XXV. A Tenth of A11. GEN. xxviii. 22.

And of all that

Thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto Thee." "TAKE it quick, quick," said a merchant, who had promised, like Jacob, to return to the Lord a tenth of all that he should give him, and found that it amounted to so large a sum, that he said, "I cannot give so much," and set aside. a smaller amount. Then his conscience smote him, and, coming to himself, he said, "What! can I be so mean? Because God has thus blessed me that I have this large profit, shall I now rob Him of his portion?" And fearing his own selfish nature, he made haste to place it beyond his reach in the treasury of the Lord, coming almost breathless to the pastor's house, and holding the money in his outstretched hand.

XXVI. Helping on the Work of God. GEN. xxviii. 22. "Of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto Thee."

A WIDOW found pardon and peace in her Saviour in her sixty-ninth year. Her gratitude and love overflowed and often refreshed the hearts of Christians of long experience. The house of God became very dear to her, and she was often seen to drop a gift in the church door box though her income was only 2s. 6d. per week. A fall in her seventy-second year prevented her ever coming out again.

A little boy being seen to drop something into the box, was asked what it was. He said, "It is Mrs. W- -'s penny." He was told to take it back to her, and to say that her good intention was prized, but that her friends could not let her thus reduce her small means, especially as she could not come out to worship. She replied, "Boy, why did you let them see you give it? Take it again and put it in when no one sees you." Then weeping she said, "What! and am I not to be allowed to help in the work of God any more because I can't get out?"

XXVII. A Christian Boyhood. GEN. xxxix. 2. "And the Lord was with Joseph."

DR. HAROLD SCHOFIELD, the talented missionary to China, lived a life of singular beauty, purity, and devotion. He

had that best of all earthly blessings-a good and godly mother. The gracious training of his childish days bore fruit early. "When nine years old he was truly converted to God." The circumstances of his conversion are singularly beautiful, and should encourage Christian parents not only to pray for, but to expect from, their children an early decision for Christ. An elder brother, who was away at school, had just found the Saviour, and had written to tell his brother of his new-found joy. After reading the letter, Harold was deeply affected, and a servant noticing his agitation went to his mother to tell her that "Harold was walking up and down the dining-room in great distress of mind." "I sent for him," his mother says, " and he handed me a letter from his brother, and stood by me in tears to think that he was not saved like him. I spoke simply of the sacrifice of Christ, and I shall never forget the ray of joy that beamed through his tearful eyes and lighted up his whole face as he owned that Christ had saved him too." Who can wonder that the spiritual life which had so gracious a beginning, had so fair a continuance and so glorious a close! Happy the child who at nine years of age is led to Jesus by a brother's letter and a mother's voice!

The gladness of that day, the settled conviction that he was Christ's and Christ his, seems never to have been lost, hardly dimmed in after years.

At school he soon won the highest place, and began his brilliant series of prize winnings. Here, too, he took his stand as a thorough-going Christian. "His piety was as well-known to all the boys as his diligence ;" and in after years old schoolfellows testified to the blessing received through his earnest religious talk in the play-ground. He was, however, always ready for out-door exercises and holiday excursions, cycling and boating expeditions in which a touch of danger only added to the interest of the enterprise.

At the University, and at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, be never hesitated to declare himself Christ's servant; and it was soon recognised by the other students that Schofield's presence must put an end to everything wrong in word or act.

XXVIII. Praying First. GEN. xli. 9. "I remember my faults this day."

Two Christian men "fell out." One heard that the other was talking against him, and he went to him and said, "Will you be kind enough to tell me my faults to my face, that I may profit by your Christian candour and try to get rid of them?" "Yes, sir," replied the other; "I will do it." They went aside, and the former said: "Before you commence telling what you think wrong in me, will you please bow down with me and let us pray over it, that my eyes may be opened to see my faults as you will tell them? You lead in the prayer." It was done, and when the prayer was over the man who had sought the interview said, "Now proceed with what you have to complain of in me." But the other replied, “After praying over it, it looks so little that it is not worth talking about. The truth is, I feel now that in going around talking against you I have been serving the devil myself, and have need that you pray for me and forgive me the wrong I have done you."

