I at Dlinois at Urbni-Chmpjign 
 
 This book has been 
 digitized through 
 the generosity of 
 
 Robert O. Blissard 
 Class of 1957 
 
 University of Illinois Library at Urbana-Champaign
 
 MEMORIAL VOLUME 
 
 LIFE AND LABORS 
 
 OF 
 
 DWIGHT L. MOODY 
 
 THE GREAT EVANGELIST 
 
 CONTAINING A FULL ACCOUNT OF HIS GRAND CAREER; HIS 
 
 REMARKABLE TRAITS OF CHARACTER; HIS WORLD-WIDE 
 
 FAME AS ORATOR AND PHILANTHROPIST; BURNING 
 
 ZEAL AND DEVOTION IN THE CAUSE 
 
 OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 INCLUDING HIS BRILLIANT DISCOURSES; PITHY SAYINGS; FAMOUS 
 
 CONFERENCES AT NORTHFIELD ; GLOWING TRIBUTES 
 
 TO HIS LIFE AND LABORS FROM THE PULPIT 
 
 THE PRESS, ETC., ETC. 
 
 We shall meet beyond the river, by and by, by and by ; 
 And the darkness shall be over, by and by, by and by ; 
 We shall strike the harps of glory, by and by, by and by ; 
 We shall sing redemption's story, by and by, by and by. 
 
 From Mr. Moody 1 s Favorite Hymn. 
 
 By REV. HENRY DAVENPORT NORTHROP, D. D. 
 
 Author of " Life of Spurgeon", "Charming Bible Stories," Etc., Etc. 
 
 Profusely Embellished with Superb Engravings 
 
 A. B. KUHLMAN COMPANY 
 
 CHICAGO, ILL.
 
 Entered according to Act cf Congress, in the year 1899, by 
 
 J. R. JONEvS, 
 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 
 All Rights Reserved.
 
 B- 
 
 .| 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 DWIGHT L. MOODY was one of the most remarkable men of 
 modern times. With few early advantages he rose grandly above 
 all obstacles and by sheer force of character, untiring zeal and 
 stirring appeals to the hearts of the people became the greatest 
 Evangelist of the century. 
 
 For nearly forty years Mr. Moody's name has been a house- 
 hold word both at home and abroad, and during this time no other 
 person exerted so great an influence in the religious world. Vast 
 multitudes hung upon his lips and were swayed by his over- 
 whelming eloquence. The results of his labors are unparalleled 
 in the history of Christianity. 
 
 He was a giant among men, possessed of tireless energy, 
 remarkable knowledge of human nature, ready tact and common 
 sense, a bright and sunny disposition, and a devotion to the sub- 
 lime work in which he was engaged, worthy of the grandest heroes 
 and defenders of the faith that the world has ever known. 
 
 Mr. Moody's marvellous career is vividly depicted in this 
 volume. It pictures him in his humble New England home ; 
 follows him to the great city where he goes to seek his fortune ; 
 relates his early struggles and victories ; tells of his rare industry 
 and perseverance ; and describes the humble manner in which he 
 began his work that aroused the whole Christian world. 
 
 After Mr. Moody had carried on a missionary work in Chicago 
 which probably no other man could have performed, he and Mr ( 
 Sankey began their evangelistic labors abroad in England. This 
 most interesting volume tells of the small beginnings ; the preju- 
 dices finally overcome ; the rising tide of Evangelism ; the great 
 multitudes ; and finally the thrill of enthusiasm that stirred Great 
 Britain from centre to circumference. As we follow these devoted 
 men through Scotland and Ireland and finally to London, the 
 great metropolis, their career reads more like a miraclo than the
 
 iv PREFACE. 
 
 actions of ordinary men. From the nobility to the denizens of the 
 lowest slums the people were stirred by the pungent addresses of 
 Mr. Moody and the Gospel songs of Mr. Sankey, his fellow-laborer. 
 
 The history contained in this work follows Mr. Moody on his 
 return to his native land, where in Philadelphia, Brooklyn, New 
 York, Hartford, Boston, Chicago, St. Louis and other large cities 
 and towns, his work was the wonder of all beholders and the joy 
 of all Christian people. Pastors and churches were united ; the 
 largest buildings were secured ; immense choirs were formed ; 
 meetings were held both week-days and Sabbaths ; and this new 
 Evangelist and his work were the theme of every tongue. 
 
 Mr. Moody was a thorough believer in educating the young. 
 He knew that impressions could be made upon young people far 
 easier than upon those who are older. His whole heart became 
 enlisted in educational work, and he established his famous Semi- 
 nary at Northfield. 
 
 Not only did he carry on this grand institution for many years, 
 but his religious conventions, held in the summer at the same 
 place, became noted throughout the world and drew visitors from 
 far and near. He showed himself to be a marvellous organizer as 
 well as financier. 
 
 "The Cedar is Fallen." This expressive language of the 
 Bible is appropriate to Mr. Moody's death. It was like the fall of 
 the majestic cedar in the forest. He labored with unabated zeal 
 up to within a very short time of his departure. Never did he 
 seem more earnest or eloquent than during his last services. His 
 removal produced a shock throughout the religious world. Chris- 
 tian people everywhere have united in hearty praise of the man 
 and his glorious work. 
 
 Mr. Sankey paid the following generous tribute to his friend 
 and associate: "I consider Dwight L. Moody to have been one of 
 the most remarkable men of the century, distinguished especially 
 for his devotion to the cause of Christ and the preaching of the 
 Gospel to the world. His character was marked by great common 
 sense and devotion to his Master. To these two points I attribute 
 in a great measure his wonderful success."
 
 DWIGHT L. MOODY 
 
 THE GREATEST EVANGELIST OF THE CENTURY
 
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 PART I. 
 LIFE AND LABORS 
 
 OF 
 
 DWIGHT L MOODY 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Moody's Marvellous Career. 
 
 nearly forty years Dwight Lyman Moody has been a lead- 
 ing figure in the evangelical work of this country and Eng- 
 1?-" 4 . He began his great work in 1860, and it was continued 
 witii unceasing vigor to within a short period of his death. 
 
 A man of sturdy frame, great physical strength and endur- 
 ance, energy that seemed inexhaustible and a hearty manner 
 that drew people to him, his power was felt by all classes of 
 people, and his achievements are the wonder of the age. v 
 
 Mr. Moody was born in Northfield, Mass., in 1837. His 
 father died when he was but four years of age, leaving a large 
 family in a destitute condition. At seventeen years of age he was 
 given a position in his uncle's shoe store in Boston, on the condi- 
 tion that he should spend his evenings at home and regularly 
 attend Sunday-school. He joined church in Boston. Soon after 
 he removed to Chicago and entered a boot and shoe store. 
 There Mr. Moody began to labor at every opportunity among the 
 waifs and ruffians of the city. He established Sunday-schools and 
 missions, gathering in the little outcasts and sparing no efforts to 
 start them in a better life. 
 
 At the sessions of the Sunday-school he was all energy and 
 vigor. Before long he gave up his work in the store and devoted 
 himself exclusively to Christain effort. This was in 1860. He 
 had labored under difficulties on account of a defective education, 
 
 and now he set to work with diligence to relieve this defect. His 
 2 17
 
 18 MOODY' S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 
 
 eloquence and peculiar power as a preacher began to attract much 
 attention. 
 
 In 1871, while attending a convention of Young Men's Chris- 
 tian Associations at Indianapolis, lie first met Ira D. Sankey. He 
 induced him to go to Chicago and help him in his work, and 
 afterward the two worked together with great success. In 1873 
 they crossed the Atlantic and spent some time in the principal 
 cities of Great Britain, gaining many converts. They made a very 
 successful tour of the United States after their return. Two more 
 tours in Europe, spent chiefly in Great Britain and Ireland, were 
 fruitful in good results. 
 
 VAST AUDIENCES AND WONDERFUL SCENES. 
 
 After Moody and Sankey returned from their first English 
 tour in 1875 they organized series of religious revivals in many 
 parts of the United States. They went to Philadelphia in 
 November, 1875, and conducted meetings, which were attended by 
 immense throngs, in the old Pennsylvania Railroad freight depot 
 at Thirteenth and Market Sts., which had been especially prepared 
 for their work. At that time Mr. Moody was a strong-headed, vehe- 
 ment man, being filled with the greatest enthusiasm for his work, 
 and disposed, like Whitefield of old, to shake sinners over the 
 very pit of destruction. 
 
 The Pennsylvania Railroad freight depot was at that time 
 for sale. The neighborhood was dull and uninviting at night, 
 comparatively deserted and poorly lighted. When the suggestion 
 was made that the property would be temporarily renovated for an 
 auditorium until the railroad company found a purchaser for it, 
 there was a good deal of derision, especially over the thought that 
 President "Tom" Scott was helping along the cause of religion. 
 But Scott had a hearty and large way of doing things, and he told 
 the men behind Moody that they could have the use of the prop- 
 erty at the rate of a dollar a year, provided they were ready to get 
 out at a month's notice, when the company should effect a sale. 
 
 It was about this period, however, that a Philadelphia mer- 
 chant was forming his plans to branch out in a business way.
 
 MOODY' S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 19 
 
 He made the Pennsylvania Railroad Company an offer for the old 
 depot and became its purchaser, but before proceeding to occupy 
 it he consented that the interior should be temporarily recon- 
 structed for the great revival of which he had been one of the chief 
 projectors. 
 
 In a few weeks there came into existence an immense hall. 
 Probably at least $40,000 was spent in its construction and equip- 
 ment. The first floor of the depot was fitted up with not fewer 
 than 10,000 seats with a platform big enough to hold a regiment, 
 with spacious aisles and retiring rooms. The original intention 
 had been to engage the Academy of Music for Moody and Sankey, 
 but this was overruled by George H. Stuart, who insisted that the 
 novelty of such an auditorium as the one at the depot would alone 
 draw thousands. This judgment was entirely correct. 
 
 GREAT RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIASM. 
 
 The success of the undertaking, from the religious point of 
 view, surpassed even his eager expectations. Multitudes filled 
 the hall day after day from November to February ; even Presi- 
 dent Grant visited it on one occasion. As many as 200 ushers were 
 required to clear the aisles at the end of each service, or to guard 
 the "inquiry rooms," and on some days prayer meetings were 
 going on at a dozen places in the neighborhood, like Dr. McCook's 
 church and Dr. Boardman's church. 
 
 Such a swarm of sinners smitten with repentance or softened 
 and mastered by the emotions of a new and sudden ecstacy had 
 not before been seen since the days when George Whitefield thun- 
 dered out his eloquence. Irreligious people smiled with a half- 
 amused contempt ; the worldly made Moody and Sankey a butt 
 for ridicule, and not at times unpardonably, when the exultation 
 of converts reached the point of intense frenzy ; Kennard Jones, 
 the then Chief of Police, had his hands full in regulating the 
 beseiging crowds, and in thousands of homes and workshops that 
 winter men and women were talking for the first time in their 
 lives of "grace," "salvation" and "regeneration." It was esti- 
 mated that fully twelve thousand persons were taken into the
 
 MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 21 
 
 As a writer, Mr. Moody also exercised a widespread influence. 
 Among his principal works have been : "The Second Coming of 
 Christ" (1877) ; "The Way and the Word" (1877) ; "The Secret 
 Power; or, The Secret of Success in Christian Life and Work" 
 (1881) ; "The Way to God and How to Find It" (1884) ; "Glad 
 Tidings" (1876); "Arrows and Anecdotes" (1877); "Best 
 Thoughts and Discourses" (1877). Both as a writer and preacher 
 the predominant quality of Moody' s style was directness, sim- 
 plicity. His sermons were largely anecdotal, but the illustrations 
 were always reverent, powerful and convincing. He was especially 
 fond of the parables, and his preaching was in large measure based 
 upon their form and teaching. 
 
 SCHOOLS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE AT NORTHFIELD. 
 
 During the twelve years preceding Mr. Moody' s death his 
 educational work at Northfield, Mass., grew to large proportions. 
 First he opened his own home for a few young ladies, and thus 
 started his young ladies' boarding school. Next he erected a 
 modest building across the way ; then East Hall was built at a 
 cost of $30,000. Next followed Frederick Marquand Hall, costing 
 $60,000, the gift of the Marquand estate. Following was Stone 
 Hall. A new library building was then erected, costing $20,000, 
 and an additional dormitory, costing a like amount. Two addi- 
 tional frame houses were fitted up for dormitories. These facilities 
 afforded accommodation for about 300 young ladies. 
 
 The school buildings occupy 250 acres, which are beautifully 
 laid out in park and woodland, traversed by a romantic glen, 
 called Bonar Glen. An artificial lake of some three acres has been 
 provided at a cost of $4,000. Mount Hermon, the school for 
 young men, is about two miles from Northfield. It is beautifully 
 situated on the west bank of the Connecticut river, and consists of 
 400 acres, purchased at a cost of $12,500. This school was started 
 with a gift of $25,000 from Mr. Hiram Camp, of New Haven. It 
 was opened in the old farm building, with the addition of a wooden 
 building, for a recitation hall. 
 
 Next, four brick buildings were erected and a large dining
 
 22 MOODY' S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 
 
 hall. But soon the school exceeded the proportions of these 
 buildings, and Crossley Hall and a new dining hall was erected, 
 with accommodations for over 200 additional students, and with 
 halls for chapel, library, museum, etc. Over a thousand young 
 men and women, representing a dozen different nationalities, have 
 been trained in these schools. Mr. Moody was no fanatic. His 
 extraordinary energy in religious work was accompanied with 
 broad and enlightened views on the subject of education, by the 
 practical results of which the whole world was benefited. 
 
 " Be good and you will be happy." This was Mr. Moody' s 
 motto, and he lived up to it to the time of his death. If any one 
 could have doubted this homely maxim they could have found 
 fulfilment of its promise by looking into and studying the life of 
 the great evangelist. There probably never was a man who 
 accepted and practiced and instilled religion with so much cheer- 
 fulness and heart sunshine as did Mr. Moody. 
 
 THE BUSINESS OF HIS LIFE. 
 
 His life's aim was to "never lose an opportunity to make 
 somebody happy," and when opportunities did not offer he made 
 them. For forty years Mr. Moody had been in the business of 
 "making people happy." If he had expended the same amount 
 of energy and ingenuity in any mercantile or professional line, he 
 would undoubtedly have accumulated a fortune. Instead, he was 
 as poor when he died as when he started upon the career of an 
 evangelist, except for the wealth of love and reverence and grati- 
 tude that rushed to him from thousands of hearts. 
 
 Mr. Moody' s success was not confined to America. In Eng- 
 land he made a great stir, and the people of the London slums 
 stopped and listened to this bright, fresh, hearty New Englander, 
 who got down to their own level and extended a cordial, chubby 
 hand in greeting, while he offered them a religion, not of sackcloth 
 and ashes, but of rejoicing and thanksgiving. 
 
 Therein was the secret of Mr. Moody' s success. He rose to 
 his pulpit and it was any pulpit, regardless of place or denomi- 
 nation with a smile on his lips and in his eyes, which gave
 
 24 MOODY' S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 
 
 His death removes from religious life a great force which, 
 made for the improvement of men and of society. He had his 
 predecessors and he will have his successors. Somewhere there 
 is to-day some young man behind a counter or in a railroad office 
 who will continue his work ; just as he took up the work which 
 Finney dropped ; just as Finney at a longer interval resumed 
 the work before done by Wesley and Whitefield. 
 
