716 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



prime of life, with every thing, apparently, to 

 make one rejoice in living, should desire to 

 throw away this wonderful and precious gift 

 from God. While these thoughts were in my 

 mind it seemed to me that I could approach 

 her in such a way that she would speak. I 

 leaned over her, and said something like this : 



"My poor friend, we know nothing about 

 what it is that troubles you ; yet God knows, 

 and he only can help you in a time like this. 

 Will you not put ^-our trust in him ? " 



She thanked me ; and when I asked her 

 what we could do for her she requested to be 

 sent home, and gave me her street and num- 

 ber. The doctor was soon at hand, and pro- 

 nounced her in a nervous chill. She was 

 dressed in dry warm clothing, and sent to her 

 home. The daily papers afterward announced 

 that it w'as, as I had suspected, an attempt at 

 suicide. She was engaged to be married to a 

 young man from Toledo ; but just on the eve 

 of the wedding he disappeared, and she after- 

 ward learned that he was already married. 



Things of this kind have happened so often 

 you wonder why I take the trouble to mention 

 it. I will tell you. In thinking it over I felt 

 impressed that it was nn^ duty to plead with 

 this poor young woman, and to use niy poor 

 powers of persuasion to induce her to choose 

 Christ Jesi:s as her friend and confidant, and 

 to cease to mourn or feel troubled about one 

 who had shown himself so utterly unworthy 

 of her care or regard. Some of you may smile 

 at my simplicity. You may think I ask some- 

 thing that is impossible to the average young 

 man or young woman. Dear friends, I know 

 whereof I speak, for I have been through Sa- 

 tan's toils. God has given you as well as my- 

 self a human life to live. It is a great and a 

 precious gift ; and if we are loyal and true to 

 the great Giver, the great Father of us all, we 

 shall so regard life. Nothing should induce 

 us to think of throwing it away, (rod gave, 

 and no possible combination of circumstances 

 should make us think we have any right to 

 throw away or destroy that which he gave. 

 Satan never misses an opportunity to get into 

 the human heart and persuade one that God 

 conferred no favor in giving us life. In fact, 

 I have sometimes thovight that Satan's whole 

 work is only for the purpose of getting his 

 victim to throw away and destroy the life that 

 God gave. We think of suicide because we 

 have broken or begun to break this first and 

 greatest of all the commandments, as in our 

 text. When that smart lawyer came to the 

 Savior and sought to test him by asking which 

 commandment was the greatest and first of all, 

 he replied, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God 

 wuth all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and 

 with all thy mind. This is the first and great 

 commandment ; " and through all my obser- 

 vation, especially since I have been trying to 

 follow the Master, it has seemed to me the 

 greater part of the troubles in this world are 

 because we let something else come before 

 God. This young woman had become so 

 bound up — in fact, her whole life had become 

 so centered in this unworthy man — that she 

 "h&d/orgoileii God ; and when this man prov- 

 ed false — when he had subjected her to that 



terrible humiliation of having to come before 

 friends and foes as a poor, deluded, disap- 

 pointed woman, she felt as if she could not 

 stand it, and she finally decided to drown her 

 troubles in the oblivion she hoped to find be- 

 yond the grave. 



Sometimes we ponder and wonder that the 

 world has stood so long, and yet nobody- 

 knows — that is, the great part of the world at 

 least thinks nobody knows — whether it is pos- 

 sible to escape trouble and humiliation and 

 guilt by suicide. Even the Bible seems 

 strangely silent on this subject. The more I 

 study it, and the more I study humanity, the 

 more I am satisfied that suicide never mends 

 matters. Jesus himself said this was the first 

 and greatest commandment of all. We must 

 be loyal and true to God if we expect to be 

 even happy in this world of ours. Many 

 young people have an idea that such attach- 

 ments, especially if they are of several years' 

 growth, are not easily cured. I think dime 

 novels and similar foolish romantic stories are 

 responsible for a great part of this. A married 

 woman who had grown-up children once con- 

 fessed to me that she could never get over the 

 consequence of an attachment of years before, 

 for another than her husband. She said she 

 could not keep his image out of her mind. I 

 said to her something like this : 



" Why, niv dear friend, you are simply 

 trifling and dallying with Satan. He is the 

 one who has got hold of you, and will not let 

 go. You must keep such thoughts out of 

 your mind. It is almost as sinful and as 

 W'icked as for the intemperate man w'ho says 

 he can not control his appetite for drink. 

 Everybody tells him, and he knows it, that it 

 is dangerous for him to even think about it. 

 His physician and his pastor tell him to keep 

 busily at work at something that is good and 

 honest ; and as he values his future life and 

 happiness he must absoluteh- />//// his thoughts 

 from all such things. He must turn his feet 

 away from the direction of evil, and he must 

 put the thought far from him. He )iiust do 

 it, even if it requires prayers, groans, and 

 tears; and you, my friend, must do the same. 

 You are sinning even now in telling me what 

 you have told. But if you have come to me 

 for counsel that my prayers may second your 

 prayers, then I will do what I can for you. 

 With Christ Jesus to help, this thing is not so 

 very hard. In a very little time the dear 

 Savior rewards the faithful and honest sufferer. 

 I know this, for I have been in his chains. 

 Oh that I had the persuasive power and elo- 

 quence to tell all the world, and to make it 

 believe, that there is no need of being in the 

 fetters of sin. Christ died that we might live, 

 and that we might be free from .sin ; and we 

 have thousands of God's promises to the 

 effect that whoso cometh to hiui he will never 

 cast out." 



Let me say further to those who have strug- 

 gled and battled along this line, there are 

 thousands of cases in this world of ours to 

 show and prove conclusively that this affec- 

 tion — this love between the sexes — can be 

 controlled by reason and common sense. 

 Right among my own relatives I am quite 



