Part 6

Notice, finally, that in following this plan of working for Christ we may, all unconsciously to ourselves, be the means of introducing to Jesus one who will be of far more service than ever we could have been. It was Simon Peter whom Andrew brought to Christ. We do not hear much in the New Testament of Andrew’s after-history, but if he had never done anything else than lead his brother to the Lord, it was worth living for just to do that; and when we get to heaven, we shall see that the lustre of Peter’s crown casts special radiance on Andrew’s face. When we read of the conversions on the Day of Pentecost; of the heroic protest before the council; of the conversion of Cornelius; and above all, when we peruse those two precious letters which Peter has indited, let us not forget that, humanly speaking, but for Andrew, Peter would not have been himself a Christian. Doubtless, God could have called him by some other instrumentality, but he made use of Andrew to teach us the lesson that, in doing the good that lies at our hands, we may at length really do more for the Church than we could have effected by more ostentatious effort in other places. Let the lowly and timid, therefore, take courage. They may not have shining talents or commanding position, yet by working where they are they may be honored in bringing to Jesus some who shall take foremost places in the Church, or become leaders in some missionary or evangelistic movement.

Many of the greatest men the Church has known have been converted through the agency of individuals all but unknown. A humble dissenting minister, whose name was scarcely heard of a few miles from his manse, was honored to be of signal service to Thomas Chalmers in the crisis-hour of his history; and I have heard Mr. Spurgeon tell how he was led to the Lord by a sermon preached by an unlettered man in a Primitive Methodist chapel.

Some of the greatest theologians the Church has ever seen, and some of the most useful ministers who have ever lived, have been made and molded by so common a thing as a mother’s influence. Robert Pollok, whose “Course of Time” used to be a household book throughout Scotland, said once of his poem, “It has my mother’s divinity in it.” Mother, will you take note of that? Many a time you have regretted that you could not take part in any public work for Christ, by reason of the bond that held you to your boy. Regret no more, but bring that boy to Christ, and he will live to do his own work and his mother’s too; and when the crown is placed upon his head its diamonds will flash new glory upon your countenance.

The sum of what we have been saying, then, is this: that each of us should begin to do all that he can, where he is, for Christ. But if we would succeed in that effort, we must be sure that we have already found him for ourselves. A minister had preached a simple sermon upon the text, “He brought him to Jesus;” and as he was going home, his daughter, walking by his side, began to speak of what she had been hearing. She said, “I did so like that sermon.” “Well,” inquired her father, “whom are you going to bring to Jesus?” A thoughtful expression came over her countenance as she replied, “I think, papa, that I will just bring myself to him.” “Capital!” said her father, “that will do admirably for a beginning.” This, brethren, is the true starting-point. We must be good, if we would do good. Bring yourselves to Jesus, therefore; and, as iron by being rubbed upon a magnet, becomes itself magnetic, so you, being united to Christ, will become partakers in his attractive power, and will draw men with “the cords of a man,” which are also “the bands of love.”

[_April 29._]

FAITH THE SOLE SAVING ACT.

By WILLIAM G. T. SHEDD, D.D.

In asking their question, the Jews intended to inquire of Christ what particular things they must do, before all others, in order to please God. The “works of God,” as they denominate them, were not any and every duty, but those more special and important acts, by which the creature might secure the Divine approval and favor. Our Lord understood their question in this sense, and in his reply tells them, that the great and only work for them to do was to exercise faith in him. They had employed the plural number in their question; but in his answer he employs the singular. They had asked, “What shall we do that we might work the works of God,” as if there were several of them. His reply is, “This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.” He narrows down the terms of salvation to a single one; and makes the destiny of the soul to depend upon the performance of a particular individual act. In this, as in many other incidental ways, our Lord teaches his own divinity. If he were a mere creature; if he were only an inspired teacher like David or Paul; how would he dare, when asked to give in a single word the condition and means of human salvation, to say that they consist in resting the soul upon him? Would David have dared to say: “This is the work of God,—this is the saving act,—that ye believe in me?” Would Paul have presumed to say to the anxious inquirer: “Your soul is safe, if you trust in me?” But Christ makes this declaration, without any qualification. Yet he was meek and lowly of heart, and never assumed an honor or a prerogative that did not belong to him. It is only upon the supposition that he was “very God of very God,” the Divine Redeemer of the children of men, that we can justify such an answer to such a question.

The belief is spontaneous and natural to man, that something must be done in order to salvation. No man expects to reach heaven by inaction. Even the indifferent and supine soul expects to rouse itself up at some future time, and work out its salvation. The most thoughtless and inactive man, in religious respects, will acknowledge that thoughtlessness and inactivity if continued will end in perdition. But he intends at a future day to think, and act, and be saved. So natural is it, to every man, to believe in salvation by works; so ready is every one to conceive that heaven is reached, and hell is escaped, only by an earnest effort of some kind; so natural is it to every man to ask with these Jews, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?”

