YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

From the Library of
HERVEY D. LELAND, YALE 1885
Gift of
JAMES R. JOY, YALE 1885

CHRIST'S CURE FOR CARE

CHRIST'S CURE
FOR CARE

BY
MARK GUY PEARSE

New York Chicago Toronto
Fleming H. Revell Company
London and Edinburgh

P3!

6h

PREFACE
A Book on Care must needs be written
with care.
Thank God, there is a blessed Gospel for
busy men and burdened women, but it must
be a Gospel that is fitted for their moments
of leisure. Whatever it may lack at the hands
of him who brings it, there must not be want
ing sympathy, interest, homeliness. This has
been my thought, my aim, my prayer in writing
this book. The homeliest of ills, I have sought
to deal with it in homeliest fashion.
To make it the more complete I have added
such hymns as seemed likely to set forth its
teaching more fully; for there is a soothing in
the lilt and rhythm of words as well as in their
sentiment, for which a jaded soul is often
grateful. For the use of Miss Rossetti's poem, I have
to acknowledge my indebtedness to Messrs.
S

6 Preface
Macmillan. Of the hymns, I can not find that
any permission is required for their use. If I
am mistaken I must ask forgiveness, and will
hasten to correct the error.
The chapter headed "Consider the Lilies"
was for the most part published some time ago
in another form.
Mark Guy PEarse.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.
PAGE
The Teacher and His Text, ii
CHAPTER II.
The Master's Command, - 29
CHAPTER III.
The Two Masters, - 41
CHAPTER IV.
Life and Its Wants, 55
CHAPTER V.
What the Birds Sing to us, - - 67
7

8 Contents
CHAPTER VI.
What is the Good of it? 83
CHAPTER VII.
Consider the Lilies, - - 91
CHAPTER VIII.
The Heathenism of Care, - 107
CHAPTER IX.
An Apostolic Injunction, 123
CHAPTER X.
The Crown and Climax of it all, - - 137

THE TEACHER AND HIS TEXT

"Your Heavenly Father" (St Matthew vi, 26).
"Your Heavenly Father" (St. Matthew vi, 32).
"Your Father which is in heaven" (St Matthew vii, 11).

CHAPTER I
THE TEACHER AND HIS TEXT
As THE Lord Jesus Christ went forth upon
his ministry how great a contrast he must
have felt between himself and every one about
him! Think of one man in the world, and
that a poor man, with many sorrows, who
never knew what care meant — one man who
walked this earth ever with an utter freedom
from anxiety, who lived a life of perfect and
absolute trust in God.
All around him there was fretting, over-
eagerness, worry, fear. The lives of men were
dwarfed by anxiety about the commonest mat
ters. He moved amidst crowds of people who
were worrying themselves to death as to how
they should live; unfitting themselves to enj'oy
anything by their anxiety lest they should

12 Christ's Cure eor Care
have nothing to enjoy. And out of that over-
eagerness came selfishness that grew by all
it gained, and covetousness that ate like a
canker into the soul. And his own life
was all calm and sunshine. These bitter ills
of anxiety and covetousness never touched
him. This ignorance of care on his part might
seem to unfit him to speak of care to others.
It is, therefore, the more needful for us to see
clearly how perfectly qualified is the Good
Physician to deal with this curse of care.
There are men and women, gifted, wise, be
nevolent, who yet are not always wise enough
to know that they are unfitted to talk to
other people about resignation. I can think
of nothing more irritating than for the min
ister, rotund and ruddy, with the ring of
robustness in his voice, and everything about
him proclaiming how well to do he is, preach
ing to some burdened woman or hungry man
the duty of contentment. Let my Lady
Bountiful, brilliant with jewels and rustling
in her silks, bring her beeftea and jelly by

The Teacher and His Text 13
all means to the sick, and send her hot-house
grapes to the fevered sufferer. In so doing
she shall do well. But let her breathe no
word about the blessedness of a contented
spirit. He who speaks with authority here must
have gone along the desert way. He must
have learned in poverty the art of pity. He
must have found in loneliness and want the
sacred sympathy which soothes and strength
ens the soul beset with care.
This is Christ's fitness to talk to us of care,
that he himself met in every condition the
cares of our humanity and conquered them by
trust in God.
He was ahungered. And to him hunger
meant all that it ever meant to any — gnaw
ing pain, the craving of every vital power
for its sustenance, the trembling weakness,
the dizziness of brain, the utter exhaustion
of every faculty of body and mind and heart.
Then to him came the Tempter — "If Thou
be the Son of God command that these
stones be made bread." There stood the

14 Christ's Cure eor Care
Christ, white-faced and worn, and calmly
spake his unfaltering trust in the Heavenly
Father. That was his stay, his strength, his
triumph. Think of him going on his way alone, past
the home where the wearied laborer sat amidst
the happy family and blessed God for the
simple evening repast. Think of him as the
sun sank behind the western hills, and the
bird flew to its shelter within the nest, and
the fox crept to its home beneath the rocks.
Stillness lay on the villages where the house
holds slept in happy safety. But he went
through the night weary, homeless, hungry,
cold. The Son of man had not where to lay
his head. Again, think of him asleep in that wild
night at sea, the darkness of the night adding
to the peril and fear of the fishermen. There
is the wild howling of the winds, while the
waves leap like living things impatient for
their prey, hissing, raging, foaming in their
madness, and he amidst it all asleep. And
when they wake him he rises, and beneath

The Teacher and His Text 15
his outstretched hands the waves sink, hushed,
and winds are silenced instantly, as if abashed
that they had dealt so roughly with their Lord.
The disciples, we read, were astonished at his
power. But he was astonished at their fear.
"Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye
have no faith?"
Filled with all this holy calm, with heaven
in his soul, the Lord Jesus looked forth upon
men dragged down and cursed by care. And
all within him longed to bring them into a
true relationship to God. Wrong with God,
the man was wrong with everything, with him
self and with all the common things of daily
life. How shall the world be brought into
its true position, and how shall men and wo
men come to share this supreme blessedness of
the Savior? Here, and here only, is the an
swer, By the revelation of the Father.
Turn for a moment from the Lord Jesus to
another teacher, the Apostle Paul. He comes
up from all the bondage of the law and the

1 6 Christ's Cure for Care
pride of the Pharisee, up as Jesus Christ came
down from the clear light of his Father's pres
ence. In all its setting and method, its shape
and color, how different is the Sermon on the
Mount from the Epistle to the Romans ! The
seventh chapter of that epistle is the cry of a
great soul struggling to be perfect, to fulfill
its own ideal. He writhes as in the folds of
some serpent, its venom in his veins — "O
wretched man that lam!" Then in the eighth
chapter comes the burst of his deliverance.
The tyranny is broken and the soul is free,
and the apostle coming upward from the
tyranny of the law finds his escape in the
truth which Jesus Christ sets forth in the
Sermon on the Mount — "we have received the
spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba,
Father." There are many ways in which we may
think of God. He is the Creator; the Al
mighty power which sustains the universe;
the All-wise directing it; the Most High de
manding the obedience and service of his

The Teacher and His Text 17
creatures. He is the Judge before whom we
must appear. But none of these can ever
satisfy us. If I am to love God, if I am to
trust him, I must know him in some other
way. He must come to me by myself; he
must meet me in the separateness of my
own soul and enter into its secret chambers to
commune with me. He must know me, not
as the All-knowing, but as one gracious and
pitiful, able to understand my wants, to help
my weakness, and to forgive my sins. And
more than that — knowing me through and
through, all that is false and selfish and mean,
yet must he love me, love me with a simple
kindliness and patient love that shall em
bolden me to open all my heart to him. There
is but one aspect, one knowledge, one relation
ship of God which can satisfy us. It is that
which the Lord Jesus Christ sets before us in
these words, "Your Heavenly Father."
In the religious life it is not too much to
say that everything depends upon our thought
of God. It is everything for us to find out
how the Savior would have us know God.

18 Christ's Cure eor Care
Some men think it is necessary for us to have
grim and terrible thoughts of God. They say
it makes strong Christians. Perhaps it does,
in the same way that the Indians make strong
children by killing all the weak ones. Twenty
must die that one may live. O, blessed is it
to turn and listen to the gracious words which
proceed out of the Savior's mouth! He who
knows my needs as no other does, he who
knows my sins as no other does, he who
knows God as no other does, comes to tell us
of the Almighty. Come and let us learn how
Jesus Christ would teach us of him. The Sa
vior leads his disciples to the mountain top.
Seated here, what shall be his chosen emblems
of the Most High? Of old the psalmist had
sung — "The Lord God is a Sun." Surely of
all created things this were the fittest image
of the Almighty, the light and life of worlds,
glorious in itself, measureless in its might,
boundless in its beneficence, inexhaustible in
its supply, pouring out incessantly its gener
ous fullness.
Then again, about them rose the hills, the

The Teacher and His Text 19
chosen emblems of the Everlasting. But the
Lord Jesus stooped and picked a flower — a
flower of the field. "Here learn of God,"
said he. "Its maker is your Father. If he
so clothe the grass of the field, shall he
not much more clothe you, O ye of little
faith?" Then Jesus staid a moment as if listening.
There rose the lark with rapturous song, soar
ing toward the sun, and from the rocky heights
came the croaking of the raven. "Behold the
birds!" said he. "Your Heavenly Father
feedeth them. Are ye not much better than
they?" Yet remains one further emblem that
brings God nearer still. We can think that
in the crowd were many children, and some
little one, gazing into that face and listen
ing to that voice, with childlike simplicity
comes to his side. The hand is tenderly laid
upon the child, the arm is set about him, while,
turning to the crowd, Jesus said : "What man
of you if his son ask bread will he give him
a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he give

20 Christ's Cure for Care
him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know
how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more shall your Father which is
in heaven give good things to them that ask
him?" A bird, a flower, a little child — these are
the voices that are to speak to men of God;
all that is glad, all that is beautiful, all that
is trustful and loving, all that tells of tender
ness and constant care — these are Christ's
chosen emblems of the Most High.
Your Heavenly Father. Here are four
great and blessed truths that we may take to
the innermost heart.
I. / have not to understand great mysteries.
How easy it is to be overwhelmed by the
thought of God! To some, indeed, it may
seem impossible not to be overwhelmed by
it. How we may perplex our brains and vex
our souls with theories and theologies, and
creeds and definitions, until God is lost to
us in a maze and mist of words! Your
Heavenly Father — that I can accept, and

The Teacher and His Text 21
there I can rest. The little child lies in the
mother's arms, ignorant indeed — all that it can
do is to delight in that ministry of love.
It unlocks chambers of the heart and claims
them for its own, which the wise and prudent
never knew. By the infinite gentleness and
patient help of the mother to the child, God
would make himself known to us. Stretch
forth to him the helpless hands, lift up to
him the longing eyes. About us, nearer and
more constant 'than anything else, sure as
the round world beneath our feet, vast and
glorious as the great heaven above us, is the
love of the Heavenly Father. That first — if
God is my Father, I have not to perplex my
soul with awful mysteries.
2. The next blessed truth is this — If God
is my Father, I have not to make him love
me. His love is mine for ever and ever,
fixed and unalterable in the very nature of
God. Think of the little child that has to try
and make the mother love it. Poor little
thing! It must not tell when it is hungry,
or cry when it is sad, or shriek when it is

22 Christ's Cure for Care
frightened; it must be always trying to be
bright and beautiful to win the mother's
love! No, that love must go before every
thing, it must underlie everything, it must
watch for the commonest, wants, anticipate
them, and find its joy in ministering to them.
Even our sins can not undo the love of the
Father ; can, indeed, only reveal the height and
depth and the strength of that infinite love that
is ours for ever and ever.
"When he came to himself he said: How
many hired servants of my father's have
bread enough and to spare, and I perish
with hunger? I will arise and go to my
father: And when he was yet a great way
off his father saw him, and ran and fell on
his neck and kissed him." Linger over the
vision until the heart glows with the wonder
of it all — the love that longed unwearied,
that waited, that watched, that ran in its eager
ness of welcome, that could not do enough
to show itself. All this is ours, yours and
mine, for ever and ever in him who is our
Heavenly Father.

