giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the naked, or visiting the
sick and in prison--never done anything of set purpose, in fact. If
people were hungry, it was mostly their own fault, and to feed them
would be to encourage idleness and vice. All the other items in the
catalogue were as easily disposed of; and so the literal duties
involved might have been set forth in the most impassioned
eloquence, Sabbath after Sabbath, without much disturbing the fine
equipose of Mr. Braxton. Alas for his peace of mind!--the preacher
of truth had gone past the dead letter, and revealed its spirit and
its life. Suddenly he felt himself removed, as it were, to an almost
impossible distance from the heaven into which, as he had
complacently flattered himself, he should enter by the door of mere
ritual observances, when the sad hour came for giving up the
delightful things of this pleasant world. No wonder that Mr. Braxton
was disturbed--no wonder that, in his first convictions touching
those more interior truths, which made visible the sandy foundations
whereon he was building his eternal hopes, he should regard the
application of doctrine as personal and even literal.

It was not so easy a thing to set aside the duty of ministering to
the hungry, sick, and naked human souls around him, thousands of
whom, for lack of spiritual nourishment, medicine and clothing, were
in danger of perishing eternally. And the preacher in dwelling upon
this great duty of all Christian men and women, had used emphatic
language.

"I give you," he said, "God's judgment of the case--not my own.
'Inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these, ye did it
not unto me. And these shall go away;' where? 'To everlasting
punishment!' Who shall go thus, in the last day, from this