faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing.' How many last words of dying saints come crowding on my memory! The latest were those of an aged servant of Christ by whose bedside I was kneeling when he exclaimed, 'Thine, Lord, is the kingdom-and the power-and the glory; For ever-and ever-and ever- and as I closed the dying eyes I uttered the Amen! But I did not intend to spend so much time in speaking of these Last Words, but I feel deeply to night that the words I speak will be my last words to you. It is not at all probable that we shall meet again; will you therefore allow me to say that I was much struck this evening with the conversation that followed Lena's affirmation that for her the last of anything' possessed a charm? I would not prevent your free expression of opinion, but the question occurred to my own mindMight not the last be merged in the Too late? It is not a pleasant thing when you have stayed till the last minute before starting to catch a last train, and then have reached the station to find the door shut, and the only words you obtain from the stolid porter are the suggestive words, 'Too late!' I could imagine my 'strong-minded' young friend equal to this emergency, but there are other and more serious matters that I would mention. The glad news of salvation for the chief of sinners has frequently been brought before you; where I to put to you the question, 'What must I do to be saved?' any one of you could point me to the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.' Ah! my young friends, to know the way, to describe the way, to point the way, is not sufficient; you must tread the way. Jesus said, 'Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.' Will you come now? Which of you will venture to say, 'I will wait to be the last ?' Might you not be too late? The glorious Gospel Feast is spread; the invitations are issued; the guest-robes provided; 'millions of transgressors poor' have been admitted, and yet there is room.' Will you wait for the last seat at the table? Is it safe? the wedding is furnished with guests; might you not be too late? It is right for the captain of an ill-fated vessel to be the last to leave his sinking ship; it was noble of the Christian miner to say to his comrade, when only one of them could be rescued from danger, 'Jump in, Bill; you are not saved: in a few minutes I shall be in heaven.' But it will be madness if now receiving another invitation to accept the pardon purchased by the blood of Jesus, and freely offered to you, any one of you should venture to say, 'I hope to do so, but I will be the last of the class.' May I press the questions, -Which of you will accept His gracious offers now? and which of you will be the last?" "O, Sir!" said Lena F-, as the gentleman sat down, "I have often, very often, been self-condemned, that I have not yielded to the strivings of God's Holy Spirit; and while you have been speaking, I have felt burdened beyond measure. Dear Emily's innocent question, 'Where will you go to at last?' was a knock at the door of my heart, and since then my feelings can only be told by the following words, 'Knocking knocking! What! still knocking! He still there! What's the hour? The night is waning, "Lena, my dear," said Miss W—, 66 'you know Who said, 'Come unto Me, and I will give you rest.' The little party now sang the wellknown hymn, "Just as I am," and after prayer they separated and went to their own homes. Grace L-accompanied Lena, and in her own quiet way spoke of the Saviour's love for sinners. Thoroughly was Lena broken down; and if any of my readers are interested enough to ask the question, "Did she open? doth she? will she? they will be glad to know that she was not the last of the girls to realize the preciousness of forgiving love. The last time her teacher conversed with her, she was calmly resting on the Atonement, and repeated with streaming eyes "Tears of joy mine eyes o'erflow That I have any hope of heaven; LILLIE. NARRATIVES AND INCIDENTS. GOD'S FLOWERS: SHALL THEY PERISH? "Flowers that could bless you for having blessed them, and will love you for having loved them; flowers that have eyes like yours, and thoughts like yours, and lives like yours; which once saved you save for ever."-JOHN RUSKIN. PROFESSOR W- sat at his librarytable, on which lay an open volume; and though it treated of a subject in which he was greatly interested, he now vainly strove to fix his attention upon the page before him. His mind pertinaciously wandered back to the neglected beings whose dismal abodes in the neighbouring city he had recently visited; and the words of his companion, a brave, laborious homemissionary, came ringing in his ears with a strange rousing power, "Some of these might have been holy and happy men and women, if Christian people had but done their duty." Professor W- had for many years been a zealous servant of Jesus Christ. To his great abilities and rare scholarly attainments, were added the graces of a renewed and sanctified nature. His ready sympathy, and actively benevolent disposition had won for him an enviable place in the hearts of many whose lives had been cheered, and whose burdens had been lightened, by his kindly words and generous assistance. Yet as he sat there, his conscience spoke in tones of reproach. He felt that the good he had done, was as nothing compared with what he might and ought to have accomplished; and the question he propounded to himself was this, "What more can I do to advance the kingdom of the Lord Christ ?" The sound of his children's voices