TRY IT.



I HAVE just been reading about a little girl who thought it could not be that it was more blessed to give than to receive.

She said "How can that be, mother? I am always so pleased when you give me anything. I don't think it would make me as happy to give away."

"Try it," said her mother. "I know you give money to the poor, but then all your wants are supplied; there is but little self-denial in that. But if you possess any article you value very much, and, seeing another person who really needs it more than you, deny yourself, and give it up, then you will taste the blessedness of giving, and feel much happier in parting with your treasure than you did in receiving it."

Amy was but a little girl; so this appeared a difficult lesson; but as it was mother who spoke, she thought it must be true.

The next day, as Amy was going to school, she overtook one of her schoolmates. It was a bitter cold morning, and as the keen, frosty air brought the color into Amy's cheeks, and made her eyes sparkle, she said, 

"Oh! What a nice morning." The little girl at her side said, "Oh! But I am so cold." Amy, for the first time, noticed how blue and purple her hands looked, and how thinly clothed she was, and ill-protected from the cold wind.

Amy was not a hard-hearted child, but thoughtless. She had not noticed how Emma (for that was the little girl's name) tried in vain to make her small shawl shield her from the cold, piercing wind; nor that her hands had no covering, and were almost frozen. Protected herself by cloak, furs, mittens, and hood, she did not feel the wind as it swept past them with its icy breath.

Amy thought, I will give her my mittens, and took them off. They were a new pair her grandmother had knit for her, of a bright scarlet color, and as Amy looked at them, she thought, Oh! How pretty they are. I can't give them away. I wish she had some so I could keep them. Amy knew Emma needed them more than she did, and as she thought of what her mother said, she felt ashamed that she had hesitated a moment.

"Here, Emma," she said, "take my mittens, I do not need them and a muff too," and she handed them to Emma. She took them and put them on; and as Amy saw how delighted she was, and heard her, "Thank you, Amy, they are so soft and warm," she felt that what her mother had said was true.

When Amy returned home at night, she told her mother what she had done, and added, 

"Oh! Mother, I am so glad I gave her my mittens, I have tried it, and I know it is more blessed to give than to receive." And her smiling, happy face was evidence that she felt what she said.  Here is a lesson for you, dear reader. Try for yourself. Do not think you know until you do try. How much do you sacrifice to make others happy? Seek to make others happy, and in so doing, you will be happy yourself. Try it.





JENNIE MERRIAM.


Battle Creek, Michigan