The Children's Tabernacle

XIII.

The Twins

“CAN one object be a type of more than one thing, mamma?” asked Lucius, “for there is something which we have just spoken of as being a type of what heals our souls – I mean by that, true living faith in the Lord; and I have thought of something quite different, of which it seems also a type.”

“Are you speaking of the river Jordan?” asked Agnes, through whose mind the same thought had been passing.

“Yes, the river in which Naaman dipped seven times and was cleansed,” replied Lucius. “When the Israelites, after their long wanderings in the desert, came to that same river Jordan, there was nothing but its waters between them and the Promised Land, which mother told me to-day is a type of heaven.”

“And the waters were divided to let the people pass over quite easily and safely,” interrupted little Elsie, who never missed an opportunity of bringing out any knowledge which she had gleaned.

“Hush, Elsie! you distract my thoughts,” said her brother, “and make me forget with your prattle what I was going to say. Oh, it is this! When Christians have almost got over their long life-journey, there is only one thing at last that divides them from heaven, their Promised Land; and that thing is death. Mother, is not Jordan a type of death?”

“I believe that it is,” said his mother and Amy silently thought of those beautiful verses which allude to this type: —

“I also believe,” continued the lady, “that the dividing of the waters, which enabled the Israelites to pass over without so much as wetting their feet, is a type of the terrors of death being taken away from the Christian. Safe through the atoning sacrifice and happy in the love of his Lord, the believer can peacefully pass on to his promised land – heaven – with as little cause for fear as the Israelites had in crossing the dry bed of the Jordan.”

“Ah! the Israelites were a happy people,” said Amy, softly. “Think of their having God always to guide them by the pillar of fire and cloud, and holy Moses always to pray for them; and the beautiful promised land Canaan before them, and so many wonderful miracles worked for their good! I almost wish,” she added, “that I had lived in those days.”

“Happier are Christians in these days, my child,” said her mother, “for they know more, far more, of the Saviour’s love than was ever made known to the people of Israel. We have God’s sure Word to guide us in our wanderings through the desert of life, and we have beyond that desert a far brighter land than Canaan, even heaven, promised and purchased by Him who prepares good things for those who love Him; and we have One far greater than Moses – One who ever liveth to plead for us at the right hand of God while we fight our battles against sin. Moses was a being of flesh and blood as we are; his arms grew tired, he needed to have them held up by Aaron and Hur; but the Lord Jesus in praying for His people never grows weary, and His love never grows cold. My children, when life was most like a desert to me, when your father had crossed the Jordan and left me behind, I cannot tell you what comfort and support I found in the knowledge of that prayer and the thought of that love!”

Mrs. Temple’s voice faltered, and Amy felt the hand which she was clasping tremble. The lady now very seldom gave way to any outward burst of sorrow in the presence of her children; her manner was usually cheerful and bright; but the elder ones could well remember how great had been her grief in the first sad days of her widowhood, when their father’s useful life had been closed by a peaceful death. The young Temples all respected their mother’s sorrow, and when she paused from emotion the room was so still that the crackling of the fire and the tick of the clock were the only sounds to be heard. But Mrs. Temple was not willing to throw even a brief shadow over the cheerfulness of her little family circle, and would not now have given way to her feelings had not bodily weariness and pain made her less able to control them. Mrs. Temple very quickly recovered her usual tone, and said in her wonted cheerful manner, “My little Elsie’s eyes are growing sleepy, she can hardly manage to keep them open! My birdie had better fly up to her snug warm nest, and prepare by a good long rest for a busy to-morrow.”

“Oh, yes, to-morrow will indeed be a busy day!” exclaimed Lucius; “I mean to be up with the lark. I hope, mother,” he added, “that you won’t mind the noise of my hammer?”

Mrs. Temple with a smile assured her boy that she would not mind anything; she had not been a mother so long without becoming accustomed to noise, and she would be just as much interested in the progress of the work of her children as they themselves could be.

“You will like me to get on with my little red curtains?” said Elsie, in rather a drowsy tone.

A fond kiss was the mother’s reply; and then Mrs. Temple herself took her youngest child up to her bed-room, for the lady always liked to hear Elsie repeat her evening prayer.

