Deacon Giles's distillery, and other miscellanies

Front matter

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Preface

In a great forest, when Spring, Summer, and Autumn have renewed and finished their work, the leaves that fall off are never lost, but still have many uses. They may pass, though trodden under foot, into the life of brighter and fresher leaves, although they possess within them no power to reproduce a tree. Thus our thoughts, abandoned to the world, may do some good, provided a good nature is in them, and not the depravity and death of our moral nature, even though they may seem to have no great active power, except merely to weave a part of the common mould where mind is nourished. Still, if of a pure moral tendency, they may have a good share of influence in producing another fresh and vigorous foliage. On this ground, any right-minded Pilgrim through our world may be pardoned for the publication of a Book of Leaves.

If they are only leaves, so they be pure leaves, they can do no harm. If efficacious seeds are found within them and among them, although these be not of much note at* present, yet possibly they may grow the better and more surely for not being noticed, in some minds on which the leaves have fallen.

We cannot help thinking ; and we are ever influencing others by our thoughts ; for our accustomed thoughts form

IV PREFACE.

our character, and character is always active, for evil or for good. It is therefore a Christian duty to use every opportunity and occasion of circulating Christian thought. All such thought in our world occupies a space that might otherwise have been forestalled and filled with evil. If the work have aught of good in it, the Spirit of grace Divine can make it active and productive. May that be granted, and its publication will not be in vain.

New York, May 1, 1849.

C ONTENTS.

Part First. Allegorical And Imaginative

PAGE

THE HILL DIFFICULTY ', WITH THE JEWISH PILGRIM'S PROGRESS, 3

THE TWO WAYS AND THE TWO ENDS. A LIFE ALLEGORY, . 27

THE TWO TEMPTATIONS; AND THE DISPOSITION OF THEM, . 60

THE LAKE AMONG THE MOUNTAINS ; A CHILD'S LETTER AND LESSON, 99

THE WISDOM OF ANIMALS; A FABLE AFTER THE MANNER OF JESOP, 103

DEACON GDLES' DISTILLERY, 106

THE HISTORY OF JOHN STUBBS J A WARNING TO RUM-SELLING

GROCERS, . . . 123

Part Second. Descriptive And Meditative

NATURE AT ROCK A WAY, 142

THE DISCONTENTED LADY-BIRD; A PROVERB ILLUSTRATED, . .150

SECRET OF SUCCESS IN PREACHING, 153

MDLTON'S CORRESPONDENCE, . . . . . . . .169

VI CONTENTS.

PAGE

LOOKING UP THERE, AND DOWN HERE, 175

RAKING WITH THE TEETH UPWARDS, 178

HEART-LEARNING, .... .... 180

MORAL DAGUERREOTYPES, 182

A GOOD OLD HYMN, 184

READINGS BY THE WAYSIDE, AND AN EVENING'S CONVERSATION

ON THE HUDSON, 186

PRAYER AND FASTING, 193

SIMPLICITY, 200

Part Third. Critical And Speculative

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER, . . . 203

THE RELIGION OF EXPERIENCE AND THAT OF IMITATION, . . 345

Part First. Allegorical And Imaginative

THE JEWISH PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.

Every man has a Hill Difficulty to encounter in his Christian life. We all march upwards, and we have to climh. There are a thousand expedients to avoid the necessity of climbing, but they are very vain, and all the way there is conflict and trial. But in proportion to the patient and persevering zeal with which the soul maintains and endures the conflict, will be the ease with which afterwards it shall be borne forward in the victory. At the summit of the Hill there are winged cars, in which you step, and are carried swiftly and sweetly onwards. Such is the power of Christian habit. It is a Hill Difficulty at first, it is a winged car at last. " They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength ; they shall mount up with wings as eagles ; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." "It is God that girdeth me with strength, and maketh my way perfect. He maketh my feet like hinds' foet, and setteth me upon my high places."

The time of trial must be encountered. We will not say whether it lasts the life long, or precisely at what point the habits become wings; whether the cars at the top of the Hill are those which receive the soul at death, and cause it to glide through the air to the abodes of the blessed, or whether the movement begins this side the

THE HILL DIFFICULTY.

grave, by the top of the Hill being reached before death, and the airy flight of the soul beginning even in the body, through the great celestial power of peace with God, and a love and joy unspeakable and full of glory. We think Paul stepped into those winged cars before he put off his mortal tabernacle. And every Christian may do so, for God has made it possible. But it depends greatly on the manner in which the Pilgrim travels up the Hill, in those parts of the pilgrimage where climbing is necessary. " My soul followeth hard after thee ; thy right hand upholdeth me." There must be labor, intense labor. " Striving according to his working, that worketh in me mightily." That was Paul's experience. " So run I, not as uncertainly, so fight I, not as one that beateth the air. I would that ye knew my conflict. Night and day praying exceedingly."

