H Arrows

H

Happy dying.

Mr. Rowland Hill used merrily to say when he got old that he hoped that they had not forgotten him. That is how he came to look at death; and he would go to some old woman if he could, and say, "Now, dear sister, if you go before I go, mind that you give my love to John Bunyan, and the other Johns. Tell them that Rowley is stopping behind a little while, but he is coming on as fast as he can." Oh! it is a sweet thing gradually to melt away, and have the tenement gradually taken down, and yet not to feel any trouble about it, but to know that you are in the great Father's hands, and you shall wake up where old age and infirmities will all have passed away, and where, in everlasting youth, you shall behold the face of Him you love.

Hard to die. A sage said to a worldling, when he looked over his beautiful gardens, "These are the things that make it hard to die." You will have to leave everything which you call your own here; and you have no possessions over yonder.

Hearers—forgetful.

There is a sad aptitude in many hearers to forget the essential point, and think of our stories and illustrations rather than of the practical duty which we would enforce. A celebrated minister, who has long ago gone home, was once taken ill, and his wife requested him to go and consult an eminent physician. He went to this physician, who welcomed him very heartily. "I am right glad to see you, sir," said he. "I have heard you preach, and have been greatly profited by you, and therefore I have often wished to have half an hour's chat with you; if I can do anything for you I am sure I will." The minister stated his case. The doctor said, "Oh, it is a very simple matter; you have only to take such and such a drug, and you will soon be all right." The patient was about to go, thinking that he must not occupy the physician's time; but he pressed him to stay, and they entered into pleasant conversation. The minister went home to his wife, and told her with joy what a delightful man the doctor had proved to be. He said, "I do not know that I ever had a more delightful talk. The good man is eloquent, and witty, and gracious." The wife replied, "But what remedy did he prescribe?" "Dear," said the minister, "I quite forgot what he told me on that point." "What," she said, "Did you go to a physician for advice, and have you come away without a remedy?" "It quite slipped my mind," he said; "the doctor talked so pleasantly, his prescription has quite gone out of my head."

Heart, An evil.

Pliny was wont to say that it was a miracle that the world escaped burning for a single day, and I do not wonder at the remark, considering the character of the district in which he spent much of his time. Yonder is Vesuvius, ready at any moment to vomit fire, and continually sending up clouds of smoke. Ascend the mountain side, clambering over ashes and masses of lava; all beneath you is glowing; thrust in your staff and it is charred.

Heart lost.

I knew a man who lost his heart. His wife had not got it, and his children had not got it, and he did not seem as if he had got it himself. "That is odd," say you. Well, he used to starve himself. He scarcely had enough to eat. His clothes were threadbare. He starved all who were round him. He did not seem to have a heart. A poor woman owed him a little rent. Out she went into the street. He had no heart. A person had fallen back a little in the payment of money that he had lent him. The debtor's little children were crying for bread. The man did not care who cried for hunger, or what became of the children. He would have his money. He had lost his heart. I never could make out where it was till I went to his house one day, and I saw a huge chest. I think they called it an iron safe: it stood behind the door of an inner room; and when he unlocked it with a heavy key, and the bolts were shot, and the inside was opened there was a musty, fusty thing within it, as dry and dead as the kernel of a walnut seven years old. It was his heart. If you have locked up your heart in an iron safe, get it out. Get it out as quickly as ever you can. It is a horrible thing to pack up a heart in five pound notes, or bury it under heaps of silver and gold. Hearts are never healthy when covered up with hard metal. Your gold and silver are cankered if your heart is bound up with them.

Heart—Will of God in the.

I have heard of a famous king of Poland, who did brave deeds in his day, and confessed that he owed his excellent character to a secret habit which he had formed. He was the son of a noble father, and he carried with him a miniature portrait of this father, and often looked upon it. Whenever he went to battle he would look upon the picture of his father, and nerve himself to valor. When he sat in the council-chamber he would secretly look upon the image of his father, and behave himself right royally: for he said, "I will do nothing that can dishonor my father's name." Now, this is the grand thing for a Christian to do—to carry about with him the will of God in his heart, and then in every action to consult that will.