About an hour afterwards all the other young Temples had wished their mother good-night, and retired to the several apartments in which they slept. The twins shared the same room. It was a very pretty one, adorned with framed pictures painted by their Aunt Theodora, and lighted by candles in elegant green glass candlesticks, which had been a birthday present to them from their mother. Both the girls were, on the night in question, more silent than usual, but from different causes.

As Agnes sat slowly brushing out her long plaits of brown hair, stopped every now and then by her cough, her thoughts dwelt much on the subject of the Israelites and their journey through the wilderness, which she was now taught to regard, not only as a historical fact, but also as a type of the life-journey of Christians.

Agnes was not by natural disposition so merry and light-hearted as her brother and sisters, and this difference between her and the rest of the family was all the more marked at the time of which I am writing, from the health of the elder twin being a good deal shaken by her illness. Agnes had naturally a peevish, passionate temper, which greatly marred her own peace of mind, and which prevented her from winning much love from her young companions. Agnes had many faults, and she knew that she had them; they were to her a trouble and burden. The young girl honestly wished to get rid of and conquer these faults, but she wanted energy and spirit to make a really good battle against her besetting sins. Agnes was too much disposed to conclude that because she was ill-tempered she must always continue ill-tempered, that there was no use in striving to subdue her evil nature. Mrs. Temple’s elder twin was wont to feel vexed and to look sullen because Lucius never cared to sit and chat with her as he would with Dora; and because Elsie never threw her arms round her neck as she would round Amy’s. It grieved Agnes to notice that no one ever called her “pet,” or seemed to take delight in having her near.

“I know that it is partly my own fault,” Agnes would often say to herself, in bitterness of soul; “but I don’t think that if I were to leave home for months, there is any one but mamma who would miss me or want me back.”

Such thoughts had only the effect of making the poor girl’s temper more cross, and her manner more peevish; it is so hard for the face to look bright and sweet when gloom is within the heart.

But better thoughts were in the mind of Agnes on that Sunday night, as she sat silently brushing her hair. Sweet and comforting was the reflection that she was not left to fight her battle alone, that there was One who would not only hear her prayer, but who would Himself pray for His feeble child – who would both watch her struggle against sin, and give her strength in that struggle. It was sweet to poor Agnes, when she afterwards knelt down to pray by the side of her bed, to feel that if she was, like an Israelite, bitten by the serpent of sin, she knew where to look for a cure; that if she was like Naaman the leper, there was the Fountain open to her, in which she could wash and be clean. Hope had sprung up in the young girl’s heart, and with hope came increase of courage. Agnes remembered that the Lord who had supplied all the need of the Israelites could supply hers also; and when temptations assailed her, as the enemy assailed that people, make her also more than conqueror through the power of His Holy Spirit.

Very, very different were the thoughts passing through the mind of Dora, though outwardly she was doing exactly the same things as were done by her twin sister. Dora was not making a brave battle against inward sin, but was, like a coward and traitor, going over to the enemy’s side. It is true that she still intended to unpick on the Monday morning all that she had sewn on the Sunday afternoon; but this resolve was made on the false principle of punishing herself for the sin she would not honestly confess, and of which she had never truly repented. This idea of self-inflicted punishment was merely Dora’s contrivance for quieting conscience, that conscience which had been very uneasy during the conversation on the subject of leprosy, the terrible type of sin. But Dora was trying, and with tolerable success, to banish from her mind all thought of that conversation. It was far more pleasant to think of the pattern of the Tabernacle curtains than of the holy things of which that Tabernacle should remind us.

A great many persons – even grown-up persons – act, alas! like Dora. They so fix their attention on outward things in religion that they quite overlook the inward meaning. Such self-deceivers are ready enough to work at what pleases the eye and amuses the fancy, and believe that they are making an offering to God; but the cleansing of the heart, the giving up sin – these are duties which they shrink from, and which they willingly put off to “a more convenient season.”

XIV.

