O Charity! till thou so comest I shall wait for thee. And, till thou comest, thy standard-bearer shall be my door porter, and thy scutcheon shall hang night and day at my door-post!
4. 'The fourth captain was that gallant commander, the Captain Innocent. His standard-bearer was Mr. Harmless; his were the white colours, and for his scutcheon he had three golden doves.' My brethren, how well it would have been with us to-day if we had always lived innocently! Had we only been innocent of that man's, and that man's, and that man's, and that man's hurt! (Let us name all the men to ourselves.) How many men have we, first and last, hurt! Some intentionally, and some unintentionally; some deliberately, and some only by accident; some of malice, and some only of misfortune; some innocently and unknowingly, and whom we never properly hurt. Some, also, by our mere existence; some by our best actions; some because we have helped and not hurt others;
and some out of nothing else but the pure original devilry of their own evil hearts. And then, when we take all these men home to our hearts, what hearts all these men give us! Who, then, is the man here who has done to other men the most hurt? Who has caused or been the occasion of most hurt? Let that so unhappy man just think that the gallant commander, the Captain Innocent himself, with his white colours and with his golden doves, is standing and knocking at your evil door. O unhappy man! By all the hurt and harm you have ever done--by all that you can never now undo--by those spotless colours that are still snow and not yet scarlet as they wave over you--by those three golden doves that are an emblem of the life that still lies open before you, as well as an invitation to you to enter on that life--why will you die of remorse and despair? Open the door of your heart and admit Captain Innocent.
He knows that of all hurtful men on the face of the earth you are the most hurtful, but he is not on that account afraid at you;
indeed, it is on that account that he has come so near to you. By admitting him, by enlisting under him, by serving under him, some of the most hurtful and injurious men that ever lived have lived after to be the most innocent and the most harmless of men, with their hands washed every day in innocency, and with three golden doves as the scutcheon of their new nature and their Christian character. Oh come into my heart, Captain Innocent; there is room in my heart for thee!
5. 'And then the fifth was that truly royal and well-beloved captain, the Captain Patience. His standard-bearer was Mr. Suffer-
long, and for a scutcheon he had three arrows through a golden heart.' Three arrows through a golden heart! Most eloquent, most impressive, and most instructive of emblems! First, a heart of gold, and then that heart of gold pierced, and pierced, and then pierced again with arrow after arrow. Patience was the last of Emmanuel's pickt graces. Captain Patience with his pierced heart always brought up the rear when the army marched. But when Captain Patience and Mr. Suffer-long did enter and take up their quarters in any house in Mansoul,--then was there no house more safe, more protected, more peaceful, more quietly, sweetly, divinely happy than just that house where this loyal and well-beloved captain bore in his heart. Entertain patience, my brethren. Practise patience, my brethren. Make your house at home a daily school to you in which to learn patience. Be sure that you well understand the times, the occasions, the opportunities, and the invitations of patience, and take profit out of them; and thus both your profit and that of others also will be great. Tribulation worketh patience. Endure tribulation, then, for the sake of its so excellent work. Nothing worketh patience like tribulation, and therefore it is that tribulation so abounds in the lives of God's people. So much does tribulation abound in the lives of God's people that they are actually known in heaven and described there by their experience of tribulation. 'These are they which came out of great tribulation, and therefore are they before the throne.'
These are they with the three sharp arrows shot through and through their hearts of gold.
