mother good-bye; and if you would come back for the second Sunday, I would too and have another Sunday evening here before I go to Australia."

This being agreed to, William returned to his lodging on the Saturday night. On the following morning he seemed out of spirits.

"Because it don't do to live two lives."

Little did that navvy think, when he uttered these words, that he was preaching a sermon which would reach the eye, and perhaps the hearts, of tens of thousands! We should all be the better, day by day, to remember, "It don't do to live two lives." It is

"Why, I have not parted. I have promised her not to go. I am her only son. She never stopped fretting until I gave over going."

The next day he started for Windsor in search of work.

His landlady informed Miss Marsh that William had been trying to persuade her husband to go to church with him on the Sunday; but he answered, "It is all very well for you, William, with your good clothes and spruce boots; but look at my old shoes, with the holes in them. I won't go till I can go like other people."

The generous fellow immediately threw off his boots. and said, "Take them, Peter, and I'll wear your old shoes sooner than you should not go to the house of God."

Meeting another navvy, John H., Miss Marsh said, "Will you come to church next Sunday?"

"Church! no; I never goes to such places!" "Will you come to a cottage where we have a Scripture reading for Crystal Palace workmen ?" "No; I goes to nothing of that sort."

"Perhaps you would like a little Testament to carry in your waistcoat pocket?"

"Well, I shouldn't mind that."

Crossing the road, Miss Marsh spoke to another young man, and told him of her father's first sermon, and the story of a man who heard it who was called "Swearing Tom" before and "Praying Tom" ever after.

John H. had been listening, when he said, "I'll come, now, to that 'ere reading you spoke of. Where is it?"

John afterwards was seen by Miss Marsh in a not very reputable condition; notwithstanding, she wrote in large characters notes of invitation to church to John and others, many of whom, on the following Sunday, in their clean white slops, filled the aisle. Meeting John, she asked if he had got her letter.

"A letter for me all the way from where you went!" he shouted. "Well, the postman did bring one, and I said 'Tain't for me. Nobody cares to write to me;' so I sent it back. But I'll go and pull the post-office about their ears if they don't give it me back again!"

Meeting Miss Marsh again, he said, "You ain't a-going to ask me to come to the lecture, after the way you heard me shouting the other evening? I had been to the public.'

"I was sure of it, John. But still, I want you to come this evening."

one.

I MUST DO RIGHT.

MUST do right," said Annie Blake to her friend CarrieGifford, who was urging her to ride for pleasure

upon the Sabbath.

"The children will be disappointed," pleaded Carrie. "They have been talking all the week about it. Uncle so seldom hires a carriage and takes them with him. And then we wished you to see the Park; and if you do not

go to-day you will have no other opportunity." Annie looked distressed. "Please excuse me," she said. "I will stay quietly at home and read while you are gone."

"If you do not go, none of us can, so uncle says. I do not care for myself, but I know that it will be a great disappointment to the children to remain at home."

"I am very sorry," said Annie.. "I wish your uncle had asked me before he ordered the carriage. I would gladly do anything that I thought was right to oblige you. I do so hate to seem ill-natured upon my first visit to you."

"Oh, then you will relent; I knew you would. I said I knew you were too good-natured to make any of us uncomfortable."

"No, Carrie. Do not mistake me. I cannot do what I know to be wrong, however much it may pain me to refuse." And saying this, Annie Blake left the room. She could not restrain her tears. "How unkind and ill-natured I shall seem! The children, whom I love so dearly, will never like me again. But I have done what I felt to be right. This is my only comfort."

When she saw the family again, every one was as kind and pleasant as usual. In the evening she asked if any one was going to church. Mr. Gifford said that he would accompany her. He had not been to church for several years. Carrie looked surprised, but did not make any remark. The sermon was solemn and impressive. Mr. Gifford was silent and thoughtful. Annie attributed his silence to displeasure with her.

As if in answer to these thoughts, he remarked, "I am deeply indebted to you, Miss Blake. Your example to-day has been a sermon which I shall never forget.

Would that I had had, all through my life, the same courage that you have manifested! Fear of offending others, and the dread of ridicule, have often kept me from doing what I knew to be right. To-night I have resolved to begin-anew. My attendance upon church is the first step in the right direction."

"Oh, sir, I am glad!" said Annie; "I hope you will go on, not trusting to yourself alone, but remember the promise, 'My strength shall be sufficient for thee.""

