{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_48399/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_48399","id":"gutenberg_48399","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/48399","summary":null,"tags":["Animals in the Bible","Category: Nature/Gardening/Animals","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Nature in the Bible"],"text":"Produced by Al Haines.\n\n\n\n\n\n\"But Love, that moves the earth, and skies, and sea,\nBeheld his old love in her misery,\nAnd wrapped her heart in sudden gentle sleep;\nAnd meanwhile caused unnumbered _ants_ to creep\nAbout her, and they wrought so busily\nThat all, ere sundown, was as it should be,\nAnd homeward went again the _kingless folk_.\"\n  --_The Earthly Paradise._\n\n\n\n                            *KINGLESS FOLK*\n\n                                 *AND*\n\n                  *Other Addresses on Bible Animals.*\n\n\n                                 BY THE\n\n                 *Rev. JOHN ADAMS, B.D., Inverkeilor.*\n\n\n\n                         Edinburgh and London:\n                     OLIPHANT, ANDERSON & FERRIER.\n                                 1897.\n\n\n\n\n                              *CONTENTS.*\n\n\nKINGLESS FOLK, The Ant\n\nHOOKS OF STEEL, The Bear\n\nTHE SACRED BIRD, The Dove\n\nLITTLE, BUT WISE, The Coney\n\nCROWNED WITH HONOUR, The Ass's Colt\n\nTHE REDBREAST\n\nA BORN MATHEMATICIAN, The Bee\n\nTHE BIRD OF FREEDOM, The Swallow\n\nA HOUSE OF GOSSAMER, The Spider\n\nLITTLE FOLLIES, The Fly\n\nPEARLS, NOT PEAS, The Pearl-Oyster\n\nSOME OTHER SHELLS\n\nCALVES OF THE STALL, The Calf\n\nFUR OR FEATHER?, The Bat\n\nONWARD AND UPWARD, The Eagle\n\nTHE VICTOR VANQUISHED, The Lion\n\nTHE BIRD OF THE DAWN, The Cock-crowing\n\nPEACE\n\n\n\n\n                               *The Ant.*\n\n\n\"Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: which\nhaving no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer,\nand gathereth her food in the harvest.\"--Prov. vi. 6-8.\n\n\nOf what use is a sluggard? \"Everything in the world is of some use,\"\nsays John Ploughman, \"but it would puzzle a doctor of divinity, or a\nphilosopher, or the wisest owl in our steeple, to tell the good of\nidleness; that seems to me to be an ill wind which blows nobody any\ngood, a sort of mud which breeds no eels, a dirty ditch which would not\nfeed a frog.  Sift a sluggard grain by grain, and you'll find him all\nchaff.\"  A sluggard is really a good-for-nothing, and no better advice\ncould be given to boys than this: \"Get out of the sluggard's way, or you\nmay catch his disease and never get rid of it. Grow up like bees, and\nyou will never be drones.\"\n\nIn this passage from the Book of Proverbs, Solomon advises the sluggard\nto go back to school that he may learn _wisdom_, for his folly is quite\nequal to his idleness. He is too lazy to drive in a nail, and as the old\njingling rhyme has it, \"For want of a nail a shoe came off, for want of\na shoe a horse was lost, for want of a horse a man was lost, for want of\na man a battle was lost, and for loss of a battle a kingdom was lost.\"\nBecause of the sluggard's first idleness in refusing to drive in the\nnail the whole kingdom comes down about his ears.  It is not much ease\nhe gets for all his scheming, and therefore he is sent back to school to\nlearn wisdom.\n\nThe schoolmaster this time is the _Ant_, for, as the Bible tells us,\n\"there be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are\nexceeding wise: the ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their\nmeat in the summer\" (Prov. xxx. 24).\n\nThe wisdom taught by the ant is threefold.\n\n\n                        I.--THE WISDOM OF WORK.\n\nIf it be the hand of the diligent that maketh rich, the ants deserve to\nflourish; for there are few sluggards in their nest. The great mass of\nthe teeming population is called \"_the workers_.\"  There may be a few\nmales and females in each community dressed in four beautiful gauze\nwings, and no doubt regarding themselves as very superior members of the\nsociety--the veritable aristocracy of ant life--but they never touch the\nwork with one of their little fingers.  The keeping of the nest, the\ngathering of the food, the care of the eggs, and the rearing of the\nyoung ants, all devolves on the shoulders of the willing workers; and\nthey, though they have no wings at all, and are called \"neutrals\" and\nsome other ugly names, cheerfully undertake the whole labour, and make\nthe entire community flourish through sheer hard work.\n\nAnd that is a splendid lesson for all young people.  All great men, as\nwell as all true ants, have been hard workers. This is the only royal\nroad to success.\n\nWhat Sir Joshua Reynolds said to his students is equally true when\napplied to other professions: \"You must be told again and again that\nlabour is the only price of solid fame, and that whatever your force of\ngenius may be, there is no easy method of becoming a good painter.\nNothing is denied to well-directed labour; nothing is to be obtained\nwithout it.\"  Jesus Himself was a hard worker.  Go, learn of the ant,\nand be wise.\n\n\n                   II.--THE WISDOM OF SELF-RELIANCE.\n\nSolomon adds that the ants carry on their labours without \"guide,\noverseer, or ruler,\" and that is strictly the case.  The ants are a\nfeeble people, but they are perfectly self-reliant.  The bees, for\ninstance, have a royal personage in their hive.  We call her the queen.\nAnd thus we may speak of bees as we speak of ourselves, as living under\na monarchical government.  But the ants have no king or queen.  There is\nno royal personage in their nest.  They are rather to be regarded as\nstaunch republicans, who carry on their labours without any \"ruler,\"\nguided simply by that unerring instinct which imitates the actings of\nreason.  The silly sheep may require a shepherd to take care of them,\nbut the sagacious ants can take care of themselves.\n\nAnd all boys who are worth their salt must try to learn the same lesson.\nThey must learn to strike out a path for themselves, and not be content\nto eat the bread of idleness.  They must work for the good of the whole\ncommunity by learning to stand on their own feet.  They must despise the\nignoble position of those who, having no mind of their own, are led like\na flock of sheep by the will of another.  They must think and act for\nthemselves if ever they are to rise to a position of influence.  In one\nword, they must be self-reliant.  No doubt there is a sense in which we\nmust be dependent on the labours of others.  Every honest man is bound\nto acknowledge the assistance which he has received from his parents,\nhis fellows, and his God.  But the two things are not opposed.  \"These\ntwo things, contradictory though they may seem, must go together--manly\ndependence and manly independence, manly reliance and manly\nself-reliance\" (Wordsworth).  The two things stand or fall together.\nSelf-reliance is not selfishness, manly independence is not ignorant\nbraggadocio.  The ants toil for the common weal.  They rely on one\nanother.\n\n\n          III.--THE WISDOM OF MAKING PROVISION FOR THE FUTURE.\n\n\"They prepare their meat in the summer.\"  This fact has been denied by\nmodern entomologists.  They have told us that ants are dormant in winter\n(at least in Europe), and, therefore, stand in no need of food.  But, as\none reminds us, \"we had need to be very sure of our facts when we\nattempt to correct the Spirit of God\" (Gosse).  It has been amply\nascertained that in the East and other warm countries where hibernation\nis impossible, ants do store up for winter use.  It is even stated that\nthese harvesting ants bite off the radicle at the end of the seed to\nprevent its germinating, and occasionally bring up their stores to the\nsurface to dry, when the tiny granary has been entered and soaked by the\nrain.\n\nIt is at this point that the example of the ant is specially severe on\nthe sluggard. In crass idleness he would sleep even in the time of\nharvest; but this little creature, the least of insects, avails herself\nof every suitable opportunity, and gathers a supply of food sufficient\nfor her purposes.  \"He that gathereth in summer is a wise son, but he\nthat sleepeth in harvest is a son that causeth shame.\"  Let all boys\nthen lay up for the future.  Is it _knowledge_? Let them sow well at\nschool, that they may reap well in business.  Is it _character_? Let\nthem sow well in youth, that they may reap well in manhood.  Is it\n_religion_? Let them sow well in time, that they may reap well in\neternity.  In all these connections let them be warned by these solemn\nwords, \"The sluggard will not plow by reason of the cold, therefore\nshall he beg in harvest, and have nothing\" (Prov. xx. 4).\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Bear.*\n\n\n\"I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps.\"--Hos. xiii.\n8.\n\n\nHowever ferocious a bear may be, she is also capable of a large and\ngenerous affection.  She is at once a fond mother, a constant friend\nand, if one may so express it, a magnanimous foe.  Her devotion to her\nyoung is proverbial.  She possesses the strongest maternal instincts,\nand when to her easily roused ferocity the fury of these instincts is\nadded, it may be imagined what the violence of her attack will be.  Any\none who threatens the safety of her cubs does so at his peril.  The\nconstancy of her friendship is shown by the following curious case,\nrelated by Brehm.  He tells us of a little boy who crept one night for\nwarmth and shelter into the cage of an extremely savage bear.  The\nlatter, instead of devouring the child, took him under its protection,\nkept him warm with the heat of its body, and allowed him to return every\nnight to its cage.  By-and-by the poor boy died from smallpox, and the\nbear, utterly disconsolate, henceforth refused all food, and soon\nfollowed its little _protege_ to the grave.\n\nBut the bear is kind--_effusively_ kind, even to its enemies.  In the\nmanner of its attack it does not fell them to the ground with one blow\nof its paw like the lion, nor seize them with its teeth like the dog.\nIt _hugs_ them.  It embraces them with its powerful fore-limbs with a\ngreat: show of affection, and continues the squeeze so long that the\npoor wretched victims are suffocated. Bruin does nothing by halves.  The\nadvice of old Polonius is followed to the very letter:--\n\n    \"The friends thou hast and their adoption tried,\n    Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel.\"\n\n\nHe _does_ grapple them.  He may give great attention to the friendships\nof life, but he does not forget to _embrace_ his enemies.\n\nWith respect to the bear mentioned in the Bible, we may note three\npoints.\n\n\n                             I.--ITS KIND.\n\nThis is not the common brown bear of Europe, nor the white polar bear of\nthe Arctic regions; but the yellowish-brown Syrian bear, which may still\nbe found in its native haunts around the wooded fastnesses of Hermon and\nLebanon.  It is shorter in limb and has smaller claws than its European\ncousin; but its most striking peculiarity is its change of colour.  Like\nmany other animals, the Syrian bear changes its colour as it grows\nolder. \"When a cub it is of a darkish brown, which becomes a light brown\nas it approaches maturity.  But when it has attained its full growth it\nbecomes cream-coloured, and each succeeding year seems to lighten its\ncoat, so that a very old bear is nearly as white as its relative of the\nArctic regions\" (J. G. Wood).  Alas! the change which is produced by age\nis not confined to _Ursus Syriacus_.  The boy, no less than the bear,\nwill yet experience that solemn transformation.  The blackest locks will\nyet whiten with the frosts of age, for lustre, youth, and virility will\nall alike perish.  But this change is only the outward symbol of what\nought to be an inward, spiritual fact.  If the locks whiten, so ought\nthe conscience, the soul, the heart. As youth passes into manhood and\nmanhood into age, the man within should \"aye be gettin' whiter\"; until\nwhen the locks have grown grey in the service of righteousness, the\nchildren may \"rise up before the _hoary_ head, and honour the face of\nthe old man\" (Lev. xix. 32).\n\n    \"Yes, childhood, mark the hoary head and rise--\n    Stand on thy feet and give the honour due;\n    That crown of glory points you to the skies,\n    Like snow-capped mountains in the azure blue.\"\n\n\n                             II.--ITS FOOD.\n\nThe bear, to begin with, is a strict vegetarian.  While he can find\nabundance of vegetables and fruit he is little disposed to go far in\nvarying his means of subsistence. His teeth are formed for the purpose.\nUnlike those of the lion or tiger, which have a scissor-blade\nappearance, and are incapable of any but an up-and-down motion, the\nteeth of the bear are true grinders or molars, and the hinge of the\nlower jaw is so constructed that it can be worked from side to side, so\nthat the bear can actually _chew_ its food.\n\nIt is said to be very fond of strawberries--like some little boys we\nknow--and like the blackbird it can walk daintily along the rows and\npick out the ripest.  But if there be one thing more than any other that\nthrows the bear into an ecstasy of excitement it is the prospect of a\nfeast of honey.  A nest of ants is nothing in comparison.  The long nose\nis thrust into the delicious comb, though it be stung and stung again by\nthe infuriated inhabitants.\n\nIt is not till other food fails that the bear becomes carnivorous.  But\nthen, driven by hunger, it will even descend into the lower pastures and\nseize upon the goats and the sheep.  This habit is referred to by the\nyouthful David in 1 Samuel xvii. 33.  King Saul was trying to dissuade\nhim from matching himself against the gigantic Philistine; but David\nanswered: \"Thy servant kept his father's sheep, and there came a lion,\nand a bear, and took a lamb out of the flock: and I went out after him,\nand smote him, and delivered it out of his hand....  Thy servant slew\nboth the lion and the bear, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be\nas one of them, seeing he hath defied the armies of the living God.\"\nAnd all the young people know the result. One smooth stone from the\nbrook was placed in David's sling, and yon huge mass of human arrogance\nwas hurled to the ground.  They who fight for Jehovah need never fear.\nA stone cast in His name becomes a thunderbolt.\n\n\n                          III.--ITS FEROCITY.\n\n\"Let a bear robbed of her whelps meet a man rather than a fool in his\nfolly\" (Prov. xvii. 12).\n\nThe whelps themselves are not ferocious. Indeed, they are remarkably\nstupid.  They are as confident as they are weak, and do not even try to\nescape when the hunters come upon them.  The young water-fowl by the\nriver-side disappear in an instant if you happen to come upon them; but\nthe cubs of the bear, with a stupid simplicity, just allow themselves to\nbe caught and massacred.  They remind one of the lamb mentioned by the\npoet:--\n\n    \"Pleased to the last they crop the flowery food,\n    And lick the hand just raised to shed their blood.\"\n\n\nBut there is something far worse than this simplicity.  There is\nbrazen-faced irreverence and impudence.  When Elisha, the man of God,\nwas going up to Bethel, a crowd of young vagabonds came out of the\nvillage and mocked the old man, and said: \"Go up, thou bald head; go up,\nthou bald head.  And two she-bears came rushing out of the wood, and\ntare forty and two of them\" (2 Kings ii. 24).  These were not little\nchildren, but \"young lads\" (R.V. margin), who had begun to herd at\nstreet corners, and to scoff and gibe at those who passed by.  And, in\nour own day, society would be none the worse of a few she-bears to act\nas a kind of police at all such corners.  They might help to rid the\nstreets of a good deal of juvenile profanity.  But alas! because this\nOld Testament punishment does not fall on these young miscreants, the\nevil, instead of becoming less, is in great danger of being largely\nincreased.  And yet, if boys only knew it, a far worse calamity has\nalready fallen.  They may not have been attacked by bears, but they\nthemselves have become bears--not growing fairer, nobler, whiter, as\nthey grow in years; but fouler, darker, meaner, with the awful increase\nof sin--selling themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord.  Ah! let\nevery true lad beware as to the company he keeps.  \"Evil company doth\ncorrupt good manners.\"  \"Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also\nreap;\" and \"the way of the ungodly shall perish.\"\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Dove.*\n\n\n\"And He said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence.\"--John\nii. 16.\n\n\nIt is reported of St Francis of Assisi, in the Middle Ages, that he\nwould sometimes go out and preach to the beasts and birds.  He treated\nthem so kindly, both in the house and field, that they would draw near\nwithout any sign of fear, and allow him to stroke and feed them with his\nhand.  In like manner, we may think of Jesus pitying the poor, dumb\nbeasts of burden, when He saw them, as we sometimes see them,\nunmercifully treated by heartless drivers; or grieving at other times at\nthe frantic efforts of little birds beating against the bars of their\ncage--those tiny songsters of the field and wood, which had been taken\nby the snare of the fowler, and bereft of their liberty.\n\nThe incident before us is a case in point.  Here, at the beginning of\nHis ministry, He made a whip of small cords and drove the traffickers\nout of His Father's temple.  Men, money-tables, oxen, were all swept\nbefore His holy indignation.  But there, in mid-air, the upraised whip\nwas arrested.  _Jesus could not strike the meek and gentle doves_. There\nthey sat in their wicker baskets, with large eyes that were full of\ntender pleading, and the raised whip was not allowed to fall.  He could\nonly say to their keepers, \"_Carry_ these things hence,\" for to the\ndumb, lower animals, He was \"moved with compassion.\"\n\nIt is a great and fitting lesson for the young.  They who are kind to\ntheir pets are not far from His Kingdom.  \"A righteous man regardeth the\nlife of his beast.\"\n\nWe ought to be like the dove in three ways.\n\n\n                           I.--IN CHARACTER.\n\n\"Be ye therefore wise as serpents and _harmless as doves_\" (Matt. x.\n16).  What the lamb is among animals, the dove is among birds.  It is\nthe divine emblem of purity and innocence--the bearer of the olive\nbranch of peace.  The whole character of the dove is in keeping with\nthis estimate.  Its voice, no less than its disposition, is the\nembodiment of sweetness.  It has \"a tender mournful cadence which, heard\nin solitude and sadness, cannot fail to be heard with sympathy, as if it\nwere the expression of real sorrow\" (Gosse).  It recalls the language of\nIsaiah, \"We mourn sore like doves\"; or those beautiful words of\nTennyson--\n\n      \"Every sound is sweet;\n    The moan of doves in immemorial elms,\n    And murmuring of innumerable bees.\"\n\n\nAs symbolical of purity and peace, it became a fit emblem for the Holy\nSpirit. \"Lo, the heavens were opened, and He saw the Spirit of God\ndescending _like a dove_ and lighting upon Him.\"  On the day of\nPentecost, however, the form chosen was quite different.  \"There came a\nsound as of a rushing mighty wind, ... and cloven tongues _like as of\nfire_, and it sat upon each of them.\"  Why the difference? Why a gentle\ndove in the one case and cloven tongues of fire in the other.  The\ndifference lay in the character of the men.  When it came to men--even\nto holy men--it encountered prejudice and opposition, which must be\nburned up, and thus it must needs take the semblance of fire.  But when\nit came to Jesus on the banks of the Jordan, it came to its own, and its\nown received it with open arms; and to show the fulness and peacefulness\nof the reception, it must needs be symbolised by a dove.  In the holy\nchrism of that baptismal hour, the dove and the lamb had met together.\nThe sacred bird had found a home, and it folded its wings upon its nest.\n\nBut this gentleness of disposition renders the dove a defenceless\ncreature, ill able to take care of itself, and it easily becomes the\nvictim of persecution.  Hence Hosea speaks of Israel as \"a silly dove\nwithout heart,\" which shall \"tremble as a dove out of the land of\nAssyria.\"  And thus the words \"_wise as serpents_\" have to be added.\nThe harmlessness of the dove must be supplemented by the wisdom of the\nserpent.  And both elements are found in the peerless example of Jesus.\nSee how He answered the quibbling questions of the Scribes and\nPharisees. They tried to entangle Him in His talk; but His wisdom was\nmore than a match for their cunning.  The wolf was utterly discomfited\nby the lamb.  And this is the only worthy ideal for His followers: \"Be\nready always to give an answer concerning the hope that is in you,\" but,\n\"with meekness and fear,\" \"be ye wise as serpents and harmless as\ndoves.\"\n\n\n                           II.--IN SWIFTNESS.\n\nThe dove is one of the swiftest of birds. The carrier pigeon \"has been\nknown to accomplish a flight of three hundred miles in little more than\ntwo hours.\"  Its wings are its strength.  Upheld by them she can fly for\nmany hours, and the birds of prey cannot overtake her.  Homer himself\nmentions the dove as the emblem of swiftness and timidity.  It is to\nthis that the Psalmist refers in Psalm lv. 6, when he beheld the rock\npigeon scudding across the sky in the direction of her mountain home:\n\"Oh that I had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away and be at\nrest....  I would hasten my escape from the windy storm and tempest.\"\nTruly a wise resolve when in the presence of strong temptation! \"O man\nof God, flee these things.\"  \"Flee also youthful lusts.\"  If you cannot\nfight like the eagle, fly like the dove, and, like the carrier pigeon,\nlet your flight be _homeward_.  May the homing instinct be as strong in\nyou as in her.  For it is only there, in the mountain home of God's\ngrace, that your soul can find shelter. Speed, then, your flight \"as the\ndoves to their windows.\"  \"Man's spiritual existence is like the flight\nof a bird in the air: he is sustained only by effort, and when he ceases\nto exert himself he falls\" (Froude's \"Bunyan\").  Let your spiritual\nadvancement, then, be like the flight of a bird.  Imitate the dove in\nits swiftness.\n\n\n                          III.--IN SACRIFICE.\n\nThe dove is pre-eminently the _sacred_ bird.  \"The dove among the\nSemites had a quite peculiar sanctity.\"  \"Sacred doves that may not be\nharmed are found even at Mecca.\"  \"We never read of it in the Old\nTestament as an article of diet, though it is now one of the commonest\ntable-birds all over the East\" (Smith's \"Religion of the Semites,\" new\nedition, pp. 219-294). As already noted, it was to the birds what the\nlamb was to the animals--it derived its chief interest from its use in\n_sacrifice_.\n\nWe find it in the purifying of the Nazarite (Num. vi. 10), in the\ncleansing of the leper (Lev. xiv. 22); and, as the children will\nremember, when Jesus was presented in the temple, His mother offered as\na sacrifice \"a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons\" (Luke ii. 24).\nIn the Virgin Mother's case the offering was the sacrifice of the\n_poor_.  For it is distinctly said in Leviticus xii. 8, \"_If her means\nsuffice not for a lamb_, then she shall take two turtle doves or two\nyoung pigeons: the one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin\noffering: and she shall be clean.\"  Jesus, the Great Sacrifice, was born\nin the homes of the poor.  Not the vicious poor, whose poverty is the\nmeasure of their thriftlessness; but the industrious poor, whose piety\nis the measure of their honesty.  \"Though He was rich, yet for our sakes\nHe became poor, that we through His poverty might be made rich.\"\n\nIn stooping thus far He was manifesting the gentleness of the dove, and\nwe are summoned to copy His example.  \"Let this _mind_ be in you which\nwas also in Christ Jesus.\"  He stooped to death, even the death of the\ncross, and we are called upon to stoop to something similar--to the\ngreat deep of self-surrender and self-sacrifice--the crucifixion and the\ndeath of sin.  This is the essence of all Christian sacrifice.  We must\nbe crucified with Christ, and rise and live through Him. We must be\nwashed in His blood.  We must be made great by His gentleness. We must\nbe like the dove and the lamb in _sacrifice_.\n\nIn character, in swiftness, and in sacrifice, imitate the dove.\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Coney.*\n\n\n\"There be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are\nexceeding wise: ... the conies are but a feeble folk, yet make they\ntheir houses in the rocks.\"--Prov. xxx. 24-26.\n\n\n\"Little, _but exceeding wise_,\" that surely is a splendid diploma for\n\"feeble folk.\"  If all the children in our homes would but try to gain\nthat \"good degree,\" it would be a merit certificate of the highest\norder, and well worthy of the best gilt frame to be had in the market.\nMr Moody, the evangelist, used to say, when speaking of college honours,\nthat he had no wish to be styled a B.D., a D.D., or an LL.D.  He would\nbe content if he got W.D.--\"_Well done_, good and faithful servant.\"\nAnd the diploma granted to little folks in the school of the coney is\nsomewhat similar.  They are \"capped\" on the day of graduation as an\nL.B.E.W.--\"Little, but exceeding wise.\"\n\nWhy, in their school, the distinction between big and little is simply\nignored. The little creature is no bigger than a rabbit, and yet,\nstrange to say, its nearest affinity is with the huge rhinoceros.\nAccording to modern classification, it is placed between the elephant\nand the horse. The shape of its teeth, and the form of its feet and\nskull, make it a first cousin to the hippopotamus.  There is little\ndifference between them, except in dimensions, and, as every schoolboy\nknows, there is not much in a difference like that. If the huge\nleviathan has nothing more to boast of than mere bulk, the little coney\ncan afford to sit on its rocky ledge and look down on its unwieldy\nproportions with the utmost indifference.  \"Wisdom is better than\nstrength.\"  It was the wisdom of the poor wise man that delivered the\ncity, and not the strength of the city walls.  And it is not the bones\nof the rhinoceros, but the wisdom of the coney, that will bring us true\nsuccess in life.  \"Wisdom is the principal thing, therefore get wisdom,\nand with all thy getting, get understanding.\"\n\n\n                 I.--THE WISDOM OF KEEPING SHARP TOOLS.\n\nAmong the Jews the coney was regarded as one of the unclean animals,\n\"because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof, he is unclean\"\n(Lev. ii. 5).  But, in actual fact, he does neither.  All ruminating\nanimals are furnished with a complex stomach for chewing the cud; but\nthis is not the case with the elephant, the coney, and the hippopotamus.\nThey neither chew the cud nor part the hoof.  But the coney has a habit\nof sitting on a ledge of rock and working its jaws from side to side as\nif it really did chew the cud, so that a careless observer would readily\nmistake it for a ruminating animal.  This movement of the jaws is a very\nimportant one.  According to J. G. Wood, the coney performs it\ninstinctively, in order that the chiselled edges of the upper and lower\nteeth may be preserved sharp by continually rubbing against each other,\nand that they may not be suffered to grow too long, and so to deprive\nthe animal of the means whereby it gains its food.\n\nThe coney knows what every good tradesman knows, that sharp tools are\nthe secret of all high-class work.  No boy ever cut his finger with a\nsharp knife, but always with a blunt one.  And what a sharp knife is to\nthe finger, a sensitive conscience is to the life.  If the heart be kept\ntrue and tender, and the mind alert and keen, the conscience will never\nsting and lacerate the soul.  It is only the wicked who flee when no man\npursueth, and whose conscience is like the worm that never dies.  \"Leave\nher to Heaven,\" said Hamlet of his guilty mother, \"and to those thorns\nthat in her bosom lodge to prick and sting her.\"  But the righteous are\nas bold as a lion.  Like Paul, they have the approval of a good\nconscience, and\n\n    \"A heart unspotted is not easily daunted,\n    Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just.\"\n\nAnd the young people will not forget that tools are kept sharp by\nexercise, not by allowing them to rust like a sluggard's spade, which no\ntrue gardener would touch; but by keeping them sharp and bright like his\nown steel blade, which is warranted to cut through any sod.  Yes, keep\nthe powers of your mind strong and active through diligent application\nat school, and the faculties of your soul responsive by kindness,\nobedience, and prayer, and you will find that this is no mean part of\nthe wisdom that will enable you to succeed in life.  For at school, in\nbusiness, and in religion, we have need of sharp tools.\n\n\n                    II.--THE WISDOM OF EARLY RISING.\n\nIf any one wishes to see or catch a coney, he must be up with the dawn.\nFor, like the rabbit, it is generally to be found feeding in the early\nmorning or at sunset; while a sentry, which is commonly an old male, is\nsaid to be posted to give warning by a short squeaking bark, at which\nsignal they all scuttle away before one can obtain a glimpse of them.\nAfter all, it is the early bird that catches the early worm, and the\nconey has long since decided that it is the early coney that enjoys the\nsweetest aromatic shrubs.  And therefore, if any aspiring sportsman\nwishes to bag _Hyrax Syriacus_ (for that is its Latin name), he must be\nup and abroad with the dawn.\n\nIndeed, the sharpest tools will avail us but little if the best hours of\nthe morning are idled away in bed.  The old adage cannot be repeated too\noften, that \"he who would thrive must the white sparrow see.\"  The lazy\nfarmer who got up at daybreak to try and get a sight of this _rara avis_\nwas not long in discovering the cause of his diminished fortunes.\nEverything was wrong at the beginning of the day.  Dishonest servants\ncame to their work an hour late, and others were helping themselves to\neverything they saw. On his farm, alas! there was neither an early bird\nnor an early worm.  They were all late together, and he, the latest of\nthem all, was simply being gobbled up by such birds as he had.  Poor\nlie-a-bed had certainly got a glimpse of the white sparrow, and from the\nday he saw it his fortunes began to mend.\n\n\"I never had any faith in luck,\" says John Ploughman, \"except that I\nbelieve good luck will carry a man over a ditch if he jumps well, and\nwill put a bit of bacon into his pot if he looks after his garden and\nkeeps a pig.\"  Exactly. Solomon Slow will never be up in time to catch\nthe coach, and then he will waste the rest of the day in blaming the\nhardness of his luck.  But there is no luck about it.  It is only\ndownright laziness. And boys cannot learn the golden text too soon, that\n\"drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.\"\n\n\n            III.--THE WISDOM OF KNOWING ONE'S OWN WEAKNESS.\n\n\"The conies are but a feeble folk, yet make they their houses in the\nrocks.\"  They cannot fight with the lion, and they don't try.  They run\nfrom the least appearance of evil, and so ought we.  It is often\none-half, and sometimes the whole, of the victory to know our own\nweakness. Discretion is always the better part of valour.\n\nHow many there are who have not this wisdom of the coney!  They are\nfeeble as he is, and yet they do not pray, \"Lead us not into temptation,\nbut deliver us from evil.\"  They cannot turn aside the fiery darts of\nthe evil one, and yet they carelessly play into his hands by dallying\nwith that which is not good. But\n\n    \"This is hypocrisy against the devil,\n    They that mean virtuously, and yet do so,\n    The devil their virtue tempts, and they tempt heaven.\"\n\nFar better to act as young Gareth acted when he lived among the\n\"kitchen-knaves\" of King Arthur's palace--\n\n      \"If their talk were foul,\n    Then would he whistle rapid as any lark.\"\n\nThe pure-minded lad refused to listen to it, and he had his reward.\nThey mocked him at first, but afterwards they turned and reverenced him.\nA like testimony was borne to John Milton when he entered Christ's\nCollege, Cambridge, at sixteen years of age.  Because of his virtuous\nconduct he was ridiculed by his fellow-students, and nicknamed \"the lady\nof Christ's.\"  But the future author of \"Paradise Lost\" could afford to\nlet them sneer.  He had the testimony of a good conscience, and \"they\nwho honour Me, I will honour.\"  And all those who are tempted to-day\nmust draw their succour from a similar divine source.  With the wisdom\nof the coney they must betake themselves to the safety of the hills, and\nsay, \"Lead me to the Rock that is higher than I.\"  And in that strong\nRock of Ages all feeble ones will be eternally safe, for neither foe nor\ntempest can reach them there.  