The Teacher and His Text 23
3. Your Heavenly Father. Then all that
he is, he is for me, and all that he has, he has
for me. How wonderful is this relationship!
Here is a man waited on by his servants,
his want and pleasure met by skillful hands,
artists that paint for him, authors that write
for him, a host that add to his safety; those
who bring him fruit and food and flowers.
And here amid them all is the little child,
without any sense, without any skill, who
brings no gain, who adds nothing to the
master's greatness or wealth, and yet this
little one is more to the father than any one
else. Others touch the master at this point
or that, but all that he is belongs to the child,
and all that he can be. Others bring their
work or wares, and get their wages. But
this little one brings nothing, yet possesses
all. "All that I have is thine," says the father,
glad for the child's sake.
Your Heavenly Father. Think of it, dwell
upon it, until the gladness of it fills and thrills
the soul.
4. Your Father which is in heaven — Then

24 Christ's Cure for Care
he understands and knows how best to train
me for the highest life and to turn me to the
best account, for within us is another nature
with wants to be supplied and capacities to be
developed, which only God himself doth under
stand. Every day bring his love afresh into the
life. Open the shutters and draw up the blinds
and let this love stream in upon the soul like
the light of the morning. Every day surrender
yourself afresh to his gracious helpfulness and
gentle guidance. It is along this way we must
go to learn the lesson that the Lord would teach
as he seeks to cure our care.
"O Lord, I would delight in thee,
And on thy care depend ;
To thee in every trouble flee,
My best, my only Friend.
When all created streams are dried,
Thy fullness is the same :
May I with this be satisfied,
And glory in thy name.
Why should the soul a drop bemoan,
Who has the Fountain near —
A Fountain which will ever run
With waters sweet and clear?

The Teacher and His Text 25
No good in creatures can be found,
But may be found in thee :
I must have all things and abound
While God is God to me.
O that I had a stronger faith
To look within the veil ;
To rest on what my Savior saith,
Whose word can never fail !
He that hath made my heaven secure,
Will here all good provide ;
While Christ is rich, can I be poor ?
What can I want beside ?
O Lord ! I cast my care on thee !
I triumph and adore ;
Henceforth my great concern shall be
To love and please thee more."

THE MASTER'S COMMAND
27

No man can serve two masters: for either he will
hate the one, and love the other ; or else he will hold to
one, and despise the other. Ye can not serve God and
mammon. Therefore I say unto you, Be not anxious
for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink;
nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not
the life more than the food, and the body than the
raiment? Behold the birds of the heaven, that they
sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns;
and your Heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not ye
of much more value than they? And which of you
by being anxious can add one cubit unto his stature?
And why are ye anxious concerning raiment? Con
sider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil
not, neither do they spin: yet I say unto you, that
even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one
of these. But if God doth so clothe the grass of the
field, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the
oven, f hall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little
faith? Be not therefore anxious, saying, What shall
we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal
shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the
Gentiles seek; for your Heavenly Father knoweth that
ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first
his kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these
things shall be added unto you. Be not therefore anx
ious for the morrow: for the morrow will be anxious
for itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
—Matt vi, 24-34.
28

CHAPTER II
THE MASTER'S COMMAND
This is the commandment of the Lord
Jesus Christ to those who count themselves his
disciples. Be not anxious. In the old version
it reads "Take no thought," but the word
thought has changed its meaning, and we must
change the word.
It was said of Queen Mary that she died
of thought about Calais. People do not die of
thought to-day, although they sometimes die
for want of it. The word meant that Queen
Mary died of fretting, worry. Even the words
"Be not anxious" are scarcely enough to
express it fully. It means that sulphuric acid
which eats into the vitals of a man. So we
may take it. Therefore I say unto you, Do
not worry, Do not fret, Do not be distracted.
29

3°

Christ's Cure for Care

Now at the outset let us think of this as the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are apt to make
the gospel very often a little shallow thing
compared with that which is set forth by the
Lord himself. With very many the whole of
the orthodox gospel is a matter of having their
sins forgiven and then going to heaven when
they die. There are hosts of good people who
have nothing whatever to do with God except
in the confession and forgiveness of sin. I
have known people who could not ask a bless
ing at dinner without the mention of their sins.
The Lord Jesus said very little about having
our sins forgiven, and still less about going to
heaven when we die. This certainly is a part
of the blessed gospel, a great part, but it is
only a part.
The Lord Jesus Christ would have us think
of his salvation as a force within us that makes
the man master of things, the master of
circumstances. Listen to the exultant boast of
St. Paul, "In all these things I am more
than conqueror in Him that loved me." That
is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The finding of

The Master's Command 31
an authority that sets the man in his right
position towards everything with which he has
to do. Because this is forgotten we have no con
science on the matter of worry ; we do not think
of it as wrong; we never confess it even as a
failing, much less ask forgiveness of it as a sin.
If the preacher were to say Do not steal, or
Do not kill, we accept the word at once as of
Divine authority. But if the preacher should
say Do not worry, there springs up instantly
a sense of resentment. Everybody knows the
kind of feeling that meets such a counsel.
"Ah ! It is all very well for you to talk," as if
the authority were that of the preacher only,
and not of the Master himself. Who is not
familiar with the angry mutter: "Let any
body live where I live, and put up with the
things that I have got to endure!" That
settles the matter in the opinion of a great
many. But mark from whom this word
comes, "/ say unto you" — with him this mat
ter must be settled, the Lord and Judge of
all men.

32 Christ's Cure for Care
How familiar we are with another plea:
"Well, but you see, I am naturally of a very
worrying disposition."
What of that? What is the meaning of
the gospel if it does not turn a man's dis
position from what it is into what it ought to
be? Think of a prisoner brought before a
judge for stealing. The judge turns to him
sternly : "You have stolen these things. What
have you to say for yourself why judg
ment should not be pronounced upon you?"
"Well, my lord," replies the prisoner, "you
see, I am naturally of a very acquiring dispo
sition." Then says the judge, "You and your dis
position must go to prison."
My disposition is no excuse for my offense.
My disposition will not save me from condem
nation for my sins.
Now shall we free ourselves from all re
serve, and let this word come to us with the
force of the Lord's own authority? Know
ing us as we are, knowing us as we should

The Master's Command 33
be, knowing all the circumstances of our daily
life, all the patience and faith that we may re
quire, he saith, "Be not anxious." Let us ear
nestly and prayerfully surrender ourselves to
this command.
The first Counsel is this : —
DO NOT WORRY BECAUSE YOU DO
WORRY
Whilst we are ready enough to excuse
ourselves, we are also apt sometimes to be
content with crying out against ourselves:
"Well, yes, I know — this is my failing, I am
so anxious, I do so fret and worry. I wish it
were not so." And thus we spend our energy
in fretting because we fret, and worrying be
cause we worry.
All this shall avail us nothing. Homeop
athy may have its place, but it will not cure care.
You can not cure worry by worrying about it.
It is well for us carefully to consider with
what exquisite graciousness the Lord Jesus
deals with this evil. In all his character
3

34 Christ's Cure for Care
there is nothing more beautiful than to see
him as Master of the art of reproof. The
hardest thing in the world is to reprove wisely.
In nothing need we take more care when
dealing with others than in the matter of re
proof. We may scold people into hell, but
we can never scold anybody into heaven. We
may scold people from delusion into despair,
but we can never scold them from failure into
hope. Linger for a moment on this aspect of the
Savior's character. On one occasion there
was a great quarrel amongst the disciples; so
fierce was it that even as they came along the
road the noise of their wrangling was borne
upon the breeze to the ears of the Lord Jesus.
"What was it," he asked afterwards, "that
ye disputed amongst yourselves as ye came
along the way?"
They had disputed which of them should
be the greatest. How it must have hurt
the heart of the meek and lowly Savior to
find this spirit springing up amongst these
fishermen, this lust of superiority! Think

The Master's Command 35
what it must have meant to him who made
himself of no reputation, and took upon him
the form of a servant, and became obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross. We
well might expect to see all the indignation of
the Lord Jesus Christ stirred to its utmost
depths. But what does he do. He sits down.
There is a great deal in that. You can
not be very fierce or demonstrative when
you sit down. Silently Jesus beckons a little
lad to come and stand at his side. The pres
ence of that little one took away all harsh
ness. Everything was filled with a beautiful
tenderness as, with his arm about the lad,
Jesus said : "Except ye become as a little child
ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of
heaven." So is it when the Lord Jesus comes to deal
with our care. He who himself marveled
that the disciples should be frightened or anx
ious even amidst the fierceness of the stormy
sea, fetches in the birds and bids them sing to
us and charm away our worry, even as the

36 Christ's Cure for Care
musician of old drove forth the evil spirit by
the sweet strains of his harp. He brings in the
flowers, and by their beauty and their fragrance
he heals this sickness of the soul, as the physi
cian finds in the plant the healing balm.
We must be careful to hear throughout all
these words this undertone of tenderness. I
sat one day by the bedside of a sufferer who
was about to undergo an operation. Her face
lit up as she said: "I never knew before the
meaning of that word — is there no physician
there? He is the Good Physician, not the Sur
geon." How blessedly true it is! He brings
only the balm. It is bad enough when any
seek to cure their own worry by worrying
about it ; but it is a great deal worse when we
try to cure the worry of others by worrying
them. Here the hand that binds must be
careful not to bruise. Here that which is
meant to heal may so easily inflame. So is it
needful to be rid of any tone and touch that
can irritate. They who dress this wound must
be careful to disinfect themselves of poisoned
germs.

The Master's Command 37
"Commit thou all thy griefs
And ways into His hands,
To his sure truth and tender care,
Who heaven and earth commands.
Who points the clouds their course,
Whom winds and seas obey,
He shall direct thy wandering feet,
He shall prepare thy way.
Thou on the Lord rely,
So safe shalt thou go on ;
Fix on his work thy steadfast eye,
So shall thy work be done,
No profit canst thou gain
By self-consuming care;
To him commend thy cause, his ear
Attends the softest prayer.
Thy everlasting truth,
Father, thy ceaseless love,
Sees all thy children's wants, and knows
What best for each will prove.
Give to the winds thy fears ;
Hope, and be undismayed :
God hears thy sighs, and counts thy tears,
God shall lift up thy head.
Through waves, and clouds, and storms,
He gently clears thy way :
Wait thou his time, so shall this night
Soon end in joyous day."