We say not, therefore, when the top of the hill is reached, or may be reached, but this we do say, that the Hill Difficulty is long, and the climbing of it is a great discipline for every soul. This also we say, that Christian habit, though difficult in the formation and establishment, turns into wings, and whereas at first the soul had to carry its habits forward with great difficulty and labor, at the last habit carries the soul forward.

I had a sight of this Hill Difficulty lately, as in a trance, in which I looked, and saw a great variety of characters laboring up. There was a bright light at the summit, and a vast, dark, wild-looking plain at the base ; but so far as sight was concerned, the Hill seemed to me to constitute the whole of the Christian life ; for the top of the Hill, and the winged cars in waiting, were out of sight ordinarily, and only now and then I seemed to be raised where I could see them floating in light. But I watched with exceeding great interest the progress of the various multitude. Some were going up, some were going back. Some set out with great apparent zeal at first, but soon became

THE HILL DIFFICULTY.

tired, and turned away disgusted with the labor. I thought of the text, that the hypocrite will not always call upon God, and also of the text, " He that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved;" and also of that, " Ye have need of patience, and shall live by faith ; but if any man draw back, my soul hath no pleasure in him."

Some seemed to take the Hill very hard, others more leisurely. Some disencumbered themselves of everything but what was absolutely necessary to a becoming appearance as Pilgrims, saying among themselves, We brought nothing into the world, and it is certain that we can carry nothing out ; others took an immense quantity of luggage, and various unnecessary burdens along with them. I thought of the text, " Laying aside every weight, and the sin that doth so easily beset us, let us run with patience the race that is set before us." Some laid in a great stock of provisions, and even of fresh water, for the top of the Hill, fearful that by and by they might find themselves destitute of everything to eat and drink ; others seemed to have little or no anxiety about the future, but just to get forward. I thought of the text, " Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," and also of our Lord's prayer, " Give us, day by day, our daily bread." And I thought of the text, " He shall drink of the brook by the way ;" for there was a stream of living water running down the Hill, by the way-side, from top to bottom, and there was no need of any one suffering from thirst, whose soul thirsted after God.

Some of the Pilgrims were in plain russet garb — travelstained and dusty, yet strong and useful garments, easily brushed, and fitted for a path over craggy mountains. There were others in elegant and costly dresses, with gold and pearls, and broidered array, which it cost a great deal of time and care to keep in the least order, and which greatly interfered with the progress of the wearers. Indeed, to see them thus arrayed for so laborions a pilgrimage

O THE HILL DIFFICULTY.

seemed quite ridiculous. I thought of Peter's warning about the hidden man of the heart, and the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, and I remembered also that beautiful remark of good Archbishop Leigbton, that we must keep our loins girt up, and cannot wear our flowing robes here in our pilgrimage, for they will be dragged in the mire, or perhaps will entangle our feet in climbing ; but that when we get to heaven we can wear our long flowing robes without danger of defilement, for the streets of that city are pure gold.

It may seem strange, but it is no less true, that there were some who made great provision for amusements by the way, thinking that it would be a dreary life if they had nothing to do but climbing. Sometimes they went so far as to club together, and hire companies of musicians, who could pitch a tent here and there, where a bit of tableland, with green grass, might be found among the crags of the Hill, as often perhaps as every Saturday night, and so enliven the pilgrimage. Out of these materials they contrived to make up a kind of Christian Opera, which was thought to be good for low spirits. And besides this, they had various Tabernacular concerts, imitated from the plains below, and public readings of Shakspeare. It was said to be as great a shame that the devil should keep all the amusements of life for his purposes in the plains, as that he should keep all the best music to himself, as he always had done. It was argued also, that if some of the same fun which they had in the plains were not carried up the Hill, and kept in exercise there, (only consecrated, of course,) people fond of the gayeties of life, and especially children, could not be induced to set out from the plains below, to go up the Hill Difficulty. It was argued also, that the Hill had been long enough, and too long, occupied only with sourfaced Puritans, with the whites of their eyes turned up, (see Macaulay's History of England) and speaking through their noses, and that it was high time there should be a sweeter, more accommodating and genteel kind of piety. Some thought that these things could better be managed by all for themselves, without need of any regulations, and that they might very well have dancing schools for the children, and French conversations to keep up their accomplishments. One lady remarked that for her part, she always, in travelling, took her Bible and Byron, and did not need anything else. There were many discussions about these things, and various opinions.

