A correspondent who deplores the increasing habit of much story-telling in popular preaching, thinks a warning should be sounded as to this, that young Christians may not trust in emotions but in Christ; not in stories, but in the gospel of God. He says:

"If the emotions are stirred by fleshly means, what is gained but an unreal aspect of things ? Making people cry one moment and laugh the next may be done without any exercise of the Holy Spirit as to sin. To make people cry is far from causing them to repent. The human heart may be moved by sentiment without submission to the gospel; and moving the emotions seldom results in permanent peace or true happiness."

In general it may be said that the more God and His word are relied upon, the more will results be stable and manifest as the work of God in man's conversion. Conversely, we have seen great "revivals" and evangelistic " campaigns," where the human means employed were so conspicuous that it was difficult to perceive if God had wrought in any of the many conversions claimed.

In his last letter to his beloved son in the faith, Timothy, the aged apostle Paul urges upon him the need of faith and courage, in view of that departure from the truth which the Holy Spirit had predicted would come. Briefly relating what his own life in the ministry of Christ had been (2 Tim. 3 :10, 11), he reminds Timothy of the Old Testament Scriptures he had known from childhood, and of the new revelations he had learned from the apostle himself (which we now have in the New Testament), putting him thus in possession of the body of truth which makes one "wise unto salvation." The apostle then charges Timothy to Preach the Word !

This is what he himself had done everywhere, as all his epistles bear witness. His preaching had not been "with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." To the cultured and gifted Corinthians he could write, "I came to you, not with excellency of speech or of man's wisdom, declaring to you the testimony of God." but he preached "Jesus Christ, and Him crucified! " and this he had done, that their faith " should not stand in the wisdom of man, but in the power of God ! "

As an example of the power of God's word, it is related of Cesar Malan, the well-known evangelist of a century ago, that in a long stage-coach journey a mixed company were thus thrown together in close contact. As Malan was refreshing his spirit by reading the Scriptures, an infidel companion remarked that he wondered at an intelligent fellow-traveler reading this book, fit only for superstitious people, or old women and children. Malan answered the sally by reading aloud a suited passage of Scripture. The infidel restored by asking if he had no better answer than reading from that antiquated book. Malan turned to another Scripture which he again read as his answer. " Did I not tell you," said the vexed infidel, "that I don't believe a word of that–book?" "Whether you believe it or not, this is what it says; " and Malan read other suited passages, of which the adversary took no further apparent notice.

A colonel, a fellow-traveler and friend of Malan, on alighting from the stage-coach said to him privately :''Much as I love and respect you, dear Malan, it seems to me you were not quite fair to your adversary in only reading Scriptures to him in answer to his arguments."
"Colonel," was Malan's ready answer; "what is that you carry at your side?"-" My sword."

"If you faced an enemy in battle would you argue with him that this blade is a weapon ? "-"No, I'd plunge it into him."

"Well, Colonel, this is just what I was doing."

Some years after, Mons. Malan was accosted by a stranger who asked, "Pardon me, sir:do you remember me"?-" I do not seem to recall you to mind."

"Do you remember traveling on the way to Lyons in a stage-coach with an infidel who objected to your reading the Holy Bible to him?"-"Yes, yes, perfectly."

"Well, I am the man; and I wish to tell you that it led me to read the Holy Bible myself, and to find Jesus as my blessed Saviour! "

A poor, deluded sinner brought to Jesus by reading the Scriptures,-what a joy !

Preach the Word.