THE TWO MASTERS
39

CHAPTER III
THE TWO MASTERS
LET us take one by one the reasons by
which the Lord seeks to cure this ill of care.
He might be content to command us only, but
he seems to say with infinite graciousness,
"Come, let us reason together."
It will be well for us to recall the scene —
how they sat of old with the Master on the
mountain-top, underneath the open heavens,
the beauty of the flowers on every side and the
singing of the birds about them. Far below
was the blue Sea of Galilee, nestling between
the hills the groups of villages clustering along
its shores. The whole scene was one of beauty.
Let us seek to enter into such an atmosphere,
so charmed. And still more, let us seek the attitude of
41

42 Christ's Cure for Care
the disciple sitting at his feet and listening to
the gracious words which proceed out of his
mouth. The natives of South Africa take
their wounded up the mountain height and
lay them there, finding that the purer air holds
some healing power that is lacking in the
lower lands. On the mountain where the
Master sits and talks we may find a cure for
all our ills.
No man can serve two masters. The word
"serve" is a sterner word than we know how
to render to-day. There is but one word in
the Bible for service, and that is slavery. The
servant is always the slave. Work was a
degradation of old, and is yet wherever the
name of Jesus Christ is not known. It is told
of some Oriental sovereign who was watching
a game of cricket that when he heard many of
the players were rich men he was amazed, and
turned to ask of those about him, "Why do n't
they pay some poor people to do it for them ?"
Almost every working man in the world was
a slave until Jesus Christ came into it. He by
his own toil has uplifted and transformed serv-

The Two Masters 43
ice from a degradation into a nobility. Now,
the shame is not in work, but in the neglect of
it. There are but two classes to-day, working-
classes and paupers.
So we must read it, No man can be the slave
of two masters, for either he will hate the one
and love the other, or else he will hold to the
one and despise the other. Ye can not be the
slave of God and mammon.
What, then, is mammon ? Money? No,
indeed ! Oftener it is the want of it. Most of
us fret a great deal more from the want of
money than from having it. Mammon is what
ever a man frets about.
The moment I fret about a thing I am its
slave, instead of its master. And there is no
slave-master in the world like worry. Another
master may grudge the dinner hour, but some
but he must give you time for sleep. Another
master may grudge the dinner hour, but some
time you must eat. But worry will work you
twenty-four hours a day and spoil your appetite
into the bargain. And if you sleep, what a

44 Christ's Cure for Care
burdened, broken sleep it is — as Hood puts it
with his grim humor:
"Fretful by day,
At night to his own sharp fancies a prey,
He lay like a hedgehog rolled up the wrong way,
Tormenting himself with his prickles."
This is the first great curse of care. When
we fret we put the good thing in the wrong
place. It is our master, instead of our slave.
And this is the only sin there is, putting the
good thing in the wrong place. There is no bad
thing in the world. God made everything that
is, and said of all, "Behold it is very good."
The apple in paradise was a good apple on the
tree ; a horrible apple in the hand ; and a cursed
apple in the mouth. It is ever so. The devil
can not make things; he is not wise enough.
He can only unmake. He is Apollyon, the
Destroyer; all he can do is to put the good
thing in the wrong place. Lord Palmerston
said of dirt, "It is good matter in the wrong
place." That is a capital definition of dirt.
Thank God for dirt — in the right place. If
there were no dirt there would be no potatoes.

The Two Masters 45
But in the wrong place it is a plague, a mis
chief, a source of a thousand ills.
Nothing can put the world in its right place
but for us to be in our right place, and this in
the meaning of Christ's Gospel. He my Lord,
and I the lord of all things because he is mine.
He my Master, and all things my servants for
his sake. It is well to set beside this aspect of care
the words of the Savior in the parable of the
Sower. The history of a seed lies in three
little words — in, down, up. It must get in, or
it can not get down. It must get down, or it
can not get up. It must get up, or it can not
get ripe.
The first failed to get in — that was a
waste of good seed, so far as it was trodden
under foot ; yet that which the fowls of the air
devoured was better than wasted. But in any
case there was no waste of soil. We have no
right to expect corn to grow on the highway;
it is not meant for it. We do not look for corn
even on Cornhill or bread in Bread Street.

46 Christ's Cure for Care
The next got in, but it did not get down,
and it withered away. Again the loss of good
seed, but not the loss of good ground.
Where nothing else will grow, we can not
expect to grow corn.
But then comes the sadness of the story,
where the seed got in and got down, but it
never got up. There was the waste of good
seed and of good ground. The waste of man's
toil and honest effort, and of God's earth and
God's sunshine and God's shower. Where
thorns grew there corn should grow, for there
is depth of earth.
How well we know these people! They
come to church; they listen with intelligence,
interest ; sometimes with eagerness and delight.
They are quick to see a point, and to seize it,
and respond in glad agreement. They have
plenty of brains, plenty of earnestness, plenty
of response; but there is no fruit. The thorns
spring up and choke it.
What are thorns? They are mammon —
the things men worry about and fret about.

The Two Masters 47
Thorns are capital things in the right place. A
farmer would as soon have a fence of thorns as
of anything — it keeps the cattle in, and it keeps
the cattle out. But thorns in the wrong place
are a torment indeed. The bramble king is of
all kings the greatest plague and the least
profit. My boy said to me a good thing one
day, when we were in the country. He had a
prickle in his finger. "Father," said he "a
thorn in the hand is not worth two in the bush,
is it?" Note well how the Lord Jesus Christ de
scribes these thorns. Not the world. It is
God's world and not the devil's, and is a grand
world in the right place. God made the man at
the first with the world under his feet, but sin
turns things upside down, and the man has got
the world on top of his back. That is why
most of us stoop so. We stagger like Atlas,
without his strength indeed, but beneath his
burden. God gave the man dominion over the
world, but sin gives the world dominion over
the man. It is the cares of this world of which
the Master speaks — they are the thorns, not

48 Christ's Cure for Care
riches. Do not let us abuse in words that which
all of us would like to have if we could.
"Ah, my dear madam," said a minister one
day to a friend of mine, "it is a dreadful thing
to have one's heart set upon money."
"Yes," said she, "but it is a capital thing
to have your hand on some."
That is precisely the difference. A good
thing in the hand, it is a horrible thing in the
heart. Not riches is it that are condemned,
but the deceitfulness of riches. How stern and
startling is the picture which the apostle sets
before us of riches beckoning the man further
and further into the bog, sinking deeper at
every step until the cold, foul waters close over
his head! "Having food and raiment, let us
be therewith content. They that will be rich
fall into temptation and a snare, and into many
foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in
destruction and perdition. For the love of
money is the root of all evil."
Not other things is it, but the lusts of other
things of which the Master speaks — it is the
strength of the soul, the energy of the heart,

The Two Masters 49
the thought of the life being absorbed in these
things. Then do the thorns strike their roots
deep in the soil, and they rise up with fierce
strength and flourish, and underneath them the
good seed is choked and becometh unfruit
ful. So nothing comes of the better thoughts ;
the Sunday purposes are slain by the Monday's
cares — "The thorns grew up and choked it."
Thorns — it is the same word that is used when
the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, which
they thrust upon the Savior's head. But they
who are the slaves of care wear the thorns in
the heart.
I heard a simple Cornish miner once utter a
prayer that it were well for us to offer every
day: "Lord, save us from over-eagerness
about the things of this life." That is the
truth that underlies the whole discourse. Be
not over-eager. So might it be rendered per
haps as best interpreting the phrase — "Taking
thought." Or we may render it as being dis
tracted, the attempt to serve two masters
whose wills and commands are utterly antag
onistic. We read of the archangel Michael and
4

50 Christ's Cure for Care
the devil contending for the body of Moses, but
in a sorer plight is he who seeks at once to be
the servant of God and mammon. Therefore
I say unto you, Be not over-eager.
There are creatures that take the color of
that on which they feed. The character of the
man is made by that on which the heart is set.
Therefore saith the Savior, "Where your treas
ure is, there will your heart be also." Wisely
has some German written, "The heart which
is created only for God is dishonored and de
graded if set on things which perish. We turn
the heart into a moth."
We are to find in the Lord Jesus Christ a
power that makes us master of things. And
yet more, much more than that. We are to
¦find in him the true purpose and service of
things. Upon him who is right with God
all things do wait, and minister with splen
did service, enriching him with the finest
gold. "All things work together" — a great
unity knits all things, one great purpose
lives and throbs in all — "All things work
together for good to them that love God . . .

The Two Masters 51
that we be conformed to the image of his Son."
As in the story of the Babe of Bethlehem, the
wise men led on by the star in the heaven come
with laden camels and troops of attendants to
lay before the Holy Child their gold and myrrh
and frankincense. Where Christ dwells there
all things in heaven and earth do bring their
fullest, richest, best. Every loss is made a
greater gain in likeness to our Lord ; every gain
becomes yet more than gain in gratitude and
fuller service; every sorrow working out a
deeper sympathy, the_ graciousness of a readier
pity, a wiser helpfulness; every joy bringing a
fuller music of praise, the life made richer in
thanksgiving. This is the divine philosophy.
The man who was the servant of things, their
slave, becomes their lord and master, and they
wait on him and bring their golden gifts and
loftiest service.
Therefore I say unto you, Be not anxious.
"My spirit on Thy care,
Blest Savior, I recline;
Thou wilt not leave me in despair,
For thou art Love Divine.

52 Christ's Cure for Care
In thee I place my trust,
On thee I calmly rest;
I know thee good, I know thee just,
And count thy choice the best.
Whate'er events betide,
Thy will they all perform;
Safe in thy breast my head I hide,
Nor fear the coming storm.
Let good or ill befall,
It must be good for me ;
Secure of having thee in all,
Of having all in thee."

LIFE AND ITS WANTS
53

CHAPTER IV
LIFE AND ITS WANTS
Therefore I say unto you, be not anxious
about your life, what ye shall eat or what ye
shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye
shall put on. Is not the life more than meat,
and the body than raiment?
Let us notice carefully what this does not
mean. It is a source of constant mischief that
we talk about the world as if it were the devil's
and not the Lord's: a world in which every
thing that belongs to it is an ill and a peril.
Some have interpreted these words "Be not
anxious" as if they mean that we are to have
our minds so set on things above that all things
of the earth are nothing to us. We are to
drift along our way accepting what comes in
this world and putting forth all our energies to
55

56 Christ's Cure for Care
grasp at the other world. This is to lose
the whole meaning of the message. As long
as we are in this world we shall have a life
and shall need the meat to sustain it; we
shall have a body, and shall need clothes to
wear. As long as we are in this world there
is a mouth to be fed; and we must find a bed
to lie on and a roof to cover us. There is
something mean in canting about the world
as if it were a plague or a peril, and then we
cheerfully go home and get our dinner off it!
He who does not do his duty in this world
will never do his duty in any world. He who
does not do his duty to his brother will never
do his duty to his God. I am bound to put
my whole strength and energy and wisdom
into my business. To be lackadaisical, half
hearted, so taken up with things above as to
be slipshod in my dealings with things below,
is neither to serve God nor man; neither to
serve this world nor the next. Because I am a
Christian I am bound to be earnest and indeed
enthusiastic in all that makes for the welfare
of the place in which I live, and of the people

Life and Its Wants 57
about me, and of the nation to which I belong.
He will never do his duty as a Christian who
does not do his duty as a citizen. I am un
worthy of my liberties unless I seek to extend
to others the good that has been conferred
upon me. Surely there is nothing more cow
ardly than that which seems to say — "This is
the victory that overcometh the world, to run
away from it!"
Let us see, then, what the words do mean.
It is as if the good Lord reasoned with us. '
"My child," he seems to say, "hast thou a
life?" "Yea, my Lord."
"And whence didst thou get that life?"
"It is indeed thy gift."
"Then if I have given thee thy life, do not
I pledge myself therewith to give thee that on
which thy life depends? Is not the life more
than meat?"
Let the argument sink down into the depths
of us. If God Almighty has taken upon him
self the responsibility of bringing us into the
world, he has accepted the responsibility of

58 Christ's Cure for Care
sustaining us as long as we are in it. He is a
faithful Creator, complete in all his works and
perfect in all his ways. What should we
think of a mother who said to her baby,
"There, I have given you your life, now you
must take care of yourself." A mother ! No,
a murderess! The faithfulness of our God is
the very foundation on which the round world
is builded, the force that holds it together.
Mark this faithfulness providing for the crea
tures at the beginning in the very order of cre
ation — first the light and then the home; first
the supply and then the creature that finds all
waiting for it; first the sea and then the fish;
first the grass and then the cattle; first the
Paradise and then the man.
Is not the life more than meat?
Think of the mystery of life.
It is God's own secret. The life is the
Breath of God. We hear the sound of it, and
see the signs of it, but we know not whence it
cometh or whither it goeth. Our life binds us
to the Author and Giver of life in a relation-

Life and Its Wants 59
ship more close and more wonderful than any
relationship on earth can set forth. The father
accepts and meets the claim of his child.
The mother finds in the care of her little
one a joy that the angels might almost envy,
a solace for every suffering, a recompense
for all weariness and watching; her service
repaid a thousand-fold in such fine gold as no
other hand can bring, the mystery of mother
hood made complete by that supply of suste
nance in which from her own bosom she gives
her life for the life of the child. The God that
made a mother is the great Father whose high
est and fullest joy is to minister to the life that
he has given. Yet with us the father and
mother do but transmit the life. God is the
great source and origin of it all. What height
and depth of mystery, what a world of claim
and what a pledge of supply lie in those words,
"The Author and Giver of life!"
Wholly dependent as we are on God for the
beginning of life, let us remember that we are
no whit the less dependent on him for the sus
taining of that life. It has been pointed out

6o Christ's Cure for Care
with great force that if the vital actions of a
man's frame were directed by his will, they are
so minute and complicated that they would
immediately fall into confusion. The action
of the heart, the circulation of the blood, and
the course of the vital functions are caused
through means and by laws which are not
dependent on our will and to which the powers
of our mind are altogether inadequate. Had
our life been in our keeping, a doubt, a
moment's pause of irresolution, the forgetful-
ness of a single action at its appointed time
would have terminated our existence. Every
heart-beat is the mysterious bidding of our
God, a thing apart from our will and our con
trol. The life which he has made so dependent
upon himself, carries in itself the pledge of
sustenance. "Is not the body more than raiment?"
Here again the Master seems to appeal
to us. "Hast thou a body, my child?"
"Yea, verily, my Lord."

