I am sorry you missed his sermon on Sunday--it
was great. He talked about Lincoln, and used a text I gave him some time
ago."
"What was it?"
"It is in Exodus: 'Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians and how I
bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself.'"
John's ready imagination began for a silent moment to play with the
words. "How did he use it, Leila?"
"Oh, he told the preceding story briefly, and then his great seeking eyes
wandered a little and he said, 'Think how the uplift of God's eagles'
wings enlarged their horizon!' Then he seemed to me to have the idea that
they might not comprehend, so he made one of those eloquent pauses and
went on to say, 'You can all, like Lincoln, rise as he rose from the
lesser things of a hard life to see more widely and more surely the
duties of life. The eagle-wings of God's uplifting power are for you,
for me, for all of us.' He made them understand."
"I am sorry I missed it. I spent the Sunday morning with my engineer."
"Aren't you getting wet, John?"
"No. How did he end?"
"What I did not like was the dwelling on Lincoln's melancholy, and the
effort it must have cost him--at times. It seemed to me, John, as if he
was preaching to himself. I wonder if clergymen often preach to
themselves.
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