Flee, then, as a bird to your mountain,\nor in the language of your hymn--\n\n    \"Yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin,\n    Each victory will help you some other to win,\n    Fight manfully onward, dark passions subdue,\n    Look ever to Jesus, He will carry you through.\"\n\n\n\n\n                           *The Ass's Colt.*\n\n\n\"And Jesus, when He had found a young ass, sat thereon.\"--John xii. 14.\n\n\nTwo varieties of the ass exist in Bible lands, namely, the domesticated\nand the wild ass.  But whether these are two different kinds, or simply\nvariations of the same species, is not yet a settled question.  On the\nassumption that they are one, it would still be disputed whether the\nwild ass is to be regarded as an emancipated domestic ass, or the latter\na reclaimed wild one. But into the merits of this question we have no\ncall to enter.\n\nWe may say at the outset, however, that when speaking of the ass of the\nBible, we are dealing with a very different animal from the poor\nweather-beaten, stunted, and half-starved beast of our commons.  The\ncoldness of our climate, and the life of hardship endured by the ass in\nthis country, have, no doubt, operated largely in the decay of the\nbreed.  But the Arabian ass is quite different.  A well-bred Syrian ass\nwill fetch forty pounds. It is well formed and muscular, well cared for\nand fed, and is altogether a finer and nobler animal than the spiritless\nand degraded creature so familiar to us.\n\nConsequently, when we read of Jesus riding upon an ass's colt, there\nwould seem to be some ground for the statement that \"there was no\nhumility in the case. He rode upon an ass as any prince or ruler would\nhave done who was engaged on a peaceful journey\" (Wood).  In fine, Jesus\ncame riding on the universal saddle animal of the East.\n\nBut turning to the ass's colt, I want you to note three things about it.\n\n\n                           I.--ITS WILDNESS.\n\nThe colt of the wild ass is really the most untamable and intractable of\nanimals.  Even when captured very young it can scarcely ever be brought\nto bear a burden or draw a vehicle.  Its wild nature is constantly\nbreaking out, and like the asses which Saul the son of Kish went to\nseek, it is always in danger of going astray.\n\nLove of freedom and hatred of restraint are its main characteristics,\nand Zophar the Naamathite reminded Job that something very similar is\ntrue of man.  \"Vain man is void of understanding, yea, man is born _as a\nwild ass's colt_\" (Job xi. 12).\n\nOf course, there is wildness _and_ wildness.  If boys are merely running\nover with fresh animal spirits, like the young lambs trying to jump over\ntheir mother's head, we cannot think there is any great harm in their\nmirth.  It is thus that lungs are exercised and limbs made strong, and\nthe whole body and mind kept healthy and happy.  Black care, alas! will\nleap into the saddle behind them soon enough. And therefore, while the\ndays of youth last, let all the young people run and jump like the wild\nass's colt.  Buoyancy of fresh young life is not to be regarded as\nexuberance in sin.\n\nIf the wildness, however, is inclined to pass over into what is called\n\"a sowing of wild oats,\" the circumstances are altered. Innocent\npleasures are good, but pleasures which are forbidden are quite another\nthing.  And if the young life is in danger of drifting into the latter,\nthe sooner the curb or drag is applied, the better for all concerned.\nIf one could sow his wild oats and then run away and leave them, it\nwouldn't so much matter; but alas! a reaping-time is sure to be treading\non the heels of the sowing.  And as no one ever yet gathered grapes of\nthorns or figs of thistles, it will not do for any of you young people\nto expect to gather fruit where you have only sown weeds.  No, no, this\nis a kind of wildness which ought not to be tolerated.  This is a piece\nof folly which must either be tamed or punished.  And if we would only\nintroduce the custom they have in Palestine of clipping a bit out of the\near of those asses that go astray, a fresh clip for every new offence,\nit might then be seen that the wildness which means mischief is not so\npleasant an experience after all, and perhaps not a few sowers of wild\noats would be found who had scarcely an ear on their head.  Some\npunishment like this is sorely needed, for while mere exuberance of\nspirits is not sinful, the exuberance that leads to forbidden pleasures\nought firmly to be condemned.\n\n\n                          II.--ITS USEFULNESS.\n\nMerchants in the East carried their riches on the shoulders of young\nasses (Isa. xxx. 6), and it is added in verse 24 that young asses and\noxen were yoked together in tilling the ground.  But the chief service\nrendered by the young ass was its frequent use in riding.  In the Book\nof Judges we read of one judge who had \"forty sons and thirty sons' sons\nthat rode on threescore and ten ass colts, and he judged Israel eight\nyears.\"  Both in merchandise, in agriculture, and in riding, the ass's\ncolt was a most useful animal.\n\nAnd this is the test which must be applied to a boy's pleasures.  He\nmust not allow them to interfere with his usefulness.  The games that\nmake him neglect his lessons, the pursuits that render it difficult for\nhim to learn his trade, the companions that tempt him to desecrate the\nChristian Sabbath, or the habits that lead him to lose respect for his\nparents or reverence for his God--all these must be freely but firmly\nlaid aside; for when judged in the light of the influence they exert,\nthey stand self-condemned.  Pleasure is never to be taken as the\ntouchstone of duty, but duty as the touchstone of pleasure.\n\nIt is this that gives the evangel of Jesus its inestimable value.  He\ncan tame our wildness into usefulness, and make duty itself our\npleasure.  He can teach us the secret of His own example, and then all\nwork is a joy, every duty is an inspiration. \"I _delight_ to do Thy\nwill, O my God.\"  The secret is love.  That is the new commandment He\nwrites upon the heart, and then the yoke He lays upon the neck is\nfur-lined--it is easy; and the burdens given us to bear are not\ngrievous, they are light.  No service can compare with His service.  Any\npleasure that would make us think lightly of His love is not pleasure,\nbut wanton folly; and any liberty that would tempt us away from His yoke\nis not liberty but license.  Therefore let every young heart learn this\nsecond lesson from the example of the ass's colt, that wildness must be\ntamed into usefulness.\n\nIII.--ITS HIGH PLACE OF HONOUR.\n\nIf wildness is tamed into usefulness, this in turn is followed by\nhonour.  The ass's colt had the high dignity conferred on it of being\nused by Jesus in His triumphal entry into Jerusalem.\n\nThe incident itself is full of meaning. Jesus was entering Jerusalem for\nthe last time.  On reaching the Mount of Olives He sent two of His\ndisciples into the nearest village.  He told them that there, \"in a\nplace where two ways met,\" they would find a colt tied \"whereon never\nman sat.\"  If the owner objected to his removal, they were to say \"the\nLord hath need of him,\" and straightway the man would be willing to let\nhim go.  And when the two disciples departed to do as they were bidden,\nthey found it even as Jesus had said.\n\nBut how did Jesus know that the owner of the colt would consent to this\narrangement?  And why must the colt itself be one on which never man had\nsat?  These two questions are deeply significant, and we may do well to\ntry and answer them. As regards the first, Jesus knew that the man would\nagree to what He had said, because, in all probability, this was not the\nfirst time that he and Jesus had met. On some former occasion the man\nhad come under the spell of Christ's teaching and example, and although\nhe had not been added, like Peter or John, to the number of the twelve,\nhe had nevertheless become in heart and life a true and devoted friend.\nAnd, no doubt, it was the man himself who informed Jesus that there, on\nthe little bit of common \"where two ways met,\" his ass would generally\nbe found grazing; and if ever the Master required it to carry Him a\nday's journey, He could come and get it for the taking. It was not a\ngreat thing he had to offer, but such as it was the Lord was welcome to\nit.  And I think I see the eye of Jesus filling with a strange moisture\nas He heard the quaint proposal of this humble villager. It was like\nholding a cup of cold water to Christ's thirsty lips.  And the young\npeople cannot possibly misread the lesson. Little things, when done for\nthe sake of Jesus, become great things.  This man had done _what he\ncould_, and love made it immortal.  \"Wheresoever this gospel shall be\npreached, this also that this man hath done shall be told for a memorial\nof him.\"\n\nOn the other hand, the colt itself must be one on which _never man had\nsat_.  Does this not remind us of what is said regarding Joseph's new\ntomb?  It was \"a new sepulchre _wherein was never man yet laid_.\"  Why a\nyoung colt and why a new tomb?  Surely to teach us that even in His\nhumiliation, Jesus the Son of God was worthy of special honour; and\nperhaps to teach this further truth, that in everything He was \"separate\nfrom sinners.\"  He who came riding on an ass's colt was still the King\nof Glory, and although He was \"numbered with the transgressors,\" He was\nstill \"holy, harmless, and undefiled.\"  \"Behold, thy King cometh unto\nthee, meek, and riding upon an ass's colt.\"  Let every child run, as the\nchildren of Jerusalem ran, and hail Him with the happy acclaim,\n\"Hosanna, blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.\"  And this\nwill be _your_ highest dignity. Wildness will be tamed into usefulness,\nand usefulness will be crowned with honour. \"Them that honour Me I will\nhonour.\"\n\n\n\n\n                            *The Redbreast.*\n\n\n\"The household bird with the red stomacher\"--a bird that should be in\nthe Bible, but isn't.  We must give it a page here.\n\n\n    Look! there on a sprig of holly,\n      Like a bunch of berries red,\n    He sits, wee bumptious Robin,\n      Cocking his little head.\n\n    Let us ask the little fellow,\n      Why he comes so late to sing,\n    For the autumn leaves are falling\n      In a whirling fairy ring.\n\n    Where did you go in summer\n      With that little purple vest?\n    Not away to the woods and hedges\n      To conceal a tiny nest?\n\n    Oh, you did! you sought the bracken,\n      Where the flowers are wet with dew,\n    And we never heard you singing,\n      You had something else to do.\n\n    You were feeding five wee Robins,\n      And they kept you on the wing;\n    But now that they've grown to _Red_breasts,\n      You can well afford to sing.\n\n    So you can, you little wise-head,\n      There is truth in what you say;\n    And may every lad apply it,\n      _That after work comes play_.\n\n\n\n\n                               *The Bee.*\n\n\n\"And the Amorites, which dwelt in that mountain, came out against you,\nand chased you, as bees do.\"--Deut. i. 44.\n\n\nIsrael had determined at all hazards to storm the strongholds of the\nAmorites.  But as those who disobey God can never stand before their\nenemies, the Israelites were no match for those hardy mountaineers of\nSeir.  Like infuriated bees rushing out from their nest, the Amorite\nhordes swept out from their mountain fastnesses, and utterly overwhelmed\nthe hosts of Israel.  They \"chased you, as bees do, and destroyed you in\nSeir, even unto Hormah.\"\n\nThis is the only sense in which the bee is referred to in Holy\nScripture.  The ant may be introduced as an emblem of industry and\ninstinct; but the bee is always regarded as one of the scourges of\nmankind.  It recalls an incident in the African travels of Mungo Park.\n\"Some of his people having met with a populous hive, imprudently\nattempted to plunder it of its honey.  The swarm rushed out in fury and\nattacked the company so vigorously that man and beast fled in all\ndirections. The horses were never recovered, and several of the asses\nwere so severely stung that they died the next day.\"  The bee was\nclearly a savage and dangerous annoyance.  They \"chased you, as bees\ndo.\"\n\nBut turning to the bee itself, let us note the three principal materials\nit uses in its hive.\n\n\n                                I.--WAX.\n\nNothing can be done in the furnishing of the hive until a sufficient\nquantity of wax has been provided.  And this, like the gossamer threads\nof the spider, is drawn from the insect's own body.  The process of\nsecretion, as it is called, may last for some twenty-four hours; and\nwhen it is completed the wax projects from between the segments of its\nbody in the form of thin plates.  The material is then taken up into the\nmouth and undergoes a process of mastication, until at last it issues\nfrom the mandibles in the form of a small white ribbon.\n\nThis is the material with which they build up their hexagonal or\nsix-sided cells; and marvellous is the skill they show in the ingenious\narrangement.  Like Plato, they might fitly inscribe over their portal,\n\"Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here,\" for the bee is entitled to\na first place in the ranks of the geometricians. It is even asserted on\nthe authority of the Rev. J. G. Wood that the angles of the bee-cell are\nso mathematically correct that by their measurement an error in a book\nof logarithms was detected; and Mr Darwin himself admits that \"the comb\nof the hive-bee is absolutely perfect in economising labour and wax.\"\n\nThe form of the cell has three distinct advantages.  It combines the\ngreatest strength, the largest storage, and the least expenditure of\nmaterial and labour; and \"the little busy bee,\" as if acquainted with\nthese strict mathematical principles, has followed them so accurately\nthat it easily steps into the first rank as a born mathematician.\n\nBut how is this fact to be accounted for?  What is the explanation of\nthese inimitable architectural powers?  \"Without thought or even the\norgan of thought, the bee can produce work which embodies thought.\"  But\nto whom does this thought belong?  Can there be thought without a\nthinker?  Can there be the marks of intelligence without an original and\ncreative mind?  No! at the building up of a bee-cell, just as at the\nframing of a world, the thoughtful soul is face to face with Him whose\nmind is stamped on every part of creation--with Him who is the great and\nfaithful Creator, whose tender mercies are over all His works.\n\n\n                              II.--HONEY.\n\nAfter the construction of the cells comes the gathering of the honey.\nHoney, as every boy knows, is the thick, sweet fluid which bees gather\nfrom the cups of flowers. Or in the language of myth and fable, it is\nthe veritable nectar of the gods.  The mouth of the bee is framed for\nthe purpose.  It is so constructed that it forms a sort of proboscis or\ntongue by means of which the insects suck up the nectarine juice.  It\nserves both as a mouth and a pump through which the liquid passes into\nthe first stomach, and thus is carried to the hive.\n\nThe abundance of honey is frequently mentioned in Holy Scripture.\nPalestine itself is described as \"a land that floweth with milk and\nhoney.\"  And we remember that on one occasion Jonathan, the Son of Saul,\nwas faint and weary, and when he saw honey dripping on the ground from\nthe abundance and weight of the comb, he took it up on the end of his\nstaff, and ate sufficient to restore his strength (1 Sam. xiv. 27).\nJohn the Baptist also was evidently in no danger of starving from lack\nof food, when the wild bees afforded him a plentiful supply of the very\nmaterial which was needed to correct the deficiencies of the dried\nlocusts which he used instead of bread.  His food was locusts and wild\nhoney.\n\nThere is only one connection in which we find honey prohibited.  It was\nto have no place in the Jewish meat offering (Lev. ii. 11).  Everything\nliable to _fermentation_ was excluded from the altar; and \"the same\nprinciple covers the prohibition of honey\" (Smith's \"Religion of the\nSemites\").  \"The effect of honey is similar to that of leaven, since it\neasily changes to acid\" (Oehler).  Honey then was forbidden on the same\nprinciple as an animal with any kind of blemish was forbidden. There\nmust be no defect in the sacrificial lamb, and there must be no\nfermentation in the meat offering.  The offering brought by man must be\nclean--a spotless sacrifice (and God's Lamb is such), an honest heart,\nand an earnest, unfeigned prayer.  Only the pure in heart shall see God.\n\n\n                             III.--POLLEN.\n\nHoney is not the only substance that bees carry home to the hive.  They\nalso collect in considerable quantities the fecundating dust or pollen\nof flowers.  