 Nothing is wider of the truth than to imagine that men like 
 Mr. Moody create their opportunities. They find them and 
 receive them. Great religious forces always exist in society. 
 Great religious desires are there. Men are not religious because 
 religions exist. Religions exist because men are religious. 
 There is present in every life, however careless and however 
 depraved ; however busy and however thronged ; however ignorant 
 or however commonplace ; a dim, dumb desire for an interpretation 
 of the universe ; a wish faint, fitful and feeble, but none the less 
 real, for some word or message which will set the soul in har- 
 mony, bring life in tune and in unison with its better purpose, 
 free men from the chains of habit and desire and give them an 
 impulse upward. 
 
 A DESIRE COMMON TO ALL MEN. 
 
 This wish is universal. It exists as a fact in the observation 
 of every man within himself, and without in the men about him. 
 Whether one accepts or rejects the sufficient explanation that this 
 is due to spiritual and divine forces, which ensphere the lesser life 
 of man, it remains true as a simple fact, apparent to all, that the 
 wish and desire for moral harmony between the soul and those 
 things in the world about which make for righteousness can be 
 observed in every nature and felt by every man. This fact is as 
 demonstrable by experience and as unmistakable in its record as 
 any in the round of human nature. 
 
 Whenever any man like Mr. Moody, with sincerity, with faith, 
 with earnestness and with eloquence, faces this unspoken yearning 
 for deliverance from sin, the response is instant. He succeeds in 
 his appeal for exactly the same reason that the original appeal of
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Early History of the Great Evangelist. 
 
 1\ l\ R. MOODY'S father died when he was only four years old, and 
 * * * a few weeks later twins were born, leaving the widow with 
 nine children to care for. The little farm upon which they lived 
 was encumbered by a mortgage. Mrs. Moody, whose birthday was 
 the same as his own, died in 1896, at the age of ninety. Her 
 heroic struggles to keep a roof over the heads of her large family 
 were greatly appreciated by her children, five of whom survived 
 their distinguished brother. The noble heart of the evangelist 
 never showed itself more plainly than when he referred to the 
 brave woman, who struggled against privations that would have 
 made many persons break up their families and send their 
 children to charitable institutions. 
 
 The early history of Dwight L. Moody was not such as to 
 suggest that he would some day become the dominant personality 
 of the Bnglish-speaking religious world. Northfield, the first and 
 last home, regarded him as an "irrepressible," and his widowed 
 mother expressed many anxious fears as to the future of a boy so 
 full of animal spirits, so reluctant to study, so impatient of con- 
 trol. Dwight at first preferred farm work to the village school. 
 
 There are many persons still living who recall Mr. Moody 
 at that time of life. They say on the whole he differed little from 
 the boys of his time. It was during this period of life, however, 
 that his strong-minded mother planted within him those seeds of 
 greatness which later bore remarkable fruit. Mrs. Betsey Holton 
 Moody, the mother of the evangelist, was a remarkable woman. 
 To her more than to the father was the famous son indebted. 
 
 The sturdiness of the mother asserted itself on the death of 
 her husband. In those years, when her children were young, she 
 struggled nobly through poverty and hardship. To her the son 
 
 is indebted for many of the elements that made him great. 
 
 27
 
 28 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 
 
 When Dwight was seventeen years old, with his mother's 
 permission he went to Boston to seek employment. His mother's 
 brother was a shoe merchant in that city, and he gave his nephew 
 work on two conditions : that he should be governed by his advice, 
 and attend regularly the Sunday-school and services of the Mount 
 Vernon Congregational Church. After Mr. Moody' s conversion 
 he applied for membership in the church. It is interesting to 
 know what was thought of his future at that time. His teacher 
 said that" he was very "unlikely to become a Christian of clear 
 and decided views of Gospel truth, still less to fill any extended 
 sphere of public usefulness." 
 
 The committee by whom his application for admission was 
 considered were doubtful at first about receiving him, owing to his 
 defective knowledge of the doctrines of the Church, but after 
 waiting a number of months for him to acquaint himself more 
 thoroughly with these doctrines, he was received. He at once 
 became an energetic worker in the Sunday-school, and was noted 
 for his plainness of speech in the prayer meeting. 
 
 WAS ADVISED TO KEEP STILL. 
 
 In the fall of 1856 Mr. Moody went to Chicago and became a 
 salesman in the shoe trade. He entered the Plymouth Congre- 
 gational Church, and showed his earnest spirit by renting four 
 pews, which he kept filled with young men and boys. He also 
 wanted to take part in the prayer meetings, but suggestions were 
 given to the effect that he could best serve the Lord by keeping 
 still. But Mr. Moody was not to be silenced. He asked if he 
 might become a Sunday-school teacher, and was told that he could 
 if he would bring his own scholars. 
 
 The next Sunday he marched into the school-room at the head 
 of eighteen ragged boys, whom he had collected during the week. 
 Later he started a mission of his own in an empty tavern in 
 North Chicago. His school grew so much that North Market 
 Hall was occupied, and John V. Farwell supplied benches for the 
 scholars and became its superintendent. Largely under Mr. 
 Moody' s personal canvassing sixty teachers were obtained, and
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 31 
 
 never again be able to undertake any active religious work from 
 the public platform. When the man, who for almost thirty years 
 had been his constant companion and most intimate friend, heard 
 this decision from Mr. Moody' s son, his throat filled up and tears 
 slowly trickled down his face. He turned away, unable for a time 
 to speak. 
 
 Next to an announcement that his greatest friend on earth 
 could not recover, no more distressing news could have come to 
 the man who made famous "The Ninety and Nine," which, with 
 Mr. Moody' s eloquent and convincing words, has aided so largely 
 in changing for the better the course of so many lives. 
 
 FIRST MEETING BETWEEN MOODY AND SANKEY. 
 
 The story of how Mr. Sankey first met Mr. Moody was told 
 by the former upon a recent visit to Philadelphia, shortly after he 
 had received the intelligence that the world had lost the services 
 of one of its greatest evangelists. It was in the year 1870, that 
 two young men journeyed to Indianapolis, Ind., to attend the 
 International Convention of the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
 tion. The one was Dwight L/. Moody, who came from Chicago, 
 111., and the other was Ira D. Sankey, whose home was at New- 
 castle, Pa. 
 
 They had heard of each other, but had never met. Moody had 
 already gained some reputation as a speaker, and Sankey for his 
 ability to win souls by his singing of hymns, but neither figured 
 very prominently as leaders of the exercises of the convention. 
 At that time Sankey was a Government officer in Pennsylvania, 
 holding a commission in the Internal Revenue service a position 
 paying him something like $1500 a year. His religious work, 
 until that time, had been conducted during leisure hours. 
 
 Sankey had heard enough of Moody to make him curious to 
 see him and hear him talk, and when he went to the convention he 
 immediately commenced to look for the young man from Chicago. 
 Arriving at the Academy of Music, where the convention was 
 being held, he took a seat close to the rear of the hall. He waited 
 and listened for an hour or so, but was compelled to leave the
 
 32 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 
 
 place without even hearing anybody mention the name of the man 
 for whom he was hunting. 
 
 Few people seemed to know who Moody was or anything 
 about him. It was afterward learned that Moody occupied a seat 
 near to the door and close to where Sankey was on the opening 
 day of the convention. Neither took any very prominent part in 
 the proceedings, the greater portion of the programme being 
 occupied by the more important speakers. 
 
 The first meeting of the two men did not occur until a day 
 or so after they had arrived at Indianapolis, and then under rather 
 novel circumstances. It was announced that "Mr. Moody, from 
 Chicago," would conduct a prayer meeting on a certain morning 
 at six o'clock in a little room some distance away from the Academy 
 of Music. Notwithstanding the early hour for the service, San- 
 key determined to take advantage of the opportunity to see and 
 hear the man whom until that time he had been unable to find. 
 
 THE GREAT SINGER THRILLS THE AUDIENCE. 
 
 The distance to the little room where the prayer meeting was 
 to be held was much greater than Sankey had anticipated, and 
 the service was half through when he arrived. He found a seat, 
 as he expressed it, in the " amen corner," and sat down. He had 
 scarcely been seated when somebody touched him on the elbow, 
 and, turning around, he discovered that he was sitting beside the 
 Rev. Robert McMillen, whom he happened to know quite well. 
 
 McMillen asked Sankey to take charge of the singing at the 
 service, explaining that there seemed to be nobody present who 
 could lead. At the conclusion of a very lengthy prayer, McMillen 
 nudged Sankey, and told him to start right in and sing. Without 
 waiting for any further invitation, young Sankey arose and sang 
 with wonderful feeling the words : 
 
 "There is a fountain filled with blood, 
 
 Drawn from Immanuel's veins ; 
 And sinners plunged beneath that flood, 
 Lose all their guilty stains." 
 
 The congregation forgot to join in on the chorus, and Sankey
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 33 
 
 finished the hymn by himself. Moody was well pleased with the 
 singing during the remainder of the service. When the meeting 
 was brought to a close McMillen asked Sankey to step forward 
 and he would introduce him to Moody. A procession was formed 
 which slowly made its way to the front of the room, where Moody 
 was standing. As Sankey drew near Moody stepped out and took 
 him by the hand. 
 
 "Where are you from? " Moody asked. 
 
 "Pennsylvania," replied Sankey. 1 
 
 "Married or single?" 
 
 "Married. I have a wife and one child." 
 
 " What do you do for a living when you are at home ? " 
 
 " I am in the Government service." 
 
 All this time Moody had been holding Sankey' s hand. Look- 
 ing down into his face with his keen black eyes he said : 
 
 " Well, you'll have to give it up." 
 
 HAD BEEN LOOKING FOR HIM. 
 
 Sankey stood amazed and was at loss to understand just what 
 Moody meant by telling him he would have to give up what was to 
 him a good position and one affording him a very comfortable liv- 
 ing. He was so taken back for a few seconds that he could make 
 no reply. Moody, however, explained what he had meant. 
 
 " You'll have to give up your Government position and come 
 with me. You are just the man I have been looking for for a long 
 time. I want you to come with me. You can do the singing and 
 I'll do the talking." 
 
 Sankey by this time partly recovered from his surprise, but 
 the thought of giving up a good position for an uncertainty was 
 too much, and he begged for time in which to consider the matter. 
 Moody asked him if he would go with him and pray over the 
 question, and out of politeness Sankey consented. Moody prayed 
 that Sankey would see his way clear to do as he had asked, and 
 Sankey argued within himself against the proposition. The two 
 finally parted and Sankey returned to his room impressed by 
 Moody' s prayer, but still undecided. That was on Sunday. All 
 3
 
 34 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 
 
 that day and night Sankey thought over Moody 's words, but the 
 next morning found him still inclined to stick to the Government 
 position with its salary assured every month. 
 
 Just at a moment when he was more inclined to be wavering 
 than anything else, a card was brought to him. He examined it 
 and found it was from Moody, and asking him to meet him at a 
 certain street corner that evening at six o'clock. Without knowing 
 what he was wanted for, Sankey wrote an acceptance upon the 
 back of the card and returned it to Moody. Together with a few 
 friends he went to the appointed place at six o'clock that evening, 
 and in a few seconds Moody came along. 
 
 PREACHING FROM A DRY-GOODS BOX. 
 
 Without even stopping to speak, Moody walked on and into 
 a store nearby and asked permission to use "a store box. The 
 permission was given, and Moody rolled the large box out on to 
 the street corner, and then, calling Sankey aside, asked him to 
 get up and sing something. Sankey complied, and after one or 
 two hymns had been sung Moody crawled up on to the box and 
 commenced to preach. The workingmen were just on their way 
 home from the mills and factories, and in a short time Moody had 
 secured a large crowd. Sankey says of him that he preached that 
 evening from that store box as he has never heard him preach 
 since. 
 
 The crowd stood spellbound as the words fell from Moody' s 
 lips with wonderful force and rapidity. After he had talked 
 for about fifteen minutes Moody leaped down from the box 
 and announced that he was going to hold a little meeting of his 
 own at the Academy of Music, and invited the crowd to accompany 
 him there. Arm in arm Moody and Sankey marched down the 
 street singing hymn after hymn as they went. The crowd followed 
 closely at their heels, and the men with their dinner pails forgot 
 to go home, so completely carried away were they with the sermon 
 from the store box. 
 
 Speaking of that march down the street, Sankey declared it 
 to have been his first experience as a Salvation Armyist. It took
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 35 
 
 but a few minutes to pack the Academy of Music to the doors, and 
 Moody saw that the men in their working clothes were first seated 
 before he ascended to the platform to speak. 
 
 His second address was as captivating as the one delivered on 
 the street corner, and it was not until the delegates had arrived 
 for the evening session of the convention that the meeting was 
 brought to a close. Sankey was still undecided when Moody 
 again brought up the question of their going together. However, 
 he accepted an invitation to spend a week with Moody, and before 
 that week was over he had sent his commission to Hugh McCul- 
 lough, who was at that time Secretary of the Treasury, and a 
 soldier who had been imprisoned at Libby Prison was given 
 Sankey 's place in the Internal Revenue service. 
 
 THE GREAT FIRE IN CHICAGO. 
 
 It was during the service at Moody 's church in Chicago one 
 evening that the great fire occurred which destroyed so much of 
 that city. The church was crowded with men and women when 
 the warning rumble of the fire alarms compelled Moody and 
 Sankey to bring the meeting to a sudden close. Moody' s church 
 was destroyed that night and some of the people who had attended 
 the meeting were burned to death in various parts of the city 
 before sunrise the next day while trying to save their homes. 
 
 The two evangelists were now without a home in which to 
 preach. Moody took the first train out of Chicago and made a 
 hurried journey to Philadelphia, New York and Washington, and 
 soon returned with sufficient money to enable his congregation to 
 rebuild their church. Prior to this time Moody had received 
 several letters from ministers in Kngland inviting him to visit 
 their country. It had been his desire to make a tour of the world, 
 and it occurred to him that while his people were rebuilding the 
 church it would be a good time to take the trip. This they 
 figured they could do before the work on the new church would 
 be completed. 
 
 With just enough money to pay their passage to London, 
 Moody and Sankey set sail for the old country in 1873. The
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 37 
 
 This interfered with the proposed trip around the world, bnt 
 the two evangelists visited many other countries while abroad, 
 conducting successful meetings wherever they went. The opinion 
 of the Surgeon-General of India, in regard to Mr. Moody' s physi- 
 cal condition, was apparently correct. 
 
 Mr. Moody, generally accompanied by Mr. Sankey, subse- 
 quently made frequent visits to England and Ireland. Among 
 Mr. Moody' s successes on the other side of the ocean none was 
 more striking than his conquest of prejudice in Oxford and Cam- 
 bridge. His first service at Oxford was so disturbed by the noises 
 made by the undergraduates that there were minutes when it was 
 impossible for him to proceed. With wonderful tact and patience 
 he persisted till he gained the good-will of his almost riotous 
 audience. Before long he had won many hearts, and the impres- 
 sion left upon numerous members of the University promised to 
 be both deep and lasting. Like success attended his visit to 
 Cambridge. 
 
 EVANGELISTIC CONFERENCES AT NORTHFIELD. 
 
 The influence exercised by Mr. Moody was not confined to 
 his personal labors in different parts of the world, but was felt in 
 many ways through those sent out from the three schools which 
 he established in Northfield, and the one in Chicago. The gen- 
 eral conferences of Christian workers held annually at Northfield 
 under his direction were also a powerful influence in the work of 
 evangelization. Widespread likewise has been the influence 
 exerted by the enormous edition of the " Gospel Hymns," issued 
 under the joint names of Moody and Sankey, which have now 
 been sung in every quarter of the globe for a quarter of a century. 
 
