Christian Books

CHAPTER I. "EMILY DID IT." Among my earliest recollections these three words have a place, coming to my ears as the presages of a reprimand. I had made a frantic effort to lift my baby-brother from his cradle, and had succeeded only in upsetting baby, pillows and all, waking my mother from her little nap, while brother Hal stood by and shouted, "Emily did it." I was only five years of... more...

THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS In the Similitude of a Dream {10} As I walked through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a Den, and I laid me down in that place to sleep: and, as I slept, I dreamed a dream. I dreamed, and behold, I saw a man clothed with rags, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own house, a book in his hand, and a great burden upon his... more...

CHAPTER I Edgewood, like all the other villages along the banks of the Saco, is full of sunny slopes and leafy hollows.  There are little, rounded, green-clad hillocks that might, like their scriptural sisters, “skip with joy,” and there are grand, rocky hills tufted with gaunt pine trees—these leading the eye to the splendid heights of a neighbour State, where snow-crowned peaks tower in the... more...

THE "SICKLE AND SHEAF." Ten years ago, business required me to pass a day in Cedarville. It was late in the afternoon when the stage set me down at the "Sickle and Sheaf," a new tavern, just opened by a new landlord, in a new house, built with the special end of providing "accommodations for man and beast." As I stepped from the dusty old vehicle in which I had been jolted along... more...

[Transcriber's Notes] Here are the definitions of some unfamiliar (to me) terms. antediluvianPerson who lived before the Biblical Flood. Very old or old-fashioned.cavilRaise irritating and trivial objections; find fault unnecessarily.coniesRabbitsChromo (chromolithograph)Colored printlivery (clothing)Distinctive uniform.taresWeedy plants of the genus Vicia, especially the common vetch. Several... more...

THE SIEUR LOUIS DE CONTE To his Great-Great-Grand Nephews and Nieces This is the year 1492. I am eighty-two years of age. The things I am going to tell you are things which I saw myself as a child and as a youth. In all the tales and songs and histories of Joan of Arc, which you and the rest of the world read and sing and study in the books wrought in the late invented art of printing, mention is made... more...

Evening Prayer. "Our Father." The mother's voice was low and tender, and solemn. "Our Father." On two sweet voices the tones were borne upward. It was the innocence of reverent children that gave them utterance. "Who art in heaven." "Who art in heaven," repeated the children, one with her eyes bent meekly down, and the other looking upward, as if she would penetrate... more...

CHAPTER I. Doubtless some of our readers are acquainted with the noble "coast road" that skirts round the north-eastern corner of Ireland, extending, it might almost be said, from Belfast to Londonderry. The characteristic features of this noble esplanade (for such it is) are chiefly to be seen between the little town of Larne, where the railway ends, and Cushendall. Throughout this drive of... more...

CHAPTER I. Breaking the News. "Mamma, what was that I heard papa saying to you this morning about his lawsuit?" "I cannot tell you just now. Ellen, pick up that shawl and spread it over me." "Mamma! are you cold in this warm room?" "A little, there, that will do. Now, my daughter, let me be quiet a while don't disturb me." There was no one else in the room. Driven... more...

CHAPTER I: "THE RELIGION OF NUMA" [3] As, in the triumph of Christianity, the old religion lingered latest in the country, and died out at last as but paganism—the religion of the villagers, before the advance of the Christian Church; so, in an earlier century, it was in places remote from town-life that the older and purer forms of paganism itself had survived the longest. While, in Rome,... more...