BENEFIT OF AFFLICTION.

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Enabling them with cheerful trust to bow before

the throne,

And in this trying hour to say-Thy will, not ours,

be done!

ANONYMOUS.

BENEFIT OF AFFLICTION.

AFFLICTIONS are God's most effectual means to keep us from losing our way to our heavenly rest. Without this hedge of thorns, on our right hand and on our left, we should scarcely keep in the way to heaven. If there be but one gap open, how ready are we to find it-and turn out at it! When we grow wanton, or worldly, or proud, how doth sickness or other afflictions reduce us! Every · Christian, as well as Luther, may call affliction one of his best school-masters; and with David may say, "Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now 1 have kept thy word." Many thousand recovered sinners may cry—"Oh, healthful sickness!—Oh, comfortable sorrows! Oh gainful hopes! Oh, enriching poverty! Oh, blessed day that ever I was afflicted!" Not only the green pastures and still waters-but Thy rod and thy staff-they comfort me. Though the Word and the Spirit do the main work-yet suffering so unbolts the door of the heart, that the Word hath easier entrance.

BAXTER.

THE INFANT'S HOME.

Occasioned by the death of Twin Children.

WHERE are ye now, sweet fair? Vacant is now your cradled place of rest; Ye slumber not upon a mother's breast, Where is your home-oh, where?

How beautiful ye were !

With your meek peaceful brows, and laughing eyes, All eloquent of life's first energies,

And joy's bright fount yet clear.

How blithely ye awoke

With each new day; familiar forms were there To meet your eager glance-kind voices near 4NT In gentle accents spoke.

Ye seemed then to be

As some pale flower, that to the morning's light Rears its frail stem, and spreads its petals bright, As if confidingly.

And when at evening's close,

Those little hands, relaxing from the grasp
That some dear object held, with loving clasp
Ye sunk into repose-

THE INFANT'S HOME.

Love made your slumber seem

As the closed flowers, o'er which the silent star
Keepeth its ceaseless vigil from afar,

And sheds its unfelt beam.

I looked upon you then

With thoughts almost of sorrow in my gaze,
As on a passing joy, which other days
Would make not mine again.

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I feared some change might sweep Through the untroubled breast, and leave its stain, Some unsuspected ill-some bitter painMar, with sad dreams, your sleep.

I know that change has past

O'er you, sweet tender nurslings! but I know
Your spirits now will never taste of wo-
That change will be the last.

Ye are before me now,

As ye were wont to be-no beauty gone
That in those eyes, even when tearful, shone,
No charm from that pure brow.

Too calm, too deeply still

Is that unchanging picture; yet a part
Of the sweet visions of the past, my heart
Can make its own at will.

And thus ye are mine own,

Mine own to dwell upon, with quiet love; Thoughts the world cannot touch, nor time remove, From me ye are not gone.

I ask not where are laid

Those faded forms-whether below the sod
Which busy feet have with indifference trod,
Or 'neath some kindly shade.

Where, on earth's tranquil breast, The peace of the Eternal One hath smiled, E'en as a mother o'er her cradled child, There is your place of rest.

He who mankind shall wake,

Over his children's rest a watch doth keep,
And with a voice that breathes of love, the sleep
Of innocence will break.

Not in that simple tomb,

But in "our Father's house"-where love shall be Abiding, even in its own sanctuary—

There is the infant's home!

FROM THE SACRED OFFERING.

THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS.

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THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS.

THERE is a Reaper whose name is Death,
And with his sickle keen

He reaps the bearded grain at a breath,
And the flowers that grow between.

"Shall I have nought that is fair?" saith he, "Have nought but the bearded grain? Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me, I will give them all back again."

He gazed on the flowers with tearful eyes,
He kissed their drooping leaves;

It was for the Lord of Paradise

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He bound them in his sheaves.

My Lord hath need of these flowerets gay,"

The reaper said, and smiled;

"Dear tokens of the earth are they,

Where he was once a child.

“They all shall bloom in fields of light,

Transplanted by my care;

And saints upon their garments white,
These sacred flowers wear."