sight, And hear the angels singing to the sleepers through the
night ; And, lo ! throughout the hours of day those gentle flowers
prolong The music of the angels in that tender slumber-song, —
" Sleep, oh, sleep !
The Shepherd loveth His sheep. He that guardeth His flock the best Hath folded them to His loving breast; So sleep ye now, and take your rest, —
Sleep, oh, sleep ! "
From angel and from flower the years have learned that
soothing song. And with its heavenly music speed the days and nights along; So through all time, whose flight the Shepherd's vigils glorify, God's Acre slumbereth in the grace of that sweet lullaby, —
"Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd loveth His sheep. Fast speedeth the night away. Soon Cometh the glorious day; Sleep, weary ones, while ye may, —
Sleep, oh, sleep ! " ^
* S. p. Cadman, Charles Darwin, and Other English Thinkers, 86. ' Eugene Field, Second Book of Verse, 25.
De Profundis.
kn
Literature,
Brown (C), The Message of God, 216.
Church (R. W.), Pascal and Other Sermons, 1.
Dearden (H. W.), Parochial Sermons, 14.
Hunter (J.), De Profundis Glamavi, 1.
King (T. S.), Christianity and Humanity, 17.
Lonsdale (J.), Sermons, 152.
Purvea (Q. T.), Faith and Life, 323.
Travers (H.), The Garden of Voices, 94.
Vaughan(J.), Set-mons (Brighton Pulpit), New Ser., xvi. (1878), No. 1078.
Christian World Pulpit, 1. 177 (H. D. Rawnsley) ; Ixxi. 346 (R. B.
Tweddell). Churchman's Pulpit : Ash Wednesday, v. 269 (W. W. Battershall).
De Profundis.
Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord.— Ps. cxxx. i.
1. This psalm belongs to the group of fifteen psalms called Psalms of Ascents or Goings up. It is a Psalter within the Psalter, and may possibly have originally formed a separate hymn-book. When these fifteen psalms — cxx.-cxxxiv. inclusive — were written we know not ; but they have about them the breath of the exile in a foreign land, who from the long levels of his alien home saw far off in fancy the hills of his beloved fatherland ; or nearer, in his going up from his captivity, beheld once more the snow- capped heights of Hermon to the north, or the grey, stony hills stand round about Jerusalem, as the mercy of God stood round about His people. Those who in imagination go back to the time when the singers took their harps from the willow-trees by Euphrates' side, and tuned them to these tender hymns, may hear as they read them how in some far warrior chieftain's tent, " upon the frosty Caucasus," the exile who has long time " dwelt among those that are enemies unto peace," chants sadly enough, " Woe is me, that I am constrained to dwell in Meshech and have my habitation among the tents of Kedar " ; or may catch the cry of hope and triumph of the fugitive band, as they see the sun rise over the purple hills that bound the parched deserts or the moon- light wastes they have left behind.
^ This was one of the favourite psalms of Luther — one he paraphrased and had set to music ; in it, he said he saw the gate of heaven opening wide to him. His paraphrase of it became one of the favourite hymns of the German Eeformers. And the song returned into Luther's own heart. During the Augsburg Diet, when he was at the Castle of Coburg, and had to suffer much from inward and outward trials, he fell into a swoon. On awak- ing from it, he said, " Come and let us, in defiance of the devil, sing the Psalm, * Lord, from the depths to thee I cry.' Let us sing it in full chorus and extol and praise God," Being asked
PS. CXIX.-SONG OF SOL. — 8
114 DE PROFUNDIS
on one occasion which were the best Psalms, he replied, "The Pauline Psalms" (Psalmi Paulini), and being pressed to say which they were, he answered : " The 32nd, the 51st, the 130th, and the 143rd. For they teach us that the forgiveness of sins is vouchsafed to them that believe without the law and without works ; therefore are they Pauline Psalms ; and when David sings, ' With thee is forgiveness, that thou mayest be feared,' so Paul likewise saith, 'God hath concluded all under sin that he may have mercy on all.' Therefore none can boast of his own righteousness, but the words, ' That thou mayest be feared,' thrust away all self-merit, teach us to take off our hat before God and confess, gratia est, non meritum, remissio non satisf actio — ' it is all forgiveness, and no merit.' "
I.
In the Depths.
1. Our human nature and human life have their depths, and not in anything are they less understood than in the depths which belong to them. Their superficial aspects are for ever hiding from us their deeper realities. What calls itself knowledge of men — acquaintance with their ordinary thoughts, passions, motives, and ways, with their various humours, caprices, follies, and weaknesses — is not knowledge of man, of the inner and real man which the outer man as often conceals as reveals.
We speak at times of "a shallow man." But is there any such man anywhere ? There are only too many men everywhere who are living on the surface of their nature, keenly alive to their earth-born wants and to the capacities of human existence for work and pleasure, men whose days are largely the record of mean ambitions and strivings. But to judge by appearances is nearly always misleading. The acutest judges of character are often at fault, and none go more frequently and lamentably astray in their reckoning than those who boast most confidently of their know- ledge of men. In the so-called shallow man we may perceive, if we look intently and sympathetically enough, what is not shallow, and find, especially in those revealing hours when the tragic forces of existence sweep into his life, some suggestion of the latent power which needs the fiery storm to throw it up to the surface.