Newspaper Page Text
13, 1849]
you gain strength to pray again to-morrow, you have cause
for thankfulness. If the food whicli vou take every day
nourishes you for one day, you are satisfied. You do not
expect that the food you ate yesterday, will nourish you to
day. Do not complain, then, if you find it necessary to ask
every day fresh supplies of spiritual nourishment, and do
think your prayers unanswered so long as you are ena
bled to struggle on, even though it should be with pain and
difficulty. Every day 1 see more clearly, how great a mer
cy it is to be kept free from open sin, and from complete apos
taey. If you are thus kept, be thankful for it.”
ill or a l an if lx clini au s.
( OX SC IENCE—A PRE ACHE It.
1. lie has been regularly inducted into office. lie was
called to the work by the highest authority; and the validity
of his ordination has never been disputed. Much as some
of his sermons have been disliked. I believe all the denom
inations claim him as belonging to them, and it is well to see
<a point in which they are all agreed.
2. He is certainly an old preacher. The first parents
had a specimen of his preaching before they left Eden, and
fie has not failed of preaching some where a dav, if lie has
an hour, since. Some people think a minister should stop
preaching after a certain age, and I think some would he glad
if this old preacher would stop. And some have taken a
giod deal of pains to stop him. Hut I never heard of their
success. Indeed, I have known cases when the more they
opposed him and tried to put him down, the louder he preach
cd, and they had to give it up. Notwithstanding his age, he
has lost nothing of the power and vigor of his voice. From’
what 1 know of him, 1 shall not think that age, however
great, will ever stop him, or any other agency, but the au-i
tiiority which first set him to work.
3. He is a very discriminating preacher. He is an ar
cher that seldom loses an arrow, lie comes directly home
to men’s bosoms, as if he hud something to do there. The,
hearer has no difficulty in ascertaining what he is about.
■‘What would he be at ?” is often asked under sermons, but
not when conscience is in the pulpit.
I lie is a bold preacher. Scowls, frowns, and threats
are all lost upon him. What he has to say, he says right on, (
no matter who is in the audience. He does not wait for peo-1
pie lo come to specified places to hear him. He fearlessly
goes after them into the parlor or the palace, lilts his voice
to the king on the throne, utters his rebukes in the hall of
revelry or the don of robbers. There is no timidity or cow
ardice about him. He tells the truth out and out, without
any kind ofcompromisc, or any sort of deference to the feel
, ings of his auditors, it may raise a dreadful storm in the:
•'“"-'kim, and hate, they may. the preacher most cordially ; hut
<l‘f| “)yg*h without shrinking, and if, matters not;
who stands in Hie tvny orlhe*7l6r. ■*-
• 5. He is certainly a very awakening preacher. People
who are good at the business? of sleeping under other preacl -
ers, never get asleep under this one. The moment he be
gins, all previous drowsiness departs. Most people bad
rather be asleep when ho preaches. And how many ol
them try to reach such a blessed state of unconsciousness !.
Rut he knows what chord to strike to keep them awake, and
awake they will be, while he is in the pulpit, take what pains',
they may to be slumberers. One of his gentlest whispers’
will make sleep an exile, and when he speaks in the fulness!
of his power, it is as if every bone was breaking, and every,
nerve was snapping. The crash of all nature about his ears,
would not more effectually keep the hearer awake.
0. He always lias something to say when he preaches.,
Fome jireachers get along somehow without this. They can
have utterance by the hour, arid say but little—some ofthem
nothing. But all who have heard this preacher affirm that!:
there ever was sound and solid matter in his discourse, lie!
has no rhetorical flourishes, no tricks and subtleties of speech j
—no sound in’ the place of sense, no thunder without light-:
ring. He has a message where he goes—an earnest and im
portant errand, whomsoever he addresses. He crowds a
good deal into a small space, and makes the hearer feel there
is abundance ot matter in a ft w words.
