Fifty-Two Story Talks to Boys and Girls Part 3

You must be on the lookout for boys like that. Don't be afraid to be called a coward by them. Don't let them "dare" you to do things which your conscience tells you are foolish or wrong. You will be a bigger coward if you do these things because you are ashamed not to take the dare.

"s.h.i.+NE INSIDE"

As I was pa.s.sing along the street the other day I saw on the window of a bootblack's parlour the words, "s.h.i.+ne Inside."

I want to turn these words around and make a motto of them for you boys and girls. For I think that if every boy and girl would s.h.i.+ne inside, our homes, and the world in general, would be a much happier place.

Of course there are some boys and girls who s.h.i.+ne only on the _outside_.

A little while ago I read a story about Byron, a great poet, of whom you will learn later in school. A man said to Sir Walter Scott that he wished he might have seen Byron when he was alive. He said he had only seen a photograph of him. Scott said, "Yes, the l.u.s.ter is there [in the photograph], but it is not lighted up." Now, there are some boys' and girls' faces that have a l.u.s.ter, but it is not lighted up.

Or their faces are like a mirror that s.h.i.+nes brightly only when there is sunlight or some other light falling upon it. The mirror only s.h.i.+nes outside. The l.u.s.ter is not always lighted up. I know boys and girls who s.h.i.+ne outside only when other boys and girls play the game which they want them to play, or when they get the clothes they want to wear or the food they want to eat, or when they are out in pleasant company. But when they don't have their own way, then their faces are very cloudy.

But the boy or girl who s.h.i.+nes _inside_ is one who "irons out his wrinkles with a smile" even though things do not exactly please him, and he thinks of other people instead of himself.

Now, how can boys and girls s.h.i.+ne inside so that they will always s.h.i.+ne outside whether they have their own way or not? Well, you remember that the Bible says that when Moses came down from the mountain his face shone, because he had been talking with G.o.d. That is the secret, boys and girls. When a man or a woman or a boy or a girl talks often enough with G.o.d in prayer and asks to be made like Christ, then a light is lighted within him which causes his face to s.h.i.+ne. You remember Christ said, "I am the Light." Let Him into your heart, and you will s.h.i.+ne inside.

"The man worth while is the man with a smile When everything goes dead wrong."

THE STORM-KING EAGLE

If you have been up the Hudson River from New York to Albany by the day-boat, you will probably have noticed a high mountain on the right-hand side of the river by the name of Storm King.

I want to tell you about an eagle that used to live there. He could be seen there almost any day soaring high above the mountain-peak. And many a hunter had tried to shoot him. But he avoided them all. And how do you think he did it? Did he hide from them? No. Just by flying so high that the bullets could not reach him, or, if some chance bullet did reach him, he was so far away that it just kissed his plumage and fell back to earth without doing him any harm.

I wish that every boy and girl were as wise as that old eagle. That is always the way to avoid being wounded by sins: just keep high up above them. I mean by that, when you are tempted to do anything that is wrong, not to stop and argue with yourself whether you will get caught if you do it, or whether you will be happier if you do not do it, or any of these things by which you lose time. But just get right away from it: put it out of your mind.

I suppose you will wonder how you can do that. I will tell you. You have often heard about "wis.h.i.+ng-caps," and how the people in fairy-stories put them on and just wish themselves wherever they want to be, and quick as a flash they are there. Well, there is a wis.h.i.+ng-cap that every boy and girl can put on when he is tempted; it is this prayer, "O G.o.d, help me not to do this thing which is wrong!" And if you say that prayer, and believe G.o.d will help you, it will take you high out of reach of the sin, just as that old eagle flew high above reach of the bullets. For G.o.d says that they who ask Him for help shall "mount up on wings as eagles."

A DOG WHICH ATE THE BIBLE

I heard an amusing story sometime ago about a savage in Africa who came to a missionary very much excited and told him that his dog had been completely spoiled as a watch-dog because he had chewed up and eaten a small New Testament he had happened to get hold of. He said that the dog would never be of any more use because the New Testament which he had swallowed would take all the fight out of him, and he could no longer keep wild animals away from the sheep.

That seems a strange notion for a grown-up man to get into his head, doesn't it? And yet, boys and girls, I run across some young people even here in America that think if they let Christ into their hearts it will make them sort of "wishy-washy" and "goody-goody," and not strong and rugged people.

