OUR SCHOOLS AND THE YELLOW FEVER.
We have been extremely gratified with the manifestations of faith and courage on the part of our lady teachers in the South during the time of fear and panic because of the yellow fever. Some were already at their stations and in their schools, and some were on the way, subject to the trials of quarantine. Not one hesitated in the path of duty. Many teachers from the different parts of the North were ready to go when the reports of the pestilence were most alarming, but not one of the teachers who had previously been in [pg 301] the work, failed to await instructions to go forward whenever we should speak the word. We have been grateful to God during all these days of the autumn for the splendid qualities of consecration and courage which have come out of our correspondence with our honored teachers. Never did their fathers or brothers, years ago, when deadly war called them to face the perils of battle, show higher courage or a larger sense of duty. Almost all of our Southern schools are now in session, and begin with increased attendance.
SCHOOL ECHO.—A teacher writes: "One of my pupils who had been teaching during the summer came to me in despair over a sum, saying: "I can't understand sympathizing fractions."
(When we went to school years and years ago, "sympathizing fractions," meant broken candy. We understood, but the teacher didn't. Times change, and we change with them.)
THE SAMARITAN WOMAN.
BY REV. C.J. RYDER, BOSTON.
"And they marveled that he talked with the woman."
Why? She was a sinful woman. But these disciples must even thus early in Christ's ministry have learned that he had come to call sinners, not the righteous, to repentance. She was a Samaritan! That was a larger reason for their marvel. They could rise above their hatred for sin more easily than their race prejudice; so can we. The Samaritans were an inferior people. Degraded they were. They had been degraded for centuries. The Jews shunned them. Socially our Lord was making a great blunder, perhaps a fatal blunder, in talking to this Samaritan woman. His cause was in its infancy. The hand of social prejudice would surely throttle it. Why antagonize the existing order of society? How much better to utilize it for the establishment and enlargement of the great and glorious kingdom of our Lord! This cause needed the influence of Jewish leaders. Why risk this potent influence for the sake of one miserable Samaritan woman, or, for that matter, for a whole race of Samaritans? It seemed very poor management of a cause, new in that country. "Far be such unwisdom from thee, Lord," we can hear the impassioned and worldly-wise Peter exclaim. But our Lord chose to sacrifice the temporary success of his kingdom that he might be true to the eternal principles of that kingdom; and so he talked with this sinful woman of this despised race just as considerately as with Nicodemus. He invited her to his discipleship just as cordially, and to the same discipleship. There is not a hint that the Good Shepherd built another fold for the Samaritan sheep, lest some of the Jewish flock should jump over the fence, if they were put into the same fold.