The model preacher Author:William Taylor Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LETTER III. SURPRISE POWER —CONTINUED. My Dear Brother,—Look into God's book of nature and see what surprise power breaks forth from every page. In smoo... more »thing down the earth's surface, he did not make it all one grand, level prairie. What an astonishing variety of hill, dale, and mountain it presents! In planting a forest, the Lord does not set out a field of oaks in straight lines, another of hickory, and another of walnut trees. He scatters them broadcast in endless variety of size, shape, kind, and position. How the traveler is surprised and entertained by the variety of landscape scenery, and no less surprised by the endless variety of sounds 'which strike his ears, from the chirp of the cricket up to the roar of the lion, and from the ripple of the rill to the thunder of the cataract! The elements around him, and the heavens above him, all unite in producing surprises and entertainment for his restless, mighty soul. In making a river, God did not spring it all up from one fountain, and convey it in gentle eddies across a continent through a straight canal. Trace, if you please, one of God's rivers. In pursuit of the bounding deer in his mountain homo, weary andthirsty, you sec, breaking from beneath the granite cliff, a sparkling little fountain. You drink, and lie down to listen to its rippling music and enjoy sweet rest. Having refreshed yourself, you start, with joyous steps, to pursue the baby river. Now delighted with its meanderings, and its sudden bounds and falls; now another kindred stream comes leaping down the mountain, and mingling with its sparkling waters, on they go, with gathering strength, as other rills, rivulets, and creeks, break in from behind the ridges, where you least expected to see them. Now the river moves in manhood's strengt...« less