(4) It would be ungrateful if we did not add one more to these occasional restings of faith, one which depends not upon any circumstance, inward or outward, of human life, but is provided everywhere, of God's goodness, in that blessed communion and fellowship which is the Church and body of Christ. When faith droops, under the pressure of things temporal, whether adverse or prosperous, how often does it draw newness of vigour from obeying the call, " Let us go unto the house of the Lord," or the charge, " Do this in remembrance of me ! " It is only presump- tion— it is not faith — that can dispense with these things. Christ judged better for us, as men not of the world y&t in it, when He
PSALM IV. 8 223
bade us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together, promised to be with even two or three thus gathered, and affixed a peculiar grace to the petition in which two should agree. If faith would know what is meant by her resting, she must frequent, with earnestness and large expectation, the table provided in the wilderness, the feast of which it is written, that, when Jesus took bread and blessed it, and gave it to them, " their eyes were opened, and they knew him." Faith, struggling elsewhere, rests here. " Handle me, and see."
^ On the next day Francis clothed Divini in the grey clothes of the Order and girded his loins with the cord, and gave him the name " Pacificus," because he had left the world's tumult for the peace of God, Thus, too, ^ century later, another much greater poet was to seek for peace among the children of St. Francis. One evening he, already grey and bowed down, stood before a lonely cloister in the Apennines and knocked at the door. And to the porter's question as to what he sought there, the great Florentine (Dante) gave only the one all-including answer, "Pace /"("Peace!")!
III.
The GivEE of Eest.
The giver of rest is God — " thou, Lord, alone makest me dwell in safety." God is here revealed to us as exercising personal care in the still chamber. And there is something here which should be inexpressibly sweet to the believer; for this shows the minuteness of God's care, the individuality of His love ; how it condescends, and stoops, and acts, not only in great, but also in little spheres ; not only where glory might be procured from great results, but where nought is to be had save the gratitude and love of a poor feeble creature, whose life has been protected and preserved, in a period of helplessness and sleep. There is some- thing inexpressibly touching in this " lay me down " of the Psalmist. In thus lying down, he voluntarily gave up any guardianship of himself; he resigned himself into the hands of another ; he did so completely, for, in the absence of all care, he slept ; there was here a perfect trust.
* J. Jorgeiiseii, St. Francis of Assisi, 155.
224 REST AFTER TOIL
]My barque is wafted to the strand
By breath Divine, And on the helm there rests a Hand
Other than mine.
One who has known in storms to sail
I have on board ; Above the raging of the gale
I have my Lord.
He holds me when the billows smite,
I shall not fall. If sharp, 'tis short; if long, 'tis light;
He tempers all.
Safe to the land ! Safe to the land !
The end is this; And then with Him go hand in hand
Far into bliss.^
^ There is no peace like the peace of the man who loves to lie down at night with the thought of God possessing his mind and heart. Happy the man who delights to recall the thought of God before he sinks into slumber !
Be my last thought how sweet to rest For ever on my Saviour's breast.
There is no peace like the peace of a man who, when he awakes in the morning, gives first welcome to the thought of God.
Fairer than the morning, lovelier than the daylight, Dawns the sweet consciousness, I am with Thee.
The man who finds in God his shield, who seeks in Him his glory, and who makes in Him his boast, will have mornings of joy, and evening times of light.^
^ Let us learn as Luther did, who, looking out of his window one summer evening, saw, on a tree at hand, a little bird making his brief and easy dispositions for a night's rest. " Look," he said, " how that little fellow preaches faith to us all. He takes hold of his twig, tucks his head under his wing, and goes to sleep, leaving God to think for him ! " "
1 Deau Alford. " J. H. Jowett, Tldrsting for the Sj>rii>jj^, 99.
3 P. B. Power, Tfie "I Wills" of the Fsalms, 19.
PSALM IV. 8 225
In The Sunday Magazine for 1877 the following hymn, written by a young Brahmin lady, was published : —
I lay me down in peace
Beneath Thy wing,
And safely sleep. Thy watch can never cease,
For Thou, 0 King,
My soul wilt keep !
My sins are all forgiven,
So now I see