Chapter I: AM going to address you again to-day as LITTLE MILLIONAIRES. Last week (1)

I showed you how your eyes were more valuable than the most costly telescopes, and to-day I want to show you how, in another way, you are little millionaires.

Very wealthy people sometimes travel in different countries, and gather very rare and beautiful paintings and pictures, oftentimes paying a thousand dollars, ten thousand dollars, and sometimes very much more for a single painting. Then they bring these paintings all together in their own homes and hang them on the walls, and as the result of the expenditure of many thousands, and sometimes of hundreds of thousands of dollars, they have a very beautiful and rare collection. But God has made you and me the possessors of a vast number of pictures, more beautiful, of greater variety, and infinitely more valuable, than all the paintings that were ever hung upon the walls of any art gallery in the world.

To illustrate my thought, I have to-day brought a camera. Sometimes such a camera as this is called a Kodak or Snap-shot. As the finest telescopes have been modeled after the human eye, so the camera is only a very imperfect imitation of the human eye. As the spy-glass and telescope have lenses, so does this camera have a lens, which you see here in the front. Just back of this lens is the dark chamber in the camera, and back of it is a ground glass, as you will see here. Now whatever is directly in front of the camera is shown on the ground glass, as you will observe, but in an inverted or up-side-down position. So the eye has its various parts, and as the rays of light pass through this lens and reflect the picture on this ground glass, so rays of light coming from any object pass first through the small opening of the eye, to the retina, where the picture is inverted just the same as upon the ground glass. When this picture is thrown upon the rear wall of the eye, which is called the retina, the seeing nerve, which is called the optic nerve and is connected with the eye, conveys the impression to the brain, and the result is what we call seeing.

What I have told you is correct, and can easily be proven by a simple experiment with the eye of some animal. If you take the eye of a dead rabbit, and cleanse the back portion of it from the fat and muscles and then hold a candle in front of it, you can see the image of the candle formed upon the retina. If you take the eye of an ox and carefully pare off from the back portion, so as to leave it very thin, and place the eye in front of (or against) a small hole made in a box; then cover your head to shut out the light you will see through the box the picture of any object which is directly in front of this eye of the ox. In both instances they will be in the inverted form. This experiment would fully demonstrate to you that the camera is only an imitation, and a very poor one too, of the human eye.

Now when pictures are taken by means of the camera, the negative can not be exposed to the light, but must be taken into a dark room, and be carefully developed by the use of necessary chemicals or liquids. Then specially prepared paper must be used for printing the photographs. This paper must also be kept in the dark until it has been thoroughly washed and cleansed. But, with the pictures which are taken upon the retina of the eye, no such delay and labor is necessary before you can look at them. The moment the eye is turned in any direction, instantly the picture is photographed upon the retina of the eye, and then stamped indelibly upon the memory and becomes a part of ourselves.

There is no cost for chemicals, no delay in adjusting the instrument with which the picture is taken, no necessity for carrying around a large camera.

The camera has many disadvantages which are not found in the human eye. The camera must be adjusted to objects near or far, and different cameras have to be used for pictures of different sizes and for different classes of pictures. These cameras are costly to purchase, a great deal of time is consumed in securing a few pictures, they are always attended with expense; and when pictures are to be removed from one place to another, the owner is subjected to much trouble and annoyance. Then, the camera also does not give us the colors of the different objects which are before it. That is the reason why, in the beginning, I spoke of these millionaires purchasing such costly paintings, because in the paintings different colors are represented.

Now, in the hundreds of pictures which are constantly being taken by your eyes, there are no delays, no expenses, no inconvenience when the pictures have once been taken. Different shades and colors are all clearly represented. And even though you were to stand on a high mountain, where you could look off over one or two hundred square miles of beautiful landscape, all that beautiful scenery would be pictured on the retina of your eye; and the picture, complete and perfect, would not be larger than one-half inch square. What would real wealthy people be willing to give for a perfect picture only one-half inch square, in which the artist had clearly defined every field and tree, the rivers, houses, roads, railways and all the beautiful landscape contained in a vast area of many square miles?

Our eyes are wonderful cameras, which God has given us so that we can be constantly taking these beautiful pictures as we pass through life, and look at them not only for the instant, but that we may treasure the pictures up in our memories and make them the rich treasures and joyous heritage of coming years.

