L I B RA R.Y 
 OF THE 
 
 U N I VER.5 ITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 
 ^S'S. 
 
 B98c 
 
 1884- 
 
Return this book on or before the 
 Latest Date stamped below. 
 
 University of Illinois Library 
 
 L161 — H41 
 
 
 n. . 
 
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 Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2016 
 
 
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 https://archive.org/details/childrensbreadshOOwilm 
 

THE CHILDREN'S BREAD. 
 
®bt @f)tIBren’£ iSreaU. 
 
 SHORT SERMONS TO CHILDREN. 
 
 H 
 
 BY 
 
 WILMOT-BUXTON, 
 
 M.A., 
 
 VICAR OF S. G1LES-IN-TIIE-WOOD, NORTH DEVON, AUTHOR OF “MISSION SERMONS 
 FOR A YEAR,” “THE LORD’S SONG,” “THE LIFE WORTH LIVING,” 
 “SUNDAY SERMONETTES FOR A YEAR,” ETC. 
 
 Second Edition. 
 
 W. SKEFFINGTON & SON, 163. PICCADILLY. 
 
 1884, 
 

251 
 
 ini 
 
 TO 
 
 THE RIGHT REV. THE BISHOP OF BEDFORD, 
 
 (Suffragan Bishop for East London) 
 
 These Sermons 
 
 ARE (BY PERMISSION) DEDICATED. 
 
<£onuttts 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 TEE W A I TING - ROOM. 
 
 (Advent.) 
 
 i Cor. i. 7. page 
 
 u Waiting.” 1 
 
 SERMON II. 
 
 THE BEST BOOK 
 
 (Advent.) 
 
 Psalm cxix. 72. 
 
 “The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of 
 gold and silver.” xi 
 
 SERMON III. 
 
 A CHRISTMAS INVITATION. 
 
 (Christmas.) 
 
 S. Matthew xi. 28. 
 Gome unto Me.” 
 
 18 
 
viii. 
 
 SERMON XV. 
 
 TEE POWER OF TEE LOG. 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 Psalm xxii. 20. pace 
 
 “ Deliver . . . my darling from the power of the dog.” 26 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 TWO KINDS OF CLOTEING. 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 1 Peter v. 5. 
 
 “ Be clothed with humility." 38 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 SEASONABLE WORDS. 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 Proverbs xv. 23. 
 
 44 A word spoken in due season, how good is it.** 49 
 
 SERMON VII. 
 
 MOR E SEASONA RLE WORDS. 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 Proverbs xv. 23. 
 
 “A word spoken in due season, how good is it. 
 
 56 
 
ix. 
 
 SERMON VIII. 
 
 ABOUT GETTING ON, 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 S. Luke xiv. io. page 
 
 u Go up higher.” 64 
 
 SERMON IX. 
 
 THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE. 
 
 (Lent.) 
 
 2 Timothy ii. 3. 
 
 M A good soldier of Jesus Christ.’' 71 
 
 SERMON X. 
 
 THE PLEADING SAVIOUR. 
 
 (Good Friday.) 
 
 Hebrews vii. 25. 
 
 “ He ever liveth to make intercession for them.” 79 
 
 SERMON XI. 
 
 SOWING AND GATHERING , 
 
 (Easter.) 
 
 1 Cor. xy. 38. 
 
 “To every seed his own body. 1 
 
 88 
 
SERMON XII. 
 
 GOD'S GREAT FAMILY. 
 
 Psalm l. ii. page 
 
 14 1 know all the fowls of the mountains ; and the wild beasts 
 of the field are Mine.” 95 
 
 SERMON XIII. 
 
 LEARNING TO WALK. 
 
 Ephesians v. 8. 
 
 “ Walk as children of light.” 104 
 
 SERMON XIV. 
 
 A DUNCE OF FLOWERS. 
 
 1 Samuel xxv. 29. 
 
 “Bound in the bundle of life with the Lord thy God.” 113 
 
 SERMON XV. 
 
 SMALL THINGS. 
 
 Zechariah IV. 10. 
 
 44 Who hath despised the day of small things?” 119 
 
 SERMON XVI. 
 
 THE BRIGHT BROTHERHOOD. 
 
 Psalm xxxiv. 7. 
 
 “The Angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that 
 fear Him, and delivereth them,” 126 
 
€f)c ©fnUmn’g Uvcau, 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 THE WAITING-ROOM. 
 
 (aifbent.) 
 
 I COK. I. 7. 
 u Waiting.” 
 
 Once, when I was holding a Mission in the North 
 Country, we had a service in a waiting-room at a 
 railway-station. You must know, children, that I have 
 held services in many strange places ; in a coal-mine, far 
 away from the light of day ; on board ship ; on board 
 a coal-hulk on the Thames, where the captain lived in 
 the middle of the river, with his wife, and a family of 
 birds and rabbits ; once I preached on the top of a 
 heap of cinders; sometimes I have held a service 
 among the great red furnaces of an iron-works, or 
 
 A 
 
2 
 
 QLfyt Cfjtttfren’g 
 
 among the wheels of a cotton-mill, or in a big stable, 
 where hundreds of horses were kept. But the strangest 
 place of all for a service was, perhaps, the waiting-room. 
 I could not help thinking how this world of ours, in 
 which we live, is like a waiting-room. It is full of 
 people of all kinds and classes, all waiting. Most of 
 you children have travelled by train, and have seen the 
 waiting-room at a station. What different kinds of 
 people you find there ! There is an old man, with 
 bent back, and white hair, he won’t make many more 
 journeys. And there is a little child, with laughing 
 eyes, he has a long way to travel yet. There sits a 
 poor widow, with tears on her face, there is a very sad, 
 dark journey before her. There is a soldier with a 
 clanking s\^ord, and a sailor with a brown cheek, and a 
 Clergyman, all doing the same thing — old age, child- 
 hood, sorrowful and glad people, men of war and men 
 of peace, all waiting . They are waiting to go on a 
 journey, or waiting for some one to come to them. So 
 in this world, little children, there are all sorts and 
 conditions of men, women, and children, some merry, 
 some sad, some prosperous, some unfortunate, all 
 waiting to go on a journey, or for some one to come 
 to them. Do you know for whom we are all waiting, 
 here in the waiting-room of the world ? We are waiting 
 for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ ! And that 
 coming, or Advent, of which we are specially thinking 
 
Clje OTatttucpEnam. 
 
 3 
 
 at this season, will be sudden and unexpected, will it 
 not ? Jesus tells us, that he will come as a thief in the 
 night, and that no man, not even the angels, knows 
 the day of His Coming Well, supposing a dear friend 
 of yours promised to come and see you, and stay with 
 you ; and supposing he told you that his visit would be 
 quite uncertain, that he might come any day, what 
 would you do ? Surely you would prepare for him, and 
 make his room ready, so that he might not take you 
 unawares. Jesus Christ has promised to come again, 
 suddenly and unexpectedly. O my children, see that 
 His room be ready for Him. See that your hearts be 
 swept and garnished, and all the cobwebs and dust of 
 sin swept away ; so that whenever the Lord comes, 
 you may be able to say — 
 
 “ O come to my heart, Lord Jesus, 
 
 There is room in my heart for Thee.’ 
 
 And whilst we are waiting we must not be idle. When 
 the Lord comes, He expects to find His people watch- 
 ings and busy about their work, preparing for Him. I 
 have heard of a little boy who once said to his mother, 
 “ I wish I had lived when Jesus was on the earth, that 
 I might have done something for Him.” And his 
 mother answered, “ What could a little boy like you 
 have done for Jesus?” The child thought for a 
 moment, and then said, “ I would have run everywhere 
 doing his errands.” Now whilst you are waiting for 
 
4 
 
 Cljtftfrai’jS 33 rcatr* 
 
 His Coming, you can all go about on errands foi 
 Jesus. When you see a schoolmate in trouble, crying, 
 perhaps, and miserable ; and when, instead of laughing 
 at him, you go and say a kind word to him, and make 
 him forget his sorrow, then you are doing an errand for 
 Jesus. When you went to see the sick child who lives 
 in your street, and offered to sit and read to her, you 
 were going on an errand for Jesus. When you saw some 
 cruel boys throwing stones at the frogs in the village 
 pond, and when you stopped their cruel sport, you 
 were doing an errand for Jesus, for He Himself says, 
 “ In that ye have done it unto the least of these, ye 
 have done it unto me.” Every child, as well as every 
 man and woman, has an errand to do for Jesus. 
 
 And now I want you to think of something else. 
 We have talked about the waiting-room at the railway- 
 station, let us think about the railway itself. You have 
 all seen the trains running upon it, and most of you 
 have travelled on it yourselves. Well, I like to get a 
 sermon out of everything, and I believe this railway 
 can give us a sermon. You know that the trains have 
 a certain line of rails to run upon, and if they get off 
 the line all is confusion, and misery, and death. Now 
 you and I have a line to travel on through life, that is, 
 the line of duty, which is laid down for us by God Him- 
 self. If we get off that line, if we neglect our duty, 
 or do what we know to be wrong, we are sure 
 
OTatttncHftnom. 
 
 5 
 
 to cause harm and misery to ourselves and to others. 
 The lines of different railways go through very different 
 kinds of country. Some lie through flat, dull, uninter- 
 esting places : others among high mountains, and over 
 great rivers. Some lines of railway pass through bright 
 meadows and pretty stations, where the flowers grow ; 
 others are all black and ugly with the smoke and 
 factory chimneys. Children, our lives are like those 
 different railroads. Some of us lead a dull life, others 
 a busy, anxious life in a great city. Some few have 
 many pleasures, those are the flowers growing beside 
 the line. But, remember, wherever the railway may 
 go, the rails are the same. $ So whether our way of life 
 is bright or dark, we must try to keep on the line , the 
 line of duty. I suppose you all know that there are 
 certain parts of the railway called Points, where a train 
 can be turned from one line to another ? These Points 
 have to be most carefully watched and attended to, for 
 if a train is turned on to the wrong line there is sure to 
 be a disaster. For instance, a number of passengers 
 travelling on the up line might be turned on to the down 
 line, and presently there would be a terrible crash, and 
 the road would be strewed with killed and wounded 
 people Think now, are there not many such points 
 in your lives, turning-points, where two ways meet? 
 One such turning-point is when a child first goes to 
 school. Instead of home life, and a father’s wise 
 
I . 
 
 6 
 
 Cfje CgtRrrtn’tf 3teatf. 
 
 words, and a mothers teaching, there is the little world 
 of school, with plenty of good in it, and plenty of bad. 
 Then you will have to choose for yourselves, you can 
 choose your companions and your own course. O, my 
 children, be careful, mind the Points, get on the right 
 line of duty, and ask God to keep you there Don’t 
 let bad example turn you on to the wrong line of dis- 
 obedience, and idleness, and disgrace. For us all 
 there are two lines, two roads. Hear what God says 
 of them in the Bible : “ There is a way which seemeth 
 right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of 
 death.” That’s the wrong way. Again, “ The path of 
 the just is as the shining light, which shineth more and 
 more unto the perfect day.” That’s the right way, the 
 path of duty. 
 
 Some of you are soon going to be confirmed. Thai 
 is another turning point . Then strength will be given 
 you from on high, the Holy Ghost will be given you 
 to help you to keep on the line of duty. That line of 
 duty will bring you to the Altar of the Blessed Sacra- 
 ment, when Jesus comes to you as the Children’s 
 Bread. Be very careful about that turning point. Bad 
 companions will be sure to laugh at you, and try to 
 turn you on to the wrong line. They will try to keep 
 you back from Confirmation, they will try to frighten 
 you away from the Altar. Be on your guard, pray 
 more earnestly for help, and keep straight on . 
 
<£f)e TOattuts-'&oamu 
 
 7 
 
 Some of you elder boys and girls are going out to 
 service, or have done so already. There is another 
 turning-point . You will be more free than you have 
 been, you won’t have your parents or your teachers 
 close at hand to advise you. You will meet with many 
 temptations which you did not know before. Take 
 care to start on the right line, carrying with you as 
 luggage, first, Prayer , then God’s Word , to be a light 
 unto your path, and then, as you travel on, be sure to 
 look out for the signals. On a railway the only way to 
 travel safely is to show the proper signals, and to obey 
 them. There are three of which we must specially 
 think. One signal means caution , another means dan- 
 ger^ another all right . Sometimes when a train is 
 
 coming to a sharp curve in the line, the engine driver 
 sees a signal, which means, “ Caution — go slowly.” 
 The driver can’t see what is on the other side of the 
 curve, so he is warned to proceed with caution. Now,, 
 my children, our way of life is full of curves, and we 
 cannot see what is beyond. Every day is a sharp curve, 
 for we cannot see what is on the other side of it, what 
 to-morrow will be like. Whenever you go into a new 
 place, or among new people, there’s a sharp curve in- 
 die line, you don’t know what awaits you. What does 
 the signal tell you ? “ Caution , go slowly 
 
 There is another signal, which is a red flag, and that 
 always means one thing — “ Danger, stop !” I will tell 
 
8 
 
 Cf)tltrrai’£ 23rcatr. 
 
 you how a little child once saved a train by showing the 
 danger signal. A train was travelling, on a certain line 
 in America, through a wild and mountainous country, 
 and as it came round one of the curves, of which I 
 told you, the driver saw a little boy ahead of him, 
 waving his hat, and holding up his arms as a danger 
 signal. The train was stopped within a few feet of a 
 mass of rock which had fallen on the line, and which 
 would have thrown carriages, passengers and all, over 
 a precipice. There are many times in our lives when 
 we need to look out for the danger signal. When 
 you get into bad company, when you boys fall in with 
 those who swear, or tell bad stories, or waste their 
 time at the tavern, then look out for the danger signal, 
 and remember what it means — Stop ! 
 
 When you girls are tempted by others to disobey 
 your mother, to run about with those who mean you 
 no good, or to spend your wages on useless finery, then 
 look for the danger signal, it says, “ Stop, or you’ll be 
 ruined.” Do you ask who will show you these signals ? 
 I answer God will. God will speak to you by the 
 voice of conscience, telling you when you are in dan- 
 ger, warning you when you are going wrong. Whenever 
 you have an uncomfortable feeling that all is not right 
 with you, that you are not quite happy, that is God 
 showing you a signal, saying, “ take heed to your ways,” 
 bidding you stop on the path of danger. When you 
 
212Eatttns*E00m. 
 
 9 
 
 read your Bible, you will see many signals shown to 
 you. The services of the Church and the lessons of 
 your teachers are all signals for your guidance. Don’t 
 neglect them, dear children, for to neglect a danger 
 signal means ruin. Try also to show the signal to each 
 other. If you see a companion going in the wrong 
 way, try to show him the danger signals. Every 
 Christian child should try to help his fellows on to 
 Heaven. Sometimes we read in the newspapers how 
 some wicked person has placed a bar or stone or some 
 other obstruction on the railway, with the hope of 
 wrecking the train. If this obstruction is discovered in 
 time the red flag is shown, and the train is stopped. 
 There are many such dangers in our journey. Satan 
 puts different obstacles in our way, trying to throw us 
 off the line of duty. Temptations, bad thoughts, the 
 example of wicked children, are all stumbling blocks 
 put in your way. Take good heed then to the red 
 signal, and help to warn others also. I read once of a 
 poor madman in an Asylum, who was always repeating 
 the same words — “ Oh ! if I only had ! ” He had been 
 a signalman at a railway bridge, which opened over a 
 river. When the bridge was swung open, it was his 
 duty to show the danger signal, and stop any train 
 which was approaching. One night he forgot to show 
 the red signal, the bridge was open, and a train full of 
 people was hurled into the river. The shock drove 
 
10 
 
 Clj c C&tUJrcn’jS meats. 
 
 the poor man out of his senses, and he always said the 
 same sad words. If we neglect to look for the signal 
 which God shows to us, or if we fail to warn others, 
 we may be forced to think and say for ever — “ Oh ! if 
 I only had ! ” 
 
 But it is time for us to think of the end of the 
 journey. All journeys, short or long, end at last, and 
 if you are God’s children, you know where your 
 journey will terminate, with Jesus in Paradise. I once 
 saw a train come in full of happy schoolboys, going 
 home for the holidays. There were friends and rela- 
 tions waiting on the platform to welcome home the 
 children, but one boy had no friend to meet him, and 
 he was crying bitterly at being thus forgotten. Dear 
 little children, if you go on life’s journey u looking 
 unto Jesus,” He will meet you at the journey’s end, 
 and will take you to that home where, among the many 
 mansions, the children are not forgotten, and in whose 
 streets there is no complaining, and the little feet are 
 never weary. 
 
SERMON II. 
 
 THE BEST BOOK. 
 
 (Sfofant.) 
 
 Psalm cxix. 72. 
 
 •'The law of my mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold 
 and silver. ” 
 
 That is what David said about God’s Word. David 
 had not so big a Bible as we have, he had only part of 
 the Old Testament, and none of the New. Yet he 
 valued it above thousands of gold and silver. I wonder 
 if you would say what David said. Some of you think 
 that you would like to have thousands of gold and 
 silver. You fancy money will do everything. , Well, 
 money will do a great deal, but it won’t do everything. 
 There are a great many things which money can buy, 
 but there are some things which money cannot buy 
 
12 
 
 OTje Cfjtnjrai’tf 23reaU. 
 
 and which we can only get from God’s Word. Money 
 will buy you a house and lands, but it won’t buy you 
 happiness. There have been many who have lived in 
 grand houses, and worn soft clothing, and yet have 
 never been happy, and have been afraid to die. Now 
 God’s Book will teach you how to be happy, and it will 
 show you how you may have a home eternal in the 
 Heavens, without money and without price. It is only 
 the children of the rich who have lands and houses to 
 inherit, but God’s word tells everyone of you, no matter 
 how poor you are, that you have an estate to come 
 into, a property to hold. In Baptism you were made 
 children of God, members of Christ, and inheritors of 
 the Kingdom of Heaven. No money can buy those 
 blessings for you. 
 
 Once upon a time, a powerful king built a very 
 beautiful city, with glittering palaces, and noble streets, 
 and high towers, and gardens full of fruit and flowers. 
 When the city was finished, the king invited all his 
 subjects to enter in. When they came to the city, they 
 found that the gates were so low and narrow that they 
 could not pass them. One was hindered by his fine, 
 clothes, which quite filled up the narrow gateway. 
 Another carried so much luggage that he could not 
 pass through ; and one lifted his head so high, that 
 he could not get it under the lowly entrance. But 
 whilst all the great men and women were thus kept 
 
t&fyc Bcofc. 
 
 la 
 
 outside the city, the little children ran in quite easily. 
 At last they asked a wise old man what they must do,, 
 and he told them that they must become as little chil- 
 dren before they could enter the city. Some of the 
 great ones were very angry at this, and went away in a 
 rage. But others, who were wiser, cast away their use- 
 less burdens and ornaments, and bent down to the 
 ground, and so entered through the gates into the city. 
 God’s Book tells us that it is the humble who shall be 
 exalted, and that unless we become as little children, 
 meek, trusting Jesus, we shall not enter into the King- 
 dom of Heaven. Two little children were once talking 
 together about Heaven, and the little girl said to the 
 brother, “ I know the way to Heaven.” “ Do you 
 indeed ! Then tell me the way,” said the boy. And 
 the little sister answered him, “ You must begin to go 
 up, and keep on going up, and you will get there, but 
 you must be sure not to turn back/’ Do you remember, 
 children, what God’s Word says about the road to 
 Heaven: “Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way.” 
 And can you tell me how we can walk in that narrow 
 way which leads to Heaven ? Jesus says, “ I am the 
 Way, the Truth, and the Light, no man cometh unto 
 the Father but by me.” So you see the Bible tell us 
 about our home in heaven, and how to get there, 
 surely that’s better than thousands of gold and silver ? 
 I told you that money would buy you a grand house. 
 
14 
 
 djc CfjtUrmt'g 3Srcatr. 
 
 but could not make you happy. Well, God’s Word 
 will teach you how to make your home, whether it be 
 small or great, rich or poor, a happy home . The best 
 home to live in is one where God dwells, and gives 
 “ the peace of God which passeth all understanding ; ” 
 a home where people pray, where they speak gently 
 one to another, where they love one another ; God’s 
 Word will teach you how to make your home like this, 
 and that is better than thousands of gold and silver. 
 
 Again, money will bring you all kinds of comforts 
 and luxuries, but it can’t give you health, or make you 
 good. Delicate food is of no use to us if we have not 
 got the appetite to enjoy it. Fine clothes are worthless 
 to a poor cripple who must lie in bed. But what money 
 cannot do, God’s Word can ; it will teach you how to 
 bear sickness, or any other trouble : it will teach you 
 how to say, “ Thy will be done.’*' And I said, money 
 can’t make you good. A little boy was once asked 
 what holiness meant; and he answered, “It means 
 being clean inside .” No money can make you clean 
 inside? y God’s word will show you that “the Blood of 
 Christ cleanseth from all sin,” and it will teach you to 
 pray like this : “ Make me a clean heart, O God, and 
 renew a right spirit within me.” 
 
 Money will bring us many friends and acquaintances, 
 but not of the best kind. I remember when I was at 
 School, if my friends sent me a hamper of good things, 
 
&f)c %z$t $aaft. 
 
 15 
 
 or some money, I found I had many more friends just 
 then than I had before. But when the money was 
 spent, and the hamper was empty, I soon missed my 
 new friends. The kind of friendship which money 
 buys is not worth having. But God’s Word will tell 
 you about a Friend who is always true and faithful. 
 You all know who that Friend is ? “ Jesus Christ, the 
 
 same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.” I want you, my 
 children, to learn to love your Bible, and to value it, 
 and respect it. Sometimes I have seen leaves torn out 
 of God’s Book, and thrown into the road. It always 
 grieves me to see this, for it shpws that people don’t 
 respect their Bible. Of course the leaves of that Book 
 are only paper and print, like those of any other work, 
 but the Words are the Words of God, and we ought to 
 reverence them. Try to make a friend of your Bible. 
 Do not look at it as a lesson Book, but as a treasury 
 full of precious gems, as a gallery full of wonderful 
 pictures, as a garden of flowers planted by God’s Hand. 
 
