R (continued 2)

“My name is Jackson,” replied the general. “What Jackson?” asked the irate farmer. “General Jackson.” “You don’t mean to tell me that you are the famous Stonewall Jackson?” the farmer stammered. “That’s what they call me.” The farmer took off his hat with great reverence and said: “General Jackson, ride over my whole field. Do what you like with it, sir.”—The Sunday Magazine.

(2707)

Requital—See Grace; Repayment.

RESCUE

Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, the pioneer missionary to Turkey, was one day crossing the Galata Bridge in Constantinople when his attention was attracted to a crowd. He prest into it to see its object of interest and found a cursing American sailor dying of cholera. The missionary asked him a few questions and was answered by oaths. He had the man removed to a house, and after a few months’ nursing by the Christians of the mission he was able to ship for America. On the morning he left, he called on Dr. Hamlin and said, “I have been a very wicked man, and have done all the evil I could in the world, and now I am going to do all the good I can.”

Three years later, the mission received this letter from him:

“Dear Mr. Hamlin: Thank God, I will survive the dead! I am here workin’ and blowin’ the gospel trumpet on the Eri Kanal.

Yours Brown.”

Twenty-five years later Dr. Hamlin met a gentleman in Paris who had just returned from Honolulu. Said he, “I met a man named Brown who has done a great deal of good among the sailors in the Pacific. He can go everywhere and anywhere with the Bible. He told me that once he was dying, a blasphemous dog, in the streets of Constantinople, and you picked him up and saved him soul and body.”

(2708)

The worth of man is independent of conditions of life or color of skin. An exemplification of that fact is recorded in the history of a rescue in Hongkong harbor:

While the cyclone was at its highest and it was still a question whether the largest steamers in the port would survive the storm, the officers of the Schuylkill noticed a vague pencil of light through the sheets of rain, lighting up a confusion of loose and drifting shipping. For the first two or three flashes they thought they were menaced with the new peril of lightning, but no detonation followed the flash. A lull in the rain showed that the search-light of the second-class British cruiser Azelia was following one of her boats while it made a desperate struggle to reach the crew of a foundering Chinese junk. The pencil of light, now bright, now dim, followed the boat as it was pulled by a crew of stout British tars and managed with almost incredible cleverness by its officer. They saw it alongside the junk, saw the Chinese tumble into it half dead with fright and fatigue, and disappear beyond the rays of the search-light. Next morning they learned that the Chinese were landed safely farther down the harbor, but that the boat was crusht like an eggshell against the sea-wall, tho the sailors were saved to a man.

(2709)

Many straying souls who have lost the way may be but fallen angels, whom love and kindness might restore.

George MacDonald tells of a young woman who had been led astray. A minister found her one night on his doorstep, and brought her into his house. His little daughter, who was up-stairs with her mother, asked, “Mama, who is it papa has in the library?” Her mother replied, “It is an angel, dear, who has lost her way, and papa is telling her the way back.”

(2710)

This incident has been related of the eminent divine, Edward Irving:

When a boy in Scotland with his little sister he went down on the sands of Solway Firth to meet his uncle, who was coming to visit their home. When the tide comes in there, it flows in with a rush. It sweeps on like a flood. All the people there know this danger of the onrushing sea and guard against it, but these little children forgot the time and tide. They were playing in a little pool of water. Suddenly a horseman dashed down from the mountain side. Without a word he came up on a run, secured the two children to the saddle and started for the hills. Faster and faster followed the rising tide, but at last the horseman and his precious load were saved.

The Christian must waste no time if he would save imperilled men. (Text.)

(2711)

A policeman shouted to a boy in the Lancaster Canal at Preston, England, “Hullo! Why are you bathing there?” “Please, sir, I’m not; I’m drowning,” was the boy’s answer, and he promptly sank. The policeman dived and rescued him.

Many persons who are supposed to be having a good time in the world are really losing their lives.

(2712)

See Kongo Missionary; Listening for Signals.

RESENTMENT, FREE FROM

A writer in the Saturday Evening Post speaks thus concerning Lincoln and Lee:

On several occasions I heard him speak most feelingly of the defamation heaped upon him by the South, but never did he exhibit the semblance of resentment. More than once I have heard him say: “If these people only knew us better it would be well for both of us.” He always spoke of them as “these people,” as did General Robert E. Lee, who in personal intercourse usually referred to the Union army when in front of him as “these people.” His last order to Longstreet before Pickett’s charge at Gettysburg was: “These people are there and they must be driven away.” Both of these great characters of our Civil War are now remembered, and will be remembered for all time, as having never uttered a sentence of resentment relating to their opponents in the war.

(2713)

RESERVATION

An old Indian in northwestern Canada, who for many years had hated Christians, was at last brought to the Savior and wished to be baptized. The examining missionary, the Rev. E. D. Thomas, was convinced that the old man was keeping back something from him, and was clinging to some form of his old belief. It proved to be a charm which he had purchased years before from a very great medicine-man. After a long talk he was persuaded to give it up. It was a small, round tin box wrapt in pieces of dirty calico and sealed with grease and clay. Inside were half a dozen little pieces of stone, each wrapt in brown paper and embedded in down. (Text.)

(2714)

RESERVE POWER

No life can be vigorous if it is not kept fresh, responsive, by great physical and mental reserves. As hibernating animals, like the bear, in cold climates sustain life through the winter wholly upon the reserve fat and nutriment stored up in the tissues, so patients who have splendid physical reserves and resisting power are carried through severe sicknesses and sustained through severe illnesses by this reserve surplus, stored-up vital power, while those who lack it, those who have dissipated it in abnormal living and excesses, often lose their lives, even in much less severe illnesses.

Great business men accomplish marvels with their reserves. Many of them work but a few hours a day, but they have such tremendous physical reserves and so much stored-up mental energy that they are able to accomplish wonders in a short time, because of their ability to work with great intensity and powerful concentration.

People who keep their physical and mental surplus drawn down very low by working a great many hours and almost never taking vacations, who do not fill their reserve reservoir by frequent vacations and by a lot of recreation and play, do not work with anything like the freshness and mental vigor of those who work less hours and constantly accumulate great reserve power.

There comes into every life worth while a time when success will turn upon the reserve power. It is then a question of how long your stored-up energy will enable you to hold out. There will often arise emergencies when your success will depend upon how much fight there is in you.—Denver Republican.

(2715)

Reserved Merit—See Books and Worth.

RESIGNATION

This note of resignation is written by F. C. Browning:

(2716)

Paul Laurence Dunbar, the negro poet, occupied a unique position in the literary world. W. D. Howells called him the only man of pure African blood and of American civilization to feel the negro life esthetically and express it lyrically. While he was dying of consumption, he contributed to Lippincott’s this verse-sermon of resignation:

(2717)

RESISTANCE

Sit upon the shore close to the water’s edge, and let the sand teach you how to resist. It runs out underneath the water, and just lies there; and when the wave hurls its tons upon it, the sand gives way, but makes the water move it. When the water rushes furiously landward, the sand goes with it, but not quite so fast; and when the wave retreats, the sand runs back, but not quite so far. It always stands close to its enemy, and a little in front of him, never lets him strike from a distance, and never allows him to make any permanent mark. It never runs away, and never melts, and it always separates itself from its antagonist and lies ready for another attack. Always prepared for a blow, it never gives one.—James M. Stifler, “The Fighting Saint.”

(2718)

The modern treatment of moral germs should be similar to that used in modern surgery:

The new era, which is to succeed the present or “pathologic” era in surgery, is the “physiologic,” and in it we are to take less care about the entrance of possible germs into our surgical wounds and more about keeping the patient in such condition that he can resist them if they do get in.—Literary Digest.

(2719)

It is said that Napoleon once ordered a coat of mail. When the artizan completed and delivered it, the emperor ordered him to put it on himself. Then Napoleon, taking a pistol, fired shot after shot at the man in armor. It stood this severe test, and was accepted.