But mankind generally, like the Jews in the days of our Lord, are under a delusion respecting the nature of the work which must be performed in order to salvation. And in order to understand this delusion, we must first examine the common notion upon the subject.

When a man begins to think of God, and of his own relations to him, he finds that he owes him service and obedience. He has a work to perform, as a subject of the Divine government; and this work is to obey the Divine law. He finds himself obligated to love God with all his heart, and his neighbor as himself, and to discharge all the duties that spring out of his relations to God and man. He perceives that this is the “work” given him to do by creation, and that if he does it he will attain the true end of his existence and be happy in time and eternity. When therefore he begins to think of a religious life, his first spontaneous impulse is to begin the performance of this work which he has hitherto neglected, and to reinstate himself in the Divine favor by the ordinary method of keeping the law of God. He perceives that this is the mode in which the angels preserve themselves holy and happy: that this is the original mode appointed by God, when he established the covenant of works; and he does not see why it is not the method for him. The law expressly affirms that the man that doeth these things shall live by them; he proposes to take the law just as it reads, and just as it stands,—to do the deeds of the law, to perform the works which it enjoins, and to live by the service. This we say, is the common notion, natural to man, of the species of work which must be performed in order to eternal life. This was the idea which filled the mind of the Jews when they put the question of the text, and received for answer from Christ, “This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.” Our Lord does not draw out the whole truth, in detail. He gives only the positive part of the answer, leaving his hearers to infer the negative part of it. For the whole doctrine of Christ, fully stated, would run thus: “No work of the kind of which you are thinking can save you; no obedience of the law, ceremonial or moral, can reinstate you in right relations to God. I do not summon you to the performance of any such service as that which you have in mind, in order to your justification and acceptance before the Divine tribunal. This is the work of God,—this is the sole and single act which you are to perform,—namely, that you believe on him whom he hath sent as a propitiation for sin. I do not summon you to works of the law, but to faith in me, the Redeemer. Your first duty is not to attempt to acquire a righteousness in the old method, by doing something of yourselves, but to receive a righteousness in the new method, by trusting in what another has done for you.”

I. What is the ground and reason of such an answer as this? Why is man invited to the method of faith in another, instead of the method of faith in himself? Why is not his first spontaneous thought the true one? Why should he not obtain eternal life by resolutely proceeding to do his duty, and keeping the law of God? Why can he not be saved by the law of works? Why is he so summarily shut up to the law of faith?

We answer: Because it is too late for him to adopt the method of salvation by works. The law is indeed explicit in its assertion, that the man that doeth these things shall live by them; but then it supposes that the man begin at the beginning. A subject of government can not disobey a civil statute for five or ten years, and then put himself in right relations to it again, by obeying it for the remainder of his life. Can a man who has been a thief or an adulterer for twenty years, and then practices honesty and purity for the following thirty years, stand up before the seventh and eighth commandments and be acquitted by them? It is too late for any being who has violated a law even in a single instance, to attempt to be justified by that law. For, the law demands and supposes that obedience begin at the very beginning of existence, and continue down uninterruptedly to the end of it. No man can come in at the middle of a process of obedience, any more than he can come in at the last end of it, if he proposes to be accepted upon the ground of obedience. “I testify,” says St. Paul, “to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the whole law” (Gal. v: 3). The whole, or none, is the just and inexorable rule which law lays down in the matter of justification. If any subject of the Divine government can show a clean record, from the beginning to the end of his existence, the statute says to him, “Well done,” and gives him the reward which he has earned. And it gives it to him not as a matter of grace, but of debt. The law never makes a present of wages. It never pays out wages, until they are earned,—fairly and fully earned. But when a perfect obedience from first to last is rendered to its claims, the compensation follows as matter of debt. The law, in this instance, is itself brought under obligation. It owes a reward to the perfectly obedient subject of law, and it considers itself his debtor until it is paid. “Now to him that worketh, is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. If it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.”

[_End of Required Reading for April._]

* * * * *

TRANSLATION.—A Welsh curate having preached several sermons which were considered superior to his own powers of composition, was asked by a friend how he managed? He replied: “Do you see, I have got a volume of sermons by one Tillotson, and a very good book it is; so I translate one of the sermons into Welsh, and then back again into English; after which the devil himself would not know it again.”

THEY GROW TO FLOWERS, OR TO WEEDS.

THE TRUE GENTLEMAN.

