PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
The Great Texts of the Bible — Volume 3
James Hastings · 189,259 words · 196 reading sections
Section 121
(4) The heart is soothed and comforted. Love alone can find its way into the innermost shrine of personality. In the atmo- sphere of beneficence our pores are opened, and subtle heavenly influences percolate into the soul. ^ Harsh and heartless criticism almost fatally wounded the imaginative genius of Turner. The pre…
1,032 wordsSECTION 122Section 122
^ The twofold subject of this Psalm is one which in all ages has served (with variations according to the nature of the religion ^ E. C. S. Gibson, The Old Testament and its Messages, 128. ^ J. J, Stewart Perowne, The Psalms, i. 86. PSALM XIX. 7-9 323 of the thinker) as the theme of pious meditation. Those eternal "…
907 wordsSECTION 123Section 123
PSALM XIX. 7-9 325 cisely the conception of poetry which Wordsworth overthrew. He renewed its seriousness ; he stripped it of poetic fiction ; he made us see nature as men who are being disciphned for eternity, who can allow themselves no idle dreams, being far too much in earnest to take the beauty of nature as the p…
1,123 wordsSECTION 124Section 124
^ We call it the law of God. It is so in the sense in which it is your law and mine. It is greater than God's throne, nay. His throne rests upon it. He obeys it, rules by it, — else He might be Zeus, or Jupiter, the fickle, wayward, unrighteous tyrant of classic mythology, but not the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ an…
958 wordsSECTION 125Section 125
By devout communion and contact a soul gains strength from Christ. I cannot tell hoio it is that I should be able to receive into my being a power to do and to bear by this communion, but I know that it is a fact.^ II. The Character of God's Law. The Law is characterized by six names and nine epithets and by nine ef…
1,051 wordsSECTION 126Section 126
2. " The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple." It is a definite voice, a voice addressed to the child in the man, ^ A. P. Pealiody, King's Chayel Sermons, 96. 332 THE PERFECT LAW and therefore capable of being understood by all men. It speaks to the conscience in the prohibitory form in which law s…
930 wordsSECTION 127Section 127
334 THE PERFECT LAW Psalmist's words, "The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart." ^ To the growing soul, there are, with maturing life, deeps of joy and an ever-increasing capacity for delight. Ever grander are the chords of happiness struck by experience — provided we keep near the Author and Giver of…
930 wordsSECTION 128Section 128
336 THE PERFECT LAW that it gives us the knowledge of what is wrong, and yet we are not pained in doing that wrong ? As conscience is constituted, it is never what it ought to be in the best of men, and it is never without some witnessing power in the worst.^ I was ashamed, I dared not lift my eyes, I could not bear…
962 wordsSECTION 129Section 129
The Psalmist perceived that in Nature the retribution and the payment take no account of moral character; they are given simply for the special work omitted, and for the special work accomplished. The missionary may be the most pious of men, but if he goes to sea in a bad ship he will probably go to the bottom. The jud…
1,061 wordsSECTION 130Section 130
* C. Vince, The Unchanging Saviour, 170. PSALM XIX. 7-9 341 the heaviest pressure of calamity, and with not a ray of hope as to things earthly, there would still be that in our souls which would give a most indignant negative to Satan's question about Job, " Does he serve God for nought ? " ^ ^ If we see law not as …
902 wordsSECTION 131Section 131
Caird (J.), Aspects of Life, 33. Halsey (J.), The Spirit of Truth, 276. Hodge (C), Princeton Sermons, 110. Keble (J.), Sermons for the Cliristian Year: Lent to Passion-tide, 95, King (E.), The Love and Wisdom of God, 97. Maclaren (A.), The God of the Amen, 77. Newman (J. H.), Parochial and Plain Sermons, i. 41. …
955 wordsSECTION 132Section 132
1 J. Thew, Broken Ideals, 110. ^ A. W. Thorold, Qiiestions of Faith and Duty, 56. PSALM XIX. 12 347 of sin recur continually in the hymnology of the Church and constitute no small part even of the sacred AVord. Is it not one of the greatest of wonders, while the holiest men esteem themselves so great sinners, while …
