"A hones' dram tuck now an' then, prayerfully, is a good thing for any religion. I've knowed many a man to take a dram jes' in time to keep him out of a divorce court. An' I've never knowed it to do anybody no harm but old elder Shotts of Clay County. An' ef he'd a stuck to it straight he'd abeen all right now. But one of these old-time Virginia gentlemen stopped with him all night onct, an' tor't the old man how to make a mint julip; an' when I went down the next year to hold services his wife told me the good old man had been gathered to his fathers. 'He was all right' she 'lowed, 'till a little feller from Virginia came along an' tort 'im ter mix greens in his licker, an' then he jes drunk hisself to death.' "There's another thing I like about two of the churches I'm in--the Hard-shells an' the Presbyterians--an' that is special Providence. If I didn't believe in special Providence I'd lose my faith in God. "My father tuck care of me when I was a babe, an' we're all babes in God's sight. "The night befo' the battle of Shiloh, I preached to some of our po' boys the last sermon that many of 'em ever heard. An' I told 'em not to dodge the nex' day, but to stan' up an' 'quit themselves like men, for ever' shell an' ball would hit where God intended it should hit. "In the battle nex' day I was chaplain no longer, but chief of scouts, an' on the firin' line where it was hot enough. In the hottest part of it General Johnston rid up, an' when he saw our exposed position he told us to hold the line, but to lay down for shelter. A big tree was nigh me an' I got behin' it. The Gineral seed me an' he smiled an' sed: "'Oh, Bishop,'"--his voice fell to a proud and tender tone--"did you know it was Gineral Johnston that fust named me the Bishop?" "'Oh, Bishop,' he said, 'I can see you puttin' a tree betwixt yo'se'f an' special Providence.' 'Yes, Gineral,' I sed, 'an' I looks on it as a very special Providence jus' at this time.' "He laughed, an' the boys hoorawed an' he rid off. "Our lives an' the destiny of our course is fixed as firmly as the laws that wheel the planets. Why, I have knowed men to try to hew out their own destiny an' they'd make it look like a gum-log hewed out with a broad axe, until God would run the rip-saw of His purpose into them, an' square them out an' smooth them over an' polish them into pillars for His Temple. "What is, was goin' to be; an' the things that's got to come to us has already happened in God's mind. "I've knowed poor an' unpretentious, God-fearin' men an' women to put out their hands to build shanties for their humble lives, an' God would turn them into castles of character an' temples of truth for all time. "Elder Butts will lead in prayer."