"MY GOD SHALL SUPPLY ALL YOUR NEED."
The Wesleyan Superintendent Minister was planned to preach one week-night near Berry Brow, and on some account he could not attend. A substitute had to be found, and Abe was waited on during the day, to see if he would act in that capacity. "I'll try," he said, and accordingly when the time came he set out for the chapel. Some of the congregation knew who was to preach, others did not. At length the door opened, and in walked Abe, and made straight for the pulpit, clamp, clamp, with his wooden clogs on the floor and up the pulpit stairs. He began the service with the usual smile on his face; then he announced his text, "My God shall supply all your need," and closed the Bible as he always did as soon as the text was read. "Naa," said he, "I knaw some o' yo are disappointed at seeing me here instead of your praacher, but it was oather me or nobody. Naa, if th' travelling praacher had come to-noight, he moight easily ha' praached a much better sermon than I can, but I'll defy him or onybody else to foind a grander text than this; it's a raight un, and it's your own fault if you doan't get some good aat on't: if the Lord had thought you needed it, He would have sent you somebody better than me, for He will supply all your need." The congregation saw at once the condition they would have been in if Abe had not come to their help. They smiled at his remarks, and from that moment forgot their disappointment, nor did they think of it again during all that service. Thus Abe's tact in managing people helped him happily through this difficulty, as it had through many others in his lifetime.
CHAPTER XIV.
Abe's Titles and Troubles.
It is time we said something on this subject, as we are come to the stage in his life when he began to be known by various dignified ecclesiastical titles. He loved his own plain name, Abe Lockwood, better than any other, and therefore wanted no improvement. That was the name in the roll of the Church, and that was the name written in the Lamb's book of life; he wanted no other. If any one addressed him as Mr. Lockwood he would often break in, "They call me Abe Lockwood!" and this was no pretended humility on his part, but the expression of a sincere preference for the name by which he had always been known among his friends: but the time came when it was impossible for him to resist the universal custom of saluting him by some title, so he had to yield to the inevitable.
A story is told, how that on one occasion a parcel of clothes came to the house for his wife and children. It was wrapped in strong brown paper, and on the address-label was written "Abraham Lockwood, Esq." Soon after this, he was taking part in a public meeting in the place from which the present was supposed to have come, and in his speech he thanked the unknown donor; and having done this, he proceeded to correct a mistake which, he said, had occurred; the person who sent him that parcel had addressed him as Esquire. "Naa," said he, "I doan't stand much upon titles, but if I am to have ony, I think I ought to have what falls to me by my birth. Yo' know, I'm a Prince of th' Royal Family, I'm a King's Son, my Father is th' King of Glory, and no man can say that, unless he is born of God, and I am, Hallelujah!" Although there may not be anything original in this, yet the happy way in which he worked it into his speech, and the use he made of it to show the necessity of the new birth, was exceedingly pleasing.
The title of "Bishop," or "Bishop of Berry Brow," was one of those by which he became familiarly known. This arose out of the position he held in the society there, almost like that of father among the members, and also from the amount of preaching he did all over the Circuit. Although this very reverend title brought him no increase to his stipend, nor any change in his social standing, it helped to show the general feeling with which he was everywhere regarded.
But the designation by which he was most familiarly known was "LITTLE ABE." This came into every-day use, and was unconsciously adopted by almost every person either in speaking to him, or speaking of him. Even the little children in the streets and in the Sunday Schools, hearing it from their elders, insensibly fell into the habit of styling him "Little Abe."
As this title is somewhat expressive of size, it may be well to convey some idea of