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Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la m^thode. 1 2 3 32X 1 2 3 4 5 6 ^■> ^^^t^ . -..1 . « ii iii i Miiii— MWwaW a.x WORDS OR )NnS OIVN BOOK OOKTAININO >ERMONS AND SAYINGS 01? W JON'FS AND SAM SMATJ, I . !/ JU.Hi-4 i^uiTS, D.D. .T.W^ iUUGCiS, 7» & 80 KIHG STRBET EAST. LIVING WORDS OB SAM JONES' OWN BOOK OOKTAININO SERMONS AND SAYINGS or SAM P. JONES AND SAM SMALL Delivered in Toronto and elseivhere, with the Story qf Mr. Jonts' Life written by himself. INTRODUCTION BF REV. JOHN POTTS, D.D. Illustnitcb. TORONTO: WILLIAM BRIGGS, 78 & 80 KING STREET EAST. I- 2152 J^ji OAJ£S ,^\9 Entered, according to the Act of the Parlianiciir. of Caiiadn, in the year one thousand ei^'iit luindred and oighty-six, bv William Briuos, in the Olfico of tho Minister of Aifricultnro, at Ottawa. INTRODUCTION. AT the request of Rev. Sam P. Jones and the -^^ publisher, Rev. Dr. Briggs, I cheerfully write a few lines to introduce to the Canadian public a volume of the Sermons and Sayings of one of the most noted evangelists of the nineteenth century. It was at my suggestion, in one of the many crowded meetings at the Caledonian Rink, that Mr. Jones was asked to gratify his many friends in Toronto and Canada by publishing a volume, under his own direction, which would be a perpetual remembrancer of the man, and the wonderful awakening with which Toronto wa5; favored in the October of 1886. In response to the enthusiastic request of the audi- ence, Mr. Jones intimated that he would be delighted to gratify the wishes of his Toronto friends, and would take special pains to make the volume the best he had ever published, and would add to the sermons an autobiographical sketch of his strangely eventful life. It will be a joy to thousands to be able, quietly, to read again and again those soul-stirring and conscience-awakening discourses with which we if Introduction. i" were instructed, and often deeply moved, both to smiles and tears. The teaching of these sermons will be found to be in perfect harmony with the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount. Never in the history of this city was there a more fearless denunciation of sin-of sin in its public and wide-spread manifestations-than by this simple, unostentatious, but heroic soldier of the Lord Jesus Christ. While unusual attention was given to the bitter consequences of ^in in this life as well as in eternity, never was the saving power of the Gospel more effectively proclaimed to listening multitudes. The intei-est awakened in this city on the subject of religion by the powerful appeals of both Mr. Jones and Mr. Small has already borne practical fruit, as evinced in the increased membership of all the churches who took part in the movement. Nor has the interest been confined to what may be re- garded as the non-church-going portion of the com- munity. There has been a perceptible quickening among the professing Christians of Toronto, business men and others freely confessing that their religion has been too ethereal, and not sufficiently touching the practical everyday work of life. The effect, upon the whole, seems to have been to make religion a prominent part of their week-day as well as Sunday Mfe. Introduction. m Far beyond the bounds of Toronto the influence of the great awakening has been felt through the instrumentality of the daily press. The newspapers of Toronto, without an exception, have given unusual attention, and, in some instances, verbatim reports of the sermons and sayings of Mr, Jones. By many throughout the country this volume, embodying in permanent form the discourses which have already been read in the papers, will be hailed with delight. I cannot close thi i V>rief introduction without glorifying God in the aim ^li miraculous deliverance of Sam W. Small from tl ; vortex of intemperance. His conversion and subsequent life are striking illus- trations of the Bible truth that the Go.spel is the " power of God unto salvation." As the companion of Mr. Jones we welcomed him, and as an eloquent and powerful preacher he was greatly admired by the many who listened to his faithful proclamation of the truth as it is in Jesus. He was converted under the ministry of Sam P. Jones, to whom he looks up as his father in Christ. Mr. Small is a man of remarkable culture, and he evidently has conse- crated it all to the service and glory of the Saviour whom he delights to extol. Canadian readers will be glad to find that this book contains the wonderful sermon which Mr. Small has entitled, " From the Press to the Pulpit ; or, Deliverance from Bondage," 1 \\\ w Introduction. which gives a g -aphic description of his slavery to the drink curse, and his freedom through the emanci- pating power of the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. I pray that this volume may be to hundreds of thousands of readers what the sermons were to the delighted multitudes who heard them in Toronto,— messages of mercy from the skies, and faithfulwarn- ings from the same loving Lord. JOHN POTTS. Toronto, Nov., 1886. I PRBKACB. T HAVE been gratified that, through stenographic reports of my sermons in the great daily news- papers at V ■ ^us points, I have been able to address a larger audience, by far, than could assemble in any hall, or be reached by any human voice. I have always encouraged the press in giving the widest dissemination to what I believe to be truths worth uttering. But, when there came a demand for these discourses in the more permanent shape of a book, I naturally felt that the author should have the privilege of choosing his own publishers, and the right of final revision of such thoughts as were to be thus committed to the future. Dr. Wm. Briggs, of the Methodist Book and Pub- lishing House in Toronto, is the only authorized rUBLiSHER of my sermons delivered during my Preface. ■lit ■111 stay in Toronto, Canada. This house will practice no extortion, but will sell the book as low as other books of corresponding quality as to material and workmanship. All other publications of these ser- mons are piratical and unauthorized, and are, therefore, stolen goods, and I hope an honest pub- lic will not deal in such. ^-<^ CONTKNTS. Introduction, by Rev. John Potts, D.D j Preface Autobiographical Sketch of Sam P. Jones 9 SERMONS BY S^M JONES. Sbrhon. I. i'ERSONALCoNSECiiATiON: ''Quit Your Meanness" 55 II. The Blessedness ok Religion gy III. The Righteous and the Wicked 79 IV. Think on these Things 9^ V. Rest in Christ jqj VI. God's Grace Sufficient m VII. What Wait I For ? j20 VIII. How TO be Saved 23j IX. Religion a Reasonable Service 142 X. Works of Faith and Love 149 XI. Why will ye Die ? ; . . . . 156 XII. The Ways of Pleasantness igy XIII. Tendencies op Righteousness and of Sin 175 XIV. The Christian's Commission ig? XV. God's Doctrine, and How to Know It 200 XVI. The Secret of a Religious Life 215 XVII. Prisoners of Hope 228 XVIIL Sowing and Reaping 240 XIX. P*.rtakers of the Divine Nature 257 XX. The Grace of God 270 XXL Living Soberly, Righteously, and Godly 277 XXII. Purity op Heart 293 XXIII. Prisoners W^ithout Hope 30Q yiii Contents. Page. Sbrmon. XXIV. I Thought on My Ways (A Sermon to Commer- cial Travellers) ^IS XXV. Confession and Pardon 332 XXVI. A New Creature in Christ (First Discourse) 347 XXVII. A New Creature in Christ (Second Discourse) 362 . XXVIII. Working Together for Good 375 XXIX. Profession and Practice 392 • XXX. Whosoever *"° XXXI. To Mothers *30 Alio XXXII. To Wives 472 XXXIII. To Daughters ^''^ XXXIV. To Young Men *^^ XXXV. The Prodigal Son ^^'^ XXXVI. Cornelius, a Devout Man 535 SERMONS BY 8A.M SMA^IL-I^. Biographical Sketch ofRev. Sam W. Small. . 551 XXXVII. What Must I Do to be Saved ? 555 XXXVIII. Hell • ^^ XXXIX. Deliverance from Bondage 571 TT^l^TJSTRA.TI01SrS. Sam p. Jones (Steel Engraving), Frontispiece. Metropolitan Church, Toronto (Exterior). Music Hall, Cincinnati, Ohio (Exterior). The Tabernacle, Cartersville, Georgia. Metropolitan Church, Toronto (Interior). Cottage Home of Sam P. Jones, Cartersville, Georgia. The Great Tent at St. Joseph, Missouri. Sam W. Small (Engraving). Caledonian Rink, Mutual Street, Toronto. Music Hall, Cincinnati, Ohio (Interior), City of Toronto. i! Autobiographical Sketch. AS Mr. Charles G. Finney, one of America's" greatest revivalists, said : " It has pleased God, in some measure, to connect ni}^ name: and labors with an extensive movement of the- Church of Christ." The world naturally looks upon these movements. Some men are n roused to bitter criticism, others are brought to Christ by the sweeping tides, while others seem to be indifferent. I suppo.se the latter class are the ones most to be pitied, for indifference is the most insurmountable obstacle when you would, reconcile man to God. I shall speak of myself in connection with these movements, recognizing the hand of God as the power, and the faithful ministers who have co-operated with me, and the ten thou- sand prayers of consecrated Christian men and women as the great factors under God that have helped me in doing my work. If I speak honestly of these revivals and my relation to» 10 Autobiographical Sketch. H them, I do so simply with the facts as they occur to my mind, without any purpose to use the first personal pronoun, except as it repre- sents the smallest factor in the movement. I shall give a brief account of my birth, family, etc., as these few pages are autobio- graphical. I was born in Chambers County, Alabama, on the 16th of October, 1847. My father was Captain John J. Jones, the son of a Methodist preacher; my paternal grandmother was one of the most godly, consecrated women of her day, she being the daughter of Rev. Robert L. Edwards, one of the pioneer preach- ers of Georgia, and a giant in his day. Four of my father's brothers are now ministers of the Gospel of Christ. We have been Method- ists on both sides of the family for several generations. As I have frequently said : I am a Methodist just as I am a Jones, and if it is a sin to be. either, it is a sin that is visited upon the children from the parents. Methodists and Joneses are getting to be very common, in that they are very general everywhere. My mother was a painstaking, sweet-spirited, Christian woman. I remember to have seen her and kissed her the last time, in my father's parlor, as I stooped over her burial case, when Autobiographical Sketch. 11 I was nine years of age. She sleeps in the old cemetery of Oak Bowery, Alabama. With one brother older than myself, a sister and brother younger than myself, with a heart- broken father, we left the cemetery for our home, to answer the oft-repeated question: "What is home without a mother?" Eternity can hardly compensate a man for the loss he suffers when he buries his mother. Four years after my mother's death (in the meanwhile my brothers, sister, and myself remained at our grandfather Jones's liome) my father married Miss Jennie Skinner, of Cartersville, Georgia, and removed us there in the year 1859, where we lived, controlled and guided not only by a father's advice, but our new mother did all she could in instilling the principles of virtue and right in our young hearts and lives, until our father joined the Army of Virginia in 1861, and by reason of his absence and the disor- dered state of society and the countr}^, due to the presence of cruel war, I began to drift away from the teachings of my sainted mother and the rules of my home ; and when my father returned from the army, before peace was re- stored, I had so advanced in the company of those who were worldly and wicked in the 12 Autobiographical Sketch. ii! -I|!!i III! habits of profanity and gentlemanly dram-drink- ing and other immoralities, that I found it much more easy to proceed in a life so at vari- ance with the right that I drifted on from month to month, until at the age of twenty- one years I was physically wrecked and morally ruined. I am sure many of the excesses of my early life would have never been indulged had it not been for the absence of my father, which gave me liberty to associate with those whose habits and character would certainly ruin those who minsrled with them. From the beginning of my school age up to the time of my mother's death, I had been a little scholnr in the excellent school of Pro- fessor Slay ton, now superintendent of the pub- lic schools of Atlanta. I remember at one of his commencements he had written for me a parody on the oft-repeated juvenile oration : "You 'd scarce expect one of ray age To speak in public on the stage." It was at night, and when the time came for the delivery of my speech, I was asleep in my mother's lap. Professor Slayton came to my mother, awoke me, and carried me in his arms to a table on the stage and stood me Autobiographical Sketch. 13 of : .■-; there. I delivered the speech, the last two lines of which I remember were these: "In thunderiug peals and Thornton tones, The world shall hear of Sam. P. Jones." I remember that for months after the de- livery of this speech I kept my little associates and myself in candy, for whenever and where- ever I would repeat it for them, I could name my price in candy. The faithful tutorship of Professor Slayton was worth much to me, because the ground work of an education had been faithfully laid before I was seven years of age. My studies were grossly neglected when my father was away from home in the army. After he re- turned and the war was over, I began to pros- ecute my studies anew in the school of ex- Congressmen Felton and his intelligent wife; farther along under Professor Ronald Johnson, in the High-school of Euharlee, Georgia. There my health completely broke down, and I suf- fered from the worst form of nervous dyspep- sia, and this robbed me of the collegiate course which my father intended for me. With health wrecked, sleepless nights, and restless days, I began to seek relief in the intoxicating cup, 14 Autobiographical Sketch. iiiji II! with no object in view but to get through the wejiry day and to seek some plan by which I could sleep an hour at night. Oh, the horrors of nervous dyspepsia ! It whs in this state of mind and body that I began to read law, and in twelve months I was admitted to the bar, growing more dissipated all the time. In November, 1869, I was married to Miss Laura McElwain, of Henry County, Kentucky, only one month after my admission to the bar. I started out in the practice of law with rich promise of success, but drink had become a passion with me, and all the ambitions and vital forces of my life were being undermined by this fearful appetite. My wife, with a cour- age born of despair, and with a faith in God that would laugh at impossibilities, and cry, "It shall be done," in the weakest and darkest hours of our married life, endeavored always to be the crutches under my arms, and to hold me up ; and never did she cease her efforts or take her faith from off the promises until she realized at last that God is not slack con- cerning his promises. While I was frequently moved by her tears and affected by her pray- ers, yet I persistently maintained a dissi- pated life until the month of August, 1872, AUTORIOGRAPHICAT. SkETCH. 15 when I was brought to face the fact that my father, my best and truest friend, was bidding earth good-bye forever; and as he said "good- bye," he looked as if he meant forever, but he lingered on this side long enough to extort the promise from me that I would meet him in heaven. Wretched and ruined as I was, I made the promise, and upon my fidelity to that promise I hang my highest hope of heaven. No man could feel as I felt or see what I saw in that death chamber, as father almost liter- ally shouted his way out of this world, with- out crying out from the depths of his heart, "I yield, I yield I I can hold out no more ; I sink, by dying love compelled, And own thee Conqueror." When peace and pardon were given, after days of seeking, I was impressed that I should preach the Gospel. I did not know from whence those impressions came; I thought, as did Gideon Ouseley, "I can not preach, I am not fit to preach, I do not know any thing to preach." I sought the advice and counsel of several faithful preachers, and I believe each of them said the same thing: "You are called to preach. You can go willingly into it, or you 16 AUTOBIOGUAPHIOAL SKETCH. i' 1' i; "will be whipped into it, or you will lose your religion if you refuse." The lust point was al- ways the most powerful in the argument. As I stated before, I was born and rjiised a Meth- odist. I conferred not with flesh and blood further, but began immediately to preach the Gospel as only a man could preach it who knew but two facts — God is good, and I am happy in his love. Like Ouseley again, I knew the disease and I knew the remedy, and this gives the physician c mplete control over the patient. The first sermon I ever preached, I believe, was the week after my conversion, at old New Hope church, two miles from Cartersville — my home. I had gone out with my grandfather Jones to that place. He was then pastor in charge of Barton Circuit, and this was one of his churches. After we had arrived on the ground, about the preaching hour at night, he learned that the Rev. Mr. Sanford, who was to preach on that occasion, would not be there. My grandfather was very hoarse ; he could not preach, and he said to me : " My grandson, you must preach for us to-night." I replied, " I thought the call was first to get ready, and secondly to preach the Gospel." He said : " If God is calling you to preach, you can preach; Autobiographical. Sketch. 17 come on in the pulpit." I did so, with much fear and trembling. The whole congregation knew me — a wild, reckless boy. After the singing and prayer, I read the text: "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." My exegesis and the critical analysis of the text I have forgotten, but, really, I do not think that either the exegesis or analysis came in on that occasion. I think before I had proceeded far into the text I adopted the plan of a good, old Methodist preacher "in the brush " who shut up his Bible .and said : " Brethren, I can 't preach the text, but I can tell my experience in spite of the devil." And out of a heart gushing full of love to God and to men, I told them of God's gracious dealings with me. Hundreds were melted to tears, and when the invitation was given for penitents to come forward, they thronged the rltar, and I believe many were converted. After the serv- ice, my grandfather slapped me on the shoulder and said, " Go ahead, my boy ! God has called you to the work." Much of my time in those days was given to prayer and reading the Scriptures. 4n. 18 AuToniooRAiMiicAii Sketch. It was still three months until the meeting of the Annual Conference in Atlanta. I began preparations by reading the course of study prescribed by the bishops of our Church for applicants for admission into the annual con- ference. Rev. George R. Kramer wjis my pas- tor and my spiritual instructor; he did much for me ; a saintly, good man, now pastor in Brooklyn, New York. I preached around through the community as opportunity offered until the meeting of the North Georgia Annual Conference. I went to that conference and offered myself, with all my ransomed powers. They accepted me; they gave me a place in the rank of Methodist itin- erq,nts, and gave me as my appointment the Van Wert Circuit. No gladder man ever ac- cepted an appointment. My heart leaped for joy, and I said, " Thank God ! I now have a place to work for Christ." On my way home from the annual conference, a good preacher said: "Jones, do you know what your circuit paid its pastor last year?" I replied : " No, I have not thought of that." " Well," said he, " it paid the preacher for his year's service sixty-five dollars." AuToniouRAiMiicAii Sketch. 19 I laughed, and told him I did not care wliat they paid or did not pay ; that I had a field to work in, and I was going to it gladly. This circuit was in Polk County, only twenty miles from my home — Cartersvillc, Georgia. I went down, prospecting around, before I moved my family. The brethren were kind, and yet I could see that Burns was right when ho said : "A man may take a neighbor's part, Yet have no cash to spare him." Of course, I could not see this in compari- son with any thing else. I had nothing to discourage me, because the picture drawn in my mind of itinerant life was one of hardships and privations. The brethren told me of a house that I could procure for my family, but did not propose to rent it for me, or even help me in procuring it. I gave my notes, twelve of them, of ten dollars each, payable monthly, for the rent of the house. This sum alone was fifty-five dollars more than the preacher re- ceived for his last year's services. In two weeks more I moved my family, consisting of wife and one child, into this house, in the town of old Van Wert. I had sold every thing that would bring money and paid on my debts i \ ^ 20 Autobiographical Sketch. i !l [( SO far as the money would go, and still I was hundreds of dollars in debt. I entered upon my work with faith in God and in the people, knowing that if I would do my duty I should not want any good thing. I was reappointed to this work until I had spent three happy, successful years on this, my first, circuit; and, if I remember correctly, the s?dary and per- quisites of these three years amounted to over two thousand one hundred dollars, or over seven hundred dollars a year. When I entered upon my work in this circuit, I had three books — the Bible, the fifth volume of Spur- geon's Sermons, and some old volume of skel- etons of sermons. Of course, my Bible was the book of all books to me, but I read and reread that volume of Spurgeon's sermons, un- til my soul and nature was stirred with the spirit of the man. I remember how I have frequently read the text of one of his sermons and then read his sermon; then I would read my text and, say: '"If Spurgeon treated his text that way, how shall I treat mine ?" And much of the directness of my style I owe to Spurgeon, the grandest preacher of this nine- teenth century, if what a man does is a test of what a man is. i!:i''!|!ii ,.*-■,„<..- AUTOBIOGRAPHICAT. SKETCH. 21 My preaching the first few months, and even the first years, was what my brethren called "f}arnest exhortation," but whether I exhorted or whether I preached, I have always been in earnest. Poor sermons and poor ex- hortation with the spirit of earnestness behind ihem will yield richer fruits than the most powerful logic and ornate rhetoric without the spirit of earnestnes^^ Earnestness can not be feigned. It is like the natural and healthful glow on a maiden's cheek compared to the arti- ficial coloring produced by rouge. So earnest- ness can always be distinguished from emo- tional gush or bellowing hurrahism. Earnestness is a thing of the eye and the; face more than of the voice or of the words. "Let us go and hear that fellow, he seems to be in earnest," is a great compliment to any preacher. Earn- estness in the pulpit is born of the experience which conscious pardon and complete deliver- ance from sin gives to the speaker. In a Gospel which has done so much for him, he sees that which will do as much for others, and he presses the Gospel, with its warning voice and its pleading tones, square apon the consciences of those who hear. There are many who are faithfully preaching the truth, but with earn- W Bi 22 Autobiographical Sketch. 1 1 estness only can they preach the truth effi- ciently. I have always had an inborn, consti- tutional hatred for shams, and especially for religious shams. Heaven and hell, one topless and the other bottomless, are real to me. Truth is real. Life is real; and no man can be a sham or a hypocrite without getting out of line with God and truth, and hell itself will make real devils out of religious shams before it will receive them. I have always contended there is no hoof and horn, fang nor poison at- tached to theoretical infidelity, but practical infidelity has all these things. I had rather be an Ingersoll and disbelieve the Book, than to be a Methodist believing every thing and living just like Ingersoll. I saw upon the first round on my first cir- cuit that there were either two distinct kinds of Christianity, or else a majority of my people had Christianity and I did not have it, or vice veraa. They had indifference and carelessness and i)rayerlessness, and I found no room for any of these in my religious life. 0, how many hours I spent as a youthful pastor try- ing to solve the problem and to know my duty towards my people. It was more than three years before my courage was screwed up to 1 m. Autobiographical Sketch. 23 the sticking point, where I could preach the truth in such a pointed way as to leave no one to doubt that I meant him. In other words, in the fourth year of my ministry I be- gan to preach to my people just as I thought about my people. I may preach the truth as it is in Christ, but a dissertation on truth is one thing, and the application of truth to the lives of men is another. A dissertation on mustard, where it grows, how it grows, and how it is prepared for the market, is one thing, and that one thing does not help the colic, but it is the spreading of the mustard upon a thin cloth and applying it to the stomach that re- lieves tha aches and pains of the agonizing pa- tient. Abstract truth may influence the inind to some extent and bring out the brain sweat, but consecrated truth, vigorously applied to the conscience, arouses the mind, produces convic- tion — and all upward movement is from convic- tion, from first to last. The bootmaker who makes the best fit gets the most customers. The preacher who fits the most consciences will get the most hearers. I have known for a long time that men knew better than they did. It is not in the pointing out of new paths, but it is the power to m.ake them walk I- ,:i(.:' ir 24 AUTOBIOGRAPHICAI. SKETCH. il III ■Km illti'llil' I I llllill' |i IK lilll iiii' ; lull in the old paths; therefore, my preaching has been at the conscience. The intellects of men, when taken in the whole, vary in altitude like mountains and valleys ; but the consciences of men form a vast plain, without an undulation from shore to shore, and he who stands on a level like this will move not onl}* the peasant and laborer, but the intellectual giants of earth alike, for the conscience of a Webster is on the same plane and level with the conscience of a brakesman or any other common laborer. In preaching at conscience there are three essential requisites: first, clearness; secondly, concentration; thirdly, directness. He who conceives truth clearly will express it clearly. Show a man all sides of the truth and then open it out and bathe it in a sea of light ; then take a whole lead mine and run it into one bullet, and then aim where you want to hit, and your work is done. When you arouse the conscience, amid its ferocious lashings, the only alternative left is a better life or complete abandonment. Very few men will choose the latter. I remember this incident, which illus- trates the point. In City, one of the leading merchants sent for the pastor, at whose church the union services were held. I was II lllliiiljil: iiiiiii Autobiographical Sketch. 25 preaching directly at conscience. When the pastor went to his counting-room, the merchant excitedly said : " I do n't like this preacher you have." "Why?" said the pastor. "Why, he makes men's wives jealous of them." Said the pastor, "My wife has been in reg- ular attendance, and she has not grown jealous of me." " Well, mine has with me," said he. " Last night, as I rolled upon my pillow, wife saw I could not sleep, and she asked me what was the matter. I told her, nothing. She replied, 'I believe something that preacher said has taken hold upon you.' Of course, I said, * No, no, nothing he said affected me;' but," said the man, "I am miserable because my wife is jealous of me, and d such a preacher." "Well," said the pastor, "may be she has reason to be jealous." "Ah," said the man, "that's the trouble. My mistress is boarding at a first-class hotel, and I have sent for you, sir, to know what I must do." "Well," said the faithful pastor, "abandon your adulterous life, and confess it to your wife." Iff 26 Autobiographical Sketch. ;iil: '/ >l i I ! of that meeting. night with the one allusion The man replied, as the great drops of sweat gathered on his face : " Such a confession would be death to the happiness of my home, and I am in mortal agony." Not twenty-four hours after this conversa- tion, this man was an humble, earnest penitent at the altar, as his wife knelt at his side; and I trust he was among the number of converts I touched his conscience that that when Christ •came down from the mountain side, the multi- tude thronged him, and a leper walked up, and the multitude fell back and gave the leper plenty of room ; and I said, " If some of your wives knew you as God knows you, they would give you the whole house to yourself." Per- haps this man was only one of the many whose consciences were stirred by that remark. Whenever I take off at a tangent like that, 1 generally find fish up that stream. When a minister earnestly preaches and applies the truth, he may rest assured that he has the con- sciences of men on his side. While they rebel with their wills and curse him with their tongues, yet their consciences are on the side of the preacher and the truth. Applying the truth to every phase of life is the general work Autobiographical Sketch. 27 of the preacher. Let him get this truth either from the oldest Testament or the Old, the new- est or the New. All truth is God's truth ; all that is false is frustrated and driven in confu- sion before the truth. When Nathan told David the truth, David replied : " The man that hath done this thing shall surely die." But when Nathan dropped his finger on David and said, " Thou art the man," the next we heard of David, he was on his knees uttering the words of the fifty-first Psalm in the most abject penitence and thorough conviction. It is the " thou art the man," that brings humanity to its knees. Thus, for thirteen years, I have not only tried to preach the truth, but so to apply the truth to the consciences of men, that there could be no mistake as to whom I meant, and amid all the harsh and seemingly unamiable expressions by which I have reached the eon- sciences, my heart has always looked in sym- pathy and love upon the man whose life I laid bare by truth. I do believe where love ex- presses itself in sympathy, the subject will submit to any treatment at your hands ; where love exposes guilt, the man falls out with him- self, grows angry with himself, and loves the .t* I I' 1' 28 Autobiographical Sketch. I i. fi\ m •liillt ! 1 I ilililiii; ; one that discovered it to his own eyes ; and you have done a bad man a good service when you make him despise himself. The object of all true Gospel preaching is to make sin odious and holiness attractive ; to make goodness as beautiful and as fragrant as a rose, and sin and hell inexpressibly horrible. 0, the hideous deformities of sin, and the symmetry and beauty of righteousness! The first three years of my ministry, as before stated, were spent on the Van Wert Cir- cuit. They were three joyous years, and by God's help and grace they were successful years, a gracious revival of religion at each Church (there were five Churches forming the circuit). I believe the aggregate increase of membership in the circuit was not less than two hundred a year, while all my Churches were quickened into new life and spiritual growth. From there I was moved, and placed in charge of De Soto Circuit, in Floyd County, Georgia, with seven Churches forming the cir- cuit. I had two happy, successful years on this circuit. Hundreds were converted to God and all the Churches quickened. These were the years that I was fortunately placed under Rev. Simon Peter Richardson as my presiding Autobiographical Sketch. 29 elder. At that time he was the most power- ful, and at all times the most entertaining, guest I ever saw. The great nuggets of truth thrown out by him in pulpit and parlor, were food to me. He saw some great truths more clearly than any man I ever heard talk ; he was a father and brother and teacher to me. I learned more from him than all other preach- ers I have ever come in contact with. I first learned from him that the pulpit was not a prison, but a throne; that inL;:ead of bars and walls and boundary lines, I might have wings and space as my heritage. I can recollect as well when my involuntary confinement ended and liberty began, as any fact in my history, and for years I have enjoyed this liberty and never consulted the theological landmarks or visited the orthodox prison. To think the thoughts of God is a freeman's right, with as little reverence for the Nicene Creed as for the resolutions of the General Conference or the Baptist Convention on the prohibition ques- tion, assured of the human origin of both alike. To stand on some mount of freedom and see that God is love and see that Christ is the manifestation of that love, — how transforming the vision ! How unlike the picture we have so Autobiographical Sketch. liii ! I i i.L; looked on so often — God angry with a world, and with the weapons of his anger drawn, he poured his wrath and anger upon the victim on the cross! To see in Christ a Savior loving a sinner and saving a sinner, rather than a victim scarred by divine vengeance and aban- doned by divine sovereignty; to see that the pierced side was an open doorway ; to see in his hands, prints made by the cruel nails, the marks of his sympathy ; and in his cross, my death to sin; and in his resurrection, my hope of eternal life; and realize tliat in all his works and sufferings and death, there is to me power given to begin, and grace given to con- tinue, and help and weapons with which to conquer, and crowns and harps for my reward ! From the last named circuit I was moved to Newberne Circuit, in Newton County, Geor- gia. There I had two more pleasant, delight- ful years, with greater success, perhaps, than any two years previous, in building up my Churches and adding to the Church hundreds of souls. At the end of my second year in the Newberne Circuit, I was moved to Monti- cello Circuit, Jasper County, and there I had a remarkable year among the noblest people in my State. Thus, eight years of my ministry Autobiographical Sketch. 81 were given to four different circuits in my con- ference. In the eight years, I suppose not less than two thousand members were taken into my Churches in these circuits, and I did a great deal of revival work in other circuits and stations. In some of those revivals there were near five hundred conversions. In scarcely any of them did the conversions aggregate less than one hundred. I suppose that I might safely put the figures of the first eight years of my life as a pastor, of those who professed conversion under my ministry, at not less than five thousand altogether. I say these things, not because I am proud of them especially, for I believe with the appliances which God af- fords to us as his ministers, that five thousand souls in eight years is a very poor work. It seems to me, as I look back over those years, that I did my best, and yet I am sorry that more was not accomplished. I think last year nlone I saw more souls than that brought to Christ in our various meetings. I am trust- ing and believing I shall live to see the day that I shall see a thousand souls born to God at one service, and I pray that God may make me the instrumentality of bringing fifty thou- sand souls to him in one year. If St. Peter, 1 1 FT™ 82 Autobiographical Sketch. ililiilli! :llli||i| :l! with the meager appliances, especially on the human side, could win three thousand souls in an hour with all Jerusalem against him, why might not a consecrated minister, with a hungry world and almost a despairing world of sinners about him, take them by the hand and lead ten thousand a day to Christ? I verily believe that I have seen five hundred souls converted at a service ; there were three thousand pray- ing Christian people present; there were a hundred consecrated preachers present; there were in the aggregate ten thousand people pres- ent; God was present; a thousand penitents were present; then doubt the statement, if you will, that five hundred of those who stood up accepted Christ and were converted. When I began to preach, I was brought face to face with this fact, that to succeed as a preacher, one must be a great thinker or a great worker. Affinities made me choose the latter. I had serious doubts as to whether I could think above the plane where the masses stood. I knew I could work under God, and be a constant, persistent, and indefatigable la- borer. I started out, determined that I would do my best. I suppose, during the eight years of my III'' r Atttobiooraphical Sketch. 88 life as a pastor, I preached not less than four hundred sermons a year; and I have preached four times a day for weeks and weeks; and when my good frien^ls would tell me I was working myself to death, I would laugh them oir by telling them what Whitefield said when a physician told him he must stop working so much, that he must not preach but four hours every day and six hours on Sunday, and he rebolliously asked, "Doctor, do you want me to rust to death?" No doubt, I would have preached better sermons if I had preached fewer sermons, but a square or an oblong bul- let will do as much execution as a polished, round one. I have never made theology a study. The great doctrines of depravity and repentance and justification and regeneration and of the judgment and final award, I have preached with all the clearness of my mind and all the unction of my heart. I have never tried to show a congregation the difference between evangelical and legal repentance. I have never discussed whether depravity was total or par- tial, or simply developed. I have never tried to prove there was a God, or that Christ was divine, or that there was a heaven or a hell. Am 34 Autobiographical Sketch. I have made these things, not an objective point, but a starting point. They have fur- nished the basis for all I have said, and they are either the inspirations of my hopes, or the ground-works of my fears. I have left the proof of the inspiration of the Bible, the dem- onstration of the fact that there is a God, the settlement of the question as to heaven and hell, to those who make a specter of such things and then speculate upon them, to the "muddy physicians." My idea has always been that Christ meant what he said when he said, "Preach the Gospel," not defend it; "Preach the Word," not try to prove the Word is true. A very laughable, and yet forcible, incident occurred during the revival at Memphis, Ten- nessee, in Court Street Cumberland Presby- terian Church one morning. The services had been going on for nearly Lxiree weeks with great power; hundreds had been converted and Churches awakened. The meeting was a union meeting; thirteen pastors and congregations, representing five different denominations, were united in the fight, and on this occasion we had what we called a talking-meeting. The pastor of the First Methodist Church made a short, pointed talk, in which he told how the -v^ Autobiographical Sketch. 35 meetings had been a blessing to him. Other pastors followed, and when the pastor of the First Baptist Church told how he and all his Church had been blessed, he continued his talk by saying that he had learned something also about how to preach. He said that in the three weeks' preaching of Mr. Jones in that city, he had not heard t single attempt on the part of the preacher to prove that there was a God, or that Christ wafi divine; there had been no hair-splitting on tbeology, or an effort to prove that h3aven was real or hell existing, and so on. After he sat down, old Uncle Ben, the faithful, old colored sexion of the First Methodist Church, stood up in the rear of the Church and said: " Brethren, you all know me. I have been trying to serve God from my childhood, and I have been greatJy exercised in the last few years for the salvation of the perishing souls of Memphis. On my knees I have begged God to send just such a preacher as this to Memphis, thou^^^h I did n't know who he was or where he was. Now he has come, thank God for him. Ho preaches the Gospel so that every one can understand it; he feeds me, he feeds the old and the young, the learned and the unlearned. Our pastors have been llliill.lj illii iiii I ml < i 36 Autobiographical Sketch. putting the fodder too high. I remember when Brother Mahon was our pastor last year, I looked into his study one morning, and he had five books lying open around him on the table, and I said, 'Brother Mahon, if you get one sermon out of five different books, you are going to put your fodder up Sunday morning where I can 't reach it, for,' I said, * I 've gone to Church hungry on Sunday morning and come away hungry; fodder too high for me.' But this man of God scatters the fodder on the ground, and we can all reach it, and we also relish it." And so Uncle Ben went on in his rambling talk until he made as fine an argu- ment on homiletics as many of the preachers said they had ever listened to. The finest compliment I haA^e ever had was in the second year of my ministry, when a lit- tle son of one of my members said: " Father, will Mr. Jones be returned to this circuit next year ?" The father replied he hoped so, and asked his son, "Why?" " Well," said the boy, " I want him to come back, because he is the only preacher I ever listened to that I can understand every thing he says." Autobiographical Sketch. 37 I believe it is possible to preach our best thoughts and highest conceptions of God and truth so that children may understand us. The fact that they do not understand us is better proof that we are "muddy" than that we are high, for truth is like the water of the River of Life — clear as crystal. Of course, in all these years of my life as a pastor, I was the object of a great deal of criticism. If no truth furnished others material with which they could assault, there was no lie that earth or hell could concoct that they would not take and circulate against me — some very ridiculous lies, some venomous lies, some very lying lies. 0, how I have looked at my wife sometimes and seen resentment written upon every feature of her ^ace; for instance, when she read the well-credited story of how I had abandoned my "first wife," and of how I was unkind to my "second wife." They have reported me drunk on a hundred different occasions; they have reported me as a wife- beater; and rumors that I afterwards thought the devil himself must have felt ashamed of, they have circulated time and again on me. I found out, after all, this world does not give a man the right of way, and the devil has 38 Autobiographical Sketch. II i ij : i 1 i ■IV li M!^ I'"M "1 p:i rights, he thinks, that even preachers must re- spect ; and frequently, after you have procured the right of way, the change of a switch, a wash-out, a cross-tie on the track, and some- times an innocent cow, plays sad havoc. The faster you run, the more dust you raise, the more noise you will make, and the more stock you will kill; and yet it is wonderfully true, the more passengers you will haul. All other railroad men, who can not make the same schedule time, will talk of danger and disaster that must overtake those who patronize the lightning express, and thus help advertise to the world that there is a lightning express — and thus keep its cars packed. Still, the slow schedule trains get a great many passengers. Some people like to ride all day for a dollar and still pay the just fare of three cents a mile; just as a gentleman remarked of the Rome railroad in Georgia, sixteen miles long. He said it was the cheapest road he ever saw, the fare being one dollar froi.i Kingston to Rome, and he could ride all day for that amount, as it took a day to make the trip. But these are, after all, the days of the tele- graph and the locomotive engine and rushing commerce. Every thing has quickened its ft Autobiographical Sketch. 39 pace, except the Church. The world and the devil can run a mile before the Church can tie its shoes. I believe in progressive theology, in aggres- sive effort, in agitation, in conflict, in conquest, and in crowns. It was God who said, " Fight, and I will help you; conquer, and I will crown you." David saw four thousand years ago that he ought to make haste. Jesus said, "What thou doest, do quickly." St. Paul said, "I run and press towards the mark." What if some men live only two-score years and die in the prime of life, after accomplishing much, how much better is it than to run the Christian race of sixty years, and die before they reach the first mile-post towards the kingdom of God? Tiiere cnn be no movement without friction, no battle without an issue, no issue without the drawing of lines. When the line is drawn then comes the tug of war. The world and the Church walk together, because in many things they are agreed ; but when, like Joshua of old, we dniw the line, and say, "Those who are on God's side come over here," then it is that they are separated ; and as surely as Mason and Dixon's line was drawn and the South separated from the North wr 40 Autobiographical Sketch. mm m^.:^ i ' Hi: by the acts of secession and war begun, just so surely when a faithful preacher draws the line, the issue is made and the good fight of faith begun. The devil has rights in this world, but they are the rights of conquest; and only by that right does he hold it, and never will he surrender an inch of his domin- ion until it is covered with blood. I have never seen the lines drawn any where, that those who were loyal to God did not take a stand for truth and right; and God fought with them, and through him they did valiantly, for he said himself, "one can chase a thousand, and two can put ten thousand to flight." The greatest triumphs of the cross I have ever witnessed have been when the roar of the cannon and rattle of the musketry and smoke of the guns almost drowned the voice of God and hid his face; and yet when the din and smoke of the battle blew away, we saw God was with us, and the angels had pitched their tents about us. The Bible has much to say of warfare, and we sing much of "soldiers of the cross." This is truly a warfare, and while victory means crowns, and palms, and harps, it also means scars, and hardships, and fears, and tremblings, and at times defeats; Autobiographical Sketch. 41 but the command is, " Fight the good fight of faith, and lay hold on eternal life." I believe it is possible to preach the Gospel and live in peace with the devil, with an arm- istice unbroken, but " woe be to the preacher when all men speak well of him." ilowland Hill was a target for men and devils ; they scoffed, they called him a mounte- bank, they derided him as a flippant wag, and declared he brought the pulpit into disrepute. I have laughed as men of to-day would eulogize Rowland Hill and then call me the same things that Rowland Hill's generation applied to him. Charles G. Finney, the most omnipotent preacher of this nineteenth century in Amer- ica, seemed to be the worst slandered and worst traduced man in America. Read his autobiography, and see what the dignitaries of the Church and hypocrites said of him. He was tried, he was condemned, he was excluded from the pulpits of his own Church. "Nothing succeeds like success," and it succeeds in projecting its favorites on a stormy sea of abuse and criticism. Where is there a, successful man in any calling of life who has not been either swallowed by a whale or 1 ' 42 Autobiographical Sketch. M 111 I Ir nibbled almost to death by minnows? I some- times envied Jonah. Criticisms, when wisely administered, are helpful; but I never could endure these little spelling-book critics, who were utterly incapable of appreciating a thought or catching an idea, yet they could see and recognize a grammatical error or a rhetorical blunder in the distance. It has been the source of much pleasure to me to see with what avid- ity they would pounce upon a disjointed sen- tence, and how their eyes glistened and gleamed as they caught it, and silently said, " We have got something to talk about now." I have been interested in the reading of natural history, and especially as it treats of the habits of some animals and what they feed upon. My knowledge of natural history has frequently helped me in the right understand- ing of human nature. I have been called vul- gar by barkeepers, obscene by women who loved the German in the ball-room, and a relig- ious jester by those whose only stock in trade was a solemn countenance and a diseased liver. When a child suffers you can generally locate the pain, because the child puts its hand where it hurts. I have seen the hands fly to a thou- sand different places on the moral body, and I Autobiographical Sketch. 43 knew where each man was hurt by where he put his hand. There is a great deal in taking aim, and yet, as Brother Richardson used to say, " there is nothing like holding the gun all over the tree." As with the old palsied father who went out with his son squirrel hunting, the old man's part v/as to shake the bush, and he had but to take hold of the bush and it would shake, without any effort. On one occasion when he was to shake the bush and turn the squirrel, after he had turned the squirrel for four or five different shots for his son, all of which failed of their mark, the old man said: "Give me the gun and you shake the bush." The boy gave up the gun and shook the bush and turned the squirrel. The old man held up the gun in his palsied hands, and as it " wobbled " all over the tree, " bang," went the gun and down came the game. At which the old man remarked, joyfully, " I told you I 'd git him." The boy replied, "Any body could kill a squirrel up a tree who would hold a gun all over it, as you did." Of course in all these years, as I have tried faithfully and persistently to preach the truth to others, I have never forgotten a single day IIM- 44 AUTOBIOGK APII ICA L SKETCH. lilPii''^ Illjijijajiilil iiii illjii Iff that I had a soul in my own body, to be saved or lost, and I have prayed earnestly for God's help so to live the truth I preach, that I shall never be among that number who shall say, "Lord! Lord! have I not prophesied in thy name, and done many wonderful works in thy name?" and then have him say to me, "Depart, ye accursed, I never knew you." I have been sorely tempted and fearfully tried; I have fought the battles of temptation and the devil, that left me covered with blood. God has put me in the fire at times until the sparks flew all around me, and I thought he would burn me up soul and body, but I found, as he took me back into his arms, that the flying sparks, which the fire caused to fly ofl" me in its intense heat, was but the burning off of a fungus growth. Frequently as the great congregations have waited on my ministry, I have been warned to keep humble — not to take the "big head," and so on. Thank God, T have never forgotten " the pit from which I was dug," and my only reply has been, " If you knew how many things I have to give me the 'little head," you never would be uneasy about my taking the ' big head.' " They have talked about my heights. Autobiographical Sketch. 46 and of my falling from those heights. To the top of Calvary is not very high, and lying down at the foot of the cross is not a very dizzy altitude. The overwhelming responsibil- ity, that there are ten thousand immortal souls now listening to your words, to be faithful to those souls and to God precludes all possibility of being puffed up. The checks and balances work in all phases of life, and the responsibility commensurate with the altitude; really IS "Love vaunteth not itself, and is not puffed up." Wherever love predominates, the man is safe — love to God and love to man. I am frequently asked the question, " How long have you been an evangelist?" I am not an evangelist, except in the sense that every Methodist preacher is an evangelist. There is no order of evangelists in the Methodist Church. I have been doing revival work, however, since the second or third year of my ministry — I mean outside of my own charge, as pastor. I was always in my younger ministerial life diffident and very much embarrassed when I tried to preach outside of my own pulpits, and not until the fifth or sixth year of my ministry could I preach in another's pulpit with any ease or liberty. 46 Autobiographical Sketch. Illliil m m mm The first revival work I did that gave me any notoriety in •^v own State, was in 1879 and 1880; then \ calls to work in revival meetings multiplied U{)on me, and 1 soon found that I v;as giving half of my time to outside work. In the Fall of 1881, I was appointed Agent of Decatur Orphans' Home, the property of the North Georgia Conference. I accepted this appointment, mainly because it gave me more tether line, and from then until now I have been almost constantly in revival work. Atlanta, Griffin, ^ ''con, Columbus, and Savan- nah, Georgia, i ling many of the towns, which I will not niention, furnished a field for my work in 1881 and 1882. In the First Methodist Church, Atlanta, I have repeatedly worked in gracious meetings. That Church has many of the most consecrated men and women I have ever known. My first revival work there was when General Evans was pastor, and again, when Howell H. Parks was the pastor. Trinity Church, Atlanta, has been a field where I have also worked repeatedly during the pastorate of Dr. T. R. Kendall, a faithful man of God, who loves Christ with all his heart, and loves humanity with all his soul. Autobiographic A I. Sketch. 47 I have seen many conversions in these two old Methodist Churches in Atlanta. At St. Luke's, in Columbus, Georgia, when Rev. J. 0. Cook was pastor, we had a glorious meeting. For three weeks great crowds gjith- ered at this church, and many were brought to rhrist. At old St. John's Church, Augusta, Georgia, during the pastorate of W. II. La Pnide and Warren A. Candler, the Lord was gracious to us. In Trinity and Monumental Methodist Churches of Savannah, Georgia, God blessed me in my work. In Mulberry Church, Macon, Georgia, Dr. Key, pastor, we had a g-Ticious reviA^al; and so in a score or more ol eading Methodist Churches in Georgia I have worked, under the blessings of God, and many of the dear brethren of those Churches iiiive borne me on their faith to the throne of God, and in answer to their prayers for me in my work God has greatly blessed me since. The first revival I ever held which gave me newspaper notoriety, was in Memphis, Ten- nessee, in January, 1883; since then I have worked in more than twenty different States with marked success, including the cities of Brooklyn, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Chicago, Balti- more, Washington, D. C, Indianapolis, St. m 'm Jill, ii' r If:' ill mi:: mm I liiiiil 48 Autobiographical Sketch. Joseph^ Mc; Waco, Texas; Mobile; Nashville, and Knoxville, Tenn., and in other cities, and in no place where I have ever preached has the bufding or tent been sufficient to hold the multitude who attempted to get in. I have repeatedly preached to ten thousand people at one time who sat under the sound of my voice. • At Plattsburg, Mo., there were at least twenty thousand who were trying to hear. Parties who were capable of estimating the numbers, said that in Cincinnati there were not less than three hundred thousand people who sat or stood under the sound of my voice in the five weeks of our meeting there. In Chicago there were, perhaps, an equal number. I regard the meeting at Nashville, Tenn., as one of the riust remarkable in my life as a preacher. Some of the papers, and many of the people of that city, had persecuted and denounced me with a persistency such as I had never seen, and wherever I have been most persecuted and denounced, I have been most successful in winning souls to Christ. In looking over the past twenty-four months of my ministry, I dare believe that in these months not less than twenty thousand souls have been brought to Christ. The converts ■! |i!f|ljll-4 |jliii;!ii|.i!j' k Autobiographical, Sketch. 49 were not only among those who heard the Gospel from my lips. Even the newspapers that denounced me editorially, printed my ser- mons in full in their columns. Take the work in Chicago, for instance. In the Inter-Ocean and Tribune, the Cincinnati Commercial- Gazette and Enquirer, and the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, all of them with an ag- gregated circulation of three hundred thousand, and with the reasonable circulation of five readers to a copy circulated, I enjoyed the privilege of preaching to a million and a half of persons a day — a wonderful congregation for one preacher, and a privilege, I dare say, that no other man in the history of the Church has ever enjoyed. Think of it, nine thousand words each night, as they flashed out on eighteen different telegraph wires to the cities of St. Louis and Cincinnati, while they were being set in type by the papers of Chicago! Thus at the breakfast table the next morning, in these three cities, I was greeted by three hundred thousand readers, and before the sun went down that day a million and a half more had read the words. From the statement of newspaper men, I suppose that is a reasonable estimate. The secular papers are so much -*- 50 Autobiographical Sketch. iiiliiiiiiii'i 'i M' I'll ?;' i.< iiinii more alive and aggressive than the religious papers, that when they fall into line with a good work they are a power we scarcely know how to estimate. To the newspapers I owe much. They have been kind to me in their reportorial columns, and I can cheerfully overlook any criticisms in the editorial columns. After all, criticisms of a man and his work only go with him up to the edge of the tomb. Every man will have his hands full " toting his own skillet'* beyond that point ; but, I suppose, the strong- est temptation of a man's life, a temptation like that which a boy feels when he stands with rock in hand and sees the dog as he jumps the fence — I repeat it, the strongest temptation of my life, and to it I have frequently yielded, is to hit back and criticise some of the critics, and especially as some of them "set so fair," that to keep from '' hitting back " requires an immense effort, yet I am sure it is best not to do so. If it is the truth they tell, we should amend. If it is a lie, we should let the lie run on and run out of breath and die. After all there has been more good said of me than evil, and as long as that is true the balance sheet shows something in my favor. lliS: ill ■)!' m Autobiographical Sketch. 51 My correspondence for the past several years has furnished me data, out of which I have gotten a great deal — letters from those who have been brought to Christ through my ministry, telling of their happy experiences, and their consecrated purposes. These letters have been a source of great thanksgiving and joy to my heart. A wife thus writes : " Our home has been an Eden since you were here." Children would write, "What a change there has been in papa!" Letters like these have a thousand tin>es gathered me up and carried me back, in memory, to the home of my dis- sipated days, cheerless, starless, rayless — the sad face of wife, disappointed ambition, and a hopeless future — and then how Christ trans- formed my life, thereby transforming my home ; and, ! what a change was there ; and as memory looks upon the picture, how dark, and then how bright. What a privilege to " Tell to sinners around, What a dear Savior I have found." What a field of this description is open for the work of an earnest preacher; how many thousands of ruined homes, made desolate by the presence of sin and the absence of Christ, 62 Autobiographical Sketch. . hi 1 iiii ■i! i :; ,i :: i . 1 I- i 1 and how blessed to know that when the strong man is come, he bind? iie wicked one and casts him out forever. How many broken hearts and disappointed lives and wretched homes, and worse than widowed wives and orphaned children are calling to-day for Plim, of whom Moses, in the law and the prophets, did write. Not only is he in himself the " chiefest among ten thousand and the one altogether lovely," but he is the comfort of ruined hearts, and can make a home like himself, "altogether lovely." Blessed fact, he is seeking open doors. 0, that the world might open the door to him and bid the heavenly guest come in; and how sweet the reflection, Jesus himself said to all true disciples, " Behold, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." By virtue of that fact, in going upon errands of mercy, Christ goes upon those errands with you, and he goes to cheer, to comfort, to bless, so full of sympathy and love and tenderness is he. He it was who told us when he found the lost and hungry sheep, tired and ready to die, how there was no room for clubs and kicks, but he gathered the tired and hungry sheep upon his own shoulders and brought him back Autobiographical Sketch. 63 to the fold. The gladness of his presence cheers myriads of hearts and millions of homes. "Jesus, the name that charms our fears, That bids our sorrows cease, 'Tis music to the sinner's ears, 'Tis life, and health, and peace. Dear name, the rock on which I build My shield and hiding-place, My never-failing treasure, filled With boundless stores of grace." There is music in his name, a charm in his presence, and life in his touch. And amid the throes and agonies of a world steeped in guilt, but for the cross of Christ tho great heart of the world would break. My mos'c lonely hours are when he is absent, and my happiest days are spent in company with him. "Happy, if with my latest breath, I may but gasp His name ; Preach him to all, and cry in death, Behold, behold the Lamb! The object of all my preaching, of its harshness and denunciation of sin, and its ex- posure of sham, has been simply to make men fully realize the truth that "all the fitness Christ requireth is" that we feel our need of him ; or, in other words, it has been the object of m if |!jlT U«,\„ mlKCt iilil iKi Jilil! mm ''lilil- ll:^' m 0. IHIB'JBIIS: 64 Autobiographical Sketch. my life, as a preacher, to make sin hideous and righteousness attractive, and I have but shown sin up in all its deformity, that I might better show righteousness up in all its beauty, and drive men from the former, and attract them unto the heights and beauties of the latter. id m er id m Ill 1 i 1 'i'-4 METROPOLITAN CHURCH, TORONTO, ONTARIO. SERMONS. Sernion I. PERSONAL CONSECRATION MEANNESS." QUIT YOUR " Rejoice evermore ; pray without ceasing ; in every thing give thanks. For this is tlie will of God in Christ Jesus con- cerning you."— 1 Thess. v. 16-18. A MAN who understands practically what those three verses teach is not only a Christian, but a philosopher. There 's a great deal of philosophy in Christianity, and the best pliilosophers make the best Christians. This terra " rejoice" is a very dif- ferent word from " happy," or " happiness." Our word " hapj)y " comes from the same word that " happening " comes from, and my happiness de- pends largely on my happenings; but joy is very different in its meaning, and different in its effects on the human heart. Joy, when we analyze it, is a sort of trinity in unity : 1. I am satisfied with the past. 2. I am contented with the present. 3. I am hopeful for the future. If you will combine these three elements in a human life, I will show you a man who rejoices evermore. " I am satisfied, first, with the past." How many 55 66 Sam Jones' Own Book. ^m' % ^ persons can look back over the past and say : " I have (lone my best since the day I started in on a religious life?" Let me say right here, brethren, that heaven is just the other side of where a man has done his best ; and sanctificatiou, when you bring it down to where you can get hold of it, is nothing more nor less than doing the best you can under the circumstances.* That 's practical sanctifi- cation, and, really, I do n't care much about any other sort. I want a practical religion. " I am satisfied with the past." That 's the grandest thing a man ever said — " I have done my best." I was talking some time ago with a grand old man in our State — one of the noblest men I ever knew — and he said, " Jones, I do n't know what people talk so much about a second blessing for. I got all that was necessary in the first place." " Well," said I, " what do you mean ?" The old man replied, "Jones, when I got religion I told the truth, and I have stuck to it ever since. When I told God I Avas going to quit my meanness, I quit it ; I meant what I said." I asked him, " Do you mean to say you never repeated a sin you repented of?" and he said to me, " Certainly not, sir; never." Right here, brethren, I bring in this point: I have said that if we would only quit our lying we would get nine-tenths of our difficulties out of the road. Mr. Finney relates an incident that occurred at one of his revival services. One of the elders in the Presbyterian Church received an overwhelming * Mr. Jones would insist that divine grace is a circum- Btance not to be left out. iiilii "Quit Your Meanness." 57 baptism of the Holy Spirit, and that day there came in from an adjoining town an elder from another Church. At the dinner-table this elder discovered the traces and movements of divine power in the very face of liis host. Finney says he liitnself was sitting at the table. This visiting elder looked at his host and said : " Tell me how you have received such heavenly baptism? How did you get it?" The host looked at him and answered : " I fell down on my knees and said to God, ' I have told my last lie. I will never tell thee another while I live ;" and the Holy Ghost descended on me, and I have been so gloriously filled since that time I scarcely know whether I am in the body or out." This elder to whom the host was speaking then jumped up from the table, and ran into a sitting- room near by, and fell down on his knees and prayed : " My God, I have told my last lie. I will never tell another on ray knees or oif my knees in my life," and when they arose and walked from the dinner-table the holy blessing fairly beamed. He had received the baptism, and went on his way rejoicing. Brethren, that 's our trouble. We have been promising God all our life that we would quit our meanness and get to doing right, but we never have done it. If I were to stop at this point and ask every Christian in the house who never told God a lie to stand up, how many do you suppose could stand up and say : " I told God the truth at the beginning, and have stuck to it to this hour. I said I would quit my meanness, and I did it. I said I would do right, and I have done it." 58 Sam Jones' Own Book. I want to tell you that every man's condemnation is bottomed on tliis one word, neglect. Take the beat citizen in this town, and let him be every thing else you want him to be, and yet lot him neglect to pay his debts, and there isn't a tramp on your streets who would have any respect for him. Isn't that a fact? My duty is my del)t to God, and if I neglect to pay my debts to God, there is n't an angel in heaven who would respect me, even if I had sneaked in there unnoticed. Duty ! " I am satisfied with the past, with my- eelf as a father. I have set a good example, and iiave led a Christian life before my children." "I -am satisfied with myself as a mother; I have done my duty to my children." " I am satisfied with myself as a member of the Church. I have kept my vows to it." Brethren, here 's a source of joy — "I have done my best from the time I started until this hour." Can you say that? Brethren, did you ever, when your innocent chil- dren played about in your lap, say : " I am the purest father God ever blessed with children?" Did you ever say that ? Mother, have you looked at your innocent children, a.s .ey threw their soft, white arms around your 'uck, and said : " I am the purest mother What is V done m Go<^ ver blessed with children ?" I am satisfied. I have u may be satisfied with some ' lu ^ ii. le to-night, but you'll be be very luch di atisfied later along. You card- playing fathers .nd mothers ! Playing cards with your children ! You may think *^hat 's very nice I .1 *' (( Quit Your Meanness." 59 now, but when you turn out on the streets of this city three more gambh rs from your so-called (liris- tiau home, you are going to got very much dissatisHcd with the way you Imve made things at' your house. I think statistics will bear me out when I as- sert that nine out of every ton gamblers in this country were raised in Christian — so-called Chris- tian — homes. They are refined, educated, and well raised men — many of them — and they come from the homes where mother and father have dedicated them to God, and, it may be, had them baptized in the name of the Trinity. I want to say another thing. People say, " Jones, you hit a little thing as hard as you hit a big thing." Yes, I do, brethren. The Church is par- alyzed in this country. It has n't the power, and we may just as well acknowledge it. Hear me ! It is not lying that is hurting the Church, nor stealing, nor drink. It is not this kind of meapness that is hurting the Church. Every body knows that Church members who do these things are vag- abonds, and pays no attention to them. Hear me. If you want to know what is demoralizing the Church, and paralyzing the Church, I '11 tell you. It is this tide of worldliness that is sweeping over the Chris- tian homes of this country. That 's it ! O, my sister, the day you entered society you laid down your piety, and you know it as well as I do, and you have learned that when a woman gives up her consecrated life to enter society, she begins a life of misery that hardly a damned spirit can exceed in bitterness. Ml. 60 Sam Jones' Own Book. Now, when you can say, " I am satisfied with the past, with the way I have lived before my family, my Church, my community, satisfied with my ex- ample in all respects," you are laying the foundation for Scriptural joy. Then the next point is, "I am contented with the present." When a man looks back with the consciousness that he has done his best, and is contented with the present, he id rich, and rich enough. St. Paul said : " I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content." He said another thing on that line : " Godliness with contentment is a great gain." Brother, con- tentment is one of the elements of real Scriptural joy in this life. When a man builds on God's pat- tern, and is contented with his lot, and is hopeful for the future, that man is happy anywhere and everywhere. Hear me, brethren. Ho^ as it shines out of a consecrated past and a contented present, is like the mile-posts on the way to God, telling us how far we have come, and how much further we have to go. Thank God for hope in the Christian life, and we sing: " O, what a blessed hope is ours While here on earth we stay !" Satisfied with the past, contented with the pres- ent, hopeful for the future — a joyous Christian — you will find the secret right along in there. Now, brethren, what are you going to do ? Thank God, you can do something ; thank God, there is only one thing necessary to be done. Satisf and ]io]){ titude an more. Til en ceasing." act when praying m man has ^ nian ca all." I work to ( down and through M gest fooll "m "Quit Your Meanness/* 61 Quit your meanness. Go to God in honest peni- tence and tell him : " My Lord, this night I burn up the cards ; this night I turn out the wines and entertainments; this night I draw the line, and I come ov3r to God's side. Good Lord, forgive me for the way I have lived as a professor of religion." Then comes in the pardon. O, mothers, fathers, let 's call a halt ; let us bring these matters to an understanding at our homes, and say, " We are done." Let us call a halt, and, on our knees before God, repent of these things. I want to live before God and my family, so that when I come to die I can say to my children, " Go and live just as your father has lived, and do just as he has done, and as certain as Christ died for sinners, some of these days we will all meet in heaven." Satisfied with the past, content with the present, and hopeful for the future ! This gives me the at- titude and the altitude where I can rejoice ever- more. Then we take the next verse, " Pray without ceasing." You say, " I can see how a fellow can act when he can rejoice evermore, but to talk about praying without ceasing — that is all foolishness. A man has got to work ; he has got to do other things. A man can 't pray all the time. That won't do at all." I heard of a fellow once who had so much work to do on a certain day that he had to lay all Jown and stop and pray three hours in order to get through with it. \Vell, you say, " That is the big- gest foolishness I ever heard of in my life." Do 62 Sam Jones' Own Book. you see that engine stopping yonder? The sched- ule of that passenger train is forty-five miles an hour, and tiiat train has stopped still. I look at it and 1 say : *' What does this all mean ? The en- gineer has stopped, and he is on schedule time. Why doesn't he go on ? What has he stopped for? He has stopped one minute, two minutes, three min- utes, five minutes. O, why does n't he go on ?" I look a little closer, and I see he is taking on coal and letting water into the tender. He has spent six minutes at the station, and has secured a supply of coal and water, and now he says to himself; " I have lost six minutes, but I have got steam power enough to carry me along sixty miles an hour if I want to go that fast ; but if I had run by that coal station I would have got stalled on the first grade. But now I have power enough to carry me through." I will tell you, brethren, when you run up to God Almiglity's coal and water station, you must take on enough for your needs. That is it. That is the way to got steam to make the trip. That is the meaning of prayer. I will say a thing now, and T would say it loud enough for all the earth to hear me. We have got men that won't pray in public and won't pray in their families. Do you want to know why that is? It is because they do n't pray anywhere. Hear me. I want to be understood now, if you do n't under- stand any thing else to-night. The man who really prays anywhere, will pray everywhere. The man who maintains secret prayer will pray everywhere in God's world that you call on him. You say the says, "■ i man do( reas, a i right be: about. up one <^^hings I pepsia t a fellow you hear smart an the breali looked a that mor: have pra^ to get do you get t( as easy to cat before pray in m I would ^ wife and pay him prayer for Talk a "Quit Your Meanness." 63 reason you do n't pray in your family is just because you are timid. That is a lie. It is because you are mean, and you know it. Talk about a great big fellow, rtiih whiskers six inches long, who will go down town on 'Change and talk bigger than any man in the pit, and he won't go home and pray with his children. " You know I would do it," he says, " if I were not so timid." Look here. If a man doesn't pray in his family there is but one reas u for it, and that is because he does n't live right before his family. I know what I am talking about. I recollect once since I was converted I got up one morning out of humor, and I said some things I had no business to say. I had the dys- pepsia they said. It w'as meanness. Every time a fellow gets his meanness oiF, it is dyspepsia. Do you hear that, wife? As I said, I was talking right smart around that morning, and directly, just before the breakfast bell rang, wife got down the Bible. I looked at it, and I would have given fifty dollars that morning if I had had some preacher there to have prayer in the family for me. O, how I hated to get down after talking that way. Brother, when you get to living right before your family, it is just as easy to pray before them as it is to sit down and cat before them. If I did n't have sense enough to pray in my family, I '11 tell you what I would do. I would go and hire me an old colored man that wife and children had confidence in, and I would pay him by the month to ccme and hold family prayer for me. I would. Talk about a man being religious who does not :i f, 64 Sam Jones' Own Book. pray in his family ! Ridiculous ! I found out long ago that religion is a good thing to have, and a father who becomes religious wants his wife and children to have all the good things in the world ; and the next thing you hear from him he will be leading in prayer and demonstrating his religion in his family, and they will full into line with him. Brother, if you don't pray in your family, go home and begin to-night. Do you hear that ? Begin to- night. " Pray without ceasing." How many people in this house hold family prayer and go to the theater? How many people in this house that pray in their families, play cards in their families? How many people in this house who give wine suppers pray at night and morning with the children ? Ah, brother, those things won't mix, and you need n't tell me they will. They won't. Pray in your families. I like family prayer, and I can't get along without it at my house. I want to get God's old family prayer elevator down into my house every night, and let wife and children get into it and all go to heaven for a few minutes, and then come back and go to bed. And then in the morning before the breakfast bell rings, down comes God's old family prayer elevator, and we will all get into it for a few minutes and go to heaven, and come back and get our breakfast and go to work. If I can just get wife and children to heaven that way a few years, they will be such children that when they come to die, they will go to heaven as naturally as they breathe. The Lord "Quit Your Meanness." 65 save my home. If there is one thought that my mind dwells upon in restful, peaceful moments, it is when I am looking ahead to that happy time when I shall dwell with my wife and loved ones in heaven. Mother, children, all of us at home in heaven forever ! Then will I have received pay for every lick I have ever struck for God and right on this side of the grave. God bless and save you, brethren. Sayinos. I USED to think when a man mistreated me, Why does n't the Lord let me jump on him and beat him ? The reason is the Lord does n't want to pro- tect that rascal; he wants to protect me. You will hear people say : " Let us Christianize America, and then let us go across the waters. I do n't believe in sending the Gospel to China while we have so many heathen at home." But the Chris- tianity of Jesus Christ makes the heathen Chinese ray next door neighbor. A Christianity that sweeps around the world — that is the sort of Christianity we want; a Christianity that locks its arms around the world. Infidelity. — The infidelity that is hurting the Church in this nineteenth century is not theoretical infidelity ; the infidelity that is demoralizing the Church and the world is practical infidelity : the fellow that believes the Bible and won't do one thing. Now you have got a fool and a rascal 6 66 Sam Jones' Own Book. mixed in one compound. It is the most awful com- pound that Christ ever tackled. He believes in prayer-meetings, but he has not been to one this year; he believes in the missionary cause, but he gets out with the least he can give. He be- lieves in family prayer, but you can't prove it by his wife and children. He goes on the principle that he that believeth not shall be damned, and he believes in every thing. The German and the Ball. — If there *s a thing in this world that I have a contempt for and can 't express it, it is the german. I suppose some of you people through the country do n't have ger- mans. It is about all this city can do to rig out enough spiderlegs for a german. To see any aver- age little town try to put on airs ! If I were you, sister, I would call it a ball; and a ball-room is so indecent that I would not let my cook go into one of them. This is enough to hurt your feelings, isn't it? Your feelings! The less sense a girl has the more feeling she has. The checks and balances must operate. What you lack in sense you make up in feeling. I wish some of you ball-room girls could hear the boys talk after the thing is over. Did you ever hear of a ball in the day-time? Did you ever hear of a lot of men getting together and having a man's german ? There is n't a boy in this town who would cross the street to hug another boy. As sure as you are born, these things are based upon the consciousness of sex. Sermon II. ^HEJ BLESSEDNESS OK RELIGION. " Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful ; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night." — PsA. 1 : 1,2. THE Psalms are an interesting study for any man. I like to read Dickons and Thackeray and Bulwer and Shakspeare, because they evince such a deep insight into human nature. A man may study the pages of such books as these to advantage, but there is more for me in these one hundred and fifty psalms than in the writings of all these masters. The authors I have named give me human nature as we might see it if we were standing on the streets or in your stores. But David gives us human nature as it is acted upon or influenced by the Divine Spirit. I never have much to say against human nature. I have very little abuse for a man in his normal state. It is perverted human nature I fight. It is the perversion of hand and foot and tongue and mind that I am ready always and forever to denounce. David gives me human nature as it is acted upon and influenced in the best way. I love to read David, because, in the first place, David knew what he was talking about. I love to hear a man talk who seems to know what he is talking about. I 've (67) rf !,';■ ' 68 Sam Jones' Own Book. 11 II III 1 i 1 i f! i heard men trying to explain a great many things they didn't understand. I love to read David, be- cause he experienced what he was talking about. No man before him knew more of God and more of humanity than David, and the best preacher that ever planted his foot in this city is the preacher who knows the most about God and the most about humanity. He stands between the two, and hence he ought to know God, and lay his hands on the shoulder of his living Father in heaven, and then put the other arm around the race, and try to lift humanity up to God. This David could do. Now this man who had studied life in all its phases, a man who seemed to understand God as no man before him and very few after him, a man who seemed to understand himself and understand human nature — gives us the conclusion he had reached in these words, " Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly," as much as if to say, " If you want to be a hnj)py man" — and all men want to be happy — " if you really are in search of happiness, listen to this prescription : ' Blessed and happy you will be, if you walk not in the counsel of the un- godly.'" An ungodly man may be a very moral man ; an ungodly man need not swear, nor drink, nor violate the Sabbath, nor commit any of the flagrant sins which men are so often guilty of. An ungodly man means simply an ungodlike man. Ungodliness and ungodlikeness are synonymous — they mean the same thing. What does ungodly mean ? It signifies not acquainted with God, and God's ways. Every man who knows God loves God, and every man The Blessedness of Eeligion. 69 who does not know God, docs n't love him. It is just as natural for a soul that knows God to love God, as it is for a mother to love her babe, or as it is for a father to love his son. An ungodly man is a man who cares nothing about God. I 'II tell you the distinguishing characteristic of that sort of men. They love to talk. They scoflF at the idea that any body ever died for them, but they are all right, and they can give more advice, and practice less of it than any tribe in creation. The way to tell an ungodly man is that he is always talking about what harm is there in this, that, or the other thing, and the way to tell a godly man is, he is always hunting around for some- thing with good in it, and not going about trying to find something that people can see no harm in, as they say. If there is no harm in cards, why I have n't the time to play cards, and I 'm sorry for the man and woman that have time to dance. I tell you, brethren, when I look around me and see a sink- ing world and humanity drifting off from God, and so many sick-beds to visit, and see so many that are poor and need sympathy and help, I have no time to spare for these things ; and you wou*ld n't have either if you were of any account. You can put that down ! "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly." In other words, if you want to be happy in this life do n't take counsel or advice from ungodly men. Do n't do that ! When you are lost as to any moral problem go to the best man or the best woman you know in the world for 70 Sam Jones' Own Book. II 11111 good advice, for they 're the only ones capable of advising you. I want a man first to practice what lie preaches, and show me it is good to do it, and then tell me how he did it, and then I want to do just like him. An ungodly man I As I said be- fore, you can hardly pick a flaw in him ; he never goes far enough to be dubbed immoral. What 'a the difference between an immoral sinner and a moral sinner? Why, it's just the difference be- tween the typhoid fever and the small-pox. That's the only difference at all. One 's internal and the other is external, but both will kill nine times in ten. An ungodly man " can 't see any harm in any thing." He is like an old Irishman down in our town, who was a devout member of his Church. He was very profane, and a man said to him one day, " Jack, how can you be called a devout mem- ber of your Church and swear and curse as you do?" And Jack replied, "Faith, sir, and there's no harm in cursing unless you make harm out of it.'' Do you get the idea, brethren ? I am not hunting those things that have no harm in them, but I 'm hunting the things that have good in them*, and so are all good men under all circum- stances. They ain't inquiring whether there is much or little harm in this, that, and the other thing. If you want to be happy, brethren, do n't take the ad- vice or counsel of the ungodly, or of those men who run on that line of things. They '11 get you into trouble sooner or later, sure. Take the question of theater-going, and nine- tenths of these ungodly people in the Church and IKH The Blessedness of Religion. 