 I have heard of a poor blind girl who had one of the 
 Gospels given to her printed in raised letters. She used 
 to read with the ends of her fingers, as blind people do. 
 By and by, with constant use, the tips of her fingers 
 grew hard, and she could not tell the letters by her 
 touch. The poor girl cut the skin from the ends of her 
 fingers, but that only made matters worse. So finding 
 she could not read her beloved Book any more, she 
 
1 G 
 
 Ojc Cinnrrfii^ Slrca^r. 
 
 said “Good bye” to it, and pressed it to her lips. To 
 her surprise, she found that her lips, more delicate than 
 her fingers, could feel the shape of the letters, and her 
 love was rewarded, for she could read her Bible once 
 more. Have you ever seen a pretty toy called a 
 Kaleidoscope. When you hold it to your eye, and 
 turn it round, you see a number of pieces of coloured 
 glass, which form all kinds of beautiful patterns, such 
 as stars, and crowns, and fountains, and flowers. Now 
 I think the Bible is very like a Kaleidoscope. When 
 you look carefully into it, the more you turn over its 
 pages and study them, the more beautiful things you 
 find there ; and remember that all these beautiful 
 things will show you something about Jesus. Whether 
 you are reading the Old Testament or the New, 
 whether you study the Law or the Prophets, or read 
 about the Judges, or the Kings, you will find something 
 about Jesus. He said “ Search the Scriptures, for they 
 are they which testify of Me.” Whenever you read 
 your Bible, always do so with one object, always read 
 looking for Jesus Christ . And you who are growing up 
 into big boys and girls, take care how you neglect your 
 Bible when you go out into the world. 
 
 There was once a sailor boy who had a good mother, 
 one who taught him to pray, and to read God’s Word. 
 When he came home from a voyage he found that his 
 mother was dead, and when he went to sea again he 
 
&f)? 23c£t iBook. 
 
 17 
 
 fell among bad companions, and in time quite neg- 
 lected his prayers and his Bible. One day there was 
 to be a grand merry-making on board his ship, and the 
 young sailor went to his chest to take out his holiday 
 clothes. As he tumbled the things out of his chest, 
 he saw a Book which had long lain neglected at the 
 very bottom of the box. The boy took it up, and a 
 folded paper dropped from between the pages. He 
 opened the paper, and saw a lock of grey hair, and 
 written underneath, in his sister’s hand, “ this is our 
 mother’s hair, her dying prayer was that you might love 
 God’s Word.” Then the sailor boy remembered with 
 shame that he never had opened his Bible, and scarcely 
 said a prayer since his mother died. He seemed to see 
 his dear mother looking at him reproachfully, and he 
 knelt down beside his sea chest, and prayed for pardon, 
 and strength to amend. 
 
 My children, make much of your Bible, and you will 
 find that David was quite right when he said, “the law 
 of Thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of 
 gold and silver.” 
 
SERMON III. 
 
 A CHRISTMA S IN VITA TION. 
 
 (Cfirfetmatf.) 
 
 S. Matthew xi. 28. 
 “Come unto Me.’* 
 
 What shall I speak to you about, my children, on this 
 glad Christmas Day ? I will speak about a Christmas 
 invitation. This is the time when families meet together 
 at home, and ask their friends to join them ; and often 
 the children are allowed to invite their school-fellows 
 and playmates to their houses. Perhaps some of you 
 have had an invitation of this sort. But I am going to 
 tell you of another invitation ; everyone of you has 
 been invited by the Holy Child Jesus, the Son of God, 
 to go somewhere to-day. Can you guess where ? To 
 
& Cijrtetma* SEmutattcm. 
 
 19 
 
 Bethlehem. Yes, to Bethlehem. What does that name 
 mean ? The House of Bread. Do you know why it 
 was so called? Because of the many cornfields which 
 were round about it. Yes, that was one reason, and 
 there is another reason why the House of Bread was a 
 good name for it. Jesus Christ, who was born there, 
 calls Himself the Bread of Life. Well, to-day we have 
 an invitation from the Lord Jesus to go even unto 
 Bethlehem. He says, “Come to me.” He bids us 
 come to Him at different times and different places. 
 At Christmas and Epiphany He bids us come to Him 
 as a little child at Bethlehem. In Lent He calls us to 
 Him in the wilderness, and tells us to fast, and to 
 watch and pray, lest we enter into temptation. On 
 Good Friday He calls us to Calvary, and bids us take 
 up our Cross, and follow Him. * Where does Jesus 
 invite us on Easter Day ? To a garden, and to a 
 grave, where the stone is rolled away, and He tells us 
 that because He is risen from the dead, we shall rise 
 also.. Then on Ascension Day He invites us to a 
 mountain to see Him go up to Heaven ; and He is 
 always asking us to turn our thoughts and wishes 
 upwards to that Heaven, and so that one day He may 
 invite us to come to Him there, and “to be ever with 
 the Lord.” Well, to-day we must think of the child 
 Christ’s invitation to you children to go to Bethlehem. 
 We cannot of course travel to-day to that stable among 
 
20 
 
 CTIjc CTjtftfrnt’g Brcatf. 
 
 the wild hills. Yet in one sense we can go there. I 
 left the home, where I lived as a child, many years ago. 
 The place is all changed now, yet I often go there. I 
 go there in memory , I picture all the days when I 
 lived there as a boy. We can take our thoughts and 
 feelings to a place, although we cannot take our bodies. 
 Let us in heart and mind go “ even unto Bethlehem. ” 
 What are we going there for? To worship the Lord 
 Jesus Christ. But He is a king is He not, King of 
 kings, and Lord of lords ? Is it easy to get into a 
 king’s presence ? No indeed, if you wished to visit the 
 Queen you would find it very difficult, almost impossible. 
 Those who are allowed to see the Queen have to obey 
 certain rules, and to wear a particular dress, and the 
 gates and doors of her palace are carefully closed and 
 guarded. But there will be nothing to stop us from 
 coming to Jesus except what we make ourselves. We 
 can shut ourselves out, no one else will If you get into 
 
 a passion, that bad temper will be a door between you 
 and Jesus. If you act cruelly and spitefully to another 
 child, that makes a door between you and Jesus. Then 
 you must be properly dressed. The court dress at the 
 Queen’s Palace is a very grand affair, and costs more 
 money than most of us can afford. The dress which 
 you must wear if you go to Jesus, will not cost any 
 money. What is it called ? Is it pride? No, that’s 
 far too gaudy and showy a dress ; people who wear 
 
$ C-ftr&tmatf Htbttattan. 
 
 21 
 
 that are thinking more about their clothes than about 
 Jesus. The dress you must wear must be very clean, 
 and simple, and unassuming, and it is called humility . 
 
 And then I think you ought to take some present to 
 Jesus. Everyone gives presents at Christmas time. 
 Jesus has given you presents, life, and health, and 
 parents, and brothers, and sisters, and a beautiful 
 world ; and He promises you something more, a bright 
 and glorious home in Heaven, and “ such good things 
 as pass man’s understanding.” Won’t you take a pre- 
 sent to Jesus ? Do you know what He values most — 
 your love. The best Christmas present to the Holy 
 Child Jesus is a little child’s love. And remember, 
 dear children, you must show your love, not merely 
 talk about it. Show it by trying to be good children, 
 by watching over your words and tempers. Show it 
 by being kind and gentle to others — to your parents, 
 your teachers, your school-mates. When you show 
 love to one another you show love to Jesus. Show it 
 by doing something for His Church, and His poor. 
 When you gather a bunch of flowers to place on the 
 Altar, that’s a loving gift to Jesus. When you give 
 up some of your playtime to visit a sick friend, 
 that’s a loving gift to Jesus. ' Every time you sing 
 a hymn, meaning what you sing, you offer a loving 
 gift of praise to Jesus. Every time you deny yourself, 
 and instead of spending your money in toys and sweet- 
 
22 
 
 CIjtl3Jrai’£ Brcatt. 
 
 meats you give it to the poor and needy, that’s a loving 
 gift to Jesus. When you bear any wrong or injury 
 patiently, you are making a very loving present to 
 Jesus. I wonder if you ever heard how a brave girl 
 bore insult for Jesus’ sake? She was one of the little 
 Sisters of the Poor, who go about begging for money 
 and broken food and cast-off clothes for the very 
 needy. One day she asked help from one who was 
 rich, and by position at least a gentleman. He had a 
 dislike to sisterhoods, and after roughly refusing to 
 give, at last he even struck the sister. She only said, 
 very gently, “ That was for myself, now won’t you give 
 me something for my poor ?” And the man was 
 so ashamed of himself that he gave a liberal present. 
 
 And now, my children, I want you all to ask the 
 Lord Jesus to take you by the hand, and lead you. Do 
 you remember a chapter in Isaiah which tells us that a 
 time shall come when the fierce beasts shall be tame 
 and gentle, and “ a little child shall lead them ?” In 
 one sense that prophecy has been fulfilled. The little 
 Child who was born on Christmas Day has changed 
 the history of the world. Before Christ came the world 
 was full of fierce and cruel nations, more savage than 
 the wild beasts. Satan ruled over the heathen, making 
 them bloodthirsty and violent, teaching the strong to 
 trample on the weak, leading the powerful to make 
 slaves of the feeble. Jesus came, and brought the 
 
Q <£f)rt3tma£ iubttattnu. 
 
 23 
 
 light of truth into the world, and it was changed. Fierce 
 men became gentle, proud men became humble, a 
 little child was leading them. There are plenty of 
 cruel and proud people among us now, but it is because 
 they won’t let Jesus lead them. I saw a little child 
 once walking with his father ; he was but a tiny little 
 creature, and as he tried to run alone he fell. Then 
 his Father lifted him up, and said so lovingly, “ Take 
 hold of Father’s hand.” That is what we all ought to 
 do, children and grown people, we can’t walk alone 
 through this world, we must take hold of God’s Hand. 
 When you are tempted to do wrong, to get into a 
 passion perhaps, or strike a playfellow, then whisper 
 this little prayer, “Jesus, take me by the hand, make 
 me gentle.” I have heard of two children, brother and 
 sister, who loved each other very dearly. The boy, 
 who was the elder of the two, fell ill, and died. When 
 he was laid out on his bed, his mother took the 
 little girl to see her brother. As she stood looking at 
 his sweet face, white and cold as marble, she said, 
 “ Mother, may I take hold of his hand ?” Then lifting 
 the dead white hand, and stroking it gently, the sister 
 said, “ This little hand never struck me.” 
 
 If you would keep your hands from sinning, ask 
 Jesus to take you by the hand, and lead you. You 
 know He has promised to be always with you. Long 
 before the first Christmas Day the prophet Isaiah fore- 
 
24 
 
 <£t)C CfnlUrni’ia 23 rcaU. 
 
 told that a Child should be born, and He was to have 
 a special name, can you tell me what it was ? 
 Emmanuel, that is, God with us . Remember that 
 
 you can never hide froin Jesus. If you love Him, and 
 ask Him to lead you, He will take you by the hand. 
 If you sin against Him, break His laws, and take His 
 Name in vain, He is still Emmanuel ; you can’t shut 
 God out of your work, or your play. He knows all 
 that you do, and say, and think. To Him “all hearts 
 are open, all desires known, and from Him no secrets 
 are hid.” Jesus is with you in school-time, and He knows 
 how you use your time, and the talents which God has 
 given you. Jesus is with you when you go out to work 
 in the fields, or the shop, and He knows if you are 
 honest and industrious, and He hears all the bad 
 words : remember that when you are tempted to speak 
 them. Jesus is with you always, even unto the end of 
 the world, and He will always be your friend if you 
 will have Him. He calls to us to-day, as it were, from 
 the poor manger, and says, “Come unto Me, learn of Me, 
 for I am meek and lowly in heart.” He calls to you older 
 children, who have been confirmed. He speaks to you 
 from the Holy Altar, where the Children’s Bread is 
 given in the Blessed Bethlehem of the Church, and He 
 gives His Christmas invitation, “ Come unto Me.” 
 
 And the day will come, my children, when we shall 
 no more keep Christmastide on earth, nor listen to the 
 
% Cf)rt»tma* 3Eubttattatx. 
 
 25 
 
 joy bells ringing in the tower. We shall not need to go 
 in memory to Bethlehem of Judea, for we shall look on 
 the better Bethlehem above, where Jesus, the Bread of 
 Heaven, the Children’s Bread, shall feed us till we 
 want no more, in that “ dear, dear country,” where the 
 children shall be “safe in the Arms of Jesus.” 
 
SERMON IV. 
 
 THE POWER OF THE DOG. 
 (Eent.) 
 
 Psalm xxii. 20. 
 
 “ Deliver . . . my darling from the power of the dog.” 
 
 The Bible does not generally speak well of dogs. 
 The word dog in the Scriptures often means a 
 wicked person. It has that meaning in my text. 
 David is speaking in this twenty* second Psalm as a 
 prophet, and he foretells the sufferings of our Saviour. 
 When he says, “ Deliver my darling from the power 
 of the dog,” it is a prayer that God would deliver His 
 only Son from the hands of wicked men. In Eastern 
 countries dogs are reckoned as unclean animals, and 
 there if you want to give a man a bad name you call 
 
CIj t iDclucr of tlje 23og;. 
 
 27 
 
 him a dog. But there are good dogs and bad dogs, 
 dogs to be trusted, and dogs to be avoided. Let us 
 think about the good dogs first. Most of you have 
 read the beautiful story of the hound Gelert. You will 
 remember that Gelert’ s master left him one day, in his 
 hut in the forest, to take care of a little child sleeping 
 in his cradle. When the man came home from hunt- 
 ing, he found the hut, in confusion. The furniture 
 thrown about, the cradle upset, the child gone, and 
 the hound lying on the floor with marks of fresh blood 
 upon his mouth and paws. There were also stains of 
 blood about the room. Then the poor father thought 
 that the dog must have killed and devoured the baby, 
 and he took his hunting spear, and stuck it through 
 the dog’s body. The hound looked at him with sad 
 reproachful eyes, then shivered, and died. When his 
 master came to look about the hut, he found the dead 
 body of a wolf lying in a corner, and in another corner 
 was the child, safe and sleeping. Thus the hunter 
 knew too late that Gelert had been faithful, and it was 
 the wolfs blood and his own with which he was stained. 
 That, my children, was a good dog. 
 
 Then there was another good dog in France. One 
 day, when he and his master were travelling through 
 the forest of Bondy, some men set upon his master, 
 and killed him, and buried his body out in the forest. 
 The dog went to the town where he lived, and found 
 
28 
 
 CIjc ffl&fltomW 3Brca». 
 
 out the friends of his dead master, and tried to make 
 them follow him. At first they took little notice of him, 
 but the dog took hold of one by his coat, and tried to 
 pull him along. Then they followed him to the forest, 
 and the dog showed them where the master’s body was 
 buried, and afterwards helped to discover the murder- 
 ers. That was another good dog. Perhaps some of 
 you have read Scott’s beautiful story of The Talisman , 
 in which he tells us about Roswal, the noble deer- 
 hound of the Scottish Knight, who kept guard over the 
 English Standard, and afterwards discovered who had 
 insulted it ? That was another good dog. Then there 
 are the dogs of St. Bernard, of which you have all 
 heard. They go out among the snow and ice on the 
 bleak mountain, and find the travellers who are lost in 
 the snow, that the monks of St. Bernard may give them 
 shelter in the monastery. And there are the blind 
 men’s dogs, which you see about the streets, leading 
 their masters carefully along, and holding a basket or a 
 tin mug in their mouth, that people may drop their 
 money in. 
 
 These are all good dogs, but there are some bad 
 dogs, of whom we must beware, and I am going to talk 
 to you about them. What ought we specially to think 
 about in Lent ? About our Lord’s Fasting and Temp- 
 tation. Yes, but there is something more for us to 
 think of, our own sins and temptations, and how to 
 
&i)£ nf t T)C 230jj* 
 
 29 
 
 conquer them. That is what I mean when I tell you 
 there are several bad dogs of which we must beware. 
 Let us think of some of their names. 
 
 First of all there is a dog called Sulky . Can you tell 
 me what colour he is ? Black. Yes, very black indeed. 
 I remember, when I was a little boy, my dear mother 
 used to tell me not to let the black dog get on my 
 shoulder, that is, not to be sulky. When a child is 
 bitten by that black dog, his face becomes quite 
 changed. It grow r s dark, and heavy, and ugly. No 
 matter how good-looking a child may be, directly the 
 dog Sulky bites him all his beauty is gone. And the 
 child’s character is altered too. He becomes stubborn, 
 obstinate, he won’t do his work, and he won’t play. 
 He does not look you honestly in the face as he once 
 did, he turns his eyes down to the ground. And 
 the child’s speech is altered too. He does not 
 answer civilly and frankly as he used to do. The 
 sound of his voice is quite different, and he keeps 
 muttering to himself such words as, “ I shan’t — I don’t 
 care.” No one can be happy with a sulky person, and 
 no one is more unhappy than the sulky one himself. 
 Oh ! my children, beware of that black dog, don’t let 
 him bite you. 
 
 Then there is another dog called Passion . Do you 
 know what colour that dog is ? Red. Yes, a very 
 
30 
 
 Che €1) tltrr en’g 23rca3r. 
 
 fiery red dog, with gleaming, cruel eyes, and foaming 
 mouth. If he bites you, he sends you mad for a time. 
 The old Romans were quite right when they called 
 anger a short madness. If you see a child with a very 
 red face, kicking and stamping and screaming, you may 
 be sure that the fierce dog Passion has bitten him. 
 
 It is a sad sight, children, one of the saddest of all 
 sights, to see anyone in a passion. Can you tell me what 
 the word Passion means ? When we speak of our dear 
 Saviour’s Passion, we don’t mean anger, do we? No, 
 we mean His suffering. Well, when you get angry you 
 suffer yourself, and you make others suffer, so your 
 furious anger is called passion. Yes, people in a passion 
 suffer whilst the fit lasts, and suffer still more after it 
 is gone, for it is sure to leave some bad consequences. 
 Men have killed their dearest friends in a moment of 
 passion. You have heard, I dare say, of Alexander 
 the Great, who sat down and cried because there was 
 only one world for him to conquer. In a famous 
 battle Alexander’s life was saved by his friend, Clitus, 
 and how do you think he was rewarded ? One day 
 Alexander was in a furious passion, and he snatched a 
 spear out of the hands of a soldier, and killed the first 
 person whom he met, and that person was his friend 
 Clitus. When the king saw his friend lying dead on 
 the ground, all his anger was gone, but that would not 
 bring Clitus back to life. Then Alexander tried to kill 
 
HZ\)t pcfocr nf tlje ©03. 
 
 31 
 
 himself, and when he was prevented, he lay upon his 
 bed weeping and groaning, I don’t think, my children, 
 there was anything very great about him there. There 
 was another conqueror, of whom you have heard, and 
 he was wiser. Julius Caesar, when he was provoked, 
 used to say over all the letters of the Roman Alphabet 
 before he gave an answer. Beware then of that fierce 
 dog Passion. Remember what Solomon, the wise man 
 says about anger, I wonder if you could tell me the 
 text ? “ He that is slow to anger is better than the 
 
 mighty ; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh 
 a city.” 
 
 There is another dog of which you must beware. 
 He is called Idle . You never see this dog doing any- 
 thing useful. You never find him carrying a basket or 
 a bundle, as some good dogs will. You never see him 
 keeping guard over his master’s goods, or minding the 
 sheep, or drawing a sledge, like the clever dogs at the 
 North Pole. He lies in the sun sleeping, almost too 
 lazy to get up and eat his food. Perhaps you think 
 this dog Idle does not do any harm. But what good 
 does he do ? People who never do any good are sure 
 to do some harm. Take care, children, not to be 
 bitten by dog Idle . As soon as he bites a child, the 
 boy or girl becomes heavy and slow. Instead of getting 
 up in the morning fresh and bright, with plenty of time 
 to say his prayers, and start for school after breakfast. 
 
32 
 
 £Tjc CljtlUmx^ 23reatr. 
 
 the child bitten by dog Idle gets up late, and so begins 
 the day badly. Then his prayers are hurried over, or 
 left unsaid. The child is almost sure to be late at 
 school, or late at his work. In school he is sleepy, or 
 inattentive, and you know where to look for him, at the 
 bottom of the class. If he has a sum to do, he wants 
 someone to do it for him. If he has a lesson to pre- 
 pare, his eyes are always wandering from his book, and 
 he tries to make others as idle as himself. When he 
 goes to Church he often falls asleep, and when he has 
 work to do you never see him put two hands to it. 
 The only thing he cares for is play, and very often he 
 is too idle even for that. Do you remember the old 
 story of the idle boy who went out one summer morn- 
 ing to find a playfellow ? First he met a horse, and 
 asked him to come and play with him. But the horse 
 told him that he must go and carry his master on a 
 journey. Next the boy saw a dog, and he invited him 
 to be his playmate ; but the dog answered that he must 
 go and drive the sheep to the pasture. So the idle boy 
 went on, wondering why everyone had some work to 
 do. Presently he saw a bee flying along and humming 
 as he went. The child begged him to come and play 
 with him, but the bee would scarcely spare time to tell 
 him that he was busy making honey for the winter. 
 He watched the tiny ants, and saw they were all work- 
 ing. He tried to make a bird his playfellow, but it was 
 
^afcoer af fyz 13 03 . 
 
 33 
 
 busy feeding its little ones, and last of all the child 
 rested by a babbling stream, and asked, “Will you 
 come and play with me ?” The stream led him along 
 for many a mile, and showed him the work which it 
 had to do. At one place it bathed the dark green water- 
 cress, and at another it nourished the blue forget-me- 
 not. Sometimes it turned a mill wheel, and ground 
 the corn. Sometimes it sent little side streams to water 
 a meadow, and by and by it joined a great river, and 
 helped to carry ships out to the wide sea. Then the 
 little boy came home very sadly, having learnt that 
 there is no place for idle people in God’s great world. 
 Dear children, beware of Dog Idle . Do whatever you 
 have to do heartily . Do you remember a text about 
 that? “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it 
 with thy might.” Whether you are learning, or work- 
 ing, or praying, do it heartily. God only helps those 
 who help themselves. 
 
 The old Greek fable says, that once a wagoner was 
 driving a loaded wagon along a muddy lane, and the 
 wheels stuck fast. Then the man prayed the strong 
 Hercules to come and help him. But Hercules told 
 him to put his shoulder to the wheel, if he wanted 
 help. Remember that we must help ourselves. We 
 must, as the Spanish proverb puts it — 
 
 11 Pray to God devoutly, 
 
 Hammer away stoutly.” 
 
 C 
 
34 
 
 STfie ffif)fRrr*ti’£ SSrcatr. 
 
 There is another dog called Mischief \ which is very 
 dangerous. You must not think that I am speaking of 
 Fun and Merriment , they are good dogs, which skip 
 and play about, and do good, not harm. But Mischief 
 is sly and secret, he goes about in dark places, and 
 is never safe to meddle with. When a child is 
 bitten by dog Mischief no one can tell what harm he 
 may do. 
 
 I know a man who is blind of one eye. A few years 
 ago he could see very well, but one day, as he passed 
 through the town, a little boy shot a stone out of a 
 catapult, and cut the man’s eye out. That child had 
 been bitten by dog Mischief and you see what came of 
 it. Two children got into a farm -yard, among the hay 
 ricks. One showed the other a box of matches. At 
 first they only looked at them, then they struck a 
 match, then another. — Presently one child held a 
 lighted match to a hay rick, and in a minute it was on 
 fire. The wind blew the sparks about, and by and by 
 not only the hay-ricks were burning but half the village 
 as well. All because the children were bitten by that 
 dog Mischief Sometimes a whole train full of pass- 
 engers is thrown off the line by a stone placed by a 
 child on the rails. Often persons have been thrown 
 from their horses, and killed, because a mischievous 
 child has purposely frightened the horse. Beware of 
 dog Mischief Think, before you do any mischievous 
 
Cfjc of tljc S03* 
 
 35 
 
 act, what the consequences may be, what harm and 
 misery you may cause to innocent people. 
 
