God is waiting to be gracious, and is willing to make us happy in religion, if we would not run away from Him. We refuse to open the window-shutters, and complain that it is dark. We grieve the Holy Spirit by little sins, and thus lose our only support. Perhaps the secret of living a holy life is to avoid everything which will displease God and grieve the Spirit, and to be strictly attentive to the means of grace. God has promised that He will regard the man that is of a broken and contrite spirit, and trembleth at His word. He has promised that they that wait upon Him shall renew their strength. The Almighty, the immutably faithful, has made this promise. He is not a man, that He should lie, and His arm is not of flesh. Wait, then, upon the Lord. Of how much real happiness we cheat our souls by preferring a trifle to God! We have a general intention of living religion; but we intend to begin to-morrow or next year. The present moment we prefer giving to the world, ‘A little more sleep, a little more slumber.’ Well, a little more sleep, and we shall sleep in the grave. A few days, and our work will be done. And when it is once done, it is done to all eternity. A life once spent is irrevocable. It will remain to be contemplated through eternity. If it be marked with sins, the marks will be indelible. If it has been a useless life, it can never be improved. Such it will stand forever and ever. The same may be said of each day. When it is once past, it is gone forever. All the marks which we put upon it, it will exhibit forever. It will never become less true that such a day was spent in such a manner. Each day will not only be a witness of our conduct, but will affect our everlasting destiny. No day will lose its share of influence in determining where shall be our seat in heaven. How shall we then wish to see each day marked with usefulness! It will then be too late to mend its appearance. It is too late to mend the days that are past. The future is in our power. Let us, then, each morning, resolve to send the day into eternity in such a garb as we shall wish it to wear forever. And at night let us reflect that one more day is irrevocably gone, indelibly marked. Good-night.”
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Footnote 1:
The late Hon. John Bailey, member of Congress from Massachusetts.
Footnote 2:
See Appendix A.
Footnote 3:
The natural tenderness of the sister from whom some of these reminiscences have been derived, has cast a mantle of charity over this episode in Mr. Judson’s life. There is reason to believe that his course was more wayward than is here indicated.
An English gentleman who, many years after, was his fellow-prisoner in Ava, writes as follows: “I will give the story as I heard it from the actor’s own mouth, and as nearly as I can recollect them, in his words: ‘In my early days of wildness I joined a band of strolling players. We lived a reckless, vagabond life, finding lodgings where we could, and bilking the landlord where we found opportunity—in other words, running up a score, and then decamping without paying the reckoning. Before leaving America, when the enormity of this vicious course rested with a depressing weight on my mind, I made a second tour over the same ground, carefully making amends to all whom I had injured.’”
This, though rather a coarse statement of the case, seems to the author in the main truthful. The author does not wish to gloze over this episode in Mr. Judson’s life. Such a wrong course, succeeded by thorough repentance and reparation, he thinks quite characteristic of Mr. Judson’s positive nature.