Once when the Union soldiers were retreating from the valley of Virginia, they burnt a bridge over the Shenandoah. Stonewall Jackson, who wanted to pursue them, sent for his old bridge-builder. “Sir,” he said, “you must keep men at work all day and all night, and finish that bridge by tomorrow morning. My engineer shall give you a plan.” Old Miles saluted and withdrew.
     Early the next morning the general sent for Miles again. “Well, sir,” said Jackson, “did the engineer give you the plan for the bridge?”
     “General,” said the old man slowly, “the bridge is done; “I don’t know whether the picture is or not.”
     Now that is the kind of bridge-builders we want in the church, men and women who go right ahead with their own work, no matter what their neighbors are doing.—By Spurgeon, Signs of the Times, January 11, 1899.