They have still, as formerly, a great concern for the Gospel, desiring to get a deeper insight into it themselves S and longing for a diffusion of it through- out the world. As the first promulgation of it was to them an occasion of joy and triumph, insomuch that they left their bright abodes in heaven, and came down, a whole multitude of them, to earth on pur- pose to proclaim it^ ; so the acceptance of it by any single individual is to them a source of unutterable joy : not even the glory of the Divine presence so attracts their notice, but they can with pleasure turn away their eyes to behold a mourning penitent ; nor is their felicity in God himself so perfect, but it re- ceives an addition from this blissful sights From the moment that any one receives the Gospel aright, they become his servants, and wait upon him with unwearied assiduity. '* They encamp around him" when he is stationary % and go out with him where- soever he goes, in order to " hold him up in their hands, lest he dash his foot against a stoned" Nor is it about his corporeal welfare only that they are concerned : they are attentive also to the concerns of his soul, and oftentimes succour him in his con- flicts, even as they did his Lord and Master, who, we are expressly told, had " an angel sent from heaven to strengthen him" when agonizing in the garden'. What was then accomplished in the Head, is doubt- less yet daily wrought in the members also : for as *' He was tempted in all things like as we are," so shall we be succoured in all things like as he was^'. In a dying hour, more especially, they redouble their attentions ; and wait with tender solicitude the de- parture of the spirit, that they may bear it on their wings to heaven into the very presence of their God. Nor do they render this service only to men of higher rank and quality : they minister with equal pleasure to the least and meanest of mankind : if there be a Lazarus so poor as to subsist only on the crumbs that
<^ 1 Pet. i. 12. « Luke ii. 13, 14. f Luke xv. 10.
fi Ps. xxxiv. 7. ^' Ps. xci. 11, 12. ■ Luke xxii. 43.
•^ John vi. 57.