(2720)

RESISTANCE AS A LEVERAGE

I know not how the stork, “leaning upon the sirocco,” makes a leverage of the opposing element for her swift flight. I leave the naturalist to explain that. But I do know that the sirocco is a challenge to her unerring instinct and strength of wing. God manipulates the wind. The stork manipulates her wings. And the working of the combination results advantageously to the stork. She does not lean upon the sirocco wind as you would lean upon a couch. That would result in a fall and the bird would be dashed in pieces. The leaning is accompanied by action. While the buoyancy of the air bears her up, the balancing of the wings bears her on. That air-cushion is no “downy bed of ease.” It is a thing to be encountered and overcome. She makes the adversary contribute to her progress. The thing from which men shrink is the thing the bird dares.—C. J. Greenwood.

(2721)

Resistance by Softness—See Substances, Penetrating.

RESOLUTENESS

The famous antarctic explorer, Sir Ernest Shackelton, has astonished his friends by his persistency of purpose. He was long ill during the progress of the “discovery” expedition. His lungs bled for months, but his indomitable purpose prevailed. He struggled heroically against a malady that threatened his life hour by hour. Before he set out he had looked at the map and said at a banquet, “Thanks, here’s to our success. I must not touch wine again until I return. I think we shall do it; at least we will try.” And he reached within ninety-seven miles of the South Pole, and returned to England sound and well.

(2722)

RESOLUTION

Robert Louis Stevenson, in “Virginibus Puerisque,” writes an account of a sea-fight in which he relates this:

Duncan, lying off the Texel with his own flagship, the Venerable, and only one other vessel, heard that the whole Dutch fleet was putting to sea. He told Captain Hotham to anchor alongside of him in the narrowest part of the channel and fight his vessel till she sank. “I have taken the depth of the water,” added he, “and when the Venerable goes down, my flag will still fly.” (Text.)

(2723)

See Convictions, Strong.

RESOLUTIONS, GOOD

When Admiral Farragut’s son was ten years old the father said in his hearing that when he was old enough to make a contract and keep it, he had a bargain to offer him. The son rose up and asked the father what the contract was. The admiral said, “The proposal I intend to make is this: If you will not smoke or chew tobacco, drink intoxicating or strong wines, till you are twenty-one years of age, I will then give you one thousand dollars.” “I am old enough to make that bargain now,” said young Farragut. “I will accept the offer.” The bargain was closed, and when young Farragut was twenty-one the cash was handed over to him. A smoking boy can save a thousand dollars in a few years in the same way, besides saving physical energy and moral power.

(2724)

RESOURCEFULNESS

“Where there is a will there is a way.”

“According to a Pittsburg telephone manager,” says Telephony, “the telephone was put to a novel and unusual use in Washington County recently, enabling two boys, sons of farmers, to hold their positions in their classes in the public schools from which they will graduate in another year. Incidentally, the patience and long-suffering of the country school-teacher was put to an admirable test. Smallpox broke out in the neighborhood in question, and the two scholars were among the early victims. The home was quarantined, and there was every indication that the instruction which they had been receiving would be cut off for an indefinite period. But the teacher was resourceful and willing. He called up the stricken home one evening and proposed that the boys study their lessons as usual, and he would hear them over the telephone. The idea was eagerly received. Each evening they took down the receiver, and the teacher, located several farms away, heard them recite. Neither suffered to an appreciable degree through their absence from school, and their chances for graduation are just as bright as before the disease entered their home.” (Text.)

(2725)

See Medical Missions.

Resources, American—See Waste.

RESOURCES, EXHAUSTED

No life is self-sustained. For the individual and the nation, isolation means death. If the resources by which life is sustained were not furnished by others we should soon be at the end of our career.

Charles Francis Adams, the historian and publicist, of Boston, Mass., in his address at Lexington, Va., on January 19, 1907, at the centennial celebration of General Lee’s birth, told the throng of Southerners, there in the shadow of Lee’s old home, that the Confederacy was beaten in the markets of the world, that the economic laws held it in an iron grip, that if 100,000 men could have been sent to reenforce Lee, in the last days of the war, his condition would have been worse than before, as even their meager food-supply would only the sooner have been exhausted. With the South depleted of food by the four years’ of conflict, with the markets of the world closed to her, and no source of subsistence open to her armies, valor and devotion could count for only little.

This consideration enters largely into England’s determination to keep her navy stronger than those of any other two powers. So much of her food-supply comes from abroad that she must maintain control of the ocean routes of trade.

(2726)

RESOURCES, GOD’S

Disposed somewhat to gloomy thoughts, especially at such times as her husband was maligned or persecuted by his enemies, Luther’s wife was on one occasion given a lesson by the great reformer in this wise: “Indeed, you torment yourself as if God were not Almighty and could not produce new Doctor Martins by the score if the old doctor should happen to drown himself in the Saal.”

(2727)

Resources, Inner—See Water of Life.

RESOURCES, MAKING THE BEST OF

In the Tate Gallery in London there is a picture entitled “Hope.” Seated on a globe representing the earth is a woman blindfolded. The water which encloses the globe reaches to her feet. In her hands is a lyre with all the strings broken excepting one. She does not mend the broken chords, she does not wring her hands in helpless remorse over opportunities that are gone forever, but continues playing on the single string that is left unbroken.

It is the part of a brave man to do his best with what material is still at his disposal, instead of wasting time in vainly regretting what might have been. (Text.)

(2728)

RESOURCES, SMALL

A general who rose from the ranks in our army told me, not boastingly, that all he inherited from his father, in Vermont, was a pair of second-hand trousers, a sealskin cap, and a tendency to rheumatism. The Spartans gave their cooks only vinegar and salt and commanded them to look for the rest of their sauce in the meats they were to serve.—James T. Fields.

(2729)

RESPECT FOR TEACHER

In Morley’s “Gladstone” there is a passage from the pen of the great premier, telling how, years after his Eton career, he sat down to a dinner in honor of the severe old head-master who had flogged every boy in the school, most of them many times. They had all hated him, they said. But when he rose to speak at that dinner, such a storm of applause never greeted a triumphant parliamentarian; and tears of affection actually overflowed all eyes.—Burris A. Jenkins, “Proceedings of the Religious Education Association,” 1904.

(2730)

Respect for the Dead—See Sympathy by Pleasure-goers.

RESPECT, NO, OF PERSONS

When King George the V was in the navy, he associated on terms of perfect equality with his messmates, among whom he was known. As an illustration of the indifference of his messmates to his royal birth, and of the spirit of equality with which he was treated by them while at sea, an incident may be related.

One night he declined to turn out, as he should have done, to go on watch. His fellow middy, whom he was designated to relieve, and who wanted to turn in, endeavored to arouse the prince. The latter, on receiving two or three shakings, opened his eyes, swore picturesquely, but refused to turn out. He hit the man who had called him one blow on the eye and went to sleep again.

The young fellow made no response, but returned to his post, resumed his watch, and thus did duty for the prince. Now, if there is one offense that is heinous, according to midshipman ethics, it is the shirking of a watch.

On the following day, the lad who had done double duty, reported the case to his comrades. It was immediately decided to hold a drumhead court-martial in the gun-room. Prince George was brought before it, found guilty by unanimous count, and sentenced to be spanked by the middy who had done his work.

The royal culprit was seized by four of the seniors and held face downward, while the middy with the disfigured eye, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, carried out the sentence of the gun-room court. When the prince was released he was furious with rage and mortification, and threatened all sorts of things. But a few hours after he thought better of it, came to his messmate who had spanked him, and apologized for the blow he had given him, as well as for making him do double duty.

