A poor boy was apprenticed to
an apothecary in a large city. To increase his wages and encourage his
efforts, his master gave him a recipe and materials for making blacking
on his own account. The blacking was made, and placed in pots in the
shop window; but day after day passed, and no purchaser appeared. One
Sunday morning, while the shop was open for medicine, before the hour
of public service, a person came in, and asked for a pot of blacking.
The boy was in the very act of stretching out his hand to reach it,
when he reflected it was the Lord's-day. Falteringly, he told the
customer it was the Sabbath, and he could not do it. After this the boy
went to church. The Tempter there teased him about his folly in losing
a customer for his blacking: the boy held in reply that he had done
right, and, were the case to occur again, he would do just the same. On
Monday morning, as soon as he had taken down the shutters, a person
came in, and bought every pot of blacking there was; and the boy found
that, after deducting the cost of materials, he had cleared one dollar.
With more faith and fortitude than some of you possess (said the
preacher), he went and took that dollar--the first he had ever
earned--to the Bible Society.
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