at play without broke in upon his reverie ; and the Professor, his query still unanswered, stepped across the room, and took his stand at the window. He watched to its close the game carried on by his three sturdy boys; and was about to turn away, when he saw his gentle-hearted little daughter come forward, and stooping down, tenderly upraise the prostrate daisies which her brothers in their heedless romp had trampled on and crushed. The father's eye wandered from the loving child to the hills that encircled his home, and a great purpose took possession of his mind. He knew that in the valleys there dwelt numbers of persons who had neither sanctuary nor teacher, to whom the Sabbath was little better than any of the other six unhallowed days. Here were souls bowed down by sin; weary of the load, perhaps, and yet ignorant of a resting-place where human guilt and sorrow may be thrown off, exchanged for a "peace which passeth all understanding;" for a joy which the world can neither give nor take away. He resolved to go among these, and try to do for them what his child had done for the daisies, giving them the message of their loving Saviour, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." His resolution was put into practice, and week after week, Professor Wsacrificed his Sunday privileges and enjoyments, that he might carry the Gospel to the lone people of the valleys. This good work had been in progress some months before any signs of success became apparent; and it was when Professor W- was in special need of encouragement, that an incident occurred which lent an impetus to all his after labours. As he was one day making his way to a farm-house, where he expected, as on previous visits, to gather the servant-men in one of the outbuildings, there to speak to them of the things concerning their peace, he espied a blue line of smoke issuing from among a group of trees on his left. Glad to think that he might say a word in season to the occupants of this isolated habitation, the Professor stepped briskly along the narrow hillside path, and descending into the dale, found himself at the door of a small gloomy-looking cottage: it stood slightly ajar, and seated by a bright fire was an old man, so bowed by time or suffering, that his chin all but rested on his knees. His palsied hands were spread out towards the flames, and his clothes, though clean, were poor and ragged. "Good-day," said Professor W—, gently pushing open the door; "will you allow me to rest here a few minutes ?" "Ay, sure; but who be you?" queried the old man, without moving his head. "A servant of Jesus Christ; and I have brought a message from my Master." "Come forward! come forward!" cried the poor man, in a voice trembling with excitement, whilst tears trickled from his eyes, on which blindness had plainly set its seal. "I'll tell you what, Sir," he continued, with an effort to control himself, "this is the day I've looked and waited for more than five years. When I was younger, and had the use of my eyes and limbs, I never cared to find out anything about Jesus Christ, and why He came to die upon this earth. I never had a Bible of my own, nor the wish to get one. But when I became old, and lame, and felt my eyesight going, I found it very lonesome sitting here all day, with scarce a soul to speak to; and somehow I got a way of thinking over past times. When I was a little lad, I lived with an aunt who every Sunday afternoon would have me bring my stool close to her side, while she read me some wonderful things out of a large Bible she had. She died before I was ten years old, and nobody else ever took like pains with me: but I never quite forgot those beautiful stories, and you can't think, Sir, how much I should like to hear them again." "Your desire shall be granted, my brother," said Professor W-; "but have you no neighbour or friend who could now and then spare a little time to read to you?" forget as there's a heaven and a hell: and where am I going? that's what I want to know. Several times I've ventured to pray that somebody might be sent to teach me. I felt very timid at praying, for I could scarce tell how to go about it; but I'm sure now that God has heard me, and sent you to tell me what I want to know." Assuredly He has," said Professor W-, deeply moved; and opening his pocket-Bible, he read of that wonderful Life, so crowded with love, and toil, and pain; and of that still more wonderful Death, round which gathers the only hope of a ruined world. About fifteen months from the time of this his first visit to the lonely cottage, Professor W- met with an accident which threatened to prove fatal. The news of this calamity was received with sincere sorrow by the people to whom he had been a kind and faithful teacher. "If prayer can save him, he shall not die," said one great rough-looking fellow; and when his day's work was done, he trudged from farm to farm, and from cottage to cottage, gathering together his praying brethren. They assembled in a barn; and the harvest moonbeams fell upon a company of sunburnt men, in their coarse working dress. And God looked down upon grateful hearts, which had seized, and were firmly grasping, the promise, "The prayer of faith shall save the sick." An answer of peace descended. And when the Professor, in his hours of convalescence, was told of the successful prayer-meeting, he said, "This is a full requital for all my labour and painstaking. If any man would know the joy that is kindled in my breast today, let him go forth as a guide to the erring, and as a messenger of mercy to the wretched and lost." SCHOOL METHODS. SUNDAY-SCHOOL ADDRESS. Important Little Things. WHAT great rivers carry.