 There is another dog of which you must beware. 
 His name is Careless . He is not so bad as some dogs, 
 at times we can scarcely help liking him, and yet he 
 does much harm. When a child is bitten by dog 
 Careless things go badly with him. Perhaps, in school, 
 the child is writing a copy, suddenly he lets a great 
 drop of ink fall on his copy-book, and there is a blot. 
 Or perhaps the child is working a sum, he knows per- 
 fectly well how to do it, and he takes up his slate to the 
 master, expecting to be praised. The sum is quite 
 correctly worked, but the answer is wrong, the child 
 has left out a figure. A child, after he has been bitten 
 by dog Careless , says his prayers without thinking 
 what they mean, and reads the Bible without under- 
 standing it. When he says his Collect in Sunday 
 School, he leaves out the chief sentence, and makes a 
 beautiful prayer sound like nonsense. Be on your 
 guard against dog Careless . 
 
 There are many other dogs of which I could warn 
 you, but I will only speak of two. There is dog 
 Selfish , one of the worst dogs of all. When we get a 
 bite from him we are never happy ourselves, and we 
 make others unhappy too. Have you ever read the 
 old story of the dog in the manger? It tells us how a 
 
36 
 
 Ctjtltrrrn’tf 33 rratf. 
 
 dog lay down in a manger of hay, and when a poor 
 hungry ox came to eat his supper the dog began snap- 
 ping at him. He could not eat the hay himself, and 
 he would not let the ox eat it. That dog’s name is 
 Selfish . 
 
 There is another dog called Greedy , and he is a very 
 near relation to dog Selfish . Children are often bitten 
 by him, and they generally suffer, for greedy people by 
 trying to get too much often lose all. There is a fable 
 which tells us how dog Greedy was one day crossing a 
 bridge over a river, and carrying a piece of meat in his 
 mouth. As he looked into the water he saw his own 
 shadow. Thinking it was another dog, who carried a 
 larger piece of meat than his own, dog Greedy flew 
 at him with an angry bark, and, as he opened his 
 mouth, the meat fell into the river, and was lost. So 
 it is often with greedy people, because they are 
 not contented with what they have, they lose it 
 altogether. 
 
 Now, dear children, these dogs of which I have 
 been speaking are sins and temptations. Who sends 
 them ? Satan, the enemy of our souls. Is he very 
 strong ? Yes, but there is some one stronger. Jesus 
 Christ is stronger. We know that because He con- 
 quered Satan. Well, we must be on our guard against 
 these evil dogs, and we must pray to God to deliver us 
 
Ojc }Dcforr nf tljc 23atj. 
 
 37 
 
 His darlings, His children, from the power of the dog. 
 Can you think of the best prayer for us to use ? Let 
 us say it together now — “Lead us not into temptation, 
 but deliver us from evil.” 
 
SERMON V. 
 
 TWO KINDS OF CLOTHING. 
 (Unit.) 
 
 i Peter v. 5. 
 
 11 Be clothed with humility. 
 
 A new suit of clothes ! That’s a subject in which you 
 all take an interest. When the baby passes from long 
 clothes to short clothes, you mothers remember the date 
 as something very interesting. When a boy passes 
 from petticoats to a jacket and trousers it is an event in 
 his life. When a lad puts on his first coat he remem- 
 bers that he is becoming a man, and must put away 
 childish things. When a boy enters the army or navy, 
 he puts on a new suit of clothes, blue or red, and that 
 reminds him that he is bound to serve his Queen and 
 
af Clntljtmp 
 
 39 
 
 country, and that he must not disgrace his uniform. 
 When a choir boy comes into the choir, he has a new 
 kind of clothing given to him, a white surplice ; that 
 should always warn him to try to keep himself pure 
 and good, because he is allowed to sing in the Church 
 on earth, as the saints sing in the Church in Heaven, 
 “ clothed in white robes, and palms in their hands.” 
 So you see, children, there is a great deal of import- 
 ance attaching to a suit of clothes. I am going to 
 speak to you to-day about some different kinds of 
 clothing, some good, others bad. 
 
 First of all, let us think of the clothes which God 
 makes for his beautiful world. He clothes the grass 
 of the field. Go and look at a pasture-field in the 
 country, and you will see that God has clothed it with 
 a beautiful green robe, and every night and morning 
 the greeh robe is all trimmed and spangled with dew- 
 drops. Or there is another field, blazing with yellow- 
 buttercups and white daisies, that’s the white and gol- 
 den clothing which God has given to it. That same 
 God dresses the woods in the springtime with a hun- 
 dred different shades of colour, and clothes the earth 
 beneath with the purple robe of wild hyacinths. Some- 
 times the good God wraps up all the earth in a white 
 dress. That’s the snow, and underneath the roots and 
 seeds are quite warm and safe from the frost. God 
 clothes the trees, from the great cedar of Lebanon, to 
 
40 
 
 0)£ OjtRfrcn^ 23mtr. 
 
 the humble bramble bush. Every tree has a different 
 shaped dress, and a different shade of colour. Even 
 in the winter, when the trees look so bare and cold, 
 they are still clothed by God. Trees have two sets of 
 leaves, one set for the summer, the other for the winter. 
 I only found that out the other day, when I w r as read- 
 ing a wise book. The buds on the branches, which 
 open into leaves in the spring, are covered in winter 
 by little scales, like the tiles on a roof. And these 
 scales are leaves, and they keep warm the other leaves 
 which are wrapped inside them, and will come forth in 
 the spring-time. Have you ever noticed that parts of 
 a beech or willow tree are covered in winter with a 
 silky down, like hair, and that the buds on a horse 
 chestnut are sticky with a kind of gum ? Well, that 
 silky down and that sticky gum cover the winter 
 leaves, and makes them air tight, so that the warmth 
 cannot get out, nor the cold come in. So God clothes 
 the trees. 
 
 And God clothes the beasts and birds and gives each 
 exactly the sort of dress which he requires. You have 
 all seen the mole-hills in a field, and sometimes you 
 have caught a glimpse of the mole himself. Well, God 
 has clothed him in a dress like black velvet, which is 
 just fitted for his home underground : and He has 
 formed his feet like shovels, so that the mole can dig a 
 tunnel through the earth. The animals which live in 
 
of Clatljtnij. 
 
 41 
 
 cold regions have a warm clothing of fur, and those 
 which live among snow and ice are white, so that their 
 enemies may not easily see them. Do you know that 
 the bones of birds are hollow? God makes them so 
 that the birds may be able to fly lightly in the air. 
 Some animals, like the tortoise and the snail, have a 
 suit of armour to wear : that is given them because 
 they cannot move fast, and escape from their foes. So 
 God clothes the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air. 
 
 Now let us think about ourselves. In the Bible we 
 hear of two kinds of clothing, the best and the worst. 
 S. Peter says, “ Be clothed with humility ; ” that’s the 
 best clothing. In the hundred and ninth Psalm we are 
 told of a wicked man who “ clothed himself with cursing 
 as with a garment.’’ That’s the worst clothing. The 
 best suit of clothes for a child of God is humility , for 
 Jesus says, “ Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly 
 in heart.” Can you tell me of two men mentioned in 
 the Gospel, one of whom was clothed with humility, 
 and the other with pride? Yes, the Pharisee and the 
 Publican. And God listened to the man who was 
 clothed with humility. What do we sing in the Magni- 
 ficat ? “He hath exalted the humble and meek.” 
 What sort of place does our Lord tell us to take when 
 we are invited to a feast ? The lowest place, because 
 “he that exalteth himself shall be abased.” 
 
 Now I have noticed that very often when children 
 
42 
 
 CfuRrren'jg SSrcatr. 
 
 are growing up into big lads and girls, there is a great 
 change in their manners. The little boy who used to 
 go merrily to school always had a bow for the clergy- 
 man and schoolmaster, and answered a question civilly 
 and kindly. But now that little boy has grown up into 
 a big lad, neither a child nor a man, and his clothes 
 fit him badly, because he has grown out of them. But 
 he has grown out of something else, and that is the 
 clothing of humility. He thinks he is too big to touch 
 his hat, too big to give a civil answer, too big to come 
 to Sunday School or Church. So he hangs about the 
 corners of the streets or lanes, and he gets into bad 
 company, and becomes rough and rude, and altogether 
 objectionable. All this has come to pass because he 
 thinks he has outgrown the clothing of humility, and 
 has cast it aside. He has got another kind of clothing 
 instead. ' Perhaps he is clothed with Pride . That’s a 
 bad sort of dress, my children. Although he is still 
 quite a boy, he thinks himself a man ; and he tries to 
 imitate the vices of a man, while he has only the sense 
 of a child. He tells people that he is as good as they, 
 he will not be spoken to, nor reproved ; he talks very 
 loud when he sees the clergyman or the schoolmaster 
 pass, to let them know that he does not care for them. 
 Oh ! my boys, don’t deceive yourselves, don’t make 
 this common mistake. There is nothing manly in 
 being rough, or rude, or coarse, or conceited. People 
 
Oau at Clcttjtng. 
 
 43 
 
 will only look at you with sorrow, or contempt. Did 
 you ever hear the old fable of the donkey who found a 
 lion’s skin ? The donkey covered himself with the 
 skin, and tried to play the lion, and frighten the people. 
 But some of them spied his long ears, and recognised 
 his well-known voice, and he was soon stripped of his 
 lion’s skin, and driven away. Now, my boys, if you 
 are tempted to put on a suit of clothes which does not 
 become you, if while still boys you put on the habits of 
 a man, and of a bad man into the bargain, remember 
 the fable of the ass in the lion’s skin. 
 
 But when a child has outgrown the good clothing of 
 Humility, and put on a full suit of Pride, there comes 
 another evil from it. He often gives up his prayers 
 and his Bible. Have you ever seen the picture of the 
 infant Samuel kneeling down and saying his prayers ? 
 It is a great favourite in many cottage homes. Now is 
 not that a better picture than that of a boy or girl who 
 is ashamed to pray : who lies down at night without 
 one word of thanksgiving or one request for pardon ? 
 My children, never think you are too big to pray. The 
 older you get, and the more you go out into the world, 
 the more need you have of God’s help. Be ashamed 
 of doing wrong, be ashamed of telling a lie, or of doing 
 a mean or cruel action, or of using filthy words, but 
 never be ashamed of asking God to heip you, or of 
 thanking Him for His mercies. 
 
44 
 
 (£Ij t CfttRrrtn’jg ftrcxts. 
 
 f . I told you that the Bible speaks of the worst kind 
 of clothing, it tells us of a man who “clothed himself 
 with cursing as with a garment.” I take cursing there 
 to means all sorts of bad language. Now if you were 
 to go into a house where smallpox and fever were 
 raging, you would not like to stay there. You would 
 not wish to breathe the foul, deadly air of that house, 
 you would not ask leave to carry away some of the 
 clothes full of disease. Well, a house full of cursing 
 and bad language is just as bad as one full of smallpox, 
 the air is poisoned, the clothes are poisoned, for the 
 people are clothed with cursing as with a garment. 
 Get away from that foul place as fast as you can, and 
 don’t try to take any of the poison away with you. The 
 old Greeks tell us a story about the death of Hercules. 
 That strong hero had shot his enemy, Nessus, with a 
 poisoned arrow, and the garment of the slain man was 
 all stained with poisoned blood. Before he died, 
 Nessus gave his clothing to the wife of Hercules, tell- 
 ing her that it would make her husband love her 
 always. It came to pass after a time that she gave the 
 fatal garment to her husband, and no sooner had he put 
 it on, than the poison seized upon him, and when, in 
 his agony, he tried to put off the clothing, it clung all 
 the tighter, and so he died, killed by his own poison. 
 So it is with the man who clothes himself with a garment 
 of cursing, or bad talk, it clings to him, and poisons 
 
&fon HtufrS of Clcitljtus. 
 
 45 
 
 him, body and soul. Have you ever heard the pro- 
 verb, that “ Curses, like chickens, always come home 
 to roost ” ? It is a very true saying. The evil wishes 
 and threats which are spoken in anger against another 
 return on the swearer’s own head. When an Arab is 
 kicked by his camel, or when the beast refuses to go 
 on, what do you think he does ? He solemnly curses 
 the camel, at the same time throwing a handfull of 
 sand into the air, and most of that sand comes back 
 into the Arab’s own eyes. So it is with curses. 
 
 Then, again, there is filthy talk, That’s a dirty gar- 
 ment to wear. There is nothing manly or brave in 
 talking indecently, any more than there is in rolling in 
 the mud. You would be ashamed to talk in that way 
 before decent people, ought you not to to be ashamed 
 to talk so before the All-pure God ? Believe me, my 
 children, bad talk is a foul and filthy garment. 
 
 There are several other kinds of clothing of which I 
 might warn you. One of these is self-righteousness. 
 I have seen a man with a very glossy black suit of 
 clothes, very carefully buttoned up, and at first sight he 
 looked most clean and respectable. But when I came 
 to look more closely, I found that his linen was any- 
 thing but white and clean. His respectability was all 
 outside . Now we sometimes find a boy or girl setting 
 himself up as being better than others. We find 3, 
 
46 
 
 <£f)c CStltfmfg 23reatr* 
 
 child of this sort very ready to tell tales of his compan- 
 ions, and ready to gain favour with teachers by being 
 very demure and quiet in school-time, very ready to 
 say, “ 1 would not do such a thing as that,” — and yet 
 anything but a good child out of school hours. I knew 
 a boy of this sort once, a very quiet, soft-spoken lad, 
 who used to bring me a present of flowers very often. 
 After a time I found that he stole these flowers from 
 neighbouring gardens, and then presented them to me, 
 and soon after he robbed his employer, and was sent 
 to a Reformatory. 
 
 Never be a hypocrite, children, never pretend 
 to be one thing when you are something quite 
 different. Don’t wear a garment which looks very 
 clean and glossy outside, but covers all kinds of impu- 
 rity within. “ Beware of false prophets, which come 
 to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are raven- 
 ing wolves.” <£ Ye shall know them by their fruits.” If 
 you hear a child singing a hymn, such as “ Gentle Jesus, 
 meek and mild,” for instance, and if directly afterwards 
 you see that child quarrelling with a school-mate and 
 striking him, you can’t believe in that child’s piety, it is 
 all outside . You have seen those plaster figures which 
 are made in Italy, and sold about our streets ? Well, 
 they are very pretty to look at, but if you peep inside 
 them you will find they are quite hollow, the beauty 
 does not go right through . If we want to be God’s 
 
5T£d 0 KtirtfS trt Clfltibtnjj. 
 
 47 
 
 children, we must be real, genuine, and honest right 
 through. And now one word more, and I have done. 
 If your clothes are old, and worn out, or do not fit you, 
 what must you do? You must get a new suit. Well, 
 there are some kinds of clothing which we should cast 
 off as soon as possible. If any of you have put on bad 
 habits, foul, filthy clothing, such as pride, or falsehood, 
 or bad talk, or any other sort of bad dress, you must 
 change your clothes. Cast off the old garment, and go 
 down on your knees, and ask God for Jesus Christ’s 
 sake, to give you a new dress. What do I mean by 
 casting away the old garment ? , I mean that you must 
 repent ; that is, you must learn to see how foul and 
 ugly the dress of sin looks. Then you must be 
 really sorry that you have ever put it on ; and next you 
 must make up your mind, by God’s help, to cast it 
 away, and have no more to do with it. You must ask 
 the dear Lord to help you ; go to Him and say, “ wash 
 me, and I shall be whiter than snow ; wash me 
 thoroughly from my wickedness, and cleanse me from 
 my sin. Create in me a clean heart, and renew a right 
 spirit within me.’ 1 God alone can make you clean, 
 God alone can give you a garment of righteousness. 
 If you have not kept your white robe carefully, if that 
 garment given you in your baptism has become spotted 
 by sin, ask the dear Lord Jesus, the children’s Friend, 
 to help you. He will say to you, “ I counsel thee to 
 
48 
 
 
 buy of Me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be 
 rich : and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed.” 
 And you can buy these “ without money, and without 
 price.” 
 
SERMON VI. 
 
 SEA SON A BLE WORDS. 
 
 (&ent.) 
 
 Proverbs xv. 23. 
 
 M A word spoken in due season, how good is it.’* 
 
 There are some words which are good at all seasons, 
 and others which are never in season at all. I will try 
 to tell you something of both. First of all, there are 
 the words which God speaks to us, they are always in 
 season. They were spoken a long time ago, and 
 wriiten in God’s Book many a year since, and some- 
 times we neglect them, just because we have heard 
 them so often. “ Honour thy father and thy mother 
 those are very old words, but they are always season- 
 able I am very much afraid that some of you children 
 
50 
 
 %Z\)z Cljtltfmi’tf 23rcatf. 
 
 who are growing up, think you have outgrown this 
 commandment. I don’t think young lads and girls 
 show the same respect and reverence for their father 
 and mother as was the custom formerly. For my own 
 part, I would not give much for the future of the boy 
 or girl who cannot make a friend of his parents, and 
 who thinks himself too clever to follow their advice. 
 It is the beginning of a bad time when boys and girls 
 have secrets from their mothers. Do you know that 
 nearly all the good men and women in the world have 
 been made so by their mothers ? If a boy goes to his 
 mother with all his secrets, his sorrows, his sufferings, 
 his mistakes, if he never ceases to love her, there is 
 good hope for him, in spite of his faults and failures. 
 
 A man, who was very famous in his day, tells us that 
 when a boy he tempted a companion, younger than 
 himself, to enter a cave on a wild part of the sea-coast. 
 Whilst the boys were looking at the wonders of the 
 cave, the tide came up unnoticed, and they were kept 
 prisoners all night. The younger boy burst into tears, 
 saying, “ What will my mother think ? I should care 
 nothing for myself — but my mother.” My children, 
 when you are tempted to do wrong, stop, and repeat 
 to yourselves the words of that little lad, “ What will' 
 my mother think ?’’ 
 
 Here is another word in season : be. gentle. Especially 
 
£>ea£0tiat)lc OTorttt. 
 
 51 
 
 be gentle in your words and manners to your mother, 
 or sisters, or anyone weaker than yourselves. There 
 is nothing noble or manly in being rough, rude, and 
 noisy. Sometimes you say of a companion who has a 
 new suit of clothes, and some money in his pocket, 
 that “ he looks quite a gentleman.” But it is not the 
 money nor the clothes which make him deserve that 
 name, he must be gentle , thoughtful for others, unselfish, 
 These are the marks of a gentleman. Jesus Christ is 
 the truest example of gentleness : whoever comes 
 nearest to His example is most worthy of the name of 
 gentleman. A lad sometimes fancies that he shows 
 his independence by being uncivil, but he is mistaken, 
 he is just breaking God’s command “to be courteous.” 
 The famous Roman, Marc Antony, was one day walk- 
 ing with a friend, and a slave saluted him. The great 
 Roman returned the salute politely. His friend was 
 surprised that he should notice a mere slave. “ Why,” 
 answered he, “ would you have the slave show himself 
 more a gentleman than Marc Antony ?” 
 
 The greatest heroes have been celebrated as the 
 most gentle and courteous in manner. There was Sir 
 Walter Raleigh, of whom you have all heard, he was 
 as brave as a lion, and as gentle as a woman. So was 
 Sir Philip Sidney, that brave warrior who, when lying 
 mortally wounded in his last battle, refused a cup of 
 water, and gave it to a private soldier lying near him. 
 
62 
 
 £Ij c CIjtftfrm’3 2$rcatf. 
 
 Be gentle, my children, and think of others before 
 yourselves. A great man says, tc A man has no more 
 right to say an uncivil thing than to act one — no more 
 right to say a rude thing to another than to knock him 
 down.” 
 
 Let me tell you a story of Sir William Napier. He 
 was taking a walk in the country one day, when he met 
 a little girl of five years, crying bitterly over a broken 
 bowl. She had taken her father’s dinner to the field, 
 and on her way home had fallen, and broken the 
 basin. She said she should be beaten on her return, 
 and then looking up with a new hope into Sir William’s 
 face, she said, “ But you can mend it, can’t you ?” 
 He told her that was more than he could do, but he 
 would give her sixpence to buy another. On feeling 
 for his purse, however, Napier found that he had left 
 it at home, so he promised to meet the little girl at the 
 same spot next day, and to bring the sixpence with 
 him. On reaching home, he found an invitation to 
 dine at a distant place next day, with a friend whom he 
 specially wanted to see. He knew that it would be 
 impossible for him to accept the invitation, and to 
 keep his appointment with the little child. Which did 
 he do? “I cannot disappoint her, she trusted me,” 
 he said ; so gave up his own pleasure for the sake of 
 making a child happy. 
 
 Here is another word in season, God’s own Word, 
 

 53 
 
 “ Buy the Truth, and sell it not.” Be truthful. No 
 one has any right to call himself one of God’s children 
 unless he is truthful, because God is Truth . Can you 
 tell me a text which shows us that Heaven is not for 
 false people ? “ There shall in nowise enter into it 
 anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh 
 abomination, or maketh a lie .” Now remember, my 
 children, no one can tell one lie, and stop there. 
 One falsehood makes many. You remember how the 
 prophets servant, Gehazi, w r ent on telling lie after lie 
 when he had once begun. So it is with all who go from 
 the truth. Lying grows into a habit. When you are 
 tempted to say something not quite true, it may be in 
 boasting, or in relating some story, or to hide a fault, 
 fight against the temptation at once, feel like the boy 
 Washington, “I cannot tell a lie.” King Alfred, of 
 whom you have all read in English History, was called 
 the Truth-teller , what a glorious title for a man to have ! 
 The great Duke of Wellington, who won Waterloo, 
 was famous for his love of truth ; this is what a famous 
 poet says of the two — He “ never sold the truth to 
 serve the hour ; 
 
 “ Truth-teller was our England’s Alfred named ; 
 Truth-lover was our English Duke ; 
 
 Whatever record leap to light, 
 
 He never shall be shamed.” 
 
