se we did it
yesterday at this hour, because people expect it of us, because A, B,
or C does it, or for a hundred other reasons, all of which are but
too familiar to us by experience. They are sure to slip in; they
change the whole character of the work, and they harm the workers.
The only way by which we can keep the garland fresh is by continually
dipping it in the fountain. The only way by which we can keep our
Christian work pure, useful, worthy of the Master, is by seeing to it
that our work itself does not draw us away from our fellowship with
Him. And the more we have to do, the more needful is it that we
should listen to Christ's voice when He says to us, 'Come ye
yourselves apart with Me into a solitary place, and there renew your
communion with Me.'

The last lesson about our work which I draw from Persis is the
unexpected immortality of true Christian service. How Persis would
have opened her eyes if anybody had told her that nearly 1900 years
after she lived, people in a far-away barbarous island would be
sitting thinking about her, as you and I are doing now! How
astonished she would have been if it had been said to her, 'Now,
Persis, wheresoever in the whole world the Gospel is preached, your
name and your work and your epitaph will go with it, and as long
as men know about Jesus Christ, your and their Master, they will know
about you, His humble servant.' Well, we shall not have our names in
that fashion in men's memories, but Jesus will have your name and
mine, if we do His work as this woman did it, in _His_ memory. 'I
will never forget any of their works.' And if we--self-forgetful to
the limit of our power, and as the joyful result of our personal
union with that Saviour who has done everything for us--try to live
for His praise and glory in any fashion, then be sure of this, that
our poor deeds are as immortal as Him for whom they are done, and
that we may take to ourselves the great word which He has spoken,
when He has declared that at the last He will confess His confessors'
names before the angels in heaven. Blessed are the living that 'live
in the Lord'; blessed are the workers that work 'in the Lord,' for
when they come to be the dead that 'die in the Lord' and rest from
their labours, their works shall follow them.

A CRUSHED SNAKE

'The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your
feet shortly.'--ROMANS xvi. 20.

There are three other Scriptural sayings which may have been f