For my part, I thought of Paul's instructions, " See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil : speaking to yourselves in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord." And I thought of the text in James, which some regarded as rather quaint, " Is any among you afflicted ? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms." And I could not help thinking also of Peter, " Be sober, be vigilant : And if ye call on the Father, pass the time of your sojourning in fear." I thought also of the experience of Solomon, who sought upon a time to go up this same Hill Difficulty with men-singers and women-singers, and the delights of the sons of men, musical instruments, and that of all sorts; and who, moreover, took up great possessions of great and small cattle into the Hill, and builded him houses, and planted him vineyards, and made him gardens and orchards. But he found out, after all, that that was not the way, but that all was vanity and vexation of spirit. And I heard him say himself, that a single handful is better with quietetness, than both hands full with vexation of spirit. Also I heard him say, that the laughter of the fool is as the crackling of thorns under a pot, and that it is better to hear the rebuke of the wise, than the song of fools. Also he said, that the house of mirth was the fool's heart's tavern ; and that, on the whole, sorrow was better than laughter.

I am now to speak of a strange thing. There were

THE HILL DIFFICULTY.

here and there, at the sides of the way up the Hill, Patent Offices, where machines had been invented to take Pilgrims up without climbing ; not for the sick and feeble, the helpless and aged merely, but for all, without respect to class, character, or condition. There was particularly such an Office, much frequented, of late times especially, at the junction between the plains and the Hill Difficulty, at the very entrance upon the hill. There had been constructed there a great balloon, to avoid climbing, named Baptismal Regeneration, in which, by an ingenious chemical use of a little font of water, a very subtle light gas was manufactured to fill the balloon ; and then the adventurers in it, having been made to inhale the same gas, stepped into a car to which the balloon was attached, and were carried along quite swiftly at the start, half-floating, half-dragging. These adventurers all lost their lives in the end, unless they got out of the car, and took to the real pilgrimage, without the patent ; for, at a certain point in the journey there was a strong wind, that took the balloon out of its intended course, and the cars were dashed in pieces. But notwithstanding this, the patentees insisted on this being the only way of salvation. They, and they only, it was said, had received the patent, and been appointed for its sole management by commission from the apostles. It was a dreadful hallucination ; the more so, because it was adopted beforehand by a great many people in the plains, who felt very sure that they need give themselves no anxiety about getting up the Hill, as the balloon was always ready, and therefore, start whenever they might, there was no fear for them, nor any need of hurrying.

Hard by this Office, and in league with the balloon system, there was another, kept by that son of Abraham who was by a bond- woman, born after the flesh ; he kept charge of Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. He persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, and in time past had thrown a great bar across the

THE HILL DIFFICULTY. V

way of the pilgrims, making it a State-turnpike instead of a free road, and letting none pass but such as would pay tribute, and swear themselves subjects of the son of Hagar, and of Jerusalem in bondage. But the Lord of the Hill ordered the bar to be taken down, and all hindrances to be removed out of the way, declaring that all who were baptized into Christ had put on Christ, and were one in Christ Jesus, while those who had not this true baptism by his Spirit in their hearts, were none the better for the external rite of baptism. For he said that in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availed anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature, and that the sinner could not be justified by anything but faith. Moreover, he said that the son of the bondwoman should not be heir with the son of the free woman. And he commanded all the Pilgrims to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ had made them free, and not to be entangled again in the yoke of bondage.

The people of the plains sometimes went to law about these balloons, with another great party, that claimed the honor of having invented them long before, and of having the only right to use them. It was said that they belonged in the first place to the Pope of Rome, and that he having charged too high for the use of them, this second party had pirated the invention, and ever since the time of Luther, had combined with several States to put it at a lower rate, and for a long time likewise, made almost everybody come into it. Now, however, the combination between Church and State being much broken up, people were not compelled to employ the balloons as formerly, and great multitudes went up the Hill without them, well knowing how dangerous it was to trust in them. Moreover, of those who had been in the habit of manufacturing and of patronizing the pirated invention, there were not a few returning to the old original balloon of the Pope, thinking themselves safer, on the whole, in that, and determining henceforward, if they must use either, to abide >y the real Simon Pure.