 Mr. Moody was a great builder. His first building was the 
 Illinois Street Church, in Chicago, erected about 1858, for the 
 shelter of his mission school and the church which grew out of it. 
 His second building enterprise was the Young Men's Christian 
 Association building, in Chicago, erected in 1866, the first commo- 
 dious edifice for Y. M. C. A. purposes in this country. His third 
 enterprise was the re-erection of the first Y. M. C. A. building,
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 39 
 
 He did not seek to found a sect, but to preach the Christian 
 Gospel in the broadest sense, leaving to his hearers their own 
 choice of denomination when they felt impressed with the necessity 
 of identifying themselves with the work of the Church. 
 
 In company with Ira D. Sankey, Mr. Moody visited many 
 cities in the United States and Great Britain. Everywhere they 
 met with eventual success, although frequently they were obliged 
 to overcome obstacles placed in their path by prejudice against 
 evangelism. While they addressed themselves chiefly to men 
 who were non-church members, thousands of Christian men and 
 women, affiliated with the various denominations, attended the 
 Moody lectures and contributed to the effective results of the 
 same. These outpourings of the people were a magnificent 
 tribute to the zeal of Mr. Moody for God's glory, and their effec- 
 tiveness was demonstrated by the new life given to the church 
 work of the religious organizations everywhere. 
 
 HE SOLVED A HARD PROBLEM. 
 
 The problem of all ministers of religion is how best to reach 
 "the masses," the general body of the people. Sermons delivered 
 to church-goers, to the ready and willing worshipers, form a part 
 of the Church's mission, but not the whole. The sheep that are 
 not in the fold call for the shepherd's care. Mr. Moody went out 
 into the world, the highways and byways, offered his hand to the 
 stranger, and brought him within the influence of religious teach- 
 ing. He encouraged men to be good and to do good, and showed 
 them that even in a material way, they that walk uprightly are 
 blessed. Impressive he was and convincing ; and it was not so 
 much his magnetism as his sincerity that drew hearts to him and 
 the cause to which he had consecrated himself. 
 
 The world is poorer for his going, but richer for his life, and 
 thousands are blessing God, and will bless Him through all 
 eternity for the message which they heard from this man. He 
 was plain and simple, almost homely, in his appearance and his 
 manner. There was no great eloquence in his speech, as men 
 reckon eloquence, nor majesty in his stature ; yet he drew people
 
 40 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 
 
 as by a miracle, because lie was so true, and because he had a 
 message. It might be said of him, as was said long ago of John 
 the Baptist : " He did no miracle, but all things he spake of Jesus 
 were true." 
 
 The "summer schools" held in the quiet little town of North- 
 field, have made it famous all over the world, and have accom- 
 plished more than can easily be calculated for the growth of the 
 Christian religion at home and abroad. 
 
 Mr. Moody never received money for his services, although 
 he accepted gifts for the work he was carrying on. It is said that 
 a friend cared for his wants, and left him free to preach and work 
 unhampered by the perplexing alliances which have often crippled 
 aggressive workers. And so, fearless, and unbound by anything 
 save the bonds of his love for his Master, he labored 011 until the end. 
 
 RAISED FROM HUMBLE LIFE. 
 
 It is a wonderful story, the life of this farmer's boy, this 
 mechanic, this uneducated, yet true and inspired teacher. Perhaps 
 all the lessons can be hardly told so soon after his ended career. 
 But surely there are some which are evident, and which this age 
 certainly needs to learn. 
 
 First, he was strongly sincere and fearless. His religion 
 meant everything to him, and his faith, therefore, was great. It 
 is the "light, half believer of a casual creed," as Arnold expressed 
 it, who is full of hesitation and trembling, and makes little head- 
 way. Honesty of religious belief will always impress men. 
 
 Second, Mr. Moody was direct. He had little patience with 
 the sophistry of theological theories ; but he knew that the world 
 was sinful, and that Christianity could help it, and that consti- 
 tuted his creed and was the basis of his preaching. And we can 
 assure ministers to-day that while men are careless of so called 
 dogma, and hate empty formalism, they will listen and profit by 
 the old story of help and comfort and godly living taught by 
 Jesus of Nazareth. Others can fill churches as well as Mr. Moody 
 filled his halls, if only they are whole-hearted, and have a simple 
 Gospel message.
 
 BETSEY MOODY 
 
 MOTHER OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST
 
 PROF. DANIEL B. TOWNER 
 
 THE CELEBRATED SINGER WHO ASSISTED MR. MOODY IN MANY OF HIS 
 EVANGELISTIC MEETINGS
 
 1. NORTH FARM-HOUSE WHERE MOODY BEGAN HIS SEMINARY 
 
 2. STONE HALL-CONTAINING CHAPEL AND RECITATION ROOMS
 
 PART II 
 
 MR. MOODY'S BRILLIANT AND 
 POWERFUL DISCOURSES. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 The Prodigal Son. 
 
 K have for our subject to-night one of the two young men 
 we have read about in the I5th chapter of Luke. There is 
 not a person in this audience here to-night but who is as 
 well acquainted with the I5th chapter of Luke as the preacher. 
 Probably there is not a prodigal in all this city but that knows 
 the story as contained in this chapter of Luke. It is not necessary 
 for ine to tell you why this young man went away. It was his 
 nature. It is natural for a man to go away from God. "All we 
 like sheep have gone astray /" every one is turned too easily away. 
 
 This prodigal went away without any reason that we know of ; 
 we are not told that his father was unkind to him, but I think, 
 however, that the father made a mistake. I think if I had a son 
 that wanted me to divide up my property and let him have the 
 share that was coming to him, I should make a great mistake to 
 give him the money. A great many people are making that mis- 
 take to-day, and if there is one person in this world to be pitied 
 more than another, it is the man who has all the money that he 
 wants to spend and nothing to do. When that young man came 
 to his father and wanted him to let him have his portion, his father 
 had better have said, " No, you had better wait until your father 
 has gone." When the prodigal son got that which was coming to 
 him, it says he gathered his goods all together and took his journey 
 into a far country. 
 
 14 209
 
 210 THE PRODIGAL SON. 
 
 Well, lie was considered popular in that distant country most 
 men who have plenty of money and nothing to do are very popular; 
 but how long his popularity lasted we are not told, because we do 
 not know just how long his money held out. But his friends 
 gathered round him ; he had a good many friends until his money 
 was gone, and then the poor man woke up to the fact that all those 
 he called his friends had been after his money and not him ; they 
 were friends to his money, not to him. And when he had spent all, 
 at last he came to want. 
 
 Did you ever stop to think how many prodigals there are in a 
 city like New York ? Suppose that we had them all here to-night, 
 and that we could bring them up here and let them pass in front of 
 this audience, it would take a long, long time -tramp, tramp, tramp 
 before this assembled audience. New York is full of prodigals. 
 They have not only left their earthly parents, they have sent many 
 of those parents to an untimely grave. And how many have 
 turned their backs upon God and have wandered away ! 
 
 AS FAR AS POSSIBLE FROM HOME. 
 
 I do not know where the prodigal son in this story went to, 
 perhaps to Egypt ; perhaps he went to Memphis that was one of 
 the magnificent cities in those days but he got as far away as he 
 could from home. Perhaps he wanted to get away from home re- 
 straint and home influences ; perhaps he talked as many young men 
 do now, in a laughing way, saying he was only " sowing his wild 
 oats." It makes my heart sad when I hear young men use that 
 expression. A great many young men seem to forget that they 
 have to reap what they sow tenfold. If a man sows a handful, he 
 reaps a bushel ; if a man sows the wind he reaps the whirlwind ; it 
 is only a question of time ; he will surely come to want some day. 
 
 All these earthly streams become dry some day ; he will surely 
 come to want. We read that when this prodigal's money was all 
 gone, a famine struck that land and there he was alone, in a strange 
 country in great want. All his friends were gone now ; he had lost 
 every one of them ; he thought he had a good many friends, but 
 they were now all gone. If they had had pawnshops in those da^s,
 
 THE PRODIGAL SON. 211 
 
 you would have seen him hanging round a pawnshop pawning what 
 he had left. The rings he wore away from home are gone ; perhaps 
 he has worn out his shoes and has not got them to pawn ; there he 
 is stripped. 
 
 But he did not go and beg, like a great many men in these 
 days. For that one thing I have respect for the prodigal, because 
 he did go to work. It was a very humble occupation, to be sure, 
 but if he could not get what he wanted he was willing to do most 
 anything rather than to beg ; and there is no meaner occupation 
 possible to a Jew than to feed swine, but he was willing to do that. If 
 a great many of those people who are now called tramps would go 
 to work we would all have sympathy for them. 
 
 DIDN'T BECOME A TRAMP AND BEG. 
 
 The prodigal got down very low, but he did not get down low 
 enough to beg ; he went to work ; his work was very mean ; he could 
 not have been in a meaner occupation than feeding those swine. 
 When the backslider goes away from God he looses all the blessing 
 of his work, and the prodigal lost all his. He had no home. A 
 man who is away from God has got no home ; he has turned his 
 back upon his home, and there was no home for him there among 
 strangers. If the strangers had attempted to give him a home, it 
 would not have been home to him, but they did not. 
 
 There he was among strangers, coatless, shoeless, hatless ; 
 some of the young men in that country came along, some of the 
 very friends perhaps that had got his money away from him for 
 men gambled in those days as they do now and they probably 
 said, " Look at that fool ; he came down here with $20,000 only two 
 or three years ago, and now it is all squandered." Those very men 
 who had got his money away fron him began to make sport of him 
 now. I think I can see him straightening himself up and saying 
 to them, " You call me a beggar ! Why, my father's servants dress 
 better than you do ! " And they laughed and said, " Your father's 
 servants why, you have not got any father." No one believed him ; 
 he had lost his testimony. 
 
 And just so has every backslider from God lost his testimony.
 
 214 THE PRODIGAL SON. 
 
 thousands to say that word to-night, "I will arise and go to my 
 Father." Nine-tenths of the battle was won when he said, " I 
 will arise and go to my father." He may be in a far country, but 
 he will soon get home if he has made up his mind to come. And 
 he made up a sort of a sermon he was going to preach when he 
 got home. The first thing he was going to do was to confess. "I 
 will confess that I have sinned against heaven. I will confess 
 that I have done wrong, and I will ask if he will let me be as 
 one of his servants." 
 
 THE BELLS OF HEAVEN RING. 
 
 Ah, he didn't know his father's heart; if he had he wouldn't 
 have asked the rest. He says, "I will just ask my father to let 
 me be as one of his servants." But now he had made up his 
 mind to go home, and he starts. He goes to the citizen of that 
 country and he says, "I have made up my mind to go home, and 
 I can't work for you any longer. My father is well off, and I am 
 sure my father will receive me back." The citizen don't care 
 anything about him, but there is a living heart there at home, 
 and he starts. I see him on his way, and there is joy up there 
 now; they ring the bells of heaven. I see the guardian angel 
 that watches over him, and the moment he came to himself then 
 there was joy on high. 
 
 Then the prodigal is out on his way see him! I can just 
 imagine his feelings as he came over the border of his native 
 land "It may be father has died; may be he is dead? If he is, 
 may be I may not get a warm welcome." It was a good thing 
 for the prodigal that his father was alive, wasn't it ? He wouldn't 
 have received a very warm welcome from that brother of his. 
 Ah, young man, you had better make the most of that experience 
 and get home before that old father dies, unless you have got a 
 godly, praying mother. Go down to your houses to-night and 
 write a letter to your mother or your father and ask them to for- 
 give you ! Ask your father in Heaven to forgive you. 
 
 But now see him as he going along toward home, wondering 
 if that father is alive waiting for him. There is the old man out
 
 THE PRODIGAL SON. 215 
 
 on the flat roof. Many a time he has been there before. Many a 
 time his eye has been looking in the direction where his boy went. 
 He cannot tell him by anything he has on; but love is keen. He 
 saw his boy afar off; that was his long-lost boy. He starts out 
 after him. You can see his long white hair floating through the 
 air; he leaps over the highway; the spirit of youth has come 
 upon him. The servants look at him leaping over the highway, 
 and they wonder what has come over him. It is the only time 
 God is represented as running, just to meet a poor sinner. God 
 walks. When those children of Israel were thrust in that fiery 
 furnace, we find that God walked in that furnace. 
 
 A STORY OF DIVINE COMPASSION. 
 
 The whole story of that prodigal is just written to bring out 
 God's love, or the compassion of God. "And when he saw him 
 a great way off he had compassion on him." He did not wait for 
 him to come. He did not say, "He went away without cause, I 
 will not go to meet him." And when he meets him, he falls upon 
 his neck, and he weeps over him ; and the servants come running 
 out to see what is the matter. And the boy begins to make his 
 speech : "Father, I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight, 
 and am no more worthy to be called thy son!" And just as he 
 was going to say, "make me as one of thy hired servants," the 
 father interrupts him and he says to one servant, "Go bring the 
 best robe and put it on him;" and to another, "Go to my jewel- 
 box and get a ring and put it on his finger;" and to another one, 
 "Go and get the shoes ;" and to another, " Go and kill the fatted 
 calf." And there was joy there. What joy there was in that 
 home! "He had compassion on him." 
 
 My friend, don't you know that since then that story has 
 been repeated nearly every day prodigals going back and I 
 never yet heard of any man going back that did not get a warm 
 welcome. There isn't a poor prodigal in this city but that if he 
 will go back to his father, will receive a warm welcome. But that 
 isn't the lesson we want to teach. It is not only to be reconciled 
 to your earthly father, but my friends, to your Heavenly Father,
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 God is Love. 
 
 <T WANT to take for our subject to-night what Christ is to us, 
 X and when I get through, and any one of our friends says he is 
 
 not convinced, it will be because you don't want to be convinced, 
 and will not have Him. He will be all that I make Him out to be, 
 and a thousand times more. No man living could tell about His 
 great love and great necessity to us in an hour ; nay, he could not 
 tell it in twenty-four hours. It is beyond thought and beyond ex- 
 pression to tell what Christ is to us that is, if we have believed on 
 Him and been redeemed by Him. 
 
 I remember speaking upon this subject some time ago in 
 Europe, and when I got through and was going home, I said to a 
 Scotch friend of mine, who was in my company, that I was very 
 much disappointed ; that I did not get through with the subject. 
 He looked at me in astonishment, and said, " My friend, what ! did 
 ye expect to tell what Christ is in half an hour ? Ye need never 
 expect to tell it in all eternity ; you would never get through with 
 it." I have thought of it often since. Take eternity ! Yes, I 
 know it would. 
 
 Well, right here I want to ask you whether Christ is worth 
 having ? I imagine that some of you will say that that is a strange 
 question a man to get up and ask that. Well, perhaps it is; but 
 it does seem to me that a great many men do think that Christ is 
 not worth having. If they do really want Him let them take Him. 
 He was God's greatest gift to the world. He is there for you and 
 for me to partake of. Just let me ask that question again, Do you 
 think the Son of God worth having ? Oh, that God may open the 
 eyes of every lost soul here to-night to see Christ here right in the 
 midst of them. Oh, that you may worship Him in spirit and in 
 truth, view him as the chief among thousands, the One altogether 
 lovely. Christ wants to be a Saviour to every one of us. 
 
