By
E. A. HENRY, D.D.
_Pastor, Deer Park Presbyterian Church, Toronto_
Introduction by
CHARLES W. GORDON, D.D., LL.D.
(_Ralph Connor_)
Thomas Allen
366-378 ADELAIDE STREET, WEST
TORONTO
Copyright, 1922, by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY
_To the
Girls and Boys of My Ministry_
*Preface*
The following short sermonettes or talks to girls and boys were given as
the children's portion at the Sunday morning services.
As a child at church, the author remembers sitting with pins and needles
in his feet, which were somewhere between heaven and earth, while he
wondered what the preacher was talking about. He determined if the job
was ever his, not to neglect the little people.
These are some of his attempts to interest them, and are given out in
print because some seemed to think them worth preserving.
If they are, and will help anybody, the author will be content and
happy. It has been suggested that the chapters might be used as bedtime
stories.
There are some little gems used which are anonymous or whose authors are
unknown. They were used in the addresses and are passed on with
apologies for not being able to acknowledge authorship.
E.A.H.
_Toronto_.
*Introduction*
_Winnipeg, 7th July, 1922._
REV. E. A. HENRY, D.D.,
Deer Park Presbyterian Church,
Toronto, Ont.
_My dear Henry_:
I have just looked into your "Little Foxes," and I am delighted to be
able to say, with a clear conscience, that you have done a fine bit of
work. The book is full of quaint philosophy, and it has the heart touch,
too, that will give it wings.
It was a happy inspiration that made you use the vernacular of every-day
boy and girl speech without descending to the vulgarity that so often
mars the attempt to use vernacular English. The vernacular lends
reality to your thought.
Then, too, I wish to congratulate you upon your admirable selection of
illustration. Illustration in literature is a very fine art, and you
have got the touch in your "Little Foxes." After all, that is the
secret of interesting speech--the power of concreting ideas. A
Congregation that will drowse or gape over the most logical argument
will suddenly wake to alert attention in response to the phrases, "Once
on a time," "There was once a boy," "I knew a man."
You have done a real service to the children, but you have also done a
real service to Preachers. For many a Preacher who has been forced to
confess himself a failure in the art of interesting children in sermons
(And how terrible a failure is that!), after reading "Little Foxes,"
will take new heart because of the suggestions your book will bring.
I venture to say that hosts of people, especially little people and
those who think little people worth while, will come to know and love
Dr. Henry because of his "Little Foxes."
And so may "Little Foxes" run far and fast.
Yours very truly,
[Illustration: Signature of Charles W. Gordon (Ralph Connor)]
*Contents*
I. Little Things
II. "It's No Matter"
III. "I Don't Care"
IV. Temper
V. Selfishness
VI. Impurity
VII. "I Can't"
VIII. "I Forgot"
IX. "By-and-By"
X. Boldness
XI. Revenge
XII. Untruthfulness
XIII. "I Can't Be Bothered!"
XIV. Thanklessness
XV. Cruelty
XVI. Cowardliness
XVII. Dishonesty
XVIII. "Limpy Late"
XIX. "Sissy Slow"
XX. Shame
XXI. "A Battered Warship"
XXII. Boucher, the French-Canadian Voyageur
XXIII. One By One
XXIV. What Makes a Good Soldier?
XXV. The Soldier's Outfit--Shoes
XXVI. The Soldier's Outfit--The Rifle
XXVII. The Soldier's Outfit--The Belt And Puttee
XXVIII. The Soldier's Outfit--The Kit Bag
XXIX. The Soldier's Outfit--The Uniform
XXX. "Q" and "S" Grocery
XXXI. Betsy
XXXII. A Life Degree
*I*
*LITTLE THINGS*
In the second chapter of the Song of Songs and in the fifteenth verse
you may read these words: "Take me the little foxes that spoil the
vines."
How often you hear people say, "Oh, well, it's so little! What
difference will such a little thing make?" And yet--
Every girl and boy knows that the mighty ocean is made up of tiny drops.
The great Niagara is, too. Its noise is simply the small patter of
drops multiplied into a thunder.
The little drops are made of molecules, which though Science gives them
a big name, are so small you cannot see them.
A great castle or a mighty palace is built up of small bricks and stones
and pieces of wood and iron, put together with small pegs and pins.
The lovely windows are made of panes of glass; each pane being sand
grains heated and fused.
The great Western harvests that cover the plains with gold, and feed the
world, come from little grains of seed wheat, any one of which could be
lost and never missed. But if all the little seeds were lost, there
would be no harvest.
These wonderful bodies of ours, Science says, are built up of cells that
are only known through the microscope.
