well as pilgrims, the present is not congenial to them, they are despised and harassed, while their pilgrimage is still pursued. Willingly they throw the earth behind them and lay hold of heaven. For this they endure, they watch, they strive: their minds are often perplexed and their footsteps weary. "Walking through this great wilderness," they are subject to cruel treachery, to bitter trouble, to vexatious disappointment. Early this course, it may be, begun. Lingering has been its progress. They still lean upon their staff. But soon shall they toil no The days of their mourning shall be ended. They shall come to their Father's house in peace.

more.

Confidence is the sentiment which is most natural to every thought of this endeared lot. Look at the home-born child. It clings to the domicile and seems to grow to it. It questions not its fullest title to appropriate its possession. It goes in and

out.

There is no such familiar remembrance, no such beloved resort. There it was cradled, there its first step tottered, nor dreams it that ever it must turn away from that door. When danger threatens, this is the bulwark: when affliction weeps, this is the asylum. What sorrows and what cares fly for succour and relief to this hiding-place! In its truth and its fidelity, what an example of worth and what a support of reliance contrast themselves to the deceptions around! It is this assuredness which is the secret of all earthly satisfaction and peace. Yet is it not always to be cherished, it may not be invariably justified, where we have fixed our most steadfast trust and expended our most devoted love. Then suspicion coils like a serpent about each flower of existence; or, like a lurking poison, taints all its springs. But with what strictest security does all the happiness of heaven rise on our view! Nothing maketh a lie. Thieves do not break through and steal. There is no more death. With what cheerful certitude may we realise that home, tread its halls and mansions as native to them, not entering it with affright nor abiding in it by constraint, not bewildered by its newness nor dazzled by its glory,-never to be confounded,resting from all our enemies,-perfect guilelessness and benevolence in all the dwellers of the same celestial abode! "In return

ing and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be your strength."

Concord is the divine element of the domestic constitution, for "He is the God that maketh men to be of one mind in a house." It is the haven defended from the wild surges of the ocean: it is the covert from the storm. Nevertheless a house may be divided against itself. There may be strife of opinion, disagreement of character, envy with its baleful glance, anger with its furious sally, revenge with its moody dint. There may grow up the root of bitterness, and there may be cast the stumbling-block of offence. But the inhabitants of that House towards which we journey are "made perfect in one." They have one heart. They see eye to eye. With the voice together do they sing. An infinite love binds and harmonises all. If we too much forget to ask each other while here below, "Have we not all one Father ?" -the remembrance of that truth will ever be vivid and efficacious in our "Father's house."

Sympathy is the most powerful attraction and bond of these pleasant places." The social range is here compressed, and all its ties become the stronger and gentler in proportion to its narrower limit. The interchange of kind offices and good feelings is its virtue and its life. The delicate surprise of thoughtful attention and interest, the look, the accent, the token, diffuse a charm around the household which a more costly expression, if not ministered with the same air and manner, would fail to impart. But sympathy has often to exercise other tasks beside those of joy. It rises into commiseration. We weep with them who weep. Pain must be soothed. Bereavement must be healed. We bear the infirmities of the weak. Where, then, can this "brotherlykindness” find a scene for its perfect expansion and fruition, but in our Father's house? There shall be no more sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain. There will be nothing to endure, nothing to estrange, nothing to forgive. Sentiment will be reciprocated as by a perfect reflection, recognition will be intuitive as twin-love, and holy fellowship will vibrate as to a common sensory and throb as to a common heart. How intermingled, united, are all those throngs! How symphonious are the

D

strains of the "thousands of thousands" while we "hear" them "saying" the same ascriptions! How simultaneous, even as in choral measure, is the "walking" of "the nations of the saved" ! All is agreement and response.

Improvement is the law of the house where holy example and instruction present themselves. This is the true sphere of education. Counsel flowing in parental tone, beaming from parental feature, ministered beside parental knee, pourtrayed by parental model, what may it not accomplish? The child finds knowledge meeting it at every point and through every sense. Discipline like an atmosphere, as inspiring and almost as undetected, invests its course. An involuntary resemblance to that which is good and high is superinduced. It is "the nurture and admonition of the Lord." Heaven is full of light and purity. During our mortal state, however matured our powers and enlarged our attainments, we speak as a child, we understand as a child, we think as a child. It is there that we "shall put away childish things." In that light we shall see light. Amidst its array we shall wear the righteousness of the saints. What shall be its solemn, sweet, companionship! What shall be its shining patterns! What shall be its glorious disclosures! O place and opportunity for the culture of the immortal mind,-for the formation of habits, for the growth of principles, for the training of sensibilities, akin to its destiny!