Heavenly choir. The music of the heavenly harmonies as yet lacks certain voices. Some of its needful notes are too bass for those already there, and others are too high for them, till the singers come who are ordained to give the choir its fullest range. At the Crystal Palace you have seen the singers trooping in. The conductor is all anxiety if they seem to linger. Still, some are away. The time is nearly up, and you see seats up there on the right, and a vacant block down there on the left.

Even so with the heavenly choir: they are streaming in: the orchestra is filling up, but yet there is room, and yet there is demand for other voices to complete the heavenly harmony.

Heaven—Going to.

Why, it is not worth while going to heaven alone. A little lost child sits down on the doorstep of a West end mansion and cries because it is so lonely: is that to be our position in heaven? Are we to take no friends there with us? Who wants to be solitary in the New Jerusalem?

Heaven in us. An old Scotchman was asked whether he expected to get to heaven. "Why, man, I live there," was his quaint reply. Let us all live in those spiritual things which are the essential features of heaven. Often go there, before you go to stay there. It was said of an old Puritan, that heaven was in him before he was in heaven. That is necessary for all of us; we must have heaven in us before we get into heaven. If we do not get to heaven before we die, we shall never get there afterwards.

Heaven—near. The other day, on a sudden, I saw the white cliffs of Dover. The swift ship had performed the passage so rapidly that the sea had been crossed before I had reckoned on reaching land. There were the cliffs, just ahead. Brethren, heaven is just ahead! Run to the bows! Heaven ahoy! Do not forever continue gazing at the misty shores behind you. Look ahead! You are far nearer than you think to the land of the immortal! We are within speaking distance of heaven! The Lord hears our cry, and we hear His promise.

" How near to faith's far-seeing eye The golden gates appear!"

Heaven or hell our port.

If I were to go out tomorrow by sea, I should not walk on board a steamer, and then enquire, "Where are you going?" I first make up my mind where I will go, and then select a vessel which is likely to carry me there in comfort. You must know where you are going. The main thing with the captain of a Cunarder will be the getting of his vessel safely into the port for which it is bound. This design overrules everything else. To get into port is the thought of every watch, every glance at the chart, every observation of the stars. The captain's heart is set upon the other side. His hope is safely to arrive at the desired haven, and he knows which is the haven of his choice. He would not expect to get there, if he did not set his mind on it. How is it with you, dear friend? You are speeding towards heaven or hell: which of these is your port?

Holiday Christians.

"Is your father a Christian?" said a Sunday-school teacher to a child. The girl answered, "Yes, I believe that father is a Christian; but he has not worked much at it lately." No doubt there are miry of that sort. Their religion has taken a holiday, and they themselves have gone to a sluggard's bed. Let them be aroused, for it is high time to awake out of sleep.

Holy bravery. A man under the influence of liquor will do what he would never think of doing at any other time: he will be rash, foolhardy, and daring to the last degree. We have heard of foreign nations whose troops have been so afraid of the fight, that they have dosed them with strong drink, to induce them to march into battle. We used to hear the expression, "Dutch courage," which meant the boldness which came from ardent spirits; though I do not suppose the Dutch had more of it than the English. No doubt many a man under the influence of drink has risked his life, and performed what look like feats of valor, when, indeed, he was simply beyond himself, and out of his right mind, or he would not have been so foolhardy. Wine does not embolden many men in the wrong way. Beloved friends, we are not to make ourselves ridiculous with fanaticism; but bold with the Spirit of truth. "Be not drunk with wine, wherein is riot," in order to be emboldened to do anything; but be ye filled with the Spirit of the Living God, wherein is quietness, and whereof comes a courage which is to be admired and not derided. Oh, how brave a man is, when he is filled with the Spirit of God!

Holy Ghost—pray for the.

