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A Heart Broken Fatiivr. Josie, Ala., March 31st 1895. Dear Brother Hanks: It is with a heart overwhelmed In grief and sorrow that I attempt to write to you this morning, and while the birds are singing sweet ly, and the buds of spring, and the , beautiful flowers in all their glory are putting forth, lam shut up in gloom, darkness, grief and sorrow. On the Sth day of this month, it pleased God to call from time to eternity, my darling son Alto. And while I know that “He doeth all things well,” yet I can not help sorrowing and crying and being bowed down in trouble on account of this dispensation of Providence. I sometimes think that I am about reconciled, but the first thing I know 1 am shed ding tears and mourning and groaning on this account. Alto had taught a school near Catalpa during November, Decem ber and January. The next week after his school closed he started to the Normal college at Troy with the intention to go until the close of tne present session; then teach awhile, and go back to that or somp other college, and in this way work out an education, with the view of fitting himself for a Civil Engineer, or a professor of Mathematics in some college, as his especial talent seemed to be in Mathematics. But God ordered it otherwise. Alto had been going to college about five weeks, when he took cold, which run into pneu monia, and he lived only four days after taking pneumonia. He was in Troy and was not able to tome home; su died in Troy, and was brought to Ramah for burial. I was very sick at the time with la grippe, and did not get to see him at all. Vernon and John Adam went to him the first day he took pneumonia. Vernon came back and John staid with him. The second day at night the Doctor sent' to me to let me know that he was dangerously sick, and next but was delayed Dy the rain, and did not reach him until Friday morning at 8 oYlock, and he died at 4 o’clock that evening. He knew Laura and Vernon, and asked them not to leave him until, he could come home with them, and talked about coming home. A while before' he died he threw his arms around Laura’s neck and said, “I am going home.” She re plied “vou are going with me aint you?” He said “No, I am going by myself.” She asked him just before the breath left him how he felt and he replied, “All right.” She asked him that question three times and the reply was the same, each time. Those that were with him say that he‘ bore his suffering with Christian fortitude and did not murmer or complain, but often had a pleasant smile on his face, and when he died passed sweetly and peacefully as one going to sleep, and in death had a sweet, peaceful and pleasant counten ance. He made his mark in College from the first day, and his Pro fessors and classmates say that from the first, by his general na ture, he endeared himself to all his fellows. All that knew him loved him and did all they could for him, and the lamily with whom he boarded seemed to love him as a brother. His landlady could not have been more affected had he been her own brother dead. She was not a member of the Church but qught to be, also her brother-in-law, who boarded with her. She told Laura that Alto and her brother-in-law would read a chapter in the Bible and sing a hymn every night. Alto leading in the service one night and Math the next and that she very often went to their room and joined them in these devotions. Some of our brethren and sis ters learned of Alto’s sickness and were very attentive! to him, espe cially brother and sister Key, sis ter Post and brother Brannan; Whether any others I have not learned. Alto was one of the best boys that I ever knew, even from his infancy to his death, Ho was strictly moral, lie never did have any inclination to attend balls, and parties,and other places where people ought not to go. He did not speak evil of anv one. Others might be talking and saying hard things about neighbors or friends, but he would not join in the talk unless it was byway of gentle remarks, such as to say: Ah! well that is their business, not mine.” He never had any inclina tion to be running about oxi Sun days, but prefered to stay at home with me or his mother during her life time, and it has often been, that the other children would be gone to meeting somewhere, or visiting and he would remain at home with me and his step mother; reading, or studying his books. But when his meeting days come he was always ready’ to go to them. No boy, or girl either, ever had greater respect for their fathers feelings than he had for mine. But space forbids that I should enumerate all his good qualities. He is gone and how sad the thought that I will never see him on earth again, but thank God fur the bright evidences he left be hind that he was, “an heir of God and a joint- heir with the Lord Jesus Christ,” and that his §pjrit is now in heaven; and that iff, the morning of the resurrection, “the same power that raised up Jesus from the dead will also raise ms body and fashion it like unto the glorious body of Jesus, and mor tality shall put on immortality and death be swallowed up in vic tory.” And I have a hope, (though it seems so little,) through Jesus, which by His grace enables me to trust in Him and look farward to .Aliipe when * shall meet my dear never comes, aud parting is no more.” Dear Brother I have written more than I expected when I be gan. Knowing how well you liked Alto I felt inclined to