' W. L. Watkinson, T?ie Gates of Dawn, 243.
ST. LUKE xn. 15 26^
to avarice. His only daughter died next door to him, and when the water came through the roof and fell upon the bed, I suggested to him to mend the roof : and he said, " Na ! Na ! many a woman as good as her has had to come on the parish." Her funeral day came, and he and I were next to the hearse. Just when the little procession was about to start he cried out, " Bide a wee," and went into the house where the coffin had been lifted. I followed him, thinking he might be ill, but I found him drawing with both hands the fragments of the funeral bread into a heap which he carefully locked in a chest. Poor old man, his own time came soon after, and I did my poor best to comfort and prepare him. Within a few minutes of the end, he was earnestly trying to speak, and I bent over him to hear his last words. I thought he would be saying something that showed he was softened. What he did say was : " Tell them to buy the murnin's
in Dumfries ; it's a hantle cheaper than at K 's " (the village
shop).^
Oh what is earth, that we should build Our houses here, and seek concealed Poor treasure, and add field to field, And heap to heap and store to store, Still grasping more and seeking more, While step by step Death nears the door?*
IL
What Tkue Life Consists in.
1. It is plain that true life does not exclude the physical There is a physical existence worth all your possessions. At least, so men have said. " Skin upon skin ; yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life." Life is worth having at its lowest point. Life is worth living, if only as a stepping-stone to greater knowledge, and infinite riches, and eternal happiness. But no possessions can keep a man alive. Death knocks at the door of the castle and palace as well as at the poor man's cottage or the beggar's hut.
II Some of the incidents of Wesley's childhood must have deeply coloured his religion. One is the historic fire which
* Prof. A. H. Charteris, in Life by Hon. A. Gordon, 70. ' Christina G. Rossetti, Poems, 197.
264 A MAN'S TRUE LIFE
consumed Epworth rectory in 1709, when Wesley was not yet six years old. On the midnight of August 24, 1709, it was dis- covered to be in flames. The rest of the household made a hurried and scorched escape, but John, in the alarm and hurry, was forgotten. The little fellow awoke to find the room so full of Light that he thought it was day ; he sprang from the bed and ran to the door, but it was already a dreadful tapestry of dancing flames. The strong wind, blowing through the open door, had turned the staircase into a tunnel of flame ; the father found it would be death to climb it. He fell on his knees in the hall, and cried aloud to God for the child that seemed shut up in a prison of flame. Mrs. Wesley herself, who was ill, had — to use her own phrase — " waded through the fire," and reached the street, with scorched hands and face ; as she turned to look back at the house the face of her little son could be seen at the window. He was still in the burning house ! There was no ladder ; his escape seemed impossible. One man, with more resource than the rest of the crowd, ran in beneath the window, and bade another climb upon his shoulders. The boy was reached and, just as he was drawn through the window, he heard the crash of the falling roof behind him. " Come, neighbours," cried the father, when his child was brought to him, " let us kneel down ! Let us give thanks to God ! He has given me all my eight children. Let the house go. I am rich enough." ^
2. But life is more than physical existence, more than the pleasures of sense. It is character — what a man, when stripped of his possessions, is before God. The life spoken of here is intensive, not expansive. Measured by what we are, and not by what we have, is Christ's rule. You may find a shrivelled soul in the midst of a great fortune, and a noble soul in the barest poverty. Life before possessions !
In vain do men The heavens of their fortune's fault accuse, Sith they know best what is the best for them; For they to each such fortune do diffuse. As they do know each can most aptly use : For not that which men covet most is best. Nor that thing worst which men do most refuse, But fittest is that all contented rest With that they hold ; each hath his fortune in hia breast,
1 W. H. Fitchett, fVesley and his Century, 32.
ST. LUKE XII. 15 265
It is the mind that maketh good or ill, That maketh wretch or happy, rich or poor; For some, that hath abundance at his will, Hath not enough, but wants in greatest store; And other, that hath little, asks no more, But in that little is both rich and wise ; For wisdom is most riches ; fools therefore They are which fortunes do by vows devise, Sith each unto himself his life may fortunize.^