The older we grow, the more we appreciate these memory pictures of the past--memories of our childhood days, beautiful landscapes, foreign travel, lovely sunsets, the glorious sunrise, green fields and orchards of golden fruit. As you grow old, I suppose the richest treasures in your picture gallery of the past will be the memories of your childhood home, of mother and father, brother and sister. Possibly when you have grown old, you will remember how one day your heart was almost broken, when for the first time you were leaving home; how mother's eyes filled with tears when she kissed you good-bye, and, following you to the gate, how she stood and waved her handkerchief, while home faded from your view as you rounded the turn in the road and realized for the first time that you were launching out into real life for long years of struggle.

Just as the hearts of the parents go out in great tenderness toward their son, who is leaving the Christian influences of his home to begin service in a distant city, surrounded by evil influences, and oftentimes by wicked people; so the heart of our Heavenly Father goes out in great tenderness towards you and me, while we are separated from the great eternal mansion of the skies. God's heart yearns over us in great tenderness, and while we live in the midst of the evil of this world we are constantly to remember that God has made us millionaires; not only in the possession of the eyes, and other faculties with which He has endowed us for use here upon the earth, but we are to remember that we are children of the King of Heaven, and that we are heirs of everlasting life and of everlasting glory. We are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, to an inheritance which is incorruptible, undefiled and that "fadeth not away." We are not simply millionaires, but we are heirs of everlasting glory.

QUESTIONS.--What instrument for taking pictures is
like the human eye? Which can take pictures
quicker, the eye or the camera? What is lacking in
pictures taken by the camera? Do our eyes show the
colors of the objects? Of what is the camera an
imitation? Is it expensive to take many pictures
with the camera? Why do people pay large sums for
oil paintings? Was there ever a picture painted by
an artist or photographed with a camera so
beautiful as the small pictures taken by the eye?
For size, color, variety and convenience, which
are the finest pictures in the world? Which
pictures are most treasured in old age?

FROGS.

THE PLAGUES IN EGYPT.

SUGGESTION:--Objects: Some paper frogs, which can
be purchased at any Japanese store for about five
cents each. They are often found also in toy
stores.

MY DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS: I am sure you will all be able to tell me what this object is which I hold in my hand (voices: "Frogs, bullfrogs"). Well, it looks exactly like a bullfrog, and was made to imitate a bullfrog. The bullfrogs I have here are made of paper, and were made in Japan. I bought them that I might show them to you and preach you an object sermon on the subject of the "Ten Plagues in Egypt."

You all remember how Joseph was sold by his brethren into bondage in Egypt, how he was cast into prison and afterward taken out and made prime minister over all that land; how during the seven years of plenty he laid up corn for the seven years of famine which followed, and afterward his father and his brethren--in all the seventy persons who constituted Jacob's family--came down into Egypt to be fed. After two hundred and fifty years this family had increased until it numbered nearly two millions of people. Pharaoh had made slaves of them, and compelled them to work in the brickyards of Egypt. The task-masters were very cruel. They beat them with whips, and demanded excessive labor from them. These people were the chosen people of God, and their voice was lifted to God their Father for deliverance from all the wrongs which they suffered. God heard their prayer, and raised up Moses to deliver them out of Egyptian bondage.

When Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh to request him to let the Children of Israel go from Egypt to the land of Canaan, which God had promised to Abraham and to his seed after him, Pharaoh would not consent to let them go. He was a proud, wicked king, and God sent ten great plagues upon him and his country, to humble him and cause him to do as God desired that he should do.

In the first plague the rivers were turned into blood. This plague lasted seven days, and at the end of that time Moses stretched forth his rod, and all the rivers and ponds and lakes of water brought forth great frogs throughout all the land. They came, not by hundreds, but by thousands and millions, until the frogs covered all that land. They were in the houses of all the people. The king's servants were busy sweeping and carrying them out of the palace, and yet they stole into the rooms, and at night when the king would go to lie down he would find these frogs in his bed-chamber and upon his bed. When his bakers went to make bread for the king, they would find them in the bread-troughs in which they kneaded or mixed the bread, and in the ovens where they baked the bread. The frogs were everywhere in the palace and in the huts of the common people; upon the streets and in the roads; wherever the people walked they stepped upon them, and the king's carriage could not be driven through the streets without crushing thousands of them. The plague was so great that Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron, and entreated them to call upon their God that He would remove the frogs; and when God heard the prayer of Moses and Aaron He caused the frogs to die. The people gathered them up in great heaps and these dead and putrefying frogs in the streets and the water of the river caused the air to be loaded with a great stench that filled the nostrils of all the people.

After this plague of frogs came the plague of lice, when all the dust of the country was turned into lice, and after that the plague of the flies; and so on through to the last plague, which was the slaying of the first-born, of which I will tell you in another sermon.