Is there not a lesson to be drawn from this simple incident? We need not fear ridicule, or dread giving pain, when we are conscientiously performing our duty. If we would win the love and esteem of our friends, and the approbation of our Heavenly Father, let the language of our lips and the motto of our lives ever be, "I must do right."

SEARCHERS AFTER TRUTH.

HE REV. THOMAS CHALMERS in his youth, and even for some years after he had become an ordained minister of Christ, spent mind, strength, and time in seeking eagerly and earnestly for happiness; not in Christ, for Him he did not then know; not in his work, which was only performed as something that must be got through, but in which he found

pleasure; but in mathematical and scientific pursuits!

But when once Chalmers Madison Mad "found the pearl of great price," che at once gave up "all that he had," mid all that he liked best, and bought od that pearl." Not that he altogether put science aside as useless; he did not do that; but he at once gave it up as the pursuit of his life, and that in which he was to find his chief enjoyment. His hitherto neglected Bible was now his great delight; and as its treasures gradually unfolded to his view, he spoke of the hours which he spent in poring over its pages as "all too little! all too little!" and his masterly mind and energies were henceforth engaged in speaking of this new-found "pearl" to all within his reach.

A missionary was once preaching at his tent-door to about a hundred and fifty persons, when he observed a tall old man approaching, leaning on a silver-headed cane. He sat down with the rest, and listened with marked attention, and afterwards addressing him, said, "Sahib, I have been to every holy place in India; I have consulted all the sages and pundits I have met with; I am two years short of eighty, and have not found a religion in which I can hope for eternity. My remaining days are few; the evening of my life

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has set in; and, oh!" he exclaimed, with emotion, may it please God to bring me, at the close of my long life, to know and find a way by which I can die in peace! Do give me a book which will tell me this way, and I will read it earnestly."

A Gospel was given, and eventually a whole New Testament; and, after further instruction, he was lost sight of, as the missionary was only travelling through the country. But we cannot believe that such a seeker would fail to find, and finding, to give up all, as he was warned he must be prepared to do, in order to possess the " "pearl of great price."

Peter Waldo, who lived in the twelfth century, when the Romish Church had become very corrupt, was a citizen of Lyons, a wealthy merchant, and a man of learning, so that he was able to read the Latin Bible, which was the only version at that time in Europe. It has been usual to speak of him as the founder of the Waldenses, but this is a great mistake, as he seems never to have been among them at all. Apparently he was living at ease, like the rest of the world, until one evening, when at supper with some friends, one of them fell down dead suddenly. This first led him to think of his soul, and he became very much concerned to find out the way of salvation. Hitherto he had just believed what the priests told him, and concerned himself very little about religion in any way. But now he was in earnest: he could not rest until he found peace to his troubled conscience; and this he at length found, not in his Church, but in Christ, revealed to him through the study of the Scriptures.

1

We may, however, judge by his actions of the joy he felt when he had discovered Jesus to be the only Saviour, and his own Saviour. The people around were not fed with the Bread of Life, as in the present day, nor were the poor cared for; so Peter Waldo, full of his new-found treasure, gave up all that he had formerly cared for, left the mercantile profession, distributed his wealth among the poor, and set to work to teach all around him the true way of life. And as he had found happiness himself in the study of the Scriptures, so he determined that the people should have them also, and either himself translated them into the language commonly spoken at the time, or was the means of getting it done. This point is not ascertained; but it is known certainly that the Christian world was indebted to him for the Provençal or Romaunt version, which was forbidden by the Council of Toulouse, just because it was in the language of the people!

He laboured diligently also to teach the people, and when reproved for doing so by the Romish Archbishop of Lyons, he said, that though he was a layman, yet he could not be silent on a matter which concerned salvation. Probably he felt that he stood almost alone, when he saw the corruptions of the Church and the vices of the priests increasing daily; and as he discovered the truth he could not but speak, and speak he

did very boldly, notwithstanding the contempt and reproach which this conduct drew down upon him. He had found the "pearl" after diligent search himself, and he had learnt its immense value, and how much depended on the possession of it. So, when he heard that another new error was to be introduced, and that the people were commanded to worship a piece of bread, and to believe that after the priest had blessed it the bread was changed into the real body of Christ Himself, he said that it was another attempt to cheat the people, and to make them bow down to idols instead of placing all their hopes in the Lord Jesus alone; and notwithstanding the dangers that surrounded him, he

opposed it with all

his might.