If the long tongue is specially adapted for sucking up the\none, the hind legs, supplied with a brush of hair, are equally fitted\nfor collecting and conveying the other. When the bee visits the flower\nin question it dives deep down among the dust-like powder, and comes out\nagain, all covered from head to foot, like a miller well dusted with his\nmeal.  But applying the brush of hair which it carries for the purpose,\nit speedily brushes the pollen all down in the form of a tiny ball, and\ncarries it home on its hind legs to be used in the economy of the hive.\n\nBut what is it for?  To make _bee-bread_ for the young bees.  The\nhexagonal cells are not all used for the storage of honey. A very large\nproportion of the comb is set apart for the hatching of the young ones.\nAnd these infant bees are voracious eaters. Like other little children,\nthey have to be carefully nursed and attended to, and the sagacious\nnurses have quite enough to do in providing them with the right kind of\nfood.  Ordinary honey is too strong for their infantile digestion, and\ntherefore the honey is mixed with the pollen to render it a fit\nnourishment for these fastidious babies.\n\nThis is the only object the _bees_ have in collecting the pollen; but it\nis not the only end they serve in the plan of the great Creator.\nUnknown to themselves they are doing a great work in the propagating of\nflowers.  The fertilising dust of one flower must be conveyed to the\ncorresponding organs of another; and the bee like a village postman, is\nbrought in to convey the necessary love-tokens.  Apart from this service\nrendered by the bee, the wild flowers that deck the fields and highways\nwould soon be conspicuous by their absence.\n\nWe cannot, then, go back to the point from which we started, and say\nthat the bee can only be regarded as a savage and dangerous annoyance.\nIt fills a very important place in the economy of nature. As the maker\nof wax it is the prince of mathematicians; as the gatherer of _honey_ it\nis the bringer of many choice blessings; and as the collector and\ndistributer of _pollen_ it is at once a sagacious nurse, and one who\ndispenses a harvest, \"sowing the To-be.\"  Well may we sit at its hive\nand learn wisdom.\n\n\n\n\n                             *The Swallow.*\n\n\n\"As the bird by wandering, as the swallow by flying, so the curse\ncauseless shall not come.\"--Prov. xxvi. 2.\n\n\nThe swallow is the bird of the summer.  Like the coming of the cuckoo\nitself, the arrival of the swallow is anxiously waited for as the\nharbinger of warmer days.  And thus we have the beautiful fancy\nconnected with the little flower Celandine.  The name means \"a swallow,\"\nand was applied to the tiny plant because it was supposed to open its\npetals when the swallows appeared in spring, and to close them and die\nwhen they disappeared in autumn.  Whether the flowers hasten to welcome\nthe little bird or not, there are many human hearts that leap up with\njoy at the sight of the airy wanderer, and hail it as the bird of\nfreedom--the herald and pledge of the summer.\n\n\n                     I.--IT IS THE BIRD OF FREEDOM.\n\nThis is the meaning of its Hebrew name, and surely no more fitting title\ncould be applied to so unfettered and freedom-loving a bird.  Tennyson,\nin his great poem, \"In Memoriam,\" speaks of\n\n    \"Short swallow-flights of song that dip\n    Their wings ... and skim away.\"\n\nWho does not love to see it darting through the sunshine, skimming along\nthe surface of a stream, or wheeling away in airy circles on its swift,\nuntired wings!  It is a thing of beauty and a joy for ever--happy as the\nsummer light, free and untamable as the breeze.\n\nAnd we set this down as the first law of bird-life--that every songster\nof the field and wood _should be free_.  This is its birthright and\nblessing, and no one has the right to rob it of its liberty.  The green\nfields and the blue sky have been given to it as its heritage, and the\nbarbarous custom of binding its wandering wing and shutting it up in a\ncage should be censured and condemned by all healthy minds.  The\nswallow, indeed, cannot be thus tamed and domesticated. She who claims\nthe whole earth as her fatherland refuses to be imprisoned in a cage.\nShe will die rather than yield. And all young hearts cannot learn the\nlesson too soon that the feathered tribes of the woodland ought to be\nleft to their God-given liberty.\n\n\n                   II.--IT IS THE BIRD OF OBEDIENCE.\n\nAnother lesson taught by the swallow is that _liberty is not license_.\nFreedom to wander from land to land does not mean freedom from all\ncontrol.  Our text speaks of the law of its migration.  Like the stork,\nthe crane, or the turtle dove, the swallow knows the time of its coming.\n\nIn France it is spoken of as \"the Jew,\" because of its wandering habits;\nand in the science of heraldry it was used as a crest by the crusader\npilgrims to symbolise the fact that they too were strangers in a strange\nland.  But to the swallow no land is strange. The whole earth is its\nfatherland.  And while it _does_ wander to and fro over land and sea, it\nalways observes its appointed seasons.  All its wandering is guided by a\npurpose.  Its freedom is regulated by unfailing instinct.  It may speed\nits flight to far distant climes, but it comes back to the same nest.\nThis is the law of its migration; and in obedience to it, the swallows\nappear in April and disappear in October with all the regularity of the\nseasons or the ebb and flow of the tide.  The cause is there, and the\neffect follows.  The bird of freedom is a slave to its own higher\ndestiny.\n\nAnd so ought we.  Freedom to wander is not so great a boon as obedience\nto a higher, diviner law.  Like the needle trembling to the pole, or the\nswallow returning to the same old nest, our hearts ought to hark back to\nthe sacredness of home and to the God and faith of our fathers.  \"There\nis an instinct in the new-born babes of Christ, like the instinct that\nleads birds to build their nests\" (Rutherford).  And this instinct, like\nthe law of migration, makes us the children of _obedience_.  There is no\nlicense in the liberty of Christ.  We are only free to _serve_.\n\n\n                    III.--IT IS THE BIRD THAT BUILDS\n                       ITS NEST IN GOD'S TEMPLE.\n\n\"Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for\nherself, where she may lay her young, even Thine altars\" (Ps. lxxxiv.\n3).\n\nSwallows sometimes build their nests in the most extraordinary\nplaces--on a picture frame, on a lamp-bracket, on a door-knocker, in a\ntable-drawer, and between the handles of a pair of shears hung on the\nwall.  James Gilmour, in his missionary travels through Mongolia, found\nthat they actually entered his tent and built their nests within reach\nof his hand.  And so fully do the little birds confide in man's\nprotection, that they will even take up their abode in his places of\nworship.  The heathen temples, the Mohammedan mosques, and the Christian\nchurches are all inhabited by the swallow, and here, in the\neighty-fourth Psalm, it is spoken of as having sought and found a home\nin the courts of the Jewish temple.\n\nThe Psalmist, detained at home, envied the little birds that built their\nnests under the eaves of the priests' houses, and thought of the very\nsparrows that were allowed to pick up the crumbs in the temple courts.\nIt reminds us of Samuel Rutherford when a prisoner in Aberdeen.  He\noften looked back to his country church and manse near the shore of the\nSolway Firth, and sighed, \"I am for the present thinking the sparrows\nand swallows that build their nests at Anwoth blessed birds.\"  These\nmen, as Spurgeon would say, \"needed no clatter of bells\" to bring them\nto church; they carried a bell in their own bosoms; holy appetite is a\nbetter call to worship than a full chime.\n\nAnd the lesson is for the young people no less than for their parents.\nFor the Psalmist adds that the nest of the swallow was for \"her young.\"\nThe swallow reared her young brood in the temple courts.  And this is\nthe duty and privilege of all Christian parents.  The house of God may\nbe a nest for their little ones.  How beautiful to see parents and\nchildren coming Sabbath by Sabbath to the same family pew!  In\nafter-years will not these little ones find their way back to the same\nold nest?  Yes, \"train up a child in the way he should go, and even when\nhe is old he will not depart from it.\"  Or if, perchance, they are\ncalled upon to suffer, and are not able, like the Psalmist, to come to\nGod's house, the spirit will still be willing though the flesh be weak,\nand they will sit and sing like another great sufferer--\n\n    \"A little bird I am,\n      Shut from the fields of air,\n    And in my cage I sit and sing\n      To Him who placed me there,\n    Well pleased a prisoner to be,\n    Because, O God, it pleaseth thee.\n\n    \"Nought else have I to do,\n      I sing the whole day long,\n    And He whom most I love to please,\n      Doth listen to my song.\n    He caught and bound my wandering wing,\n    But still He bends to hear me sing.\"\n\n\n\n\n                             *The Spider.*\n\n\n\"The hypocrite's hope shall perish, ... whose trust shall be a spider's\nweb.\"--Job viii. 13, 14.\n\n\nWhat is hypocrisy?  It is a bird of evil omen that builds its nest on\nthe tree of religion. It is a kind of homage that vice pays to virtue.\nWere there no virtue there would be no need to simulate it.  Every act\nof hypocrisy is a tacit acknowledgment of its greatness.  O Virtue! how\ngreat thou art, when even the bad and the vile are constrained to do\nthee homage!  No one becomes a hypocrite when he pretends to be\ndifferent from what he is, but when he pretends to be _better_ than he\nis.  In spite of himself he is paying a high tribute to thy greatness\nand goodness!\n\nThe attempt to conceal the evil heart, however, shall not always be\nsuccessful. \"The day is coming when hypocrites will be stripped of their\nfig-leaves\" (Matthew Henry).  Their trust shall be as frail as a\n_spider's web_.  Could any language be more expressive?  In Eastern\nlands the flimsiness of the spider's web is proverbial. \"He shall lean\nupon his house (on that light _gossamer_), but it shall not stand: he\nshall hold fast thereby, but it shall not endure.\"  The material is so\nfrail, that the least violence destroys it; and the hypocrite's hope is\nso flimsy, that it shall not stand in the judgment.  \"They weave the\nspider's web, but their webs shall not become garments, neither shall\nthey cover themselves with their works\" (Isa. lix. 6).\n\nBut turning to the spider itself, we may learn various lessons.\n\n\n                       I.--ITS SKILL AS A WEAVER.\n\nLike Hogarth's good apprentice, it has made admirable use of its trade.\nIts web, however frail, is really a marvellous production.  It is\ndistinguished by beauty of design, fineness of texture, nicety and\nsensitiveness of touch, reminding us of Pope's couplet--\n\n    \"The spider's _touch_, how exquisitely fine,\n    Feels at each thread and lives along the line.\"\n\n\nAnd when we add to this that the whole fabric is spun out of its own\nbody--a part of its very life--it is not difficult to see that the\nspider's work must be of the finest order, and well worthy of the study\nand imitation of every young apprentice.\n\nEvery lad in going forward to the work of his life should set up a high\nideal.  In all that he does he ought to aim at perfection.  Like the\nspider's web, his work, whatever it is, should be a bit of\nhimself--steeped in his own thought and shaped by his own effort.  He\nmay only be a weaver, but he must aspire to be a _good_ one--one who\nplans as well as labours, and reads as well as plans.  For in the race\nof life, muscle is no match for mind, and skill will always outstrip\nslovenliness--just as the great Goliath must go down before the alert\nson of Jesse, and the pigmies of the African forest can easily outmatch\nand out-manoeuvre the lion.  Let every young life go and examine the\nperfection of the spider's web, and seek to do likewise.\n\n\n                     II.--ITS PROWESS AS A HUNTER.\n\nPopular prejudice has always been against the spider; and it must be\nadmitted that there is a good deal to sanction the poet's unfavourable\nverdict when he says regarding it--\n\n    \"_Cunning_ and _fierce_, mixture abhorr'd.\"\n\n\nIts cunning and craft have passed into a proverb; and all the children\nknow that its apparent treachery, in decoying the little fly into its\nparlour, has been suitably expressed in verse.  Its fierceness also is\nquite equal to its cunning, and when the thought of its hairy-looking\nappearance is added to the fact of the poison-fangs which it buries in\nthe bodies of its victims, there would seem to be enough to warrant the\ngeneral dislike with which the spider has at all times been regarded.\n\nOn the other hand, we must not forget these two things--(1) That the\nspider is only fulfilling the instinct which an all-wise God has\nimplanted in it; and (2) that it is of great service to man in\ndiminishing the swarms of insects by which he is molested.  Thomas\nEdward, the Banffshire naturalist, calculated that a single pair of\nswallows would destroy 282,000 insects in one year while rearing their\ntwo broods, and sometimes they rear three.  And if this be the service\nrendered by a single pair of birds, what may not be accomplished by\nthose innumerable spiders that weave their gummy webs on every bush and\nhedge-row, and spend the entire day, and sometimes the whole night, in\ntrapping and ridding the atmosphere of those annoying pests.  Bereft of\nthese wily hunters, we should be like the Egyptians in the time of\nMoses--plagued and eaten up of flies: so that in spite of prejudice and\ngeneral dislike the spider is occupying a real sphere of usefulness in\nthe world.  And so may we.  We can afford at times to pause and study\nthe hunter's skill, and do something to imitate its prowess.\n\n\n                      III.--ITS FAME AS A TEACHER.\n\nIt teaches us how to spin and how to weave, how to hunt and how to\nsnare. And as one has expressed it, it has solved many a problem in\nmathematics before Euclid was born.  Look at the spider's web, and see\nwhether \"any hand of man, with all the fine appliances of art, and\ntwenty years' apprenticeship to boot, could weave us such another.\"\nNay, if we think of the _water_-spider, which bottles up air, and takes\nit under water to breathe with, it is not too much to say, that if\npeople had but \"watched water-spiders as Robert Bruce watched the\ncottage spider, diving-bells would have been discovered hundreds of\nyears ago, and people might have learnt how to go to the bottom of the\nsea and save the treasures of wrecks.\"\n\nThe name of King Robert the Bruce suggests one special lesson.  If all\nhistory be true, the spider will always be known in Scotland as the\nteacher of _perseverance_--\n\n    \"If at first you don't succeed,\n    Try, try, try again.\"\n\n\nOnce, twice, thrice, nay, six times over the tiny creature, like a\nswinging pendulum, had swung towards the opposite rafter in that little\ncottage, but always without success; and the eyes of the defeated and\nalmost hopeless hero of Scotland watched its repeated struggles. But\nhowever often it had failed, it was in no wise beaten nor discouraged;\nbut gathered up all its energies for another and more strenuous effort.\n\"England, Scotland, Spiderland expects every one to do his duty,\" and\nwith one supreme push it swung out and won at last.  \"Bravo!\" exclaimed\nthe Bruce, as he recalled how he himself had been defeated six times,\nand might read in the triumph of the spider the promise and pledge of\nhis own. Little did the cottage spider think how a mighty courage had\nbeen rekindled by its tiny struggles, and how a brilliant page in\nhistory would be opened by the memory of its splendid success.  Yet so\nit was. Great results have sometimes sprung from small causes, and the\nchampion of Scottish liberties arose from his pallet bed to deliver and\nconsolidate his kingdom.\n\nAnd little do children in any age think how great an influence _they_\nmight wield, if only in devotion to what is right they would follow and\nobey Christ's gospel. Many a tiny seed has grown into a great tree.  And\nJesus Himself has said, \"Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou\nhast perfected praise\" (Matt. xxi. 16).\n\n\n\n\n                               *The Fly.*\n\n\n\"Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a\nstinking savour.\"--Eccles. x. 1.\n\n\nBoth of these terms, \"apothecary\" and \"ointment,\" need to be explained.