condary lights of
the world must keep their satellites in their orbits, and bring back to
their spheres the stars that fall or lose their way, by kindred
influences. The mightiest and divinest power in the universe is
LOVE.

5. And now comes a lesson to the young thinkers. Suppose your elder
brethren should treat you unkindly; suppose they should discourage your
search after truth, and require you to conform your creed to their own
ideas, and your way of speaking to their own old style of expression;
suppose that they should look with suspicion on your endeavors to come
nearer to the truth, and, whenever you give utterance to a thought or an
expression at variance with their own, should denounce you as heretics,
and threaten you with excommunication, what should you do?

We answer, go quietly on in the fear of the Lord. Make no complaint, but
prepare yourselves for expulsion. When expelled, go quietly to some
Church that can tolerate your freedom, and work there in peace as the
servants of God. Cherish no resentment. Commit your cause to God, and,
laboring to do His will, leave Him to choose your lot.

Even the trials that come from the ignorance or wickedness of men, are
of God's appointment. We are taught that it was by God's ordination
that Judas betrayed Christ; that God employed the wickedness of the
traitor for the accomplishment of His great designs. David said,
referring to Shimei, "Let him curse, for God hath commanded him." God
employed the wickedness of Shimei, to try and punish David. Wesley has
embodied the sentiment in one of his hymns, as follows:

"Lord, I adore Thy gracious will;
Through every instrument of ill
My Father's goodness see:
Accept the complicated wrong
Of Shimei's hand, and Shimei's tongue,
As kind rebukes from Thee."

Joseph said, God had sent him down to Egypt to save many souls alive.
His wicked brethren were only the instruments of his banishment. _They_
meant it for _evil_, _God_ turned it to _good_. And so in your case: God
may be using the ignorance or the wickedness of your persecutors to
separate you from a body for which you are not fitted, and to place you
in one where you will be more useful and more happy. When we do right,
God will make the errors, and even the sins of our enemies, work for our
good.

6. Another lesson which I have thoroughly learnt is, that though men may
become unbelievers through other causes than vice, they cannot