What They Said

“Moreover, the farmer is in a very special sense made to see his dependence upon God from season to season. He has never done; his labour is never ending, still beginning; and his hopes are never all fulfilled. From the time he sows the seed to the day when he sees the corn in the ear he is every hour dependent upon the Lord for sunshine and shower; and even when the grain is ready for the garner a stretch of rainy weather will take his harvest from him and leave him mourning at the last. He can never count his profits till he has them in his pocket, and hardly then. This manifest, absolute, and daily dependence should help the good farmer to learn the lesson of faith right thoroughly. He must look up, for where else can he look? He must leave his business in the Lord’s hands, for who else can be his helper? Faith which is daily tried, and tried all the day long, has a fair opportunity of becoming unusually strong, and hence our agricultural Christians ought to be the strongest believers in the land. They have not of late been indulged with much temporal prosperity, but our hope is that a succession of adversities may have driven them to set less store by the world, to look more eagerly for the better portion, and to leave all things more believingly in the Lord’s hands. This will be good out of evil beyond all question, and such good we ought to look for. Sharp discipline should by this time have made good soldiers of our yeomanry. If it be so, the failing purse is more than recompensed by the enlarged heart: if our farmers are wiser men through their bad seasons, that will be better than being richer men.”