 219
 
 220 GOD IS LOVE. 
 
 In the second chapter of Luke and the tenth verse we read 
 that a Saviour has been given us : " Behold, I bring you good tidings 
 of great joy, which shall be to all people ; for unto you is born this 
 day, in the City of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." 
 And if we know he is our Lord and truth and wisdom and life, we 
 must first know Him as our Saviour. You must first meet Him at 
 Calvary first see Him on the cross. There is no life in us except 
 we come to Calvary no life until we come to that mountain. Now, 
 I don't want you to think I mean to ask you to trust in the form. 
 Many, yea thousands, make that great mistake. We are not tak- 
 ing Him as a personal Saviour ; we don't try to know Him as our 
 own. This is a great mistake, and it is a common mistake. 
 
 DELIVERANCE FROM ALL EVIL. 
 
 During the last few years I was not occupied with the person 
 of Christ ; it was more about the doctrine and about the form. 
 But lately Christ is more to me personally. And it would be a 
 great help to you to cultivate His acquaintance personally, and 
 come to Him as the personal Saviour, and be able to take Him and 
 look up to Him and say, " He is my Saviour." I don't know how 
 many times I have heard men say during the past few weeks, " I 
 would come to Him and love Him, but I don't think I could hold 
 out." But I tell you, He is not only a Saviour, but a Deliverer. 
 He can deliver us from the power of sin. He can deliver us from 
 Satan. There is not a guilt, crime, trouble or trial but that if we 
 go to the Son of God He is able to deliver us from it. 
 
 Bear in mind that we are the lawful captives of sin. If a man 
 has committed a sin, Satan has a power over him and a claim upon 
 him and holds him as his lawful prey. But saith the Lord, " Even 
 the captives of the mighty shall be taken away." And He saith 
 further that He will contend for thee and take thee from those that 
 hold thee captive. Thanks be to God, we can go to Him with con- 
 fidence, and have Him deliver us from the power of our besetting 
 sin. If there be a man here who is the slave of strong drink, I 
 bring him good news ! God is able to deliver you from that which 
 has gained the mastery over you.
 
 GOD IS LOVE. 225 
 
 from this hour, until He presents you before the throne without spot 
 and without blemish. Don't tell me He doesn't have the power to 
 keep you. He has. That is what Christ came into the world for, 
 to keep sinners. Some men have an idea when they get converted 
 that they have got to keep Christ and themselves, too. It is all 
 wrong. 
 
 LITTLE GIRL AND HER MUFF. 
 
 I remember one time my little girl was teasing her mother to 
 get her a muff, and so one day her mother brought a muff home, 
 and, although it was storming, she very naturally wanted to go out 
 in order to try her new muff. So she tried to get me to go out with 
 her. I went out with her, and I said, " Hmma, better let me take 
 your hand." She wanted to keep her hands in her muff, and so 
 she refused to take my hand. Well, by and by she came to an 
 icy place, her little feet slipped, and down she went. When I 
 helped her up she said, " Papa, you may give me your little finger." 
 " No, my daughter, just take my hand." u No, no, papa, give me 
 your little finger." Well, I gave my finger to her, and for a little 
 way she got along nicely, but pretty soon we came to another icy 
 place, and again she fell. This time she hurt herself a little, and 
 she said, " Papa, give me your hand," and I gave her my hand, and 
 closed my fingers about her wrist, and held her up so that she could 
 not fall. 
 
 Just so God is our keeper. He is wiser than we. Run to your 
 Elder Brother for aid. Is there a man here to whom a saloon is a 
 temptation ? Who can't go by a saloon without wanting to go in ? 
 Just let him throw himself upon the Lord. Say, " Lord Jesus, 
 keep me." 
 
 There are thousands and millions around the throne of God 
 to-night. Yes, God gave them grace, and overcame all things for 
 them. Thank God, oh, thank God for that. When I was in 
 England I had a great curiosity to visit the Zoological Gardens, 
 because of a story I heard concerning them. There was a man 
 who had a little dog which he had trained to run. So one day he 
 made a bet about his dog's running, but when the time came for the 
 
 15
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Christ's Mission to the World. 
 
 OU will find my text this evening in the igih chapter of the 
 Gospel according to St. Luke, and part of the loth verse : 
 
 "For the Son of man zs come to seek and to save that which was 
 lost" In this little short verse the whole mission of Christ is told. 
 He came for a purpose, He came to do a work, and we get the in- 
 formation of what He came to do in this verse he came to save 
 sinners to save the lost. If you will look in your Bibles care- 
 fully you will find that every man that God sent before Christ 
 had a work to do, and he always succeeded, and do you think that 
 God will send His Son to do work on earth and not give Him 
 power and strength to do that work ? He sent His Son here to 
 save sinners, and He did give Him the power to accomplish that 
 work. 
 
 Do you think that Christ, who voluntarily came into the 
 world to save sinners, is not willing to receive all that come to 
 Him not willing to save them? Now let us take up this verse 
 and look at it on every side, and look around it, and see how it 
 was that He uttered these words. In the last part of the i8th 
 chapter, that I read this evening, we find Christ coming near to 
 the City of Jericho. A man who had come down to Jerusalem 
 had met a poor blind beggar sitting by the wayside. The beggar 
 had probably asked him for something some money. But the 
 stranger said to him, "I have got something more precious than 
 silver or gold; you may get back your sight." "Oh," says Bar- 
 timeus, "that cannot be; there is no chance for me. I have not 
 got eye-balls, even. I was born blind; never saw the mother that 
 gave me birth; never saw the wife that leaned on my breast; 
 never saw my offspring; never saw my friends or neighbors or 
 the light of heaven.." "But," says the stranger, "it is yet true; 
 for I have come down from Jerusalem, and I saw there a man who 
 
 227
 
 230 CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 
 
 You can all take in the joy of that moment that had arrived to 
 this poor man. When he gets to the city he leaves the crowd, and 
 says he will just step round and see his wife. He had never seen 
 her before, and wanted to find out what sort of a wife he had. He 
 also wanted to see his children. Well, as he goes on his way a man 
 meets him and looks at him in astonishment. " What, who is this ? 
 Is your name Bartimeus ? " " Yes," says Bartimeus, " it is I." 
 " Why," says his fellow-citizen, " how's this ? I thought you were 
 blind." " Yes," says Bartimeus, " I was blind, but I just met Jesus 
 outside the city, and He has given me my sight." 
 
 HE CAME DOWN INSTANTLY. 
 
 Another man also heard of Jesus, and another convert was 
 made Zaccheus. And just here I want to put this picture before 
 the minds of those who don't believe in sudden conversions. This 
 Zaccheus had gone up among the branches and the leaves of a 
 sycamore tree, but as Jesus passed under He saw the man, and said 
 at once to him, u Zaccheus, come down," and the eye and the voice 
 of the Son of God flashed life into the soul of Zaccheus. He told 
 Zaccheus that that was the last time he should pass that way ; and, 
 sinner, when God calls upon you it may be the last time you will 
 ever hear his voice. But Zaccheus heard the voice and obeyed it, 
 and he was not scared into obeying it, either. Some persons at the 
 present day would rather be scared into the Kingdom of Heaven 
 than any other way. But that is not the way that Jesus did. 
 
 Some of these professed Christians talk against sudden conver- 
 sions ; but how long did it take the Lord to convert Zaccheus ? 
 He must have been converted getting down. It was right in the 
 air, between the branches and the ground. You see those people 
 who say, " I don't believe these are genuine conversions." Ah, I 
 wish we could have a few more conversions like Zaccheus. Zaccheus 
 gave one-half of his goods to the poor. Do you think you could 
 make a poor man in Jericho believe that conversion not genuine ? 
 If we could have a few more conversions like that here, do you think ' 
 you could make the poor people in this city believe that that conver- 
 sion wasn't genuine ?
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 The Victory of Faith. 
 
 ^TWENTIETH verse of the fifth chapter of Luke: "When he 
 \) saw their faith." A little while before this Christ had been 
 driven out of Nazareth, in his native town, and had come 
 down to Capernaum to live, and He had begun His ministry, and 
 some- mighty miracles had already been wrought in Capernaum. 
 A little while before this, one of the officers in King Herod's army 
 had a son who had been restored. Peter's wife's mother, that lay 
 sick with the fever, had been healed, and Mark tells us that the 
 whole city was moved, that they had come to the door of the house 
 where He was sitting, the whole city bringing their sick. 
 
 In fact, there was a great revival in Capernaum. That is 
 what it was, and it is all it was. The news was spreading far and 
 near. Everybody coming out of Capernaum was taking out 
 tidings of what this mighty preacher was doing, and His mighty 
 miracles, and the sayings that were constantly falling from His 
 lips. And we read in a few verses before this aoth verse, that a 
 man full of leprosy had come to Him and said: "Lord, if Thou 
 canst, make me clean," and I want to call your attention to the 
 difference between a man that had the palsy and the man that had 
 the leprosy. 
 
 The man with the palsy had friends who had faith. The man 
 who had the leprosy had no friends who believed he could be 
 cleansed. There had been no leper cleansed for 800 years, and 
 we read back in the days of Elisha that there was a leper that 
 was cleansed, but none since that time until now. Here is a leper 
 that has faith and goes right straight to the Son of God Himself; 
 and I want to say if there is a poor sinner here to-night that has 
 not got any friends that would pray for him, you can go right 
 straight to Jesus Himself. You don't need any Bishop or priest 
 
 235
 
 242 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 
 
 us go and bring our unconverted friends here. All through the 
 services let us be lifting up our hearts in prayer. God save our 
 friend ! O God, convert him ! And in answer to our prayer the 
 Lord will save them. 
 
 While in London there was a man away off in India a 
 godly father who had a son in London, and he got a furlough 
 and came clear from India to London to see after his boy's spiritual 
 welfare. Do you think God let that man come thus far without 
 honoring that faith ? No. He converted that son, and that is the 
 kind we want where faith and works go together ; and if we have 
 faith God will honor it and answer our prayer. Only a few years 
 ago in the City of Philadelphia there was a mother that had two 
 sons. They were just going as fast as they could to ruin. They 
 were breaking her heart, and she went into a little prayer-meeting 
 and got up and presented them for prayer. They had been on a 
 drunken spree or had j ust started in that way, and she knew that 
 their end would be a drunkard's grave, and she went among these 
 Christians and said, " Won't you just cry to God for my two boys?" 
 
 HAPPIEST HOME IN THE CITY. 
 
 The next morning those two boys had made an appointment 
 to meet each other on the corner of Market and Thirteenth Streets 
 though not that they knew anything about our meeting and 
 while one of them was there at the corner, waiting for his brother 
 to come, he followed the people who were flooding into the depot 
 building, and the spirit of the Lord met him, and he was wounded 
 and found his way to Christ. After his brother came, he found the 
 place too crowded to enter ; so he, too, went curiously into another 
 meeting and found Christ, and went home happy ; and when he got 
 home, he told his mother what the Lord had done for him ; and the 
 second son came with the same tidings. 
 
 I heard one get up afterward to tell his experience in the 
 young converts' meeting ; and he had no sooner told the story than 
 the other got up and said : " I am that brother, and there is not a 
 happier home in Philadelphia than w* 3 have got ;" and they went 
 out, bringing their friends to Christ.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Courage and Enthusiasm. 
 
 T SHALL- take for my subject to-night only two words, Courage 
 X and Enthusiasm necessary qualifications for successful work 
 in the Lord's service. In this chapter, Josh, i., I read to-night 
 four different times God tells Joshua to be of good courage, and He 
 says that if he was of good courage no man should be able to stand 
 before him all the days of his life. And we read that in the even- 
 ing of his life he was successful, and that no man was able to stand 
 before him all his days. God fulfilled His promise. God kept 
 His word. But see how careful God is to instruct him on this one 
 point. Four times in one chapter he says to him, "Be of good 
 courage, and then you shall prosper ; then you shall have good 
 
 success." 
 
 And I have yet to find that God ever uses a man that is all the 
 time looking on the dark side, and is all the time talking about the 
 obstacles and looking at them, and is discouraged and cast down. 
 It is not these Christians that go around with their head down like 
 a bulrush, looking at the obstacles and talking about the darkness 
 all the time, that God uses. They kill everything they touch. 
 There is no life in them. Now if we are going to succeed we have 
 got to be of good courage, and the moment we get our eyes on God 
 and remember who He is, and that He has all power in heaven 
 and earth, and that it is God who commands us to work in His 
 vineyard, then it is that we will have courage given us. 
 
 Now if you just take your Bibles and look carefully through 
 them you will see the men that have left their mark behind them ; 
 the men that have been successful in winning souls to Christ have 
 all been men of that stamp. You will notice that when Moses com- 
 menced, after he had been among the Egyptians forty years, he 
 thought the time had come for him to commence his work of deliv- 
 ering the captives, and he went out, and the first thing we hear is 
 
 245
 
 246 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 
 
 that lie was looking this way and that way to see if somebody 
 called him. 
 
 He was not fit for God's work. God had to take him on the 
 back side of the desert for forty years, and then God was ready to 
 send him, and Moses then looked but one way. And He sent him 
 down into Bgypt, and he had courage and God could use him. But 
 it took him forty years to learn that lesson, that he must have 
 courage and boldness to be a fit vessel for the Master's use. 
 
 THE PROPHET OF MOUNT CARMEL. 
 
 Again we find Elijah on Mount Carmel, full of boldness. 
 How the Lord used him ! How the Lord stood by him ! How the 
 Lord blessed him ! But when he got his eyes off the way, and 
 Jezebel sent a message to him that she would have his life, he got 
 afraid. He was not afraid of Ahab and the whole royalty, and he 
 was not afraid of the whole nation. He stood on Mount Carmel 
 alone, and see what courage he had and admiration. But what 
 came over him I don't know, unless it was that he got his eyes off 
 the Lord, and when one woman gave him that message he got 
 frightened, and God had to go to him and ask him what he was 
 doing ; and he was not fit for God's communion. 
 
 That, I think, is the trouble with a good many of God's people. 
 We get frightened, and are afraid to speak to men about their souls. 
 We lack moral courage, and if we hear the voice of God speaking 
 to us and saying, " Run and speak to that young man," we will go 
 to him meaning to do it, and will really talk to him about everything 
 else, and dare not about his soul. When we begin to invite them 
 to Christ is when the work begins, and it won't begin until we have 
 the courage given us and are ready to go and speak with them 
 about their souls. We read that when the apostles were brought 
 before the council they perceived their boldness, and it made an 
 impression on the council. The Lord could use them then, because 
 they were fearless and bold. 
 
 Look at Peter on Pentecost, when he charged the murder of 
 the Son of God upon the Jews. A little while before he had got 
 out of communion, and one little maid had scared him nearly out
 
 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 253 
 
 or if not an hour five minutes. If you have not strength to do 
 anything personally, you can pray for this work. 
 
 Now, it is a good deal better to do that than it is to stand off 
 criticising. Some will say, " O, I heard my grandfather say how 
 such things should be done. This is not managed right to be suc- 
 cessful." And they stand off and criticise and find fault, and we 
 will never succed as long as they do this. All should work and ask 
 God's guidance. 
 
 THE FIREMAN AND CHILD. 
 
 Once, when a great fire broke out at midnight and people 
 thought that all the inmates had been taken out, way up there in 
 the fifth story, was seen a little child, crying for help. Up went 
 a ladder, and soon a fireman was seen ascending to the spot. As 
 he neared the second story the flames burst in fury from the 
 windows, and the multitude almost despaired of the rescue of the 
 child. The brave man faltered, and a comrade at the bottom cried 
 out, "Cheer!" and cheer upon cheer arose from the crowd. Up 
 the ladder he went and saved the child, because they cheered him. 
 If you cannot go into the heat of the battle yourself, if you cannot 
 go into the harvest field and work day after day, you can cheer 
 those that are working for the Master. 
 