 Always speak the truth. It has been said, “ Sin has 
 
54 
 
 Cl )t C&iRrrcn’l 33 r catr. 
 
 many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.” 
 If once you begin to go from the truth you will go 
 down hill very fast. Now I’m going to tell you a 
 story of a brave boy who would not tell a lie. A 
 Liverpool steamer, bound for New York, had been 
 three days at sea, when a little lad, not ten years old, 
 was found hidden away among some casks. He was a 
 “stowaway,” trying to get a free passage to America. 
 The grim chief-mate of the steamer stood, surrounded 
 by the passengers and crew, as he questioned the little 
 stowaway. The boy told him that his step-father had 
 put him on board, giving him a little food to last him 
 till the ship was well at sea, and bidding him make his 
 way to an aunt in Halifax ; and the boy placed a 
 crumpled paper with the aunt’s address into the chief 
 mate’s hand. The sailors believed the lad’s story, not 
 so the mate. “ Some of these men of mine are in the 
 secret,” he said, “point out this minute the man who 
 stowed and fed you.” The boy looked up with a thin, 
 but fearless face, and answered, “ I have told you the 
 truth, and have no more to say.” The mate turned 
 angrily to the crew, and gave this order, “ Reave a 
 rope to the yard.” Then pointing to the cord which 
 hung from the yard-arm as from a gibbet, the mate 
 said to the little stowaway, “ You see that rope, my 
 lad? I’ll give you ten minutes to confess,” he took 
 out his watch as he spoke, “ and if you do not tell the 
 

 55 
 
 truth before the time is up I’ll hang you like a dog.’* 
 The little fellow turned yet paler, but never flinched, 
 whilst the crew began to utter angry murmurs. “ Eight 
 minutes,” cried the mate ; “ if you’ve anything to con- 
 fess you’d best be quick, for your time’s nearly up.” 
 “ I’ve told you the truth,” answered the little lad, “ and 
 I cannot tell a lie. Please, may I say my prayers ?” 
 The mate nodded, and the boy went down on his 
 knees on the deck, with the rope over his head, and, 
 putting his small hands together, repeated softly the 
 prayer which his mother had taught him. Then rising, 
 and turning to the mate, he said very quietly, “ I’m 
 ready.’’ In a moment a change came over the stern 
 man’s face. Tears sprang to his eyes, he caught the 
 boy in his arms, and cried, “ God bless you, my boy, 
 you’re a true Englishman, every inch of you, you 
 would not tell a lie to save your life.” Yes, he was a 
 true hero, he was only afraid of one thing, of doing 
 wrong. 
 
SERMON VII. 
 
 MORE SEASONABLE WORDS. 
 0Unt.> 
 
 Proverbs xv. 23. 
 
 tf A word spoken in due season, how good is it.” 
 
 I spoke to you lately some words in season, can you 
 remember what they were ? “ Honour thy father and 
 thy mother, be gentle, be truthful.” Now I want you 
 to hear some more words in season, hear these first, — 
 Be in earnest Have you ever watched a boat’s crew 
 rowing from a man-of-war ? If the sailors don’t row 
 quickly enough, the officer will cry out, “Give way, 
 my lads, give way with a will” Now that is the way to 
 do all work, with a will. God says so — “ Whatsoever 
 thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” Work 
 
iHarc £ca£attaljlr ££fGrtt£< 
 
 57 
 
 when you work, and play when you play, and do both 
 earnestly. The motto which a famous old painter used 
 to put on his pictures was, “as 7uell as I can ;” and that 
 motto of Van Eyck is an excellent one for all, do the 
 best you can . Whatever is worth doing at all is worth 
 doing well. No schoolmaster likes to see work half 
 done, no employer likes to see his servant working in a 
 half-hearted way, and above all, God does not respect 
 work in which we have not done our best. Sometimes 
 you children have to write a copy. And you begin 
 very well, and form your letters very carefully, but 
 when you are half through the copy, you begin to grow 
 careless, and the page ends with crooked words and a 
 great blot. , That is because you are not in earnest to 
 the end. So it is with some lives. They begin well 
 enough, like the copy. . 5 The boy at school, or at 
 service, starts very fairly;, but he does not per- 
 severe, he is not in earnest, and so, although 
 he began so well, he ends in failure, and perhaps in 
 disgrace. I was reading a very good book lately, 
 which gives this advice, do in the day the day's work. 
 Every day has its duties, do not put them off till 
 to-morrow, but work your work while it is called to-day . 
 Make up your mind to be in earnest, and you will 
 succeed. “ I can’t,” never did anything ; “ I will try,” 
 has done much. “ I will do it,” has done wonders. 
 Yes, every day brings its work to be done, its tempta- 
 
58 
 
 ®fjiRrrcn'$ SStTatr. 
 
 tions to be guarded against, its innocent pleasures to 
 be enjoyed. I read some simple rhymes the other 
 day, which you must try to remember — 
 
 “There’s a prayer that should be said. > 
 
 And a book that should be read, 
 
 Every day ! 
 
 There’s a work that should be wrought, 
 
 And a battle to be fought, 
 
 Every day! 
 
 There are duties to be done, 
 
 And victories to be won, 
 
 As soars and sets the sun, 
 
 Every day! 
 
 There’s a Cross that must be borne, 
 
 And a thorny chaplet worn, 
 
 Every day ! 
 
 If in patience we are strong, 
 
 We shall not suffer long, 
 
 But shall beat down fraud and wrong, 
 
 Every day I 
 
 And when the race is run, 
 
 And the battle has been won, 
 
 We shall rest 'our duty done, 
 v Everyday! 
 
 Try then, my children, to do each day’s work 
 thoroughly every day, and then you will never have to 
 say sadly, like the Roman Emperor, “I have lost a 
 day.” I will tell you of a good man who always tried 
 to do a day’s work in a day. He was called the 
 
fHcrc i~ca£aitaMc OTav&£. 
 
 59 
 
 Venerable Bede, and he was a Priest of God, who 
 lived in an Abbey in Northumberland, after the Eng- 
 lish became Christians, He has written some very 
 interesting stories about those old English days. Bede 
 never liked to be idle for a moment, and all the time 
 which he could spare from his work as a Priest, he 
 spent in study and writing. He fell ill about a fortnight 
 before his death, and feeling that his time was short, 
 he tried to make the most of every minute which was 
 left him. One of the things he did in these last days 
 was to turn S. John’s Gospel into English. The day 
 before he died, Bede was very weak, and could scarcely 
 breathe, but he was quite cheerful, and spent the 
 morning in dictating the Gospel to a little boy, perhaps 
 a choir boy, named Wilbert, who wrote down the verses 
 one by one, as fast as Bede turned them into English. 
 Every now and then Bede would say, “ Get on as 
 quickly as you can, for I do not know how soon I may 
 be gone. ,, On the day of his death, which was in 742, 
 (think, children, eleven hundred and forty years ago) 
 Bede worked all the morning as before, and reached 
 the last chapter of the Gospel . . then he sent for his 
 brethren from the Abbey to say farewell. As the bell 
 rang for evening service, the boy Wilbert said, “ Dear 
 master, there is still one verse to be written.” “ Then 
 write quickly,” answered Bede, and told him what to 
 put down. “ Now it is finished,” cried the boy, as he 
 
60 
 
 Cbe Cf)tUrmi’£ SSrcatf* 
 
 laid down the pen. “ Yes, it is finished,” Bede said ; 
 “and now lift up my head, and hold me up, that I may 
 look upon the Church where I have been used to pray.” 
 And as the boy was holding him up, he died, with a 
 prayer upon his lips. God grant, my children, that 
 when we come to die, we may not leave one verse of 
 our life’s story unfinished, but may say humbly, 
 in the words of our dear Saviour, “I have finished 
 the work which Thou gavest me to do— it is 
 finished.” 
 
 Here is another word in season for you — Persevere. 
 No matter what you have to do, whether it is to con- 
 quer a bad temper, or to curb an unruly tongue, or to 
 break from some bad habit, or to get through a tough 
 piece of work, or to do a hard sum, persevere , try, try 
 again. You have often seen a little baby trying to 
 walk. It looks as if those weak, bending legs would 
 never carry the child upright. He tails every minute, 
 yet he learns to walk at last. So when we try to walk 
 in the right way, to keep out of the dirty ruts of sin, to 
 keep in the middle of the road, we shall often fall at 
 first : but if we persevere, all will be well. You have 
 often seen people skating on the ice ; how swiftly they 
 glide along, what wonderful things they can do with 
 their feet. Well, they could not do these things at 
 first. When they put on skates for the first time, they 
 went slipping and stumbling along, and they had 
 
fHarc £ca*>anafc!c fcSfartte. 
 
 61 
 
 many falls, but their motto was, Get up , and try again . 
 Make that your motto, if you find it hard to do right, 
 hard to get through a day without offending God, or 
 your parents, hard to keep on your feet, pray to God to 
 give you strength, and each time you fall, get up a?id try 
 again . There ought to be no such word as “ I can't” 
 among Christian boys and girls. “ You can do all things 
 through Christ who strengtheneth you.” No one knows 
 what he can do till he tries, and God helps those who 
 help themselves. 
 
 I will tell you a story of a man, which was written 
 for our learning by the same Bede of whom I spoke 
 just now. The man was called Cadmon, the horse- 
 tender, and he was a servant in an abbey in Yorkshire, 
 and took charge of the horses. Cadmon was a kind, 
 Godly man, but not educated or clever, and he could 
 not even sing or play on the harp like his fellows. 
 When there was a merry-making, the harp was passed 
 round, and each in turn played upon it, and sang a 
 song. When it came to Cadmon’s turn, lie could 
 neither sing nor play, and this vexed him sorely, and 
 often he would leave the merry company, and go away 
 to his stable. This had happened one night, and 
 Cadmon was asleep in his stable, when he dreamed a 
 wonderful dream. A man stood before him, and said, 
 “ Cadmon, sing me something.” And the horse-tender 
 told him sadly that he could neither sing nor play, and 
 
02 
 
 Clje CfjtlUrcn^ 23rcatf. 
 
 for that same reason he had left the feast But the 
 man answered, “ For all that you must sing to me. 
 Sing to me of the beginning of things.” And then 
 Cadmon began to sing a beautiful song, which he had 
 never heard before, and Bede tells us that these were 
 the two first lines — 
 
 “ Let us magnify meetly the Master of Heaven ; 
 
 The might of the Maker, the thoughts of His Mind.” 
 
 When Cadmon awoke he could remember what he 
 had sung, and was able to go on with the song, and 
 put fresh verses as well as any poet of them all. Well, 
 they brought the horse-tender before the learned men 
 in the Abbey, and he told them of his dream, and they 
 believed that he had received a gift from God. To see 
 what he could do, they told Cadmon a story out of the 
 Bible which he had never heard, for there were no 
 English Bibles then, and they told him to turn the 
 story into verse, and to sing it to them the next day. 
 AVhen the morrow came, Cadmon sang a fine new poem, 
 which he had made out of the Bible story. So it was 
 clear that he must use the gift which God had given 
 him, and he was taken out of the stable, and placed 
 in the Abbey, and by degrees he turned nearly all the 
 Bible stories into verse, and some of them still remain 
 written in old parchment books. So you see, children, 
 Cadmon did not know what he could do till he tried. 
 Whatever gift God has given you, and he has given 
 
fbTave £ca£cmahle ranrttf. 
 
 C3 
 
 you all something, make the most of it. Because a 
 work is small and common it must not be neglected. 
 Have you ever heard a great musician play the organ 
 in ChurcH ? You think what a grand thing it is to be 
 able to play like that. But if you go behind the organ 
 you see a boy blowing the bellows, without that humble 
 worker the grand musician couldn’t play a note. In 
 this life some of us occupy high places, like this 
 musician, — making sweet music, — others lowly situa- 
 tions like the organ-blower, in either place let us try to 
 do our duty to God and our neighbour, and do it with 
 all our might, and do it well . 
 
SERMON VIII, 
 
 ABOUT GETTING ON. 
 (Unit.) 
 
 S. Luke xiv. io. 
 
 “Go up higher.’* 
 
 » 
 
 I am going to speak to you about getting on. We bear 
 the question asked very often, “ How are you getting 
 on People speak of a child at school, and they say, 
 u How is he getting on P”# You look at a man doing 
 some work, and you ask the same question ; you meet 
 a. man recovering from an illness, and you say to him, 
 “How are you getting on?’’ And some one else also asks 
 the same question, God asks how we are getting on. 
 We are intended to get on, not to stand still. As we 
 
gfiaut Getting ®it. 
 
 65 
 
 grow older every minute, so we ought to be always 
 moving on in other ways, learning something, improving. 
 You children are sent to school that you may get on 
 with your learning, and so be able to get on in the 
 world. God sends us all into the world as into another 
 school, a very large school indeed, where we may get 
 on, and be made fit for Heaven. This life is God’s 
 school, and if we are diligent scholars we shall be pre- 
 pared for the life everlasting. So you see, children, 
 God means us all to get on. Well, if we are to get on, 
 the first thing we must do is to climb. The child who 
 gets on is not content to be at the bottom of the school, 
 he begins there, but he climbs till he gets to the top. 
 There are two things which people have to remember 
 in climbing — first, to look up, and next, not to turn 
 back. I was once climbing up a very steep cliff, over- 
 hanging the sea. When I had gone up a long way, I 
 looked down, and directly my head began to grow 
 dizzy, and my legs to tremble. So I looked up again, 
 and went on climbing quite safely. A man once 
 climbed up to a certain natural bridge over a torrent 
 in America, and cut his name on it, higher than any 
 man had ever done before. But when he tried to come 
 down, he found it was impossible, the only safety for 
 him was to keep on climbing right to the top. t& So it 
 is with all climbing in this life, there is no going down, 
 it is either climbing, or falling.” Remember, before 
 e 
 
66 
 
 CfjfRfrtn’4 2Smtr. 
 
 we can reach the top of any tiling high we must climb , 
 not sit at the bottom and wish. Many of our greatest 
 men began at the bottom of the ladder, with no advan- 
 tages, and plenty of difficulties, but they were climbers, 
 and they got to the top. 
 
 Faraday, the famous chemist, had very little educa- 
 tion, and at twelve years old was an errand boy to a 
 London bookseller and bookbinder. He got up, 
 summer and winter, at five o’clock, and took out the 
 daily papers to his customers. His master made him 
 his apprentice, and whenever a book was sent to be 
 bound, the boy read it first. He became one of the 
 greatest chemists of the day. He was a climber. So 
 was James Ferguson, the astronomer. He was only a 
 poor boy, a labourer’s son, in Scotland, but he was so 
 anxious to learn that, when quite a little fellow, he 
 would listen when his brother was taught to read, and 
 could actually read himself before his father was aware 
 that he knew the Alphabet. Ferguson was sent out to 
 keep sheep for a farmer, and on starlight nights, he 
 would lie in the fields, wrapped in a blanket, with a 
 thread of small beads stretched out before him and the 
 sky. What was he doing? He was watching the 
 motions of the stars, and he would slide the beads 
 along the thread till certain stars were hidden from his 
 sight, and then try to measure the distance of one star 
 from another. In time the poor shepherd boy became 
 
$ftaut <§£ttUICJ 
 
 67 
 
 famous, he not only learned astronomy, but watch- 
 making, portrait-painting, and many other things. He 
 was a climber. 
 
 There are hundreds of stories of poor boys who 
 became great men, statesmen, soldiers, engineers, 
 painters, because they were determined to get on, and 
 to climb. I will tell you one other story of this kind. 
 There was once a very famous painter in Spain named 
 Murillo, and he had many pupils who used to paint in 
 his studio. These pupils were waited on by a Mulatto 
 slave named Sebastian Gomez. Oftentimes the young 
 students amused themselves by laughing at the dark 
 skinned negro, and making fun of him ; no one ever 
 thought of teaching him how to paint, or supposed that 
 he knew one colour from another. But the despised 
 Mulatto slave was really a better artist than any of the 
 young students. He used to watch and learn every 
 day, and at night, instead of sleeping, he would practice 
 his art. After a time he began during the night to correct 
 some of the mistakes made by the pupils in the day, 
 and Murillo was astonished to see an arm or leg added 
 to a figure, or a rough, badly-coloured sky softened 
 and made beautiful. How was all this done ? Some 
 thought it was done by magic. One day Murillo found 
 a beautifully-painted head of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 and no one knew how it came there ; so he watched 
 secretly, and at last discovered that the work was done 
 
68 
 
 €f)e Cfjtttrrai’jEi Brratr. 
 
 by the Mulatto slave. Afterwards Gomez rose to be a 
 great painter. 
 
 But, my children, I want to speak to you about 
 another kind of climbing, that which God expects of 
 us. Every day God says to us all, “ Go up higher” — • 
 higher in thought, and word, and deed. You all hope 
 to go to Heaven one day ; well, Heavenly life is so high 
 a life, that we must climb up daily if we are to get 
 there at last. 
 
 We must be content to climb step by step as men 
 climb a ladder. I have read of a little child who was 
 taken to a great cathedral. He stood on the marble 
 floor, and looked up with wonder at the men and 
 women who were walking in a gallery round the great 
 dome, a hundred and fifty feet above him. How did 
 they ever get there, thought the child. He longed to 
 get there too, but he thought, “ It’s too high, too far for 
 me.” Then the child’s father opened a door in the 
 wall, and taking him by the hand, led him through it. 
 The child saw some stone steps in a winding staircase. 
 One by one he put his feet upon the steps, and pre- 
 sently he found himself in the gallery, with the blue 
 dome just above his head, and the floor on which he 
 had stood far below He had come all the way step 
 by step. So, dear children, must you climb ; let Jesus 
 take you by the hand, and lead you on step by step. 
 
®l}0ut (Setting <&n> 
 
 69 
 
 If every day you take one step upwards, by conquering 
 one fault, by struggling with one bad habit, by getting 
 the better of one selfish wish, you will get nearer to 
 |God, and farther from all that is low, and mean, and 
 contemptible. We must not put off our thoughts 
 of Heaven till this life is all but over. People who live 
 always in a low-lying district, could not breathe moun- 
 tain air, and we shall not be fit for the high life of 
 Heaven unless we climb. Heaven means simply being 
 with God, and doing the will of God. We should try 
 day by day to get nearer to Him, and to do His will, 
 that’s why we are told to pray, “ Thy will be done in 
 earth, as it is in Heaven.’’ Do you know that the 
 higher you climb up the mountain the purer the air 
 becomes, and the wider the view ? So the higher you 
 climb in life, the more you pray, the more you 
 think about God, the more you love Jesus, the more 
 you struggle with self, the' purer your life will be, and 
 you will see a far wider view than those who live down 
 in the dirty ways of sin. 
 
 i. v A little boy was once taken for the first time up a 
 high mountain. When he got to the top, and looked 
 on the grand, silent, melancholy hills, with the blue 
 sky looking so near, and the world so far below, he 
 said to his father, “ May I say my prayers ?’* 
 
 Yes, my children, the more we climb, the nearer we 
 
70 
 
 HLfyz (tLfyiTiSvm’g 2Srcatf. 
 
 come to God, and the more we want to speak to God 
 in prayer. 1 know of a tiny little boy, only about two 
 years old, who looked up at the starry heavens one 
 night, and said, “ I should so like to climb up a ladder, 
 and peep at God.” 
 
 My little children, the dear Lord Jesus has given each 
 of you a ladder to climb on, your prayers are steps on 
 the ladder, the Sacraments and teaching of the 
 Church are steps on the ladder, the troubles and 
 sorrows of your little lives, the conquests over your 
 tempers and your faults, all these are steps on the ladder 
 and the Hand of Jesus is ever helping you upward to 
 that life, where beyond the stars, you shall look on 
 God, and be satisfied. 
 
SERMON IX. 
 
 THE CHILDREN’S CR USA DE. 
 (Eent) 
 
 2 Tim. ii. 3. 
 
 “A good soldier of Jesus Christ/' 
 
 I suppose many of you have read of those strange 
 wars called the Crusades ? They were undertaken to 
 deliver the Holy Sepulchre of Jesus at Jerusalem out of 
 the hands of the heathen. Thousands of brave men, 
 besides their friends and followers, went to the Holy 
 Land, at different times, to fight in the Crusades. The 
 warriors wore a blood red cross on their clothing, from 
 which they got their name of Crusaders, and their 
 motto was, “ The Will of God." It was a very good 
 motto, but not a very true one for them, for I am 
 
72 
 
 CIjc Cl)tnrrtii’£ SSrcatr. 
 
 afraid they did many cruel and wicked things which 
 certainly were not the will of God ; and thousands of 
 people perished miserably abroad, who might have been 
 doing useful work at home. Well, amongst these 
 Crusades there was one called the Children’s Crusade. 
 A boy in France went about singing in his own 
 language — 
 
 ‘‘Jesus, Lord, repair our loss, 
 
 Restore to us Thy Holy Cross.” 
 
 Crowds of Children followed him, singing the same 
 words. No bolts, no bars, no fear of fathers, or love 
 of mothers, could hold them back, they determined to 
 go to the Holy Land, to work wonders there ! This 
 mad crusade had a very sad ending ; of course young 
 children could do nothing, being without leaders, or 
 experience^ or discipline, and they all perished 
 miserably either by land or sea. 
 
 Now I want you to think about another Children’s 
 Crusade, in which you are all engaged. What do we 
 mean when we pray for the Church “ militant here on 
 earth ?” We mean the fighting Church, the Church 
 on the battle-field of the world. We are God’s army, 
 and every one of us, man, woman, and child, must 
 try to show that he is a good soldier of Jesus Christ. 
 When were you made Christ’s soldier; my children ? 
 At your Baptism, when you were admitted into the 
 
tEl)c CljtRrrru’tf €ru£atfc. 
 
 73 
 
 Body of Christ’s Church, and signed with the Cross, as 
 a token that hereafter you should not be ashamed to 
 confess the faith of Christ Crucified, and manfully to 
 fight under His banner against sin, the world, and the 
 devil, and to continue Christ’s faithful soldiers and 
 Servants unto your life’s end. So you see you are 
 pledged to fight as long as you live, and since you fight 
 under the sign of the Cross, your warfare is a Crusade. 
 What do you think is required of a good soldier ? 
 First of all, he must be brave. It has been said that 
 an English soldier or sailor never knows when he is 
 beaten. Now I hope you will all grow up brave Eng- 
 lish men and women, because the word coward does 
 not seem to go well with the name Briton. But there’s 
 a better sort of courage than that of a fighting soldier, 
 that’s the courage of a Christian, which makes him do 
 right at any cost ; which makes him bear sorrow, and 
 insult, and loss, for Jesus Christ’s sake. We all like to 
 hear about acts of bravery, like that of the little mid- 
 shipman who spiked the Russian guns in the Crimean 
 war ; or of the boy Ensign, Anstruther, who at the 
 battle of the Alma planted the colours of the 23rd 
 Regiment on the wall of the great Redoubt, and then 
 fell, shot dead, with the colours drooping over him 
 like a pall. But the courage which is thought most of 
 in Heaven is the courage to do right. The boy or girl 
 who won’t tell a lie to escape punishment, the schoolboy 
 
74 
 
 
 who is brave enough to say his prayers with a whole 
 bedroom of companions laughing and jeering at him ; 
 the young servant-girl who won’t cheat and lie, 
 although her fellow-servants persecute her ; the child 
 who is brave enough to say, “No,” when he is asked 
 to do wrong ; these are the heroes whose names are 
 written in God’s Book. You little soldiers of Jesus, 
 members of the Children’s Crusade against the world, 
 the flesh, and the devil, must pray to be brave. You 
 must be brave to endure hardness, to deny yourselves 
 for Christ’s sake. Every soldier in war time has to 
 give up much which is pleasant, and dear to him : you 
 must not expect to have your own way always if you 
 are Christ’s soldiers. 
 
