A. L. O. E.

“ Dora’s selfishness was marring her offering, [73] as Agnes’s pride had blemished hers. How difficult it is even in the most innocent pleasure, even in the most holy occupation, to keep away every stain of sin! Ever since the sad time when evil entered the beautiful garden of Eden, and Adam and Eve ate of the fruit which God had forbidden them to taste, pride, selfishness, and unholiness have been natural to the human heart. Even when we most earnestly try to do what we think good works, how much we need to be on our guard lest sin creep in to spoil all! ”

“ Half a dozen times was the poor girl on the point of laying her head on her aunt’s knee, and sobbing forth a full confession to relieve her burdened heart. But to own repeated falsehood and long deceit to one herself so truthful, to lose the good opinion of one whose regard she so greatly valued, oh! Dora could not muster up courage sufficient for this! ”

“ We have no power to remove one spot from our souls;” the eyes of Miss Clare chanced to rest, as she spoke, on the embroidery, stained and destroyed; “but there is the Lord’s promise to comfort the broken and contrite heart, ‘Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow—though they be red as crimson, they shall be as wool.’”
Dora and her aunt knelt down together and together prayed, but in silence. When Dora rose from her knees, though [259] she was still very sad and subdued, there was a peace in her heart, a sense of sin forgiven, which she had not experienced for months. ”

“ Temple guessed what it cost Agnes to bear a rough joke in silence, to lend pretty things which she feared that the borrower might spoil, to give up her own way, and to show no jealous anger when another was preferred before her.
“My girl’s character is becoming [197] stronger and nobler every day,” thought Mrs. Temple; “I thank the Lord for my Agnes, for I am sure that it is His grace that is working in her heart. Agnes promises to grow up into a really valuable woman, one whom her mother can trust.”
Mrs. Temple could not have said as much for her dearly loved Dora. ”

“ The proposal set Dora, Amy, and Elsie laughing, and a smile rose even to the lips of Agnes. She saw that Lucius was anxious to make up for his folly; but the big school-desk would have been a poor exchange for her own, which was neat and [13] had red velvet lining; while hers, being scarcely larger than a work-box, would have been of little service to Lucius at school.
“O no! I’ll keep my own desk; the carving does not look so very bad, after all,” murmured Agnes, who had an affectionate heart, though by no means a perfect temper. ”

“ It was the work which had been given to her, and she would do it, without asking herself whether she liked it or not.
“This material, neither smooth nor pretty, is something like a type of me,” thought Agnes, as she put the finishing stitch into one of her mohair curtains; [196] “but the goats’-hair had just as much its appointed place in the Tabernacle as loops of silver and sockets of gold. I shall never be as much liked and admired as Dora is—I may as well make up my mind to that; but if God help me by His grace, I too may lead a useful life, and be dear—at least to my mother.” ”

“ Such thoughts had only the effect of making the poor girl’s temper more cross, and her manner more peevish; it is so hard for the face to look bright and sweet when gloom is within the heart.
But better thoughts were in the mind of Agnes on that Sunday night, as she sat [169] silently brushing her hair. Sweet and comforting was the reflection that she was not left to fight her battle alone, that there was One who would not only hear her prayer, but who would Himself pray for His feeble child—who would both watch her struggle against sin, and give her strength in that struggle. ”

“ Amy has never been known to quarrel or utter an angry word, and is always ready to give help to any one who needs it. It is no wonder that [64] so gentle a girl is beloved. But Amy knows herself to be by no means faultless, and is much, on her guard against the silly vanity which a mother’s watchful eye has found out to be lurking in the mind of her dear little girl.
Elsie is a merry blue-eyed child, full of life and intelligence, forward—rather too forward for her age. ”

“ Conscience could be silenced no longer; the second sin into which Dora had been drawn by her fear showed her in a strong light the nature of the first, into which she had been drawn by her love of amusement. If she had not been doing what was wrong, she would not have been afraid lest her occupation should be found out by her tender, indulgent mother. ”

“ Why should pride make you refuse to own that there are some things in which a younger sister may excel you?”
Agnes hesitated, and glanced at her mother. The girl’s brow was a little clouded still, and yet there were signs that her pride was giving way.
“I leave the decision to your own good sense and feeling, my love,” said Mrs. Temple. “Judge yourself whether, if your desire be to make a really beautiful [47] model worthy of the good object to which we devote it, it would be better to place the embroidery part in Dora’s hands or your own.” ”

“ But knowing how to make money is quite a different thing from knowing how to enjoy it. With all his ill-gotten gains, Chang Wang was a miserable man, for he had no heart to spend his silver pieces, even on his own comfort. The rich dealer lived in a hut which one of his own laborers might have despised; he dressed as a poor Tartar shepherd might have dressed when [305] driving his flock. Chang Wang grudged himself even a hat to keep off the rays of the sun. Men laughed, and said that he would have cut off his own pigtail of plaited hair, if he could have sold it for the price of a dinner! ”

