THE LOST SON FOUND.

I was standing by the side of my mother, under the spacious porch of Dr. Beattie's church, Union-street, Glasgow, awaiting the hour for afternoon service. A holy calm hung over the city; no discordant noise broke the solemn stillness of the day of rest and worship; scarcely a whisper was heard in the assembly of waiting worshippers who crowded the broad pavement on which I stood. All seemed profoundly impressed with the solemn and sacred character of the day, the place, and the occasion which had called them together. It was, in short, a Sabbath in the land of Knox and Chalmers.

I had been in this position probably ten or fifteen minutes, when I observed two young men turn a corner and walk towards the church. They were dressed in their working clothes, unshaven and dirty, and slightly intoxicated. As they passed the church door they assumed a swaggering, irreverent gait, laughed, and finally commenced singing a profane song. Some of the bystanders expressed their horror at the occurrence, others wondered what had become of the police; but my mother turned to me, and said, "Follow these two men, and invite them to a seat in our pew."

I soon overtook them, and delivered my mother's message. One laughed scornfully and began to swear; the other paused and pondered; he was evidently struck with the nature of the invitation, and probably also with the earnestness and simplicity with which it was delivered. His companion again swore, and was about to drag him away. But he still paused. I repeated the invitation, and in a few seconds he looked in my face and said, "When I was a boy like you, I went to church every Sunday. I have not been inside of a church for three years. I don't feel right. I believe I will go with you."

I seized his hand, and led him back to the house of God, in spite of the remonstrances and oaths of his companion. The doors were now open, and the church was filling rapidly; we entered, and I conducted him to the pew, where my mother was already seated. A most excellent sermon preached from Eccles. xi. 1, "Cast thy

was

bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days."

The young man was attentive, but seemed abashed and downcast. At the conclusion of the service he hastened out of the church, but he was closely followed and soon overtaken by my mother, who kindly said to him, "Have you a bible, young man ?” "No, ma'am; but I can get one,' " was his reply.

"You can read, of course?" said she.
"Yes, ma'am."

"Well, take my son's bible until you can procure one of your own. Read it attentively during the week, and come to meeting again next Lord's-day. I shall always be happy to accommodate you with a seat."

He put the bible in his pocket and hurried away. At family worship that evening my mother prayed fervently for the conversion of that young man.

Next Sunday came, and the next, but the stranger did not appear. My mother frequently spoke of him, and appeared grieved at his absence. He had doubtless been the subject of her closet devotions. On the third Sabbath morning, while the congregation were singing the first psalm, the young man again entered our pew. He was now dressed genteelly, and appeared thin and pale, as if from recent sickness. My mother looked at him with great earnestness, and a gleam of satisfaction and thankfulness overspread her pale intellectual features. Immediately after the benediction, the stranger laid my bible on the desk, and left the house, without giving my mother an opportunity she much desired, of conversing with him. On one of the blank leaves of the bible, we found some writing in pencil signed "W. C." The writer stated that he had been confined to his room by sickness for the previous two weeks. He declared his inability to express the gratitude he felt towards my mother, for the interest she had manifested in his spiritual welfare; he asked to be remembered in her prayers; and concluded by stating that he was an Englishman, and would return to his native land in about ten days.

Years rolled on; my mother passed to her heavenly rest; I grew up to manhood, and the stranger was forgotten.

In the autumn of 18- the ship St. George, of which I was the medical officer, anchored in Table Bay. Between us and Penguin Island I observed a man-of-war which I had seen before and knew well; it was Her Majesty's brig Chanticleer of ten guns, Commander Forbes, on a surveying expedition. The surgeon of the brig, Dr. F-, had been my preceptor, and I resolved to pay him a visit. He received me with his usual warmth and kindness. After dining with the gun-room officers, he proposed that on the following day, which was the Sabbath, we should attend meeting in Cape Town. "It will remind us," he said, "of old times, when we used to go arm in arm to church in Union-street."

Next day, in company with my friend, I attended morning service at the Wesleyan chapel. At the conclusion of worship, a gentleman, seated behind me, asked to look at my bible. In a few minutes he returned it, and I walked into the street. We had Darranged to dine at "the George," and I was mounting the steps in front of that hotel, when the gentleman who had examined my bible laid his hand on my shoulder, and begged to have a few minutes' conversation. We were shewn into a private apartment. As soon as we were seated, he examined my countenance with great attention, and then began to sob; tears rolled down his cheeks; he was eyidently labouring under intense emotion. He appeared to be about thirty-five years of age, was tall and slender, and neatly dressed, but apparently in bad health. He asked me several questions-amongst others, my name, age, occupation, birthplace. He then enquired if I had not, when a boy, many years ago, invited a drunken Sabbathbreaker to a seat in Dr. Beattie's church. I was astonished-the subject of my mother's anxieties and prayers was before me. Mutual explanations and congratulations followed, after which Mr. C. gave me a short history of his life, from the time he left Scotland to the day on which we met so unexpectedly in a foreign land.