 I have read a story of a wounded soldier lying on a 
 battlefield, whose mouth had been struck by a shot. 
 When the doctor placed a cup of water to his mouth, 
 the man was eagerly going to drink, when he stopped, 
 and said, “ My mouth is all bloody, it will make the 
 cup bad for the others.” That soldier, in giving up 
 self for the sake of others, was more of a hero then 
 than when charging against the foe. Try to remember 
 that story, children, and if you are tempted to do any- 
 thing selfish or wrong, stop and think, “ It will make 
 it bad for the others I 
 
 You must expect to find enemies and difficulties if 
 
t£Ij t Cljtltfrcn’g Cru£afc. 
 
 75 
 
 you do what is right. Everyone was against Daniel 
 because he prayed to God. Everyone was against 
 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, because they 
 would not bow down to an idol. But God was on their 
 
 side. 
 
 There was once a famous man of God named Athan- 
 asius, you all know the Creed which bears his name in 
 the Prayer-book. He was bold enough to maintain 
 the true faith of Christ against Emperors, and Bishops, 
 and he was driven into banishment over and over 
 again. Some of his friends advised him to give in, for, 
 said they, the world is against you ; “ Then/’ answered 
 Athanasius, “ I am against the world.” Now you must, 
 as Christ’s soldiers, “learn to suffer and be strong.” 
 Remember the Lord Jesus is with you, and He will 
 give you strength enough for your need, you must do 
 your part, be sure God will do his part. You must not 
 expect difficulties and troubles to be removed out of 
 your way, nor the road of life made all smooth and 
 easy for you. If we are lazy in our work we can’t suc- 
 ceed, if we are lazy in our religion we can’t expect to 
 be rewarded. To win a victory we must fight, to get 
 to the end of a journey we must bear fatigue. Let me 
 tell you a fable about that Three animals, an ermine, 
 a beaver, and a wild boar, made up their minds to seek 
 a better country, and a new home. After a long and 
 weary journey, they came in sight of a beautiful land 
 
76 
 
 Cfullrmi’rf SSrcatf. 
 
 of trees and gardens, and rivers of water. The travellers 
 were delighted at the sight, but they noticed that before 
 they could enter this beautiful land, they must pass 
 through a great mass of water, filled with mud and 
 slime, and all kind of snakes and other reptiles. The 
 ermine was the first to try the passage. Now the 
 ermine has a very delicate fur coat, and when he found 
 how foul and muddy the water was, he drew back, and 
 said, that the country was very beautiful, but that he 
 would rather lose it than soil his beautiful coat. Then 
 the beaver proposed that as he was a good architect, as 
 you know beavers are, he should build a bridge across 
 the lake, and so in about two months they might get 
 across safely. But the wild boar looked scornfully at 
 his companions, and plunging into the water, he made 
 his way, in spite of mud and snakes, to the other side, 
 saying to his fellow-travellers, “ Paradise is not for 
 cowards, but for the brave.” 
 
 Dear children, between you and the Paradise of God 
 there lies a long journey, the enemy’s country, where 
 the devil and his angels will fight against you, where, 
 there are deep pools of trouble to be gone through, 
 rough, stony, roads of temptation to be traversed, high 
 rocks of difficulty to be climbed : but don’t be afraid, 
 only be brave, and go forward, and follow Jesus your 
 leader, and you will be able to say, as S. Paul said, 
 “ Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory, through 
 
Cft? Cfttttfmi’tf Cru^atfc. 
 
 77 
 
 our Lord Jesus Christ.” Every day of your lives there 
 is a battle to be fought, and hard work to be done, if 
 you are really good soldiers of Jesus Christ. Every 
 day you must fight with temper, or falsehood, or selfish- 
 ness, or pride, or idleness, or impurity : you must fight 
 yourselves, and help others to fight, remembering whose 
 soldiers you are, Crusaders, Soldiers of the Cross. 
 
 Well, we have seen that soldiers must be brave, 
 what else must they be ? Obedient ? Can you remember 
 any one mentioned in the Bible, who was a very tall, 
 powerful, and brave soldier, and yet not a good soldier, 
 because he was disobedient? King Saul. Yes, God 
 told Saul to do a certain thing, and he did not, and 
 God would no longer have him as a soldier. Do you 
 remember what was said to him ? “ Behold, to obey is 
 
 better than sacrifice.” The first thing a soldier has to 
 learn is to obey orders. If you really love the Lord 
 Jesus Christ you will keep His commandments. 
 
 About thirty years ago, a troop-ship, called the 
 Birkenhead , , struck on a rock off the coast of Africa. 
 There were a great number of troops on board, and 
 when all who could be saved had left the sinking ship, 
 the officer gave the order for the soldiers to parade and 
 stand at attention, and so standing, as firm and steady 
 as if they were on their parade ground at home, officers 
 and men went down with the ship. They obeyed their 
 orders. 
 
78 
 
 &fjc Cfjtttfrat’g 23rartr. 
 
 Remember, little flock, a soldier must not do what 
 he likes, but what he is ordered to do. May the dear 
 Lord help you to be brave, and faithful, and obedient 
 soldiers of Him, “ Whose you are, and Whom you 
 
 serve. 
 
SERMON X. 
 
 THE PLEA DING SA VI 0 UR. 
 (<§0ott dfriton).) 
 
 Hebrews vii. 25. 
 
 41 He ever liveth to make intercession for them.” 
 
 Can you tell me what that word Intercession means ? 
 A child was once asked the question, and he answered, 
 “ It means speaking a word to God for us.” Supposing 
 a servant has done wrong, and his master is going to 
 discharge him. And suppose a friend of the master 
 comes to him, and says, “I am sorry for your servant ; 
 he has done wrong certainly, but I believe he is peni- 
 tent, and I want you to forgive him, and give him 
 another trial.” Then the master answers, “ You 
 have done me much good, and I am deeply indebted 
 
80 
 
 Cljc CIjtltfnm’3 23rcatr. 
 
 to you : for your sake I will pardon the man.’’ So by 
 that friend’s intercession the servant is restored. 
 
 Now who is it who died for us on Good Friday? 
 The Lord Jesus Christ. And who is it who “ever 
 liveth to make intercession for us ?” The Lord Jesus 
 Christ. Did our Lord intercede for men before Fie 
 died ? Yes, when Fie was on the earth He prayed for 
 all men. When he was hanging on the cruel Cross all 
 those terrible hours of Good Friday, He was inter- 
 ceding for men. Do you remember one of his speeches 
 from the Cross— Father, forgive them, for they know 
 not what they do.” That was an intercession for his 
 enemies. Can you tell me anyone who was forgiven in 
 answer to that prayer ? The penitent thief — he went 
 with Jesus into Paradise. Was Christ’s work finished 
 when he died on the Cross ? No, He rose again for 
 our justification on Easter morning. And even then 
 His work was not done. He showed his Church for 
 forty days, all that must be done and taught after He 
 was gone into Heaven. And when Jesus ascended 
 up to Heaven His work was not done. He is doing 
 something for us now — what is it ? Interceding for us, 
 pleading before the throne of God. Every time we 
 repent, and are truly sorry for our sin, and tell God so, 
 Jesus takes our prayer and our confession, and offers it 
 as a Priest in Heaven, and pleads for us, showing His 
 pierced hands and feet and side, and all the marks of 
 
tJTIjf ftfcntu'iijj |S>atucur. 
 
 81 
 
 His agony, and thus He pleads the Sacrifice which He 
 offered on the Cross, and makes intercession for us 
 sinners. 
 
 Once, among the old Greeks, there was a man named 
 ^Eschylus, and he was condemned to death, and was 
 going to be led to execution. He had a brother called 
 Amyntas, who had gained victories for Greece, and in 
 one battle had lost his hand. Just as HSschylus was 
 going forth to die, Amyntas entered the court, and, 
 without saying a word to the Judges, he held up on 
 high the arm which had no longer a hand. Then the 
 Judges remembered his services, and pardoned his 
 brother. Children, the dear Lord Jesus is ever holding 
 up those wounded Hands marked with the cruel nails, 
 and pleading for us. Do you think He can remember the 
 names of all, even of the little children like you ? Oh ! 
 yes, a Father never forgets His children, and we are 
 God’s children, remember. All our names are written 
 on the heart of Jesus. Are any of you careless or 
 thoughtless on this sad, solemn day ? Try to think, try 
 to remember, Jesus is interceding for me now, Jesus is 
 holding up His pierced Hands for me now , my name 
 is on the heart of Jesus now. You know many people 
 don’t keep Good Friday holy, they make it a day 
 of amusement and noise; it is because they don’t 
 stop to think , they don’t remember what Jesus did, 
 
 what He is now doing. A friend of mine, a clergyman 
 F 
 
82 
 
 QLfyt Cfttltfrox’rf 2$rcatt. 
 
 in London, was going one Good Friday to preach in a 
 very poor neighbourhood. As he hurried along the 
 streets, where many of the people didn’t seem to care 
 about the day, the Church bell began to toll, and as my 
 friend passed two young men, one said to the other, 
 “ It sounds very solemn, doesn’t it?” 
 
 Yes, my children, Good Friday is a very solemn 
 day indeed. I want you to be very serious. You know 
 I like to see you happy and cheerful, but you must not 
 suppose all life is going to be a play-time. As you grow 
 older, you will find that — 
 
 “ Life is real, life is earnest, * 
 
 a very serious thing indeed. As you grow older, you 
 will find that the pleasures and amusements, which you 
 think so much of now, pass away very quickly. I think 
 you have all seen the pictures in a magic lantern. You 
 know how the little ones shouted with delight at the bright 
 figures on the curtain. They saw blue seas, and sunny 
 skies, and waving trees, and gilded palaces, and their little 
 hands were stretched out to grasp the beauteous vision, 
 and lo ! it was gone, it had faded away, it was only a 
 dissolving view. Well, my children, if we are in earnest, 
 and try to do our duty, and get the better of our sins, 
 then, for the sake of Jesus our Intercessor, God will 
 give us “such good things as pass man’s understand- 
 ing,” and a crown “ that fadeth not away.” 
 
€1 )z pieatrwjj 5?abt0ttr* 
 
 83 
 
 Have you watched children blowing bubbles ? 
 Perhaps the child is standing by the churchyard wall, 
 and the bright bubbles rise up one after another, the 
 child eagerly watches one floating globe of gold and 
 green and crimson, and presently it flies over the 
 wall of the Churchyard, and strikes against a tomb- 
 stone, and is gone. A good many people, men and 
 women, as well as children, spend their time in blowing 
 bubbles. One mans babble is to grow rich, another’s 
 bubble is pleasure, but all these bubbles come sooner 
 or later to the churchyard, and end there. Be in 
 earnest, children, “ Seek ye first the Kingdom of 
 Heaven, and his righteousness.” 
 
 Now I want to say something more to you about 
 intercession. I have told you that Jesus Christ is 
 always pleading, interceding for us. We should try to 
 intercede for each other, to pray for each other. When 
 you say your prayers you ask God to forgive you, and 
 to help you to be good, and to keep you from dangers 
 and temptations, and you pray for your parents and 
 friends, and your brothers and sisters. But I want you 
 to do more than this— to pray for your school-fellows, and 
 all the children in the parish. . How blessed a thing it 
 would be, if in every parish each child were to pray for 
 every other child. Those prayers from little lips would 
 be very sweet and precious in Heaven, and the dear 
 Lord Jesus would offer them as a sacrifice of a “ sweet- 
 
84 
 
 CIjc CTjtltfrru’tf 53rcatr* 
 
 smelling savour.” Oh ! my children, pray for each 
 other. If you know of any boys or girls who are not 
 going on well, who are getting into bad ways, do not 
 speak evil of them, nor judge them, but just pray for 
 them . 
 
 I’ll tell you about an Intercession service, which I 
 always have at a Mission. I put up a box in the 
 Church, and ask the people who want prayers offered 
 for them, to write down their request on a slip of paper, 
 and put it in the box. I have had thousands of such 
 papers, and very sad and touching many of them 
 were. Sisters asked us to pray for drunken brothers, 
 mothers begged us to pray for disobedient children, 
 people who had committed great sins asked for prayers, 
 people who had met with terrible sorrow asked for 
 prayer. On one night during the Mission, when the 
 Church is full of people, I kneel before the Altar, and 
 read out these petitions one after another, and all the 
 people say after each is read, “ Hear us, Holy Jesus.” 
 Very often the people are sobbing and crying as they 
 intercede one for another, everyone praying for everyone 
 else. I have many of these intercession papers sent in 
 by children. I remember one, it was written in a 
 child’s round-hand, in these words, “For a little boy, 
 that he may govern his temper.” Another was from a 
 girl — she wrote, “ Do please pray for my poor drunken 
 uncle, I want him so to love Jesus.” I found another 
 
€lj t $3Icathng Jrahtaur. 
 
 85 
 
 of these papers in my draw to-day, it says, “ Dear 
 Missioner, please pray for my wife, as she is not able to 
 come to hear your dear prayers through illness; also for 
 me, that I may live a godly life, through this mission 
 being held in this parish.” Now this was evidently 
 written by some poor working man, and spelt all wrong, 
 but it was so thoroughly true and real. I never like to 
 destroy these papers, they seem to me like letters 
 addressed to God, and I’m sure he does not mind the 
 bad spelling. Now could not you children do some- 
 thing for each other, and have an intercession service ? 
 At least you could do this, you could put down on a 
 card or a paper the object of your intercession, like 
 this — For the children of such a school, for the children 
 in such a street, or the names of anyone may be put 
 down. You need not pray for children only, but let 
 the children be the children’s special subject of inter- 
 cession. Yes, and I want you to take others into your 
 prayers, all the children who don’t know and love 
 Jesus. Here you are wellxared for, and well taught, 
 but in London, and many other great cities, there are 
 hundreds of poor children who are brought up in the 
 streets from babies, they are often nearly starving, they 
 are taught to lie and steal ; they live in the midst of 
 dirt, and drink, and bad talk, and they do not know or 
 love the Lord Jesus. But He knows them, and He 
 intercedes for those poor waifs and strays. “ Do you 
 
£6 
 
 Cbe Cijtftrrtti’£ SSiTaft. 
 
 hear the children crying, O my brother,’’ that’s what 
 might be said to us — the poor neglected children crying 
 for bread, and above all, wanting the Children’s Bread, 
 the Bread of Life. Other people, older and stronger 
 than you, are beginning to help tlies z gutter children, as 
 they are called, but you can do something, a great 
 deal, if you pray for them. Each parish might pray 
 for the neglected children in some special place, we 
 might pray for the waifs and strays of London, another 
 parish might take Liverpool, and so on. I will tell you 
 about a children’s service which I once held at a Mis- 
 sion in the East of London. There were boys and 
 girls in the mission room, and the girls were very quiet, 
 but the boys were very rough and disorderly. It was 
 almost impossible to make them listen. There was one 
 little fellow, about five or six years old, and he was 
 crawling about on the floor just in fiont of me, and 
 amusing himself by blacking his face at the stove. The 
 big boys kept poking at him with sticks, and enjoying 
 the fun. Well, at last I could not get their attention 
 fixed at all, so I took up the little boy by the hand, 
 and asked him to stand by me on the altar step whilst 
 I talked to them. I thought the little fellow might be 
 frightened, or angry, at my taking him up, but he 
 stood by my side whilst I preached, as good as possible, 
 one little black hand in mine. When all the rough, 
 unruly boys saw that little one standing quietly there 
 
(Elje picatrtttjj Jrahtour. 
 
 87 
 
 they became quiet too, and listened very attentively. 
 When I knelt to pray, that little boy knelt by my side, 
 and put his little dirty hands together. You can’t 
 think what a help and comfort that little child was to 
 me in that service ; I thought of the time when our 
 Lord took a child, and set him in the midst, and when 
 I saw the noisy lads grow quiet, I remembered the 
 words of the prophet, l< A little child shall lead them.” 
 
 We shall have kept this Good Friday to some pur- 
 pose, it you make up your minds for the future to make 
 prayers and intercessions for the children of this place, 
 and those in London, who know not the love of Jesus. 
 Kneel down now, and ask the Lord Jesus to hear you: 
 
 “ Intercessor, Friend of sinners, 
 
 Earth’s Redeemer, plead for me, 
 
 Where the songs of all the sinless, 
 
 Sweep across the crystal sea.’* 
 
SERMON XI. 
 
 SOWING AND GATHERING, 
 (ea&ttvo 
 
 i Cor. xv. 38. 
 
 “To every seed his own body.** 
 
 There are in Rome some very ancient burying-places 
 called the catacombs, and on the walls there are many 
 epitaphs to Christians buried there, some very beautiful. 
 One of these epitaphs is exceedingly short, it is this — 
 Tentianus vivit , that is, Tentianus lives . That seems 
 perhaps a strange thing to put on a grave, yet it is per- 
 fectly true. The soul of that Christian, Tentianus, is 
 alive, and his body will rise again. Sometimes we see 
 a long epitaph on a tomb all about death, as if that 
 were the end of all things. The people who write these 
 
antr 
 
 80 
 
 gloomy epitaphs have forgotten the Resurrection. I 
 like the words in the Catacombs best. There was a 
 great painter once called Albert Durer, he lies buried 
 in his native city of Nuremberg, in Germany, and on 
 his tomb-stone they have put the word Emigravit - — he 
 has gone to another country. 
 
 “ Emigravit is the inscription on the tomb-stone where he lies ; 
 
 Dead he is not — but departed — for the artist never dies.*’ 
 
 This Easter teaches us that as Jesus rose from the 
 grave with His Body, so shall we rise with our body. Where 
 was the soul of Jesus during the three days between 
 the Crucifixion and the Resurrection ? In the place of 
 departed spirits. Yes, and His Body was in Joseph’s 
 new tomb, and when it was time for the Resurrection, 
 the soul came back into the body again. So it will be 
 with us, our bodies will be laid in a grave in the 
 churchyard or cemetery — cemetery means a sleeping- 
 place you know — and our souls will be in the place of 
 departed spirits, and when the great day of Resurrec- 
 tion comes, we shall have bodies into which our souls 
 will come again. But you are thinking, my children, 
 that our bodies will moulder away into dust. Yes, but 
 God who made the first man out of the dust can make 
 our bodies again out of the dust. One of the old 
 saints of the Church, S. Chrysostom, whose prayer, 
 you all know, explains this very well to us. He says, 
 that when we pull down a house in order to re-build it, 
 
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 tZTIje Cljttftrnt’ia 33reatr. 
 
 or repair its ruins, we take the inhabitants out of it, 
 lest they should be injured by the dust and rubbish, 
 and we find them some other dwelling till the house is 
 rebuilt and beautified. Then we bring them back to 
 their old home made into a better dwelling. So when 
 God overthrows our worn-out, decayed body, all falling 
 to pieces from disease or old age, He calls out our soul 
 for a time, and takes care of it in some part of His 
 great Kingdom ; and when our body is repaired and 
 restored, and made fit for the resurrection, He places 
 our soul back again in its accustomed home. 
 
 You, my children, all knew something of death, for 
 it comes to all houses sooner or later. There is a very 
 beautiful story among the Indians, which tells us how 
 a young mother lost her only child, and went in the 
 agony of her grief to the Great Prophet of her people, 
 asking if the dead child could be restored to life. The 
 prophet told her that if she could obtain a mustard- 
 seed from a house where there had never been a death, 
 her child should be given back to life. The mother at 
 once set forth among the houses of her neighbours, 
 and begged for a mustard-seed. At the first house the 
 seed was given readily ; but when she asked if death 
 bad ever been there, they told her how their eldest son 
 had died there in the midst of his strength and beauty. 
 Then the mother turned away sadly, and sought another 
 house : but there they spoke of the white-haired father 
 
Jrotmmj a xits <§alljn*tng. 
 
 91 
 
 who had passed away. In another home they told of 
 the young wife’s death, and so in every house there 
 was a tale of death ; and the mother knew that her 
 child might not return to her. But I want you to feel 
 that although death comes to all our bodies, we are 
 just as much alive five minutes after death, as we were 
 five minutes before. When your little brother died, 
 you missed the bright smile, and the loving look in the 
 eyes, but what made him love you, and smile upon you, 
 is just as much alive as ever, his soul has only gone 
 from one kind of life to another. So when you walk 
 through the churchyard, God's acre , as it has been 
 rightly called, I want you to feel, as you look at the 
 tiny graves of the children, that their tired little bodies 
 are only resting in their new cradles ; or when you stand 
 by the grave of father or mother, I want you to be 
 able to say, not “ Here lies my dead father,” but, “I 
 believe in the resurrection, my father lives. ,, If we 
 did not believe in the resurrection, the churchyard 
 would be a sad place indeed, we should be obliged 
 to say — 
 
 “Colder, colder, colder still, 
 
 Upward steals a vapour chill ; 
 
 Strong the earthly odour grows — 
 
 I smell the mould above the rose/ 
 
 But when we believe in the resurrection, the church- 
 yard becomes God’s garden, and all the dead bodies 
 
92 
 
 dje CfitttiraihS 23rcatf. 
 
 are precious seeds sown there, one day to grow up 
 into glorified bodies ; and we can say — 
 
 “O’er the earth there comes a bloom • 
 
 Sunny light for sullen gloom, 
 
 Warm perfume for vapour cold — 
 
 I smell the rose above the mould.” 
 
 Now let us look at the resurrection in another way. 
 God’s world is always showing us a resurrection. You 
 sow a seed in your garden, and it comes up as a new 
 body, a flower. The chrysalis opens, and there comes 
 forth a butterfly, the resurrection body of what was 
 once a caterpillar, S. Paul tells us that God gives “to 
 every seed his own body,” that means, that if you sow 
 wheat it will come up wheat, if you sow thistle seed you 
 will gather thistles. . What you sow you will reap. 
 Now remember, that all your acts and words and 
 thoughts are like so many seeds sown, they will come up, 
 they will have a resurrection. You may have forgotten 
 w r hat you said or did some time ago, but it will come up, 
 and bear fruit, it will have a resurrection here, and 
 at the Day of Judgment it will rise again. All the 
 good things we have been able to do, the kind acts 
 done to the poor and needy, the loving words spoken 
 to our parents or friends, these are not lost or forgotten. 
 They will grow up, and on the Judgment Day they 
 will stand round us like sweet-smelling flowers. Think, 
 my children, each time you try to do right for Christ’s 
 
antf (SatSrrtn^. 
 
 93 
 
 dear sake, each time you deny yourself, or give up 
 your own way, or conquer a bad thought, just think — 
 “I am sowing a good seed for the Day of Judgment, 
 it will blossom and smell sweet on the great day of 
 gathering in the Harvest.” Yes, and the bad things we 
 do, and say, and think, they too are seeds, and they 
 will grow up a bitter crop, both here and hereafter. 
 All our acts, good and bad, have a resurrection. 
 There is a fable among the ancients, that Jason sowed 
 the ground with dragon’s teeth, and there sprang up an 
 army of fierce armed men. Every sin wilfully com- 
 mitted, every mean, cruel action, every bad word 
 spoken, every impure thought indulged in, is a dragon’s 
 tooth sown, and it will spring up into an enemy of our 
 peace. What sort of resurrection can you look forward 
 to ? It depends on what seed you are sowing — don’t 
 sow thorns and brambles , they will grow up to tear you 
 and others also. Angry tempers, passionate words, 
 sulky humours, these are all thorns and brambles, and 
 they will make you suffer, and those about you. When 
 a child is disobedient, wilful, violent, he is platting a 
 crown of thorns, do you know for whom ? for himself, 
 for his friends, and above all for Jesus. Stop and think, 
 when you are tempted to do wrong, “ I’m doing what 
 those cruel men did of old, I’m platting a crown of thorns 
 for Jesus.” Don’t sow nettles and thistles , those prickly, 
 stinging things will grow up to hurt you, and others 
 
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 €I)c Cljiltrriu’g SSrratr. 
 
 also. Ill-tempered, fretful, discontented people are 
 sowing nettles and thistles, and they are sure to have a 
 large crop. But what a disagreable crop it is ! You 
 can no more be happy with an ill-tempered person, 
 or a fretful person, or a grumbling person, than you 
 can sleep comfortably in a bed full of prickly thistles 
 and stinging nettles. I will tell you what to sow, sow 
 sweeltiess and you will gather sweetness. Once a little 
 boy sowed the seed of a violet on a bank in his garden. 
 Before long he was taken away to a foreign land, 
 where he grew up to be a man. After long years he 
 came back, and went to visit his old home. In the 
 garden he found a bank covered with sweet-smelling 
 violets. He had sown sweetness, and he gathered it. 
 Every little loving word, every little kindly act of ours, 
 is like the violet seed, it will grow, and bring us a crop 
 of love and sweetness. Ask the dear Lord Jesus to 
 sow in your hearts the seed of love and kindliness, of 
 gentleness and faith, ask Him for good seed, that you 
 may sow it day by day in the field of this world, and 
 it will grow; so that on the great Easter day of 
 all, at the end of the world, you shall stand with glori- 
 fied bodies, and every good thing, which God has given 
 you strength to do, shall blossom as a sweet flower at 
 the feet of Jesus. 
 
SERMON XII. 
 
 GOD’S GREAT FAMILY . 
 
 Psalm l. ix. 
 
 lt I know all the fowls of the mountains ; and the wild beasts of 
 the field are mine.’’ 
 
 I am going to talk to you about being kind to animals. 
 God is love, and He cares for all His creatures. Do not 
 suppose that because you are so much bigger and 
 stronger than a fly that you have a right to be cruel to 
 it. The same God who made you, made the fly, and 
 as He gave you the power of walking upright on your 
 feet, He gave the fly the power of walking upside down 
 on a ceiling. Both you and the fly are members of God’s 
 great family. There was once a holy man of God 
 named S. Francis, he was good and loving to all men, 
 
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 Che &TjtRrrtn’£ 23rcaXr* 
 
 and not only to them, but to all God’s creatures. He 
 used to call the birds and the beasts his brothers and 
 sisters, because he loved everything which God had 
 made, and when he was dying he was perfectly peace- 
 ful and happy, and said with his last breath, “ Wel- 
 come, sister Death.” 
 
 Now no one has a right to be called a good Christian 
 who is cruel to any of God’s creatures. Our religion 
 is not worth much if our dogs and cats and other 
 animals don’t come in for a share of it. Very often 
 men and boys are very brutal and cruel to the horses 
 and donkeys which they have to drive. It is a common 
 mistake to say that a donkey is a very stupid and very 
 obstinate animal, and that the more he is knocked 
 about the better he works. Now that’s all wrong. A 
 donkey is not naturally stupid, nor obstinate. He is 
 very thoughtful, he always thinks where he is going to 
 put his feet, that is what makes him so sure-footed. 
 It often happens that the boy who is driving the donkey 
 is stupid, and he is too blind to see his own fault, and 
 so thinks it is in the donkey, Then a donkey is not 
 naturally obstinate, he is not flighty or excitable like 
 some people, but very sober, and steady, and trust- 
 worthy, and so his enemies give him a bad name and 
 call him obstinate. But you may spoil the donkey’s 
 temper as you may spoil a child’s. If you are contin- 
 ually knocking a boy about the head with a thick sticK, 
 
<&vtzt dfanulm 
 
 97 
 
 you can’t expect him to grow up very intelligent or 
 very sweet-tempered- And so if you treat an animal 
 in that way, and half starve him into the bargain, it is 
 your own fault if he becomes stubborn. Kindness will 
 work wonders, where the stick will only make failures. 
 I have said a donkey is not naturally stupid. I have 
 one at home, a great pet with my children. She always 
 looks round at me when I call her by name, and 
 comes up to me in the meadow, and expects something 
 nice in my hand. But if a boy tries to catch her, she 
 puts back her ears and runs at him, because she looks 
 on boys as her natural enemies. She knows the differ- 
 ence between friends and foes. I know a donkey who 
 would open the churchyard gate, in order to graze on 
 the grass, and I have read of a still more wonderful 
 animal in Spain. There they treat donkeys very well, 
 the Spaniards know they are neither stupid nor 
 obstinate, and so they make pets of them, and feed 
 and groom them carefully, and they are handsome and 
 prosperous-looking. Well, a certain poor man in Spain 
 had for many years carried milk into Madrid, to supply 
 his regular customers. Every morning he and his don- 
 key travelled the same road. .. The man fell ill, and 
 had no one to send to market. The wife suggested 
 that they should send the donkey alone. The panniers 
 were filled with the milk-cans, and the village Priest 
 wrote an inscription, asking customers to measure 
 
 G 
 
98 
 
 £Ij c Clj{ttrr*n’£ Brratf. 
 
 their own milk, and return the vessels. The donkey 
 set off with his load, and in time returned with his 
 milk-cans empty. This he did for several days. In 
 Madrid the bell-handles mostly hang down by the side 
 of the walls, and it appears that the donkey had stopped 
 before each customer’s house, and if no one came in a 
 little while, he pulled down the handle with his mouth 
 and rang the bell. Now I don’t think we must call a 
 donkey stupid after that, 
 
 If any of you are tempted to be unkind and cruel to 
 an animal, just try to put yourself in his place. Think 
 to yourself, how should I like to be treated in this 
 way. You know that the old heathen used to think 
 that men’s souls after death passed into different 
 animals, so that he who had been a great soldier or 
 speaker might become a dog, or a lion, or a horse, 
 Now if that could really be the case, if some of you 
 children were to become dogs, or horses, or donkeys, . 
 don’t you think you would find it very hard to be 
 kicked, and beaten, and sworn at, when all the time 
 you were doing your best ? Ah ! If the animals could 
 speak to us, as Balaam’s ass did once, what sad, 
 reproachful things they would have to say ! 
 
 A man was cruelly beating a horse one day, and a 
 neighbour remonstrated with him, and asked him why 
 he did it. “ Because,” said the man, “ he is the most 
 
threat dfamtln. 
 
 99 
 
 obstinate and ill-conditioned beast in the world.” “ Ah,” 
 said the neighbour, “ I should like to bear what the 
 horse has to say about it.” If you could change places 
 with the donkey you were belabouring so unmercifully 
 yesterday, I wonder what you would say to the heavy 
 blows showered upon your head and sides. There is a 
 fable of an enchantress called Circe, who turned a 
 number of people into pigs. I wish just for one day 
 the old fairy tales would come true, and all the unkind 
 boys and girls could be changed into the animals which 
 they ill-use, and could feel in their own bodies what the 
 poor dumb cattle feel in theirs. Well, that cannot be, 
 but I hope you will try to remember my words, and 
 think of the sin of causing God’s creatures unnecessary 
 pain. 
 
 Sometimes when I am walking along the roads I hear 
 lads swearing at the horses which they are driving. 
 Nothing seems to me much more cowardly and con- 
 temptible, than to use bad language to a poor dumb 
 animal who cannot answer. Every one of those bad 
 words are set down in God’s Book be sure, though 
 they were only spoken to an animal. “That horse 
 knows perfectly well when I swear at him,” said a 
 coachman to a passenger. “Yes,” was the answer, 
 “and so does God.” We have no more right to abuse 
 or illtreat an animal than we have to abuse or ill-treat 
 a man, the same God is the Maker of both. Be kind 
 
100 
 
 dThc Cbtltfrax’g 25rcatt. 
 
 to all God’s creatures, and you will win their love and 
 gratitude. 
 
 Do you remember, children, the story of Androcles 
 and the lion? Androcles took a thorn out of a lion’s 
 foot, and sometime afterwards he was ordered to be 
 thrown to the wild beasts by the cruel ruler of his 
 city. When all the crowd had met together in the 
 amphitheatre, expecting to see Androcles torn to pieces 
 by a lion, to their astonishment the animal came for- 
 ward and licked the man’s hand, for it was the very 
 lion for which Androcles had done a good turn. Then 
 all the people were amazed, and the prisoner was set 
 free. We read in the newspapers lately of an elephant 
 which remembered an injury, and crushed to death a 
 man who months before had treated it most cruelly, 
 
 I advise you children to try to study the habits of 
 animals, watch them when you are out in the fields, read 
 about them in a book of natural history, and when you 
 find what wonderful sense and knowledge God has 
 given to them, you will not venture to be cruel. If 
 you watch a bird building her nest, or sitting on her 
 eggs, while her mate sings to her in the green wood, 
 you will not feel inclined, I think, to go and destroy 
 that poor bird’s house with wanton hands. On a sunny 
 day in summer nothing is more beautiful than the 
 butterflies which float about like winged flowers in the 
 
<L>atT3 (Srcat jfamtlin 
 
 101 
 
 air. Yet as soon as some of you children catch sight 
 of them, you take off your caps, and try to catch 
 them. And if you succeed, what then ? Look into 
 your hot hand, and you will see a poor, bruised, dingy- 
 looking insect, all its beauty gone. You have spoilt 
 what God made beautiful, just as some wanton people 
 will pick lovely flowers, and trample them under foot. 
 Again I say, study the nature of animals, and you will 
 find that many despised creatures, such as the toad for in- 
 stance, are quite harmless, and very useful. You have no 
 idea what wonderful creatures even the smallest and 
 commonest of insects are. Solomon says, 1 ‘Go to the ant, 
 thou sluggard and indeed everyone, whether he be 
 idle or industrious, can learn something from an ant’s 
 nest. I have not time to tell you half of the wonderful 
 things connected with ants. Their nests are just like 
 cities, and there are different classes of ants to do 
 different kinds of work/ The very young ants, whose 
 skin is soft and tender, devote themselves to feeding 
 the little white grubs, which change in time into 
 insects. As they grow older and stronger the ants do 
 other kinds of work, for one thing they become 
 soldiers, and go out to battle, or defend the nest 
 against enemies. Do you knotv that some kinds of 
 ants keep slaves ? Well, these ants go out to find food 
 for their mistresses, who stay at home and attend to 
 household duties. If any one ant is taken prisoner 
 
102 
 
 (£f ) z Cfitltrrm’tf 23rratr. 
 
 when out on a foraging expedition, or is otherwise 
 prevented from returning home, another is sent out to 
 take his place. I dare say you never heard that some 
 kinds of ants keep cows . Their cows are a certain kind 
 of green fly, which is often found on flowers, and they 
 give a sweet fluid, which is to the ant what milk 
 is to us. These wonderful creatures build covered 
 cow-sheds in the earth for their tiny cattle. Ants are 
 very fond of keeping pets, only they make them work 
 for their living. Two kinds of insects are found in the 
 galleries of an ant’s nest, and it is supposed that they 
 are the scavengers who keep clear the streets of the 
 wonderful insect city. A curious little beetle, which is 
 quite blind, is found living among the ants. He seems 
 to be very helpless, and cannot even feed himself, and 
 the ants take great care of him, and keep him perfectly 
 clean, oftentimes they may be seen licking him all 
 over. As the blind beetle does not seem to have any- 
 thing to do, perhaps the ants keep him out of charity, 
 like an old blind man in an alms house. There is one 
 kind of ants called the Amazons, and they teach us a 
 lesson on the folly of depending upon others, instead 
 of helping ourselves. These Amazon ants keep slaves to 
 do all the work for them, and they have actually lost 
 their teeth from want of using them, and they cannot 
 even feed themselves. They have been seen to be 
 starving in the midst of food, because there were no 
 
6rcat JfamtTin 
 
 103 
 
 slaves to feed them. But I must not stay to talk to 
 you any more about the ants. What I want you to 
 learn is, that you must never despise any of God’s 
 creatures, however small. “ In wisdom hath he made 
 them all.” I wonder if there is any Heaven for the 
 animals ! Many wise and good men have thought that 
 there is. One thing I am quite sure of, there will be 
 no Heaven for those who are cruel to any of God’s 
 creatures. If we really love God we shall love our 
 brother also, yes, and all the humble brothers and 
 sisters, the beasts and the birds and the insects, of 
 God’s Great Family. 
 
 “ He prayeth best, who loveth best 
 All things both great and small ; 
 
 For the dear God who loveth us, 
 
 He made and loveth all.” 
 
SERMON XIII. 
 
 LEARNING TO WALK. 
 
 Eph. v. 8. 
 
 “ Walk as children of light.” 
 
 I suppose that all you boys and girls think that you 
 know how to walk. You would laugh at the idea of 
 being taught how you are to use your legs now, as you 
 were when you were babies. -.'Well, we will see. You 
 all know how to walk along the country lanes 
 and turnpike roads, but if you were to go to London 
 for the first time, you would find that you did not 
 know how to walk. I have sometimes seen a country- 
 man in one of the crowded streets of the City of Lon- 
 don, trying to make his way along, and every minute 
 
Eftirntnjg to OHalft. 
 
 10-5 
 
 he would run against some passenger, and get in the 
 way of another, till the busy city folks were quite angry 
 with him. There is a particular way of walking in 
 crowded streets, and, like everything else, it has to be 
 learned. 
 
 But there is another kind of walking which has to be 
 learned. We hear a great deal about that in the Bible. 
 S. Paul has much to say about how we ought to walk, 
 and he was not writing to little tiny children, but to 
 grown up men and women. In this very chapter from 
 which my text comes, we read these words — “ Be ye 
 followers of God, as dear children, and walk in love 
 see that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise 
 redeeming the time.” In another chapter S. Paul 
 writes, “ I beseech you that ye walk worthy of the 
 vocation wherewith ye are called. 5, In another place 
 we read, “ Let us walk honestly, as in the day.” And 
 again, “ Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the 
 lusts of the flesh.” “ As ye have received Christ Jesus 
 the Lord, so walk ye in Plim.” 
 
 Now there are only two roads on which we can 
 walk. One is the broad road which leads to destruc- 
 tion, the devil’s road. It seems easy to travel on it at 
 first, but it grows harder and rougher as we go on, for 
 “ the way of transgressors is hard.” You know what 
 the other road is ? The King’s Highway, the narrow 
 
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 path which leads to life eternal, God’s Way, of which 
 He says, “Walk ye in it.” Very often this road is 
 difficult to journey on, it is very steep and up hill 
 sometimes, but there is always some one to help us, 
 and there are the foot-marks of One who has gone 
 before us, to show us the way. You know that we 
 sing a hymn sometimes, in which are the words — 
 
 “ O let me see Thy foot-prints, 
 
 And in them plant mine own,” 
 
 Well, those are the foot-prints of Jesus Christ, aud He 
 has gone before us along the path of holiness, and 
 patience, and sorrow, to show us the way. Some of 
 you children have no doubt heard of King Canute the 
 Dane, who was King of England, and who rebuked 
 his courtiers by bidding the waves obey him ? One 
 day, long ago, Canute was staying in a village among 
 the fens, and he wished to cross over to the Isle of 
 Ely. The weather was very cold, and the fens were 
 all frozen, so that the only way to reach the Island was 
 by sledge. But it was a very dangerous journey, for 
 there were places where the ice was rotten, and would 
 not bear the weight of a sledge, and in other places 
 there were holes and deep pools. Whilst King Canute 
 was doubting what was best to be done, a poor labourer, 
 who had got the nickname of Bodge, because he was 
 big and stout, came forward, and offered to go before 
 the king’s sledge, and find a safe track for him. So 
 
Ewrntns tn CTfalk. 
 
 107 
 
 they started on their journey, feeling quite safe, since 
 if the ice would bear poor Bodge it would bear the 
 sledge. When they reached Ely, the king found that 
 the labourer was a slave, and he set him free, and gave 
 him a great reward. When I read that story, I was 
 reminded how the dear Lord Jesus has gone over the 
 difficult road before us to lead the way to rest and 
 peace. When the journey seems very hard, and it is 
 very difficult sometimes for little children, and for men 
 and women, to walk in the right way — then remember 
 that Jesus has gone before, and that He can and will 
 give you strength to walk in His holy ways. Here are 
 some plain rules for you, my children, which will 
 show you how you ought to walk through life as God’s 
 children, as children of light. 
 
 First of all, then, keep io the right. You will often 
 see these words printed up in the crowded streets of 
 great cities. Your own conscience will tell you what is 
 right, and whenever there are two ways for you to go 
 in, the right or the wrong, be sure to keep to the right. 
 
 The next rule I give you is, keep your eyes open . If 
 you were to walk along a road with your eyes shut, you 
 would soon stumble or fall, or wander out of the right 
 path ; but if you keep your eyes open, you see the 
 rough places over which you might stumble, and the 
 muddy places where you might splash your clothes 
 
10S 
 
 Kl)t CIjtBfrcn^ SSrratr. 
 
 with dirt, and you can see the finger-post showing you 
 the right way. Well, in walking along the path of life 
 you will need to keep your eyes open. There are 
 dangerous places, over which you will stumble and fall, 
 unless you watch for them carefully ; there are tempta- 
 tions, like muddy pools, which will stain your white 
 robe, and make it foul, unless you avoid them. If 
 you keep your eyes open, you will see God’s Hand 
 directing you, and you will find that He has placed 
 many finger-posts to show you the right way. The 
 Church is one finger-post, the Bible is another, your 
 teachers are all pointing out to you the right road. If 
 you were to journey along with your eyes shut, you 
 might meet with bad company, with those who would 
 rob you, and wound you. There is plenty of such bad 
 company on the road of life. There are bad boys and 
 girls who will try to lead you out of the right way, out 
 of the King’s highway, into some back lane of sin. 
 They want to rob you, to take your good name from 
 you, to strip off the dress which God gave you in Holy 
 Baptism. Keep your eyes open, my children, and see 
 well what sort of company you keep. And not only 
 keep your eyes open, but don't wear spectacles . I don’t 
 mean actual spectacles, you may need them some day, 
 when you grow older ; what I mean is that some people 
 see things quite wrongly, because they look at them 
 through coloured spectacles. I know some people 
 
learning ta ©SJalfc. 
 
 10& 
 
 who always seem gloomy and discontented. Nothing 
 suits them. The weather is always wrong, they say the 
 sun never shines, and the rain is always falling. Why 
 is it ? Because they are looking at everything through 
 dark spectacles , and so everything seems dark to them. 
 There are some boys and girls of this kind. At school 
 they are generally grumbling. They complain that the 
 food is bad, that the teachers are unkind, and that they 
 themselves are very unlucky. It is just because they 
 are looking at things through dark-coloured spectacles. 
 You find them murmuring over their sdhool-work. They 
 never can read that hard book, they tell us, they never 
 can master that difficult sum ! It is all the fault of the 
 dark spectacles. Sometimes we find children very 
 quarrelsome, always saying unkind things to each other, 
 and if we ask them the reason, they tell us that some 
 one is so cross, or so unkind, but the fault is in them- 
 selves. They have been looking at a companion’s face 
 through black spectacles. Some children look at 
 things through magnifying glasses. Every little fault 
 in a companion is magnified, till it looks quite big and 
 terrible. When they come to look at themselves, they 
 magnify their own goodness, and they think they are 
 wonderfully clever, pleasant, amiable people. My 
 children, don’t look through these glasses. - 
 
 My next piece of advice to you is, push your way . 
 There are sure to be difficulties in your path. You can 
 
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 dTIje CljtttJren^ 23rcatr. 
 
 do one of two things, you can wait for the difficulty to 
 be removed, or you can push your way through it. In 
 large towns, where there are great public buildings, 
 such as banks and offices, you often see a heavy door 
 leading into the building, and on it is written the one 
 word, push . Now, suppose you wished to enter that 
 building; you might pull at that door for hours and 
 not open it ; you might ring the bell, or call to some- 
 one to open, but everybody would be too busy to listen. 
 There would be only one thing for you to do, you 
 must pushy then the door would open. So it is with 
 all difficulties, “where there’s a will there’s a way,” if 
 you push against the door which is blocking your 
 way, it will open. 
 
 There was a famous painter at Antwerp long ago, called 
 Quintin Matsys. He was a blacksmith at first, and this 
 is how he became a painter. He fell in love with a young 
 woman, but her father refused to let her marry the 
 blacksmith unless he painted a great picture. Now 
 here was a great difficuliy in the way. Quintin Matsys 
 knew something about painting, but much more about 
 a blacksmith's anvil. He did not give up his purpose, 
 however ; he studied and painted early and late, and 
 in six months he produced his famous picture, The, 
 Misers , and won his wife. On his own portrait he 
 wrote the words, “ Love made me a painter.” If you 
 want to succeed in anything, my children, you must push. 
 
Ucarmntj ta E&Jalk. 
 
 ill 
 
 If you want to be good children, to walk as children 
 of light, you must push your way through the tempta- 
 tions and difficulties of life. Remember there is 
 always another hand helping you. God helps those 
 who help themselves. God expects us to do something 
 for ourselves. When He sent the quails to the Children 
 of Israel in the wilderness, they had to prepare and 
 cook them. When He rained down manna for them 
 to eat, they had to go out and gather it. 
 
 Take another word of advice, when you meet with 
 your enemy, fight . I don’t mean an earthly enemy, 
 and I don’t mean fighting with your fists. As you 
 walk along the roads of life, your enemy, the devil, 
 will often stand in the path to injure you, to turn you 
 out of the way, “Whom resist, steadfast in the faith • 
 The ancient Greeks, who were the most famous soldiers 
 of old times, carried a shield in battle. To lose this 
 shield and leave it behind, was the greatest disgrace 
 which could happen to them. When a soldier was 
 killed, or badly wounded, his companions laid him on 
 his shield, and carried him out of the fight. I have 
 read of a Greek mother, who said to her son as he 
 was going to the battle, “ Either return with your shield 
 or upon it.” That meant, “Either conquer or die.'* 
 My children, it would be very sad for us to have to say, 
 after we have met with temptations to sin— “ I have 
 returned again, but 1 have left my shield behind” 
 
112 
 
 CljtlUrni^ 23r catf. 
 