We are now told that the matter that makes our bodies and the great
world is a centre of the tiniest bits of revolving force called electric
ions, which nobody has ever seen. A pin-head is not very big, but it
has a whole system of these revolving little things as wonderful as the
way in which the planets roll round the sun.
Across the continent stretches a great road of iron called the C.P.R. or
the National R.R., and both never could have been but for littles.
The iron comes from ore in the mines, picked out with small picks, one
pick at a time. The ties on which the rails rest are trees that once
were little seeds. The gravel of the road bed is made of heaps of sand,
shovelled with hand shovels, one shovel at a time.
The engine strength lies in pins that couple, and joints that unite all
its wonderful parts. When the fire is started that makes the steam, the
fireman builds it with small sticks and pieces of wood and spends his
time shovelling little coals out of the tender.
When the train is loaded, it has a mighty weight; but each car was
filled with bundles one at a time. The passenger coaches fill up one by
one, with persons who travel with a little piece of paper called a
ticket, that gives them right of way.
Little, you say! Why, there is nothing real that is little! It only
looks little on the surface. Think more deeply and you will see how big
all real things are!
So of your character and mine.
A big man is one who has big ideas and plans, and these can never be
weighed or measured.
Big events are due to little long continued acts and thoughts, each of
which looks small; but taken together make the world go round.
So little kind words, gentle deeds, unselfish acts, make life circles
radiant and happy. If we offer nothing because what we have seems
small, a lot of happiness is lost to the world.
So, too, little white lies make big black spots in character.
Little bursts of temper start fires that end in murder.
Little wrong words and little nasty deeds make wrong and nasty people.
Dear girls and boys, we are all bundles of habits, good and bad, and
they grow from the smallest acts.
Just keep on doing a little deed day by day, and soon you cannot stop,
for you have the habit.
A boy puckered his face a little each morning, and now he has a wrinkle
he cannot iron out.
A girl puckered her life with an inside squint, and now she has a squint
habit in her soul.
For the next few pages we will study some of the little things we need
to be careful of.
The verse we have for a motto calls them "little foxes that spoil the
vines."
You have all seen a beautiful garden, and can imagine what it would
become if little sharp-toothed foxes got inside the fence and bit away
leaves and stems and buds. There would soon be no garden.
The names and nature of some of these little foxes appear in the
following chapters.
*II*
*"IT'S NO MATTER"*
When a girl or boy is slovenly, with tously head and dirty hands; or
washes the face and forgets the ears; or leaves a high water mark around
the neck, and mother makes a remark on the way things look to her, the
girl or boy says, "Oh, it's no matter." And first thing they know, a
fox has bitten off a green leaf in their garden.
Or John makes a mistake and the teacher corrects it, and John says, "Oh,
it's no matter."
Foolish John!
Say, boy, did you know an architect once made plans for a great building
and when he went to work it out, nothing fitted, because away back in
the beginning he made a mistake of _one inch_ with his ruler, and it put
the whole thing out of joint!
Or Mary, her mother's pride, did not put into her work quite enough
time. She fooled over it, and played with it--and when the examination
results came out, she failed. And when she saw her mother's sad face,
she tried to comfort her by saying, "Oh, it's no matter!"
It seems so dreadful to see a man who has grown up to think things do
not matter. His looks--"Oh, well, what's the odds how I look?"
Of course, it is only when he is married or else settled into a grouchy
old bachelor he says this. If he is still looking forward--Huh! That
makes a difference!
Some young fellows once were lounging about the street corner, when one
of them saw a bright young girl coming down the street, and say! he went
away so fast his companions wondered what had happened. Well, he did
not want her to see him, for he felt it would matter very much for him
if she saw his careless street life.
Or his clothes.--Sometimes you can almost tell what he had for dinner by
the spots on his vest; and the whole thing started a long time earlier,
when as a little boy he said, "It's no matter!"
And it is just the same with the girl. She grows up with a faded
character and lopsided gait, and looks as though what she wore had been
thrown at her with a pitchfork and sort of lodged on her person.
Sometimes she is real clever and knows a lot, but oh, the pity! She did
not think her appearance mattered, and there she is, so that people look
at her when she passes, and laugh.
It is very much worse, though, to let that spirit get past your body and
your clothes and your outer habits, into the inside of you.
For then, when people see you doing things and saying things you should
not,--things that make people look at you--the old habit, started when
you were a girl or boy, comes out, and you think it does not matter.
But it does.
It matters whether you are loving or unloving. It matters whether you
are kind or ugly in temper. It matters whether you are at the foot of
the class or its head. It matters whether you are neat or just a
disorderly heap. It matters whether you are a sunbeam or a shadow. It
matters whether you are growing up straight or with a lean.
It makes a big difference.
Of course it matters, silly child!
If it didn't matter, God would never have given us so many lessons in
nature and history and biography.