filberts from a huckster's barrow." No illustrations are half so telling as those which are taken from familiar objects. Many fair flowers grow in foreign lands, but those are dearest to the heart which bloom at our own cottage door. _Elaboration into minute points is not commendable_ when we are using figures. The best light comes in through the clearest glass: too much paint keeps out the sun. God's altar of old was to be made of earth, or of unhewn stone, "for," said the Word, "if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it" (Ex. xx. 25). A labored, artificial style, upon which the graver's tool has left abundant marks, is more consistent with human pleadings in courts of law, or in the forum, or in the senate, than with prophetic utterances delivered in the name of God and for the promotion of his glory. Our Lord's parables were as simple as tales for children, and as naturally beautiful as the lilies which sprang up in the valleys where he taught the people. He borrowed no legend from the Talmud, nor fairy tale from Persia, neither fetched he his emblems from beyond the sea; but he dwelt among his own people, and talked of common things in homely style, as never man spake before, and yet as any observant man should speak. His parables were like himself and his surroundings, and were never strained, fantastic, pedantic, or artificial. Let us imitate him, for we shall never find a model more complete, or more suitable for the present age. Opening our eyes, we shall discover abundant imagery all around. As it is written, "The word is nigh thee," so also is the analogy of that word near at hand: "All things around me, whate'er they be, That I meet as the chance may come. Have a voice and a speech in them all-- Birds that hover and bees that hum; The beast of the field or the stall; The trees, leaves, rushes, and grasses; The rivulet running away; The bird of the air as it passes, Or the mountains that motionless stay; And yet those immovable masses Keep changing, as dreams do, all day." [1] [1] Slightly altered from "Fables in Song," by Robert Lord Lytton. There will be little need to borrow from the recondite mysteries of human art, nor to go deep into the theories of science; for in nature golden illustrations lie upon the surface, and the purest is that which is uppermost and most readily discerned. Of natural history in all its branches we may well say, "The gold of that land is good": the illustrations furnished by every-day phenomena seen by the plowman and the wagoner are the very best which earth can yield. An illustration is not like a prophet, for it has most honor in its own country; and those who have oftenest seen the object are those who are most gratified by the figure drawn from it.