CHURCH NOTES.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 16 April 1901, Page 4

CHURCH NOTES.

[By Amicus.]

Last Sunday, the Sunday School anniversary services were held in connection with the Wcsleyan Church. The morning and afternoon services were well attended, and conducted by the Kov. Mr Oxbrow. The evening service was largely attended, and the singing of the scholars was well rendered. The Eev. Mr Gray preached a very earnest sermon to the young people selecting as his subject the youthful Samuel, he drew some practical lessons as to God's dealings with the young. The accusation of Eli when he said Hannah was drunk because she did not conform to usual customs in the Temple, was commented upon as an example to teach others not to bo harsh in their judgment of one another. The mothers in the congregation would feel specially helped to know of the Divine watchfulness and interest taken in their children. God is interested in men at the earliest period of their existence, and childhood was a season specially used hy God as a means to bless others. God ■is always sending messages by little children. The address was simple, so that every child could understand, and a fitting discourse'for the occasion. The minister and teachers of the School should feel gratifying at the success of the services on Sunday. The practise followed in some churches of having the selection of hymns to the organist might have led a few Sundays ago to a damaging misconception. At the church in question it happened, by some strange foursight, that' Sun of my Soul ' was placed on the list for the morning service. The officiating minister hai not been at the pains to examine tho list beforehand, but simply took the hymns as they oarne. The place of this one was just before the sermon. Its anticipation of ' the soft dews of kindly sleep ' and its prayer " Come near and bless us when we wake " did not disconcert the preacher but caused some amusement among the congregation , whose sense of the ludicrous enabled them to detect a possible interpretation of these verses. In these days of extreme specialism it is refreshing to come across evidences that the all-round man is not extinct. In an American University city a local paper contained the following advortisemen t : Eev. L. Goldstein ; Private lessons in Hebrew and German at reasonable rates. Also picture, frames, umbrellas covered, and general repairing neatly done.

Nothing is so necessary among young men of our day as attention to self-culture. Our space is too limited to comment upon the subject here, but Professor Blackie puts the matter in a clear concise manner:—"Never whip your bran. All high pressure is dangerous. Study to think as quietly and as easily as you breathe. Never force yourself to learn what you have no talent for. Knowledge without love will remain a lifeless manufacture, not a living growth. Be content to bo ignorant of many things, that you may know one thing well, and that the thing which God especially ondeavoured you to know. It requires fiire to fuse the material of thinking no less than to melt tho iron at the foundry, But remember this, however strong you may be physically to strike a blow, and however sharp iatcl-

leclually to recognise a fact and discern a difference, your success in the game of life depends on the serious culture which you give to the third formative force in human character, your moral nature, and --if 'h>- ru'h'f'il supremacy of rhis pl^nr - "* Vl L'X i.i.SSlUii lo fi/UuU the right simple word, Love, On this aii prophets, poets, and philosophers arc agreed.