CHAPTER XXVIII. I HAVE already spun out a much longer thread in this supplementary narrative than I at first contemplated; but I feel now as I do sometimes after having preached an hour. The harvest-field seems to wave as the wind of the Spirit blows upon it, as if to beckon me on; and I think I would like to cut another swath around the field, and gather a few more sheaves and bind them up for the barns of heaven, before I lay down the sickle. Even so when I would lay down the pen, I have before me the last two years of my life, more glorious than all the rest. It is true that the way of holiness grows narrower and brighter; and the farther we travel in it, the more our happiness increases. In the course of my narrative, you have been with me to a great many camp-meetings. I was justified and sanctified at a camp-meeting, and if it is the will of God I should like to die on a camp-ground. Where could I find a better place to lay down my armour and take up my crown? Yet if it is the will of God I had rather tarry a few years, that I may preach the gospel to the poor and forsaken. Probably more than half my labours, for the last few years, have been at the various county poor-houses; and I do believe this day, should death overtake me, that if I have any honest and sincere friends, who would plant a rose upon my grave, and mourn that I was gone, it would be some of my brethren and sisters from the poor-house. This would be a greater satisfaction to me than to receive the salary of a rich and worldly congregation, who are saying within themselves, like an ancient backslidden Church, "I am increased in goods and have need of nothing." I have often heard people remark, "What a pity that the county does not make some provision to pay for preaching the gospel to the poor." Dear reader, there are provisions made, and a fund set apart by the great Head of the Church far superior to any earthly treasure. My custom has been to go on Saturday night, have a prayer-meeting and a word of exhortation, and on Sabbath morning, immediately after breakfast, pass through all the rooms, and pray with the sick and the cripples. This will generally take about two hours. Then we have a sermon and class meeting in the forenoon, preaching and prayermeeting in the afternoon and evening, making about nine hours of sweet labour in preaching and praying, exhorting and singing. How glorious is the rest of those who labour in the vineyard of the Lord! how smooth the pillow, how delightful the night vision! Then in the morning to pray with them and take an affectionate farewell, reminds one of the brethren weeping on the neck of Paul as he was about to go to Jerusalem. The blessings of the poor, mingled with the smiles of God, are salary enough for me. I think I now fully understand what the apostle means by "being poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing all things." I should like to tell you of some of the glorious scenes, the shouts of triumph that we have had at the poor-house. If a stranger were passing by he would suppose, and rightly too, that the prodigal had got home. There is the poor mourner, trembling perhaps over a drunkard's grave; and the saint shouting glory to God, rejoicing even in tribulation, having a blessed hope of heaven, and looking for the glorious appearing of her God and Saviour. The first time I visited the poor-house I was led up to the bedside of "Granna Taylor." She was ninety-eight years old, blind, and nearly deaf. By putting my mouth close to her ear and speaking loud, she could hear me. When I introduced myself to her as a blind preacher, her soul seemed to take fire at once. I asked her if she knew anything about Jesus of Nazareth. She clapped her bony hands together and said, "Yes, glory to God! he is my Saviour. He converted my soul seventy-two years ago, and he has supported me ever since by his grace. When all my earthly friends forsook me, he came with me to the poor-house, and hath comforted me here. O how I love Jesus, and long to be with him!" During the seven years that I preached there it was pay enough for going twelve miles to have the privilege of pouring a prayer into her ear, and hearing her shouts of praise as she loaded the humble messenger with blessings and thanksgiving. The last time I saw her she had, as usual, her sorrows as well as her joys to tell me. She had several hymns that she loved to sing, and portions of Scripture, learned before she was blind, that she was in the habit of repeating. But she said of late when she began to sing some one would come and slap her in the face. Before I saw her again she had gone to a country where there are no poor-houses, and, blessed be God! no wicked to molest the saints of God. Sing on, Granna Taylor, and by-and-by I will join you where the deaf ear is unstopped and the wicked cease from troubling. We might relate many incidents of the aged and crippled lovers of Jesus who have been carried by angels to Abraham's bosom, but we have not room to do so. Great God! what must the angels think to see a poor-master drive to the door of some wretched hovel, and take one of Jesus's brothers and carry him to the poor-house. Suppose that, on his way there, he halts in front of a splendid mansion, its windows hung with rich and splendid tapestry, its rooms luxuriously furnished with mahogany sofas and rose-wood pianos, its floors covered with soft carpeting, its wardrobes crowded with silks and costly broadcloths, its tables adorned with massive silver, and presenting every tempting variety gathered from all quarters of the globe, its inmates carrying a small fortune upon their persons; the pauper in the cart, in his rags and wretchedness, ventures to ask the poor-master who lives there, and is told that brother and sister A., of the Church, live there-excellent people. The poor man, maybe, is not wise in this world's wisdom; but as he remembers, "Whoso hath this world's goods and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?" he raises his eyes to heaven in astonishment, and ventures to ask again, "Do they when they make a feast invite the poor?" But the question is unanswered; for they have arrived at the door of the poor-house, and the pauper is hustled in, to spend the remnant of his days with the drunkard, the profane, the idiot, the half-rotten, the dying and the dead. - But," says the reader, "why do you claim for this pauper a relationship with Jesus Christ ?” We will let Christ answer for himself:- "Whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." Matt. xii, 50. And, to show his regard for his adopted relatives, he says again: "Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me." Surely, if there was any abuse to be offered, I should rather have it done to me than to my tender wife and children. Even so the Husband and Father of the Church will sympathize with |