Part 58 (1/2)

Lo! I come with joy to do The Father's blessed will; Him in outward works pursue, And serve His pleasure still.

Faithful to my Lord's commands, I still would choose the better part; Serve with careful Martha's hands, And loving Mary's heart.

C. WESLEY.

A soul cannot be regarded as truly subdued and consecrated in its will, and as having pa.s.sed into union with the Divine will, until it has a disposition to do promptly and faithfully all that G.o.d requires, as well as to endure patiently and thankfully all that He imposes.

T. C. UPHAM.

When we have learned to offer up every duty connected with our situation in life as a sacrifice to G.o.d, a settled employment becomes just a settled habit of prayer.

THOMAS ERSKINE.

”_Do the duty which lies nearest thee_,” which thou knowest to be a duty.

Thy second duty will already have become clearer.

T. CARLYLE.

November 9

_Say not thou, I will hide myself from the Lord: shall any remember me from above? I shall not be remembered among so many people: for what is my soul among such an infinite number of creatures_?--ECCLESIASTICUS xvi. 17.

Among so many, can He care?

Can special love be everywhere?

A myriad homes,--a myriad ways,-- And G.o.d's eye over every place?

I asked: my soul bethought of this;-- In just that very place of His Where He hath put and keepeth you, G.o.d hath no other thing to do!

A. D. T. WHITNEY.

Give free and bold play to those instincts of the heart which believe that the Creator must care for the creatures He has made, and that the only real effective care for them must be that which takes each of them into His love, and knowing it separately surrounds it with His separate sympathy.

There is not one life which the Life-giver ever loses out of His sight; not one which sins so that He casts it away; not one which is not so near to Him that whatever touches it touches Him with sorrow or with joy.

PHILLIPS BROOKS.

November 10

_In Him we live, and move, and have our being_.--ACTS xvii. 28.

_Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence_?--PS. cx.x.xix. 7.

Yea! In Thy life our little lives are ended, Into Thy depths our trembling spirits fall; In Thee enfolded, gathered, comprehended, As holds the sea her waves--Thou hold'st us all.