Life and Its Wants 6i
"Didst thou come by it by any thought of
thine?" "Nay indeed, my Lord. Thou hast fash
ioned it with all the mystery of brain and heart,
of nerve and strength. These subtle energies
are thine."
"Then, my child," saith he, "if I have given
thee a body, have I not thereby pledged myself
to give thee raiment wherewith to cover the
body? Do I send forth the birds without
feathers, or the beasts without fur? Do I not
wrap the very buds in their brown overcoats
until they are ready to open in the full sun
shine? Therefore I say unto you, Be not
anxious." How much we lose for ourselves and for
others by always talking about our souls and
forgetting our bodies. As Professor Drum-
mond has reminded us, in reality Christ never
said, "Save your soul." It is a mistranslation
which says that. What he said was, "Save
your life." God is the Maker of the man,
body and soul, and he cares for us not in bits
and patches, but in all and in everything.

62 Christ's Cure for Care
The body that he has made so wonderfully,
is redeemed from destruction as much as the
soul, and is cared for as much as the soul. It
is as men and women that he knows us, not as
souls, and it is in the whole round of life that
he holds us dear to himself, not in solemn
moments now and then. God cares as much
for us in the world as in the Church ; as much
for a man in a workshop as for a man in wor
ship ; as much for a woman in a pantry as in
a prayer-meeting; as much for us in our busi
ness and pleasure as in our devotions.
Is not the body more than raiment? Think
of its mystery. Stretch forth your hand and
move the supple wrist. Think of the score of
hinges on which its movements turn. Ask the
cleverest mechanic you know to make a hinge
that can turn a dozen ways at once. Ask him
to work it by some noiseless energy unfailing,
stored up and waiting for use almost without
effort, often without consciousness.
"The human hand," says Sir Charles Bell,
"is so beautifully formed, it has so fine a sen
sibility, that sensibility governs its motions

Life and Its Wants 63
so correctly, every effort of the will is answered
so instantly, as if the hand itself were the seat
of that will ; its actions are so powerful, so free,
and yet so delicate, that it seems to possess
a quality instinct in itself; and there is no
thought of its complexity as an instrument,
or of the relations which make it subservient
to the mind ; we use it as we draw our breath,
unconsciously, and have lost all recollection
of the feeble and ill-directed efforts of its first
exercise. Is it not the very perfection of the
instrument which makes us insensible of its
use?" And this is no less true of every part of the
human frame. Everywhere there is the same
infinite skill, the same perfect adaptation, the
same noiseless energy. That which God hath
fashioned so perfectly, shall he not graciously
cover and protect? Is not the life more than
meat, and the body than raiment? Therefore
I say unto you, Be not anxious.
"Through all the changing scenes of life,
In trouble and in joy,
The praises of my God shall still
My heart and tongue employ.

64 Christ's Cure for Care
Of his deliverance I will boast,
Till all that are distressed
From my example comfort take,
And charm their griefs to rest.
O magnify the Lord with me,
With me exalt his name !
When in distress to him I called,
He to my rescue came.
The hosts of God encamp around
The dwellings of the just:
Deliverance he affords to all
Who on his succor trust.
O make but trial of his love ;
Experience will decide
How blessed they are, and only they
Who in his truth confide.
Fear him, ye saints, and you will then
Have nothing else to fear ;
Make you his service your delight,
He'll make your wants his care."

WHAT THE BIRDS SING TO US
65

CHAPTER V
WHAT THE BIRDS SING TO US
It is a pleasant thing to know that the Lord
Jesus heard the birds that we count to be our
English birds. We think of him standing
and listening to the rapturous music of the
lark, listening as it soars into the sunlight
until hidden in the height, listening till the
very song dies in the distance. We are glad
he heard the cuckoo, the herald of our sum
mer; that he heard the piping of the thrush
and the rich notes of the nightingale. Pleasant
is it to think that he knew the sparrow that
comes to see us even in our great cities.
"Behold, behold," saith he, "the birds of the
heaven, that they sow not, neither do they reap,
nor gather into barns." 67

68 Christ's Cure for Care
St. Luke places these counsels upon care as
immediately connected with the stern parable
of the Lord in which he condemns the curse
of covetousness. This gives altogether a new
impressiveness and force to the words. Godet
points out that all the figures from nature em
ployed in reference to the fowls of the air
seem to be connected with the foolish rich
man — Sowing, reaping, storehouse, barns.
"The ground of a certain rich man brought
forth plentifully. And he reasoned within him
self, saying, What shall I do because I have
not where to bestow my goods? This will
I do: I will pull down my barns and build
greater, and there will I bestow all my corn
and my goods. And I will say to my soul,
Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many
years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be
merry." This takes us back to the incident out of
which this parable grows, where one comes to
the Lord Jesus, asking him to bid his brother
divide the inheritance. "And Jesus said,
Take heed and beware of covetousness, for

What the Birds Sing- to Us 69
a man's life consisteth not in the abundance
of the things which he possesseth."
Covetousness is the sin of which Jesus
Christ spoke more earnestly, more solemnly,
and more constantly than of any other. "Take
heed and beware of covetousness."
Here is its terrible illustration — it is inde
pendence of God. Thou sayest, "I am rich and
increased in goods, and have need of nothing."
Then comes the terrible and tragic ending of it
all. "God said unto him, Thou fool, this night
thy soul shall be required of thee; then whose
shall those things be that thou hast provided?"
It is in utter contrast with the rich fool that
the Lord Jesus sets the birds. They neither
sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor
barn. Therefore are they more dependent
upon the Heavenly Father's bounty, and afford
the greater opportunity for the Heavenly
Father's care.
"Your Heavenly Father feedeth them."
Underline the word in your Bibles and un
derscore it in your hearts — "Your Heavenly
Father feedeth them." Not their Heavenly

70 Christ's Cure for Care
Father. Their Maker, but your Father; their
Master, but your Father.
The picture that rises before me as I think
of these words, is of a farmhouse where the
mother comes with the basin in her hand, while
at her side there stands the little maiden
watching the fowls that gather and scramble
for the scraps that are thrown to them. Do
you think the little one ever looked up and
said, "Mother, you have fed the chickens, but
you have forgotten to feed me?" Never. The
little one had her breakfast first, and then the
chickens had what was left. "Your Heavenly
Father feedeth them."
This is the next argument. Think how
many creatures there are in the world that
have all the things we fret about without any
fretting at all. It is sometimes hard indeed
to be otherwise than anxious about the daily
bread, but that is all the more reason that we
seek the cure for care which is ours in Jesus
Christ. Dependent for our life on the daily
bread, unable to control the future, with many
possibilities of ill that threaten us, with lives

What the Birds Sing to Us 71
about us dearer than our own, it is natural,
very natural, that we think anxiously about
the daily bread. And more than natural, it is
a duty to think of it. There is a word strong
and stern spoken by St. Paul, that he who doth
not provide for his own house is worse than
an infidel. To the man who eats his last crust,
to the woman who grudges the slice as she cuts
it, God knows how tenderly this word must be
spoken. For such here is a sweet message —
Your Heavenly Father careth for you.
The Master bids us when we pray say, "Our
Father, give us this day our daily bread."
Our Father — is it not in itself a cure for
care? Speak it over softly and lovingly in
the heart. Whence, think you, comes our pity
for the children and our care for them but
from the great heart of our Father in heaven ?
And he teaches us to pray, "Give us this day
our daily bread." He is not so all taken up in
the spiritual and the sublime that he forgets
the lowest needs of our nature. It is good to
pass through these great ascriptions of praise
to the simplicity of this lowly petition — "Hal-

^2 Christ's Cure for Care
lowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy
will be done in earth, as it is done in heaven."
It is as if I stood a little child and saw the
great palace of the King of kings in all its
splendor, as if I stood amidst the ranks of
Seraphim and Cherubim, all eager for their
stately service; as if I looked forth over the
kingdoms of the world and all the glory of
them, and far away beyond I think of a mil
lion worlds through which his will has sway.
What am I and my little common daily needs ?
But lo! the Almighty Father takes me by the
hand and leads me into the banqueting cham
ber, and bids me look into his face and ask,
"Give, me this day my daily bread."
In the thought of the vastness of the uni
verse we are apt to be lost, overwhelmed by
its greatness, until it seems an impertinence
to think that the Great Creator can concern
himself about creatures so insignificant on so
minute a portion of his creation. Here, in
deed, we cry with the psalmist : "When I con
sider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers,

What the Birds Sing to Us 73
the sun and the moon which thou hast or
dained, what is man that thou art mindful
of him, or the son of man that thou visitest
him." "Look up at the sky at night ; you will see
a host of stars : try to think that every one of
them is itself a sun. It may probably be that
those suns have planets circulating round them,
but it is hopeless for us to expect to see
such planets. Were you standing on one of
those stars and looking towards our system,
you would not perceive the sun to be the
brilliant and gorgeous object that we know so
well. If you could see him at all, he would
merely seem like a star, not nearly so bright
as many of those you can see at night. Even if
you had the biggest of telescopes to aid your
vision, you could never discern from one of
these bodies the planets which surround the
sun. No astronomer in the stars could see
Jupiter even if his sight were a thousand times
as good or his telescope a thousand times as
powerful as any sight or telescope that we
know. So minute an object as our earth

74 Christ's Cure for Care
would, of course, be still more hopelessly be
yond the possibility of vision." (Sir Robert
Ball, Starland.)
Again we read another passage from the
same writer, and are lost utterly in the sense
of our insignificance.
"If the sun were to be extinguished alto
gether the calamity would no doubt be a very
dire one so far as we are concerned; but the
effect on the other celestial bodies (moon and
planets excepted) would be of the slightest
possible description. All the stars of heaven
would continue to shine as before. Not a
point in one of the constellations would be
altered; not a variation in the brightness;
not a change in the line of any star could be
noticed. The thousands of nebulae and clusters
would be absolutely unaltered. In fact, the
total extinction of the sun would be hardly
remarked in the newspapers published in the
Pleiades or in Orion. There might possibly
be a little line somewhere in an odd corner
to the effect 'Mr. So-and-So, our well-known
astronomer, has noticed that a tiny star, in-

What the Birds Sing to Us 75
conspicuous to the eye, and absolutely of no
importance whatever, has now become in
visible.' "
Amid such immensities what am I, or the
common wants of a passing day!
Very blessed in the midst of such thoughts
is it to turn to these words of the Lord Jesus.
He leads us forth amidst the birds of the
air that we may learn our greatness and
dignity, and our claims as children of the
Heavenly Father. "Are ye not much better
than they?"
The tempter took the Lord Jesus up an ex
ceeding high mountain and showed him all
the kingdoms of the world and the glory of
them. Our blessed Master leads us up the
mountain height and shows us the gracious
care of the Heavenly Father to the least of
his creatures that he may cure our care.
It is as if he said, "Come, anxious child,
and see the bounty of thy Heavenly Father;
how that he openeth his hand and satisfieth
the desire of every living thing." Every living
thing — what a family is this to be provided for !

