“But I think we should be just as good, if he did not make us feel bad and cry.”

“That is your mistake.  Do you think you would be just as good a child, if your parents always humored you, and gave you every plaything you asked for?  Are you quite sure that you would now mind your father and mother as well, if you had always been allowed to have your own way?”

“But you don’t make me sick, mother.”

“True.  We correct you in another way.  But we sometimes give you pain, and make you cry.  Did you ever think, when your father reproved you and punished you, that it was because he did not love you?”

“Oh, no, mother.”

“You can see how your father can be kind and affectionate, and still give you pain?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then cannot you see how God may disappoint his children, and even make them unhappy for a time, and love them tenderly, too?”

“Oh, mother, I see it all now!  I wonder I never thought of this before!  Well, the whooping-cough is not so bad, after all.  I’ve learned something by it, at any rate.”

“Yes, and it may be worth a great deal more to you than the ‘show’ would have been.”

THE OLD MAN AT THE COTTAGE DOOR.

Come, faint old man! and sit awhile
Beside our cottage door;
A cup of water from the spring,
A loaf to bless the poor,
We give with cheerful hearts, for God
Hath given us of his store.

Too feeble, thou, for daily toil,
Too weak to earn thy bread—­
For th’ weight of many, many years,
Lies heavy on thy head—­
A wanderer, want, thy weary feet,
Hath to our cottage led.

  Come rest awhile.  ’Twill not be long,
    Ere thy faint head shall know
  A deeper, calmer, better rest,
    Than cometh here below;
  When He, who loveth every one,
    Shall call thee hence to go.

  God bless thee in thy wanderings! 
    Wherever they may be,
  And make the ears of every one
    Attentive to thy plea;
  A double blessing will be theirs,
    Who kindly turn to thee.

STORY OF A STOLEN PEN.  WRITTEN BY ITSELF.

My friend, Theodore Thinker, who is an odd sort of a genius, and frequently takes up things after a singular fashion, has put into my hands a paper with this caption:  “Story of a Stolen Pen, written by itself.”  It seems, from a somewhat lengthy introduction—­too lengthy to be here quoted—­that the pen once belonged to some editor or another; and as Theodore has something to do with editorial matters himself, I should not wonder if he is the one.  Some curious readers may be disposed to inquire how the pen was made to talk so fluently, and perhaps some others would like to know how it was found in the first place.  I can’t answer these reasonable inquiries.  The manuscript is entirely silent on both points.  I have my conjectures in relation to the thing—­pretty strong conjectures, too.  I guess the whole story is a fable, to tell the truth.  But never mind.  There is a great deal of sense in fables sometimes; and who knows but there may be some in this?  At all events, we must have