71 out you'll find go to the theaters. Let's raise that question a little while here. A preacher in St. Louis told me that during his pastorate in Chi- cago there was a young lady, teacher in one of the schools, who came to him during a revival. Her conscience was stirred, and she walked up to him and said, " I want to be a Christian. I want to join your Church, but you object to theater-going, and I can 't see any harm in that at all." The pastor said to her, "Sister, give your heart to God, join the Church, and go to the theater as much as you please." She joined the Church, and after that went to the theater. Next Summer the revival started again, and the young lady came into the church, and took a class in the Sunday- school, and tried to live right. One day during the revival one of the young lady's pupils, who had become penitent, came to her and said, " Miss So- and-so, do you go to the theater?" And she an- swered, " Yes ; I go occasionally." The pupil then asked, " Do you think it is right as a Christian to go to the theater?" "Well," said the teacher, "I do n't know." And the pupil asked again, " Miss So-and-So, if you can go as a Christian, can I go as a penitent ?" And the young lady told her pastor, "I looked that sweet girl in the face, and said, 'Darling, I'll never put my foot inside anotlier theater, God helping me, as long as I live.' My lib- erty as a Christian was costing that girl her soul, and I said to myself, * My liberty shall never do that,' and I gave up the thing that was leading a soul off from God." 72 Sam Jones' Own Book. iiiiiti!' That's the way a Christian will settle that ques- tion every time. My liberty and license in these things shall never cost a human being his soul. Lord cure us of this abominable way of asking, " What harm is there in this?" But nobody has ever asked me, *' Is there any harm in family prayer?" They never asked me if I thought there was any harm in reading the Bible ! Do you want to know why ? Because they knew there was no harm in it I Why did they ask me the other question ? Be- cause they knew there was barm in it, and that settles the whole question. " Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly." When a man gets to listening to bad advice the next thing he 's going to do is to stand in the way of sinners. That means, keeping the company of sinners ; and a man is n't going to listen to bad advice long before he '11 be with sinners. I do n't care whose boy, or wife, or child you are, you can not stand the pressure of bad company. We need to inform ourselves in this question of company. There is n't an angel in heaven that can keep the company some of you do and be pure. Above every thing in the universe, a man ought to be choice about his company and about his books. If you will show me the company you keep, I will write your biography ten years ahead of your death, and I will not miss the mark one time in ten. " Birds of a feather flock together." I will tell you another thing. There is but one safe rule in this line. Do n't you ever go with any TnK JJlksskdnehh of Rklioion. 7n body that will say things you won't, that will «lo tilings you won't do. You won't run with them long until you will be doing those things and say- ing those things yourself. Always hunt better company than you are, for when some of us get up to ourselves we are with the biggest raseal in town right then. And that gets things in a bad shaj)e, doesn't it? I am sorry for a fellow when, every time he goes off by himself, he is in the worst company he was ever in in his life. I will illus- trate that for you. There was a very stingy man I once heard of down in our country. His wife was a Methodist, and he would go with his wife to Church, but he never would pay a dime toward the support of the Church. One summer he professed religion and joined the Church himself. Well, shortly after he joined the Church the stewards went over to his house and spoke to him kindly and told him: "Our preacher is now in need of provisions, and I came over to see if I could get some meat from you for him." He had a smoke- house full, and he thought a minute: "Why," said he, " certainly, I will give the preacher some meat." He went out to his smoke-house while the steward sat at the window. He walked up to the smoke-house, unlocked the door, took down a big, tine ham, brought it about half-way to the house, stopped and laid it down. He looked at it a while, and turned around and walked back to the smoke- house, got another and came and laid it down also. Then he stood and looked at it a minute, turned hack to the smoke-house and brought another. The 74 Sam Jonks' Own Book. steward was watcliiiig him, aiul he looked down at thn three hams. He heard him say : " If you do n't shut your mouth, you old stingy devil, I will go and give him all the meat there is in the smoke- house." The devil was in him, and told him every time: "Are you going to give away that ham?" And the devil kept after him, and he tried to hush his mouth by putting down one ham at a time, but finally he silenced him when he said : " If you do n't hush your mouth I will give him every ham in the smoke-house." And then the devil hushed. So a man can be in bad company when he is by himself. "Bad company will ruin you." Above all things we ought to be careful about the associations of our children. If that neighbor of yours is worth fifty, or seventy-five, or a hun- dred thousand dollars, hc; mav have the worst children in the town, and yet you will let those children of his come over there and ruin yours be- cause he has got a little money. Did you ever notice that streak of human nature? If that neigh- bor's son of yours drives a fine horse and buggy in the streets of this city and belongs to one of the fashionoble clubs, that is all I want to know about him or any other man. It is only a question of time when hc will be drowned in d .bauchery and ruin if he is a member of a city club. I do n't care if you are as pious as Job, if yon will join one of those clubs and begin to run with them I would swap your chances of heaven for those of Judas Iscariot. I am determined to be understood, you see, and The Blessedness of Religion. /.) I you all can disagree with me if you want to; but you shan 't run away from here and say : " I declare, I did n't understand that fellow." You shan't say that. I want to make you see what I am talking about. " Nor standeth in the way of sinners." O, mothers, look to the company of your children. Fathers, look to the company of your sons. And I say to you to-night, whenever it becomes a known fact that my daughters keep company with dissipated young men and my sons have gone out into bad company, I shall lose all hope for the future of my children. O, stand by your children and protect them. Boys, listen to me. You ne^J^er can get higher than the company you keep. If you would be noble and true, seek the best atmosphere of earth, and live in it forever. Stand not in the way of sinners. In this verse, David adds, " Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." Now, brethren, we notice first he is walking along, in the counsel of the un- godly. Well, when a man is walking in this way he can turn to the right or turn to the left by the movements of one set of muscles ; but you let him stand right still and he has got to move every muscle in his body to >^et off; and then let him sit down, and nine times in ten he is there to stay. While walking along in your youthful days, God's minister used to come and impress you and move you and turn you, but by and by you got to standing, and then the thuiiders of worlds could not shake you or 76 Sam Jones' Ow\ Rook. turn you. Some of you have nached the last stage, the ante-room to hell, and that is sitting in the .scut of the scornful. God pity a poor wretch that has gone through bad counsel into bad company until finally he is sitting down in the seat of the scornful, where he can laugh at the preacher and make fun of God and scorn the Bible. "•Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." A man never gets over the fact that he has taken sucli an attitude toward God. " But his delight is in the law of the Lord." I tell you, brother, when you get to where you will like this Book, and read this Book, you are laying a foundation then. Young boys, take this Book ; let your delight be in the counsel, in the law of tlie Lord. I never think of what this Bible is to a man but I think of a little boy. He was the good boy in the town, and all the boys recognized him as a good, upright boy. And they laid their traps to get him drunk. Tiiey sent one of the shrewdest of the bad bovs to him, and be met him on the street, and he said, " Johnny, come into the grocery and let us have a mint julep." Johnny says, "O, no, I can 't go in there " " Well, why ?" " Well, my Book says, * Look not upon the wine when it is red,' much less drink it." '' O," he says, " I know the Book says tha^ but come in and take one drink." " AVell," he says, *' I can 't do it." " Well, why ?" " Because my Book says, * At the last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder.' " " O," he says, " I know the Bible says that, but come in and take one drink." " No," he says, " my Bible says, ' When sinners entice thee, The Blessedness of Religion. 77 consent thou not.' " And the bad boy turned off and left him, and went over to his companions, and they said, " Did you see him ?" " Yes." " Did you o;et him to drink?" "No, I could n't get him in the grocery." " Well, why ?" He said, " That boy was just as chuck full of Bible as he could be, and I could n't do a thing with him." Ah, brother, " his delight is in the law of the Lord." Now, let me give you the germ of happiness that may spring up and be a tree under which you can sit in its shade and eat its fruits. Listen : these texts, these two verses, furnish the secret of a happy lite. I beg you, do n't walk in the counsel of the ungodly ! Do n't stand in the way of sinners ! Do n't sit in the seat of the scornful, but take the Book of God, make it your counsel, give yourself to the right, and live and die for God. Sayings. The roar of commerce, the click of the telegraph, and the whistle of the engine have well-nigh drowned out the voice of God. We little preachers think that wo are doing first- rate if v;e take a text and announce about three propositions, and discuss them for an hour. But do you know that Christ, in his sermon on the mount, announced and discussed one hundred and twenty diiferent propositions in the compass of half an hour ? 78 Sam Jones' Own Rook. A MAN who believes only in what he can see, doesn't believe he has got a backbone. I am not running on understanding. I co ild not get to my front gate on understanding, but I could get from earth to heaven on believing. Going to Church is like going shopping : you generally get what you go for — no more and no less. A woman will go into a store with a hundred thou- sand dollars' worth of goods all around her, buy a paper of pins, and walk out ; that is all she came for. I have seen the store-house of God's grace packed from cellar to ceiling, and I have seen men go in and gather up an expression of the preacher and go home. If any man does n't love God, it is because he doesn't know him. To know him is to love him, and to love him is to serve him. And if any man on the face of the earth does not love God, it is be- cause he has not seen him in all his characteiistics. If any man does not love God at all, it is because he has not seen him at t;ll. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." I have evidence of God's presence all around me ; but when I want to see God I will go and talk with him, and put my arm in his, and walk step by step at his side. Just take the path of Christian duty, and all along the line you will find God at every step. Sermon III. THE RIQHTEOUS AND THE WICKED. " The righteous shall flourisb like the palm-tree ; he shall iirow like a cedar in Lebanon." — Psa. xcii, 12. " I have seen the wicked in great i)0\ver, and spreading himself like a green bay-tree." — Psa. xxxvii, 35. WE narrow these two expressions which I have just read down to this: "The righteous are liice the palm-tree, the wicked like a l)ay-tree." First let us stop and ask, " What is a palm-tree ? What is that thing which I am or ought to be like?' The Eastern people boast of the fact that the palm-tree is good for three hundred and sev- enty-six different things. They say, " We live upon its fruits ; of its sap we make wine for medicinal purposes ; its wood we use for various manufactur- ing purposes; its bark and its roots we use for this and that ;" and they have summed up all the differ- ent things that the palm-tree is good for. They say that from its topmost sprig to the last fiber of its roots it is of use. There is not a particle of the palm-tree that is not useful, and r^l over, through and through, first to last, it is good for three hun- dred and seventy-six different things. " The right- eous are," or ought to be, " like the palm-tree," good for many different things, good from top to bottom, through and through, with not a particle of soul, body, or spirit that is not good in the serv- ice of God. 79 • I i-.i.ll: 80 Sam Jones' Own JJook. My Bible here, brethren, looks upon me as a sort of trinity in unity — a body, a mind, and a spirit. Now, a man who takes good care of his body, and eats when he ought to eat, and does so with special reference to the great purpose of his existence, is physically religious. Then contemplate the mind. A man who reads the right books, and only the rigiit books, and who improves his mind and grasps at those thoughts which are ennobling and elevate him, is intellectually religious. A. man who looks after the spirit — a man who lives in a spiritual at- mosphere, and who abides in eternal life, and has eternal life abiding in him here and now — that man is spiritually religious ; and, brethren, I like a re- ligion that permeates a man from the top of his head to the sole of his foot. I like a religion, a Bible, a Gospel, a system that looks after me as I am now — mind, body, spirit. A man who eats too much, drinks too much, sleeps i,oo much, or sleeps too little, is a physical sinner, and he will suifer for it, too. I do n't know how much he '11 suifer for it in the next world, but he '11 catch it in this — no avoiding that ! A man who punishes his mind sins against it. Tt has its life just as the body has, and needs nourishment, too. Tiiere 's many a starved mind in this country, brethren. If I were simply to feed my body upon husks that had no nutriment, how could I perpet- uate physical life ? If I do not sit down and eat those things that tend to produce strength and per- petuate life, in so far am I sinning against ray body. I wonder what those people are doing that spend Thk Righteous and the Wicked. 81 their intellectual hours playing cards? How much mental food is there in that ? One evening, where I was preaching, I denoimced social card-phiying and progressive euchre. Let mo teJl you, too, if you play progressive euchre — and 1 do n't care whose son, whose wife, whose husband you are — you are a gambler as much as any blackleg in this city. You can 't play progressive euchre without the " Booby prize," and you can 't play for a Booby prize without putting up the stakes; and if you win or lose, you are a gambler in the sight of God just as much as is the worst blackleg that ever cursed this city. Well, one of the society women who heard me, a member of the Church, said : " Why, 1 'in disgusted with that preacher. I have a con- tempt for him. How in the world could I interest my husband at night if I did n't play cards with him? It's the only way I have of amusing my husband." If I were you, sister, I 'd send my hus- band to a lunatic asylum, where they have cards for the inmates in all the rooms. The Lord pity the woman who has married such an intellectual starve- ling that she has to sit down and debauch her mind to interest her husband. Intellectually religious! Thank God for a sys- tem of religion that from foot to scalp makes one a holy man all over. I like that sort! The re- ligion of Jesus Christ makes me eat just as the engineer fires his engine — to got strengtli to go on! Nothing m; rCj nothing less! My intellectual nature calls for things that bring out the brain sweat, and fill the brain with ihoughts like those which God 82 Sam Jones' Own Book. mmm thinks, and the brightest man in this world is the man who thinks the thoughts of God. 1 can see how the righteous are like the palm tree, for they are good all over, good for many dif- ferent things. Brother, how many are you good for? Sister, get out your pencil and a little piece of paper, and let 's run the rule of addition over your life. Now, how many things are you good for? I mean how many things are you good for relig- iously ? You can run a world of things outside of your religious duty, but I am talking about the thing religiously. Now how many of these things are you good for? That sister yonder says, " Wait a minute, and I'll tell you. I'm good for — I'm good — I 'm — I 'm — I' — I — urn ;" and, brethren, that's just where she'll get to. That brother yonder has been in the Church for ten years, and he is idle to- day, and God speaks every day in his hearing, " Go work in my vineyard," and he stands there with his hands in his pockets, and says, " I would go to work in a minute if I only knew any thing in the world to go to work at." Whenever you hear a man talk that way he 's a fool or a rascal, one, in- evitably ; and sometimes he 's a compound of both, and then you get him in bad shape indeed I Stand- ing here idle with his hands in his pockets, and there are thirteen hundred and fifty millions of sin- ners in this universe ! He 's standing around idle, with a world sinking, sinking down to hell, and he says, "I can't find a thing to do!" Brother, when you talk that way, you show mentally you are a blank. If you are intellectual at all, rlien you are The Riohtkous and the Wicked. S.3 intellectually false, and you misrepresent yourself when you say, " I can 't find a thing to do in the world." There's work for you. Every sinner in this town is a good subject for you to work on. If I had my home here I wouM n't say, " I can 't find a thing in the world to do;" and you 'd better not go to the judgment and talk that sort of foolishness, for God will say, " Did n't you live in such and such a city?" Good anywhere — good everywhere! O, brethren, the Lord gave us the sort of religion that doesn't stand on the banks of the river and sluulder and shake with dread, and shrink ; but the Lord gave us the sort of religion that .ans and leaps into the current that is lined from source to mouth with human wretches. God help us to bring them over. The Lord give us the sort of Christianity that doesn't sit around with folded hands waiting for something to turn up, but give us the sort of Christianity that will pitch in and pound the iron until it gets red-hot, and then we can shape it as God wants it shaped. It will got warm under the blows of an honest, earnest heart! God everywhere, and God all over! I want the Christianity that makes every deed of my life and every word of my life a maxim for iniiversal appli- cation, and as I apply the maxim the world grows better. Good for three hundred and seventy-six different things! I have heard some brethren in the Church say, "You're all loading me too heavy. I must help my- eelx" some. I 'm going to quit being deacon. You 're «4 Sam Jonrs' Owx Book. all putting every thing on me." Look iicre, brother, get down on your knees and count out the three hundred and seventy-six dilFerent things you are good for and busy at, and then '.vlien you come out get the measure of the palm tree, and then you '11 let them put any thing on you. There 's some- thing wrong with the man that lies down on the ground with his cross on t(jp of him. I am disgusted with the Christianity that thus breaks down, i look back about eighteen hundred years ago, and I see what the disciples of Jesus Christ went through in order to make their way to God, and to make themselves the ministers of God's grace, and I am ashamed of every officer of religion W(! have upon the face of the earth. Why, brethren, then they took them out of their homes and stripped them and misrepresented them, and persecuted them, inflicting stripes and imprisonment, and cruci- fied them. And yet people are no better now than they used to be. I wonder if the difference is in the preachers, and not with the people? I have been hunting for a martyr for thirteen years. I want to find a martyr ; a fellow that died for the truth. If I could get him, I would have a text that I could make things hum with. But I have been hunting one for thirteen years, and I have never found a martyr yet. O, for a Christian that goes out to battle red-hot, and makes it so warm for those who sin that this world would surrender, or put that man out of the way. You can get it in that shape if you want it. God forbid that I should bring a railing and a scoffing against any preacher. The Righteous and the Wicked. 86 I would not strike a blow at you that I would not 1)0 williuf^ niyaelf to receive. But what is the matter with us? We want a Christianity that walks right out. A liquor paper in (foorgia denounces Sara Jones as a firebrand. God grant that if ever I have my name changed from Sam Jones to " Firebrand," 1 may go forth a fire- brand in the name of Jesus Christ. Jesus said: "I am come to send fire on this earth." We need an issue, brethren — a clearly defined issue, and we must have it, brethren, if we ever get this city for Christ. The devil now possesses it, and the only road we have to take in order to get it from him is the road of Christ. The Lord help every preacher in this city next Sunday morning to turn his guns on sin, and if you will bombard sinners in the right way, they will run uj) their white flag within thirty days from to- day. Let the pulpit be sure that it is right, and then go to hitting hard, and "carry the war into Africa." Rush it right on. How your enemies will howl, and kick, and rear, and pitch, and talk about vulgarity and vulgar witticisms, and slang, and all that sort of thing. But T toll you, i)rethren, one thing, that you will got at the meanness of them if you will get at them in the right way. Meanness is always cowardly. One good Christian can chase away a thousand, and two good ones put ten thousand to flight if you will get God with you. T hope that every newspaper in this city, and every pulpit in this city will get square up on the Ten Commandments. Thoy are good for any- ^c\S ^% .%W IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 II " IIIIIM " m II 2.2 2.0 III 1.8 i 1.25 1.4 1.6 M 6" ► ^my w -yf, e". ^^.<^ /i S>1 /^ > n, pening of the door ; and if they turned me out I would go again. A colored man was noticed joining a Church every time he could get a chance. He was asked, " What makes you do that w^ay ?" He answered, " O, it did me so much good the first time that I joined that I want to keep on joining every time you open the door." Thank God for his grand Church. God bless you and help you to see that the Church of Jesus Christ i;. the only hope of this world. If that is the truth, then let us make tlie Church what God wants it to be. Sermon IV. ' ^1 THINK ON THESK THINGS. "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatso- ever tilings are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatso- ever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatso- ever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." — Phil, iv, 8. WE have been misled, perhaps, some of us, as to what Christianity is. We have heard much on the subject of the terms of discipleship; we have heard a great deal about repentence for sins com- mitted ; we have read and heard a good deal about pardon ; we have heard a thousand sermons, more or less, on the subject of faith, and many on the subject of regeneration and sanctification, but here is a clear, sensible, philosophical statement as to what Christianity is. St. Paul begins this verse with this word "finally," — "linally! brethren;" as much as if to say, " I have written many things previous to this, I havf .said mar ' things in your hearing, but, breth- ren, you may forget all I have said and take your eye from oif all I have written ; yet if you will ju.st fix your mind and memory on what I am going to say now (for I will now give you the whole thing in a nut-shell), you can get hold of this, it is brought to you clearly and plainly." As a man thinks, .so he is. What I think to-day will determine what I may be doing to-morrow. The actions of this day are the embodied thoughts 91 iai 92 Sam Jones' Own Book. M of yesterday. Let me know what you are thinking about to-day, and I will tell you what you ^^ill be doing to-morrow. A man partakes of the nature of the thing he is looking at with his mind and eye. In the presence of the dead, I turn my thoughts to the object before me, and become saturated from head to foot with solemnity. You may bring in a beautiful bouquet of flowers, and I put my mind and eye intently upon that bouquet, and the first thing I know my whole nature is filled with the aroma and beauty of the flowers. I partake of the nature of the thing I look at, hence God tells us he will keep him in perfect peace whose mind and heart is in him. And, brethren, we have something to do with creation around us. We partake largely, morally I mean, of the world in which we live. He who thinks and sees only goodness, mercy, glory, and blessings with his own eye, shall live and die in a perfect atmosphere of heaven. Brethren, let's have some more of it down here now. Let 's not talk so much about hereafter. I need it here. This old world needs heaven, your city needs heaven, needs it implanted right down in every street, in every home, and in every heart in the community. And I say unto you, if you will, under God, make your city what God intended it to be, it will be a suburb of the city of the New Jerusalem. Think on these things. And, after all, what is a thought? I am no metaphysician, and I'm no kin to one, but we '11 say for the sake of the argu- ment, as the lawyers say, that thought is the result Think on these Things. 93 of an impression upon one of the five senses. Now we won't go into the discussion of intuitional thought, that's a matter too deep for me, but we'll take things as we see them. We say all thought, below the strata of the intuitional, is the result of an impression upon one of the five senses. I know God has come into ray soul, but when I touch in- tuitional thought God gets in without entering through one of the five senses, for I do not hear him come in, I do not see the door open as he comes in, nor do I see it close as he goes out, and yet I know God has been in there and talking to me. I see something that puts me to thinking; I touch something, and it brings up a thought ; I taste something, and it sets me to thinking, and so all the way through. The sense of perception then looks upon the scene, and the sense of conception then carries me back into my room and shows to me again, even v/ith my e^es closed, the picture I have just perceived. Then judgment will measure and weigh tlie picture for me, and by and by I turn it to the faculty of imagination, and I see her poise on her wings, and then go up, up, and up, until she goes above the moon and the stars, and I find my- self looking down on towering spires, jasper walls, and pearly gates of the city of God. Thought ! Well, if what I see opens ray raind to thought, I had better be careful what I look at. If what I touch opens ray mind to thought, I ought to be careful what comes in contact with mv hands. If what I taste brings forth thought, then I ought to be careful what T taste. Brother, be careful of n ■k.l i'- if''- lu* I' r ■ 94 SA^r Jones' Own Rook. what you hear, touch, taste, feel ; be careful of your five senses. Think on these things. Well, we say, thought is an emotion arising from something wo see, something we hear, something around us. A developed thought is ready for the hand, is ready for the tongue, is ready for the foot; that's the idea of developed thought — thought gotten into shape for the tongue, for the hand, and for the foot. A thought will develop into purpose. You had better look out there, there 's danger all along that line. A man can't help evil thoughts coming in, but ho can pre- vent them from developing into a purpose. Wesley said: "1 can't help evil thoughts from coming into my mind any more than I can help birds flying over my head; but I can help the birds from building their nests on my head and there hatching their young." Always keep the back door of your mind open whenever you open the front door, and make these evil thoughts pass along, and say to them : " You can 't stay until you are developed into an idea.'' I can't help a tramp knocking at my front door, but I can prevent myself from asking him into my parlor and telling him to make himself at home. Ten thousand evil thoughts may come in unawares, but I say, You can't stay here and make yourself at home and develop into an idea. Bad ideas are like the devil ; he tries to make your acquaintance and be with you ; but he is too much of a gentleman to stay where he is not wanted. I'll tell you another thing, if the devil comes and stays with you it is be- cause you make him at home and treat him well and are kind to him. Think on tiip:se Things. 95 "Thiuk on these things." Now, brother, St. Paul said, if you would be what the honest aspira- tions of an honest soul would make you, put yonv mind and thought entirely upon the truth. Now, just as with the pictures of the bouquet and the corpse I stirred my nature up, then just so, by thinking of God, 1 can put myself in an attitude, and keep there, until my whole nature is stirred with religion and truth, and when I speak I speak the truth just as naturally as I breathe. Truth is always uppermost in the normal state of man, and i)j man who is a man of integrity will tell a lie until he rams back the truth first. Men tell the truth naturally, but it is unnatural to tell a lie; and now, if I come up those steps and a man shakes my hand and bids me God-speed, it is per- fectly natural for me to say that he shook my hand and bade me God-speed; but it is perfectly unnat- ural for me to say that the man cursed me and kicked me down the stairs. It ^s natural to tell the truth ; it *s unnatural to tell a lie. Whenever a man is a cordial liar he has perverted his nature from head to foot. A liar is a consolidated, con- centrated lump of falsehood, and when he talks he tells lies just as easily as he lives in that atmos- phere. I despise a liar. I have seen some men who thought on evil so much that they could n't tell the truth at all. The man who thinks on the truth, who reads the truth, and fills his heart with the truth, will speak the truth : for out of the abun- dance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A man can tell lies and never open his lips; he 96 Sam Jones' Own Book. iPiil can tell lies with his hands, and he can tell lies with his feet ; he can tell lies with his eye, with an expression of his face. O, brother, be so loyal to truth that it will be impossible for you to tell a lie or act a lie. And, brother, you can never be right unless you are saturated with truth and on the true side of every thing. God g've us truth if we have any thing else or not. We need it all over this country. We want men we can bank on. If every body in this city and State will not tell another lie for ten years it will starve the lawyers to death and put them to plowing ; no doubt about that. Now, I do n't say that men of this profession live u})on the falsehood of the world. They may have to defend truth. It is not always a lawyer's duty in his practice to assail the opposite client, but it is the noble duty of a great lawyer to defend a good man against the onslaughts of unjust men. God give us lawyers who scorn the wicked side and stand up for justice and truth. Truth — I think in truth ; I saturate mind and heart with truth, and then I can s})eak nothing but the truth. It ought to be the normal state of every man. "Whatsoever things are true !" Brother, let 's avoid evils of every kind ; let 's look out for the things that would lead a man into telling a lie. Let our utterances be truthful, and let us die before we tell a lie. " Whatsoever things are honest !" When I say " honest " I do n't mean simply a man who pays all his just debts, as we call it. I have heard of a man walking all across the town to pay a nickel he Think on these Things. tl7 owed ; bu* I would n't trust that man in my room when I was asleep if I had a quarter in my pocket. Bless your soul, he is often paying that nickel to jrot some hold for an imposition upon the com- munity. When you let me define that word, " hon- esty," it is a man who lives up to his convictions, and will die by his convictions. That's what I mean by being an honest man. Many a man who has paid every dollar he owed in this world may he put in hell at last for being a thief. You say that is a mighty strong expression ; but theft is the unlawful taking of the property of another without his knowledge and consent. You can steal from a man when he is looking at you as well as you can when he is asleep if you just cover up some fact in the trade, and thereby carry your point ; but may be you would have seen the covered point if you yourself had not been working your tricks to gouge him. Dishonesty ! Down in my State I had my mind directed, two or three times, to a man of whom every one said : " There goes an honest man." I thought, a time or two, I 'd walk out and take his hand and ask him if he did n't feel lonesome in this country. He was a cotton buyer, and he would pay to the most ignorant negro as much for his cotton as to the shrewdest white farmer. An honest man going around by himself in broad daylight ! I was in p store, in a circuit I was on once, when a farmer came in to get some plow-points. He had just moved into the settlement, and it was the first or second time he had been to town. He cam.; into 9- r^im. 98 Sam Jones' Ovvx Book. the store and he asked the proprietor: "Are these plow-points tempered hard enough ?" " No," said he; "I think not. I tried some of them, and they are soft." When the farmer had gone out I said to tnc proprietor, " Why did n't you tell that man that the plow-points were well tempered and hard, and would do the work he required of them? Why, you told him the naked truth, and missed a sale; you're a strange man." But I tell you one thing: just as long as I staid in that community that man had a customer who would spend his last dollar with him. Tell the naked truth — the naked truth that makes a man honest. Do you know where we get that expression, "the naked truth?" The old story is that Truth and Error, a long time ago, went in bathing together. It isn't told what Truth was doing, but, while bathing, Error ran out of the water and put on Truth's clothes, and ran off with them on ; and when Truth sew thfit Error had take-n all of her clothes, she said : " I have nothing left to put on but the cl'^thes Error has left; but before I will put those on I will go naked the balance of my life." Since that time we have had the plain naked truth, and I never want any clothes on it. "Whatsoever things are jujt" — I like a just man. Brother, you hear people say, " You had better be just before you are generous." It 's a great deal harder to be just than it is to be gener- ous. I could pull cut ten dollars and give it to a poor woman, and I do n't miss it, and it does n't uother me. But to be just to all mankind, that 's ■!'?!^1 TISSTIi Think on these Things. 99 another thing. I tell you what it is: it is a great deal easier to give fifty dollars to an orphans' home than it is to be just. I hurt my little boy's feelings, and take little Bobbie in my lap, precious little fel- low, and say, " Son, forgive your father for hurting your feelings." It 's a great deal easier to be gen- erous than it is to beg your little boy's pardon for your harshness and meanness. Justice ! It is very easy for a man to be gener- ous, but, brother, have you the justice in ycu to implore the forgiveness of a wife for an unkind word uttered? If I infringe on the rights or feelings of others, then I will go to them and do right by them. " Whatsoever things arc pure " — pure in word, pure in your life, pure in all manner of conversa- tion, in every thing. Observe it — purity I purity ! purity ! We want purity ! purity ! I tell you, my brother, if a man lives pure and acts pure and is pure, he is good in the best sense — in the most refined sense. Purity is like the little ermine, with its hair and skin as white as the driven snow ; and when its capture is sought, its path to its home is made dirty and muddy, and when the little animal reaches the tnud and diri it lies down and subjects itself to ca[)- ture and death before it will besmirch one of its beautiful white hairs. I want to say to the Chris- tian world, rather let us lie down and subjec^t our- selves to capture or to death than besmirch our character as Christians by any contact with the sins of the world. God make us pure on earth. God Ri Ill 'Mil 100 Sam Jones' Own Book. bless you and take you under nis care, and God help you to live so that if you put your head under the block and it is severed from your body, God will be there to pick it up and put a crown of ever- lasting lii'e on it. m Sayinos. The fellow who believes only what he can un- derstand does n't believe there is a muley-headed cow in the universe. I revere him, but I will not imitate him. If I had a " creed," I would sell it to a museum. Creed shows itself in the wars of the last few hun- dred years. It was over creed that men fought, and not over Christ. Orthodoxies are what have ruined this world. I ONCE made this proposition : If there is a man in this house who feels in his heart that nobody prays for him, I want him to give me his hand, and leave here with the assurance that one prays for him. It is something to know that some one prays for me. The most lonely feeling that overtakes an immortal spirit on its pilgrimage to eternity is the feeling that nobody prays for him. Sermon V. R E ST IN CHRIST. '^•r' f " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me ; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."— Matt, xi, 28-30. THE first clause of this portion of Scripture which we read is an invitation. " Come unto me." Christ was not only a divine Savior, brt he was as truly a divine philosopher. Christ was not only a physician in the sense that he had remedies for the race, but he was a philosopher in the sense that he understood the condition of the race. He not only knows the remedies for man's ills, but he knows what your ills are in every sense of the word. There is a great deal, brethren, in a physician hav- ing the case thoroughly in hand. In sickness in ray own home I have sent for our old family physician. I have great confidence in his medical skill and ability. And when I see that my child is very sick, I watch the doctor as closely as I do the child. I never feel satisfied about mv little one until I can see an expression of confidence on the doctor's face. And I will tell you when that expression of confi- dence comes. It is the very instant when the doc- tor sees he has the case thoroughly in hand, that he understands the nature of the disease afflicting the child. 101 6:. ,-11 > ,.-ii insi '^^ i 102 Sam Jones' Own Book. All physicians will tell you that the greatest trouble in their practice is with little children. If you ask them why — as it is i fact that the system of a child will respond to treatment much more readily than those of grown people and old people — they will say : " The great trouble in the manage- ment of a child is in the diagnosis — to find out what is the matter with the little fellow. If I know just exactly what his trouble is, I know what to do with him." And there is where the skill comes in. Right at that point a good doctor will beat a sorry one in finding out what is the matter. The sorriest doctor knows exactly what to do if he knows what is the matter. What is the trouble? Locate it, and when the trouble is located and named, then any physician knows exactly what the remedy is. Now, brethren, I thank God there is a great Physician that diseased humanity can apply to, and apply to with the most unbounded confidence. He not only knows the remedies, what the " balm in Gilead " is, but he knows just exactly what is the matter with every one of us. He can put his finger on the spot that hurts you to-night, and he knows what it is as well as you know your name. There, you po >r, broken-down wagon of humanity. He knows what part is broken. He knows whether it is axle or tongue ; he knows whether it is spoke or hub. The Lord Jesus Christ knows just exactly where you have broken down ; and that is not all. He has in the great store-house of his remedies the very thing at hand to supply you and make you every whit whole. \u> ^V\'^l-i Rest in Christ. 103 :> M And now, brother, you can go and apply, or answer to the call of this great Physician. We generally call our doctor when we are ill, but in this case, blessed be Christ, he calls us, " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest/' He does not say, " Go to that Church," or " this priest," or " that rector," or " this pastor," but " Come to me." These are the words of the Lord Jesus. " Come unto me." I am so glad it is a call from a person to a person. There is not much theory about this. And after all, brethren, when you come to weigh this question aright it is not creeds and dogmas that saves men. It is the name of Christ, and he is the only name and the only power in tli? universe that can save a man. " The great Physician now is near, The sympathizing .Tosus," and he bids you come to him. He knows you. He knows what your trouble is and where your pain is, and he has the remedy at hand. " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden." Well, that invitation takes us all in. There are but two classes in the world. The first class are the aecent, respectable, law-abiding, clever folks Ivhat want to do right, and do their best to get to heaven. Well, now Christ says to them, " Come." And then there is another class that nre very heavy laden. Their cry is, " I have sinned and done wrong, I am guilty before God • and man. I lay no claims to righteousness. I break down under the law." Now, Jesus looks at them and says, "Come to me." r.-. m m ftr 104 Sam Jonks' Own Book. And after all, brethren, we need a sovereign remedy, every one of* ns. Now " come to me, and I will give you rest." It is peace to come. It is yours to come, and it is his to give the rest. " Come unto rae, ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." What does this world want anyhow? Years and years I struggled and toiled and suffered, and I didn't know what I wanted. If you had asked me I could n't liove told you to save my life. But I will say this, when the Lord Jesus Christ took me in his arms and gave me rest, then I said, '' Glory to God, this is the thing I wanted. I didn't know what I wanted, but if this is rest, then it is rest I wanted ex- actly." Poor, tired, ruined wretch ! Rest I wanted ! Rest ! And I will tell you, brethren, about all the rest from the cares and the troubles in this life is when you pillow your head on the blessed Christ. That is where rest is. I recollect when I went to Corinth, Mississippi, I was broken down in strength and I had only a week to stay. I told the brethren I would have to preach four times a day in order to get through with my work. It was midsum- mer. I had been working incessantly and preach- ing, four times a day, and preaching right along, and about the first day I said to my w^fe, jogging on to the Church, " I believe I will ask them to let me sit down and preach to-night. I can 't stand up ; I have n*t strength." She said she would ask them ; they would n't care. I went on to Church and got up and read my hymn, and we sung and prayed, and I got up and took ray text and preached Rest in Christ. 105 longer than sixty minutes, and the Lord bathed my soul and body in a perfect sea of heavenly rest. And I preached an hour, and ran about all over that immense building that night until about eleven o'clock, and then went to the house where we were stopping, and pillowed my head, and in five minutes I was sound asleep. The next morning, after sleep- ing eight hours on a stretch, I woke up and turned to my wife and said 1 did n't feel as if I had struck a lick in six months, and I believe it was weeks and weeks after that before I had a conscious sense of tiredness upon me. And I tell you, my breth- ren, this blessed rest will come to a man. In the tiredest moments of my life I have gone home to my room sometimes and lain down, and I said, "I am so tired I can 't sleep to-night. O, how truly tired I am." And I would lie there a few moments, and directly the restful praises of heaven would begin to play all over my soul. I would lie still so far as I might as they passed over me backward and forward, and I said to myself, " I wish this night was a thousand hours long and I couldn't sleep a wink. God give me this kind of rest." Bathed in that bliss I woke up the next morning, and it was the same delightful sensation playing all over my soul. Brethren, I tell you the Lord Jesus Christ has the keys to the great storehouse of rest, and can rest the soul in the sweetest and divinest rest. " I will give you rest." Well, that is what we all want. That is what you want, friends. That is just what you need. You have known all the time R !■ \\ i-i ? i 106 Sam Jones' Own Book. you needed something, but you did n't know what it was. But if you ever get rest you will realize that this is the thing you wanted. Rest I " I will give you rest." And what more does he say ? " Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart ; and ye shall find rest." There is a given rest and there is a found rest. There is a difference between rest and resting. First the Lord gives us resting. You see a man who comes in from his field after plowing all day, and sits down quiet in his cabin home with his arms folded. I ask, " What are you doing ?" He says, " I am resting." " Then, what are you going to do ?" " I am going to get up and eat my supper, and do something." Just as soon as a man is rested he begins then his activity again. A man that is resting must be quiet. The Lord Jesus gives us rest from guilt and soul-quiet. When we are rested, then the natural instinct is to get up pnJ go at something. Take the yoke and find rest. The grandest rest in this universe is the found rest; the rest in activity, the rest in movement, the rest in doing something; that 's it. I have sat in my own State, as well as other States, on a grand engine, with twelve or fourteen passenger coaches attached, and heard its exhaust noise, and felt its powerful influence as it moved the train along. It looks as if it don't need any rest at all. It has been pulling us two hun- dred miles, and it rolls on as grandly as it did when it first started. "Ah, Mr. Jones," says the en- gineer, " she takes her rest better when she 's flying ■wpi mm Rest in Christ. 107 on the track trying to make her destination on time." I tell yoi:, my brother, the soul goes on its way to God, and takes its greatest rest when it is bringing other souls to God with it. Praise the Lord ! What are you good for? A great many people think, " Well, I will just look after myself, and I will take care of myself," and the Lord knows that that is the biggest job a fel- low can undertake — to look after himself. I would rather try to run this city than try to run myself — to sit up with myself. What is a man worth that won't do any thing but look after himself? Sup- pose the president of the grand trunk railroad had an "iigine that could run by itself sixty miles an hour, and would run as smooth as a die, but would n't pull any thing else ; how long do you reckon he would keep that engine? How much would he value it at? He wouldn't value it any more than a scorpion. He would just tell the mas- ter machinist: "You just take that engine to pieces and throw it into the scrap-pile." Just show me a man that can not run any thing but himself, and I '11 show you humanity not fit for any thing but the devil's scrap-pile. Brothers, go out and do something for God and humanity, and find the grandest rest that ever stirred a mortal soul. Go out and go to work if you want to find rest. You see that little brooklet as it flo^ws along, winding its way through fields and villages, and turning around mountains, until finally the little streamlet says : " I am so tired ; I have been rolling and running, and leaping and i"'' „ i n if 108 Sam Joneh' Own Book. jumping ever since I was born into tiiis world, and I am so tired." A kind friend throws an obstruc- tion across its bosom, and malces a dam across it. And it stops still to pile its placid waters up, and I see it resting as quietly as a forest on a summer's afternoon. Then I see tho water piling higher and higher, and the little streamlet is sleeping so nicely, and it sleeps on and on, and by and by it breeds miasma, mosquitoes, and frogs, and a great many things; and it says: "I have slept too long; turn me loose and let me go again." And they open the dam and the brook rushes on and turns the factory wheels, and runs on and on, doing its work and making music as it goes. Brother, a few years ago I was so tired, I had run so long, and had been a sinner so long, when the liord Jesus Christ laid his hand lovingly upon me and said : " Have rest !" And soon my soul was bathed in the sea of heavenly rest, under the powerful influence of his love. He removed all obstructions, and turned me loose to preach the Gospel to every creature, "that he that believeth on the Lord Jesus Christ may be saved." Thank God, he bids us go on our way rejoicing every day. " Take my yoke upon you, for my yoke is easy." The yoke is an emblem of subordination, of servi- tude. See that wild ox roaming out in the forest. He comes when he pleases, and he goes when he pleases and where he pleases. He eats and drinks when he wants to. But go out there and bring that ox in, and let man control him ; then, when his master says go he has to go, and when he says stop Rest in Chriht. 109 he has to stop; and he perniits him to eat and drink when he thinks it proper to do so. When his mas- ter bids him to lie down he lies down. Look here! tliat ox has changed his whole nature. He is now submissive under the yoke. Look at that man. He won't work; he will do as he pleases; but now he takes the yoke of Christ upon him, and says: " Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth." There is the difference between the Christian and a sinner. " Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest for your soul ; for my yoke is easy and ray burden is light." Thank God that there are so many to testify to that ! Religion! If I were young, or if I were old; if I were rich, or if I were poor ; if I were living, or if I were dying; if I were in heaven, or if I were on earth, I would want religion. Religion is the best thing on earth, and there is nothing in heaven that will surpass religion. Let 's have it now, and let's have it every day, and work our way to the better world. Religion is like a beauti- ful casket. A man takes one home to his wife, and she puts it on the center-table in the parlor, and friends come in, and she shows it to every one, and they say, " O, how beautiful it is !" But one day the woman picks it up and touches a secret spring, and when the lid flies open for the first time sjie sees that it is not the inlaid casket on the outside, but the gem inside, that makes it lovely. Religion, with love, joy, peace, long-suffering, is like so many diamonds inclosed in this old, wretched nature of 'it w u 110 Sam Jones' Own Book. ours. It is beautiful to the world in its outer ap- pearance; but, when Christ touches the hidden spring, then heaven itself opens up in all of its glory to the eyes of the faithful. Glory to God for itl May God give it to you, and may he bless every one in this house. Sayings. He has either a mighty long head or a mighty short creed who believes only what he under- stands. Many a fellow is praying for rain with his tub the wrong side up. God can not fill a tub when it is wrong side up without inverting the law of grav- ity. God is holding up his clouds for you while you are holding your tubs the wrong side up. Turn them up and push them under the eaves if you want them to be filled, for the shower is coming. Life, with its three-score years and ten, is said to be like a tale that is told ; like grass that grow- eth up in the morning, and is cut down and wither- eth. Life is but one step from the cradle to man- hood, but one step from manhood to old age, and but one step from old age to the grave. The few moments spent here to-night are but a few moments we spend on our way to the bar of God. > ■ -, p-'"' 4 !■■:■ i_ ; I •« -J.;. L MUSIC HALL, CINCINNATI. O., WHKHE THE GREAT REVIVAL MEETINGS WERE HEI.D. Sermon VI. QOD'S QKA.C1S SUKF^ICIENT. " And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the re<^elations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. For this thing I be- sought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness." — 2 Cor. xii, 7-9. WE ask your attention, especially to these words : " My grace is sufficient for thee." The devil is a cunning and an artful adversary. His first effi)rt on humanity is to make us believe that we are strong enough and that we are good enough without any religion, that we are all right, and we needn't give ourselves any trouble; we're as good as any body ; a first-class fellow ; but by and by we become possessed with an idea that we are not so strong, and not so good, and not so pure. The fact of the business is that when we reach the conclusion of a sensible and wise man, we say, " I am not good at all— I am not strong at all," and then the devil takes that fact and works on it and says : " You 're too mean and too weak to travel and to talk about being good." How many thousand men who walk the streets of this city have been possessed of one of these ideas to their ruin and to others' ruin ! The first thing a man so possessed says, is : "I 'm all right — I do n't need any help— I don't want any Christ to die for 111 } ■ 112 Sam Jones' Own Book. me. I don't ask odds of any body. And the next thing you see, the poor fellow has jumped clear over on the proposition, and says, "Now, there isn't any use of my trying; I'm the meanest man in the world, the wickedest and of the least account. If I just thought there was any chance for me I wouldn't mind starting. The fact is, I'm so low down, and so weak, there 's no chance for me at all." Now, I want to say to you, brother, that of the two cases I prefer the latter. There is no hope pt all for a fellow who believes he is all right, when he isn't. That man is hopelessly lost while in that condition, but I have great hopes for a fellow that has touched bottom on the other side, and who feels, " I am not right, I 'm not pure, nor good, and I have n't strength to be so, though I want to be right." I sat this morning a half-hour talking to an honest man. I believe he was an honest and a true man. He said, " Mr. Jones, I havo indulged in sin and been so depraved that I have lost my will power. I want to be good. I want to be a Chris- tian and to abandon my sins. I want to live right and get to heaven. But, Mr. Jones, my will power is gone." I wish every Christian in this house and all these preachers could say, " I have lost my will power." Their case is mighty hopeful then. They can then say, "All my will is swallowed up in Thy will. Now I will consult the will of God and bid good-bye to my will and accept the will of God and the truth of God." I wish the whole universe would lose its will and have its will swallowed up in the will of God. God's Grace Sufficient. 113 Now, here, we have a case before us to-day. Paul was largely like some of us, in that he once felt, " I am all right now ; I am blameless ; I never did contrary to right ; I live on the straight edge ;" but, the time came, when in hopeless despair he fell; and when he arose he said : " Though I am a Phar- isee of the Pharisees, of the tribe of Benjamin, I count all these as nothing compared to the excel- lency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord." Paul seemed to have been in need of this sub- dued condition of his will. He had been exalted to the third heaven, and had heard the unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to utter ; his ears had been touched with the music of heaven ; but at last he came down from these towering heights. Like Paul, the deeper down you go the more Artesian power will be added to the current of your life. There are many little shallow wells in this country, with a great many wiggle-tails in them. You all do n't know exactly what that means. We do in South Georgia. In some places down there they keep a long-handled gourd — they do n't need any bucket or rope for a man can dip his water out of the well — but in one place in South Georgia there is a long-handled gourd and a pine knot at the well. The pine knot is very much worn. The first thing they do when they want to get water out of the well, is to knock against the wooden sides with the pine knot to make the wig- gle-tails sink, so that they can dip the water up, free from them. And there are many preachers ia this country that have to use the pine knot. 10 114 Sam Jones' Own Book. O, brother, we will go into the deepest depth, and go up into the highest heights, but there are depths and heights in piety I know nothing about. There are heights in divine life I never have reached. There are beauties in Christian experi- ence that you and I know nothing about. O, brother, let 's go down in humility, in contrition, in honest confession before God. • Now, when you find a fellow away down, re- member David said, " I was brought low and the Lord helped me." The Lord fishes on the bottom, and if you want to get to his bait and hook, you 've got to get right on the bottom, brother. "I was brought low and the Lord helped me." Now, St. Paul had been high and he had been low. We find him here on a very low plain. "There was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me." What was that thorn, do you know? I am glad I do not know. I am glad no human being knows just what that thorn was. Some of the wise men say the thorn in St. Paul's flesh was the fact that his eyesight was defective. For you know when he fell under the convicting power of God, he was blind three days and nights, and they tell us his eyesight was never entirely restored, and that that was the thorn in his flesh. Perhaps as he walked the streets the people said, " There goes old half-blind Paul, trying to teach people the way to heaven. Just look at him!" This was trying to a sensitive nature such as his. Others have said that the thorn in St. Paul's flesh was a defect in one of God's Grace Sufficient. 115 his legs, by reason of which he had to limp as lie went through the world, carrying the Gospel, and then perhaps they would say as they saw hiiu, " Watch old Paul now, hobbling along, trying to show the people how to get to glory. He is a nice fellow trying to teach people." The fact that he was lame was indeed a Sore trial to him, and then to be scoffed at on account of his infirmity was in- deed sad. Another wise man tells us that he thinks the thorn in St. PauPs flesh was the continued sup- pression of the ambition of his nature. Paul was eminently a great man. God never made a greater man, intellectually, morally, or spiritually than St. Paul. I measure his head and his heart, and I don't know which is the bigger. If you will find me a man who has a great deal of brains and no heart, I will find you a stolid, sound, solid, decent, dog- matic doctor of divinity that has not won a soul to Christ in twenty years; but there is one thing he will do, — he will " contend for the faith once de- livered." And he is giving a falsehood to his own proposition, " contending for the faith once de- livered." It ought to be for the faith delivered ten thousand times. Brother, I reckon we need these men in the world. I have never been wise enough to know why these men go all to head. There is a woman, they say, in the show who is nearly all gone to feet, but it 's a sad sight to see a fellow gone altogether to head. He would wear a number thirty hat, I sup- pose, .and his head would weigh fifty pounds and his body forty. That 's out of proportion. Brother, ills ■^ii;^ -^r" 116 Sam Jones' Own Book. uiiH Hi' II j^l' '' lUKiilll Ulil it 's tlie head and the heart together that we are to look at, and this grand man had both. And now to curb the ambition of his nature, St. Paul — the Saul of Tarsus, with a world stretched out before him, with powers to succeed in any direc- tion, with qualifications equal to the grandest accom- plishments in life — is chained in the eyes of the world to the humble and despised Nazarene and his truths. I do not think it was the defect in his eye- sight; I do not think it was his lameness. I do not think it was suppressed ambition or sub- dued ambition. You ask me what it was — this thorn in his flesh. I say I do not know. Look here. If suppressed ambition were all my trouble, I could get along finely. If it were only lameness, I could hobble along. If it were defect in my eye- sight, I could put up with that. But I tell you, brother, every man in this world has some supreme thorn in his flesh, and he can cherish the blessed thought, " May be this was the very thing that crushed St. Paul's spirit, and brought him so low to the mercy-seat." Now, what your thorn is I do not know^, but there is not a person here to-day without a thorn. You know there is something you never talk about, never mention to any human being on the face of the earth. Did you ever notice that ? You may talk a great deal, yet there is something you keep to yourself. There are some moments when God alone can take our arm and walk with us, or we would not go right. Paul did not tell what his thorn was. He might w^ God's Grace Sufficient. 117 have said, " I am suffering more than angels can bear.'' What is your case? "I can not tell you about it; I want your sympathy and prayers." Where is the man who has not carried a thorn in his flesh of which he has never spoken? I know that I have gotten a great deal of cons( elation in my distressed moments in the thought that " Well, after all, may be this thing that pressed so sorely on the life and character of this great man — may be I am to bear that." Now, brother, St. Paul carried this thorn in his flesh, the messenger of Satan, to buifet him. He carried it until he felt in his heart, " I can carry it no longer." Have n't you been right there ? Have you not felt that you must be relieved, or you would die? St. Paul reached that point. What did he do? St. Paul looked at this whole trouble, and then, when the world and his friends had turned their backs upon him, he fell on his knees and prayed, " O, Lord, I beseech thee, let this depart from me ; I am overloaded." He got up off his knees and said : " I get no relief in prayer. If angels do n't help, humanity won't. My friends turn their backs on mc What must I do ?" And he dropped on his knees the second time, and said, " O, Lord, do have mercy upon me." And he prayed earnestly, and got off his knees the second time, and there was the thorn still in his flesh, with all of its unspeakable pain. He looked at the world ; his friends turned back from him ; and at the angels, and there was a moment, perhaps, when he said, "O, what can I do?" And St. Paul dropped the i ■ m ^HHF -' ■ ^^^H^ff'')' ^^^^^H^^^j;^ 118 Sam Jones' Own Book. third time on his knees. And there is a charm in this third prayer, brother ; and imagine the third prayer of St. Paul, and the blessed Christ, as he stood at the Father's side and said : " Father, something must be done. I recollect the third time I prayed in the garden of Gethsemane. I remember when I had prayed once and got up, I found my disciples all asleep, and I awoke them, and when I went into the garden a second time, and came back, I found them asleep again, and I went all alone and almodt hopeless into the garden, and kneeled down the third time, and the bloody sweat burst from my body, and how I prayed that the cup might pass from me, and that I might be fanned with the wings of thy love. O, Father, I recnllect that. Some- thing must now be done." And I imagine the great God stood up in the presence of the angels, and looked over the parapets of heaven, reached down and put his thumb on the thorn in St. PauPs flesh, and drove it up, and said, " My grace is suffi- cient for thee." And St. Paul stood up, and has never said a word about that thorn from that day to this. Thank God ! " My grace is sufficient for thee." That 's it, brother ; that ^s it. I tell you, my brother, to-day, whatever your supreme trouble is, whatever may be the thorn you are carrying, go to God with it. If God does not pluck it out, he may drive it to the very head, but he will say, " My grace is sufficient for thee." When we go to God, and he puts his hand on that thorn, and drives it up, and says, " My grace is sufficient "II! UmI'^ God's Grace Sufficient. 119 for thee," trust him and he will give you strength. When you are weak you are going to be strength- ened under him. Thank God, I say, that there are weak moments in our lives. Then God shows his power and love. May God help you to trust in him, and help you to see that whatever your thorn is he will take care of it for you. Sayings. Repentance is the first conscious movement of the soul from sin toward God. Christ always lives where there is room for him. If there is room in your heart for Christ, he lives there ; if there is room in a law-office for Christ, he lives there ; if there is room in your store for Christ, he lives there ; if there is room on a loco- motive engine, he will be there ; if there is room in your baggage-car, he will be there. Eveiywhere there is room for him ; he will come into our homes, and into our stores, and into our shops, and on our engines, and in our cars — that is, if we will provide room for him. ¥ Sermon VII. WHAX WAIT I KOR? "And now, Lord, what wait I for? My hope is in thee." — PsA. xxxix, 7. "TT THAT wait I for?" Here is a very practical V V question, and a very wise conclusion ; and we notice, first, that it is a person vl question. It is not. What is this city waiting for? not. What is my neighbor waiting for ? not, What is my wife waiting for, or my children waiting for, but " What wait I for?" It is a personal matter at last; nobody can believe for you; nobody can repent for you; no- body can join the Church for you ; nobody can be baptized for you ; nobody can shoulder the cross for you ; nobody can die for you ; nobody can stand before the judgment throne for you ; nobody can be bound hand and foot and cast out for you ; nobody but you can wear the starry crown that may be yours. O, if we could just get men to think per- sonally about this question : "As soon as I from earth shall go What will become of me ? Eternal happiness or woe Must then my portion be." O, how can a man be religious without making it a personal matter? How can a man write a re- ligious epistle, as St. Paul did, without putting a great deal of the first person singular in it ? If a 120 What Wait I For? 121 mail talks out of liis heart he appears egotistical. If a man sits down and writes out of his heart he appears egotistical. Somehow or other, though, if you take that " I " out of your head you '11 be ego- tistical; but when the "I," and the "my," and the " me " come out of the heart there is really no ego- tism in it. " What wait I for ?" " Well," that man sitting back there says : " I '11 tell you what I 'm waiting for : I 'm waiting for time to consider this great question. It is a momentous question. I do n't believe a man ought to hurry into a thing of this sort ; and I believe if there is any thing that ought to demand the most painstaking care and coolest thought and meditation it is this great step. This is an important point to me, and I tell you I 'ra waiting for time to consider this question." Con- sider what? Look here! Do you want any time to consider whether it is better to live right than to live wrong? Do you want any time on a proposi- tion like that? Do you want any time to consider this proposition : " Is it better to live and be a good man than it is to be a bad man?" How much time do you want to consider that question in ? Why, there is not a sensible man forty years old that did n't settle the question twenty-five years ago that right is right, and he ought to do it ; that wrong is wrong, and he ought not to do it ; that it is better to be good than it is to be bad ; that it is better to go to heaven than it is to go to hell ; and yet some one says: "I want time." Look here, brother: is that wise? is that sensible? When I look at the 11 122 Sam Jonks' Own Book. iw infinite goodness of God and his numberless calls to men to lead a better life, and I look at what an infinite cheat the devil is, and always has been, that is the most ridiculous proposition that a mortal man ever made in his life. Want time to consider this great question! "What wait I for?" "Well," says another, " I 'm waiting for better terms. You preachers and the Bible are too hard on us poor fellows. 1 'ni waiting until the day comes when I can drink whisky, and tell lies, and dance, and play cards, and do as I please, and be a Christian man at the same time. Whenever that time comes around you can put my name on the roll." Now, brother, if you want an easy religion, some of the Churches in this town will accommodate you. That is, they will accommodate you as far as they run their train. There 's a great deal in that. There 's many a little short branch road in this country, and they 're trying to advertise them as grand trunk lines to Glory. But, brother, there 's only one grand trunk line to Glory, and the only terminus of that grand trunk line is Conviction and Repentance. The next station along the route, as you move up the line, is Conversion. That's a beautiful city. I stopped there, and found grand accommodations. The next station on that line is Obedience. You never spent a day in a happier, brighter town than that. A little further along the line is Brotherly Love, and this line just runs through the garden spot of the universe. When you step aboard that train once you step aboard with a through ticket, ! i^ ' y What Wait I For? 123 and your l)aggago chocfkcd, and do n't get off any- wliero. I believe tlie Metliodist train on tliis route stops occasionally and lets off passengers that do n't want to go through. But 1 pray God, if the Meth- odists of the city ever get going again fifty miles an hour they will never stop any more, and if a fellow is fool enough to jump off you let him go ! O, hovv I wish every man here to-night could see that' the terms of Christianity, the terms of apostleship, are just about these: Quit every thing that ever degraded a mortal man, or ever led a soul astray, and then do the thing that will help human- ity and bless the world. The terms of discipleship are about these : " Cease to do evil ; learn to do well," and I, for one, am glad that the Lord won't take a man until he agrees to do the clean thing. I am so glad God told me, " You have got to quit drinking." If the Lord had said, " I will take you in, but you can drink on," I should to-night, it may be, have been in a drunkard's grave and in a drunkard's hell. I am so glad the Lord imjjoses conditions that must be agreed to if a man wants to be religious. Another says : " T '11 tell you what I am waiting for: I'm waiting for the Church of God to get right." Yes, and you '11 be in hell a thoiisand years before that thing ever happens. You can put that down. It never has been right. When Jesus called his twelve apostles aside and conse- crated them to the work of their discipleship, one of them had^a devil ; and I think we 're getting on first-rate if we have twelve hundred members and have but a hundred devils in the whole number. 124 Sam Jones' Own Book. If there 's an} thing in the world that disgusts me, it is to see an old sinner walk into the Church and take out the lamest, shortest, crookedest, tri- fiingest old member we have got, and measure with him. Why does n't he pull out a first-class member, and measure with him? He wouldn't go within a mile of him. If he were to lie down by his side, he 'd look like a little rat terrier lying by an ele- phant. I say, in the name of sense, brother, what do you want to bother with the hypocrites in the Church for ? Listen to me. Those mean members in the Church are cast into hell, to live with the wicked forever. Come into the Church and live with the hypocrites, anyhow, for twenty or thirty years here, and go on to heaven and be rid of them forever. That 's my doctrine. Hypocrites ain't in my way. I have put them all behind me. Noth- ing can be in my way unless it's ahead of me. I '11 tell you, whenever you hear a man talking about hypocrites being in his way, it 's because he 's in the rear of the hypocrites, and that's mighty Ioav ground, isn't it? " I want the Church to get right." Brother, let 's you and I tote our own skillets, and let every body else alone. What do you say? When it ccm;.s to working, and striving, and toiling with other men, I want to do what I can to help every man to be good, but you can 't talk the meanness out of some men, because they take their meanness as a reason M'hy they 're mean. Talking about hypocrites as being in your road, you 're mighty far back if that 's the case. " Waiting for the Church What Wait I For? 125 to get right." Stop all such talk as that. There are enough good people in the Church to form fel- lowship with you, and help you to God if you want to go, thank God. Another man says : " Well, I ^m not waiting for the Church ; I 've got through that. The Churches ain't bothering me. I used to talk a heap about them, but since I have got a good look at myself I have never been bothered much about other folks' meanness." And there is a good deal in that, too. An old member of the Church said to me one day, " Jones, my trouble is this — I can 't love my neigh- bor as I do myself." Said I, ''You can't?" He answered, " No, I can 't." " Well," said I, " I have never had any trouble on that score." " How did you work it ?" he asked. '' Well," said I, " I got a good look at myself thirteen years ago, and I have n't met a man since that I did n't think more of than I did of Sam Jones." , Why, I am getting along finely on that line. O, me, if you ever get a good look at yourself, then you are going to think more of every body you meet than you do of your- self. You let all other people alone. Every tub must stand on its own bottom. I am responsible to God at last for myself, and for no other being in the universe. " But, ' says another, " I am waiting for feeling. If I ever get feeling, then I am going to start." Look here! The dog is running on feeling. When he feels like running rabbits he will run them, and when he does n't he won't. If I were you, and had made up my mind to run on feeling, I would run IlJi ■WSTf m m n i 126 Sam Jones' Own Book. rabbits the balance of my life. I think I would make that my business. A man waiti*:g for feeling is like a fellow sitting down by the big oak tree in the morning. It is a frosty, cold, crisp morning. He is sitting there by the tree, with an ax leaned up against his knee. T ask him, " Friend, what are you going to do ?" " I am going to cut down this tree and maul it into rails." " You are ?" " Yes." " Well, why do n't you get up and go at it ?" " I am waiting to sweat." " Well, if you will get up and go to cutting, you will sweat." " I — I ain't going to cut a lick until I sweat," and he just sits there until he freezes to death. Now, what are you going to do with a fel- low like that? Feeling is the result of religious exercise, just as perspiration is the result of physical exercise. But I can prescribe feeling for you now, if you are honest about it. You stir around and begin to right the wrongs you have done in this city. Go and try to bring character back to the one that you have robbed of her character. Go and take that money that you have defrauded another man out of, and count it out, and say : " Sir, T got this wrongfully. I am sorry for it. Here is your money." You will have feeling. ^ Look here, what do you mean by feeling, any- how ? Listen ; if you mean serious tVought. then I say you are right. Have n't you got serious thought, and have n't you had it for several days, on the subject of religion ? Then, brother, that is all What Wait 1 For? 127 the feeling that a sensible man wants — serious thought. Another says, " Well, I am not waiting for feel- ing ; I am waiting until I know I can get througn." Now, we get to the serious part of this question. Brethren, I always had an infinite horror of starting to be a Christian and then stopping. 1 preferred waiting until I got religion enough to take me clear through before I started. Now let me illustrate that for you. Once I was going out of Atlanta. Just before the engine backed down to couple on the passenger train, I was walking out around the en- gine. I wanted to look at the magnificent locomo- tive that would pull us out toward my home. The engineer was oiling it up. Directly he looked up in the cab and said to the fireman, " Have you got steam enough to start?" The fireman answered, " Yes." I walked back and peeped around at the steam gauge and I saw he had about seventy or eighty pounds of steam, and about three minutes later he rolled his engine back and coupled on to the passenger train and rung his bell and moved out. When I got on that train, I thought, " Well, it is strange; it is one hundred and thirty-eight miles to Chattanooga, and a great deal of it up grade, and that engine carries one hundred and sixty pounds of steam, and he left here with eighty pounds. I wonder what in the world is the matter with those men ? What do they mean ?" Well, then I got to thinking. The engineer never asked if he had enough steam to run to Marietta, twenty miles, nor enough to run to Carters ville, fifty miles, nor ""^^"^^^j^iflKBumj Ill m I 11 m 128 Sam Jones' Own Book. enough to run to Chattanooga, one hundred and thirty-eight miles, but he asked, " Have you got enough to start with ?" Then the fireman eaid yes, and off he started. And Ohattahoocliee River was sixty-seven miles from Atlanta, and just before we got to the river the engine turned around the curve, and why, she was blowing off; she had more steam than she wanted ; she had more than one hundred and sixty pounds. Then I got to thinking this way : Suppose that engineer had stopped and waited in Atlanta until he had steam enough to run to Chattanooga. That would have blown the engine into ten thousand pieces ; she could n't have held it to save the world, do n't you see. And there is a littl ' fellow out there who is waiting for enough re- ligion to take him to glory, but before he could turn a wheel, if he could get that much into his little soul, it would blow it into ten thousand pieces. Do n't wait to get enough religion to take you to heaven. Do n't wait to get enough to take you half-way to heaven, or ten years on the way to heaven ; but, brother, have you got enough to start with? That's it. Well, how mvica is enough? Wrong is wrong; I will quit. Right is right; I will go at it. That is steam enough to start with. If you will pull your throttle wide open, and move out, you will be blowing off before you get half- way to heaven. But now let us step back on the right side of this question. " What I wait for? My hope is in God." Well, brother, here is the great soul-stirring What Wait 1 For? 129 thought of the whole thing. When I first started out they could have said to me, " Jones, you are as weak as a bruised reed ;" but I would have told them, " O, I know that, but my hope is in God." If they had said to me, " Jones, you will have ten tliousand temptations," I would have said, " O, I know that, but my hope is in God." They could have said to me, " O, Jones, I tell you, you have undertaken a task that is a great one indeed ;" but I would have told them, "I know that, but my hope is in God." " Jones, you will fail a thousand times." " Well, I may, but I want you to know that my hope is in God, in God." If my hope had been in money, I could not have bought a hope. I had nothing to buy it with. If ray hope had been in my wife — and she lias been all the world to me; she has been like a crutch under each one of my arms, carrying me along for seventeen years — I might have had to bury her, and then my hope would have been buried for- ever. Suppose my hope had been in my children, the time might have come when I would bury the last one of them, and then my hope would have perished with them. Suppose my hope had been in the preachers, the time might have come when they would all turn their back on me, and then my hope would be departed. Suppose my hope had beeii in the Church, the time might have come when the Church would drive me away from her presence, and then I would be driven away from my hope. But hear me, brother, my hope is not in wife, dear as she is ; nor in children, precious as they are ; nor in the Church, as blessed in her influence as she is i i nM 130 Sam Jones' Own Book. to me ; nor in the preachers, whom I love more than all other men in the world; but thanks be unto God. my hope is in him, and I want to announce the truth that ought to inspire every heart here to- night. Brethren, I am as strong as the thing I commit myself to and no stronger. If I start across the Atlantic Ocean in a paper box, just as soon as my paper box gets wet, it goes down, and I go down with it. I am no stronger than the box I have committed myself to. If I step on board of that grand ocean steamer and start out over the ocean, then all the strength in her hull and all the power in her boiler and all the comfort of her cabin are mine, and I will never go down until she goes down. If I commit myself to the arm of flesh, I am no stronger than the arm I commit myself to, and when the arm of flesh fails, I fail with it. But blessed be God, if I commit myself to God, I will never go down until God goes down. He is my hope and my strength and my portion forever. Blessed be his holy name. I give him my hand and my heart. Let your hope be in God, and there is no power in earth or hell that can wreck you or ruin you. Start out, friends, with that hope to-night. If you will just start, then God will carry you through. Sermon VIII. HOW TO BE SAVED, "What must I do to be saved? And tlioy said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved and thy house." — Acts xvi, 30,31. THIS is the language of the Philippian jailer to St. Paul, and Paul's answer. As a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, I have no right to advise a man to do any thing that he may not die doing and die saved. I might advise a man to join the Church — I know that is helpful and good ad- vice, and I wish every man was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ, and was living up to the precepts of his blessed religion; and yet I see how a man may join the Church, and live in the Church and die in the Church, and yet be lost at last. And that's the saddest reflection of a human soul — gone from the heights of profession down to the depths of damnation. T might advise a man to read good books, and I wish there were no bad books in the universe. I am sorry that a bad book was ever published. I am sorry that any bad book ever had an entrance into your home, brother. I am sorry that one of your children, or one of you, ever sat down and worse than threw away your time read- ing bad books. I wish there were only good books, and that men would read them, and when I advise a man to read good books I am giving him good advice ; but I see how men may go from the best 131 i i 'it 132 Sam Jones' Own Book. libraries of earth down to hell at last. I might ad- vise a man to be baptized in the name of the Trinity, and, brethren, this is a rite commanded of God; yet a man who has been baptized may go down to hell, unsaved at last. I might advise a man to take the sacrament of the Lord's-supper. This is one of the sacraments of the Chur(!h of God, and I am sorry for any man who lies down to die with the consciousness, " These hands liave never handled the cup of my Lord, and have never tasted of the bread which is emblematic of the broken body of the Son of God." Yet I see how a man may take communion regularly, may partake of the sacrament once a month, and die and be lost at last. I might advise a man to keep good company, and I wish all men were good, so that there would be no bad company, for nothing can be more in- jurious than bad company, and nothing more help- ful than good company ; and yet I see how it is possible for a man to keep good company all his life and die unsaved. These things are all good. I would not, I say, underestimate a single one of these efficient means to take us to God ; but there is only one sufficiency, and that is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And he who has this faith with works of love, and purifies his heart and overcomes the world shall be among that blood-washed num- ber that shall shout and shine forever in heaven. "What must I do to be saved?" The question is given, the question is answered, and I have often thought how good God is to us. He asks us ques- How TO BE Saved. 133 tions and there on the pages of that book six thou- sand years old, some of them four thousand, some two thousand years, are the answers. But now here's a trembling, ruined man who cries out, " What must I do to be saved ?" And the answer in the twinkling of an eye comes ringing down through his soul: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." Thank God for an answer as quick as heaven can give it to all who ask in sincerity and truth what they must do to be saved. We might stop profitably to-night on the ques- tion itself, " What must I do to be saved?" Now, this term, "saved," "salvation," is not a song; it is not a sentiment; it is not a tear; it is not a shout; it is not feeling happy ; but in its broadest, high- est sense it means simply this — deliverance from sin ; deliverance from all that God despises. Brethren, we may leave this city for the city of refuge. Every step that takes me away from it is carrying me towards the city of refuge. PJvery step from sin is bringing me a step closer to the right. And conversion means being turned from the wrong and turned to the right. It is being brought into such relations to God, and into such harmony with God that I naturally love the right, and abhor the wrong. Behold all old things have passed away, and all things have become new. Now I find that what I once hated I love, and what I once loved I hate. Whenever I realize in my soul that I abhor sin and love the right, I have passed from death into life, because passing from death into life is Vf W i'«iii 134 Sam Jones' Own Book. always presupposed by the fact that I loved the wrong and did the wrong, and eschewed the right and would not do the right. But now, when one steps out into the realm where he hates the wrong and loves the right, if there has n't been a mortal change in the nature of that man, what in the universe could have produced such a state of things with hitn? " What must I do to be saved ?" Now we have had a great deal to say about getting religion. There is no such a phrase as " getting religion " in the Bible. Brother, let your religion get such a grip ou you that you love the right and eschew the wrong the rest of your days. Religion is not the love of the beautiful and aes- thetic, but it is the grand principle underlying every stratum of life, guiding me and directing me in the path of truth and of righteousness. A good many men are looking for some mysterious transforma- tion, some sudden, unexpected, serious, radical trans- formation. The best men T have ever met in my life did n't know the day nor the hour when they were born to God. The best man in my State told me from his own lips : " Brother Jones, I have loved Jesus ever since I commenced loving ray mother, and my mother and Christ have always been associated together in my mind." Brother, I never ask a man what sort of experience he had to begin with, but, " Brother, are yon loyal to God now ? Do you love the right, do you hate the wrong?" That is the question. Well, a great many say, " If I ever get religion as you say, why, I will know it by certain signs." How TO HE Saved. 