 I see many old people in their old days, get crusty and sour, 
 and they discourage every one they meet by their fault-finding. 
 That is not what we want. If we make a mistake come and tell 
 us of it, and we will thank you. You don't know how much you 
 may do by just speaking kindly to those that are willing to work. 
 I remember when I was a boy I went several miles from home 
 with an older brother. That seemed to me the longest visit of my 
 life. It seemed that I was then further away from home than I 
 had ever been before, or have ever been since. 
 
 While we were walking down the street we saw an old man 
 coming toward us, and my brother said, "There is a man that will 
 give you a cent. He gives every new boy that comes into this 
 town a cent." That was my first visit to the town, and when the 
 old man got opposite to us he looked around, and my brother not
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Confessing Christ. 
 
 AST night I spoke to you about believing. I want to follow 
 that subject to-night with another subject as important, and 
 that is Confession of Christ ; not confessing sin, that is not 
 what I want to talk about to-night, but confessing Christ. In 
 the iotfy chapter of Romans, loth verse a very little verse 
 you will find these words : ' ' For with the heart man believeth unto 
 righteousness ; and with the mouth confession is made unto salva- 
 tion.'' I believe there are a great many people who have got into 
 trouble and difficulty right in the middle of that verse, because 
 they do not understand why it is that they do not have the joy 
 they have heard other Christian people talk about. They say they 
 believe in the Lord Jesus Christ ; they say they trust Him, and 
 Him alone, for salvation ; they say that Christ is their only hope ; 
 but there they stop. 
 
 Now I say to you that confession is as important as faith. 
 " With the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the 
 mouth confession is made unto salvation." Then the next verse 
 says, " For the Scripture sayeth, Whosoever believeth on Him shall 
 not be ashamed." Now, if a man really believes in his heart, the 
 next thing he ought to do is to confess Christ, is it not ? And you 
 won't get the blessing until you do. " With the mouth confession 
 is made unto salvation." The fact of the matter is that we are all 
 moral cowards ; we are ashamed to come out and confess Christ 
 and take our stand on the Lord's side, and on the side of His 
 religion. 
 
 It is the only religion in the world that is worth having ; it is 
 the only religion in the world that gives life to man ; but, strange 
 to say, I believe we are the only people on earth who are ashamed 
 of their religion. You cannot find a man who holds any false doc- 
 trine of religion who is not proud of it. If a man has got hold of 
 
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 REV. R. A. TORREY 
 
 MR. MOODY S CO-LABORER IN HIS CHICAGO MISSION
 
 CONFESSING CHRIST. 257 
 
 myself want to." I said, " Thank God for that ; that man has more 
 courage ; he is willing to let the world know that he wants to be on 
 the Lord's side. " I never yet have seen a man who came out boldly in 
 that way but that he surely turns out all right at last. Look at the 
 9th chapter of Luke, the 23d verse : "And He said unto them 
 all, If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself and take 
 up his cross daily and follow me." 
 
 TRYING TO GET TO HEAVEN WITHOUT A CROSS. 
 
 But the cross is what men do not like ; they want to get to 
 heaven without taking up the cross any way but that. If men 
 could buy salvation, they would be willing to pay a good price for 
 it ; they would go round the world to get to heaven without the 
 burden of the cross. The way to heaven is straight as an arrow ; 
 it is perfectly straight. A man need not be in darkness about the 
 way if he really wants to know. But on the way to heaven there 
 is a cross, and if you try to go around it, or to step over it, or to do 
 anything else than take it up and bear it onward, you get lost. 
 When men are ready to follow Christ, to deny themselves, and 
 humble themselves, and take up the cross, then salvation is ready 
 for them. Satan puts a straw across our path and magnifies it and 
 makes us believe it is a mountain, but all the devil's mountains are 
 mountains of smoke ; when you come up to them they are not there, 
 but mere mountains of smoke. 
 
 Now there is nothing to hinder this whole audience from 
 coming out on the Lord's side to-night, and confessing Jesus 
 Christ to be their Saviour; there is nothing but your will to prevent 
 it. Satan has not the power to keep you from it if you will. 
 Christ says, except a man become converted and like a little child 
 he is not fit for the kingdom of God. Pride, I think, is the worst 
 enemy we have. It keeps thousands of people out of the kingdom 
 of God. The idea that we have to humble ourselves and become 
 like a little child is too much for our pride, but, " whosoever shall 
 save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose his life for My 
 sake shall find it ; " but, " whosoever shall be ashamed of Me and 
 
 of My word, of him shall the Son of Man be ashamed, when He 
 17
 
 264 CONFESSING CHRIST. 
 
 But this man began to publish it, and it says that all men 
 did marvel. They wouldn't have it that the Son of God did it. 
 The man had never been to college. I don't know as he could 
 write his name; I don't know as he had ever been to school. 
 There was one thing he did know: he knew the Son of God had 
 healed him and had put a new song into his mouth. Christ says, 
 " Go home and tell your friends what great things the Lord has 
 done." Thus he had the highest eloquence; he had the eloquence 
 of heaven. The spirit of the Lord God was upon him. Yes, but 
 some of these women say u If I was only a man, I would confess." 
 
 WOMAN THAT STIRRED A WHOLE TOWN. 
 
 Look into the 4th chapter of John. There was a woman that 
 stirred up the whole town ; she took one draught of the living 
 water and when she went to publish it, she says, "Come and see 
 the man that told me everything I ever did; is not this Christ?" 
 And then it says that many believed her testimony, and then they 
 got Christ into town and He stayed there two or three days and 
 many more believed on account of His own works. I wish we had 
 a few more women like the woman of Samaria, willing to confess 
 what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for our souls. 
 
 Now, there is one man in the Qth chapter of John I want to 
 call your attention to. I do not know his name ; I wish I did, 
 because he is one of the men I want to see when I get to heaven. 
 I would like to read the whole chapter, but it is so long. I will 
 just read a few verses in the ninth verse or eighth verse. It is 
 that blind man that Christ gave sight to. Here is a whole chapter 
 in John of forty-one verses, just to tell how the Lord blessed that 
 blind beggar. It was put in this book, I think, just to bring out 
 the confession of that man. "The neighbors, therefore, and they 
 which before had seen him which was blind, said, Is not this he 
 that sat and begged. Some said this is he; others said, he is like 
 him; but he said I am he." 
 
 If it had been our case I think we would have kept still ; we 
 would have said, "there is a storm brewing among the Pharisees, 
 and they have said "If any man acknowledges Christ we will put
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Compassion of Christ. 
 
 <T WANT to call your attention this evening to just one word 
 I Compassion. Some time ago I took up the Concordance, and 
 ran through the life of Christ to see what it was that moved 
 Him to compassion, for we read often in His life, while He was 
 down here, that He was moved with compassion. I was deeply 
 pleased in my own soul, as I ran through His life and found those 
 passages of Scripture that tell us what moved Him with compassion. 
 In the 1 4th chapter of Matthew and i4th verse we find these words: 
 " And Jesus went forth and saw a great multitude, and was moved 
 with compassion toward them, and He healed their sick" 
 
 He saw the great multitude and He was moved with com- 
 passion, and He healed their sick. And in another place it says 
 that He healed all that had need of it. There didn't any one need 
 to tell Him what was in the hearts of the people. When I stand 
 before an audience like this, I cannot read your history, but He 
 knew the history of each one. It says in one place in Scripture, 
 "each heart knows its own bitterness," and when Christ stood 
 before a multitude like this, He knew the particular bitterness 
 in each heart ; He could read every man's biography ; He knew the 
 whole story ; and, as he stood before that vast multitude the heart 
 of the Son of God was moved with compassion, just as in the pre- 
 ceding verses we find Him, when John's disciples had come to Him 
 with their sad story, and with broken hearts. 
 
 Their beloved master had just been beheaded by the wicked 
 King ; they had just buried the headless body, and came to Jesus 
 to tell all their sorrow to Him. It was the best thing they could do. 
 No one could sympathize with them as Jesus could, no one had the 
 same compassion with them that Jesus had. In all our troubles the 
 best thing we can do is to follow in the footsteps of John's disciples, 
 and tell it all to Him. He is a high-priest that can be touched with 
 
 268
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 What Seek Ye ? 
 
 'HBRB are two things I want to call your attention to this 
 afternoon. The first is in the words of the ist chapter oi 
 John, 38th verse, and the second is in the 6th chapter oj 
 Matthew, 33d verse. The first text is the first words that fell 
 from the lips of Christ at the commencement of His ministry. It 
 was the question He put to those two disciples that came and ques- 
 tioned Him as to where He dwelt. 
 
 One afternoon, about four o'clock, John the Baptist stood with 
 two of his disciples, and Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, a little 
 way off, and John lifted up his hand and pointed to the man off in 
 the distance, and said: " Behold the Lamb of God that taketh 
 away the sins of the world !" and John the beloved disciple, and 
 Andrew, left their old master and went together toward Jesus, and 
 Jesus turned around as they came up to Him and said : " What 
 seek ye ?" I thought this afternoon I would like for a few moments 
 to call your attention to that text and press that question home 
 upon the people here. I would like to have all of you ask your- 
 selves the questions. What are you seeking ? What did you come 
 for what motive brought you here this afternoon ? What do these 
 great crowds of people here mean, day after day, week after week ? 
 There were all classes of people seeking for Christ, and they 
 had every kind of motive for seeking Him. There were some who 
 came out of curiosity, just to see what would happen. There was 
 another class who came to Him just because they had friends that 
 were diseased, and they wanted their friends to be healed and blessed. 
 There was the class who came with the hope of getting the loaves 
 and fishes. And there was still another class that were trying to 
 murder Him and to get Him out of the way ; they were watching 
 Him and striving to get Him into some conversation in which they 
 might entangle Him with His words, and so get an excuse to bring 
 
 277
 
 WHAT SEEK YE? 281 
 
 bank account was swelling. " Soul, take thine ease ; thou hast 
 much goods laid up for many days." He never thought of the 
 future ; the present was all he cared anything about. But in his 
 fancied security he heard the dread and startling summons, " Thou 
 fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee." He had to 
 leave all these things behind him ; death snatched him away, and 
 he lost the heaven he had neglected to make sure of on earth. 
 
 I heard a story of a young lady who was deeply concerned 
 about her soul. Her father and mother, however, were worldly 
 people. They thought lightly of her serious wishes ; they did not 
 sympathize with her state of mind. They made up their minds that 
 she should not become a Christian, and tried every way they could 
 to discourage her notions about religion. At last they thought 
 they would get up a large party, and thus with gayety and pleasure 
 win her back to the world. 
 
 THE BELLE OF THE BALL. 
 
 So they made every preparation for a gay time ; they even sent 
 to neighboring towns and got all her most worldly companions to 
 come to the house ; they bought her a magnificent silk dress and 
 jewelry, and decked her out in all the finery of such an occasion. 
 The young lady thought there would be no harm in attending the 
 party ; that it would be a trifling affair, a simple thing, and she 
 could, after it was over, think again of the welfare of her soul. She 
 went decked out in all her adornments, and was the belle of the 
 ball. Three weeks from that night she was on her dying bed. She 
 asked her mother to bring her ball dress in. She pointed her finger 
 at it, and, bursting into tears, said, " That is the price of my soul." 
 She died before the dawn. 
 
 Oh, my friends, if you are anxious about your soul, let every- 
 thing else go ; let parties and festivals pass. Seek ye first the 
 Kingdom of God ; then all these things will be added unto you. 
 God commands you to do it. If you are lost if you die in your 
 sin whose fault is it ? God has commanded you to repent and 
 to seek salvation at once. 
 
 Are any of you going to take the responsibility of putting it
 
 282 WHAT SEEK YE? 
 
 off? You complain because Christ is urged upon you ; you com- 
 plain because your friends are anxious about you. How can they 
 be otherwise than anxious ? You heard what Mr. Sankey said a 
 little while ago about the death of a husband of one of our choir. 
 This morning, while I was preaching, he passed away. We prayed 
 for him at the opening, and again at the close of that service, but 
 he was gone before we got through. Three of the ushers have been 
 taken away since I have been preaching here. 
 
 A CLEAR TITLE. 
 
 When I got up here to preach this afternoon I said to myself: 
 " Perhaps it is my turn next." But, thank God, I have an interest 
 up yonder. I can read my title clear there. I have sought and 
 found Christ. But on the other hand, see how people go on day by 
 day and year by year and disobey the command of God. They say 
 there is plenty of time. Why, you hear every day of wills being 
 upset because the man's mind was proved not to be clear when 
 he made the will on his death-bed. If his mind is not clear 
 enough when he is dying to settle his little affairs here below, is 
 that a time to repent and make provision for eternity ? Is it the 
 time, when we are racked with pain and tortured with anguish, to 
 turn our hearts to God ? Is that a time to begin to think of salva- 
 tion ? Is it right or honorable to give the dregs of a wasted and 
 misspent life to God? 
 
 I tell you I have not much faith in death-bed repentances. I 
 do not limit the power and mercy of God, but I do not believe in 
 them. If there is one out of a thousand that are saved, there are 
 nine hundred and ninety-nine that are lost. They think that they 
 repent then, but they are scared and terrified ; it is not repentance, 
 it is fear ; when they get better, they go right back again to their 
 wicked ways. We cannot scare people into repentance ; they must 
 be born in, not be scared in. 
 
 Let us reason for a moment. Suppose you ask the advice of a 
 friend on the earth as to whether you had not better repent now. 
 While I am preaching, young lady, just ask your mother sitting 
 beside you what you had better do. Whisper to her I'll excuse
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 "To Every Man His Work." 
 
 <T WANT to call your attention to a verse you will find in the 
 I 1 3th chapter of Mark, part of the 34th verse " To every man 
 
 his work." " For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far 
 journey, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and 
 to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch." Now, 
 by reading that verse carefully it don't read, " to every man some 
 work," or " to every man a work," but " to every man his work." 
 And I believe, if the truth was known, that every man and woman 
 in this assembly has a work laid out for them to do ; that every 
 man's life is a plan of the Almighty, and way back in the councils 
 of eternity God laid out a work for each one of us. 
 
 There is no man living that can do the work that God has got 
 for me to do. No one can do it but myself. And if the work ain't 
 done we will have to answer for it when we stand before God's bar. 
 For it says: " Every man shall be brought unto judgment, and 
 every one shall give an account of the deeds done in the body." 
 And it seems to me that every one of us ought to take this ques- 
 tion home to-night: "Well, am I doing the work that God has for 
 me to do?" God has got a work for every one of us to do. 
 
 Now, in the parable the man who had two talents had the same 
 reward as the man who had five talents. He heard the same words 
 as the man who had five talents: "Well done, thou good and 
 faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." The men 
 that take good care of the talents that God has loaned them, he 
 always gives them more. But if we take the talent that God has 
 given us and lay it away carefully in a napkin and bury it away, 
 God will take even that from us. God don't want a man that has 
 got one talent to do the work of a man that has got ten. All a 
 man has got to answer for is the one that God has given each man. 
 
