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Family h
LOST! LOST!
By S. Addison McElroy.
(The account of a mis-spent life !ollowed by a
hopeless death has suggested to the author the following
poem. The last words of the dying one were:
"Light, more light, 1 must not die in this darkness.")
Light! Light! more light!
I die in the dark!
Fling open the window
And give me?but hark!
Voices long silenced
Now laugh in derision!
Forms, long since buried,
Now dart on my vision!
Standing before me.
Amid the iiend's revel,
Waving my torments?
Ix)ok! 'Tis the Devil!
Oil, the deep horror!
He beckons me to him!
Hellish Intentions
Are sure passing through hiin! 1
Darkness and terrors,
Fears so contagious 1
Fall on my wild heart,
Once so courageous.
Light flashes round me # j
Still greater horror!
Even the darkness J
Would shield me from sorrow!
Dashing tempestuously 1
Higher and higher, ' 5
Burning with fiercest heat?
Billows of fire! 1
t
Sulphurous vapors
Stifle my breath? (
Oh, what an agony! t
Can this be death?
Fearful departure, ;
Sin's dreadful cost.
Mercy has vanished, ;
I'm lost! I am lost!
Lancaster Texas.
THE CRUELTY OF CANDOR.
Woe to the 1111 tor tun ate individual who, by I
some evil chance, has given what Oliver Wendell
Holmes calls the "Key of the side door" to a
candid friend. To all of us there come uuguard- 1
ed moments in which some feeling hidden in the
heart finds expression. The sweet of nature 1
realize that the confidence is but half intended, 1
and treat it as a sacred thing. Candor, however,
stalks about manfully in one's holy of holies,
trampling down the beautiful flowers of the soul 1
beneath a brutal hoof and desecrating forever
the quiet chamber of the heart.
The cultivating of candor is a hardening process.
Not only that, but, to make way for it and
irivp it inprAHcintr smoo annVi maffninj oa c^mno 1
V M %J ovtvll UlUllV^lO UO OJ ill^/U"
thy, tenderness, gentleness, consideration, and
even common courtesy are pushed aside and
gradually disappear. They are crushed out by
the abnormal growth of quality that, if kept
to its due proportion, would mean a delightful |
honesty, straightforward frankness and simplicity.
The thrusts so liberally dealt by the candid
are double-edged. The recipient is hurt not only
by the disagreeable truth presented to him, but
also by the conviction that it was meant to
wound. A girl, flying to her mother for sympathy
under some such blow, says dolefully: "I
can't think why she would want to hurt my
feelings. I've always been nice to her." Her inexperience
incapacitates her from perceiving the
motive that IIKHaIIv Hob huhind q nmiol ooooiilt
of the kind. Jealousy is sometimes the moving
cause, and we know from a high authority that
it is "cruel as the grave." Self-love wounded
is another source of those "home-truths" that
often make the home a place of misery to the
sensitive, to be escaped from at any cost. Mealtimes
are favorite opportunities for unkind re- i
'RESBYTERIAiS OF THE SI
leadings
marks, meant to wound as much as possible.
n,ven the parcuts join sometimes in this detestaoie
oractice. dealintr out cuts and thrusts to
their children, and very often receiving 4 4 as good
as they gave." Tovsuch an inferno as this may
undue candor lead.
Hypocrisy is odious, poisonous to friendship.
But doctors know that a small quantity of poison
is not only harmless but actually benelicial. So
it is with that mild kind of hypocrisy which veils
away the harsh, unlovely things of life and draws
into prominence all that is agreeable. There need
be no actual unfaithfulness in this.
"11 y a des chases ne se disent pas," says the
French proverb. The kindly among us leave
them unsaid if likely to wound or annoy. The
barbarous make haste to say them. "Why are
you so sallow this morning?" is not a remark
calculated to cheer the recipient. "How fat you
iire getting!" is another bit of badly-placed candor.
to which a morsel of milfl hvnnorisv wonlrl
/ ? ? ..
be highly preferable. True, the candid friend
lias his uses. He prevents our indulging in any
igreeable fallacies as to personal appearance or
intellectual gifts. "I don't call you clever exictly;
you've had great luck," was the remark
iiade to a well-known novelist on a recent occa>ion.
The distinguished man stared, as well he
night, for there was no occasion whatever for
he observation. "How clever of you to find me
>ut!" was his delightful reply, made with a
harming smile and a real enjoyment of the situltion.
There have been excellent retorts made
n similar circumstances. "I'm going to give
you a bit of my mind," said an angry man in a
burst of frankness. "Pray do not; I am sure you
cannot spare it!" was the immediate answer.
