Mary Edwards was very poor—hers was a heavy cross. One of seven children, and her father blind; often and often had she come to school faint with hunger and sick at heart. But for the kindness of friends, the family would have been half-starved. Mary had never known what it was to have a blanket to cover her; very seldom had she been able to eat till she was satisfied; her clothes had been mended over and over again, to keep them from falling to pieces; ill did they protect her when the cold wind blew through the broken pane, or found its way through the crevices in her miserable hut. Yet Mary had comfort in the midst of her poverty; she remembered him “who, though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor.” She had read the inscription on her cross: “Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him?” (James ii. 5). And Mary would meekly repeat the hymn of good Bishop Heber:—
“The cross our Master bore for us, For him we fain would bear; But mortal strength to weakness turns, And courage to despair. Then pity all our frailty, Lord, Our failing strength renew; And when thy sorrows visit us, Oh, send thy patience too!”
Amy Blackstone never spoke of her cross; she bore it in silence without complaining. Her father was a drunkard—her mother never entered the house of God. If she heard the name of the Holy One uttered in her home, it was but in an oath or a profane jest. She never complained, as I have said; for, while others would have been complaining, she was praying. Fervently did she pray for her unhappy parents—fervently for herself, that evil example might not draw her from God. Many a silent tear she shed over her cross; and this was the inscription upon it: “I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Rom. viii. 18).
All pitied Ellen Payne, for her cross was sharp. A lingering, painful disease had taken the strength from her limbs, the colour from her cheek. She never rejoiced in one waking hour free from pain, and often the night passed without sleep. The doctors gave no hope, medicine no relief. She had nothing to look forward to but pain, increasing pain, till she should sink into an early grave. This was her cross; and this was the inscription upon it: “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life” (Rev. ii. 10).