WHY PETER WENT A-FISHING. 207 



loye such are the fishermen of our day, and such, I 

 doubt not, were the fishermen of old. They were 

 men with whom a mother would willingly trust her 

 young boy, to whom he would become attached, with 

 whom he would enjoy talking, and, above all, who 

 would pour out their yery souls in talking with him, 

 when among their fellow-men they would be reserved, 

 diffident, and silent. They were men, too, who would 

 recognize in the boy the greatness of his lineage, the 

 divine shining out from his eyes. Who shall prevail to 

 imagine the pleasantness of those days on the sea when 

 Peter and John talked with the holy boy, as they 

 waited for the fish, and their boat rocked to the winds 

 that came down from Lebanon. Who can say that 

 there were not some memories of those days, as well as 

 of the others when we know Christ was with him, 

 which, when he was tired of the waiting, led Peter to 

 say, " I go a-fishing !" 



I believe that he went a-fishing because he felt exactly 

 as I have felt, exactly as scores of men have felt who 

 knew the charm of the gentle art, as we now call it. 

 No other has such attraction. Men love hunting, love 

 boating, love games of varied sorts, love many amuse- 

 ments of many kinds, but I do not know of any like 

 fishing to which men go for relief in weariness, for rest 

 after labor, for solace in sorrow. I can well under- 

 stand how those sad men, not yet fully appreciating 

 the grand truth that their Master had risen from the 

 dead, believing ; yet doubting, how even Thomas, who 



