n the Wilderness
at the time the brazen serpent was lifted up. The dramatis personae were
a Young Convert, a Sceptic, and the Sceptic's Mother. The convert, who
has been bitten by the serpent, and, having followed Moses' injunction,
is cured, "comes along" and finds the sceptic lying down "badly bitten."
He entreats him to look upon the brazen serpent which Moses has lifted
up. But the sceptic has no faith in the alleged cure, and refuses.

"Do you think," he says, "I'm going to be saved by looking at a brass
serpent away off on a pole? No, no."

"Wall, I dunno," says the young convert, "but I was saved that way
myself. Don't you think you'd better try it?"

The sceptic refuses, and his mother "comes along," and observes,
--"Hadn't you better look at it, my boy?"

"Well, mother, the fact is, if I could understand the f'losophy of it I
would look up right off; but I don't see how a brass serpent away off on
a pole can cure me."

And so he dies in his unbelief.

It seemed odd to hear this conversation from the Wilderness recited,
word for word, in the American vernacular, and with a local colouring
that suggested that both the sceptic and the young convert wore
tail-coats, and that the mother had "come along" in a stuff dress. But
when the preacher turned aside, and in a few words spoke of sons who
would not hear the counsel of Christian mothers and refused to "look
up and live," the silent tears that coursed down many a face in the
congregation showed that his homely picture had been clear as the
brazen serpent in the Wilderness to the eyes of faith before which
it was held up.

The story of Daniel is one peculiarly susceptible of Mr. Moody's usual
method of treatment, and for three-quarters of an hour he kept the
congregation at the morning meeting enthralled whilst he told how
Daniel's simple faith triumphed over the machinations of the unbeliever.
Mr. Moody's style is unlike that of most religious revivalists. He
neither shouts nor gesticulates, and mentioned "hell" only once, and
that in connection with the life the drunkard makes for himself. His
manner is reflected by the congregation in respect of abstention from
working themselves up into "a state." This makes all the more impressive
the signs of genuine emotion which follow and accompany the preacher's
utterance. When he was picturing the scene of Daniel translating the
king's dream, rapidly reciting Daniel's account of the dream, and
Nebuchadnezzar's q