When someone said to Dr. Johnson, "You're no
gentlemen!" he retorted, "You're no judge!"
It 11 l/<ll U7QO O t lontd nrtiinlln
iijvu uuo at icaoi C4Uail^ UUlSJJUht'll.
The worst thing about the habitually candid
person is that he or she is seldom remarkable
for honesty and directness in matters personal
to themselves. This brusquerie to others seems
to be a sort of shield behind which they conceal
their lack of real sincerity. They are foc w :r
saying that they never flatter, but they themselves
take very kindly to a little flattery, and
thus prove their disingenuousness.
St. Paul tells us that he was "all things to
nil men," which probably meant that he was a
master of the tact that comes of good manners,
culture, and a fine perception.?"Madge," in
'Ihe Young Woman.
WHAT IS A CALL?
A vision of need has impelled many of the
great missionaries.
William Carey said his call was an open
Bible before an open map of the world.
Robert Morrison faced the question of his
life work in a heroic manner. "Jesus I give
myself to thy service. The question with me
is, Where shall I serve? I consider 'the world'
as 'the field' where thy servants must labor.
When' I view the field, I perceive that by far
the greater part is entirely without laborers,
or at least has but here and there one or two,
while there are thousands crowded up in one
corner. My desire is to engage where laborers
are most wanted."
Mary Lyon, the founder of Mount Holyoke
College, and for twelve years its principal,
was wont to say, "To know the need should
prompt the deed."
Bishop Tucker, of Uganda, left the secluded
artists' studio for the work of Christ. He had
HTH [ October 4, 1911
been painting the picture of a poor woman
thinly clad and pressing a babe to her bosom,
wandering homeless on a stormy night in a
dark deserted street. As the picture grew the
artist suddenly threw down the brush, exclaiming.
" I iistond nf morp.lv nnint.inir thp Inst, t will
go out and save them."
James Gilmour, of Mongolia, decided the question
of his field of labor by the logic of commonsense.
"Is the kingdom a harvest field? Then
1 thought it reasonable to seek work where the
need was greatest and the workers fewest."
Ion Keith-Falconer, a man of most brilliant
attainments, son of a peer, rich, one of our greatest
athletes, Cambridge University reader in
Arabic, said: "A call?what is a call? A
call is a need, a need made known, and the
power to meet that need."?The Presbyterian
(London.)
THE PATHWAY TO A POWER.
BY REV. S. G. HUEY.
The highest types of civilization are but exponents
of Christianity. Draw a line between
the civilizations which are Christians and those
which are not and you have separated barbarism
and civilization.
Where the Christ spirit prevails, art, literature,
science, invention, civil liberty and discovery
have prevailed as nowhere else- The
telegraph was not invented in India, nor the telephone
in Africa, nor the aeroplane in the Cannibal
Islands, but in Christan lands. Without
this influence science could not have made its
marvelous strides, nor could invention have furnished
for us its great wonders, nor could our
great discoveries have been made.
Would you see the monument of Jesus Christ
in the world, you have but to look about you.
i ne nospitais, asylums, ana eiemosenary institutions;
the public schools, the colleges, the great
universities are all monuments erected in his
memory. What a tremendous change he has
wrought in the ideals of those who denied his
claims.
When lie was born, wise men came from the
east to worship him; when he died, wise men
came from the west to do him homage. The
world's wise men have been coming to him ever
since fi om every quarter- Among his devoted followers
may be found the world's greatest statesmen,
physicians, warriors, discoverers, astronomers,
geologists, psychologists and theologists.
All but three of the Presidents of the United
States are among his friends. A majority of the
supreme court bench; of the cabinet, and of the
governors of the States are Christians. The
rulers of four greatest nations are subjects of
King Jesus.
To the believer no other person is so attractive.
For him no burden is too heavy; no sacri
f'ee too great; no journey too long. Houses and
lands; parents and children; intellectual and
commercial pursuits are yet given up for Christ.
Were it necessary, multitudes would go to the
gibbet and stake for the defense of his name
and his cause. The secret of his unparalleled
prestige is his self-denial. He saved others;
himself he could not save. The supremacy of
Jesus is due to the sacrificial life he lived- He
who would hold a place of preeminence in the
world must possess the mind of Jesus and follow
his footsteps.
TTn urVtA nrnn 1A J -- ? ~? ?
niiu nuuiu Btauu upuil lilt! S8JI16 H10UDtain
peak of success must trudge his way hither,
step by step, up the lonely mountain trail of
sacrifice. He who would reach the summit of
the pinnacle of fame must climb thither by the
innerest way of self-denial. He who would choose
an ideal, bows to it, takes off his coat and works
for it, if need be, is bound to win.