LITTLE SERMONS. Life is a sheet of paper white, His word or two, and then comes night. Our nibs upon the edge-and die. Not failure, but low aim, is crime. JAMES RUSSELL Lowell. I pity the man who steals when he is hungry or when poverty is pinching his family. I can understand the power of the temptation to which he yields. I have sympathy for the man who drinks when a demon of thirst is at his throat and every drop of blood seems to be calling for rum. But the man who swears bites at a bare hook, and goes to hell like a fool.-DR. S. F. UPHAM. It is no man's business if he has genius or not. Work he must, whatever he is, but quietly and steadily; and the natural and enforced results of such work will always be the thing that God meant him to do, and will be his best. If he be a great man, they will be great things; but always, if thus peacefully done, good and right.— RUSKIN. Great merit or great failings will make you respected or despised; but trifles, little attentions, mere nothings, either done or neglected, will make you either liked f disliked. It is the general run of the world.-MICHAEL ANGELO. There are some old things we can not dispense with, and among these are God's word and truth and those religious influences by which He brings the heart of man into subjection to moral law. Do not be ashamed to confess yourselves Christians. To me, one all-important thing is that we should have a freer flow of conversation relating to nature, God and eternity. I have always had a sort of compassion for those who think they are wiser than the Creator. There is a God--and if a God, then a governor. He has not created us and flung us out to be the mere sport of chance and time. But I will not dwell upon the relation of science to religion. I will only add that he is as cruel who attempts to scorn away and overthrow religion as he who knocks the crutches from beneath a lame man. In the observance of the laws of God and in the promise of the Gospel of Jesus Christ there is the best guaranty of peace upon earth and the only hope of eternal life.--BENJAMIN HARRISON. Bear the hen's cackle for the sake of the eggs. Little annoyances must be put up with because of great advantages. SPURGEON. My life is not my own. True, it is mine; but, then, it belongs also to others. So far as my own personal interest is concerned, suicide may be excusable. But life is a divine trust-a part of the social order. To live is not only an individual duty but a social obligation. Thus suicide may be a sin against humanity even when it is no sin against one's self.-NEWMAN SMYTH. Do not be afraid. Are you down? Make a struggle, and because you struggle God will struggle in you, and with you, and for you. Samson, call upon thy God. Backslider, remember, and return and repent. All is not lost. Call upon Him, and He will answer thee; because He hath set His love upon thee, He will deliver thee. "I will set him on high." "Thou shalt tread upon the lion and upon the adder; the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under foot." What a victorious life we might live in the midst of the well-meant, destroying devilment all round about us, if we only used the power that worketh in us !--MCNEILL. A man should not allow himself to hate even his enemies; because if you indulge this passion on some occasions, it will rise of itself in others. If you hate your enemies, you will contract such a vicious habit of mind as by degrees will break out upon those who are your friends, or those who are indifferent to you.—PLUTARCH. In the front they bear the brunt. No one who considers his own ease or pleasure should desire to be a leading man. He is little more than the chief drudge, while he is supposed to be a king.--Spurgeon. In company, guard your tongue; in solitude, your heart. Our words need watching; but so also do our thoughts and imaginations, which grow most active when we are alone.--SPURGEON. |