135 Do you know that has been the curse of the world, crying for signs? Do you know that religion and I will catch it, and it shall be mine forever." ti I f How TO BE Saved. l;'.9 God ifj all around you in every direction, and you are walking right up to God ; and when you walk far enough from sin, and close enough to God, the doors of your heart fly wide open, and you say, " My Lord and my God." Is n't it strange that God will come to a poor fellow when he gets down to where there is no chance at all ? Every other hope is gone. In your lost estate God begins to whisper to the soul, " The word of faith is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart." There is the life, there is the hope, there is the blessedness, and there is the heaven in following the Lord Jesus Christ. That is it. Be- lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ. When Matthew was sitting at the seat of customs, Christ (same along and looked at him with his tax-books, and said, " Follow me." Matthew closed up his tax-books, and went right after Christ. When he got up and commenced to put one foot after another right down in Christ's tracks, if that is not religion, what do you call it ? Listen : It is not the sentiment of faith, but it is the actual stepping out ; it is the actual committal of your soul to the care of Christ. Believe. Now, a great many men say, I believe. Well, the mere believing that Christ implanted in every woman's nature an in- veterate hatred of the devil ; and your success for both worlds depends on how you live out that prin- ciple. Die fighting him. It is customary in Georgia to build storm-pits to protect the people from the fury of storms. I would not give one honest prayer for all the storm-pits in Georgia. I heard of a lady who, when she thought a storm was coming, started down to the storm-pit, and fell and broke her neck, and they never had any storm. * ■ f Sermon IX. REIvTQION A. KlSA.SONA.BIvB SERVICE), " I beseech you, tlierefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." — K()3I. XII, 1. THERE is nothing more reasonable tlian religion and the conditions upon which we may become Christians. It is reasonable, right, and wise to be- come a Christian, and we are besought to do vso by the mercies of God. The great question in this nineteenth century is not whether a man ought to be rclici:ious, but how can he be? We have in our text a lesson : *' Present youi bodies a living sac- rifice, holy, acceptable unto God." That 's it. What do you mean by that? I mean simply this: Tliere is but one road in the moral universe of God ; heaven 's at one end of it and hell ^s at the other, and this text simply says : " Keep your back on hell and your face on heaven." In this road, and there 's only one, if you turn your back on heaven, hell would be before you. A man does n't have to take a week's journey through the wilder- nes.s, across the mountains of God, to be in the road to heaven; all he has got to do is just to turn around, and he is just as much on the road to heaven as any body. There 's only one road. Which direc- tion are you taking? Up or down? Hellward or 142 Religion a Reasonable Service. 14;} heavenward? This text turns a man around, and turns his face toward heaven, and turns his back upon all that's bad. If I turn my back on the good, then I 'm bound to go to the bad. If the train I am on is going forty miles an hour south- ward to Chattanooga, I can 't come to Cincinnati. Its momentum, its speed, its power, all carry me in the other direction. " Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God." No man ever was or ever will be religious until he settles the question some- where along the line of life that he will have re- ligion. The Spirit of God, the Gospel of Christ, the Sabbath-school, with its training, a mother with her prayers, never made any man religious. When a man once decides the question of his destination all the resources of God help him along. How are you going to make a farmer out of your boy when he doesn't want to farm? How are you going to make a lawyer out of your boy when he does n't want to study law? If you want to help him how arc you going to help him? How can God Al- mighty help a man to be religious when a man hasn't made up his mind to be religious? That's the question. This text involves the idea of choice. Do you know what choice means ? It means I '11 take this in preference to that. It means I '11 give up that and take this. There is a great difference between a desire to be religious and a choice to be religious. A man may die desiring to be a Christian and yet he may go to hell, for he dies without religion ; but no man 144 Sam JoNEfs' Own Book. ever did make a choice to be a Christian and die without religion. Choice means, I '11 give this up and take that. Choice means, I will sell out all I have and invest in this. I will be religious. A man must come to an agreement with his Maker. O, happy man that has reached this point in his experience, where he can look into the face of his Maker and say, " Father, God, from this moment I will be loyal to thee; I will do right, I will quit wrong !" " Fear God and keep his commandments." Let a man come to the point in his understanding with his Maker, and say, " In thy name and with thy blessing I will quit all that 's wrong and do all that 's right," he is a happy man. There 's no doubt about that ; there 's something sensible in that. It 's astonishing how we know right from wrong and wrong from right. It's astonishing how many people know all about these two things ! There 's something practical about this. Quit what's wrong and get to doing what 's right. That 's it ! Just as certainly as any railroad leads into or out of this city, just so certainly a man who will quit wrong and take to doing right will find his way to God. There are a great many little side issues I might bring, to be specially orthodox ; but the question is not whether you are orthodox, but is your life con- secrated to Christ, and are you doing your duty? That's my religion. I like the good old practical religion that will make a fellow tell the truth when- ever he opens his mouth ; that will make him pay his debts, and love his neighbor, and be good to his ■• - - -^» Religion a Keaisonable Service. 146 wife and pleasant to his children. I do n't eare what your professions are, if you have that kind — if you 're not a hypocrite — you are on the right road. A man who is snappish, and cross and mean to his wife and his children, and won't pay his debts, no matter what he professes, is a hypocrite. If a man has assumed a right attitude towards God, then the next question comes, " What are you going to do about this world ?" This world is a multitudinous affair, and the apostolic injunction is, " Be not conformed to this world, but be ye trans- formed by the renewing of your mind." Do you know what 's the matter in this city ? Is it the drunkenness, lying, thieving, licentiousness and outbreaking wickedness of the Church members? No, sir ! But, if you want to know what 's paralyz- ing the Church and destroying its heart power, I '11 tell you: It's the tide of worldliness that's sweep- ing over your homes and dragging families down to hell. It's dancing with this world, and going to theaters with this world, and drinking with this world, until we have only about one more thing to do, and that 's to go to hell with the world ! A great many of us are doing that very same thing, too. I like to see a Christian put himself in a right attitude towards the world. This world has no right to furnish a fashion for us to be governed by. Fashion ! Custom ! I declare it has reached that point now where some of our Churches increase their membership by dragging tlio Church to see new families moving in the neighborhood, and say- ing to them: "If you want to get into society you'll 13 146 Sam Jonks' Own Book. have to join our Chiircli." I am glad of every social feature in this universe, but you liuow what 1 nieai; by " society." Tliese dinners, where you 're consid- ered stingy, may be impolite, if you don't have wine on your table, and cards in your home, and germans in your house ; that 's the society I mean. It is a heartless cannibal, tt;ding upon soul and body. " But every one has cards, or social dances and ger- mans !" Every body ! It's a lie! They do n't, and 1 'm glad of it. My house is consecrated to God, just like this church, and nobody comes there to dance or engage in a wine supper, or a ball, or a game of cards. They all know that house is God's house. I will protect my home. I never shall let this tide of worldliness sweep over my children. I see what it has done for others. I see how others are cursed and blighted. A Catholic priest in New York said that nineteen women out of twenty who had lost their character, and came to the confessional, told him they got their downfall in a ball-room. I know a man who opposes the world will be called a fanatic, and worse things than that. You Christians need to be looked after. If these sinners want to dance and drink and carouse about you I can safely plead with them ; but, when a man pro- fessing to be iv Christian goes into these things, I will denounce him as Jesus Christ denounced whited sepulchers eighteen hundred years ago. What's the use talking to sinners when the deacons and leaders of the churches, and stewards, rent their houses to women of ill-fame, and their property for bar-rooms III Religion a Reasonable Skrvice. 147 and whisky-shops, and gambling hells, and worse? You will have to sweep before your own doors bo- fore you can reach Jesus' heart. Lord Jesus, give us men who say, " I have set- tled some questions with God. I am going to settle it now that 1 won't drink, nor play cards, nor run with this world, nor do any thing for or have any thing to do with it any further, if Jesus Christ will be with me. One of the governors of Georgia removed to the capital of our State. His wife, a good woman, ac- companied him. After they had moved into the city of Milledgeville she sent her children to school, and one afternoon they came home and said to their mother, " Mamma, if you do n't take these red flan- nels off o^ us we '11 quit school." " What 's the matter?" said the mother. "Well," said her chil- dren, "all the other children laugh about wearing red flannels, as they 're out of fashion." The old governor's wife said, "Now, look here, children, you must n't come here and complain about the fashions, because I set the fashions here, myself, for the other folks." Let 's look this old world in the face, and set the fashion of what is right and keep it. " Be not conformed to this world." Do right under all circumstances, and everywhere. Suppose you starve to death, do right anyhow. Come to a good understanding with the world, but do not fol- low or love it. I do not know that I have been any more lucky than other people, but I tell you this, brethren, when I gave my heart to God, and mv life to the service of God, this old world, some- I. ' I mil; i •If 148 Sam Jon eh' Own Book. how or another, thouglit I was in earnest. From that dav to tliis no man has ever asked rae to take a drink of whisky; no man has ever invited me to a ball ; no one lias ever invited me to a german, or to play a game of* cards. 1 heard a trifling old Methodist in my town say once, " Our (landidates are grand boys ; they 've asked me seven times to drink this morning." A candidate knows whom to offer drinks to. God lielp me so to keep my life ever before people that they may never dare ask me to do an unholy thing. It is an insult to a good man to be asked to do anything a Christian should not do. The truth ! the truth ! Be not conformed to this world. I love to see a man or woman in the right attitude toward this world. Brother, you '11 never feel religious until you settle some questions with this world, and say, " I will not drink, or dance, or frolic, or go to theaters, or do any thing that's wrong — I won't do it." Now, let us see how good we can be. » Sayinos. What is salvation ? Every theological book I look into tells me that salvation is deliverance — iirst, from the guilt of sin ; second, from the love of sin; and, third, from the dominion of sin. That is what the books say salvation means ; but if 1 were to answer out of the Word of God, and out of Christian experience, 1 would say that it is the loving of every thing that God loves, and the hat- ing of every thing that God hates. Sermon X. WORKJS OK KAII'H A.NI3 LOVE. " Remembering without ceasing your work of faith and labor of love uud patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father." — 1 Thess. i, li. THESE are the three elements of a Christian Church in its active life : works of faith, la- bors of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. The Thessalonian Church, my breth- ren, did have favor with God and great influence among men. I believe in primitive Christianity. I will take apostolic Christianity with all its Puritanism and with all its transcendentalism before I will take nineteenth-century Christianity, with all its adultera- tions and all its finery. Apostolic Christianity; first-century Christianity! Well, that involves a great many things, brethren. A man gave np all then, and received all. A man is filled with the fullness of God just in proportion as he empties himself of the fullness of the earth. No two substances can occupy the same space at the same time. The more of this world we have in us, the less of God we have in us. In the very nature of the case this must be so. And if any man loves the world the love of God is not In him. We have made a great many improvements in other things, but when have we made any im- provement on apostolic Christianity? Paul said to this Church of the Thessalonians, " Remembering 149 Pf!T 160 Sam Jonks' Own Rook. your works of fuitli." What is a work of faith? Wliat is faitli? Faith is taking Homething that i.s offered us from God, and giving something to God that he asks for. Tiiat is all. There is a sense in which 1 receive from God by faith. Th(>re is a grander sense in which I give to God by faith. It is more blessed to be where you can give than where you have to receive. Now, there is a faith that receives, and J like that sort of faith. '^ Every good gift and every perfect gift comes from God." O, brother ! God did not say, " Stand still and receive salvation," but, " Work out your salvation with fear and trembling." AVorks of faith ! Now, I say that faith — simple faith — either takes something or gives something every time you offer it an op- portunity for so doing. It is doing the one thiijg or the other all the time. Wlienever God offers you something — and he is always offering you every thing when you have got hungry — take it of God and be thankful for it. But there is a giving faith also, and that is shown in works. I know what is the work of sight. There is a farmer there plowing all along between the rows of his corn in his field. The corn waves on both sides of him, like a sea of green, and he })lows along between the rows of his corn, and the man almost hears the joints of the corn cracl covering, it is growing so fast. That is r sight. What is a work of knowledge? gi\ . you an illustration. I see a colored n.ai valkinp along the street. I talk to him and he tells ni , " I likes to work for So-and-so." " Why ?" '' Be- Works of Faith and Love. 151 cause T knows that jes' as soon as tlie work 's done there 's the money." You see there is the work of knowledge. But what is a work of faith ? An old colored man hit it the best. He said, " If (lod would tell me to jump through a rock wall ten feet thick I would jumj) at it. (ioiug through it belongs to God, but jumping at it Ijclongs to mc." That is pure, clean-out, naked faith — God's faith. In other words, a work of faith speaks out, as Joshua did at Jericho, and says, "The Lord hath delivered this city into our hands," when there is not a crack in the wall. 1 will tell you another thing about faith. There is a past faith and there is a ])res{'ut faith, and there is a future faith. Faith ought to be like the Hebrew verbs. They are all of one tense, and that a present tense. You see sometimes our faith com- ing ahead of us, and we say that we are going to have a good meeting, and then it runs on for a while, and they say, " We should have had a good meet- ing, a splendid meeting, if we had done so and so." Now, it is the tense gone back and dropped behind. Whatsoever faith we have let us have it now. That is what we want. It is a faith thai: appropriates now the blessings God proposes to give vs. Present faith ! A work of faith ! It is getting right straight along and doing what the Lord tells you to do, and asking no questions about it. A work of faith is manifested by obedience to the will and the word of God. The best reason that I have for knowing that my children have faith in me and 152 Sam -Ionks' Own Book. faith in my love and devotion to them, is thut they never question me a moment when 1 tell them to do any thing. I would hate to have them to stop and question me about every thing that I tell them to do. If I told my little boy to bring me a drink of water, and had to explain to him for ten min- utes why I wanted a drink of water, I vvould sooner get it myself and have done with it. If the Lord had to spend all his time in explaining why he wanted us to do this thing and thut for him, why, he would not do it, for he can and would come down to do it himself. When you understand what the Lord wants, go on and do what he tells you. Well, then, the next thing we take up is the labor of love. What is the difference between a work of faith, and a work of love? There is no dif- ference in kind, but there is a difference in degree. Let us illustrate again. The day I joined the Church I sat up at night and talked with my wife. She was a hapj)y woman, too, you can believe. A new day and a new life had dawned upon our home. Ati'^ before she retired that night she took down the Bible, and said *' Let us begin right," and gave the Bible to me. I took the Bible in my hand, and I commenced reading, but the words seemed to run all together, but I managed to get through some chapter, but I never remembered what chapter it was, or a word in it, and I have never remembered a single utterance. But this nuich I do remember, and that is that I read this Bible, and that I prayed, and that big drops of sweat covered my face when I had got all through. l)igf Works of Faith and Love. 153 O, how hard it was. It was a work of faith. But I have kept at family prayer every night and morn- ing ever since, and the most blessed moments — the sweetest moments I have at home are passed when I am reading the Bible. It was a work of faith then, but it turned into a labor of love, and now it is one of the sweetest duties in my home. Labor of love ! Get .so as to love to do right. I recol- lect the first sermon that I ever preached. O! the agony I felt while I stood up before the people and tried to preach. O! brethren, I went right along, straight ahead, preaching the Gospel of the Son of God; and this evening, I would rather be a })reacher than be a king. I woi>id not swap places with the President of the United States. I would much rather be an humble minister of Christ Jesus than be the king of England or the czar of Russia. I will make it look as if I meant what I say if I show what I am talking about. I never told a bigger truth than that, and if God helps me to do n\y part well, and in the kingdom of God, I shall outsliine every man who has been President of the United States, every thing else being equal. And labor of love ! I am sorry for the Chris- tians that have been long in tho heavenly race and have not yet got so that they love to run. We have been cursed with people who have only talked about duty and done no running. What we want is love of labor. We want to be God's willing agent. We want to consider it a privilege to do what God wants us to do. I tell you I use family prayer, and trusting prayer, and seeking the needy, I' : If 154 Sam Jones' Own Book. and giving to the poor. I use all of these things as a bird does its wings, to carry me to where I am going to ; and when I get to the kingdom of God I will cut off my wings and throw them away. I shall have no further use for them. But while I am going there I want wings just as a car wants wheels to roll on. I want visiting the t-ick, I want prayer, I want prayer-meetings, I want reading the Bible, because I use these things as the engine uses its wheels — to roll on. Take the wheels away from under an engine and w liat is it without thom ? It is nothing but an old stationary affair and good for nothing but to run a saw-mill in the back-woods to saw fuel for the devil. And there is many a fellow in the Church who is good for nothing but to serve as a stationary engine back in pine woods cutting out lumber for the work of the devil. Labor of love! I like a Gospel that gives a man a delightful feeling every step he takes on the way to the better world. Labor of love! I recol- lect when I was visiting Brother Prade in Rome. I was then a preacher at De Soto. Brother Prade was at the First Church. I was standing on my side of the river in a cabinet shop, and a lady stepped up on the front step and said, "Gentlemen, we have a gracious meeting in our church. Won't you come and enjoy it with us?" And they said, " Yes, ma'am ;" and I walked to the door to see who the lady was, and recognized her as the wife of Colonel , who was confined to her room six mtmths in the yeai *th sickness, and yet I saw that woman halting and tottering along the side- thi side phyi and ther liev( save ^^'oRKs OF Faith and Love, 155 walk, pale aud trembling, doing a labor of love. And if I ever saw an angel of mercy on her mission of love and kindness to the human race, she was one. That is the sort of Christians we wc.iit That is the labor of love we want. Those are the people who want to work for God, and you can not help them out of it. Let us take hold of these things we have been talking about, and get some good out of them. There is a rich, delightful territc ~y higher up the stream to talk about. Brethren, there is nothing like leaning upon God's promises, and waiting upon God for his own good time. Sayinqs. If you will tell mo what you love, I will tell you what you are. A man's likes and dislikes de- termine his character. The diiference between the Lord Jesus Christ and the enemy of souls is in their likes and dislikes. A man's affinities determine who he is and what he is. T AM no metaphysician, but I can see a hole through a ladder if there is any light on the other side. I will tell you there was very little meta- physics when the jailer stood up there trembling and asked, "What must I do to be saved?" And there is not much metaphysics in the answer: "Be- lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." There is not much metaphysics about that. Skrmon XI. V/HV WILL YE. DIE? " Say unto theiu, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked ; but that the wicked tnrn from his way and Uve ; turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for wiiy will ye die, O house of Israel ?"—Ezek. XXXIII, 11. GOD has said frequently to his children, " Come, let us reason together." He is a reasonable God, and you are reasonable men in many things, and he challenges you into his presence, and says, " Let us reason together about this. I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked." In other words, " I have nothing to do with the death of the wicked." I say there is nothing in the grace of God, and nothing in the blood of Jesus Christ, to save an impenitent man. These are clear, honest statements of Scriptural truths. There is nothing in the Pacific Railroad'.s movement of its trains to make you ship your goods over that road if you don't want to ship them that way. There is nothing in the management of the Pacific road that can compel a man to travel over its lines if the man doesn't want to go over them ; and we'say honestly ai emphatically that there is nothing in the atonement of Jesus Christ to save any but the lost ; and no man is saved, in a Gospel sense, until he first sees and feels he is lost. AVhen a man feels that he is lost in this sense, thank God 166 1 Why will ye Die? 157 he is getting to be found ! Your salvation depends on your patient continuance in well-doing. What is the judgment at last? "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." It is n't, Well commenced. I have known people to begin a great many things well. It is n't, Well carried on. I 've known a great many people to carry on an enter- prise for years, and then break down. It is n't. Well begun or well carried on, but it is " Well done, well finished, well rounded up, thou good and faithful servant." And now, brother, listen : If you are an earnest, humble Christian, your salvation does not depend so much on what happened in the past, may be, as on what are you going to do from now on ? " If a righteous man forsake his righteousness and commit iniquity, the righteousness he hath done shall be forgotten, and he shall die in his sin." God says to the wicked, " If you forsake your wick- edness and do right, you shall live. I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked." I know the question is asked, " If God is omnip- otent and is love, then why should any man per- ish?" Brother, we have what we call human will in this world, and that will determines for you where you will go. If j^ou go to hell, it is a matter of choice with you ; if you go to heaven, it is likewise a mat- ter of choice. Say, why did God endow man with will, theft ? Look here, there are some things that are inherent in the nature of the thing. How cometh that engine on the track yonder ? Its gauge indicates one hundred and fifty pounds pres- sure of steam. What do they want with the steam ? I i It g II' rf 158 Sam Jones' Own Book. M M' Why, to pull tlie train behind the engine. But it may burst the boiler into ten thousand pieces ! Yes, but that 's the inherent nature of the steam. When you sit in tlic train you always feel the pow- erful pulsations of the majestic engine in front, and that engine has power enough in its nature to blow the boiler into ten thousand pieces. The powers that God has given you to direct you and move you, these same powers may destroy you for time and eternity. Righteousness is the right use of God's given thing, and sin is the wrong use of God's given thing. If you use a thing wrongly, God is not responsible if you are blown up by it ; and the power to do right or wrong is inherent in the nature of man. I suppose they could have made an engine so that its boiler would n't burst ; but if they did, they'd have to make some other sort of an engine than a steam engine. I 've seen caloric engines, but they never get anywhere. Hear me, God has no pleasure in the death of him that dies ! My mother loved me because she had some of the nature of God in her own heart ; my wife loves me because some of the nature of God has been poured into her heart. God is love, and the great store-house of God's love is his heart, and we all draw from that store-house ; and all the love my wife and my mother and my children have for me has been drawn from the great store-house of the love of God. Did my wife's love save me ? Did my mother's love save me from a wicked life ? No, sir ! No, sir ! In that sense God's love can 't save any man, and it never did save any man. Way will ye Die? 159 If God's mercy, and God's love, and God's good- ness could save a man, then God was guilty of cru- elty to send his only begotten Son to suffer on the cross that he might wash away with his blood our sin. There is no means by which wc can be saved except in the name of the only begotten Son of God. The Father sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but that through him the world might be saved. He bridges the chasm be- tween a sinking world and the God that made it ; and he was sent not to break down and crush and ruin humanity, but that we might cross over in safety on his atonement into the kingdom of God. I declare it to be as true as that I read my Bible that there is not a man here to-night but who may be in heaven within a hundred years from to-day. There is n't a man here to-night but who, if he makes the choice, can be in hell a hundred years years from to-day. Those ten decades will soon be gone, brethren. O, how the time flies! Let's you and I settle it to-night. " By the grace of God, if that be true, I '11 be in heaven a hundred years from now." We may be there in ten years ; it may be in ten months; it may be in ten days; it may be in ten hours ; — we will be in the one place or the other. To the righteous I say, " Keep on ; plow your furrow out; go on through;" but to the wicked I say, " Stop ! there 's danger and death aheiwl of you." There 's a message for you both to-night ! Christian people, hear me, and go on in your way ; but, sinners, just stop long enough in your mad, 160 Sam Jones' Own Book. onward rush to hear these truths. " Turn ye, turn ye, why will you die." The turning spoken of here means an actual, business-like turning away from sin, not a mock turning. There 's no farce about this thing; it's an actual turning away from sin. Here 's a merchant that 's been merchandising ten years, and he 's been losing money right along, and now he 's almost near to bankruptcy, and he re- solves he '11 close out his stock on hand, and quit the business and go to farming. There 's a business turn about that thing. He does n't want to go on losing money ; he sees he 's sinking every year, and he resolves to quit merchandising and go to farm- ing. Turning away from sin is just as actual as is that man turning from merchandising. It seems to me sometimes that we 've got relig- ion diluted down to a sentiment or to a song; but it 's an outrage on the glittering, glorious Gospel of the Son of God. It is not a sentiment — it 's a sanc- tified business. It 's a business contract binding: on you. You do what God tells you to do, and then if God does n't do what he said he would do, you have an issue that will bankrupt heaven in a minute. A great many people in this world want their pay before they do the job. There are two bad paymasters — one who pays before the job is done, and the one who never pays at all ; and the one that never pays at all is the best one, because if he pays humanity before they do the job, they will tell a thousand lies to get out of it, and never do it at all. Ijisten ! Some of you people want the pay before II ii Why will ye Die? 16] you do the work ! That 's your trouble. You say, " If God will bless me, I will do so and so." I guess you will. Who are you that want to dictate the terras to him, and receive all the benefit your- self? God says, " You do so and so and I will do so and so." Do your duty ; that 's the way. If you will do your duty, you will be religious, and you will be religious if you do your duty. ISome people are always troubled to know what the Lord will do for them. Turn and vou will be saved, said the Lord. The turning is your duty, and the saving is God's. If you turn and God doesn't save you, then you will have an issue that will overturn the pillars of justice. The turn must be business-like, how- ever. You do n't want other people to pay you be- fore you do your duty, and why do you want the Lord to do it? A man doesn't want to pay for a bill of goods until he orders and receives them. You do n't want to pay the blacksmith until he shoes your horse. Let's be decent and sensible in our turning to God. What's the use in forswearing ball-rooms, and then wanting to go back to them ? What 's the use in giving up cards, and still you 're nearly dead to play cards again ? I believe in Christian liberty, in a fellow getting religion and doing right. But whenever you get to rubbing up against ball-rooms and card-rooms and theaters, and such, you make a mistake — you have n't given up any thing. I loved to dance and do a hundred things that are wrong, but I have had as much desire to go to hell as to a ball-room since T got religion. T believe in a re- 14 162 Sam Jonf.s' Own I'ook. ligion that sets us at liberty, and makes us do the things we love to do, and makes us love the things we ought to do. You can 't turn away heartily to heaven, and yet long for the fleshpots of Egypt. I 've got into Canaan now, where the grapes and the pomegranates and the figs cluster thick above my head, and I can eat and rejoice. I have had enough of the leeks and onions. It is all choice. I take God's love to my heart, and put it on, and follow his directions. Now, from every thing that is wrong I take my heart, and put it on these things which are right. And a man is never converted until he is converted from the wrong and converted to the right. God pity you, my brother ! Let us go out on one side or the other. Let us take a stand. If it is right to do wrong, let us go on boldly ; and if it is right to do right, and stick to God and live for heaven, let us go over on that side. I heard of a gambler in Louisville who gave himself to God, and joined the Church ; arid then he went on the streets next day, and Avhen he met his former companions, he said to them, "Good- bye, boys ; I will never do those things again ; and unless you come into the Church and take a stand with me, I will cut your acquaintance to-day, and cut it forever." That is what I call taking a stand ! And if you want to be religious, take a stand. May the good Lord give these poor sinners grip. That is what we want ; the nerve to come up and assert our manhood, and take sides in this great moral issue. Turn — an actual, hearty turning away from sin. "Why will ye Die? 103 And not only that, but lot it be an immediate turn- ing. Be not among these everlasting dilly-dally men, putting off, and putting off. You can 't be in too big a hurry in this great question of preparing for eternity. And, thank God, when a man prepares to die, then he is prepared to live ; he is prepared for every good work and word. It is an immediate turning away from sin that is necessary. O, brother, that heart that beats in your bosom is but a muffled drum beating your funeral dirge to the tomb, and you know not when that heart will stop beating. Brother, you have no time to lose — you have no more time to throw away. What- ever else may happen, if you will put in your best licks from this hour until you die, you will find out you just barely made your way safely to the good world. An immediate turning away from sin ! And not only must it be an immediate turning away, but a thorough turning. Brother, there is no use in talk- ing about giving up part. One sin in your life is like one leak in a ship; it will sink your 'soul be- fore it reaches the other shore ; and it is a question not of how many sins have you given up, whether twenty or fifty or a thousand, the one question for eternity is, have you given them all up ; and have you emptied them down to-night so that you can say, " There is the last sin of my life, it is given up forever?" Will you do that? O, brother, you can not swim the ocean of time with any sin rest- ing upon you ; you can not do it. And you can just as well give your sins up now and give them II nr 164 Sam Jones' Own Book. all up. T know what hunuin nature is. I recollect how I tried to scatter my sins along and give up those I felt I could get along best without. But, brother,! never made any headway until I emptied them all down, and said, ' Lord, I will never do another thing that di.^pleases thoo." And I said, " If 1 am damned at last it will be for those sins already committed. I will never commit another." And it must not only be a thorough giving up, but, brother, hear me once more — it must be an eternal f!;iving up of sin. When General Lee, un- der the apj)le tree at Appomattox, handed his sword to General Grant, he said with his whole heart, and said it for his whole army, " We will never take up arms against the old flag again." I tell you, my fellow-citizens, when a poor sin- ner goes to the cross and surrenders, let him sur- render with the understanding that he lays down his old weapons of rebellion. Let him say: "I do not lay them down for a week, or a month, or a year, but so help me God I wifl never, never fire that old gun again. I will never handle it any more. God helping me, I will be true to the flag of the cross from this day until the minute I die." Now you say, " What is the necessity of my turning?" Do you know, brother, that this nine- teenth century is wicked, and more wicked perhaps than the century that preceded it, and that the more wicked and depraved men get the more they fight this idea of hell ? And did you ever see a man that did n't believe in an eternal hell, but that when Why will ye Die? 165 he came to die he would go there? There is many a fellow in this country who says, "Tiiero is no hell," and mark the expression, he won't be in hell more than ten minutes before ho jumps up and cries out, " O, what a mistake I made in my doctrine. I did n't have any hell in it, and now I am in hell forever." Hear me, my brother. Let us open the pages of this Book, and we will see that for tlie wicked- ness of mail God drowned this old world. We turn over a little furtiier, and see the burning hail falling on Sodom and Gomorrah. And we turn over a little furtluir, and there are Pharoah and his hosts, horses, chariots, all drowned in the Red Sea. We turn over page after page, and we find a little further along Ananias and Sapphira as they dropped dead in their tracks for lying. We turn over and over until the end, and find that God has been punishing sin for four thousand years. As I look an all merciful God and loving Father in the face to-night, then I look at myself and say, O, God, if thou hast destroyed armies and drowned the world, and sent the burning hail upon cities and destroyed them, and caused the earth to burst open and swallow the wicked ; I look at all this and then I ask myself the question, if God will drown worlds and burn cities and destroy armies as he has done in the past, then will God let me go unpunished in the future? And the man who says that God will not punish sin must fly in the face of the record and of the history of this universe. l(i(> Sam Jo^i:^' Own Book. II E'JB: j m WIM, ,S-2. mi^i :m And, now, the means of turning. What are the means? " Lord, here I am to-night, a poor sinner. I give up and surrender to the cross. 1 take the line of duty thou hast marked out for me. 1 give myself to tliee from this time on." Brother, sister, won't you turn to-night ? 'Sinners, turn! why will you die? God, your Savior, asks you why?" Woi/t you turn to-night and be saved forever? Turn ! turn ! Sayinos. If there is any thing in this world I admire it is a man with a big soul — a soul big enough for God to come in and live with him, and for the an- gels to come in and sit down and be at home for- ever. God give us a soul on fire, and growing and developing in divine light I Brother, is your soul growing every day? Let your light so shine that evary one will see your good works,, A great many people, with what little religion they have, will run out in the corner and sit down and say, *' God save me and my wife, and my son John and his wife, us four and no more !" That is the sort of religion that is cursing the world. The true principle of a good man is, the more he gets the more he wants ; and the more he gets the more he wants others to have. ilil I II lll'l i^i m ;i rt :: if Sermon XII. THE WAV.^s OK I'LEASAr-iTNESS. " Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." — Prov. hi, 17. THE Christian life is often spoken of in the Scriptures as a ** way," and our walking in that way makes what we call a Christian pilgrimage. This is a world of traveling. Here we are on our journey ; there we will be at our journey's end. There is no such thing as stopping. The vast surg- ing masses behind us push us along in life's path- way, and as earth is filling up daily with its thou- sands, it is gradually, yet persistently and continually pushing others into the grave. We are all on one grand solemn march from the cradle to the grave. We are all marching day after day, hour after hour, in the great journey of life. We are all in the same broad illimitable thoroughfare, some going in one direction, some in the other. Now, there is a way, and its ways are pleasantness and all its paths are peace. It is to this that 1 want to direct your attention briefly to-night. ""here are many things to make a journey pleas- ant. We will mention a few of them. The first thing that contributes to the pleasantness of a Cliris- tian's journey is that he goes upon a good errand. When a man starts out on a good errand, he starts out with a. good heart and a light step, and it makes 167 168 Sam Joni:s' Own Book. I 'i but little difference to him whether ragged rocks line his pathway, or whether the flowers blossom all along. I imagine that when God summoned an angel to his side and said to him, " Strike dead to-night the first-born of Egypt," or, " I want you to go down and with the blast of yonr wing drive Cendebeus's army from the earth," the angel lin- gered about the throne and waited, with a hope that the order might be countermanded. He looked at the Father's face and at the destination be- fore him, and lingered about the throne, loath to go on such an errand, and when at last he leaped over the parapet and poised his wings for flight, he came slowly to earth, wishing that a countermand would come, but on he comes, slowly, to his mission of death and destruction ; but I imagine that when God summoned that angel into his presence and said, " I want you to go to earth and cry out in the ears of the people that now it is peace on earth and good will to men," that angel stayed scarcely long enough in tlie presence to hear the message, before ho was winging his way, swift as the morn- ing light, and in the twinkling of an eye he had reached earth and shouted it out to earth's fur- thermost limits, " Peace on earth and good will to men." Another thing that helps to make a joi;r- ney pleasant is to know that you '11 have the strength and ability to make the whole journey. Down in my section, frequently from these North- ern States come in the wintry months of December and January the invalid and the consumptive, seek- The Ways of Pleasantness. 109 ing the bahny climate of Florida, and on the jour- ney some stop at Atlanta, and can go no further, and die ; some die on the train ; some get as far as Macon ; but, brethren, thank God to-night I know not whether I will have strength and ability to get to my home, four hundred miles to the south, but thank God for the assurance that I will have strength and ability to go all the length of the celestial road, and make ray way to God. "As thy days, so shall thy strength be ;" and in thy weak- ness shall thy strength be developed in all its beauty and grace. I care not hovv feeble you are, or how lame you may be, or whether you are unfit for the journey physically; thank God, if you start you have the assurance from the God that made you of strength and ability to travel all the length of the celestial journey. Again, it helps to make the journey plea uit to know ihat we shall have all needful acoommo- dations on the way. Sometimes we dread a jour- ney because the accommodations — the hotel fare, and one thing and another — are so bad. Trains miss connection, we miss meals for a whole day ; and O, what dreadful times we sometimes have en route; but God Almighty has promised to see that we have all needful accommodations on this heav- enly road. The heavenly road is one on which you never miss connections, and never pass an eating- house without having full time for dinner; and the fnre on this road is love to God and love to one another. It 's a feast of love, day after day. You shall have love for supper, love for dinner, love fo!" 16 ■ 1 lll 170 Sam Jones' Own Book. breakfast, and you shall have a big bed of love to lie down and .sleep in all the way to the good world. Tliank God, on this journey you shall want for noth- ing good but it will be supplied to you. Do n't forget that. Then it helps to make the journey pleasant to have a good guide along with you. It makes the way through the wilderness less devious. The finger-boards, the sign-boards, all along this route, read, " To the world of bliss ;" and every man can read and rejoice tlmt he is in the path that leads to heaven, where, Jesus said, " I will be with you always." Another thing that will help to make it glo- rious and blessed, is to have some one along with us to guard and protect us. God says the angels will pitch their tents about us, and watch over us, and that the sun shall not smite us by day, nor the moon by night, and he promises us pro- tection in every hour of danger. I used to think what a grand thing it would be to have Samson for a friend. If I had lived in Samson's time, and had Samson for my friend, to go round with me, I used to tliink I would n't be afraid of man or devil. But, brotlier, I have n't got Samson for a friend, but I have Samson's God for my friend, walking with me side by side, ready to protect me in every time of danger. Blessed be God for the guide that goes along with me to show me the way, and for the guard that protects me if any danger should overtake me. Live right up to the truth, love the truth, and God Almighty will take on prii The Ways of Pleasantness. 171 you through safely in this world of cares and troubles. And then it helps to make a journey pleasant, brethren, to know that the way lies through fj;roon pastures and beside the still waters. Thank God for every green pasture along our pathway, and the still waters of grace that gladden our hearts. Then it helps to make a journey pleasant to know that there are the footprints of good men and women that have gone on before. O, how bU-sscd it is marching tlirough the paths of life to see tlie footprints of my precious father, and I know he went right. This is his footprint. And to see the footprint of my precious mother, marching to a bet- ter world. What a blcsssd thing it is to know these are the footsteps of Jesus himself, and that I am putting my tracks in his tracks as I am marching along to glory and to God. It is worth a great deal to a man to know that his pathway is marked by the footprints of all the good that have gone on before, and those that follow shall see their foot- prints and take courage and press their way along. Then it helps to make a journey ])leasant to have good company all the way. O, me, what a pleas- ant thing good company is. I have sat in the train sometimes until one or two o'clock in the day, and I was just utterly worn out ; and directly some good man would come in and sit down by me, and we would sit and talk three or four hours, and sud- denly the engine would whistle and the train would come to a stop, and I would turn to the brakeman and say, " Where are we ?" and he would say, " oo 172 Sam Jones' Own Book. many miles from So-and-so." " Why," I would say, " the last time I took notice we were one hun- dred miles from there, now we are going right into tiie city." Brother, it helps to make a journey pleasant to fall into good company ; and then, glory be to God, it helps to make a journey pleas- ant to sing on the way. Thank God for the old Bongs of Zion. I love to hear a grand congrega- tion rise up and sing, " Praise God, from whom all blessings flow." I like that good old song — " Happy (lay, happy day, When Jesus washed my sins away." It brings up pleasant memories. And I like that grand old song, that will never die in earth or in heaven, " Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me; I once was lost, but now I 'm found, "Was blind, but now I see." And then, brother, the grand old harmonies of the Gospel in melodies and music, breaking out upon the ears of the people — O, how they cheer our hearts. I like good singing, and thank God for the consecrated singers. lirother, the angels of God listened to that organ to-night. It has got religion. That old organ sounded as if it were one of the con- verts of the meetings. It has heard enough sermons, and I believe there has been enough power in these meetings to convert even an organ. O, brother^ I The Ways of Pleasantness. 173 want that old organ to have the chance to sing it out — *' Praise God, from whom all blessings flow, Praise him all Ci'eatures here below." God bless every instrument in the world that makes music and melody in the ears of the peop'e. And I have been mad for fifteen years because the "fiddle," that grandest instrument that man ever made, and which gives the sweetest music I have ever listened to in my life, has been stolen by the devil and taken away from me. Let us get it back and have it reconverted; let us have it and keep it. Then, it also helps to make a journey pleasant to know tliat we have been instrumental in bring- ing others along the way towards the good world. I have led some men and boys off into mischief; but I thank God I do n't know of one that associated with me in my wicked days that I have not, through God and other means used upon him, brought to Christ, and they are members of the Church to-day. I don't believe there is a soul on earth or in hell that can say I was instrumental in damning it. Thank God for that. And I hope some day to be able in heaven to rejoice in the fact that I have been instrumental in the salvation of some poor soul. Lastly, brethren, it helps to make a journey pleasant to know that it is going to end well. I just sit down sometimes, hours at a time, when I am too tired to do any thing else, and think about the journey's ending. O, grand time ahead ! I have thought of the glorious world up yonder. And do you want to know what I am going to do for the first ' ' nl 174 Sam Jones' Own Book. thousand years — if there is any sucii thing as years in heaven? I am going to spend thetu at the pearly gates, if that is possible, just watehing the flow of souls sweeping in one at a time, sainted forever. O, what a grand time that will be! Don't you reckon I will be glad when wife comes in with the speed of the archangel, and alights at my side and says, " Glory to God, safe here with you forever." And we will stand at the gates and see all our precious loved ones coming in. Glory be to God for the world where our journey is at an end, and we can just look back at the others coming in, saved for- ever. What a grand sight that will be ! I love to think of the journey all over now, when soul and body shall be reunited. I have often thought about the resurrection. What a sight that will be! What a sight — the earth giving up its dead ! But the grandest sight of all will be to go up a little higher and see the arm of Jesus Christ that is lifting the world up and passing it into heaven forever. May God start you upon this journey and guide you up safely into the kingdom of God. Sayinqs. Some people say they do n't believe in woman's work. There is an old preacher down in Georgia who preaches against woman's work, and that preacher has not had a conversion since the war. Sermon xiii. TENDENCIBiS OK KIGHXEOUSNESS AND OK SIN. "As ri^rliteousness tendcth to life, so he that pursueth evil puisuoth it to his own death."— Pro v. xi, 19. WHEN a good man dies, as we isay, he goes to lieaven, drawn thither by the natural forces of spiritual gravity, by the approval, not only of (Jod and angels, but by the common consent of every intelligent being in the universe. When a bad man dies he goes to hell not only by the ap- l)roval of God and the acgels, but of every other man in the world. Did you ever attend the funeral of a good man ? Have you, when the minister had pointed down to his body and said, " The spirit of this good man has gone home to God,'' walked away from the Church and heard the comments of both saints and sinners? Each one said alike, "Yes, that good man has gone home to God. He is in heaven now. That preacher told the truth." Then, again, have n't you attended the funeral of a bad man — a doubtful character, even though he was a member of the Church, and haven'u you heard the minister say, "This is the body jf our brother, but his spirit has gone home to heaven ?" And have n't you, in walk- ing away from t'le Church heard such comments as these ? — " That preacher outraged every principle of truth. I n<3ver will hear that man preach again. 176 IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) / O ^{/ / %?.r iM 4c i.O I.I 1.25 ■ 50 "'== ^(, IL3_2 |4£ 2.0 1.4 i.8 1.6 6' PhotogTdphic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 # ^^ ' 4 I ' 'Tf 178 Sam Jones' Own Book, account of One of our Senators from Georgia, Ben. Hill, who had some trouble on the side of his tongue. His friends made light of it, and said it was caused by a fractured tooth. The next I road of Ben Hill, he was under the knife of a surgeon at Philadelphia, and they took out about one-third of his tongue, and then they said he would be well in a few days. But the next I read of his case he was back un- der the knife of the .jurgcou at Philadelphia, and they had taken out all the glands in one side of his face and neck, and when the operation was finished, young Ben Hill said to the doctors, " Now, doctors, is there any chance for my father's life ?" And the doctors said, "Yes, sir. If we have extracted all the virus of cancer from his system he will cer- tainly get well, but if the least particle has strayed out into some other gland of his system, he will certainly die." The next I saw he was at the famous mineral springs in the West. A few days later I walked down to the depot at my home, and the passenger train came rolling down and trembled under its air-brakes and stopped, and I thought I saw in one of the coaches the outlines of Senator Hill's face. When I walked out toward the car window, the window was up. He pushed his bony hand out of the window and took mine, and I looked in his face and thought, " O, my soul, is this all that is left of Senator Hill, the man that Georgia is most proud of?" Then a few days after- ward I picked up the Atlanta Constitution, and read where it said, " Th^i grandest procession that ever marched through Georgia marched to the cemetery Righteousness and Sin. 179 yesterday and buried the remains of Senator Hill cut of sight forever." Brethren, just as certainly as the virus of cancer killed Senator Hill's body, just so certainly will the virus of sin kill your soul at last. It is only a question of time. Brother, we are diseased unto death, and I praise God to-night that eighteen hundred years ago, be- fore my mother sung the lullabys of the cradle to me, that there was a fountain opened in the house of David for sin and uncleanness. I thank God that eighteen hundred years ago, before I saw the light of this glorious country, Jesus Christ the Son of God, found a balm in Gilead, and he has successfully treated millions of patients, and they have passed into the blood-washed throng that surrounds the throne of God to-night. The question is not, " Have you quit drinking?" "Have you quit swearing?" "Have you quit gam- bling?" or "Have you joined the Church; have you been baptized ?" But the question of all ques- tions in time and eternity is, "Have you been down under the blood, and have you had this sin in your nature washed away, and do you rejoice to-night tliat there is cleansing power in the fountain, and that the drop of blood can purify you and make you clean, and rid your nature of all disease that could destroy you in time or eternity ?" That 's the ques- tion ! Will you face it to-night? O, my soul, it is not a question of morals, or outward right-living. God knows I put as much stress on that as any man in the world, but I hang my hope, not on the fact that I keep the commandments, not on the fact thafc o m 180 Sam Jones' Own Book. mi I live by the Sermon on the Mount, but my precious experience dates from the day, from the moment that I went down on my knees under the blood, and realized that the blood of Jesus is the only thing that cleanseth. That is the key-note of the Gospel of the Son of God. " He that pursueth evil " — the evil tendencies, the innate tendencies of his nature — pursueth it unto death. To be practical now, let us say, first, "He that pursueth evil pursueth it to the death of his conscience." Sin does its work gradually and almost imperceptibly on man. I read, some months ago, how an insidious, subtle, venomous serpent in the East fastened its poisonous fangs in the toe of a native, and how he sent for the doctor, and the doctor walked up and said to him, " There is no remedy for the bite of that serpent." And I read, further along, how the poor victim said : " Doctor, my foot is now dead up to my ankle." A few minutes later the poor fellow said again : " Doctor, ray leg is now dead up to my knee." And soon he said again : " Doctor, my leg is dead all the way up to my body." Then again he said : " Doctor, I feel this deadening sensation creeping all over my body ; my right arm has now lost its power — it is dead." Then he said : " I can not move my left foot. My left arm is growing powerless." Later he again said : " Doctor, it is gathering near my heart, and now," he said, " I feel the deadness in my heart;" and in a few moments he was in a sit- tinp- posture, perfectly dead. The subtle poison had crawled over his body inch after inch. Righteousness and Sin. 181 Now, brother, sin does its work the same way. Its first work is with the couscience. Every delib- erate sin of your life is a stab, and a stab of death, at your conscience. I might stop here and say the great trouble in America to-day is that conscience is dead. Church members live in sin because their conscience is dead. Worldlings sin all day and gloat and rejoice in sin, because conscience is dead. The world is running rampant into wickedness to- day because conscience is dead. Brother, listen : To-day, this nineteenth century, is wicked, far more wicked, and far more outrageous in its flagrant sins, than the century behind us, but we feel it less, be- cause conscience has been stabbed and murdered; and to-day a man can walk your streets with head erect that is guilty of sin that would have made him skulk and hide a century ago. What's the matter with humanity? O, brother, we are wicked beyond description, but we hold our heads up and march erect because conscience is dead. O, con- science ! Conscience outraged ! Conscience stabbed ! Conscience dead ! Conscience buried ! Conscience with its tombstone erected ! O, sir, what is the condition of your conscience to-night? He that pursueth evil pursueth it to the death of his own powers of resistance. Every sin in a man's life is a sin against his powers of resistance. The greatest power of this nineteenth century is the throt- tle of the locomotive engine. It represents the power to start, the power to move, the rate of speed of the engine! Next to that grand invention, the throttle, comes the air-brake — the power to stop. I was _j^^gm, \ -TT" m 182 Sam Jones' Own Book. sitting, some months ago, with a k)eomotive engi- neer in his cab. The engine was sweeping along at the rate of fifty miles an hour round curves, and pushing its way on rapidly to its destination. I threw my eyes ahead, and said to the engineer: " See those cattle !" In an instant his hand flew to the air-brakes, and he turned them on, and pulled open the whistle valve, and with the noise of the whistle the cattle scampered from the track, and I said to myself: " If we had no brakes we might have run into those cattle, and perhaps been ditched and killed on the spot." Thank God for air-brakes on the trains running across this country at such speed ! And then, he that pursueth evil pursueth it to the death of his reason. Now, man sins against God, and sins against himself, and sins against his reason, till — I dare assert it — a man can sin against his reason so that his mind, at last, will reach a point where he can not grasp a Scriptural truth to save the world. In my own State there is a prom- inent lawyer; whenever I get to his town I see him in the congregation, and then I meet him some time the next day on the street. He says : " I go to hear you preach ; I believe yon arc honest in what you assert. But, Jones, the Gospel itself is all non- sense and foolishness to me ; there is nothing in it." And I have looked at the poor fellow many a time and said : " That poor man has sinned until he has been given over to a delusion that he may believe a lie and be damned." O, sir, what a fearful thought: to tam])er with a man's mind and abuse it to where Righteousness and Sin. 183 the truth is a lie and a lie the truth ! O, God save us from this mental prostitution ! Save us from this mental degradation that paralyzes the mind and ruins the soul ! The Lord help us to stop at this point to-night! Next we say, he that pursueth evil pursueth it to the death of his sensibilities. I believe it is the natural tendency of sin to dry up the fountains of a man's nature to where ho has no sensibilitv at all; he can not feel. Why, I have had men to boast to me, "I have no religious feeling!" and, V henever I hoar a man say, " I can not feel," I look at him and think, " I would as soon shake hands with a dead mini as to shake hands with you." You are dead to all that is noble and true; dead to all that is loving and gentle, and all good report. You are as virtually dead as you will ever be. Thank God for the preservation of sonsibility ! I have seen the time when I would n't go to church in twelve months; I would stay out of church and let my good wife go by herself. God forgive me for the way I treated my wife. I have begged her pardon a thousand times, and I will never be satis- fied until I have begged her pardon in the presence of the angels of God. I want to tell every man in this house, every wicked man, you owe your wife a debt you will never pay her, until you pay it at the cross of Jesus Christ. You mark that expres- sion. I say, sometimes I would not go to church in twelve months; but I can tell this and say the truth, I never went to* church in my life and heard ii: i I.. ■. ■-» ■ii m 184 Sam Jones' Own Book. An honest sermon that it did not stir me from head to foot. I wouldn't have let ray wife know how much I felt. God knows I have gone off by myself and buried my head in my hands and said: " O, how I suffer ! how I suff'er \" Brother, have you reached the point where truth' makes no im- pression upon you? And then, lastly, he that pur- sueth evil pursueth it until the death of his soul. Now, I see conscience is dead, and I see powers of resistance are gone, and I see that reason has been dethroned ; I see novv that sensibilities have been destroyed. There is but one thing left for sin to do. O, sir, what is that ? The death of the soul! Somebody has said eternal death is death prolonged forever. I know what natural physical death is. I have seen that. But couple that on to this, the word eternal, death eternal. These are the most fearful words in human language. Death eternal ! Eternal death ! Each word rendered ten thousand times more awful by its association with the other! I have walked up to the bedside of my friend, and I have looked at him as death was doing its work, and I have said : " O, death, how hard thou art upon my friend." I have stood and looked at the glare of his eye, at the heave of his bosom and the jerk of his muscles, and the twitch of his nerve, and then I have walked off^ and said: " O, death, how terrible thou art!" And then I have walked back and put my eyes on the scene, and there was the same heave of the bosom, the same glare of the eye, the same jerk of the mus- cles, the same twitch of the nerves, and I have Righteousness and Sin. 185 walked off and said: "O, death, what is eternal death ? If that is death, then what is eternal death ?" And then I said : *' O, God, is eternal death the everlasting glare of the eye? Is it the everlasting lieave ui the bosom? Is it the everlast- ing jerk of the muscles? Is it the everlasting twitch of the nerves? Is this to die forever?" And yet I can never die. O, sir, may Gcd im- press upon every man to-night this tremendous thought : " Nothing is worth a thought beneath But how I may escape the death That never, never dies ; How make my own election sure, And wlien I fail on earth secure A mansion in the skies." Thank God, whosoever liveth and believeth on the Son of God shall never die ! Thank God for the Gospel ! Here is death to my friend ; here I am a sinner dying; here I am bound in physical infirmity and death ; I can not move hand or foot, and there the venomous reptile of eternal death is approaching. It comes nearer and nearer. I shrink from its presence, but I can not move. It comes up closer, and coils around my limbs and my body, and in the cold embraces of this reptile I am fastened; and then it draws back its head and opens its mouth and exposes the fangs and poison of eternal death, I look in this mouth a moment with terror, and then it makes the fatal plunge of the fangs and in- jects the poison of eternal death in my veins, and I die forever and forever. 16 ---«?" 'm I' i . ir 186 Sam Jones' Own Book. O, to the Cljristian what is deatli? I see that reptile approacliing! Here It? a Christian, and can not get out of its way, but ju>- . before it reaches mc a kind friend steps down and takes the reptile back of its head, pries its mouth open, extracts the fang, takes out the poison, turns liini loose right before my eyes. He coils around my body and around my limbs. It makes me shudder to be in the embraces of this cold serpent — and then when the snake brings back its head for tiie final bite and opens its mouth, I look it in the face and say, " O, Death! where is thy sting? O, grave! where is thy victory?" and leap out of the coils of the serpent into the arms of God to live forever. God give us the Christian's hope of life, and the Christian's grace of death, and in God to live on forever. O, brother, friend, to-night let me beg you, shun that death that never, never dies. Sayings. The woman that never helped the Lord never got much help from the Lord. The best way to help yourself is to help somebody else. A WOMAN is naturally a very sharp trader, and very few women have any conscience when it comes to a trade. They will sell an old pair of trousers for more than their husband gave for them when new, and then brag about it. Sermon XIV. THE CHRISTIAN'S COMMISSION. " Delivering thee from the people und from the Geiitiles, unto whom 1 now send thee, to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and in- heritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me." — Acts xxvi, 17, 18. THIS is what we might call St. Paul's creden- tials; this is his parchment; this is his instruc- tion from head-quarters; this is what God said to him when he wanted him to go forth as a preacher. You remember in this chapter, St. Paul is stand- ing in the presence of Agrippa, and perhaps the finest piece of oratory extant in tiie whole universe to-day is his defense before that monarch ; and now he gives us these words as those which he heard when he had fallen down before the light, and the conversation had been carried on between him and his Christ. "And I said, AVho art thou. Lord ? And he said, I am Jesus, whom thou persecutest. But arise, and stand upon thy feet, for I have ap- peared unto thee for this puipose to make thee a minister and a witness, both of these things thou hast seen, and of those things in the which I will appear unto thee." "Arise — stand upon your feet," or in plain Eng- lish, take a stand. There's a good deal in that. Take a stand! What's the matter all over this country? No man is fit to be a Christian, no man 187 ■^ 188 Sam Jones' Own Book. will ever succeed as a Christian ; no man is fit to be a preacher, no man will ever succeed as a preacher, until he takes a stand. I tell you, my brethren, to-day, the Church of God is at fault right there. The ministry of Christ, with some glorious exceptions, always, is at fault right there. They haven't taken a stand. Well, there is a reason why we have n't done all we ought to have done, but is there any reason why we have n't taken a stand? I know one pastor in Chattanooga, Tenn., who took a stand, and he took it on high ground, and he commenced shelling the words over the people, and the newspapers commenced shelling back, and his cowardly, pusillanimous members began to take to the woods, and it was n't three weeks until per- haps one-half of that man's Church had taken to the woods and the other half put him on the shelf and told him he had better go slow. Well, the preacher, poor fellow, said: "Brethren, have I been preaching a lie?" They said "No." "Have I been preaching any thing but the truth ?" " No," they said. "Well," said he, "you want me to go slow on the truth ?" " Yes, you '11 have to do it. If you don't things will be ruined." Ruined ! Ah, my brother, if I had but one prayer to offer up that prayer would be, God help every preacher, God help every professed Christian to take a stand, take a stand — one way or the other, either for or against. There was a newspaper man after me to-day on the subject of amusements. Said he : " Mr. Jones, The Christian's Commission. 189 please give us the amusements that Christian people can go into. You've named a great many that they can not." " I won't do it," I said. " i can point out to a man the amusements that are not sin- ful, but just as soon as I point them out every body will run them into a common meeting ground for the world, the flesh, and the devil, and it would n't be six months before they would be the dirtiest things in the country, and I do n't want to do that." Rise, stand on your feet, take a stand, that's it. O, how I wish we could be brought to our feet, and brought to take a stand on every moral question. Brother, if I can get you to take a stand for God and right, for piety and spirituality, you will never go into the Stock Exchange and Produce Exchange any more. You have taken a stand, and that means, " I have done with it." You Icnow that. You can find out why you do n't take a stand if you look around you. Well, brother, let's take a stand and hold our ground if we starve to death for it; if we do, it will only be a nigh cut to heaven. I told them down in my State, when they threatened to send me up between the flashes of dynamite into the other world; "Well," said I, "the roaring of the thing won't die out before I'll be in heaven. You ain't doing mo any harm; you'll just start me by a nigh cut to glory .^' If you are a man take a stand and let the world do its worst on you. If they starve you to death you'll just get to heaven a few minutes aheiid of time. Take a stnnd. Rise, stand on your feet. If you ill: 190 Sam Jones' Own Book. are a Christian, be a Christian; if you are a Meth- odist, be a Methodist ; if you are a man, be a man — all over, from head to foot. Don't be a little dwindling fool. Nowhere and under no circum- stances be any thing else but what you are. I had rather be a first-class sinner than a tenth-rate Meth- odist, and when you get a Methodist down to about a tenth-rate Methodist you are getting him down pretty low, for a first-class one is n't up very high. Rise — stand upon your feet. O, brother, if we would just come out on the Lord's side. I know Paul did. He arose, he stood on his feet and fought for the right, and when the battle had ended he said, " I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith." Ah me; if we could get people to take sides. Sinners! Men of the world! God says to you, " Choose ye whom ye will serve." If you want to be on God's side come over here. You have got just as much right as any body, just as much right as I have ; the only difference is that you love sin and fight for it, and I love holiness and fight for that. We are men alike, with the same character- istics. Brother, come over on the Lord's side, lay down that old muskot and take up the flag of the cross and fight with the weapons God gives you. That's it. Take a stand. Ah me; if I could get every man who professes to be converted to take a stand — but they are doubtful about it, hesitating, uncertain. I say to one : " Brother, are you going to pray in your family ?" " I do n't know. I have n't decided yet. I '11 see about it." Go to an- The Christiam's Commissiox. 191 other and ask him : " Brother, are you going to the theater?" "I don't know. I (hinno whether I will or not; sometimes I think I will and then again I think I won't." "Are you going to keep on playing cards?" "I dunno ; I came mighty near burning up my cards the other day, but I did n't do it, though." "Going to have any wine suppers?" "Sometimes I think I will and then again some- times I think I won't." And now, what can God do with that sort of a tribe ? And that 's the truth about it. You know, brethren of the ministry, as well as you know your names, you can 't bank on a man like that. You do n't know whether he will be play- ing cards or at prayer-meeting next Wednesday night, except you know pretty well that he'll be playing cards. " Rise, stand upon thy feet." Take a stand one way or the other. If it's right to play cards, stand up to it, and tell your preacher it's right to do it, and defy earth and hell. If it's right to go to the theater, just stand by it like a man, and tell your preacher, " If you do n't like theater-going Christians, turn me out." Be a man. Then take a stand on one side or the other. I like a man that will do that. "Rise, stand on your feet." When a man says, "I'll take my stand," asK him, "Are you going to pray in your family ?" " I 'm going to pray in my family every night and morning." " How are you on prayer-meetings ?" " I am going to prayer- meetings every chance I get, and if I stay away I'll send the preacher a doctor's certificate that I ■Ml i .1 ■^■^1' -si 192 Sam Jones' Own Book. am sick in bed and can 't go." " Well, how are you about visiting the sick?" "I refer you to the five blocks around my house. There isn't a family with sickness in it that I do n't look after if I hear there is any sickness there." " How are you about giving for missions ?'* " I refer you to the trustee. I can show you his receipt for foreign missions every year." Ah, me, brother, that fellow means business; there is no doubt «bout that. Then take a stand. How much are you going to be a man this year? *' I do — do — n't know. I do n't know what I '11 do." Brethren, what can we do with your sort any- how? You are like a fellow's piece of timber that I heard of, that was so tough and crooked that when he wanted to plane it and smooth it, he tried it both ways, but could not plane it from either end. He would dig in both ways. "Arise. Take a stand!" Brethren, if we be Christians, let us be so out and out. If we be sin- ners, let us be sinners out and out. O, in the name of all that is true and good, and all that is worthy, if we are not going to take a stand for the right, let us go out of the Church ; but if we are willing to take a stand, let us go into the Church and do its work and stay there till wo die. Now, if these old sinners want to play cards, and go to the theater, and run after the devil, I am perfectly willing that they should do so, if that is their line. I never said a word about an old goat going into the devil's pastures, for that is just where they belong. But if I am a Christian, let me stand up and fight the "''^u: The Ciiet.stian's Commission. 193 devil every time he sticks up his head. That is business. O, I wish that we had that sort of re- ligion, every one of us. I wish we would all fight it out on that line. Well, I will tell you another thing. When you take a start so that you have got to fight, you can not back. You have got to fight. I will tell you, you will reach that point when you see that blessed moment when men shall revile you for His name. Christ tells you of it when he says : " Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake." You will find out what that means. They will call you vulgar, and they will call you a blackguard and a mountebank. I am much obliged to them for it. Pile those names on me and I will bear them to the judgment and throw them down at the feet of Jesus, and tell God what they did to me when I tried to get them to live right. Just look! Take a stand. O, I wish I could get every body here to take a stand on one side or the other. If we think it is right to be a Christian let us be one soul and body, and every day in the week and every minute in the day, and every breath we take let each of us be one sure enough. There is many a fellow in this country riding his little religion around, as he calls it. This re- ligion reminds me of the time when I used to get on a stick, astride of it, you know, and I would lope it and pace it and trot it. In fact, it could go all the paces; I called it a iiorse, and I used to ride it up to the bucket and water it, and take it to the 194 ll Uil Sam Jones' Own Book. trough and feed it, though it was only a little stick horse. And if any body hud tohl me that it was n't a horse, I wouhl have been mad enough to fight. And I rode and drove and watered and fed him, and all that. And it was only a stick. But when I got on a sure-enough horse, and felt his great muscles un- der me, I looked back upon my little stick-horse with the greatest disgust. And, I tell you, there is many a Christian in the country to-day riding a stick. I say, brother, they don't like to be told that they have stick religion. It makes them mad as can be to tell them that. They don't like it. They say it is a genuine horse. O, take it to Christ every Sunday morning, and water it and have it baptized, and make it take communion. Do n't you see this is religion. O, but brother, if you ever get to be mounted on the grand principles of the Gospel of Christ, as St. Paul was, and feel every fiber of your being stirred as it is driven by the impulse of this divine life, you will look back on such a life as you are living now with the greatest disgust in the Avorld. Now, brethren, here is where Paul's life started. The first was he took the stand ; and then Jesus said : " Now, Paul, go forth and preach to the peo- ple, and open their eyes. I want you to say to every people in this world, * Open your eyes.' " A man, or a woman, or a Church, or a city, or a coun- trv Avill never be what each ought to be until you show them what they are. Hence, open their eyes that they see themselves and see what they are. Do you know what that quarrel was which God 'f'^^mi The Christian's Commission. 195 had with his ancient Church. They would not con- sider. Consider? Do you know what the etymolog- ical definition of the term "consider" is? I am not much on syntax, they sav. I have been doing a good deal with sin-tax, and have been taxing sin since I have been in the city. But I am some on etymology. Consider — look at a thing until you see it. Now, brethren, if you will make people look at themselves in this way, you have taken the first step toward their reformation. A man can never reform his life until he sees what his life really is. He can never reform until he can say to himself, " I see wherein I am slack ; where I have done this, and where I have neglected doing that." Brother, will you open your eyes to know yourself as you are; to know how you look in the sight of God? Paul's first duty was to open the eyes of the people, and, when he had opened their eyes, to lead them from darkness to light. This term darkness means simply sin. Darkness and sin mean about the same thing. Light and righteousness mean about the same thing. Lead them from sin into righteousness, Paul was told. Now, brother, show me where I stand. Look at the Prodigal son ! He came to himself. He was without food. He was hungry and naked and far away from home, and disreputable among men and disgraced before God; and he then got to thinking and thinking about himself, and what he was, and he saw. He came to himself. And when he saw himself he thought about home. And then he said : " What ,1 . t h( fi 106 Sam Jones' Own Book. am I hei-e for?" And then he said, "I will arise and go to my father." Open their eyes and show them what they are, and then let them come out from that city of sin. Let them come from sin unto righteousness. Brothers, it is the duty of every preacher to go after you and tell you what you are; to show you what you are ; but that is dangerous business. Many a preacher has got a cursing for doing just such work as that. Tliut is a fact. And I suspect many a preacher has got a whipping for it; and I know that the one I am talking about now got his head cut off just for nothing in the world but show- ing people what they were, and for telling thera how they lived. There ain't any preachers' heads cut off in these days, though ; and the saddest com- mentary on the world to-day is that none of them have got their heads cut off. I do n't want mine cut off; but — but I wish I could see a martyr! Siiow them what they are, and, when you have done that, take them by the hand and lead them out into a better state of life. Open their eyes; show them their sins and their sinful life; and lead them from that vile and wicked life. What does that mean? If you open your eyes you see your life, and you know what is right and what is wrong in it. Then comes the next thing, the next ques- tion : Is there any thing better? If there is, show me it, and tell me how to get it. Lead me into a better state of things. Lead me from the power of Satan into the power of God. That is the plain thing about it. Now, brother, where you are now The Christian's Commission. 107 you are in the power of Satan, in the power of sin ; in the dominion of tlie devil. You have made a tliousand efforts to reform. You nialic good reso- lutions. You have said a thousand times that you would be a better man ; but a man can never be a good man while he is under the dominion of the devil. First come out of that dominion, and then say to yourself: ** By the grace of God I am out from under his feet, and I will put myself under the power of the good Spirit of God." You know what the Bible says: Come "to the help of the Lord against the mighty." Does it mean that God wants you to help him in the reformation of human sin? No; it means, Come up where I am, and I will protect you. There was no power to protect the Union man from the bullets of the rebels if he stayed in the ranks of the rebels. I will tell you that, if a young man was just standing with both armies in front of him, his own friends will be just as likely to kill him as his enemies. If God wants to protect you, and turns the guns loose upon your enemies, and you are among them, you may be the first one that will fall. And now he wants you to take a stand on his side, so that the evil can not touch you, and he will not mistake you for one of his enemies. He says: "I will protect you then, and look after you, and save you; but there is no power to save you while you are in the ranks of sin. Come over to this side." Come from under the power of Satan, and be under the power of God, that you may have remission of your sins. Now, here is the point : When I quit sin I quit I S!1 Mill M -'tt '- ii i i 1 k 1 198 Sam Jones' Own Book. all that is bad, all that is wrong. I come over to the Lord's side, and it is his business to save you. God will condone your sins if you will come over to his side. By doing so you get remission of your sins. Lay down any thing that is bad and take a stand for the right, and if the Lord doesn't save you it is not your fault. And I will tell you, if a man will quit all his meanness, nd take the side with the Lord's people, and that man is unregenerated and not pardoned — I will say this to you, and that is, the Lord will have to make another world for him. He can not take him into heaven if he is not regenerated, and he will have to make another world and stop the machinery of the universe in order to do so, for he can not take any body into heaven who has not been born again. But you will never find such a case as this. Lead them from the power of Satan to the power of God, that they may have a remission of sins and an inheritance. If I go from Satan to the side of God I am saved, and have an inheritance here and hereafter among the people of viod. I am glad that the Church is mine, and that I am the Church's. I am glad for the home for Christian people in this world. And I want to say another thing: You may live right and go to heaven outside of the Church, but it is all I can expect to do to get up there from inside the Church. I thank God for this inheritance among the people of God. And I trust that this night every one of you will say : " I am done with my sins. My eyes are opened. I am done with ray . f: The Christian's Commission. 