It is true that to be a Christian does take some of the fight out of a person, but it is the quarrelsome kind of fighting that has neither beauty nor strength in it which it takes out of one. But when you come to read history you will find that some of our bravest soldiers were Christians. John Havelock, a British general who fought in India for the sake of his country, was called "The Christian Warrior." Sir Oliver Cromwell, who had to lead an army in England against the king, who was ill-treating the people, had a body of soldiers under him who were Christians, and they were such good soldiers and so hard to defeat that they were called "Cromwell's Ironsides." Sometimes just before battle these soldiers used to sing hymns and then pray on the battlefields. And because they were Christians it made better and braver soldiers of them.

And so the truest kind of courage that any boy or girl can have is the kind that Christ gives. Paul tells all of us Christians to be "good soldiers." The Bible takes the wrong kind of fight out of you and puts the right kind of fight into you, the fight for n.o.ble things.

STEAM AND SAILS

All the vessels on the oceans can be divided into two cla.s.ses: steams.h.i.+ps and sailing vessels. The sailing vessels, as you know, set their broad white sails like wings to catch the favouring winds, and then they go scudding across the seas like birds to their distant harbours. But when there is no wind these vessels must sometimes lie becalmed, and do not move for days or sometimes weeks. The steams.h.i.+ps, on the other hand, do not depend upon the wind to drive them ahead.

Their power comes from great engines away down in the heart of the vessel. Even if the wind blows right in the face of the s.h.i.+p, it only makes the boiler-fires burn faster and brighter, and she plunges ahead in spite of wind or tide.

Boys and girls also can be divided into two cla.s.ses, like s.h.i.+ps. Some depend upon other boys and girls to make them go; others have the "go"

in themselves. These people with the "go" in themselves we call "go-ahead" sort of people. They are the boys and girls who become leaders. The others are followers.

What the world most needs is these "go-ahead" people. There are plenty of people who go like a sailing vessel when there is something from the outside to send them along. I heard a man say the other day that another man was like "a chip in a pan of milk;" that is, he went only where he was pushed.

If you want to have "go" in yourselves, try to think things out for yourselves. Don't do things just because somebody else does them. Don't wear things just because somebody else wears them. Don't say things just because somebody else says them. Paul says that people who are blown about by every wind do not amount to much. I am sure of this, at least, that I should rather be a steams.h.i.+p than a sailing vessel, that only goes when a wind blows.

A FISH-STORY

A recent writer tells in one of his books of an experience he had as a boy when he went on a fis.h.i.+ng-trip with his father.

They were wading along in brooks with their rubber-boots on. But sometimes the water was too deep for him, and he was in danger of getting his feet wet by the water running in over the tops of his boots.

When, however, they came to places like these, his father would take him pig-a-back and carry him along, and then the boy would fish with his rod resting on his father's shoulder, and his line dangling in front. And this writer says that he used to catch many fish in this way. Then he adds, "How many of our best catches in life are made over someone's else shoulder?"

I think that fathers and mothers are always allowing their children to fish over their shoulders, don't you? When they send you to school to get an education, so that in later life you may enjoy good books, you are catching fish over their shoulders. When they give you money to travel, so that you may know what a big, beautiful place the world is, you are fis.h.i.+ng over their shoulders. When they give you beautiful homes, so that you shall have good friends and grow up thoughtful, well-mannered men and women, you are fis.h.i.+ng over their shoulders.

In fact, it seems to me that we should not catch many fish at all if it were not for our loving, painstaking, unselfish parents.

And don't you think we ought to be obedient and thoughtful of them when they carry us along so uncomplainingly and rejoice in seeing us take in such beautiful catches from life?

OPPORTUNITY

Have you ever heard of a picture that was called "Opportunity?" It represents a person with a great deal of hair on her forehead, but none on the back of her head. The meaning of the picture is this: When you catch an opportunity as it _comes_, it is easy to hold; but once you let it get by you, it is very difficult to catch it again. It is something like trying to catch a train that has just pulled out of the station.

I used to live near a boy in Canada who did not like to go to school, and when the snow was deep and the weather was frosty he would find some excuse by which he got his mother to let him stay at home. When he grew up he found out what he had missed by not getting an education, and he tried to make it up, but he could not. He was running after the train.

He soon got discouraged and gave up, and tried to get his living in some other way than by hard work. The last I heard of him he had just been arrested for stealing.

I have known other boys and girls who thought of joining the Church, but they just kept putting it off and putting it off, thinking that any time would do well enough. And then, as they got older, they felt that they weren't good enough, or that some of their friends might not approve, and so they have grown up and have not yet joined, and each year it keeps growing harder.

The two opportunities that you boys and girls ought to take "by the forelock," as we say, are, first: in getting all the schooling you can while you have the chance. You will never have such a good opportunity again, and if you let it slip you may never, never catch up. And second: in making as fine a start as you can in your Christian life by learning all you can about the Bible and by getting Christ's example into your hearts.