76 Christ's Cure for Care
Think if they could pass before us in all their
variety and all their hosts. The myriad crea
tures that do inhabit the ocean; huge mon
sters each needing a vast supply. The shoals
of fish that swim in millions, each with its
separate need, increasing in number as they
decrease in size, until we reach the tiny crea
tures whose universe is a drop of water — each
with life to be sustained, each to be adapted
to all the subtle influences on which its life
depends. Let us wander in the great forests and think
of the creatures that roam within it. Shall we
stand and let the procession pass before us —
the stately monarchs of the woods; these that
bound swift as the wind across the plains;
these that crouch in their lurking places;
these that find their strength in companies;
these that people the trees; these that burrow
in the earth. How vast the provision that is
required !
Think again of the myriad hosts of the in
sect world, each with its need not only day by
day, but hour by hour, and moment by mo-

What the Birds Sing to Us 77
ment, each with its very shape and instincts
and powers perfectly adapted to its surround
ings. Let us behold the fowls of the air, again a
mighty host — the eagle soaring in the height;
the birds that fill the woods and valleys with
their song; the great hosts of the sea-fowl.
Think of their adaptation to their food ; some
times the plumage changing with the seasons
for their safety. Think of the tender ingenuity
that builds its nest so perfectly, rounded and
smoothed by the breast of the bird. Think
of the mystery of their migration that brings
these tiny hosts in millions unerringly across
the mighty seas and under the trackless heav
ens for thousands of miles.
Then pass from the host of creatures to
consider the least part of any of the most in
significant of these creatures. Is there any
thing, for instance, that seems of less concern
than the dust from the wing of a moth or but
terfly? Yet a French naturalist, M. Bernard
Deschamps, tells us that each particle of dust is
a scale composed of three membranes or plates,

78 Christ's Cure for Care
laid one on the other. The first is covered
with granulations of a molded form, which
give the thin scales their splendid and varied
coloring. The second plate is covered with silk,
forming sometimes various designs. The third
plate, that which rests on the wing, has the
peculiar property of reflecting colors the most
brilliant and most varied. Suppose a painter
were possessed of colors rich enough to repre
sent on canvas, with all their splendor, gold,
silver, the opal, the ruby, the sapphire, the em
erald, and other precious stones, one might af
firm, without any fear of contradiction, that he
would have no color and no shade of color
which could not be discovered on part of the
scales of a butterfly. Each of these scales is
fastened to the wing by a small tube, arid the
scales are arranged in rows, each row partially
overlapping the other.
Think again of the great provision which is
needful to minister to all these hosts. Think
of the forces of the mighty sun; the supplies
of light and heat incessant; the adaptation of
the seasons; the needful changes of day and

What the Birds Sing to Us 79
night; the mystery of the air, ever renewed
and waiting for the renewal of all life.
If our God can afford to keep so great a
household, surely we need not fear. If our
Father hath such a host of servants, his child
shall certainly lack no good thing. These hired
servants of our Father's have bread enough
and to spare. Is God going to feed the great
whales and the young lions and the ravens
which cry, and forget thee? The hand that
is opened to feed all these is stretched forth
to grasp thy hand in love. So much for the
servant, what then for the son? "When he
was yet a great way off his father saw him,
and ran and fell on his neck, and kissed him.
And he said, Bring forth the best robe and
put it on him, and the ring for the finger, and
the shoes for the feet. . . . And they be
gan to be merry."
Behold the fowls of the air. Are ye not
much better than they? Therefore I say unto
you, Be not anxious.

80 Christ's Cure for Care
"God is near thee, Christian cheer thee;
Rest in him, sad soul ;
He will keep thee, when around thee
Billows roll.
Calm thy sadness, look in gladness
To thy Friend on high ;
Faint and weary pilgrim, cheer thee;
Help is nigh.
Mark the sea-bird wildly wheeling
Through the stormy skies;
God defends him, God attends him,
When he cries. '
Fare thee onward, through the sunshine,
Or through wintry blast :
Fear forsake thee, God will take thee
Home at last"

WHAT IS THE GOOD OF IT?

Si

CHAPTER VI
WHAT IS THE GOOD OF IT?
"Which of you by being anxious can add
one cubit unto his stature?"
Here is the next argument. Sit down and
fret for a year, and see how much bigger you
are. You may well perhaps be something
smaller; certainly shriveled in soul if not in
body — but you will be no bigger. Put the fin
ger of one hand on the finger of the other, and
carry it down to your elbow, that is a cubit.
Can you add that to your stature by your fret
ting and your care?
How quickly should we cease from worry
if we did but think within ourselves — What
good is it? Can you undo anything by fret
ting? Can you change it? Can you lessen it?
83

84 Christ's Cure for Care
If minding will not mend it, then better not
to mind. Some time ago I was talking with a friend
of mine whom I had met in the train. I in
quired after the health of his wife. "Well,"
said he in reply, "my wife is well, always well,
and always very well, and what is better still,
she is always happy. I used to think that she
had not the same sensitive nature that I have.
When anything occurs to annoy me I am utterly
upset. I can not eat my breakfast; I can not
do my business ; I am really ill. But the other
day I found out the secret of my wife's com
placency. Something had gone wrong which
very much worried me. In the course of the
morning I went into the house and found her
cheerily going on with her work, actually sing
ing as she bent over it; I felt quite annoyed.
"Really, my dear," I said, "you do n't seem
at all put out by what has happened to-day."
"O, no," she said, "I am not."
"Well," I said, rather angrily, "then I think
you ought to be."
"No, no, you must not say that. Look

What Is the Good of It? 85
here. Years ago I made up my mind that
when anything went wrong I would ask myself
honestly and earnestly — 'Can I do any good
by thinking about, it? Am I to blame in any
way? If so, do not let me spare myself. Can
I do anything to put a better face upon it?'
If after looking at it honestly all round I found
I could do no good, I made up my mind that I
would give up thinking about it."
"Thank you," said I to my friend. "That
is the philosophy of the highest life — 'Whatso
ever things are lovely, think on these things.' "
"But," said one to me one day, to whom I
told this story, "I can not help thinking about
them." "Then," said I, "you are the slave of the
thing, and not the master. You remind me of
a story I have heard of a soldier who on the
field of battle called to his commanding officer,
'Captain, I have got a prisoner.' 'Bring him
on then, my man,' said the captain. 'Please,
sir, he won't come,' was the answer. 'Then
come yourself,' cried the captain. 'Please, sir,
he won't let me.' "

86 Christ's Cure for Care
We ask often how much a man possesses.
That is not the question. The question is how
much possesses him.
Some time ago I was at the house of a gen
tleman in Yorkshire, who said to me, "I used
to be a most irritable man. When anything
went wrong I fussed and fumed, was miserable
myself, and made all about me miserable. My
religious influence was worse than undone. I
suffered in health and I suffered in my busi
ness. But one day I pulled myself up and said,
'Look here, you are a fool !' "
Whilst we are forbidden to call our brother
a fool, it is well to hurl the epithet at ourselves
if we deserve it.
" 'You are a fool,' I said to myself. 'If
your religion does not cure your temper, what
has it done for you?' I made up my mind
that I would bring all the strength of my will
and all the grace of God that I could get to bear
upon this besetment. Now I do not want to
boast, but I thank God that it is a very long
time since I found myself fretting or worried.
I can not tell you the difference it makes, not

What Is the Good of It? 87
only to myself in the happiness of my own life,
but in the happiness of those about me."
Here is a homely counsel on care which we
may take to heart :
"Within a garden by the cottage door
Sits an old mother, knitting busily —
Hair snowy white beneath a snow-white cap;
Eyes blue as the blue skies that arch the place ;
A face all full of peace and sunny hopes.
A cheery song she sings, a moment stayed
To count the stitches and to set them right,
Then click the needles music to her song.
From her I learned this counsel upon care:
Do n't you trouble trouble
Till trouble troubles you.
Don't you look for trouble;
Let trouble look for you.
Do n't you borrow sorrow ;
You '11 surely have your share.
He who dreams of sorrow,
Will find that sorrow 's there.
Do n't you hurry worry
By worrying lest it come.
To flurry is to worry,
'T will miss you if you 're mum.
If care you 've got to carry
Wait till 't is at the door,
For he who runs to meet it
Takes up the load before.

88 Christ's Cure for Care
If minding will not mend it,
Then better not to mind ;
The best thing is to end it —
Just leave it all behind.
Who feareth hath forsaken
The Heavenly Father's side ;
What he hath undertaken
He surely will provide.
The very birds reprove thee
With all their happy song :
The very flowers teach thee
That fretting is a wrong.
'Cheer up,' the sparrow chirpeth,
'Thy Father feedeth me;
Think how much more he careth,
O, lonely child, for thee!'
'Fear not,' the flowers whisper,
'Since thus he hath arrayed
The buttercup and daisy,
How canst thou be afraid?'
Then do n't you trouble trouble,
Till trouble troubles you :
You '11 only double trouble,
And trouble others too."

CONSIDER THE LILIES
89

CHAPTER VII
CONSIDER THE LILIES
There is an exquisite bit of tenderness in
the story of the Creation that it will do us good
to notice. Of all the vast heaven and earth we
read God spake and it was done. He said,
"Let there be light, and there was light." At
the bidding of his word there came the grass
and trees, and the herb-yielding seed. At his
command there came the creatures that flew in
the heavens, or filled the seas, or roamed on the
land. But when God comes to deal with man
and with flowers there is a new method. The
Lord God formed man, and breathed into his
nostrils the breath of life, and the man became
a living soul. And the Lord God planted a
garden, and there he put the man whom he
had formed. The flowers come in with the
91

92 Christ's Cure for Care
man ; the man with the flowers. Geology shows
us that in the earlier ages there grew vast reeds
and tree-ferns, but no flowers.
And the garden was the first sanctuary.
There amid the flowers that spake the "fear
not" of God to the heart of man, and that pro
claimed his gracious care, he walked and talked
with his child. And there in the garden was
such pure worship as no stately cathedral has
ever known.
And when the Lord Jesus comes to restore
our Paradise and to teach us of the Father, he
does not gather his disciples about him in the
temple. He goes there indeed, but it is sternly
to reprove, indignantly to overthrow the tables
of the money-changers — to drive forth the
sheep and oxen with their defilement, and to
scatter the seats of those that sold doves. But
when he would open his mouth and teach his
disciples, he went up into the mountain, and
sat down amidst the abundance of flowers. We
must not picture the scene like that of our own
mountain slopes, beautiful as they may be with
purple heather and golden furze, and daisies

Consider the Lilies 93
bright and shining buttercups. Palestine is the
land of flowers. Its most striking feature is the
abundance of flowers, their variety and bril
liance. A land flowing with milk and honey
meant, in other words, a land of rich pastures
and many flowers. "A Garden of Eden run
wild," says Canon Tristram. So we must think
of the mountain slope where the Great Teacher
sits as rainbow-hued with flowers. And here,
as in the garden that the Lord God planted of
old, the Savior finds the sanctuary, and pick
ing a flower he held it up and said, "Consider
the lilies of the field, how they grow."
"Consider the liles of the field." There is
much in that. The flowers that are wholly and
only dependent on the Father's care. Not the
garden flowers that have a man trained in all
knowledge of flower lore to take care of them.
Nor the hothouse flowers screened from the
sun and sheltered from the frost with all kinds
of costly appliance for their culture. The lilies
of the field, the trembling buttercup and daisy
that the wind can wither and the frost can
kill, that the sheep can nibble and the oxen

