What the Pastor said was always in such a cheerful, good-humored way that it was sure to increase the pleasure of the day, instead of damping it. "Well, farmer," said he, "and you, my faithful Sarah, any other friend might recommend peace and agreement to you on your marriage; but I, on the contrary, recommend cares and strifes."[5] The company stared--but Sarah, who knew that her old master was a facetious gentleman, and always had some meaning behind, looked serious. "Cares and strife, sir," said the farmer, "what do you mean?" "I mean," said he, "for the first, that your cares shall be who shall please God most, and your strifes, who shall serve him best, and do your duty most faithfully. Thus, all your cares and strifes being employed to the highest purposes, all petty cares and worldly strifes shall be at an end. [5] See Dodd's Sayings. "Always remember that you have both of you a better friend than each other." The company stared again, and thought no woman could have so good a friend as her husband. "As you have chosen each other from the best motives," continued the Doctor, "you have every reasonable ground to hope for happiness; but as this world is a soil in which troubles and misfortunes will spring up; troubles from which you can not save one another; misfortunes which no human prudence can avoid: then remember, 'tis the best wisdom to go to that friend who is always near, always willing, and always able to help you: and that friend is God." "Sir," said Farmer White, "I humbly thank you for all your kind instructions, of which I shall now stand more in need than ever, as I shall have more duties to fulfill. I hope the remembrance of my past offenses will keep me humble, and that a sense of my remaining sin will keep me watchful. I set out in the world, sir, with what is called a good-natured disposition, but I soon found, to my cost, that without God's grace, that will carry a man but a little way. A good temper is a good thing, but nothing but the fear of God can enable one to bear up against temptation, evil company, and evil passions. The misfortune of breaking my leg, as I then thought it, has proved the greatest blessing of my life. It showed me my own weakness, the value of the Bible, and the goodness of God. How many of my brother drivers have I seen, since that time, cut off in the prime of life by drinking, or sudden accident, while I have not only been spared, but blessed and prospered. O, sir, it would be the joy of my heart, if some of my old comrades, good-natured, civil fellows (whom I can't help loving) could see as I have done, the danger of evil courses before it is too late. Though they may not hearken to you, sir, or any other minister, they may believe _me_ because I have been one of them: and I can speak from experience, of the great difference there is, even as to worldly comfort, between a life of sobriety and a life of sin. I could tell them, sir, not as a thing I