(2731)

RESPONDING TO THE CALL

I went a few weeks ago out to Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, to attend the dedication of the gymnasium there built in memory of Hugh McAllister Beaver; and as I came away, his father gave me the history of his regiment in the Civil War, the 148th Pennsylvania Volunteers. One of the first chapters of all is entitled “The Sister’s Story.” It is the story of how some of the lads of the regiment came to be enrolled. It was in the year of 1862. President Lincoln had issued a call for 300,000 men and then a call for 300,000 more, and the War Department had drawn up provisions for a draft in case the men were not voluntarily offered; and this one county in Pennsylvania did not wish to stand under the ignominy of a draft, but desired that the men who were to go from that county should offer themselves freely in response to that call. This sister tells of how the appeal came to the little village in which she and her brother lived, in Center County, Pennsylvania. There was a small country academy there, and the summer vacation was just over, and the boys and girls had come back from the farms for the first day of the academy year again. She said that she came walking up the village street with a friend of hers, another little child, and as they came up the pathway through the yard of the school, arm in arm, with a little bunch of flowers held in both their hands and their heads bowed down very close together, as little girls would talk with one another confidentially, they were suddenly imprest with the silence of the school-yard. Instead of the noise of play and the chatter of an opening day at school, all the boys and the little girls were sitting quietly on the school stoop, and when they came they asked the older boys what the trouble was. Was there any specially dark tidings from the war? And they said: “No, it was not that;” but Professor Patterson had decided to enlist and he wanted to know how many of the boys of the school would go with him, and a meeting was to be held in the village church that evening, in which they were all to be given an opportunity to say what they would do. She said that at once she left her little companion and sought out her brother, and she said to him, “Harry, are you going to enlist?” and he said, “Yes, he thought he would.” “Well, but,” the mother argued after they reached home, “you are only sixteen years old; you can not enlist without father’s allowing you to go, and you know how we have all built on you, on your brightness, and are making sacrifices at home in order that you might go to college. You must not go away now to the war.” He insisted that when the opportunity came he was afraid he would have to respond. And the sister tells how that night, in the little village church, when Mr. McAllister, of Bellefonte, made his appeal for volunteers and had finished, the principal of the academy rose with a long paper in his hand; and her girlish heart almost stopt beating when she realized what it was that he was going to do, and then when he had made his careful, simple statement as to the purpose that led him and the motives that constrained him, he said he was going to call the school roll, and every boy who wanted to could respond “Ready” to his name; and in a silence like the silence of death he began at the top of the line: “Andrews,” “Ready”; “Baker,” “Ready”; and when he came down to K the little girl said her breath just absolutely stopt, and when the name Keller was called, she heard a clear, boyish voice answer without a tremor, “Ready” to his name.—R. E. Speer, “Student Volunteer Movement,” 1906.

(2732)

Response—See Character.

Response of God—See Fatherhood.

RESPONSIBILITY

(2733)

Dignity sometimes goes down before a solemn responsibility. Susannah Wesley started some prayer-meetings in her house. When her husband, the rector, heard of it, it seemed to him to infringe on the dignity of the Anglican order and he wrote to her in disapproval of the meetings. Her reply is quoted in part by Rev. W. H. Fitchett:

If you do, after all, think fit to dissolve this assembly, do not tell me that you desire me to do this; for that will not satisfy my conscience. But send me your positive command, in such full and express terms as may absolve me from guilt and punishment for neglecting this opportunity for doing good when you and I shall appear before the great and awful tribunal of our Lord Jesus Christ.

That terrible sentence was too much for the little rector, and the meetings were continued until he returned from London.—“Wesley and His Century.”

(2734)

Men are often exalted in their best moral attitudes by being entrusted with great responsibilities. Thus Lamar Fontaine writes:

I received from Major Livingston Mimms, the chief quartermaster of the Department of Mississippi and East Louisiana, and also of Johnston’s army, a carte blanche on the Confederate treasurer, in these words:

“The Confederate States treasurer will honor any draft presented to him signed by Lamar Fontaine.”

As I realized the immensity of the trust that this paper conveyed to me, and imposed upon my integrity, I trembled and could hardly sit on my steed, but there arose in my heart a something, a feeling beyond my powers to describe. I was transported to a higher, better plane than I had ever before trod, and a determination that all the gold of earth could not have purchased.—“My Life and My Lectures.”

(2735)

We may often accomplish more by putting responsibility on others rather than exercising it ourselves:

Daniel O’Connell had to defend a prisoner for a capital crime, and the defense was said by the attorney to be hopeless. Sergeant Lefroy happened to be acting for the judge, who had been suddenly indisposed, and being then young and his character known to O’Connell, the latter purposely put several inadmissible questions to the witness, which, of course, were objected to by the opposite counsel. The sergeant at last rather peremptorily stopt further questions of the same kind. O’Connell then, with great warmth, said, “As you refuse me permission to defend my client, I leave his fate in your hands—his blood be on your head if he be condemned.” He left the court at once with majestic stride, in a huff, and paced up and down outside the court for half an hour. At the end of that time his attorney rushed out of court, exclaiming, “He’s acquitted! he’s acquitted!” This stratagem was successful, and O’Connell with complacency told his friends that he had intended to throw the responsibility of the conviction on the judge. (Text.)—Croake James, “Curiosities of Law and Lawyers.”

(2736)

One of the particulars in which we are drawn away from our traditions is in respect to the make-up and government of society, and it is in that respect we should retrace our steps and preserve our traditions; because we are suffering ourselves to drift away from the old standards, and we say, with a shrug of the shoulders, that we are not responsible for it; that we have not changed the age, tho the age has changed us. We feel very much as the Scotchman did who entered the fish-market. His dog, being inquisitive, investigated a basket of lobsters, and while he was nosing about incautiously one of the lobsters got hold of his tail, whereupon he went down the street with the lobster as a pendant. Says the man, “Whustle to your dog, mon.” “Nay, nay, mon,” quoth the Scotchman, “you whustle for your lobster.”—Woodrow Wilson.

(2737)

See Desires, Inordinate.

RESPONSIBILITY AFFECTS JUDGMENT

Judge Collamore, who for many years was a distinguished United States Senator from Vermont, used to illustrate his troubles by this story:

He was sitting on the porch of his law office during a recess of Congress, when a farmer drove by and said, “Judge, my conscience troubles me so I can not sleep, about keeping four millions of fellow human beings with the same souls and the same Creator as ourselves in slavery. With all this wealth, I am sure that we, as a nation and as a people individually, will be curst unless slavery is abolished. Now, it is hardly fair to destroy the property of the South, who are not directly responsible, and so I think we ought to all bear our share and buy them out.”

Senator Collamore replied: “Well, in part I think you are right. Now, let’s see practically how it works out. The estimated price is four thousand millions of dollars. It would have to be raised by a direct tax proportioned among the States. Vermont’s share would be so many millions. This county, so many hundreds of thousands, this town so many tens of thousands.” Sitting in the same place the next afternoon, and greeting friends as they passed to and from the market, the old Puritan farmer reappeared. Reining up his horses, he shouted: “Judge, I have been thinking over that question. Crops are poor, taxes are high; I don’t think we need bother just at present about them infernal niggers.”

(2738)

RESPONSIBILITY EVADED

When the Massachusetts Sixth was there in Baltimore and being mobbed, and stood for a long time perfectly patient till their officers commanded them to fire, a long Yankee—who had stood watching this crowd and saw that the poor ruffians round about were merely the tools of the respectable scoundrels standing away across the square on boxes and barrels—stept out from the ranks and drew his bead and sent a bullet through one scoundrel’s heart, and knocked him like a pigeon off a branch. In Baltimore I heard the other side of that story, when a clergyman of that city told me, “We lost a good deal out of our church that day.” “Ah?” said I, “how was that?” “Well, one of the class-leaders of our church was down there looking-on. He stood on a box on the other side of the square; he was not among the crowd at all, but a stray bullet came across the end of the square and shot him!” He was one of those broadclothed scoundrels, with a gold-headed cane, surrounding those poor fellows, and ought to have been shot.—Henry Ward Beecher.

(2739)

Responsibility for Others—See Mutualism.

RESPONSIBILITY OF GREATNESS

Does some Napoleon “wade through slaughter to a throne, and shut the gates of mercy on mankind,” and break the hearts of a million peasant women, and handicap the careers of ten millions of orphan children? Recently when I used Napoleon in an address as an illustration of unbridled and selfish ambition, and spoke of him as a man raised up to correct the abuses of the French Revolution, who ought to have imitated Washington and Jefferson, and as a man of patriotism all compact concluded his career without a mixture of meanness and sin, a score of people wrote protesting against judging Napoleon by the ordinary standards of morality. Does Goethe forget the law of marriage? For thirty years cast the reins loose on the neck of passion? Use a score of women as material and dynamic for literary work? It is said Goethe was too great to be held down to the ordinary petty rules that control the limited career of peasant souls. Does Byron forget the law of sobriety, and fling himself into wild excesses and lift the cup of flame to his lips? It is said that Byron is a child of genius, quite beyond the pale of convention. Does some Crœsus with the money-making gift get his hands on the reins of power use his secret knowledge to secure exemption from taxes and enjoy special privileges, freeing himself from economic duties that his competitors must bear, not only for themselves alone but for him? The excuse is that the moral laws that hold for those that buy and sell a few pounds of groceries are to be laid on the table and abrogated in the presence of the merchant princes owning uncounted millions.