94 Christ's Cure for Care
trample — these are to bring us the sweet mes
sage of the Heavenly Father's care.
"Consider the lilies." It is the bidding of
the blessed Lord. He would have us not only
look at them, not only admire them, not only
think about them. It is rather, Be still and
let them preach to you. Let us seek from him
the anointed eye, the opened ear, the tuned
heart. Look at it, the beauty of the shape, the rich
ness of the color, the powdered gold, the grace
of stem, the tender care of swathing leaves
about the bud. The very seasons are set, and
the sun shines and the showers fall, and the
mysterious energies of the earth are controlled
for the flower's sake. These all wait upon the
flower and minister to it. All the forces of
nature are charged concerning the flower.
If God cares so much for flowers he must
be very kind and patient and gentle. What
images and thoughts of God the world had
in the old time, and what thoughts some men
have still! They listened to the thunder, and
said it was his voice; they saw the lightning

Consider the Lilies 95
flash, and said that God passed by. When
the mountain flamed and melted, the people
fled, crying, "Let not God speak with us lest
we die." The prophet sought for him in the
fire that fused the solid rock and ran along the
ground; and in the whirlwind that swept and
roared resistless in its might ; and in the earth
quake that shook the solid hills. But lo! he
cometh who hath seen the Father, and he saith :
"Consider the lilies of the field. Behold the
fowls of the air. Your Heavenly Father careth
much more for you."
I have known men who did not care for
flowers. They have been so taken up with
business that their hearts have become as
phalted, as hard and barren as the city streets,
trodden by the restless feet of a thousand fret
ting thoughts, and where the heavy wagons
of their cares go rumbling all the day and far
into the night. They have no room for what
they call sentiment. The children are trouble
some, and are banished into the nursery; the
birds are noisy, and should be shot ; and as for
the flower-garden, they would turn it into a

96 Christ's Cure for Care
potato ground, unless flowers pay better — then
they like flowers. Now I might go to such
people for advice; they know all the good
investments; they are sharp, shrewd, what the
world calls clever. But I should never dream
of going to them for sympathy, for pity, for
help. I hold the flower in my hand, and I feel
at once how gracious He must be who makes
the flowers — how pitiful, how patient, how
tender, with what care and skill he deals with
things. These are the proof and pledge of his
tenderness. "If God so clothe the grass of the
field — the common flower of the hedgerow and
the pasture — shall he not much more clothe
you?" Consider the lilies, and see how he delights
to give. In poorhouses and prisons — alas!
that we should have to put them together, and
that poverty should be treated so much as if
it were a crime — the food is allowanced, the
weight exact, lest a bit too much should be
given — bread to the crumb and rice to the
grain. They may claim enough for bare exist
ence, but must not ask for more. Even kind-

Consider the Liwes 97
ness and pity find their limits in men's wants.
They look up what they can spare, and give
their scraps and cast-offs. But love, glad love,
can not bear to weigh and measure. Love
can not limit itself to wants, and stop there.
Love must give its luxuries. Love must lavish
its best, its all. "Bring out the best robe, the
ring for the finger, the shoes for the feet" — all
these are luxuries, not necessaries, in Pales
tine^ — "and bring hither the fatted calf" — the
daintiest and best. Flowers are the overflow
of God's love, the luxuries thrown in. It is
much that he should give us bread to eat, and
water to drink, and light to see by, and air to
breathe; but these can not satisfy him — his
love must go further, and he sends us the
flowers and bids them bring the assurance,
"Your Heavenly Father careth for you."
Consider the lilies, and see again how God
loves beauty. Our Heavenly Father cares for
the look, the shape, the color of things. He
decks the heavens with glory, and makes the
flowers beautiful. "Shall he not much more
clothe you?" Is there not more in the word
7

98 Christ's Cure for Care
than we sometimes think? It certainly means
that God will give the needful clothing; but
does it not mean more than that ? Shall he not
deck and adorn his children? Shall he not
array them in beauty if he so clothe the grass
of the field, which to-day is and to-morrow is
gone? The beauty of the Lord our God is to
be upon us. He who teaches the birds their
song, how it must grieve him when his chil
dren speak harsh, angry, unkind words! He
who makes the daisy and peeping violet so
beautiful, how it must hurt him when his chil
dren are hideous with envy, ugly with pride,
scarred by meanness and selfishness! What a
blot and stain upon his fair creation!
Consider the lilies, and see how God makes
his beauty. What a complicated process it is
when man manufactures his beautiful things!
The ax must cut down ; the tree must be rent ;
the plane must smooth; the turning lathe and
chisel must be at work ; dust fills the air ; chips
and shavings litter the ground. There is the
din of the hammer and the heat of the fire.
I watched one making his flowers of glass —

Consider the Lilies 99
here the fierce furnace, heated to its utter
most; then the lump of glass thrust into the
glare, twisted and turned; then the pincers
seizing it and pulling it and pushing it, and
then the thing plunged into the fire again and
again. I turned away and thought within my
self — Some people think that is how God makes
us beautiful. Consider the lilies, how they grow — grow:
furnace and heat, hacking and hewing, rending
and tearing — hammer and pincers — where are
they? Tell us, lily, how did He make thee
beautiful? "O, he blew me about with his
south wind, and sent his great sun to shine
upon me, and refreshed me with the showers,
and the dew came noiselessly while I slept.
Day after day he cared for me, and I came
to this." Do not be afraid of the processes of God in
beautifying us. He does not burn and beat
and break that we may be adorned; but he
breathes his south wind, and shines upon us
with his favor, and shapes us by his grace,
and so he makes us beautiful.

100 Christ's Cure for Care
Again, "Consider the lilies how they grow."
Here is the balance of earth and heaven — the
ministry of each accepted; the claims of each
satisfied. Here heaven and earth do meet and
blend. The dark root lay in the ground, down
amongst the clods of the earth, and on the
stick that marked the place was thrust a label
with a name grand enough to turn the head of
any simple flower. And the lily said: "What
have I to do in this dirty earth? Faugh! I
can not bear to touch it. I who belong to the
Lilia Splendiosa, to be prisoned here like this !
I know my place too well to think that I was
meant for such a dungeon — cold, damp, dark —
as if indeed I were dead and buried. I ought
to be up in the heavens, lifting my head
proudly, and unfolding all my glory to the
sun." And it sulked, and muttered, and re
fused to thrust out the root. So it missed
heaven because it neglected earth.
Take care how you grumble at your cir
cumstances — so many difficulties, so many hin
drances to cry out against. To do our duty
on earth is the only way of getting to heaven.

Consider the Lilies ioi
But think of another flower that should say,
"O, it is all a mistake to call me a lily. Lily
indeed! I am just a poor dirty brown thing,
and haven't any beauty in me. Without any
stem, without any leaf, it is no use my dream
ing of heaven and hoping to be anything."
And it thrust down its roots into the earth, but
it forgot to push its stem up into the light !
The heavenly-minded man who neglects his
duty in the world is as unlovely to God as he
is ugly to men. And the man that is so ab
sorbed in earth that he forgets heaven misses
the very beauty and blessedness of life.
The message of the flowers ends with this
much more. The Maker of the flowers is our
Heavenly Father. God's delight in his works
prompts the perfection of their beauty. But
love needs more than the flowers can bring.
Love seeketh not its own, yet love ever seeketh
itself. Love only finds love, and love only loves
love. That we are made in the likeness and
image of God, the one creature in all the world
that is capable of knowing him — that to us is
spoken the command to love him with all the

102 Christ's Cure for Care
heart — means that we are infinitely more and
dearer to him than any other creature can be.
Much more; that infinitely more is ours. Lift
your eyes from the hly of the field to him who
holds it in his hand. For the lily God hath
given the sunshine and shower, and the orderly
seasons and the refreshing dew; but for us he
hath sent the blessed Lord himself, the Well-
beloved. And turn again from the lily in its
beauty and fragrance to him, and think how he
is going on to the darkness and agony of the
cross — giving himself for us "that he may
present us to himself, a glorious Church, not
having spot or wrinkle or any such thing." If
the beauty of the flower be the outcome of the
sunshine and shower, what finished beauty,
what perfect blessedness is that which shall
satisfy him, who hath loved us and given him
self for us.
Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed
like one of these. It is not only that the beauty
of the flower outpasses the glory of Solomon,
but the method of that beauty. The glory of

Consider the Lilies 103
Solomon was all "put on" — the glory of the
flower is all "wrought out."
King Solomon would have a crown of the
finest of gold, but he could not make it. He
must send for Hiram, the widow's son. And
I think the man who can make a crown and
make it well may be more royal than the man
who can only wear it when some one else makes
it. Solomon would have some royal robes,
splendid robes wrought with the finest of
needlework; but he could not make them.
The women must make them, and they who
made them did a more noble thing than he
who only wore them. She whom this gener
ation will think of as our late queen, Victoria
the beloved, would never have been what she
was in the hearts of her people because of
the crown upon her head and the robes about
her shoulders. It was the queenliness from
within, not from without, that made her glory
and her greatness. God makes his kings not
by trappings from without, but unfoldings
from within. You must grow the true glory
like the flowers — you can not put it on.

104 Christ's Cure for Care
"Flowers preach to us if we will hear:
The rose saith in the dewy morn :
I am most fair ;
Yet all my loveliness is born
Upon a thorn.
The poppy saith amid the corn :
Let but my scarlet head appear
And I am held in scorn ;
Yet juice of subtle virtue lies
Within my cup of curious dyes.
The lilies say : Behold how we
Preach without words of purity.
The violets whisper from the shade
Which their own leaves have made:
Men scent our fragrance on the air,
Yet take no heed
Of humble lessons we would read.
But not alone the fairest flowers :
The merest grass
Along the roadside where we pass,
Lichen and moss and sturdy weed,
Tell of His love who sends the dew,
The rain and sunshine too,
To nourish one small seed."

THE HEATHENISM OF CARE
105

CHAPTER VIII
THE HEATHENISM OF CARE
"Be not therefore anxious, saying, What
shall we eat? or what shall we drink? or
wherewithal shall we be clothed? For after
all these things do the Gentiles seek : for your
Heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need
of all these things. But seek ye first his
kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these
things shall be added unto you. Be not there
fore anxious for the morrow, for the morrow
will be anxious for itself. Sufficient unto the
day is the evil thereof."
Here is the next argument : The heathenism
of care. "After these things do the heathen
seek," those who never heard of the Father's
love, who never knew of the tender care of
our God. 107

108 Christ's Cure for Care
This heathenism of worry is a double
wrong; it is a forgetfulness of God and a deg
radation of life; all is absorbed in eating and
drinking, bent downward over the husks and
blind to the heavens, deaf to the voices that
call us up higher.
These two aspects of care are met by the
two remaining counsels. For the first, the
remedy is in the assurance, "Your Heavenly
Father knoweth that ye have need of all these
things." For the second comes the command, "Seek
ye first his kingdom and his righteousness and
all these things shall be added unto you."
To look down, and only down, with fear
and anxiety is the life of the heathen.
To look up to the Father's love and then
to look down, is to find a confidence in which
fear and care are lost.
This is ever the difference between the land
of the heathen and the home of the children
of God. Egypt is the land where they look
down for everything. The rising of the Nile
brought the supply of all wants, whilst Canaan

The Heathenism of Care 109
is the land that drinketh in the rain of the
water of heaven. Between the two lay the
school of the wilderness, where Israel was
trained in this art of looking up; down from
heaven came their daily bread. Their shade,
their guidance, their protection, their all was
in heaven above. Only when they had learned
to look up were they ready rightly to look down
upon the land that flowed with milk and honey.
After these things do the heathen seek. He
who frets has lost his God — is indeed as if God
were not.
Surely it is worse than having no God, to
kneel down and say, "Our Father who art in
heaven," and then to go forth fretting and
fearing as if he never knew or cared.
It is worse than being an orphan to have a
Father, and yet forget his love.
How perplexed the angels must be at the
sight of the fretting child of a Heavenly
Father! "Has he not a Father ?" asks one in amaze
ment. "Does not his Father love him?"
says another. "Does not his Father know all

no Christ's Cure for Care
about him?" says a third. "Is not his
Father great and rich?" asks a fourth. "Has
not his Father given us charge concerning
him?" say they all. "How then can he
fret?"
If there be one grain of truth in our belief
that there is a living God who holds us un
utterably dear, who is seeking in all things and
through all things ever to lead us to the high
est, the fullest, to the best, what room is there
for us to fret or fear?
"Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye
have need of all these things." Some time ago
I was reading a book on "Geology," by Pro
fessor Geikie. I came across a statement that
arrested me and filled me with wonder. "It
is calculated that the river Rhine brings down
annually lime enough to supply three hundred
and thirty-three million oysters with shells."
It was during my holidays, and I was fish
ing off the coast of Guernsey. I read it to the
boatmen who were with me, and it was the
topic for a day's conversation. I saw in my