write you in regard to his death, and after be gining could not quit.. We are ex pecting you to visit us at Ramah this Spring, and if I do not write an obituary before then, will get you to do so, or assist me in writing one. Dear Brother may God breathe into your heart a spirit of prayer for me and my sorrow-stricken family, that we may be. reconciled to His dealings with us, and en abled to say, “Thy will be done.” And oh! may our lives be as near right as Alto’s was. But it is so hard to the flesh to give him up. In Tribulation Your Brother, W. H. Wilkes. Remarks. This precious family has my deepest heartfelt sympathy- This dear young brother wrote me his experience a little over a year ago and I encouraged him to be bap tized and bad the sweet privilege of baptizing him about one year ago. He was indeed a model boy and felt very dear to me. . He is now asleep in Jesus, while his wafted spirit is resting sweet ly in the bosom of our precious Redeemer, who will call his sleep ing body forth, immortalized, and spiritual in the sweet bye and bye. Your loss, dear brother Wilkes, is his eternal gain. It is hard to give our loved ones up, but this sinful world is not home. He is better off than we are. May the Lord bless you all.—H. Balter, Catoosa, Co., Ala., Marell 3rd, 1893. Elder Lee Hanks, Boston, Ga. Dear Brother:—As I hope by the grace of God, or being born again of a heavenly parentage, thereby having a heavenly in heritance by the blood of Jesus. Grace be unto you, and peace from him which was, and is, and is to come. I chanced to get hold of a paper that had your biography printed in it, I was made to grieve at your troubles and the hardships you had to endure, but was made to rejoice at the great victory you obtained by the blood of Jesus. You complain of being ignorant —the “Lord has hid these things from the wise and prudent and re vealed them unto babes.” You spoke of being brought up in the backwoods; “The Lord’s portion is his people, Jacob is the the lot of his inheritance. He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness, he led him about, he instVucte.d . him, he kept him as the apple of his eyt-s.” Deut. 32: 9, 10. So the Lord alone bore thee on the wings of His everlasting love, out of the kingdom of darkness, into the kingdom of Jesus. I am your little brother in. af fliction, in trouble, in trials, in op position, in persecution, in weak ness, in grief, in poverty, : n being bereaved of my beloved compan ion, and in hope and victory which I hope I obtained by the blood of Jesus. Yes it is by the grace of God that lam what I am. I hope I am a little Christian and the Lord has made me so, a new cre ation in Christ. What wonders he can perform. I love the things I ones’hated, and |iate the things I once loved. I hope my Master is preparing mejto reign with Him above. I sometimes long to go and be with the from troubles, strife, persecution and peril among false brethren, yet I pray the Lord to forgive them for they know not what they do. Some are condending that there is Jesus aid not die for mortal man Ido not know for whom he died. If Jesus did not redeem poor mor tal sinful man I am lost, for I know lam a mortal sinful man. We are first born into the kingdom of God, then in the resurection we are changed from mortal to im mortality. Sweet to rejoice in lively hope, That when my change shall come; Angels will hover around my bed, And waft me safely home. Dear brother, my wife has been dead two years. I have four chil dren. lam trying to ’keep them together. My time is hard in this world, but I hope I have a reward where moth aud rust cannot cor rupt. Farewell, and if we never meet on-ear th, oh, may we meet on the sunny banks of sweet de liverence. Yes, my hope is that we shall all meet and shout “victory” in that morning, not a part of us, but the whole man will be resurrected. Yours in hope, • J. W. Howell. Chipley Ga. April 7th, 1895. Elder A. V. Simms. Dear Brother:—The Banner for April Ist, came to hand yesterday and I enjoyed reading it. All the writing seemed to be characterized by a good spirit. I regard your reply to brother E. D. Varnes as being all right. He wrote it in a good spirit and I think his piece will do good. God has revealed unto us in his word that He has predestinated his people unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto him self according to the good pleas ure of His will; that He foreknew them,predestinated them to be con formed to the imago of His Son, justified them and glory fled them ‘ This we should rejoice in and preach and teach. As to God having predestinated all things, evil as well as good, we do not know so much about that. God has not revealed that so plainly to us to say the least of it. It is a mystery that none of us under stand, nor can we understand it; 'while in ihia tnno It is enough forU>«t (Mh W revealed a suflu Jeucy uuto us, and that what ho has revealed unto us belongs unto us and to our children while secret thing?, unrevealed tilings, belong uuto God. We may take either side of the question as to whether God has predestinated all things or not, and. we will soon be come bowilderedj and find that we can not measure arms with God that we can not pass the bounds that God hath set. But this ques tion is not troubling me. I do not fall out with a brother that takes either side of the question unless he makes a hobby of it, runs on ex tremes or tries to make it a test of fellowship amojig our