 Last of all, take this rule if you would walk rightly, 
 mind the crossings. In London streets it is very difficult 
 and dangerous to cross the road sometimes. If you 
 are not very careful, and quite accustomed to it, you 
 may be knocked down, and run over : or you may take 
 the wrong turning, and lose yourself. So it is with 
 life, we have to cross over a difficult crossing very 
 often, and there is a great crowd of temptations and 
 sins all around us, and if we are not very watchful, we 
 shall be knocked down and run over by some of these 
 temptations. I have known many boys and girls who 
 were once pure, happy children, who lost their good name, 
 and their happy looks, because they did ?iot mind the 
 crossings. They came to Purity crossing, and they were 
 careless, and evil lust came upon them ; and they were 
 run over, and cruelly wounded. They came to 
 Honesty crossing , and they were not on their guard, 
 and they were run over by a temptation to steal, and 
 so they were ruined. When they passed over Truthful 
 crossing , they were not watching, and Falsehood came 
 upon them, and overthrew them, and whilst they were 
 trying to escape from the consequences of this, they 
 took the wrong turning, and have never been in the 
 right road since. My children, be careful how you 
 walk, keep your eyes open, and ask God for help every 
 day — “ Walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise f 
 4< Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.” 
 
SERMON XIV. 
 
 A BUNCH OF FLOWERS. 
 
 i Samuel xxv. 29. 
 
 “ Bound in the bundle of life with the Lord thy God.’’ 
 
 My children, let us say the Creed together, slowly and 
 carefully. When we publicly say that we believe these 
 great and solemn truths, we should not do so hurriedly 
 or thoughtlessly. Now I want you to think specially 
 about some words in the end of the Creed — “ I believe 
 in the Holy Catholic Church, the Communion of 
 Saints.” I will try to explain to you what those words 
 mean. You have all seen a bunch of flowers tied 
 together into a nosegay. You can see such flowers on 
 the Altar now ; you often bring a bunch of flowers to 
 
 H 
 
114 
 
 Kfyz BSrratr. 
 
 school, and give it to the master, to make his desk 
 look bright. Well, try to think you are looking at a 
 bunch of flowers now. What strikes you first ? That 
 all the flowers are different from each other. They are 
 unlike in colour, in shape, in size, and in scent. Some 
 are red, some blue, some white, some yellow. Some 
 flowers are shaped like stars, others like a bell. Some are 
 much prettier and sweeter than others. You children are 
 like those flowers, so are we all. We are all unlike each 
 other. No two people are exactly the same in appear- 
 ance or character. Some of you children are handsomer 
 than others, some are more clever, some are stronger 
 than their companions. Some of you have more sweet- 
 ness of temper than others. Some of you girls are very 
 handy with your needle, others of you are quick at 
 arithmetic or geography, just as every flower has its 
 place and its work in God’s world, so has every child. 
 The fern growing up in the lowly corner does not say, 
 “ If I were an oak I might do some good.” A daisy 
 doesn’t say, “ If I were a rose, I would do something.” 
 Each does his work in his appointed place. If you 
 look at the bunch of flowers again, you will see that in 
 some things the flowers are all alike. They all begin 
 alike . They spring out of the ground, and God’s sun- 
 shine gives them colour and beauty, and God’s rain 
 refreshes them, and makes them grow. 
 
 It is the same with us. We all begin alike. God 
 
& 28 uiiri) of Jflotocr^. 
 
 115 
 
 makes us all, and the Holy Spirit is like the sunshine, 
 giving us the beauty of holiness : and like the rain, 
 washing us, and purifying us, and making us grow in 
 grace. 
 
 And the flowers all end alike . They all wither and 
 die, and from them comes new life. So it is with us. 
 We all must die, and we all must rise again in the new 
 life of the resurrection. 
 
 And these different flowers are all bound together 
 and centred in one bunch. Now you will see what 
 this has to do with the Church of Christ. The Catholic, 
 or Universal, Church, is called the Communion of 
 Saints, that’s very much the same as if we called it a 
 bunch of flowers. In the Church there are all sorts of 
 different people, just as there are all sorts of different 
 children among you. There are rich and poor, high 
 and low, clever and dull, strong and weak. But all 
 who are God’s people form one body, just as the 
 different flowers form one bunch. All those who love 
 the Lord Jesus Christ, all who try to do His will, and 
 keep His commandments, no matter whether they be 
 old people or little children, no matter whether they be 
 high or lowly, form one bunch of sweet flowers, the 
 Communion of Saints. What is it which binds the 
 bunch of flowers together? One piece of cord. 
 What is the cord which binds all the Saints of 
 
116 
 
 
 God together? The love of Jesus, which makes 
 them love one another. People are often mis- 
 taken about the meaning of the word Saint They 
 think the Saints are a small class of people, different 
 from everyone else. My children, all God’s people 
 are called to be Saints. Jesus says, “ Be ye holy, for 
 I am holy,” and being a Saint only means being holy. 
 When we speak of Saint John, we merely mean, holy 
 John. Being a member of the Holy Catholic Church, 
 trying to lead a holy life, means belonging to the 
 Communion of Saints. But the Communion of 
 Saints means more than this. Many holy men, and 
 women, and little children, have passed away from this 
 earth. We say they are dead, but rather we ought to 
 say they are living. God is taking care of them in 
 Paradise : — 
 
 11 O happy Saints ! For ever blest, 
 
 At Jesus’ feet how safe your rest.” 
 
 Do you remember that beautiful hymn which we sing 
 at Harvest Thanksgiving, and which tells us that — 
 
 “Within an hallowed acre 
 He sows yet other grain, 
 
 When peaceful earth receiveth 
 The dead He died to gain ; 
 
 For though the growth be hidden, 
 
 We know that they shall rise, 
 
 Yea even now they ripen 
 In sunny Paradise.’ ’ 
 
& Bund) cf Jlafcocn?. 
 
 117 
 
 Yes, the flowers which seem to have dropped from 
 the nosegay are not lost, they are growing, ripening, 
 in sunny Paradise. When your little brother died, 
 after being so patient, and tender, and loving, through 
 all his illness, do you think he was lost to you ? Do 
 you think he forgets you ? Oh, no ! That little flower 
 still forms one of God’s great bundle of sweet Saints, 
 and he loves you, and cares for you, and prays for you 
 now just as of old, he is your brother still, and you are 
 all one family, “bound in the bundle of life with the 
 Lord your God.” Your mother, who was laid to rest 
 in the churchyard, has not forgotten her darling. She 
 taught you to pray, she first showed you how to clasp 
 your little hands, and to say, “ Our Father,” and she is 
 praying for you, and watching you as you grow up day 
 by day. So you see the Church of Christ in earth, 
 and the Church of Christ in Paradise, is all one, one 
 bunch of sweet flowers, the Communion of Saints. 
 The bunch of flowers which you placed on the master s 
 table has one common home , the flowers, though many 
 and different, all have one place, the vase in which 
 they are put. So you, my children, though many, are 
 one body, and you have one home, the Church. The 
 flowers in the nosegay have all the same work to do, to 
 adorn and beautify and sweeten the teacher’s room. 
 The different flowers do this in different ways. One 
 flower lights up the room with its bright colour, another 
 
118 
 
 &fj t C&tRrmi’g 2Srcatf* 
 
 has no colour, but its white flowers give a delicious 
 scent. Some blossoms stand out grandly, like the rose, 
 or flash red and dazzling, like the geranium : others 
 are lowly, but very sweet, like the violet or the lily of 
 the valley, but you see they all work together to do 
 one thing, to make beauty and sweetness. 
 
 You, children, as members of the Church, which is 
 the Communion of Saints, have a common work, to 
 make your lives beautiful and fragrant with the beauty 
 of holiness, that you may present them to God. You 
 cannot all work in the same way; just as the flowers in 
 the nosegay are all different, yet all combine to do the 
 same thing, to beautify the teacher’s room ; so you in 
 your different ways can do your part to beautify your 
 Heavenly Teacher’s House. His Church on earth can 
 be made sweet and fair by your lives, if you are good 
 children, and when your work is done here, you will 
 join the saints in Paradise, and beautify the Heavenly 
 House of God your Teacher, still one body, one united 
 family, one sweet bunch of flowers, ‘‘bound in the 
 bundle of life with the Lord your God.” 
 
SERMON XV. 
 
 SMALL THINGS. 
 
 Zecii. v. io. 
 
 ° Who hath despised the day of small things ?” 
 
 You, my children, are living in the day of small things, 
 the day of little sorrows, and little joys, and little sins, 
 and little words and thoughts ; but do not despise the 
 day of small things. The greatest results, both of good 
 and evil, come from small beginnings. There is an 
 old fable that the trees of the forest once held a meet- 
 ing, to complain of the injuries which the woodman’s 
 axe had done to them. All the trees determined that 
 none of them would give any wood to make a handle 
 for their enemy the axe. The axe went travelling up 
 
120 
 
 VL\)t &$tnrrcu’£ 33rratr. 
 
 and down the forest, begging the oak, and the elm, 
 the cedar and the ash, to give him wood enough for a 
 handle, but they refused. At last the axe begged for 
 just enough wood, only a little bit, to enable him to cut 
 down the brambles, which were choking the roots of 
 the trees. Well, they agreed to this, and gave him a 
 little wood, but no sooner had the axe got a handle 
 than the cedar and the oak, the ash and the elm, and 
 all the trees were cut down. So it is with sins and 
 bad habits. They begin with a very small beginning, 
 the Tempter whispers, “ Is it not a little one ? M and 
 then, if you yield to them, they cut you down and 
 destroy you. 
 
 A number of people were once assembled in a grand 
 park, and the owner of it pointed to a magnificent 
 sycamore tree, which was dead and decayed to the 
 core. “ That tree,” said he, " was killed by a single 
 worm.” Two years before it was as healthy as any 
 other tree in the park, but one day a worm, of about 
 three inches long, was seen to be forcing its way under 
 the bark. A naturalist who saw it, told the owner that 
 if left alone it would kill the tree. The master of the 
 park scarcely believed it possible, but next summer the 
 leaves of the sycamore fell very early, and on the 
 following year it was a dead, rotten thing. One worm 
 can kill a whole tree, one sin or evil habit persisted in 
 can ruin a child for whom Christ died. 
 
Jhnall CTpnci^. 
 
 121 
 
 You have all read about the great fire of London, 
 in King Charles the Second’s time. Nearly all the 
 houses and churches in London, even S. Paul’s Cathe- 
 dral, were destroyed ; and all that terrible loss arose 
 from one fire in a baker’s shop. My children, never 
 think a sin is a trifle, it may seem small to you, but it 
 is none the less dangerous. A scorpion is a very small 
 reptile, but it can sting a lion to death. There are 
 plenty of criminals in our prisons and reformatories 
 now who began by stealing a postage stamp or telling a 
 lie. There are plenty of ruined men and women, 
 who began as children by being too idle to get up 
 betimes in the morning, and to do their work. 
 
 My children, if you want to get rid of the weeds in 
 your garden, pull them up when they are young, don’t 
 give them time to grow strong, and run to seed. So if 
 you want to grow up to be good men and women, try 
 to get the better of bad habits whilst you are young. 
 I have sometimes spoken to you about Hercules. One 
 of the stories about him is that he had to perform some 
 very hard, almost impossible, labours. One was to 
 clean out the stable of King Augeas, which had never 
 been cleansed in the memory of man. Hercules per- 
 formed this task by turning aside a river out of its 
 course, and carrying it through the stable. Now, my 
 children, we have all got some cleansing work to be 
 done every day. If we do not watch over our lives, 
 
122 
 
 3TI Cf)tRrmi’£ ISreatr. 
 
 and our tempers, and our words every day, they will 
 become as foul as the Augean stable. Every day we 
 must examine ourselves, we must ask, what wrong thing 
 have I done, or said, or thought to-day, then we must 
 ask God, for Jesus Christ’s sake, to pardon us, and to 
 help us to keep our lives clean for the future. If we 
 put off this, we shall find our life as hard to clean as 
 Hercules found the Augean Stable. 
 
 Another of the labours of Hercules was to kill the 
 Hydra, a horrible monster with one hundred heads. As 
 fast as one head was cut off, two more grew in its 
 place, unless the wound was stopped with fire. We 
 have all got some kind of a monster like the Hydra to 
 fight with. Perhaps your monster is Bad Temper, 
 perhaps yours is Laziness, and yours Untruthfulness. 
 Children, you must fight against the monster, and cut 
 off its heads. If laziness is your monster, make up 
 your mind, and to-morrow morning jump out of bed at 
 once, when the proper time comes, without waiting : 
 that’s cutting off the monster’s head. But you will find 
 that if you only do this, two heads will grow where 
 you cut off one. To-morrow you will get up in time, 
 but the next morning the temptation to be lazy will be 
 stronger than ever. What must you do ? Why, when 
 you have fought with your monster, your temptation, 
 and cut off a head, you must get the wound burnt 
 with fire, that the heads may not grow again. I mean 
 
Jhuall 
 
 123 
 
 you must pray to God to help you, and to send the 
 fire of the Holy Spirit to your assistance. 
 
 Now let us go on again to think of the importance 
 of little things. In the picture shops in London just 
 now, there is a photograph of a book with some of the 
 leaves cut and torn. What do you think that picture 
 represents? A New Testament, which a soldier had 
 in his bosom in one of the Egyptian battles, and the 
 bullet which would have killed him, struck the Book 
 instead. 
 
 Some years ago, a ship was wrecked off the Sussex 
 coast. All on board were lost, except four sailors, and 
 they were cast on the rocks ; but as the sea was rapidly 
 rising, they had no hope, for they felt that the tide 
 would gradually cover them, and they must perish by a 
 lingering death. Suddenly one of the men took hold 
 of a plant upon the rock to steady himself, the leaves 
 gave way in his hand, and he saw that the plant was 
 the Samphire, and he remembered that it never grows 
 under water. So such a little thing as a handful of 
 leaves on a rock brought comfort to those shipwrecked 
 men, for they knew the waters would not cover 
 them. 
 
 Remember what I said about little sins. They seem 
 like trifles to us. Well, a grain of sand seems a very 
 little thing too, yet millions of grains form the desert. 
 
124 
 
 Kfyt CTjtltfrax’g ISrcatf. 
 
 and bury the traveller beneath them. When we do 
 wrong for the sake of pleasing ourselves, we think it 
 a small matter, and look forward to having our own 
 way. But we find in time that what we get by our sin 
 crushes us at last. I will tell you a story about that. 
 In the early days of Rome, the Governor of the Citadel, 
 the strongest part of the town, had a daughter called 
 Tarpeia. When the Sabines, a neighbouring tribe, 
 came to attack Rome, Tarpeia promised to open the 
 gates to the enemies of her people. As a reward she 
 asked for what the Sabines carried on their left hands, 
 meaning their golden bracelets. When the treacherous 
 woman had let them in, the king of the Sabines not 
 only threw his bracelet upon Tarpeia, but his heavy 
 shield, which was also carried on the left hand. His 
 followers did the same, and Tarpeia was crushed 
 beneath the shields and bracelets. So it is with sin, 
 u the wages of sin is death.” 
 
 Again, liiile words seem mere trifles, but they are 
 very important. Such words as “ I shan’t,” “ I won’t,” 
 “ I don’t care,” have made many a parent's heart sad, 
 and spoilt many a promising life. I will tell you a very 
 terrible story about those words, “I don’t care.” A 
 young man once made a bet with some of his com- 
 panions, that he would go to a priest, and confess his 
 sins in sport, and tell his friends all that happened. 
 The bet was accepted. The young man went to the 
 
CIjtncj£. 
 
 125 
 
 priest, and tried to treat the whole matter as a joke, 
 saying he had only come to win a bet. So he confessed 
 his sins, saying after each, “ But I don’t care for that.” 
 When he had finished, the priest told him that he must 
 do penance, and this is what he set him to do. Every 
 day, at morning, noon, and night, he was to say these 
 words three times — “ I know that I must die, but / 
 don't care for that ; I know I must be judged, but I 
 don't care for that ; I know there is a Hell for sinners, 
 but 1 don't care for that .” When the young man told 
 his companions, they insisted that he should undergo 
 his penance. He accordingly repeated the words at 
 the stated time, carelessly at first ; but the ofiener he 
 said them the more terrible they seemed ; and he 
 returned to the priest in real sorrow and repentance. 
 
 I saw two little words put up in the window of the 
 post-office the other day, they were these— Too late . 
 If I had wanted to send a letter that night, no matter 
 how important, I could not have done so. Dear chil- 
 dren, don’t neglect repentance now, don’t put off 
 doing your duty now , or the day will come when you 
 must say those words — Too late . 
 
SERMON XVI. 
 
 THE BRIGHT BROTHERHOOD. 
 
 Psalm xxxiv. 7. 
 
 4 The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear 
 Him, and delivereth them.'’ 
 
 There is a picture which some of you may have seen. 
 It represents a little child, dressed as a pilgrim, walking 
 along a narrow path. On either side of the path is a 
 steep, dangerous precipice, the edges of which are 
 hidden by fair flowers and fruit. Behind the child is 
 an angel, whose face is full of anxiety for the little one, 
 and who rests its hands upon the child’s shoulders, to 
 keep him in the middle of the path. That picture is 
 not a mere fancy. Every child of God has a guardian 
 Angel, who watches over him, and helps him on life’s 
 
dTIje 93rtgf)t ISratljcdjaatf. 
 
 127 
 
 journey. Can you remember any words about this in 
 the Psalms ? “ He shall give his angels charge con- 
 
 cerning thee, and in their hands shall they bear thee 
 up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.” 
 
 As soon as you were baptised, my children, God 
 sent an holy angel, one of the bright Brotherhood on 
 high, to be your guardian and guide. There is a great 
 army of bright angels all around us, although we cannot 
 see them. Do you remember how the prophet Elisha 
 went with his servant to Dothan, and how the king of 
 Syria surrounded the city with chariots and horsemen, 
 to take them prisoner ? And when the prophet’s ser- 
 vant was frightened at the sight, God opened his eyes 
 to see that the mountain was filled with angels sent to 
 protect them. Well, my children, there is a great host 
 of angels encamped round those who fear the Lord. 
 You know that we cannot see the stars in the bright 
 sunshine of day, but they are there all the same. And 
 this Church is filled with bright angels, and the high- 
 ways of our cities, and the schoolroom where you do 
 your lessons, all have their angel visitors, although we 
 cannot see them. 
 
 When our soldiers were in Egypt the other day, they 
 marched by night to take Tel-el-Kebir. In perfect 
 silence and thick darkness, over an unknown way, the 
 troops moved forward. And we are told that many of 
 
123 
 
 €Ije Cljtltfren’£ SSreatr. 
 
 them felt depressed and sad on that night march, far 
 away from home, in a strange land. But there was 
 something to comfort them. We are told that they 
 looked up to the sky, and saw the stars shining down 
 on them, the same stars which shone at home, and 
 they found companionship and comfort in them. 
 
 I think, my children, we shall find the same, if we 
 remember that the eyes of the bright angels are watch- 
 ing us, and looking down lovingly upon us. These 
 holy angels are our high-born brothers, for God made 
 us a “little lower than the angels they are God’s 
 great army, who do His will, and go to and fro between 
 Heaven and earth. Can you tell me of anyone men- 
 tioned in the Bible who saw the angels going up and 
 down between earth and Heaven? Jacob, when he saw 
 that wonderful vision at Bethel. Let us think of some 
 of the different kinds of work which angels do for us. 
 They take care of us in times of danger. You remem- 
 ber how Daniel refused to give up prayer, and was 
 cast into a den of lions. Now it would seem that 
 nothing could have saved Daniel from death. But we 
 read that when the king came to the lions’ den, he 
 found Daniel alive and unhurt, and he told him that 
 his God had sent His angel and shut the mouths of the 
 lions. Dear children, if you will only be brave as 
 Daniel was, and let nothing keep you back from pray- 
 ing, and doing what is right, the same God who saved 
 
tHjC 33i*tg$t 33rntIjcrI)oatr. 
 
 129 
 
 Daniel will send His angel to take care of you. We 
 read in the Bible of a certain poor mother, who was 
 wandering in the sandy, burning desert with her child. 
 They had no water to drink, and the child was almost 
 dead with thirst. Do you remember who they were ? 
 Hagar and Ishmael. Yes, and God “ heard the voice 
 of the lad” when he cried out, and God sent his angel, 
 and showed poor fainting Hagar a well of water. Can 
 you tell me of some one who was in great danger, 
 because he lived in a wicked city ? Yes, Lot, who was 
 dwelling in Sodom, and God’s angels came and hurried 
 him away. Now think of some one who was put into 
 prison for Christ’s sake.f He was sleeping between two 
 soldiers in the inner prison, and his wrists were chained 
 to the wrists of the soldiers, so that it was impossible 
 for him to escape. Who was it ? S. Peter. Suddenly 
 a light shone in the prison, and the angel of the Lord 
 came and raised up S. Peter, and his chains fell off, 
 and the angel took him safely out of prison. Do you 
 know any special reason why the angel came to deliver 
 S. Peter ? Because he was a good man ? Yes, that 
 was one reason, but I read in the Acts of the Apostles 
 that whilst S. Peter was in prison “ prayer was made 
 without ceasing of the Church unto God for Him.” I 
 think that was the chief reason why the angel was sent. 
 When our Saviour Jesus was in the Garden of Gethse- 
 mane, and His agony was so terrible that the bloody 
 
 i 
 
130 
 
 Clje CTjtTtfnm’^ Brratr. 
 
 sweat dropped from His Brow, who came to strengthen 
 Him ? An angel. 
 
 When you go home to-day, children, take your 
 Bibles and try to find out as many places as you can 
 where we are told about angels and their work. We 
 know that God’s angels fight for us. The devil and 
 his angels are always making war with us, trying to 
 force us to sin. When you got into a passion yesterday, 
 that was because an evil angel was fighting with you. 
 Just as the holy angels are all around us, watching over 
 us, and helping us, so a cloud of dark angels, the 
 devil’s servants, are watching us, laying traps for us, 
 putting temptations in our way, struggling with us. 
 We must fight against them, and the angels of God 
 will fight on our side. I told you that the holy angels 
 are constantly going to and fro between Heaven and 
 earth, between God and man. They are God’s mes- 
 sengers, and they take our words to Him, and bring 
 back His message of comfort to us. When we pray 
 earnestly the angels take that prayer to God. A little 
 child’s whispered prayer seems a very small matter in 
 the great busy world. But there is an angel waiting to 
 bear it to the throne of God. When we have done 
 wrong, and are truly sorry, and when we kneel and 
 confess our sin to God, an angel takes the message to 
 Heaven, and there is joy among the angels of God 
 over one sinner that repenteth. 
 
