Puslapio vaizdai
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GREATNESS.

ASCRIBE ye greatness unto our God.-Deuteronomy, xxxii. 3. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; and His greatness is unsearchable.-Psalm cxlv. 3.

Then there arose a reasoning among them, which of them should be greatest.

And Jesus perceiving the thought of their heart, took a child, and set him by him,

And said unto them, Whosover shall receive this child in my name receiveth me; and whosoever shall receive me receiveth him that sent me: for he that is least among you all, the same shall be great.Luke, ix. 46, 47, 48.

O HAPPY man, saith he, that lo I see
Grazing his cattle in those pleasant fields,
If he but knew his good. How blessed he
That feels not what affliction greatness yields!
Other than what he is he would not be,

Nor change his state with him that sceptre wields.
Thine, thine is that true life; that is to live,

To rest secure, and not rise up to grieve.

Samuel Daniel.

The good alone are great!

When winds the mountain oak assail,
And lay its glories waste,

Content may slumber in the vale,

Unconscious of the blast.

Through scenes of tumult while we roam,
The heart, alas! is ne'er at home;

It hopes in time to roam no more.
The mariner, not vainly brave,
Combats the storm, and rides the wave,
To rest at last on shore.

Ye proud, ye selfish, ye severe,
How vain your mask of state;
The good alone have joy sincere,
The good alone are great!

Great, when amid the vale of peace,
They bid the plaint of sorrow cease,
And hear the voice of artless praise;
As when along the trophied plain
Sublime they lead the victor train,
While shouting nations gaze.

Beattie.

The wretched tumults that confound

The soul, nor wealth can tell, nor kingly state;
And subborn are the cares that hover round
The vaulted ceilings of the great.

To meet life's ills with soul serene,
Treading the path our Saviour trod:
To live as seeing things unseen,

Horace.

To walk and commune with our God;
This is true greatness! worth divine!
Giv'n by the Spirit and the Word
To man! Thus grows that living shrine,
Formed, hallowed, dwelt in by the Lord!
Rev. W. M. Hetherington.

What though the great,

With costly pomp, and aromatic sweets,

Embalmed his poor remains; or through the dome
A thousand tapers shed their gloomy light,
While solemn organs to his parting soul
Chaunted slow orisons; say, by what mark
Dost thou discern him from the lowly swain,
Whose mouldering bones beneath the thorn-bound turf,
Long lay neglected.

Glynn.

The truly great are those who make least noise,
And walk with humble looks upon the earth;
They nor affect a swelling part, nor speak
Big words, that make their hearers stand aside
In silent awe, and clear an ample space,
Like Liliputians for some Gulliver.

Greatness consists not in such empty gauds
As dazzle and attract the public eye;
It rests not on the breath of multitudes,
For soothly hath the poet said "The world
Knows nothing of its greatest men."

There went

A great man once about the daily paths
Of life, and few there were that recognised
The greatness that in goodness dwelt; and still
Small is the number unto whom this truth
Is made apparent.

Egone.

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GRIEF.

HE is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.

Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.---Isaiah, liii. 3, 4:

For the Lord will not cast off for ever:

But though He cause grief, yet will He have compassion according to the multitude of His mercies.

For He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men. Lamentations, iii. 31, 32, 33.

For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully.-I. Peter, ii. 19.

WHEN grief that well might humble, swells our pride,
And pride increasing, aggravates our grief,
The tempest must prevail till we are lost.

Every grief we feel

Shortens the destined number; every pulse
Beats a short moment of the pain away,

Lillo.

And the last stroke will come. By swift degrees
Time sweeps us off, and soon we shall arrive

At life's sweet period. Celestial point

That ends this mortal story.

Watts.

We grieve to think our eyes no more
That form, those features loved, shall trace.
But sweet it is from memory's store

To call each fondly-cherished grace,

And fold them in the heart's embrace.

No bliss 'mid worldly crowds is bred,
Like musing on the sainted dead.

We grieve to see expired the race
They ran, intent on works of love;
But sweet to think no mixture base,
With which their better nature strove,
Shall rear their virtuous deeds above.
Sin o'er their soul has lost its hold,
And left them with their earthly mould.
Bishop Mant.

This is the curse of time. Alas!
In grief I am not all unlearned;
Once thro' mine own doors death did pass—
One went who never hath returned.

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Let grief be her own mistress still,
She loveth her own anguish deep,
More than much pleasure. Let her will
Be done-to weep or not to weep.

Words weaker than your grief, would make
Grief more.
"T were better I should cease;
Altho' myself could almost take
The place of him that sleeps in peace.

We overstate the ills of life, and take
Imagination, given us to bring down
The choirs of singing angels, overshone

Tennyson.

By God's clear glory,-down our earth, to rake
The dismal snows instead; flake following flake,
To cover all the corn. We walk upon
The shadow of hills, across a level thrown,
And pant like climbers. Near the alder-brake
We sigh so loud, the Nightingale within
Refuses to sing loud, as else she would.
O, brothers! let us leave the shame and sin
Of taking vainly, in a plaintive mood,
The holy name of Grief!-holy herein,
That by the grief of One, came all our good.

Miss Barrett.

Warm, soft, motionless, As flowers in stillest noon before the sun, They lie three paces from him: such they lie As when he left them sleeping side by side, A mother's arm round each, a mother's cheeks Between them, flusht with happiness and love. He was more changed than they were, doomed to show, Thee and the stranger, how defaced and scarr'd Grief hunts us down the precipice of years, And whom the faithless prey upon the last.

W. S. Landor.

GUIDANCE.

For this God is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death.-Psalm xlviii. 14.

The Lord shall guide thee continually.-Isaiah, lviii. 11.

Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My father, thou art the guide of my youth?-Jeremiah, iii. 4.

THAT man

May safely venture to go on his way,
That is so guided, that he cannot stray.

Marmyon.

Though in the paths of death I tread,
With gloomy horrors overspread,
My steadfast heart shall fear no ill,
For thou, O Lord, art with me still;
Thy friendly crook shall give me aid,
And guide me through the dreadful shade.

Addison.

Difference of good and ill for men to know
Was needless sure, while, with the fearless eye
Of an obedient son, he might look up
To the Almighty Father of his race,
And claim his guidance.

Whither midst falling dew,

John Hey.

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far through their rosy depths dost thou pursue Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

Thou 'rt gone, th' abyss of heaven

Hath swallowed up thy form; yet in my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone,

Will lead my steps aright.

Bryant.

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