905 wordsSECTION 133Section 133
^ The ancient precept, " Man, know thyself ! " was recognized as so wise and good that it was thought to be of Divine origin. The best of the ancients regarded self-knowledge as the very beginning of wisdom, just as they regarded self-mastery as the very beginning of practical virtue. It is said that Socrates, on one o…
905 wordsSECTION 134Section 134
1 T. G. Selby, Tht Imperfect Angel, 144. PSALM XIX. 12 351 fallen into the same condition by reason of the multitude of small ones. " He that despiseth little things shall fall by little and little " ; and whilst the deeds which the Ten Commandments rebuke are damning to a Christian character, still more perilous, be…
925 wordsSECTION 135Section 135
2. Another cause of hidden sin is a hlunt conscience. Secret sins arise from inadequate religious knowledge, and neglect of religious thought and instruction not infrequently explains this defect of knowledge. Secret sins arise from the fact that passions which are antagonistic to keen intellectual and religious suscep…
1,141 wordsSECTION 136Section 136
My smile is bright, my glance is free, My voice is calm and clear; Dear friend, I seem a type to thee Of holy love and fear. But I am scann'd by eyes unseen, And these no saint surround ; They mete what is by what has been, And joy the lost is found. 356 HIDDEN FAULTS Erst my good Angel shrank to see My thought…
940 wordsSECTION 137Section 137
358 HIDDEN FAULTS us. To the eye and to the ear of the Maker all these worlds have been open from the beginning. They are just coming into our horizon with the development of science. And in the same way there must be the growth within us of a fine moral science, that will bring home to our apprehension the most obscu…
992 wordsSECTION 138Section 138
^ The only way for us to be delivered from the dominion of our unconscious faults is to increase the depth and closeness and constancy of our communion with Jesus Christ ; and then they will drop away from us. Mosquitoes and malaria, the one unseen in their minuteness, and the other, " the pestilence that walketh in da…
988 wordsSECTION 139Section 139
' H. Black, Christ's Service of Love, 210. PSALM XXI. 3 365 ^ We are rising to the conviction that we are a part of nature, and so a part of God ; that the whole creation — the One and the Many and All-One — is travailing together toward some great end ; and that now, after ages of development, we have at length beco…
913 wordsSECTION 140Section 140
O'er a new joy this day we bend, Soft power from heaven our souls to lift; A wondering wonder Thou dost lend With loan outpassing gift — A little child. She sees the sun- Once more incarnates thy old law : One born of two, two born in one, Shall into one three draw. But is there no day creeping on Which I should trem…
918 wordsSECTION 141Section 141
3. It cannot be that God is absent from the most untoward environment. There are children born into the world for whom you would say little preparation had been made by any one. Nobody seems to want them here. It is scanty care they receive from any one. They are left to grow as they may ; and live, one hardly knows ho…
919 wordsSECTION 142Section 142
As a man deepens so his longings deepen, till they reach to the Infinite and the Eternal. And the strange thing is, that as these cravings alter, and rise from the transient to the enduring, so God is ever there before us, with His prepared answer to our quest. We crave for light, and the sun and moon are there, and th…
993 wordsSECTION 143Section 143
^ I am filled with shame and confusion when I reflect, on one hand, upon the great favours which God has bestowed and is still unceasingly bestowing upon me ; and, on the other, upon the ill use I have made of them, and my small advancement in the way of perfection. Since, by His mercy, He gives us still a little time,…
1,060 wordsSECTION 144Section 144
^ Bishop Boyd Carpenter, Some Pages of My Life, 332. 376 THE MINISTRY OF SURPRISE career and rendered helpless for the remainder of his days, yet who was able, almost at once, to accept his Father's will and to be content with it. Had not such humble trusting sufferers found the "blessings of goodness" in those dark …
942 wordsSECTION 145Section 145
