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A r o u n d t h e O l d A r m Chair.
"I love it, I love it,
And who shall dare
To chide me for loving
The Old Arm Chair."
THE CHRISTIAN NATION. Vol. 59.
uneducated, to my mind, as to the
Christian religion."
"Come—that's too hard on
him!" said the other. "Elenry believes
in God, and in doing right."
"\'es—in a queer, spineless way.
Henry thinks right is the wise
thing, and sin a mistake—just a
mistake, that a loving God will
pardon. Now, I'm thrown quite
a lot with criminals—have to defend
them sometimes—get their
points of view. The strange thing
is that they all think as Henry
does. Henry's religion is the popular,
criminal brand. Criminals be­
THE HOME-MAKER.
lieve, usually, that they'd rathei Jesus. What use is a cheap religion,
of cheap forgiveness, for mere
I kiss my hand to the morning star.
And call "Arise!" to the sun.
do right, but they happen to have
Off on my orbit I've swung afar made mistakes, and so been landed
in crime. They're sure God W'hat use, indeed? The other to it in the arena. 'That sort of
mistakes ?"
E'er he has his course begun.
will pardon them, and they hope day a modern scientific expert was easy gospel would not matter very
Through opened windows the
the judge will, too. It's strange, lecturing: on cancer. He told his
much to anybody—certainly not
breeze new born
Comes rollicking, fragrant, free.
but the criminal is very much like audience that the reason there enough to die for. "Easy pardon, '
And all the glories ol early morn the rest of the ordinary world. were so many deaths from cancer easy sin"—the two belong together,
and belong to a general relaxa­
Are glowing for mine and me. After I hear them talk, I'm thrown was that the victims refused to
back upon mj' own heart. I look take it seriously at first. They tion of all moral logic.
In cheerful kitchen the kettle sings.
at my own excuses, and it makes could not be convinced that the "'Why didn't I keep him in my
There's sizzle, there's sav'ry smell,
And all of the little homey things me ashamed all through, for I see little lump or sore was of any employ?" said a man who had let
Are doing their duties well. my close mental kin t.> the convict
in stripes.
the idea of the knife, and would worker go. "I'll tell you why. He
consequence. The}' shrank from a most brilliant and promising
Under the magic of my hands two
"That makes me doubt any religion
that suits the view of the to cut out the affected place. In partly responsible for what they
not believe that it was necessary believed that people were only
The wheat flower turns to bread.
The brown beans change to a nectar
brew.
sinner—in or out of prison. I want the large majority of cases, the exa
doctrine of sin—a teaching about Pert went on to say, the cancer
did—that fate determined much of
And so are my loved ones fed.
their doings—and he included himself
in his belief. I can't afford to
Bin—that's different, that comes cells, if cut out at once, with all
A kiss for my good man at the gate—
from above, not out of human na- the adjoining tissue, would never
have any man in a position of trust
That never his love flame cool;
A swift caress for each curly pate— ture. I want a teaching about the appear again, and the cure would
who feels that way about the human
soul. No, it isn't
To shorten the road to school. cross that meets the awfulness of ^^ simple, perfect and permanent.
nonsense—
And then while my broom and needle
fly.
And my washtub sparkles foam,
I sing, "Oh, blessed of women, I!
For I am the Heart of Home!"
—Lillian Dynevor Rice in the New
York Times.
HENRY'S KIND.
it wobbles about and sprawls all
over the place. It's the kind of religion
'Lefty the Kid' has when he
"No. I don't care for Henry's
religion," said a young man—an
cries and tells me, as his lawyer,
energetic, forceful, young lawyer,
that he used to go to Sabbath
"It hasn't enough backbone in it,"
scbool, and that if he gets oft' this
"Oh, well, you don't expect doctrinal
points from Henry," said his
time he'll never steal again. Lefty
sings hymns in his cell—and has
friend. "He's too modern for
been arrested twenty-seven times
that."
"Doctrine means teaching—thai
is all," said the lawyer. "I can't
conceive of any worth-while religion
that isn't doctrinal, because
n
that would mean that it didn't
teach anything. Henry is entirely
for thieving! W'hat he needs is
a different sort of religion, that
will make him see his sin as more
deadly than death, and die to it
through Christ's cross, and be
Ijorn again a new man in Christ
to die. If he came just to set a
good example, to preach the Sermon
on tbe I\Iount, and utter the
parables, there was no reason why
he should have marched so yjifalteringly
toward the cross. There
was no need that the apostles
should proclaim the cross even unto
death, and the martyrs witness
sin. So, of course, in the end, I ^ut alas! most people waited till
you wait and watch that fellow.
want a teaching, or doctrine, about 't was too late, and too much tisfedemption
and the new birth of -^"e became involved. Then, when
Either he'll change his belief, or
he'll go to pieces!" The prediction
was justified. The young man
the soul, and what the old preach- they acknowdedged the disease, and
ers used to call 'the whole body of "''^''^ willing to have the operation,
went rapidly to the top, was given
doctrine'—a body with a backbone. the cancer had a terrible grip on the presidency of a business enterprise,
took it forward to what
Henry's religion can't stand up— tbeir lives.
looked like success—and then was
"It is the cheap, easy cancer
found to have yielded to pressure,
cure, sold by quacks," said tht
scientist, "that makes the death
manipulated things dishonestly,
and wrecked the concern. He left
rate so high. People use it, and
refuse the only logical way of
lown one night b)- stealth and disgrace
and exposure followed. The
cure."
logic of his. living was wrong, and
Evil is no light matter. Sin is
it landed him in ruin.
no mere mistake. If sin were not
Doctrine is logic. It teaches
deadly, then Christ had no need
cause and consequence. The young
man who wants a religion without
doctrine is making a deliberate
choice of a feeble, useless religion.
and thus of one that is untrue.
Such a religion is not Christian.
'i'he Cbristian religion has always
taught men's souls the truths of
is easy enough of attainment if, every time
the gospel about sin and salvation,
you^wash yourself, you use
which are logical truths. No man
can understand, \\ ithout doctrinal
truth, that God is love, for without
the cross, how can the depth
Pears' Soap
of God's love to man be realized?
It forms such an effective combination of detergent and
en:ollient properties that, as the late Professor Sir Erasmus
No man can understand his own
'Wilson, the greatest skin specialist of the 19th century, said, sin aright till he sees it in the
searchlight of the cross. Young
"Pears is the most refreshing- and agreeable
of balms for the skin" and it is
people often miss a satisfying, dynamic
religion because they accept
Matchless for the
a weak, uneducated faith instead.
Why choose Plenry's kind, when
Complexion
one can hare that of the apostles,
the martyrs and the saints?—Forward.
L J