This is the dormitive I take to bedward; I need no other laudanum than this to make me sleep ; after which I close mine eyes in security, content to take my leave of the Sun, and sleep unto the Eesurrection.^
5. Often in the midst of life, often in the very spring-time of life, we are in death. But whenever it eomes — the decisive, the final sickness — it brings with it one call, one trial, one necessity, one only possibility — a call to rest. Nothing can now be done but to lie still. And is that so easy ? Visit a bed of death, and see whether even patience, whether even submission, much more, whether affiance, whether faith, is the grace of every man ! We * Sir Thomas Browne.
2i8 REST AFTER TOIL
see then the truth of the saying, " And that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God ! " To rest on the Lord then is just as impossible with man as it is in life to work for God. But faith — the man of faith — can do it. He thinks this one of the chief blessings, one of the chief evidences too, of Christ's Gospel, that it never sets a man to do anything impossible ; that its demand is always appro- priate, its call exactly suitable to youth and to age, to health and to sickness, to life and to death. To him now it says only these two words, Faith, rest ! Lie still and look upward. What has been left undone cannot now be done : rest it upon Christ. What has been ill done cannot now be amended: rest it upon Christ. What has been done amiss cannot now be undone : rest it upon Christ. Lean all thy weight upon Him. He is sufficient. He has borne all. Trust Him, and doubt not. He will under- take for thee. It is enough.
^ Two days later, with no premonitory consciousness of any- thing but perfect health, he fell suddenly ill, and a serious opera- tion was deemed necessary. He was taken at once to a hospital and the operation was performed. It was apparently wholly successful, but strength was slow in returning, and the end began to be in doubt. For six weeks he lingered, bearing his painful days and nights with cheerful courage and a sweet and patient self-effacement. All his thought was centred in the effort to keep from the one dearest to him the foreboding that was becoming a certainty to him. To a friend who sat by his side he said, " For myself, I regard death merely as the passing shadow on a flower." On 17th March he expressed a wish to be taken home, and there on 19th March, in the greyness of the deepening twilight, the end came. He met death as he had met life, bravely and serenely, fully conscious of the loosening of the cords that held him to the earth. With his last look and smile he said, " In spite of all, I am going to sleep ; put out the lights " ; and for those who loved him darkness came.^
Mysterious Night, when our first parent knew Thee by report Divine, and heard thy name, Did he not tremble for this goodly frame, This glorious canopy of light and blue ? But through a curtain of translucent dew, Hesperus with the host of heaven came, Bathed in the hues of the great setting flame. And lo ! Creation broadened to man's view. ^ Ferris Greenslet, Thomas Bailey Aldrich, 237.
PSALM IV. 8 219
Who could have guessed such darkness lay concealed J^ifehin thy beams, 0 Sun, or who divined, When flower, and leaf, and insect lay revealed, Thou to such countless worlds hadst made us blind ? Why should we then shun death with anxious strife If Light could thus deceive, wherefore not Life ? ^
IL
Best of Spirit.
" Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Faith is the apprehension of that rest ; the laying hold now upon the promise, the entering at last into the fruition. Faith which works is also a faith which rests.
1. There is a resting of faith which is habitual. Faith rests while it works. This is a peculiarity of the true Gospel. No false religion could teach it. Many human forms even of the true Gospel do not teach it. Many professed disciples of Christ Himself — men to whom the name of religious persons cannot be denied — never learn it. True faith rests habitually; rests in working. It is a paradox; but a paradox full of truth, full of beauty, full of admonition.
When King Asa went out against Zerah the Ethiopian, and set the battle in array against overwhelming numbers, he " cried unto the Lord his God, and said, Lord, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power : help us, 0 Lord our God ; for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude." Faith rested while it wrought. And when King Hezekiah saw the mighty host of Sennacherib coming to fight against Jerusalem, he said to his captains of war, " There be more with us than with him : with him is an arm of flesh ; but with us is the Lord our God to help us, and to fight our battles. And the people," it is added, " rested themselves upon the words of Hezekiah, King of Judah." It was an example of faith resting (not after, but) in working. The Gospel of Christ lays great stress upon this point. " What shall I do," asks an awakening conscience, " to work the works of God ? " Surely