I*

It was said that Simon Peter himself had given it with his own hands to the Pope, and a great many Tracts for the Times were written to prepare men's minds for a return to the general use of it. After the year 1848, some said that if it were found necessary, Peter would undoubtedly give the Pope a second balloon to carry him back from Gaieta to Rome, and keep him suspended, untouched and intangible, in his temporal sovereignty.

There was another patent higher up the Hill Difficulty than this, called Perfection ; where the souls of the pilgrims that were willing to undergo the operation, were fitted, or appeared to be fitted, with wings, after having been, made to drink of a very penetrating and delicious cordial, entitled self-esteem. This cordial was made up, in part, out of the elements of past experience, kept till they were rotten ; after which, like the process of malt liquor, made out of pure grain, the cordial being distilled, got into the head and heart, and prepared its subjects for the most venturesome and desperate expedients with those artificial wings. Men could go with them to the edge of steep precipices, where they sometimes threw themselves off, and were dashed in pieces, or, in endeavoring to fly, stumbled and fell. Sometimes the fall broke off their wings without killing them, and then, after great labor and pain, they found their way back again into the right road upon the Hill, where, without any more patent wings, they went anxiously and sadly all their days. But it was a very dangerous delusion, and some who were carried away by it, forsook the Hill Difficulty altogether, and threw off all law, saying that they were not under law but under grace ; and so they set up in the wilderness an establishment something like the system of Communism or Fourierism, where they had all things common except the Water of Life, which was not to be had among them.

Of those who were climbing up the Hill in the right way, there was a great variety of persons and of characters.

Some moved confident and light-hearted, some went desponding and much burdened. Some went at a very snail's pace, some more swiftly, some seemed for a long while to be standing still. Some few shot upward with an earnestness and vigor most surprising and animating to look at. And what seemed a little strange, the more heart and strength were put into the work of climbing, the less the fatigue appeared to be felt. Indeed, the air grew more bracing and clearer, the farther they w^ent up, and the prospect everywhere began to be glorious. I thought of our Lord's words, " He that folio weth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." And sometimes there seemed to be a mist of light in the clouds above the Hill, in which, when the climbers at a hard part of the pilgrimage looked steadily up, the words of that great promise were seen distinctly shining, " Blessed is the man that endureth temptation ; for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him." In very clear weather these glittering words could be seen from the top to the bottom of the Hill, and they were like a crown of blazing jewels, set upon a city battlement, and the sight of them sometimes prevented Pilgrims, even at the plains, from getting into the patent balloon cars instead of climbing, and sent them on, with a great impulse, rejoicing even in the discipline of trial, and struggling up the Hill.

There were steady climbers, and there were inconstant, fitful ones. There were those of strong faith, who girded up the loins of their minds, and hoped to the end, and there were those who were constantly doubting they should never get to the top of the Hill. Some would go like the wind for a few days or hours, seeming as though they would outstrip all competitors. Then they would stop by the way-side to gather some rock-crystals, or would engage in some disquisition about wings, and sometimes were tempted to step into the patent office, and lost much time in this way and that, instead of climbing. Others seemed to be continually thinking of their comfort in climbing, having some way got the notion that the proof of their progress lay in the sensible delight which they experienced in the work. This was a great injury both to their advancement and happiness. They sometimes envied those patent wings, though they did not dare really to try them. I thought of David, when he was climbing, and was forced to come down upon his hands and knees, with the way so dark, moreover, that he could see no light ; and I thought if he had been in the habit of making his hope and his evidence to depend upon his comfort, he would twenty times have given up in utter despair. But he cried unto God in the day of his trouble, and climbed on, even when his soul refused to be comforted. He was still thinking of the next step. "From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee when my heart is overwhelmed ; lead me to the rock that is higher than I." Sometimes David himself said, " O, that I had wings like a dove !" But he never applied at the Patent Office. And when he really had wings, and was singing like a lark because of what God had done for him, he said he was a poor and needy sinner, whose only hope was that the Lord was thinking upon him. Blessed is the man that maketh the Lord his trust, and respecteth not such as turn aside to lies. Those that, like David, thirsted after God, rather than for comfort, and preferred a clean heart before a merry one, found comfort enough without thinking of it. I observed that when, according to David's experience, their souls in climbing labored hard after God, then they had also David's assurance of the right hand of God upholding them.