^ As Washington Irving was passing a print window in Broadway, New York, one day, his eye rested on the beautiful engraving of Christus Gonsolaior. He stopped and looked at it intently for some minutes, evidently much affected by the genuine inspiration of the artist in this remarkable representation of the Saviour as …
1,038 wordsSECTION 146Section 146
This present life is like crossing the Stelvio. We are going towards the glorious secret, but meantime the way hides it. The more we think of the land within the veil, the more we must look ^ Lucy Larcora. PSALM XXI. 3 381 forward to the top of the pass, when we shall see the secret for ourselves. It is ready, as Pe…
970 wordsSECTION 147Section 147
^ In January 1681, two "honest, worthy lasses," as Peden calls them, Isabel Alison and Marion Harvie, were hanged at Edinburgh. On the scaffold they sang together, to the tune of " Martyrs," Psalm Ixxxiv. " Marion," said Bishop Paterson, " you would never hear a curate; now you shall hear one," and he called upon one o…
907 wordsSECTION 148Section 148
II. Jehovah Mine. 1. "The Lord is my shepherd." Here is the link that connects our hearts with the living God. It is a grand thing to consider how far out His shepherd-care extends. Man never yet lighted upon an unblest spot where no token of it could be seen. It meets us everywhere, and every hour. "The Lord is good…
965 wordsSECTION 149Section 149
PSALM XXIII. I 391 word for him, the word " my," and explained personal faith in a personal Saviour. The boy grew interested, and the light dawned upon him. One day Jamie's mother met the minister at her door, and said, " Oh, come in, my Jamie is dead, and you will find his fourth knuckle folded in, and his forefinger…
910 wordsSECTION 150Section 150
The darkness gathers, thro' the gloom no star Eises to guide. We have wandered far, Without Thy lamp we know not where we are. At evening bring us home. The clouds are round us and the snowdrifts thicken, 0 Thou, dear Shepherd, leave us not to sicken, In the waste night, our tardy footsteps quicken. At evening bring u…
1,027 wordsSECTION 151Section 151
IV. His Peovidence. 1. "I shall not want." Coverdale's translation, used in the Prayer Book, is better, " Therefore can I lack nothing " ; still better, as more literal, is Kay's, "I shall have no lack." The word is used in Deut. ii. 7 of Israel's " lacking nothing " during its passage through the wilderness ; and in…
1,029 wordsSECTION 152Section 152
398 A PERSONAL PROVIDENCE hearts, and whose decrees, as unalterable in the eternal future as in the eternal past, yet in the close verity of visible fact, bend, like reeds, before the fore-ordained and faithful prayers of His children.^ 0 strong, upwelling prayers of faith, From inmost founts of life ye start, — • T…
918 wordsSECTION 153Section 153
The wind is chill, the hour is late; Haste thee, dear Lord, undo the gate; For grim wolf-sorrows prowling range These bitter hills of chance and change: And from the barren wilderness With homeward face Thy flocks do press: Their worn bells ring a jangled chime — Shepherd, come forth, 'tis eventime ! ^ 1 May Byron, Th…
911 wordsSECTION 154Section 154
Eest. "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." 1. The green pastures, says Delitzsch, are pasture-grounds of fresh tender soft grass, where one lies at ease, and rest and enjoyment are combined. The word rendered " pastures " is the plural of a word which is used for a dwelling or homestead. In six of the twelve…
1,086 wordsSECTION 155Section 155
1 Ruskin, Modern Painters ( Works, \y. 113). * Life and Letters of F. W. Robertson, 204. PSALM XXIII. 2, 3 407 The universal instinct of repose, The longing for confirmed tranquillity, Inward and outward; humble, yet sublime: The life where hope and memory are as one; "Where earth is quiet and her face unchanged Save…
928 wordsSECTION 156Section 156
^ What if one who calls himself my friend should ask me to his house, and welcome me with many words, and entertain me with sumptuous show of hospitality, and give me a thousand tokens of his regard. He bids me make myself at home, and hopes I shall bo comfortable ; but as I am going to rest, he takes me aside. " This …
1,078 wordsSECTION 157Section 157
