The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1880-11-25

the drawer and took out the much-worn
account book
" lis close on to Monday" he said,
half-aloud, as though TO still the quiet
rebuke of conscience, which came like
an echo of his wife's words: g Wait,
and do week DAYS work on week days."
/ but he put it aside, and in its place adj
mitted the evil thought which had
flashed into his mind an hour before
and vet he was Christian man; he
thought he had been trying to follow
Christ for years. Had it been all the
time in his own strength? He had al
WAYS been honest; but had his honesty
never been really tried before? He had
always been truthful; but had he never
been really tempted before to deceit?
The Bible says: I" Let him that think
eth he standeth take heed, lest he fall. D"
1.-THE devil" says wise man of old,
"does not tempt bad men, because he
has got them already; he tempts good
men, because he has not got them, but
wants to get them" In the darkness
of that night, Farmer Newton forgot
for a while these truths-forgot that
temptation met and resisted, or met
and yielded to, is the test of what man
really is.
mot for myself" he said to himself.
as he sat down to count and recount the
lines of figures in the book; mot for
myself but for Molly and the children"
1t could be done so easily by recording
profts-that-w ll!-could be done so
easily if on the morrow he faced Squire
Forbes with a promise to pay later on,
giving that book as pledge, with its
fiction, of money coming to him, when
he knew there was none to come.
And a subtle voice seemed to whisper
in his heart: You will only be doing
what hundreds of men in trade are
doing every day; you will only be Civ
ing a wrong impression. and, then,
there came to Andrew Newton a temp
tation so fierce, so powerful, that strong
man though he was, he bowed before it
as a reed before the wind. But, as he
almost yielded, he heard another whis-
per in his heart saying: IF you do
it, you will be acting a lie, Andrew;
you will be losing what is worth
more than house or land-losing
honor and TRUTH" and those two
voices kept up their strike in Andrew
NewtOn's heart, till the autumn night
gave place to morning; and nights end,
Just as temptations do, either in bright
sunrise of victory won, or d dreary
dawn. dark with clouds! How did
Farmer Newton's end? In sunrise; for
right conquered; God helped him to re-
sist, though he did not ask the Lords
help till the night had well nigh waned;
then, finding his own strength utter
weakness, hecried aloud at last: Lord,
help me;n and no sooner did he cry
than help came. For, over and over,
the experience of Gods children of old
is lived in the story of His children
nowadays. Do you remember" And
the Lord said unto Moses: Make thee a
fiery serpent and set it upon pole and
it shall come to pass that every one that
is bitten (surely that means tempted),
when he looketh upon it, shall live; and
it came to pass that if serpent had Bit
ten any one, when he beheld the SER
pent of brass he livedP" The only con-
dition of healing, the looking as the
Lord commanded; just as the only
strength to resist temptation is found in
asking the Lords help, with faith in his
promise: . Ask and We shall receive"
And so the Newton family kept
Thanksgiving that year, after all though
only such brief time does it take for
change to do its work, when the APP
pointed day came, the rooms of the old
farmhouse resounded with the voices
and laughter of children other than the
Newtons; another husband and wife sat
together in the cheerful sitting-room
and yet, spite of it all, the Newton
children said, We never had
such a good Thanksgiving before"
And at nightfall, when they had gone
to sleep, Farmer Newton and his wife
repeated the children's words; for it
was then that Andrew told Molly of the
night when temptation had assailed
him, when, because he had at first tried
to resist in his own strength, he had
almost Welded. " You see, if | had,
Molly" he said, " the old farm house
might still have been our home, but it
would have been by the loss of my honor
and my truth, and as that voice in my
heart which sounded so like yours,
though | know it was the voice of con-
science, kept repeating: Without
honor there can be no Thanksgiving
for you, your wife, or your children
and yet l rebelled sorely against that
voice." he added, till, all of a sudden,
in answer to my prayer for help, l
seemed to see how much more they
were worth than all my worldly prop
erty put together" AS she listened to
his story, again Mrs. Newton laid her
hand on her husbands knee-the hand
which he clasped in his owns saying:
@ Yes, you told me the truth, little
wife, when you sale the trouble-though,
sure enough, it has been hard. hard, l
say-looked worse in anticipation than
it proves in reality, and I've come to
see it is not what we own in house or
land, but what we are in heart, that
makes a glad Thanksgivingr-M Y.