb, and who, next to the desire of being with him, burned with ardor to be like him, — however scanty your present knowledge, you will learn in proportion as you love; however many your present doubts, they will all be drowned in adoration and astonishment, while you can only cry, “My Lord, and my God!” And however defective your present character, there will be kindled in your soul a hope and an effort — the hope that when he appears, you shall be like him — the effort to purify yourself as Christ is oure.
Farewell, my reader. To write these papers has been a pleasant task. I have liked the thought that I was working for working men. It has carried me back to the days when the gospel was new and the Church was young; and it has more endeared that heavenly Teacher of whom it is recorded, “the common people heard him gladly.” Much would I delight to visit your abode, and learn if these friendly hints have done you any good; — but life is short, and labors multiply. Most likely this is all our earthly intercourse, and, except with pen and ink, I may never be able to say, “Peace be lo this house.” But in the Father’s house are many mansions. As the Saviour’s humble disciples, may we meet in that happiest home!