song," Come, and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He hath done for my soul." ALMIGHTY POWER AND SUFFICIENT GRACE. "Give us day by day our daily bread."-LUKE Xi. 3. "The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms."- I know not ere nightfall What comforts may perish, But this doth sustain me, Let pleasure or pain be, On Thee ever casting The cares that surround me, Thine arms everlasting Beneath and around me; Then shall I go boldly And keep me from falling. "Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be."DEUT. XXXiii. 25. How many linger on life's way, "He hath said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee."—HEB. xiii. 5. Evening shades fall fast around me; Cherished ones no more surround me: Gone for ever! "I will never, Never leave thee nor forsake." Hushed are voices full of gladness; Must I float in lonely sadness Down Time's river? "I will never, Never leave thee nor forsake." Earth's most treasured joys may perish; From the gourd I fondly cherish Death may sever! "I will never, Never leave thee nor forsake." XIII. THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE HOLY DEAD. 66 AND I HEARD A VOICE FROM HEAVEN SAYING UNTO ME, WRITE, BLESSED ARE THE DEAD WHICH DIE IN THE LORD FROM HENCE FORTH."-REV. xiv. 13. THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE HOLY DEAD. HE thought is a cheering, hallowed one to many a bereft parent-the numbers of beloved children now in glory. How many mothers have little angels before the Throne! How many youthful tongues beginning to lisp the praises of the Saviour on earth have been hushed in the Church below, only to resume the unending song in the Church of the Glorified! In a beautiful figurative sense may the words of the prophet Zechariah, uttered regarding the future earthly Jerusalem, be applied to the Heavenly one: "And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof" (Zech. viii. 5). That "voice from heaven" in the verse which heads this chapter, with its elevating and triumphant words, embraces, among others, these youthful members of the Celestial City-a little multitude, among that vaster "multitude which no man can number." It is vain to inquire from whom this voice, addressed to St. John in the words which head this meditation, proceeded. This is left indeterminate. It may possibly have come from one of the four-and-twenty elders spoken of in a preceding chapter (chap. vii.);—possibly |