IN the early days of Cape Colony one of the governors was a Dutchman named Van N—, and he has unfortunately left behind him a sadly tarnished reputation.
Besides other exactions, he made himself very obnoxious by keeping back, for his own use, some of the money due to the soldiers. In consequence of his injustice thirty or forty of them made a conspiracy to desert, but their design was found out and seven of the ringleaders condemned to death. One by one the unhappy men met their cruel doom, but when the executioner prepared to adjust the rope around the neck of the last victim, the man turned his head towards the Residency and cried—
“Governor Van N—, I summon you this hour to appear before the tribunal of Almighty God to render account of my soul and the souls of my comrades!”
After the execution, tire counselors returned to the Residency to tell the Governor that the sentence had been carried into effect. They found Van N—seated in an armchair at the end of the audience-chamber and saluted him, but—to their great surprise without obtaining the slightest sign of his attention.
Solemn to relate, he had suddenly been called through the mysterious portal of death into the audience-chamber of God, there to await the consequences of his misspent life. The counselors were in the presence of another corpse, for the tyrant and the tortured, the murderer and the mangled, had together gone to appear before Him.
In the museum is still shown the chair in which the Governor died, but oh, if remembrance upon earth is so keen, where all impressions and remembrances are but transient, what must there be before the eternal God! What memorials does He keep?
It is very solemn, but at the same time very salutary, to reflect that God holds each one of us as responsible creatures, to whom He has entrusted valuable gifts—such as time, talent, energies, etc., and of whom He will certainly require an account of what has been done with them.
What use are you making of His gifts, my reader? Is this warning voice altogether out of place with regard to you— “Do thyself no harm”?
No doubt Van N— thought he was sharper than most men, and would amass his fortune sooner and more easily than his predecessors; but no wise person will slight that terrible asseveration— “The wages of sin is death” (Rom, 6:23), or that other weighty utterance— “What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matt. 16:2626For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? (Matthew 16:26)). Will not the wise consider the end of plans and projects, the “afterward” of these responsible lives, lent for God’s glory in a death-stricken world?
Real, abiding and satisfying gain is to be found only in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the easily entreated grace, love, and power of that perfect Friend every tempted and distressed soul will find a peaceful shelter.
L. J. M.