Southern Christian Advocate

THE POCKET-BOOK.

"Tom Jackson says he does not believe there is a God: he says he never saw him. And I don't know as I believe: I never saw him," said John Clary, just come in from out-doors, and, I suppose, from the society of Tom Jackson.

"I do," replied his mother; and she said nothing more.

A week or two after this, John burst into the kitchen, with Tom Jackson at his heels. "O see, mother," he cried, "what I have found—such a handsome pocket-book!"

"Where did you find it?" asked his mother.

"In Pine Grove. Now, whom do you suppose it belongs to?"

"Did it not grow there?" said his mother.

"Grow there!" exclaimed John, lifting up his eyebrows with great surprise. "A pocket-book grow in the woods! Who ever heard of such a thing? It could not be."

"Why not?" she asked.

"Why not!" replied the boy: "the pocket-book was made on purpose. Look here!" opening it; "here is a place for the bank bills; and here is a little out-of-the-way spot, with a snug fastening, for gold dollars, and a memorandum book, and a pencil-case, and such a beautiful gold pencil. Look, mother—with a pen and lead both. It was made for a man to use."

"Some contrivances here, certainly," said his mother, putting down her work, and taking it in her hands for examination. "It is one of the most useful pocket-books I ever saw. If it did not grow there, perhaps it made itself."

Both boys stared at her more and more.

"Why, mother, you talk foolish," said John, with a puzzled and sober air. "There must have been a man with a mind to have made this."

"A man that knew how—a pretty neat workman," added Tom Jackson.

"How do you know? You never saw him," said Mrs. Clary.

"No, but I've seen his work; and that's enough to convince me. I am just as certain that somebody made it as if I saw him."

"You are!" said Mrs. Clary: "how so?"

"Why, mother," said John, very much in earnest, "you see the pocket-book had to be planned to answer a certain purpose. Now, it must have had a planner: that's the long and short of it; and I know it just as well as if I saw it planned and done. It's foolish to think otherwise."

"Now," said his mother, "it is just as foolish, when you see the wonderful contrivance of the beings around you, and the design with which they are put together, for you to doubt or to deny that there is a God who made them. Who planned your eyes to see with, your ears to hear with? Can eyes make themselves? Can a man make a bird? Who created the sun, and planned the day and night? Did your parents plan your fingers, and make them grow? You know perfectly well that a great Being thought beforehand, designed, and contrived the eye, and the ear, and the sun, and your fingers—all things and all beings around you. And that great Being is God the eternal Mind, the great Maker of us all."