199 sins. I coine out from the devil's side to the rij^lit side, to the Lord's side. And now, what I want is a remission of sins and an inheritance among the people wiu) love the Lord, and then an inheritance in heaven." That is what we want. And, brethren, if we will come from the other side and take a stand, and get our friends to see these things, then we can lead them from the power of the devil into the power of God, and then to a remission of their sins, and then take them to their inheritance, and then to everlasting life in the world to come. Can not we do that ? Can you make any thing plainer than that? Is not that your duty? Down with your meanness first, and take a sto;,cl for the right, and then pray God for a remission of your sins, and for an inheritance in heaven. Sayinos. When a poor sinner falls on his knees and says, *'God, be merciful to me, a sinner," there is always some angel near by to gather up the prayer and carry the news, " Behold, he prayeth !" A MAN is never free until love abounds in his heart toward God and man. The freest man is the man who loves God most and loves his neighbor as himself. There is no law in heaven or earth that fetters or proscribes a character like that. w '4 ' m '■I Sermon XV. ood's dootrinis, and how to know it. " If any man will do Ili.s will, he shnll know of the doc- trine, whothorit be of God, or whether 1 Hpeuk of myself." — John vii, 17. AT the time Jesus uttered these words, he was surrouiKlod by tlie sharj), cunning Pharisees; by the slirowd, ealcuhiting Sadchieces, and the law- yers of the day. They were probing, and dissect- ing, and looking, and wondering, and questioning, and Jesus looked at them, and threw the gauntlet down on the ground at their feet, right in their faces. It is wonderful, but strangely true, that all the scholars in this world's history have met with oj)- posers. They have met with scoifers, and perhaps a large majority of them with contempt and scorn. You know that when Galileo discovered that this world rotated on its axis, the stupid monks ar- raigned him immediately, and they tried him as a heretic and a humbug. And they convicted him, and made him retract. But the wise old man, as he walked out, whispered to himself, "And still the world moves." When Harvey discovered that the blood circulated from the heart to the extremities and back again, the medical world arraigned him as propounding a false theory, and argued against it. When Watt discovered that steam, a bland vapor, had 9.00 How TO Know the Doctuine. 201 power almost omnipotent, the Hcientists of his day ar- raigned liini, and demanded the proofs. Wlun Morso discovered that you might chain eU'ctricity to a wire, and that one man cuuld sit a thousand miles from another, and hold a conversa^^ion with him, the world arraigned him, and doubted his discovery. No wonder, then, that when Jesus Christ discovered "a balm in Gilead," a remedy for sin, this world ar- raigned as an impostor, and tried and convicted him. I don't see how the discovery that the world rotates on its axis breaks into a fellow's prognim much. I do n't see how the fact that steam, a bland vapor, is omnipotent, could interfere with a man's system of living. The fact that the circulation of the blood is a great discovery does not make a fel- low quit lying, or stealing, or any thing of that sort. And when it is a demonstrated fact that a man can sit down to-night, anywhere in America, and hold a friendly conversation with a man in Liverpool, that does not make him pray or quit his meanness. It is no wonder that men oppose the science of Christ crucified. All other sciences have had their opposers. No man to-day, excepting the famous preacher of Richmond, doubts the fact that the world turns on its axis. I believe he still sticks to it, that " the sun do move." No one to-day doubts that steam is an almost omnipotent power. I have only to look on those iron horses as they move over the country, with their giant power, in order to tell the world that steam is power. The moment that a physician walks into my room, and tells by thi Ht '\ il: 202 Sam Jones' Own Book. m^ accelerated movement of my pulse my condition, I can not doubt as to the circulation of the blood. No one can doubt the fact that we may sit in this city and talk with a friend in London to-night. Brother, these grand discoverers met with opposers, and yet the world does honor the first four to-day, but still the majority of the world to-day despise the last one — the blessed Christ — the greatest dis- coverer of the ages. Do you know why that is? The greatest discovery ever declared to man is the fact that God can be just, and the justifier of the ungodly. The greatest fact in the universe made knovvn to men is, that a poor man may have his sins forgiven, and may make his peace with God, and die in faith, and go home to heaven. And yet while the opposition, which these other great discoverers met, has died out, still to-day, after the blood- washed throngs of earth have been marching- home to God for eighteen hundred years ; after our precious mothers and our pious fathers have marched into heaven under this gracious banner, and after all that his blessed scheme of redemption has done for our race, there are thousands and millions of men who despise Jesus Christ and reject him as a grand discoverer, with all the power of their nature. O, strange beings that we are! Wonderfully strange ! And when you go breaking into a fel- low's program, he gets his heart full of doubts immediately. Did you ever notice that? There can be but one objection to the Lord Jesus Christ among men, and that is, when they bring their life ■iff How TO Know the Doctrine. 203 up and place it beside his life, there is an over- whelming sense of guilt and shame. Brethren, it is a good deal owing to circum- stances as to what you are. When I hear you sit in judgment on the spotless character of Christ, I do n't want to hear a word from your lips. I want to hear what your life is, and then I will know what your comment on the character of Jesus Christ will be. If your life is confirmed to Jesus Christ, then is the Christ the Son of the living God to you. But if your life is disreputable and dis- honest, you see in him nothing but the son of a harlot and an impostor. Is not that strange ? A man's moral condition determines for him what the Gospel and Christ and the truth are to him. O, blessed Christ! When I look over this world toward thee, all is mystery, all is confusion, all is desolation! O, brethren, there is but one place in this universe, from which I can look, and see as God sees, and that is when I reach right up to the point where Christ is, and look out upon this world as Christ looks upon it; and look at truth as Christ looks at it; and look at God as Christ does. Look from a Christ-like point, and you will see a thousand things you never saw before. " If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether it be of myself." I want to say, in the first place, that if any man has a peculiarity in his case, I want to know what it is. Now, you make out as if you had something peculiar to yourself; you say I'l i\ 204 Sam Jones' Own Book. Ill that there is something special about you; that you see very well how others should do such things, but not yourself. Brother, I look at it simply as the devil's work to persuade a man to follow him by saying, " Now, if your case were just like that of any body else, it would be all right to do that; but yours is a peculiar case." That is what you say to yourself. Poor fellow ! I wonder if you think the Lord never made any one else like you. I do n't know, but I think that if lie did n't the world hasn't lost much. But at the same time, brother, that is just what is the matter with the world. There are so many like you. There are plenty of peculiar cases. I have seen mental, and social, and phenomenal peculiarities. Brother, God does n't care any thing about your peculiarities, he wants yon ! A genuine, thoroughly trained musician can play on any thing in the universe, frora a jcw's-harp up to the grandest instrument. Well, brother, the Lord Jesus Christ can take a man up and down every grade of his spiritual nature in the twinkling of an eye, and make music that would charm an angel's ear. Your trouble is, that you are trying to fix up, and tune up your own instrument. But you have no tuning fork; you don't know the lick it is done with. That is the trouble with you. I don't care how old you are, or how young you are ; I do n't care how learned you are, or how ignorant you are ; I do n't care what your difiiculties are, or what your peculiarities are; if any man will do the will of God, he shall know of the doctrine. There How TO Know the Doctrine. 205 is no hobby, now, in that. It is simply, " Have you faith ?" Now, I want to say that Christianity is some- thing that may be tested like any thing else. Now, here is a man who comes up to me and says, " Brother Jones, the science of mathematics is a grand science, and it is true." " Well," I say, " dem- onstrate the truth of mathematics." He says, ** Well, twice two are four." " But I do n't want any silly talk like that; demonstrate it to me." " Well," says he, " five times six are thirty." " Go along with your school-boy talk ; demonstrate to me that the great science of mathematics is true." He says to nie, "We will demonstrate the thing; I will demonstrate every problem ; I will work it out by that rule that two and two make four. The two governments of France and Switzerland pro- posed to luunel the Alps, and desired to begin the tunnel on both s'des of that immense mountain range at the same time. So the engineers took their instruments to the mountains, and located the route, and the miners and sappers toiled for days and weeks, and thousands and hundred of thousands of dollars were spent in the work. And the two gangs labored and wrought towards each other, while all the world stood gazing on. Finally, one day while France's side were sitting down to dinner, Switzerland's side got up and went to work, and the thuds of the pick were heard through the thin partition, and then France's side jumped up and gathered their tools and commenced digging away. In five minutes' time the middle wall of parti- i ') 206 Sam Jones' Own Book. ii ¥ \ i f' ^i tion fell out, and their lines met each other to the huudreth part of an inch. There is an everlasting demonstration of the truth of mathematics." Now, I say Christianity may be tested just as the science of mathematics is tested. " Well," you say, " give me a demonstration." Thirteen years ago I looked to God and prayed, and he saved me, and I have been happy ever since. " Ah, me," you say, " do n't talk that sickly sentimentalism to me. I have heard that all my life. There isn't any proof in that." Well, my mother told me that at the age of thirteen, Jesus saved her, and she lived happy in his love, and died happy and went home to heaven. " O, well, I do n't want any old woman's story about the thing. If you can demonstrate the truth of the religion of Christ crucified, I wish you would do it." Well, look here. Take the case of the man that was born blind. As he walked up, groping in darkness, he said, " Lord Jesus, that I may receive my sight," and Jesus stepped down and spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle and rubbed it on his eyes and said, " Go wash in yonder pool." I suppose if some of you scientific gentlemen had been there you would have told that poor blind fellow, " Look here, science has demonstrated that there are curative powers in dry dirt, but He has gone and spit on the dirt and wet it, and taken all the curative powers out of it, and in addition to that he tells you to go and wash in that pool, where you have bathed a hundred times. Just look, now, he is playing his nranks on you. But the How TO Know the Doctrine. 207 poor blind fellow had more sense than that. He said, " Whether the clay has curative powers in it before or after it is wet I do n't know ; and about that pool, I have washed in it many a time ; but this man says if I will go now and wash this dirt off my eyes in that pool, I will have my eye-sight. That is what I am after, and I am going to do his will; I am going to put him to the test." And I see the poor blind fellow groping off in darkness, until he reaches the edge of the pool, and he steps down and lifts the water to his eyes, and washes off tbo clay and spittle, and then he looks up and sees rocks and rivers and mountains that his eyes had never looked on before. That crowd got around him and said, " Well, now look here, give God the glory. This man has a devil." " Well," said he, " whether he has a devil or not, I know not, but one thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see." There is demonstration. Well, let us take another instance — the ten cases of leprosy. Here is the most fearful disease man ever had. The lepers came up and said, " Master, look. We are diseased from head to foot with this fearful disease, leprosy, for which there is no cure " — and no cure to this day has ever been discovered. " Now, Master, that we may be made whole." Jesus just looked at the lepers and said, " Go show your- selves to the priest." Now the scientific gentleman I suppose, if he had been present, would have said, " Listen to that. Does n't he know the priests won't let those fellows come about them, as they have banished them from the congregation of the w 208 Sam Jones' Own Book. people ? And they have to spend their lives in old waste places, and every time any body approaches them they must raise up their hands and cry, ' Un- clean !' O, how wicked in him to tell those men to go to the priests when the priests won't let them approach." But those poor lepers said, " Master, we will do thy will ; we will do what thou sayest." And I see just ten men start oif, and they walk but a short distance until one looks at another and says, *' The scales are all gone and I am sound from head to foot ;" and one runs back and praises God for the wonderful cure of the whole. Brother, do you believe that? I have often wondered what a life Christ must have had among men. I picture to myself, breth- ren, as the news went abroad, how he gave sight to the blind, and how he healed the sick, and how he raised the dead, that they pressed him on all sides; and when all along his pathway he scattered bless- ings in the hearts of men, I wonder that any man to-day by his life and character, should fight such a being as the Lord Jesus Christ. Demonstrate this truth. Now, sir, I feel just this way about it. I was preaching down in one of the towns in our State. An old colonel — a clever old man — sat in the congregation. He was wicked and godless. He was an old citizen of my town. I was a boy there, grew up there. This old citizen had been away for several years. I went down to his town in Georgia, and stood up and preached to the people, "Repent and come to God." Well, when I walked out of church that day this old M How TO Know the Doctrine. 209 gray-headed man was standing at the gate of the yard in front of the church, and he took my hand, and the big tears ran down his eyes. Said he, " Are you the same wicked, daring, godless, drunken boy that used to curse Cartersville so?" Said I, " I am the very one." " Well," said he, " no mat- ter what my doubts have been about the power of God to save a sinner, I yield thoui ii>'W, and pray God Almighty to save me just as he saved you." Demonstration ? I do n't reckon there is a man or woman or child in Cartersville that doubts there is power in Christianity to save a sinner, not one. Now, brother, " if any man will do the will of God, he shall know of the doctrine " — know for himself. And what does God want us all to do ? " Cease to do evil, learn to do well." " Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord." It is the will of God that we repent. It is the will of God that we accept salvation on his terms. Doc- trine is a good thing and fear is a good thing; but one fact stops a man ; he can 't get over it, nor under it, nor around it, nor through it. There it is, and he must do something with it. Now, I will tell you — one man became the grandest Christian in our State, and his plan just opens the way for every man. God is no respecter of persons. Now, listen to this. If you really want to be religious, I will tell you how. This man lived in middle Georgia. I was afterward the pastor of his wife, and pastor of the Church in which he lived and died. For forty odd years he labored in the Church of God. 18 ''i''t ff ■ ..J !i .r-.-ll 1 V i 210 Sam Jones' Own Book. I will tell you how he started. Shortly after he was married, perhaps a year or two — I do n't know exactly — the Church that he and his wife attended Avas in the country ; they lived in the country. He was a farmer. On a certain Sunday his wife did n't go to Church with him. The preacher came around once a month, and it was the regular preaching serv- ice there on that Sabbath. In his sermon the preacher made this remark : " If a man will do be- fore he gets religion just as he thinks he would do after he gets it, he will get it." Now, do you get that point? Well, this fellow was a sensible man, and he took it in in all of its bearings. So that day, when the preacher was through preaching, he opened the door of the church. This man walked right up and gave his hand to the preacher, and joined the Church. He got home, and his wife said, " What sort of meeting did you have?" " Well," said he, " we had a good meeting, I think. Mr. So-and-so preached a good sermon, and I joined the Church." " You joined the Church ?" " Yes." " Have you got religion ?" " No." " Well, what in the world did you join the Church for without religion ?" " Well, the preacher said if I would do before I got religion as I thought I would do after I got it, I would get it; and I know I would join if I had it, and I am going to do before I get it just what I think I would do after I get it." " Well, well, well," she said, " that beats any thing I ever heard." That night, just before time to retire, he said, " Wife, get the Bible, please, and a candle." "What are you going to do?" "lam going to ii''1 iffi»'i How TO Know the Doctrine. 211 read a chapter in the Word of God, and hold fam- ily prayers." " Hold family prayers and got no re- ligion ?" " Yes." " Why, what are you going to do that for?" "Well, the preacher said if I would do before I got religion as I thought I would do afterward, I would get it ; and I know I would pray in my family if I had religion." He read his chap- ter and got down and led in family prayer. The next morning, when the breakfast bell rang, he said, " Hold on to that breakfast, wife! I am going to read another chapter and pray here." " Are you going to pray on here every day, and haven't got religion?" "Yes," he said. " Well, and what are you going to do that for ?" " Well," he said, " the preacher said if I would do before I got it as I would do after I got it, I would get it; and I know I would pray every night and morning the Lord sent, if I had it." And Wednesday night they went out to the week's prayer-meeting, and the leader of the meeting called on him to pray, and he got down and prayed the very best he could, and his wife, as soon as they came out of the church, caught his arm, and she said, " What in the world do you pray in public, and have no religion, for?" " Well," he said, " wife, the preacher said if I would do before I got it just as I thought I would do afterward, I would get it; and I know I would pray in public if I had religion." And he just plowed his furrow along that way for about two weeks, and got the biggest case of religion that any man ever heard of Now, that is the whole thing in a nut-shell. The means of grace will take a man to God. • i'j *l 212 8am Jones' Own Book. "If any man will do the will of God, he shall know of the doctrine." Do as God wants you to do, and he will bless you as certain as you are a man. Yes, but you say, " Mr. Jones, that won't do, because I joined the Church once, and I finally told them to take ray name off. T would n't be a hypo- crite, and there is n't any thing in joining the Church." No, there isn't; but there is a heap in what sort of fellow joins, I tell you that. Yes, but you say : "Now, I like what you say, but, Mr. Jones, I ain't fit." I declare I never want to go into the family that ain't fit to join the Church ; ain't fit to do any thing. They are the hardest cases that I ever struck — these "ain't-fit" fellows. I will tell you, you may take the most ignorant man in this city, colored or white, to-mor- row, and you may meet him on the street — say he is a colored man — and say to him: "Tom, are you a member of the Church ?" " No, sir." " Why ?" "Because I ain't fitten." That is just what he will say. Then you meet the most intelligent lawyer on the next bloclr, and say, " Colonel, are you a mem- ber of the Church?" "No, sir." "Why?" "Well, to tell you the truth, I ain't fit." And he talks just like that poor ignorant fellow that does n't know a letter in the book. The fact of the business is, that is the only thing that is the matter with them. I will tell you just where all such as that stand to-day. Here is a fellow out here that hasn't had .1 bite to eat in a week ; he is starved nearly to death, and he says: " I never was so hungry in my life." "Well, here is a table loaded with food. How TO, Know the Doctrine. 213 Come up and eat." He sayH, *' Ugh, ugh !" I say, " Why ?" He says, " My hands ain't fitten." " Well," I reply, " there is soap and water and a towel. Wash your hands." " Ugh, ugh ! I ain't fitten to wash." So he just stands there and starves to death. Now, is n't that so ? What are you going to do with him? There you are, friend. Givo yourself to God and his Church. " Ugh, ugh !" " Why?" " I aih't fitten." Well, come up here and seek to be saved and seek to be made fit. " Ugh, ugh ! I ain't fitten to get fitten." And there he sits and there he dies. Now, what are you going to do with a case like that? He says he isn't fitten, and when you want him to get fitten he sa^s he isn't fitten to get fitten. And what to do witli a case like that is the profoundest mystery of the world to me. Brethren, let us learn some real good hard sense on this thing, and say this: The only fact that ever commended me to God was the fact that I wasn't fit. Jesus came to seek and save the lost, and all the fitness he requireth is to feel my need of him. I feel my need ; you feel your need. If you were fit, then I have no word to say to you. Jesus came to call not the righteous, but sinners, to repentance, and these poor fellows that ain't fit — you are the very ones. If your hands are dirty you are the man that ought to wash your hands; and if your soul is dirty by sin you ought to seek the fountain that washes away all sin and uncloanness from your soul. Won't you do that to-night? " If a man will do the will of God he shall know li 214 8am Jonks' Own Book. I"* f If ' ■! If t ; i m > of the doctrine." And I want to tell you to-night, if I were you, standing where you are, I would walk up and say, " My brother, put me down on God's side from this day until I die." God says, " Choose ye this day whom you will serve." Now, will you listen to-night, and will you not, as an honest man who knows he ouj;ht to be good and give himself to the right — will you not in love and kindness say, " God being my helper, I start a bet- ter life to-night? I start on God's plan, eschewing the evil, taking up the right, and the balance of my days I give to the service of God." And when the battle is over God will say, "Now you are crowned," and then the palm, and then everlast- ing life. Sayinos. The firbt and lowest expression of love is the love of trust. This we see manifested in the con- duct of the child toward its mother. There is a sort of love that we call the love of admiration, which admires the true, the noble, and the good, and makes us aspire to it. That is a higher order of love. Of all love that is the most sublime which you see illus- trated when the bride and bridegroom walk up to the altar. He gives himself to her, and she gives herself to him. There they are, and if they are mar- ried according to God's ordinances, he does n't con- sult his own wishes — he just wants to know what his wife wants ; and she does n't consult her own wishes — she just wants to know what will please her husband. Sermon XVI. THE SECRET OB^ A. RELIGIOUS LIF^E. " I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a hving sacrifice, holy, ac- ceptable, unto God, wliich is your reasonable service." — KoMANS XII, 1. WE have down South what we call the intensive system of farming. That means, enrich your soil, cultivate it more thorouglily, and you can make more cotton and corn on ten acres with less work tlian you now make on forty acres; and, after all, the question is not how many acres you cultivate, but how many wagon loads of corn you gather, and how many bales of cotton you have for the market. That's the test at last of farming. The intensive system of farming is to get the most possible out of the parcel in hand. I would like to see the same system universally tried in re- ligion — to get the most possible out of the facilities afforded. I have always heard it said, there is more in the man than there is in the land, and I have found out in this country, as I have opened my eyes and looked around me, there is more in the character of the man who joins the Church than there is in the Church which he joins. You will excuse me, I hope, if I say there are some pieces of hickory the Lord himself can't make an ax-handle out of. That's not exactly orthodox, but it's a fact. He can polish it up, and make it of 215 >' 'li 216 Sam Jones' Own Book. the same shape and same size and the same polish as any other ax-handle, but it will break off the first time you throw the ax into a log. You've seen this sort? Hickory that has been subjected to certain influences and despoiled by certain atmos- pheres, brother, is n't the sort that is good for the purpose you want to use it. I want to tell you that there are men and women all over this country that have subjected themselves to so many injurious in- fluences and despoiled their character and under- mined their foundation with so much that is wrong, that there must be, in the very nature of the case, a new creation to make them of any account. That's true of a great many men. N, w, I want you all to-day to get down to the bed-rock facts, and let us talk about them. I like the rock idea. A rock is the foundation stone; a rock supplies the great shadow in a weary land. Now we strike this bed- rock on this text : *' I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies," first, a living ; second, a holy ; and third, an acceptable sacrifice. Now these three words are not put there to round up the rhetoric in this sentence. They are put before that tc a "sacri- fice," but each word is a pillar holding up the great truth expressed in it. "A living sacrifice." The Lord wants fifty million Christians. I believe there are that man) professed Christians — fifty million people — in this world, who love God with all their heart, and love their neighbors as themselves. He wants fifty million soldiers of the cross that ain't afraid of any The Secret of a Religious Life. 217 thing but sin, that love the right, and that dare to do the right. We are willing to give our proportion of hos- pital rats and ambulance drivers, and so on, but I tell you when we get three-fourths of that kind into the front we ain't in much fix to fight. We know, though, there are plenty in the rear to take care of our wounded if any fellow happens to get wounded. We can do that. The finest hospital facilities in the universe are found in the Church of God. Is n't that true? Brother, Christianity in earnest, the in- tensive system of living right, means simply this: "Lord God, here I am, just as I am, with every passion of my soul, every faculty of my mind, and every power of my body. Here I am ; if you want to use my hand, use it ; if you want to use my foot, use it; if you want to use my tongue, use it; if you want to use my brain, use it; if you want to use my eyes, use them. Lord God, here I am, all over, through and thuugh, from head to foot, I give myself to thee." A living sacrifice in fuct — that's what we want in this country. I will tell you how we can have heart religion, brother, unin- tentionally. We have heard some old friend get up and talk, "I have religion in here. I know I have it in here." Well, if you have got it at all it is in there. " O, I believe in heart religion" yon hear folks say. "That's my sort of religion." Well, I believe in heart religion, too, but I believe in finger religion as strongly as I believe in heart religion. I '11 tell you another thing. If I could n't have it in but one place I want it in this hand here, and. 19 i-r I 218 Sam Jones' Own Book. make it go out and do something for somebody. Your heart religion is n't worth a thing in the world by itself, because your heart never comes out; and if it did and any thing would come in contact with it you 'd be gone. If any thing touches it, even the point of a cambric needle, you're dead. You've got religion as you 've got your heart — if you ex- pose it, if any thing touches the receptacle of your religion you 're gone. I 'm sorry for you if you have only heart religion. I want head religion, hand re- ligion, foot religion as well as heart religion. I want every square inch in me, and about me, all over, head to foot religious. Get a man religious all over, and if the Lord wants him to work his head and feet he will visit the sick ; if his head and tongue, he'll talk to him; if he wants to put intel- ligent thought into his heart his ear is open to hear. What we want in this country is the sacrifice that is willing to do right and live right and whole in every respect — a whole sacrifice. Now, some of you here are thinking men, and some of you are thinking about going up a little higher, getting dis- satisfied with your latitude, and with your altitude, to say the least of it. Let 's see what we can do. A man said to me about six months ago, and he was an intelligent Christian, " Mr. Jones, we have got men in our Church worth one hundred thousand dollars, and somt worth two hundred thousand dol- lars. They have been in the Church twenty-five years, seme of them, and some of them pay our pas- tor two hundred dollars a year; they pay about twenty dollars for missions, and for all purposes '.ir ■I" ? The Secret of a Religious Life. 219 they pay about three hundred dollars. Mr. Jones, I 've been in the Church only six years. I 'm not worth more than twenty thousand dollars, but I tell you I had to oottle that money question some time ago. The Lord just brought me up to where that question had to be settled, ' What are you going to do about money?' and the least amount I can get off with to save my life is one thousand five hun- dred dollars, and sometimes I have to overhaul the thing or I feel bad about it, and still I don't think I 'm doing right toward God." A whole sacrifice — a man that will tote fair with God in his money ! There is n't one in a thousand that will do it. Did you ever notice how still a crowd becomes when you get to talking about money ? 0, my friends, hear me to-day ; if you intend to give yourselves a liv- ing, whole, sacrifice, you 've got to settle this money question. Your money has to do w' \ your relig- ion just as every thing else. A man's money will help him to heaven just as it will h^lp him to New York. " O," you say, " you 're preaching a mon- eyed gospel now." Well, now, let's talk a little sense along with it as we go and see how the thing works. I can get to New York without a cent if I foot it all the way and beg my bread. Can 't I ? It is n't necessary to have a cent to go to New York just as surely as it is n't necessary that you must have a nickel to go to heaven ; and that old sister that sang " I 'm glad salvation is free," said, " I 've been in the Church forty years, and it never cost me but twenty-five cents." The old soul spent her quarter at last, but I do n't believe she ever got ^.i n III :^l ! ' 220 Sam Joxes' Own Book. up there to enjoy it. Here a man's money will help him to heaven, or it will help him to hell, which- ever route he wants to go. A man can take his money and go up with it or down with it, or run on a dead level with it — either way. " Let 's hear you explain that." Well, I '11 il- lustrate it for you. Here 's a mechanic that has worked a couple of days for a man, and has earned two dollars a day, we will say; the man hasn't the money, but he says, " I '11 pay you in four bushels, of corn, if that will suit you." " Yes, that will do." Now, I 've got four bushels of corn. I want to run on a dead level with it. How am I to do it? I'll take that corn out here in this field and plant it, and next fall I have five hundred bushels; but I haven't any thing but corn. I started with corn, and I ended with corn. You see that 's a dead-level, dog-trot line. Therd 's many a fellow in this country, if you were to analyze him and show him how much genuine dog he had in him, he would be ashamed of himself the balance of his life. A fellow has got one hundred thousand dollars, and he says, " I 'm going to make this one hun- dred thousand dollars earn me another one hundred thousand dollars." He has money. He started with money, and he ended with money. You put it in two piles, and when death turns his lantern ®.n ot^o pile and then on the other you would n't turn around for it. I want to go down with my corn now. How am I going to do it? Why, I '11 take it up to the still-house and have eight gallons of whisky made out of it, and then every thing T touch is going down- The Secret op a Religious Life. 221 ward and hellward. Do n't you see ? I want to go up with it. How am I going to do it? I'll take my four bushels of corn to the mill and have it ground, and put it on a dray-wagon, and get up on the sacks myself, and drive down this street and turn up this alley, and stop in front of the house of a poor widow, and I '11 take those four bushels of meal out of that wagon and carry it into the house and lay it on the floor, and tell that poor widow and her children, " In the name of Jesus, my precious Savior, I will give you these four bushels of meal ;" and at the last day, when the man walks up to the pearly gates, Jesus will say, "Open wide the everlasting gates and let him in," and the angels say, " Why, Master, on what grounds do you admit him ?" and Jesus will say, " I was hungry and he fed me. I was naked and he clothed me. I was sick and he visited me." Jesus points at the little cabin in the alley, and says, " Even as ye did it unto the least of these, my brethren, you did it unto me. Enter thou into the joys of thy Lord." Now hear me. What about my money ? Have I consecrated myself to God? I will say one thing, and I mean it with all my heart. If I had as much money as some of you have got who look me in the face, and if I did n't do more for God and humanity than you do with your money, the devil would get me as certain as my name is Sam Jones, and he '11 get you, too, unless you make out a clear case of idiocy. If you do that you may slip through. If you go up there as a sensible man, and show no better ■ 1 1 Mriti' 222 Sam Jones' Own Book. dividends in righteousness than you now show, my candid judgment is the sentence will be, " Depart, ye accursed. I trusted you and yon robbed me." Your money — you 've got to straighten that out somehow. Many a man is appreciative. A fellow in Cincinnati said, " I would n't have missed that sermon for two hundred dollars," but when they })assed around the hat he slipped in a copper cent. He was just one hundred and ninety-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents meaner in his pocket than he was in his mouth. That fellow's mouth was all right, but his pocket was all wrong. I said once, " Brethren, pitch in and give every thing you have to God," and a brother tackled me after dinner and said, " Look here, Jones, you told these people to give every thing they had to God. Do you mean it?" "No," I said, "I just put it strong that way and told them to give their all, and by the time it works down to their pocket-books it will be just about ten cents." We have got to start mighty strong to get there at all. Money ! Religion is the cheapest thing in the world. There is n't an enter- tainment on earth as cheap as a religious entertain- ment, if you won't put it on any other basis in the world. I recollect going down the street of ray town one day and I passed a squad of men, who were standing on the sidwalk, and heard one man say, " Every time I go to Church its money, money, money." I have heard that, have n't you? I'll tell you another thing. Have you not noticed that whenever a pocket-book flies shut a man's mouth flies open, and he '11 talk ; but whenever his pocket- The Secret of a Religious Life. 223 book flies open his mouth flies shut ? The fellows that never give a cent are the fellows that are run- ning around talking money, money, money all the time. You watch the next tonguey chap that 's going about talking money and he 's the very fellow tliat has n't invested a quarter since these meetings started. Did you ever notice that. " Barking dogs never bite." I have heard that all my life ; and the man that growls about money is the man that never pays any thing. Listen. I was walking along the street when one of these men said to the others: "It's just money, money, money the year round." I stopped, an.l there it was the steward of the Methodist Church talking that way. I looked at him and said, " What did you say?" and he said: " Sam, I didn't see you, or I do n't reckon I 'd have said that." Said I, " What did you say ?" He said : " I declared it a siiamc how people are going about talking about money. Every time you go to Church they take a collection, and they stick the contribution-box un- der your nose now every time you go to Church." I said, " Look here ; talking about money, I '11 tell you what I '11 do. You pick out six of the leading Methodists or Baptists in the Church, the most liberal ones, and I '11 agree to pay every dollar of what these six pay in a year, every cent, to the preacher and to Church missions, with less money than it takes to run one old red-nosed drunkard. Now, what do you say ? Why, one old red-nosed drunkard pays more for his whisky and his devilment every year tluui the six leading Chris- ^n W.'i :!l 224 Sam J()ni:s' Own Book. tians of the town pay for the privilege of serving God and doing right and going to heaven. Brother, I'd just shut my little mouth and never open it again on that subject if I were you. It 's better to be poor than to be drunk ; it's better to be a good man than a bad man ; you better shut your mouth and go along and say nothing about money." If I were on any thing else than money, you'd all cheer like forty, but I do n't expect much cheer- ing on the line I'm on. It is as the old colored preacher says, " Talk about money and you throw a dampness over the meetin'." I'm not preaching for my pocket, brethren, I 'm preaching for souls. Do you hear that ? Brother, tote fair with God; do right towards God your Maker, and wherever there is a demand on your head or heart or hand or feet or pocket- book, in the name of sense meet it as an honest man ought to meet a thing. That's religion — a holy sacrifice. Well, we take it for granted you have given God your heart and pocket-book, and your hands and feet, but now how about your time? Have you ever settled any thing about your time, whether any of it belongs to God, and if so, how much of it belongs to God ? Did you ever sit down and make an honest division with God of your time — I will give God so much every week? John Wesley, a grander man than whom tever lived, sat down and divided the twenty-four hours of the day into three equal parts, and said, " Eight hours a day I give to sleep and recreation ; eight hours I give to my business, and eight hours I give to The Secret of a Religious Life. 225 God." When I look at Wesley's life, and see how many sermons he preached, I 'm astonished that he had any time to travel ; and when I look at the number of miles he traveled on horseback, I 'm astonished that he had time to preach ; and when I look at the number of books he left behind him I say, " Well, well, how did Wesley have time for writinjij and preaching?" and the whole life of that great man, the most laborious life almost of any century, was made successful and extensive because he divided up rightly with God. How many weeks in the year do you give to God ? How many hours a day do you give to God ? That 's the way to talk it. How many days in the week, how many hours in the day do you give to God? Many a fellow goes crying around u big meeting and asks people to pray for hiui, but, brother, you do n't want to go where God is. He is all around here. I tell you you can find God all over this city, and there 's many a place I 'd rather go to find God than to this hall. " What do you mean ?" I mean this : I heard of a backslidden Methodist once who was making money pretty fast — and that's a pretty good way to find a blackslider. It 's a fellow in the Church making money rapidly. "He's preaching against riches," you say. Well, if were I would preach against Abraham, and I never will preach against Abraham. That grand old saint could have come to this city and bought out the whole town before breakfast, and it would n't have interfered with his other transactions of the day. You show me a man that says I am preach- ■| "^ 226 Sam Jones' Own Book. ing against Abraham, and I '11 show you a man that's not growing in grace. This man wont to a Methodist preacher, and said he, " I wish you would tell me where and what heaven is ;" and the preacher said, " I can tell you where if is." "Where is it?" Said he, "Last year you made forty thousand dollars on one lot of cotton ; now you are rich, and there 's one of your sisters in Christ who is a member of the Church, and she 's lying up on the hill yonder and she 's down with the typhoid fever and her children have the chills, and that poor woman hasn't a cook or a nurse or any one to look after her wants. Now, if you will just go down town and buy fifty dollars* worth of nice provisions and take them up there — and she has seen better days — and get a cook and nurse to take care of her so that she '11 never want for any thing, and then get down the Bible and read the twenty-third Psalm, " The Lord is my Shep- herd, I shall not want," and pray God's blessing on the poor widow and her children ; if you do n't see heaven before I see you again I '11 foot the bill." The next day as he was walking down the street along came this man, and with the tears running down his face he said, " I did as you told me. I bought fifty dollars' worth of provisions and put them in a wagon and drove up to her house, and I got her a cook and a nurse, and I told her she should not want again, as I was her brother ; and I read the twenty- third Psalm, and got down to pray, and God and angels came down and filled that room, and I was the happiest man I have ever been in ray life." The Secret of Religious Life. 227 The charity that will simply pitch a ten-dollar piece into a poor widow's lap, is not charity. The charity that hunts up and sympathizes with and puts its arm around and helps a brother — that 's the charity that takes us close to heaven. Sayings. Thank God, this old world has never seen the time when it did not take its hat off and make a decent bow to a good woman ! This world is the fruit-bearing world. Up yonder we will eat and rejoice forever over the fruit we have matured here below. Between the bud and the blossom and the ripe fruit of love there are manv difficulties. There are the cold winds of neglect, and the biting frosts of temptation ; there are a thousand intervening difficulties between the blossom and the ripe fruit. As soon as a man quits doing wrong toward God he begins to see how good God is. I had u friend in Cartersville who was mad with another member of the Church; and I said: "If you will go and pay that man all that you owe him, I venture to say that it will be all right." I got the man to pay his debts, and there are no better friends in the town than those two men. If you will pay your debts to God, none will be better friends. K \ ;:?•? l!ll w mJ/^ 1 .IMi Sermon XVII. P R I ii O N E K t- 'T HOPE. " Turn you to the Ktrongliola, ye prisoners of hope ; even to day do I declare that I will render double unto thee." — Zkch. IX, 12. GOD is in earnest about the salvation of men. As I read this book I close it ever and anon, and say to myself, the all-absorbing theme with God and angels and good men is the salvation of the living — not the salvation of men who lived a hun- dred or a thousand years ago. They have had their privileges, enjoyed their opportunities, and destiny is fixed with them. Their eases have ceased to engage the mind and t of God in the sense in which our cases engage i. o mind and heart. It is i^ot in the salvation of men that shall live a hundred years hence ; they have yet to be born, and yet to enjoy their privileges and opportunities. But it is the salvation of men and women who live and walk and talk upon the face of the earth now. Is it not strange that this question should so engage the mind of Deity, and so interest the great heart of the Church and angels, and that you, for whom all this sympathy is poured out, and all these man- ifestations are given, should be the only being in the universe disinterested in this great question? Now, locate yourself somewhere in one of these classes to-night. I do not purpose to draw upon 228 Prisoners of Hope. 229 my imagination, hut we will stick to the record* If you helieve the Bihle, give me your attention. If you do n't helieve in the Bible, the discussion to-night will have very little to do with your case. When a man has found sonietliing better than the Bible, something more promising than the Gospel, something more inviting than heaven, he is not the man to whom I preach the Gospel, or would plead with to lead a better life. But, if vou have found nothing better than the Gospel, nothing truer than the Bible, and nothing sweeter than heaven, give nie your attention ; we will stick to the record. I shall talk about things we all know about. The first class of prisoners with liope we men- tion are the good men and women, the best charac- ters in all the Churches of earth. I have never yet been pastor of a Church that did n't have conse- crated men and women, who loved God with all their h( irts and their neighbors as themselves. I um ready to say that every good man I have ever met was a member of some Christian Church. I have never yet found a man out of the Church that talked like a Christian in the deeper and better things of a spiritual life. Now, I have heard peo- ple say, " I\Iy father was a good man, and he did n't belong to the Church ;" and " My mother was a. good woman, and she did n't belong to the Church." Well, in the name of common sense, do n't take me to the graveyards to find good folks. Every body out there is good, if you will read their epitaphs and what is written on their tombstones. Every body i» good after they die, but I want you all to rack me I Jill 1! 'Mt li!9 230 Sam Jones' Own Book. UTf . i ' out a living, kicking fellow in this world that does n't belong to the Church. He's the one I'm hunting for. Where is he? I say all the good people I have ever known were members of some Christian Church. If you have a man in this city that 's a good Christian and doesn't belong t any Church I want to see him. I want to get his photograph to take around with me, and say, " Here 's one Christian that has had an op- portunity to join the Church, but would n't join." When a man gets religion, brethren, he breaks right away for the Church of God, just as a young duck does for the pond, precisely. I do n't care how he was hatched out, it 's his nature to go to the pond. I used myself to talk that way — " I can live as well out of the Church as in. There's no use in joining the Church at all." But, as soon as I gave my heart to God, if the door of the Church had not been opened to me I would have broken it down and got in anyhow. I must get in. I '11 tell you another thing : When a man stands up and preaches the G jpel to me I want to know that he 's a member of the Church, and I do n't want him to be ashamed to tell what Church he belongs to, either. If you ever expect to be a Christian, the fact that you gave your heart to God involves the fact that you gave your hand to the Church. Some people, when they get religion, sit up and say, " To sa^e my life I can 't determine what Ciiurch to join. I do n't think any of them suits me." Per- haps yours is a peculiar case, and I reckon the Lord will have to send his angels down just to organize Prisoners of Hope. 231 a Church to suit you. Lord, have mercy on some people in this world. They are like a class of fight- ing men we had during the war : There were Union men and Southern men who would n't join any reg- iment, and they were what we called a " bush- whacker ;" and a bushwhacker would kill a Union man as quick as he would a rebel, because he was after what the fellow had in his pocket. God de- liver me from these religious bushwhackers that do n't belong to any command^ but are just after the spoils^ You give your heart to God, and don't let a Sabbath pass without going to some of these Chris- tian Churches, and say : " Brethren, take me in, and lift me." And do n't come in to be a little baby to be nursed ; but say, " Brother, I will lift you ; I will measure arms with any body. I never come in to be fed on soothing syrup and the bottle ; but I 'm going to be some one, God being my helper." Brother, we don't want any more babies. It's a heap of trouble to run a church full of babies. Now, the prisoners with hope are the first class we men- tion — faithful men and women who belong to the great Church of God in some of its branches, and are working out their salvation with fear and trem- bling. They have denied themselves and taken up their cross to follow after Christ. Every good man in this town who is striving to please God and do good is a prisoner with hope ; but he 's a prisoner still, hemmed in with the environments of earth, and with the temptations of earth thrown all around nim, with nothing certain except heaven to m 1? 232 Sam Jones' Own Book. him, if he is faithful unto the end. Now he's a prisoner with hope. •' O, what a blessed hope is ours, While liere on earth we stay ; We more than taste the heavenly powers, And antedate that day." Hope to the Christian is the anchor of his soul which entereth into that within the veil. When hope, tlie anchor, is pitched out into the great deep of life, the winds may beat and the storms may blow, but, blessed be God, it will hold me fast. A prisoner, but a prisoner with hope ! My pre- cious motiier was a prisoner with hope once, but twenty-eight years ago her spirit went home to God, and she has ever since been roaming Eiysian fields, one of God's freemen in heaven. Thank God, they are freemen up yonder, with no environments, no imprisonments, but everlasting freedom in the presence of God. My father was a prisoner of hope thirteen years ago, but death cut the last ligament, and his liberated spirit went home to God, and he has been walking the golden streets for thirteen years-;-a freeman in God's great world. Every good man and every good woman is a prisoner with hope here, but there they are God's freemen. I have sat down often and buried my face in my hands, and wondered if I will ever get to heaven. It will be a glad moment to my spirit when I have fought my last battle, when I have overcome my last temptation, when I have kneeled down and said my prayers for the last time, when I have kissed my wife and children good night, and started home Prisoners of Hope. 233 to heaven like a little school-boy going home from school, and when my feet shall strike the pavements of the golden streets of God, and I shall at last, blessed be God, be at home, and free forever. There is another class of prisoners with hope, and they are the men and women who are not members of the Church, nor professors of religion, but they are seeking it ; they are p .nitent sinners. . After all, there are but two classes of sinners in this world of people — the penitent and the impenitent. All pen- itent sinners are saved, and all impenitent sinners are lost. Every penitent, heart-broken, and con- trite mortal in this house is a prisoner of hope. If a man is honestly seeking grace in the pardon and salvation of his soul, that man is as much on the road to heaven, as far as he has gone, as any man here. Thank God, he never lets a penitent die until his penitence has issued into pardon and j)oace. If you are an honest penitent, and will keep your traces tight going in that direction, you can never die until you are pardoned. An honest and per- sistent penitent never yet was damned. Are you an honest penitent ? Do you mean business ? Are you honestly sorry about the way you have been doing? Have you honestly made up your mind to give your heart to God and be religious? If you have, my brethren, you are prisoners with hope. There is a chance for you to get to heaven, and I say to you this, that is all I want to know to-night or any time in my future life in this world : Is there a chance for me to get to the good world ? If there IS, count me in. 20 234 , i m- Sam Jones' Own Book. I '11 tell you another thing. I 'ra going to take every chance for the good world. I was at a meet- ing once, and the preacher said : " All of you that are not doing your whole du* come up here." And I felt that I ought to be the lirst one to go. " All of you that want more religion/' said the preacher, " come up." And I said to myself, " That means me." . " All of you that feel in your heart," con- tinued the preacher, " that you are unworthy, come up." And I thought, " I am the most unworthy man in the world. That means me." And then the preacher said, " All of you that want to conse- crate life and soul and body to God, come up here and kneel down.' And I ought to be the first fel- low there, I thought. " And all of you who love God and trust in him, come up," said the preacher again, and then I thought, " Well, I ought to go right along with the first, for I do love him and trust him every day." I 'm going to take every chance for the good world, and if there 's any good in the Methodist mourners' bench, I 'm going to get it ; and if there 's any thing in the Presbyterian in- quiry chair, I 'm going to take that chair ; and if there 's any good in those rooms, I 'm going in there. I 'm going to take every chance I can get for a better life. I shall never dodge a duty or shirk a responsibility. Now, here, if we are prisoners of hope, then let us take the chances that we have to-night, and let us fight it out, fight the world, the flesh, and the devil, until we are no longer prison- ers of hope, but enjoy the freedom of God's chil- dren in heaven. m », PmsoNERS OP Hope. 235 There is another class of prisoners with hope. There is that man out there, who doesn't know what to do, hardly. He has very nearly made up his mind to-night : " It is right to do right, and it is wrong to do wrong, and I believe I will fall in with this movement." Thousands came for curios- ity, or for the fun there is in it, and he among the number. He said to himself, " 1 will have more fun to-night than I ever had in my life. I am going to have lots of fun." But watch him, and the first thing you know the man sits uneasily in his chair. The spirit of God has convicted him, and before the service is over he will look just as if the devil had a mortgage upon him. He is a prisoner with hope. Every man here, anxious and earnest for the salvation of his soul, no matter whether he has taken the step or not, is a prisoner with hope. Thank God, I would that every man in this house to- night might take his chance for heaven and work it out until it should end in a grand result. Look at Garfield, shot down by the assassin's bullet. We see the doctor probing the wound, and Garfield turns to him and says: "Doctor, what are the chances ? Do not hesitate to tell me the worst, be- cause you know I am not afraid to die." The doc- tor looks at him and replies, " There is only one chance in a hundred for your life." " Then," says Garfield, " I will take that chance." He did grap- ple with death for ninety days as scarcely any man ever did. Now, brother, there is a chance for you to be saved. Will yo?; just say, " By the grncc of God I will take that chance, and grapple with sin 1 . I i Ik VI ' n 11 'f^iu 236 Sam Jones' Own Book. and the devil until God shall say, ' It is enough ; come up higher ?' " That is what we want. Now, turn, you prisoners of hope ; I dare assert that every man here is a prisoner of liope. There is a chance for you to be saved, and come to God and have your sins pardoned. There is a chance for each and a chance for all. Now, let us to-night say : " Whatever others may do or not do, by the grace of God I will take that chance, and will work out tiiis great problem by the direction of the good Spirit, and make my way to heaven." " Turn you to the stronghold, ye prisoners of hope." Then what is the promise ? " Even to- day" — to-day, says the Lord, not to-morrow nor next week, but to-day — " I will render double unto thee." I never read that promise that I do n't think of an incident that one of our old preachers told me. He said, in one of his revivals, there was a young man who was very much interested in the meeting. He came up and was earnest and prayed and yet he was not converted. He walked out of the door with the young man one day, and turned to him and said,^"My young friend, you seem to be in earnest, and seem to be honest. What is the matter with you? You are not converted yet." " Well," said the young man, " I am in earnest. No man was ever more in earnest than I am, but I tell you, whenever I go up to the altar and begin to pray, I think of the business I am in. I am employed as a clerk in a grocery store where they sell provisions in one room and liquor in another by the quart, and I frequently have to go into the i Peisoners of Hope. 237 liquor part and draw whisky and sell to customers. Every time I kneel down at the altar and pray God to save my soul, that part of my work comes up, and I can 't pray to save my life." Do you hear that ? A man can 't get religion and clerk where whisky is sold, much less can he keep it and rent a house for others to sell it in, or sell it himself after he is converted. No, sir ; no, sir. A man that will rent his house to a bar-keeper and call himself a Christian, is a hypocrite of the deepest dye, and he does not find quarters in my Church where I am pastor. That boy couldn't get religion and sell whisky, and the preacher said to him : " My young friend, it is not a question at all. If it is in your way, give it up. Give up your employment and give your heart to God." " Well," said the boy, " you know my widowed mother and my three orphaned sisters are depending upon me for every bite they eat ; and," said he, " if I give up my employment, my mother and sisters will starve ; and if I do n't give it up, my soul is lost. I am in a strait." The preacher said, " Now, listen to me. God never asked a man to do any thing that would damage him in eithei world. Now, if it is your duty to give up that job, you do it." The young man went right down to the store and saw the head employer, and told him, " I have been seeking religion three days and nights, and I can 't get it. Every time I go to the altar and try to pray, that whisky part of your business comes up before me, and I can 't get religion and sell whisky." " Well," said the 238 Sam Jones' Own Book. senior partner of the firm, " I am sorry to have you leave. You have been a dutiful, faithful boy, and I am sorry to give you up. We are paying you good wages, fifty dollars a month, and you are poor; but if you say quit, we can 't say a word." The young man replied, " 1 am obliged to quit for conscience' sake." His employer settled up with him that afternoon, and the boy went back to the Church at night and was converted to God. The next morning after breakfast he received a note, and opened it, and it was a note from his old em- ployer, saying, " Come down to our store this afternoon." After dinner the boy walked down to the store and into the office room, and his employer met hira and shook hands with him, and said, *' I am glad to see you back, sir. Now, walk into this room." He took him into the liquor-room, and every barrel had been rolled out. He said, "Now, you see we have quit that business, and I will give you a hundred dollars a month if you will come back and clerk again." " Even to-day !" In twenty-four hours after the time that boy gave up his business for Chi'ist's sake and for conscience' sake, God doubled his salary and put the whisky out, and put him back. Thank God, no man loses any thing by doing right for God and conscience' sake. " Even to-day do I de- clare that I will render double unto thee." " Well," you say, " I do n't believe that story is true." Well, sir, I know it is true. And what I am go- ing to say now is true, and it is a story a hundred times bigger than the one I have just told, too. You say. Prisoners of Hope. 239 "What is that?" Well, sir, when I was a poor sinner, they used to tell me that " if any miin will forsake houses, and lands, and w.'fe and children, and home, and friends, and be my disciple, I will give him a hundred fold more in this life, and life everlasting in the world to come." Thirteen years ago, brethren — listen to me — I left one little cottage home in Cartersville to follow Christ, and, glory to hia name, he has given me a thousand homes as good as any man ever had. Thirteen years ago I bid farewell to a few friends in my town to follow Christ, and lie has given me a thousand friends for every one I left on that day. Thirteen years ago I left one mother — a step-mother, but kind and good to me — to follow Christ ; and I want to say to you that everywhere I have gone, God has ever given me a hundred mothers just as good and kind to me as my own mother could bo. And I want to say to you brethren, that God has given me a hundredfold more in this life. I left two brothers at home to follow Christ, and God has given me a hundred thousand brethren who are just as good to me as my own brothers could be. I stand here to-night to testify to the fact that God gives a hundredfold more in this life, and his precious promise of everlasting life in the world to come. Half of the promise is true, and I just know that God is going to fulfill the whole promise. Brother, turn to the stronghold to-night. Your Savior, Christ, is the stronghold, and God himself has promised, " Even to-day do I declare that I will render double unto thee." 1 i I :■ . ■ wr li'i!^' Sermon xvill. SOVVINQ AND REA.PINQ. " Be not deceived ; God is not mocked ; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption ; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." — Gal. VI, 7, 8. WE say there are three absolute impossibilities in this life. There may be many, but we know of three. First, it is an absolute i'rapossibility for a man continuously and successfully to practice a fraud upon his own immortality. If you are a good man you know it. I care not how much you may bring to bear — your self-pride and the flattery of your friends — if you are not what you ought to be there are periods in your history wiien God Avakes you up and shows you what you are, and who you are, and whither you are tending. I am so glad God won't let a man lie down and sleep his way to hell. In spite of dissipation, in spite of gayeties, in spite of temporal pleasures, there are moments when God arrests you and shows you what you are, and who you are, and where you are going. I imagine that every thing in the universe has its purpose. There is not an agency but what is working to an end. I think that bar-rooms, and ball-rooms, and card-tables, and a thousand things I might mention, a.re but so many influences to keep a man's mind off of himself. A man infatuated 240 Sowing and Heaping. 241 with the game of progressive euchre never thinks wlio he is, or what he is, or where he is going. A man looking at the guy jim-jams, you might say, on tlie stage at tlie theater, is attracted by the siglit, and never sees himself. A man steeped in and stupefied by whisky loses sight of himself; and these are agencies employed by the devil, and by devilish men, to make you shut your eyes to yourself; but sooner or later, ever and anon, God makes you stop, wakes you up and shows you what you are. And now, brother, if you are a good man, you know you are a good man ; if you are not a good man, you know you are not a good man, and that 's the end of logic on this question. We say, in the second place, it is absolutely im- possible for a man continuously and successfully to practice a fraud upon his neighbor. Now, your neighbor knows you, and a great many things he has never told you. Somehow or other if there's any good about you, your neighbors will find it out, and if there 's any thing bad about you they '11 find it out, too. If you were to dress up in disguise to-morrow night and go to your neighbor's house and get him to talk about you, and spend an hour with him on this subject, you 'd leave that house with your face buried in your hands, and you 'd say : " Well, well, well, I had no idea in the world that that man knows me as well as he does." You 'd be aston- ished along on that line. O, how much we know about each other, and how false we are toward each other. There's many a person in this world n?^ ]; I 242 Sam Jon eh' Own Book. that will fawn around you and flatter you to get your money, or influence, or something; but they can look clear through you, and they know you ; and when the day comes they'll tell it, too. Yon mark wiiat I say. Do you know that the worst enemies you have in the world are those who were once your best friends? They ran with you until they found you out, and, my, my, what a contempt they have for you now ! You can 't practice a fraud on your neighbor. This estimate of a man is pretty fair at last; and I want to say to you if your neighbors all concur in the fact that you won't do, I'll take their word ; if they concur in the fact that you are upright, and generous and noble, I'll take their word. Mark you, you are known in this commu- nity as you are. That's a sad revelation to some of you. You 'd be astonished to know how many people have seen you going into certain places at doubtful hours, too ; doubtful places where a decent man can't go. You'd be astonished to know how many could write your life and history. You are practicing a fraud upon nobody. Then we say, in the next place, it is absolutely impossible for a man to practice „ .laud upon God Almighty. He knows yon (Urough and through. He knows where you ^' whnt your name is, how old you are, ar i\ of your head are numbered. ' > jvery word you say, but he knom ^' moi 04 our life. This is the meaning oi tii exprep .on here: "Be not deceived; God is not mocked ' You know yourself; your Sowing and Reapino. 243 neighbor knows you ; God knows you. This is one text that the world assents to whether you be Jew or Gentile, wliether you be atheist or deist, Chris- tian or infidel. Do you know that all huinunity gathers on it as a common platform, and all agree to the truth of this proposition that, " whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap?" This text is not true simply because I find it ia the Bible; but it would be as true if Hume, the historian, or if Bacon were its author as it is true when God is its author. Really, brethren, leaving out the question of God, we know this text is true. " Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." This world around us, brethren, is but the photograph, a counterpart of the immortal world. Now we know this text is true in physical things, for whatsoever I sow as a farmer I reap. Like be- gets like. If I go out in my garden and sow a row of lettuce, I do n't expect any thing but lettuce from the time the seed drops from my hand until it ia gathered for the table. I go into my garden and plant a row of potatoes, and I do n't expect any thing but potatoes. If I go into my field and plant corn, from the time the seed is covered up in tho furrow until the ear is gathered for the barn, I do n't expect any thing but corn, If I go out into my field and sow wheat, I do n't expect any thing but wheat. Whatsoever I sow, that I reap. I want to call your attention to another fact along here. Like not only begets like, but multiplied produc- tions follow. I plant one grain of corn and I gather eight hundred grains. Some years ago one 244 Sam Jones' Own Book. of our leading pastors in our State told me himself tliat there sprouted in his garden a seed of oats. He let it grow on and spread, jind mature; and he said, *'I pulled up that bunch of oats all growing from one seed, and carried it to my back veranda, and sat down and counted the grains, and there were eight thousand seven hundred of them. They all came from that one single grain. ' I believe it is a true, plain, literal fact which he stated. You take that eight thousand seven hund'*ed grains of oats and sow it; next summer you have forty bushels. Take that forty bushels and sow it, and you have one thousand six hundred. Take the one thousand six hundred, and then begin to multiply in this way, if such a thing were possible, and you would have this world a hundred feet deep in oats in two or three decades. Now, brother, listen. Like not only begets like, but look at the multiplying, increasing nature of every thing you sow. Back yonder ih the Garden of Eden, six thousand years ago, Ada n dropped one little seed of sin in the garden, and now to-day this world is foul with sin and full of woe. Now, there is a sense in which we are immortally sowing. Every man is going through this world with a basket of immortal spiritual seed on his arm, and every step he takes in life his hand goes down into the basket, and he scatters the seed to the right and to the left, not out on your prairie lands, or down on the red hills of Georgia, but in human hearts, and they grow up and mature, and there is a harvest from the sowing that has been Sowing and Reaping. 245 done in the preceding months and years. O, brother, as I look at this city to-day, and see it reeking- vvitli iniquity, I say, " O, ray God, what a sowing! O, what a harvest tliere is in this city to sadden the heart of God and make angels weep !" Every word of my mouth is a seed; every act of my life is a seed, and it falls in ground that will produce and reproduce, and we are sowing and reap- ing, and sowing and reaping until by and by comes the harvest ; and then the time of weeping, or the time of rejoicing, when we shall bring in our sheaves. When a Catholic woman went to her devout priest in confessional, and said to him, " I have talked between my neighbors, and I have got the community in a perfect uproar; neighbor is mad with neighbor, and it is caused by what I said," the priest listened through, and said, " Now I have heard your confession. I give as a penance now that you go and gather a basket of thistle-seed and go between each house and houses in the commun- ity, and scatter the thistle-seed to the right and to the left along your pathway." Next morning she came back and said, " I have done as you told me. I pray for absolution." " No," the priest said. "Be- fore I absolve you I want you first to go and gather up all this seed you have scattered by the way- side, and put it in a basket and bring it back to me." " O," said the despairing woman, " I can never do that." "Neither," said the priest, "can you ever undo the mischief you have done in your community by scattering your bad talk and com- munications among those neighbors." \m 246 Sam Jones' Own Book. O, brother, it 's mighty easy to scatter, but O, how hard it is to pUick up and bring back again. Can you take buck that oath you swore yes- terday? It dropped in the ears of a little boy, and that boy will scatter oaths for fifty years to come. You miorht affofd to be wicked and sow evil seed if you were shut up in some lonely island all by yourself, but in this community, where every man touches another man, where little children play around you as you walk along the streets, where your examples are seen and felt by all men, I warn you, brother, you sin with a vengeance when you f^ ) wrong in this city of many thousands of people. " Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." There is a very general sense in which this is true. Now, I want you to answer one question for me. If I sow bar-rooms and whisky, what will I reap? Will you answer it in the halting, stag- gering gait of every drunkard that curses this city to-night? If I sow whisky I shall reap drunkards. Do you doubt it? Is there a man here to-night that says, " That logic won't do ?" Is there one ? I do n't care whether you sow whisky at your wine suppers, or whether you sow beer for your health ; I care not what your excuse may be ; every glass drunk by yourself, and passed to others, is sowing a seed that shall produce a harvest of drunkards that will curse this country when you are dead and gone. Do you know that every bar-room means ten steady drinkers? I am told that there are in this city thirty-three hundred bar-rooms. If you can put out two or tiiroe hundred bar-rooms, or five or six Sowing and Reaping. 247 hundred, or a thousand bar-rooms with high license, I want to tell you how you can put thera all out, and put thera out forever — and that is with prohibition. Now, I ask every intelligent man, if you have ten sto'idy drinkers for each of these bar-rooms, ten men who have crossed the line and will die drunk as certain as those bar-rooms stay in your city, will you not have thirty-five thousand human beings that to-night are marching into drunkards' graves? I verily believe, and I utter it with the conviction of my soul, that in less than fifty years from to-day our children will look back on us for licensing whisky as the most blatant barbarians that ever cursed the world. Talk about civilization, prate about liberty, boast about intelligence ! God Almighty let our children live and die idiots, if you call the present outgrowth of things the product of intelligence, and liberty, and freedom! Sow whisky, reap drunkards. They have reaped your husband, may be, sister. They have reaped your boy, may be, mother. They have reaped your neighbor, may be, friend. Call me a fanatic ; say, " There is a religious enthusiast ;" then go and shoulder your drunkards and bear them to the judgment-bar of God. Sow whisky, reap drunkards. Do you deny it? Can you, my brother, be a party to the sowing of the seed that will produce drunkards when God himself has said, " No drunkard shall enter the king- dom of heaven?" Will you tie your own brother, hand and foot, :uul cast him out of the reach of the If 248 Sam Jones' Own Book. arm of God ? Can you do that ? Every license to every bar-room in this city is furnishing the tether by which your brother is bound hand and foot and cast where God's arm can never reach him. I '11 tell you another thing. We have lain low and said notliing, until to-night the strongest power in America is the whisky power. The Congress of the United States just stands and trembles in its presence. The legislatures of three-fourths of these States stand and tremble in its presence, and the pulpits of this country say, " I do n't want to preach politics." What's the matter with them? The liquor question is no more a political question than is " Thou shalt not steal " a political question. Sow whisky, reap drunkards. My most earnest prayer, my greatest longing, is to live to see the day in this grand country of ours when there is nothing to break a mother's heart or to make a wife weep her life away ; when there is nothing in America that will make a man stagger, and make an honest man steal and a sensible man a fool. Every lewd house in this city is bottomed on your bar-rooms; every gambling hell in this town is bot- tomed on your bar-rooms ; and when you put whisky out of America you will put out of it the gambling hells and lewd houses, and those are the three biggest guns of hell turned loose upon our country. They fire often enough to kill more of our race than all other guns put together. Men and boys go from the bar-rooms to the gambling hell, and from the gambling hell to the shameless houses, just as naturally as a living man breathes. Sowing and Reaping. 249 But we go on. Sow cards and reap what? In- dustrious, hard-working boys? Sow cards and reap farmers? Sow cards and reap first-class mechanics? Sow cards and reap lawyers ? No ! no ! a thousand times no ! But sow cards and reap gamblers. Corn never grew from corn and wheat never grew from wheat more legitimately than the sowing of cards in your household will produce a harvest of gamblers. " I can 't nee any harm in the world in a social game of cards," you say. I repeat what I have said frequently, that nine gamblers out of every ten that I have ever met were from the homes of so-called Christian people. That is a fact. What does that teach us? It teaches us this: that in the boyhood of your sons you teach them a passion for games and gambling that in their after-life they can never overcome. God pity a man that can 't run his home without a deck of cards ! Some of you say, "I must have amusement for my children ; I shall bring cards to my house ; and I am going to put a billiard-table in there, too." A billiard table in a private house ! As God is my judge, in all my re- lations of life I never have seen a first-class billiard player that was worth the powder and lead that it would take to kill him. Now, what do you say ? " O, I believe in having a billiard table, and cards, and wine, and all that sort of things." You say, " Why, give these to the children, and let them have them now, and they won't care any thing about them after a while." Just give your hogs some good slop every morning for a week, and on the same principle they will just get so they won't care any 250 Sam Jones' Own Book. thing about slop at all! Why, they won't look at it! Sow cards, reap gamblers. O, what a life you project upon this world when you train a boy up who has no respect for God, and his greatest passion is to sit down with a deck of cards before him ! And Paul hit on this point, brethren, when he said, " I would have you wise u"to that which is good and simple concerning evil." What did he mean ? Blessed are they that do n't know how to do any sort of meanness. Their parents have never taught them how, and they have never learned. Then, again, we say, sow profanity and reap blackguards. I can put up with any other sort of a case better than I can with one of those cursing, swearing men. He is to me the most contempt- ible animal that walks this earth — a cursing man, a man that can 't talk business, can 't talk any thing without injecting his oaths, the most venom- ous, into his conversation. I have thought many a time that every swearing man ought to command some lonely island to himself — get off like Robin- son Crusoe, and curse it out among the goats. Sow whisky, reap drunkards; sow cards, reap gamblers ; sow profanity, and reap a debauched race. Then, again, we say — and we are following this logic out, and it is as resistless as the tide, and as clear as the mind of God — sow parties and reap balls ; sow balls and reap germans ; sow germans and reap spider-legged dudes ; and sow a spider- legged dude and reap a thimbleful of calves'-foot jelly. I tell you, my congregation, to-night, that Sowing and Heaping. 251 certain roads lead to certain places, and I ask you to mark the assertion. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. Listen to me, brethren. Of all the creation of God, the greatest moral, mental, physical mon- strosity in the universe is the natural product of fashionable society, the dude and the dudine ; and you never catch a dude and a dudine marrying one another. They will spoil two houses in spite of creation. I have never known them to take to one another, have you? Sow whisky, reap drunkards. Sow social evils and social amusements, and the natural product is a lot of young people in the community that are sliift- less and helpless and powerless, and that will be a dishonor to their parents all the days of their lives. Now, follow this line out. If I sow to the flesh, I shall of the flesh reap corruption. This is inev- itable. If I sow to the Spirit, I shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. Now, we can not undo what we have done by any power in the world ex- cept to change the sowing. That is it. The only process that will overcome the evil that you have done is to change the sowing. Mother, if you have been teaching your daughter worldliness, teach Christ, and peace, and heaven to her from this time on. Father, if you have been playing cards with your boys, change the sowing, and go to reading the Bible and praying with your boys. Motiier, if you have been taking your girl off into amusement, change the sowing, and take your girl to prayer- meeting and to the Church and to God. t.\ 'j i 252 Ram Jonfs' Own Book. , ^■ M III my town, when I was growing up, I was a sort of leader among the boys. I reckon I led many a boy off fi'ora right. But I will say this much : As soon as I was converted I commenced changing the sowing ; I commenced sowing good. I have preached in my town in the churches; I have ])reached on the streets ; I have preached under bush-arbors and under tents; and last year, at our bush-arbor meeting, God gave me the last friend of ray boyhood days to join the Church and go to heaven with me. Thank God, there is n't a being in this world that I ever led astray but whom I have, under God, been instrumental in turning around and bringing back to Christ. I am prouder of that than of any fact in my life to-night, except Ciirist's pardon of my own sins. Sow to the Spirit and you shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. Now, if you will pardon me, I will make a little personal allusion here. I want you to think about it when you go home to-night, and I want every mother and every father to take this incident home with them. It is a little family history that I want to give you all. A few years ago, five or six years ago now, just a little earlier than this in the year, wife and I re- ceived a letter from old Grandfather Jones. He is now living and praying for me, and no doubt does so every day in my town, Cartersville. That old man summoned us all down to his double log cabin in our county, for he is a poor man now and has al- ways been a poor hard-working man, to celebrate his golden wedding. At first I didn't think much Sowing and Reaping. 253 about it, but the day before the wedding I said : *' Wife, let us get in the buggy and go down to old grandfather's golden wedding." We went down there, a family gatliering of children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, and we all gathered after dinner in the big room, as it was called. The large room was twenty-four feet square, I believe, or near that. And after dinner the old grandfather and grandmother sat in the center of the room, and all the children and grandchildren and great- grandchildren gathered around them in a double circle, and the old man said : " Now, children, I do n't know how much longer I will be with you, but I want to give you a little history and some statistics. We have been married, your mother and grandmother and myself, fifty years to-day, and we have lived all this time in holy, happy wedlock. When I was a twelve-year old boy my mother and father both died^ and I was bound out until I was twenty-one years old. When I was sixteen years old the Methodists started a protracted meeting in the settlement, and I went out, and God converted my soul, and I joined the Church. In a year or two they made a class-leader out of me, and in another year they made me an exhorter, and before I was twenty-one years old they made a Meth- odist preacher out of me, and I have been a local Methodist preacher now for nearly fifty years. When I was twenty-one I married this, my wife, and we have lived happily together for fifty years. The night we moved into our humble home, the first night after our marriage, I got down the old 254 Sam Jones' Own Book. 1 1 1 ] Bible and read a chapter and started family prayers, and I have prayed night and morning in my home for fifty years. Nothing ever kept me from this duty. I have preached the Gospel in njy poor way for nearly fifty years. I have been tempted many a time to give it np and quit. I have been tempted that I was doing no good ; but I have prayed on and praised on, and now," he said, " here are tliese statistics : There are fifty-two of us in all, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Twenty- two of that number have crossed over to the other side, and sixteen of the twenty-two were children, infants, and have gone safe. Six were adults, and they all died happy and went home to heaven." And one of that number he was talking about, I had the honor to call my father. O, I saw him literally shout his way out of this world. " Now," so id the old man, "twenty-two of them are safe in heaven. There are thirty left, and every one of the thirty left who are old enough to know right from wrong, have been converted and have joined Church except one." O, how I have prayed, and wrestled, and prayed, and had my heart bleed about that poor fellow, until at last God has saved him, and he is a preacher of the Gospel now himself. The old man said, " Now, I do n't care much whether I go on up and live with them or stay here with you all. I am ready whenever God shall call." Precious old grandmother, she has joined the hosts up yonder. I went off from there and said to my wife : " Wife, grandfather said every one that died had gone to heaven, and those that were here i) Sowing and Reaping. 255 were all on the way hut one. T luivi' heen wanting to go to heaven all my lite, and, God helping me now, I ean not atl'ord to miss heaven." Now, that poor old man is in Cartersville to- night, a hopeless cripple the balance of his life from a fall a few weeks ago. He was very low when I was preaching at Nashville, and when I got back to Cartersville and walked over to his humble home, he took my hand and said, " God bless you, my grandson ; I did n't believe God would let rae die until I saw you again." They write me now from my home, " Grandfather says he is praying for you every day." Thank God Almighty for such an an- cestor as he is. Four of that old man's boys, my uncles, are preaching the Gospel to-day. 1 have two brothers; they arc both preachers, and I want to teach my children, if God shall call them to preach, to go on. And if all of us together can gather a million sheaves, we will put them all in that old grandfather's crown and tell him, " Grand- father, you are the blessed one that taught us the way to God, and passed religion down to four generations." Thank God for such a home as my old grand- father's was and is. Thank God that I belong to a religious family. Brethren, if I had lived in some families, nothing on earth could have saved me. But my grandmother prayed for mo. my mother did, my father did, and my grandfather did, and when I was breaking away from every band that could hold rae to God and rushing headlong to hell, God threw my precious father in my pathway and let me bid him good-bye, and then I turned around 256 8am Jones' Own Book. aud Buid, " God bcsing my helper, I am goln*; to heaven with all who iiro going in that direction of the family to which 1 belong." God lielp you mothers and fathers to begin a re- ligious home. God help you to settle it now and forever. I intend to live a Christian life and set a good example to my children, because God has said if 1 sow to the Spirit, I shall of the Spirit reap everlasting life. Sayinos. Let me say to you : If you can 't help but one family in town, let that be the family which needs the help. I have got a profound contempt for folks who are always helping those that do n't need any help. I BELIEVE the greatest moral monstrosity in the universe is an impious woman. I can understand how men can be wicked ; I can understand how men can be wicked and turn their backs on God, and live in sin ; but the greatest moral monstrosity is a woman with the tender arms of her children around her, their eyes looking up into her eyes with innocence and love, and that mother despising God in her heart. '^^'tt-.