The farmer and mechanic., 1915-10-26

IA iII-sV.
(By WILLIAM T. ELLIS.)
rhe new is ever wrapped up in the
oi. and the old repeats itself in the
Nv Today is yesterday come again
10 life. Because they mirror the es-
sential realities Of our own dav.
these stories of Bible times are close
Is studied by the Sunday School mill
itans week by week. The intrinsic |
facts Of the case-the who's who |
among the kings and counsellors and |
warriors-are not of great impor-
tance. 1t is poor pedagogy and bare !
piety that would require the mem |
0rizing Of all the names Of the Jew
ish rulers. Even the tangle of izin-s
and queens who pass before us in the
present lesson cannot claim very
much attention.
forth as types, and of eternally con-
temporaneous interest. The first is
woman, Jehosheba. wife Of the
high priest, who saved the boy Joash,
who became king, from massacre:
and the other is the baby prince hlr.,-
self All others are but background
for our present purpose.
A Bad Family Line.
Like many another youth of our
own day, whom the scientists would
foredoom to failure, because his he
redity is bad, Joash came from stock
which. in the immediate past, was
mighty poor. His grandmother was
the wicked queen rAthaliah, daughter
Of the infamous Jezebel wife of
Ahab. the king who gave Elijah so
much trouble.
bers of the royal family whom she
could find, that she herself nigh. Slt
supreme upon the throne of Judah
We shrink from teaching the stony
of the Athaliahs and JezebeIs to
youth, but they need to know, in
preparation for life, that there are
such women in the world. More than
he supposed all women were as "ood
as his mother Thank God, most
of them are. But to see life whole
and see it true" we have to reckon
with the bad as we'll as with the good.
1t does not do to leave the Ahabs and
Jehoshaphats and Jezebels and Ath-
aliahS out OF our reckoning.
few weeks ago some teachers Of
this lesson might have said, in con-
temptation of the bloOdthirstiness and
massacres of this period. that the
world has outgrown such cruelties;
they belonged to the dark ages. Now
while we write, the soil of the Bible
blood Of hundreds of thousands OF
Christian Armenians, slain by the
Moslems. This is the worst persecu
tion in the history Of the Christian
Church. The enlightened" youns
Turk leaders, educated in Berlin anc
Paris, are sponsors for atrocities
worse than any of the bloody deed
of Abdul Hamid's reign. We hear o
Turkish women shooting down Chris
tians from sheer blood-lust and o
shepherds on the plains shooting an.
Armenians who escaped. Evidently
takes something more than the mer
passage of years to deliver the hu
man rase from cruelty and Savagery
Good Branches of Bad Tree.
There is another woman in tn
story besides Athaliah. Her ow
daughter, Jehosheba, was as good a
her mother was bad. Like her littl
nephew, JoaSh, she seemed to reveI
TO her nobler forebears-Ruth an
David and Solomon-for her quail
ties. She became the wife of Jehoi
ada. the high priest, and had no pal
in the bloody politics of the palace.
If we wonder at the badness {
some women, what shall we sa
about the goodness of others, WIZ
with every temptation, by blood an
op only the qualities OF purlt
strength and sweetness? Only tn
angels know the struggle that man
girls and women, especially out
the workaday world, have to retail
their noblest womanhoOd. They al
the saviours of society. In such fasi
ion, Jehosheba stood, in terrlD
time. for the divine ideals OF justi<
and mercy.
Her way of serving God and h.
country was by taking care of bal
boy. We rejoice in all the new o.
portunities for noble self-expressl6
open to women but. after all. h
greatest work is the training OF
child. If ever she turns aside fro
that, it will be a black day for n
and for the race. When the carnlv
of cruelty was at it's height, and At
allah was Staying all who had roy
blood in their veins, Jehosheba su
reptitiously got possession OF e
baby prince Joash, only one year OF
The eternal mother instinct In n
heart warmed to the helpless 1nfal