The Heathenism of Care hi
mind the Alps rise mighty and majestic hold
ing communion with the stars. What to them
with their heads in heaven could be the little
paltry things of the far-off sea? And yet from
these must come the lime for oyster shells.
I saw the sun in the heavens lighting up
the worlds, so far away with its exhaustless
energies of light and heat. What to it were
the needs of tiny hidden things in the ocean's
depth? And yet the sun was lifting up the
vapors into the heights where they became
snow ; and the snow in turn became the glacier
that ground and ground the mountains into
lime for oyster shells.
I saw ten thousand leaping, laughing water
falls flinging themselves from the heights,
eager, ceaseless, resistless, as if they knew the
glad errand on which they went ; bringing down
the supply for the tiny creatures that waited in
the North Sea. And then I saw the stately
river Rhine, proud arbiter of nations, flowing
past the cities that it made great, and under
neath the shadow of ancient castles that it had
made safe, and it hastened on its way bearing

112 Christ's Cure for Care
the material in which the oysters were to find
their shells.
My heart laughed within me with the glad
faith — What a thing it is to be an oyster!
And yet are we not much better than they?
"Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye have
need of all these things."
Look back and see the marvelous provision
that the Heavenly Father has made for every
one of us. There was a time when we were
all want, and nothing but want. If we could
have anticipated our coming into this world
no dream of horror could ever have seemed so
dreadful. If we could have stood and said, "I am
going into that strange world, the most helpless
thing in it. Of course, I shall know nobody,
and, of course, no one will know me. I shall
not be able to understand their language, and I
shall not have the sense to know my own wants,
much less to tell them to any one else. I shall
be so little that, of course, no one will care for
me; I shall be in everybody's way, and quite
unable to get out of it." O, the agony of it,

The Heathenism of Care 113
that cruel loneliness. The angels surely shud
dered the first time they saw a baby, and won
dered that God dared make anything so awful
in its helplessness.
No terror that ever came into a man's
mind in thought of going out of this world
would have compared with that terror of com
ing into it.
And lo! we came — and a mother's love
bent over us. O, the marvelous and perfect
ministry! Little — and yet because little so
unutterably dear. Weak — yes, omnipotently
weak. Waited upon day and night with a
service unwearied, a service that found its
heaven in its ministry. The power that made
a mother is the power that I can trust for ever
and ever. A mother is the "Fear not" of
nature to our hearts.
Now may we think of our gracious God
speaking to us, "Come, let us reason together,
my child. There was a time when thou wert
all want, and in that time didst thou lack
anything? Was not every want anticipated
and perfectly supplied? And the love that
8

114 Christ's Cure for Care
fashioned the mother for thee at the beginning
of thy life is the love that still holds thee dear,
caring as surely and sacredly for the wants of
manhood and of old age as for the wants of
the little child."
"Your Heavenly Father knoweth that ye
have need of all these things."
But seek ye first his kingdom and his right
eousness. So we reach again the great lesson that the
Gospel of Jesus Christ is a power within us to
keep the man right with things.
All the money in the world will not hurt a
man if he keeps it in the right place; but two
brass farthings will blind him if he puts them
over his eyes. We are wrong with things,
little or great, when they hide from us the
vision of the heavenly; when they deafen us
to the voices that are ever calling us higher;
when they deaden us to the impulses and
promptings of the Good Spirit; when they
divert us from the path in which God would
lead us.

The Heathenism of Care 115
"All these things shall be added unto you."
Note well how much. God never promises to
make a rich man. I am glad of that, though
I should not mind trying the experiment.
There is an awful law that runs through all
things, which finds its crudest force in money.
The more a man has the less he thinks he has.
All that God promises is all that we need, not
all that we desire. Our desires are infinite —
they are made for God, and what is great
enough for him is too great for anything less.
We are always trying to make ourselves little
enough for the world to fill us, and we can not.
This is the source of our divine discontent.
We perish with hunger so long as we seek to
fill ourselves with the husks the swine do eat.
It is only in the Father's house that there is
bread enough and to spare, and the heart will
never be merry with the abiding merriment
until we arise and go to the Father.
All these things — how much? As much as
God gives the birds, and as much as he gives
the flowers; and think how much that is.
For the birds, a nest to lie in and a heaven to

116 Christ's Cure for Care
fly in. Come, if I have that I am well off. A
nest to lie in and a heaven to fly in.
As much as he gives the flowers : and how
much is that? Earth to grow in, and heaven
to go into. If I have that, then how much
more do I want ?
Somebody said to me one day, "I suppose
you have not much of the garden living in
London ?"
"Well," I said, "it depends which way you
measure it. It is many miles deep and many
miles high and about six feet across." That
is what God gives us all. Plenty of depth,
plenty of height, and as much across as we can
stand on, and if we had more we could not be
in two places at once.
Therefore I say unto you, Be not anxious.
The weight that a man carries upon his
back is altogether determined by the size of the
world beneath his feet. In those lectures in
which Sir Robert Ball has put the mystery of
the heavens within the compass of such simple
and unskilled folks as most of us are, he says

The Heathenism of Care 117
that a man who carries a sack of corn on earth
could as easily carry six sacks of corn on a
globe the size of the moon. But in a world as
vast as the sun even to pull out the watch
from the pocket would be to tug at a weight
of some five or six pounds, and that it would
be impossible, indeed, to lift the arm; and if
once a man were to lie down there he could
never get up again.
That is the truth, the very truth, we have
to learn. Our burdens are heavy, not in them
selves, but in the attraction and gravitation of
the earth. If the earth is all to us, then, alas !
how true is it that its burdens crush and over
whelm us, and then indeed we can scarcely lift
a hand to heaven, all unable to raise ourselves
to higher things. The Lord Jesus Christ has
come to bring in our midst the forces of another
kingdom that are able to loosen and lessen
the attraction of the earth. Above us and
about us, hidden and unheard, but ever pres
ent, ever mighty, is the power of the kingdom
of God and his righteousness. So is it that
for us the yoke of life is made easy, the bur-

118 Christ's Cure for Care
den pf life is made light, and we enter into
rest. Nor is this all. The truth is made complete
by yet another illustration from astronomy.
The last of the planets was discovered by no
telescopic observation, but by mathematical
calculations. It was found to be attracted
from its ordinary and regular course by some
strange and unknown body, whose exact posi
tion was determined by means of these calcula
tions. This is the fullness of the blessed truth.
The gentle yet mighty forces of another world
are brought into this by the Lord Jesus Christ;
forces that attract and draw us to himself.
"I have overcome the world," saith he. So
are we set in our true position toward earth and
heaven. The burden gone, it is easy to live
like the lark of which Wordsworth sings :
"To soar, yet not to roam,
True to the kindred points of heaven and home."
"O Lord, how happy should we be
If we could cast our care on thee,
If we from self could rest ;
And feel at heart that One above,
In perfect wisdom, perfect love,
Is working for the best 1

The Heathenism of Care 119
Could we but kneel, and cast our load,
E'en while we pray, upon our God,
Then rise with lightened cheer;
Sure that the Father, who is nigh
To still the famished raven's cry,
Will hear in that we fear.
Lord, make these faithless hearts of ours
Such lessons learn from birds and flowers ;
Make them from self to cease,
Leave all things to a Father's will,
And find, before him lying still.
E'en in affliction, peace."

AN APOSTOLICAL INJUNCTION

Casting all your anxiety upon him, because he careth
for you. — i Pet. v, 6, 7. 122

CHAPTER IX
AN APOSTOLICAL INJUNCTION
Note well what leads up to these words:
"Yea, all of you gird yourselves with humility
to serve one another. . . . Humble your
selves therefore under the mighty hand of God,
casting all your anxiety upon him because he
careth for you."
* The greater half of our worries, certainly
the most irritating half, comes from our pride.
Care hath many wives, but I think Conceit
hath borne him the most children, and these
the most greedy and unruly of them all. To
humble ourselves is to be rid of many of our
heaviest burdens. It is well for us to set as
frontispiece the picture on which St. Peter is
looking as he writes these words. We find
the clue to the scene in this phrase: "Be
clothed with humility." The word is used
123

124 Christ's Cure for Care
nowhere else in the Bible. It refers to the
apron of coarse texture which was worn by
the slave when he made himself ready for
service. It was the mark of his subjection.
So we may read it. Be toweled with humility.
The word at once takes us back to the
scene of the Last Supper. There starts before
us that incident which would remain for
ever vivid in the minds of the disciples, and
most of all in the case of Peter. The guest
chamber had been made ready for the Master
and his disciples. The good-man of the house
had set the water in the room and made
all provision for the feast, and then had with
drawn. Now the disciples begin to take their
places at the table. It was probably the
only occasion in which they had sat at such
a ceremonious gathering, and it may be
that the dispute which broke out amongst
them was caused by the very order of their
sitting. The supper is ended, and there beneath the
very shadow of the cross, the sacred emblems
of the holy sacrament before their very eyes,

An Apostolical Injunction 125
they argue angrily as to which of them shall
be the greatest. The dispute seems to have
been referred to the Lord himself for his de
cision. Eagerly they wait for the word which
should settle the matter once for all. Very
solemn, very impressive is the reply of the
Master. Not in words that they could forget,
but in a scene to be forever graven upon
their memories, is the answer given. In that
silence they watch him rise from the couch
on which he reclined. He begins to take
off his outer garments and lay them aside —
no stately robe was it, but the simple vesture
of the peasant woven from top to bottom.
Then, taking the towel, he girds himself as
the slave, thrusting the corner of it beneath
the fold at his side. Eagerly their eyes fol
low him as he passes to the pitcher and
lifts it and pours the water into a basin.
Then, setting it down beside one of the
disciples, most likely Peter, he begins to
wash his feet. Peter is shamed and troubled
by such condescension, and shrinking from
those outstretched hands, he cried almost

126 Christ's Cure for Care
reprovingly, "Thou shalt never wash my
feet." "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part in
me," was the Lord's reply.
Then all the soul bursts forth in entreaty,
"Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and
my head." So knelt their Lord before each of them
in turn. The work done, he rose and again
put on his garments and sat down in their
midst. "Know ye what I have done?" he
asked. "Ye call me Lord and Master and ye
say well, for so I am. I have given you an
example that ye should do as I have done
with you."
The scene comes back to Peter now in all
its vividness, that consuming care of each
for his own importance that provoked the
unseemly dispute. And, moved by that sad
memory, he writes: "Yea, all of you gird
yourselves with humility to serve one another,
. . . humble yourselves under the mighty
hand of God, . . . casting all your anxi
ety upon him because he careth for you."

