“Well, yes, I likes to see folks, ’cause my Fader up dar made ’em all; but it’s most fo’ de sunshine dat I stays out here. O, God’s sunshine’s a powerful blessin’, dear. When I’s cold I comes out and sits in it, and I grows warm; when I’s hungry, and Jim’s wife’s got nothin’ to eat, I comes out here and ’pears like I’d had my dinner; when I’s in pain, and ’scruciated all over wid de rheumatiz, I comes out into the sunshine, and de pain skulks off; when Jim don’t be good and ’pears like he was goin’ to ’struction, and my heart is bustin’ like, I comes out and sits in God’s sunshine, and peace comes through His beam into my soul; when old Death comes an’ star’s in my face, and say, ‘I comin’ arter ye soon, to take ye into de dark grave,’ den I comes out into God’s sunshine, and dares him to frighten my soul! Says I to him, ‘Ye hasn’t power in ye to throw one shadow on to my pillow; for my blessed Jesus, de Sun of Righteousness, He been down dar before me, and He left it full, heaped up and runnin’ over wid God’s sunshine. I shall rest sweet in dat warm place, for de eternal sunshine dat shall magnify and glorify all as loves de shinin’ Jesus.”
“Auntie,” said her friend, who always felt that she could sit at the feet of this humble saint and learn of Jesus, “that is very lovely. But there come days when there is no sunshine—when the clouds gather, and the rains fall, and the snows come, and the winds blow. What do you do then?”
“O la, honey, by de time de storms come, I’ve got my soul so full ob sunshine dat it lasts a heap o’ time. Dem times Jim scolds, and his poor wife’s ’scouraged, and de child’n are cross, and de stove smokes and de kittle won’t bile; but I never knows it. God’s sunshine is in my soul, and I tries to spread it round, and sometimes Jim’s wife feels it, and she says—oh, she’s a good daughter-in-law—‘Long’s I keeps close to granny, ’pears like my heart’s held up.’
“Well, well, dear, you can teach me somethin’, and ye can fetch me nice things to make mo’ sunshine; but I can teach you what ye never thought on—dat God’s sunshine’s ’nough for rich and poor, and dem dat thank Him for it, and sit in it, or work in it, and let it into dar heart, will soon go whar it’s all sunshine. Try to make folks live in God’s sunshine, and get it into dar hearts, honey.”—Intelligencer.
RECEIPTS
FOR FEBRUARY, 1878.
| MAINE, $491.13. | |
| Andover. Cong. Ch. and Soc. | 5.00 |
| Augusta. So. Cong. Ch. and Soc. | 31.50 |
| Bethel. A few Ladies of First Cong. Ch. | 11.00 |
| Blanchard. Daniel Blanchard | 5.00 |
| Dennysville. Mrs. Samuel Eastman | 5.00 |
| Gilead. Rev. H. R. | 0.50 |
| Holden. “A Friend” | 1.00 |
| Orland. Mrs. Buck and daughter | 30.00 |
| Portland. State St. Cong. Ch. $302.13;Second Cong. Ch. and Soc $40; Seamen’sBethel Church $15; Mrs. David Patten $5. | 362.13 |
| Salem. A. P. | 0.50 |
| Searsport. J. Y. B. | 1.00 |
| Weld. D. D. Tappan | 2.00 |
| Wells. First Cong. Ch. ($30 of which fromMrs. B. A. Maxwell to const. Mrs. W. S.Kimball, L. M.) | 36.00 |
| Winthrop. Mrs. E. S. B. | 0.50 |