Here and there in almost every community is a man or woman who might profit by this incident.

XXIX. Troubles. GEN. xli. 52. "The land of my afflic

tion."

"WHEN in Amsterdam, Holland, last summer," traveller, "I was much interested in a visit we made to a place then famous for polishing diamonds. We saw the men engaged in the work. When a diamond is found it is rough and dark like a common pebble. It takes a long time to polish it, and it is very hard work. It is held by means of a piece of metal close to the surface of a large wheel which is kept going round. Fine diamond dust is · put on this wheel, nothing else being hard enough to polish the diamond. And this work is kept on for months and sometimes for several years before it is finished. And if a diamond is intended for a king then the greater trouble and time are spent upon it."

Jesus calls His people His jewels. To fit them for beautifying His crown, they must be polished like diamonds, and He makes use of the troubles He sends to polish His jewels.

XXX. A Son's Affection. GEN. xlv. 3.

"And Joseph said unto his brethren, I am Joseph; doth my father yet live?" THE Huguenots were persecuted beyond measure in southern France, and were not allowed to meet together for worship.

On New Year's Day, 1756, the Church at Nîmes held a service in the gorge in the desert. The people had scarcely assembled when they were surprised by the soldiers. They flew up the rocks like a scattered flock of goats. Among the more agile was a young man named Jules Fabre. Suddenly he remembered his father, a feeble old man of seventy. He was sure that he could not have escaped. Returning, he found his fears realized; his father and another man had been captured. He ran up to the soldiers and insisted on their accepting him in place of his father. The old man besought him to go. The altercation had gone on some time, when the young man seized his aged parent round the waist and carried him to a stone, where he gently laid him down, more dead than alive. Jules Fabre then gave himself up as a prisoner, was convicted of being present at an illegal assembly, and sent to the galleys, where he might have remained for life, had not the peculiarity of the case touched the hearts of some powerful people, and he was released at the end of six years.

XXXI. The Homesick Mount. GEN. xlvii. 9.

days of the years of my pilgrimage."

"The

WE are told that in the neighbourhood of Interlaken there is a prominent point, though not of great height, called the "Heimwch Fluh," which means the Homesick Mount. It is so called because it is generally the last spot which the traveller visits before leaving that part of Switzerland, and at a time when his thoughts are turned homeward. It commands a view of the whole valley of Interlaken, with its cultivated fields and pastures and picturesque villages and lakes in the cup of mountain walls, and beyond the Jungfrau and other mountains, which never doff their caps of eternal snow. It is beautiful to look upon, but the heart of the tourist is not there. He is thinking of friends

It is the Homesick

and loved ones, and his own country. Mount. And so they to whom faith makes the invisible most real may have their moments of uplifting, standing on some "Heimweh Fluh," some Mount of Homesickness, and, while they acknowledge all the beauty, all the glory, all the gladness of the world, their hearts are not here; this sight does not enthral them, for their faces are turned toward home. They dwell in the Land of Promise as in a strange country.

XXXII.

is to be

Eternity, and Where it is to Spent. GEN. xlvii. 29. "And the time drew nigh that Israel must die: and he called his son Joseph."

A MINISTER was dying, and he called his son, who was a thoughtless lad, to his bedside. "Tom," he said, “will you promise me one thing before I die? I only ask that, when I am gone, you will go every evening alone for fifteen minutes and say, 'What is eternity? and where shall I spend it?" The promise was given, and faithfully kept. At first the lad thought little of the words; but he went on doing as he had promised, until at last he was not able to face the awful question any longer, and gave himself up to Jesus.

XXXIII.

The Great Pilot is on Board. GEN. xlviii. 21. "And Israel said unto Joseph, Behold, I die: but God shall be with you."

JOHN OWEN, two days before he died, thus wrote in a letter to a friend: "I am leaving the ship of the Church in a storm; but whilst the great Pilot is in it, the loss of a poor under-rower will be inconsiderable."

XXXIV. The Persecution of the Huguenots. EXOD. ii. 23. "The children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage."

MANY otherwise estimable people approved the Huguenot persecution at the time. Thus Madame de Sévigné, one of the most amiable women of the seventeenth century, a most tender mother, an example of virtue, and noted for

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