The biographies of great men are filled with excuses for great generals who have been selfish, of poets who have been wild and lawless, apologies for statesmen who have been drunken, merchants who have been false. And the whole world has suffered through this misconception. As men go toward greatness they go toward responsibility and obligation. It is true that the great man with his gifts must not be judged by ordinary rules—he must be held to extraordinary rules and standards doubly severe. Selfishness can be pardoned in a peasant soldier, not in a great general.—N. D. Hillis.

(2740)

Responsibility of Privilege—See Privilege Involves Responsibility.

Responsibility, Personal—See Place, Filling One’s.

Responsibility, Sense of—See Personal Preaching.

RESPONSIBILITY, UNDESIRABLE

The following Lincoln anecdote is quoted in the Literary Digest:

One evening, just before the close of the Civil War, he had some visitors at the White House, among them some Senators and members of Congress. One of the guests asked the President what he would do with Jefferson Davis if he were captured. Crossing his legs and looking at his friends with that peculiar twinkle in his eyes, he said: “Gentlemen, that reminds me of an incident of my home in Illinois. One morning, when I was on my way to the office, I saw a small boy standing on a street corner crying as if his heart would break. I asked him what was the cause of his sorrow. He said, ‘Mister, don’t you see that coon?’ pointing to a poor little beast that he had tied to a string. ‘Well, that animal has given me a heap of trouble all the way along, and now he has nearly gnawed the string in two. I wish to goodness he would gnaw it in two and get away, so I could go home and tell my folks he had escaped from me.’”

(2741)

RESPONSIVENESS

One of the wonders of China is the Bell Temple near Peking. Its great curiosity is the great bell. It was cast five centuries ago and weighs fifty-three and a half tons—the largest hanging bell in the world. It is covered all over with extracts from the Buddhist canon, in Chinese characters. It is rung by means of a huge hanging timber swung against it, calling forth tones the sweetest, most melodious, and resounding, as if echoing the chords of eternity. But the striking thing about this great bell is that its tones vary in proportion to the quality of the sounding-board receiving them.

Does not a ringing truth or a loving deed depend upon the response it gets?

(2742)

We are told that if one were to suspend a bell weighing a hundred tons, and a little child were to stand beneath it and play upon a flute, the vibrations of the air produced by the playing of the flute would cause the bell to tremble like a living thing and resound through all its mass.

As bell responds to flute, so the heart of the Christian responds to the music of the message that issues from that manger cradle of the Babe of Bethlehem. The time will come when the music from that manger shall melt into itself all earth’s Babel sounds and fill the world with harmony.—J. D. Freeman, “Concerning the Christ.”

(2743)

REST

There is no music in a rest, but there is the making of music in it. In our whole life-melody the music is broken off here and there by “rests,” and we foolishly think that we have come to the end of the time. God sends a time of forced leisure, sickness, disappointed plans, frustrated efforts, and makes a sudden pause in the choral hymn of our lives, and we lament that our voices must be silent, and our part missing in the music which ever goes up to the ear of the Creator. How does the musician read the rest? See him beat the time with unvarying counts and catch up the next note true and steady, as if no breaking place had come between. Not without design does God write the music of our lives. Be it ours to learn the time, and not be dismayed at the “rests.” They are not to be slurred over, not to be omitted, not to destroy the melody, not to change the keynote. If we look up, God Himself will beat the time for us. With the eye on Him, we shall strike the next note full and clear. If we say sadly to ourselves, “There is no music in a rest,” let us not forget “there is making of music in it.”

(2744)

Rest-day, Weekly—See Sunday Work Discontinued.

RESTITUTION

One of the strangest wills ever made was that of George Brown, Jr., the noted gambler and race-horse man, which was filed in the Probate Court at Kansas City, Mo., recently. “It is my desire, as far as possible,” a clause of the will reads, “to repay every person, man, woman and child, any money which I may have won from him by gambling during my lifetime; and I direct my executor to make efforts to learn their names and reimburse them to the full amount, with interest from the day the money was won.” This penitent gambler has set an example here which it would be well for those to follow who make larger pretensions to integrity. There are some wrongs to fellow men which never can be repaired, but there are others that can and should be made right. (Text.)

(2745)

General John Gibson, of Ohio, in old age was asked what he was doing. Said he: “Well, I am a very old man, and I suppose that most people would think I am not doing much of anything. But, to tell the truth, I am trying to hunt up every person whom I have wronged in life, and if I can find them, to ask their forgiveness and make atonement for all the wrongs I have done. And I am trying to be as good and kind and loving to all my neighbors as I know how. And I am becoming one of the biggest beggars for mercy at the Bank of Grace you ever saw. In short, during the little time that is left me on earth, I am fixing up for a mighty big funeral.”

It is no small duty to make amends for all the wrong-doing of a life whether long or short.

(2746)

RESTORATION

The following illustration is from a sermon by Dr. Henry Van Dyke;

The portrait of Dante is painted on the walls of the Bargello, at Florence. For many years it was supposed that the picture had utterly perished. Men had heard of it but no one living had ever seen it. But presently came an artist who was determined to find it again. He went into the place where tradition said that it had been painted. The room was used as a storeroom for lumber and straw. The walls were covered with dirty whitewash. He had the heaps of rubbish carried away, and patiently and carefully removed the whitewash from the wall. Lines and colors long hidden began to appear, and at last the grave, lofty, noble face of the great poet looked out again upon the world of light.

“That was wonderful,” you say; “that was beautiful!” Not half so wonderful as the work which Christ came to do in the heart of man—to restore the forgotten image of God and bring the divine image to the light.

(2747)

The blood of Christ is a symbol under which is often described the vitality of divine life restoring the image of God in the soul of the sinner. An illustration from nature of this process may be found in this extract:

A valuable discovery has been made whereby the faded ink on old parchments may be so restored as to render the writing perfectly legible. The process consists in moistening the paper with water, and then passing over the lines in writing a brush which has been wet in a solution of ammonia. The writing will immediately appear quite dark in color; and this color, in the case of parchment, it will preserve. On paper, however, the color gradually fades again; but it may be restored at pleasure by the application of the sulfid. The explanation of the action of this substance is very simple. The iron which enters into the composition of the ink is transformed by the reaction into black sulfid.—Electrical Review.

(2748)

See Nature’s Recuperative Powers.

RESTORATION IN NATURE

“It is a libel on Nature,” says Dr. Ambrose Shepherd, “to declare that it never forgives. On the contrary, Nature is ever seeking to repair injuries and to forgive errors.”

Every surgeon knows that but for nature’s restoring tendencies his skill would be applied in vain. Illustrative demonstrations of these beneficent proclivities multiply daily. When an accident happens in which a limb is broken, what follows? With surgical assistance the fracture is set and the limb is bound up and left to rest for a time. Nature instantly, delicately, but powerfully and unerringly begins the beautiful and wonderful process of reparation. The cementing of the broken parts is mysteriously inaugurated. But, of course, much depends on a man’s previous life. If he has been a wise man, nature works rapidly; if a fool, more slowly; but nature always seeks to work in the direction of restoration. (Text.)

(2749)

RESTORING GOD’S IMAGE

Not long ago, a lady living in Hartford, Conn., bought at an auction in New York a painting begrimed with smoke and dirt. Her friends laughed at her for buying such a “worthless daub,” but she took the picture to a restorer of old paintings, who, after hours of patient labor in removing the dirt, brought to view a beautiful sixteenth century painting, representing a mother with her children. The painting is of almost priceless value. The penny they brought the Master was coined from base metal, but the image on it gave it value.

We are made in the image of God, and that makes us precious in His sight. The skin may be black or yellow, or brown or white—it matters not. Sin may have obscured the image, but we are Christ’s coins; He paid a great price for us, and seeks in every possible way to restore in us the image of Himself. (Text.)