^NUlSaCK^MO' Sermon xix. PARTAKERS OK THE DIVINE NATUFIE. "According as liis divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue ; wlierel)y are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises ; that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nalure, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust."— 2 Peteu i, 3, 4. THE first thing we notice in these verses is that according unto the divine power God hath given unto us all things that pertain to life and godliness. God is the source of all life, physical, intellectual, and spiritual. He is not only the source, but the })reserver of all life. I am not only redeemed by grace, but I live by grace. I was born by grace, and I have lived up to this hour by grace, and I shall ultimately be saved in heaven by grace. TTnto God be all praise, and all glory, because he is the source of all life, and he is the benefactor who pre- serves all life. But I might buy at this point that there are con- ditions upon which I may live physically, and if I meet them I live. There are conditions upon which I perpetuate intellectual life, and if I meet those conditions I live intollectually. There are condi- tions upon which I live spiritually, and if I maet those conditionp I live spiritually. Peter says we become " partakers of the divine nature." What are we to understand by this expression? I may .Ol 09 258 Sam Jones' Own Book. I discuss more intelligently, and perhaps more satis- factorily, the results of a converted or renewed life ; I may consider more widely the manifestations of a renewed heart than I can discuss the nature of these renewals — the how, the why, and the where- fore. O, how deep this water becomes when you get out in it! Whenever I reach the point of this text I say, " Father, take my hand ; lead rae ; I do not know the way, but thou knowest the way. Lead me unto the way of everlasting life." Brethren, there are some things we know, and some things we do not know, and some things we never will know here. But I thank God I won 't have much to do in the other world but to learn, and have facilities that Harvard and Yale never give any man. I am going to practice what I do understand in this world, and study what I do n't understand in the next. I am satisfied that's the best way we can dispose of these tilings we can 't understand. Let 's practice the Ten Command- ments, and live upon a level with the Sermon on the Mount here, and then hereafter we will study the mysteries with the Teacher who understands and who can explain them. We may have the ca- pacity for learning, but there 's no one here who can teach these things. Science proposes to tell us some things ; science has to deal with the past ? \ ytves- ent ; but when I get to talking with scientists about the future, they do n't know any more about it than I do. Science, after she burrows five thousand feet down deep into the earth, does not know what is beyond that point, because she has not been there. Partakers op' the Divine ^'ature. 259 and after science has gone up in the air two and a half miles she does not know what is up beyond there, because she has never been up there ; and when it comes to the great questions of eternity, heaven, and hell, science knows as little about them as any six-weeks-old babe in this city. It is well enough for us, brethren, to take in hand and practice what we understand ; and, after all, it is not the mysteries of the Book that disturb me ; but I will tell you, the part of the Book that troubles me is the Ten Commandments and the Ser- mon on the Mount. O, how hard it is for me to live upon a level with them ; and I never will be satisfied with myself in time or eternity until I can live upon a dead level with the Ten Command- ments and the Sermon on the Mount. When a man comes to me and tries to draw me out on the mysteries of the Bible, I say to him, " Sir, how are you on tho Ten Commandments ?" My friends, let us get straight with them, and let 's go on up. Let 's not try to get in the senior class at college until, at least, we have studied awhile in the freshman. That 's a good idea ! Let 's not try to explain the mysteries until we understand and prac- tice the plain things of the Book. Do you enforce the command, " Thou shalt not steal ?" If you do n't, you ought to do as the preacher did in Maine, where the business of the community was to get out and market logs, and ■where the great sin of the community was stealing logs. This preacher preached about it, but without success, until at last he found he must fit his text to 260 Sam Jones' Own Book. f ' the settlement in which he lived, and so he siid: ^' Brethren, my text to-day reads, ' Thou shalt not steal — logs.' " Good Lord, help us to make the prac- tical things of Christianity clear and plain, then the Lord help us all to live up to those things, for if I would be a scholar, I must be a practical worker of righteousness in time. " Partakers of the divine Fxature." Brethren, let 's talk sensibly. I grant you this much, breth- ren, that when you get on to this question of regen- eration and of renewed nature, being born again, you are in the very whirlpool of the mysterious in Christianity. I do not think Jesus, when he preached his own Gospel among men for three years, ever mentioned the doctrine of regeneration more than once; and he did it then at midnight to one man, and that man the most intelligent of his day ; and when Jesus mentioned it to him he stag- gered back and said, " How can these things be ?" Jesus told him, " The wind bloweth where it list- eth. Thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh nor whither it goeth." My brethren, if this thing could be explained to men, Jesus would neve'' have let Nicodemus walk off without a full explanation of the whole question ; but, instead of explaining it, Christ seemed to push him off with the simple illustration. Now, why should I get on to the dixine side of the question, and try to explain it to you ? Christ himself did not do it, and why should you as a preach<'r, or I as a preacher, attempt to do the thing that Christ iiimself did not attempt to do? Partakers of the Divine Nature. 201 " Partakers." When Christ auuounced the doc- trine of the new birth to Nicodemus, he did it for all the world and for all ages. But be careful how you broach that subject, brethren, and do n't con- fuse men with it. That's the point I'm driving at. I like the way Peter touches on that question here, when he says, " Partakers of the divine na- ture." Being born again means simply born from heaven, or lifted up. I say that a raan^ until he is born from above, can no more live a life in the spirit of Christ Jesus than a rock can live the life of a plant, or a plant can live the life of an ox, or an ox can live the life of a man. That which is born of flesh is flesh. If you ever get to the spirit you will have to be lifted up. That's the idea. A man can 't catch hold of his boot-straps and lift himself up, that's a settled proposition; and the only hope of the race is the extended hands of God that lift us up, and I 'm not troubled about the Lord being able to lift me up, or being willing to lift me up, but my great concern is, will I ever push my hands up to God, that he may take me and lift me up? That's the question. " Partakers of the divine nature." Let us sup- pose a case, and let us suppose a sensible man, forty years old, if you please. He is a sensible merchant, a sensible citizen, a sensible father — in fact, a sensi- ble man altogether. Now, it matters not what was the primal cause of his spiritual concern, whether, it was the death of a good wife or the burial of one of his children, or the pungent words of an earnest preacher, or one of the sweet songs of Zion, or 2G2 Sam Jones' Own Book. the kind words of a little girl. But all at once that man says in his soul, " I am wrong. I am out of harmony with myself. I am out of harmony with God. My life has not been right. I am sorry for it. I wish I were right. I would give the world if I were what I ought to be." He is pondering now. He is thinking. Somehow or another, just as soon as he gets alone, this ques- tion recurs again. It goes to bed with him and gets up with him ; it goes to the breakfast-table with him, and goes to his business with him, and he thinks and thinks, and the more he thinks the more utterly he is displeased with himself, until by and by he begins to conceal himself somewhere, and reads the Bible. Suppose he is a lawyer ; a Bible has been lying on the table in his office for ten years, and he never endeavored to conceal it from the gaze of those who came to his office, but he conceals the book now. He hears a knock at the office door, and he hastily conceals the Bible under the pile of books on the table before the client enters, and covers it up with his Greenleaf and Blackstone and other law-books. As long as he was a mean sinner he did n't care who saw the Bible in his office, but now when any one comes in he wants that Bible hid. What's the matter with him? I '11 tell you. Ev- ery time any man comes into the room the Bible turns with its index finger to him and says, " Look at this rascal here! What a scoundrel he is!" And he wants it out of the way ; he does n't want to be seen reading it; he doesn't want it to be seen in his office, and if he prays at all, he will go off into If ^ Partakeks of the Divine Nature. 263 some secret place. If he goes out into the solitude of the woods to pray, the least cracking of a stick or a twig in the woods will make him jump up; he would n't be seen praying for any thing in the world. Poor fellow ! But he prays, and angels could not see a gladder thing in heaven than to look down on a fellow and say, " Behold, he pray- eth." He has got so far along that he prays now. He goes on in this way for a day or two, growing more and more dissatisfied with himself, until finally he addresses a note to the preacher. May be it 's the very preacher of whom he said, " I '11 never listen to that man again." The preacher comes around to see him, and he says : " Sir, there 's something wrong with me. I do n't know what it is. I 'm out of harmony with myself, and I 'm growing more and more heartily dissatisfied with myself every day. I don't know what's the mat- ter with me at all." The preacher talks with him and encourages him. He goes to Church, and now he is at the altar, perhaps, to be prayed for ; and, may be, six weeks pass, but all at once he turns loose all earthly hope and all earthly plans, and falls into the arms of Omnipotent love, and realizes " I am a saved man." Now you ask, "When was he saved? When did he become partaker of the divine nature?" Was it when he looked up and said, " Glory to God?" Was it when he wrote that note to the preacher? Was it when he was hiding the Bible that day ? Was it when he was down on his knees prating? AVas it when he went to bed and 2G4 Sam Jones' Own Book. i couldn't go to sleep that night? No. That man was made a partaker of the Divine nature when he said that first day, " I am wrong, I wish I were right. I would give all the world if I could get rit>;ht with God." The Divine nature touched his heart and the dead man lived again, and it could never die again until it struggled into life and joy and peace in the Holy Ghost. Brother, do you see that? Is there a man here that never had a touch of the Divine nature in his dead goul? Haven't you felt dissatisfied with your- self? Listen, brother ! The sin against the Holy Ghost is said by some to be, when touched and moved by the Divine nature, willfully to drive from your heart the only thing that can perpetuate your life and carry you to joy ; and he who stabs the only in- fluence that can save him, is a man who commits suicide upon his own mortality. Brethren, if you have it, cherish it for all time; give heed to it and foster it. Take care of every divine touch on your soul, and let it live on until it is like a rose, blos- soming out into beauty and perfection. Now, let us escape " the corruption that is in the world through lust." God has given us his great blessing; and, brother, don't you trouble yourself about the Lord's readiness, and willingness, and ability, for all you need to do in the universe is to trouble yourself about whether you will co- operate with God in this great matter. Here, I see a man as he ascends the narrow, rocky, difficult pathway up the Alps; on and on he goes, until at last I see he reaches a point in the pathway that is Partakers of the Divine Nature. 265 ii impassable ; ho is on this narrow cliff and he can no more pass that point than he can fly. And that man's personal means, in so far as the reaching of the top of tl.e mountain is concerned, are exhausted. He can 't get any further. But he has a guide along, and his guide says to him, " Now you can pass that rock," and the guide lies down on the rocky path and puslies out his brawny arm and hand, auci says, " Step on this hand here and I will pass you up and around that rock, and you can step safely on the other side," and the guide pushes his sleeves back, and the man steps on the brawny arm and hand of the guide, and passes safely round, and presses on his journey to the mour'ain top. There is a point, brother, in every man's experience that he reaches before he goes to heaven, where human power gives way; but blessed be God, the divine Savior lies down and tells you, " Step on this hand, and I will pass you safely round, and you can pursue your way to glory." Did you ever step in the Savior's hand, breth- ren ? If you have n't, you have to do it before you can get to glory. Put that down ! I will tell you ; Christ passed me around that rocky place, but T had to go to it before Christ could help me to get around it; and before that I had to press the balance of my way alone, stepping on the pave- ment as I walked. Christ helps a man only where he can not help himself. I never pray for any thing but that I do my best to answer my own prayer, and right where I get out of breath, that 's where God comes and finishes up the job for me. It 's all 23 266 Sam Jones' Own Book. foolishness to pray God to do something for a man tiiat he can do for himself. 1 wish I could see five hundred stalwart men and women here to-day rise up and say, " God has touched my heart, and it shall blossom into €ternal life. I have the resolution, the purpose, the desire to be good, and, God helping me, I start out on that line to-day." Well, some of us say, *' How is it that some men get along easier than others ? See here ! Here 's a man, and it 's no trouble for him to live right. He can get along without trouble in the world, but I have the hardest time of it of any poor fellow on earth." Brother, I'll tell you. Largely your trouble is owing to the fact that you never started in, and you never meant any thing when you did start. Look! See that engineer on his engine. At the movement of one muscle of his arm on the throttle, that engine rolls along sixty miles an hour. He shuts off the throttle, turns the air-brakes' lever, and the engine slacks up and trembles and stops. " What an easy thing it is to run an engine," you say ; " why it 's the easiest thing I ever saw in my life." But you '11 have to go behind the throttle, brethren, before you '11 get the secret of that rapidly running and easily controlled engine. If you will get up here I '11 show you. A few years ago you could see hordes of hard-working men digging and tunneling those mighty hills yond:^r, and filling up the valleys, a,nd cutting mighty trees down and hewing cross- ties from them; you could see miners far below the ground digging the iron ore ; you could see brawny Partakers of tiik Divine Natup.e. 207 men at the furnaces dumping and smelting tliat ore; you could see the poor fellows working at the pud- dling furnaces, almost burning up with the intolerable heat; and again down in the bowels of the earth you could see myriads of colliers busily digging the coal that is to fill that engine tender, and, brethren, if you will only go behind that engine, you'll not tliiidc it's so easy to run one. You say Christian people get along easy ; but you go behind their lives, go underground, I might say, and see how they pray and strive ; and how much they give, and how much they have suiFered. If you will go behind and see their conscience, you won't think it's such an easy task to live right after all. You must get behind the throttle to get at the secret of how easy it is to run an engine, and you must get at the inside of a Christian life to see how it moves to the good world ! I '11 tell you, if you '11 start out to-day and do as the best man in this Church does for the next six months, you '11 be as good as he is when the six months are passed. No man can be religious with- out living religion, and no man can live religion without bei ig religious. The rule works both ways. If the means of grace won't take a man to God, then what's the use of the moans of grace? If family prayer, secret prayer, that Bible, joining the Church, baptism, taking the sacrament — if all those things won't take a man to God, what are they for? That 's the way to talk it! If that street out yonder does not lead on down town to the bridge across the river, if it isn't a highway to reach a destination, 72 'm ^: w •# ^>/ # y IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I llli= 1.25 ■^ IlilM IM 22 % ii£ IP 2.0 1.8 1.4 1.6 Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 872-4503 // // ,<' C^ > m^ e w^- Q- C/a # iV ^^^ . \ \ <>^ ..#*» %< rv # 6^ r^: our life. You are silent when you ought to be talking, and talking when you ought to be silent. The religion from above is first pure, then peace- able, gentle, and "easy to be entreated." I like that sort of religion that you d(j n't have to sit long with, and beg with, and plead with in order to get a few dollars or a few good works done. I like the Christianity that says to my call upon it: "Put my name down for any amount you need. Call upon me for what you want." That is " easy to be entreated ;" that is easy to be induced to take the proper steps in any movement; that is willing to do any thing and any work that is for the good of others. If a preacher says : " I will tell you what I want you to do. I want you to take charge of such and such a thing," you want to say, " I will do any thing for the Lord and for the salvation of souls to God." I was once riding along behind a man in the pine woods. His wagon was stuck in the mud and remained stock still. It was mired down, and when the driver got oif and pried one wheel up, he had no one to drive the horses, and he was in a bad fix because his team had balked. But about 302 Sam Jones' Own Book. IT r i the same time I got up with him, a gentleman came riding by on a mule, and he told the fellow to go again and pry up the wheel, saying, "I will drive your team for you." The gentleman then took a switch and went to the balky mule and whipped it until it stood firm against the 'traces, and then he licked the other mule until it leaned against the traces; and as each would drop back, he would make it stand against the collar, and as soon as he pulled at the heads of the mules they carried the wagon out of the deep mire as if it had been a thing of life. My brothers I want to see every man of you lean against the collar which is around your city, and if we do that we will carry the whole thing out of the mud, and carry this city to God. Why not? Now, some of you have probably got your dignity outraged by my talking about collars and horses in connection with yourselves. Let us talk about souls, and how to get them out of the m\^e of sin. Now, in this lesson we draw about this picture as to what I must be like. First, I must be pure in my heart and life. I must be peaceable in ray nature. I must in all my ways be gentle. I must be easily entreated, and must be all these things without partiality and without hypocrisy. I will tell you what some of us say we would like to have in our meetings. "I would like to have Colonel So-and-so, and Judge So-and-so, and Major So-and- so in this meeting." Now I do n't go much on these colonels and judges and majors, so far as I am con- cerned. Wliat do you want with them? Brother, Purity of Heart. 303 sister, this is where I stand, " without partiality and without hypocrisy." There is not a poor tramp hogging his way through this town that I am not as glad to see coming to get his soul saved as I am to fjee the richest man in this city. His soul is worth just as much. The others are valuable. "They make us preachers work ourselves to death," said a preacher to me. " In a town I was in there was a rich old colonel, and he was not a member of the Church, and I said to myself, I will angle for him. And I angled for him for about three weeks, but I never got him. But I got about sixty other first- class sinners. And the next year I said again I would angle for him, and I did angle for him about four weeks, but I did n't get him, but I got forty converts; and the next year I was determined to get him, and I angled for him for four weeks, but could n't get him, but I got in seventy-five other sinners. And, Brother Jones, those two hundred souls would not have been brought to Christ if it had not been for Colonel So-and-so." Old colonels are good nest-eggs. They make preachers work themselves to death trying to get them. There has been many a poor fellow got into the fold of Christ in this way. I open the door of grace to every body ; but if there is any body that I want to see come to God it is the poor fellow who never had any thing in the world, who never will have any thing, and who will die as poor as he has lived. The poor are the ones I want to get in. I want to tell you that it is the tramp and the poor men and the humble classes that need religion and they feel its influence the 304 Sam Jones' Own Book. most when they get it. A young lady who be- longs to one of the wealthy families of this city said, when she was invited to come to this meeting: " What do you want me to come to the meeting for? It is poor folks wlio get religion." She did not think it was for rich folks to have it. O, what a transition it must be from a four-story, marble- front mansion, down to the depths of damnation at one leap! O, what a fearful thing that is! And thousands such as she are making that leap every day. God help us to do what we can for tijem, as well as for the poor of thi^. great city. Christ said himself, " The poor ye have always with you." Let us go among them and bring them to Christ ! Now, just one word and I am done. When I was in Louisville at one of the meetings, fifteen men were taken to the front pew and knelt there as penitents. There never had been fifteen such char- acters in that house of God in all its history. They were ragged and dirty. 0, how degraded they were. One of them was a man named Harney, a son of the editor of the Louisville Democrat. He told me that he had been drunk thirty years. While I preached, the pastor talked with the poor fellows and prayed with them, and when he was about to dismiss the congregation, he said : " Brethren, you see these poor ragged and dirty men. They are seeking religion. It is just as necessary to put clothes on them and make them cleanly as it is to pray with them. Now I want these official men to take them to the bath-rooms and barber shops, and dress them up neatly." This was done, and the Purity of Heart. 305 next day and night when they were at the meeting you would not have known them again. And these fifteen men were converted to God. Now, what was tlie result ? I was there twelve months after that, and tliirtoen out of those fifteen men were as bright, u.«eful Christians as any I met in that city. One of them had backslidden, another had died happy and gone home to heaven, and the pastor of the Church told me : "I have had no more active man than Mr. Harney has been." For five years he had been one of the principal clerks in the Louisville and New Albany depot, and now he was sound and well clothed and in his right mind. That is the kind of religion we want in this town. This is the kind of religion we are going to give you Christians. We are going to tell you to go down if you want to go up. The way up ia down. God help us to throw our arms around the perishing of this city. And let us work for the poor fellows ; and when a poor fellow comes up here, let us take him to Christ. I have seen a whole community moved by one of those old colonels getting saved, I saw every body in the meeting crying, because the old colonel came to God. Let us cry over these poor fellows. Let us do our duty by them. May God bless you in your home life, and may he crown you with everlasting life. 26 1 SERMON XXIII. • PRISOKERS WITHOUT HOPE. •' Turn you to the stronghold, yo prisoners of hope ; even to-day do I declare that I will render double unto thee." — Zech. IX, 12. BRETHREN, there are many words in this text we might dwell at length upon. They are rich in their meaning to us. But the special words we want to direct your attention to are these: "Ye prisoners of hope." And we stand squarely upon the word of God and upon the pages of tliat Book we have just laid down. If you say, " That is not the word of God," then, sir, I shake hands with you with an affectionate adieu at this point of the service. I have no Gospel to preach to you to- night if you deny that the word of God is the truth of God. I get this text from that book, " Pris- oners of hope." This expression presupposes that there are prisoners without hope, and when I turn over the pages of the Book I have just laid down, I find there are three classes of prisoners without hope. The first class we mention are the angels who sinned against God and kept not their first estate, but were cast down in chains of everlasting dark- ness to await the final judgment day; and while atonement was made for man, and offers of mercy and pardon were given to men, those angels cast down in their dark and doleful estate, this moment are still without a ray of hope or a spark of 3Uti Prisoners Without Hope. 307 heavenly day. While the sweet songs of the Gospel make melody in our lu-'urts, and while the Gospel of love and promise is ottered to fallen man, we are assured by that Book that no glimmering light or ray of promise has ever pierced the dark dungeons of despair that hold in their chains these lost and damned spirits. But we know not how to sympa- thize with angels. Angels are unlike men; they know not and they have not gray hairs, and wrinkles, and old age, and graves, and death as we have. We never see an angel, we know not how to talk with an angel ; but, brother, while they are in chains of everlasting darkness, let us look upon the picture and shudder and dread, lest it may be true that men from America will take up their eternal abode with those lost and damned spirits in hell forever. There is another class of prisoners without liope, and that is men — men who lived here and died in this city amid its Gospel privileges, and have lived and died without hope and without God in the world. If that Book teaches any truth plainly and pointedly it is this : There is no knowledge, or device, or re- pentance in the grave whither we are all tending. This is a world of sowing — that of reaping. This is a world of character-building — that at the judg- ment a place of award and assignment. The good go to heaven, the bad go to hell. I believe all Bible-reading men believe in punishment, and the only point at which men who revere and read the Bible differ at all, is in the duration of the punish- ment. Some men say it is not eternal, and when you prove to my mind that punishment is not ■I nil i| !■ ■ I. -C! P'lli' i i..\; 308 Sam Jones' Own Book. eternal, then with the same logic you prove that heaver is not eternal. The same adjectives that apply to hell apply to heaven. " These shall go away into everlasting punishment, these into eternal bliss." But, after all, brethren, I am not so much interested as to the duration of hell. I will answer your question as to the duration of hell, if you will answer me a question: "How long will sin last?" If you will tell me how long sin will last, then I will tell you how long hell will endure. When in the history of America, or in the history of eternity, will the lie you told yesterday be any thing else than a lie ? When God can make things t'lat ought not to have been, as they ought to havo been, then I can tell you when sin shall be wiped out of the universe. And it is n't a question of eternal fire, but it is a question of eternal sin, of eternal remorse, and eternal regret ! If we are taught any thing plainly in the Scrip- tures, it is that what we do for eternity we must do for this life. Mother, look me in the face. Have you ever prayed for your wayward boy since he breathed his last? Have you ever knelt at his grave and said, " O, God, save my boy from hell and save him in heavon?" Wife, have you ever knelt at the foot of your husband's grave and prayed, " Gracious Father, forgive his sins to-day and take him to heaven?" Listen to me a moment. I care not what the record of your prayers may have been previous to his last breath, none of us have prayed for loved ones since they breathed their last. Mother does not pray for son, wife does not pray Prisoners Without Hope. 309 for husband, father does not pray for loved ones who are dead. No, the common sense of humanity teaches ua that as the tree falleth it shall lie for- ever. There is nothing in eternity that can undo the evil deeds of time, and if you live and die im- penitent you have settled the question, and settled an eternal issue that involves. the loss of your soul. "Prisoners without hope." The old couplet may be true, that " While the lamp holds out to burn, The vilest sinner may return." But when fate snuffs the candle and it goes out, it is out forever. None of us looks to the fact that there is a chance beyond the grave. Brother, will you meet me in your thoughts at this point; all the time that I have to prepare for eternity is between this and my grave; between this and my shroud ; between this and my last breath. The great issues of eternity that involve eternal happiness or eternal damnation are v\ rapped up in the few hours between me and my dying couch. Will you face that fact a few moments, and look in the face of that propo- sition, and will you settle your mind squarely on it while we discuss these fearful questions to-night? Your heart in your bosom is but a drum beating your funeral march to the grave, and every heart- stroke is numbered, and, when numbered, is proof of the fact that your heart shall beat one time less in all this world before you. Brother, suppose you knew that clock that sits upon your mantel at home, ticking away each fleeting second, would stop before you got home to-night, and you were to know that ■pra m m'l' I 310 Sam Jones' Own Book. if that clock stops while you are away that yon will never see your home again, and you will be carried in a corpse. Brother, if that little pendulum in your bosom stops beating before I am through preach- ing, if you have come here impenitent, then you shall be a prisoner without hope forever. Is it true that the gasp or two of the last dying moments are the only things between me and that doleful state of everlasting despair — "a prisoner without hope ?" I have preached the Gospel in twenty different States, perhaps, in America, and I may preach it in every State in America. Thank God for open, doors! I may preach the Gospel in China. If God were to call me there, I would go as willingly as I came to this city; but there is one place, brethren, I have never preached, and there is a spot oh which I never intend to preach, and that is at the cemetery. I will never stand among the tombstones of earth and beg dead men to come to God and love. But God has spared you from among the dead and brought you to this hall to- night to hear the Gospel. Will you wisely consider, and well, the proposition ; that gray-headed man sit- ting here, this gray-haired woman, this young man — will you consider to-night that just a few more passing days and the question of eternity with you will be settled forever? I notice in reading the papers that more than one man I have preached to earnestly has gone to eternity, and, young as I am in the ministry, I have preached the Gospel to thousands of men who have rejected it, and to- HI Prisoners Without Hope. 311 night they are prisoners without hope forever. O, sad thought ! In Knoxville, Tenn., I pointed my finger one night at a man, without special aim, of course, and said, " It is now or never with you," and two weeks after I left the city I got a letter from a friend saying, " The man you dropped your finger on that night died last night, and he said, * It was then or never with me, I saw, and I sur- rendered my heart to God,' and he died happy in the faith, and has gone home to heaven." O, sir, trifle not with the extraordinary means of grace; trifle not with the truths that will bring thousands of souls to Jesus Christ; trifle not with the meeting where the sermons are repreached to almost a million of souls through those secular pa- pers. God has brought to bear on you extraor- dinary means to save you from hell, and may you give yourselves to God before these extraordinary means leave you forever. God has thrown these services between you and your grave; God has put this gracious revival between you and your coffin, and will you overleap all these things and die a sinner and pass into eternity unsaved, a prisoner without hope, forever? Brother, let's you and I say, " If there is but one man who goes to heaven out of this meeting, God helping me, I am going to try to be that man. If there are only a half dozen saved, I will, with God's mercy, be one of them." O, sir, rush into the open gate, and find mercy and peace while it is called to-day. You may trifle with me and the meeting, and the calls of mercy ; you may trifle 3 1.H 312 Sam Jones' Own Book. with the prayers of God's people; but while you trifle with us you are trifling with God, and, above all things, you are trifling with your immortality, and you can not aflford that. Friends, may be this sermon and this service to-night are put between you and this eternal issue that shall settle the ques- tion forever. Will you take the time and meet the issue squarely to-night, and say : " Whatever other men do, I do not intend to die impenitent?" As the rabbis used to say, every man ought to get re- ligion one day before he dies ; and, for fear you die to-morrow, hadn't you better seek religion to-day? But there is another class of prisoners without hope. They are, thirdly, men and women who live, and walk, and talk to-day in this city that are just as certain to be damned as they walk and talk to- day. Do you know there are whole families in this town that not one — father, mother, son, or daugh- ter — has ever been religious? This is the saddest ihing you can say about any family God's sun ever shone upon. Neither father nor mother, son nor daughter — not one of them — ever made any preten- sions to being religious! And I can tell you another thing: T could be irreligious four years as a hus- band, twenty years as a son, and twenty-four years, I say, as a brother or a sister; but I could not be irreligious twelve months with a precious child looking up in my face. When you talk to a man of sense about his children, if you do not arouse his conscience and probe his soul it is because he is dead already to every thing that is ennobling and promising. kki'M qm Prisoners Without Hopk. 313 lor jn- ler is- lirs, ibe ild |an [his is Ind There are noble citizens all around this town ; they are men of prominence, men of means, men of influence, and there they are — prominent to-day on the side of the devil. I was asking to-day what Church Mr. So-and-so belonged to. " He does not belong to any, but he attends a certain one." ** Well, what Church does his wife belong to?" " None at all." I can see how a man can be Christ- less and godless, but the profoundest enigma in the universe to me is a godless mother — a mother with, innocent children hanging about her neck ! O, mother, are you here to-night? If you are I pro- nounce you tlie most fearful monstrosity in all the moral universe of God. Prisoners without hope ! Whole families irre- ligious! And do you not know right here a father,, and son, and grandson, not one of whom for three generations has ever been religious ? Look at that picture. I will tell you another thing : If you will take a boy or a man whose grandfather and father never were religious, and who is himself irreligious, I would almost as soon preach the Gospel to a horse or to an ox as to preach to that grandson. " The iniquities of the father shall be visited upon the children to the third and fourth genera- tions." What a sad thought that is! Shut out heaven to your children and to your gran(^children ! There are families in this town who, if this meeting Avere to be protracted in every church in this city, and in every theater, every rink, every hall, would never put their feet in those places. They have de- liberately, not with their tongues, but in all the 27 i ^ m 814 Sam Jonp:s' Own Book. thoughts and acts of their mental and moral consti- tution, said, " For time and eternity I never intend to try to be religious !" Prisoners without hope ! Why, sir, when I walk these streets and take the hand of a man, and feel in my heart, " There is a man that never intends to repent, who intends to die as he is, I would as soon shake hands with a dead man as to shake hands with him. He is al- ready dead to all that is true, and noble, and good. He is dead to heaven, and dead to God, and dead to the blood of Christ, and dead to every thing except the excruciating pains of eternal damnation. O, what a thought, what a thought ! A prisoner with- out hope! He may be walking on the street; rnay be sitting in the hall to-night. Will any man in this audience to-night say that every man here will be saved? If there is only one to be eternally damned, which one? I wonder which man it is sitting and looking at me to-night that is just as certain to be damned as he hears my voice this mo- ment. O, sir, is it you? is it you? A prisoner without hope ! I praise God for preserving me through a wicked life up to twenty-four years of age. I praise him in time, I shall praise him in eternity, that he kept me alive until I found peace with him and felt that he was my Father and my Friend. I can look back over my past life at the flash of a pistol in my face, the dirk in some enemy's hand, the crash in some railroad accident ; I can see where I just missed death by a hair's breadth. O, my >God, if T had gone unprepared as I was then! &!^ mw] Prisoners Without Hope. 315 O, blessed Savior, I praise thee to-night that I found the " Fountain filled with blood Drawn from Inimanuel's veins ; And sinners plunyed beneath that flood Lose all their guilty stains." Thank God, I live to see the day when I can testify to the world that Jesus Christ hath power on earth to forgive sins. I will praise him forever. A prisoner without hope ! Will you go through to the benediction of this revival service and stand out as a monument of what indiiference and reck- lessness and prayerlessness can do for a man? W^ill you do that? Can you afford to do that? Can you? If we live right and die right, even while our friends mourn around our dying bodies they rejoice. When Bishop Marvin, the grandest man the Church of the South ever had, returned from his tour around the world and came back home and died in his own quiet, peaceful home, and his wife gave up to God the best husband and father and preacher the South ever knew, she looked upon his pale corpse and clapped her hands together and said, "God is so good to me to let my husband go to heaven from his own quiet home." The very fact that he passed out into heaven was the source of infinite gratitude to his wife. I heard Dr. Haygood say, " I stood by the death- bed of Bishop Pierce, our grand old Georgia bishop, but he did not die ; I know he did not die. He talked to me up to the very edge of the grave, and I almost literally saw him sweeping out of this !«?!' 316 Sam Jones' Own Book. world into the arms of God." Die ! No, sir ; no, sir. If I had had any doubts of the immortality of the soul, they would have been removed in the first town I was a pastor at. Dr. Ingraham, a quiet, peaceful, good man, a kind neighbor, who loved God and loved all mankind, was stricken with that fearful disease, consumption. And finally he was taken down to his bed, and for three long months he was a hopeless invalid, and death came hour after hour and stripped his bones of their flesh and muscles. There he was, under the potsherd of death, until death had robbed him almost literally of every ounce of flesh. I believe he was the thin- nest man I ever looked into the face of when death had done its worst upon him. The morning, when death walked into his room and drove the dagger to his heart, he pushed his bony arms behind him and raised himself up, and just as death struck him the last blow he said, " Life, eternal life \" and swept out of his body to go home to God. O, brother, the man that can meet the dagger of death and cry "eternal life" is proof to all mankind that we shall live beyond the dying moment. Ah, me, to live beyond that time, and not to die beyond that time! A prisoner without hope ! The lost soul ! Lost ! lost! lost! Brother, can you meet your dying min- utes without making your peace with God? If you can, you are a braver man than ever I want to be in time or eternity. And to the poor wandering one to-night let me say just one word more. Turn to the stronghold. The gates of mercy are open. You need not die, you need not be lost. But turn Prisoners Without Hope. 317 to the stronghold. And what does God say? "Even to-day I will render double unto thee." And may God draw reluctant hearts to himself to-night and bring us all to heaven ! Savings. Everybody ought to keep good company. There is not an angel in heaven that would not be cor- rupted by the company that some of you keep. I LIVE here a prisoner of hope, but at last I shall overleap the circle of friends above my dying couch, and my spirit shall be free and mix with the freemen of heaven forever ! As long as the star of hope shines over my pathway I am ready for every good work. Every man in the world ought to be in the Church of God. When I see men out of the Church I want to save them. To you men who drink, Bwear, and break the Sabbath, let me say : I have a right to-day to get as drunk as any man in this city. I have just as much right to steal something to-day as anybody. Wlio gave you the right to get drunk and swear? Who gave you the right to tell lies? Who gave you the right to profane God's name? I have just as much right as you to do it. I won't do it; you ought not to do it, and you know it. : i Sermon xxiv. I THOUQHT ON MY WAYS. "I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy tes- timonies. I made haste, and delayed not to keep thy com- mandments." — PsA. cxix, 59, 60. THE commercial travelers of America, or per- haps the more refined name is " the angels of commerce," are unlike the ang.els of old. Their visits were " few and far between," but your visits are every day and everywhere. Your name is le- gion. I suppose you number three hundred thou- sand in the United States. What an army that is ! What a power for good or evil in the morals of America ! What a power for good or evil in the commercial interests of America! If the Lord Jesus Christ had an army of three hundred thousand active agents — as active in preach- ing love, joy, peace, long-suifering, gentleness, good- ness, and faith, as you are in pushing the sale of your goods, it would not take Christ long to bring America to his feet, and my greatest desire and earnest prayer to God is that the day may come when you will carry your "grip-sack" in one hand and your Bible in the other and do business for both worlds on every trip and everywhere. I have been thrown a great deal with commercial 318 I Thought on My Ways. 319 men. I am a sort of drummer myself. I lead a sort of drummer's life. I spend very little time at home. It 's a great sacrifice. My cliildren see very little of me. My wife sees very little of me. God forbid tint in my absence from my wife and chil- dren there should ever be any wandering away from them. I never want to see the day come in my life's history when my wife shall detect any differ- ence, any impatience, any restlessness when I am at home. The curse of a traveling man's life is this: You are from home so much that you can hardly be at home when you get home. How many of you have brought tears of blood, almost, to your wife's cheeks by your treatment of her, by your selfishness and indifference to your home? Home! Home! The sweetest place on earth ! " Be it ever so humble, there 's no place like home." My wife has a claim upon me, my children have a claim upon me. And as a commercial man in one sense I can talk to you commercial men, and say this to you : Not only would I spurn and scora an act that is unfatherly and unhusbandly when I am at home — but, brother, when you go home show your wife that home is the sweetest spot on earth, and peace and joy will reign in that home. Well, there 's another thing. The question comes up, " If you have never been a commercial man you do n't know how hard it is for a com- mercial man to be a Christian." I have received one letter that I want to read Iv;jj'j •»» 320 Sam Jones' Own Book. to you, before 1 go into the text. The writer says : ** I am a New York * drummer.' I believe in Jesus Christ, ray Savior. For some years I thought I could not sell goods without drinking with my trade, but finding it a dishonor to my Lc I wrote down in my order-book, * No more driu. , of any kind, so help me God,' and God blessed me. And I did the same with smoking, and ever since I wrote that down I have never used tobacco in any form. Hallelujah ! I want to offer you, my brother, my sympathy and help, for I know what a terrible struggle it is to quit tobacco; but God is not unrighteous, and he will give you more joy thaa tobacco ever gave. Just tell the drummers that God saved me and kept me from sin and tobacco, and his grace is sufficient for me." You see how he puts it — " sin and tobacco.*' rather like that. Now, he says after having givei» sin and tobacco, " I sell as many goods, to the best trade, as any man on the road." That 's a great declaration, brother, and if it is necessary in order to be a successful drummer that a man must be a blackguard, and a dram-drinking, and a dirty story-telling one — if that 's essential to be a first-class drummer, I would rather be a third- rate dog than a first-class drummer. Now, brethren, I wanted to read this letter in the first place because, if I can establish the fact that there is just one pure, good man, there is a living, walking demonstration of the fact that we can all be religious — every one of us. When you find only one man in a calling who is good it is a demon- l!!' * i I Thouoiit on My Ways. 321 stration that every man in i lint same calling can do that same thing and be good. Now, we come to the text, " T thought on my wavs." Brethren, inconsideratoncss is the curse of the world. Men won't think about the right things. They will think about stocks, and bonds, and money, and trade, and about what they will do, and what they will wear, and what hotel they will put up at, and by which route they will go. They will tldnk about every thing in all the enterin'isea of life, ex- cepting about their ways, their manner of living, their acting, and where they are going to for time and eternity. And now if we can spend a few minutes in wise, candid, considerate, and conscien- tious thought on this matter we shall be benefited by this service. " I thought on my ways." Are my ways the ways of a wise i an? Would a sensible, wise, thoughtful man liv as I am living? Would he go where I am going .' Would he do as I am do- ing? Would he talk as I am talking? Would a wise, prudent, careful, sensible man run on the line that I am running? You know your lives, breth- ren. You know how you have been running during the past two months, during the past four months, during the past year, during the past ten years. You know how you have talked and acted on the road. Will you run your mind back and ask your- self the question : " Are my ways wise ? Have I done the best I could? Have I lived the best life that I could? Have I been prudent in the selec- tion of my comrades? Have I been wise in my 322 Sam Jones' Own Book. conduct in the midst of their company ? Am I wise at day time and at night-time, and in all my ways? Does wisdom control me in ray life, in my words? Does it control my character ? Am I seeking al- ways the best means foi- the best end ?" That is wisdom. Knowledge is one thing, wisdom is another. Wisdom is the skillful application of knowledge ; the employment of the best means to secure the best ends. Now, knowing that I can go to New York is one thing; and then wisdom steps up into the province of knowledge and selects the nearest route, the best route, the fastest train, the most expeditious way to reach it. Now, here I am a moral being. I have been selling goods for thirty years, but I must quit that some time. I have to die; and when I quit selling goods, I want to be able to look back and say in the midst of my family, " I have never done any thing that dishonored God or degraded my own be- ing." And no drummer, no commercial traveler, can expect any thing valuable in his latter life where he has previously resorted to bad means to reach his ends, I do n't care what sort of an end thut may be. I have received letters that have brought ques- tionable transactions and questionable ways to my notice on the part of commercial men. Some of you use the bottle, some of you play cards and gamble — that is, you say, you put up just enough to make it interesting. And some of you use means that I could talk very plainly to you about, if it were not for those innocent, pure faces with bonnets ov r them here to-day. !■: I Thought on My Ways. 323 " I thought on my ways," Brethren, I have seen the day when I could be devilish, and mean, and do a htap of bad things, but I can say honestly this thing, that a man could never hire me to do mean things by the month. I never got that low down from God. I never was on the market for sale. I never propose to let myself out to do any one's dirty work. I always had as much of my own as I could stand. And I will tell you another thing — the man who would ask you to do those things that are wrong in themselves in- order to push his trade, is the man that sooner or later will become your worst enemy, and he will never give a dollar to your wife and children after he has ruined and debauched and damned you. The man that does evil that good may come, is only going to do evil to you in the end, and bid you a final farewell when you cease to be useful to him ; do n't you for- get that. " Well," you say, " what are we to do.'* Well, I will tell yon what I say to that. When there is no reputable, decent, honorable, upright employment in this country ibr me to get, I am going to emigrate to the poor-house and die there. I would rather be an Itonest, pure, and upright man dyin£; in the poor-house, than be a man who has to make himself disreputable and be dishonest in his own eyes in order to make a living. I feel that, and no man can be reputable when he uses bad means to a good end. It's no matter how good the end is as long as the devil himself runs that way to earth. Ho wants you to push trade in that way. There is only one line of business that li : ^ if \\ II ^: 324 Sam Jon lis' Own Book. you can run that way properly, and that is the liquor traffic. If I were running for that sort of business I would run it pretty lively. Every town I came to I would get them all drunk. I would get my business well started in that way in every community I went into. I will tell jou another thing. There is not enough money in this world to hire me to sell whisky and beer. And God Al- mighty vvill hold you responsible as a ^ aid minion of those fellows who are trying to damn this coun- try if you' let yourself out for any such business. I tell you, that for all the drunkenness and the evil and the fearful misery and the wrecking of homes brought on by whisky in this country, the manu- facturer of whisky, the wholesale dealer, the drum- mer who is hired by him, and the saloon-keeper who deals it out, are responsible. I am angry with whisky, but I am not angry with any man that ever drank it or ever sold it. I do n't get mad with men. I get mad with demijohns, bottles, and that sort of thing, and I get mad with every thing that will hold whisky. "I thought on my M'ays." My life; what is it? Am I a wise man ? Am I \vise in the selection of my occupation ? Am I wise in the carrying on of my occupation? Am I wise in the best sense of the Avord? And then we stop and ask ourselves this question: Am I an honest man of business? "An honest man is the noblest work of God." O, brother, an honest man is worth his weight in gold any- where. And when you are so honest your employers will find you and they will double your wages. And I Thought on My Ways. 325 how many of you have been turned off on that line ? I will tell you there are just hundreds of firms waiting for some of you of that kind to be turned oflP. " I have thought on my ways." Am I honest and candid ? If there is any miserable thing to do I would not be hired to do it. It won't pay. You will never get rich in misrepresenting things. You may go on for a while, but you will be like the farmers getting rich. Every pound they grow costs ten cents. They can not get eight for it. The only way they explain this style of doing things is to say they make so much off of it. If it were not for that they would be ruined. Determine first, to work for none but an honest house. You drummers have the power in your hsaids to reform all the houses that do business through your agency. All that you have to do is to say to dishonest houses, " We won't get business for you, and when you employ a man that is willing to do your dirty work we will boycott you and adver- tise you as scoundrels everywhere we go." If you drummers took a stand like that what a grand thing it would be. You would say, " Such an agent shall not travel on the road. That house shall not be represented on the road. We won't have our fra- ternity degraded with any such concern. That is a good thing. My way is honest. I deal honestly. I do honestly." Then again I stop and ask myself, Are my ways pure or impure? Purity is one of the greatest blessings that ever crowned a life. O, brother, about the dirtiest thing in this universe is a really Ml I 326 Sam Jones' Own Book. iiii>>> dirty drummer — dirty in conversation, dirty in his thoughts, dirty in his life. O, brethren, let me say to you to-day, live as pure men. Never say a word anywhere that you could not say in the p s- ence of a parlor full of ladies. And never go a place that you do n't want your sister or wife to go to. And whatever you do let your love and vows to your wife be kept as sacred as the word of God is sacred. And I beg you, brethren, to preserve the integrity and purity of your characters and be pure men everywhere you go. " I thought on my ways " to see whether they were pure or impure. I thought upon my ways as a father. There is many a commercial traveler in this country that is the father of a precious group of little ones at home. Father, what is your in- fluence over these precious ones? What is your ex- ample to. them ? What is your light before your children ? I have thought many a time of that father who, traveling through the snow, when he had got one hundred yards from his house heard his little son cry out, " May I go with you ?" and he said, " Yes." The father walked on, but directly he turned and looked back and said to his child, "How are you getting along?" "Finely, papa; I am putting my feet in your tracks." And the little fellow was jumping from one track to another where his father's feet had been. The father was a wicked man. As he walked along in the snow with the voice of the little boy in his ears, repeat- ing, "I am putting my feet in your tracks," he said to himself, "God helping me, I will straighten out ■1^ I Thought on My Ways. 327 my tracks. I will turn right about, and lead my boy in a purer, nobler, and better track all the rest of my days." Now, father, let me tell you that your boys are putting their feet in your tracks. They will go to the same house that you go to. They will drink at the same place that you drink at. They will gamble with the same cards that you gamble with, and if you live long enough they will follow your track when they become men unless you so alter your life that you will be indeed a father to your children. When a man gets so that he does n't love his children, when he gets so that the pride of his heart is not with his children, then he is indeed be- yond the reach of any thing that I can say to him. Then, in addition to that, " I thought on my ways " as a husband. I have received a letter from a lady in this city. It was a long letter, a sad letter, a heart-ache letter, a letter that meant a great deal. God forbid that my wife should write of me and of my sins in that way. This lady says: "We lived happily together for more than ten years. In the last few years the growing indifference of my hus- band — he has been on the road so much — almost breaks my heart. I could not bear it if it were not for the love of God in my heart ; and I pray every day that God will help me to bear it, and make me as good a wife as it is possible for me to be." A growing indifference! Now, I was head-over- heels in love with my wife when I married her, but I love her a hundred times better now. They cir- culated the story about me, in some town I was at 328 Sam Jones' Own Book. 'it ■w that I had quitted my first wife. Well, I never harl but one wife, and, God helping, I will never have but one. I am like the Irishman who said, " I hope I will never live to see my wife married again." Many a fellow in this State has lived to see that, and some of them have lived to marry them again themselves after being divorced from them. Somebody told me the other day that a judge granted a fellow a divorce six minutes after he walked into the court-room. That is a disgrace in any civilized country where such a thing is pos- sible. I tell you that when you let up on your matrimonial relations, right then you let up on the very foundations of your life. There is not a doubt about that. Well, I happened myself to get a good wife, I do n't know how. But if I had got a bad one I would have stuck to her through thick and thin. I would not want to have her divorced from me and get her off upon some other fellow. Now, " I thought upon my ways " as a husband. I thought of the vows that I had taken that I would love and cherish and keep, and that I would always, even unto death, be true to her that I had plighted my vows to. I thought upon my ways as a husband. And then " I tliought upon my ways " as a ciHzen. Now, every man in this country is a good citizen or a bad citizen. You know what a bad citizen is? Now, suppose every body were like him, what sort of a country would we have here? Suppose every body drank whisky like him, what sort of a country would we have here? Suppose every body, you can say to yourself, told as many lies as I do, or was as ^!^ "f I Thought on My Ways. 329 m. or )rt W Ian as unfaithful to his wife as I am, what sort of a coun- try would we have? Brother, did you ever look at your duty as a citizen? Did you ever consider that you are either a blessing or a curse to your country? Did you ever consider you are a part of the body politic, and that it takes just one hundred thousand good citizens to make a city of one hun- dred thousand people a good city, and that it does n't take any more or any less? Then " I thought on my ways " as a Christian. I thought of the vows I had taken to God. I thought of the promises I made to God. I thought over this whole question. Now, brother, let u» come close to these thoughts. No matter how much you think or how little you think, God help you to think enough to do as David did when he said : " I made haste, and delayed not to keep thy com- mandments. I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies." Brother, I want tO' say to you this : I am like the old lady, who, when a man asked her which is the way to heaven, answered : " Just turn to the right, and keep straight forward, and you will get there." Now, what we want you to do is to turn to the right,, and make haste and delay not to keep the com- mandments of God ; and, if you have seen that your ways are not right, turn. Do it at once. Just think of Alexander Stephens, of Georgia, who died a gov- ernor. " I made it the one great rule of my life," he said, " when I found I was in the wrong road, to turn right and keep there." If we are wrong, turn around and go right. If we are right, keep Z6 330 Sam Jones' Own Book. to the right, and keep straightforward, and keep so during the balance of our life, and take no more time to consider when you find you are wrong. Make haste and delay net. But you say : " I want time to consider. I want to do this thing, and I want to do the other thing first." You do n't want to do any thing, except to quit your mean- ness and tv -n to God. There was one of the in- quiry women- workers (I do n't know what you call them) who sat down before a penitent ; and she said : " You need not be in a hurry. I was a year and one-half in getting religion, and you will be in good luck if you get it in a year and one-half." Now, the devil sent her in there. There are a good many doing that. How long a time does a man need to turn ? It is done in a second. If you have not lived right there is but one course for you to take. Make haste and turn around. You have no time to waste. " When I first sent letters of condolence," said the noble secretary of your institution, "to the wives and children of deceased drummers, it was merely mechanical. It was nothing but sounding brass and tinkling cymbals ; but, thank God, Mr. Jones, I am on the side of Christ now, and right where I can pour out Christian sympathy and love into bereaved and sorrowing hearts." O, brother, that is a point. Some of you say : " I have been thinking of being a Christian, but I think I had bettor put it off. I do n't want to take any stand until about twelve months from now. They say I must not hurry about the thing." I reply, brother, |IM! I Thought on My Ways. .^31 run up the flag right where you are, and let tlie world see that you intend to do right. Turn around! Now, who wants to do right — to turn around, to go the other way ? Can you ? Ought you? Will you? Is it best to turn? You must haste to do it while you can. In a few more days some of you will be very near that point where no man ever did turn. A few more days in those depths, a few more days of that debauchery, a few more days of drunkenness, and cursing, and licen- tiousness, will put you where you can not turn, and that is the saddest thing ever said about any man — he can not turn ! O, thank God, you can turn to- day ! The grandest period in a man's life is when he walks up and gives himself to God. Brother, I read yesterday in a commercial paper these words : " Feed your farm, and your farm will feed you." Now, what we want is to give ourselves to-day to God and his righteousness, and God will give himself to us ; and then we will realize that it is more blessed to give than to receive. Give all you are and all you get and you shall receive it back from God. Give yourselves to a better life ; and may God's blessings rest upon the commercial travelers of this city and of America, and on your wives and widows aud children, forever and ever. Sermon XXV. CONKESSION AND PARDON. " Blessed is lie whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the nmn unto whom the Lord iin- puteth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile."— PSA. XXXII, 1, 2. DAVID surveyed the whole field of human con- duct, and swept the horizon of thought as mueli as any man before him, or any man after him. He took in the whole situation, and he said, " If you want to be happy, if you want to be contented, if you want joy, if you want peace, secure the for- giveness of your transgressions. If you are a par- doned man you are a happy man. If you are un- pardoned you are unhappy." Really, brethren, as we get further into life, we find there is nothing really here to make a man happy. Lord Byron, with a capacity of earthly enjoyment that perhaps you and I know nothing of, was sitting quietly and meditatively on one occa- sion shortly before his death, and a friend said to him: "My lord, what are you thinking about so solemnly?" " I was just trying to recollect and count up the happy days of my life." " How many days did you count?" Said he, "I can count only eleven days of actual happiness; and I was just wondering if I would live long enough to make out one more happy day, and say that I have had twelve it :tJ7r Confession and Pardon. 333 such days in my life." Tliis was a man who had lived in wealth. There was not a cup of pleasuie he had not drunk of. With a genius that gave life to every enjoyment, with an influence that swept along the social circle and moved all the intellectnal features of the lives around him, and with an appetite for earthly things, he said, " I have had but eleven happy days." I reckon he must have seen these happy days before he was eleven years old ; but he did n't tell when he had experienced thom. This old Epicurean theory, which is but modern science turned inside out, is to " eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow you die." There never was any thing in the universe, brother, more fatal and false, than to seek happiness from this old Epicurean theory, the most selfish in the world. Look at it — " eat, drink, and be merry." I am glad that in the kingdom of God we do not have to eat or drink. The Epicurean theory is the father of all gouts and drunkenness in the universe. Now, David teaches us a different philosophy. Here is happiness in- deed, but it does not consist in what we eat or drink. A man may be happy whether he has little or much. St. Paul was happy in prison, and did not care what sort of bed he had to sleep on, or what he had for supper or breakfast, but he said, whatever was set before him, " To-day I will take dinner with God and the angels." " Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven ;" not, Blessed is that man who lives in a four-story house ; not. Blessed is that man who has a hundred thousand dollars to his credit in bank; not, Blessed I 334 8am Jones' Own Book. is the man that owns the most railroad stock and government bonds. No, sir. If you are seeking liappiness in that direction, it is like trying to satiate your thirst by drinking salt water — the more you drink the more you want, and when you get filled up, you will want water ten times more than you did before. If you want to be happy, you must obtain the favor of God. And the way to ob- tain it, is to seek God's pardon. This strong ground and high ground David takes — happy is the man who is pardoned for all his past transgressions. Then, ** Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity." Brother, my relations to God are determined by my loyalty to him — that 's the trutli at last. If I know my boy is through and through loyal to his father, I do not walk around watching him all the time; if he is playing marbles or whistling, I ain't bothered about liim. Now in the same way, the Lord does n't look so much at what a fellow does as at what makes him do it. He doesn't look so much at how many times he has fallen, but how hard he has tried to get up. God doesn't deal with us as to the exact words and deeds, but as to the motives, altogether. Do you believe that? If that isn't so, h(>w could Jrnns have said, " Whosoever hateth his brotho'' a murderer?" A great many people c ♦ ^^ they say, " The Lord knows my n^ !V« though." Yes, but the trouble is, _ uaya > ^o. any motive. "Blessed is the man unto whom the L rd im- P> I I ■' 1 V '1 CoxrKssioN AND Pardon. 335 puteth not iniquity," and that's the man that God can trust. He does n't have to watch him. The Lord tells the servants of men not to be eye-.servunts, that require constant watching. Brethren, I just want to live so thi.t the Lord doesn't have to watch me every day as if he were doubtful of my integrity, 80 that he can say, " I know that you have been all right." Some of you look as though you would like very much for him not to look after you for a month at a time. Brother, when there is a man in your em- ploy and you never look over his accounts, you know that man is correct, and whatever the error may be you know you can not attribute it or trace it to that servant. God works on that plan, and let us live on it. God himself has confidence in you, and you know your motives are pure and your loyality is unchallenged. Now, listen further. " In whose spirit there is no guile." Here you have the whole matter of uprightness pointed out to you. I like a guile- less man. Just think of the guile of this world. I passed by a dentist's shop the other day, and he had an artificial set of teeth wnth plugs in all of them. I asked him, " What do you put those plugs into arti- ficial teeth for ?" He answered, " To make them look more natural." Think of that ! Do you see the guile? And there is guile in every thing now. Now, let me tell you, if there is any thing in this world that I detest it is guile. Guile! A person that is one thing to-day and another thing to-morrow ; who is one thing in one place and another thing in another 336 Sam Jones' Own Book. place, I despise. If there is any thing that I ad- mire about a thing it is that it is real on both sides, that it is real ol the outside and ou the inside. • I want to know of a man that he would not make u diiferont looking man in the sight of God than he does in the sight of his friend. I want to have a man pure at the top, pure in the center, pure at the bottom, and pure all over. Brother, in the sight of God you are a trans- parent man. He can see through you. I have a contempt for a man who has any thing in him to hide. I believe in having no wrong side and no right side to a character. It should be all right. I like that. But poor old human nature is so made up that no man knows every thing. Some will say in their hearts, " If our pastor knew these things about me, what would he say? If our pas- tor found this out, what would he say ? If our Church heard of this thing, what would they say ?'' O, listen; God hath already found it out. Be what you are through and through. Let the first half- inch of earth about you be just like every other half-inch clear down to the bottom. Some pieces :I humanity are put up like some bales of cotton down South. They put the nice, white cotton out- side, and in the center they put the dog-tail cot- ton — the worst cotton there is. And some human- ity is put up on the same principle exactly. There is many a Methodist and many a Baptist in this town with the nicest part of his character on the outside, but he will bring the price in the market just in proportion to the depth you can reach into Confession and Pardon. 337 his character. Dealers have got a method of find- ing out what a bale of cotton :•. right through. And, brother, some of these dayu God will show you what you are through and through. Now, I will tell you another thing. A guile- less, transparent man will make a heap of enemies, because a heap of folks will misunderstand him. They think that if he is just like that on the out- side he must be worse on the inside, and so they will think he is a bad fellow, because he does not look right to them on the outside, and they decide he must be terrible on the inside. Do n't judge people that way. A guileful man will say to you that every body has his price, that you can buy every body. Now, he is just telling his own ex- perience, and putting himself in the market. He says to you, " Just give me a tolerably good price and I will sell myself" And that sort of a man can be bought. If you are in need of him you can buy him. David tells us that he sinned against God, and kept silence, and would not confess ; and that by reason of his refusal to confess his sins, " day and night the hand of God was heavy upon him, and his moisture was turned into the drought of Sum- mer." O, what striking figures he uses hore ! And right along here we find in this territory the whole question on this point opened up to us. A man walks up in front and takes his seat in the peni- tents' chair; he walks into the inquiry room and says, " I confess to God and man that I am not right." He gives us his hand, and opens his heart 2U It''1« %$ if ,;;,;| 338 Sam Jones' Ov/n Book. to the love of God. He is confessing his sins in pub- lic. Brother, if you have siuned against God, go to God and confess it. " I kept silence," says David, " and my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long; for day and night thy hand was heavy upon me." Listen to me now, you who have not had peace of mind for these ten days, for months. Days seem years when your mind is on yourself, because you are miserable. David told what his trouble was, what your trouble is ; and he said because of it, " My moisture was turned into the drought of Summer." I have learned how a person feels by seeing how the fields are in a droughty season. Our garden is dried up, and every green thing droops, and the best land produces only about ten per cent of a crop. We have only ten per cent of a crop of grain. As I look out upon the orchard leaves and the corn I understand how drought has laid hold of this crop. The poor farmer suffers for it. Brother, a drought of this kind may only last for weeks, but a drought in the human heart may be one that will last forever. " My moisture is turned into the drought of Sum- mer." O to see the drought of Summer upon the hearts and lives of professing Christians, and upon those out of the Church, and to see their spiritual nature droop, and wilt, and wither, and die under a drought that is brought upon them by their own voluntary conduct and action ! Where is there a man that won't confess? We come to him to-night asking him to seek the Lord, and he says, " I do n't wan<^ +o come up." What he means is, " I Confession and Pardon. 339 do n*t want to confess ;" that is the trouble. When a fellow gets willing to confess he will go and do it before any thing else. The Lord says, " He that confesseth shall find mercy." " If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Sin is a debt : " Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." Now, we will start out with that proposition. If I owe a man a dollar, I have to meet that debt with a hun- dred cents, or witf^ bankruptcy. I must do one or the other. Now, down South our farmers are fur- nished by merchants or warehousemen with money and provisions to last until they make their crops. The farmer comes to the merchant and mortgages his farm, his buildings, and horses, and stock, and crop, and draws money and provisions to use during the year. At the end of the year he goes into town and pays about sixty-six cents on the dollar, and when he has paid this amount he says to the mer- chant, " You must carry the other thirty-three cents over to the next year." The merchant holds the mortgage on his farm and stock, and carries him over to the next year. The next year the same thing is repeated, and he carries over another thirty- three per cent, making sixty-six per cent for the two years. And then he does the same thing the third year ; there is another thirty -three per cent added to his indebtedness. The next year I see the sheriff with a paper in his hand, crying, This plantation for sale." What does it mean ! It means that the mortgage is due, and the offi- i( 340 Sam Jones' Own Book. <5ers of the court are selling the owner out to pay his debts. Now, brother, I will say this much : to get into debt financially is about the worst thing that a man Pardon. 341 dress, because people would have said, " You see Jones has money, but he won't pay it back to his creditors." The same God that said, " Thou shalt not steal," tells us " Owe no man any thing but to- love one another." And yet a great many people think that they are all right when they do not pay their debts, and they simply say that they owe them- They think that it is not stealing, even though they are able to pay them. I believe that I would rather have a man steal from me when I am sleep- ing than have him steal from me when I am look- ing at him. Now, brother, as sin is a debt, the best thing to- do in the world is — don't sin at all. That is best, and thank God it is possible. " Yes," but you say, " I can 't help sinning." You can help it just a» well as you can keep from getting into debt — da you know that? Am I obliged to get into debt to- day or to-morrow? Which sin am I obliged to commit to-day or to-morrow? "You are not like me," you hear people say ; " I can not live without sin." Whenever you hear a person say that, you may know he is falling into sin more deeply, and that he has made provision for it. Well, I say, the best thing in the world is, do n't do wrong. But if you do happen to slip and do wrong the best thing is to fall down and repent. Do n't let it get cold before you have repented of it. I believe it is a good idea if you sin on the sidewalk, to drop down on the sidewalk and repent then and there, A man ought to be able to repent and to pray any- where that he can afford to sin. The best thing for 342 Sam Jones' Owii Book. you to do when you do wrong is to exclaim : " Now, Lord, I am sorry, but I repent right now." That was one good thing about David. He got out of the right path and did wrong frequently; but as soon as Nathan would drop his finger upon him lie would sinlc down and go to repenting with all his might and soul on the spot. That is tlie next best thing — to repent on the spot for the sin there committed. If you do n't do that ther you will probably say, "God helping me, I won't go to sleep any night until the day's unworthy transac- tions are repented of." That is the way that fellow on the plantation got bankrupt — putting off paying his debts and letting them run one year after an- other. Now, brother, here is a member of the Church, and he is letting his sins go on without re- penting of them week after week and month after month, and year after year, until they are piled up mountain high; and he walks up to the preacher and tells him to take his name off the Church book, and the poor fellow goes into temporal and spiritual and eternal bankruptcy and gives it up forever. And do you know there are hundreds of just such cases as that ? " But," you say, " Mr. Jones, what are you going to do with the doctrine of final perseverance?" I tell you the doctrine of final perseverance won't hold good here. But that is the only exception, thank God, in the universe. The doctrine of final perse- verance will hold true in every other instance. You know how a poor fellow in debt for money will get despondent and discouraged. And it is the same —-y-^ Confession and Paedon. 343 with a poor fellow whose sius are allowed to accumu- late, and he makes no effort to get rid of them. Sin is a debt you have to meet at the mercy-seat of God with an honest, open confession, or you will have to meet it in the judgment with eternal bankruptcy of your soul. Now, which will you do ? If you have sinned, brother, the best time for you to repent is just now. You can not afford to put it off any longer. Brother, I do not want to do wrong at all, but if I do I want to repent at once — repent right now. And you would better not go to sleep to-night with a consciousness that you have unpardoned sins hang- ing over you. Whether you 've been in sin forty years or thirty years, brother, if you will not see yourself in the light of truth to-night, despair will take possession of your soul. If all of the sins you have committed were scattered out among the people in this city, there would be enough to damn them. Now, brother, let 's you and I begin to look over ourselves. God helping me, I will have a re- ceipt, written in the blood of Jesus Christ, that all my sins are forgiven. You would better trifle with anything of a temporal nature than with these debts ; but confess them at once, and obtain pardon. I'll tell you another thing, brother: When you go to confession, go to the bottom. I '11 give you an instance, and what I shall say some of you, per- haps, will not like. In one of the Southern cities there was, perhaps, as respectable a woman as ever moved in the high circle to which she belonged. m ■5WiP ...■■rlWlpl I 344 Sam Jones' Own Book. Wv. She became interested in a revival going on, and gave her heart to God, and on the Saturday after- noon before she was to be received in the Church she sought one of the best women in that town and said to her: " I 've come to talk with you. To-morrow morn- ing I 'm going CO join the Churcli — the Churcli you belong to ; and I say to you I have given my heart to God, rnd have repented of my sins, but I shall be disgraced to-morrow when my name is read out to the people." " Why," said the lady, "what do you mean?" "I mean this: I have lived a false life; I am living a falsehood. You know my little son Willie, ten years old?" " Yes," said the lady. " Well, you know I am called Mrs. So-and-so. My name is not Mrs. So-and-so, but it is Miss So- and-so ; and so it shall go on the register of God's Church. I will go to the bottom." God pity us if there is any thing wrong, what- ever it is; let us go down to the bottom, and out with it. That woman had to do it or be damned. You can not live a false life and be a Christian. Go down to bottom facts. Say, " I will go to the bottom if it disgraces me among men ; but I Ml put myself right before God and his holy angels." That's what that woman did. And, whenever you see a man or woman who would rather please God than to have all the cheers and honors this world can bestow upon him or her, you can thank God that there is one honest man, that there is one Confession and Pardon. 345 honest woman, who has come down to bottom facts. O, brother, if we could just spend one honest hour before God ! and every man of us ought to pray God on our knees in confessing these sins tliat are piled up upon us, and which will inevitably doom us in the end if we do not repent. Tliat is what we want — confession. God will listen and save. David said, " I acknowledged my sin unto thoo, and mine iniquity have I not hid." There is the whole process of salvation in a single line : I have acknowledged my sins, I have confessed my trans- gressions unto God. I know only one chance for us poor mortal beings, and that is, an honest confession before God. Two brothers went to battle. One was shot down. The other exclaimed, " Thank. God, my brother was ready, and had given himself to the Lord !" Brothers, sisters, let us so live and die, having our peace made with God, that it may be said of us, " Thank God, he was ready !" Let us^ you and I, get ready, live ready, and die ready. Sayings. There are problems and questions in your home life that no one but God can settle wisely and cor- rectly. If you will know God personally, and will adjust yourself fully toward God, then all the love and grace of his heart will be poured into your heart and life day by day. 346 Sam Jones' Own Book. The biiok door of the Cluireh ought to be opened onco 51 your and givo all who have not lived up to its rules an opportunity to pass out. Theology is a good thing. It is a good thing to stuff with sawdust, like the skin of a fish, and put in a museum as a relic of antiquity. We see God all around us. The mountains are God's thoughts upheaved. The rivers are God's thoughts in motion. The oceans are God's thoughts imbedded. The dewdrops are God's thoughts in pearls. The difference between a backsliding Methodist and a lukewarm Cumberland is this: The Method- ist knows he has lost his religion, and the Cumber- land, since he can 't lose his, knows he never had any to lose. A man's power to love determines his immor- tality. Then, if that be true, let us bottom charac- ter on affections. How will we do it? I'll tell you how. I believe I would put law supreme, then I would put conscience right under law, then I would give conscience a good grip on the will, and then I would let the will through conscience and law, subjugate the affections, until I love every thing that is good and hate every thing that is bad, and then I think I am getting in shape to be a man — a true man. to nd ire (I's lits In list )d- er- lad Dr- ac- ;ell ne, icn ill, ice nj id, J a 1 ih k , '■' ; i .■ i ji s 5 ml w w o to w O u W K ►1 < o " w n o o f 1 j'l'J ■;: '' 1 1 ' 1 »' ''''' li'l 1 nlii Sermon XXVI. A NEW ORKATURE IN CHRIST, (ifiret |p{0cour««.) "Therefore, if any imin be in Christ, he is a new crea- ture."