THE GARLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 3488, 18 January 1921, Page 45

THE GARLAND.

FOR THE QUIET HOUR. No. 386. By Duncan Wright, Dunedin. “A GOOD HOME TO GO TO.” Go wing thy flight from star to star, From world to luminous world, so far As the universe spreads its flaming wall: Take all the pleasures of all the spheres, And) multiply each through endless years-, One minute in heaven is worth them all. —Thomas Moore. An aged Christian, when asked how he did, answered quietly : “I am going home as fast as I can, as every honest man ought to do when his day’s work is over; and I bless God I have a good home to go to.” PATHOS. . Two little wanderers, brother and sister, abroad and shelterless, were found in the streets of a great city on a wintry night. The boy, at length, becoming angry with their hard lot, and losing faith in Providence, but still afraid of God, is supposed to turn and appeal to the cold and unreplying Empress of the Night in this fashion: You Moon! have you got any God in the sky ? That wo. should be scorned by passers-by, And left in the street to starve and die — Bessie and I ? Ye’ve been thrust away from many a door; And we only asked for the alms of the poor, A crust of bread and a bed on the floor— Bessie and I? We re hungry and tired, and sore are our feet., From treading so long up and down the street Thro the blinding storm of snow and sleet — Bessie and I? I guess I’ll make us a bed in the snow, Tor Sis. is so tired, and then you know In all this big city we’ve nowhere to go — Bessie and I ? We'd go to heaven if it wasn’t so high, But may be the angels will come by and bv, And carry us up to the bright, blue eky— Bessie and I? _ A SCOTCH IDYLL. In 1 The Doctor’s Last Journey” lan Maclaren tells us that when William Mac Lure was dying he said to Drum sheugh: “A’m gettin* drowsy, an’ a’ll no be able to follow ye smie, a doot: wud ye read a bit tae me afore a fa’ ovver? “Ye’ll find rna mither’s Bible on the drawers’ heid, but ye’ll hae tae come close to the bed, for a’m no hearin’ or seein sae weel as a wes when ye cam.” Drumsheugh put on his spectacles an i searched for a comfortable Scripture, while the light of the lamp fell on his shaking hand and the doctor’s face, where the shadow was now falling. “Ma mither aye wanted this read to her when she was weak.” And Drumsheugh began: “In my Father’s house are many mansions,” but Mac Lure stopped him. ‘‘lt’s a bonnie fvord, an’ yir mother was a sanct ; but it’s no for the like o’ me. It’s ovver gude; a daurna tak’ it. “Shut the buik an’ let it open itsel’, an’ ye’ll get a bit a’ve been readin’ every night the last month.” The Book opened at the words, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” But- the doctor’s last conscious thoughts lingered about the 23rd Psalm, “The Lord is my Shepherd.” GOD’S SUN HAS SHONE ALL THROUGH THE YEAR. (By William Luff.) God’s sun has shone all through the year! His goldien sun of love; By day and night, far off and near, Beneath ms and above. Sometimes it seemed I turned away, The light at times seemed gone; But soon I found returning day— All through the year God’s sun has phone. God’s sun has shone all through the year! And I have walked in the light: A light that chased the shades of fear, And made the shadows bright. Coo's sun has shone, and so fair flowers Have month by month been born : Heaven’s gems adorning earthly bowers— All through the year Gcd's sun has shone. God’s sun has shone all through the year! Some lesser lights have paled; But God’s good sun above me clear Has never, never failed. Sometimes a cloud has cast a shade, And half a dread, came on, Then a new burst- new joy has made— All through the year God’s sun has shone. All through the year, another year, Now added lo the rest, All through :-!! years lie has been near, His beams have made mo blest. My heart, reflect His constant light, And to now years pass on, Till thou sir,ib sing on glory’s height, All through, all years God’s sun has shone. Readers of “The Garland” will, I think, he glad to read the following from a well known magazine. “Great Thoughts”: “Charles Dickens was not a church member, or what some people would call an orthodox Christian; but he preached many a good sermon for all that; and his text was the Golden Rule in all its various readings. In many wholesome, reverent ways does the ' Bible figure throughout his pages. “One of the earliest recollections of

David Copperfield was the stcV. j 4 the raising of Lazarus, at it was read to him and Feggotty by his mother one Sunday evening. Little Nell [dear little Nell!] used to take her Bible with her to react in tlie quiet, lovely retreat of the old church. 'I ain’t much of a hand at reading “writing hand,” ’ said Betty Higden, ’though 1 can read my Bible and most print’; Oliver Twist read the Bible to Mrs Maylie and Rose Fleming; Pip read the Bible to, and prayed with, the convict under sentence of death; Scrooge heard Tiny Tim say, ‘And He called a little child to Him, and set him in the midst’; and when Jo was on his deathbed Allen Woodcourt asked him : “ ‘Did you ever know a prayer, Jo.’ ‘Never knowed nothink, sir.’ “ ‘Not so much as one short prayer?’ “‘No, sir, nothink at all.’ “ 'Jo, can you say what 1 say?’ “ ‘l’ll say anythink as you say, sir, for I know it’s good. ‘“OUR FATHER ’ “ ‘Our Father! Yes, that’s werry good.’ 'Which art in heaven ’ ‘Art in heaven—-is the light a-coming, sir ?’ It is close at hand. Hallowed oe Thy Name.’ “ ‘Hallowed be—Thy ’ “The light is come' upon the dark benighted way ! Dead ! And dying around us every day.” “Dead, your Majesty ; Dead, my Lords and Gentlemen; Dead, Right Reverends and Wrong Reverends, of every order. Dead, men and women, born with heavenly compassion in your hearts. And dying thus around us every day.” Oh! if the atheist’s words were true, If those we seek to save Sink —and in sinking from our view Are lost beyond the grave! If life thus closed, how dark and dlrear Would this bewildered earth appear— Scarce worth the dust it gave: A tra-ct of black sepulchral gloom, One yawning, ever opening tomb! Blest be that strain of high belief, More heaven-like, more sublime, Which says, that souls who part in grief Part only for a time! That, far beyond this speck of pain, Far o’er the gloomy grave’s domain. There spreads a brighter clime— Where care, and toil, and trouble o’er, Friends meet, and meeting, weep no morel —Furlong. Sir Humphry Davy wrote:—“lf I am allowed to give a metaphorical allusion to the future state of the blessed deal I should imagine it by the orange-grove in that sheltered glen on which the sun is now beginning to shine, and of which the trees are, at the same time, loaded with sweet golden fruit and balmy silver flowers. may well portray a state in which hope and fruition be come one eternal feeling.” One of the old preachers and of the old school of poets writes as under concerning Heaven, the home of the redeemed : Her street with burnish’d gold are paved round ; Stars lie like pebbles scatter’d on the ground | Pearl mixt with onyx, and the jasper stone, Made gravell’d causeways to be trampled on. There shines no sun by day, no moon by night, The palace glory is the palace light; There is no time to measure motion by— There time is swallow’d up in eternity: Wry mouth’d! disdain, and corner-hunting lust, And toudy-faced fraud, and bettle brow’d distrust, Soul-boiling Tage, and trouble state sedition, And giddy doubt, andi goggle-eyed suspicion, And lumpish sorrow, and degen’rous fear Are banish’d thence, and death’s a stranger there: But simple love and sempiternal joys, Whose sweetness never gluts, nor fulness cloys: Where, face to face, our ravish’d eye shall see, Great God, that glorious One in Three, And) Three rn One—and seeing Him shall bless Him, And blessing, love Him—and in love possess Him!