perfect way, however otherwise it may appear to blind unbelief. If I am straitened, it is not in Him. Let me then cast myself unreservedly upon Him, and by faith seek to pierce the gloom; let me entreat His direction, and with simplicity and earnestness of heart concern myself with this one thing to cling unto Christ with soul and life.

3. Let me now bring all my sins, but especially my besetting sin, to Christ; to wash away its guilt, and to find grace to help. This day let me pray and watch, and beware of mine eyes, my tongue, and my heart.

4. Let me be jealous of my feelings towards His saints; let me ever view them as His children. Do I really regard them as brethren; do I love the brethren-all the brethren? Am I concerned for Christ's Church, without respect of sect or party--the body of Christ; and wherein do I seek to promote its increase and wellbeing? Let me now seek to realize the spiritual character of the Church, and my own living connexion with it, and with Him who is its exalted Head. Out of His fulness have we all received, and grace for grace.'

HOLY SPIRIT, come, we pray,
Come from heaven and shed the ray
Of Thy light Divine.

What is arid, fresh bedew ;

What is sordid, cleanse anew;

Balm on the wounded pour.

What is rigid, gently bend;

On what is cold, Thy fervour send;
What has stray'd, restore.

KING ROBERT II. OF FRANCE.
(The Voice of Christian Life in Song.)

XLV.

COMFORT TO THE MOURNER.

I HEAR my prayer, O Lord, and let my cry come unto thee.

2 Hide not thy face from me in the day when I am in trouble;

Incline thine ear unto me: in the day when I call answer me speedily.

3 For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as an hearth.

4 My heart is smitten, and withered like grass: so that I forget to eat my

bread.

5 By reason of the voice of my groaning my bones cleave to my skin.

6 I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl of the desert. 7 I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house-top.

8 Mine enemies reproach me all the day;

And they that are mad against me are sworn against me.

9 For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping,

10 Because of thine indignation and thy wrath: for thou hast lifted me up, and

cast me down.

11 My days are like a shadow that declineth; and I am withered like grass. 12 But thou, O Lord, shalt endure for ever;

And thy remembrance unto all generations.—PSALM CII.

OUR seasons of holy gladness and spiritual resolution are, alas, in our present state but transient. Perhaps the very intensity of our asseveration to be, to act, and to appear on the Lord's side, may lead us to self-examination, to discoveries of our weakness and backsliding, and even to deep sorrow and

almost despondency. Thus, by being made to look into our hearts, even after grace has laid hold on us, we learn to know our misery, and our need of Him, and are ever cast afresh upon the infinite compassion and the unfailing help of our blessed Redeemer. Accordingly, the earnest entreaty, 'When wilt Thou come unto me?' (Ps. ci. 2) is taken up in the language of deepest humiliation, ‘let my cry come unto Thee' (Ps. cii. 1). It is indeed, as the inscription bears, 'a cry of the poor and needy, when he faints and fails' (compare the term thus paraphrased with Ps. lxi. 2, and the precious promise in Isa. lvii. 16), and pours out his meditative complaint before Jehovah.' Indeed, these words, 'I will not contend for ever, neither will I always be wroth: for the spirit should fail before Me, and the souls which I have made,' might be placed as inscription over this Psalm. Most precious encouragement this in our 'meditative complaint' not a mere complaint, but prayerful also, and mindful of His covenant mercy and His covenant promises. And so the Psalm, which opens with such mournful words, closes in the bright anticipation, not only of redemption, but of the consummation of all things, and of His people with them (ver. 26-28). The Lord will not only arise and have mercy upon Zion when the 'set time is come,' but the heathen shall fear the name of Jehovah.' He will not only 'build up Zion,' and appear in His glory,' but (as included in it and giving present comfort in present trouble) ' He will regard the prayer of the destitute.' For as all suffering and sorrow pointed forward to the suffering of Christ, the God-man, the second Adam, so all prophecy of the future glory, and even

of the restoration of all things, point back for comfort and consolation to the state and wants of God's people at all times. That is the full consolation, this its first-fruits; that is the full deliverance, this its commencement; and the same principles which shall be fully unfolded at last are every day applied for the deliverance of the Church as a whole, and of believers in their individual capacity. And so all past history of our sufferings contains a principle which truly applied to Him, and all future glory of the Church, a principle which even now truly applies to us; and thus has Scripture ever an eternal meaning, reaching far beyond man, and a present application, even in its loftiest strains, ever descending to our lowest estate. Accordingly, we do not wonder to find, at the close of this Psalm, the comprehensive view expressed of God's works, in the widest sense the record of the first creation of heaven and earth by Jesus Christ (see the application of vers. 25-27 to our Lord in Heb. i. 10), bringing up the promise of the new heavens and the new earth (ver. 26), rendered necessary by the state of matters complained of in this 'prayer of the needy.'

The general scope of the Psalm, and its connexion with the following, has been well traced by one as follows: To feel sin and death, and under it to wrestle for grace and pardon, and to seek after the kingdom of God and His righteousness, is the subject-matter of Psalm cii. To feel sin and death, and withal to have received pardon, and the Spirit who maketh alive, and thus to praise God, and in faith and patience to join one's-self to all God's saints, is the subjectmatter of Ps. ciii.' Whatever the immediate occasion of this

complaint may have been, it is the cry of the Church in dark and evil days, in which by faith and prayer she gradually rises above the things seen to assurance of God's mercy, and to bright anticipation of the full glory to come. Thus it is prophetical as well as historical.

The Psalm opens in the manner, and almost with the words, of so many others uttered under similar circumstances (vers. 1, 2). For these three features of sin, mercy, and deliverance of confession, faith, and joy-are the fundamental characteristics of the hymnal of the Church. One has designated such words as 'the old and stereotyped words of God, which spontaneously rise in the heart and on the lips of every one who giveth himself to prayer.' The peculiar wants and feelings of the Psalm appear with ver. 3. What an expression of felt misery under a deep sense of God's displeasure! His days' or life 'consumed in smoke'-passing like the unused fuel; his bones (or innermost being) 'burned as an hearth;' his heart smitten and withered like grass-and all enjoyments and pleasures converted into sorrow and bitterness. And if such is our partial sense of His 'indignation' and 'wrath' (the terms here used being the strongest in the language), what would the full realization in eternity be! Mark its effects upon his heart. He seems to himself like one of those unclean birds, tenanting desert and ruined places (ver. 4). During the hours allotted to sleep 'I wake,' like a little bird which sits solitary on the house-top, while all beneath enjoy the sleep which He giveth to His beloved. The rage of his enemies has been unloosed against him: 'they that are raging against me, swear by me'-make me