’Tis he whose very thought and deed By rule of virtue moves; Whose generous tongue disdains to speak The thing his heart disproves. Who never did a slander forge, His neighbour’s fame to wound; Nor hearken to a false report, By malice whispered round. Who vice, in all its pomp and power, Can treat with just neglect; And piety, though clothed in rags, Religiously respect. Who to his plighted word and trust Has ever firmly stood; And, though he promise to his loss, He makes his promise good. Whose soul in usury disdains His treasure to employ; Whom no reward can ever bribe The guiltless to destroy.

Be honest. Not only because “honesty is the best policy,” but because it is a duty to God and man. The heart that can be gratified by dishonest gains; the ambition that can be satisfied by dishonest means; the mind that can be devoted to dishonest purposes, must be of the worst order.

Having laid down these general principles for the government of personal conduct, we will epitomize what we would still enforce;—

Avoid idleness—it is the parent of many evils. Can you pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” and not hear the reply, “Do thou this day thy daily duty?”

Avoid telling idle tales, which is like firing arrows into the dark; you know not into whose heart they may fall.

Avoid talking about yourself; praising your own works; and proclaiming your own deeds. If they are good, they will proclaim themselves; if bad, the less you say of them the better.

Avoid envy, for it cannot benefit you, nor can it injure those against whom it is cherished.

Avoid disputation, for the mere sake of argument. The man who disputes obstinately and in a bigoted spirit, is like the man who would stop the fountain from which he should drink. Earnest discussion is commendable; but factious argument never yet produced a good result.

Be kind in little things. The true generosity of the heart is more displayed by deeds of minor kindness, than by acts which may partake of ostentation.

Be polite. Politeness is the poetry of conduct—and like poetry it has many qualities. Let not your politeness be too florid, but of that gentle kind which indicates refined nature.

Be sociable—avoid reserve in society. Remember that the social elements, like the air we breathe, are purified by motion. Thought illumines thought, and smiles win smiles.

Be punctual. One minute too late has lost many a golden opportunity. Besides which, the want of punctuality is an affront offered to the person to whom your presence is due.

The foregoing remarks may be said to apply to the moral conduct, rather than to the details of personal manners. Great principles, however, suggest minor ones; and hence from the principles laid down many hints on personal behavior may be gathered.

Be hearty in your salutations.

Discreet and sincere in your friendships.

Like to listen rather than to talk.

Behave, even in the presence of your relations, as though you felt respect to be due to them.

In society never forget that you are but one of many.

When you visit a friend, conform to the rules of his home.

Lean not upon his tables, nor rub your feet against his chairs.

Pry not into letters that are not your own.

Pay unmistakable respect to ladies everywhere.

Beware of foppery and of silly flirtation.

In public places be not too pertinacious of your own rights.

Find pleasure in making concessions.

Speak distinctly.

Look at the person to whom you speak.

When you have spoken, give him an opportunity to reply.

Avoid drunkenness as you would a curse; and modify all appetites, especially those that are acquired.

Dress well, but not superfluously.

Be neither like a sloven, nor like a stuffed model.

Keep away all uncleanly appearances from the person. Let the nails, the teeth, and, in fact, the whole system receive _salutary_ rather than _studied_ care. But let these things receive attention at the toilet—not elsewhere.

Avoid displaying excess of jewelry. Nothing looks more effeminate upon a man.

Every one of these suggestions may be regarded as the center of many others, which the earnest mind cannot fail to discover.

HABITS OF A MAN OF BUSINESS.

A sacred regard to the principles of justice forms the basis of every transaction, and regulates the conduct of the upright man of business.

He is strict in keeping his engagements.

Does nothing carelessly nor in a hurry.

Employs nobody to do what he can easily do himself.

Keeps everything in its proper place.

Leaves nothing undone that ought to be done, and which circumstances permit him to do.

Keeps his designs and business from the view of others.

Is prompt and decisive with his customers, and does not over-trade his capital.

Prefers short credits to long ones; and cash to credit at all times, either in buying or selling; and small profits in credit cases, with little risk to the chance of better gains with more hazard.

He is clear and explicit in all his bargains.

Leaves nothing of consequence to memory which he can and ought to commit to writing.

Keeps copies of all his important letters which he sends away, and has every letter, invoice, etc., relating to his business, titled, classed, and put away.

Never suffers his desk to be confused by many papers lying upon it.

Is always at the head of his business, well knowing that if he leaves it, it will leave him.

Holds it as a maxim that he whose credit is suspected is not one to be trusted.

Is constantly examining his books, and sees through all his affairs as far as care and attention will enable him.

Balances regularly at stated times, and then makes out and transmits all his accounts current to his customers, both at home and abroad.