\nIn Hebrew they have no reference to anything _medical_, whether it be to\nthe person of a chemist or the contents of a chemist's shop.  The\nointment means the various perfumes in use among the Jews--both in the\nanointing of the living and in the embalming of the dead; and the\napothecary meant the perfumer who prepared and sold these perfumes,\nwhether as cosmetics for the toilet or as spices for the tomb.\n\nIf, therefore, the perfumes were carelessly stored or insecurely\nprotected, the flies managed to gain admittance, and the priceless\ntreasure became corrupted by the odour of their dead bodies.  For \"the\nfly that sips treacle is lost in the sweets.\"  And the lesson drawn by\nthe preacher is sufficiently telling, \"So doth a little folly him that\nis in reputation for wisdom.\"  The man himself is the ointment, his\nreputation is the perfume, the little folly is the dead fly, and his\ndisgrace is the stinking savour.  Ah! little foxes spoil the vines, and\nsometimes little follies lead to great sins.  \"It is very cold,\" said\nthe camel in an Eastern fable, \"and I would be so thankful to you,\nMister Tailor, if you would only let me put my nose inside your door.\"\nAnd the good man consented.  But soon the camel had thrust in his head\nas well as his nose, then his neck and his forefeet, and last of all his\nwhole body, which completely filled up the tailor's little shop. It was\nno use now pleading that there was no room for both.  The camel coolly\nreplied that in that case the tailor could go outside.  It was the\nbeginning of the evil that wrought the mischief.  It was allowing the\n_nose_ that did it.  \"A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump,\" just as\na tiny spark will kindle a great fire, or little snowflakes become a\ndreaded avalanche.  Let every young heart shun the least appearance of\nevil.  Dead flies corrupt the costly spikenard.\n\nBut the fly itself will repay attention from two points of view.\n\n\n                           I.--ITS STRUCTURE.\n\nWere we in search of design in nature, or an illustration of the wonders\nof the microscope, no better example could be suggested to us than the\nform and structure of a fly.  Its tiny body is even more wonderful than\nthe body of a man.  Take, for instance, its marvellous power of walking.\nIt can walk anywhere or anyhow, setting every principle of gravitation\nat defiance by promenading head downwards along the ceiling, or skipping\nup and down the glittering window-pane, pursuing objects that to us are\nquite invisible. How is the feat accomplished?  What peculiarity has its\nlittle foot that the daring acrobat can keep itself suspended in that\ndizzy and foolhardy position? The microscope gives us the answer. The\nfoot consists of two pads covered with innumerable short hairs, and\nthese hairs are hollow, having trumpet-shaped mouths filled with gum.\nThis gum becomes so hard when exposed to the air, that it will not\ndissolve in water, so that at every step the fly glues itself to the\nceiling, and there it would remain unless it knew how to lift its feet.\nIt lifts them in a slanting direction while the gum is still moist, just\nas you would remove a moist postage stamp by taking hold of one corner\nand gently drawing it back.  And think of the creature's eye. It can\nobserve everything in four-fifths of the circle round it, so that to\ncompete with a fly we would require two more pair of eyes, one at the\nside and another at the back of our head.  But in no sense can we\ncompete with these aerial nomads.  They have three sets of brain instead\nof one.  They have wings, which we have not.  They have six legs instead\nof two; and their proboscis or trunk is as far beyond that of an\nelephant \"as a railway engine is beyond a wheelbarrow.\"\n\nAs seen under a powerful microscope, the structure of a common fly is a\nperfect marvel of design, and it may well excite our curiosity and call\nforth our admiration. It points us to the greatness and wisdom of Him\nwhose works are as perfect in the tiniest insect as in the brightest\nstar, whose power is as manifest in the humblest sea-shell as in the\nhuge leviathan that makes the ocean its playground--\n\n    \"All are but parts of one stupendous whole,\n    Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.\"\n\n\n                          II.--ITS USEFULNESS.\n\nInstead of usefulness, one might almost be tempted to say that the first\nlaw of their nature is to _torment_ people; but the service they render\nto the world at large must not be lightly esteemed.\n\n1. The very torment of which they are so capable may be turned into a\nvisitation of _judgment_.  When Isaiah refers to the scattering of the\nTen Tribes, he exclaims, \"The Lord shall hiss for the fly that is in the\nuttermost part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the\nland of Assyria\" (Isa. vii. 18).  And the children will remember that\nthe ten plagues which fell upon Egypt included \"swarms of flies\" in all\nthe houses of the Egyptians.  These little insects were used as the\nscourges of mankind to wreak the vengeance of a broken law on the heads\nof the transgressors.  And especially is this the case with the law of\ncleanliness. The one sin that the fly will not tolerate is the sin of\nlaziness and dirt. Wheresoever the filth is, there will the flies be\ngathered together.  Those who despise this first law of their being will\nnot offend with impunity; and if no other scourge be available, that\nlittle torment--the common fly--will be commissioned to undertake the\nduty.\n\n2. But the sword they wield is double-edged. It not only flays the\nlaw-breakers, it also slays the infection and the fever which have\nfollowed in their train.  They are _the scavengers of the atmosphere_.\nThey do for the air what the pariah dogs of the East do for the\nearth--they gather up and remove everything that offends, everything\nthat occasions or breeds disease.  Let no one say that the swarms of\nflies bring the cholera and the fever.  They are the camp-followers who\ntread on the heels of those dreaded foes, and they feed upon and do\ntheir best to remove the foulsome odours.  We need not grudge the spider\nhis savoury morsel, but it will be a dark hour for the earth if he\nshould gain the mastery.  If he should prove too much for the fly, we\nshall be left to the miasmas and pestilences from which the presence of\nthe fly relieves us.\n\n3. Even in its death the fly renders a most substantial service.  It\nforms the food of innumerable song-birds, which, apart from the fly,\nwould never be found in our land at all.  How dull and lifeless would\nthe months of the summer be without the swallow, the willow-warbler, and\nthe fly-catcher.  And yet these feed almost entirely on flies.  \"And if\nthe trout had not discovered what a savoury morsel the fly is that\ndances on the stream, what a very dull, stupid amusement would fishing\nbe!  Many a schoolboy would lose the greatest treat of a summer holiday\nif there were no flies, and no trout that appreciated them.\"\n\nThe niche filled by the fly is therefore a very important one.  It\nneither lives a useless life nor dies a useless death.  Its sphere of\nusefulness is as striking and suggestive as the wondrous delicacy of its\nform and structure, and they both point us to the Great Creator whose\ngreatness and goodness are manifested through all His works--\n\n    \"Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,\n    A hero perish, or a sparrow fall.\"\n\nAnd if the boy be the father of the man, we may justly emphasise another\nlesson--that the law of kindness ought to rule in the least as well as\nin the greatest--that he who begins by torturing a fly may end with\nsomething far more solemn--_a human heart_.\n\n\n\n\n                          *The Pearl-Oyster.*\n\n\n\"Neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under\ntheir feet.\"--Matt. vii. 6.\n\n\nThe disciples of Jesus are here told not to talk too freely of their\nspiritual enjoyments before men of debased tastes.  Religion is brought\ninto contempt, and its professors insulted, when it is forced upon those\nwho cannot value it and will not have it.  \"Throw a pearl to a swine,\"\nsays Matthew Henry, \"and he will resent it, as if you threw a stone at\nhim; _reproofs_ will be called _reproaches_.\"  Such men cannot\nappreciate the jewels of Christianity, and like swine, which prefer peas\nto pearls, they will trample them under their feet and turn again and\nrend you.\n\nOn the other hand, this caution is not to be carried too far.  We are\nnot to set down all our neighbours as dogs and swine, and then excuse\nourselves from trying to do them good on this poor plea.  The Saviour's\ngolden rule shows us a more excellent way: \"Whatsoever ye would that men\nshould do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the\nprophets.\"  We are to deal with each other as God deals with us.  He\ndoes not judge us uncharitably; but still less does He give that which\nis holy to the dogs.  He gives to each what is suitable to each.  He\nsends His _rain_ on the just and on the unjust; but He keeps His _love_\nfor those who worship and love His Son (John xiv. 21).  And that is His\nexample to you and me.  We must seek His Spirit to guide us in all\nthings, that being made wise with His wisdom, we may ourselves possess\nthe pearl of great price and not cast our pearls before swine.\n\n\n                        I.--BUT WHAT IS A PEARL?\n\nIt is a well-known gem found in several shell-fish, such as the common\nmussel and the oyster.  How it came to be there was long a puzzle to\nman.  In ancient times they imagined it was formed from the dew of\nheaven.  The sparkling dewdrops and the shining pearls were so like each\nother that they adopted the beautiful fancy that the pearl was begotten\nfrom the dew.  To explain the shining lustre of the gem this other\ndetail was added, that just at the moment when the conception was taking\nplace there was a vivid flash of lightning, and the pearl caught\nsomething of the fiery gleam.  All these fancies are read together by\none ancient writer, when he says regarding the pearl of great price,\n\"This Pearl is Jesus, whom the virgin conceived from the divine\nlightning.\"\n\nBut all this, of course, is pure fancy.  A pearl is not formed from the\ndew, and still less is its lustre derived from the lightning. Science\nwould describe it as the result of an accident.  It is \"an _accidental_\nconcretion of shelly matter deposited within the shell of certain\nmollusca.\"  If you open an oyster-shell you find the inside of _it_ all\ncovered over with a bright smooth covering of shelly matter.  This is\nlaid on in innumerable layers, the one above the other, and the thinner\nand more transparent the layers, the more perfect is the lustre.  Now,\nif any hard substance like a grain of sand gets inside the shell, this\nshelly matter begins to gather round it, coat after coat, which harden\nas they gather, until the pearl is fully formed.  It is said the Chinese\ntake advantage of this fact to get the little creatures to make\nimitation pearls.  They insert round pellets between the valves of the\nmussel, and in a short time the creature deposits a coating of this\npearly substance upon them, and they can scarcely be detected from true\npearls.\n\nA pearl, then, is a grain of sand transformed into a precious gem.  It\nbegan as a kind of thorn in the flesh, and ended in a jewel so valuable\nthat thousands of pounds cannot buy it.  The unwelcome intruder was\nreally an angel in disguise.  The pain became a pearl.\n\nAnd do not all human pearls come in the same way?  Is there any gain\nwithout pain? or is there any perfection without the fire of suffering?\nNo.  The fruit-tree does not flourish apart from the pruning-knife, and\nthe fruit is not ripened apart from the scorching heat of the sun.  Iron\nis not hammered into shape until it has been thrust into the furnace,\nand character does not glisten like a gem until it has been polished by\nthe lapidary.  And thus we find the poets saying that they learn in\nsuffering what they teach in song; and the young people will not forget\nthat even Jesus--the Pearl of great price--was made \"perfect through\nsufferings\" (Heb. ii. 10). So that Carlyle was well within the mark when\nhe wrote: \"Thought, true labour of any kind, highest virtue itself, is\nit not the daughter of pain?\"  Yes, every thorn may be a blessing in\ndisguise.  Every pain may become a pearl.\n\nThere is one gem in the character of Jesus that all you young people\nwould do well to imitate.  I mean the _pearl of obedience_.  Though He\nknew that God was His Father, and the temple was His Father's house, He\nwent down to Nazareth with Joseph and Mary, and was \"_subject unto\nthem_.\"  That was the keynote of His life.  To obey was better than\nsacrifice; and even at the tragic close He was \"obedient unto death.\"\nIs that the ornament, children, with which you are trying to adorn your\ncharacter?  Are you in loving subjection to your parents on earth, and\nare you learning to be in subjection to your Father in heaven?  That can\nonly be obtained in one way--the way Jesus won it--the way of\nself-sacrifice and self-denial.  Every pearl is the product of a pain.\nJesus _learned obedience_ by the things which He _suffered_ (Heb. v. 8).\n\n\n                       II.--THE VALUE OF PEARLS.\n\nThe most valuable pearl-fisheries are to be found in the Persian Gulf\nand on the western coast of Ceylon.  The annual produce of the former is\nsaid to be over L200,000; while that of the latter is set down at even a\nhigher sum.  The value of single pearls has sometimes been enormous.\nThose who have read Rider Haggard's books will remember the graphic way\nin which he describes an incident in the life of Cleopatra.  That\nunscrupulous woman, at a supper with Mark Antony, took from her ear one\nof a pair of pearls of the value of L80,000, and having dissolved it in\nvinegar, swallowed the absurdly precious draught; and she would have\ndone the same with its fellow had it not been rescued from her wanton\npride.\n\nBut however valuable pearls may be, there are other things more valuable\nstill. Holy Scripture mentions three.\n\n(1.) *Wisdom*.--\"No mention shall be made of coral or of pearls; for the\nprice of wisdom is above rubies\" (Job xxviii. 18). The wisdom here\nreferred to is the divine wisdom--the plan or purpose of God exhibited\nin the universe.  But the same truth applies to human wisdom--the\ngaining of knowledge and discretion in human affairs.  The price of this\nis far above rubies.  It is not to be had for pearls.  How then shall a\nboy get it? Only by hard work and diligent application. He must shun the\ncompany of the idle and the frivolous, and give his time and thought to\nthe companionship of books.  He must show diligence at school, obedience\nin the home, and reverence in the church.  All his lessons must be\nfaithfully learned, every task must be faithfully performed.  And if he\nlearn thus early to sow well in youth, a harvest of intelligence and\nwisdom will be the reward.  And this will be a possession more valuable\nthan pearls, for\n\n    \"Just experience shows in every soil\n    That those who _think_ must govern those who _toil_.\"\n\n\n(2.) *Good Works*.--\"In like manner, that they adorn themselves ... not\nwith gold or pearls, but with good works\" (1 Tim. ii. 9).  The wisdom\nmust show itself in outward action.  If the fountain be pure, so also\nmust the flowing stream.  The hand must follow the heart.\n\nAnd all this in the way of adornment--the adornment of a good woman; and\ngirls especially will not miss the lesson that broidered hair and golden\ntrinkets are not the only kind of ornaments.  Peter speaks of the\nornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of\ngreat price; and Paul points us here, in 1st Timothy, to the beauty and\nexcellency of good works. She who is arrayed in meekness and\nkind-hearted generosity has no need of flounces and finery.  She may\neven say of all other ornaments, \"Unadorned, adorned the most.\"\n\n(3.) *Salvation* (Matt. xiii. 46).--Both wisdom and good works must show\nthemselves in religion.  The beginning of wisdom is the fear of God, and\nthe best of good works is to believe on Him whom He hath sent (John vi.\n29).  Till this is done, we are like the merchant man seeking goodly\npearls.  He found a great many; for this beautiful world in which we\nlive has many precious secrets to reveal to the earnest seeker.  But not\nuntil we find salvation through Jesus does the great _Eureka_, \"I have\nfound it,\" burst from our lips.  This is the treasure which all the\nwealth of the world cannot buy.  Not all the thousands of Cleopatra\ncould lay it at her feet.  And yet, wonder of wonders, it is given to\nthe penitent soul without money and without price.  