A shoe-maker being asked how he contrived to give so much, replied that it was easily done by obeying St. Paul's precept in I Cor. 16: 2: "Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him." "I earn," said he, "one day with another, about a dollar a day, and I can without inconvenience to myself or family lay by five cents of this sum for charitable purposes; the amount is thirty cents a week. My wife takes in sewing and washing, and earns something like two dollars a week, and she lays by ten cents of that. My children each of them earn a shilling or two, and are glad to contribute their penny; so that altogether we lay by us in store forty cents a week. And if we have been unusually prospered, we contribute something more. The weekly amount is deposited every Sunday morning in a box kept for that purpose, and reserved for future use. Thus, by these small earnings, we have learned that it is more blessed to give than to receive. The yearly amount saved in this way is about twenty-five dollars; and I distribute this among the various benevolent societies, according to the best of my judgment."
The History And Business Successes Of Liberal Givers.
Mr. Nathaniel R. Cobb, a merchant connected with the Baptist church in Boston, in 1821, at the age of twenty-three, drew up and subscribed the following covenant, to which he faithfully adhered till on his death-bed he praised God that by acting according to it he had given in charity more than $40,000.
"By the grace of God, I will never be worth more than $50,000.
"By the grace of God, I will give one fourth of the net profits of my business to charitable and religious uses.
"If I am ever worth $20,000, I will give one-half of my net profits; and if I am ever worth $30,000, I will give three-fourths; and the whole, after $50,000. So help me God, or give to a more faithful steward, and set me aside.
"N.R. COBB."
Faith In God's Liberality.
A clergyman, himself an exponent of God's bountiful dealings with men, was called upon in test of his own principles of giving to the Lord.
Preaching, in the morning, a sermon on Foreign Missions, an unusually large contribution was taken up. In the afternoon, he listened to another sermon, by a brother, on Home Missions, and the subject became so important that he was led closely to agitate the question how much he should himself give to the cause. "I was, indeed, in a great strait between charity and necessity. I felt desirous to contribute; but, there I was, on a journey, and I had given so much in the morning that I really feared I had no more money than would bear my expenses.