CHARLES A. was an earnest worker, full of love to Christ and His gospel, which he delighted to make known, and which he constantly preached, and, like most earnest men, he needed encouragement. But, as is often the case with such, he looked too much to the stars and too little to the small things about him; or, to speak more plainly and without a figure, he was looking for certain large results to come in the way which he himself had marked out, and thus frequently overlooked the simple and unobtrusive evidences of the divine blessing springing up around him and waiting for his grateful recognition. At the time, for instance, to which we refer, there was a little, quiet, pale-faced girl, who came to the service with her parents, and heard him regularly. Charles A. frequently saw the child, whom it was impossible to watch closely without perceiving, as many did, the deep and beautiful work which the word communicated was doing even when the speaker to whom she listened was most cast down and desponding.
This little girl, however, was taken ill, and it was soon painfully apparent that death very speedily must be the ultimate issue. Her sufferings were very great, but were borne with heroic patience, cheering all around, and more especially the speaker from whose lips she had received the gospel of Christ. We wish, however, to call attention to a little incident in her history which happened just before she died.
Being in great pain on one occasion, and wishing to change her position, long occupied and very painful, she asked her father, who was himself very weak, to try and move her. "I wish, father," she said, "you would try and lift me to your knee." "Impossible, my child," was the reply; "I would, gladly, but have not the strength, and indeed if I could, I fear my moving you might prove fatal," for this the doctor had said would be the case. "Oh, do try I" she exclaimed, "and I will pray to God to make me lighter.”
Overcome at last by her importunity and faith, her father, with tears, put forth all his strength, looking to the Lord, and succeeded in getting her upon his lap. While he was making the attempt, however, and while holding her in his arms, the little girl constantly exclaimed, "O Lord, make me lighter! make me lighter!" and when at last she found herself seated on her parent's knees, she said, "There, father, did I not tell you the Lord would make me lighter?”
We can readily believe that some hard and logical intellect would laugh at this child's faith; but granted that there is a God, and that He is what He declares Himself to be, it was after all but an approximation to that spirit which ought to live in every heart in simple accordance with the word of God, and the highest form of true reason. B. F. N.