ith the cheerful contented manner in which he
said it, that he desired him to go on freely, for it was a pleasure
to him to meet with a plain man, who, without any kind of learning
but what he had got from the Bible, was able to talk so well on a
subject in which all men, high and low, rich and poor, are equally
concerned.

"Indeed I am afraid I make too bold, sir, for it better becomes me
to listen to such a gentleman as you seem to be, than to talk in my
poor way: but as I was saying, sir, I wonder all working men do not
derive as great joy and delight as I do from thinking how God has
honored poverty! Oh! sir, what great, or rich, or mighty men have
had such honor put on them, or their condition, as shepherds,
tentmakers, fishermen, and carpenters have had! Besides, it seems as
if God honored industry also. The way of duty is not only the way of
safety, but it is remarkable how many, in the exercise of the common
duties of their calling, humbly and rightly performed, as we may
suppose, have found honors, preferment, and blessing: while it does
not occur to me that the whole sacred volume presents a single
instance of a like blessing conferred on idleness. Rebekah, Rachel,
and Jethro's daughters, were diligently employed in the lowest
occupations of a country life, when Providence, by means of those
very occupations, raised them up husbands so famous in history, as
Isaac, Jacob, and the prophet Moses. The shepherds were neither
playing, nor sleeping, but 'watching their flocks,' when they
received the news of a Saviour's birth; and the woman of Samaria, by
the laborious office of drawing water, was brought to the knowledge
of him who gave her to drink of 'living water.'"

"My honest friend," said the gentleman, "I perceive you are well
acquainted with Scripture." "Yes, sir, pretty well, blessed be God!
Through his mercy I learned to read when I was a little boy; though
reading was not so common when I was a child, as, I am told, through
the goodness of Providence and the generosity of the rich, it is
likely to become now-a-days. I believe there is no day, for the last
thirty years, that I have not peeped at my Bible. If we can't find
time to read a chapter, I defy any man to say he can't find time to
read a verse; and a single text, sir, well followed, and put in
practice every day, would make no bad figure at the year's end:
three hundred and sixty-five texts, without the loss of a moment's
time, would make a pret