1879 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CtJLTUEE. 



36? 



ture are to be suspended for your especial 

 work?" 



I presume I have not given his words in 

 the above, but it was the thought conveyed 

 to me. After he was gone, I dwelt on it. 

 Had I not really been carrying things too 

 far? Had I not been trusting to God and re- 

 ligion, where I had no business to do so, and 

 in things I could manage myself? These 

 thoughts were not new to me ; they had 

 often come up before, when I found some- 

 thing in the Bible I did not comprehend, or 

 when the Bible stood in the way of some 

 pet project" of mine. If he is right, there 

 must be some safe neutral ground. I must 

 not ask God for the money that I need to 

 day, for nothing short or a miracle could 

 bring it, in letters that were written days 

 ago. My Savior, who had been all these 

 years a warm personal friend, growing 

 warmer and nearer every day, began to 

 grow farther off. A cold chill began to 

 come over me. I did not know where to go 

 to work or where to turn. Not a move 

 could I make in business, or my work among 

 the boys, unless I could first ask my Savior's 

 approving voice. I tried to think I had 

 no business to ask God to help me in every 

 little thing. The Bible seemed suddenly an 

 old book of no use, and the meetings I had 

 taken so much pains to attend day and night 

 in these years seemed a waste of time. I 

 groped vainly for this more sensible ground 

 for all of one day, if I recollect aright. I 

 thought of my conversion and my new 

 home; was it a delusion? I thought of the 

 boys who had come out of jail and gone to 

 teaching Sabbath schools, and of the revivals 

 that had followed at least one of those 

 schools; was that a delusion? I thought of 

 the prosperity of my business, and the num- 

 ber it employed ; of the new engine down 

 below, so bright and shining and moving 

 with such resistless power. How often have 

 I looked at it, and wondered if it could be 

 so, that such a piece of machinery was all 

 my own ! Where did I, the awkward, un- 

 couth boy that every body laughed at, ever 

 get money enough to pay for such a thing of 

 life and beauty? Well do I remember how I 

 prayed and worked to scrape together the 

 money to pay for it, and how God seemed to 

 smile on me at just the last moment, when I 

 feared the money would not come in time. 

 Why, you might as well bid a bee go gather 

 honey with his wings cut off, as to tell me 

 that God does not answer these daily prayers 

 for our needs. I do not know about mira- 

 cles, nor do I very much care, so long as that 

 great kind Friend is near me, ready to re- 

 ward me almost instantly, when I put away 

 temptations, and strive to keep my heart 

 pure in his sight. 



I read the paper over again, that the Doc- 

 tor thought would kill my journal, and then 

 I knelt in prayer, and asked God "to show 

 me if I had been making a mistake, and had 

 not been led by him. He was back again 

 near to me, and I felt safe. I opened the 

 Bible, and almost the first words I saw were 

 these. 



Then said he unto me. Fear not, Daniel: for from 

 the first day that thou didst set thine heart to un- 

 derstand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy 



words were heard, and I am come for thy words. 



Daniel, x. 12. 



I had, until then, doubted somewhat what 

 might be the verdict of my pastor, but, from 

 that time forward, I felt that God was with 

 me, and that I was safe. For further evi- 

 dence, I prayed that God would, through 

 the mails, then being opened, indicate to 

 me that my conceptions of the hearts of the 

 people to whom I was writing through the 

 "Home Papers" were correct. Pretty soon, 

 the following was handed me. 



I have seen, in other journals, several slurs cast 

 on the "Home Papers"; but, Mr. Root, don't give 

 up. I am no professor of religion, but I feel I have 

 been drawn closer to God by the reading- of your 

 "Home Papers" than by all the other reading 1 and 

 sermons I ever saw or heard. A. Wilder. 



Sandwich, 111., Jan. 20, 1879. 



I prayed again, that I might have still 

 plainer evidence; and this came. 



Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.— 

 Acts, xxvi. 28. 



As it has been some time since you heard from 

 me, I feel that I owe you my thanks, any how, for 

 the good and kind lessons in the "Home Papers" of 

 Gleanings. I always thought well of God's people, 

 and when I read of the honest zeal you have shown, 

 it made me almost say, and I have said it, that I am 

 determined to be a Christian, and I am rejoicing in 

 it to day, and thank God that he ever put it in your 

 heart to publish the Home Papers. It is the first 

 thing I read after getting Gleanings, and there are 

 others who are strangers to our God, that like to 

 read that part. I hope it may prove of benefit to 

 them. O, if I could only have the faith that you 

 have, how happy I would be ! Please remember me 

 when you go before God and think that I am plead- 

 ing for you, that he may keep you unspotted from 

 the world. James Parshall. 



Union Valley, Mo., Feb. 3, 1879. 



Once more I asked that I might have evi- 

 dence that my very words and manner of 

 writing was guided and directed so as to 

 reach hearts and save souls ; and, almost at 

 once, came the following. 



Dear Brother Root r— I must write something for 

 your encouragement; and, to begin with, I will say 

 that I am almost 66 years old, and I do not recollect 

 ever taking any serious thought about the salvation 

 of my soul, until after I read "Our Homes" in No. 2, 

 of 1877. That article about walking 10 miles through 

 the snow, for nothing but the good of other people, 

 set me to thinking, and I have watched "Our 

 Homes" very carefully ever since. When I read 

 No. 1, '79, I determined to seek the Lord and his sal- 

 vation. 



The M. E. quarterly meeting commenced on Jan. 

 11th. 1 was away from home, and did not get back for 

 3 days. A protracted meeting followed, and I at- 

 tended with my mind fully made up to go to the 

 altar with the first that went. I attended every 

 night, and none went to the altar till Sunday night, 

 the 19th, when the Spirit said, "You are the oldest; 

 go first, and see who will follow." I went, and the 

 next night a young man, or rather a boy, came and 

 knelt by me, and I went every night for 11 nights, 

 during which time several found the Savior. Among 

 them was a man who had signed the Murphy pledge 

 last winter, who had not drawn a sober breath for 

 over 5 years before that time. I heard him say that 

 bis craving for whiskey was so great that he neither 

 ate nor slept for 3 days and nights after he signed 

 the pledge, and his wife said she kept the coffee hot 

 on the stove, and carried hot coffee to him very 

 often, for she really feared he would go mad; but 

 he is now clothed and in his right mind, and I think 

 in a fair way to get to Heaven. Thank the Lord. 



Well, I prayed as best I could for the Spirit to 

 come down on me there at the altar, and the preach- 

 er and the members prayed and talked, and the 

 more they prayed and talked, the harder my heart 

 seemed to get. On the 11th night the Devil said, 

 "There is no use trying; you are too old a sinner to 

 be saved." But I remembered the man who was 

 called to work in the vineyard at the eleventh hour, 

 and that he was the first to receive his wages, and I 