I wish you would at your earliest opportunity turn to the second book in the Old Testament, the Book of Exodus, and in the early chapters read about these various plagues of Egypt. When you read the account of the various plagues, you will see how after each affliction Pharaoh's heart seemed to relent. He would consent for a time that the Children of Israel might be liberated from their bondage, and depart from Egypt and start on their journey to the land of Canaan. When he was in affliction he would make good promises, but as soon as God had removed the plague, and the sorrow of his people seemed to be ended for a time he again hardened his heart against God, and refused to do what he had promised. Again and again the king refused to do that which he had agreed, and caused the unhappy Children of Israel to continue in their bondage.

We may think that we are not wicked like Pharaoh was. We may not be wicked in the same degree, but we are wicked after the same nature and kind; and so God brings upon us various providences, some of which are not very pleasant. God is seeking to educate us by the trials and sorrows and disappointments and afflictions which He permits to come upon us, so that we will be more obedient, and more faithful, and more Christlike. But I suppose you have seen people who were just like Pharaoh. When they were sick they would promise to become Christians, and live good and right lives, and join the Church and be faithful followers of Christ all the rest of their lives. And yet when God would raise them up from their beds of sickness they would forget all their promises, and generally, as it always was in the case of Pharaoh, their hearts became harder and harder. Instead of being better after God had raised them up and made them strong and well, or removed some trial or affliction, they became worse than before.

Have you not found something of this also in your own experience? When you have desired something which you have asked your father or mother to secure for you, you have promised that you would run all the errands they asked, or that you would go to school and study your lessons very faithfully, or that you would go to bed cheerfully at night without complaining, or you have made your parents some other promises; and yet, after you have received the object you asked for, you have failed to keep your promise.

Or, to go a step further, has it not been so with what you have promised God that you would do? You may have entered into covenant with Him, made certain promises, and then afterward forgot to fulfill those promises. Let us always remember when we make promises to God, or to our parents, that we are not to be like Pharaoh. After God has answered our prayers we should not forget to be obedient to Him and to keep our promises.

Pharaoh was a great covenant-breaker, but when at last he gave the Children of Israel permission to leave Egypt, and then broke his promise and followed them with his army that he might destroy them, God opened up the waters of the Red Sea and the Children of Israel fled from before Pharaoh. When this wicked king and covenant-breaker saw them, he pursued after them with his horses, his chariots and his army; and when they were all in the midst of the sea, God took away His restraining power from the water which stood piled up on both sides of the way along which the Children of Israel had marched safely, and the water came down in great torrents and buried this wicked king and all his horses and his chariots and his men. So God destroyed this great covenant-breaking king, because after all of the judgments and wonderful miracles which He had wrought before Pharaoh, in order to teach him that Jehovah was God, Pharaoh's repentances were all mere shams.

This was a great object sermon which God did before the eyes of all these thousands of the Children of Israel, and it should teach you and me that we are to be honest in all our covenants with God, and be obedient to the will of God in all that we do and say.

QUESTIONS.--Upon what king of Egypt did God send
the plague of frogs? How many plagues were there?
What effect did each plague have upon Pharaoh? Was
he honest when he repented? What did he do each
time after the plague was removed? What was the
last plague? After the death of the first-born,
did he allow the Children of Israel to go? After
they started, what did he do? How did God enable
the Children of Israel to cross the Red Sea? When
Pharaoh followed into the sea after them, what
occurred? Should we always keep our covenants,
both with God and men? If we do not keep our
covenants, whom are we like? Will we also be
punished?

BLOOD.

THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER.

SUGGESTION:--The object used is a bottle of red
ink to represent blood.

CHILDREN OF THE COVENANT-KEEPING KING: Last Sunday I talked to you about Pharaoh, as the great covenant-breaking king. I showed you some paper frogs, and told you how after all of God's long-suffering with Pharaoh, He eventually destroyed him and his army in the midst of the Red Sea.

Now, to-day I have this bottle, which has this deep red colored fluid in it. This is red ink. But I have brought it not to talk to you about ink, but to talk about something else which is of the same color; namely, of blood.

Copyrighted Sylvanus Stall]

You remember that there were ten plagues in Egypt; the first was the turning of the rivers into blood, then the bringing up of the frogs from all the rivers and lakes; and then the turning of the dust into lice; and then the plague of the flies; and then of the murrain which destroyed the cattle; and of the boils which came upon all the people; and of the lightning, and rain, and hail which destroyed man and beast. Then the locusts came which ate up everything that remained; afterward the three days of continuous darkness; and after these nine plagues God had yet in store one great plague which He purposed to bring upon Pharaoh and his people. After each of these plagues which I have named, Pharaoh promised that he would let the Children of Israel go, but instead he hardened his heart and refused to keep his promise. At last God was going to bring upon him and his people the greatest plague of all. (Ex. xii: 1-28.)