He was born in the town of Leeds, in the West-riding of Yorkshire, of highly respectable parents, who gave him a good education, and trained him up in the way of righteousness. When about fifteen years of age his father died, and his mother's straitened circumstances obliged her to take him from school, and put him to learn a trade. In his new situation he imbibed all manner

of evil, became incorrigibly vicious, and broke his mother's heart. Freed now from all parental restraint, he left his employers, and travelled to Scotland. In the city of Glasgow he had lived and sinned for two years, when he was arrested in his career through my mother's instrumentality. On the first Sabbath of our strange interview in Union-street, he confessed that, after he left church, he was seized with pangs of unutterable remorse. The sight of a mother and her son worshipping God together, recalled the happy days of his own boyhood, when he went to church and Sunday school, and when he also had a mother-a mother whose latter days' he had embittered, and whose grey hairs he had brought with sorrow to the grave. His mental suffering threw him on a bed of sickness, from which he arose a changed man. He returned to England, cast himself at the feet of his maternal uncle, and asked and obtained forgiveness. His conviction of sin,-his battlings with temptation,-his repentance, -his victory over the world,-the growth of his faith in the great atonement,-and, finally, his peace in believing, formed a deeply interesting and instructive narrative. With his uncle's consent he studied for the ministry; and, on being ordained, he entered the missionary field, and had been labouring for several years in Southern Africa.

"The moment I saw your bible this morning," he said, "I recognized it, and the examination of the writing, which is still legible on the blank leaf, assured me that I was not mistaken. And now do you know who was my companion on the memorable Sabbath you invited me to church? He was the notorious Jack Hill, who was hanged about a year afterwards for highway robbery. You can now see and appreciate the terrible fate from which I was rescued by the unfathomable love and boundless grace of God, through your own and your mother's instrumentality. I was dragged from the very brink of infamy and destruction, and saved as a brand from the burning. You remember Dr. Beattie's text on the day of my salvation: Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days.' The proud, hardened, scoffing sinner is found, after thirteen years, a humble minister of salvation to the benighted heathen; and your sainted mother is doubtless enjoying the reward of those who turn many to righteousness-shining as the stars for ever and ever."-American Messenger.

1

THE DECISION.

Mary and Emma B- were children of wealth and luxury. A father's and a mother's love had, so far as earthly power can, guarded them from sorrow and pain. Want they had never known; adversity had never darkened their pathway; not even had a cherished friend been taken from them; and now, their school-day trials over, with wealth, rank, beauty, and accomplishments, they were entering the fashionable world. The future, as to the young and trusting it ever does, seemed strewn with flowers, and sparkling with gems; they had but to stretch forth their hands to grasp the prize, and happiness would be theirs. For years they had been looking forward to this hour, anticipating its joys, feasting on its fancied delights. Alas, they knew not, thought not, how true an emblem of life is the far-famed fruit, which, fair and beautiful without, is but rottenness and hollowness within.

A month rolled away, during which Mary and Emma had been courted and flattered, feted and admired, till the world's votaries might think their cup of joy was running over. It was a little season, too brief for pleasure to have become wearisome, and yet they had tasted of almost every earthly joy. Were they satisfied? Had their bright anticipations been realized? Let us listen.

One beautiful evening, as the departing rays of the setting sun were tinging with gold the waters of a quiet lake, which lay spread out before them, the sisters walked forth alone. "Silence reigned," but it was a silence which said unutterable things, which unconsciously led the heart "through nature up to nature's God." The day had been one of weariness and lassitude, the reaction of a previous one of excitement and so-called pleasure. calm and lovely is this scene," exclaimed Emma; "look, Mary, how beautiful the lake is tinged with the setting sun. What a contrast is this to the revelry and excitement of last evening."

"How

"Beautiful, indeed," said her sister, "but we do not want to admire this always, it would not atone for company, and parties, and the pleasures of life. I am so vexed, however, I thought last night, or rather this morning, as I laid my aching head on my pillow, I never would go to another party, and I never will at Mrs. D.'s. How provoking every thing was."

"I am weary," said Emma,-"weary of parties, almost of our so much dreamed of pleasures. Let us sit down on this green mound and talk of something else."

The sisters seated themselves.

"Mary," added Emma, looking up sorrowfully, "I am sad, and I cannot tell why. Everything about me is bright and happy; my desires are gratified, pleasure is always before me,-what can be the cause of my sadness ?"

"I cannot," replied her sister; "I am not sad that I know of, but angry, which is worse."

"But," asked Emma," does not this peaceful scene, so unlike the commotion of angry feelings, produce such a discord in your heart as to make it heavy ?"

