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النشر الإلكتروني

No. XVI.

I dwell among my own people.

2 KINGS, chap. iv, ver. 13.

Ir was never intended by the Great Author of our being, and the Sovereign Disposer of our concerns, that we should travel along this perilous wilderness, solitary, without companion or friend; but it is only those individual families, societies, and communities, who dwell together in unity, that truly fulfil the Divine intentions in thus assembling them together, and enduing them with social propensities. It is but a fair inference from the story, that the family and connexions of the Shunamite were thus happily united, or she would not have so replied to an overture, which would have been seized by many, among whomsoever they had

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dwelt, with eagerness and avidity: but no such ambition appears to have infested the bosom of this female; no desire to attract notice, or to be raised above the rank and sphere in which Providence had placed her. Her ambition seems to have been like his, who said, 'Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me.' This habitual contentment, under circumstances not in themselves desirable, was still further evidenced in her appeal to the Prophet on the loss of her only child - Did I desire a son of my Lord?'- and eminently so, in her resignation, when bereaved of him, which enabled her to say, while smarting under the pangs of separation, It is well.' Indeed, the general tenor of her conduct is fraught with an impressive lesson, not merely to individuals, but to families, who can experience such happiness as a desert affords, only in proportion as this benign temper prevails among them. It is one thing to dwell among our own people; and quite another,

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so to dwell among them, as that we become mutual blessings to each otherblessings to that extent, as not to induce a wish for change, in the expectation that our stock of happiness might be ultimately increased by any new society or other connexions. And may it not, in most cases, be said, that if families do not so dwell together, the blame, instead of being attributed to this or that turbulent individual, as the cause of strife, ought to be shared with those who make the complaint?

Traveller, you need not be told that nothing is perfect here; nor, it may be presumed, need you be reminded, that as you are not so yourself, you have no reason to expect perfection in those around you. Experience proves this wilderness to be such as it has ever been represented: it is not-it cannot be your rest; if here you seek uninterrupted repose, you shall not find it. Where then, will you roam in quest of solid, of rational pleasure? If any where it can be found

-if it at all exist, it should be in your own tent: if at all enjoyed in perfection, it should be at home. Vanity, and pride, and dissipation, may seek and find their pleasures abroad; but these will leave the heart desolate. Home-home is the spot, the consecrated spot, in this wide waste, on which heart's ease and true repose must be sought.

Certainly, while here below, many are the sorrows of our homes. Notwithstanding all our efforts, we cannot entirely close our tents against those intruders ; and yet, many are admitted that might easily be kept away. Could we prevail on ourselves to make an impartial estimate of our situation, compared with what we know of many of the homes around us, we might, instead of the complaints we utter, or the discontent we cherish, more frequently find reason to acknowledge, with thankfulness to our Divine Benefactor, that the lines are fallen to us in pleasant places, and that we have (considering in what a wilderness

we are placed) a goodly heritage.' Let us not, by our murmurings, provoke the Giver of every good we enjoy to wither our palm-trees, and to dry up our wells of water. On the contrary, wherever a right view of things prevails, we shall feel no more ambition than the Shunamite did, to obtain the favour and attract the notice of the great and powerful, or to become so ourselves; it will be sufficient for us if, like her, we'dwell quietly among our own people'— sufficient surely for those of her own sex, to whom she exhibits an example which some of them might do well to study; such at least as seem disposed to forget, that the duties of home stand next in order to their duty to God, and that on them it devolves, and greatly depends, to render that home pleasant to their fathers, to their husbands, to their children. These are the paramount duties required of mothers, of daughters, of sisters; and which, as they would embellish their Christian profession, they will industriously instil into

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