God told Moses and Aaron to command the Children of Israel that on the tenth day of the month, each family should select either a lamb or a kid and shut it up until the fourteenth day, and in the evening of that day they should kill it. This was to be a male lamb, one year old, and without spot or blemish. The blood, as it flowed from the neck of the lamb, was to be caught in a dish, and with a bunch of hyssop the blood was to be sprinkled upon the door-posts or the door frame, both above and around the door, so that when the Angel of Death whom God purposed to send upon that eventful night, when he should pass throughout all the land of Egypt and see the blood upon the door posts and upon the lintel over the door he would pass by or "pass-over" these houses of the Israelites and would not smite their first-born with death; as would be the case in every other home of the Egyptians throughout all the land.

After the Children of Israel had sprinkled the blood upon the door-posts, they were to roast the entire lamb, and they were to eat it with unleavened bread, which was bread baked without yeast, and eat it also with bitter herbs, while at the same time their long, loose garments were to be tucked up under their belts which went around their waists, or as the people in those days would have said, with their loins girded. They were to have their shoes on their feet, and a cane or staff in their hand, so as to be all ready to start out upon their journey at any moment.

At midnight, after these Israelites had eaten this "Passover" meal, and had also destroyed, by burning, any portions of the lamb which might remain, the Angel of Death passed through all the land of Egypt and slew the first-born, the oldest in every house, where there was no blood sprinkled upon the door-posts.

As soon as the angel had passed by, the people rushed out into the streets in terror and alarm, for in every home there was one or two or more persons lying dead. The Egyptians brought out their jewels and gold and valuables, and offered, not only to let the Israelites retain the jewels which they had already borrowed, but to give them more if they would only depart immediately, so that God should bring no further afflictions upon them. Pharaoh consented to their going, and immediately the Children of Israel started on their long journey to the Promised Land.

This eventful night was called, and is to this day called, "the night of the Passover," and to this day the Jewish people still celebrate the Feast of the Passover. It occurs in the spring of the year, and corresponds very closely to our Church festival day, known as Good Friday, at which time we commemorate the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ upon Calvary.

You will see from what I have said, how the lamb which was chosen was a figure of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world to take away your sins, and my sins, and the sins of all who would believe on Him. As this passover lamb was a year old, without spot and without blemish, so Jesus Christ was perfect, without blemish, He never committed a sin of any kind; He was but thirty years old when He was crucified, and consequently was young in years.

As the blood sprinkled upon the door-posts and the lintels of the doors was the sign by which the Angel of the Lord was to know the homes of the Israelites, and deliver their first-born from death, so the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin and delivers us from eternal death.

You and I and all mankind must die, but after this death of the body there comes either everlasting life or spiritual death. Now, when the spirit leaves the body, or is separated from these bodies, we speak of the body as being dead. The death of a person is just the same as when wheat is sown into the ground and is said to die; the life that formerly was in the seed only springs up into the stalk and grows into a new life and into a multiplied fruitfulness.

The life of each grain of wheat does not cease to exist, but is simply separated from the seed or grain which was sown in the ground, and lives in the new plant and new grain which springs up. So also when the life or the soul leaves the body, the body is dead, because it is separated from the soul. In like manner also, if the soul is separated from God, the Bible speaks of the individual as being spiritually dead, even while yet living in this world. Now, if because of sin any soul that is banished forever from God's presence, and is eternally separated from God in the next world, that eternal separation of the soul from God is spoken of in the Bible as eternal death.

From this eternal death you and I can only be delivered by the blood of the Son of God. Jesus Christ is our Passover Lamb. Neither is He a dead, but a living Savior.

"He ever lives above,
For me to intercede;
His all-redeeming love,
His precious blood to plead;
His blood atoned for all our race,
And sprinkles now the throne of grace."

QUESTIONS.--What was the tenth plague? How were
the homes of the Israelites to be marked, so that
the angel of death would pass over them? How old
was the lamb to be that was to be slain? What was
to be done with the body of the lamb? When they
ate it, how were they to be clothed? (So as to be
ready to start immediately upon their journey.)
What did the angel of death do where the door
posts were sprinkled with the blood? What was the
event called? (The Passover.) What people continue
to celebrate the Feast of the Passover today? Of
whom was the slain lamb the symbol? What is Christ
frequently called? From what does the blood of the
Lamb of God save us?

PINE BRANCH.

THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES.

SUGGESTION:--The objects used are a green branch
of a tree and a glass of clear water.

DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS: Last Sunday I told you about the Feast of the Passover, how it came to be instituted, and what it signified. To-day I want to talk to you about the Feast of Tabernacles. The Feast of the Passover occurred in the spring, nearly corresponding to our Easter; and at such times when the Israelites from every quarter of the land came up to Jerusalem, as was the custom at the three annual feasts, some provision had to be made for their entertainment.

At the Feast of the Passover all the Jews living in Jerusalem had to throw open their homes, and entertain under the cover of their own roofs, all who came to them. They could not decline to receive the thousands of worshipers who came up to the Feast, but were required to afford them a place of shelter in their homes. Therefore it was that before the Feast of the Passover Jesus sent two of His disciples, and told them to go into the city, and they would find a man bearing a pitcher of water; they should follow him and ask him to direct them to a room in his house, where Jesus might eat the Passover with His disciples. (Matt. xxvi: 17; Mark xiv: 13.)

At the Feast of Tabernacles, which occurred in the fall of the year, after the harvest and the fruit of the vines and the trees had all been gathered in, it was very different. At this Feast, when the Israelites came up to Jerusalem, not only those who came from a distance, but even those who lived regularly in the city, were required to tent or live in booths made by simply placing some poles in the ground, with other poles reaching across the top, so as to form a roof or covering. This roof was not shingled, but was formed by laying branches of trees upon the sticks which had been laid across from one pole to the other. (Neh. viii: 14, 15.)

You now see why to-day I have chosen this branch of a tree to show you in connection with this sermon. I have chosen this to impress upon your mind the character of the arbors used at the Feast of Tabernacles; the tops or roofs of which were formed or made of olive, and willow and pine, myrtle and palm branches. These booths or arbors were to remind the Children of Israel of the journey of their forefathers through the desert, when for forty long years they did not live within the walls or under the roof of any house, but dwelt only in booths.

I am sure that you and I would like to have looked in upon Jerusalem at the time when one of these Harvest Home festivals was being celebrated. We would like to have seen the booths on the tops of the houses and along the side of the hills, outside of the walls of the city, and sloping down through the valleys and crowding far out into the country upon the Mount of Olives and beyond. We would like to have seen the bright faces of the happy throngs of people as they moved in procession through the streets, waving their palm branches; and to have listened to the music of the trumpeters of the Temple, as they sounded their trumpets twice every hour throughout the entire day. I am sure we would have been delighted to look down upon the festive crowd at night, when, instead of waving palm branches as they did during the day, they carried bright flaming torches, amid the clashing of cymbals and the blast of trumpets.

This Feast lasted for eight days. The first day and the last were especially sacred. And now I want to call your attention to this second object which I have; namely, this water, and I want to tell you how it was related to and used at this Feast of Tabernacles. On the morning of each day, while the smoke of the morning sacrifice was ascending in beautiful wreaths in the still air, a priest bearing a large golden bowl, and followed by a long procession of boys and girls waving palm branches, descended the side of the hill to the pool of Siloam, which was in a quiet recess at the foot of Mount Moriah, on the summit of which the Temple was built. When the priest had filled the golden bowl with water from this clear pool, he held it above his head and bore it aloft as he ascended the stairs. As the procession entered the Court of the Temple, the trumpets sounded, and all the throngs of people gathered within its walls took up the words of the prophet and sang, "With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation" (Isaiah xii: 3), and as the priest came to the base of the altar he poured the water from the golden bowl into a silver basin amid shouts and gladness. Upon the eighth day, "the last day, that great day of the feast" (John vii: 37), the joy was greater than upon any of the other days. The priests in glad procession moved around the altar seven times, singing the Psalms.

It was at the last Feast of Tabernacles which Jesus attended, that He stood in the midst of this glad assembly, and beheld their joy as they remembered how God had supplied their fathers with water in the wilderness; and how God had given them a land of streams, and rivers, and wells of water, and it was then when Jesus heard them crying "Hosanna, blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord," that Jesus stood up in the midst of the Temple and of the people and said, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink." (John vii: 37.) To those of us who have always lived in the midst of a bountiful supply of fresh, clear, crystal water, these words are not as impressive as they were to the people to whom they were then spoken. For their land was surrounded by deserts, and they lived in the midst of nations whose people often famished and died, because there was not a sufficient supply of water to drink.

While we live in a country where there is always an abundant supply of water to satisfy the thirst of the body, yet spiritually, like these people at the Feast of Tabernacles we have the same spiritual needs that they had, and if you and I thirst for the water of life, if we desire everlasting salvation, if we thirst for the knowledge of sacred things and desire to do that which is right, Jesus invites you and me to come to Him, and says to us: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters." (Isa. lv: 1.) "If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink," (John vii: 37.) "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." (John iv: 14.)