 If we are all of us doing the work that God has got for us to 
 286
 
 292 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 
 
 I have known a great many ministers who wanted to know 
 how they could keep their congregation out of the world. Give 
 them so much to do that they won't have time to cherish worldly 
 influences. This young lady of whom I was speaking came home, 
 and her father and mother wanted her to shine in fashionable 
 society. No, she said she had got something better than that. 
 She went to the Sabbath-school superintendent, and said to him, 
 "Can you give me a class in the Sunday-school?" He was sur- 
 prised that this young lady should want that. He told her that 
 he had no class he could give her then. 
 
 CHASED BY THE OLD SHOEMAKER. 
 
 She went away with a resolve to do what she could outside 
 of the school. One day, as she was walking up the street, she 
 saw a little boy running out of a shoemaker's shop, and behind 
 him was the old shoemaker chasing him with a wooden last in his 
 hand. He had not run far until the last was thrown at him, and 
 he was struck in the back. The boy stopped and began to cry. 
 The spirit of the Lord touched that young lady's heart and she 
 went to where he was. She stepped up to him, and asked him if 
 he was hurt. He told her it was none of her business. She went 
 to work then to win that boy's confidence. She asked him if he 
 went to school. He said, "No." "Well, why don't you go to 
 school?" "Don't want to." She asked him if he would not like 
 to go to Sunday-school. "If you will come," she said, "I will tell 
 you beautiful stories and read nice books." 
 
 She coaxed and pleaded with him, and at last said that if he 
 would consent to go, she would meet him on the corner of a street 
 which they should agree upon. He at last consented, and the 
 next Sunday, true to his promise, he waited for her at the place 
 designated. She took him by the hand and led him into the 
 Sabbath-school. " Can you give me a place to teach this little 
 boy?" she asked of the superintendent. He looked at the boy, 
 but they didn't have any such looking little ones in the school. 
 A place was found, however, and she sat down in the corner and 
 tried to win that soul for Christ.
 
 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 293 
 
 Many would look upon that with contempt, but she had got 
 something to do for the Master. The little boy had never heard 
 anybody sing so sweetly before. When he went home he was 
 asked where he had been. "Been among the angels," he told his 
 mother. He said he had been to the Sabbath-school, but his 
 father and mother told him he must not go there any more, or he 
 would get a flogging. The next Sunday he went, and when he 
 came home he got the promised flogging. He went the second 
 time and got a flogging, and also a third time with the same result. 
 At last he said to his father, "I wish you would flog me before I 
 go, and then I won't have to think of it when I am there." The 
 father said, "If you go to that Sabbath-school again I will kill 
 you." 
 
 HOW THE BOY SPENT HIS SATURDAYS. 
 
 It was the father's custom to send his son out on the street to 
 sell articles to the passers-by, and he told the boy that he might 
 have the profits of what he sold on Saturday. The little fellow 
 hastened to the young lady's house and said to her, "Father said 
 that he would give me every Saturday to myself, and if you will 
 just teach me then I will come to your house every Saturday after- 
 noon." I wonder how many young ladies there are that would give 
 up their Saturday afternoons just to lead one boy into the Kingdom 
 of God. 
 
 Every Saturday afternoon that little boy was there at her 
 house, and she tried to tell him the way to Christ. She labored 
 with him, and at last the light of God's spirit broke upon his heart. 
 One day while he was selling his wares at the railroad station, a 
 train of cars approached unnoticed and passed over both his legs. 
 A physician was summoned, and the first thing after he arrived, 
 the little sufferer looked up into his face and said, " Doctor, will I 
 live to get home?" " No," said the doctor, "you are dying." "Will 
 you tell my mother and father that I died a Christian?" They 
 bore home the boy's corpse and with it the last message that he 
 died a Christian. 
 
 Oh, what a noble work was that young lady's in saving that
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 The Six "One Things." 
 
 T WANT to call your attention this afternoon to six " One 
 $ Things." The first, Mark x. 21 : " One thing thou lackest." 
 
 We very often hear people say, " Oh, well ; he is a very good 
 man," or, " She is a very, very good person ; but she lacks one 
 thing," or, " He lacks one thing." But if that one thing is salva- 
 tion, why, he lacks everything. You might say all that a dead 
 man lacks is life. That is all. All that a beggar lacks is money 
 to make him rich. Only one thing ! A sick man that is lying 
 right on the borders of the eternal world only lacks his health to 
 make him all right. 
 
 That is one thing, but it is everything to a man that is sick. 
 Money is everything to a man in want a beggar ; and if a 
 man lacks salvation he lacks everything ; and it seems to me it 
 would be well for us just to pause in life once in a while and ask 
 ourselves the question, " Do we lack that one thing ?" Now, that 
 young man spoken of here came to Christ, and Christ, beholding 
 him, loved him. He was a noble young man. He tried to save 
 himself by the law. He had the law and the prophets ; but when 
 Christ just touched his heart for he had his heart set on his pos- 
 sessions he found that he did not love God with all his heart; 
 he did not love his neighbor as himself. He thought he did; 
 but he didn't know himself. He spoke very well of himself. He 
 had a good opinion of himself. 
 
 There are a great many such people, and it is almost im- 
 possible to do them good. It is a good deal better for God to 
 say, " Well done !" than for us. It is a good deal better for 
 God to say we lack nothing than it is for us to say ourselves 
 we are not lacking. 
 
 I am told Whitfield once was a guest of a General high in 
 position, and Whitfield's courage failed him. He wanted to speak 
 296
 
 300 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 
 
 And another thing : I don't believe we will have any peace or 
 comfort or joy until this question of assurance is settled. Some 
 people say, " It is presumption for you to stand up there and say you 
 know you are saved." I say it is presumption for me to stand up 
 here and say I doubt it when God has said it. Shall I doubt God's 
 own word ? 
 
 But you say it is too good to be true. Then you must go and 
 settle that thing with the Lord, not with me. I take it as I find it in 
 the Word of God. Do you think He is going to leave His children 
 down here in the dark world to go through life with terrible uncer- 
 tainties, not knowing whether we are going to glory or perdition ? 
 There is no knowledge like that of a man who knows he is 
 saved, who can look up and see his "title clear to mansions in 
 the skies." 
 
 EMPEROR MADE HIM CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD. 
 
 It is said of Napoleon that while he was reviewing his army 
 one day, his horse became frightened at something, and the Em- 
 peror lost his rein, and the horse went away at full speed, and the 
 Emperor's life was in danger. He could not get hold of the rein, 
 and a private in the ranks saw it, and sprang out of the ranks 
 towards the horse, and was successful in getting hold of the horse's 
 head at the peril of his own life. The Emperor was very much 
 pleased. Touching his hat, he said to him, " I make you Captain 
 of my Guard." The soldier didn't take his gun and walk up there. 
 He threw it away, stepped out of the ranks of the soldiers, and 
 went up to where the body-guard stood. The captain of the body- 
 guard ordered him back into the ranks, but he said "No! I won't 
 go!" "Why not?" " Because I am Captain of the Guard." "You 
 Captain of the Guard?" "Yes," replied the soldier. "Who said 
 it ?" and the man pointing to the Emperor, said, " He said it." 
 
 That was enough. Nothing more could be said. He took the 
 Emperor at his word. My friends, if God says anything let us 
 take Him at His word. "He that believeth on the Lord Jesus 
 Christ shall not perish, but have everlasting life." Don't you 
 believe it? Don't you believe you have got everlasting life? It
 
 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 307 
 
 to be the worst thing you could have done, and the thing you have 
 least hope of may turn out to be your greatest success. 
 
 An old woman who was seventy-five years old had a Sabbath- 
 school two miles away among the mountains. One Sunday there 
 came a terrible storm of rain, and she thought at first she would 
 not go that day, but then she thought, ' ' What if some one should 
 go and not find me there ? " Then she put on her waterproof, and 
 umbrella, and over-shoes, and away she went through the storm, 
 two miles away, to the Sabbath-school in the mountains. When 
 she got there she found one solitary young man, and taught him 
 the best she knew how all the afternoon. She never saw him 
 again, and I don't know but the old woman thought her Sabbath 
 had been a failure. 
 
 OLD WOMAN RECEIVED A LETTER. 
 
 That week the young man enlisted in the army, and in a year 
 or two after the old woman got a letter from the soldier thanking 
 her for going through the storm that Sunday. This young man 
 thought that stormy day he would just go and see if the old 
 woman was in earnest, and if she cared enough about souls to go 
 through the rain. He found she came and taught him as carefully 
 as if she was teaching the whole school, and God made that the 
 occasion of winning that young man to Christ. When he lay dying 
 in a hospital he sent the message to the old woman that he would 
 meet her in heaven. 
 
 Was it not a glorious thing that she did not get discouraged 
 because she had but one school and scholar ? Be willing to work 
 with one. Bear in mind the words, " This one thing I do." I live 
 for souls and for eternity ; I want to win some soul to Christ. If 
 you want this and work for it, eternity alone can tell the result. 
 May God give us a passion for souls. 
 
 When Joshua was one hundred and ten years old, the old war- 
 rior lay dying, and he called the Elders in Israel around him, and 
 as they gathered around his bedside, he gave these words as his 
 dying testimony. There stand the Blders in Israel and he was the 
 last one of the great leaders alive. Moses was gone, Aaron was
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 Christ's Call to Peter. 
 
 fWANT to call your attention this afternoon to the life of Peter. 
 If you will just turn your Bibles to the first chapter of John, 4oth 
 
 verse, that is the first glimpse we get of him : " One of the 
 two which heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon 
 Peter's brother. He first findeth his own brother, Simon, and saith 
 unto him, we have found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, 
 the Christ. And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus 
 beheld him, He said, Thou art Simon, the Son of Jona; thou shalt 
 be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, a stone." That is 
 John's first account of Peter and Christ's meeting, the first time 
 they met. Then in Matthew, in the 4th chapter, i8th verse, we 
 find that they met again, and I have an idea that that account in 
 John was that Peter was called to be a disiciple, a follower of 
 Christ; but in Matthew, iv., 18, he is called from his business, his 
 occupation, to become an apostle and a worker in the vineyard. 
 
 The i8th verse says: "And Jesus, walking by the sea of 
 Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his 
 brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers. And 
 He saith unto them, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. 
 And they straightway left their nets, and followed Him." 
 
 One thought I want to call your attention to is this: that 
 before a man leaves his occupation, whatever his business may 
 be, to give his whole life and service to God, he must be sure he 
 has got the call, u Follow thou me." I think there are great mis- 
 takes being made every year by men who would make good far- 
 mers, carpenters, and mechanics, perhaps by those who would make 
 good business men, giving up their occupation and attempting to 
 preach, to work for God. 
 
 Now, I don't know how many men have come to me during 
 the past few months and asked my advice about their going into 
 
 309
 
 310 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 
 
 the ministry. I never advised a man in my life to go into the 
 ministry. I don't think I ever shall, for I think the ministry is too 
 high a calling for a man to be influenced to enter it by anybody. 
 He must get a higher call than from man. He wants to get a call 
 from above. If God calls him into His service, to leave all and 
 become a "fisher of men," he won't fail. One reason why so many 
 break down in the pulpit is because they run before they are sent, 
 in fact before they are called at all, and the result is so many 
 failures. Now let us be sure we have got a call before we give up 
 our business to go into the service of the Lord, and one good way 
 to tell whether you have got that call is : Has God used you ? 
 
 TRIED BY A PRACTICAL TEST. 
 
 I think Wesley had a good idea of it. When a man came to 
 him and asked him if he should enter the ministry, he used to ask 
 him: "Has God blessed you? Have there been any souls con- 
 verted under your efforts ? How is it when you preach ; do people 
 go to sleep under it or wake up ? Do some get mad and some get 
 converted ?" He thought that was a good sign that they had been 
 called to the ministry, for that is what the Gospel does, for it wakes 
 up some and brings them to the feet of Christ. It is better if they 
 get mad, for then there is some hope of their getting over it and 
 becoming Christians ; but if they go to sleep they may make up 
 their minds they are not called. We don't want that. 
 
 Now, undoubtedly, Peter, after he met Christ, went about fish- 
 ing, and undoubtedly he was a successful man at that work. He 
 stayed there until Christ came along one day and told him, " Follow 
 me.'' There is something very sweet about this, that when He 
 called Peter to His service the thing He said was, " Follow me." 
 Christ said to Peter, " Follow thou me," and as long as Peter fol- 
 lowed Him he was successful. As long as any of us will follow 
 Christ we will be successful, successful in everything we under- 
 take to to do. Christ never failed in anything He undertook to do. 
 God never failed. It is man that is constantly failing ; but if we 
 get our orders from above and God calls us we cannot fail. It is 
 utterly impossible.
 
 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 313 
 
 edict had gone forth. " You are around among the people, preach- 
 ing in the towns and villages, and whom do the people say I am ? 
 What do they say ?" 
 
 "Well, some say that Thou art John the Baptist, and some 
 say Elias, and others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets," and He 
 saith unto them, " But whom say ye that I am ?" 
 
 There was the question brought home to them. They had 
 strong faith in Him, and strong love for Him, but they would not 
 confess Him because if they did they would go out of the Syna- 
 gogue. "Now, whom do you say I am?" "And Simon Peter 
 answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." 
 
 PETER'S FRANK CONFESSION. 
 
 That is who He was Christ, the Son of the living God. That 
 put Peter out of the Synagogue. He could not get in after that. 
 He had made his confession. "And Jesus answered and said unto 
 Him : Blessed art thou Simon Barjona ; for flesh and blood hath 
 not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." It 
 seems as if Christ was always, when down here, was all the time 
 trying to find some one willing to confess Him. It was to Him 
 like a cup of water to a thirsty man to find in this dark world a 
 man ready to say He was all He professed to be. 
 
 There are men now trying to make out that Jesus was not the 
 Lord divine, the Lord of glory, the Lord of heaven ; that He was 
 not what He professed to be ; but, ah ! thank God ! there were some 
 men that believed in Him, stood by Him, confessed Him, M'ere not 
 ashamed of Him ; and, thank God! they live to-day, their influence 
 lives to-day, here in this city, at the close of the nineteenth century, 
 because they took their stand and were not ashamed to confess 
 Him. 
 
 But now turn to the 9th chapter of Luke, 28th verse. Here 
 is Peter turning his eyes toward Rome, getting to worship the 
 saints, and not knowing the difference between Christ and Moses 
 and Klias. The idea that Peter should put Christ on the same 
 level with Elias and Moses. " And it came to pass about eight 
 days after these sayings, He took Peter and John and James and
 
 320 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 
 
 But now they start back into the city with Christ. They have 
 got him under arrest, and the next thing is, Peter follows Him 
 afar off. This is the fourth step of Peter's downfall. When Chris- 
 tians get to following Christ afar off you may know it won't be long 
 before they will deny Him. If there was any night when Christ 
 needed Peter it was that night. 
 
 If there was any night when He needed His little band around 
 Him it was that night, He did not want to be forsaken that night, 
 but at that very hour Peter was following Him afar off. How many 
 Christians to-day are following Him afar off. How the cause of 
 Christ to-day needs everyone that professes to be a follower of Jesus, 
 and how we ought to come out and follow Him boldly and gladly. 
 The first words were "Follow me," as He took Peter from his 
 business and now he follows Him afar off. 
 
 PETER'S BASE DENIAL. 
 