7. He is a very effective preacher. Some preachers seem
to have no more effect upon their hearers than a child’s breath
in stopping a harneane. Rut hard hearts have melted, iron
walls have bowed, deeply loved objects have been forsaken,
inveterate sinful habits have been abandoned, the very deep
est depths of the human soul have been stirred; ali these :
things have been done by this preacher. Effective! Look :
at David wetting with his tears the parchment on which he
wrote the fifty-first Psalm ! Look at the king of Babylon as
his eye fell on tin hand writing on the wall! Look at Judas
as he dashed on the pavement of the temple the price of the
batrayal of his Lord ! And then at Peter weeping bitterly ij
over his c 1 nialofhim. Here was preaching to some purpose,
and conscience did it. And there never was a human being
deeply and powerfully moved by the grand and momentous,,
interest of religion, but this preacher had been uttering his
terrible voice in the depth* of the guilty soul. Verily the j
iiistory of human hearts testifies he is an effective preacher.
8. He preaches every where. Preaciiing is usually done
at stated times and places. But here is a preacher who has
no confinement of this sort, and he can skillfully adapt his
discourse to any capacity. Their goes a pouting, stubborn ,
t child ; this preacher is there. There is a reckless and un
godly young man, and the preacher is there. He is preaching
that parlor, where domestic peace is broken by a profit
gale husband, or an ill-tempered wife. He is down in that
forecastle, making that wicked sailor tremble. Heisshaking
a thousand people with fear in thatgreat congregation, and at
the same time he has gone out on that pleasure excursion,
and is making the ears of those Sabbath-breakers tingle. Fie
makes the open villains of yonder penitentiary hear him, and
so he does the but a little smaller villains who are yonder,
at midnight, counting the days’hard bargains. While ho
thunders in the ears of that impious blasphemer, he sharply
admonishes that professed disciple’s omission of prayer. He
is the greatest busybody about preaching ever known. In
season and out of season, night and day—at home, abroad
on the land—on the sea—in cell, or attic, or parlor, he
drives a great business. He is nevei-tired, never frightened,
never sick, never discouraged, never dies. As one genera
tion ot his hearers passes away he makes the next his audi
tors always, therefore, has plenty so hear him, and hear him
they must, though the majority hate, most intensely, tho
preacher and his subject.
9. He will never stop preaching. He not only preaches
this side the grave, hut b yon 1 it. All who have heard nim
here, will also hear him there, lie will preach in heaven. —
All the audiences then will lev to hear him. When they
weie in tiie world, for a wh . . they disliked the preacher us
much as any others; bu : consequence ot an occurrence
ealleil ‘‘the working of r generation and the renew al of tin
Holy Ghost,” they came to take great pleasure in this preach
er before they died—and now in glory they like linn better
than ever, it is one of the highest pleasures of that world
to hear him. He has not a word to say that does not fall on
their ears like tiie sound of the most delightful music.
But he will preach elsewhere than in heaven. No preach
ing in this world was so loud as his to prevent people going
to the world ot woe. But they would not hear him. They
tried to fill their ears with every other sound rather than w ith
his voice. And they did gt-t rid of him for long periods to
getlier, and hoped they should never hear him again. But
they will, lie will preach the louder for all the ill-treat
inentgiven him in this world. He will preach some old
sermons which it will be anything but a comfort to hear.—
And he will have a great many texts furnished by the hear-1
; ers themselves. And he will preach long. They had short!
■ sermons from him once, and those were too long for them—,!
and thankinl were they when he was done. But he will:
keep on preaching, though his hearers may “say in the!
| morning, would God it were evening; and in the evening,
would God it were morning!” And to any who should in
quire when he will stop, there will be hut one answer— their
I worm dieth not! Who will be the happy, and who the sad
hearers of this Great Preacher? — N. Y. Observer.
A NUN IN PARIS.
The “Paris Constitutional” publishes the following:
“The houses of religious communities are much more nu
merous at Paris than is believed, especially those of women.