We know how often in Scripture the emblem of water, as a purifying and refreshing element, is employed to represent the gracious operations of the Holy Spirit. " If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink . . . this spake he of the Spirit." This is the " pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, pro- ceedi…
1,104 wordsSECTION 158Section 158
^ An evangelical hymn from this Psalm by Sir Henry W. Baker, the editor of " Hymns Ancient and Modern," is among the most generally appreciated in that collection. The Kev. J. Julian {Dictionary of Hymnology, v. " Baker ") says : The last audible words which lingered on his dying lips were the third stanza of his exqui…
924 wordsSECTION 159Section 159
^ David had lived a full life. He had known the extremes of want and wealth. He had endured the tortures of physical hunger and thirst, and had moved amid all the splendours of an Oriental court. He had mingled freely with the affairs of State, and knew all its ambitions and temptations, its plots and counter- plots. H…
996 wordsSECTION 160Section 160
^ J. Brierley, Life and the Ideal, 74. ^ Autoliography of Dr. Talmage, 156, PSALM XXIII. 2, 3 419 to propagate vital religion," As a means of revival, the import- ance of praise is coming to be recognized more and more by all good men.^ Praise is devotion fit for mighty minds, The diff'ring world's agreeing sacrific…
982 wordsSECTION 161Section 161
^ I am to think of Jesus as the Good Shepherd who speaks to me. He calleth His own sheep by name. If I will, I can hear His voice in words spoken from the pulpit, in the conversation of friends, in the reading of devout books. Sometimes He speaks in sweet thoughts which come to me, in the tender touches of the Spirit o…
1,101 wordsSECTION 162Section 162
1 J. E. Hellier, Life of David Hill, 72, ^ A. C. Benson, The, Leaves of the Tree, 206. Good Guidance. Literature. Brooks (P.), The Spiritual Man, 281. Burns (J. D.), Memoir and Remains, 293. Clarke (G.), From the Gross to the Grown, 16. Cooke (G. A.), The Progress of Revelation, 105. Culross (J.), God's Shepher…
915 wordsSECTION 163Section 163
PSALM XXIII. 3 429 ^ Wherever St. Francis and his six friends went, their sermons excited the greatest attention in peasant circles. Some would speak to them, asking what order they belonged to and whence they came. They answered that they were of no order, but were only "men from Assisi, who lived a life of penance."…
911 wordsSECTION 164Section 164
PSALM XXIII. 3 431 from negative restraint. The latter may be no more than the rebuke or cry of our own alarmed conscience. Laws written involuntarily upon our heart operate upon our fears. Guidance appeals to our faith. " I will guide thee with mine eye " is a promise to God's people which goes far ahead of conscien…
930 wordsSECTION 165Section 165
PSALM XXIII. 3 433' Thirty-second Psalm, and the Psalm itself provides us with the figure of violent contrast. " Be ye not as the horse or the mule." The mule is headlong and headstrong, and he is to be guided by the "strong hand." But the Lord would guide us by His eye. How exceedingly delicate is the guidance of a l…
946 wordsSECTION 166Section 166
That is the supreme wonder — the infinitely gracious God takes charge of thee and me ! We are neither of us overlooked in the vast crowd. "I know my sheep," "He calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out." So let me step out without fear, " Whither he doth lead — to the thirsty desert or the dewy mead." II. …
903 wordsSECTION 167Section 167
Unceasingly they creep. When silver moonlight floods the nights — 0 hark ! across the sea These roads, the wanderer's delights, Are calling you and me. Singing their challenge sweet and clear For wanderers to roam ; But, all at once, I only hear The road that leads me home.^ 3. While they are paths of righteousnes…
968 wordsSECTION 168Section 168
^ Mr. Edmund Gosse's poem, " To Tusitala," addressed to Eobert Louis Stevenson, reached him at Vailima three days before his death. It was the last piece of verse read by Stevenson, and it is the subject of the last letter he wrote on the last day of his life. The poem was read by Mr. Lloyd Osborne at the funeral. It i…
960 wordsSECTION 169Section 169
^ We should have expected him to say, " God is leading me in green pastures on account of the good life / have led." On the contrary, he says, " God is leading me in green pastures to further the good of other people — to minister to those who have not led a good life." And I think the experience of the Psalmist will b…