QUESTIONS.--At what season of the year was the
Feast of Tabernacles held? How long did it last?
In what did the people live or dwell during the
Feast? Of what were the booths built? Why did they
dwell in booths instead of in their houses at this
time? Of what was all this to remind them? Which
was the great day of the Feast? On this last day
of the Feast what did the high priest bring from
the well? By whom was the priest accompanied? Into
what did he pour the water from the golden bowl?
Of what was this water the symbol? Does every
human being thirst for or desire righteousness?
Did Jesus invite such to come to Him and drink?
Should we always go to Him to satisfy our
spiritual hunger and thirst?

LEAVES.

THE LESSONS WHICH THEY TEACH.

SUGGESTION:--Objects: Some autumn leaves or green
leaves of different varieties.

MY DEAR BOYS AND GIRLS: To-day I picked up these few beautiful leaves, which during the summer were lifted aloft on the trees and cast their grateful shadows upon the weary traveler as he journeyed under the scorching rays of the sun. But with the coming of autumn these leaves have faded, and the first frost of winter has tinged them with crimson and glory. I am sure we cannot look upon them without thinking of the words of the Prophet Isaiah, in the sixty-fourth chapter and sixth verse, where he says: "We all do fade as a leaf."

I desire, however, to use these leaves to teach you not only this lesson, but also several others which they suggest.

If, during the summer, you go out into a forest and study the leaves, one of the first things which you will notice will be that the leaves which grow upon one kind of trees differ from the leaves which grow upon every other kind of trees. Indeed, if you pick up a leaf from the ground and examine it carefully you will find that the leaf is largely a picture of the tree upon which it grew. The shape of the leaf will correspond very largely with the shape of the tree from which it has fallen. If you study the leaf more carefully you will discover that the veins in the leaf will quite closely resemble the shape of the limbs of the tree. You would not be able to study the different leaves which you pick up without being impressed with the resemblance in many instances between the leaf and the tree upon which it grew.

Now, I think that we may learn a very profitable lesson from the leaves in this respect. I think that you will find, when you are able to study with a little closeness of observation, that the scholars of different Sunday-schools are different from each other, at least in some respects. Those who come from the school where good order is maintained, where there are consecrated, devoted teachers who give themselves carefully to the preparation of the lesson, secure the attention of their scholars, impress the truth deeply upon the minds, and hearts and consciences--you will find that the scholars of this school become attentive and orderly, and well behaved, and all the scholars in the school partake of the influences which are exerted over them from Sunday to Sunday. The scholars who attend a school where the superintendent does not keep good order, where the teachers are irregular and disinterested, and where everything is permitted to go along as by mere chance, these scholars will partake of the influence of the school, and will individually become like the school. So you see how important it is that each and every scholar should be attentive and thoughtful, and give the very largest amount of help possible to the superintendent and teachers to render the school orderly, and to encourage the teachers who desire to devote themselves to the teaching of Bible truth and the impressing of the spiritual lessons, so that those who are under their influence may be brought to a saving acquaintance with Christ.

What I have said with reference to the Sunday-school is also true with reference to the Church. There is an old saying, that "like priest, like people." When a pastor continues for a long period of years in the same pulpit, ministering to the same people, if he has their sympathy, co-operation and assistance the people will become very much like each other in their spiritual character, and all will become more and more like the pastor and his teachings. If he is godly, and consecrated, and upright, his people will become increasingly so. And you will find not only that each scholar becomes a miniature of the Sunday-school which he attends, but each Christian becomes a miniature of the congregation of which he is a member.

But the leaves teach us another lesson. The great trees which you see in the forest are the result of the united efforts and labors of the leaves. Each leaf is gifted with individual power, and together they all drink in the influence of the sunlight and the showers, and unitedly they build up the great oaks and elms and poplars, and all the trees of the fields and forest. The coal, which is now dug from the mines, was once a great tropical growth of forest trees which were afterwards buried by some great convulsion in nature, and now when we dig up the coal and burn it in our stoves we are simply releasing the buried sunshine which was accumulated and stored up by the individual leaves of the great forests of centuries ago.

As we look upon the leaves of the trees I think we must be impressed with the fact, that each one labors in his own appointed place. There is no conflict, there is no crowding of one, thinking to exalt himself above the others. There are no little parties of leaves joining together and trying to crowd themselves to the top of the tree, but each and all work faithfully and zealously in the place which God has appointed them.

