' H. Bonner, Ssrmons and Lectures, 208.
EPHESIANS V. i6 255
man's past — its evil and its good ; what he has done and what he has left undone — lives in the man to-day. If he has lived an evil or thoughtless life, he may, indeed, amend his ways and live a pure and noble life ; but time lost is still time lost to him for ever. There are signs in St. Paul's Epistles that he was occasionally haunted by the shadow of his own past, but still he does not attempt to recall that which is irrevocable ; rather, he turns his back deliberately upon it, looks away to the present and the future which are still within his power, and says, " Forgetting those things which are behind, I reach forward."
^ Our life is not like a placid stream on which, by steadfast endeavour, we may pull back against the tide. It is, rather, like a torrent which, rising on the mountains of Eternity, plunges, the instant it has passed us, into an unfathomable abyss. Our most strenuous effort only maintains us on the edge of the fall ; the stream is for ever sliding from under us ; and at last we too shall be swept over and be no more seen. Whatever chances we had yesterday, last week, last year, of showing kindness or doing good, of fitting ourselves whether for earth or for heaven, are past for ever. All these opportunities are gone by. No sighs, no tears, no prodigal vows of amendment, will bring one of them back. We might have redeemed them ; but now they are captives for ever ; or, rather, they are martyrs, and have perished in their captivity. Henceforth there is no redemption for them}
^ Have you ever seen those marble statues in some public square or garden which are so fashioned into a perennial fountain that through the lips, or through the hands, the clear water flows in a perpetual stream, on and on for evec ; and the marble stands there, passionless, cold, making no effort to arrest the gliding water ? It is so that time flows through the hands of men, swift, never pausing till it has run itself out; and there is the man, petrified into a marble sleep, not feeling what it is that is passing away for ever.^
Listen to the watermill, all the livelong day;
How the creaking of the wheel wears the hours away.
Languidly the water glides, useless on and still;
Never coming back again to that watermill.
And the proverb haunts my mind, like a spell that's cast —
The mill will never grind with the water that has passed.
^ S. Cox, Expositions, i. 9.
' James Brown, Sermons with Memoir, 150.
256 THE PURCHASE OF OPPORTUNITY
Take the lesson to yourselves, loving hearts and true ; Golden years are fleetmg by, youth is fleeting too. Try to make the most of life, lose no honest way ; Time will never bring again chances passed away. Leave no tender word unsaid, love while life shall last — The mill will never grind with the water that has passed.
Work while yet the daylight shines, man of strength and will; Never does the streamlet glide useless by the mill. Wait not till to-morrow's sun beams upon your way, All that you can call your own lies in this, To-day. . Power, intellect, and strength, may not, cannot last — The mill will never grind with the water that has passed.
Oh ! the wasted hours of life that have drifted by — Oh ! the good we might have done, lost without a sigh, Love that we might once have saved with but a single word, Thoughts conceived, but never penned, perishing unheard. Take this lesson to your heart, take, oh ! hold it fast — - The mill will never grind with the water that has passed.^
3. We can all buy up for profitable uses what remains to us of time.
(1) The words of the Apostle have a meaning for our ordinary everyday work. Buy up your opportunities. Be diligent in business. Lay yourself to your work with your full mind and strength. There is no opposition between a godly life and the energetic and successful handling of business. A Christian man need not be a dreamer ; he may be as wide-awake, as quick on the spot when there is a chance for him as the man who is not a Christian. " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might."
^ Of Darwin we read : " One characteristic was his respect for time ; he never forgot how precious it was. He never wasted a few spare minutes from thinking that it was not worth while to set to work." His golden rule was " taking care of the minutes." In one of his letters occurs this passage : " A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life." ^
^ On his way to Marengo, Napoleon stopped at the door of a barber's shop, and asked his former hostess if she remembered a young officer named Bonaparte once quartered in her family.
1 S. Doudney. ' ^W.L. Watkinson, The Mitcatim of the Heart, 229.
EPHESIANS V. i6 257