— 2 CoK. V, 17. I TRUST that the good Spirit to-day may give UP his presence and his help in the discuHsion of this wonderful text. For, after all, brethren, if Christ Jesus be any other than the Son of God and the personal Savior of man, then our preaching is vain and onr faith is vain, and we are still in our sins. Whatever else may be said of us, I am glad that more men are asking, " Who is Christ?" " Wliat is Christ?" to-day than in any day in this world's his- tory. There have been more lives of Christ written since I was born than were ever written before. In the last three decades there have been more men trying to answer these two questions — and not only more men, but the most gifted men this world ever knew, are asking, "Who is Christ?" "What is Christ?'' and T believe the most philosophical statement in answer to these questions is about this: Christ is tiie living personal embodiment of wisdom, of justice, of love, of mercy, of truth, of purity, ard all the attributes and characteristics which make the character of God lovely. Christ is not a sentiment, brother! H(^ is not :547 --r^K 348 Sam Jones' Own Book. simply an historical person, but Christ is a living presence. The creed of a Church is but a garmeiit we put about Christ, and there is no more life in a creed than there is life in this coat I have on. I am glad that my salvation and your salvation does not depend upon our belief in this creed or in that creed. And I sometimes think we make an idol of our creed and our Church. Our creed ! I have known ministers to spend mo"e time in the defense of their creed than they did :)iH';K'hing Christ to dying men. I am sorry for any preacher that has a creed which needs a defense. I would much rather have a creed that all men who want to be religious can assent to. It's not faith in a creed that saves. The Meth- odist creed can not be swallowed by a great many intelligent men. The Presbyterian creed has never gone down some very good, wise men. The Cath- olic creed does not suit others, nor will the other creeds suit others ; and when we come to boil this question down to a sensible proposition, brethren, we find at last that God does not say, " Whosoever believes in the five points of Calvinism shall be saved." He never put salvation on *^hat proposi- tion. He did not say that *' Whosoever bclievotl; in falling from grace shall be saved," nor " Whoso- ever believeth in immersion shall be saved," nor " Whosoever believeth in sprinkling shall be saved," nor yet "Whosoever beli(»veth in final perseverance shall be saved," nor " Whosoever believeth in the infallibility of the pope shall be saved," nor " Who- soever believeth in apostolic succession shall be A New Creature in Christ. 349 eaved : " but " Whosoever believeth on the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved." And it's faith in a person, and not in a creed, that saves the soul. It is very ridiculous to nie to hear a Methodist preacher speaking on infant baptism and all the lit- tle babes in town asleep, and half of the grown people in town going to hell. I could never see where the wisdom of such a movenent as that came in. I have sometimes been disgusted with seeing a Baptist ])reaching " much water," and a majority of his crowd going where they can not get a drop to cool their parched tongues; or seeing an Episcopa- lian minister ringing the changes on apostolic suc- cession, while a great many of his flock ought ij be looking out where they are going to, rather than where they came from. That 's a very serious question to me. I am not so much interested about whence I came as to whither I am going. That's it. The doctrine of a man preaching that " mine is the only Church, mine is the first Church," contains no saving power. A great many very nice people assemble together, and call themselves " our Church," and " the Church," and really they are nothing more or less than a religious crocheting society. They can do almost any little thing — get up nice suppers, or run a Church entertainment or fair, or any such thing. They are first-class on that line ; but if we get after them about visiting the sick, rescuing the perishing, and saving the fallen, they say, " O, we never do any thing like that in our Church." I have thought sometimes that if the Tiord were to take that crowd 350 Sam Jones' Own Book. i.o heaven as they are, it would not be six raontha before they would have all the angels rigged out in lace. The Lord be merciful towards us, and help us to be truly good ! After all, brethren, what is my Methodism, and your Presbyterianism, and Episcopalianisra, and Baptism? It is nothing more than a duster we put on over our cloth coat, to keep off some of the dust and dirt of earth, and when we get to the pearly gates, we will pull off our dusters and walk in with our dress coats — we will never carry our dusters in with us, you may put that down ; and is it not ab- surd that we should quarrel over the color and quality of our dusters down here? O, for a Church universal, that loves God with all its heart, and soul, and power, and in which we can get along with one another in spite of the little difference of the color of the dusters ! Would n't it be a good idea to have such a Church universal? Here, my brother; when you come to this one single question of all questions, it is not faith in a creed, nor membership in a Church, but it is your relation to the Lord Jesus Christ that brings salva- tion. That's it. Now, you will say, "Why, Mr. Jones, you make light of the Church." No, no, I do not anv more than I make fun of mv coat ; but I put my coat in its right place. The crowned in- strumentalities in religion are all sent from God, for our good, and are efficient means to bring us to God. But there is only one sufficiency, and that is faith in Jtsus Christ. Let us meet that fact. When a Church reaches the point where its ser- A New Creature in Christ. 351 vices are all formal, where there is nothing but formality, then religion with it is nothing more than what yoa see represented in a watermelon patch — a scare-crow put up on a forked stick. But where Christ rules and re'gns in the heart, there is love and life and movement. Who is Christ? The living personal embodi- ment of truth. He is all wisdom, all mercy, and all forgiveness. Well now, brother, St. Paul said: "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Tiie same de- sire, purpose, and resolution that moved Christ him- self should move me. The wisdom, justice, mercy, purity, and love of Christ have been imparted to me as a Christian, and now with wisdom, mercy, love, and truth, I manifest to the world what it is to be a Christian. That man is the best Christian who is the most like Christ. Perhaps you remember having heard of that heathen who came to America, and finally when he bade farewell and stepped on the ship at San Francisco that was returning him to his native country, he looked out, and said, " In all Christendom I have found no man like Christ." What a commentary on this Christian continent! "I have found no man like Christ." Now, brother, if a Christian is any thing, lie is wise. There is a great deal of diiference between knowledge and wisdom. T have seen very knowing men v.'ho were very foolish men. Wisdom is the skillful application of knowledge — it is the right use of what you know, of what you have in hand. Wisdom is doing the best thing in the best way. 852 Saim Jones' Own Book. Now a Christian is wise in this; he will adapt the best means to the best ends always. The water of the river of life is as clear as crystal, and thank God, any body who drinks of it and has eyes to see, may see the spring from which it flows. Wisdom ! Do you live on a wise plane and plan? Do you in your heart moan to live as you profess, to deny yourself and take hold upon Christ? Are you wise in your religious profession and prac- tices every day? Do you counsel your family in godly matters? Do you pray in your family, read your Bible, visit the sick, help the destitute and needy, comfort the afflicted? Now look here, brother; are you really honest in proposing to get to heaven? Will you adopt every plank in your platform as a Christian that has helped others to be Christians indeed? If you are honest in your purpose to get to heaven you "will adopt every such plank, and help to lead others to Christ and to hold Christianity up. I said once, while preaching in a Southern city, that a man wlio would not pray in his family had no more religion than a horse. Some rose up in arms against me and were about to put me out. The next day I walked down to the store of a leading Methodist there. He accosted me, and said: "Mr. Jones, did von sav last night that a man who wouldn't j)ray in his family didn't have any more religi'on than a horse?" I said, "Yes, I did." "You're mistaken, sir," said he. "I've got as much religion as you have, and I don't pray in my A New Creature in Christ. 353 family." And lie was about to jninp on me; and if ho had iiad much religion he would not have wanted to do that, would he? I said, "Look here, do you know what re- ligion is?" "Well," he replied, "you say what it is." Said I, " It is loyalty to God." He said, " That 's so." " Now," said I, " let us take a sensible view of it. Is not my loyalty to my duty a test of my loyalty to God?" " Yes, that 's good logic." " If I am disloyal to ray duty, can I be loyal to God?" "No." "Can a disloyal man be religious?" "I never looked at the thing in thai way," said he ; and when he went home that night, he said to his wife: "Wife, get down the family Bible, and let us have prayers, and, God he i ping me, we will always have them and try to do our whole duty." There 's many a fellow in this country who thinks he has religion, when it is just something he has eaten. But religion is loyalty to God. A preacher came to me once, and said: "Jones, you say that any man who has got religion will pray in public?" " Yes," said I. " Well, the best man I 've got in my Church won 't pray in public." " Well," said I, " that man is either a hypocrite, or he has no pastor to instruct him." _:: L 30 - ■ '- :il 354 Sam Jones' Own Book. H That preacher went off as mad as a hornet with me. Now, hear me, brethren, whenever the best moans are brought to bear upon your conscience, you have got to adopt them or backslide, one or the otiier. You have to do what God demands, or violate his will. And wisdom says, I must adopt that plank in my platform. These people would do their duty much better if you put thumb-screws on them. We know that if a man is disloyal to a plain, distinct duty, he can not be loyal to God. Do n't you have those old sinners point their fingers at you at the judgment bar of God and say you were lacking in your duty. Take care, brethren, and do n't let it be said that your lack of duty damned any man. Talk to your people, toll them their duty, even if they choke you for it. This is the very essence of Christianity — loyalty to God. I was pastor seven or eight years of my life, and my mind and memory run back to-day over the different men and women of the Churches I was pastor of, and I can almost put my finger on every one I expect to meet in heaven, if I get there. It is those men and women who were loyal to God. I tell you that is a serious question to think of. Some folks do n't like the Methodist Church be- cause it changes its preachers every three years. But when you stay ten or fifteen years at the same place, you ought to get scared and say : " I wonder if some other preacher could not do more than I could." AYoll, Christianity means justice. A Christian A New Creature in Christ. 355 ought to be a just man. He ought to be just to his wife, just to his children, just to his neighbor, just to every body. O, how innocent we seem. We hear people say: "You would better be just before you are generous." It is ten thousand times easier to be generous than it is to be just. I can give a poor, old woman a ten dollar bill much easier than I can bog my friend's pardon for an in- jury I have done him. I can give a check for a hundred dollars for a charitable purpose, and it doesn't hurt me; but when my little Bob runs into my study while I am busy writing or reading, and I say to him, "Go out of here. Bob; I told you not to come in here and bother me;" the little fellow goes out, and my conscience says, " You have been unjust to that boy," and I sit there feeling as mean as a dog. I go out and find him, and see him sit- ting on the porch-steps, crying. T tnke him up on my lap and kiss him and beg his pardon. It is hard to do, but I say : " Bob, papa was cross and rougli to you just now, but you will forgive him, won't you?" And the dear little fellow clings to my neck and says, " Papa, you must forgive me, for mamma told me not to go in there." You see, wife had found out that there was an old bear in there, and was trying to keep her children out. Justice! You all know how that is, don't you, brethren? Justice! I will be just to my wife, and beg her pardon if I have been uncouth. I will be just to all. If I trample upon the feelings of a dog, I will pet and feed 1 iui. and show him I am sorry for it. Justice makes a Rilow do the cleaa 356 Sam Jones' Own Book. thing. A Christian must be a just man; not sim- ply pay his debts and pay what he owes, but, brother, there are some debts men won't pay. Let me tell you that in sim])le love and justice yon ought to meet everv claim of humanity upon vou. A Christian ought to be just, and he ought to be a pure man. A great many people are very fas- tidious and have a great deal of mock-modesty among them, but are very impure people. I have found that out. I could stop right here and say some things th'at would burn like fire. I have no doubt in my mind there are people in this city who have criticized Sam Jones as being vulgar. Sam Jones may be plain and outspoken, coarse if you will, in his sermons, but, thank God, he is pure in his life. And if I am going to be vulgar any- where, it 's going to be when T am handling that sort who say, "Unto the pure all things are pure." I preached at a famous watering-place once, an-l I got on the subject of dancing. I simply told the plain, naked truth; I said that if many a girl in Georgia could have gone to the rooms of the young rncn and listened to what they said about them after the dance they v/onld never put their feet into a ball-room or dance again. What I said at that famous watering-place aroused a tumult. They called me vulgar, obscene, vicious, ill-bred, and all that, but they came back to the meeting, however. And the girl who had the lecherous arm around her waist, thought that all I had said was vulgar and ill-bred ; but the girl who was pure indeed, said, " Mr. Jones, that sermon was a good one, and A Np:w Cueature in Christ. .'3: ) I in perfect harmony with my ideas." " Unto the pure all things are pure." It is not so much who is the preacher, and what he is saying, as who is listening. Purity ! I know what it is to call a precious woman " mother !" I know what it is to call a precious woman "my wife!" I know what it is for my sweet, innocent daughters to put their arms around my nock and imprint the kisses of purity upon my cheek ; and as God is my judge, in so far as mind and muscle goes, no man in America will stand to the death any more readily to defend the purity of the women of this country than the man now speaking to you. I would build, if necessary, a wall a mile high around the virtue of every girl this country has in it to-day. To those very per- sons who say, " he is vulgar and ill-bred," the day may come in their history when they will be sorry that such was ever said by them. I will tell you another thing. If I had a company of ten thousand angels to preach to to-day, every word I uttered, in all of its applications and its ety- mological sense, should be as pure us heaven ; but why preach thus to men? Our Savior himself preached to men, and I have thought a thousand times his sermon would not have had so much in it about adultery and a great many ^\Mcked things if he had been preaching to angels. God, keep me pure, and then keep mc dead honest in dealing with souls, and help me to strike right straight out from the shoulder. I want to take a plumb-straigiit rest for my gun, and if I hit a fellow anywhere else but ^^^v 358 Sam Jones' Own Book. in lieart or head, I will step up to him and apolo- gize, and tell him I meant it to be a dead shot. And if you think I hit you by accident, you were never more mistaken in your life. The shot was sent with design to hit. And the Christian must be a forgiving man. Thank God for the disposition of the heart I have to-day, through grace, that makes me utterly incap- able of malice aforethought. I feel sorry for those Christians who are unforgiving in their nature. There are mothers and fathers who won't forgive their children, and sisters and brothers who won't forgive each other. God pity them. A lady once came to me, and said : " My mother won't spealc to me. I wish you would say something about UiOthers whose unforgiving disposition will not let them even speak to their daughters." I said in my next ser- mon, " You mothers, who are unforgiving to your children, come with me to the zoological garden, and watch the lioness how she fondles her whelp; and you could see, if opportunity should arise, how she will give her very life for it. AYatch the tigress as she stimds over her cubs with guarding and lov- ing eye. I will show you the house cat, how she tenderly carries her kittens about in her moutii ; and when you have spent an hour in the zoological garden, then just look at yourself, and see what an old bear — or, rather, what an unnatural creature — your children have for a mother." Ah me, what is it in heaven or earth that couid prevent ray speaking to one of my children? As Christians we are brothers and sisters — some, per- A Nkw Ckkature IX Chuist. 359 haps, step-brothers and sisters — but brothers and sisters, nevertheless. Thank God for the power to forgive in the name of Christ. Jesus said that we must not bear malice towards our enemies, but " love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you." The first year I began preaching I had two or three fights. I did not have any better religious sense than to want to fight when a man did not treat me right. But I used to wonder if the Lord Jesus would want me to pray for and do good to and encourage a man in his meanness. If I could whip him, I thougut, I would do him a great deal of good. But I found out at last that Jesus was not trying to protect the rascal, but was protecting me. Love your enemies. The best way in the world to kill an enemy is to love him to death, and you don't have to bury him and make a widow out of his wife. O, what a stupendous fact this is, — what a pat- tern ! If this world had had any response in it, Christ would have loved it to death long ago. He taught us how to love. When he wiiS buifeted, he buffeted not again ; when he was reviled, he reviled not again. Alexander the Great, Charlemagne, and Kapolcon each gathered around himself great armies and marched them against their enemies, and at- tempted to conquer the world by force and blood, and each died a wretched death. When Jesus Christ wanted to conquer this world he went up on Cal- IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) y < ok. ^'^ *• m, O 7 Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 372-4503 ^V # ^ »•:«■. 6^ I % "'/. '^ Q< WJ>, Q, I I I i 360 Sam Jones' Own Book. vary and suffered and died for it. Napoleon founded his kingdom and empire by force on that which perisheth, but Jesus founded his on love, and mill- ions would die for it. ^' Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which dospitefully use you and persecute you." That is the Christian spirit — doing good for evil, overcoming evil with good. The only principle in this world that will overcome evil is good. Evil with evil is a Kilkenny cat sort of business, and each will hurt the other equally. Overcome evil with good. Thank God for a weapon that not only knocks my enemy down, but restores him to me as a friend. The best way in the world to get the advantage of a man is to love him. He that loves the most is the man who has the most immortal capital. God measures you off a lot in size and dimensions on the streets of the New Jerusalem by the amount of love which you have to pay for it. God gives us all enough love for a million-acre field in heaven, and we will have elbow room then. Love much, and God will give you plenty of room in heaven. Thank God, I have nothing to forgive any man. I am determined upon this much, never to get mad with any man until be treats me worse than I have treated my Lord. Let us bear in mind that our hopes for time and eternity rest ujion our acting upon those sweet words, — "Simply to tliy cross I clir.g," A New Creature in Christ. 361 Or, better still, — "Safe in the arms of Jesus." God bless you all, and preserve you ever in his love! Bribk Sayinqs. In a Georgia town a number of girls married men to reform them, and now the town is full of little whippoorvvill widows. The greatest rascals are those who are scrupu- lously honest. If I see a vian walk across town to pay a nickel, I M'atch him. A HORSE that will pull on a cold collar will do to depend on — and the best Christians are those who never need " warming up." Whisky is a good thing in its place, and that place is in hell. If I get there I will drink all I can get, but I won't do it here. The capacity of a woman for making every body about her uncomfortable can not be calculated by any known process of arithmetic. The Churches of Nashville furnish whisky to tho surrounding country. Some of our wholesale liquor dealers belong to the Church. The matter of Church doctrine is an accident. If my mother and Brother Witherspoon's mother had swapped babies he might have been a Meth- odist preacher. v,^'^ SERMON XXVII. A NEV/ CREATURE IN CHRISX. " Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new crea- ture."— 2 Cor. V, 17. CHRIST JESUS was a man, and in referring to his relation to our race, he spoke of himself as " the Son of man." " These works that I do demonstrate that I am divine. Now I M'ould not have you forget that I am also the Son of man." We have Christ in two manifestations, and I wish we had more of him in a third. We have Christ in his works, and we have him in his Avords. We have books written on the latter. Rudolph Stier, on the Words of the Lord Jesus, is, perhaps, one of the most valuable books in a preacher's library. I have been panting and hungry a long time for a book on the Thoughts of the Lord Jesus. Really when I look at his works, I wonder and say, " Behold !" Then, when I read his words, I say, "A man that could talk like that, of course could work like that;" and when I get into the frreat thoughts of Christ, then I say, " The words and works of Christ are the mere bubbles on the great ocean of his life. He who thought like Christ could surely work like Christ and talk like Christ." Christ Jesus is a great deal more to us, brother, than we have ever realized. Really the wealth of 362 A New Creature in Christ. 363 the universe is hidden in Christ. Now I would not stand here and study Christ • I would not stand here with all the infirmities and difficulties that en- compass me, with the seen things, and study the Lord Jesus, but I would go where Jesus is, and study the universe ; and a man who stands where Jesus is understands things very differen*;iy from a man who stands here and studios them. Jesus Christ is the great telescope to the Chris- tian's eye. He not only brings the unseen things, which are afar off, down to where I may reach them, but he is also the great microscope to the Christian's eye, so that the things that are close to me I can see a thousand times better when I look through Christ. Christ in his works and in his words, Christ in his thoughts, in the unfailinr^ purity of his social life, his grandeur of intellectual life in the whole sura of his life, is an examplar for all men. O Jesus, thou art all in all, and from thee and through thee I may see all things in the light God sees them. " If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." I believe that Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin Mary. I believe that he was God. I believe that he was man. I believe we needed this God-Man. Jesus Christ is a mediator— one who works between two parties. I think it was Bishop Morris who put this in the strongest way. He said, " Jesus was the mediator, the one between the two, and Jesus was divine, and Jesus was human, and he laid the left hand of his humanity on the shoulder of man. I'! 1 364 Sam Jones' Own Book. and then, reaching up, caught the shoulder of God with the right hand of hia divinity, and he brought God and man together." We needed Christ. And 1 believe another thing, brother. I believe the Lord Jesus Christ not only came and lived among men, but he fared largely as other men did and do. Jesus Christ sufl'ered and died for what he was and for what he said and for what he did. That's true. And Jesus Christ died as naturally as St. Paul died, and St. Paul died a natural death. Do you want to know what I mean by this? I mean that in that day, in the fullness of the time, when Jesus came, it was death to any man to preach righteousness and live it before the people. And Jesus came and suifered the penalty of his righteous life and his righteous words. Now, on this question, I want to say, brethren, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of men, suffered the penalty of his words and his works. It was death to the God- man. It was death to those who loved this God- man, to talk and preach as he did. Then J see Jesus on that cross as he suffers and dies; and, lis- ten, brother, on that cross I see the divinest, grand- est manifestation of God's love to man. If you want to draw out from the deepest depth all that 's true in me, listen. You see Christ on that cross. I have heard men say that Jesus hung on the cross to satisfy the claims of divine justice. I have heard them say Jesus was hung on that cross to appease God's wrath against man ; but I will tell you my conception of it, and this little bundle of paper, the Bible, which I hold in my hand, is with me. Jesus ■■«-.• a .a«fiii!!T!| A New Creature in Christ. 365 lis- d- 011 1*083 ird base my Ithe isus Christ was not there to satisfy claims of diviue jus- tice. He was not there as a target of diviue wrath. No. Would you make me believe that God was angry witii humanity six thousand years ago, and that the only way to keep him from killing out the whole concern was to put his only Son on the cross and sacrifice him? I do not believe God suffered his Son to be crucified because he was mad with men, but that Jesus came and died because of God's love for man. " God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him might not perish, but have everlasting life." God does n't love me because Christ died for me, but Christ died for me because of God's unspeakable love for me. Now you are getting your theology right on this question, and you can knock all the infidelity outof this country by this great New Tes- tament doctrine. Love! " Herein is love, not that we loved Him, but that he loved us, and sent his Sou to be the propitiation for our sins." And this old idea we have, that God does not love any body but good people, won't do. Some people get this idea in their heads, and the first thing you know they think. they have a corner on the grace of God, and are trying to run a monopoly on the love of heaven. Hear, my brethren , God loves every man in this universe. I will take this view. The sun in mid- heaven shines on every thing alike. It shines on the verdant valleys, on the bold mountain peaks. It pours its vivifying rays on growing grain, fruits, and flowers, as well as on the stricken oak, or blasted 1' t .|;l|l li 366 Sam Jones' Own Book. tree, and sterile ground. It shines on all alike. Why? Because it is its nnture to shine on every- thing. God's name as well as nature is love, and God loves every thing that comes under the burn- ing rays of his love. God loves all men. He loved me just as much before I was converted as he loves me now. If he had not, I never would have been converted. It is God's nature to love, and you can not make it out that God is mad with moii. O thou infinite God of love and mercy, of long suffer- ing and goodness, show us all that thou hast never dealt with us in anger, but always in love. God loves us, brethren, and Jesus Christ was not hung on the cross as a target of divine justice, or to placate divine anger, but as the manifestation of God's love to dying men. That's it. I hope I am orthodox, brethren ! I hope I am. If I am not, I will tell you this much, I can love God more with this view of the divine atonement than I can with any other ; and you must let me have my way, because I can get along better on that than on any other ground. We won't quarrel about it. You may take the other view of it if you like, or mix the two together if you please, but I loye Him be- cause he first loved me. He is a loving Savior; a loving Savior, living; loving, dying; loving, going to the grave; loving, rising; always filled with love for me. "Now, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." Jesus was emphatically a new creature in the world. There was none like him before, nor any like him since. Jesus prayed, "Father, as we A New Creature in Christ. 367 are one, grant that these people may bo all one with us." All are merged into one in Christ — one in purpose, one in desii'e, one in intention, one in love, one in purity, one in faith, one in forgiveness, one in pardon. It is a oneness in sentiment, purpose, virtue, desire, love, and purity. You see two men walking along. You say these two men have the same prrposes, tlie same interests, the same desires, every thing tlie same. When you hit one, you hit both. Tlie bar-keepers in this city are all one. If you raise your voice against one of them, they will all rise up against, you. You hit one of them in denouncing their traffic, and you hit them all. Their interests are identical. I wish I could say that when you hit one Christian in this town, you hit all; but, instead of that, when you hit one, the rest all say, " I am glad it was not me." Thank God, though we can not know like him, and can not have power like him, one thing we can do, and that is, love like God. And that is the grandest of his attributes — love. Now, brother, being in Christ Jesus, presupposes a longing for Christ. I said before, Jesus Christ is not a sentiment. He is a divine person, and in the divinity of his person he embraces all wisdom, jus- tice, mercy, love, and purity. Of all of these attri- butes Christ is the living embodiment, and he who is in Christ the most necessarily partakes most of these divine characteristics. The Scriptural term for this longing is " hunger- ing and thirsting after righteousness." That is a healthful and relisrious state. David said : "As the ri m LB !, 'H-"f If ir ! ■' liH -/f^-r^ 368 Saisi Jones' Own Book. hart panteth after the water broolcH, so panteth my soul after thee, O God." Hunger of tlic soul is a hunger for Christ. The sense of hunger and of thirst of the body, how intense it is. Did you ever locate tlie sense of physical hunger? A little boy once said to his father, " Papa, I feel so hungry." " Son," said the father, " how do you feel when you are hungry ?" " I feel like chewing something," said the boy. So the organs of the appetite are where to look for i)hysical hunger. Now where do I locate the sense of spiritual hunger? It is in the heart. My heart, my soul panteth after the living God. Tliis longing, this intense burning desire, O Christ, nothing can satisfy but thyself. See that baby boy ; how h'3 cries and kicks and screams! His nurse endeavors to pacify him by oifering him his little toys and playthings, but he .says: "I don't want my toys." She offers him marbles, but he cries, " I don't want any marbles." After she has exhausted all her resources to quiet him, and he still cries and refuses to be comforted, the little fellow's mother comes in. The instant his eyes light upon her his crying ceases; he rushes up and is caught in her loving arms. He "just wanted mamma." He did not want any thing else ; and with her his soul was satisfied. And, brother, whenever a soul gets to the point in its childlike simplicity, that the devil, the world, and the flesh, with its cards, and dancing, and theaters, and all its other allurements can not satisfy it, and it says, " I do n't want that, I want my Savior," he is sure to come and abide with that soul. T A New Creature in Christ. 369 The way to get the fullness of Christ is to empty your heart of every thing that rejects Christ and his affinities. Always lean to those things that are Christ's. TiCt your prayer be, "Lord, lielp me to turn each idol out that dares to rival thee." How many can say now, " I would rather have Christ for my portion than all else besides?" Being in Christ not only presupposes a longing for Christ, but a fleeing to Christ. O, blessed Christ, I will run upon the swiftest feet of faith to meet thee. O, dear Lord, I tried until I could try no more to remain away ; my soul became im- patient, and I could stay no longer ; show me thy way. I will rush into thine arras of waiting love. Thank God for that purpose of my soul that makes me go out in search of my Lord. I will search for him. I am so glad that I never let the grass grow up in my pathway between ray Lord and me. The devil sliall never come between my Savior and myself I saw some time ago an illustration of how the devil works among his crowd, by an old colored preacher down South. He laid three objects on his Bible, and he said : " Now, brethren, I 'm a-going to show how dc debbil works de Christuon. Here's de Savior, here's de Christuon, and here's do deb- bil. Now when de Christuon move up to Christ, den de debbil he move off; de Christuon move nearer Christ, and de debbil he move furder off; den de Christuon sort o' back-slides, den de debbil move up ; de Christuon gets furder and furder away from Christ, and de debbil moves up closer and 370 Sam Jones' Own Book. closer to him, and de first thing you know, de dt'bbil jump over him ^ 1 get right between him and Christ; and when he gets over dar between you and Christ he 's got you, and den he '11 say, * Now I's got you, sure.'" This is a living illustration. Never let the devil get between you and your Lord. Say to him, "Get thee behind me, Satan ; you shall never come between me and my Lord." Then running to Christ! Thank God for the privilege of going to Christ. Is there trouble any where? Take it to the Lord in prayer. What a Friend we have in Jesus ! Thank God, brother ! I have beeu at times in such tight places that I could not do a thing in the world but pray ; and thank God that was all I needed to do. Just leave it all with the Lord. That 's what we call rushing to the Lord in prayer. O, my brother, if I wanted to divide the armies of Satan and put all perdition to flight, I would not order down a legion of angels and all the artillery of heaven ; but I will tell you what I would do : I would fall on my knees in prayer to God. " And Satan trembles when he sees The weakest saint upon his knees." A man can fall into no harm while he is on his knees praying. Did you ever hear of a man get- ting drunk on his knees? Did you ever hear of a man stealing while on his knees in prayer? I will tell you, your trouble is, you have not been on your knees enough. Ah, me! how Satan has tempted me, how the passion for drink has come on and almost over- A New Creature in Christ. 371 whelmed me ; but, thank God, I have found his grace sufficient to sustain me. Those people who say, I can not help drinking; or, I can not help doing this or that when tempted, — I know what the matter with them is : you do n't do enough of this knee-work I am talkinj^ about. I hear people say, " I 'm afraid to join the Church, I 'm afraid I can't hold out, I'm afraid I'll swear or drink or do something wrong;" and I have said to them, "I never have been afraid of but one thing rince I joined the Church, and that is, I am afraid I won't pray enough." I am omnipotent when leaning on the arm of God in prayer. If you want to whip the devil, just fall on your knees in prayer. Being in Christ pre-supposes, again, submission to Christ. O, how we want our own way ! How jealous we are of what we call our privileges! How we kick and rear if we can not have our own way, and how we rave, and pitch, and tear if we don't get it ! Why, we fall out with our preacher and abuse him like a pick-pocket if he attempts to abridge " our privileges." Ah, we are jealous of these " privileges." You touch them, and you get your foot into it. I sail into you on your dram- drinking, theater-going, card-playing, and dancing, and the town rises up in arms against me ; but it is the hit dog that hollers, you may put that down. If you go and break a drunkard's jug, he'll get mad, every time ; but his wife won't. If we sail into these people who do these things I have the utmost pity and sympathy for them, and I do be- lieve, my brethren, the poor people are so deluded Ill 372 Sam Jones' Own Book. and persuaded by the world, that they do n't see any harm in the things they are doing. Let us get them to reading books that have sense in them — I mean religious sense. If I have got but a little sense, good Lord, let it be religious sense. I heard a man say once, " Myself and my wife never had a squabble in our lives — never had a quarrel — only when she wanted to have her own way." "Well, who isn't lovable that way? The devil himself is agreeable enough when he has ev- ery thing his own way. Listen : I am sorry for Christian people who have reserved rights. K:lig- ion is like that pearl of great price, which, when found, the buyer sold all that he had and purchased. And, brother, thank God, from the day I gave up sin to this hour, I never had a reserved right. I say, " Lord, I will do any thing — every thing." I have invested my all in it. All that I have is in this Book, and if it does n't break I am a million- aire through all eternity. That 's the way to talk it. Submission to Christ ! Do as he tells you to do. You are a most liumble member of your Church un- til your preacher says something that touches you, and oif you fly, and say : " If I can 't live in peace here, I'll go and join another Church." Or per- haps some good sister says, " My husband and I were tclking about this the other night, and we ain't going to stand this sort of thing." Sister! God bless you; go over there, and have the best time you can while you are here. A gentleman said to me that at a meeting of an official board of his Church, at which his wife and A New Creature in Christ. 373 himself were present, rum was passed around, and every one present, members of the boarl, including the pastor of the Church, except the geutleman who told me and his wife, drank of it. A preacher who M'ill indulge in such things, not only with his mem- bers, but privately, belongs to the devil from his hat to his heels. I know when I did that way I belonged to the devil, and I Jo n't care whether the man is a preacher or not, the test of his allegiance to Christ is how he lives. Christ says, " Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven." Now you say, "Mr. Jones, you ought not to be so rough on the ministers." Well, I called no names, and I would not tell ray preacher that " Jones is hitting at him." It 's an insult to tell him that he is being hit. Then we say again, that being in Christ Jesus presupposes union with Christ. "I am the vine, and ye are the branches," says Christ. Did you ever go into a vineyard and examine the vines and branches? Did you ever see how closely in vital forces they were united? how the very vitality of the branch was determined by the vine? If united to Christ, he and myself are one, one in all things, in earnestness, in energy, in goodness, in mercy, in purity, in truth. Being in Christ Jesus presupposes also all the affinities which control one's life — his likes, his looks, his thoughts, his tastes, his all. It is a re- ligion, assimilation with the character of our Lord Jesus Christ, doing like him, thinking and being w ll.\ \ w. k\ 374 Sam Jones' Owx Book. like liim. Blessed Christ, give us a religion that makes us like thyself, and then we shall be Chris- tians in the grandest sense. Our blessed Lord loved the sinners and died for them. Let us, breth- ren, imitate our divine Lord, and do the best we can for the sinning and erring ones around us. Brikk Sayinqs. A Christian who will do things in New York that he would not do at home is a very poor Christian. It takes less sense to criticise than to do any thing else. There are a great many critics in the asylum. I don't think much of dignity. My observa- tion is that the more dignity a man has, the nearer dead he is. When the doctor says you can't live but an hour you'll want just such a preacher as myself talking to you. When you find a man that is first-class for some one thing, you will find him pretty good for every thing else. There is more rel'gion in laughing than in crying. If religion consists in crying I have the best boy in the world. If any of you do n't like the way these services are going, there are three doors — you are cordially asked to leave. ■ Sbrmon XXVI it. WORKING TOQETHER FOR GOOD. "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." — Rom. viii, 28. WHY am I in this world ? I had no choice as to the time or the circumstances of my coming into it. The question of environment is a question that was decided for me — that temptations should beset me ; that difficulties, sometimes insurmount- able, should present themselves ; that obstacles, over which I might not go, should be in my way. After all, this question has aroused the imagination and escaped the lips of many a man — " Why am I in this world of so much sin and so much suffering? What am I doing here?" And the mot^c patient man the world ever saw cursed the day he was born. Brethren, if a man looks on the things that are seen, and not on the things that are unseen, it is not much trouble to get up a state of mind to curse the day when he 'vas born ; but a man who looks at the unseen and determines what the seen things are by the unseen things, then, thank God, he blesses the day he was born into a world of such provi- dences and privileges. Ten thousand men, may be, had walked along the highway and had seen that block of marble. It had been gazed upon by thou- 375 ■{. T^ *^i'ir" 376 Sam Jones' Own Book. sands of eyes, but they saw simply a block of stone; but Michael Angelo came along and saw what they did not see. He saw an unseen something in it, and he sat down at that block with chisel and mal- let in hand, and the first thing they knew, he had hewn out an angel, which, if God had breathed the breath of life into it, might have sat near the throne of God and adorned heaven with its beauties. He saw an angel there that others did not. I tell you, brethren, when I simply look at rough-hewn nature, as I see it, I am astonished that I am here; but when I see God with the mal- let and chisel of his goodness, as he begins to hunt for the angel that is in me, and I realize that if I lie still under the strokes of God's hammer, some of these days God will hew that angel out of me, then I realize that in this world it is possible to make an angel out of every such a being as I am. After all, brethren, it is to the unseen that we must look. I walk into a great work-shop, and I see in there pieces of timber, boards, carpenter's tools, saws, planes, and machinery at work. I say, "What is all this? It^s confusion and disorder to me. What do they mean?" The architect looks at me, and says, " Wait about three months, and I will show you what it all means." And I wait three months, and there is a palatial residence that grew out of the disorder in that work-shop. I did not know what it all meant, but the architect did. In this world of temptations and trials and griefs and tears, sick-beds and good-byes, we do not un- derstand these things, but the great Architect, who 'WW ■ Working Together for Good. 377 is working out the problem of eternity, understands them all, and if we only stand still, he will show u« the mansions " not made with hands, eternal in tiie heavens." I wish we had faith to look on and see God at work. And, brother, really, I believe I am willing to turn the matter over to the good Lord. I tried to run the thing according to my own notion twenty- four years, and I declare to you, I wound up in disgust. I said, I am willing to turn this thing over to any body. But 1 found nobody but God to take it off my hands in the condition I was in, and it is astonishing how he is working things into or- der out of chaos. The process in this world is to take from, and not to add to. Michael Angelo never added any thing to the marble block ; he just cut it away and chipped it off, until finally there was an angel, sure enough. Now, brother, you lie still under fire, and let God chisel off the rough and rugged points and angles of your nature, and let grace work you down to where you ought to be, and you will be beautiful enough to charm heaven after a while. Human nature wants something added, but God wants to take away all those things that damage you in time and in eternity, and if you let God hew off and take away all that ought to be taken off, he Avill see to it that eternal life, in all its purity and glory, is imparted to you. Let no one say the Lord does n't do any thing for him but hew off things from him, that God doesn't put any thing on to 32 i 378 Sam Jones' Own Book. him ; for God imparts to man some things, and those things are all necessary for a pure and holy life, for time and for eternity. I suppose our text is one, of all texts, the hard- est to be understood. "All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." You see it is in the present tense; the work is going on now, and for all who love God. In order that we may the better understand it, let us notice some of the terms. "All things work together for good to them who love God." Good ! AVhat do you mean by good ? There is no wonder you do not under- stand the text, you have interpreted it wrongly. If you have interpreted it wrongly, there is no sense in it. With a wrong interpretation, there is not a word of truth in it ; but if you interpret it wisely, it is the divinest, grandest truth of all. Suppose you interpret it this way: "All things work together for good to them who have riches." That would not be true, because many of the poor- est people in the world are God's people, and they never have any thing; they live from hand to mouth day by day. And if that were true then re- ligion Avould be something we could buy — " the rich would live, and the poor would die" — but it is not. I am so glad that it doesn't take money to get religion, for I was bankrupted with all worlds, and I never would have gotten it if it re- quired money to have it. It doesn't take any thing to purchase religion, but it takes a good deal to keep up repairs after you have got it. Well, 11! 1 1 .;St I . Working Together for Good. 379 you can 't get to New York quickly or easily, with- out a cent. You might foot it every step of the way and beg your bread, but that 's a hard route ; but you can c go on a Pullman sleeper, with all the conveniences and comforts at hand, without money. And that 's the difference in the routes or manner of traveling. One is easy and restful, and the other is exhausting and uninviting. Hear! There is not a man in the world who values the stated meetings of the Church and the work of the pastors more than I do. I was eight years a pastor myself. Thank God for every pastor and all Church organization in this country. Sup- ])ose there was nothing in tliis country but evangel- ists ; you would be in a bad fix. What is an evangelist? He is just an extra hand at the harvest, to throw the cradle. If you had not prepared the ground, sowed your seed, and protected the growing crop, you would have had no use for evangelists. Remember our Father saith, *' One man soweth and another reapeth, and let him that soweth and him that reapeth rejoice together;" and " He hath given to some prophets, and to some evangelists, and to some pastors." It takes more patience, and courage, and fortitude to make an efficient pastor than it does to make a hundred evangelists. It's a nice thing to go around throw- ing your harvest cradle into somebody else's wheat. No man values the work of a pastor more than I do ; but, brother, I think our membership is very much like locomotive engines. An engineer told me once that after every trip the engine went into i:ii :IV ^ If \ lift ' it' >H ir >ii 380 Sam Jonks' Own Book. the shops; her machinery was overhauled, the bolts tightened; but, he said, about every four years she must go into the round-house and be taken all to pieces, overhauled, and made new again. So Avith our mombership; every -y mind to submit to God." He said, " O precious wife, what great victory? Did you gain it understandingly ?" '' Yes, yes," said the wife. " Well, let us see ; we have the best home here any body ever had." "Yes," said the good woman. "Wife, will you submit to that?" "Yes, husband." "Well, we have the best friends God ever gave any body." " Yes, that is true." "Will you submit to that?" " Yes," she said. " Well, we have a darling daughter in heaven, sitting now under the shade of the tree of life to be with God forever. Will you submit to that?" "Yes, yes," she said. "Then, wife, we have all the precious promises of God to be ours every day. Will you submit to that?" " Yes, O yes." "Well, God is going to come after a while to take us both to heaven to live and reign with Christ. Will you submit to that?" " O, ray husband, hush, hush ; I '11 never say I'^F' Working Together for Good. 391 any thing more about submission as long as I live. I'll praise God the balance of my life." And, brother, all we have to do is to submit to the will of God. Even with home and all gone, submit yourself to God without a word of murmur or a thought of reproach. "I will just praise God always." And in the direst extremities of life we can thank God for ten thousand blessings we re- ceive from him. I will tell you when we reflect upon the good- ness of God to us we ought to be ashamed of our- selves to be talking about our "crosses and our losses." Let us have that kind of religion, oven though we lose all that we have and love here ; we can love God and submit with patience and grati- tude to his will. God bless you, my brethren, and keep you according to his perfect will. Brief Savinqs. X HAVE known women too poor to own a pair of shoes — but I never knew one to be too poor to own a looking glass. I HAVE seen preachers who looked as sad and solemn as if their Father in heaven was dead and had n't left 'em a cent. Heaven is the spiritual center of gravity for all things good ; hell is the spiritual center of gravity for all things evil. You don't believe what you don't understand? Bo you understand why some cows have horns and some are muley? SKRMON XXIX. PROKESSION AND PRACTICE. " Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name ? and in thy name have oast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity."— Matt, vii, 22, 23. IT is not advantages, but disadvantages, that make a man. Many a time you hear a man say, " I 'm going to lay by something for my children; they shall never undergo the hardships that I under- went." But he does n't know, you .see, that those very hardships that he underwent made him what he is, and that if he lays by and endows his chil- dren, the probability is, they won't have money enough to pay for their funerals, when the time comes to bury them. God save this country from an endowed Church, and the Church from an en- dowed member. The one will soon be a failure, the other will soon be in the cemetery, or vice versa. I have never known a prosperous endowed Church, and very few endowed sons. I say it is disadvant- ages that develop the man. It is hindrances, not help, that make success. Almost any body can come to a meeting on a fair Sunday, but earnest people only come out on stormy days. * I have been sitting here, brethren, revolving in my mind what is the best evil to run on this morn- 392 "*■ '■ TPf' Profession and Practice. 393 iDg. What is the best thing to do? Now, I like expressions like this : " Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name." " What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits towards me ? I will take the cup of salva- tion and call upon the name of the Lord." "I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall be continually in my mouth." "lly soul shall make her boast in the Lord." People are afraid to say much about their religion. They're afraid some- body will consider them Pharisees. Well, now, brother, I think you would do just as well to give over any such notion as this of being considered a Scriptural Pharisee. I do n't know any body here that is likely to be one. Do you know any body that fasts twice a week and gives one tenth of every thing he possesses to the Lord? So now, it is possible that you might be considered a Pharisee, but I do n't suppose you ever were within a thousand miles of being one. You have n't got that near yet. Do you know any who fast twice a week, and give abundantly to God ? If there are any such persons, they 're com- ing along to where they might be considered Scriptural Pharisees. A great many things are worse than being a Pharisee. I believe that being afraid you will be called one, when you ain't worthy of being called one, is worse than actually being one. To say the least of it, there was a strong dis- position in the minds of the Pharisees to tote fair with God; and I say to you, that's our difficulty — toting fair with God; giving God such a portion .1 'f Fit, '> -'i '1 'MTM 394 Sam Jones' Own Book. of my time as he ought to have, such a portion of my money as he ought to have, and such a portion of my influence as he ought to have. Very few people will do that — very few. Our Christianity, somehow or other, has been converted largely into a sort of begging arrange- ment — everlastingly receiving and holding on to what we get. I went to a good old woman's house once, and she put me up stairs in a room, and there was an old chest in the room — a large chest, the top of which was sprung up. I had a curiosity to know what the old soul had in there, and I just raised the lid and looked. It was about four dozen of the nicest counterpanes you ever saw in your life. But she did n't have a single one on any bed in the house that I saw at all ; and I wondered in my soul why this old woman did n't put some of these on the beds. But I heard, after that, that another gentleman went in there — it was n't myself — and he dropped a coal of fire off a match, or a cigar, or ti pipe, and set fire to the old lady's counterpanes and burned the whole business, and was like to have burned the house up. That was a natural consequence of keeping counterpanes packed up that way. I do n't say that in some great case- ment in your heart you have got a thousand good sermons, and good resolutions, and good purposes packed away, and the lid of t^^e thing is springing up, it is so full; but you have n't got a single one on your tongues that you might speak words of cheer and kindness; on your feet, that you might walk in the paths of righteousness. Just say. Profession and Practice. 395 " Every sermon, instead of being packed away in the casement of my heart, I believe I will spread out on my tongue, and hands, and feet, and make it indeed not only an adornment to my life, but a blessing to ray neighbor." Now we have been pack- ing away sermons, and we are evrlastingly intent on receiving. Well, now, a man gets out of religion just in pro- portion as he puts into it. A man gets off his farm just in proportion as he puts into it. A man that 's everlastingly drawing off his farm and never putting any thing in, is headed to agricultural bankruptcy. A man that 's everlastingly drawing on his religion, and never putting any thing in it, is headed to spiritual bankruptcy. I believe that. Now, I infer that most of us here are professed Christians, and we are here to receive something. There appears to be a type of Christian in the world who has every pocket empty every time he comes to hear about God. He has every hand empty, and his mouth wide open, to get something. He is one of those receiving Christians, like an old pond with water draining in ; the pond takes in every thing, but has no outlet in the world. You know a pond or a lake that has no outlet, only tends to breed miasma, mosquitoes, and tadpoles, and such like, and in religious life, when it catches every thing, and has no outlet, it breeds division in the Church and selfishness. I hear a great deal said about "self" — the worst and most miserable picture of hell. Hell is nothing but selfishness on fire. Brethren, it is not what we receive; it is what we w ] ■l I 'A- ■ +- r I 39G Sam Jones' Own Book. give out, that keeps us spiritually alive. Tiicre waw a good old woman wlio got up at the camp- meeting and said she was going to fly to heaven, and she jumped up, and gave a flop, and down slie came. Every body laughed, and she jumped up, and brushed the straw off her dress, and said, " Well, ye need not be laughing ; my trouble was I did not get the right flop." There is a good deal in the right " flop." Religion in a big meet- ing is not the best religion in the wo"ld. You can not fly to heaven from a revival. Revivals ! reviv- aid ! A great many people think they are the best things in the world. Brother, in a sense, they may be very good, but they are not the best things in the world. A revival like this may be likened, in a sense, to a conversation I heard between a sewing machine agent and a merchant. A gentleman was talking sewing machines to the merchant, and he talked with a vengeance. I listened, and I said, " O, if I could only preach Christ as that fellow talks sewing machines." By and by, the merchant said, " I would take all the machines you have, if I could talk 'machines' as you can." The agent said, "When I sell a lady a machine, I say very little about it. All I do is to put the machine up, and show her how to thread the needle, and let her learn the rest from the book of instructions." At the revival we show you how to thread the needle, and here is the Book of Instructions to guide you in every thing to success in life. Revivals can only start you, but God says, " Continue patiently in well doing," and says, " Well done, thou good PltOFKSSIOX AND PUAtTICE. ;J97 and faithiiil servant." Well finished! Tiiere is a lieap in a good start. There is a great deal more in carrying a thing on well, but w'len it comes to " Well done, it is finished," you are right. Now, brother, there is more real joy in giving a cup of cold water in the name of Christ than there is in receiving any thing at the hands of another. Sometimes we value a present, not so much by its intrinsic value as by the person who gives it to us. I have known a souvenir of some sort, a present not worth fifty cents if its associa- tions are taken away ; but a person would not take thousands for it. This was a gift of a precious mother, on her dying bed. This was the gift of the best friend you ever had. Brethren, God's gifts to his children are invaluable. This Bible was given me by God. You can not price such presents as that, and yet God is giving, and giving, and giving; and what have we shown in return? Lord, thou hast fed me this day upon thy bounty; and to show thee I am grateful for it, I am going to feed some other one. The best way to get God to help you is for you to pitch in and help every person else that needs help. The Lord helps men that help somebody else. The Lord works on a contrary line to self- ishness every time. You hear a fellow say, " I have about as much as I can do to get to heaven myself I hav3 no time to fool with other people." Take him now, and follow him up. It is the truth. He has all he can do to get himself to heaven. He has the biggest job of any man I know of 'l'" I: rr iiiWi ill 11 • * ''"11"^ 398 Sam Jon eh' Own Book. Really I would rather run forty locomotives, direct twenty cyclones, and look after forty earthquakes, than look after two hundred pounds of the genu- ine selfishness that wears breeches, and looks like a man. It is about the toughest job a man could undertake, to rule a genuine, solid lump of pure concentrated selfishness. Do n't get shocked at any of these things. I am talking about natural his- tory now. These animals live all about in these days. "You may not be familiar with them," as uje old darkey says, " but they lie 'round as sure 's you live." Really, some of us are too decent to be religious, anyhow. That is the fact about it. There are plenty of people here in churches too decent to be religious. I read a clause this morning in one of the papers, about what a preacher said in St. Paul. He is preaching to a fashionable church. They drove up in their carriages. At the meeting he said, " Brethren, if Jesus Christ were on earth, and followed the trade of a carpenter, as he did in his youth among men, there is not one of my members who would speak to him, and he could not come into the respectable society of this town until he got into a carriage to attend the divine service, and joined some town club." Do you believe that? Now, Jesus Christ is represented in the person of every poor man in this town. Do you know that when Old Hickory Jackson, President of the United States, sent over to France to know by his representative, what France was going to do about the American claims, they treated his messenger Profkhsion and PuArncE. .399 with indignity, and when Old Hickory received the message, that they said they would not pay the claim, he shook his fist towards France, and said, " By the eternal, if they do n't pay it, I will make them do it." Do you get the idea? Whenever France, or any other country, so heaped an indig- nity upon the ministers of the United States, they heaped that indignity upon the government of the United States. When you meet some Christian people in this town, whom you do n't run with, and associate with, because they do n't ha|)pen to have as much as you have, you heap indignity ui>'>a Jesus Christ, and he will resent it with all the oe of heaven, earth, and hell. Why, we move in strata. Some of you good women know there is a certain stratum you run with. There may be thirty or forty ladies in the Metropolitan Church, about a dozen of whom you call upon, and about half a dozen you are really intimate with. Take the Metropolitan Church, with all her history, and if we were all called up to heaven to-morrow, it would take the angels two or three weeks to get you all introduced to each other. It would just keep the angels busy awhile. Now, what sort of religion do you call that ? When two or three hon ton members get off to themselves, you might overhear something like this : " I can tell you why I never met her. She was cook with Mrs. So-and-so, and we never associate with this sort." Sister, what are you going to do in heaven? Won't you hate to run with your cook in glory? Is it not true that there are some too decent to be rr 400 Sam Jones' Own Book. religious? Tlie hopeful, brotherly, cheerful Christ- ianity is unselfish. This is what we want in this world. I was in Milledgeville, Georgia, preaching once, when I struck the idea of brotherly kindness, I used this illustration just as it happened to come upon my mind, and I said, " Here is Mrs. A. She lives in a beautiful, palatial home. She has the best servants in the town, the best husband, and every thing she could wish for. She gets sick, and I sit on a portico opposite the home. I say, * What does it mean by all these ladies going in and out of that home? ' And as I sit there for a few minutes, there comes un elegant waiter, covered with its linen towel, and I ask, * What is the mat- ter over there?' * Well, Mrs, So-and-so is sick, and the neighbors are calling on her with their waiters, and nice things fixed for her.' I say, ' I declare, there are the cleverest people here I ever saw in my life. I have seen nothing comparable to that,' And the first thing I know the door bell is muffled. The doctor says she must not have company, and I call in for a few minutes to know how she is getting on. When u^c elegant waiters are going into her sick-room, I understand she said: 'Take them to the kitchen,' and I hear that when they went out to the kitchen, the serv- ants had a good time over the waiters, Ihey are sending in things, and that woman has a better cook in her place, and better things than any one else, and she does not need a thing in the wrrld. But/' said I, "there's old Sister Snipe, living Profession and Practice. 401 down there on the hill side, in a little log cabin. She got sick three weeks ago, and I never saw any body going there to call on her, and she was a member of the same Church. And," said I, " I never heard the doctor tell her she 'd better not re- ceive company for so many weeks, and I never saw the waiter going up to her house." Well, you '11 hardly believe it, but at the end of that service, an old lady came up to me, and said, " God bless you, Mr. Jones; you just gave them the truth. I have lain sick three weeks many a time, and no one of them ever came near me." " Why, what's your name, sister?" I asked. "Snipe," she said; " 1 thought you knew me. I live up in the little log cabin on the hill side." Well, I never was more surprised in my life. Old Sister Snipe was there " boda- ciously," as they say, and I just happened on the truth. O brothers and sisters, do good to them that need it most. Thank God for the unselfish Chris- tianity that n)akes me see in every man's face the beaming eyes of a brother, and that makes me see in every woman's face the countenance of a sister; Suppose we were brothers and sisters, indeed ; would any man, could any creature upon this world do aught to spoil the life or the character of a sister or brother ? There 's where the world has missed it. We won't be brothers and sisters. God wants us to be. And, brethren, the more un- fortunate your brother is, the more kind, and the more faithful you should be to him. I want to see a religion that gives us something to do, and is n't 34 iiP?^^ 402 Sam Jones' Own Book. everlastingly catching at something. Why, if your religion were like grapes, and would not keep but two or three months, why, bless your soul, what would become of you ? 'T would all go off on your hands like the grapes. Just get up and get at work, and not let your religion decay on yotir hands. O brethren, religion not used is religion misused. I wish you could see that. " What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me?" Some of you say, "I got a deal yesterday. I wonder how much' more I shall get to-day." " What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me?" Let's look around to- day, and say, each one of us, "As God is my judge, I am going to do something for God; I am going to do good to somebody to-day." I have gone home from a revival many a time very hungry, because passive religion is not the best religion in the world. When I got home, I would say to my wife, "How is poor old Aunt Ann up the hill?" Slie was a poor, old negro woman, dying from the cancer, and my wife had been feeding her from her table for months. My wife says, "She's a great st driving horses I ever drove in my life I was warned of this fact — you may let them go at certain speed, and control them safely ; if you let them go at full speed and then check them, they'll fall to kicking the buggy all to pieces. And, 440 Sam Jones' Own Book. sister, there's the point. Up to a certain point you can keep your children under your control ; but let them ^o beyond that point, and then try to put the check on, and they'll just kick creation all to pieces. I said .somethinji^ aloni;- that line one day to a congre- gation, and an old niotluir said: " There, that's just my case. I said to my daughter, ' Daughter, you shall not go to that ball," and she just kicked the chair clean across thu room, and look(>d like she'd kick me." I wish these girls would kick .some of these dudes out of the parlors, but don't let your poor old mother have any of the kicking. I don't mind having a triHing J'oung man sa3'ing a girl has kicked him out, but I do hate to hear a mother say she has been kicked by her daughters. But I'll get to the girls Saturday, and have a talk with them. God pity the mother that has raised up a lot of kicking animals — animals that bite and kick too. Sister, let you and I maintain a Christian firm- ness in our homes. " Right's right ; I do it ! chil- dren, I want you to do it. Wrong's wrong ; I won't do it ! children, I don't want you to do it." A mother had a brother-in-law — I believe it was — who wanted her to send her daughter to a dancing-school. He said : " There's a dancing-school beginning at the house of Prof. Arori." He was a hook-nosed French- man — I don't know how^ long he'd been out of the penitentiary. Can't say anything about that, but he started a dancing-school, and when this brother-in- law wanted to send the young lady there the mother, who was a Christian woman, said, " I am a widow, and not in a condition to pay for the dresses that my To MOTHKHS. 441 (liuin^hter would require if slie learned dancing." The brother-in-law promised to Imy the dresses. " Hut," said the mother, " I can't afibrd to pay for the tui- tion." And the brother-in-law promised to pay for that, too. Then the mother said, " Well, you send daughter to me, and if she wants to go I'll let her do so." The daughter came in all gleeful, and said : " Now, mamma, you said, if we understood each other, you'd let me go." And the mother said : " My daughter, I promised your Christian father, in his last moments, to train you for heaven. Now, daugh- ter, do you think that dancing-school will help train you to meet your Christian father in heaven? If you think so you can go to the dancing-school, but not otherwise. What do you say, daughter?" And the daughter threw her arms around her mother's neck, and said : " Mother, if you made such a promise, I will never go to a place that dissipates my life and brings me out of harmony with God." Don't you see ? Sister, the fact that vou have children involves a pledge on your part that you will train your chil- dren for heaven ; for God never gave a woman a child to debauch it by sending it to a dancing-school kept by an old hook-nosed Frenchman — I don't know, as I said, how loncc he'd been out of the chain-jjano; — who came into the settlement with a fiddle on his back, and proposed to start an establishment to teach your children manners. God pity a mother that has to send her children to a dancing-school to learn grace and manners ! If I'd a mother in my church that sent her daughters to a dancing-school, I'd turn her out. Not the daughter — I'd not turn her out. ■Pf 442 Sam Jones' Own Book. I >■■' H I Imt the old hypocritical inainniy that sent her there. If there is a thing in this world I have the prot'ound- est contempt for, it's the infernal dancing-master going through the land despoiling the young people of our country. And I would send my child to a workshop to work at fifteen cents a week, half clad and half fed, before I'd send him to a dancing- school. God pity the mother that has no more esti- mate of the soul and best interests of her children than not only to agree that they should 'earn to dance, but to pay for it, and a Methodist i„t that! The Catholic Bishop of Liew York said the other clay that the confessional had shown him that nineteen out of tu enty ruined women who came to the con- fessional got their ruin through the ball-room. Now', if that's so, how can you trust your daughter in such a place as that ? Awful fact ! Awful fact ! God pity a woman that will raise her daugliter to dance to the tune of a fiddle with the arms of a lecherous young man around her person ! I know I have had girls go away from me and 'jurn up their noses at me, and say Mr. Jones is vulgar. But, sisters, you never looked into the face oi a man that estimated the virtue of your precious daughters higher than the man to whom you are listening puts it. Why I would build a wall a mile high around every girl in America, and say to her, " Now, you look out on the sea of humanity, and say, ' My person is as sacred from the touch of men as the innermost recesses of God's heart.' " Call that vulgar, and let your daugh- ters be hugged in a ball-room ! "Be not conformed to this world: but be ye trans- To Mothers. 448 formed by the renewing of your mind." Now, we want not only right relations with God, but right re- lations towards this world. Let me say to you, you can't run with this world, and mix with this world in fashionable society, and be religious, and train your children religious, no more than you can tly : and you know it. Be not conformed to this world. You see, just as soon. as your luisband gets a little prosperous, and builds a throe-story house on a prominent street — did you ever noti -o how all society would take you up ? But as long as you wore industrious and poor they had no use for you. I've got a contempt for any- body that runs for money. A moneyed aristocracy- people that have not anything but money — ar*; the poorest people in the world to-day. " A man's a man for a' that " — and I don't care what sort of clothes he's got on, if he's an honest, industrious ir.an he's as good as anybody. I am glad that sort of people (the moneyed ari.stocracj') do sort of run by them- selves. T would hate them to come down among other people and run them like they do themselves. " We're ooinsj to have a sociable," or "We're goinc; to have a dining." Suppose an invitation is sent to a good Methodist woman that loves Uod, and the first thing you know she is overwhelmed by the thought, " 1 will not be a lady unless I give a dining too," and the devil just whips you right in on that line. I won't go to anything that 1 won't have one just like it at iriy own house; I won't go to the theatre, because if they were to come in to my parlor and say some of the things they say on the .stage of the avorage theatre, I would kick them out of my house. mmm I 1 44* Sam Jones' Own Book. i A theatre manager came to me and said, " Jones, the theatre is run on this principle : everybodj' wants to go to the theatre and hear some old hag howl and cry a little." And I'll tell you another thing. You are raising your children in such a way that they will be out of reach of the Gospel before they are sixteen. The hardest people in Toronto are not the old drunkards and gamblers, but children between ten and twenty. How few of them give their hearts to God! I will show you ten grey-headed people giving their hearts to God where you \';ill find one child under fifteen years of age giving his heart to God. How is this ? Because mothers will fall right in line with the evil, and ruin their children, so far as re- ligion is concerned, before they are eighteen years of age. And J will tell you how it works: — "Husband, our little girl is just eight years old, and I think I will give her a little party." " Well, wife, our child is too young to talk about parties, you are not going to start that , already." "Oh, husband, just a little party." " Wife,our children are too young to be talking about parties yet." "Oh, that's the way with you,you're always cross and mean when T want the children to en- joy themselves." Then the husband says, " The best thing I can do is to surrender, she'll give me no rest for the next month if that don't happei. ' So she gets up a little part}'. What's a little party ? Nothing in the world but a big party with state clothes. They run a little party, and first thing ^'ou know there is a big party. And they go from the big parties to pro- gressive euchre, and from progressive euchre to the To Mothers. 445 ball-room, and from the ball-room to the German — I mean the decent American called the German. I don't mean any race of people. I'm glad it ain't called American, but it's called German — I don't know why, I didn't name it. And on they go ; on they go. And now yovir daughter say.s, " Law me ! I can't see any harm in this thing ; my mother's as good a woman as ever walked on top of the earth, and she doesn't object to it." Mother thinks : " If I don't push my daughter into society when she is fifteen years old, she will be an old maid." Sister, you would have better died an old maid than to have been a mother of such a crowd as you have, maybe. There are many things worse than old maids. I tell you right now, I would rather be a happy old maid than a thousand miserable mothers. Be not conformed to this world : but be ye trans- formed, and be acceptable to the will of God. When our home is consecrated to God, and we talk to our children in the lines of the true teachings of Scrip- ture, I don't believe our children will want any such things as balls or parties. Now, T have talked this sort of talk in my own b.ome for years. I can see what is runnino- families. I haven't been liviuij thirty- ei"ht years for nothinof. I have learned a few things. I tell you, I see just as plain as I see my hand before my face what is the matter in all this land. Parents don't control their children, and you know they don't. Children are controlling parents three times in five all over this land, and whatever youi- children say you do, and what you tell your children not to do they will do it if they want to. Ain't that a fact ? |li • »JJI' 446 Sam Jones' Own Book. :^wl1 * 1 m When you let your children get from under your grip you have done fearful damage to your child, to say nothing- about aide of pure love than ni}' wife had. I have noticed this fact in life, and this is one of the mo.st .serious things in life, that as hu.s- band goes up and occupies higher and higher strata in social and commercial life, wife is right along be- side in the same altitude exactly. I have noticed that when husb^.nd goes down, down in social scales and social and financial life, I find him at the very bottom and the wife on a dead level with him. I have noticed that every lick that wife hits for hus- band she is hitting for her.self, and everj'^ move made by the husband for wife he is making it foi' himself. We are one ; our purposes, our aims, our triumphs, our failures, are one ; and your husband can't yo up without taking you with him, and can't go dow^n without taking you with him. When we realize how closely we are united — these twain, this twain, .shall be one ; one in hope, one in i i .%.. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) ,t- 7 ^^ i/x :A 1.0 I.I 1.25 Jfriil 2.5 i^ 1.4 2.0 I— 1.6 P /i (^ /i "cr-l VI .^ ^ ^^ A // yM Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y 14580 (716) 872-4503 <^\.. \ \ % V o V < , ^ 6^ ^^..V. pi? ¥ MP.. !. i ' JO- 404 Sam Jones' Own Book. life, one in purpose, one in effort, one in love, one in triumph, one in enjoyment, one in misery, one in defeat, one in degradation — when I see these things, then I say the greatest blessing, next to a precious good mother, is a good wife. God give a man a good wife — I won't say who gives him a bad one ; but I know the Lord didn't. I haven't taken any text yet. A preacher once said that I could preach as well without a text as with one. I don't know whether that was a compliment or not. Another told me that I could preach a whole w^eek on a locomotive. I told him that was longer than he could preach on the whole Bible. I dried him up. But we haven't got to the text yet. Let us talk a little about home life before we get further home, where love runs streaming in your heart, and every motive, every word of your life is a spring from that fountain, that source of life. I want you to know that love is not only the divinest and sublimest, but the most om- nipotent power in the world. What is love ? 1 never saw an angel, but I do think the most lovable being in this world is a woman — when she is a lovely and lovable woman. There's many a woman is just as unlovely as she can be with her husband, and then .she quarrels and fu.sses about him, because he don't love her. I mean United States ladies. I don't mean you — but it might get that way over here. Why every woman in the world has a lovely side to her character, and an unlovely side to her character. I found out another thing. If you turn the lovely side of your character to anybody and everybody, anybody and everybody will love you. It's natural To Wives. 455 for us to love the lovable. If you turn the unlovely side of your charaieter to anybody, they won't love you — they can't help it. It's just as natural to love the lovable, and not love the unlovable, as it is for me to preach. And if you want the love of your husband to go out like the gust of a great river upon you, you always keep the lovable side of your char- acter turned towards him. He can't help but love you. He can't help but respect you. I can say this much, love may sometimes argue a point, but it is done with soft logic. Love may sometimes speak its sentiments out right. But I tell you> love can look sad, and lovf can look injure-l, and love can cry. Why, wife, I know what home life is. Sometimes my wife argues a proposition with me. I can beat her arguing — carry the point every time. Some- times she has what we call concentrated logic. Sister, you know what that means. Somehow or other if she puts temper into her words, that puts the same element into my words. I am as resentful as she is resentful. But I tell you this much, I can carry a point when we disagree, I can carry a point when tem- per is raised ; but I tell you, when she gets me with her heart full of love, and buries her face in her hands and commences to cry, I will pull away her hands, and kiss her, and say, " Hush, I will do any- thing in the world." I can put up with anything better than I can with wife crying. I cannot that. Sister, let love have its way ; but be sure it is love, and love will have its way. I will tell you that some of you have mighty hard cases to manage. Some women have a way of making home very if! ' 1- I- l>9 456 Sam Jones' Own Book. unpleasant to husband, and make it still more un- pleasant for him because he don't stay there. If your husband likes any place better than he does home, he is either a poor, depraved wretch, or his home is not what it should be. I see some of you good sisters nodding* your heads. I say, the fact that you cannot get your husband at home at the hours he should be at heme is a proof that you have not made home what it ought to be, or you are dis- appointed in your marriage. Your husband is a de- praved man. I believe every man ought to be just like the Irishman : " Faith," and he says, " I hope I will never live to see my wife married again." I believe that every man should feel that way towards his wife. A man should love his wife more than anybody else in the world, and I believe he will have a wife the most lovable woman to him in the world. I believe that. But, sister, it is unnatural for a man to love a cross, crabbed woman. Now, 1 make all due allowance for the sick headache, and for all these nervous spells you have. Sister, you owe it to yourself, to society and to your children, and above all things, you owe it to your husband, to make wife the most pleasant woman in the world. Now, let us run over home life this morning. If there is anything unpleasant, let us stop right here and say : — " Is it my fault ? If it is, God help me, it shall never be my fault again. If there is ever another unpleasant occurrence in our home again it shan't be my fault." Sister, let us have peace at home. My father told me this incident : — When he was refugeeing south during the war he drove up to To Wives. 457 a country home and said to the lady, " Where is your husband?" She said, "He is not at home to-day, sir." " We)l," he said, " can't I get some corn and hay for my horses ; they are coming in a few minutes ? " " Well," she said, " if husband was here I think you could. I think he has corn and hay. Still, I don't know." He says, " Won't you let me hav^e it ? I can pay for it." "No, sir," she replied, " when husband is not here I don't know whether he would like it or not." " Well," said my father, " I wish you would let me have some ; I don't know where to get corn elsewhere." " No," she replied, " I cannot let you have it, because I would rather have peace at home than peace abroad. I will please my husband, whether 1 please anybody else or not. I never saw you before. I am going to have peace at home, whether I have peace abroad or not." I wish every woman in the world would work in that line: "I don't care whether anybody else in and around earth is pleased or not, I am pleasing my husband." Now, you all say, " I wish you would talk to my husband this way; and work on him a little." Sister, I am jjoing to work on him. I tell you, you both need working on. That is the truth about it. It takes a first-class husband and a first- class wife to make a first-class family and a first- class household. That is the truth. Now, you will pardon me if I go a good deal on these little matters this morning. Don't you know it v/as the little fly that spoiled the ointment. It is the little things in this life that keep up the worry. Sister, if you will be what you ought to be — if you If: „, i"^ ' -)\ y:i ' \: Mi ■■.■'''}] 4-i SM^ 458 Sam Jones' Ovvn Book. haven't made a mistake in marryino- — you are going to have just such a husband as you should have ; but I dare assert here in my place that tliere are many instances in this world where wife either makes or unmakes her husband. 1 will give you this little incident. In Edentown, Ga., the pastor told me this himself. He said: "When I. became pastor of the Edentown church I married one of my Chris- tian girls to a young man out of the Church. A few days later, I married one of my Christian young men to a girl out of the Church," and he said, " in less than six months the worldly, fashionable girl had her husband away from the Church. He quit. In less than six months the sweet-spirited Christian girl had got her husbr/nd to repent his sins and join the Church, and start with her to heaven." The Christian girl married the worldling, and in six months she brought him to Christ, and the young man of the Church who served God married the worldly, flippant girl, and in six n^onths she had him out of the Church and awav from God. There are few men in the world better than their wives. To one that will go to heaven in spite of his wife, Jordan is a hard load to travel. You may say that now with all your heart. I believe a Christian oirl runs a great risk when she marries a worldling. I said to my wife : " I have danced, and frolicked, and caroused around with other girls, but when 1 wanted to get me a good wife, I came to prayer-meeting and hunted her up." I said, " Is that not strange ? " " Yes," she saj's, " I wish I had had as much sense as To Wives. 