They are not only faithful workers, but they are unselfish workers. No leaf can have the joy which belongs to another, or the glory of all the leaves. Each leaf has the reward of doing a little, and when its work is done it must drop to the ground and perish in the dust. The work which it has done and the tree which it has helped to build will be its monument and reward. If each leaf gives its life faithfully for the building up of the tree, no leaf can fall to the ground or be shaken from its place by the autumn wind and perish in despair.

If you will go into the forest at the autumn period of the year, or go into the orchard and examine where the leaves are about to drop off, you will find that at the base of the stem of each leaf, already there appears the budding of the leaf which is to be unfolded next spring, and even though the leaf withers and falls to the ground, leaving the barren limb alone to battle with the winter storms, yet there is the promise and the evidence that when the gentle breath of spring shall come and break open the icy sepulchres of the winter, these little buds will feel the genial warmth and unfold their green beauty in a radiant springtime of beautiful foliage. So one generation of men may die and pass away, to have their work continued and completed by those who are to come after them.

But these leaves also teach us of our mortality. For, as Isaiah says, "We all do fade as a leaf." We are all very apt to forget that we must die. And so each year, when the summer is over and the fruit is gathered, the leaves begin to wither, and the early frost tinges the forests of the closing year, like the sun oftentimes makes the clouds all crimson and glory at the close of the day. These things should teach us that as advancing years come, we also must fade and die. God spreads out before us this great panorama along the valleys and on the hillsides each autumn to teach us that as the leaves perish, so we must also fade and droop and die.

But there is one great encouragement, and that is, that although the leaves fall, the tree stands. The leaf perishes, but the tree abides, and year after year, sometimes for centuries, it goes on increasing in stature and in strength, abiding as the giant of the forest. So also, when at last each of us must die, that which we have built shall abide, and what we have received from others and to which we have added our efforts and our labors, others shall receive from us, and they also shall carry on the work in which we have been engaged. So each generation receives and carries on the work of those who have gone before. As the poet has well said,

"Like leaves on trees, the race of man is found,
Now green in youth, now withered on the ground;
Another race the following age supplies;
They fall successive, and successive rise;
So generations in their course decay
So perish these when those have passed away."

The tree stands a monument of strength and beauty at the grave of all the dead leaves which lie buried at its feet. So what each boy and girl, each man and woman, shall have accomplished of good or evil, will remain after they have perished and passed away, to tell of their lives, and God will note the result. He who says that not even a sparrow can fall to the ground without His notice, and who tells us that the very hairs of our heads are all numbered, He will note our deeds, and He will be our reward.

If I were speaking now to older people I might call attention to the fact that the autumn leaves are more beautiful than the summer leaves. And so boys and girls, it seems to me, and it has always thus seemed to me, that there is something more beautiful in manhood and womanhood, during the later years of life, than during the earlier years. Always honor and respect the aged whose heads are gray, whose features are venerable and whose characters are Christ-like.

QUESTIONS.--Are the leaves alike on all trees? In
what ways are the leaves like the tree on which
they grew? Are Sunday-school scholars much like
the school that they attend? Are grown people
greatly influenced by the pastor who preaches to
them, and the people with whom they are
associated? Of what are great trees the result?
How do leaves accomplish this? When a leaf drops
from the tree, what has already started? What do
fading and dropping leaves represent? Does the
tree abide when the leaves fall? When we die do
the great influences which we have helped forward
remain to bless the world? Who still notes our
deeds when we pass away? Which are more beautiful,
summer or autumn leaves? What periods of life are
they like?

THE TURTLE.

MEN LIKE AND YET UNLIKE THE ANIMALS.

SUGGESTION:--While it is not at all necessary to
present any special objects, it will add to the
interest if the parent has a turtle shell or even
the shells of oysters, clams or abalone, which are
somewhat the same in principle, the outside cover
of the animal constituting both its home and
defence, although differing from the turtle in
other respects.

MY DEAR BOYS AND GIRLS: I want to show you to-day how in some respect we are like the animals, and how in other respects we are very unlike them. To illustrate what I desire to say I have brought this small turtle shell. From the way that some boys treat flies and bugs, and birds, cats and dogs and all kinds of animals you would suppose that many boys and some girls think that animals have no feeling. Boys who have never suffered any bodily pain themselves, oftentimes act as though they thought that animals could not suffer pain, but in this they are greatly mistaken. Animals can and do suffer pain, the same as people suffer pain, and in order to defend them against their enemies God has provided these creatures of His hand with some means of protecting themselves. The birds can fly away. Some animals, like foxes, have holes in the ground where they can hide. Others, like the squirrel, hide in the hollow trees. Bees can sting. Some cattle have horns for defence, and some others, which are not as capable of defending themselves against the stronger animals, God has marvellously provided with two stomachs. The cow goes out in the field and crops off the grass rapidly and can then go to a place of shelter and lie down, and there, protected from the attack of wild beasts, chew what she has gathered. This is known in the country as chewing the cud. The same is true with sheep; they also bite off the grass and swallow it quickly. It passes into a first stomach and then they can lie down in some quiet place and chew the cud; or in other words chew that which they have hastily bitten off in the fields.