957 wordsSECTION 170Section 170
^ The wilderness of Judsea is not a barren waste of sand and land without water, as a major portion of the Occidental world believes it to be. " Wilderness," as the word is now understood, is altogether a misnomer. The " Wilds of Judaa " would be more correctly descriptive. The wilderness of Judaea is about forty miles…
937 wordsSECTION 171Section 171
^ One night, when I was a lad, lying in my bed at home, long ago, I awoke, and it was dark, and I heard a voice in the night — not a song, but I heard the voice of my mother as she lay upon her bed of pain. She was twenty-five years in the valley of the shadow of death. Her " light affliction " endured for a quarter of…
908 wordsSECTION 172Section 172
2. What is the bearing of the Lord's flock in entering this valley ? It comes into view in these words, which one speaks for all, " I will fear no evil." Mark, it is a single voice that speaks, a man all alone, conscious only of the presence of God. I will go into the death-gloom without dread and palpitation of heart.…
979 wordsSECTION 173Section 173
There is a courage, a majestic thing That springs forth from the brow of pain, full grown, Minerva-like, and dares all dangers known. And all the threatening future yet may bring; 1 Life and Letters of George John liomanes, 188. ' J. Culross, God's Shei)licrd Care, 106. " John McNeill. 454 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW…
929 wordsSECTION 174Section 174
^ The highest courage has its root in faith. One may be bold because he is ignorant or because he lacks sensitiveness ; one may 1 W. G. Blaikie, David Broivn, D.D., LL.D., 36. 456 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW be indifferent to danger because he is indifferent to fate ; one may be brave from that instinctive pluck which …
908 wordsSECTION 175Section 175
^ R. E. Prothero, The Psalms in Human Life, 313. ^ W. H. Gray, Ott,r Divine Shepherd, 21. 458 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW death, one has stood forth as a champion-fear to terrify and daunt me. It is the loneliness of death. " I die alone." ^ Jesu, have mercy ! 'Tis this new feeling, never felt before, (Be with me, Lor…
962 wordsSECTION 176Section 176
^ M. G. Pearse, In the Banqueting House, 145. 46o THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW lost in the din, but reaches His ear, when I draw close to Him in the darkness, and breathe out my confidence, " Thou art with me." ^ III. COMFOET. "Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me." 1. The shepherd is as powerful as he is tender ; f…
1,037 wordsSECTION 177Section 177
Death! I know not if my small barque be nearing you; But if you are at sea. Still there my sails float free; " What is to be will be." Nor will I mar the happy voyage by fearing you. Death ! I know not what hour or spot you wait for me ; My days untroubled flow, Just trusting on I go, For oh, I know, I know, Dea…
1,099 wordsSECTION 178Section 178
1 John McNeill. ^ M. M'Neal-Sweeney, Men of No Land, 77. 3 A. C. Benson, Thy Bod and Thy Staff, 60. Entertainment, Enjoyment, Enrichment. JOB-PS. XXX. — 30 Literature. Burns (J. D.), Memoir and Remains, 305. Clark (H. W.), Laws of the Inner Kingdom, 72. Culross (J.), God's Shepherd Care, 121. Duff (R. S.), The …
960 wordsSECTION 179Section 179
PSALM XXIII. 5 • 469 trouble was in his life, he could still calmly see and realize God and the goodness of God. You do not find any weak repining, fretful crying out against God, morbid dwelling upon the gloomy events that darken his life. Anything but that. His trouble did not blind him to the Almighty guidance and …
960 wordsSECTION 180Section 180
4. This idea of fellowship is prominent in the Sacrament of Holy Communion. We sit down together at the table of our heavenly Father; we take the bread as from the hand of the unseen Christ ; we acknowledge our brotherhood, with all its high and sacred obligations, in the Divine family; we feel ourselves united, by clo…
918 wordsSource & rights
Public-domain historical edition (1910); OCR text from Internet Archive. OCR may contain scanning/transcription errors. Verify quotations against page images when precision matters.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.