people. God rules over all the works of His hands, but we can not understand how. Our God reigns. He doeth all His pleasure. He love th us and hath made ample provisions for us in all things. He hath all wisdom and power and bath all things His way,but in a mysterious way to us. Bull will leave this subject desiring to caU attention, tq the fact that we do not understand it,and should not strive among ourselves about it. But I notice no disposition in the writers for theBANNER to strive about it. And I believe that our bretiiern generall^iMrth,south,east and west are nearer together and have a more charitable spirit to wards each other on this subject than they were a few years ago. Well may David say “how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.” I set out to write something on Christian forbearance and will now try to do so. It seems to me that there has been a great lack of forbearance among our prople. At least, I feel that I have not manifested this precious fruit of the spirit of God in my intercourse among and towards the dear saints of God as much,as I should. We are exhorted and comanded in,the scriptures to fove one and as we obey the heavenly injunction forberance will be manifested. It is said that Jovb covers a multitude of faults, things bavo fervent charity among your- ( selves : for charity shall cover the ’ multitude 1 of sins.” Peter 4: 8. 1 Charity is love and it covers sin in 1 the sense of bearing with it in those loved. It follows then that we can bear with those that we love; bear 1 with them m sin even not approv ing of the sin at all but rather re proving it,forbearing with them in away so as to not cast them off, unnecessarly expose them or to hurt them any way. “Charity suffereth long and is kind.” The best peo ple I have ever known were those who have had the most Christain forbearance Love is declared in the scriptures to be a fruit of the spirit of God , in us, and it is the first fruit men tioned in the catalogue, and is set forth throughout the scriptures as being the most important If then we have not loved it is an evidence that we are not born of the spirit But we are told to let brotherly love continue.” We can not originate this love, but we can let it contiueor,we can hinder it in a measure. When we are forbearing towards our brethern wa are letting love have its course. We are manifesting and exercis ing this love when we act in accor dance with its promptings and it is thereby promoted or I might say increased. Jude says/‘Keep your selves in the love of God” As the children of God we obey this injunction when we so act as to not interfere with the intercourse to love between our God as our selves. It means that we are to keep ourselves in the love of God in an experimental way; walk and commune with God. * And as we love and walk and com mune with God, we love and walk and commune with His dear chil dien and have and manifest a ten der merciful forgiving and for bearing spirit towards them. We all are very imperfect, and . are compassed about with many, infirmities while we live in the flesh and there is a great necessity for forbearance among us one towards another. If we all could live exactly right in every particular there would be no necessity for forbearance. In as much as forbearance is enjoined it is an evidence that there will be or is a necessity for it because of something not exactly right. Oh brethern that we could keep this in constant rememberance in our intercourse with one another. But alas! We too often let the flesh get the advantage of us and through pride, envy, selfishness, anger or some other-fleshly lust are ready to take advantage of the faults infirmities or blunders of our broth ern and are ready to murder them in a sense that we ourselves may be promoted. Admit that our brethern are to be blamed for this or that we are not licensed-thereby to do them a wrong by speaking evil of them or becoming their judge. James says“ Speak not evil one of onother, brethern. He that speaketh evil ,of his brother and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law but ft judge. There is one law giver, who is- able to save, and to destroy; who art thou that judgest another 2 James 411 12. There is a law touching transgressson or sin of any kind in the church, and there, are proper executors of that law,, but let us not Constitute ourselves executors or judges of that law. The chur ch collectively and officia ly is the Judge aud executor, of that law of discipline. Any one of us is on dangerous ground when we undertake to discipline a brother ourselves and have him turned out of the church, or even have him to look contemtible to his brethern. James says.“So speak ye,and so do, as they that shall bo judged by the law of liberity. For he shall have judgment without; mercy that nath showed no mercy; and mercy rejoicoth against judgment.