(Hfljc bright SSi^tljcrljaatr* 
 
 131 
 
 But the angels have another kind of work. As they 
 guard and keep the good, so they punish the wicked. 
 An angel with a flaming sword kept Adam and Eve 
 from returning to Paradise, after they had sinned. The 
 angel of the Lord smote the Army of Assyria, and in 
 the morning they were all dead corpses. It was an 
 angel who brought the pestilence upon Jerusalem for 
 David’s sin. Long after the Bible days, in the sixth 
 century, the city of Rome was visited by a terrible 
 plague, like that which came on Jerusalem. S. Gregory, 
 who was afterwards Pope, caused the clergy and people 
 to walk solemnly for three days through the streets, 
 chanting sad Litanies of penitence. It is said that on 
 the third day, as the procession stood before the Mole 
 of Hadrian, Gregory saw in a vision the Archangel 
 Michael alight on the top of that great monument of 
 Hadrian, and sheathe his sword. Then he knew that 
 the pestilence was ended, and ever since the Mole of 
 Hadrian has been called the castle of Sant ’ Angelo , 
 that is, of the Holy Angel. 
 
 But last of all, my children, when God’s people die 
 the holy angels carry their spirits to Paradise. The 
 Gospel tells us that very plainly. When Lazarus the 
 beggar died, “ He was carried by the angels into 
 Abraham’s bosom,” that is, to the rest and peace of 
 Paradise, where faithful Abraham is rewarded for his 
 faithfulness. 
 
132 
 
 Qifyz Cljtl&ren^ 2$reatf. 
 
 I saw a picture the other day which is very sad, yet 
 very beautiful. It represents the Roman arena, or 
 amphitheatre, in the days when the Christians were 
 thrown to the wild beasts. It is the evening after one 
 of these cruel scenes. On the dark, blood-stained 
 sand lie the mangled bodies of the martyrs, some or 
 them little children like you. But in the air above is 
 a cloud of bright angels, who are bearing away the souls 
 of the Christians to Jesus in Paradise. Don’t you wish 
 that you could see the bright angels now, my children ? 
 Well, perhaps if we led more strict and holy lives we 
 might do so. Some people have seen angels in these 
 days. I will tell you of two children who did so quite 
 lately. The clergyman, who knew the children, tells us 
 he is quite sure the story is true. A poor woman in a 
 country village had one child, a boy of three years old, 
 whom she loved dearly. One day, whilst she was 
 absent from the cottage, the child fell into the fire, and 
 was badly burned, that he died in a few hours. The 
 poor mother was kneeling by the little one’s bed a short 
 time before he died, quite overcome with grief, when the 
 child said, “ Mother, don’t you see the beautiful man, 
 who is standing there waiting for me ? ” Again and 
 again the child repeated that the beautiful man was 
 waiting for him, and he seemed quite ready to go. 
 So the poor mother found comfort, because she knew 
 that God had sent his angel, to carry her darling home. 
 
(EIjc 2$rt<jljt 23rfltftcri)0atf* 
 
 133 
 
 The same clergyman tells us that a little boy of ten 
 was lying on his deathbed. His parents watched 
 almost constantly beside him, and his mother found it 
 almost impossible to say, “ God’s will be done,” and 
 that made her sorrow all the more bitter. Suddenly, 
 one night, the boy’s parents saw a beautiful gleam of 
 light over the head of the sleeping boy ; as they 
 watched it in astonishment, the light grew larger and 
 brighter, and the most lovely colours, clearer than 
 those of the most glorious rainbow, went and came. As 
 the light faded the boy awoke, and joyfully told his 
 parents that the Lord Jesus had come to him with two 
 beautiful angels, and had told him that he would not 
 die until that day week. They bid him also cheer his 
 mother with the tidings that her child was going to be 
 with Jesus. That day week the boy died full of happy 
 joy, and the bright vision which had come to them 
 cheered the parents in their sorrow. 
 
 Dear children, may the Lord Jesus bless and keep 
 you, and ever send His angels to watch about your path 
 and about your bed — 
 
 ‘ ‘ Still let them succour us, still let them fight, 
 
 Lord of Angelic hosts, battling for right ! 
 
 Till, where their anthems they ceaselessly pour, 
 
 We with the angels may love and adore.” 
 
 THE END. 
 
SERMONS BY H. J. WILMOT BUXTON 
 
 SUNDAY SERMONETTES FOR A YEAR, 
 
 Being a complete set of Short Sermons for all the Sundays and 
 some of the chief Holy-days of the Christian Year. A most use- 
 ful and interesting volume. Just published (October, 1883.) 
 Cr. 8 vo, cloth, 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 NEW SERMONS TO CHILDREN, entitled 
 
 ‘•THE CHILDREN'S BREAD.” This most successful 
 volume is really suited for children. It is full of anecdotes 
 illustrating its practical lessons, and the Publishers confidently 
 recommend it. 3/6, by post 3/9. 
 
 Price 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 THE LIFE WORTH LIVING. Cr. 8vo., cloth, 5/-, 
 by post 5/4. A New Vol. of 24 Plain Sermons, replete with 
 Anecdotes. Illustrations, etc., and most suitable for Village 
 Congregations, or for evening Sermons in large towns. Includ- 
 ing A complete course for Advent, on The Four Last 
 Things,' 5 besides other Church Seasons, and many general 
 Sermons. Among the contents are The Conquering Life. The 
 Courageous Life, The Consistent Life, The Rejoicing Life, 
 The Patient Life, The Tempted Life the Persevering Life, The 
 Praising Life, The Praying Life, Bible Reading, Confirmation, 
 The Message of the Church Bells, A Common Sin, etc. By 
 post 5/4. 
 
 “Is fully equal to the former productions of this gifted preacher. 
 No listeners or readers either of such discourses as these could ever 
 complain of dulness. The whole four and twenty abound in happily 
 chosen illustrations and anecdotes, both new and old .” — Church Times. 
 
 “ Are, as usual, vigorous and stirring. He does not make his 
 anecdotes unduly prominent ; his teaching is often enforced with a 
 pungent terseness of manner which is very telling and his Chureh- 
 manship is clear and decisive.”— Guardian. 
 
 “Strikingly original, and have a current of earnest, solid piety 
 running through the whole which may be worthily imitated.” 
 
 — Ecclesiastical Gazette 
 
 Price 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 THE LORD’S SONG, AND OTHER PLAIN SfRMONS, 
 consisting of some Twenty-two Sermons suggested by well- 
 known Hymns, including several for Children’s Services. 
 
 The Sermons mainly follow the course of the Church’s Seasons. Among 
 the titles we may mention The Long Journey — The Bright Morning — 
 The Dark Evening— The Warfare— The Wanderer— The True Friend. 
 
SERMONS BY REV. S. BAR1NG-GOULD, M.A 
 
 AN ENTIRELY NEW SERIES (THE SECOND) 
 
 OF VILLAGE PREACHING FOR A YEAR The great 
 success of the First Series, with its rich store of illustrations, 
 anecdotes, and practical lessons, has induced the publication 
 of this New Second Series. It is issued in Four Quarterly 
 Half-crown Parts, and will shortly be published in 2 vols., cr. 
 8 vo., cloth, price 5 s. each vol. 
 
 VILLAGE PREACHING FOR A YEAR. A 
 
 complete collection of 65 specially-written Short Sermons for 
 all the Sundays and Chief Holydays of the Christian 
 year, Missions. Schools, Harvest, Club, &c. ; with a 
 supplement of Twenty Sermon Sketches. 
 
 This complete and excellent series of Sermons forms a perfect store- 
 house of Teaching, Illustration and Anecdote for the Whole Year, and 
 will be found an invaluable aid to the Preacher in Country Towns and 
 Villages. 
 
 Cowphte in 2 vols ., ehgant cloth, 10/-, by post 10/7. 
 
 Vol. I . separately, from Adv nt to Whit- Sunday , 5/-, by posto/i 
 Vol. II. separately, misc»lUineous. from Trinity 1 
 to Advent, also 20 Sr man Sketches J 
 
 ► 5/-, bg post 5/4 
 
 “Thoroughly excellent, and admirably calculated to excite the in- 
 terest of a village congregation, while the great doctrines of the Christian 
 Faith are clearly and boldly set forth ” — (Guardian. 
 
 “They are exquisite, most suggestive, and among the most remark- 
 able sermons of the day .’’ — Literary Churchman. 
 
 “ Sound in doctrine, vigorous and telling in expression, devout in 
 feeling, yet abounding in illustration and anecdote .” — John Bull. 
 
 “ We strongly recommend them to the Clergy, who will gather from 
 them many a hint how to make use of anecdote, illustration, scraps of 
 
 personal experience, &c., in their pulpit teaching Always 
 
 interesting and effective.”— ' hurch Times. 
 
 “Short, sketchy, and wonderfully graphic — model sermon«.” 
 
 — English Churchman. 
 
 “These brilliant sermons will be really valuable to the clergy, they 
 suggest innumerable novel trains of thought, and their illustrations are 
 lavish and singularly beautiful .” — Church Quarterly. 
 
 VILLAGE PREACHING FOR SAINTS’ DAYS. 
 A speciallv-written set of 21 Short Plain Sermons for ALL THE 
 Saints Days. Uniform with the same author s Village 
 Preaching for a Year.” to which it forms the 1 'hird and 
 Completing Volume. One volume, fcEip. cloth, price 4 /-, 
 post free for 4/3 
 
 The publishers are glad by the issue of this Volume to be able to 
 comply with the numerous requests they have received for the Saints’ 
 Day Sermons to complete Mr. Baring-Gould’s former vols. of Village 
 Preaching for^the Sundays. 
 
23 ii t fyz Eeb. <&. 23 acr tits:* a uXtf [continued). 
 
 THE VILLAGE PULPIT. COMPLETE FOR THE 
 WHOLE YEAR, in 2 vols., io /-, by post 10/8. Or— 
 
 Vol. I. separately, Advent to Whit-sunday, 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 Vol. II. „ Trinity to Advent, 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 This useful work contains Sermons, or Outline Sermons, for the 
 whole year. The outlines are so full as almost to form com- 
 plete short Sermons in themselves, while they are full of 
 illustrations, anecdotes, and useful matter drawn from 
 Lives and Writings of the Saints, the Fathers, etc., as well as 
 from modern everyday life and experience, and they form a 
 perfect storehouse of original thoughts and ideas for the Preacher 
 in Villages, Country towns, &c. 
 
 “ May be profitably used either for devotional readings or as supplying 
 material for use in the composition of Sermons.” — Guardian. 
 
 “These ‘Village Pulpit Sermons’ are composed in terse and telling 
 sentences, are full of anecdote or illustration, and in no way shrink from 
 calling a spade a spade, for plain speaking is one of the characteristics of 
 the Author’s style.” — Church. Times. 
 
 “ The Preacher cannot easily find models more useful or available.” 
 
 Church Review. 
 
 “ Two remarkable volumes. . . Pointed and telling in the extreme, 
 
 models of manner, and storehouses of matter.” — Ecclesiastical Gazette. 
 
 SERMONS TO CHILDREN. A specially- written 
 Series. Twenty- three in number, including a Set of Six on 
 Children's Duties and Faults (Tidiness, Idleness, Wilful- 
 ness, Obedience. Perseverance, Idle Talk, etc.), and also a Set 
 of Four on the Seasons of the Year. The very practical lessons 
 of everyday life, combined with the picturesque language, the 
 rich store of anecdotes, and the unflagging interest of these 
 Sermons, will render them not only useful in Church, but most 
 valuable and instructive for School Readings, or Prizes, or for 
 Birthday or other Home Gift Books for children of all ages and 
 classes. Fifth Edition. Cloth, price 3/6, by post 3/10. 
 
 “These are really sermons suited for children. Alike in mode of 
 thought, simplicity of language, and lessons conveyed ; and they are very 
 beautiful. No mere critical description can do justice to the charm 
 with which spiritual and moral lessons are made to flow — (not merely 
 are drawn) — out of natural facts or objects. Stories, too, are without 
 exception sound and admirable. We cannot doubt that the volume 
 will be, and will remain, a standard favourite.” — Church Quarterly, 
 
V 
 
 Ecb. J>>. 3SariUiS-<§0Uttf {continued). 
 
 THE preacher’s POCKET. A Volume of 
 
 Sermons, Crown 8vo, cloth, 5 s., by post 5 s. 4d. 
 
 The Author has specially endeavoured in each one of this Col- 
 lection of Sermons to provide some material really calculated to set 
 people thinking. Be trusts that they will serve the country clergy 
 with ideas which their own opinions of the wants of their people 
 will enable them to adapt to even the most homely requirements. 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF SUFFERING. A Course of 
 Lectures (i. The Mystery of Suffering. 2. The Occasion of 
 Suffering. 3. The Capacity for Suffering. 4. Suffering Educa- 
 tive. 5. Suffering Evidential. 6. Suffering Sacrificial.) Third 
 Edition. Square crown 8vo, cloth, price 3/6, by post 3/9. 
 
 33» ti)t late 3ft. 30. 33. JftatunSlej), 
 
 Hector of Halton Holgate. 
 
 VILLAGE SERMONS (3rd Series.) Being an en- 
 tirely new volnme of those Village Sermons of which the 
 Author’s former Series have been so successful. Price 5s., by 
 post 5s. 4d. 
 
 (N.B. — This volume is entirely new, and quite distinct from the 
 same Author’s “ Christian Exhortation.” 
 
 3S» tftc late Sfteb. jj. ®ouraa» -ParSonS, 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION BY THE 
 
 Rev. R. W. RANDALL, M.A., 
 
 Vicar of All Saints ’ , Clifton. 
 
 Cloth 3/6, by post 3/9. 
 
 SERMONS TO VILLAGERS: A COLLECTION OF 
 Villagf. Sermons. 
 
 33« tl)e 3fteb. J§>. $. (Sales. 
 
 Author of “ Via Crucis,” etc., etc. 
 
 Principal of S» Boniface , Warminster , 
 
 Cr. 8vo, 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 SERMONS ANCIENT AND MODERN, from 
 
 Advi nt to Whitsuntide, being a full and complete collection 
 of material for Sermons and Services for Each Sunday and 
 Chief Holyday, in fact, the Church’s Services harmonised 
 and illustrated from the Fathers, and Mediaeval Writers, as 
 well as from the best Modern Authors ; to which are added 
 Incidents from the Lives of Saints, Legends. Parables, Anec- 
 dotes, Poetry, etc., arranged under the days they illustrate. 
 
 K 
 
33» 3fteb. H>. OT. J^kctfwgton, fBLSl. 
 
 Fellow of University College , Oxon. 
 
 And Author of “ The Sinless Sufferer .” 
 
 OUR SINS, OR OUR SAVIOUR, and other 
 
 Parochial Sermons. A Volume of Parish Sermons, including 
 Sermons for Advent, Epiphany, Lent, Eastertide, and other 
 Church Seasons to Trinity Sunday, and General Sermons, etc. 
 Cr. 8vo., cloth, 5/-, by post 5/4. 
 
 Bearing in mind the great success of the Author's former vol- 
 ume “ The Sinless Sufferer f which has reached a Tenth Edition, 
 the Publishers hope that this volume , though not written for pub- 
 lication , but selected from the Authors working stock of Parish 
 Sermons, may be found specially useful and practical. The Sermons 
 have been most kindly edited by the Rev. G. E. Jelf, Vicar of 
 Saffron Walden. 
 
 “ There is in these sermons so singular a depth of earnestness, so rich 
 a source of beauty, and so eloquent pleading on behalf of the Atoning 
 Sacrifice .... in wealth of thought and language, in richness of style and 
 in tone these sermons are all that one could expect from the author.” 
 
 — Church. Times. 
 
 “ Full of Scriptural, earnest, and loving council, from first to last.” 
 
 — Ecclesiastical Gazette. 
 
 CHEAP EDITION OF “THE SINLESS SUF- 
 
 FERER.” Sermons or Meditations on the aspect of our Lord's 
 Passion. This cheaper Edition (the Tenth) forms a most 
 valuable Volume for distribution, for Lent, for Devotional Read- 
 ing, for Mission purposes, for the Sick or Sorrowing, &c. 
 Cloth elegant, price I/- by post 1/2. 
 
 FROM THE RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. — “ I have read 
 the Sermons with the earnest desire that both the spirit in which they 
 are written, and the ability they display, may be largely increased and 
 extended in the Church of England.” 
 
 FROM THE REV. CANON LIDDON.— 1 "It is indeed a book of 
 original beauty, and a book, as I think of no ordinary merit. There is 
 a freshness and bona fide character about its thought and its pathos 
 which tells its own story. 1 shall prize it very much,” 
 
 “Simple in style and language, they are yet the fruit of most deep and 
 devout meditation on their stupendous theme ; they are evidently 
 written by one who has entered deeply into the mystery of suffering"; 
 and gazed with an intensity which few perhaps could attain to on its 
 s upreme example . ” — Qua rd ian. 
 
 “ Of a high order as regards beauty or tenderness of thought, and of 
 singularly devout feeling ; — the sermons are exquisitely beautiful,” 
 
 — Literary Churchman . 
 
 “It is impossible to speak too highly of the beauty of diction, the 
 earnestness of tone, and the freshness yet depth of thought, which per- 
 vade these sermons.”— John Bull , 
 
 “ They are of an exceptionally high type and have evidently been 
 writteu with the fullest sense of the grandeur of the subject which their 
 author could bring to bear upon them. It will bear reading over and over 
 again, and we can recommend it in the warmest terms.” — Church Times , 
 
SHORT VILLAGE SERMONS. Each Number of 
 
 “The Literary Churchman” contains an original Plain Sermon 
 for some Sunday or Special Day shortly following the date of 
 its publication. Besides this, The Literary Churchman ” is a 
 really useful and practical aid to the Parochial Clergyman, and 
 a most practical and serviceable guide to all who are interested 
 in Church Literature and Church Questions, whether Clergy or 
 Laity. It is published every alternate Friday, and is sent post 
 free to Subscribers for one year for 9/6. Specimen No. for 4|d. 
 
 23 1 > tljc 2$p. of (Sraijamstoum. 
 
 Fourth Edition. Cr. 8vo, cloth, price 3/6. 
 
 THE PRESENCE AND OFFICE OF THE HOLY 
 
 SPIRIT. Six Addresses, given at the Church of S. John the 
 Evangelist, in the Parish of S. Peter’s, Eaton Square, together 
 with Three Sermons preached at S. Peter’s, Eaton Square. 
 
 The immediate Sale of the first Edition of this Book caused 
 it to run rapidly out of print ; the subsequent editions are in 
 every way greatly improved and enlarged. 
 
 Just out. By the same Author, cr. 3vo., cloth, 2/6, by post 2/8. 
 
 SISTERHOOD LIFE, AND WOMAN’S WORK 
 
 in the Mission Field of the Church at Home and Abroad. 
 
 m. &. 60 e*, fti.a. 
 
 Cloth, price 2/6, by post 2/8. 
 
 THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST; their Nature, 
 
 Origin and Result. A Course of Six Plain Lent Sermons. 
 
 3£Ub. m. <£. legate, 
 
 Rector of Brighstone. 
 
 FIRST SERIES OF SHORT TALES FOR LADS. 
 
 OF A BIBLE CLASS' OR NIGHT SCHOOL, relating to 
 various Places, Callings, Difficulties, and Temptations, so as to 
 be generally useful. Most suitable for a School Prize, Sixth 
 Edition, 3/6, by post 3/9. 
 
 SHORT TALES FOR GIRLS. 
 
 Fourth Edition 3/6, by post 3/9. 
 
 “Written with much sense and vigour, and well adapted for their 
 purpose. — Guardian. 
 
 “These books would be an acquisition to the lending library of any 
 parish.” — Church Times 
 
 “ Teachers and Superintendents of Schools will find them the very thing 
 they want to read or tell to their classes,” — Literary Churchman, 
 
Messrs. SJceffington ash attention to the three following Manuals, 
 as thoroughly practical, useful, and attractive little gift boohs 
 both in town and country parishes ; for boys and girls on 
 the threshold of grown-up life, for Confirmation gifts, etc., 
 they have been everywhere found of the utmost value and 
 suitability . 
 
 1. BOYS : Their Work and Influence. Specially 
 
 suitable for Parochial Distribution. (Home and School — Go- 
 ing to Work — Religion — Courage — Money — Amusements — 
 Self-Improvement — Chums — Courtship — Husbands, etc.) Sixth 
 Edition, bound in elegant cloth, price 9d. 
 
 2. GIRLS : Their Work and Influence. Specially 
 
 suitable for Parochial Distribution. (Home and School — The 
 Teens — Religion — Refinement — Dress — Amusements — Rela- 
 tions — Friendship— Youth and Maiden — Service and Work — 
 Courtship — Wives, etc.) Seventh Edition. Bound in elegant 
 
 cloth, price 9d. 
 
 * ‘ The merit of the Papers lie greatly in their exceeding simplicity, and 
 strong good sense ; they are just precisely of the kind our girls in the 
 humbler classes need — true, affectionate, sympathetic, and real.” — 
 
 Literary Churchman. 
 
 “It is altogether one of the most valuable, useful, and interesting 
 little works we have ever met with. Every mother should buy it for her 
 children. We shall be glad to see it purchased in hundreds by the clergy 
 and others for free distribution.” — 8. L. Gazette . 
 
 New Book by the same Author. Second Edition, elegant cloth, 
 price 1/6, by post i/8. 
 
 HE THAT SERVETH : Council and Help for 
 
 Workers: being Short Readings, &c., specially but not solely 
 adapted for domestic and other servants, &c. Including each 
 Sunday in Advent, Christmas, and other Church Seasons ; also 
 on various Duties, Faults, Temptations, Confirmation, Holy 
 Communion, etc. The Publishers believe this little book will 
 meet a very felt want. 
 
 JJp tlje dfvanfe 
 
 “ Vicar of Eastry , Kent. Author of Bible Class Notes g etc. 
 Square i6mo, in elegant cloth, printed and lettered in violet and 
 red, price i/-, by post i/i 
 
 THE MOURNER’S MANUAL. A short manual 
 
 of comfort and consolation for the bereaved, including Short 
 Meditations, a Creed for the afflicted, Hymns and Prayers, a 
 Short Office for use at a Celebration of the Holy Communion, 
 if the friends and relatives of the departed wish to communicate, 
 and blank space to fill in name, etc., to render the book useful 
 also as a memorial gift. 
 
 The Publishers reccommend this little manual as lihely to 
 meet a very felt want. It would form a most appropriate gif t 
 to anyone or to any family suffering under recent bereavement. 
 
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