41:2 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 



vehement in denouncing the Bible and re- 

 ligion, he almost insisted that I should take 

 his boy into my employ. I told him if I did 

 I should insist on an observance of the Sab- 

 bath and all these things, but he said he 

 didn't care anything about that, if I would 

 only take him on some condition, he cared 

 not what, he would silence all his scruples, 

 and our differences in opinion. He wanted 

 the fruits of religion, but ridiculed the means 

 I used to bring about these fruits. 



After a few days, a good friend of mine 

 came to tell me that the whole article would 

 probably be put in our principle county 

 paper. I had never dreamed of this. To 

 keep the article within bounds as well as I 

 could in our town, I had, contrary to our 

 usual custom, refused to give sample copies 

 of this month free, and applicants who 

 wanted them evidently for the purposes of 

 gossip and not bee culture had been asked 

 10c. per copy, the usual retail price. I after- 

 wards learned that, even at this price, they 

 were sold by boys on the street. Although 

 I was greatly pained to learn of its further 

 dissemination in our own town through the 

 weekly paper, on a little reflection, I con- 

 cluded it was my duty to trust God in the 

 matter, and be not troubled. I told my 

 friend the matter was in God's hands, and 

 the best I could do was to trust him to bring 

 good out of it. The editor of the paper was 

 the one to whom I referred on page 152, of 

 the April number. The paper came out, 

 with a long editorial notice of it, in which, 

 with an ingenuity that none but Satan could 

 devise, as it seemed, the whole was twisted, 

 misrepresented, and misstated. I will just 

 mention one point. 1 was accused of doing 

 it all as a money speculation, and of sending 

 boys out on the street with them, after hav- 

 ing printed several thousands extra. I did 

 not print one extra copy for that month, and 

 I hindered the sale in every way I could 

 consistently, in our own town. When the 

 county paper came out, every body was car- 

 rying it about, and a great many, it seemed, 

 followed the editor's version and comments. 

 There had been excitement before, but now 

 the excitement seemed to have risen to white 

 heat. My former virtues were recounted, 

 but religion had ruined me. I was a relig- 

 ious fanatic and had gone crazy. 



There was another paper in our town, 

 conducted by a man or known intemperate 

 habits, a frequenter of the saloons. He 

 could not well denounce my course more 

 than the other did, but he had a different 

 way of doing it. The summing up was that 

 I was crazy, and dead in the estimation of 

 every good citizen. My business was gone, 

 and, of course, that was the end of me. I 

 can readily have charity for these brothers, 

 for I well remember years ago, how I hoped 

 that the revival meetings would prove a 

 failure, and Christian people would no more 

 take notice of me, and endanger givipg my 

 guilty life publicity. If I were really crazy 

 (or thought to be so), I should not have it in 

 my power to worry the saloon keepers and 

 their customers. 



This last named editor, by some means, I 

 know not how, got hold of the article in the 

 January A. B. ./"., in regard to myself and 



the Home Papers, and this, too, was held up 

 before our town's people. As an illustration 

 of how God helps his children over persecu- 

 tions like these, I would go back for a 

 moment to the time when I first saw this 

 article in the A. B. J. It was in the evening, 

 after a hard day's work, about the first of 

 the year. I was just turning out the lights 

 to go home, as my eye caught sight ot the 

 wrapper of the familiar and welcome A. B. J. 

 I tore off the wrapper, and, glancing through, 

 my eye very soon lighted on that article. I 

 need not tell you that, when I read it through, 

 it fairly wrung my heart with pain, to think 

 that it was within the ingenuity of man, to 

 so twist and subvert that part of my life's 

 work, that I had never dreamed any body 

 could object to. The moment I had finished 

 the last line, I dropped on my knees, feeling 

 as perhaps I never had before, the need of 

 that friend who never fails. I was really 

 driven to him, and as I knelt, I remembered 

 that that was exactly the spot where I had 

 knelt four years before, when I uttered that 

 first prayer, and it was almost the same time 

 of the year. "Come thou, O my Savior, to 

 thy child to-night, and as thou didst lift him 

 up on that memorable night before, and al- 

 most hourly during the intervening years, 

 lift him ^to-night, and help him to bear this 

 new cross, and not to feel unkindly to the 

 brother who did it." 



"I will, my child, peace be unto thee,'' 

 was the answer, almost instantly. My sim- 

 ple prayer was answered so completely, that 

 neither at that time nor at any time since 

 have I ever felt troubled about the matter. 

 Why should I feel troubled about what God 

 has promised to take care of. When Prof. 

 Cook so very kindly took my part in the 

 matter, and placed me and my motives in 

 their true light, I could then see plainly how 

 much better it was for me to keep silent, 

 rather than to try to set it right myself. It 

 seems^to .'me that it was in answer to that 

 prayer that God moved the kind heart of 

 friend Cook to do this. 



You may remember that, in the January 

 number of Gleanings, jthe burden of the 

 Home Papers was the lines, 



"Jesua,'I my cross have taken." 



Well, all at once, it burst upon me, that 

 God was only schooling; me to be able to 

 drink' in the.' joy and peace of the sentiment 

 contained in the second verse. Just notice 

 how wonderfully the words were framed by 

 that poor girl (should I not say ric/i rather?) 

 for my present needs. Read it : 



Man may trouble and distress me 

 'Twill but drive me to thy breast ; 



Life with trials hard may press me, 

 (Heaven will bring me sweeter rest. 



O! 'Tis.not in grief to^harm me, 

 i*--- while thy love is.left to me; 



O! 'Twere not in joy to charm me, 

 Were that joy unmixed with thee. 



Is it strange that I went home through the 

 darkness that night, happier and nearer to 

 my Savior than if those hard lines in the 

 A. B. J. had never been printed, and do you 

 not get a glimpse of the wonderful truth in 

 the little text at the opening of this article V 



And we know that all things work together for 

 good to them that love God. 



