but be very sure of this, no one will be wounded or slain by my hands.”

66

But," said the mother, secretly rejoiced, but more than half frightened, "you should try to beat the enemy; your country demands it.”

He smiled at her.

"I cannot believe that my country would be any the gainer for my having committed a murder," said he. "I love my countrymen, but I do not hate my enemies. How can I, when I am the servant of Christ, who has taught me the blessedness of peace? I must go into this horrible battle, but I am sure that the old command, 'Thou shalt not kill,' will sound louder in my ears than any general's orders."

Only a day or two afterwards Paul held his mother to his heart and kissed her for the last time.

"Oh, my boy, my boy!" she said brokenly; "why should this cruel strife rob me of you? What would be the good of victory to me if my son should be killed? Paul, do you know that you may be slain upon that terrible battle-field?"

He looked down at her with his steadfast, undimmed eyes.

“I am not afraid to die, my mother. If my country wants my life she can have it; but if they come to you after the battle with news that I am among the dead, you may know that I have no man's blood upon my soul, but that God has in mercy taken me out of the strife into His peace. If it were not for you, mother, I should be glad to think that it would be soon; for indeed”—and here the brave young voice faltered-"I do not know how I shall bear the sights of suffering and death."

And so this boy went away to the war.

It was noticed that before he was engaged he was able to render assistance to the wounded, and that he was among the most active in the burial of the dead.

He was never heard to complain, although he must have been as hungry as the rest, and although he slept for several nights upon the wet ground, with the rain pouring upon him, after enduring the toilsome and fatiguing march which must have told upon a frame never robust and strong.

and sends it, and we are so dispieased that we fret and fume, and worry ourselves into a fever of impatience, then we are not waiting really.

It is wonderful what different ways there are of doing this same thing. If we happen to be spending a morning at a railway-station, we see how persons are affected by it. One has an hour to wait for a train, and he saunters up and down the platform or lounges on a seat in the waitingroom with a most placid and contented smile upon his face. Another has to wait half an hour, and he goes off into a passion, scolds the officials, makes himself disagreeable to his companions in tribulation, threatens to write to the papers, and is altogether anything but patient.

But there are more painful things than this kind of waiting. Do we not know what it is to have striven and watched, have risen early and worked late, and then have had to wait for success? Patience then, is a very necessary virtue. It is not easy to be content to wait when we expected the blessing earlier. But it is often good to wait even for this.

It is a painful thing to wait on a sick bed. To suffer pain and weariness and hope deferred, while the long hours pass by and the faint heart grows fainter still. But we see some waiting thus in patient confidence and trust, not passionate, nor eager, not anxious or impatient, but, not knowing whether life or death is before them, lying still and simply waiting. Oh, it is surely not of themselves. that the restless spirit is curbed, the eager heart still. And it should comfort us to know that God does not make His children wait without giving them the necessary power.

There is another waiting still. It is when heart and flesh have failed, when the pulse is low, and the eyes are dim, when hope dies, at least with reference to this life, and there is nothing to do but be quiet and listen for the sound of the wings of the dark angel. And yet how many are thus waiting now! Earth is receding, though heaven does not yet loom in sight. They have spoken their farewell to their friends who have walked with them hitherto, though the angel's greeting has not yet reached them. Day and night, in isolation and silence, they wait for the summons. But it shall come soon. They know that. And they shall arise and have what they have hoped for

and reach the home where there will be no longer need of patience.

Let us be content to wait. God help us not to be impatient and hasty; but may we be quiet and resigned, even when the time is long! For He will not mock our patience. His blessings are worth waiting for.

The Necessity of War.

We have heard a great deal about "the sad necessity of war." But are the words really truthful and well chosen? It is sad beyond all possibility of doubt or power of expression; but are we quite assured that it is also a necessity? Our hearts have been horrified by terrible stories of wholesale bloodshed and murder; but was it obliged to be? Has the fight been a sacred one? and are the slain only a host of martyrs? Was it impossible either to prevent it or to do without it? Was it in very truth necessary to the world or even to a single nation?

One man Very well,

If there

It may be ignorance of matters too profound for any but wiser minds, but we cannot ourselves see where the need was, nor what adequate good there is to result from it. And this we feel with regard to all wars. A misunderstanding arises between two or three men, who happen to be placed in high and responsible positions. insults another, and angry passions are aroused. let them settle their quarrel between themselves. must be fighting, if boasted civilisation and even Christianity can find no other way, let those who have quarrelled fight it out. The young men cultivating their farms and courting the lasses whom they hope to make their wives, have not quarrelled; why should they be called out to strew other fields with their dead bodies? The middleaged men, doing their duty as fathers of families, spending their time and brains in inventions of machinery and other aids to progress, do not hate the men of other lands; why should they leave their homes to kill and slay those with whom they have not so much as a quarrel? And the

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lages have been burnt, and bodies buried by thousands, what is there but heart-sickness and grief as relics of this most unholy and absurd war?

Let us talk no more about the "sad necessity." It is idle to speak thus at such times as these. Are not the people greater than kings and stronger than governments? If they say, "We will not fight," who is to make them? Let them obey all righteous laws right loyally; but when God says, "Thou shalt not kill," shall they obey man, who bids them take mitrailleuses and chassepots that they may do the more murder?

War is a terribly guilty thing; and though almost always a few persons are the most to blame, yet there are very many others who are not guiltless. Those who, either by spoken orations or written words, stir up the people to strife and hatred until they forget that they are brothers, and think only that they are enemies, are not guiltless. Those who fan the flame of ambition or jealousy in the breasts of monarchs are not guiltless. Those who write war songs strong with subtle passion are not guiltless. And the men themselves who, though they are men. and can be brave as heroes, yet allow themselves to be slaughtered by thousands, instead of banding together in peaceful resistance, are not guiltless.

How long is it to continue? Surely there will be better times when swords shall be beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning-hooks, for the Lord hath spoken it. But cannot we hasten it on? Cannot we at least help to make the next generation a peace-loving one?

teaching our children not to be cruel. And surely we shall soon also teach them that it must be in the sight of Jesus, the Prince of Peace, a most sinful thing to take away human life. But let us exercise a little common sense about it. Let us not talk to them of glorious victories, and say nothing of suffering and dying men. Let us not provide them with mimic swords and guns for toys, nor solicit their admiration for red coats. Let us teach them that the pomp of war is the pomp of death. If they grow up, hating wrong but loving their fellows; if they are trained to be soldiers of Him who said, "Blessed are the peace makers," we shall soon have heard the last about "the sad necessity of war."