The Central Presbyterian

All Those Virgins Arose and Trimmed their Lamps.

With one exception, this Parable of the Virgins has perhaps more graphic effect than any other of those spoken by our Lord.—That one, the peerless and supreme among Parables,—the "Pearl of Parables," Hamilton calls it—is, of course, the Prodigal Son. In that and in this, almost every sentence is a picture.

You see the ten fair young maidens, chosen out of all the village to do honor to the Bride by their watching for and welcoming the Bridegroom; no doubt rejoicing in being chosen, and fully purposed to show their gratitude for the distinction by their zeal. You see them gathering at the appointed place, see their greeting and hear their innocent mirth as they while away the hours of waiting. But the time is long, the young eyes grow weary with watching, the chat and the laughter dies out. One after another they all fall asleep, depending on the watchman's call to arouse them in time. We can hardly suppose the Lord would have called the first five Virgins "wise," if their sleeping involved any unfaithfulness on their part, or stood as the symbol of neglect, or sin on our part. Plainly, it stands for that necessary inability to realise the coming of the Lord before he comes, and the natural and proper attendance of the mind upon its temporal duties.

But now we see lights glancing under the trees, and hear the merry shouts of the bridegroom's companions as they draw near. The watchman cries aloud—"Behold, the bridegroom cometh! go ye out to meet him!" And they spring up from their sleep; the lamps of the foolish are gone out, even the lamps of the wise burn low. They all, wise and foolish try to brighten them; and the wise having taken oil in their vessels with their lamps, succeed; while the foolish fail and are rightly excluded from the marriage feast."

Now while I read and pondered these things, the question rose up in my heart.—"If those virgins had been aroused by the watchman at any previous time, and had been warned that the bridegroom might come very suddenly, should we not have seen the difference between the wise and the foolish? Would not the wise have been thankful for the call, and have taken that opportunity to trim their lamps, and be ready? And would not the foolish, on learning that it was only a caution and not a final summons, have shown their folly— the amiable, by ridiculing the watchman, and the unamiable, by railing at him?

But my errand to-day is to the wiser part, and I remind them of Christ's command, in the parallel passage in Luke—Let your lights be burning. Let every call of the watchman arouse your diligence and increase your care.

I suppose there has never been a time of greater "slumber" (in the sense of the parable) than there is now; a thousand things, not sinful in themselves, a dangerous absorbing influence of the temptations of the day.—And, in a degree, God is proportionately multiplying His warnings—both the gentle and the severe.

That which has especially awakened these thoughts in my mind has been the tokens of His mercy, here as well as elsewhere. From many parts of the land come tidings of good. In one school in South Carolina we have news of fourteen young hearts given to the Lord, and the work advancing. Every week, the South-Western gathers a cluster of cheering facts of this sort. And we know that drops of blessing are falling in this city now; to be, or not to be, the prelude of a mighty flood?

Could there be a kinder—and at the same time a more solemn—challenge to us, than this? What mischief one untrimmed lamp may do! One careless, disobedient, worldly Christian—one lighthouse unlighted—what wrecks it may make!—S. W. Presbyterian.