Work

ALMOST every inmate of Cedar Lodge was up very early on Monday morning, Agnes being the only member of the family who did not rise till her usual hour. The first crow of the cock, strutting about in the yard behind the house, roused little Elsie from sleep. The child was restless and impatient in her white-curtained cot, until she was suffered to rise, dress, and set about her Turkey-red work for the model. Amy was bending over her strip of white linen almost before there was sufficient light for her to see how to thread her fine needle, for the morning was dark and rainy; indeed the sun never showed his face during the whole of that cheerless day.

Drip, drip! fell the rain, but none of the children regretted that they were not likely to go out of the house. “I don’t mind the rain one bit!” cried Elsie. “I’m glad that it rains; we’ll get on so famously with our work!”

Drip, drip! fell the rain; clink, clink! fell the hammer of Lucius; and blithe sounded his whistle, as he labored in the midst of his squares of pasteboard, strips of wood, and lengths of wire. The schoolboy set to his work with a will; and how pleasant is work when we have strength and spirit to do it, and feel that we have a worthy object before us!

No one was up earlier than Dora. She sprang from her bed before twilight had given place to day-light, so impatient was she to get to her embroidery pattern again. The noise of Dora’s rising awoke Agnes, who had not passed so good a night as her more vigorous twin had done, the sickly girl having been several times disturbed by her cough.

“What are you about, Dora?” murmured Agnes, in a drowsy and rather complaining tone; “I’m sure that it can’t be nearly time to get up.”

“Oh, I like to set about my new work quickly, and get a good piece of it done before breakfast,” was Dora’s reply.

“There will be plenty of time for work between this and Christmas; I wish that you would keep quiet and let me rest,” yawned Agnes.

“You can rest if you wish it; I won’t make a noise,” replied Dora. “But for my part I like to be up and doing. You know that:

Agnes said nothing in contradiction of the old proverb which her sister had quoted, but turned round on her pillow, and with a weary yawn composed herself again to sleep. She thought that it would be time enough to get up when Susan should call her at a quarter to seven, and she only wished that Dora had thought so also, for it fidgeted Agnes to hear her moving about in the room. But Dora had cared as little about disturbing the sleep of a sickly sister as she had about letting her mother go out in the rain. Dora admired her own energy, and looked upon Agnes almost with scorn, as being lazy, cold, and dull, with not a bit of enthusiasm in her nature.

“We should not have had a model worth looking at had the embroidery been left to her,” said Dora to herself, not without a feeling of self-complacence, as she glanced at her twin who had again sunk into slumber.

It will be remembered that Dora had resolved to unpick all the work that she had sewn upon the preceding Sunday. As soon as the little girl had hastily finished her toilet, so hastily that she forgot to button her sleeves or put on her collar, she opened her workbox, took out her work, and seated herself as close to the window as possible, in order to catch as much as she could of the dim light of dawn. It might have been expected that Dora would also have forgotten to say her prayers, but such was not the case. She remembered to kneel down by her bedside and hurry through a mere form of words, without paying the slightest attention to their meaning, thinking of her embroidery all the time. It was a satisfaction to the conscience of Dora that she had repeated a prayer, and she never stopped to ask herself whether that prayer were not in itself a sin.

Dora with needle and scissors set first to her work of unpicking. But every one who has tried such an occupation must know it to be one of the most tedious and disagreeable of tasks. It was doubly so to Dora, because she greatly admired the embroidery work which she was thus beginning to spoil.

“It is a great pity to undo this,” Dora said to herself before she had been for two minutes plying the scissors. “I won’t go on with this foolish unpicking. After all, my undoing every stitch of my pretty work would not undo the fault of my having put it in on Sunday.”

This was indeed true. A fault once committed, no human being has power to undo; but while looking to the Lord alone for forgiveness, we are bound to prove the sincerity of our regret for a fault by making what amends lie in our power. Dora took the easier, but far more dangerous way, of trying to forget the fault altogether, or to make up for it by what she considered to be her zeal in charity work. She certainly sewed very diligently on that dull morning, scarcely lifting her eyes from the pattern which she had neatly traced on the linen. She was filling up the pencilled outlines with chain-stitch, satin-stitch, and other stitches, in bright-colored silks and a brilliant thread of gold.

“Oh, look! – just look how famously Dora has been getting on with her work!” exclaimed the admiring Elsie, when, summoned by the bell at half-past eight, the children had assembled in the breakfast-room, awaiting their mother’s coming down to prayers.