The steady climbers of course made the surest progress. They went straight onward, and if a very rough place came in their way, such was the habitual directness and intensity of their zeal, such their habit of application to the pilgrimage, that almost before they had time to think whether there might be an easier way, they found themselves entered upon the difficult, rough passage, without attempting to go round it. But these steady climbers had for their motto, " I will go in the strength of the Lord God ; I will make mention of thy righteousness, even of thine only." And also this : "I can do all things through Christ who strengtheneth me." Their combined intensity and perseverance was the effect, under God's grace, of continued, strong, steady, Christian habit. It was like the impulse of a swift skater, the application of whose muscular energy has given him such power of impetus, that if he should attempt to stand still, the very habit of motion will carry him swiftly forward. These steady climbers had thus gained the power of a continued impulse, without relying on it. Their whole reliance was on Christ. " Without me, ye can do nothing."

Theyjiiade much use, unceasing use, of prayer. Prayer and God's Word, indeed, kept up a fire within them, that seemed to scorn the cold, the rain, the fatigue, without them. And it was observed, that while these steady climbers had great enjoyment by the way, they did not stop to ponder upon it, to luxuriate over it, as it were, but still pressed upward, always eager to advance. I thought of Paul's relation of some passages in the history of his own soul : " I count not myself to have attained or to have become perfect ; but this one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and reaching on after those that are before, I press towards the mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." Indeed, according to the experience of another great old climber, who once slept in the Arbor on the Hill, in consequence of very delight in pondering over his joy, and who for a season lost his roll in consequence of that sleep, it was observed that those who, even in a very clear frame of mind, began to sit down and delight themselves with reading their roll,

THE HILL DIFFICULTY.

soon grew confused again, and lost their place in it, or fell asleep and mislaid it. It was not by pondering their own experience, and delighting in that, but by pondering God's word, and delighting themselves in God, that they found the desire of their hearts, and went safely onwards. " Thou wilt light my candle," says David: " the Lord my God will enlighten my darkness. Thou wilt show me the path of life : in thy light shall we see light."

Moreover, the best climbers did not compare themselves with one another's progresses, but measured the Hill, and thought how far still they were from the top of it. On the other hand, a great many seemed to think that if they did but go as fast as their neighbors, they were in very good case, and had no occasion for anxiety. This evil was the source of a very slow advancement with many, who never, in consequence of this very thing, got to the top of the Hill, to the winged cars, as long as they lived, but were all their life- time subject to bondage.

In the variety of character among the true Pilgrims, you might distinguish several prevailing forms, singularly separate and distinct, the work of particular individual undercurrents of temperament and habit, modifying the direct ideally perfect result of the workings of that One and the self-same Spirit, who divideth to every man severally as he will. There were the brooding 1 Pilgrims, bent down, and looking into self, sometimes so intent on this inspection, so absorbed in it, that they could see nothing else, not even the path before them, nor seemed to notice any of their felkrws ; and in consequence of this brooding, they often stumbled up the Hill rather than climbed, but still more frequently thought they were advancing, while they were only standing still and groaning. They needed to look out of self up to the top of the Hill and the Lord of the Hill. And I observed that in this desperate brooding over self, instead of the consequence being a sympathy with others' distresses, they seemed to think only of their own, and fell into the imagination that the great weight and care of their own sins and sorrows unfitted them for any active part in helping others, or excused them from it ; which was a great mistake. I heard of one great Pilgrim, who once for a season was in danger of this habit, but afterwards by the grace of Christ, and by looking to Christ, got out of it, who exclaimed in a voice loud enough to be heard all the way down the Hill, No good ever comes of brooding !

There were also the legal Pilgrims, looking to duties rather than Christ, as the others did to frames rather than Christ. The tendency of this was to injure, if not to spoil both their duties and their frames — both their works and their faith ; and in truth their ideas of faith w T ere very much clouded and darkened, and their souls were kept in bondage. For they could not satisfy conscience, and yet they looked very much to that for justification and comfort ; but this they could not find, without casting all on Christ daily, and having him and his love as the spring and strength of duty, and receiving his pardon daily, as guilty and lost, but believing, trusting, loving, and obeying out of love. The havoc made with the comfort and fervor of the Pilgrims by this want of faith and love, and this legal resort to forms of duty as a kind of purchase-money, was very sad. They had a sort of measuring rod of Moses, by which they endeavored to graduate their steps and guage theix progress, instead of walking by the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus. The Lord of the Hill had been at great pains to keep them from this evil, and had taught very clearly the difference between children and slaves, and had told them that in Christ they were children, and must walk in love, as dear children. " Ye have not," said he, " received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but ye have received the Spirit of Adoption, whereby ye cry Abba, Father."