G88 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



NovKMuiiR, 1020 



Tired as I was, I started off, ijrayino- for 

 faith and guidance of the Holy Spirit. The 

 man was stubborn and obdurate. To my 

 great surprise his wife sided in with him. 

 All I could say or do was unavailing. 1 

 asked to kneel in prayer before leaving. 

 After some hesitation permission was 

 granted. My prayer was something like 

 this : 



"0 Lord, thou seest how utterly I have 

 failed in my work. Give me faith while I 

 pray that thy Spirit may take this father 

 and mother in hand, and do what I have 

 utterly failed to do." 



Then I praj'ed for the two children who 

 were jjresent. I think the outcome must 

 have been a surj^rise to the father as well 

 as to myself. The young mother rose up, 

 and, altho her eyes were drenched with 

 tears, there was a new light in them that 

 l)roke forth. She arose to her full height, 

 and, pointing her linger at her husband, 

 said, "Sir, you know how 1 have objected 

 to tliis thing from first to last; but I am 

 ashamed to say that I reluctantly consented. 

 I have changed my mind, and hereby give 

 you notice that if you open that saloon to- 

 morrow morning, as you are i)lanning, you 

 and I are no longer husband and wife." 



At tliis he turned on me and said : 



"Aren't you a pretty specimen of Christ- 

 ian to come here and break up a family 

 and make trouble between a man and his 

 wife?"* 



I am afraid, to tell tlie truth, that the 

 result was that 1 laughed outright. I did 

 not fear any separation, and there was 

 none. Under tlie circumstances I did not 

 worry, even if I had succeeded in making 

 trouble in the little household. There was 

 ]iresent with me an old friend of mine who 

 had been all his life a skeptic and an in- 

 tl<lel, and one who ridiculed Christianity. 

 As we went out of the door he took back 

 wliut lie liad said, in words something like 

 this: 



"Mr. Root, if this is Christianity, I will 

 take back all I have ever said against it. 

 T believe in that kind of religion — a sort 

 of ]-eligion that doe.'^ somelhiiKj." 



Well, wlien I started back home it was 

 still snowing, pitchy dark, and I had no 

 lantern. I had to make my Avay along the 

 railway, and it was a good deal of the time 

 didicult to get my feet on the ties, but I 

 was so happj^ that I felt like sliouting 



*I hardly need tell you tli.at the s.aloon w.ts 

 never opened. I think he sent the liquors all 

 hack to where he got them. Neither did any di- 

 vorce follow: and I am sure the good father, when 

 he came to think it over calmly, decided more em- 

 phatically than lie ever did before, in regard to the 

 good wife, in the l;ingiiago of Holy Writ, "Her 

 price is tar above rubies.'" 



praises almost every step of the four 

 miles. 



The stanza from the hymn "He Lifted 

 Me" was clipped from a weekly periodical 

 entitled God's Revivalist and Bible Advo- 

 cate. Cincinnati, Ohio. From the same 

 periodical, dated Aug. 19, I clip as below 

 from an article entitled The New Birth : 



We have a nature as we come into the world 

 that is thoroughly alive to sin. In all languages 

 men know how to quarrel, how to be fussy and 

 abusive, how to lie, how to curse and be profane. 

 Sin is common to the race, and sinful speech to 

 all languages. Thus men are alive to evil, to 

 wicked deeds, and to corrupt conduct. 



The statement in the above, that all 

 nations and all languages know how to 

 curse and swear, was a new idea to me; 

 and it recalls to my mind that when I 

 passed the winter in Cuba a good mission- 

 ary explained to me the "swear words" 

 used in the Spanish language. Somehow 

 I had got it into my head that the heathen 

 on the face of the earth who do not know 

 our language do not swear nor curse at all. 

 Very likely the above statement is true. 

 If, then, humanity, no matter wdiere or 

 what language they speak, know how (per- 

 haps we might say from instinct) to curse 

 and swear, tliey must have some conception 

 of God the Father of us all. If, then, they 

 know how to rebel against the rule of the 

 great Father, it follows, so at least it seems 

 to me, that they have some conception also 

 of love and loyalty to this same God. Or, 

 to i^ut it short, every heathen, unless he is 

 an idiot or an imbecile, has a conception 

 of right and wrong. I wish every reader 

 of Gleanings might read that whole article 

 on the new birth. It is by L. L. Pickett. 

 I quote again, toward the close of the arti- 

 cle, a consideration of a child of humanity 

 after the new birth. 



He passes from death unto life. Old things 

 pass away. AH things become new. He now 

 loves what he once hated, and hates what he once 

 loved. Old habits are abandoned, old ways for- 

 saken. His plans^ are new; his companions, his 

 purjjoses, his desires are new. Sin becomes e.\- 

 ceedingly .sinful to him. Its ways are olt'ensive, 

 repulsive. He is horn ayaiii. 



The expression in the above, "lie now 

 loves what he once hated," pictures my 

 i:)Oor self exactly. All at once I turned 

 square about. — "old habits abandoned, old 

 ways forsaken." in some of our old hymn- 

 liooks there is a beautiful hymn beginning: 



Jesus, I my cross have taken. 



Let me digress again. 



Our youngest son, Iluber, urged that 

 Mrs. Root and 1 should go with him down 

 to Cleveland and visit a moving-picture 

 show. It took a strong hold of him be- 

 cause it told (»r n iiiot tier's loxe and a 