 The next thing is we find him with the enemies of Jesus 
 Christ. It won't be long before from following afar off we will be 
 with Christ's enemies. There he is among Christ's enemies. That 
 is the next step, and at last one comes in and looks at him and 
 says, "You are one of His disciples?" "No, I am not." He 
 denies it. The man that had been with him for three years says, 
 " I am not His disciple. I don't know Him." " I believe you are." 
 "Well, I am not." I suppose he thought that was the end of it; 
 that it was all settled. A little while after another came and 
 looked at him saying : " This man is one of that Galilean's fol- 
 lowers." " I am not," says Peter. " I am not. Don't you accuse 
 me of that. I tell you I don't know anything about it." "Well, 
 you look very much like a man I have seen with Him. I was out 
 there in the wilderness when he fed the five thousand, and if you 
 are not one of the men who passed around the bread you look very 
 much like him." And Peter says, " I am not the man. Don't you 
 accuse me of that." 
 
 Thus Peter denies Him. And by-and-by another man comes 
 up and he, too, recognizes Peter and says, "Surely thou are one of 
 His disciples, and Peter denies Him again. The third man comes
 
 WANAMAKER FALLS-NORTH Fl ELD
 
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 ONE OF MR. MOODY'S MOST TRUSTED AND SUCCESSFUL HELPERS
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 Decision. 
 
 will find my text this afternoon in the 27th chapter of the 
 A gospel according to Matthew, part of the 22d verse : " What 
 shall I then do with Jesns which is called Christ?" Our 
 last Sunday here has come, and I am speaking to many to-day 
 that will probably not be here again. Even if you should all 
 want to come you probably would not be able to; so to-day I want 
 to press this question home upon you. For ten weeks we have 
 been trying to preach to you about Christ, and tell you something 
 about Him. To be sure we have done it very poorly, but now the 
 time has come for us to close. It remains with you to say whether 
 these meetings shall close and leave you out of the ark or in it. 
 A good deal depends upon this afternoon's meeting. A solemn 
 question and a personal one is before you ; not what your neigh- 
 bors and friends are going to do, but " what shall I do with 
 Jesus ? " 
 
 Pilate was in great difficulty. The question had been sprung 
 upon him, as it were, suddenly. He had not heard about Christ 
 for ten weeks, as you have, nor, as it may be, for twenty-five or 
 forty or fifty years. He had not been proclaimed to Pilate as He 
 has been proclaimed in this Christian land. 
 
 We live within sight of the cross and of our Saviour glorified 
 in heaven, but Pilate only saw Him in His humiliation, when He 
 was condemned and cast out by His own nation. He was a 
 heathen man, wakened perhaps suddenly early one Saturday 
 morning, between the hours of six and seven, called into the judg- 
 ment hall in great haste to pass sentence upon a man that they 
 wanted to have put to death at once. They wanted him to sign the 
 death-warrant. They did not want any trial or examination. 
 
 But when Pilate looked at Him, he saw that he was a different 
 prisoner from, any he had had before. Pilate asked a few questions: 
 
 323
 
 326 DECISION. 
 
 for eternity for want of decision ! I believe in my soul that there 
 are more at this day being lost in this city for want of decision than 
 for any other thing. 
 
 O, my friends, what is your decision to-day ? What are you 
 going to do with Christ ? That is the question to-day. I do not 
 care much about the sermon ; if I could only get this text down 
 into your heart, get it down deep into your soul, I should feel I had 
 accomplished my work here. It is not preaching you want now ; 
 it is to come to a decision, to decide what you will do with God's 
 own Son ? He gave Him up freely for us all. Will you not receive 
 Him ? It is to have Him for our Saviour now, or at some future 
 day to have Him for our judge. 
 
 TRIES TO SHIRK RESPONSIBILITY. 
 
 Pilate, like every other sinner, wanted to get rid of the respon- 
 sibility. He did not like to be pressed to a decision. He shifted 
 the responsibility to Herod. But even Herod refused to take His 
 life, and sent Him back ; so Pilate tries again. He thinks he has 
 got a plan that will work. He puts it out of his own power foolish 
 man ! He ought to have decided " it" himself, and not left the 
 multitude to decide. He said, a I will put the question to them now 
 and get them to decide." Poor deluded man ! He thought they 
 would choose Jesus instead of Barabbas. 
 
 He did not know the depravity of man's heart, and how they 
 were in league with hell against Christ. He took the murderer and 
 highwayman, and asked them which one he should release, and the 
 multitude lifted up their voice and said, " Release unto us Barab- 
 bas." After they had made that decision the poor disapppointed 
 Governor said to them, " What shall I do with Jesus that was called 
 Christ ?" And they answered, " Let Him be crucified." 
 
 Let us look at Barabbas. It seems to me that there is no case 
 in the whole Bible where the great doctrine of substitution is 
 brought out better than in this one. There was a man condemned 
 in one of our Western cities. What troubled him the most was, 
 that the night he was to be executed, they were making the gallows 
 in the prison. He heard them sawing the planks and driving the
 
 DECISION. 329 
 
 Won't you stop just a moment and think, What shall I do with 
 Him ? One of two things you must do ; you must either receive 
 Him or reject Him. You receive Him here, and He will receive 
 you there ; you reject Him here and He will reject you there. O, 
 may every soul make up its mind where it will spend eternity ! 
 Whether it will be found in the world of light or in the dark cav- 
 erns of eternal woe. 
 
 ONE THING WEALTH COULD NOT BUY. 
 
 There was a young woman dying. Her father and mother 
 were wealthy. They had brought her up with every wish gratified. 
 She had lived in luxury. In worldly things she had wanted noth- 
 ing. Her parents bestowed upon her all that wealth could buy ; 
 but at last she was taken sick, and when she came down to the 
 bank of the river, she said : " Father and mother, won't you go with 
 me, it is dark ? " They wept bitterly over the dying child, but they 
 told her they could not go. Then she wanted them to pray for 
 her, but they didn't know how to pray. The father and the mother 
 stood at her bedside and sent for a minister, but it was too late. 
 When he arrived she was dead. 
 
 My friends, that dark hour will come to all of us. We must 
 pass through the valley of the shadow of death, and if we have 
 not Christ it will be very dark. A man became anxious for the 
 spiritual welfare of a friend. He went and asked him if he would 
 not come to Christ. The man was occupied in business ; he didn't 
 have time to seek the Kingdom of God. Time passed on, and one 
 day this kind friend heard that the man to whom he had spoken 
 was sick, that he had caught cold. The friend went to the sick 
 man's bedside, hoping to win the soul to Christ. He spoke to him 
 about Jesus, and begged him not to delay repentance. The man 
 said to the friend, " I wish you would come in to-morrow ; I don't 
 feel well enough to talk now, but come in to-morrow, and I will be 
 better." 
 
 The next day he went again, and the man said, " Don't talk 
 to me now ; I am not well enough yet." The next day he went 
 again, but the doctor had given orders that no one should go into
 
 332 DECISION. 
 
 You would not give up your home, your advantages, all your 
 friends, if you did not love the person. 
 
 So it is with Christ. You have been told about Him, read 
 about Him, and I have come to-day and asked you if you would 
 accept Him. I have come to-day to get a bride for my Master. I 
 have come to plead Christ's cause among you. Out of these 
 thousands of women are there not some who are willing to become 
 Christ's people? Is there one who will go with this man? Now, 
 just answer it in your own heart and say, "By the grace of God I 
 will accept Jesus. This very day and this very hour I will become 
 His." Now, just think a moment and answer the question, "What 
 shall I do with the Jesus who is called Christ?" 
 
 MADE A GREAT MISTAKE. 
 
 I remember when Mr. Sankey and myself were in Chicago 
 preaching. We had been five Sunday nights on the life of Christ. 
 We had taken Him from the cradle, and on the fifth night we had 
 just got Him up to where we have him to-day. He was in the 
 hands of Pilate, and Pilate didn't know what to do with Him. I 
 remember it distinctly, for I made one of the greatest mistakes 
 that night I ever made. After I had nearly finished my sermon I 
 said, "I want you to take this home with you, and next Sunday 
 night we will see what you will do with Him." 
 
 Well, after a while the meeting closed, and we had a second 
 meeting. The people gathered in the room, and Mr. Sankey dur- 
 ing the service sang a hymn, and as he got down to the verse 
 "The Saviour calls, for refuge fly," I saw I had made a mistake in 
 telling the people that next week they could answer. I saw that it 
 was wrong to put off answering the question. After the meeting 
 closed I started to go home. They were wringing the fire-alarm at 
 that time, and it proved to be the death knell of our city. I .didn't 
 know what it meant and so went home. That night the fire raged 
 through the city, destroying everything in its path, and before the 
 next morning the very hall where he had gathered was in ashes. 
 
 People rushed through the streets crazed with fear, and some 
 of those who were at the meeting were burned to death.
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 Man's Great Failure. 
 
 T WANT now to call your attention to a clause in that chapter I 
 I have just read, a part of the 22d verse : "For there is no differ. 
 
 ence" Now that is one of the verses, one of the portions of 
 Scripture, that the natural man don't like. I have had many a 
 quarrel with men on this verse, because we are just apt to think 
 we are a little better than our friends and our neighbors, and men 
 don't like to believe there is no difference. It is one of the greatest 
 lesssons a man has to learn that he is a sinner. If you don't 
 believe that you are sick you won't call in a physician. It is just 
 because the natural man don't like this text I have taken it to-night. 
 
 I have found out long ago that the lessons we don't like are 
 the best medicine for us. I can imagine there is some one here 
 who says, " I don't believe that statement, that there is no differ- 
 ence." I can imagine there is some one here who says, " Isn't it 
 better for a man to be a sober man than it is to be a drunkard ? 
 Isn't it better for a man to be honest than it is for a man to be dis- 
 honest ? " Yes, we will admit all that ; but that don't apply when 
 it comes to the great question of salvation. If a man has not been 
 saved from sin he must perish like the rest of the world. 
 
 Now if a man wants to find out what he is, let him turn to the 
 3d chapter of Romans. He can read his life there. If you want 
 to read your own biography, you need not write it yourself. Turn 
 to the 3d chapter of Romans, and it is all there written by a man 
 who knows a good deal more about us than we do about ourselves. 
 Christ was the only one that ever trod this earth that saw everything 
 in the heart of man. We read that he didn't commit himself, because 
 he knew their hearts. The heart is deceitful. Who can know it? 
 It is deceitful above all things, and it is desperately wicked. Now, 
 Satan either tries to make men believe that they are good enough 
 without salvation, or if he can't make them believe that, he tries to 
 
 333
 
 338 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 
 
 ment was, "Thou shall not have other gods." Then Moses and 
 Joshua go to have an interview with God, and the people whom 
 they had left behind at once begin to say, "Make us a god." And 
 the golden calf was made and they worshipped it. When Moses 
 and Joshua returned from Horeb they heard a great shout. Ha! 
 do you hear that shout? Is it the shout of victory, of those who 
 are rejoicing in conquest? No, it is the shout of the idolater. All 
 worshipped the golden calf. 
 
 BOWING DOWN TO A CALF. 
 
 It was an idolatrous shout that the prophets heard. The wor- 
 ship of the golden calf! You'll find it in this city. One man 
 says, Give me more money; another, Give me a seat in Congress; 
 another, Give me a bottle of rum. Ah, it's easy to condemn the 
 Israelites it is easy to smile, but beware that you are not guilty 
 of the same sin. Man was a failure under the judges, failure 
 under the prophets, and now for 2000 years under grace he has 
 been a most stupendous failure. Walk the streets and see how 
 quickly he goes to ruin. How many are hastening down to the 
 dark caves of sin ! Man in his best day, under the most favorable 
 circumstances, is nothing but a failure. 
 
 Imagine Noah stopping work on the Ark, and going on a 
 preaching tour. He tells the people of the Flood. He warns 
 them of their danger. He exhorts them to repent. All are to 
 perish, the wise, the rich, the great all, all are to perish when God 
 comes to judge. They mock at him, They tell him, "You'd 
 better go -back to your old Ark : do you think we will believe that 
 the rich, the priests, the great, the powerful, are going to perish as 
 you say?" They would mock, and would not believe. I can hear 
 over the waves, that proved the warning true, this one text, "All 
 have sinned and come short of the glory of God." 
 
 Take the people of Sodom. Do you believe they would believe 
 the warning voice, "No," they would say, "Sodom to be destroyed? 
 Nonsence; it was never more prosperous." They would not 
 believe, and didn't they all perish alike? I tell you there is no dif- 
 ference when God comes. It was my sad lot to be in Chicago
 
 340 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 
 
 was right, his friend had died for him. Christ died for me. The 
 wages of sin is death. Christ has received this payment. It is 
 the height of folly to bear this burden, when he can so easily step 
 out from under it. 
 
 A MAN WITHOUT ARMS. 
 
 In Brooklyn, I saw a young man go by without any arms. 
 My friend pointed him out, and told me his story. When the war 
 broke out he felt it to be his duty to go to the front. He was en- 
 gaged to be married, and while in the army letters passed frequently 
 between him and his intended wife. After the battle of the Wil- 
 derness the young lady looked anxiously for the accustomed letter. 
 At last one came in a strange hand. She opened it with trembling 
 fingers, and read these words : " We have fought a terrible battle. 
 I have been wounded so awfully that I shall never be able to sup- 
 port you more. A friend writes this for me. I love you more ten- 
 derly than ever, but I release you from your promise. I will not ask 
 you to join your life with the maimed life of mine." That letter 
 was never answered. The next train that left the young lady was 
 on it. She went to his hospital. She found out the number of 
 his cot and she went down the aisle, between the long rows of 
 wounded men. 
 
 At last she saw the number ; she threw her arms around his 
 neck and said : " I'll not desert you. I'll take care of you." He 
 did not resist her love. They were married, and there is no hap- 
 pier couple than this one. You're dependent on one another. 
 Christ says : " I'll take care of you. I'll take you to this bosom 
 of mine." That young man could have spurned her love; he 
 could, but he didn't. Surely you can be saved if you will accept 
 salvation of Him. Oh, that the grace of God may reach your 
 heart to-night, by which you may be brought out from under the 
 curse of the law.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 Taking God at His Word. 
 
 'HERB are times in meetings when I feel like bowing my head 
 and praying. It seems as if we had preaching enough for 
 ten weeks, day after day, night after night. I am sure 1 
 don't know how to present Christ in any other light than I have. 
 I've tried to tell you of His wonderful grace, and how full of love 
 He is; and now, after I have read a few verses of Scripture, I shall 
 call on some of our friends to tell you the way of life, in hopes that 
 you may get it from other lips if not from mine. Every soul here 
 to-night may be saved if he will only take God at His word. Let 
 me read from the i3th chapter of Acts, 39th verse. 
 
 I do not know of any verse in the whole Bible that puts the 
 way of life in clearer light than that 39th verse : " By Him all that 
 believe are justified from all things from which he could not be 
 justified by the law of Moses." So it is just simply to believe. 
 You say, What am I to believe? You are to believe God's Word; 
 you are to take God at His word and trust Him for salvation. If 
 you trust Him to keep you, He will keep you. He will save you 
 the moment you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Instead of 
 trying to trust Him, instead of trying to save ourselves, just drop 
 the word try and put the word " trust " in. He will justify us in 
 all things by just simply believing on Him. 
 
 I do not know any word that the inquirers stumble over more 
 than they do over that word believe. It is not any miraculous kind 
 of belief. Some people are waiting for some belief to come down 
 out of heaven. In their hearts they do not believe they can have 
 the same kind of faith in Him that they have in one another. It 
 is not any miraculous faith or belief we want. It is to put our 
 trust in God, and say with Job, " Though He slay me yet will I 
 trust in Him." "I will cast myself on the mercy of God." I 
 
 341
 
 PART III. 
 
 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS, 
 ANECDOTES AND INCIDENTS. 
 
 SHOW YOUR LIGHT. 
 
