of little faith, wherefore dost thou doubt?" It is that very shadow that has now come athwart your soul, and which you so bitterly mourn, which tells of sunshine. As it is the shadow which enables us to read the hours on the dial, so is it in the spiritual life. It is because of these shadows on the soul's dial-face that we can infer the shining of a better Sun. "The wicked have no bands in their (spiritual) death.” Their life has been nothing but shadow; they cannot therefore mourn the loss of a sunshine they never felt or enjoyed. Well has it been said, "When the refreshing dews of grace seem to be withheld, and we are ready to say, 'Our hope is lost, God hath forgotten to be gracious'-this is that furnace in which one that is not a child of God never was placed. For Satan takes good care not to disquiet his children. He has no fire for their souls on this side everlasting burnings; his fatal teaching ever is, Peace, peace!"* But what, desponding one, is, or ought to be, thy resort? Go! exile in spirit— go, like that royal mourner amid the oak-thickets of Gilead! Brood no more in unavailing sorrow and with burning tears. Thou mayest, like him,

*Miss Plumtre's Letters.
с

have much to depress thy spirit. Black and crimson sins may have left their indelible stain on the page of memory. In aching heart-throbs, thou mayest be heaving forth the bitter confession, "Mine iniquities have separated between me and my God." But go like him! take down thy silent harp. Its strings may be corroded with rust. They may tell the touching story of a sad estrangement. Go to the quiet solitude of thy chamber. Seek out the unfrequented path of prayer;-choked it may be with the weeds of forgetfulness and sloth. Cast thyself on thy bended knees; and, as the wounded deer bounds past thee (emblem of thine own bleeding heart), wake the echoes of thy spirit with the penitential cry, "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God!"

CONTENTS OF THE PSALM.

H

The Hart Panting.

66

'Oh, would I were as free to rise

As leaves on autumn's whirlwind borne,
The arrowy light of sunset skies,

Or sound-or rays-or star of morn,
Which meets in heaven at twilight's close,

Or aught which soars uncheck'd and free,
Through earth and heaven, that I might lose
Myself in finding Thee!"

"O mysterious Jesus, teach us Thy works and Thy plans. Let our hearts pant after Thee as the hart after the water-brooks. Create a thirst which nothing shall satisfy but the fountain of eternal love. See the velocity with which the needle flees to the magnet when it gets within distance; so shall we hasten to our Magnet-our Beloved-as we approach Him."-Lady Powers court's Letters.

66

As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God."-Verse 1.

L

THE HART PANTING.

WE have pictured, in a preceding chapter, the uncrowned Monarch of Israel seated, pensive and sad, amid "the willows by the water-courses;" or wandering forth, amid the deepening twilightshadows, with the roll of Jordan at his side, perhaps, like his great ancestor, to "wrestle with God until the breaking of the day."

We have already adverted to the simple incident which arrested his attention. A breathless tenant of the forest bounded past him to quench its thirst in the neighbouring river. That unconscious child of nature furnishes the key-note of his song. Let us sit by the banks, as the Exile takes down his harp, and thus sings "AS THE HART PANTETH AFTER THE WATER-BROOKS, SO PANTETH MY SOUL AFTER THEE, O GOD."

God is the only satisfying portion of the soul