Now the turtle cannot escape from his enemies because he cannot run very rapidly, and so God has covered him with a coat of mail and given him a helmet, a hard, bony covering for the head and this large bony covering for his body, which we can very properly call his house. When danger approaches, the turtle quickly draws his head and his feet into this large shell, and is quite safe from the attack of his enemies. Whatever animal might desire to eat the turtle is prevented on account of this hard outer shell. On this lower part you will notice how the turtle can draw the front portion up more closely, and thus the more securely shut himself within his house. So you see how God has provided all the animals with a means of protection and defense, first, to protect their lives, and secondly, to save them from pain and suffering.

While God has thus successfully protected them against other animals, they are not protected against the superior intelligence and ingenuity of man. The birds can fly faster than the man can run, but man can shoot the bird with an arrow or with a rifle. So with all the other animals. Now God has made it right for us to kill animals for food, but it is very wrong for us to destroy animals for the simple pleasure of taking life, and it is also very wicked to inflict pain unnecessarily upon any of the animals.

I want to tell you about a boy who was once strolling through the fields with his sister. They found a nest of rabbits. The sister was charmed with the beautiful nest itself and with its living occupants, but the boy teased them, mimicking their squeaks and their struggles. In vain his sister plead with him not to hurt these pretty little creatures, but the wicked boy flung them up into the air one by one and shouted when each fell dead upon the stones. Ten years after the sister sat weeping again by that boy's side. He was in chains, sentenced to be hanged for shooting a farmer who was hunting in a neighbor's field. They were waiting for the awful procession to knock at the cell door. "Sister," he said, "do you remember the nest of rabbits ten years ago; how you begged and prayed, and how I ridiculed? I verily believe that from that day God forsook me, and left me to follow my own inclinations. If I had yielded to your tears then, you and I would not be weeping these bitter tears now."

You see how it is that boys who have no regard for the suffering, or the preservation of the life of animals are likely to inflict pain and even to take the lives of people.

But I want to call your attention to another respect in which we are like the animals, or perhaps, more correctly, in which the animals are like us. The forms of most all animals have some resemblance to each other, and all are somewhat in form like man. If you take the bird, his wings correspond to our arms, his legs and feet are somewhat like ours, only his toes are longer, and the nails are slightly different in form. If you will take the horse you will see that his neck is longer than ours, that his front legs correspond to our arms, and if you take your fingers and press them together you will see how, if you were to study the anatomy of the horse's foot carefully, it resembles the bones in our hands, and the bony foot of the horse corresponds to the nails on the ends of our fingers, only that in the case of the horse the nails are all in one, forming the hoof, to which the blacksmith nails the shoe. The horse's hoof, however, is not solid as you might think, but only a shell, the same as the nails on the ends of our fingers.

Now if you were to take the turtle that lives in this shell or house you would find that he also has four legs, the front legs corresponding to our arms, and his hind legs corresponding to our legs and feet. On the end of each of his feet he has nails, the same as you and I have at the extremities of our hands and feet. But I am sure you would say that the turtle was very much unlike us, in that he has such a hard shell of a house which he carries about with him. But if you will feel of your hands you will discover that you have bones inside of your hands. So you have bones in your arms and all through your body. These bones of your body are covered with flesh, so our bones are _inside_ of us. But with this turtle almost all of his bones are made into one bone, and that is on the _outside_ of his body.

Our muscles, with which we move our hands and feet and different portions of our body, are attached to the bones which are inside of us. His muscles are attached to the bone which is on the outside of him. So you see that we are like him, in that both of us have bones, only his are on the outside while ours are on the inside.

His bone or shell is a covering and a defense. Our bones, on the inside of us, are so constructed as to enable us to defend ourselves also. God has given the turtle a house, but He has given us the knowledge and the skill, so that we can construct our own house. We are created with capacity to till the earth and to subdue the wild beasts of the forest, and with our superior intelligence to be king over all the other creatures which God has created.

Now, there are several lessons which we may learn from what I have said. God has protected all animals against their foes. He has not fully protected the animals against us, but He expects us to use our intelligence and our better nature, to be thoughtful and careful not to inflict pain even upon the worm or insect which crawls upon the ground beneath our feet.