THE SACRIFICE OF CONTINUAL PRAISE. I Father’s baud, do we need, as we approach the Throne of God, to keep clearly between ourselves and the great Jehovah, ('hrist our advocate. When we see clouds of judgment gather dark and threatening, when the storm pours out its fury, when the very foundations seem unsettled, then it is as at no other time that we feel the presence of our Mediator. Christ Jesus and His cause is the central pivot on which all other events turn. Centuries ago, recorded on the pages of prophecy, stands an injunction, to which all the nations of the earth do well to take good heed: “ Be wise now, therefore, oh ! ye kings, he instructed, oh! ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice rvith trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little." Because I firmly believe in this principle of interpretation, and because in these events of terror, in which we have so deep an interest, I see the hand of God stretched forth to lift up, out of the dust, heaven-born truth, I bail this day of festival and praise with profound gratitude. If you go forth into a burial-ground you walk over the graves at every step. There is no turmoil here, all is peaceful. The quiet sleepers heed not the sounds of life above them. But this quiet is the quiet of death and festering corruption ; to remain thus unbroken until the resurrection trumpet shall awaken the sleepers : then there will be commotion, yawning graves and rising forms, wails of woe and songs of joy. So once there was comparative quiet in our land; peace reigned undisturbed ; under her fostering care the arts and sciences flourished, literature advanced, while in
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