Sometimes when we arc praying that, we may feel the power of theJoin? Word, we hardly know what we are praying for. I saw a venerable brother the other day, and he said to me, "I remember speaking with you when you were nineteen or twenty years of age, and I never forgot what you said to me. I had been praying with you in the prayer-meeting that God would give us the Holy Ghost to the full, and you said to me afterwards, 'My dear brother, do you know what you asked God for?' I answered, 'Yes.' But you very solemnly said to me, ' The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of judgment and the Spirit of burning, and few are prepared for the inward conflict which is meant by these two words.'" My good old friend told me that at the time he did not understand what I meant, but thought me a singular youth. "Ah!" said he, "I see it now, but it is only by a painful experience that I have come to the full comprehension of it." Yes, when Christ comes, He comes not to send peace on the earth, but a sword; and that sword begins at home in our own souls, killing, cutting, hacking, breaking in pieces. Blessed is that man who knows the Word of the Lord by its exceeding sharpness, for it kills nothing but that which ought to be killed.

Holy Spirit like the wind. In this land especially, we can never tell what wind will blow to morrow. A few days ago, it was the south west, and it brought a rapid thaw; but the next morn it was nearly north, and a frost was upon us. We may well put vanes on our public buildings, for without them we could never tell from the day of the year or the season of the year, from what quarter the wind would come. I feel thankful when I remember that, like the wind, the Holy Spirit bloweth where He listeth, for I cannot tell where next He may operate.

Holy Spirit our guide. The truth is something like those stalactite caverns and grottoes of which we have heard, which you must enter and see for yourself if you would really know their wonders. If you should venture there without light or guide, you would run great risks; but with blazing flambeaux, and an instructed leader, your entrance is full of interest. See, your guide has taken you through a narrow winding passage, where you have to creep, or go on bended knees. At last he has brought you into a magnificent hall; and when the torches are held aloft, the far-off roof sparkles and flashes back the light as from countless jewels of every hue. You now behold Nature's architecture, and cathedrals are henceforth toys to you. As you stand in that vast pillared and jewelled palace, you feel how much you owe to your guide and to his flaming torch. Thus the Holy Spirit leads us into all truth, and sheds light on the eternal and the mysterious.

"Honest doubt."

Unbelief calls itself "honest doubt," and not without cause; for we should not have known it to be honest if it had not labelled itself so. When a man puts up in his shop window,Join? "No cheating practiced here," I should trade next door. He doth protest too much. Your free love, free thought, free life, and so forth, are the empty mockery of freedom.

Honest failure. A good doctor of divinity whom I knew well, met a Christian man in the street, shook hands with him, and congratulated him. The man said, "I do not know why you should congratulate me, for I have had a world of trouble; in fact, I have failed in my business." To which the doctor replied: "I congratulate you, because you failed honestly; you are the only man for years I have seen fail like that. "Then he shook hands with him again, and said: "My dear fellow, I do thank God you failed honestly." But no man need fail because he serves God.

Honesty needs no defence. The Chinese trader who put over his shops, "No cheatee here," turned out to be the biggest rogue in the street. If you are honest you will confess you have sinned, and then you will come to Jesus for that remission of sins, which comes through His sacrifice.

Hope—a cheerless. When I was in the Church of St. John Lateran, at Rome, I read a request for prayer for the repose of the soul of his Eminence, Cardinal Wiseman. Now Cardinal Wiseman was a great man, a prince of the church, but yet he is somewhere in the other world, where he is not in repose: so this request indicates. There must be a very poor outlook for an ordinary Catholic. For my part, I would give up so cheerless a hope, and become a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, and go to heaven.

Hope for great sinners.

You remember what the Scotchwoman said to Rowland Hill when she stood looking at his face. He said, "Well, good woman, you have looked at me a long while. "What are you looking at?" She said, "I was looking at the lines of your face." "Well, and what do you make of them?" said he. "I was thinking what an awful rascal you would have been, if you were not converted," was her unexpected answer. Now I think we might say the same of a good many; and if it be God's intent, He should get a glorious name for Himself. I see hope for big rascals, I see hope for great sinners.