]Of what occurs therein, in macerations and mortifications of
all kinds, the following fact hardly creditable in the century
in which we now are, may give an idea. On Tuesday last,
Dr. B was invited to visit one of these convents of clois
: tered women to prescribe for one of the nuns. On his arri
val at the convent he was introduced to the cell in which the
jsiek person on whose behalf he had been called in was lying
‘in bed. He questioned her about Iter symptoms which she
felt. The sick person answered in a weak voice tiiat noth
;ing was the matter with her, but her features showed pain,
and soon alter Iter strength gave way and she fainted. The
doctor hastened to unfasten her dress, and partially opened
it in the endeavor to restore her to consciousness: but judge!
of the surprise ho then ’ fe|t, on seeing a crucifix placed on
the breast of the nun with spikes which entered the flesh.—
He immediately removed this instrument of torture, hut thc
nun, on recovering from her fainting fit, pul tier hands to ■
her breast, and perceiving that her crucifix had disappeared,
demanding it with loud cries, and repeating that she could
not allow it to be taken from her, for that she bore it in fuk!
fi 1 merit of a vow and of an act of penitence imposed on her
by her confessor. The doctor employing his authority, de-!
cured that he would oppose the continuation of such macer
ation by all the means in his power. ‘J he sick nun had
not only her breast torn and full of holes from the points
with which the crucifix was covered, but her buck presented
traces of similar injuries. It appears, in fact, that the un-|
happy woman, thinking to conform with more zeal to the in
junctions of her spiritual director, and to make more com
plete her penitence, took the precaution every evening of
placing the crucifix between her two shoulders, and thus to
iie on the buck, notwithstanding the horrible puin which she
■ must have endured. Dr. B on leaving the convent,
took the crucifix with him.”
Politeness at Home. —Always speak with the utmost po.
l:tenes and .deference to your parents and friends. Some
children <u£jtglite and civil every where else, except at
home j but M£te,/4hey are coarse and rude enough. Shame
\M\ ‘ ‘
j Nothing sits so gracefully upon children, and nothing
makes them so lovely, as habitual respect and dutiful deport-!
merit towards their parents and superiors. It makes the
|j plainest face beautiful, and gives to every common action a
nameless but peculiar charm.
“My son, hear the instructions of thy father, and forsake;
not the law of thy mother; for they shall be ail ornament of
grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.”—Pr: 1:
cl, 9.
Self-Esteem. —Opinion of. ourselves is like the casting of
a shadow, which is always longest when the sun is at the
greatest distance. By degrees the sun approaches, the shad
ow shortens, and under the direct meridian light it becomes
none at all. It is so with our opinions of ourselves; while
the good influences of God are at the greatest distance from
us, it is then that we conceive the best opinion of ourselves.
As God approaches, the conceit lessens, till we receive the
fuller measures of his grace, and then we become nothing in
our own conceit, and God appears to be all in all.
[From the Watchman <]• Reflector .]
W 0 RK— WORK—YVOR K.
Messrs. Editors , —l have read with much satisfaction, the
letters recently published in your paper on work ; and read
ing the seconii letter, a sentence or two in it brought fresh to
my mind an interview which 1 had, over twenty years ago,
with a great worker, under whose hospitable roof I was
then sojourning for a few days. This worker was a lady ;
she was ‘.he wife of a worker; and both she and her husband,
at this time, were doing a great business, in which they con
tinued diligent as long as they lived. They have since died
—died in the Lord, and their works do follow them.
Under the same roof, at the same time, was a working
young man—poor, a stranger, who had left his home under
die impression that God had called him so preach the gospel;
hut first, he sought tho advantages of a liberal education. —
During our stay, he was made the beneficiary of this work
ing lady ; and by her unsolicited benefactions, was enabled
■to pay his passage in a schooner, from Boston to a distant
oily, where he found other working friends, by whose aid he
became liberally educated, a preacher of the gospel, and a
; working minister. He stid*4iv£s by work, Slid - works to
live. But leaving him and returning to the lady, I lecl im
| pressed, to tell, lor your edification and that of your working
I readers, the story which she then told to me. First, howev
er, the sentences which brought this interview, and story to
{mind:
“Most of our merchants and mechanics are longing to
make a fortune and then retire, in order to rest and enjoy
Jthemselves. In nine cases out often are they disappointed,
jeven after arriving at this point. .They miss life,labors and
j engagements of tlulr ordinary employments, and suffer ex
jeessively from ennui.”