Waldo had now many friends and adherents, but the storm became too violent for them, they could neither protect him nor themselves; So, after Waldo had lived for three years concealed in Lyons, he was

obliged to escape, and his disciples followed his example. Pope Alexander III. had pronounced his anathema against the reformer and his adherents, and a persecution began which soon scattered them far and wide. And thus, while they were suffering the loss of all things for the truth's sake, and going continually in fear of their lives, they were carrying the treasure which they had discovered into all lands. Waldo himself went first into Dauphiny, and afterwards into Picardy; and when Philip Augustus of France took up arms against the poor persecuted Christians there, he at last fled into Bohemia, where he settled and lived till his death. In all these countries there had been people who had followed the simple faith of Christ before his going among them; but no doubt his arrival and his earnest zeal strengthened their hands and

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established them in this faith, and his Romaunt Bible must have been an inestimable boon wherever it went. Some of his disciples carried this into the valleys of Piedmont, where there were many Vallenses, and they probably joined themselves to the inhabitants of these valleys, and thus, it may be, their name has become, changed to Waldenses.

Often and often were they subjected to most fearful sufferings. Sometimes numbers were seized and put to death, or imprisoned and tortured, while at other times they were driven out of their beloved valleys

on their refusal to go to mass. And this went on century after century, without apparently diminishing their numbers; for, notwithstanding the cruelties practised on the parents, the children rose up to defend the treasure which had been bequeathed to them, and in their turn were ready to shed their life's blood rather

than part with

it.

"I have already," said Samson, "confessed myself to God."

"Throw him down!" said the cruel inquisitor. The next day, the viceroy, passing below near the said tower, saw the poor fellow yet alive, with all his bones broken. He kicked him with his foot on the head, saying, "Is the dog yet alive? Give him to the hogs to eat!"

Thus amidst the most cruel persecutions did the faithful Vaudois hold fast the truths of the Scriptures.

Now, our minister said to me the other day, "John, if you were on the committees of some of our societies you would see this mouse-hunting done to perfection. Not only committees, but whole bodies of Christian people, go mouse-hunting." Well, said I, minister, just write me a bit, and I will stick it in my book; it will be beef to my horse-radish. Here's his writing:

"A society of good Christian people will split into pieces over a petty quarrel, or mere matter of opinion, while all around them the masses are perishing for want of the Gospel. A miserable little mouse, which no cat would ever hunt, takes them off from their Lord's work. Again, intelligent men will spend months of time and heaps of money in inventing and publishing mere speculations, while the great field of the world lies unploughed. They seem to care nothing how many may perish so long as they can ride their hobbies. In other matters a little common sense is allowed to rule, but in the weightiest matters foolishness is sadly conspicuous. As for you and me, John,

I

A MOUSE.

HERE'S not much profit in this game. Think of a man and a boy and four horses all standing still for the sake of a mouse! What would old friend Tusser say to that? I think he would rhyme in this fashion

A ploughman deserveth a cut of the whip. If for idle pretence he let the hours slip. Heaps of people act like the man in our picture. They have a great work in hand which wants all their wits, and they leave it to squabble over some pretty nothing, not worth a fig. Old master Tom would say to them

No more tittle tattle, go on with your cattle.

He could not bear for a farmer to let his horses out for carting even, because it took their work away from the farm, and so I am sure he would be in a great stew if he saw farmers wasting their time at matches, and hunts, and the like. He says

"Who slacketh his tillage a carter to be,

For groat got abroad, at home shall lose three;
For sure by so doing he brings out of heart,
Both land for the corn, and horse for the cart."

If

The main chance must be minded, and the little things must be borne with. Nobody would burn his house down to kill the blackbeetles, and it would never answer to kill the bullocks to feed the cats. our baker left off making bread for a week while he cracked the cockroaches, what should we all do for breakfast? If the butcher sold no more meat till he had killed all the blow-flies, we should be many a day without mutton. If the water companies never gave the Londoners a drink till they had fished every gudgeon out of the Thames, how would the old ladies make their tea? There's no use in stopping your fishing because of the sea-weed, nor your riding because of the dust.

From John Ploughman's Pictures, published by Alabaster & Co.

a mousetrap or a cat should not thoughts.

occupy all our

"The paltry trifles of this world are much of the same sort. Let us give our chief attention to the chief things, the glory of God, the winning of souls for Jesus, and our own salvation. There are fools enough in the world, and there can be no need that Christian men should swell the number. Go on with your ploughing, John, and I will go on with my preaching, and in due season we shall reap if we faint not."