Avoids as much as possible all sorts of accommodation in money matters and lawsuits where there is the least hazard.

He is economical in his expenditures, always living within his income.

Keeps a memorandum-book in his pocket, in which he notes every particular relative to appointments, addresses, and petty cash matters.

Is cautious how he becomes security for any person; and is generous when urged by motives of humanity.

Let a man act strictly to these habits; when once begun they will be easy to continue in—ever remembering that he hath no profits by his pains whom Providence doth not prosper—and success will attend his efforts.

HABIT OF TAKING PAINS.

By JAMES KERR, M. A.

Who can doubt that the habit of taking pains, the habit of minute attention, of patient thought and persevering study, is one of the leading characteristics of genius! To this rule there seems to be no exception.

We see it illustrated in the lives of our greatest thinkers. Did a genius like Lord Bacon compose his immortal works with ease, and, as it were, without effort? Far from it. On the contrary, he took great pains. They were written and re-written. They were the fruit of much patient thought, of repeated revision and persistent effort. Thus, we are told that he transcribed his “Novum Organum” twelve times with his own hand, each time revising it carefully. He was employed on this great work at intervals for a period of thirty years. When he transcribed it he did not merely recopy what he had written, with a few verbal alterations only, but changed it in substance, so as to bring it nearer the model in his own mind. This was his constant practice, as we know from his own words. Writing to a friend, he says—“My great work goeth forward, and, after my manner, I alter even when I add; so that nothing is finished till all be finished.”

Who is there among us who would have the patience to write any literary production in which he might be engaged twelve times over with his own hand! Think, too, of the patient thought that must have been bestowed on the work each time it was transcribed! If Bacon’s genius is immensely greater than what any of us can boast of, do not his patient thought, his persevering study, his habit of taking pains, exceed ours in the same proportion!

Bacon’s precept corresponded to his practice. How does the great author of the inductive method direct us to make discoveries? Not by volatile flights of fancy, but by patient labor. We are patiently to observe and make experiments. We are to collect all sorts of facts which have any bearing on the subject, not even neglecting what may appear trifles. We are to arrange them under proper heads. We are to examine them under every aspect, and reflect upon them with deepest thought. Thus only, he tells us, will discoveries be made worthy of the name.

Let us turn to another great philosopher of our own country. How did Newton succeed in making his name immortal? The poet says of him—

“Nature and nature’s laws lay hid in night, God said—Let Newton be, and there was light.”

Yet it was not without effort and painstaking care that he made his discoveries. The laws of light and gravitation did not reveal themselves to him at a glance. The process of discovery was much slower. Let us go to the man himself and learn the secret of his success. He tells us that he made his discoveries by _always thinking_ about them. This patient thought, this persevering study, this painstaking care, enabled him at last to succeed where others failed. This it was, and not mere genius alone, that shed a luster on his name, which shall last so long as the sun and the moon endure.

To come nearer our own times and to men of less dazzling fame. George Stephenson, the inventor, we may say, of railways, will be allowed to have been a great mechanical genius. The lesson we learn from his life is to take pains and persevere. His inventions were, in no small degree, the result of careful study. We see the pains he took to acquaint himself with every detail as to the habits of “the engine” while still a brakesman. He thus laid the foundation of his future success in applying the steam-engine to the railway. We read, also, that when he retired for the night, it was not always to sink into slumber. He worked out many a difficult problem in bed, and for hours he would lie awake and turn over in his mind, with painstaking care and patient thought, how to overcome some mechanical obstacle that stood in his way.

In the later years of his life, when railways had spread over the kingdom, he was fond of pointing out to others the difficulties he had to surmount, and what pains and perseverance had brought him to. It was not talent, it was not genius, in the ordinary sense of the word, to which he attributed his success; it was to perseverance. In addressing young men his grand text was “persevere,” and on this theme the old man grew eloquent, glowing with the recollections of his own personal experience.

Hugh Miller was another man of undoubted genius. When we contemplate such a man rising to distinction both in science and literature, in spite of the most adverse circumstances, we are apt to think that he must have been indebted to the native vigor of his mind alone, without the aid of any extraneous advantages. But what do we find to be the case? No one can peruse his works without perceiving that he was a great reader, and that the thoughts of others supplied the food on which his mind grew. Like Dr. Johnson, he was a robust genius, capable of grappling with whole libraries. He seems, while yet unknown to fame, to have ransacked our whole literature, quarrying his way into many hidden recesses not generally explored. Even classical works, translated into English, he read with avidity. He says himself—“I have read Cowper’s ‘Homer’ and Dryden’s ‘Virgil’ again and again, and drunk in all their beauties.”