earth of which thou hast of old laid the foundations, and these heavens which are the work of thy hands, shall perish, but thou shalt endure; yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment, as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed; but thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end. It exalts the importance of the material universe, and gives it a grandeur even beyond its own immeasurable wealth of the Divine intelligence revealed in its principles and laws for our study, when we regard it thus as God's loom, the frame-work for higher designs and a more infinite glory. In our globe there is reason to believe that the changes of the seasons, and the processes of seed time and harvest, were ordered and arranged on purpose to serve as indications and illustrations of moral causes and consequences, opportunities and responsibilities, and as stepping stones for faith in regard to the great truths revealed in the Gospel. Hence the perpetual appeals to these natural types and analogies. In disclosing and proving the doctrine of the resurrection, the inspired apostle goes directly to God's works, with an intimation that the lesson there taught for faith is so clear and palpable, that the reproach of a fool belongs to him, who, with such peculiar and significant manifestations of God's power to his very senses, doubts and questions, when the rising of the body from the dead is presented to his mind in the light of revelation. Thou fool! that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die. Thou stumblest at a resurrection from the dead, not seeing that death itself is but a process for the resurrection. And so the apostle carries on the analogy, interweaving it step by step, process by process, with his argument, and rising higher and Ligher with the theme, till it ends in the Halleluia of immortality, lee Net Ruling new dan moes of living saints shall ex(as a la zoning of an eye, in the resurrection-morning. All 2 en dans, vhå vil den take place in a moment VAIKAS may be going on through ages with the Now fom villed parar af de horizon shall we come into a Bure a de su off var and death, and the over the graves on one side, sửa ố xưng, suming, and is. We must enter by the SouthEY QANUN ERI de su as så ad vim upon the verdus and bych s da vas te meditadon, in the Eight of the sustine of hau the sui There may be days, when, ghong) a stowy slevad sens u thuy à a và á hest, by ing green on the other. Look thou spot de pare it the breeden of de quiesening light, and read the wild premise à de sy à me, and vicice in it. This is Da se s srcy aught by the Feet Wordsworth, in that very deadful, though simple, unpretending picture in the fifth daat a' sie Beursen. Sa changerhi Lard, when, as he is wont, Your w High climbing, hath attained his noon-tide height, With more than wintry cheerlessness and gloom This contrast not unsuitable to life Is to that other state more apposite, Replete with vivid promise, bright as spring. We have been viewing our beautiful world as one of hieroglyphical predictions, both in the changes of its scenery and the working of its laws and elements of reproduction and decay. For the interpretation of this grand natural language we look into our own being, as well as into the Word of God, remembering that he hath set the world in our hearts. In this view, how full of profound meaning is the following suggestive and comprehensive passage from Coleridge, worthy to be made the text grounds for the belief of God and a future state "could not be intellectually more evident without becoming morally less effective; without counteracting its own end by sacrificing the life of faith to the cold mechanism of a worthless, because compulsory, assent." This remark is exceedingly profound and important. The evidence of faith may be as demonstrative where the heart is right, as that of mathematics to the understanding; but the life of faith is not in the clearness of the proof, nor the comprehensiveness of the reason that embraces it, but in the congenial affections that spring to meet it, in the intuitive unerring spiritual yearnings that predict it, and in the earnest of the Spirit, which is the consequence and seal of our adoption as the sons of God. Without or star or angel for their guide, Who worship God, shall find him. Humble Love, And not to lose his plummet in the depths YOUNG'S Night Thoughts. |