469 you had." And then she laiij^hed and said : " Thank God, alJ's well that ends well." I tell you she ran a risk that like to have broken her heart ; and T tell you with the deepest sense of regret and sorrow to-day, in three years from the day my wife left her home, mother, and friends to be my wife, my life of transgression had caused the rose to fade from her cheek, and it has never come back any more. God forgive me. God forgive me. I tell you women to-day, young ladies especially, you had better he careful ; you had better be r reful. The girl that will marry a boy whose breath smells with whiskey is the biggest fool angels ever looked at, ex- cept the one that marries him and stirs his toddy for him. Down in a town in Georgia a whole lot of young girls married a drunken lot of young men to reform them, and now there are more little old Whip- poor-will widows in that town than you can shake a stick at, and they look as if they weighed from sixty to ninety pounds each. God pity the woman that has no more sense than to marry a man that drinks. What an awful thing it is. If there is anything in this world that whiskey is a direct enemy of, it is woman. If there is a thing on earth that whiskey has troubled the life out of, it is woman. If there is a thing on this earth that the whiskey barrels of this country have rolled over their hearts, it is the women of this country, and yet there are women that not only will drink and pass it to their husbpnds, but will have it on their tables. Mistress President Hayes, of America, would not touch it. She would not handle it, or let it come into the White House of A m:m 4G0 Sam Jones' Own Book. America while she was the President's wife. Law ine ! it ain't wi.ose wife you are, but what sort of a wife that fellow has got where you live. That's it. A wife wrote me the other day : — " I have a good husband. He is a good business man. 1 have drunk wine with him at our table. I enjoyed seeing him drink, till one day the conviction came upon me that husband came home that nighta little full of whiskey. The next morning I said, ' Husband, I have made up my mind to this : no more brandy or whiskey will be drunk at our house forever. If you come home again and I smell it on your breath, I am going to pack up my duds and go away from home, and you will never see my face any more.'" And she said, " From that day to this my husband has never drunk one drop of whiskey ; and now he is a live business man in this town. " And I believe if that woman had not taken that step he would have been found lying drunk in a gutter one day, or would have been buried in a drunkard's grave. She said, " I said to my husband, if you ever drink another drop, and I smell it on your breath, I'll pack up such few things as are my own, and go away from you, and you'll never look in my face again while you live." And she meant it, too. Law me ! If your husband loves whiskey better than you, you had better get away from him, and the sooner the better. Well, now, I have said these things in an unpre- meditated sort of way. I had no idea of saying one- tenth of them when I began, and now I'll go on with the text and talk for some twenty or twenty-five minutes. I believe this is the sweetest passage in To Wives. 461 the Holy Scriptures, and the Lord help us to under- stand and appreciate it. Here it is. Here it is : — '* The Lord is my shepherd ; I shall not want." You know that is the first verse of the 23rd Psalm — the sweetest thing in the Book, and I am so glad that all our commentators ajjree that David is the author of this Psalm. It does not make much differ- ence who is the author of the 22nd Psalm, or of the 24th Psalm, or of the 40th Psalm ; but I am very- glad they all agree that David is the author of the 23rd Psalm. Listen. " The Lord is my shepherd ; I shall not want." David, when he wrote this, his memory ran back to those days when it was his business to care for his father's sheep, and then he meant more by it than any other man I know since the days of David, or before the days of David, could have meant. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want." David remembered how he used to lead the sheep forth from the fold, and how when the little young lambs would get out on the high- way and stray away, he would go after them and carry them in his arms to the pasture. He remem- bered how he left some old sheep in the fold because it was too weak to go to the pasture ; and how, as he led the others forth in the morning, when the grass was wet with dew, and all green and tender, he would think of the old sheep which he had left back in the fold, and he would pluck up some of the green tender grass, and lay it by in the shadow of a tree or a rock ; and how, when he came back that way in the evening, he would collect the grass and m 462 Sam Jones' Own Book, 1 ■ I I ■ i carry it home to the fold in his arms and give it to the old sheep. And he remembered how, when the wild beast came and took off one of his lambs, he followed it and slew the wild beast, and brouijht home the young lamb to the fold. And when David remembered all these things, he said to himself, " If I am young, the Lord will carry me in his arms to the pasture ; and if I am old and decrepid, iie will bring mo the sweet grass of his grace, and I shall not want ; he will prove to me the worth of his sovereign, omnipotent, and eternal love." And David remembered how the Lord would take care of him through every danger, and would protect him from the wild beasts of temptation ; that the Lord would come and rescue him, as David had rescued his sheep. " The Lord is my shepherd ; I shall not want." That meant a great deal. David thought, " Now, as it was my duty to look after my father's sheep, and as I attended to their interests and protected them, so in that senile is the Lord my Shepherd, and I shall not want. As God is infinitely more than I am, and I am infinitely more than a sheep, so, in that sense, the Lord is my Shepherd, and I shall not want. That is a sweet fact. There is a sweep of faith in it that I wish every one of us could make this morning — " I shall not want ! " shall not want anything that it is best for me to have, in time or eternity. No matter what God wants of me, I'd give it to him, and I'd rather the Lord had it than I'd keep it myself. If the Lord takes my husband, I'd rather he would do so if he wants my husband, than I'd keep him. If To Wives. 4G3 ,g_" I at it is matter md I'd df. If uld do ra. If the Lord takes my chiUlren, I'd rather he wouhl do 80 if he wants them, than I'd keep them. I sluiU not want liusband it' God takes husband ; nor chil- dren if God takes children ; nor property if God takes property. I am my Father's child, and what he wills is be.st. That is the text, and that is the sentiment of the text ; and brothers, sisters, T have never found a finer expression of this idea than that found in the little book entitled " Steppin4| 'h Lit 470 Sam Jones' Own Book. balance of the night. I am the most miserable man in the world." And next morning when I walked down to the breakfast table I saw the happiest husband and wife in the country; and twelve month's later, when I went there, they were just as happy ; and twenty-four months later I again went back there, and they were just the same ; and to-day that man and wife are happy, on their way to heaven, and I tell you, wife, when you get into close harmony with God yourself, you are going to help your husband there. The Lord keep you to be what you ought to be, and help you to make your husband what he ought to be. Lord, come down here and bless every woman present, and send us away full of faith and the Holy Ghost! I have not time to follow this subject further this morning, I have tired you already. God bless this service to us. The greatest blessing I can conceive of for your husband is that he shall have such a wife as that one I have spoken of. Now I want to keep you here about five minutts. I fancy if you have got an old bear of a husband that will growl with you if his dinner isn't ready, you can go. Before I was connected with the Orphans' Home in Georgia, I was riding along in the train with my wife — we were coming home from my wife's mother's place in Georgia — and at a junction a lady came in. She was dressed in deep mourning, and had a little infant child in her arms. She took the scat behind us, and my wife, with a woman's quick instinct, said, " Madam, you look sad." " Yes. I started with my husband and my precious baby ; we had started out to visit my mother and father in To Wives. 471 Georgia, and on the way my husband took ill and died. So, instead of goino; home on a pleasure trip, I am going back a poor broken-hearted widow, with a poor little orphan child." When we got to her native town, her face was turned out of the window, and she was looking about her, and the big tears ran down her cheeks. And as I bade her good- bye, I said, " Suppose that it had been my wife that had slipped oft' from me, or I had died, and my wife had to take her poor little fatherless ones home." And I said, " God, thou art very merciful to me ; and from this time henceforth I am going to do all I can for poor little orphans." Ladies, what you give to-day shall be a donation from the Toronto women — wives, and mothers, and daughters — to the little orphan ones of Georgia, and they will accept it gratefully, and may God's blessing be upon every giver. If any of you are opposed to the orphan children being helped, I won't keep you, but the balance of you stay. SAYINQvS. I WANT a growing faith. Good company is a blessing to anybody. If you tell me what you love and whatj'ou hate I will tell you your character. If the devil ever puts his foot upon a woman once she never gets up any more. The biggest fool God's eyes ever looked upon is the woman who stirs the toddy for her husband and helps to debauch the man. :i Is 'v: I f, r SKRMON XXXIII. TO 33AXJGmTERS. "A\hat8oever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, wliatso- ever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report ; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." — Phil. iv. 8. THE girls of to-day are the women of to-morrow. These daughters growing up in the homes of Toronto are the future mothers and wives and women of this country. I am very much interested in our young people. I want to see our young girls grow up to be better women than our mothers and our wives are. I want to see our young men grow up to be better men than their fathers were. I want to see not only a great deal but a glorious im- provement in the generations which follow us. I want to see all our young girls grow up to be pleas- ing to a community and an honor to the world, but a stranger to society, so-called. I want to talk to you just as I would like some minister of the Gospel when he comes to my town to talk to my daughters ; one who has the best interests of my daughters at heart ; one who will give them such advice as will be good for them any time and good for them in eternity ; and I tell you, good, honest, plain truths will do you girls as much good as anything. I might say, I don't think all girls are earthly angels. 1 don't want that impression to get out, that I think 472 To Daughters. 473 girls are all anf^els. Some of the stubbornest, tross- eab, meanest creatures I ever seen in my life were girls, and I wish some of that class were here this afternoon — we would give it them ; but as we have nothing but nice, good girls here this afternoon, yon tell these cross, stubborn girls what I said the first time you meet them. Now, I don't think you are angels. I don't think you are the personification of perfection — if you will allow me just one big word while I am here. I don't think you are perfect in any sense of the word. But I believe that our girls are much better than our boys. I believe our girls are a great deal more comfort to mother and a great deal more pleasure to father than the boys are. Our boys are not the worst boys in the world ; there may be some worse. I am so glad that nearly every father and mother has got some comfort in some precious daughter for the waywardness of a godless son. I think the saddest calamity that can befall a family is where the boys keep father saying, " Where is my wandering boy to-night?" and then mother can sing the next verse, " Where is my wandering girl to-nijrht?" There is a sjreat deal in turningf that sonof. All the wanderinj; creatures in the world are not boys. All that have strayed away from home influences are not boys. And I want to talk to you plainly on that. I want to build a wall around you as high as the stars, and keep you near the purity of your home and the blessed influences of the teaching of Jesus Christ. Some of you may think : " Well, I don't think Mr. Jones ought to talk to girls that way." Well, I am about the only fellow in the m 474 Sam Jones' Own Book. £Va it r. I f country that will do it, and you should put up with one fellow that talks on rijrht along. You know how you have been flattered and praised, and how fre- quently you have been referred to as the blossoming roses of the country, and beautiful pinks, and the elegant sunflower, and all that sort of thing. You have been touched ofl' on that line. Now let us get on the other side a little. And here's something that will help us ; and I have but one object in view, I speak the sentiments of my heart. There is not a girl here this afternoon that I wouldn't make you better, nobler, purer. There is not a girl that walks this earth who has lost her character that I don't look upon her without the pity and sympathy of a brother. God help us to luok at these questions in a right light. We have selected, perhaps, one of the most comprehensive verses in this book. I need a good deal of territory to talk to so many girls, and I find all I need in the text. I suppose we may notice the last clause of the text first, " Think on these things." As a man thinks so he is. Tell me what you are thinking about to-day, and I'll tell you what you will be doing to-morrow. Our actions of to-day are our thoughts of yesterday. It is not so much what your name is, and how old you are ; but there is a great deal in "what do you think about." -What is thought ? I am not much of a metaphysician, but I can see through a hole — through a broken window if there's any light on the other side. What is thought ? We will say, for the sake of argument, that a thouyht is the result of an impression upon one of the five senses. Of course, I don't go into intuitional thought. To Daughters. 475 I know God can reach my thought and mind with- out coming through any one of the five senses — but we will say this afternoon that thought is the result of an impression upon one of our five senses. I see something, it puts me to thinking ; I hear something, it puts me to thinking ; I touch something, it puts me to thinking ; I taste something, it puts me to thinking. Well, I reckon I had better be careful what I see, if thought is the result of an impression on my eye. I had better be careful what I touch, if thought is the result of an impression on one of the five senses. Then I guess I'd better be careful what I do, because I'm responsible for my thoughts. Now, an idea is different from a thought in this — it is a developed thought ; a thought run out to a point where it is ready for the hand, and the foot, and the tongue. The difference between the thought and the idea is this. Thought is the process by which I develop and systematise things so that I can take hold of the conception wioh my hand, or foot, or tongue. Now, I may not be so much to blame for a thought, but it is very criminal to work it out into an idea that is wicked, and have it ready for the hand, or the foot, or the tongue. " Think on these things." It makes all the diflference in the world where we live in our thought. Really, I partake of the nature of the thing I am looking at. If you bring a coffin in here, with a corpse in it, and open it before me, and I look down upon it with my mind and my eye, the first thing I knpw is my whole nature is saturated with the gloom of the corpse. I partake of the nature of the thing that I n > 470 Sam Jones' Own Book. I II U 1 di: * am lookin<^ at. Brinj^ n\e a bouquet of beautiful flowers and put them in my mind, and let me gaze upon them, and tlie first tiling I know my whole nature is saturated with the aroma and the beauty of the flowers. I partake of the nature of the thing I am looking at. God says, " I will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on me." It's not so much who you are or what you wish, but what you are thinking about. If you live in impure thoughts you will be impure in your lives. If you have wicked thoughts you'll be wicked in your lives. Your life will partake largely of your thoughts. Hence the Apostle says, " Think on these things." What thinors ? First, whatsoever thinors are true. If I put my mind and eye and heart on the truth, and get it there, and saturate my whole nature with truth, when I speak I tell the truth as naturally as I live. If I put my mind and heart on falsehood, and get it there, and saturate my nature with false- hood, I begin to tell lies as naturally as I breathe. A truthful man is a jrrand thintr, but a truthful woman is the grandest adornment of a home in this land. Let me toll you the honest truth, as I am talking this afternoon. If I ever had caught my wife in a downright falsehood — and I thank God I never did — or if I ever should catch her in a down- right falsehood, I should never again while I live have the respect for her that I have now. Well, now, all of you that are not going to die old maids are goin^ to be somebody's wives. Do you hear that ? And I tell you another thing — if you tell stories before you're married, you'll tell stories after To DAU(iIlTEUS. 477 you're married. A girl that is not truthful and reliable when she is sixteen won't be truthful and reliable at eighteen, and if she is not so at eighteen, wh?n she gets old enough to marry she won't be a truthful girl ! What excuse can there be in the universe for a want of truth, except we have been thinking on the false and siding on the false side of the question, until our mind is saturated with falsehood, and out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. The heart is full of falsehood, and so the mouth speaketh it. " Whatsoever things are true." A truthful child ! Mother, I heard a father one day, when his five children were out playing together aiid a disturbance occurred among them, and they all came to him, and, except the youngest, who remained silent, gave a different report of the affair. I heard the father say, " I took the little four-year-old boy and put him on my knee, and said, ' Tell me how that thing was.' The little fellow couldn't talk plain, but he prattled away and did his best, splitting hairs all along, and when he got through telling aoout it, I said, ' Now, children, you are all wrong. This little fellow never told me a lie in his life, and I believe every word he says.'" How proud a father should be to be able to put his hand on the head of one t)f his children, and say, " Thank God, that child never told a lie in his life." Now, I am not going to accuse you all of doing a thing of that sort. The truth ! St. Paul said, " Whatsoever things are true." Tell the truth, no matter what the rest is to you. Be reliable. Let your word be as true as the word of 478 Sam .Ionks' Own Book. fin M an arif^el. Die before you will make a false state- ment ; and the only way you can ever get there is to reach the point where truth lives in our hearts and in our minds. Then we will tell the truth as natur- ally as we breathe. Some time ago I said in the presence of a lady, speaking of a girl whom we saw, " That's a beautiful girl ; she has a sweet face. She is a nice girl, is she not ? " " Yes," said the lady, " with one exception. She can't tell the truth to save her life. She is the most unreliable creature I ever met." Do you hear that ? My ! my ! a pretty, nice, respectable girl, with a beautiful sweet face, but a miserable liar. " You can't depend on a word she says." I am glad that was not a Toronto girl. I have a better opinion of you all. Now, girls, I talked plain to your fathers, and to your brothers, and to your mothers, and let you and I talk plain to each other this afternoon. Do you know a girl that has told one story is on the way to tell as many more as the devil wants her to tell ? Be true to your word. Let it be known at the school, let it be known at your home, let it be known on the street, let it be known everywhere, that your word is as sacred as your heart. That's it. " What- soever things are true." It is a thing of joy to have anybody say of you : " There is the most truthful person I ever saw in my life." We have a little fel- low down in Georgia — he hasn't got much sense, just a passable amount — but he's the most interesting talker I ever listened to, and everything he says is the truth. If he tells what anybody says or did, he tells exactly what they said or did, and doesn't add To DAUCiHTEHS. 479 anything to it or talce anything away from it, and I repeat, he's the most interesting talker I ever listened to. That is one of tlie grandest traits in human character — a desire to represent things right, and to let falsehood be eliminated from life and tongue for ever. Truth I truth ! I tell you this : If there's a mother here this afternoon will show mo a truthful daughter, I'll show you a daughter that's obedient. I tell you, girls, when you get up where God and man can bank on every word you say, you are loyal to your mother, you are good to your mother. No truthful girl will bo false or cross or mean to her mother. No truthful girl will lie up in bed in the morning until mother gets up and gets breakfast. If a girl is false to her mother she is false to everything that is noble. In one town in Georgia I knew a family of girls. Listen ! Their mother was a perfect slave for them. She cooked and ironed for these girls and did all the work about the house, and those girls just sat up and took care of their complexions and read ti*ashy novels; and that mother just protected the com- plexions of those girls and would not let them go out anywhere. Why, if they came down into tlie kitchen mother thought their complexions would be spoiled, and .sent them out again. Well, the mother got them the most beautiful complexions, and one of the girls married a barkeeper ; no, two of them married a barkeeper — at least, two barkeepers ; and one of them married a one-armed barkeeper — and all the others are old maids to this day. Uiiln't .she come out wonderful with her girls? Awful thought! Girls, (,. i. '. i'f.'l.y ■.i:.-;:ii 480 Sam Jones' Own Book. be truthful ; be true to father, be true to mother, be true to the right, be true to everything that God tells you. That is the truth. The Apostle said, put your mind and heart on truth and keep it there, and only study the true side of life, of character, and of all things, and live on that side ; and then he said, "Whatsoever things are honest!" Oh, an honest, open-hearted giv\ that never had a secret from mother, from brother, from father ; one of those honest- hearted girls that you can see through from her face to her heart ; I like that. Secrets have ruined many a girl. " I know something, and I ain't going to tell anybody." " I have a secret. I would not let ma know it for anything in the world. She would oppose it right straight. Mother has more old fogy opinions than anybody I ever saw in my life. I just know before I tell mother she will not like it at all." Mother won't like it. Especially if a girl has picked out one of those little perfumed, part-his- hair-in-the-middle, tooth-pick dudes in town. And you are satisfied mother won't like it. I will tell you another thing, girls. Listen ! Here are two 3'oung men come to town, both from the country, away out about forty miles from here. One comes to town. He has his old grey suit — an old grey wool suit — and a wool hat on, and he goes to clerk down here in a store. He is somewhat of an office boy at first, and he gets twelve dollars and a half a month. He boards with his aunt, who lets him stay vvith her for ten dollars a month, and that boy has to clothe himself on two dollars and a half a month — on two dollars and a half a month ! He jroes To Daughters. 481 to prayer-meeting every Wednesday night, Sunday- school every Sunday morning. Two young ladies afterwards meet at a young lady's house, and they say : " Well, there goes that fellow. He is a pluui duff, and my, I would ne\er like such a thing as that to call on me." Miss So-and-so says : " He met me one day, and he was just talking about prayer and Sunday-schools all the time. He is the biggest fool I ever saw in my life. My, I just pass a young man who cannot talk anything but prayer- meeting." Well, that bey goes on. At the end of the first year he is here in town they raise his wages from twelve dollars and a half a month to forty dol- lars a month, but he is sticking to his plain clothes and his plain warp. He still goes to prayer-meeting and to Sabbath-school, and w^rites home to mother about two or three times a week, and on he goes. By-and-by, when that boy has been here five years, I notice his name as a man in the firm's name. He is a partner in the business. It goes on, and in two more years he is still prospering. He is building him a nice little cottage out here in the suburbs, and the girls in town wonder who is jT^oiny to have that sim- pleton. Who is fool enough to marry him i Well, bless your soul, girls, he has sense enough to go back where he came from to marry, too, if you will watch him. Sure enough he goes back to the settle- ment, wath the old country church, right where he is raised, and he marries Mary Brown, the sweetest- spirited, nicest girl, and her character for right is as strong as her physical womanhood. He marries her and brings her into that beautiful little cottage, and i 1 ft (' il;: 482 Sam Jones' Own Book. she makes him a wife that is a wife indeed. She has joined the committee that has charge of the Orphans' Home over here, and then she is a consecrated woman trying to rescue the perishing, and save the fallen ; and she went to prayer-meeting with him every Wednesday night, to Sunday-school every Sunday morning. The next thing I see, that man now is a senior partner of that firm, and one of the leading business men of Toronto — a magnificent man. He is a member of the Church, and the Church looks upon him as one of its strongest props, and that man is an honor to Toronto, and his wife is a blessing to the poor fid destitute of the town. He started in the old grey clothes, and every girl in town laughed at him, and said they did not want any such fellow as him, the Lord knows. Well, here comes another boy from the country. He comes slicked up, and dressed up the first rlay he gets into town. From the start he is to get S2o per month. He starts right in. He was invited to everj'' parlor dance from the first week he got here. He is the verv ideal of good, and girls said that he was just too irresistible for anything. He is as sweet as apple pie, and they begin to take up with him, and every gii»l is getting jealous of every other girl. Which one will catch him ? One got him and she married him. About two years afterwards I was at her mother's house, and when we sat at the table for dinner, there came down a pale, sad, and desolate looking girl about twenty-one years old. She gave me a cold, stifi' bow and sat there and ate like a corpse would eat, if I can imagine a corpse eating — only the jaws and hands moving. She got To Daughters. 483 up and walked out of Uie room, and the poor old mother said to me : — " Mr. Jones, that is our unfor- tunate daughter who fell in love with a young dude here a few years ago and married him, and now he has run off and left her, poor child, and broke her heart." And now, girls, let me tell you, when you want to marry, don't run off with one of those little spider-legged dudes. I know where you get your dudes. The parlor dance is one of the best traps I ever seen to catch one in. You be what you ought to be at home ; be an honor to your mother and a blessing to your father. Know how to knit and how to make any garments, and get so you can play as well on the stove as you can play on the piano. And work along that way awhile, and first thing you know some first-class young man will find out where you live. He will hunt you up. I reckon some of you think he's mighty slow about it. But hold your ground, girls; live right and do right, and be an honor to yoir home, and some of these days you will prove the words of the preacher. Be true to , yourselves, true to God, and true to your mother; be an honest, transparent girl that everybody can see through — pure gold from head to foot. Then he said, " Whatsoever things are just." Well, now, justice is a great principle at home. Be just to your brother, be just to your sister, be just to your father, be just to your mother, be just to the young ladies with whom you associate. To be just in the best sense is one of the grandest principles in human nature aided by the divine grace. Be just 484 Sam Jones' Own Book. towards everybody. Sometimes you young ladies are very unjust to the servants at your father's house. I can put up with every other sort of a girl but a young lady that is cross and n^ean to another young lady that has to work for her living. You know that if you are that sort of a girl, that servant girl is better than you are. If you are cross and mean to her in your father's house, I say that servant girl, is in the eyes of God, better than you are. Nothing suits you. I put up at houses sometimes and I watch 'em. I can tell a girl by how she speaks to a servant at the table or in the sitting-room. I can just watch how she treats her mother and how she talks to her brothers, and I can tell a girl before I have been in a house forty-eight hours whether she is coming up on the line I am talking about. I went to a house once where justice was a great principle. I just watched them there awhile. I had my wife with me. We M'ere staying there two or three days, and I never saw anything like it in my life. Sisters v/ere just as kind and considerate with one another as could be, ahd you could see it wasn't any fixed-up pudding for show. It was that way all the time. You can tell the difference between the natural color and the paint on the cheek. I could see there was a perfect stream of kindness and justice flowing be- tween their hearts and lives all the time. I said to the lady of the house, her husband being present : " How many quarrels have you and your husband had since you were married?" She said, "We never had a quarrel." " How many unkind words ? " " We To Daughters. 485 have never had an unkind word at our house since we were married." Then I said to the husband: " Do you tell me that that's true ? " He said, " Yes, sir ; my wife has never spoken an unkind word. I am afraid I have." " What did you say ? " He said, " I cannot remember." Then his wife said, " Husband, you know you never spoke an unkind word to me in my life." I went back to that house in about three months. They asked me, " Why didn't you bring Mrs. Jones ? " " Didn't want to, she's been throwing all you up to me ever since she was here before. I am sorry she ever came here at all. I can't cut up a bit without her reminding me about you." Ladies, seek to make your home attractive to your brothers, so that they won't want to leave it. Make home such an attractive place that mother will never have to sing, " Where is my wandering boy to- night ? " Maybe he is running away from his cross sister right then. " Whatsoever things are just." If you do unkindly to your sister, go and apologize. If you treat brother unkindly, go and apologize. If you have spoken crossly to your mother, go and tell mother you are sorry, ask her to forgive you, and tell her you won't do it again. " Whatsoever things are pure." I will give you this little incident to show you that to the pure all tilings are pure. A gentleman met me on the street, and said, "Jones, a man told me that he would never go and hear you any more ; that you were the most vulgar man he ever listened to." " Who was he ? " " He's a bar- keeper in town." A bar-keeper, that lived in an atmosphere of vulgarity and wickedness, thought I m 486 Sam Jones' Own Book. r . t ' ■ ^^ Ui« ji was the most vulgar man he ever heard. " To the pure all things are pure." I was preaching at Springs. I talked about the fashionable dancing girls — shook 'em round. They went away the mad- dest crowd you ever saw. Did you ever see a mad girl ? I reckon you've heard 'em. Well, sir, they just went away raving. I heard about what they said, and I said, " Girls, you left last night mad. I tried to talk to you in an honest, brotherly way about those ball-rooms over at that hotel. I talked candidly and plainly. I talked to you girls with a father's love and a brother's tenderness, and you went away mad. That pure, innocent girl that never went to a ball-room thought those remarks were so gracious ; it was so kind to talk that way to girls ; but you girls that have been waltzing round with the drunken young men, you think I am the most vulgar man you ever listened to." You see it ain't "Who's talking?" but it is "What does he say ? " and what sort of a girl is it out there listen- ing to him ? Do you get the idea ? " Oh, Mr. Jones, tell us what harm there is in dancing ? " Oh, dear ! There is not anybody since I have been here, to ask me to please tell them what harm there is in family prayers ? Nobody has asked me what harm I thought there was in paying your debts. Nobody has asked me to give my opinion of the harm there was in reading the Bible and doing: the will of God. Nobody asked me that sort of a question. I will tell you another thing. Whenever you hear folks asking what harm there is in so and so, they already know there is harm, but think they may be able to argue To Daughters, 487 around so as to make it appear that there is none in it. Girl, listen ! the Bishop of the Catholic Church of New York said that nineteen out of every twenty- fallen girls, at the confessional, told him they got their downfall first at the dancing-room. Now, girls, are any of you idiots enough to ask the ques- tion again — " What harm is there in dancinjr ? " Can you hear a Catholic priest say nineteen out of every twenty fallen girls at the confessional state that they got their fall in a dancing-room ; that nineteen out of twenty fell in that way, and have you no more sense than to ask the question, " What harm is there in dancing ? " Then I will say another thing. I will talk plain to you. I will never get a talk to you again this side of the judgment, and I am talking straight from my text. " Whatsoever things are pure." Are pure, girls, listen ; listen to me. You mind whom y^" associate with. You cannot associate with the wicked without becoming contaminated. To save your life you cannot do it. A girl that will sit down in her parlor with a young man who drinks and is steeped in sin, she cannot sit down and talk with him with- out being contaminated to save her life. " Whatso- ever things are pure." The father is sitting alone in his study, and the daughtei* comes in and says : " Father, do you care if I go tc the ball to-night ?" He said : " No, daughter, I would rather you would not go." "Why, father?" " Daughter, I don't like the company you will be in." She said : " Papa, I know the company ain't all first-class, but I am not afraid of that hurting me." He says : " Daughter, m \ I 488 Sam Jones' Own Book. :4r ' 'y .i:.-;»- .,ii ^^f, 1 7?" II what is that on the hearth ?" She says : " It is a dead coal." He said : " Pick it up." She picked it up ill her fingers and her father said : " Daughter, does it harm you ?" She says : " No, sir." " Well," says her father, " throw it down." He says : " What is that on your fingers, daughter ?" She said : " It is smut." Well, daughter, when you go into bad com- pany, if they don't burn you they will smut you every time." I will tell you another thing. That girl out there fifteen years old. There she sits back there. Ain't these fast girls mighty attractive to you ? Mother, you had better lay your daughter on the funeral pile and burn her into ashes, than let her run with some of these fast young ladies in this town. You mark what I tell you. There are girls in this city who will ruin any girl in the world that will run with them. Bad company will ruin young ladies just as bad company will ruin young men. That is the truth. Watch your company. Don't you ever go with any girl if she M'ill do things that you won't do, and say things that you won't say. If you do, you will be saying those says and doing those things yourself. "Whatsoever things are pure." Then I give you a little advice along here. When you walk with a young man, especially in Toronto, with its gas lights and electric lights burning, you just say, " I an: not afraid of falling ; I don't need to take your arm ; I am sure-footed." Well, I can see how you might take a young man's arm ; but the most despicable sight is a young lady that will let a young man take her arm. Are you afraid the girl will break her neck ? It's a scandal, a young lady •w^ To Dauohteks. 489 walking- clown the street with a young man, his arm inside of hers, and he grasping her wrist, and his arm playing between her arm and her body. It's one of the most disreputable, vulgar sights any good society ever tolerated in the world. Now, get mad with me for that. I say I can see how a young lady can take a young man's arm. That's all right, per- chance. But, young lady, you dare not, by the price of all that women hold inestimable — you dare not let a young man take your arm ; for I say to you, your protection of all that you call valuable in this world depends upon the fact that you keep your person as sacred as the heart of God. That is the reason I don't like these round dances. Young lady, listen ; when a young man puts his arm around you and dances with you, you are a pure, noble girl ; but you don't know what sort of a lecherous wretch has got his arms around you. You cannot tell to save your life. If I were going to walk into a room, whether fiddles are going or not ; if I walked into a room, whether they were dancing or not, and saw my daughter with the arms of a young man about her, I would slap them both down to the floor ; and I don't know which I would slap first. But I'll never see that. I trust God my daughter will have so much respect for her pure mother, if not for herself, that she will never be clasped in the arms of a young man dancing to the tune of a fiddle. You will say, " Mr. Jones, you are too rough." But girls, remember, you may have listened to smoother-tongued preachers, but you never looked in the face of a preacher that loved and prized your 1 1 : -. i 490 Sam Jones' Own Book. nil •il integrity more than I do. I love your character as 1 love the character of my precious daughters ; and I say to you, let your character, like your person, be as sacred as the heart of God. That's it. Girls are not particular enough about who they go with. Don't go with a young man that drinks or doesn't live right. Oh, girls, I tell you we need some fathers in this country worse than we need anything else. Oh, that any man can lay around and drink Saturday night, and maybe spend the night in a shameless house, and then be found Sunday after- noon dressed up and perfumed anmi ■ age who had been oft" to school, Mary was invit' md she brought the invitation to me. She sa^ " Now, father, I submit the (juestion to you, ana iiere it is. I am invited to supper, and now, shall I go ? " I read the note of invitation. I said : "Daughter, do you want to go?" She said just as honest and candid, " Father, if you want me to go, I want to go. If you don't want me to go, 1 don't want to go." And she said, " That is the secret of it. Your will is my pleasure about the whole matter." I pulled the child up to my heart, and I said, " Daughter, just speak your will;" and she said, " Father, I have no will at all in this matter. I will be happy to go or stay if you will be happy in my going or staying." That is the way for a daughtei to talk. The father only says his will and his daughter is happy either way. Girls, father says you cannot go, and yon sweep out of the room and run up stairs and pout for a week. " The Lord knows, he never did let me have any pleasure. I wish I was dead, that's all I wish." God pity the girl who does not know enough to submit such a tk\ f I'' ' 494 SaiM Jones' Own Book. question to mother, who does not love mother enough. Now, children, I spoke of that little girl simply to show you if you run on that line father will talk about you just as I talk about that darling child. The balance of them are just about as bad as you are, but, thank God, that is one good one. Chil- dren, do right, live right. Mind these plain things. I could have told vou a lot of ghost stories and had you all sobbing, but life ain't a life of ghosts. I don't want to scare you with ghosts, and make you laugh and cry over things that have no existence. But I have talked candidly and plainly, and may God sanctify the talk to the good of every one pre- sent. And now I want every young lady that says " God help me, I am going to lead a better life than I ever led before" to stand up. Well, thank God for such a sight. Little girls, elder girls, everybody, when you pray, pray that God may help me that I may be useful wherever I go to work in the name of Jesus Christ. Sayinos. Hope is but the mile post on the way to heaven. That's religion — to want to avoid the thing that's wrong and to do the thing that's right. Religion will make the /'cor clean and the pillow- case shine as bright as snow in its puritj' and white- ness. If ray daughter only had one dress, that should be a whole one. If it lacked anything at all, 1 should cut it off at the bottom and never at the top. tr*'^ e mother little girl ine father %i darling as bad as ne. Chil- in thing.s. s and had ghosts. I nake you existence, and may r one pre- bhat says life than k God for /erybody, me that I ! name of heaven, in (J that's le pillow- id white- it should at all, I the top. SBRMON XXXIV. TO YOUNG MEJS\ I BELIEVE I'll give you your choice. What shall I preach about? What is the best thing for this hour? Would you rather have an ordinary, mat- ter-of-fact sermon, or the truth — right out from the shoulder ; the truth rubbed in a little thicker and faster than you ever had it before ? [The evangelist halted for ?. reply, and there came from nearly every section of the great hall a respon- sive murmur, " The truth."] Well, let's be quiet, then. I tell you how I feel against this. Whenever a man stands up to preach the Gospel to me I have just three questions I want to put to him. The first is this: "Do you mean kindly towards me? Have you sympathy and kindness and brotherly affection in your breast towards me?" If he answers that satisfactorily, I'll put another question to him, and it's this : "Do you know what you're talking about?" There's a good deal in that question. The next question is this, and it's the last: "Do you live what you preach?" Now the first question — Do I mean kindly towards you? Well, now, I could not mean otherwise, because I haven't got anything against anybody in Toronto. I have no reason why I should be mad with anybody here. I never wu.s treated kinder, and never was 495 496 Sam Jones' Own Book. ■S—Tt- more drawn to a people in my life than I have been to you. The second question — Do I know what I'm talking about ? Well, now, maybe I'll answer that before I get through. The third question — Do I live what I preach ? If you will catch me at anything I have denounced I'll quit that or quit preaching at once. I never intend being a hypocrite, God being my helper. I'll tell you another thing. If, as a preacher, I didn't want to live what I preached, I'd live what I preached for policy's sake, if for nothing else in the universe. A man who will preach against a thing and then do it is not only a hypo- crite, but a fool. Now, let's throw our hearts wide open to receive the truth to-night. Let's love the truth, and the man that tells the truth. If there's a young man here afraid of having his feelings hurt by hearing the truth, there's no question in my mind but he'd better go home. Candidly, if I never preach again, God helping me, I'll preach the truth to-night, just as I see it and believe it. Don't come blubber- ing after it's over and tell me your feelings are hurt. I'll not hurt the feelings of any man that does the right thing." Now this is my text, taken from Genesis : — " Escape for thy life." The love of life is nstinctivein the bosom of every man, and right alongside of it is the instinctive dread of death. We all love life and we all dread death. There is only one thing stronger than my love for life and my dread of death, and that is despair ; and suicide is the last retreat of despair. That we love To YouNo Men. 497 life we have but to look around us and see the mil- lions spent annually on physicians and mineral waters, and the various sanitary features of the earth. Now I might say by way of analof^y here, that I have a physical existence and a moral existence — the soul and the body. I know that there are certain substances that are life-perpetuatinj^ to anybody, that feed and sustain me if I take them, and I know that there are certain death-producing substances that kill the body if I take them. If this be true, it is equally true that with a moral or spiritual nature there are certain lines of moral conduct that perpetuate the life of the soul, and certain lines of immoral conduct that will kill the soul. Our text to-night comes to us with all the force of a God-pro- nounced exhortation, and says to us, " Escape for thy life." Escape ! From what ? There is only one answer. It is this — Escape from sin. Sin is the only thing in the universe that can harm a man's soul. Disappointment may render me unhappy, and grief may make me weak, and misfortune may make me sad, but, thank God, nothing in this universe can harm my soul but sin. A great many men propose to differ as to the duration of hell. Some say it will last simply for a while ; and others say it is eternal. I am not interested to know how long they may put it at. The question of all questions with me is not — How lonij will hell last ? But — How long will sin last ? How long will that lie you told yesterday last ? How long does it take for a lie to get old and gray-headed, and wrinkled, and die ? I promise you hell will last just as long as sin will live, and no 498 Sam Jones' Own Book. longer. Ain't the lie you told ten years ago as much of a lie to-day as when you told it ? It' you coui- mitted adultery or fornication 40 years ago, ain't it just as much adultery now as then ? It will live for- ever. It does not make much difference which way you came to the Rink, but it makes an eternal differ- ence whether you did right or wrong on your way here to-night. I believe in the omnipotent grace of God and I build ray hopes on it ; but I don't believe that God can ever make it so that it was right for you to have told a lie or committed a deed out of harmony with His law. God can't do that until He can make what oujjht not to have been what ought to have been. Some men think that God can do any- thing. I heard a man say one day, " I can do some- thing God can't do." " What's that irreverent man talking about," I said to myself, but he repeated, " I can do something God can't do ; I can tell a lie, and God can't." God did not lie when He said, "The wicked shall be turned into hell, where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." I want you to remember that when you read this passage. I say, my brethren, God works within a circle of laws, and of laws that are God -made, and if it is wrong to tell a lie to-day, and 1 tell a lie, it will be a lie forever, and in heaven, if I get there. I shall regret that I ever told that lie. " Escape for thy life." Escape froui what ? Escape sin. What is sin ? A transgression of the law. Let us discuss it under that broad proposition, and let us be very practical, and let me deal with you just as I would like a man to deal with me when he stood up To YouNo Men. 499 and preached to me. Some o? you may not see it just as I do. It makes all the difference from what stand- point you look at a thing. It' I was down there with some of you I should see it as you do. But I'm afraid to go down there. I'm afraid I'd die before I'd get back, and how awful that would be ! And if you come up here you'd see it from the same stand- point that I do. Escape the sin of profanity. That's a very generally practised sin among men. We have it on every square of this beautiful city. Do you suppose there's a square in this city where an oath has not been uttered to-day, beautiful and quiet as your Sunday here is ( Do you suppose there's a hundred cubic feet of atmosphere in this city into which an oath has not been wafted to-day ! Pro- fanity is a much more generally practised thing than preachers think. I tell you man's getting mighty low down socially when he will swear in the pre- sence of a minister, and our preachers have very little conception of what we call profanity. Suppose I were to stand up here and say that every man who would swear would steal. If I said that, somebody would jump up and shake his list in my face and say I lied. Now, let's see about that. There's a man sitting out there who will swear, but you couldn't get him to steal. That's a fact. But why won't he do it ? Here's four sins. Suppose I say a man that will steal will tell lies and get drunk and curse. " Oh, yes," you say ; " that's true enough; 1 believe that." Well, suppose I couie back the other way, and say, " The man who will cur.se will tell lies and steal and get drunk." " Oh, no ; that won't do," you say. n:l' 500 Sam Jones' Own Book. Well, they say it's a mighty poor rule that won't work both ways. " Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for He will not hold him guiltless that taketh His name in vain." And again, " Thou shalt not steal. " Here'.s a man who will curse and not steal. Why won't he steal ? He can .sin as much as he likes and break the one commandment, and keep clear of the law of man ; but if he starts to get around the other commandment, liPi runs right into the arms of the sheriff, and the judges, and the policemen. Let me whisper this into your ears in thunder-tones to-night : The man that will break one of God's commandments habitually and continu- ally, if you will turn him loose, will break them all. I will risk my all on that proposition. Profanity! profanity! .Little boys swear! Grown men swear! Fathers swear in the presence of their children. What do you want to swear for? How much more salary do you get on your " cus.sing" ? Does your wife think more of you ? You have a very strange wife if she thinks more of you because you are a good " cusser." Does it make your chil- dren respect you more highly? Strange children if it does. Does it make your neighbors think more of you ? How degrading the sin of profanity! A young man about town who's not cut his moustache yet, and he can outcurse a sailor. I see very little future ahead of a young man that has learned the cursing alphabet from Alpha to Omega before he has learned properly anything else in the world. Hear me now. Make up your mind all of you to .say to-night, what- ever you may do or not do, " I have sworn my last To Young Men. oOl oath." It i.s a disreputable, degrading prtictice, and you may say what you please about it, but profanity IS more or lesa a profession of your loyalty to the devil. The man who will swear lacks that much of being a gentleman, whatever else you may say about him. For you to stand around on a street and curse and swear before strangers is the height of bad manners and ill grace, when a gentleman who loves Gud and honors His name perhaps is subjected to your miserable profanity, and is compelled to hear a black-mouthed radical like you blaspheme the name of God. Now, if you don't like that, old fellow, you can lump it. You told me you wanted the straight truth, and I'm giving it to you. Escape the sin of profanity. Quit it now and quit it forever. It is one of the cardinal sins of humanity and a damning- sin. Let's never more be guilty of a sin for which there is no excuse in this world or in the world to come. Next escape the sin of Sabbath-breaking. Many a man in this town is going to hell as a Sabbath-breaker, and goes about bragging all the time what a good Sunday we have here in Toronto. Don't understand me as under-estimating the grace and virtue of this city, but the fact that there are enough good people here to make the rest of you behave yourselves on Sunday is not a proof that the majority of you are God's people. There's a good deal of difference between decency and religion. Suppose I want to make a proposition. Every man who has reverenced and kept holy one Sabbath this year, stand up. I won't make the proposition, because I don't want to make tlie If ' ii. H ; f^ If r ii 502 Sam Jones' Own Book. majority of you feel bad. People say, " I don't like those Sunday Christians." Well, I do. Sunday Christians are the only kind of Christians that I do like. You show me a man who keeps the Sabbath day holy, and I'll show you a man that's a Christian all the week. T like the old Presbyterian record — cold dinners and Bible and faithfulness to the words of the Lord on this Sabbath question. I have some respect for the old hard-shell Baptist who said : " I was born a hard-shell Baptist and shall live and die one, but, thank God, I have a j^ood Presbyterian wife to raise my children ! " But you Presbyterians can't take that credit to you now. I'm talking of you as you used to be, not as you are now. Escape the sin of Sabbath-breaking, young man. Where did you go last Sunday night in that carriage or buggy ? Where did you go ? Who did you have there with you ? What did you have under the seb,t ? If I could see this city on Sunday night as God sees it, I should be able to pick out hundreds and thousands of beings that desecrate the Sabbath in this city. You shut your bar-rooms in front on Sundays, but how many of them are shut in the rear ? There's not an old red-nosed toper in this town that don't know his way into a bar-room when every door is closed ; he can get in through the keyhole. I know how impossible it is to have the law enforced on this liquor question. I have seen men perjure their souls as black as hell down in Atlanta, to shield the men that sold them the cursed stuff after the Prohibitory Law had been passed. " Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy." Spend it in the fear and love To YouNo Mkn. oO.S 't like nnday it I tlo abbath iristiau jcord — 3 words tre some aif all so. .,.». There is no future before you if you do 'hese things. If you love to play cards now you ma be iramblins this time twelve months. What a fearful thing is licentiousness among the children of men I When a man sinned in this way he committed a sin which might last forever. Boys, there are women in this city whose character is gone forever. God pity the wretches that despoiled them of their virtue. There were doctors who would say to young men : " You cannot be virtuous and be healthy." In such instances they said : " You must do this in order to perpetuate your life." It was a lie ! it was a lie ! God never made man so that he could not be decent without injuring his health. The doctor who told a voung man he must have illicit To Young Men. 605 cohabitation to preserve health was a scientific scoundrel. If a doctor made a similar statement to his daughter he would give him the essence of a double-barrelled shot gun. I believe the moat fearful lick that Ingersoll ever hit the Church was when he pictured a girl debauched by a villain, and the girl goes down to hell, but the man marries a virtuous girl and joins the Methodist Church, and dies, and goes home to heaven, and his poor victim writhes down in hell forevpr I can't believe it. God pity the man that has the blood of virtue on his head. Escape licentiousness. I see some of you old brethren shaking your heads at me. Where's my Bible ? (Turning round, the evangelist secured his Bible.) Now shake your dignified heads at God's Word, or not at all. Turn to the 7th chapter of Proverbs : (the preacher read the chapter named, stopping at the verse, " Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.") A gentleman told me the other day, speaking of the town he was living in, that he did not believe there was a pure boy in the town between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five. Awful thought ! What if this wave of licentiousness should sweep over the other half of society ! Good Lord ! Let me see virtuous wives and daughters cold in their graves before that fearful tide shall sweep over the other half of society. God keep our women. I wish society would look at this thing right. There is not a wife or a daui>:hter on earth that has not as much right to be unclean to- wards you as you to them. Boys, as you look into the faces of your mother and sister say : " I shall live m 606 Sam Jones' Own Book. and die with virtue written upon my character as it is stamped on the character of my mother and sister." I have done my message. I have been as honest as I knowed how to be. I've been as gentle as the subject would permit me. God help you to take these things home. Now, I want every man here who means to hrv and live an honest, truthful, virtu- ous life in future to stand up. [Every man in the great hall stood.] " Thank God ! There's 5,000 men. God help and bless you ! " Sayings. There is not an old sinner in Toronto that some church member has not acted dog with him, and made him say, " If this is religion, I don't want religion." They will put you in gaol for stealing a man's money, but you can be an average church member and steal a man's character. God does not judge by numbers ; God goes by weight. Many a good, fat 200 lbs. avoirdupois Methodist won't count one-third of an ounce in God's scales. God pity a man that hasn*t got enough to keep him enjoying life, without running into the sins of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Heaven is just the other side of where a fellow does his best. The lazy man is not worth anything in the king- dom of heaven. SKRMON XXXV. THE P»ROr)IG-ATj SON. " I will arise and go to my father." — Luke xv. 18. WE shall read a running comment on the Parable of the Prodigal Son : "And he said, A certain man had two sons ; and the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living. And not many days after the younger son gathered all together and took his Journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living. And when he had spent all there arose a mighty famine in that land, and he began to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat ; and no man gave unto him. And when he came to himself he said, How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger ! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him. Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son : make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said unto him : Father, I have sinned against 607 tl 508 Sam Jones' Own Book. lir _ji .,.-.- 1, heaven and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet. And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat and be merry. For this my son was dead, and is alive again ; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry. Now, his elder son was in the field, and as he came and drew nigh to the house he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the ser- vants, and asked what these things meant. And he said unto him, Thj brother is come, and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound. And he was angry, and would not go in ; therefore came his father out and en- treated him. And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither trans- gressed I at any time thy commandment ; and yet thou never gavestme a kid that I might make merry with my friends ; but as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf. And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad ; for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again ; and was lost, and is found."— Luke xv. 11-32. I never feel I am any kin to this older brother. Really, I don't know who he is. I don't know what place God intends he shall fill in the vast moral uni- verse. This much I know : we live in a fallen world. There are unfallen worlds. I reckon the inhabitants The Prodigal Son. 509 of these worlds ought to have kept their first estate, and they would not have had to cry out when God threw his arms around a wandering, wayward man that has spent his all with harlots. I suppose the unfallen worlds look on with astonishment and won- der, and they wonder why it is God should be so good to tliis fallen world when they never transgressed. Brethren, there isa moral universe allaround us. This young man, the older of the two, occupies some place in that moral universe. I hope, I trust, I believe that there is such a thing ?" mercy to cover his case. We will leave him in the hands of God while we di.scuss the other brother this evening — the one that is kin to us ; the one we have known all our life. If this prodigal boy were not my brother I should never think I am a man myself. Let us take the parable just as it presents itself to us, and we will modernize it so that we can get hold of it and see it plainly ; for this is one of the most perfect pictures of human nature the world ever looked upon. This parabolic illustration of a thing is but the photograph, the portrait of it ; and here is one of the finest portraits of humanity that inspiratiui^ ever drew, for it is so lifelike — so like me, so like you, and so like every man of us. O, what a picture of human nature ! If Christ had never said another word but this I would have always looked upon the author of this parable as divine, for it stamps him as a divine person. " A certain man," he said, " had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father. Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth io me. IP ,i,^ 510 Sam Jones' Own Book. And he divided unto them his living." I have heard preachers say some mighty hard things about this )y ; they said he was wicked, dissipated, and wila ctnd profligate at home; that he was the worry of his father's heart, and gave his mother so much trouble. I don't know where they got that idea of this prodigal boy; they didn't get it out of the Bible, sure. Look here now : if that young fellow was prodigal and wild, and dissipated and wasteful, and his father divided with him his living, his father was a fool to start with. We will put it in that shape. This younger brother (according to the laws in those days, the older brother inherited the estate, and the younger brother had no legal claim on his father), this younger brother comes to his father and says : " Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me," and he immediately divided his living. Without a word of remonstrance, or hesitancy, or advice, he turns over to this young fellow this great amount of property. The face of the parable shows that, up to that hour, the young man was praiseworthy, upright, industrious, and worthy of the confidence of his father, so far as all outward manifestations of his conduct w ere con- cerned. I repeat it : A man that has sense enough to accumulate a fortune, or sense enough to take care of an inherited fortune, is too wise to turn over a vast amount of property without a word of remon- strance or advice, to a wayward, dissipated, profli- gate boy. He wouldn't do that — no father would — and the very face of the parable shows that this m The Prodigal Son. 511 boy, so far as his father knew, was trustworthy. I have always felt sorry for this boy when 1 saw the preachers jump on him, and stamp on him, and beat and kick him. I have ! I feel sorry for many a poor sinner, too. I wouldn't touch a hair of your head, brother, if I could get the meanness out of you without doing it ; and every stamp and kick and jerk I make at you is to jerk and stamp and kick the meanness out of you. If I could go through this country with Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup and get more souls to Christ by having the sinners each take a teaspoon- ful, I would invest every nickel I have in that syrup. • I would that ! I am for the efficient thing, for that which will make you cease to do evil and learn to do right. That's all I have against you. I haven't anything else against you, for I love you all as if you were my own brothers ; but, O, how it makes me feel bad and sad to see the way you do ! It hurts me on your account, and on your wife's account, and on your children's account, and on account of humanity. I am your brother, and when you suffer I suffer ; when you rejoice I rejoice. I am happy at every happy man I meet ; I am sad at every dejected, sorrowful, sinful character I meet. I weep with those who weep, and I rejoice with those who rejoice. Lord, lift us up here in this city, to where we can rejoice with those that rejoice, and where there will be none to weep with and mourn with, and none to feel sad over! Let's catch the thought of this parable, and find our way back to God. "A certain man had two 612 Sam Jones' Own Book. ^ " Ai • sons. And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living. And not many days after the younger son gathered all to- gether, and took his journey into a far country." We may imagine this father divided his portion to the younger son, and the young man then spent a whole week in getting everything in order for the journey. We may say that his property consisted of camels, and sheep, and horses, and servants : and now he has spent the week in gathering all together ; and we will say when Saturday niyht comes all the plans have been perfected, and on Monday morning, bright and early, this grand pageant, this vast caravan, drives out in front of the old homestead, and the young man calls a halt to all movement, and stops, and hushes everything into silence ; and he walks back up through the front gate, and up the avenue on to the porch of the old homestead, and he takes his father's hands, and says: "Good-bye, father!" and we can see that father look upon him with eyes of love and mercy, and .say : " Good-bye, boy !" and the tears course down his cheek ; and then the boy turns to his mother to bid her good-bye, and the mother instinctively throws her arms about her boy, and says: "Good-bye, son !" and then she imprints a thousand kisses on his face, and she says to him : " Son, remember the instructions of j^our youth." The young fellow then deliberately turns his back on father, and mother, and home, and walks out of the front gate, and bids the caravan move off, and The PiioDioAL Son. 513 they move off in grand style. It is a wonderful pageant, and mother and father linger on the front veranda and watch the procession as it passes out of sight, and gradually winds its way over the brow of the hill and disappears from view. The father turns round and utters an earnest prayer, " God, look after my boy ;" and the mother, with the tears running down her cheeks, says, " O, shall I ever see my boy again?" On the boy moves with his caravan, and I imagine about sundown he drives out on a beautiful camping- ground, pitches his tent, and arranges everything for the coming of the night ; and now I can see every- thing in order, and everything has been cared for, and now I see the young man as he unfolds his coat, spreads it out, and lays himself down for his night's rest, and turns his eyes to the heavens above him, and he begins to think, " This is the first night I have spent from my home. This is the first night I have ever slept from beneath the roof of the old homestead. This is the first night I have been where I could not hear mother's voice, and could not hear father's advice." I have wished many a time that that boy, before he went to sleep that first night, had settled it in his mind, " This is my first night from home, and by the grace of God it shall be my last, for to-morrow morning, when I arise I shall turn this caravan around, and will drive back to the old homestead." 0, if he had settled that, how many hours of heart- ache, and anguish, and desolation and misery that boy would have avoided ? 0, poor, miserable. ol4 Sam Jones' Own Book. ■:!' wandering boy, I've thought a thousand times of you, and wished you had turned around and gone back. We see him next morning with renewed vigor rising early, and after a simple breakfast drives on and on, and the next evening the same scene is re-enacted. He goes to bed, and I think, " Well, young fellow, you see now this is your second night out. You're on your journey, two days away from home ; " and I wish that night the boy had settled it in his mind, " This is my second night from home, and by the grace of God to-morrow night shall be my last. I will turn my face on my journey and will go back, and in two days I'll reach the old homestead." That boy would have been away from home only four days if he had done that. But on and on and on he drives, each night repeating the same scene ; and at the end of vhe sixth day, Satur- day night, he picks him out a pleasant camping- ground on which to remain over Sunday. A boy never gets his own consent to break the Sabbath the first week he is away from home. The boy says, " I'll tie up here, and rest. It is father's Sabbath and mother's Sabbath, and I will reverence this day." The boy was only a week from home then, you see, and he couldn't afford to break the Sabbath. He winds up his first week on Saturday night, and he goes to bed, and as he lies there look- ing up at the bright, cold stars in the heavens he says, " I am six days' journey from home." The next morning is the Sabbath, and the sun rises gloriously and bathes the scene in a sea of light, and as he t. The PiioDioAL Son. 515 looks around on that beautiful Sabbath-tlay he haa the consciousness, " This is the first Sabbath I ever spent from home ; this is the first Sabbath sun that ever rose on me when away from my father's house." I wish he had settled it that morning, and said, " By the grace of God as this is my first Sunday from home, it shall be my last Sunday froTn home." I've wished a thousand times this wayward boy had turned his train around the next morning, and driven back to the old homestead. If he had, he would have been out just one Sabbath from home, and the next Sunday would have found him sitting by his mother's side, listening to her sweet voice, and by his father's side, listening to his words of counsel. 0, if had settled the thing that way, how many weeks of hard- ship he would have shunned, and how many hours and days of misery he would have avoided ! Monday morning finds him driving on and on, and I imagine that at the end of his second week's jour- ney he drove into a magnificent, fertile country, and as he looked at the beautiful land and surveyed the situation, he said : " I believe this would be a good place to settle down ; " but something suggested to him the thought : " Well, if you buy here and settle down, you won't get more than settled before the old lady'll come down here on a visit with the old man, and they'll want to break in on your arrangements and advise you how to run things, and they'll meddle with your affairs ; and if you're going to make out for yourself and create a name for yourself and build up a fortune, the best thing for you to do is to pick up and get to where they won't visit you." WT I 516 Sam Jones' Own Book. The fact is, the purpose of the boy's mind was this : he had been watching his father, and saw his old fop^y notions and way of doing things, and lie thought many a time, " If the old man would turn this thing over to me, I'd manage the thing better than he does." Yes, and some of you fathers who turned things over to your boys — where are you now ? If you don't mind your boys, some of you, they'll ruin you ! You can't afford to turn over to your son his part of the estate, and you mustn't let your boys bankrupt your wife, their mother, and their sisters. Well, the boy watched the old man until he thought the old man was stupid, and he thought his old fogy notions wouldn't do, and his idea was, " If father will turn his estate over to me, I will be able to double, and triple, and quadruple it in value in less than ten years. My idea is to buy a magnificent plantation, stock it well with fine stock, build me a palatial resi- dence, and arrange everything in first-class order, and when I get to counting the money, then I won't mind a visit from the old folks. But I'll want to have matters all arranged before they begin to meddle and interfere." Well, the prodigal boy drives on and on, and at the end of the third week he drives into another beautiful locality, and I imagine he says, " This suits me. This is magnificent ground here. I like this soil and climate. I like this altitude. I'll buy here." Then he begins to think, " Why there's a post-office in the settlement over yonder, and I won't be here three weeks before I'll get a long letter from father full of advice, and I'll get a long sentimental The Prodigal Son. 517 letter from mother, and they'll bo doinj^ nothinj^ but advising and sug^^esting. The fact of the business is, if I'd wanted their advice I'd have stayed at home. I don't want to be meddled with and inter- fered with, I'm a whale, and if there's anything bigger than that, I'm that!" Boys, liaven't you often felt that way ? Haven't you felt it crawling up your sleeve and running all over you, and you thought you were bigger than your father ? " Into a far-off country," and on he drove. I want to say another thing here. The boy's moving off in style ; he's got plenty of money ; he's no poor man ; able to pay his way. I imagine him moving on with his great train of servants and stock, until at last he pulls up before a beautiful country place, and he says, "I guess I'll sleep in a uu? .sion to-night. I'll tie up at this good man's house on the wayside here." Next morning, when the time comes for him to depart, he turns to the good man, and says, "What's your bill, old fellow?" The old man says, " Why, it's nothing. I'm glad to have you stay with me. I won't charge you a cent." The young fellow swells up, and he says, " You can't insult me, old man. I've got plenty of money. I'm no pauper in this country. I don't want to be insulted by having any man treat me like a pauper. Name your amount." That's the way ! You've been there, haven't you, boys ? I'll tell you another thing; whenever you strike one of these I'ln-no-pauper fellows, if you'll put your dogs on his track they'll treo him at a hog-pen ! There's many a boy in this rink this evening that's 518 Sam Jones' Own Book. headed for the hoj^-pen ; and you'll never turn until you get there either, and some of you never ! " Able to pay my way ! " I imagine when his money did get scarce he sold some of his stock and still had plenty of money. On and on the prodigal boy drove, and when he had reached a far-off country — then what ? He bought him a hundred thousand acres of the most fertile land in the settlement ; he built him a pala- tial residence and stocked his farm, and he was a prince in the land ! I've seen many a boy that thought he was a prince. But when he reached that far-off country, what did he do ? He spent all — not part of it — in riotous living ! Listen, again. When he had spent all there arose a mighty famine in that land. Did you ever notice, brother, when you're out of money it seems as if everybody else is out too ? Didn't you notice when you didn't have a thing in the world you couldn't get a man to be your friend ? Did you ever notice when a man had spent his all there w'as a famine to him, no matter what there was to other people ? Ever think of that, boys ? Oh, how true that is ! There is a family down town here ; they haven't a dollar in the worjd, and there's a famine right here in T(»roiito for them. Every grocery in town is loaded " vith riour, and meat, and all kind of eatables, •re's a famine in their home. And it was they had spent all that their arose a mighty lani.iio in this land. Now, brother, w^hen you get to this point where you see the f e nine, where you see how this young The Prodigal Son. 619 man ended, we'll leave the young man there, and let's you and I go back and come down round this line ! Brother, here's human nature ; let's see what there is in this for us. Let's see what's in this life- picture. When you were ten — and you were twelve — and you were fourteen — and you yonder sixteen, you were spotless boys, as pure as snow. You looked up to your father's God, and said, " Give me the spiritual portion that falleth to me," and God turned over to you your mother's prayers and your father's advice and Gospel influences, and the precious Bible given you by ;your mother, and all good influ- ences God turned over to you, and then you started into a far-otf country. Do you know that a man can live in the same house with his mother, and sleep in the next room to his mother, and yet be in a far-off country from his mother ? Do you know that ? Do you know that a man may be in the world with God and yet be away from God ? J )o you know that? Oh, young man, I'm so glad that the purity of your mother and the sanctity of your home make you a great distance from it. I am so glad there's a place of purity for poor disconsolate ones on earth to resort to occasionally. Young man, listen ! You started out with your spiritual heritage ; you went on spending your sub- stance ; you threw away your father's advice, your mother's prayers. Oh, mother's prayers, how much they are worth ! You threw away the Gospel in- fluences of your younger days. You threw away all that was good. You have been scattering, scattering ! scattering it along the way, and there you sit to-day. 520 Sam Jones' Own Book. and you haven't a vestige of your spiritual heritage left you. All gone ! All gone ! " And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in the land." Oh, loy, with the world full of Bibles, you haven't one ! With other mothers praying, your mother has gone from you forever ! With other fathers advising their children, your father has ceased to speak, and his lips are closed and cold in death ! Oh, how desolate is he who has spent his all in riotous liviug ! I was preaching once, and after preaching I said, *'If there is a man in this house that feels in his heart, ' I haven't a thing left, I haven't a friend left in the world,' come up and give me your hand," and immediately one poor disconsolate fellow arose and walked up the aisle and took me by the hand, and with a face that spoke more than words could, he said : " Mr. Jones, I haven't a friend in the world. I haven't anything left on ( arth. It is all gone, all gone." Oh, '^ethren, there was a mighty famine in that man's laud. Oh, what a thought ! Oh, what a thought ! He had wasted all ! Boys, where is the Bible mother gave you ? Where's the sweet lullaby of your cradle ? Fathers, where are the sermons that touched your hearts in your younger days ? Men of the world, where are the good influences that should have made you happy Christians ? All gone ! All wasted in riotous livinof ! " And when he had spent all there arose a mighty famine in that land." My presiding elder told me this incident once : " In my district, some time ago, I was driving along the road, and I reached a country The Prodigal Son. )21 cross-roads grocery, and, as I drove along in front, a poor, desolate, trembling man walked out of the grocery and accosted me, and said : ' You don't recog- nize me, but I know you. We were college mates, and graduated in the same college class, twenty years ago. We joined Church at the same time, but when I came out of college I got into bad compan3^ and I have been going from bad to worse ever since, I've been on a spree, drinking hard, and just now, when I went in that grocery, desolate and moneyless, the bar-keeper said he would give me a drink for nothing, and I took hold of the bottle, but ray nerves were so unsteady I couldn't pour the whiskey out, and the grocery-keeper poured it cut for me, and as I took the glass and raised it to my lips I felt my old mother's hand come down on my head, and she said: " ' Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep ; If I should die before I awoke, I pray the Lord my soul to take.' " My precious old mother had been in heaven twenty years, but I felt her hand just as I did in days gone by, and as she spoke to me I dropped the glass, and I walked out and met you.' " The presid- ing elder said that when he pas.sed on (so he was told afterwards), that fellow walked back into the store and drank the stuff, and he was carried out a corpse. That poor mother followed her boy to the very gates of hell, and had her hand on his head as he foundered on the rocks of hell and sank forever. O, my, how a man can squander all and spend all in riotous living ! " And when he had spent all," the f ■ -1^ 522 Sam Jones' Own Book. parable says, " there arose a mifjhty famine in that land." And the next thing he did he joined himself to a citizen of that country ; and when he joined himself to a citizen of that country that citizen put him into the field to feed swine. Recollect, that is a Jew ; that young man was a Jew. What more dis- reputable work could a Jew be put at than feeding hogs ? He put him into the field to feed swine. Look here, brother, when a man disposes of all ; when mother's prayers, father's advice, the Bible, all good influences, are disposed of, the next thing a ma. is going to do after he has disposed of all is to join himself to a citizen of this country, the devil ; and the devil puts him to work — puts him to blasphem- ing the God of his mother, violating the Sabbpth of his mother ; puts him to drencliing his body with liquid fluid ; which is but the essence of damnation. Now, here I have said before that God wants hu- manity to help him bring the world to Christ; the devil wants humanity to help him danni the race; and whenever a man joins himself to the devil, the devil puts him at the work of damning humanity ; and every wholesale liquor house, and every brewery, and every saloon, and every still-house in Toronto is an agent of the devil, doing his work. "And he joined himself to a citizen of that coun- try," and the devil put him to stilling whiskey, and the devil put him to running a brewery, and the devil put him to opening a saloon, and the devil put him to the w^ork of damning humanity — and that is the only work of every servant of the devil, damning humanity. ■: ':^'\\ The Prodigal Son. 523 I go to the Legislature of Ontario. I say, " Gen- tlemen of the Legislature, I want you to make the sale of liquor in the Province of Ontario free, and with the freedom to sell it I demand the privilege of debauching the children of your wives, and cursing your homes." And I will tell you another thing : The Legislature of Ontario, if they were asked by the bar-keepers of Toronto the privilege of damning their own children, and breaking the hearts of the wives of that Legislature — what do you think the legislators would say to that ? From a legislator down to a scavenger, I would not vote for a man that touches, tastes, or handles whiskey to save my life. God save the legislatures from the fearful curse of being controlled by the liquor element in this country ! But " money makes the filly go;" you have heard that. Money makes the filly go. And I will tell you another' thing : money makes the filly's son go, too. The earth swal- low me up before I would lend myself to any influ- ence and join any citizen of this country and help him to debauch and damn my race ! I would die by the inch ; 1 would walk up on a burning fire and be burnt to ashes before I would lend myself to an in- fernal alliance like that. In Georgia (and I know it is true of other States) we have had men in the legislature that just stag- gered around town drunk, on both sides of the streets, and they staggered into the legislative halls drunk. They were not fit to be in the penitentiary, much less the legislature. God give us sober men — sober men to rule us and to make our laws ! God save our codes m\ i(,;),!r:3 i . 