Jesus says, \"Buy of\nme gold tried in the fire, that thou mayst be rich; and white raiment,\nthat thou mayst be clothed.\"  \"He that hath no money, come ye, buy and\neat, yea come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.\"  This\nis true wisdom, and this is the soundest morality, to come and find in\nthe salvation of Jesus _the Pearl of Great Price_.\n\n\n\n\n                          *Some Other Shells.*\n\n\n                                   I.\n\n    Happy sunlight on the sea,\n    Sparkling diamonds, all for me;\n    Wavelets chasing for the land,\n    There to kiss the golden sand.\n\n    See! a floating, straying shell,\n    Run! it has a tale to tell;\n    Children, with their eager eyes,\n    Splash the water, seize the prize.\n\n    Hold it to the little ear,\n    List and tell me what you hear..\n    Music?  Yes, for you and me,\n    That's the music of the sea.\n\n    Down below the water blue,\n    There it lived and there it grew,\n    Gazing through its watery dome,\n    Happy in its ocean home.\n\n    List'ning there both night and day,\n    Hearing what the wild waves say,\n    Watching sea-weed float along,\n    There it learned the ocean's song.\n\n\n                                  II.\n\n    But the children never still,\n    See them leap like mountain rill,\n    Ringing out their laughter sweet,\n    Sending forth their little fleet.\n\n    Full of mirth, but leaving me\n    Musing by another sea,\n    Casting with its angry swell\n    At my feet another shell.\n\n    There upon the sand to rest,\n    With a babe upon her breast,\n    Came a mother, not a wife,\n    Tossed upon the sea of life.\n\n    As she sat and sat alone,\n    Did she hear another moan?\n    Waves that smiled, then swept the deck,\n    Till they left this shattered wreck?\n\n    Yes, while tear-drops rose and fell,\n    There I heard the murmuring shell;\n    Strange the tale it brought to me,\n    Moaning echoes of the sea.\n\n    Round and round the eddying world\n    Had this straying shell been whirled;\n    Round and round lay blackest night--\n    Moths see nothing but the light.\n\n    Tossed by sin and idle care,\n    Pain and anguish found her there,\n    Young and mirthful, fair but frail,\n    There she learned the ocean's wail.\n\n\n                                  III.\n\n    Hold it to the little ear,\n    Children, tell me what you hear.\n    Nothing?  No, you cannot know\n    All this human tide of woe.\n\n    Would I be a child again,\n    Not to know another's pain?\n    Mourn like some for childhood's hours,\n    Gathering nought but summer's flowers?\n\n    No.  I want the power to tell,\n    Power to hear the murmuring shell,\n    Power to catch the rising moan,\n    Power to make its wail my own.\n\n    Learning thus to feel with pain,\n    I shall be a child again,\n    But a child experience taught,\n    Child in heart--a man in thought.\n\n    Then I'll hear the echoing swell\n    In the murmur of each shell,\n    And with touch of friendship warm,\n    Try to lull the raging storm.\n\n    Lulled to rest, its song shall be,\n    Murmurs of _another_ sea--\n    Heavenly love shall thrill and dwell\n    In the murmur of the shell.\n\n                     *      *      *      *      *\n\n    Of that higher sea to tell,\n    Make me, Lord, an echoing shell,\n    That the world may hear in mine\n    Echoes of the love divine.\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Calf.*\n\n\n\"Ye shall go forth and gambol as calves of the stall.\"--Mal. iv. 2\n(R.V.).\n\n\nMalachi is known as \"the last of the prophets.\"  With him the sun of a\nthousand years was sinking in the west.  It had its rise in the\nprophetical school of Samuel, its zenith in the glowing visions of\nIsaiah, and its setting in the earnest appeals of Malachi.  But before\nit loses all its glory in the gathering twilight, it gives the fair\npromise of another and better sun. Malachi is led to write--\"Unto you\nthat fear My name shall the _Sun of righteousness_ arise with healing in\nHis wings; and ye shall go forth and gambol as calves of the stall.\"  He\nhad frequently seen the young calves let loose in the morning sunshine,\nand as he stood and watched their happy gambols, they became a kind of\nillustration to him of far higher joys. They led him to think of the\ncoming \"day of the Lord,\" when, in the brightness of that better Sun,\nthose that feared His name would rejoice with joy unspeakable and full\nof glory.  They too would go forth like the beasts of the field and skip\nand play in the sunshine.\n\n    \"To hail Thy rise, Thou better Sun,\n      The gathering nations come,\n    Joyous, as when the reapers bear\n      The harvest treasures home.\"\n\n\nThe Bible imagery of the calf, however, has much more to tell us than\nthis, and I propose to-day to direct your attention to three points.\n\n\n                        I.--THE CALF AS AN IDOL.\n\nIn Exodus xxxii. we have the story of the _golden calf_.  It was a\nsolemn hour in the history of the Hebrews.  Moses was up on Mount Sinai\ncommuning with God, and all the people were waiting in the plain.  They\nhad watched their leader ascend the hill and disappear within the cloud;\nand for well-nigh forty days they had been waiting for his return.  But\nevidently they were waiting in vain.  Day by day they had expected the\ncloud to lift and pass away, but there it was still lying on the rocky\nsummit, brooding and dark as ever.  They began to lose heart.  They\ngradually grew impatient, and finally they broke out in actual\nrebellion.  They turned to Aaron and said, \"Up, make us gods which shall\ngo before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of\nthe land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.\"\n\nAnd then follows the sad story of Israel's idolatry.  Moses on the hill\nwas receiving a new revelation.  He was receiving from Jehovah the two\ntables of stone.  And these were the first two lines inscribed upon\nthem: \"_Thou shalt have no other gods before Me_.\"  \"_Thou shalt not\nmake unto thee any graven image_.\"  And lo! at the very moment that\nthese words were being written, the chosen people at the foot of the\nhill were breaking off their golden earrings and making a molten calf.\nThey were renouncing the worship of Jehovah and setting the worship of\nEgypt--the worship of the _bull_, Apis, in its place.\n\nWhen Moses came down and beheld this idol, he was completely overcome.\nIn a great outburst of grief and anger he dashed the tables out of his\nhand and break them beneath the mount. Israel had sinned a great sin.\nThey were a stiff-necked and rebellious people.  And the anger of the\nLord was kindled against Israel, \"and there fell of the people that day\nabout three thousand men.\"\n\nIt is the same taproot of sin which is the cause of all our sorrows.\nWe, too, have sinned against the Lord.  We have made some kind of golden\ncalf, and set it in the place of Jehovah.  And unless we are saved from\nthe awful consequences of our sin, we also will suffer, as those\nrebellious Hebrews suffered, because of the idol which we have made.\nThis is the first lesson that we may learn from the Bible imagery of the\ncalf.  It sets before us the true nature and the terrible consequences\nof sin.\n\n\n                     II.--THE CALF AS A SACRIFICE.\n\nThe stain of sin may be deep, but the power of redemption is deeper.\nMoses said unto Aaron, \"Take thee a bull calf for a sin offering, and\noffer it before the Lord\" (Lev. ix. 2).  Not indeed that the blood of\ncalves could take away sin.\n\n    \"Not all the blood of beasts\n      On Jewish altars slain,\n    Could give the guilty conscience peace,\n      Or wash away the stain.\"\n\nBut that was the Old Testament way of setting forth the great fact of\nredemption. The offering of the bull calf was a picture of the sacrifice\nof Jesus.  For as we read in Hebrews ix. 11, \"Christ having come a high\npriest of good things to come, not through the blood of goats and\ncalves, but through His own blood, entered in once into the holy place,\nhaving obtained eternal redemption for us.\"  This is the hope and plea\nof every poor sinner.  \"The blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanseth us from\nall sin.\"\n\nAnd as a sacrifice, the bull calf _could not be redeemed_.  The\nfirst-born of man might be redeemed, as also the firstling of any\nunclean animal; but not so the firstling of an ox.  It was a _clean_\nanimal, and its blood must be sprinkled upon the altar (Num. xviii. 17).\nIn this way it shadowed forth the sacrifice of Christ, of whom it was\nsaid, \"He saved others; Himself He cannot save.\"  As our Divine Isaac He\ncame to Mount Moriah, but there was no ram found there to take His place\nas the sacrifice.  He alone was a perfect offering.  He alone was clean;\nand therefore He alone as the Great High Priest offered Himself as the\nvictim.  He poured out His soul unto death.  And it is to this Saviour\nthat all you young people must look.  \"Neither is there salvation in any\nother: there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we\nmust be saved.\"  Looking unto Jesus, loving Him, and resting on\nHim--that is the way we enter into life.  \"Behold the Lamb of God, which\ntaketh away the sin of the world.\"\n\nThis is the second lesson we learn from the Bible imagery of the calf.\nSin is followed by sacrifice.  The molten calf gives place to the calf\nthat was slain.\n\n\n                       III.--THE CALF AS A FEAST.\n\nYou remember the story of the Prodigal Son contained in the Gospel of\nLuke.  In that pearl of parables we have the mention of the \"_fatted\ncalf_.\"  This was considered a great delicacy among the Jews. Large\nnumbers were carefully selected and fattened for the purpose.  And this\nis what we are to understand by \"calves of the stall.\"  Even the witch\nof Endor had \"a _fat_ calf\" in her house, which she killed and dressed\nfor King Saul (1 Sam. xxviii. 24).  And Abraham ran unto the herd, and\nfetched \"a calf _tender and good_,\" and prepared it for the three angels\nwho had visited him in the plains of Mamre (Gen. xviii. 7).  This was\nhospitality worthy of both kings and angels; and this is the kind of\nentertainment which is set before every returning prodigal. They feed on\nangels' food.  They eat of the finest of the wheat.  They are brought\ninto Christ's banqueting house, and His banner over them is love.\n\nDid ever any one sin a more grievous sin than the prodigal?  Was ever\nany one visited with a sadder and sorer punishment?  Like the silly\nsheep, he had strayed away into the far-off country; and there, in that\ndistant land, he found himself in penury and rags.  He would fain have\nfilled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat.  But the\nShepherd found the sheep.  The poor wanderer came to himself in that\ndistant land, and found his way back again to his father's house.  And\nwhat was the result?  His home-coming was celebrated by a feast.  The\nfather said unto the servant, \"Bring hither the _fatted calf_ and kill\nit.\"\n\n    \"A day of _feasting_ I ordain,\n      Let mirth and song abound,\n    My son was dead, and lives again,\n      Was lost, and now is found.\n\n    Thus joy abounds in paradise,\n      Among the hosts of heav'n,\n    Soon as the sinner quits his sins,\n      Repents and is forgiven.\"\n\n\nThe sin, the sacrifice, the feast.  The golden calf, the slain calf, the\nfatted calf. The first is ours, the second is Christ's, and the third is\ndesigned for _both_. \"Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man\nhear My voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup\n_with him_, and he _with Me_.\"  Nay, Jesus Himself is both sacrifice and\nfeast.  He could turn to the Jews and say, \"Whoso eateth My flesh, and\ndrinketh My blood, hath eternal life.\"  \"I am the living bread which\ncame down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for\never.\"\n\nWe must repent of the sin, we must trust in the sacrifice, and we must\nfeed upon the feast.  Not till then shall we be fired with the hope and\nfilled with the joy of the last of the prophets--\"Unto you that fear My\nname, shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings:\nand ye shall go forth and _gambol_ as calves of the stall.\"\n\n\n\n\n                               *The Bat.*\n\n\n\"In that day a man shall cast his idols to the moles and the\nbats.\"--Isa. ii. 20.\n\n\nThe bat is only mentioned three times in the Bible, and it cannot be\nsaid at a first reading that the references are very flattering.  They\nseem to justify the kind of horror which most people feel when they\nencounter a bat; for it is generally regarded as \"a creature of such\nill-omen that its very presence causes a shudder, and its approach would\nput to flight many a human being.\"\n\nMoses speaks of it as one of the unclean animals--a creature neither to\nbe eaten as food nor offered in sacrifice; while Isaiah describes it as\na fit companion for the mole, or rather the mole-rat, which crawls away\nfrom the sunshine, and seems to love the darkness rather than the light,\nbecause its deeds are evil. Clearly the little \"night-flier\" has a good\ndeal to contend with in winning for itself a place among the world's\nfavourites.  It has enough against it to crush an Atlas, not to speak of\na bat; and if it rise to a position of honour after all, it does so in\nspite of the incubus of general dislike and loathing which the ignorance\nof superstition has heaped upon it.  But all true bats, like all true\nboys, but seek to rise above any such reputation.\n\n\n                      I.--THE JEWISH PROHIBITION.\n\nThe bat was regarded as unclean.  Two reasons may be given for\nthis--corresponding to the two classes of bats which are known to have\nexisted in Bible lands. We have first the _insectivorous_ bats, which,\nboth in habits and appearance, are so repugnant that no one would ever\ndream of regarding them as food, or as fit objects for sacrifice.  They\nwere rejected on the principle that nothing repulsive or hideous is to\nbe eaten or offered; for this would offend the _horror naturalis_ which\nis so great a safeguard in human life.  And indeed, if these were the\nonly bats known to the Jews, the prohibition as thus applied would seem\nto be needless.  But these were not the only bats.  We have also the\nlarge _frugivorous_ bats which have been used as food in various parts\nof the world; and they may have been so used by the Jews themselves when\nsojourning in the land of Egypt.  The Egyptian monuments show that these\nlarge fox-headed bats were not at all uncommon in the valley of the\nNile; and Canon Tristram secured two fine specimens even in Central\nPalestine, which measured twenty and a half inches from wing to wing.\nNow if surrounding nations ate these bats as a common article of diet,\nwould not this be a sufficient reason why the Jews should not be allowed\nto touch them?  I think it would.  Israel as a nation was set apart to\nJehovah.  They were His peculiar people.  They were His chosen and\npurchased possession; and therefore even in their food there must be a\nseparation in which this reference to Jehovah was expressed.  They must\nbe made to feel that even in the prohibition of the bat and other\nanimals, the divine command had been addressed to them, \"Come out from\namong them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord.\"\n\nAnd yet one cannot but think that all this was rather hard on the bat.\n\"It is said that the African negroes depict and describe _their_ evil\nspirits as white; and that in consequence, the negro children fly in\nconsternation if perchance a white man comes into their territory.  Yet\na white man is not so very horrid an object after all, if one only dare\nlook at him, and the same remark holds good with the bats.\" (J. G.\nWood.)  A very pretty and useful creature is the bat, and it is quite\nqualified to teach us many valuable lessons.\n\n\n                          II.--WHAT A BAT IS.\n\nHow are we to describe this little puzzle?  Are we to call it a bird or\na beast, or is it both of these rolled into one? The possession of wings\nwould seem to argue that it must be a bird; but then its sharp teeth and\nmouse-like body would as clearly prove that it must be a beast; so that\nthe simple question whether the bat is a bird or beast is not so simple\nas it looks.\n\nThe common name, \"_Flitter-mouse_,\" exhibits the same difficulty; and so\nalso does AEsop in his amusing description of the battle of the beasts\nand birds.  The bat, availing himself of his combination of fur and\nwings, did not join himself to either party.  He hovered over the field\nof battle, and waited to see which side was going to be victorious.  