Human efforts are vain.

Human effort and self righteousness is like a man trying to patch up an old house. You find such in country villages; a place which nobody has ever repaired for fifty years. I do not know if there is any landlord; but if there is he would like to forget that he has such property. The main beam is nearly cracked through. The lath and plaster have gone long ago, and the birds go in and out the best parlor whenever they like, and the whole thing is tumbling down. A man buys it, and he says, "Now, you know, it is a pity to pull this house down; I think I will repair it." So he puts in a beam there, just under the roof; and he puts a strut here and another timber there; and by the time he has spent as much as would have built a house he has got a very handsome ruin left, and nothing more.

Human instrumentality.

I read the other day of a certain writer who says, "I wrote the four hundred pages of this book with one pen." Where is that pen? Does anybody want it? If it were advertised as an exhibition I should not go to see it. I care a deal more for the hand that wrote, and for what was written, than for the pen with which it was written. A common goose quill it was in the case referred to, and no more. Ah, how plainly can we see where the quill came from! God uses men for a certain purpose, as we use a hammer, or a saw, or a gimlet. Suppose that when we had done with such tools, and put them back into the box, they all began to cry, "See what we have done! What a sharp saw I was! What a heavy hammer I was! Did I not hit the nail on the head?" Such boastings would be foolishness. Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? We do not judge that the instrument ought to take credit to itself; but it does so in our case whenever it can, and this is a great injury to us. Some of us might have enjoyed a much larger blessing, if we had not grown top heavy with the blessing we already enjoyed.

Hunger belt. The poor Bushmen, when they have nothing to eat, tie a girdle around them, and call it the hunger belt, and when they have gone a few days they pull it tighter still, and tighter still, in order to enable them to bear hunger: so any man who has to live upon himself will have to draw the hunger belt very tight indeed. A soul cannot be persuaded by philosophy to content itself without its necessary food: eloquence may try all its charms to that end, but it will be in vain.

Hunger best appetite. The man who has grown accustomed to luxuries is the man who turns his meat over, and picks off a bit here, and a bit there; for this is too fat, and that is too gristly. Bring in the poor wretches who are half starved. Fetch in a company of laborers who have been waiting all day at the docks, and have found no work, and in consequence have received no wage. Set them down to a joint of meat. It vanishes before them. See what masters they are of the art of knife and fork! They find no fault: they never dream of such a thing. If the meat had been a little coarse, it would not have mattered to them; their need is too great for them to be dainty. Oh, for a host of hungry souls! How pleasant to feed them! How different from the task of persuading the satiated Pharisees to partake of the gospel!

Hunger deadened.

I am told that there is a country—I think it is Patagonia—where men in times of want eat clay in great lumps, and fill themselves with it, so as to deaden their hunger. I know that many people in England do the same. There is a kind of yellow clay which is much cried up for staying spiritual hunger; heavy stuff it is, but many have a vast appetite for it. They prefer it to the choicest dainties.

Hypocrites.

We cannot prevent hypocrites arising; it is only a proof that true religion is worth having. You took a bad half sovereign the other night, did you? Did you say, "All half sovereigns are worthless, I will never take another"? Not so, you became more careful; but you were quite sure there were good half sovereigns in currency, or else people would not make counterfeit ones. It would not pay anybody to be a hypocrite, unless there were enough genuine Christians to make the hypocrites pass current.

Half way house godliness is wretched stuff.

Hannibal, it is said, dissolved the rocks of the Alps with vinegar; but Christ dissolves our hearts with love. Have the blood-mark very visibly on all your mercies.

Heaven hides itself away within the gospel.

He that can stand on the hill-top can stand in the valley.

He wears for His princely star the lance mark in His side.

Holiness is the royal road to Scriptural knowledge.

How can a soul make progress if it is evermore changing its course? Do not sow in Beersheba and then rush off to reap in Dan.