into the
atmosphere.

Now just the same as men load grain and fruit and other things into the
cars to ship them to some distant place, so God loads these vapors into
the atmosphere or into the clouds. When the clouds are all loaded with
vapor, or that which is to descend upon the earth in the form of rain,
God sends the winds, and these winds blow the clouds from over the ocean
far inward over the land until they come to the place where God wants
to pour them out in showers and rain, and in snow and blessing.

[Illustration: Clouds and Rain.]

But now, you will see that there is another difficulty. When all this
vast quantity of water is held in the clouds, a mile or two above the
earth, if it were to be poured out, it would come with such force upon
the earth that it would destroy every living thing. Now, as God used the
warmth from the sun as His agent to lift the water into the clouds, so
also, when He desires to unload the clouds, to pour the rain upon the
earth, He causes the warm air which carries the water to be blown upon
by the colder air which floats above it, and as the heat lifted the
water, so the cold causes it to descend; and immediately it begins to
form as clouds, one particle or atom of moisture touches another, and
the two form the larger atom, and these again unite with others, until
finally a drop is formed, and it begins to descend and comes down in
gentle showers upon the earth as though it were sifted through a very
fine sieve. These small drops fall upon the earth so gently as not even
to bruise the leaf of the tenderest flower or the tenderest insect that
walks upon the earth.

Possibly some children may not fully understand, but the older ones will
get some idea of the vast quantity of water which God pours upon the
earth, when they are reminded that all the water that flows in the
rivers has been let down from the clouds. God is daily pumping up from
the ocean and other bodies of water rivers as vast as the combined
waters of the Mississippi, Missouri, Susquehanna, the Hudson, and every
creek and streamlet and river that flows, not only on this continent,
but in all the world. And God is doing this constantly by His own
infinite wisdom and infinite might. The machinery with which men pump
the water from the river for the supply of a single city wears out; but
these great engines with which God is constantly keeping the earth
supplied with water for man and beast, for tree and flower, for