“Why, you don’t mean to say that you have worked all that this morning?” said Lucius to Dora.

The question was rather an awkward one for Dora to answer – it took the girl by surprise. Dora replied to it by an evasion, which was another act of deceit. “I couldn’t begin my embroidery on Saturday night,” she said, actually congratulating herself that she had this time spoken the exact truth, as if it were not the very essence of falsehood to deceive, even though the lips may utter no lie. As Dora had not sewn on Saturday, she knew that Lucius would take it for granted that she had been so clever and industrious as to do all the work which he saw on the Monday morning, for he would certainly never suspect her of having put in one stitch upon Sunday.

“Don’t you admire Dora’s curtain, is it not lovely?” said Amy to Agnes, who was examining the work of her twin.

“Rather,” was the reply, uttered in a hesitating tone.

Agnes could not truthfully have expressed warmer admiration, for she did not think that the figures of the cherubim were at all gracefully drawn, nor did she consider that the colors were perfectly blended, there being too little scarlet in proportion to the purple and blue. But the cold praise of the twin was not unnaturally set down by her family as coming from a mean, unworthy motive.

“She is as jealous as a cat!” exclaimed Lucius; “Agnes can’t forgive poor Dora for having been trusted with the most difficult part of the work.”

The irritable temper of Agnes fired up in a moment at an observation which she felt to be unjust as well as unkind. But Agnes on that Monday morning had not merely said her prayers, she had really prayed for grace to conquer besetting sin, and now, though she could not help her cheeks flushing scarlet at the taunt of her brother, she pressed her lips closely together, and kept down the passionate reply which it was so hard, so very hard, not to utter.

“How much of your work have you done this morning, Agnes?” asked Elsie, rather proudly, showing her own three inches of seam in the Turkey-red cloth.

“I have cut out my mohair curtains,” said Agnes, who had also, though she did not choose to say so, been mending her gloves, in obedience to the known wish of her mother.

“Cut out – only cut out?” laughed Lucius, who had been doing great things in the nailing and hammering line; “if you take the matter so easily, Agnes, every one will cut you out, though you may not be made into curtains!”

Agnes was provoked at the joke, and all the more so because Dora and Elsie laughed, and Amy could not help smiling. Few persons like to be laughed at, and the peevish-tempered Agnes was certainly not one of the few. But the girl had made a resolve, not in vain trust in her own power of carrying it out, but in a spirit of humble prayer, to set a watch before her lips; and if she could not speak kindly, not to utter a single word. Agnes could not, indeed, yet manage to take a disagreeable joke with smiling good humor, but she bore it in resolute silence, she did not utter any retort.

No one admired Agnes Temple, no one praised her self-command: she was thought lazy because she had not eagerly rushed into an occupation in which she took no particular pleasure, and for which she knew that she would find plenty of time without neglecting more homely duties; she was thought jealous because she had simply spoken the truth; and yet on that day Agnes had begun a nobler work than that of embroidering in purple and gold, and her offering was a far more acceptable one than that of which Dora was proud.

XV.

Different Motives

“WHAT a busy, cheerful little party!” exclaimed Mrs. Temple, as she entered the study on the afternoon of that same day, and found all her children sitting together, sewing, cutting, gilding, and chatting merrily as they worked. “You remind me of the busy, happy scene outside Jerusalem, beheld every year when the Feast of Tabernacles was kept.”

“What was the Feast of Tabernacles, mamma?” inquired Amy. Lucius would have asked the same question, but he dared not speak at that moment lest his breath should blow away the sheet of gold-leaf with which he was trying to cover his wires.

“The Feast of Tabernacles was a yearly festival held by the Israelites in remembrance of the time spent by their fathers in tabernacles or tents in the desert,” replied the lady. “This was the most cheerful of all the feasts, and was kept in a remarkable manner. The people made booths for themselves of the branches of palm, willow, and other trees, and for seven days lived in these booths. There were processions, glad hosannas, and sounds of singing and mirth. The people enjoyed their out-of-door life, and blessed the Lord for His goodness in guiding the Israelites through the wilderness to the good land in which their children now dwelt.”