An Apostolical Injunction 127
He who is ever seeking to assert his own
importance, greedy for the recognition of his
greatness, lives in a perpetual worry. Pride,
however much it has, claims ever more. We
may say of pride what Matthew Henry
says of sin: "Nature is satisfied with little,
grace with less, pride with nothing." He
who puts on the towel of service, puts off
a world of care. There is no surer and no
readier remedy for our own cares than to
try and lessen the cares of other people.
When the little pin-pricks of life's annoyances
rankle and fester, it is a symptom of too much
self-indulgence and too little exercise. Mr.
Wesley tells how that once, sitting beside
some rich man in his drawing-room, there
came down a puff of smoke from the chimney.
"Ah, Mr. Wesley," sighed the rich man,
"these are the annoyances which I have to
endure." Poor rich man, how he would have
lost his annoyances if he had measured them
by the annoyances of most other people! He
who seeks to bring a ray of sunshine to some
soul, and a song within some heart, shall

128 Christ's Cure for Care
himself walk beneath blue skies, and his feet
shall move to strains of heavenly music.
"Casting all your care upon him for he
careth for you," so the old version has it, but
the two words rendered care are very differ
ent. The care which we are to cast upon the
Lord is the distraction, the worry, the anxiety
against which the Lord Jesus warns us, but
the care of God is in taking care of us. We
are to lose our care in being taken care of.
This word, too, was used by the Lord Jesus,
and it is well to recall its association. When
the Good Samaritan brings the man to the
inn, whom he found in the way, wounded and
stripped, he directs them to take care of him,
to see that he wants nothing. So it is that
we, beaten and burdened by a crowd of cruel
fears and anxieties, are to find our refuge under
God's Almighty Hand, and to find our rest in
his care. We in our pride are apt to think that to
humble ourselves is to be forced to an un
willing surrender, a hard necessity of sub-

An Apostolical Injunction 129
mission. But with our gracious Father, to
humble is not to humiliate. The true and
best humility is that which love wins from
us as the sunshine and soft breath of spring
woo the flowers from the hedgerow. Of old,
when God would humble Israel, he fed them
with angel's food, or as it is rendered in the
margin, "Every one did eat the bread of the
mighty." (Psa. lxxviii, 25.)
God loves us into humility.
To humble ourselves under the mighty hand
of God is to live in happy submission to his
will, in restful assurance that over all and
through all and in all there is at work for
us the love which can only be satisfied with
that which makes for our highest, fullest,
richest good. "Thy will be done" is not a
sigh of compulsion, but a triumphant song.
"Brave trust in God be thine alway,
So shalt thou rest
Infallible; if day by day
He have in all things his own way,
Thou shalt be blest :
And good shall be yet more than good-
God's very best."

130 Christ's Cure for Care
To humble ourselves under God's mighty
hand is to find the fulfillment of the promise
made to Benjamin, of all the promises made
to Israel surely the sweetest and best. "The
beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety by
him: and the Lord shall cover him all the
day long." In such a dwelling place, com
passed with that favor as with a shield, in
stinctively, almost of necessity, we cast all our
care upon him who careth so graciously for us.
"Casting all your anxiety upon the Lord,
because he careth for you." Is it not the deep
est, bitterest cry of many a heart — nobody cares
for me? There are hosts of men and women
ready to give in, who could go bravely on in
life's wind and rain, if somewhere a little bit
of love awaited for them to keep the heart
warm — some old mother to speak the name
tenderly and bless it as she spoke, or some
little child to brighten at their coming.
"If the veriest cur would lick my hand,
I could love it like a child."
We have heard of care killing its hosts;
but there is something more cruel than that.

An Apostolical Injunction 131
Untended, unmourned, unmoved, men die be
cause they find no one to care for them.
Here is the great and blessed cure for care.
The Lord careth for you.
Therefore cast all your care upon him.
Many can cast the burden of their sins upon
the Lord who yet do carry the burden of their
daily worries.
One hot summer day I was driving along
when I overtook a woman who carried a heavy
basket. She gladly accepted my offer of a
ride, but sat with the heavy basket still on
her arm.
"My good woman," I said. "Your basket
will ride just as well in the bottom of the
carriage, and you would be much more com
fortable." "So it would, sir, thank you," said she. "I
never thought of that."
"That is what I do very often, too," I
said. The woman looked up inquiringly. "Yes,
I do the same thing. The Lord Jesus has
taken me up in his chariot, and I rejoice to

132 Christ's Cure for Care
ride in it. But very often I carry a burden
of care on my back that would ride just as
well if I put it down. If the Lord is willing
to carry me, he is willing to carry my cares."
Cast your care. It is not enough to put
it down while we pray, and then shouldering
it once more to go groaning up the hill. It is
to have done with it — to fling it right away —
fling it off and let it sink down in the ocean
of God's great love.
The Lord careth for you. In that touching
story of the mother who hid her little son for
three months after the king's decree that the
male children should be slain, what a picture is
there of troubled care! What terribly weary
ing months they were! How the mother
smothered the little one's cry lest her secret be
betrayed ! How often she started and listened
with beating heart at the sound of the passing
footsteps! How in her dreams she saw that
dreadful end, and woke stretching eager hands
to assure herself of the child's safety!
But to-day the King's daughter has found
the child, and has compassion upon it. The

An Apostolical Injunction 133
King's daughter has taken the little one to her
arms, and has said, "He shall be my son."
Now how safe is the little one, the son of
Pharaoh's daughter! Every soldier grasped
the glittering weapon to defend her child. All
the wealth of Egypt ministered to his wants.
All the might of Pharaoh girt him about with
honor and safety. For him nothing was too
much to ask or claim. The mother's care is
gone now — flung to the winds. Her child is
called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
The Lord careth for you. Cast off your
burden of care in the safety of his care. All
that he is and has is yours for your safety
and welfare. Behold what manner of love the
Father has bestowed upon us that we might be
called the children of God — and such we are.
"A safe stronghold our God is still,
A trusty shield and weapon ;
He'll help us clear from all the ill
That hath us now o'ertaken.
The ancient prince of hell
Hath risen with purpose fell ;
Strong mail of craft and power
He weareth in this hour ;
On earth is not his fellow.

134 Christ's Cure For Care
With force of arms we nothing can,
Full soon were we down- ridden ;
But for us fights the proper Man,
Whom God himself hath bidden.
Ask ye who is this same ?
Christ Jesus is his name,
Of Sabbaoth the Lord,
Sole God to be adored,
'T is he must win the battle.
And were this world all devils o'er,
And watching to devour us,
We lay it not to heart to sore ;
Not they can overpower us.
And let the prince of ill
Look grim as e'er he will,
He harms us not a whit ;
For why? his doom is writ;
A word shall quickly slay him.
God's word, for all their craft and force,
One moment will not linger,
But, spite of hell, shall have its course;
'T is written by his finger.
And, though they take our life,
Goods, honor, children, wife,
Yet is their profit small ;
These things shall vanish all,
The city of God remaineth."

THE CROWN AND CLIMAX OF
IT ALL
135

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors
through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor
height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able
to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord. 136

CHAPTER X
THE CROWN AND CLIMAX OF IT ALL
There are things too great for the Lord
Jesus Christ to utter; our words are too shal
low to hold them.
Let us come again and sit beside the Master
on the mountain-top, and, looking into his face,
let us ask,"Whence hath he come, the glorious
Son of God?"
Think how for us men and for our salva
tion he has come down from his high estate
to be the Babe of Bethlehem, to dwell amid
the rough conditions of our daily life, to toil
as we must toil, and share with us earth's com
mon wants.
Let us look into his face again and ask,
Whither doth he go? Think how for us men
and for our salvation he goes on to all the
137

138 Christ's Cure for Care
shame and agony of his most dreadful cross.
Then let the words sink down into the inner
most heart. He that spared not his own Son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not also with him freely give us all
things? That is the measure of the Heavenly
Father's love and the pledge of our supply.
The love that gave the well-beloved is no past
love. The cross of Christ is not the high
mark of a great love that once swept and
surged about the world. It is the measure
of the abiding love that ever holds us dear,
the love that concerns itself about our every
little care, and counts the common want a
sacred thing to which he hath a joy in minis
tering, like the joy of a mother in ministering
to her child.
For the cure of care the Son of God reveals
the love of the Heavenly Father, and for
our deliverance from this ill, as from the de
liverance of every ill, here is the fullest
revelation of the Father's love in the gift of
the well-beloved Son. Let us seek to rise step
by step towards the fullness and height of

Crown and Climax of It All 139
these great words, praying that we may find
in them that triumph in which the apostle ex
ults so rapturously.
Who shall separate us from the love of
Christ? But is there not another question:
What oneness can there be between him and
us, God and man? — the King of saints and
the chief of sinners — what can ever make them
one? Between the glorious Son of God and
us there must yawn the gulf of an infinite
distance. That his love may bind us into oneness
with himself, think of the Son of God becom
ing man in all points as we are. To make the
lowest and the least of us one with himself he
lays aside his glory and becomes the lowly
brother of us all; he who was rich becomes
poor for our sakes, and makes himself one with
us iirthe lowly surroundings of his life.
But yet remains that deepest gulf which
severs us. We have sinned. Is there not a
kind of dreadful comfort in shrinking from
the sight of those eyes that look us through,
and see as we have never seen our own

140 Christ's Cure for Care
vanity, our faults, our folly, and our sin ? We
cry as Peter cried in that too glorious pres
ence: "Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a
sinful man." Yet even here the Savior meets
us in a mystery of oneness. He bare our sins
in his own body on the tree. He gives him
self to die for us, the Just for the unjust, that
he might bring us to God. Dwell upon it all,
the height from which he came, the depth to
which he sank, the great things he hath
wrought. Herein is love. With him all
things also must assuredly be ours.
He who can make these words his own,
resting as sure of them as of the ground-work
beneath his feet, lives evermore the conqueror
in all things and of all things.
Let us be bold to claim them as our own.
The cross of Christ is the glorious revelation
of God's love to the world; but it is more
than that only; it focuses the infinite love
and throws it burning and transforming upon
the heart that bows beneath it. It is ours
and all our own. The love that endured dis
grace and poverty and pain could only be for

Crown and Climax of It All 141
such as we are. Now is it ours to ask this
question with a boldness triumphant as his
of old, "Who shall separate us from the love
of Christ?" Let us find in this love all that the apostle
did, seeing it is ours as it was his. He rose
up in it ever strong for victory, ready for any
condition and any circumstances. He chal
lenged and defied all forces that could oppose
him as he felt the glowing love of Christ within
the soul. He put that love as if to every
possible test, and in it found himself ever
triumphant. See this man as he stands and
looks forth upon his foes. Surely never was
man faced by so threatening and terrible a
host. There is Tribulation, a giant stained
with blood, the flail upon his shoulder, thresh
ing men and women as the thresher threshes
corn. There is Distress stripping life of all
that gladdens it. There is Persecution, leading
on his accursed crew, prison, torture, outrage,
agony. There is Famine, gaunt and hollow-
eyed, blighting with her breath and bringing
in her train a hundred forms of ill. There is

142 Christ's Cure for Care
Death, with its terrors. And all the air is
filled with legions of Principalities and Powers
that fight against him.
Turning from them for a moment Paul
glances upward. One sight of that Face, and
they are all forgotten. A whisper of the Mas
ter's love, and these forces are made powerless ;
one touch of that Hand, and they are gone.
Then all the heart within him bursts with rap
turous triumph. In all these things we are
more than conquerors through him that loved
us, for I am persuaded that neither death nor
life, nor angels nor principalities, nor things
present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor
heights, nor depth, nor any other creature shall
be able to separate us from the love of God
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. It is the
voice of this love so wonderful, so infinite, so
abiding, that speaks to us every one.
Therefore I say unto you, Be not anxious.
"The King of love my Shepherd is,
Whose goodness faileth never;
I nothing lack if I am his,
And he is mine forever.

Crown and Climax of It All 143
Where streams of living water flow
My ransomed soul he leadeth,
And, where the verdant pastures grow,
With food celestial feedeth.
Perverse and foolish oft I strayed,
But yet in love he sought me,
And on his shoulder gently laid,
And home, rejoicing, brought me.
In death's dark vale I fear no ill
With thee, dear Lord, beside me ;
Thy rod and staff my comfort still,
Thy cross before to guide me.
Thou spreadest a table in my sight;
Thy unction grace bestoweth ;
And O, what transport of delight
From thy pure chalice floweth !
And so through all the length of days
Thy goodness faileth never :
Good Shepherd, may I sing thy praise
Within thy house forever!"

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