She said:—“At the age of seventeen, I was a poor orphan
girl. 1 then resided here arid supported myself by my nee
dle. 1 used to w. lk into the city, purchased remnants of
caiico and other goods, return, make them into garments
and sell them, bio 1 began tho world. 1 then thought if!
; eonld ever see the day, that I had a shop of my own and two
hundred dollars worth of goods in it free from debt, I should
lie satisfied and completely happy; but afterwards, when I
j knew myself to be worth fifty thousand dollars, I was no
■ more satisfied or happy than before. I became a Christian.
!Afterwards 1 married Mr. F. who had been for several
years a clerk in my employ. lie, too, was a Christian,
|and was then worth several thousand dollars. Soon after
■we were married, we thought and talked much about retir
ing from business, knowing that tve had enough to retire on,
and support ourselves comfortably as long as wo might live,
without labor, ln-side having much to bestow on others.—
But we finally came to the conclusion as we were stewards
that it was our fluty to continue our business, and in it make
what we could, und what tve made as opportunity offered,
give in worksot charity and benevolence fir promoting the
cause of the Lord. We concluded that in so doing also, we
should be more happy than to change our former course of
life; arid so are we doing.”
1 hat lady, twenty years ego, was called “the hundred
dollar woman. # Her name was Furtvell. Her husband
the late, lamented, Dea. Levi Farwell, of Cambridge. The
young man, who is now an old working minister, subscribes
himself, Respectfully, A. N.
I *So called, because one hundred dollars was the surn
which she usually gave, as a first instalment, to every great
j and good enterprise in which her sympathies were enlisted.
[From the Golden Rule.}
TUB MONSTER SLAIN.
TESTIMONY OF REV. WM . II . KENDRICK.
Messrs. Editors, —Will mv testimony avail aught? It is
at your service. When quite a boy 1 contracted the dirty
habit of chewing tobacco, and continued it until my nervous
system was a mere wreck, shattered and laticred ! For two
years or more, I was under the care of medical aid. During
this period 1 uses but little of the “weed.” Very soon, how
ever, “the dog returned to his vomit.”
I was a perfect slave to this vile lust, till I became rnoro
; thoroughly convinced that I was not merely destroying my
i health and life, but was indulging in a species of the grossest
; intemperance. One or two tilings was’evident, I must either
j banish th e quid, or he a ruined man, soul and body !
Ifchewing tobacco, as a luxuty, was intemperance, (which
l saw eiearly,) I was sure it was morally wrong, asin against
’God and my own soul. For God says: “be temperate in all
things.” i also looked upon the habit as indecent, and a
wicked waste of God’s money, an abomination in His sight?
1 could no longer pray with tobacco in my mouth, and having
gone thus fur, it was not difficult to go a step farther, for the
same God who said, “be temperate,” said also , '■'pray always!”
Where, then, the time for chewing and spitting the poisonous
weed ! Furthermore, God says, “deny thyself,”—of what?
! “all ungodliness and worldly lusts,” arid tobacco chewing
and smoking, 1 felt sure was not among the least of these
lusts. Bless that little sheet of yours, the Lord send it far
and wide, till every soul is reproved. Yours in the Gospel,
W. H. KENDRICK.
Greensfork, I rid., July, 1849.
The Mother. — A writer beautifully remarks that a man’s
mother is the rep'resentative of Ins Maker. Misfortune, and
even crime, set up no barriers between her and her son.—
While his mother lives he has one friend on earth, who will
not desert him when he suffers; who will soothe him in his
sorrows, and speak to him of hope when he is ready to des
pair. Her affections know no ebbing tide. They flow on/
from a pure fountain, and speak happiness through this val a
of tears, and cease only at the ocean of eternity. J
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