 A friend of mine was walking along the streets one dark 
 night, when he saw a man coming along with a lantern. As he 
 came up close to him, he noticed by the bright light that the man 
 had no eyes. He went past him ; but the thought struck him, 
 "Surely that man is blind !" He turned around and said, " My 
 friend, are you not blind ? " " Yes," was the answer. " Then 
 what have you got the lantern for ? " " I carry the lantern," said 
 the blind man, "that people may not stumble over me." Let us 
 take a lesson from that blind man, and hold up our light, burning 
 with the clear radiance of heaven, that men may not stumble 
 
 over us. 
 
 FAST TO THE SHORE. 
 
 I once heard of two men who, under the influence of liquor, 
 came down one night to where their boat was tied ; they wanted 
 to return home, so they got in and began to row. They pulled 
 away hard all night, wondering why they never got to the other 
 side of the bay. When the grey dawn of morning broke, behold, 
 they had never loosed the mooring line, or raised the anchor ! 
 And that's just the way with many who are striving to enter the 
 kingdom of heaven. They cannot believe, because they are tied 
 to this world. Cut the cord ! cut the cord ! Set yourselves free 
 from the clogging weight of earthly things, and you will soon go 
 
 on towards heaven. 
 
 LAZY CHRISTIANS. 
 
 A good many people are complaining all the time about them- 
 selves, and crying out: "My leanness! my leanness!" when 
 they ought rather to say, " My laziness ! my laziness !" 
 
 32 497
 
 498 MOODY' S ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 THE OLD MISER. 
 
 One of Mr. Moody' s favorite stories was about a converted 
 miser to whom a neighbor in distress appealed for help. The 
 miser decided to prove the genuineness of his coversion by giving 
 him a ham. On his way to get it the tempter whispered : " Give 
 him the smallest one you have." A mental struggle ensued, and 
 finally the miser took down the largest ham he had. " You are a 
 fool," the devil said, and the farmer replied, " If you don't keep 
 still I'll give him every ham in the smoke house ! " 
 
 A SKEPTIC ANSWERED. 
 
 Being interrupted by a man in his audience during a meeting, 
 Mr. Moody said : " My friend, if you will let me get through I 
 will listen to you all night. But don't stop me to ask skeptical 
 questions because they only strengthen my faith." 
 
 ONE PLACE OF SAFETY. 
 
 Out in our western country in the autumn, when men go 
 hunting, and there has not been any rain for months, sometimes 
 the prairie grass catches fire, and there comes up a very strong 
 wind, and the flames just roll along twenty feet high, and go at 
 the rate of thirty or forty miles an hour. 
 
 When the frontier-men see it coming, what do they do ? 
 They know they cannot run as fast as the fire can run. Not the 
 fleetest horse can escape from that fire. They just take a match 
 and light the grass around them, and let the fire sweep it, and 
 then they get into the burnt district and stand safe. They hear 
 the flames roar ; they see death coming towards them ; but they 
 do not fear, they do not tremble ; because the fire has passed over 
 the place where they are, and there is no danger. There it noth- 
 ing for the fire to burn. 
 
 There is one mountain peak that the wrath of God has swept 
 over ; that is Mount Calvary, and that fire spent its fury upon the 
 bosorn of the Son of God. Take your stand here by the cross, 
 and you will be safe for time and eternity.
 
 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 499 
 
 CHRIST'S FORGIVENESS FOR HIS MURDERERS. 
 
 I can imagine when Christ said to the little band around Him, 
 " Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel." Peter said, 
 " Lord, do you really mean that we are to go back to Jerusalem 
 and preach the Gospel to those men that murdered you?" "Yes," 
 said Christ, " go hunt up that man that spat in my face ; tell him 
 he may have a seat in my kingdom yet. Yes, Peter, go find that 
 man that made that cruel crown of thorns and placed it on my 
 brow, and tell him I will have a crown ready for him when he 
 comes into my kingdom, and there will be no thorns in it. Hunt 
 up that man that took a reed and brought it down over the cruel 
 thorns, driving them into my brow, and tell him I will put a 
 sceptre in his hand, and he shall rule over the nations of the 
 earth, if he will accept salvation. Search for the man that drove 
 the spear into my side, and tell him there is a nearer way to my 
 heart than that. Tell him I forgive him freely, and that he can 
 be saved if he will accept salvation as a gift. Tell him there is a 
 nearer way to my heart than that." 
 
 AN EARNEST LEADER. 
 
 Mr. Moody once consented to permit an expert in palmistry 
 to read his hand and was immensely pleased when told that his 
 distinguishing characteristics were love of his fellowmen and 
 ability as a leader. "That's good," said he. "I'll try to lead 
 every man in the world to Christ." 
 
 OVERCOMING JEALOUSY. 
 
 Here is a story that Mr. Moody told himself: " I found myself 
 in Chicago a few years ago getting jealous of a prominent clergy- 
 man. He was saying harsh things about me. I found that I was 
 feeling harshly toward him. I said to myself : ' Moody, this 
 won't do.' I went to him and told him that I wanted him to take 
 charge of a prominent meeting. He said he'd come. Then I 
 took pains to see that he should have a tremendously large audi- 
 ence. He preached a fine sermon. He came to me and said kind 
 words. Since then we have been great friends. Don't ever let 
 jealousy get control of you."
 
 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 501 
 
 TREATMENT OF CRITICS. 
 
 When Miss Helen Gould laid the corner stone at Overtoun 
 Hall, at Hast Northfield, Mr. Moody saw one of his relatives com- 
 ing toward the platform. The exercises had been started, but Mr. 
 Moody turned to his wife, and said, so that every one on the plat- 
 form could hear : " There comes Aunt Mandy Holton, mamma ; 
 make a good place for her on the platform," and his order was 
 carried out. " Aunt Mandy " had been one who criticised Mr. 
 Moody severely. 
 
 THE PLAGUE OF FROGS. 
 
 Look at poor old Pharaoh down there in Bgypt, when the 
 plague of frogs was on him. What an awful time he must have 
 had ! Frogs in the fields, and frogs in the houses ; frogs in the 
 bedrooms, and frogs in the kneading troughs. When the king 
 went to bed, a frog would j ump on to his face ; when he cut into a 
 loaf of bread, there was a frog in the middle of it. Nothing but 
 frogs everywhere ! Frogs, frogs, frogs ! He stood it as long as he 
 could ; and then he sent for Moses, and begged him to take them 
 away. " When would you like to have me do it?" says Moses. 
 Now just listen to what he says. You would think he would say, 
 Now ! this minute ! I have had them long enough ! But he says, 
 " To-morrow." Kept the frogs another day, when he might have 
 got rid of them at once ! That is just like you, sinner. You say 
 you want to be saved ; but you are willing to keep your hateful, 
 hideous sins until to-morrow, instead of being rid of them now. 
 
 HEELS VERSUS HEART 
 
 One of the seminary girls in Northfield intimated to Mr. 
 Moody that dancing among family friends was desirable. Mr. 
 Moody's reply was : " My dear girl, I would a thousand times 
 rather have you get more grace in your heart and less in your 
 
 heels." 
 
 HOW TO TREAT DISCOURAGEMENTS. 
 
 There is a large class of people who are always looking upon 
 the dark side. Some time ago, I myself got under the juniper 
 tree. In those days I used to fish all night, and catch nothing.
 
 504 MOODY' S ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 HOW TO MAKE CONFESSION. 
 
 Every man ought to make a public confession if his sin has 
 been public. Suppose, now, I have done this man a wrong, and 
 no one knows it but us two. Then the confession ought to be 
 between us two alone. I don't believe in making confession of 
 such a thing publicly ; it isn't called for. Suppose I had a diffi- 
 culty with my family. It ought to be settled with my family. It 
 needn't go forth to the world. But suppose I have been a public 
 blasphemer have been seen reeling in the streets of Northfield a 
 drunkard it is known by all the people here I ought to make 
 my confession so that the whole town will hear it, and the chances 
 are they will receive my testimony. 
 
 THE BELIEVER'S SECURITY. 
 
 What is it that protects the crown of Victoria ? It is the army. 
 The army keeps the crown perfectly safe. I remember in London 
 holding meetings in the Bast End, and as we were going along the 
 streets one night, we met some soldiers marching. I said : 
 "Where are those soldiers going?" "They are going to the 
 Bank of England." It was the law of the land that just as soon 
 as the sun went down, a certain number of soldiers went to the 
 Bank of England and stayed there till daybreak. That made the 
 bank perfectly safe. There was no chance for thieves to get in 
 there. So, if our life is hid in Christ, how are the powers of 
 darkness going to get at it ? 
 
 LIBERATED FROM PRISON. 
 
 There was a story told me while I was in Philadelphia by Capt. 
 Trumbull. He said when he was in I/ibby Prison the news came 
 that his wife was in Washington, and his little child was dying ; 
 and the next news that came was that his child was dead, and the 
 mother remained in Washington in hopes that her husband could 
 come with her and take that child off to New England and bury 
 it ; but that was the last he heard. One day the news came into 
 the prison that there was a boat up from City Point, and there 
 were over nine hundred men in the prison rejoicing at once. They 
 expected to get good news.
 
 506 MOODY' S ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 and at last there came the governor of the prison, bringing a dis- 
 patch from the Queen pardoning the man ! 
 
 O, they said, what joy there was in that cell, what joy there 
 was in that man's heart when deliverance came ! I have come to 
 bring you a proclamation of deliverance. You are slaves. Sen- 
 tence is out against you. You are already condemned, and wait- 
 ing for the execution. I have come to tell you of One who will 
 set you free if you will believe Him. 
 
 SOWING AND REAPING. 
 
 I remember reading in history that in the days of Louis XI. 
 he had a cruel, wicked bishop that was persecuting some of the 
 saints of the Most High God, and the king wanted to know how 
 he could make their punishment more cruel and bitter. " Well," 
 said the bishop, " make them a cage, and have it so short and 
 narrow they cannot lie down, and so low they cannot stand straight, 
 and they will have to be in a bent position all the while." The 
 king ordered the cage made, and the very first one that went into 
 that cage was the bishop himself. He had offended the king before 
 he got the cage finished, and for fourteen long years the king kept 
 him in that cage. He had to reap what he sowed. 
 
 ON DANGEROUS GROUND. 
 
 Be sure that your sin, young man, will find you out. It may 
 be this very day you took out of your employer's till twenty-five 
 cents. Perhaps last week you took fifty cents and went to the 
 theatre with it. But you say, " I will put it back some time." 
 That is the way these defaulters begin. That is the way men 
 that become forgers begin. Men don't go to a precipice 
 and jump down. They come down step by step. It is these 
 little things twenty-five cents or a dollar. You say, " I can 
 replace that any time ; that don't amount to anything." Ah, my 
 friends, " Be not deceived." A man that steals twenty-five cents 
 is just as much a thief as one that steals $5000. He has made 
 his conscience guilty. He is not the man he was before he took 
 it. He is laying a bad foundation, and if he attempts to build on 
 that foundation the structure will fall.
 
 MOO DV S ILLUSTRATIONS. 507 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF FREEDOM. 
 
 When Wilberforce was trying to get a bill through Parliament 
 to liberate all the slaves under the British flag, away off in the 
 islands subject to the British flag there was great excitement. 
 They were anxious to get their liberty. When they were expect- 
 ing the vessel which would bring the news that the bill had failed 
 or succeeded, thousands of people went down to the shore to get 
 the first news. The captain of the coming vessel knew how 
 anxious they were to get it. As soon as the vessel was in sight, 
 and he saw the multitude on the shore watching for him, he 
 shouted the words, " Free ! free ! free ! " and they all took up the 
 cry, and it spread through the island. 
 
 Oh, my friends, we came here to-day to proclaim the Gospel 
 message. " Free, free." You will never know what liberty is 
 until you know Christ. This very hour you can be free if you 
 want to be. We come to proclaim the Gospel of freedom here 
 
 to-day. 
 
 THAT COLD WORD "DUTY." 
 
 I am tired of the word duty ; tired of hearing duty, duty, 
 duty. Men go to church because it is their duty. They go to 
 prayer-meeting because it is their duty. You can never reach a 
 man's heart if you talk to him because it is your duty. Suppose 
 I told my wife I loved her because it was my duty what would 
 she say? Once every year I go up to Massachusetts to visit my 
 aged mother. Suppose, when I go next time, I tell her that I 
 knew she was old and that she was living on borrowed time ; that 
 I knew she had always done a great deal for me, and that I came 
 to see her every year because it was my duty. Don't you think 
 she would say, " Well then, my son, you needn't take the trouble 
 to come again?" L/et us strike for a higher plane. 
 
 PUT YOURSELF IN THEIR WAY. 
 
 There was a prominent minister in New York City a good 
 man too and one of his elders said to him : " Why can't we 
 have an inquiry meeting? It seems to me we might have a great 
 many converts just now." The minister said: "Well, just to
 
 510 MOODY' S ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Just that little kindness showed I was in sympathy with him. 
 Another young man, just out of the penitentiary, came to me, and 
 after I had talked with him for some time, he didn't seem to think 
 I was in sympathy with him. I offered him a little money, "No," 
 he said, "I don't want your money." " What do you want?" "I 
 want some one to have confidence in me." I got down and 
 prayed with him, and in my prayer I called him a brother and he 
 shed tears the moment I called him a brother. So if we are going 
 to reach men we must make them believe we are their brothers. 
 
 MORE LIFE WANTED. 
 
 I have come to this conclusion, that if we are going to have 
 successful Gospel meetings, we have got to have a little more life 
 in them. Life is found in singing new hymns, for instance. I 
 know some churches that have been singing about a dozen hymns 
 for the last twenty years, such hymns as " Rock of Ages," "There 
 is a fountain filled with blood," etc. The hymns are always good, 
 but we want a variety. We want new hymns as well as the 
 old ones. I find it wakes up a congregation very much to bring 
 in now and then a new hymn. 
 
 And if you cannot wake them up with preaching, let us sing 
 it into them. I believe the time is coming when we will make a 
 good deal more of just singing the Gospel. Then when a man is 
 converted, let us have him in these meetings, giving his testimony. 
 Some people are afraid of that. I believe the secret of John Wes- 
 ley's success was that he set every man to work as soon as he was 
 converted. Of course, you have to guard that point. Some say 
 they become spiritually proud no doubt of that ; but if they 
 don't go to work they become spiritually lazy, and I don't know 
 what's the difference. 
 
 BRINGING OUT LATENT TALENTS. 
 
 I believe there are a great many in our church prayer meet- 
 ings who could be brought out and made to be a great help if the 
 ministers would only pay their attention to it. How many lawyers, 
 physicians, public speakers we have who do nothing to actively
 
 
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 Mr. Moody's Marvellous Career is vividly depicted in this masterly work. It pictures him as 
 New England home; follows him to the city of Boston, where he goes to seek his fortune; relates 
 and victories ; tells of his great industry and perseverance, and describes the humble manner in i 
 
 grand work that later aroused the whole Christian world. 
 After Mr. Moody had carried on his missionary work in Chicago for several years, he and Mr. 
 
 evangelistic labors in England. This most interesting volume tells of the small beginnings; 1 
 overcome ; the rising tide of Evangelism ; the great multitudes who attended their meetings ; and 
 
 Enthusiasm that stirred Great Britain from centre to circumference. 
 As we follow these devoted men through Scotland and Ireland, and finally to London, the Gr 
 career reads more like a miracle than the actions of ordinary men. From the nobility to the d 
 
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 and the joy of all Christian people. 
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