“ James 2: 12, 13. When wb persue a brother for his life so to speak tak ing advantage of some mistake he has made, because to take' care of’ the cause, shewing no mercy and trying to bring him to Judge ment, we are “forsaking our own mercy,” and shall have judgement without mercy meted out to us sooner or later. How careful we should be in our treatment of our brethern generally, but specially oi our poor, weak, erring , brethren. I do not mean that we are to set aside discipline as taught in the scriptures, but that w r e are to avoid all usurpations of it. Brother Simms,l have written in a scatter ing way, and have labored under some disadvantages while writing, but if I have written the truth,and something that should be* written, and the bretren and sisters will take up the refrain and obey the truth, all will be well. Your Brother in Love, T J Bazimore. ” Happy is the man that findeth wisdom” The world says the rich man is.the blest or happy man, or the popular man, but the man that findeth wisdom is the happy .man, because here is hidden riches that the fool can never find, aud the thief can never steal. Her trade or income is better than the merchandise of silver, and her grains more valuable than fine gold. She is more precious than rubies; and nothing else, nor all else thou canst desire, can be com pared to her. In her right hand is length of days, immortality; in' her left hand are riches and honor. Her ways ar pleasantness, her paths are peace. —She is the tree of liie to those that lay hold upon her. That so seek her is clear proof of the folly of mankind. We stumble over true wealth and chase the toys of earth. Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? for riches cer tainly make themselves wings; 'they fly away as an eagle toward heaven. Proverbs xxiii. 5. * Cause of Barrenness. LureviJe, Suwannee Co., Fla., March 4th 1895. Elder A. V. Simms: Very Derr Brother in Christ, as I sometimes feel to hope; I again attempt to write you a few lines, though I hardly know what I shall write upon, for ray inability to write or do anything, that would be any satisfaction to God’s children seems to loom up before me, insomuch that I am almost made to shrink and recoil from the effort ere I begin; but having it on my mind and, for the reason why I can’t tell, still 1 try in my weak ness to write. Brother Simms, I wanted to write, or try to, about the cold bar ren condition which some of the churches seems to be in,and I will try in my weakness to point out some of what I think is the causes of this coldness in the house of God. First, it is the neglect ot the brethren to attend their meetings. They will perhaps let this little thing-or that little affair which has nothing to do with, nor is it any excuse for the child of God to get. out of the path of duty by neglect ing to attend to his conference days as he should; thus my brother it will begin,maybe that some good faithful brother will have a lawful excuse for one or more confer ences. Still even that will cause a' cold feeling in hiejieart and he will not have the pressing desire to go to meeting that he did when he first staid away; now I do not to be faithful at al], but I Wife these things from experience. I can go to church feeling as good as a hungry dog in expectations of something.to eat, but let me arrive there about eleven or a little be fore and see two or three of the brethren standing around and two or t hree off somewhere else sitting On a log and when I approach them what do I hear? Brother A, (al though he is a good brother) is re lating some little smutty anecdote, and brothers B, 0 and D, are ap parently enjoying the joke; and confirm their looks by one of them telling one when Brother A, gets through. Well their coversation don’t suit my feelings and I go to where I sec the brethren collected at another place and w’hen I get there I find them engaged in talk ing political matters, or general I the cause of Christ is forsaken and the dear brethren, though not aware of the fact have thrown a damper over me that wont ware off before it is repeated again, and I wish to say right here, though notone myself I believe that such as that and a good many Other things are what causes so many cold Darren churches, and the preacher to get cold and lifeless in his feelings; is any wonder that the sore tried minister of God, when he comes to his masters flock and finds them engaged in vain babblings, such as God has commanded them not to indulge in. I say is it any wonder that the poor minister gets discouraged and thinks often to himself, “well it is all my fault; I am not the one to serve" these brethren, or they would not be found in such con ventions; then my brethren, where ever you may be, let me beg you as one that loves the cause of Christ and all his dear children, not to neglect your meetings, go to meet ing, and when you get there, don’t for God’s sake, don’t let your dear pastor find you scattered around the grounds talking of things that will dishonor- God’s cause, f r I believe that we should be very careful about such conversations at all times and more especially at our church meetings. But let us meet in godly fear, and godly con versation, and as soon as our pas tor gets there, don’t wait for him to go in the house and call us in, but let us go in and take a front seat, near the stand and engage in singing, or giving admonition to each other in telling how God’s children should act to keep a clean house for his services. If we will only do this, God will warm up our cold, barren churches by giving us a live minister, and live brethren, and the young and old will soon be found engaged in i the dance to the honor and glory , of God, and the peace and com fort of his people. If this meets ’ your approval I may write more anon Yours in Hope, ! J. E. Sheffield. ' If thou sayest, Behold, we fuew' it not: doth not he that pondereth i the heart consider it? and hethat - keepeth thy soul, doth not he ; know it? and shall not he render to I every map according to his works? Proverbs, xxiv. 12.