Mary gazed around, an expression of sadness came over her countenance, and she was compelled to own, that, with no sympathy of feeling, the scene was robbed of its brightest attractions. The sisters conversed till the gathering shades of night admonished them that it was time to retire, but, not discovering the cause of their sadness, they resolved to continue their round of pleasure, without allowing themselves to be annoyed by the little vexations incident to life, and again they pictured the future bright and happy.

The mother of these sisters was a christian, but, perhaps a little blinded by the whirl of pomp and fashion amid which she dwelt, and with a husband not a help-meet in the way of life, she found it difficult to stem the tide which was rapidly carring her daughters into a vortex of dissipation, and leading them to forget duty and obligation. The hour of retirement, however, came, and with it calmness and reflection; and earnestly then she prayed for grace and wisdom from above, to guide her children aright; nor were her prayers unanswered.

Another and another month fled away, and Mary and Emma were still basking in the sunshine of worldly prosperity, but all would not do. Though the excitement of the moment banished care, and led them to imagine themselves happy, they only felt the more exhausted, sad, and disappointed, when the giddy scene was over. Happiness was always flitting just before them, but though in a thousand ways they sought to attain it, it ever alluded their eager grasp. A young friend, who had mingled with them in their pursuits of pleasure, was now suddenly summoned to her last account.

Death had not come very near, and yet he was nearer than he had ever approached before, and his summons reminding them, votaries of pleasure as they were, that their hour of doom must also come, caused their hearts to quail.

"Mary," said Emma, the evening after they had seen the earthly remains of their young friend consigned to the narrow house, 66 our mother told us to-day, that the soul cannot be satisfied with attending to the things of earth merely. I think I realize the truth of that remark, for I sometimes feel such an aching void within me, my mind seems struggling to soar beyond the perishing things around me to higher and holier scenes. Do you never feel this?"

"Oh, yes," was the reply, "I sometimes feel sad, and an indefinable longing after something, I know not what, at 'twilight's witching hour,' or when I am alone; but it vanishes with company, and other means of enjoyment in our possession."

"That may be," said Emma, "but then the void, the sadness, return with redoubled force after the excitement has again passed by. No, it is not solitude which is the cause of all this, but the confining the mind to sensual objects, which is contrary to its nature. When I pass an hour in useful conversation, or in relieving suffering, the recollection, though something still seems wanting, gives me pleasure. I have been thinking, dear sister, of a future world, and how unfitted we are for its solemn realities. I fear that we are quite forgetting that our summons must soon come."

"Dear Emma," exclaimed Mary, "do not be so solemn, I cannot think of that."

"But what propriety," asked Emma, "is there in banishing such thoughts; these pleasures, which so engross our attention, even now leave a sting behind, and they will soon pass away. Life is so uncertain. How has our dear mother, in these last sad days, sought to impress this truth upon us. Our young friend, only a week ago with us, with health and the most brilliant prospects before her, now lies mouldering in the dust. How little did she think, as joyfully she arrayed herself for her last splendid fete, that the next great assembly she should meet would be at the bar of God. Oh, I wish I could think of the grave with calmness, but to give up life, to leave its pleasures, friends, every thing we love, to moulder away in the cold earth, food for

worms, is too much; and the soul! ah, Mary, what will become of that?"

Mary was deeply affected. She threw herself into her sister's arms, and wept. Thoughts of her friend, of the grave, and that she, too, must soon lie there, distressed, but did not lead her to seek for consolation where alone it can be found. The sisters found no consolation in these sad but profitable reflections, and they soon turned from them; and on the morrow when they awoke from their troubled slumbers, they thought not from whom came all their mercies, felt no emotions of gratitude toward Him who is alike the dispenser of life and death. But they had learned that mere sensual enjoyments do not constitute happiness, and this conviction, together with the tears and prayers of a pious mother, had, at length, induced them sometimes to think of higher objects than the perishing things of earth. Glowingly did she picture before them the benevolence of their Heavenly Father, who had strewn their path of life with blessings,-the love and mercy of a Saviour, who had suffered and died that they might live,-and the return they had made for all this; and earnestly did she entreat them to seek his forgiveness and favour. They listened and wept, but not with a sincere sorrow for sin, but from a dread of its fatal consequences. Time passed on, in a struggle between the desire to enjoy the pleasures of sin and the hopes of christianity. Again they went to the house of God, and listened to the oft told tale of a Saviour's love, of his agony for their sakes, of his power and willingness to save to the uttermost all who will come to him, of the sin and wretchedness in which they were involved, and of the glorious hopes of christianity; and their hearts were moved; almost they were persuaded to be christians. On the eve of that Sabbath their mother approached them:

"My dear children," she said, "will you, can you, any longer reject the gracious offers of which you have to-day again heard, thus crucifying the Saviour afresh, and bringing upon yourselves swift destruction; or will you now resolve to renounce the world, to take your hearts from its fleeting, deceitful pleasures, and dedicate your future lives to His service whose mercies have been new every morning, and fresh every moment of your lives?"

A solemn pause ensued. At length Mary sobbed: