Souls who in God alone confide Have truth essential for their guide; Illuminations clear To heaven their spirits steer; The Godhead, full of truth and grace, Deigns in our flesh to guide all human race. Oh, may I study Jesus' law, From fontal truth my knowledge draw! Shews me the heavenward way: The star had a less radiant light Which led the Sages to their Saviour's sight. Of all the truths which from Thee shine, Next to my heart still lies; And turns my ghostly eyes From all ill-natured schemes, design'd To bound what thou hast to no bounds confin'd. Praise to the God of Truth! may I His word read, ponder, and apply! I may myself delude; Satan may lies intrude; Thee only, Lord, I can believe, Who nor canst be deceiv'd, nor me deceive. BISHOP KEN. Solemn Scenes that will Come. HE very moment of your final farewell, if you are not previously cut short by death, which is a very possible thing, that moment will come, and old age will come, and the last sickness will come, and the dying-bed will come, and the last look you shall ever cast upon your relations will come, and the agony of the parting breath will come, and the time when you will be stretched a lifeless corpse before the eyes of your weeping relations will come, and the coffin that is to inclose you will come, and that hour when the company assemble to carry you to the churchyard will come, and that moment when you are put into the grave will come, and the throwing of the earth upon it-all, all, will living creature, who now hears me. come on every And in a few little years, the minister who now addresses you, and each one who now listens, will be carried to their long home; now, all this will come; you may have been careless or heedless about these things formerly; but, I call upon you now, to lay them seriously to heart, and no longer trifle, or to parley, when the scenes of life are thus set so evidently before you. What more shall I say?-shall I carry you beyond the region of sense to the region of faith, and assure you, in the name of Him who cannot lie, that when the hour of laying the body in the grave comes, the hour of the spirit's returning to God comes too? Yes, and the day of reckoning will come; and the appearance of the Son of God in heaven, and His holy angels around him will come; and the opening of the Books will come; and the appearance of every one of you before the judg ment-seat will come: and the solemn passing of the sentence which is to fix for Eternity, will come; and you refuse to be reconciled to God in the name of Christ, now that He is beseeching you to repent; and, if you refuse to turn from the evil of your ways, and to be and to do, what your Saviour requires you to be and to do, I must tell you what the sentence is, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels!" To-day, then, while it is called to-day, harden not your hearts, seeing that now is the only accepted time, that you can count upon, and that now is the day of salvation. if DR. CHALMERS. Fading. "We all do fade as a leaf." ADING, fading, all are fading— Beauty, with her customed smiling, Like to pilgrims, worn and weary, Toil we on our weary way, Through this night of life, while gazing For the dawning of the day. Like a stately pageant moving Bending all to sceptered Death. And the tread of valiant nations, In the crumbling halls of Time. Yes, these bright majestic heavens, Unto nothing, whence we came. But when, like a baseless vision, There is built a home eternal On the Hill of God it standeth ! Rearing high its golden dome, And the song comes swelling from it, "Welcome pilgrim, welcome home!" : |