ing, and to engage a little lodging in the suburbs--a
sitting-room and bedroom in one--undertaking to board myself. In this
way I was able without difficulty to tithe the whole of my income; and
while I felt the change a good deal, it was attended with no small
blessing.

More time was given in my solitude to the study of the Word of GOD, to
visiting the poor, and to evangelistic work on summer evenings than
would otherwise have been the case. Brought into contact in this way
with many who were in distress, I soon saw the privilege of still
further economising, and found it not difficult to give away much more
than the proportion of my income I had at first intended.

About this time a friend drew my attention to the question of the
personal and pre-millennial coming of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, and gave me
a list of passages bearing upon it, without note or comment, advising me
to ponder the subject. For a while I gave much time to studying the
Scriptures about it, with the result that I was led to see that this
same JESUS who left our earth in His resurrection body was so to come
again, that His feet were to stand on the Mount of Olives, and that He
was to take possession of the temporal throne of His father David which
was promised before His birth. I saw, further, that all through the New
Testament the coming of the LORD was the great hope of His people, and
was always appealed to as the strongest motive for consecration and
service, and as the greatest comfort in trial and affliction. I learned,
too, that the period of His return for His people was not revealed, and
that it was their privilege, from day to day and from hour to hour, to
live as men who wait for the LORD; that thus living it was immaterial,
so to speak, whether He should or should not come at any particular
hour, the important thing being to be so ready for Him as to be able,
whenever He might appear, to give an account of one's stewardship with
joy, and not with grief.

The effect of this blessed hope was a thoroughly practical one. It led
me to look carefully through my little library to see if there were any
books there that were not needed or likely to be of further service, and
to examine my small wardrobe, to be quite sure that it contained nothing
that I should be sorry to give an account of should the MASTER come at
once. The result was that the library was considerably diminished, to
the benefit of some poor neighbours, and to the far greater