't for one feel like turnin' an old hoss that's done good
sarvice, when he gits stiff in the j'ints, into slim pastur', and I
don't feel like stuffin' on 'em with bog hay in the winter. There's
folks that dooz; but _I_ don't. Now, brethren, I motion that we
continner to give as much as five hundred dollars to the old Doctor, and
make the best dicker we can with the new minister; and I'll clap ten
dollars on to my pew-rent; and the Deacon there, if he's anything of a
man, 'll do as much agin. I know he's able to."

Let no one smile. The halting prudence, the inevitable calculating
process through which the small country New-Englander arrives at his
charities, is but the growth of his associations. He gets hardly; and
what he gets hardly he must bestow with self-questionings. If he lives
"in the small," he cannot give "in the large." His pennies, by the
necessities of his toil, are each as big as pounds; yet his charities,
in nine cases out of ten, bear as large a proportion to his revenue as
the charities of those who count gains by tens of thousands. Liberality
is, after all, comparative, and is exceptionally great only when its
sources are exceptionally small. That "_widow's mite_"--the only charity
ever specially commended by the great Master of charities--will tinkle
pleasantly on the ear of humanity ages hence, when the clinking millions
of cities are forgotten.

The new arrangement all comes to the ear of Reuben, who writes back in a
very brusque way to the Doctor: "Why on earth, father, don't you cut all
connection with the parish? You've surely done your part in that
service. Don't let the 'minister's pay' be any hindrance to you, for I
am getting on swimmingly in my business ventures,--thanks to Mr.
Brindlock. I enclose a check for two hundred dollars, and can send you
one of equal amount every quarter, without feeling it. Why shouldn't a
man of your years have rest?"

And the Doctor, in his reply, says: "My rest, Reuben, is God's work. I
am deeply grateful to you, and only wish that your generosity were
hallowed by a deeper trust in His providence and mercy. O Reuben!
Reuben! a night cometh, when no man can work! You seem to imagine, my
son, that some slight has been put upon me by recent arrangements in the
parish. It is not so; and I am sure that none has been intended. A
servant of Christ can receive no reproach at the hands of his people,
save this,--that he has failed to warn them of the judgment to come