Content and Happiness, if found on earth, are to be sought alone in this peaceful enclosure. This lamp would be in every dwelling, but for evil principle or external adversity. It is sin which brings down the curse. A home may be a more compact mass of iniquity: a more condensed nucleus of woe. "Surely such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him who knoweth not God." There are other ills which invade even the habitation of the just: poverty and disease, heart-breaking loss and desolating death. Our fathers! where are they? children! Their beauty consumes in the grave from their dwelling. Is there no unholy branch? David's house is not so with God. Is there no sudden separation? "Lazarus is dead." How our families decay around us! They are "minished and brought

Our

low." The roof-tree falls! There is a longer home to which we go! Yet this is the only spot where content may smile and happiness rally. The soul dwells at ease. The heart finds rest. The plague does not come nigh. The voice of joy and of salvation resounds. Peace sheds its balm. Love unfolds its wing. Hope bends its rainbow. What, then, is our Father's house? Even now we make the Most High our habitation,-He is for a house of defence to save us,-the Lord God dwells among us,He walks in us,-He has been our dwelling-place in all generations, but ah, nothing of the dearest human love, nothing of the most ecstatic piety, nothing of the most sainted communion, can represent what it is to be "at home* with the Lord ?" "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

But it is not only our Father's house in the associations of a home, it is the consecrated receptacle of His worship. And these ideas are not incompatible, but of easiest concurrence. For, to the Christian's perception and taste, what can make Heaven more delightful, in addition to its illustration as a home, than that this home shall be devoted, with the family which fills it, to the high praises of our Father in heaven? He even now inhabits the praises of his people. They who dwell in his earthly house are still praising him. Is this appropriation unworthy of His celestial palace? Yet all is softened to the conception of a home. It is indeed a Temple, august and awful. The ark of the testament is laid up there. The tabernacle of the testimony is opened. Altar and censer are seen. Angels blow their trumpets. Harpers harp with their harps. The heavenly things themselves are so holy that they needed to be purified by the blood of the Great Sacrifice ere fallen creatures, though sanctified wholly, could stand in contact with them. It is a manifestation of the Infinite Presence, until it becomes so full, so clear, so unconfined, that space with all its mightiest dimensions melts away, that material proportions are lost, "for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." This is beautiful, most beautiful! The

* 2 Cor. v. 8. “ ενδημῆσαι προς τον Κύριον.”

votary is the child! The child is the votary! He is not "afraid with any amazement." In trepidation he does not "make haste.” Pilgrim never touched more reverently the dreadful shrine: son never more joyously beheld the paternal eaves or bounded upon the paternal threshold. With this double intention, of resting in a home and of ministering in a sanctuary, he exclaims: "I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever." The entrance has been given. Low bows his head, but it is to a Father! In that place the divine name is set, but it is the name of a Father! It is a house for the Lord Almighty, but he will be a Father unto us, and it is therefore our Father's house! Faithful to the adoption of children, he commands, "Bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth :" and his sons. and daughters gather themselves together to his bidding, they come to Him! The concourse swells! From the four winds of heaven they congregate in their fulness! tudes"! They enter in! And now are sacred leaves, the domestic doorstead! nally fold in the dwellings of Jacob! those gates! They are the children of the free! They are the children of Zion! Yet is it the glorious liberty of the children of God! They are priests unto God, and serve him day and night in his temple! Yet are they the children of God, being the children of the resurrection! It is the Church in the

House!

"Multitudes, multiclosed upon them the The gates of Zion eterThe stranger is not in

II. WE MUST REMEMBER THAT IN THIS HOUSE OF HOME AND TEMPLE THERE ARE MANY MANSIONS.

And thus are we taught that the greatest amplitude consists with the strictest unity, that though the mansions are numerous the house is one. Stars, wide distant from each other, furnish not to separated companies their deep recesses, their pavilions of gold; but "the general assembly" is convened in its entireness and unrestrained intermixture. It is the same habitation. And thus, also, we learn that there is no monotony in that blessed state, no dull level; that the multitude of the redeemed do not appear in an indistinguishable, undelineated, semblance: but that, as in the angelic hierarchy there are marshalled ranks,-thrones,