Download PDF - Free Methodist Church

40 THE EARNEST CHBISTIAN.11ii '4'sing, " The sun is up, the cloads aregone,"Happy for us, if we learn, as wedoubtless will, the meaning of thesewords, " Resist the devil and he willflee from you," If we resist him, weturn a deaf ear to him, and prove byour experience what we are told in thesacred word that " He is a liar," Tobelieve his lies is to peril our comfortand retard our progress heavenward.If we keep our eyes on him who hassaid, " I am the way and the truth andthe life;" and our ears open to hisvoice, our tongues " bridled," we shallescape many of his snares. We haveopenly professed to " renounce thedevil and all his works," His worksare legion, but God can help us keepthem renounced and pilot us throughto immortal glory, if we are true tohim,•»»THE BRiGHr SIDE,—It has beentold us, that if we wish to make ourselvesmiserable, we have only to complainand find fault with our surroundings.The misery will come of itselfif we give it such encouragement. Ifany one determines the earth is a howlingwilderness, to him it is a howlingwilderness. We can evoke shadowswherever we wish, and pain wUi oomefor our asking, or even for our believing,if we give it the proper patronage.But it is just as sure that if we wish tobe happ3', we can be so, under theconditions in which God places us, nomatter what those conditions may be.The shepherd of Salisbury plain waspoor, afiiicted, overworked, and besetwith embarrasments, with which mostqf us would be appalled, but he knewnothing of unhappiness because he sawGod in all, and felt that from him therecan come nothing but blessing for hischildren. Let us look al the brightside, and cultivate a thankful spirit,a'nd to every soul, no matter how burdened,the day will break, and the shadowsflee away.—Faith is exceeding charitable andbelieveth no evil of God.—Rutherford.CONTENTMENT,If we had discerning eyes, we couldread in the accidents, and little Occurrencesof every-day life, manychapters of instruction.Sometimes the language is so striking,that the dull perception is forcedto understand it, as in the followinginstance, where I read a beautiful lessonfrom the. homely page of incident,I give it as noted down in my diary:As I was passing throngh the hallI noticed a couple entering, whose singularappearance arrested my attention.They were a man and woman ofthe same height, but both much undersized ; their dress was tidy, but quaintin the extreme; and in the person ofeach was such an entire absence ofevery giace or beauty, that one wouldsuppose such awkward looking bodiesmust really feel uncomfortable. I wasbeginning to regard them as a verygrotesque pair; but my mirth waschecked upon observing that the womanwas entirely sightless. Alas!thought I, how unequally the gifls ofGod are distributed ! Here is deformity,poverty, and blindness! Whataccumulated misfortunes! Wouldthat I could do something to alleviateso sad a fate ! My meditation of con- •dolenCe was interrupted by an awkwardbow from the man to myself, atthe same time asking, in a brisktone :" Would you like to look at somefirst-rate shoes ?"He produced some shoes as extraordinaryas the venders themselves.I could scarcely repress a smile at hisevident pride in the article; but hewent on to say :" They'll outwear four pair of shoemakers'shoes. These, you see, aremade by my wife, MoUy. She's blind,yon see, but she cuts these out andsews them every stitch herself."The woman stood by with that calm,resigned expression pecaliar to theblind. I said to her :" My friend, is it possible you areVo