-The little basket at the river-side.-The Princess takes the child.-It is a little matter.Little things important (1.) because they are not noticed-Building up a character -Straws on the brook-The boy and the Testament-The girls at the fountain-No "little sins." (2.) Because they are repeated-Drops of rain-Coral insectsSpider and snake-Chalk rocks.—(3.) Because they draw great things after them-A tree in India - How chimneys are climbed-Sinful thoughts-A child snatched from a fire. - IMPORTANT LITTLE THINGS. "She laid it in the flags by the river's brink." (Exodus ii. 3.) Great rivers carry much with them to the sea. They bring down mud and sand, which, lying at their mouths, form large islands. They bring down the bodies of sheep and cattle which the floods have carried off their feet in the mountains, and the summer waves will by and by play with their bones on the sea-shore. But no river brought down that which Pharaoh's daughter found near the long papyrus reeds when she came to bathe. There it was, a little basket daubed all over with slime, which looked gray and hard as the sun shone upon it. No crocodile had overturned it. No ibis had pecked at it with its long beak. The child inside is fair and well fed, and it opens its little dark eyes wonderingly, and gives a restless cry which goes straight to the heart of that young lady. There is a girl hurrying past the rushes, coming to see what is the matter. She says, Shall I call a woman to nurse the child for you? The girl is the baby's sister; the nurse who is called is the mother, you know the plot they laid. It was no uncommon thing to find a Hebrew child in the Nile in those days, with its eyes closed, its tiny hands clenched, and death on its face. Why should Pharaoh's daughter take up one of these children, when her father had ordered them to be thrown into the river? Will not she soon be tired of it? No. The baby will grow up to the boy, and then she will take him from his mother's hut to the palace. Teachers will be found for him, and he will learn all about the language, and laws, and army of Egypt. He is to become a great man, who will himself make laws for the Hebrews, and lead them on to battle. We shall hear of him again as Moses, the friend of God, the writer of part of the Bible. It was a little thing for Pharaoh's daughter to come upon a child there on the river bank, but see what the result is! Children, I want to teach you this afternoon so that you may remember it for many years, how serious and important are little things. What I would first say is, that, I. LITTLE THINGS ARE IMPORTANT BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT NOTICED. Many men and children go staring through the world, looking at nothing in particular. They like great shows, great things, great men. They never look carefully at little things. They pass through a wood, and say, "How dark and dull it is." Another keeps his eyes open, and he says, "How I've enjoyed the walk! Did you notice how old those yew-trees were ? Here's a fine primrose I picked up! What a pretty fern!" Little things are not noticed, but there we make a great mistake. What would you think of the man who expected his house to be built, and yet told the bricklayers they must not go to the trouble of laying every little brick? I wonder how our watches would keep time if the watchmaker had told his men that it did not matter about putting in some of the little parts. You want to build up a good character of your own, you want to be honest men and good women, yet you think you can do it without putting in good tempers and sincere prayers,-you I was walking along a brook-side the other day, and the water seemed to follow me. There it was stirring the grasses, and I should have said the brook was flowing that way. But looking at it more closely, I found some straws and sticks which, though the wind was against them, were moving steadily past me in the other direction, and of course I saw that that was the course of the brook. Which is the best way to find out the character of people? Why, to look at the little things about them. A boy once went to a merchant for a situation. It was the first time he had tried to do anything for a living. "Have you got a character?" asked the merchant. "No, Sir." "What's that shining in your jacket pocket?" The boy went rather red, and pulled out a New Testament, with gilt edges. Inside was written, "Presented to for good behaviour and attendance, by his affectionate teacher." "That's character enough for me, my boy," said the merchant. "You may come in the morning." It was a little thing to carry a Testament, but it showed the merchant what sort of a boy was before him. Suppose it is a hot July day, and some of you girls are coming home from school. There is a fountain on the way, and you get round it. An old apple-woman comes up; one of you makes way for her, and because it is awkward for her, you say, "Let me help you," and hand her the brimming cup. Then, without waiting to be thanked, the girl that did it might run off with a shake of her curls and a hymn on her lips. That would be a trifling thing, but it would show a kind heart. This is the way in which good, kind natures are formed. If you neglect to do little kind things, you will wake up some day and find a cold, hard heart within you that will not feel. You never hear God speak about "little sins." It is as wrong to steal a lead pencil as it is to steal a pound, because |