sus quite a changed woman; she's twice the wife to
him she was, and his home ain't like the same place. What's the secret
of this change? He don't like to ask; but he watches, and he finds the
worn old Bible hidden in the baby's cradle. He reads it secretly; he
prays over it; the scales fall from his eyes; he becomes a changed man;
he comes out boldly and nobly for Christ; he and his wife rejoice
together in the Lord.

"But the little homely book hadn't quite done its work yet. Foster one
night asks me to help him in a little trouble which the words of the
book had got him into. Strange that, isn't it? No, 'tain't strange;
'cos there's deep things, wonderful things, and terrible things in that
blessed book; but then there's light too to help you past these deep
pits, if you'll only use the Word as God's lamp. I takes up the Bible
to help William to a bright text or two, and I sees my mother's name in
the cover. Here was our long-lost Bible; its work so far were done, and
now it's got back to its rightful owner. But after we'd got it back
we'd some time to wait; but waiting-times are blessed times for true
Christians. At last the full evidence, of which Jane's Bible were one
little link, came up, and my dear sister's character were cleared of
every spot and stain as had been cast upon it by her fellow-servants.

"Now, what I want you to notice, dear friends, is just this--how
wonderfully the Lord has worked in this matter. If my dear sister had
not suffered in the first instance from the tongue of the slanderer,
that blessed book'd never have done all this good, as far as we can see.
The butler wouldn't have been convinced of sin; the publican's daughter
wouldn't have been brought to repentance and praise; William and his
wife wouldn't have been made happy and rejoicing believers. And indeed,
though I can't explain all now, neither, as far as we can tell, would
Jim Barnes have been what he now is, with his missus like a new pin, nor
would poor Ned Taylor have died a humble penitent. All these precious
fruits have growed and ripened out of the loss of my dear sister's
Bible. And she herself--well, it's been a sore trial, but it's yielded
already the peaceable fruit of righteousness. She's lost nothing in the
end but a little dross, and her sorrow has helped to bring joy to many.

"Now, I ask you all to cling to the grand old book; to use it as a sword
and a lamp,--a sword against your spiritual enemies, an