(2750)

RESTRAINT

A traveler among the Alpine heights says:

We were at the foot of Mt. Blanc, in the village of Chamouni. A sad thing had happened the day before we reached the village. A young physician, of Boston, had determined to reach the heights of Mt. Blanc. He accomplished the feat, and the little village was illuminated in his honor; the flag was flying from the little hut on the mountain side—that all who have visited Chamouni well remember—that told of his victory. But after he had ascended and descended in safety, as far as the hut, he wanted then to be relieved from his guide; he wanted to be free from the rope, and he insisted that he could go alone. The guide remonstrated with him, told him it was not safe, but he was tired of the rope and declared he would be free of it. The guide had to yield. The young man had only gone a short distance when his foot slipt on the ice and he could not stop himself from sliding down the inclined icy steeps. The rope was gone so the guide could not hold him or pull him back. And out on a shelving piece of ice lay the dead body of the young physician, as it was pointed out to me. The bells had been rung, the village illuminated in honor of his success, but, alas, in a fatal moment he refused to be guided; he was tired of the rope.

The restraints of life are usually salutary. Those of the gospel always so. (Text.)

(2751)

Wild forces may be sublime and majestic, but it is when force submits to authority that it becomes power for usefulness, for service, for benefit.

Venice lies in a lovely and gentle series of lagoons. The sea, which is terrible in storms when it is uncircumscribed, has here built barriers of sand in which it becomes self-restrained. In the lagoons the Adriatic is tamed to rest, and even in furious weather it remains tranquil. It has lost its recklessness and terror but has gained in beauty, reflecting everything in pictures of incomparable loveliness. The sea at Venice by sacrifice enters into service and ministers both utility and charm to humanity. Over the quiet lagoons are built scores of bridges, and along their borders stand lines of stately edifices, and here stands in its matchless beauty a city unique in the world. (Text.)

(2752)

See Prohibition.

RESULTS AS EVIDENCE

I get into what were once the Black Lands, of Arizona, known as the great American desert, and I find it blossoming with fertility, and I say, “How is this?” The reply is that irrigation has been established. How can you prove it? Look about you. It is interesting to know what engineers built the reservoirs on the mountain tops and how much they cost, but the evidence that they have been built are the rills of water running through the land and the crops growing there. Now I look upon the world that nineteen centuries ago was desert and I see flowers of hope and fruits of love and visions of faith springing up. That is the evidence.—Lyman Abbott.

(2753)

RESULTS ENLARGED BY GOD

When David Livingstone went to Africa there was a Scottish woman by the name of Mrs. MacRobert who was quite advanced in years. As she was unable to go herself she gave Livingstone thirty pounds which she had saved and said, “When you go into Africa I want you to spare yourself unnecessary exposure and bodily toil by hiring some competent servant, who shall go with you wherever you go and share your sacrifices and your exposures.” With that money he hired the faithful Sebalwe, who saved him from death by a lion, and this added those last thirty years of wonderful service to the world.

(2754)

Results not Processes—See Silent Processes.

RESULTS OF GOOD DEEDS

Charles Mackay writes of the good that is done by apparently insignificant services:

(2755)

Results Unforeseen—See One, Winning.

RESULTS VERSUS DISPLAY

It is not by the number of discourses that you can test the effect of the ministry of any preacher, but has it brought those who heard him nearer to the divine life, nearer to the life in God? Sir Astley Cooper, when in Paris once, met the chief surgeon in France, who told him about a difficult operation he had performed. He said: “I have performed this operation 160 times; how often have you performed it?” Sir Astley replied: “I have performed it thirteen times.” “And how many of your operations were successful?” “Eleven of my cases have lived.” said Sir Astley; “how many of yours?” The great French surgeon replied: “All my 160 cases have died, but the operation was most brilliant.”

(2756)

RESURRECTION

The following gives an idea of the strong faith of D. L. Moody; it is the law of the resurrection in operation:

“Some day,” he said, “you will read in the papers that D. L. Moody is dead. Don’t you believe a word of it. At that moment I shall be more alive than I am now. That which is born of the spirit will live forever.” (Text.)

(2757)

See Judgment Day.

RESUSCITATION

Lamar Fontaine describes his sensations when he was about to be buried alive after being desperately wounded on the battle-field:

Some time in the night I heard the approach of voices and the tramp of men. Soon I heard the sound of picks and spades and caught the gleam of lanterns, and knew a burial-party was on the field, and that surgeons, with their attendants, had come to pick up and care for the wounded. Again and again I tried to speak, but no sound came. Presently I felt the jar of the picks and spades as they dug a grave by my side, and then I felt a strong hand grasp my head and another my feet, and lift me clear of the ground. There was a sharp click, and then a loud buzzing sound in my ears, and my whole body was in an agony of pain. A fearful thirst tortured me. I spoke, and my friends let me drop suddenly to the ground. The jar awoke every faculty to life. I asked for water, and at once a strong light was flashed in my face, a rubber canteen applied to my lips, and I felt a life-giving stream of cold, refreshing water flow down my swollen throat, and seemingly into every part of my frame.—“My Life and My Lectures.”

(2758)

RETALIATION

During the South African War, when that country was under martial law, every letter which was sent home had to pass through the hands of the press censor.

A private in the Yorkshire Volunteers had sent four or five letters home, telling his parents about the doings of the regiment, which portions had been obliterated by the censor, and were therefore unreadable on their arrival at the destination.

He decided to get square with the censor, and at the foot of the next letter he wrote the following words:

“Please look under the stamp.”

“At the censor’s office the letter was opened and read as usual. The officer in charge spent some time in steaming the stamp from the envelop so that he could read the message which he was certain he would find there.

At last his patience was rewarded; but his feelings can be better imagined than described when he read these words:

“Was it hard to get off?”—Tid-Bits.

(2759)

We never can tell when rudeness and ill-manners may return upon our own heads:

George Ade, in the early days of his career, before his “Fables in Slang” had brought him fame, says the New York Tribune, called one morning in Chicago upon a Sunday editor, on a mission from a theatrical manager.

“I have brought you this manuscript,” he began, but the editor, looking up at the tall, timid youth, interrupted:

“Just throw the manuscript in the waste-basket, please,” he said. “I’m very busy just now, and haven’t time to do it myself.”

Mr. Ade obeyed calmly. He resumed:

“I have come from the —— Theater, and the manuscript I have just thrown in the waste-basket is your comic farce of ‘The Erring Son,’ which the manager asks me to return to you with thanks. He suggests that you sell it to an undertaker, to be read at funerals.”

Then Mr. Ade smiled gently and withdrew.

(2760)

RETARDATION

Many Christians converted years ago show no more progress than the subject of this sketch:

“There is a young man in England,” says The Dietetic and Hygienic Gazette, “who at the age of twenty-four is developing at the rate of only one-sixth of that of the average human being. At present he is learning his alphabet and can count up to ten only. During the last nineteen years he has eaten but three meals a week, has slept twenty-four hours and played twenty-four hours, without the slightest variation. In spite of his twenty-four years he looks no older than a boy of four or five and is only thirty-six inches in height. For the same period his development physically and mentally has been at only one-sixth the ordinary rate, while absolutely regular and perfect in every other way. At his birth this child weighed ten pounds and in no way differed from any other child. He grew and thrived in the usual way until he attained the age of five. Then his progress was suddenly and mysteriously arrested, and since then six years have been the same to him as one year to the normal person. He has attracted the attention of many medical and scientific men, more than one of whom has exprest the conviction that this remarkable man will live to be no less than three centuries old.” (Text.)

(2761)

RETICENCE

There are times and circumstances in which one may well refuse to be pumped of what he knows.

A Scotch laddie was summoned to give evidence against his father. “Come, my wee mon, tell us what ye ken aboot this affair.” “Weel, ye ken Inverness Street?” “I do, laddie,” said his worship. “Weel, ye gang along and turn into the square.” “Yes, yes.” “Turn to the right up into High Street till ye come to a pump.” “I know the old pump well,” said his honor. “Weel,” added the laddie, “ye may gang and pump it, for ye’ll no pump me.”