1' (if I f' ' ''i' 524 Sajm Jones' Own Book. ( and our statute books from the danger that liquor will do them all over this country ! "And he joined himself to a citizen of that coun- try." Whenever a legislator joins himself to a citizen of that country he is going to do some bad work. When any influential man joins himself to the devil, he can play havoc among the rest of men. Now, listen ajjain : " And he fain would have filled himself with the husks that the swine did eat." Now, you notice he went at the most disreputable job in the world, and when he went to feed the hogs he would eat the husks, and he fed the hogs on husks, and ate husks himself — ate the same husks he fed the hogs with. "He fain would have filled himself with the husks the hogs did eat." Did you ever notice the fact that just what the devil makes you feed other folks on he makes you eat yourself ? Did you ever notice that nine out of ten of these beer-drinking fellows are puffed up with beer, so that if you would stick something in them it would run out by the gallon ? Did you ever notice that nine bar-keepers out of every ten die drunk themselves ? Did you ever notice that ? If you feed other people on liquor, the devil will make you drink it. If you pour beer down other people, the devil will make you gulp it down, and away you go. God pity a man that just sits and feeds out damnation to others, and then sits and enjoys it himself. Ah, me, what an awful thought ! Just what you feed other folks on you will feed yourself with. You are a gambler, and you win other folks' money, and the devil makes you sit right down to the table, and The Prodigal Son. 525 you lose it again. Did you ever notice that ? That's just as certain as we are in this house this evening. " And he fain would have filled himself with the husks that the swine did eat." O, how low down we get, how low down we get. I took a bar-keeper into the church once, and he said : " Jones, I never sold liquor but nine months, and I stayed drunk those entire nine months. I couldn't sell it without stay- ing drunk ; my conscience would not let me." I like that ; that's a sign a fellow has got some conscience. It is a sign his conscience is not dead. But there are men in this town that sell whiskey all the year round, cool, sober men. You who do this have no conscience ; your conscience is dead ; dead and buried forever, and God pity you ! " And he joined himself to a citizen of that coun- try." Some of us have joined ourselves to a citizen of that country, and O, how fearful our lives are. What disreputable lives we lead every day. 0, young man, you never could hold up your head again in the presence of your poor mother if you could get your conscience aroused once more. O, think what awful lives we have led, and then think how pure and good our lives might have been. " And he joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into the field to feed the swine ; " and after this famine had pressed him sore, and he began to be in want, what then ? " And when he came to himself " — O, brother, here is a point ; let us look a minute. " And when he came to himseU'." What is the matter with humanity ? What is the matter with you ? What was the matter with me ? ir 626 Sam Jones' Own Book. I look back fifteen years ago. What was I doing 1 Wringing the blood out of my father's heart ; mak- ing my precious wife cry her eyes out, and my little innocent ones threatened with no home, and with orphanage, and with want. What was the matter with me ? Do you mean to tell me if I^had been myself I would have done that way ? No, sir. I will tell you another thing : If you can get your eyes wide open this evening you will be turned around, a sensible man, .and won't do as you are doing. A man of good, sourd sense, to say nothing about religion, won't treat his wife as you treat her and love her as you love her. A man of good, hard sense won't treat his children as you treat your children, and at the same time love his children as you love your children. I tell you there is something wrong with humanity. And that boy bid his father good-bye and started away, and spent weeks on the road, and spent months in feeding swine, and filling himself with the husks that the swine did eat, and all at once his eyes got opened and he came to himself. Look here, I can't help believing that there was a strange infatuation had hold of him. I don't know how you feel about it, but when I look back I say, "I wasn't my- self, and there is no use talking about it." And every son in this country that is running in his mad career, he is mad with his wickedness, his intellect is beclouded, he doesn't see himself, and he doesn't see the truth as it is. Now, when that boy came to himself he said, " Why, sir, who am I ? What am I ? Where am I ? What am I doing here ?" Look here, it The Prodigal Son. 527 will do you some good if you will ask those questions this evening : " Who am I ? Where am I ? What am I doing here ? " O, brother, you are away from where you took your mother's hand the last time; you are away from where your father's advice would have led you. Where are you ? Joined to a citizen of that country feeding swine, danniing humanity. " And when he came to himself." Just here let me say this much. I had gone along, and occasion- ally I had realized that I wasn't living right ; I saw that my wife was fnding away in grief ; I saw that my father was dying by the inch. At last I looked around me and came to myself, thank God, and I glorify his name forever for that day in my history when I got my eyes wide open and saw the deeds of my life, and saw how wicked I was. 0, brother, I thank God for getting my eyes opened that day ; and since then I have been sing- ing, " Happy day, happy day, when Jesus washed my sins away." I was a new man, a saved man, and I went right about and left off my wickedness from that day to this. And when he came to him.self what did he do ? He said, " In my father's house even the servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger. Here I am starving to death, with the best father and the best home a boy ever had." And when he got his eyes open what did he say ? "I will arise and go to my father." I will arise. Look here, that boy got the whole secret of the matter in that one expression — I will, 1 will, I iviU arise and go to my father. When he said that, the miles be- 628 Sam Jones' Own Book. U" • tween him and his father's house melted away ; there was nothingf between him and his father. " I will arise and go to my father." I suppose the devil said oo him, " Well, you are in a pretty fix now to go to your father." And did you ever notice this is just what the devil will do to you ; he will take you by the heels and drag you through the mud-holes of sin, and then make you get up and look at yourself and tell you that you ain't fit to go anywhere. Did you ever notice that ? O, what a mean old devil he is ! PTe said to this boy : " Just look at yourself now ; you ain't fit to go home ; you have no clothes and you are a thousand miles from home ; you have no shoes, how can you walk ? You haven't got a dollar to pay your way ; you have no hat to cover your head. Ain't you a pretty one talking about going home ? " But when that boy jumped up in his manhood and in his resolu- tion, and said, •' I will arise and go to my father," why, sir, there was God Almighty's excursion train run right up to the side of him, and it came to a dead halt, and God told him to get aboard, and that he would see him the balance of the way. If you will say that this evening and mean it, God will do the rest. "I will arise and go to my father; I am going, money or no money, shoes or no shoes, hat or no hat, miles or no miles, I am going." And now we see him start back — no shoes, no hat, no money, and a long way to go. Off" he starts and on he goes. And I imagine I see him when on the way he comes across the mansion where he had stopped some time ago, and where he had been insulted when The Prodigal Son. 529 no hat, ts an' :? SKRMON XXXVI. CORNELIUS, A. DEVOUT MA.N. "There was a certain man in CiBsarea called Cornelius, a cen- turion of the band called the Italian band, a devout man, and one that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to God alway." — Acts x. 1, 2. '"T^HE first century of the Christian era produced 1~ some of the most remarkable men of this world's history ; and perhaps the most remarkaV)!'^ character of this century of great characters was this devout man Cornelius — except Christ alone. Cornelius' character was remarkable, in that it was symmetrical. It presented a perfectly rounded wholeness. There was a finish and a roundness about his character that we scarcely see in any other character in history ; and I am free to confess when I look at this portraiture of this man, I am ashamed of myself, and ashamed of every man on the face of the earth. Amid the noon-day blaze of the nine- teenth century, with all the accumulated forces of Christianity at work, this world to-day does not present the peer of this heathen man Cornelius. And after all, brethren, character outranks every- thing. Reputation is cheap. Reputation is like the glove. I may put it on my hand or take it off, or rend it to pieces and throw it away, a,nd not feel the loss of it. But character is the hand itself ; and when once it is scarred it is scarred "forever. Char- 535 ii^J' I 536 Sam Jones' Own Book. acter is immortal. Character shall live on beyond the stars. Character shall live as long as God lives. Character-building is the one work of true men in this world. I used to want religion, when I was a sinner, to keep me out of hell. I used to think I would love to have religion that I might get to heaven. But heaven and hell are both secondary with me now. I want religion now and for ever- more to make a true man out of me ; and I don't believe there is anything else in the universe that will make a true man out of me and out of vou but religion. I reckon I was the biggest failure the world ever saw up to twenty-four years of age — except you, if you haven't got any to-night. I said a few moments ago that character outranks every- thing. Character, said Coulton, is perfectly educated wnll, and one which says to the Divine will, "Thou orderest," "I will;" '"'Thou commandest not," " I will not." In other words, character is builded by living in perfect harmony with God. Religion is harmony — religion is the setting of the Ten Commandments to music in your soul. Oh, we hear of Christian people taking up crosses. Breth- ren, do you know what a cross is ? There is a cross, where God's will is one way and yours is another, right across — what a cross ! But if your will is on a right line parallel -'ith the will of God, the cross is all gone. Oh, how L-ornelius got into harmony with God. First, he was devout ; and I simply hurriedly present the picture, for I purpose not to preach more than an hour at any service. And the rule always at these services is, whenever you get as much as ; ! ' ■! Cornelius, a Devout Man. 537 you want, every door is open to you, and the side- walks are free, and you can go any minute. Really we wouldn't have missed you if you hadn't come at all. You can consider yourself dismissed any moment when you get enough. Don't you go home and say, " That man bored me or worried me." It's iniofhtv hard to talk sense, a whole hour and not bore some greenhorn. We are told that this heathen Cornelius was devout, and that term devout is a very broad term. Sometimes we say a man is a very zealous man ; of another we say he is a very earnest man ; of another, a very pious man ; of an- other, a prayerful man. But when inspiration tells us that Cornelius was a devout man, it nieant to teach us that Cornelius was zealous, prayerful, pious, earnest, upright, and all those other adjectives tiiat are descriptive of a true character. Cornelius was a devout man ; in other words, Cornelius was a thoroughly religious man. He was religious any- where; he was religious everywhere; he Avas religions in anything ; he was religious in everything ; and he vf&y, religious everyday in the week. I declare it is a joy to me to meet a man like that, or a man who appreciates such a character as that. And, brethren, let me say right at this point, no man can hv religious in anything unless he is religious in every- thing. Religion is loyalty to God and the right. It is not doing right ninety-nine times out of a hundred; but it i.s doing right a hundred times in a hundred, and a thousand times in a thousand, and a million times in a million. This term, holy holiness, if you will put a " w " before it, you will get the best idea 538 Sam Jones' Own Book. of believers you ever had. It is a hundred cents in the dollar; it is doing the square thing every time you do anything. Now, you hear a man say : " Business is business, and religion is religion." Yes, that's true, and 1 hope when you get through doing business, I hope you will set in and be religious some of these days. Some people can't run two things at once, especially when they are so diametric- ally opposite as the way you run business, and the way God wants you to run religion. A man ought to be just as devout and religious selling calico or sugar as he is at home in his family devotions. This world will never proceed on the lines of peace, happi- ness, and prosperity until every man trades and talks and lives on Gospel principles. Who trades on Gospel principles ? Well, I would make the merchant trade in the interest of the cus- tomer, and the customer in the interest of the mer- chant. Suppose you had that sort of tradesmen in this country, do you reckon there would be anybody that would not pay their debts ? Do you reckon there would be anyone swindled in a trade ? This is simply doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. These are Gospel principles. I wish we would run this world on Gospel principles. We would have a grand world. Why, if we are not going to get to heaven at all, the next best thing is to get up as much of a heaven down here as it is possible for us to have. Ain't that a good idea ? We have been singing to-day, " Sweet By-and-bye." We are ringing the changes on this all over the land. I wish that we would hush that for twelve months. GouNELii's, A Devout Max. o:}9 and .sinji: the " Sweet Now and Now." Some of our preachers are always preaching on the heavenly recognition — about whom we will see in heaven, and whom we will know. I tell you, so long as I am here I don't care much about heavenly recognition ; but I do care about earthly recognition. I am a poor fellow who cares about earthly sympathy. Brethren, do recogni/e me every time ^''ou meet me here, and give me a kind word and a consoling thought ; but when I get to heaven after a while, and sit down under the tree of life, with a crown on my head and a harp in my hand — why then, if you don't want to recognize me you need not, for I am fixed up then. But we need recognition here ; and if we will iio in and make Toronto what God wants it to be, you won't have to go away to find heaven. God will expand your streets and incorporate you with the New Jerusalem, and the^'e will be a heaven for you. But God can only incorporate a town in the New Jerusalem when it is like the New Jerusalem — free from sin. A devout man has re- ligion through and through him every day in the week, and all the time everywhere he goes. You have not got many of that sort of men. When you meet such a member of a Church as that you know him. He is worth his weight in gold in any of your Churches. You know what to expect of him. If you have a prayer-meeting, you know he will be there if he is alive. When 3'ou have work to be done in your Church, you know he will lend a hand. I vvisli we had theni all of that sort. I will tell you another thinif : That is just what is the matter in all this m 540 Sam Junks' Owx Book. broad land of ours. We have so few in the Church who are what they profess to be ; and I have always had an eternal consecrated, consolidated hatred for shams ; and of all humbugs that ever breathed God's air, the biggest humbuj^ is the relifjfious humbug. He will go up and swear eternal alleg;iance to God, and then will go right out into the world and mingle with God's enemies, and tire guns right at the side of the bleeding hands and feet of Jesus Christ. It is true to-night, and it was true 1800 years ago, Jesus never received a wound or a blow from anyone Ijut a pro- fessed friend. Did you ever think of that ? Do you know who it was that denied him ? A professed friend. Do you know who sold him for thirty pieces of silver ? A professed friend. Who signed his death- warrant ? A professed friend. Never from anybody but professed friends were these wrongs received b}' Jesus Christ. A devout man ! What a blessing to every community such a man is ' We read, " Cor- nelius, a devout man, and one who feared God with all his house." So, you see, as soon as he had got religion himself it began to spread out over his family. Just at this point T want to say, that if you have not got enough of the religion of Jesus Christ to. make your own home religious, I don't think you have got enough to take you to heaven. We Meth- odists are great at revivals. We glory in revivals. The other Churches that do not believe in revivals profit by ours. When the river of life flows over with us it runs over and fills up their old ponds. Show me a Church that does not believe in revivals, and I will show you a Church that looks like an Cornelius, a Dev(ktt Man. 541 Cor- )d with ad got ver his if vou Christ nk you Meth- evivals. evivals vs over ponds, vivals, like an abandoned cemetery. Stagnation ! Stagnation ! Stairnation ! Talk about enthusiasm ! We are not sufferino- in that lino. Stagnation is the last station this side of damnation I I say that we Methodists, and Baptists, and Presbyterians, believe in revivals. We o-() in for them. But revivals are not the best things in the world. Rather the need of revival is a proof that we are not right, ft is an abnormal state of things that makes revivals necessary. I want to be understood. So long as the Churches work on the plan they now work on, revivals are a nece.ssity. What would become of us with- out them ? But, brethren, I will tell you why the necessity arises for revivals. It is because the place where Christ ought to be met, that is the coldest place in the land, and that is our home I verily believe every man who is a father ought to be the priest of his home, and every mother the priestess of that home, and our children ought to be V)rought out to the church on Sunday morning, and let the father say to the pastor, " Please open the doors, my little Willie was converted at the family altar. He has a happy experience in Christ, and I want you to help me to raise him for heaven. ' If you would have the country religious have religion in your homes, and you will nevea* have necessity foi' another revival in this godly city of yours. Cornelius got converted " with all his house." There is many a mother who can go home and sing with as much .understanding as spirit, "Where is my wandering boy to-night ( " Whore is he i Where is he ? Where is my wandering daughter in her spiritual and moral 542 Sam Joxks' Ovvx Book. vmt life ? Hrethren, the longer I live, the more I see of life, the more I see this fact — brethren, we have bad members in the Church. I expect every Church, almost, in the land has members in it that may be, ought' to be, in the penitentiaries in your country. But I will say this much — it is not the lying, and stealing, and drunkenness that is sapping the life of our Church and i-uining the spiritual life of our com- munity ; it is the tide of worldliness sweeping over our homes, crystallizing our children in worldliness, and making them impervious to the truth. The mother thinks, " If I don't push my daughters out in society they will die old maids." Parents saj', " We are obliged to let our children go in society." People say, " We are obliged to do this and do that." Mother, T will tell you what I knew. I found, through the good providence of God, where there was a sweet, pretty Christian maid living in a city tive hundred miles from where I lived — good and true and sensible. She knew how to make up a bed, knew how to make bread, knew how to work and how to play — how to play on a stove in the kitchen and on a piano in the parlor — and I found out through the mysterious providence of God that she was there, and I went live liundred miles and got her, and so if you have the light sort of daughters you need not push them. They will find out they are there, and come for them. God pity the old mother who ha.s got a lot of daughters that she is trying to stick off on the world. Mother, make your home a sacred place. Make a room for Jesus where he maj* lie met, and you will live in the Cornelius, a Devout Man. o4:J hearts of your daughters, and you will raise them to be true and noble, and loyal to the good, and you need have no fears a.s to their future. You are bringing your boys up ; train them for business. I want to say there is a great deal of difi'erence between home training and home piety. There is many a man or woman in this house who have tried to raise their son a gentleman, and their daughter a lad3\ One is 21, and the other is 18. One marries and moves off to himself. He is not a Christian, and what a dangerous thing it is to project a boy on this world who doesn't know Jesus Christ. Your daugh- ter marries. She knows nothinfj about God and hope and heaven. She goes out into the world to be a wife and motlier of a home. God pity the home when the mother don't know God, and where the wife doesn't know Jesus Christ. Home religion, home piety. Brethren, I say it with all the earnest- ness of my heart, I would rather raise a true, noble, loyal boy to Christ and the right, and he just have sense enough to plow a straight furrow, than to be the father of the brightest genius in America or in this Dominion and project him upon this world a dissipated, godless wretch that will debauch himself and set a bad example to the world. It is not how nmch sense the bo}- has got, but how much religion ; not how well have you trained him in b\isiness, but how close does he live to Jesus Christ ? I'll tell you another thing. When a father hasn't left his boys anything but money he has left them bankrupt. If a man has all the money he wants, and has nothing but money, that is the poorest man you v. ver looked 544 Sam Jones' Own Book. at. Let us turn a little more attention to lieaven an ^^^ .0. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I iiii 1.25 m IIIII15 - m IIIIIZ2 1.4 1.8 1.6 p% ! -^^ ^W % % .1 #^. :5§^ *;, .> "•^^ /f5« Photographic Sciences Corporation ^. ^ # 1 V 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 872-4503 C^ ^ V^^ 'J Religion when you boil it down to a concrete es- sence is nothing more than something to do, some- thing to love, and something to hope for. Where is the woman who can stand up and say, '• I never said an unkind word to my sister ? " She is here to-night, but she hasn't got any sister. You have no more right to flaunt your diamonds and your riches in the face of the poor than you have to shake bread in the face of a hungrj' man and not give him anj'^ of it. At a workingmen's picnic in the States the ban- ners bore the motto, " Our children cry for bread," and on the grounds 1,400 kegs of beer was drunk. Their children need not cry for beer. I believe a blessing is one of two things. It is either given by God to a man because that man has done his duty and God has paid him, or because God knows he has determined to do his duty and has paid him on credit. A big nose is a sign of intellect ; a big mouth, character ; a big chin, courage ; and big ears, gvin- erosity. Some of you pastors ought to get ear- fertilizers ; for there are more little 'possum-eared church members in this country than you can count. PI- -^"--|r- - 'sf j,-tm- rete es- I, soine- nd say, " She amonds )u have ind not le ban- bread," drunk. , It is I an has se God id has mouth, s, gon- t ear- l-eared count. Ui^ 4 4 } SAIvI W. SMALL. KEV. SAM W. SMALL. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. P EV. SAM W. SMALL, eolIea.uo „f Rev. San, P /"^^ ^"^ b»™ in Knoxville, Te„„e,.ee, on the . rd July, 185L He received a liberal education and then entered the legal profession, practicing but a short time, his natural tastes and inclinations <,iv- .ng the preference to journalism. At different time, and m various places in the South, he was editor and proprietor of several papers, ,-.,d also occupied the pos,t.on of Official Stenographer of the Superior Court of Atlanta, Georgia. In early life his .,,ind and memory were stored with sacred truths, and the .nfluence of his Christian home training, though ^^adly abused for a time, was not wholly lost upon h.m Indulgence in strong drink in later years had nearly effaced his manliness and self-respect, and had all but destroyed his mental and physical powers, as well as his temporal and eternal prospects. When almost in despair on account of the apparent 551 552 Sam Jones' Own Book. !* ■ '-t li i •i IJ M 'J [PijIifc'^H mi^si^ip fir ^' hopelessness of his own condition, and suffering some quahns of conscience because of his neglect of his family, it occurred to him that ho might atone, in a measure, for some of his past omissions of duty to home by taking his children on a day's excursion to Carters ville, where the Rev. Sam Jones was to preach. The Spirit, who had been preparing both speaker and listener for that critical hour, sent con- viction to his heart, and wounded that He might heal. So sorely did the arrow of conviction pierce his soul that he again turned to the intoxicating cup to drown his remorse and unbearable trouble ; but while body and nerves were acted upon by the stimulant, conscience refused to forget and his mis- ery would not slumber. On the fourth day after the visit to Cartersville, 18th September, 1884, in the privacy of his own room, he pleaded for mercy for several hours until the words, " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest," came into his mind with great force, and immediately he accepted the gracious invitation and obtained a consciousness of forgiveness of sin. That very evening he went out into the streets, where he had been so well known in dissipation, and declared to old companions in sin, who had gathered out of curiosity, the wonderful deliverance that had been wrought for him. • >Rev. Sam W. Small. 553 To his wife the news seemed ahnost too good to be true, and she received his testimony with some hesitation, but since then joy and peace have come back to abide in that home. And now the advantages of the early religious training could be distinctly seen. The store-house of the memory brought forth, as with a rush, its long-neglected treasures of Bible truth, and just at the moment when most needed they supported, strengthened, encouraged and cheered ; and Mr. Small, on account of his familiarity with Christian teaching and doctrine, was now better equipped for the battle of life than many who have been much longer in the way but had not enjoyed early Chris- tian training. The morning after his conversion the old desire for alcoholic stimulants came over him. Feeling dis- trust in himself, he calmly thought the matter over, and came to the conclusion that God, who had for- given his sins of the past, could impart to him strength to overcome in the future or take away from him altogether the terrible appetite that had controlled him. Accordingly, he again besought his Heavenly Father to remove from him entirely and forever this awful craving. The long-felt desire left him there and then, nor has it returned to this day. i 654 Sam Jones' Own Book. J 1 m '*t^^l Hi ' *'} 'p''---' '^ ' ii >" ' ;f^\2\ It1 Since that time Mr. Ship 11 has realized and en- joyed the freedom from sti aj; drink, as only those can who have once known its bitter slavery, and now his heart yearns in sympathy over those who are still in its thraldom. He warns those who are tempted to take the first glass, and longs to emancipate the habitual drunkard. To this end he advocates prohibition, and his denunciation of the whole liquor traffic is in the strongest language. As a speaker Mr. Small has an easy flow of pure English. He is an orator of a high order, and in Toronto his powers in this direction reached their zenith in his peroration to the story of his life, de- livered to a crowded house in the Caledonian Rink. All who heard him were delighted with his clear, definite and earnest utterances, realizing that, while he was a man of culture, he had certainly offered his many natural gifts and acquired attainments on the altar of consecration to the Lord who had wrought such wonders in hira and for him. md en- ly those ry, and 3se wlio se who Dngs to end he of the Lge. of pure and in 3d tlieir life, de- ,n Rink, is clear, it, while bred his s on the vrought .I,, ,, .„ ;1 ' > ^ 1 Sam W. Small's Sermons. I lilii PS SERMON XXXVII. AVIIA.T MUST I DO TO HE S^VED ? "But now in Christ Jesus ye that once were afar oflF are made nigh in the blood of Christ So then ye are no more stran- gers and sojourners, but ye are fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household of God.' —Era. ii. 13, 19. WHEN we look out over the mass of our fellow- men, whether they be in the active and busy pursuits of worldly atfairs, or whether we look over them in the presence of large congregations gathered in a place like this, there is a painful consciousness in the heart of everyone of us who are spiritually inclined, that a great many — a large percentage, in- deed — of these, our fellow-men, are in a state of alienation, a state of estrangement, a state of rebel- lion—frequently active rebellion— against God. There is no peace between thern and the great Creator. There is no sense of freedom from condemnation in their hearts. There is no sense of perfect reliance on God, no sense of perfect willingless to submit to the word of God. And when we come to enquire why this strange state of affairs should exist; why these men and women should be alienated from their Creator, we are necessarily plunged into a large sea of questionings and investigations, and that question 555 566 Sam Jones' Own Book. If 'i ' ' s . • ; ! k^ .,.,.i|.; - in its concrete form is the one which agitates the great world to-day. It is the one question with which the pulpit has to deal in its concrete form. The solution of that question is one over which the great world is now agitated, and in the solution of which it is struggling to bring men's minds up to that spiritual plane where they can comprehend truth and apprehend it, and apply it in their lives, and bring it themselves through the Gospel into a state of reconciliation with God. The reason why so many of our fellow-men are in this state of aliena- tion is not because they do not recognize that there is a God, not because they deny the existence of a God ; because the existence of God is an omnipresent consciousness with men. Wherever you find men, even in the most benighted parts of the world, even in the centre of the dark Continent of Africa, you will find men who have the uplifting of the soul to the Supreme Being ; you will find expressions which represent the lonying of the soul for the Supreme Essence, the Supreme Power, the Supreme Being, which are an uplifting of the soul to God. And everywhere we find it, among the most benighted as well as among the most cultured ; and the great trouble of the world to-day is, not that it is in a state of open denial of the existence of God, for the rational creature has passed that part of the world's history, that part of intellectual life, that part of moral and spiritual responsibility where he would deny the existence of God. When he looks out on Nature it- self and sees the thousand magnificent works with which it is crowned ; when he sees the majestic T What Must I Do to be Saved ? 557 mountains, when he sees the spread-out lakes — this beautiful one at your very door ; when he sees the broad plains ; when he views all the continents from pole to pole, his consciousness is impressed, and he is made to recognize the fact that there is a great Creator of all these stupendous w^orks. When he looks at himself he recognizes that he is a part of this great creation, and that he has through all these centuries remained an enigma to himself and a puzzle and a riddle to his fellow-men. He is not capable of understanding man in all his relations, and his fel- low-men, with all their progress in science, and physiology, and intellectual development, and philo- sophical research, are incapable of understanding him to this day, and man is the thread riddle of the world at this very moment — man in himself, in his composition, in his relations to nature and to God. And so it is that when he looks at himself he must recognize — his conscience insists upon his recognizing — that he is a creature of this ffreat God, and that God is his Father. And so when he goes to question him- self concerning his relations, he knows that this God, omnipotent and omniscient, and who created him and all else in the world, has a design in it. He recognizes the necessity *or a system of government and laws, and that God is thcit government and law ; and he must recognize, since he knows himself to be God's creature, that he is amenable to God's law, to the form of God's government, and to the duties He has imposed on him — the responsibility and duty of being a loyal subject to those laws and of this government. K he is not this loyal subject, if he 558 Sam Jones' Own Book. i does not recognize this supreme authority ; if he will not be subject to this government, he enters in- to a state of alienation from God, of rebellion against the laws and government of God. And this is the trouble with men to-day, that while they know there is a God, and that they are His creatures, and that they have imposed on them a responsibility to God and to His laws and government, they refuse to recoiniize and act upon that responsibility, and to put themselves into a state of subjection and submission to God and His law. They are aliens, and are rebellious against the government and the law of God. They are in a state of open rebellion. Their carnal nature and carnal mind cannot compre- hend those spiritual laws that God has set over them, and so they are at enmity with God. They do not, either, deny the immortality of the soul — a man would rest satisfied in a state of open defiance to God if he thought this life was to end all. He might take the chance of compassing all human pleasures. But he knows that this world does not end all. There is a comethirig in the consciousness of man that teaches him that fact. And this is the expres- sion in all ages of the world, and among all races of men, that the soul is immortal ; that this which is in me, which is the essence of my life, which is the real substance of my being ; this which energizes me, this which shines 'out through my eyes, this which speaks through my voice, my tongue, my lips ; this which makes me what I am, which makes me lovable or despicable, mighty or weak ; this which compasses all the powers and energies of my nature — that What Must I Do to be Saved? 559 t^is is not for this transient life, but is in immortal- ity, and it will live beyond these earthly scenes. If man were only to live in this world — if this world will be the plane of his work and operations, and there was no other goal to which he must tend — then this would satisfy him. Some men would at- tain to perfect ^ratification in it. And yet it is true that we do not attain to it. All things around us bear the mark of decay ; they bear the mark of im- possibility to satisfy, and we never become satisfied \vith the thinfjs of this world. We are reachinof out after something beyond. We know that when we leave here we are going to a destiny that is beyond, and must be eternal. So that men are not denying the immortality of the soul, and resting upon the plane of satisfaction with the world. But one great trouble with men is that they have endeavored to satisfy these longings of the soul with something that was made by themselves, and would satisfy their human reason. There is a disposition to go away from the spiritual. There is a tendency in human nature to repel that which is supernatural, and that which comes down from God, and that which is according to God's plan, and to rely upon something which the human mind has devised for itself. Men have been seeking throujjhout the ages to satisfy their longing for immortality by some mode of human reason. We have passed, however, that day when men relied upon poetic fancy. They are immortal, they have an immortal destiny, which means either eternal life or eternal death. Right there every man must pause for reflection and con- 560 Sam Jones' Own Book. M |J» tf.l sideration. Right there a man must make his de- cision. Right there his immortal interests must, once for all, he determined. How abhorrent it is to us to think that we make a fatal choice at this point. How abhorrent to look in the face of such an eternal death. I can't stand here before an audience of people, though they may all be stangers to me ; I cannot stand here for my life and say to you to-day with that brazen impudence which it would demand, and say, " I will choose eternal death for my portion " I think of a mother who in early life prayed for me and taught me at her knee to read the Scriptures, and helped me with her faith and life until I had grown up to young manhood, and followed me with her prayers into the world, and never failed to go to the mercy-seat of God in my behalf during the days of my wickedness and waywardness, when I M^as going away from God and from my eternal interests. I cannot think of her dying with that prayer upon her lips, and with that feeling of relief and peace that comes from knowing that her son is redeemed by the blood of Jesus ; I cannot look up into heaven to-day and say, I will deliberately choose that that loss for me shall be eternal, and that I .shall never look into the face of that sainted mother, and beg her pardon upon the plains of heaven. I would not .say here to-day for all this world, though it were a hammered ball of gold, that I would go to an eternal hell, or willingly make choice recklessly against my immortal interest. I would not choose that I should never look again into the face of my father, who followed me with a devotion second only mm What Must I Do to be Saved ? 5G1 to that of my mother, and died without hope of my redemption. I cannot say tliat I would look my wife squarely in the eye — she who followed me also with her prayers ; she who was devotion personified ; she who wrestled with the evil spirits that surrounded me when I lay in debauchery and drunkenness ; she whose faith surmounted the obstacles thrown around it, and who clung to me until at last Jesus Christ, by the power which is in Him, reached down and raised me from the horrible pit and from the miry clay, and established me upon the Rock — and think that the time will come when we must part never to meet again. Therefore, looking out upon humanity, and its struggles, and its efforts, I come back to the con- sciousness of the truth, that human resolution, and human philosophies, and human exemplars will not aid me, and the great cry goes up again, as it has gone ever and anon, from the great heart of hu- manity : — What must I do to be saved ? How may I inherit eternal life ? And when we hear that cry coming from the heart of our sin-sick, weary, and rebellious brother we give him the answer that comes down from heaven, that speaks peace to the human soul. I point tc that blessed Book and say : Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou .shalt be saved. A man says to me : " Do you believe that record ? Do you believe in Jesus Christ ? Do you believe that Bible that tells of Him ? " I say, " Yes ; thank God !" I believe every word, every line, every letter, from lid to lid in the Bible. Once it was nothing to me but a bundle of paper, bound together, with 662 Sam Jones' Own Book. nothing in it for me. Perhaps it was an idle jest. But to-day, thank God, it is all in all to me ; it is the treasure of the world to me. It is a continuous unfailintT source of life to me. He is my rock which is cleft for me ; my refuge, to which I can go for peace and consolation, and life and strength, and hope and health. He came down, and on Calvary He went upon the cross and shed His blocd, and in shedding it He pur- chased liberty for human souls. And therefore it was that Paul said, " Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free." Christ with His blood paid the price. There is nothing more to pay. We have nothing more to do with it. The work has been done, and now we who were in the bondage of sin have power to renounce the devil and all his works, and swear allegiance to Jesus Christ, claim our liberty purchased by His blood, and come in and bo fellow-citizens with saints. "Well, but a man says something about a new birth. You tell me there must be some new birth, and I do not understand it." I do not pretend to understand all the mysteries that are in the new birth. I do not know what God may have wrapped up in that sug- gestion. I do not know because Christ Himself hesi- tated to explain it in what He said to Nicodemus. I do not know that it is necessary for me to know all the profundity of God in His plan of the new birth. But I can tell you a thing that has brought peace and perfect satisfaction to me. In all countries we have what are called our naturalization laws. We have the machinery by which foreigners from What Must I Do to be Saved ? 563 another country than ours may become citizens of our country. Among all these nations these laws vary in non-essentials, but in the essentials they are the same. It is named " naturalization," because it is intended to make a man, as it were, over again, to give him a new nature as a citizen of our country. Suppose he comes from the United States to Canada, the real essence is that you must renounce your al- legiance to your old Government — renounce it com- pletely — and come away from it, and withdraw your loyalty and love and service from it. The next thing is to swear eternal loyalty to this Government and to its lands and its constitution, and give it your loyal service, your faith and your confidence and sup- port. Now, when a man has done that he is made a citizen of this countr3\ He was a foreigner before, but the very moment he pronounces the oath of allegiance, and takes on his new allegiance, he dies as a citizen of his former country, and lives as a Canadian. If he loes not he commits a fraud upon you. That is the purpose of the naturalization laws. I rest in perfect confidence, in perfect peace, in per- fect faith in the fact, that on the fifteenth day of September, a year ago, I came to that point and renounced the devil and all his works, and sin and its bondage, and all loyalty to them ; withdrew service from them, and walked up and took the oath of allegiance to Jesus Christ, and to the laws of God, and I say that Saih Small, as a sinner, died, and Sam Small, as a fellow-citizen of the saints, was born. It is by the blood of the cross, and only by the blood of the cross, that I was brought in, and no i"' 1:1 i: 1 :. 1 564 Sam Jones' Own Book. more was I a stranger and an alien and a foreigner but I became a fellow-citizen of the saints, and was brought into the household of God. I know it. I feel it. I felt then, as I have felt every day since, the blessings of new knowledge, intention and purpose in every fibre of my being ; I have felt I am a new man. I have looked upon human affairs through new eyes, land with new faith and new love. Indeed, I was made a new creature in Christ Jesus. My wife and children know it. I have sixty thousand fellow- citizens in the city of Atlanta who, I am sure, would be ready to go on the witness-stand and take oath that I am a new man, and not the same man I was before. I say I was born again. Hallelujah, 'tis done,, I believe on the Son ; I am saved by the blood Of the Crucified One ! jner was 5. I ,the 36 in man. iyes, was and low- ould oath was , ! *, 1 \n'.>' Jh'' V-r.>:' ;:t|, "■Tf fii ^ 1 ■iiMp UE ■^ ~=::SK«:^ =?n>^ SERMON XXXVIII. "He that debpised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses. Of iiow much sorer punisliment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden under foot the Hon of God, and hath counted the blood by the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace, " 'H'iS^U THESE two verses, taken together, constitute an argument by way of suggestion. The word " despised " in the text is the word used by a man when he repudiates anything. When a man despises a thing he has no use for it. To despise a law is to hold it in supreme contempt, and to reject its authority, and pay no heed to it. He that despised Moses' law was put to death. His body was killed. He died without mercy. How much sorer the punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God ? How much sorer ? What sorer punishment can be inflicted than death to the body ? There is a punishment that is worse than killing the man. Human justice can punish an offender no further than to kill the body. This is the ultimatum of human justice. This sorer punishment is the punishment inflicted upon the immortal soul of man. The^^sorer punishment comes upon a man's soul when he despises the Son of God. God has said it. This sorer punishment is in an eternal hell. 565 666 Sam Jones' Own Book. !' K pr '-T k. >K' You say, do you believe there is a hell ? Is it possible that we cannot have a revival without some- body preaching the doctrine of an eternal hell ? That is the truth. God forbid that I should preach an eternal hell to scare people. If I was a minister of a church to which any person came after being scared into religion, I would not let that person join the church until he got the right idea of Jesus Christ. I preach God, a loving God. No man will inherit hell who keeps himself divorced from sin. No man will suffer eternal damnation unless he is allied to sin, and refuses to accept Jesus Christ. A man says : " There is no hell. Science has proved it." I have read a few scientific works. I have been for twelve years an active man in the manufacture of a newspaper for the education of the people ; but have never read a book, or heard of a book, in this world that has altered revelation from God upon eternal punishment as given in the Bible before me. Science has never made one step of true progress unless pioneered by Christianity. Some men have read Bob Ingersoll, Tom Paine, and Voltaire, and a few of these infidels. The disciples of these men are to be found on street corners. They talk about there bein' no God, there bein' no hell, and there bein' no eternal punishment. Where are the followers of these infidels ? Has anyone ever seen a congregation of this sort ? No ! Bob Ingersoll, for fifty cents or a dollar a head, will mouth over things in his satirical way, but he finds no disciples. A gentleman once called upon Bob Ingersoll at his oflfice, and seeing a beautifully bound flELL. 567 copy of Voltaire's works lying on his desk, he said : "IngersoU, what did that work cost you?" IngersoU replied : " It just cost me the governorship of Illi- nois." The people of the State did not want an infidel as their Governor, although IngersoU was the most prominent man for the governorship. When Mr. Gc.rfif^d was elected President of the United States, he n^d it in his mind to appoint Mr. IngersoU Minister to the Court of St. James. The President's mind was changed, and it afterwords came out that the reason why IngersoU had not been appoin'^ed was that, when his pronounced views on infidelity had become known, he would not be received at the Court of St. James. A man who had not the common sense and decency to believe in God would not be received. All honor to that good Queen of England and her Ministers for teaching the United States that much. A man says : " I don't know ; there may be a hell. It may be. I will not stop to discuss it; but I will tell you I believe a man gets his hell here on earth." A man must be mighty idiotic to believe that. For my part I would rather God woula judge me. You take that young man back there who goes against the advice and counsel of his father. He has no respect for him. Eighteen years old now, and his father's grey hairs ha\o no influence with him. Eighteen years old now, and he defies that father to check him in his wayward course. He cares nothing for the lines of grief on his mother's brow. He cares nothing for her prayers. He cares nothing for the bleeding and dripping heart that lie knows is in his mother's bosom. He takes to drunkenness and lewd 568 Sam Jones' Own Book. '■V, ■ women, and revels in it. He finds his highest enjoy- ment in it, and perhaps he dies in one of these abomi- nable orgies. And you tell me he has suffered for all here. He might have died with his arm around a courtesan, one of the lowest. He delighted in this sort of thing, and it was no punishment to him while he lived. Take that husband out there. He swore at the altar of God, and took the most solemn vow that a man takes in his life, when he took a precious, lovely young woman to his heart for the rest of his life. To-day he is a perjured scoundrel. He has become a drunken sot, and has inflicted woe upon his poor wife and children. His wife and children perhaps fall into degradation. His sons become con- victs, or drop into hell through the trap in the gal- lows. And yet you tell me that this perjured father, that debauchee who lived in his selfishness, pays the penalty of his .sin in this world. It is a horrible lie. He does not suffer here. He will have his good time if he goes to hell for it, and he does go to hell. I believe a man is conscious in hell. A man says : " I think when we die that is the end of it. I don't believe the soul is conscious of the death." This doctrine shuts out heaven as well as hell. That makes a hog out of you to start with. That makes you a brute. If I believe there is a heaven, I believe there is a hell. The one is involved in the existence of the other. I believe the one is as eternal as the ether. You tell me when sin dies and I will tell you when hell stops. The story of Dives and Lazarus was introduced to give us a peep into hell. Dives was conscious that HELL. 569 he was in hell. Water was what he wanted to quench the flames. A man must be saved before he dies. There is no mercy in the grave. There is no repent- ance in hell. I believe the devil in hell would repent to-night if He could. I do not believe in death-bed repentances. Every man has his chance. Death sometimes comes quicker than repentance. If the smallest of God's laws are broken, all his laws are broken. Another man says : — " God would not keep a man in hell for ever for a small offence. He would keep him there for a little and let him out." This is a very foolish doctrine. A man would look nice going into heaven to meet his loved ones as an ex- convict out of hell. I do not intend to paint hell to you to-night. I believe hell is just what the Bible says it is. The devil will paint hell to a man any way he wants it, but when he gets him in hell he won't let him out. If hell was anything else than to project yourself just as you are to-night into eternity and fix you, there is a terrible fact. Would you want any worse hell than that ? Your life may be full of greed for gold. You will do anything for the almighty dollar. All your strength and energies are used toward this end. Just project your life into eternity and your thirst for gold continues. You grasp at the glitter- ing stuff*, and when you grab it you find it is nothing but ashes and leaves. There is no gratification. Take the man out there who is a gambler. The aim in life is to speculate, play cards, shake dice and bet on anything. He also takes his chance for eternity. Let him project his life into eternity, and be fixed 570 Sam Jones' Own Book. A ;; 1.1. T^? i theio. - He hears the cards go flip, flip, flip, and the roll, roll, roll of the wheel, and the rattle, rattle, rattle of the dice, and yet there is no gain, no satisfaction, and no end to the horrible thing. It is awful. Take that woman who dances in preference to taking Chi'ist. Her life is projected into eternity, and she dances, dances, and dances. There is the waitz, the German, and the polka. She wishes that horrible music to stop, but it does not. It goes on forever. Take that man who drinks. He says : " I would rather have ray dram to-morrow morning than have the religion of Jesus Christ. I would rather drink." He will drink, drink, and drink, and bring his wife, mother, children, and himself into disgrace. Pro- ject him into eternity. Can you think of anything more awful than that man running over the burning cinders of hell, and drinking the molten lava that runs from its volcanoes. This one idea of hell is horrible enough. It is a question of receiving Christ or facing the awful certainty of going to hell. d the rattle ,ction, Take aking id she iZ, the rrible rever. »vould have rink." wife, Pro- thing rning b that lell is Jhrist M ^'t' If 1 |,i n !■ ■A • i m ■ 1 « 'i ; « DELIVERANCE FROM BONDAGE. A Temperance Sermon ■< O O H O o H Cm O tH H BY SA.MUEIv W. SPvIAT i>. I HOPE you will give me your prayerful atten- tion to-night. What I shall say shall be based on the sixteenth verse of the third chapter of Acts: " And his name, through faith in his name, hath made this man strong, whom ye see and know ; yea, the faith which is by him hath given him this per- fect soundness in the presence of you all." On one occasion there came into the market- place of a far Eastern city an aged, decrepit, and travel-stained man, who was a stranger to them all. He wandered through the vast bazaar without seem- ing to regard or take notice of the vast stores of merchandise, wealth, and accumulated wondrous handicraft of the people. Aimlessly he threaded his way about in that multitude until he attracted the attention of the people. Suddenly he stopped before one of the booths, where hung gilded cages, in which had been imprisoned birds of precious plumage and sweetest song. They were fluttering their little wings against the bars of their prison, and he listened intently that he might haply catch some note of their song ; but they, thus imprisoned, refused to give forth any of the melody of their 572 Sam Jones' Own Book. r-i I ■ 'A'- li^ ■- ffT": throats, but struggled and struggled impatiently and ineffectually against their imprisonment. Suddenly the old man put his hands in the folds of his garment, and drew therefrom coin of a strange realm. He asked the price of a cage. He bought it, and, opening the door, he turned the feathered songster loose, and it fluttered its wings, so long untried, and for a little while balanced its slight body in mid-air, until nature restored its powers of equilibrium, and then it mounted up, and up, and up, and with a glad song of joy circled above tlie heads of the multitude, until it caught sight of the distant cloud-capped mountain, where its home had been, and then, with its precious mel- ody flowing from its soul, it winged its way into the far and ethereal distance, and was lost to sight. Thus one by one he bought these little birds, and thus one by one he loosed them, and they repeated the glad notes of surprise, and took the same course back to their native mountain fastnesses. He seemed to take a greater pleasure and a sM'ceter joy as each little prisoner regained its liberty, and the tears streamed down his travel-stained and dust-covered face. Those who stood by said to him, " Why dost thou do these strange things?" He said to them in reply, with a look of charity and joy indescrib- able on his face, " I was once a prisoner myself, and I know something of the sweets of liberty." I, brethren, was once a prisoner myself, and now I have tasted something of the sweets of liberty in Christ, and with the precious coinage of his mercies Deliverance prom Bondage. 573 and his promises I would stand before this multi- tude to-night and purchase from the willing hearts of men the liberty of their souls from a bondage more despicable and deadly, and more repressive of the natural melody of men's souls, than were these gilded cages to the birds of this far Eastern mart. I have been under the bondage of sin, a bond- age that was galling every moment almost ; a bond- age from which there was eliminated every element of joy, and from which there seemed to be at times no avenue of escape. If you will pardon me, I will refer to myself. I will tell you something of my experience, because I would have my young compatriots know it, and know it to the good of their souls. I would have my fellow-men who are in middle life, with fami- lies, hear it. I would have these veteran fathers of this community hear it. I was well born. I was given by kindly par- ents all the true and the religious culture that a boy could have in a loving home. I was instructed in right speaking ; I was encouraged in right doing ; I "was inspirited at times to consider myself a child of God, and to recognize in my youth my responsibil- ity to him. And when I had left my mother's side, and had left my father's counsel, and left the old hearth tree and the family altar, and gone out into the avenues of the world, seeking, first, an education, and after- ward position and prosperity, I fell into evil ways. With the strong and lusty passions of youth, with 574 Sam Jones' Own Book. If ' If . those whom I mingled I found there were courses and ways, there were alluremonts and temptations, that were strange to me ; and I stood reliant only upon myself, forgetting the prayers and teachings of mother and father, and I was eager for a place, eager for the pleasures of this world, eager for the happiness and the enjoyments that I saw about me. And thus I easily fell in allurements, thus easily fell from virtuous thoughts and virtuous acts, and from the virtuous course of my life. The g' eat bane, as I look back over my life, and conjure up the recollections of my past — the great bane of all my sinfulness, the great moving cause of all the moral iniquities I committed — was nothing more nor less than this great gorgon-headed evil that is devouring so many of the people of this land, and sowing broadcast sin and sorrow in this chosen nation of ours — the sin of intemperance. I thought that it would be manly to do as nearly every man I saw about me did. I thought there would be some addition to my pleasure and expe- rience by going with them into their drinking places and indulging with them. I felt all the time that I had strength of will enough, that I had force of character enough, to protect me from the excesses that I could see other men had fallen into. I believed that when I reached a dangerous point, if I ever did, I could put on the brakes of my nature and stop. I went away to college, and there again fell into evil courses. I struggled at times with the innate manhood that was in me, and attempted to throw off the growing appetite for these things. When I Deliverance fkom Bondage. 575 came away, after I had graduated, and began to enter among men and their pursuits, and endeav- ored to acquire a profession, 1 tliougiit still that 1 must mingle with my fellow-men ; have some par- ticipations in their customs and in their habits ; that I must bring myself into some sort of agreement and harmony with their ideas of social enjoyments, and I yielded again and again to the temptations thus presented, and again and again I fell from my rectitude, and away from ideas that lingered with me of what was right and proper. And thus, day after day, these passions grew stronger and stronger within me. I could feel and see that I was falling, falling falling all the time. I saw that there would not be left in me strength enough to save me, and I was unconscious at times of the fearful length to which I had fallen ; but I would not look at the picture I knew I was presenting to others. I went on and on. I went until I brought tears from the eyes of my precious mother, until I brought, fearful lines to her face, until I brought gray streaks into her beautiful hair, until I had brought the lines of care about her loving eyes ; and until I knew I was dragging, drop by drop the life-blood from her devoted heart. I knew that my strong and manly father was suffering on my account tortures that he would not, in his courage, let the world know were gnawing at his heart and at his soul. I knew how it went out to me ; how it followed me abroad in other lands, and I knew that the fail- ing, of his step, and the silvering of his hair, and 576 Sam Jones' Own Book. the deepening of the lines of grief about his mouth, that had so often spoken golden words of counsel, were due to the course and ways into whieii I had fallen, and to the apparent hopelessness of my ever coming out of them, and being reformed and being renewed in mind and in body. O, I shall never feel satisfied short of the ability in heaven to make obeisance at their feet and crave their pardon, which I know has long since been granted me, and which I shall ever see beam on their angelic faces until I am in my grave. I married a lovable woman. I married one who was proud of disposition; one who had high and noble traits of character; one who had quick and responsive sensibilities ; one to whom the very taint of any thing that was disreputable was like a knife- stab to her heart; but I disregarded the love and devotion of that precious wife. I went on and on, unheeding her counsel, disregarding her prayers, and from day to day getting grosser and grosser in my appetites, and getting more brutal in my insen- sibility to her pleadings and her prayers. And when children came to bless my home, even the sight of them in their little cradles, unconscious in the first moments of their life, and with the smiles of God drawing responsive smiles from them, I found it impossible for me to know that I was doing that which would sooner or later bring shame and sorrow and degradation upon those innocent babes; and as they grew from year to year their voices came, and they prattled about me ; it was only at distant intervals that I began to regard the future Demvekance from Bondage. 577 that was stretching far off in the di.stance before them, and which I must make either one of peace and pleasure, or one of despair and wretchedness. And year after year I went on and on in this course of sin and wickedness, and the light of my home went out. The love of my wife gave way, but the process of murder of affection could not last forever; and I saw at last, it seemed to me, that she had returned it to the sepulcher in which she had laid it away in its tear-bedewed cerements forever. I could see that the love and affection of my chil dren were turning from me daily, seemingly by in- tuition. They saw I was not he who was appointed to be their father in the manifestations of father- hood that I made to them. I could know, and know with a treble emphasis, that drove unutter- able horrors into my soul, but it seemed only to drive me further and further into despair, that they would, at my coming, flee from my presence far away into the darkest and remotest parts of the house, for fear of the consequences of meeting their father. I had friends, friends in position, friends high In authority, friends who were true and steadfast to me ; but they, too, were unable to paint to me any picture that would allure me from the one I was painting with my own hand in the horrible colors of hell itself They would point me to a goal that my bleared and confused vision would not see. They would endeavor to lift me up on plains of hope and sensibilities of ambition that I had ceased to be sensible of, as being worthy of achievement. 678 Sam Jones' Own Book. Mi - — tji They would endeavor to control my appetite, and find it as useless as to bind with a cotton-woven string the raging lion of the arid and tempest-swept desert. I had at times my lucid intervals, when there would come memories of mother's prayer, of father's counsel, of wife's tears, and of children's mute and helpless look ; and I would say to myself, " I will summon to my aid all the powers of my soul and manhood, and I will put under foot this monster of hideous mien that is dragging me down into degradation, into social ruin, and taking a fast hold upon my soul, and which sooner or later will drag it a trophy into hell. I would summon all my powers, only to find that I was weaker than a babe in the arms of so strong a passion as I had awakened. I would go to physicians, and ask them in the name of my family and future to do something for me, if indeed there had been found medicines on earth to minister to a mind diseased and an appe- tite debauched, and they would exhaust their knowl- edge and their skill, and hundreds ai^ thousands of dollars did I snend in the endeavor to reinforce will, manhood, and my own powers of repression, but all in vain. There were antidotes that were published abroad in the world, and with the use of which cures are guaranteed, but all, all in vain. I spent hundreds and thousands of dollars, and hours and days of time, and I purchased advertised efficient and war- ranted cures for drunkenness, and I was as faithful hi ♦ *■ Deliverance from Bondage. 679 in the application of them as ever human being was ; but it was all in vain ! in vain ! ! in vain ! ! ! There was no medicament in them to cure my aroused passion and appetite. I went so far that my wife, under the laws then existing in Georgia, had written by the j udge of the court in which I was the official short-hand re- porter, a legal notice, couched in the language of the law, and had this notice served upon every dealer in liquors in the city of Atlanta, warning them, under penalty of the law, not to let me have their damning fluid over their counters; and yet, outlaws as they were, disregarding my interest, disregarding my wife's pleadings and the tears of my children, and disregarding the very law of the land, they Ftill continued to supply me with the horrible drau^^ht for which my inmost nature seemed craving with insatiety. I even employed attendants and detectives, who followed me as I went about on my business in the streets of .'ay city, and they followed me with the purpose, and were employed for the purpose, of keeping these men who would not keep the law themselves from furnishing me with whisky; and yet I, in conjunction with them, was able to hood- wink and defy detectives and law. Further and further, deeper and deeper, I was sinking , I was getting hopeless for business; hope- less for all social standing; hopeless for all the temporal interests of this world ; hopeless for eter- nity ; and, in the very madness of my disordered brain, and in my very soul, there seemed at times 580 Sam Jones' 0^^^x Book. ■i4 HO avenue of escape at all from this self-imposed bondage, except through insanity ou the one hand, and throi-gh suicide on the other. I saw that my wife and children had given up all hope ; they did not know, from day to day, how I would come home to them. They had seen me brought there, day after day, time after time, in- sensible and unable to recognize them, from the in- fluence of this deadly and poisonous drug. They had seen me when I was brought in and laid on my bed covered with blood, and it seemed as though my days were indeed numbered, and that I would soon fall in the midst of my iniquity. They had seen me when I was brought home with the "wounds of the knife and pistol on my body, and they had heard the rumors from the streets and dives of the dangers with which I had been con- stantly surrounded of late. To them it seemed as though there was no avenue, no loophole, of escape for me from a terrible death. There was not the sign of hope or spirit beaming out from their beautiful faces. They knew not, from day to day, whether 1 would live to greet them another day. They knew not whether, if my life was prolonget^, they would be able to procure the very necessities of life from day to day. They knew not at what hour the very shelter that shielded them from the storm and from the heat wr>uld be removed from over their head, and they removed from under its shelter. There were visions of uncertainty, of the sheriff to dispossess, of the heartless landlord to distrain for rent, of the Deliverance from Bondage. 581 debtor to come and take all. There was no future ahead of them, except a future of impenetrable gloom, throup-h which seemed to come nothing but warnings of deeper woe and agonies yet to come. O, Lord, how good thou wast to me! thou hast given me relief from that bondage at my seeking. At last there came a time when I seemed to have reached the limit. Something strange im- pelled me to take my little children, as a loving act, an act, it seemed to me, of reparation for neglects of weeks preceding, and go upon the train to Car- tersville, where Brother Jones was preaching to immense audiences, and from which the report had come that there were many and many hundreds, and even thousands, who were coming back into harmony with God. And as I sat upon the plat- form, endeavoring to take in stenography the words as they fell from his lips, it seemed lo me that God had inspired him to preach upon one certain line. He preached it with that faith which is his alone ; he preached it with that fidelity which is his dis- tinguishing characteristic ; he preached with the earnestness and with the conviction tltat broke down the casements of my heart and went home to it. When he had finished those words of Conscience I Conscience ! Conscience ! and of Record ! Record I Record ! of God, the infinite, the all-seeing and the ever-judging God, came home to me. I went away from there troubled in mind and soul. I went home, and back into the devious ways, back into the bar-room, baek into the open highways, back to the maddening pool, in order to o82 o Sam Jones' Owx Book. m 1^1 '■■'fi get away from the torments I was suffering from an awakened conscience. But they would not leave me. I could find no solace where I had often found insensibility. I could find no relief in pota- tions where I had often found indifference and capability to take on a cool exterior. There was nothing there to give me surcease from the sorrow in my bosom ; and I went on and on until the sec- ond day, on Tuesday, at noon, I went into my library-room, fell upon my knees, buried my face in my hands, and I pleaded with Christ that he would let me cling to his cross, lay down all my burdens and sins there, and be rescued and saved by his compassion ; that I might be washed in his blood, and that my sins, though they were scarlet, might be white as snow. I wrestled for four long hours, in as much agony as I ever suffered. At the end of that time, when I had reached a conclusion, when I had come to understand that there w^as nothing of earth that could avail me, least of all with Christ, then I gave myself entirely to him, made an unconditional sur- render, and that moment he seized my soul. He dipped it in the stream which was white and pure, and the light of heaven shone in upon me. In my new-found joy, I rushed into the prosence ot wife and children. I proclaimed the glad udings to their astonished cars, and they could hardly be- lieve it, though they saw that some great revolution had taken place. They knew not whether it was a surrender to Christ, or whether it had been a surrender to madness. Deliverance from Bondage. 583 But when I went out that evening, I had three thousand circulars printed and distributed all over Atlanta, telling the jieople I had found my Savior ; I had made peace with God, and that I would live a life of righteousness ever after, and desired to make a proclamation for once and irrevocable. They gathered at seven o'clock upon the public streets that night, and there before them I proclaimed the fact, and, blessed be God, I have been proclaiming it ever since with increased joy, and with the cer- tainty that my salvation is complete. Returning home, I could see that Jesus had luiockea at the tomb of my wife's life, as it did at that of Lazarus, and had called it forth in all its pristine strength and beauty, and its bloom and blossom has been my pathway ever since. I could see that my children had found tongue to sing the joy and praise, and their hearts had been set attuned, as they never had been before, to the melody of childhood, singing to the ears of fatherhood. I could see that there was gladness, wherever I went, upon the faces of friends and acquaintances ; and, when the news had gone abroad in the land, they who had known me abroad sent me their glad con- gratulations and their encouragement. Blessed be God that, from the day he reached down and lifted me up from the horrible pit and the miry clay, and established my feet upon the rock of Christ that is higher than we, I have been going on from joy to joy, a bird of liberty, singing the praises of my Redeemer. And so, having been thus saved and thus healed. 684 8am Jones' Own Book. I would call you who are in that terrible bondage to seek relief of the same great Physician, and to draw your medicine from the same infallible spring. What are we doing with ourselves? O, how, when we look abroad in this land, we can see how intemperance is becoming the great national vice, and how it is becoming the fell destroyer of so many thousands and thousands of our loved ones. What are we doing with these bodies of ours? "What, know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?" Fellow- men, fellow-men, let me bring you to the contem- plation of the fact that these bodies of ours are the temples of the Holy Ghost, and that they were fashioned after the architecture of his great brains, by the great Being who is the architect of the universe. These bodies he made of the dust of the earth, and these bones of his rock ; he made us with veins and with arteries, and filled them with the blood from the seas of his providence ; he gave us breath, which, like the wind, cometh and goeth and scat- tereth ; which cometh we know not whence, goeth we know not where ; he gave us sight for all the beauties and grandeurs of the world, and inflamed it with fire from the center of his storehouse of fire ; he gave us thoughts, like the clouds, for, like them, they move, and as they play in the sunlight of right- eousness, are transformed into beauty, whether it be the beauty of the dawn, presaging what is to come. iTf? Deliverance from Bondage. 5S5 id frc; '111, [ht- be le. or the beauty of the sunset, presaging the glorious death toward which we tend. And we can make these minds of ours reflect the light of* heaven, or they can have the light of heiiven withdrawn, and be dark and dismal and foreboding as the storm-clouds, from which the mutterings of heaven come and roll the thunders of agony that spread destruction and death upon us. And in these temples he has placed the Holy Ghost in spirit for us, and we are its custodians, the priests of these temples; and when we degrade and defile them, we are degrading and defiling the architec- ture of God and his chosen resting-place in us. O, what a touching instance it was when the favorite son of TertuUian died ! His companions •were bearing his corpse to the cemetery upon their shoulders, and as they Avent along, occupied with their thoughts of sorrow and grief, they stumbled by the way, when the grief-stricken father, noticing it, called out to them : " Young men, beware how you walk; you bear upon your shoulders the temple of the Holy Ghost." So with us. We go about bearing with us the temple of the Holy Ghost, and we arc recreant to our own creation, recreant to our own destiny, re- creant to the great God who fashioned us, recreant to the great God who made us his temples, when we defile these bodies of ours, and ruin them with the licenses of our baser natures and our depraved appetites. One time Diogenes saw a young man going to a place of revelrv, where drinking was the custom, 42 o8G Sam Jonks' Own Book. 'I. i ''pi • w :^ ^ and from which men who went in sober and rational beings emerged besotted, and not knowing their way. He seized upon the young man, carried him to his friends, and informed them that he had res- cued their precious boy from a great and awful danger. So it would be well if we had friends who would thus rescue us. But there are times when friends, as I told you, can have no influence, and no Diogenes, however wise, however honest, however mindfid of his neighbor, could restrain us from going into these places. But how many Diogeneses it would take to seize upon those that night after night and day after day are going into these places of danger and ultimate death in the city of Cincinnati ! O, let us seek to save ourselves through the only influence, the only medicament, and the only Physician that this uni- verse affords us ! What is intemperance doing? It is not neces- sary to marshal here before yon the figures ; you can see it all about you. Young man, you know that you started in your intemperate habits just as I did. You know what influences have led you ; you know what ambitions you thought you could cultivate by listening to them ; you know how you have run out and gone into these places with like ideas of strength and ability to control yourselves just as I had. And now you arc buoyant in the consciousness that you think that at any time you can slap on the brakes of your nature, and save yourselves from degrada- tion that you see upon the planes just below us. Deliverance from Bondage. 5S7 Beware, beware of that fatal cup. There are fathers, middle-aged ; they know what intemperance will do. They are listening to me to-night, and they started on that road just as I started ; but if they have not reached the same length to which I went, they are on the high road to it. They can already know that they are not received where once they were welcome guests ; they know that they are passed every day on the streets of Cincinnati by men who formerly regarded them with esteem and claimed them as friends. They know that avenues were once open to them of usefulness, and which are now closed upon them forever on account of their habits, their companionship, and their places of resort. They know that the happiness of their families, once complete, is now gone, apparently forever. They know that the blanched cheek of that wife, that the constant redness of eye when they enter home, that the fleeing children, are all evi- dences of the steady growth of the evil ; and they have grown just in proportion as they have gone deeper and deeper into this besotted condition. There are old men here to-night who have led a long life, it seemed, of moderation, and who thought that they were exemplifying the ability of a man to drink and drink and drink, and yet preserve his manhood and his honest position ; but they can see that their excesses are not only sapping the foundations of their health ; they can feel that they are untimely gray ; they can feel that they have diseases in them that they would not have had but for their intem- perance; and thoy can see before them no life that 5S8 Sam Jones' Own Book. is leading them on and brightening their way as they go. But they are seeing, upon the other hand — and if they are honest with themselves, they will confess it to their souls — that they arc losing the powers, and that sooner or later they, too, must sink into the lowest depths of degradation, and be untimely cut off, ajid go to hell to everlasting death. Families and individuals — cities — prostrated. There is nothing that is so glaring about them as intemperance, which sweeps over them like the storm over a forest, day after day and night after night. Thank God that my city of Atlanta has redeemed herself under the white banner of temper- ance, with the cross of Christ on it! Thank God, she will shine as a city set upon a hill, giving a light to this nation ! Ohio to-day is giving full liberty to the whisky dealers to debauch and damn the most precious sons of your loins and your house- hold. God can not bless a people who are thus recre- ant to themselves and thus recreant to their duties, both to humanity and to God. Thank God that old Georgia is rapidly redeeming herself, and that after a while she will still be lying in the very apron of this nation, a redeemed State from tlie tyr- any of alcohol, and that she will raise her banner and commend it in its purity to every State in this nation, as it blazons M'ith the legend of Wisdom, Justice, and Moderation, under the broad and glit- tering arch of the Constitution. Nearly twenty-five years ago misguided men in the South fired the first shot upon Fort Sumter that fii i" Deliverance from Bondage. 589 that that |veiy tyr- Innor this lloni, |gUt- [n in that awakened this entire nation, and led to reform, and led to liberties, and led to the release of slaves from bondage, led to what no man had eontemplated as being eapable of realization. It niarsiialcd the most impregnable arms of this continent, and that shot reverberated all through eivilization. I tell you that whatever were the disasters of war, it struck the shackles from six million slaves ; but to-day, in a holier and grander cause, by the approving smile of God, old Georgia has fired a gun upon the Sum- ters of sin and intemperance in this country that will arouse this whole nation ; and we will batter down these forts of intemperance, whether they are in Cincinnati, Ciiicago, or Ne.w York. The army of God in this nation is on the march. And you may listen here; and if you have not the courage and the C^hristian zeal, we will come and break down the barriers ; we will pound down the forts of the demon of alcohol, and we will release you from this terrible bondage. In the midst of influences like this, with these facts staring them in the face, statesmen of this country are too cowardly to seize upon this great question, and make it a question of public policy for the Christian people. Politicians go wandering about among the lower classes, and talk and rant about personal liberty and sumptuary laws, as though they had a right to give laws to these people, when these smiling scoundrels are only seeking popularity and applause from the foolish and de]iraved. Scientists are disputing and debating, when all history and all true science have demonstrated that ."90 8a >r JoNEfl* On'N Book. if-i no curse is greater upon a people than to have the saloons aad the dissemination of these deadly com- pounds in the community. These whisky dealers are outlaws; they are ag? the law; they are anomalous creatures, and th .narchists of the nine- teenth century. If they would disobey and disre- gard the laws in my case, they will do it in yours, and they will do it in the case of every precious son you have got, of every living father you have got, of every devoted husband you have got in this country. Churches meet in conventions, meet in confer- ences, meet in assemblies, meet in synods, and pass resolutions on the subject of temperance, and yet the very ministers, it seems, in places, are unwilling to enforce the declarations " laws of their own Churches against their ow ibers, notwithstand- ing that right here in Cincinnati ministers of the Gospel have been disrobed through its influences, and Churches have been debauched. And thus our very rulers, law-makers, public men, and public teachers are thus indifferent or cowardly in the face of an evil like that, while the red-winged and fiery-eyed Zamael of these distillers and brewers of the country is sweeping over this land and laying low in horrible death the first-born of American homes, as the angel did at the command of God in the land of Pharaoh centuries ago. And every man and every woman, especially in America, has a direct personal interest in seeing the banner of Christ triumph over the sign of the beer barrel and the whisky worm. f 1 .. Deliverance from Bondage. 591 Is there any thing needed to arouse the humanity and the patriotism of you people to the iniquities that are being thus committed in your midst, and the sad havoc that is being made in your homes ? If I to-night were to call around me a staff of bailiffs and furnish them with Hubprenas, I could send them into the streets, and into the back-yards, and into the slums and alleys and tenement districts of Cincinnati, and I could send to Walnut Hills, and to Mount Auburn, and Avondale, and Mount Adams,* and other of your respectable and high- toned suburbs of Cincinnati, and from the palaces of your richest down to the humblest huts and dens of your poorest, and examine the widows and the orphans that whisky has made, and array them here in grand mass by the thousands, with their weeping «^yes, with their dismal recollection, with their 1 ourning, with their hearts crushed and bleeding, an« they would say to you, "If you are men, in the name of God and humanity, rise in your might and drive this monster out before he destroys and ruins your homes too." If we but heed these witnesses, and are true to ourselves, to our children, to humanity, and to God, we can destroy this flaming monster, and soon be able to sing out to men and angels that our people are redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled from the fatal powers of the dragon. Then we will be blessed by our Father in heaven with a posterity given to paths of righteousness and lives of Chris- tian endeavor and achievement. Our sons shall grow up in strength and honor. 592 Sam Jones' Own Book. ■i 1 'I \ ii and wear the Christian armor. Their feet will be shod with the preparation of the Gospel, their loins be girded about with truth, their bodies guarded by the breast-plate of faith, their shield be righteous- ness, their manly, sun-lit brows be crowned with the helmet of salvation, t-nd their good right arms will wield the trenchant, victoiious sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. Our daughters will grow up in beauty and come- liness of Christian graces. Their feet will be san- daled with truth and faith ; their lira us be clothed with robes of purity, on which, in silver and gold and prismatic hues, will be embroidered the record of their good deeds; their waists will be encircled with the golden girdle of strengthening prayer; their bosoms shielded by the bodice of innocence cover- ing the virtuous heart, on which burn vestal fires of love ; from their shoulders will drop the mantle of humility, and their hands will dispense the golden showers of charity upon the one side and of mercy upon the other ; their throats will be wrapped with the pearls of prcciuus words ; their lips will give forth sweet songs of praise to God ; their eyes will ever turn in trust to the groat white throne, whose radiance will glint in the folds of tlieir tresses, and presage the crown of immortal life that shall press their brows in Paradise. And these two shall dwell in the splendors and happiness of the palace of purity, that rears its walls and dome around and over every true and consecrated Christian heart. They will go up to it over the broad white flag-stones of perfect desires; Deliverance feom Bondage. 693 they will climb up its great steps of geometrically and systematically fashioned purposes and ambi- tions; they will pass between the grand columns of strength and wisdom that stand before the Gate Beautiful, with its golden welcome, "All that is pure may enter in;" and in the hall of consecration they will put on the insignia of their heaven-given prerogatives and pass on into the ro.unda of a righteous life, and up into the throne-seats of honor m the East. From that exalted place, they may contemplate with rapture the idealized tableaux of the virtues of their lives. Here the picture of Iruth a fair maiden drawing from her exhaustless well the waters of sincerity that are poured out for the ennobling and refreshing of all people, and over her the g ittering legend: <^Maffna est Veritas et prevaleht- There is the tableau of Faith, clinging to the rock-rooted cross that tow.rs heavenward and around which the wild waves of worldliness woe, and i)a.sion surge unavailing, their highest spray not touching even the hem of her garments. Yonder is seen the fair form of Virtue her beautifu feef. standing amid the treasures of th. upturned cornucopia of fortune, her hands folded m peacefulness across her lovely bosom, and her golden hair blown into a halo about her head by the breezes that are born in the hills of happiness. Here again is figured the faultless goddess of Justice, standing upon the uppermost pole of the t^irth, holding the scales of God's earthly impartial- ity and weighing out the dues of men in harmony with eternal truth. Over her the constellations 43 594 Sam Jones' Own Book. I M i:>* gather and glitter in the edict of Jehovah : "Fiat Justitia, mat caelum!" There again is the sweet face of Charity, swift-paced to carry succor and life to the hovel of the poor, the cots of the sick and cells of the wretched. And next comes the picture of gentle and tender-hearted Mercy, soothing the cares, relieving the burdens, reconciling the hearts, and ministering to tie redemption of all the souls of God's children. And here is the grand portrait of the strong, manly apostle of Temperance, the embodiment of health, vigor, energy, and philan- thropy; a giant in all good works, and approved servant of heaven. Over in the West is the grand horologe of Time, counting out the moments of life in a monotone peean of patience and labor, while its great pendu- lum swings through an arc that reaches from the cradle to the tomb. In the center is the Christian's altar, on which praises and prayers turn to worshiping incense and pervade the place with heavenly odors. Up in the high center of the vast dome blazes the Sun of righteousness, that lightens forever the splendid scene. Looking into it, the eye of faith, strengthened like the young eaglet's, can discern the transfigured cross of Calvary, pointing the soul to its home and rest around the throne of God in heaven. Who are these that thus reign and rejoice? They are the Prince Christian and Princess Chris- tiana of the kingdom of God on earth. They are the heirs apparent to everlasting life and the im- DelivekAnoe peom JJondaoe. 59j perishable possessions of the King of Itin^s ' Gorf Jhrect us with his wisdom to so Hve auT.se our hves as to endow our ehildren with these titles and ^n "tte cit!' T'' "','"; f"^ *'^™P™"=. -<• dutiful, in the city whose builder and maker is God." THE END.