"And with just cause," observed Harry Maude. "Now, will you forgive me," he continued, leaning his arms on the table, and bending forward in the earnestness of his speaking, "will you forgive me if I remind you that you both have received—not merely once—but very many times, a most gracious invitation, which is also a command, from your Heavenly Sovereign, the King of kings? He bids you appear before Him at His table to partake of His Holy Supper; you know better than I can know, how you have received the gracious invitation." Both the cottagers were taken aback by this sudden turn which the conversation had taken. Mrs. Garth uneasily twisted about in her fingers the card which she still retained. Michael was silent for some moments before he replied, "Ye see, sir, there's such a difference!" "A difference indeed," said the naval officer; "we are a thousand times more bound to obey a Heavenly than an earthly monarch, and the honour and privilege of being bidden to God's table are a thousand times greater than those of appearing at the Queen's." "I don't gainsay that, sir, I don't gainsay it," replied Garth; "but there be some difficulties, you see—" Harry waited for the labourer to finish his sentence, but as he either could not, or would not, the officer spoke again. "I suppose that there are few duties, Michael, which we might not find some excuse for neglecting. For instance," he held out his hand for the card which was returned to him by Martha, "I might find plenty of excuses for not obeying my Queen by going up to London to-morrow. I might plead that I had just returned to my home after a very long absence, that my family were unwilling to part with me, that I was weary of travelling, that I was expected to attend at a wedding, and was very anxious to do so. I might make such excuses, and others besides, and even persuade myself that they were good ones; but in truth not one of them, nor all of them put together, would really be sufficient to acquit me of disloyal, undutiful neglect of my Queen. Now, my friends, suffer me to entreat you to ask yourselves honestly, as in the sight of the Lord, will your excuses for never attending His Holy Supper be such as you will venture to plead when you stand at the last great Day in the immediate presence of your King?" "I never had it put to me afore like that," said Garth, looking fixedly into the fire. "There are various lights in which we may regard the Lord's Supper," continued Harry, "the first and most simple, perhaps, is this; it is a feast to which His faithful subjects are specially called by the great King, whose invitations are commands. Turn to the parable which the Lord himself has given to us. * Observe the gracious invitation, 'Come, for all things are now ready.' Notice the excuses made by those who should have been joyful guests, the ground bought, the oxen to be proved, the wife that had lately been married. Were these excuses accepted?" * Luke xiv.