He\nwas determined in the final issue to be on the side of the victors.  But\nin this little game he was entirely unsuccessful; for when they saw the\ntactics of the little traitor, he was scouted by both parties, and has\nbeen compelled ever since to appear in public only at night.  It is\nquite evident that when AEsop wrote this fable, he was not sure what to\ncall the bat--whether to describe it as a bird because it had wings, or\nto place it among the beasts because it had fur.  But what then is the\ntiny creature?  A mammal, of course.  A whale is not a fish because it\nswims in the sea, and the bat is not a bird because it flies in the air.\nThey both suckle their young, and therefore are true mammals.  Nay,\nLinnaeus has actually placed the bat in the highest order of the\nmammals--in that of the primates beside the monkey and the man. Indeed,\nin one essential particular it has easily excelled both.  It has grown\nfor itself a pair of wings--not a mere parachute like that of the flying\nsquirrels or the flying fish, but a real pair of wings which enable it\nto laugh to scorn all the flying machines and balloons ever invented by\nman.  How clumsy all these inventions are in comparison with a bat's\nwing.  Four of its fingers are drawn out like the ribs of an umbrella,\nand then covered over with its own skin like the web of a duck's foot;\nand thus furnished with the necessary means of competing with the birds,\nit sails out like the swallow in pursuit of its prey.  The remaining\nfinger or thumb is used as a hook to suspend it from the roof or rafters\nwhere it takes up its abode.  Here then is the high position to which\nthe bat has attained.  It is the only mammal that flies.\n\n\n                        III.--WHAT THE BAT DOES.\n\nLet no one say that it lives a useless life.  It is one of the most\nuseful animals we have.  It vies with the swallow in destroying the\nswarms of insects that infest the atmosphere.  They divide the day of\ntwenty-four hours between them. The bat begins the work where the\nswallow lays it down; and ruthlessly pursues the insect prey all through\nthe night.  From dark to dawn, and sometimes far into the day, it does\nyeoman service in this important connection.  The present writer\nremembers a pair of bats in Perthshire, which were found in company with\nthe swallows even at the hour of noon.  It was the month of September,\nand perhaps they felt they must now make haste in preparing for the\nwinter's hibernation.  For the bat is not able, like the swallow, to\nmigrate to a warmer clime when the supply of insect food begins to fail.\nIt must find another way of spending the long months of the winter. It\nmust pass into a deep death-like slumber, from which it is awakened, as\nthe flowers in spring are awakened, by the returning life of the summer.\nBut the traces of a wise design are seen everywhere. The marks of a good\nand faithful Creator are found through all His works. If one creature\nhas the power of migrating, another has the power of hibernating; and\nthus even in the mode of existence pursued by a bat, there is abundant\nevidence of the wisdom and goodness of God.\n\nAnd how is the bat able to thread its way through the darkest caverns\nwhere the sharpest eyes are rendered useless? It is not blind, like\nTibbie Dyster in \"Alec Forbes\"; and yet it might say, as she did when\ncongratulated on her fine spinning, \"I wadna spin sae weel gin it warna\nthat the Almichty pat some sicht into the pints o' my fingers 'cause\nthere was nane left i' my een.\"  The bat has indeed a marvellous power\nof sight in \"the pints o' its fingers.\"  Prof. Mivart can only compare\nthe sensitiveness of its _touch_ to a state of inflammation; and it is\nthis extreme sensibility that enables them to direct their flight in\nthese dark caverns. This is another coign of vantage reached by the bat.\nIt is the only mammal that possesses wings, and these wings, in turn,\nare the very perfection of the delicate sense of touch.\n\nBut we go back to the point from which we started, and say that, however\nuseful and wonderful the bat may be, it is not to be eaten as food or\noffered in sacrifice. It is _unclean_.  This, indeed, is a principle\nwhich is full of gospel teaching.  A thing may be good and useful in its\nown place, and yet be quite unfit as an offering when we appear before\nGod.  Good thoughts, kind words, and brave deeds are all needed.  They\nare all necessary for the adornment of our Christian character; but for\nthe forgiveness of our sins, and the reception of \"so great salvation,\"\nthere is no sacrifice which can be mentioned save one: \"Behold the Lamb\nof God, which taketh away the sin of the world.\"  To Jesus then must\nevery boy and girl look, saying in the language of the hymn--\n\n    \"Just as I am, _without one plea_,\n    _But that Thy blood was shed for me,_\n    And that Thou bid'st me come to Thee,\n      O Lamb of God, I come.\"\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Eagle.*\n\n\n\"Doth the eagle mount up at thy command, and make her nest on\nhigh?\"--Job xxxix. 27.\n\n\nJehovah is answering Job out of the whirlwind.  He brings before him a\ngrand panorama of external nature--the earth and sea, snow and hail, the\nPleiades and the lightning--the wild goat, the wild ass, the ostrich,\nthe hawk, and the eagle; and as the glorious pageant defiles before his\neyes, he forces him to face and answer the question: Shall mortal man be\nmore just than God?  Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct\nHim?  He that reproveth God, let him answer.  And Job's answer is all\nthat could be desired: \"Behold, I am vile: what shall I answer Thee?  I\nwill lay mine hand upon my mouth.\"  The greatness of God in nature has\ntaught man his own utter insignificance.\n\nDoth the eagle mount up at _thy_ command?  No.  All these pictures point\nman to God.  They combine to illustrate the mind and thought of Him who\nformed them and cares for them.  So that the conclusion of Ruskin is\nmore than justified that the universe is not a mirror that reflects to\nproud self-love her own intelligence.  It is a mirror that reflects to\nthe devout soul the attributes of God.\n\n\n               I.--THE ROCK-DWELLING HABITS OF THE EAGLE.\n\n\"She dwelleth and abideth on the rock, upon the crag of the rock and the\nstrong place\" (ver. 28).  It is to this that Obadiah refers when he\ntakes up his parable against the Edomites.  They too were rock-dwellers,\nwho had made for themselves houses and founded cities in the rocky\nfastnesses of Mount Seir.  But they are reminded that the impregnable\nand inaccessible heights to which they have resorted will be no defence\nagainst Jehovah: \"Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though\nthou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith\nthe Lord.\"  It is even added that Edom would become utterly desolate:\n\"As thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee, ... and there shall not\nbe any remaining of the house of Esau.\"  And if the testimony of modern\ntravellers may be accepted, the desolation is mournful enough.  In 1848\nMiss Harriet Martineau visited Petra, the chief of these rock-cities,\nand describes it as follows: \"Nowhere else is there desolation like that\nof Petra, where these rock doorways stand wide--still fit for the\nhabitation of a multitude, but all empty and silent except for the\nmultiplied echo of the cry of the eagle, or the bleat of the kid.  No;\nthese excavations never were all tombs. In the morning the sons of Esau\ncame out in the first sunshine to worship at their doors, before going\nforth, proud as their neighbour eagles, to the chase; and at night the\nyellow fires lighted up from within, tier above tier, the face of the\nprecipice\" (\"Eastern Life,\" vol. iii. 5).\n\nThe Edomite, alas, is gone, though the eagle is still left, and she\nfixes her habitation on the dizzy crag.\n\n\n                II.--THE ACUTENESS OF THE EAGLE'S SIGHT.\n\n\"From thence she seeketh the prey, and her eyes behold afar off\" (ver.\n29). The eye of a bird is a marvellous structure.  It is a telescope and\nmicroscope combined.  It has the power of compressing the lens to adapt\nit to varying distances; and is larger in proportion than the eye of\nquadrupeds.  The kestrel hawk, for instance, feeds on the common field\nmouse; but this tiny creature is so like the colour of the soil, that a\nhuman eye could scarcely detect it at the distance of a few yards.  The\nkestrel, however, has no such difficulty.  Her telescopic eye sees it\nfrom the sky overhead, and like a bolt from the blue, she swoops down\nupon the helpless prey.  No mistake is made as she nears the ground.\nSwiftly and almost instantaneously the telescope is compressed into the\nmicroscope, and the daring freebooter could pick up a pin.\n\nThe same power is possessed by the Griffon vulture or \"eagle\" of Holy\nScripture.  \"_Her eyes behold afar off_.\"  A dozen eagles may be soaring\nupwards in the sunlight, until they become mere specks against the blue\nof heaven, but they are carefully watching each other in their wheeling\ncircles, and diligently scanning the desert below in the hope of\ndiscovering some prey.  The moment the object is sighted, and even one\nbird has made a swoop downwards, the movement is detected by the one\nnearest, which immediately follows; while the second is followed by a\nthird, and the third by a fourth, until in a few minutes, \"wheresoever\nthe carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together.\"  Their vast\npower of wing and acuteness of sight have led them to the prey.\n\nAnd the lesson is not far to seek.  In the Carlyle use of the word it\nemphasises the need of being able to _see_.  \"To the poet, as to every\nother, we say first of all, _see_.  If you cannot do that, it is of no\nuse stringing rhymes together and calling yourself a poet, there is no\nhope for you.\"  And in religion it is the pure in heart that see God.\nIf the inner eye be single, the whole body shall be full of light.  The\naged _seer_ on Patmos saw into the heaven of heavens.  Like Paul, he\nheard words not lawful to be uttered; and thus in the symbolism of the\nChristian Church, he is known as the New Testament _eagle_.  He was the\none who \"saw more and heard more, but spake less than all the other\ndisciples.\"  But all the saints of God may soar and _see_ in some\nmeasure as he did--\n\n    \"On eagles' wings, they mount, they soar,\n      Their wings are faith and love,\n    Till past the cloudy regions here\n      They rise to heaven above.\"\n\n\n                     III.--THE EAGLE AND HER YOUNG.\n\n\"Her young ones also suck up blood, and where the slain are, there is\nshe\" (ver. 30).\n\nThe eagle is one of the most rapacious of birds, and her terrible\ninstincts are transmitted to her young, which \"_suck up blood_.\"  This\nis heredity in its most awful form, and is well fitted to shadow forth\nthe grim heritage of woe which is handed down to _their_ children by the\ndrunkard, the libertine, and the thief.  But in any form the thought is\na solemn one, forcing even the Psalmist to wail, \"Behold, I was shapen\nin iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.\"  The fountain of the\nlife is polluted, as well as the streams--\"Her young ones also suck up\nblood.\"\n\nBut this is not the only way in which the eagle influences her young.\nAllusion is frequently made to the way in which she supports them in\ntheir first essays at flight.  When the tired fledgeling begins to\nflutter downwards, she is said to fly beneath it, and present her back\nand wings for its support.  And this becomes a beautiful illustration to\nthe sacred writers of the paternal care of Jehovah over Israel: \"As an\neagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad\nher wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings: so the Lord alone did\nlead them, and there was no strange god with them\" (Deut. xxxii. 12).\n\"I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto Myself\" (Exod. xix.\n4).\n\nLet ours be the holy ambition to be worthy of that care.  Let us try,\nlike the young eagles, to soar and _see_ for ourselves. Let us gaze upon\nthe Sun of righteousness and rejoice in the fulness of His light,\nremembering the promise, that \"they who wait upon the Lord shall renew\ntheir strength: they shall mount up with wings as eagles: they shall run\nand not be weary, and they shall walk and not faint.\"\n\n    \"What is that, mother?  The eagle, boy!\n    Proudly careering his course with joy.\n    Firm on his own mountain-vigour relying,\n    Breasting the dark storm, the red bolt defying:\n    His wing on the wind, and his eye on the sun:\n    He swerves not a hair, but bears onward, right on.\n      Boy, may the eagle's flight ever be thine,\n      Onward and upward, true to the line.\"\n        --G. W. DOANE.\n\n\n\n\n                              *The Lion.*\n\n\n\"He went down also and slew a lion in the midst of a pit in time of\nsnow.\"--2 Sam. xxiii. 20.\n\n\nThis text treats of the way in which lions were hunted in Bible lands\nbefore the introduction of firearms. A deep pit was dug in the woods,\nand carefully covered over with withered leaves, and when the monarch of\nthe forest came out in search of his prey and stumbled into the trap, he\nwas easily secured by the wily hunters, or forthwith despatched with\ntheir long-pointed spears.  Benaiah, however, did a more valiant deed\nthan this.  He went down single-handed to the bottom of the pit and slew\nthe lion in the depth of winter. Evidently he was one of those muscular\ngiants whom all young Britons will delight to honour--a very Samson in\nsheer herculean valour, a brave and dauntless warrior, who was well\nworthy of a place among King David's mighty men.\n\nDavid himself, as a young shepherd, had gone after a lion and a bear,\nand rescued a lamb out of their teeth.  And Samson, when going down to\nthe vineyards of Timnath, had also slain a young lion which came out and\nroared against him.  But both of these encounters had taken place in the\nopen, where there was a fair field and no favour; whereas Benaiah met\nhis antagonist in the most dangerous circumstances--in the middle of\nwinter, when the lion was ravenous with hunger, and at the bottom of a\nlion-trap, where there was no possibility of escape.  Clearly this man\nwas a hero who would neither flinch nor fear: \"He slew a lion in the\nmidst of a pit in time of snow.\"\n\n*Brave and fearless*--that is the lesson which is written large for all\nhealthy and noble-minded boys, and it is taught by the character of the\nlion, no less than by the courage of the lion-slayer.  There are few\nbooks in the Bible that do not contain some reference to this majestic\nanimal, and it is always introduced as an emblem of strength and force,\nwhether used for a good purpose or abused for a bad one.  Jesus Himself\nis spoken of as the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and our adversary the\ndevil is described by Peter as a roaring lion walking about and seeking\nwhom he may devour.\n\n\n               I.--THE MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LION.\n\n(1.) It is the incarnation of *strength*. Size for size, it is one of\nthe strongest of beasts.  It can kill a man or an antelope with one blow\nof its terrible paw; and so powerful are the muscles of the neck, that\nit has been known to carry away in its mouth an ordinary ox.  Well may\nits name signify in the Arabic language \"the strong one.\"\n\n(2.) It is also celebrated for *courage*.  A lioness is simply the most\nterrible animal in existence when called upon to defend her cubs.  We\nall know how a hen, when concerned about her chicks, will beat off both\nthe fox and the hawk by the reckless fury of her attack.  And it may be\nimagined what the fury of a lioness will be when she has to fight for\nher young ones.  She cares little for the number of her foes or the\nnature of their weapons.\n\n(3.) Another marked feature is that \"in the dark there is no animal so\n*invisible* as the lion.  Almost every hunter has told a similar story\nof the lion's approach at night, of the terror displayed by the dogs and\ncattle as he drew near, and of the utter inability to see him, though he\nwas so close that they could hear his breathing.\"\n\n(4.) The main characteristic, however, is the lion's *roar*.  This is\nsaid to be truly awful.  Gordon Gumming speaks of it as being \"extremely\ngrand and peculiarly striking.  He startles the forest with loud,\ndeep-toned, solemn roars, repeated five or six times in quick\nsuccession, each increasing in loudness to the third or fourth, when his\nvoice dies away in five or six low, muffled sounds, very much resembling\ndistant thunder.