(2762)

RETORT, A

President Taft was hissed by a number of women when he was courageous enough to confess at the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association that he was not altogether in favor of women having the right to vote. President Taft was welcoming the delegates to Washington, but told them frankly that he was not altogether in sympathy with the suffrage movement. He said he thought one of the dangers in granting suffrage to women is that women as a whole are not interested in it, and that the power of the ballot, so far as women are concerned, would be controlled “by the least desirable citizens.” When these words fell from the President’s lips the walls of the convention hall echoed a chorus of feminine hisses. It was no feeble demonstration of protest. The combined hisses sounded as if a valve on a steam-engine had broken, according to one correspondent. President Taft stood unmoved during the demonstration of hostilities, for the hisses lasted only a moment, and then smiling as he spoke he answered the unfavorable greeting with this retort: “Now, my dear ladies, you must show yourself capable of suffrage by exercising that degree of restraint which is necessary in the conduct of government affairs, by not hissing.” The women who had made the demonstration were duly rebuked. The suffrage cause was undoubtedly hurt by the demonstration, as the President, regardless of his personal views, is entitled to consideration and respectful attention.—Wisconsin Farmer.

(2763)

Retort Effecting a Change—See Eccentricity.

RETORT, PERSONAL

Victor Hugo did not love the brilliant son of Alexander Dumas, and when the latter was a boy the poet was very fond of snubbing him. It is on record that one day young Dumas asked Victor Hugo why he did not allow his children to take walks and have talks with him. “It is,” answered the poet, “because Mme. Hugo is alarmed about your morals. She is afraid you will lead away the boys; in short, you pass for having violent passions.” “Monsieur,” said the young Dumas, looking the poet in the eye, “if one has no passions at twenty he is likely to have vices at forty.” A day or two afterward the elder Dumas, meeting with Hugo, said: “How do you like my son? Do you not think he is witty?” “Yes,” said Hugo, “but he makes very bad use of his wit.”—Philadelphia Press.

(2764)

Retracing Steps—See Barriers.

RETREAT DISCOURAGED

The battle of the Cowpens, altho hardly more than a skirmish when tried by modern standards, was in its day, according to the British historian Stedman, “a very principal link in the chain of circumstances which led to the independence of America.” To draw up an inferior force for a pitched battle directly in front of a broad river has always seemed to the military critics very imprudent. But this very act showed the daring and the foresight of Morgan. When blamed he afterward answered: “I would not have had a swamp in view of my militia on any consideration; they would have made for it, and nothing could have detained them from it.... As to retreat, it was the very thing I wished to cut off all hope of. I would have thanked Tarleton had he surrounded me with his cavalry.” Braver and shrewder words never were spoken by a military commander.—Thomas W. Higginson.

(2765)

RETRIBUTION IN THE INDIVIDUAL

What is true of the mass is first true of the atom; what is true of the ocean is first true of the drop. It is easy to see the law of retribution when it is exemplified in the broad effects of national calamity, but not so easy to apprehend its action in the individual fortune. We stand in awe over the shattered greatness and buried splendor of Egypt, Babylon, Judea, Phoenicia, Greece; but the ruin that sin works in the individual destiny is just as certain, and infinitely more awful. If we could once see a soul in ruins, we should never speak again of Nineveh, Memphis, Jerusalem, Tyre, Athens. “Deceive not yourselves.” (Text.)—W. L. Watkinson, “The Transfigured Sackcloth.”

(2766)

RETRIBUTION INEVITABLE

With great injustice and cruelty the French drove out the Huguenots, but in expelling these sons of faith, genius, industry, virtue, the French fatally impoverished their national life, and they are suffering to-day from these missing elements which none may restore. It is impossible for a people to increase in material wealth and political consideration while its true grandeur, its greatness of soul, is gradually passing away. Very strange and subtle are the causes of the decay of nations, and little by little, quite unconsciously, does a people lose the great qualities which made it. Poets lose their fire, artists their imagination, merchants their enterprise, statesmen their sagacity, soldiers their heroism, the people their self-control; literature becomes commonplace, art lifeless, great men dwindle into mediocrities, good men perish from the land, and the glory of a nation departs, leaving only a shell, a shadow, a memory. Retribution may not come suddenly, but it will come.—W. L. Watkinson, “The Transfigured Sackcloth.”

(2767)

Retribution, Just—See Responsibility Evaded.

RETRIBUTION, THE LAW OF

For centuries did the kings and nobles of France oppress the peasantry. It is impossible for us to think adequately of the vast, hopeless wretchedness of the people from the cradle to the grave. When Louis XVI came to the throne it seemed incredible that the long-suffering people would ever avenge themselves upon the powerful classes by whom they were ground to the dust, and yet by a marvelous series of events the “wounded men” arose in awful wrath, burning palaces with fire and trampling greatness under foot. “Pierced through” were those hungry, hopeless millions; but the day of doom came, and every bleeding wretch arose invincible with torch and sword.—W. L. Watkinson, “The Transfigured Sackcloth.”

(2768)

RETRIEVED SITUATION, A

When Senator Hanna was walking through his factory in Cleveland some years ago, says The National Magazine, on the lookout for new ideas, or anything which would aid the progress of business, he overheard a little red-headed lad remark:

“Wish I had old Hanna’s money, and he was in the poorhouse.”

The Senator returned to his office and rang to have the boy sent to him. The boy came to the office timidly, just a bit conscience-stricken, wondering if his remark had been overheard and ready for the penalty. As the lad twisted his hands and nervously stood on one foot before the gaze of those twinkling dark eyes fixt on him by the man at the desk, he felt the hand of Uncle Mark on his shoulder.

“So you wish you had old Hanna’s money, and he was in the poorhouse, eh? Suppose your wish should be granted, what would you do?”

“Why,” stammered the lad, “the first thing I would do, sir, would be to get you out of the poorhouse.”

The Senator laughed and sent the boy back to his work. To-day he is one of the managers of a large factory, but he never tires of telling the story that held his first job.

(2769)

Retrogression—See Down Grade, The.

RETROSPECT

We all know what distance does. Standing on the floor of a cathedral in St. Petersburg, the loud conversation of the multitudes surging in and out seems to roar in the ear. But standing in the tiny dome, three hundred feet above, all the harshness is strained out and the sounds become song. Those who dwell inland know how the trees strain out the roughness, and the surge and the roar of the waves turn to music, falling on the fluted tree-tops. Near at hand the frescoes in the cathedral dome are blotches of blue and red; from the floor beneath they melt into the most exquisite tints, and shaded lines proclaim the genius of an artist. For the architect planned that dome to be seen from afar, and God plans the events of childhood and youth to be surveyed from the summit of maturity.—N. D. Hillis.

(2770)

Reunion—See Future Reunion.

Revealing Stolen Property—See Exposure.

Revelation—See Utterance.

Revenge—See Anger, Futile.

REVENGE, A CHRISTIAN’S

A bed in the Bannu mission hospital in India is known as “The Christian’s Revenge.” It is supported by a sister of Captain Conolly, who was cruelly murdered by order of the Ameer of Bokhara after long incarceration and many tortures, because he refused to become a Mussulman. She endowed this bed twenty-one years after the captain’s death, when a full account of his sufferings, written by his own hand in prison, came unexpectedly to light, a little prayer-book containing the record coming into the hands of his relatives.

That bed is an object-lesson to the inmates and visitors of the hospital, teaching the gentle and forgiving spirit that the gospel of Jesus ever breathes and inculcates.

(2771)

REVERENCE FOR PARENTS

The family of Jonathan Edwards consisted of three sons and eight daughters. It is said that when Mr. Edwards and his wife entered the room the children rose and remained standing until father and mother were seated. (Text.)

(2772)

REVERSED ATTITUDE

The moral health of some could be restored only by turning their thoughts and inclinations upside down, as patients are treated according to this description:

In France, when a patient is under chloroform, on the slightest symptom appearing of failure of the heart, they turn him nearly upside down—that is, with his head downward and his heels in the air. This, they say, always restores him; and such is their faith in the efficacy of this method that the operating tables in the Paris hospitals are made so that in an instant they can be elevated with one end in the air, so as to bring the patient into a position resembling that of standing on the head.—Scientific American.

(2773)

Reversion of Nature—See Circulation Impeded.

REVIVAL

In some neglected church-yards there are old inscriptions so moss-grown and weather-beaten that they can no longer be easily deciphered. So there are men who in early life were marked by high and noble principles, which the wear of the world has almost destroyed in them. They need a thorough regeneration to revive the old lines and ideals of duty and character.

