Page images
PDF
EPUB

SUITABLE MERCIES.

253

"When I look back forty years of my life, I remember I was perpetually in company, full of animal spirits, thoughtless, self-pleasing, and solitude would, then, have been the heaviest burden to my mind. Now, to be alone; to be looking on my bed as probably the spot on which I am to fight the last battle before I win Christ, and see him as he is; to consider, with the closest attention, the origin, and the nature, and the consequences of death, to the friends of Christ :this work invigorates my mind, and nourishes my soul. I accept the privilege and power of doing thus, and the great opportunity I have for this exercise, with joyful gratitude, saying, 'The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places: yea, I have a goodly heritage,'" Psa. xvi. 6.

[ocr errors]

THE SEASONS.

You will agree with Old Humphrey that Spring is a pleasant time; and when the sun is shining, the flowers blooming, the green trees waving, the birds singing, the balmy breeze blowing, the spirit rejoices, and the lips burst into a song.

Summer is a pleasant time, when the noon-tide ray gilds up the woods, the waters, and the mountain-tops; when the air is filled with odours, and the laugh of the merry haymakers is heard in the meads.

Autumn is a pleasant time, and we cannot look without gladness on the golden grain, the laden fruit trees, the varied foliage, and the kindling heavens.

Winter is a pleasant time to all who are hardy enough to walk abroad when the frosted snow lies on the ground, and the trees are hung fantastically with rime; for then wonder is awakened in the mind, and the pure, sharp, bracing air gives a cheerfulness to the spirit.

Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter, are

[blocks in formation]

pleasant seasons, and if any thing can make them more pleasant, it is the heart-felt remembrance that they are the gift of God. Yes, He who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance; He, with whom the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance, who "taketh up the isles as a very little thing; for whom "Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt-offering; He has given them to me. And what have I given in return? the fragments of my feelings, and the mere shreds of the joyous days and peaceful nights he has bestowed upon me.

[ocr errors]

Oh let me then with all my powers,

Prolong his sacred praise

Through Spring and Summer's rosy hours,
And Autumn's pleasant days!

And when the keener wintry skies
Shall freeze the sterile ground,
Then let my halleluiahs rise,

And more and more abound.

WE

SHALL MEET IN HEAVEN.

I HAVE just received a letter from a Christian friend, a dear, afflicted, aged, and dying friend; but his heart is where it should be. It has got above the mists and fogs that gather about us here, and seems to set but little store by any thing that has not immortality written upon it. One paragraph of the letter says, "We shall meet in heaven;" and if this expression has brought tears into my eyes, it has also given joy to my heart and soul. "We shall meet in heaven." Why, then, what need have we to be cast down by any thing that shall happen on earth?

The thorny and boggy places, the rough and crooked pathways that we sometimes get into, are enough to make our faces a little cloudy, and our souls a little sorrowful, so long as we can see no end to them; but what bewildered and benighted wanderer ever despairs while he sees before him a friendly light? What weary and way

WE SHALL MEET IN HEAVEN.

257

worn traveller gives way to despondency while he discerns in the distance the door of his own cottage open to receive him?

The assurance that " we shall meet in heaven" is a cure for all earthly ills.

Can we

But, then, is the saying a true one? depend upon it? Are we sure that we shall meet in heaven? What the heart says, either when it is in trouble or in joy, is very uncertain; and what the world says is still less to be depended on; therefore, we must go to the words of unchangeable truth for a reason of the hope that is within us. Will the word of God warrant the expression spoken by one follower of the Redeemer to another, "We shall meet in heaven?" If it will not, we have darkness and despondency; if it will, we have light and exultation.

Let, then, every saint-and what is a saint but a pardoned and saved sinner?-let the lowliest disciple of Jesus Christ take courage, and gird up his loins, and not faint by the way; for these words were spoken by the lips of the Redeemer, "I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also," John xiv. 2, 3.

66

Yes! yes! my friend, you are right! we shall meet in heaven," nor can the dim eye, the

« PreviousContinue »