“ THE HOLY PLACE AND THE MOST HOLY PLACE.
Children’s Tabernacle.
p. 56.
“Ah, my child, none of us would have dared to have lifted that Veil or to have placed a foot within the Holy of holies!” exclaimed Mrs. Temple. “No mortal was ever suffered to enter that place, most sacred of all, except the High Priest, and that but on one day of the year—the Day of Atonement. Aaron himself, the first High Priest, with trembling awe must have lifted the Veil, and approached the Mercy-seat over which the cherubims spread their wings of gold!” ”

“ I remember the story of the poor leper who came to the Lord Jesus,” said Elsie, “and how he cried, ‘Lord if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean!’”
“How much more deeply interesting is the Saviour’s reply, ‘I will, be thou clean,’ if we look upon leprosy as a type of sin,” observed Mrs. Temple. “The Lord was able and willing to heal, not the poor man’s body alone, but also his soul; and make him free from all stain of sin as well as from all taint of disease.” ”

“ Worn, weary mothers, at their sewing or washing, paused, needle in hand, or with arms whitened with soap-suds, to hear of the golden pillars, and silver loops, and above all of the splendid embroidery that adorned the inner part of the model, that part which, as Miss Clare had told them, was called the Holy of holies. ”

“ The Tabernacle was in itself a holy thing, made so by the special appointment and presence of the Lord. I would wish the making of its model to be a kind of holy employment, one never to be marred by jealousy and pride. The profits of your labor, if [45] there be any, you mean to devote to helping the poor; therefore I hope that we may consider the work as an offering to the Lord—a very small offering, it is true, but still one which He may deign to accept, if it be made in a lowly, loving spirit; but if selfish, worldly feelings creep in, then good works themselves become evil. ”

“ This time it was the voice of Lucius at the door.
“No, no, I’ll not be late; I’ll be down in ten minutes!” cried Dora, digging her scissors vigorously into the cork. The clatter of Lucius’s boots showed that he had followed little Elsie.
“Oh, this cork, this tiresome cork!” [246] exclaimed Dora; “there, it’s out at last;” and setting the opened bottle on the table, she turned round in a great flurry to get from her box the skein of silk which was to be changed from white to scarlet.
“More haste, less speed.” Dora was not the first who has proved the truth of that proverb. ”

“ If you remember the readiness with which, as we know, the Israelites brought their precious things for the Tabernacle, and if you can realize the eager pleasure with which, after the long idleness which had ended in grievous sin, men and women set to work, you will feel that the order to make a beautiful place for worship must have been the opening of a spring of new delight to the children of Israel. ”

“ There is, perhaps, no more dangerous error than to think that the end justifies the means—that it is lawful to a Christian to do evil that good may come. Oh, dear young reader! if you ever find yourself trying to quiet conscience by the thought that to do a great good you may do a little harm, start back [98] as if you caught sight of the tail of a snake in your path! Yes, for the serpent who deceived Eve is trying to deceive you also. If Dora had been honest and candid with herself, she would have seen, as her fingers busily plied the needle, that she was really working for her own pleasure ”

“ We need no scape-goat now, for when Christ went forth to die, He carried away with Him the burden of the guilt of all His people.”
“But then, mother, is every one’s sin taken away, is every one sure to enter [110] heaven, the real Holy of holies?” asked Lucius. The question was a very important one, and poor Dora’s heart beat fast as she listened to hear what answer her parent would give to the boy.
“No, my son,” replied Mrs. Temple, “for not every one has true faith in the Lord and His Sacrifice, that faith which makes us repent of sin, be sorry for sin, confess it and try to forsake it. ”

“ The sacrifice of our pride and self-will is more pleasing to our Maker than the most costly gifts can be. It is worthy of notice that it was not the outer covering of the Tabernacle, that part which would be seen from every quarter [48] of Israel’s camp, that was most beauteous and precious. The richest curtains were those seen far less often, those that had the lowest place in the building. So our Maker cares far more for what is within than for what is without, and there is no ornament so fair in His eyes as that of a meek and quiet spirit. ”

“ Now, my children, if we compare small things to great things, cannot you of yourselves find out of what this Holy of holies was a picture or a type?”
“A type of heaven!” exclaimed several voices at once; but Amy looked distressed, and murmured softly, “I hope not a type of heaven.”
“And why not?” asked Lucius, quickly.
“Because no one was ever allowed to [85] go into the Holy of holies save one man, and he only once in the year,” replied Amy, sadly. ”