(2774)

Like pneumatic tires, the Church needs to be “pumped up” by special efforts from time to time. The same is true of the individual.

Pneumatic tires, whether on a bicycle or an automobile, always become more or less deflated in the course of time, even when there is no puncture and the valves are perfectly tight. All cyclists and chauffeurs know that a tire needs pumping up, from time to time, to keep it hard and rigid. This is because the enclosed air constantly tends to escape through the envelop; the phenomenon, which is due to what chemists call osmose, is quite complex and is worth attention. (Text.)—Cosmos.

(2775)

Reviving the Forgotten—See Memory Renewed.

REVOLUTION, CAUSES OF

It becomes us to watch carefully against crowding society to that point of compression where the mass of men have nothing to lose and little to live for, with the balance rather in favor of dying. Then the last argument, the bayonet, fails against a people whom it is of no use to kill. They are the innumerable majority. A citizen soldiery sickens at the work of slaughter, and like the soldiers of France in the Revolution, will walk over to the mob, guns and all. Then, what are you going to do? How far are our great cities from that condition? Go through the “slums” and see. Look at the wan faces leaning from high windows for a breath of what is not the air of heaven. See the pallid little children in broken rocking-chairs sitting out on the balconies of the fire-escapes, or the five-year-old holding the two-year-old from falling out as they lean over the window-sill. Coming on the elevated road through such a scene one sultry evening lately, the writer saw a woman sitting near a window with a look of unutterable sadness; and, while we looked, a stout man in shirt sleeves came across the room, stooped down and kissed her. She looked up at him pitifully but despairingly, shook her head, and began wiping away the tears. Then the swift train whirled us from where hearts were breaking. It is ill for such men to reach the point where they know that no toil, no frugality, no self-denial can make things any better to-morrow, or next year, or ten years hence—that no work of arm or brain can lift his face from the grindstone, and that this—or worse—is all the inheritance he can leave his children. Then the sight of a carriage with gold-caparisoned horses, a flash of a diamond, or the sweep of a silk dress will make that man clench his fist. Thousands of such will pull down a Bastile with their bare hands. And in the midst of all this, social leaders withdraw into a little clique and parade and proclaim their fewness—they are “the Four Hundred.”—J. C. Fernald, The Statesman.

(2776)

Reward for Service—See Courage, Moral.

REWARD, RIDICULOUS

During the heavy rains and floods in the cantons of Geneva and Vaud at the end of January (1910), a Swiss railway gatekeeper at level crossing named Allaman, hearing an unusual hissing sound, walked along the lines, having a presentiment that there was something wrong. He found that a stream flowing from the Jura mountains into Lake Geneva had become a torrent, and overflowing its banks had swept away about thirty yards of the permanent way, leaving the rails suspended in the air.

As the Geneva-Lausanne express traveling at sixty miles an hour was due in a few minutes and would be precipitated into the torrent with its sixty passengers, Allaman ran to his little house for a red flag and stopt the express fifty yards from the suspended rails, and then returned home pleased with the fact that he had prevented a terrible accident. Some days ago the news of the affair arrived at the Bern headquarters of the Federal Railway Company, and the Swiss managers thought that such an act on the part of a gatekeeper should be rewarded.

Allaman received his reward this morning for saving the express and its sixty travelers from destruction. The reward was 8s., which works out at 1½d. a life.

If the accident had occurred the Federal Railway Company would have been obliged to pay between £8,000 and £10,000 damages.—Pittsburg Sun.

(2777)

REWARD, THOUSANDFOLD

In India a number of years ago there lived a good Christian English judge who was a warm supporter of missions. It came to his ears that a certain rich native, possessor of an indigo farm, had been cast out of his home and had lost everything because of acknowledging Christ as Lord. “Let him come to me,” said the judge, “I will employ him as a household servant.” So Norbuder came and was child’s attendant in the judge’s family. Every evening after dinner the judge assembled the household for family prayers, and read the Scripture from the native version. One day he came to the verse, “There is no man that hath left home or parents or brethren or wife or children for the kingdom of God’s sake who shall not receive an hundredfold and shall inherit everlasting life.” The judge paused and looked at the dark eyes fixt on him, and said, “None of us have left houses or lands or wife or children for Christ’s sake but you, Norbuder. Will you tell us, is it true what this verse says?” Quietly Norbuder took up the Mahratti Testament and read the verse through. Then he raised his hand and said, “He says He gives a hundredfold; I know He gives a thousandfold.”

(2778)

Rewards, Pecuniary—See Motive, Mercenary.

REWARDS, SPIRITUAL

Here is a boy, who, in sweeping out the shop to-morrow morning, finds sixpence lying among the orange-boxes. Well, nobody has missed it. He puts it in his pocket, and it begins to burn a hole there. By breakfast-time he wishes that sixpence were in his master’s pocket. And by and by he goes to his master. He says (to himself, and not to his master), “I was at the Boys’ Brigade yesterday, and I was to seek first that which was right.” Then he says to his master, “Please, sir, here is sixpence that I found upon the floor.” The master puts it in the till. What has the boy got in his pocket? Nothing; but he has got the kingdom of God in his heart. He has laid up treasure in heaven, which is of infinitely more worth than sixpence. Now, that boy does not find a shilling on his way home. I have known that to happen, but that is not what is meant by “adding.” It does not mean that God is going to pay him in his own coin, for He pays in better coin. (Text.)—Henry Drummond.

(2779)

Rhythm—See Music, Good Cheer in.

Riches—See Wealth, Comparative.

RICHES, IMAGINARY

A Russian folk-story tells of a man who entered a diamond-mine in quest of riches. He filled his pockets with precious stones, and forthwith flung them all away to make room for larger ones. Thirst coming on, he was dismayed to find that there was no water. In his delirium he imagined he could hear the flow of water, which proved, however, to be the flow of gems and jewels running in rivers and falling in cascades.

Only one thing could meet his need in his dire distress, and that was, not imaginary wealth, but real water. So it is with the soul. (Text.)

(2780)

RICHES UNREALIZED

George MacDonald, in one of his stories, tells of a father and his daughter who lived in an old Scotch castle in poverty, while all the time in a secret cupboard were masses of jewels which had been put there by an ancestor long years before.

Many a soul is living in poverty of life and experience equally ignorant of the wealth of joy and service that has been laid up for him in the purpose of God. (Text.)

(2781)

Riddles of Life—See Sphinx, The.

RIDICULE, APT

A very self-respecting and self-asserting bon vivant showed his desire to cut down the fees of waiters to a minimum and at the same time to ridicule the whole system. As the waiter held out his itching palm for the gratuity the epicure dropt a cent into it. “Oh, sir, you’ve made a mistake!” blurted out the waiter. “No,” replied the donor, with an air of dignified benevolence; “I never give less.”—Taverner, Boston Post.

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Ridicule Rebuked—See Kindness.

Right and Wrong—See Ethical Principle.

RIGHT LIVING

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RIGHT, TRIUMPH OF

Too apt are we to forget the need of patience and to lose sight of the promise of a sure reward to those who are not weary in well-doing.

For two generations in the Turkish Empire, during the latter half of the nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth, the world at large took little notice of the obscure party known as the Young Turks, seeing that its representatives for a long period consisted mainly of exiles whose lot seemed to be hopeless. But one day it was reported to the amazement of the whole world that six hundred young officers of the Turkish army had gone up to the mountains at Monastir, and had startled the Sultan by sending a telegram to Constantinople demanding the convocation of the Parliament which he had supprest long before. Rigid orders were immediately sent from the capital to shoot them to the very last man. Now these officers formed the flower and hope of the country. They were brave, cultured, and patriotic, and the rest of the army well-knew their quality. The regiment from Anatolia sent to shoot them not only refused to raise arms against their brethren, but immediately joined them, and regiment after regiment followed suit. Then came the revolution and the reward of those who had waited so long. (Text.)