\"  It is to this Amos refers when he speaks of his own\nprophetic call: \"The lion hath roared: who will not fear? The Lord God\nhath spoken: who can but prophesy?\"\n\n\n                    II.--TWO LESSONS FROM THE LION.\n\n(1.) _It is glorious to have a lion's strength, but it is inglorious to\nuse it like a lion_. When this is not attended to, heroism degenerates\ninto big-boned animalism, and courage into selfishness and ferocity.\nWhat might have been the glory of our expanding manhood and a tower of\ndefence to the weak and defenceless becomes the Titanian arrogance of\nthe bully and the senseless boast of the braggart.  This is to imitate\nthe lion in a bad sense, and \"I'd rather be a dog and bay the moon than\nsuch a Roman.\"  This is to walk in the footsteps of those Assyrian\nmonarchs who took the lion as their favourite emblem, and counted it\ntheir greatest glory to lash the nations in their fury.  But all this is\nselling oneself to do wickedness in the sight of the Lord, and becoming\nwilling captives to him who walketh about as a roaring lion seeking whom\nhe may devour.\n\n(2.) _It is glorious to have a lion's strength, if the strength be the\nmeasure of our gentleness_. It is in this sense that Jesus is the Lion\nof the tribe of Judah.  He conquers by stooping.  His other name is the\nLamb.\n\nYou remember how beautifully this is illustrated in AEsop's Fables.  A\nlion asleep in the wood one day was awakened by a little field-mouse,\nand quick as lightning he laid his terrible paw on the tiny intruder,\nand forthwith would have sentenced it to death.  But the trembling\ncaptive implored him to show mercy, and the great beast was softened,\nand allowed it to escape. And that gentleness was twice blessed--it\nblessed him that received and him that gave.  A few days after this the\nsame lion was caught in a strong net which the hunters had set for him,\nand struggle as he might, he could not set himself free.  But the little\nfield-mouse heard his terrible voice, and came to the rescue.\nPatiently, thread by thread, it gnawed through the stout rope, and the\nmonarch of the forest was free.  And no doubt, as he stood and shook his\nbushy mane before plunging into the depths of the forest, he thought\nwithin himself, saying, \"My former gentleness hath made me great.\"\n\nYes, \"he that is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he that\nruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.\"  Even a lion may be\ntamed.  Even a lion may become a lamb; and it is glorious to have a\nlion's strength when it is tempered and tamed into gentleness.\n\n\n\n\n                          *The Cock-crowing.*\n\n\n\"And one shall rise up at the voice of the bird.\"--Eccles. xii. 4.\n\n\nYouth and age are strangely blended in this chapter.  With a pathetic\nreference to old age, the young heart is called upon to remember its\nCreator in the days of its youth. The days of youth are the choice--the\nchoosing days.  They are full of temptation, but they are also blessed\nwith many great advantages; and no better season could be mentioned for\nresisting the one and improving the other than the moulding season of\nwhat the paraphrase calls \"life's gay morn.\"  Old age, like a sick-bed,\nhas enough to do with itself.  There are many discomforts that beset the\npath of the aged.  For one thing, they cannot sleep so soundly as young\npeople do. \"_They rise up at the voice of the bird_.\"  The first twitter\nof the swallow under the eaves, or the first crowing of the cock, is\nquite sufficient to break their night's repose, for their light and\nfitful slumbers are very easily disturbed.  And old age is soon followed\nby death.  The silver cord is loosed, and the golden bowl is broken; the\npitcher is broken at the fountain, and the wheel broken at the cistern.\nAnd the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns unto\nGod who gave it.  How foolish then to neglect religion until a time of\ndecay like that!  It is worse than foolish: it is suicidal.  The whole\nlife ought to be given to God, and not the mere dregs of the cup.\n\"Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come\nnot, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in\nthem.\"\n\n    \"Deep on thy soul, before its powers\n      Are yet by vice enslaved,\n    Be thy Creator's glorious name\n      And character engraved.\"\n\n\n            I.--THE COCK-CROWING AS A DIVISION OF THE NIGHT.\n\nWe are so accustomed nowadays to clocks and watches, that the ancient\ndifficulty of marking the time may never have occurred to us.  We listen\nto our time-pieces striking the hours and think no more about it.  But\nthe Jew had no such time-piece.  He had no other way of knowing the hour\nthan by listening to the voices of nature.  The starry heavens stretched\nabove him like a great clock, and he could read its face every night.\nThe clear ringing voice of chanticleer was also heard, reminding him of\nthe advent of the dawn.  And listening to these and such like voices,\nand dividing the night by means of them, he was able in a rough and\ngeneral way to tell the advance of the hours.  He made the night to\nconsist of four watches--\"the even\" from sunset to about nine o'clock,\n\"midnight\" from nine to twelve, \"cock-crowing\" from twelve to three, and\n\"morning\" from three to sunrise (see Mark xiii. 35).\n\nThe Rabbis used to say that David, the sweet singer of Israel, had a\nharp hung over his bed, which sounded at midnight of its own accord, and\nwoke the king to prayer. And the children may remember that our own King\nAlfred is reported to have used graduated candles to measure the hours\nof the night.  But until the advent of the pendulum, the accurate\nmeasurement of time was impossible.  The face of the sky or the crowing\nof the cock could not give an exact chronometry.\n\nNevertheless it had one clear advantage. It kept man in touch with\nnature.  It made him listen reverently to the voices of the night.  And\nthat was an education which we can ill afford to disregard.  We are not\nmade richer by its loss.  We may only have lost our reverence for the\nsake of our mathematics.  Influenced by it, the pious Jew responded to\nevery voice of nature by uttering a blessing on the divine name.  Even\nwhen the crow of the cock fell on his ear he was instructed to say,\n\"Blessed is He who hath given wisdom to the bird.\"  If our modern\nchronometry has abolished that, perhaps we have paid too dear for our\nclocks and watches.  To have time-pieces that go to the minute is a\ngreat deal; but to hear voices that keep us in touch with God is a great\ndeal more.  \"Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth.\"  Rise up\nand pray at \"_the voice of the bird_.\"  We are even told that God giveth\n_songs_ in the night (Job xxxv. 10).\n\n    \"They err who say that music dwells\n      Alone within the halls of light;\n    In anthems loud it also swells\n      Within the temple of the night.\n\n    The happy birds that soar and sing\n      May all be mute when day is done,\n    The hum of insects on the wing\n      May sink to silence with the sun.\n\n    But when the sounds of toil are o'er,\n      And silence reigns beneath the stars,\n    A murmur runs along the shore,\n      Where ocean smites his sandy bars.\n\n    Its echo floats upon the wind,\n      Beneath the moonbeam's mystic light,\n    And stealing o'er the listening mind,\n      Produces music in the night.\n\n    While far among the stars, as runs\n      The legend through a thousand years,\n    Amid the rolling of the suns\n      Is heard the _music of the spheres_.\n\n    The roll of ocean and of star\n      Dispensing music through the night;\n    The one behind its sandy bar,\n      The other in the realms of light.\n\n    But both to teach the human breast\n      That He who guides the star and wave\n    Can also breathe a psalm of rest\n      Around the portal of the grave.\n\n    The night of grief, of sin, of death,\n      Is not impervious to His power;\n    It feels the influence of His breath,\n      Like springtime come to woo the flower.\n\n    It melts in music o'er the soul,\n      For grief has caught the glorious light,\n    And rolling as the billows roll,\n      _His_ songs are heard within the night.\"\n\n\n              II.--THE COCK-CROWING AND THE FALL OF PETER.\n\n\"Verily I say unto thee, Before the COCK crow _twice_, thou shalt deny\nMe thrice\" (Mark xiv. 30).  But why twice?  There is no mention of this\ndetail in the other three gospels.  No; but Mark got his information\nfrom Peter himself.  The pain of the degradation had sunk so deeply into\nPeter's soul that he had no difficulty in recalling each separate\nparticular.  His self-confidence had been so great that he would _not_\ndeny his Lord, and his subsequent profanity had been so awful after he\nhad once entered on the downward course, that not one warning was\nsufficient to show him his danger, but a warning repeated and repeated\nagain, before he was rudely awakened from the terrible stupor of his\nsin.  The first crowing of the cock at midnight, and the second\ncrowing-time about three o'clock, were both alike needed to arouse and\nhumble him in the dust; and thus with painful accuracy he was able to\nrecall the very words of the Master, \"Before the cock crow _twice_, thou\nshalt deny Me thrice.\"\n\nOn the other hand, his self-confidence was a measure of his sincerity.\nMatthew Henry has well said, that Judas said nothing when Christ told\n_him_ he would betray Him.  There was no protesting on his part.  \"He\nsinned by contrivance, Peter by surprise: he devised the wickedness,\nPeter was overtaken in this fault.\"  In the language of \"Baxter's Second\nInnings,\" \"It was a _swift_ that bowled out Peter, the night the cock\ncrowed.\"  And the same author adds, \"The best of boys are sometimes\ntaken by swifts.\"  But, swift or slow, it was clearly Peter's duty not\nto wait even for the first crowing of the cock, before he laid to heart\nthe solemn warning of the Master.  It would have been his wisdom to say,\n\"Lord, Thou knowest my nature better than I do; and if Satan desires to\nhave me, that he may sift me as wheat, take Thou charge of my life, lead\nme not into temptation, but deliver me from evil.\"  That would have been\nPeter's wisdom and safety.  But this he didn't do.  He planted his feet\non the shifting sand of his own self-confidence, and fell into the awful\nquagmire of denying his Lord.  He would not believe the pointed warning\nof his Master, and therefore he was left to start up at the voice of the\nbird, and to go out and weep bitterly.  The cock-crowing may come to one\nman as the summons to praise and prayer; but it comes to another as the\nvery trump of God, calling him to penitence or--judgment.\n\n\n           III.--THE COCK-CROWING AND CHRIST'S SECOND COMING.\n\n\"Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house\ncometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or in the\nmorning\" (Mark xiii. 35). There is here a large element of uncertainty.\nNot the uncertainty of the event, for the second coming of Jesus is one\nof the things that cannot be shaken, but the uncertainty of the _time_.\n\"Of that day or that hour knoweth no man, not even the angels in heaven,\nneither the Son, but the Father.\"  The time of His coming has not been\nrevealed, to the end that we should be always ready.\n\nAnd yet, in that early age, the second advent was believed to be nigh at\nhand. Jesus spake of it as \"_a little while_.\"  \"Behold, I come\n_quickly_, and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his\nwork shall be.\"  And James, the Lord's brother, wrote, \"Be patient,\ntherefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord, for the coming of the\nLord draweth nigh.\"  If the little while has now stretched out into\ncenturies, and the crowing of the cock has not yet been heard, it is not\nbecause the Saviour has forgotten His promise, but because the\ngodlessness of men and the worldliness of the Church have raised up\ninnumerable obstacles in His way.  Oh, if men would but repent and turn\nagain to Him, those times of refreshing would not be long delayed. God\nwould send Jesus, whom the heavens must receive until the times of\nrestoration of all things (Acts iii. 19-21, R.V.).\n\nWhat a coming that will be to all those who love His appearing!  At\nmidnight, or at the cock-crowing, the cry will be heard, \"Behold, the\nBridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet Him.\"  And they who are ready will\nrise up at \"the voice of the bird,\" and go in with Him to the marriage\nsupper of the Lamb.  But the foolish virgins will be shut outside.  They\ntoo will rise up at the voice of the bird; but for them, alas! it will\nbe no \"bird of the _dawn_.\"  Like Judas, they will go out into the\ndarkness--a darkness that has no morning; and there will be the weeping\nand the woe.\n\nBut that day, or rather that night, has not yet arrived.  It has not yet\ncome for you young people.  With you it is still the time of _choosing_;\nand if you choose Jesus, if you remember your Creator in the days of\nyour youth, that evil day will never come at all.  The cock-crowing will\nstill be to you the trump of God; but it will call you to happiness and\nnot to misery.  It will proclaim to you the advent of the eternal dawn;\nand you will rise up at the voice of the bird to exclaim, \"Even so,\ncome, Lord Jesus.\"\n\n\n\n\n                                *Peace.*\n\n\n\"Then had thy peace been as a river.\"--Isa. xlviii. 18.\n\n\n    I sat alone in the pinewood,\n      And mused with the falling leaves;\n    And the Autumn breath like a requiem\n      Hymned low for the garnered sheaves.\n\n    And the pensiveness of the Autumn,\n      Like the ocean rocked to rest,\n    Found a fitting shell-like murmur\n      In the heavings of my breast.\n\n    For a something came from the stillness,\n      It had touched me oft before,\n    Sometimes in the hush of pinewood,\n      Sometimes on the lonely shore.\n\n    It came and it touched my being,\n      Laid its finger on my brain,\n    And there alone in the pinewood\n      I could _pray_ as a child again.\n\n    It was not the spell of memory\n      Cast around me its soothing power,\n    Nor the magic of thought that held me\n      Entranced in that silent hour.\n\n    The rarest and deepest impressions\n      Come from fingers, but not our own,\n    From music unbarred and unmeasured,\n      From language unuttered, unknown.\n\n    They come, the unnamed and the dateless,\n      They come as the waves of light,\n    Like the murmuring breath of the pine-woods,\n      Like the voices of the night.\n\n    And they leave their deep impressions\n      In the tidemarks of the soul,\n    Those pulses that come as in secret,\n      And roll as the billows roll.\n\n    It may be in yon far region,\n      Far above the remotest star,\n    My glowing and growing vision\n      May find what those pulses are.\n\n    May find in the land of the morning,\n      In the brightness beyond the flood,\n    That the pensive hush of the woodland\n      Was a breath of the _peace_ of God.\n\n    Till then I will seek the pinewoods,\n      I will muse with the falling leaves,\n    And watch the design in symbols\n      That the silent finger weaves.\n\n    And catch from the fleeting river,\n      And the ocean so vast and broad,\n    From the Autumn quiet and the pinewoods,\n      How to know and worship God.\n\n\n\n\n           *      *      *      *      *      *      *      *\n\n\n\n\n                      *THE \"GOLDEN NAILS\" SERIES*\n\n                                   of\n\n                        ADDRESSES TO THE YOUNG.\n\n       _Post 8vo size.  Neat Cloth Binding.  Price 1s. 6d. each._\n\n\"Messrs Oliphant, Anderson, & Ferrier's 'Golden Nails' Series is one of\nthe happiest of recent enterprises in book-publishing. Every volume has\nhad a good reception, and every new volume increases one's admiration\nfor the enterprise.\"--_Expository Times_.\n\n\nGOLDEN NAILS, and Other Addresses to Children.  By the Rev. GEORGE\nMILLIGAN, B.D.\n\nPLEASANT PLACES.  Words to the Young.  By the Rev. R. S. DUFF, D.D.\n\nPARABLES AND SKETCHES.  By ALFRED E. KNIGHT. With Illustrations by the\nAuthor.\n\nSILVER WINGS.  Addresses to Children.  By the Rev. ANDREW G. FLEMING.\n\nTHREE FISHING BOATS, and Other Talks to Children. By the Rev. JOHN C.\nLAMBERT, B.D.\n\nLAMPS AND PITCHERS, and Other Addresses to Children.  By the Rev. GEORGE\nMILLIGAN, D.D.\n\nA BAG WITH HOLES, and Other Talks to Children. By the Rev. JAS.\nAITCHISON.\n\nKINGLESS FOLK, and Other Addresses on Bible Animals.  By the Rev. JOHN\nADAMS, B.D.","title":"Kingless Folk, and Other Addresses on Bible Animals","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":23368}