“ I don’t like reading, I’ve enough and too much of that at school; you won’t let me go out, lest the damp should bring back my coughing and whooping—I’ve had enough and too much of that also; I’ve only the girls to play with, for none of my own friends must come near the house because of this tiresome infection; and I shall be taking to cutting my own fingers off some day for want of something better to do!”
“It’s a case of idleness being the mother of mischief,” cried the bright-eyed Dora, who was busy embroidering with many-colored silks an apron for little Elsie’s doll. ”

“ A fault once committed, no human being has power to undo; but while looking to the Lord alone for forgiveness, we are bound to prove the sincerity of our regret for a fault by making what amends lie in our power. Dora took the easier, but far more dangerous [180] way, of trying to forget the fault altogether, or to make up for it by what she considered to be her zeal in charity work. She certainly sewed very diligently on that dull morning, scarcely lifting her eyes from the pattern which she had neatly traced on the linen. ”

“ This idea of self-inflicted [171] punishment was merely Dora’s contrivance for quieting conscience, that conscience which had been very uneasy during the conversation on the subject of leprosy, the terrible type of sin. But Dora was trying, and with tolerable success, to banish from her mind all thought of that conversation. It was far more pleasant to think of the pattern of the Tabernacle curtains than of the holy things of which that Tabernacle should remind us.
A great many persons—even grown-up persons—act, alas! like Dora. ”

“ It was a satisfaction to the conscience of Dora that she had repeated a prayer, and she never stopped to ask herself whether that prayer were not in itself a sin.
Dora with needle and scissors set first to her work of unpicking. But every one who has tried such an occupation must [179] know it to be one of the most tedious and disagreeable of tasks. It was doubly so to Dora, because she greatly admired the embroidery work which she was thus beginning to spoil. ”

“ If it’s an ill wind that does nobody good, it must be an ill child that does good to no one.”
Merrily and heartily Harry and Nina set about their labor of kindness. And cheerfully, as the children tripped along with their burdens to the poor woman’s cottage, Nina repeated her old nurse’s proverb, “’Tis an ill wind that blows nobody good.” ”

“ Lucius was puzzled to explain his own meaning, which was perhaps not very clear to himself, so his mother came to his help.
“Elsie’s very minute photograph is not a bad illustration of what Bible types are,” remarked Mrs. Temple. “They look small, and might almost escape notice, until the eye of faith sees them in the clear light of God’s Word, and then what seemed little more than a speck, [91] may be found to be a likeness of something grander far than a royal palace.”
“It would be interesting to find out some other Bible types,” observed Agnes. ”

“ We have God’s sure Word to guide us in our wanderings through the [162] desert of life, and we have beyond that desert a far brighter land than Canaan, even heaven, promised and purchased by Him who prepares good things for those who love Him; and we have One far greater than Moses—One who ever liveth to plead for us at the right hand of God while we fight our battles against sin. Moses was a being of flesh and blood as we are; his arms grew tired, he needed to have them held up by Aaron and Hur; but the Lord Jesus in praying for His people never grows weary, and His love never grows cold. ”

“ Then, as well as she could through her tears and her sobs, Dora relieved herself of the burden of concealment which had [254] become at last intolerable. She told everything to her aunt—the first fault, the breaking of the fourth commandment; then the falsehood, the deceit which had followed, for when did an unrepented sin ever stand alone! Dora concluded by passionately exclaiming, “You cannot, you must not, give me the brooch—Agnes has deserved it much better; she has been conquering her temper and doing all that she can to please mamma, while I have been only a hypocrite! ”

“ It was pleasanter to Dora to examine the little model before her, and to admire and praise her mother’s skill, than to think of what was inscribed on the mitre worn by Aaron and his successors. It is the sad, sad effect of sin concealed in the heart, that it keeps those who indulge it from daring even to wish to be holy.
The Tabernacle was now carefully taken down, piece by piece, to be packed in a box, ready to be carried along with the [214] rest of their luggage when the family should quit their home for awhile. ”

“ Bible, but from what we see in the world around us, and that thing is that sin and suffering are bound together, we cannot separate them; suffering is the shadow of sin and must follow it; THE WAGES OF SIN IS DEATH (Rom. vi. 23) .
“But you have taught us that God is love,” said Lucius, thoughtfully.
“Surely God is love,” replied Mrs. Temple; “God loves man, but God hates sin, which is the greatest enemy of man. It is God’s merciful will that man should be saved both from sin here, and from its most terrible punishment hereafter.”
“The Holy of holies is a difficulty to me,” observed Lucius ”

“ First there is the man possessing all that earth can give him, but afflicted with a deadly disease.”
“Like the people who were bitten by the fiery serpents,” interrupted Lucius. [154]
“Here in the leprous Naaman we behold a type or picture of a soul with unforgiven sin staining and corrupting it,” said his mother. “Next we find the leper at the door of the prophet. Can any one of you tell me of what Naaman now is a type?”
“A seeking soul,” replied Agnes, after a little pause for reflection. ”