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RIGHT VERSUS EXPEDIENCY

During the unparalleled excitement caused by Wilkes’ outlawry in 1768, Lord Mansfield, on pronouncing the judgment of the King’s Bench reversing the outlawry, discoursed on the terrors held out against judges, and the attempts at intimidating them. He said: “I honor the king and respect the people, but many things acquired by the favor of either are in my account objects not worth ambition. I wish popularity; but it is that popularity which follows not that which is run after; it is that popularity which sooner or later never fails to do justice to the pursuit of noble ends by noble means. I will not do that which my conscience tells me is wrong upon this occasion to gain the huzzas of thousands, or the daily praise of all the papers which come from the press. I will not avoid doing what I think is right tho it should draw on me the whole artillery of libels—all that falsehood and malice can invent, or the credulity of a deluded populace can swallow.” (Text.)—Croake James, “Curiosities of Law and Lawyers.”

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Righteousness—See Convictions, Strong.

Rights Preferred to Privilege—See Politeness.

RISK

It is better to go down on the great seas which human hearts were made to sail than to rot at the wharves in ignoble anchorage.—Hamilton W. Mabie.

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RISK SHIFTED

A young lady, in giving her reasons for preferring a particular church, remarked that she “liked it best because it allowed its members to dance.” She had been brought up to regard this as inconsistent for a professor of religion. She could not help feeling that it was running a risk to try to get to heaven and carry the world with her. But here was comfort. She had found a religious guide on which she could, as she fancied, shift off the responsibility. Instead of deciding for herself, in the light of Christ’s teachings, she chose to take a second-hand opinion of a mere man as a rule.

One is reminded of an incident related by Dr. Whately, of an old bridge which had long been thought unsafe even for foot passengers. People usually went a considerable distance around rather than venture upon it. But one evening a woman in great haste came up to the bridge before she reflected on its unsafe condition. It was late, and she had yet to dress for a party. She could not go all the way around, tho still afraid to venture. At last a happy thought seemed to strike her. She called for a sedan chair, and was carried over. Now the young lady who desired to follow the world and go to heaven too, was afraid to trust her own judgment on the subject of dancing. She feared the tottering arch might give way, and she be lost forever. To make all safe, she added to the weight of her own chance of error the additional chances of her human authority being wrong also.

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Risking Life—See Coolness in Danger.

Rivalry—See Stimulus from Rivalry.

RIVERS OF GOD

The Rev. Thomas G. Selby says:

Copious and unfailing rivers run just beneath the burning desolations of the Sahara. Twenty or thirty feet under the sand-drifts there is an impervious sheet of rock which prevents the escape of the collected rain-waters. It is easy to see the oasis, but not so easy to track the windings of the hidden river. The skilled engineer can get at the river, bring it up through his wells, and change the desert into an earthly paradise.

Society at large is not the dreary, all-devouring, illimitable ethical waste we often imagine. The rivers of God flow under natures we call reprobate, and create penitential moods which are the earnest of a coming righteousness. It is easy to map out the strips of moral fruitfulness which appear here and there in the world, but not so easy to find the deep secret contrition of those who are often classed as abandoned outcasts. The Savior of the world has an insight into character which enables him to see promise where men less sympathetic and discerning see the black marks of reprobation; and the angels share the visions of the Lord on whom they wait. It is by His art, as the Prophet of coming good, that the desert is made to bloom.—“The Divine Craftsman.”

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Robbery, Moral—See Repentance, Late.

ROBBING JUSTIFIED

A wife has a right to rob her husband, in some cases, according to a decision of Judge Gemmell in the Municipal Court (Chicago). Gustave H. DeKolkey had had his wife arrested for taking money from him by force.

“My wife robbed me right in my own home,” said DeKolkey. “She got a boarder and her brother to help hold me. Then she went through my pockets and got $11.”

Mrs. DeKolkey was led up in front of the court’s desk.

“Did you rob him?” asked the judge.

“Yes, I did,” she said. “There was no other way to get money out of him. He hasn’t given me a cent for over a year. So I decided to rob him. I called my brother and we held him and I got what was in his pockets.”

“This is a plain case of robbery,” said the judge, “but it was perfectly justifiable under the circumstances. The defendant is discharged. A wife has the right to hold up her husband when he squanders his wages and does not give her enough for her support.”

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Rock of Ages—See Security.

Room Enough—See Upward, Look.

ROOT CONNECTION

To-day I have been transplanting magnolia-trees. There is one that stands among the earliest I planted, twenty years ago, and now it is a vast ball of white. I suppose five hundred thousand magnificent cups are exhaling thanksgiving to God after the long winter has passed. Now, no man need tell me that the root that nestles in the ground is as handsome or smells as sweet as these vases in the air; but I should like to know what would become of all these white cups in the air if the connection between those dirt-covered roots and the blossoms should be cut to-night. The root is the prime provider, and there can be no life and no blossom where there is no root connection.—Henry Ward Beecher.

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ROTE VERSUS REASON

Soon after I had left school—and when I was a freshman at college—I made the acquaintance of a young man of about my own age who possest a most marvelous memory, while he also showed most marvelous mental density. He had occasion to pass examination in Euclid, as we all of us did at the university at those times, and one would have said that he would have been singularly successful in these examinations, for, tho he had only read through our college Euclid once, he could recite or write out the whole of it; or, if preferred, he could begin at any point where one might start him and reproduce any quantity verbatim et literatim—atque punctuatim—so far as that was concerned. But not only was he utterly unable to understand a word of it all, he had not even brains enough to keep his real ignorance of Euclid to himself. He was always forgetting the good old rule ne quid nimis, and as he did not know where to stop in his marvelous recitations, the examiners naturally came to the conclusion, perfectly justified by the facts, that he knew his Euclid by heart, but knew nothing about geometry.—Richard A. Proctor, New York Mail and Express.

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ROUTINE

Commenting on the well-known dislike of the late Russell Sage for vacations, Forest and Stream says: “An office dig who digs voluntarily is as uneasy and as unhappy on a holiday as were those Pennsylvania mine mules which, on the occasion of the coal strike, were for the first time in many years lifted to the surface and turned out into the green fields in the sunlight. The poor creatures were in actual pain until they got back again into the darkness and the close atmosphere in the mine. The trouble with them was, that their whole nature as surface-dwellers had been supplanted by the attributes common to moles and the blind fishes of Mammoth Cave, and they could not stand in the open air and the light. So with a human being under the obsession of inordinate money-getting. The loss of time is only one component of the restlessness which attacks him after he gets away from the rut. His nature has become so molded and restricted to the ruling passion that he has lost capacity for finding employment in other things, least of all in vacation surroundings and vacation ways.”

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ROYALTY

Where was the real royalty as between the two individuals mentioned in this historic incident?

It was arranged by his friends that Doctor Morrison should be presented to George IV that he might bestow a copy of the Chinese Bible upon His Majesty. Who would not have liked to witness the interview! On the throne sat “the handsomest prince in Christendom, the finest gentleman of Europe” (so his courtiers told him), but whom Thackeray dubs “a monstrous image of pride, vanity and weakness,” who had lived sixty-two years and done nothing but invent a shoe-buckle; who had spent hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, on mere sensual gratification. Fifty thousand dollars a year, we are told, it took to clothe that royal back. Before His Gracious Majesty stood the son of a farmhand, Robert Morrison, twenty years his junior, who had lived simply and given largely; who had found out a useful thing to do, and had worked at it so faithfully that he had raised himself to be the equal of the greatest man in the realm.

Robert bent the knee and presented the Chinese Bible to his sovereign, which gift His Imperial Highness was pleased to accept. But it is to be feared that His Imperial Highness’ morals were no more benefited by the Chinese than by the English version.

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Royalty, Spirit of—See Christian Spirit, The.

Royalty Unrecognized—See Bargain-making.

Royalty’s Kindness—See Appreciation.

Rubbish—See Value in Rubbish.

Rudeness, Reaction of—See Retaliation.

Ruin, Spiritual—See Neglected Lives.

RUINS UTILIZED

A news item from Gainesville, Fla., says:

English and Eastern capitalists have bought a site here and it is said will invest $2,000,000 in mills for the manufacture of paper from the fiber obtained from pine stumps, thousands of which may be had in the immediate neighborhood.

The old pine stumps are useless. They are only the remains of past possibility and power. Their hope for future usefulness seems gone. Yet there is a new and better future for them, a greater possibility than ever known before. So in the realm of human lives a character that seems to be ruined is often reclaimed to useful living.

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