shall no longer worship God as we do here, tentatively and strugglingly; we shall stand in the presence of God as men stand in the light of the sun. When the sun pours itself down upon men they cannot look at it, from its fullness and glory of light. And the glory of God is a glory which the disengaged spirit shall appreciate. It is a glory that the love of every ransomed human soul shall appreciate. It is a glory which, made ineffable, shall be appreciated by all that is pure and true and noble in us. It is a glory that shall shine out so transcendently that every soul shall be awakened by it as flowers are by the sunlight. And those to whom here, looking upon the career of time, it seems most murky and muddy, shall in that blessed state see reason of congratulation and rejoicing.

Now, I do not ask to know how it shall be: I only ask that it shall be. I am satisfied that there is no other outcome to human life than that. I see from day to day what is the difference between men-between the worst and the best; and I go back to Solomon, and must needs take his melancholy philosophy. After all the strivings which men go through, when you consider how imperfect life is, what is it worth? It does not seem to be worth much here; but oh! it is the beyond that gives value to the present. It is not the measure we have here, but the fulfillment which we expect there, that makes life worth having. Who would bear the frets, the annoyances, the burdens, the long-continued sorrows, the accumulated insults, the raspings, the pressures of life; who would carry on and on this troubled dream which is so easy to be ended (for life, like a candle, you can blow out with a puff); who would take all the sufferings of this life, if there was nothing but this? It is true of many a man in the conflict of life, that the more suffering he has, the harder it is to bear, the more it has power over him, the more he shuts himself up in his feelings. But when I look beyond and see an unexplainable victory, let me know that it is certain and that there shall be a period when I shall stand among the ransomed throng, and see on every side radiant manifestations of harmonious wisdom in perfected form, and then in that faith and in that hope I am

willing to live, to bear and to suffer. For all I want is certainty. I can wait for the consummation.

When, in 1863, I was a pilgrim in Paris, my country lay upon my soul, and almost took joy from my eyes and my heart in the scenes that I beheld, and in the company that I met. The depth and blackness of her struggle lay heavily upon me. And it was on one radiant Sunday, not unlike this, that as I wended my way from the Grand Hotel to the church the tidings came of the surrender of Vicksburg. No words can tell the buoyancy, the awful sense of gladness, that I had. I went into the house of God, and I sat down in the pew of our minister, Mr. Dayton. By my side sat his daughter, about eighteen or twenty years of age. In a pause of the service (and I thought it was not unmeet to be mingled with the religious service), I said to her, "Vicksburg has surrendered." She answered me not a word; but, turning to her companion, another young lady, she whispered it to her; and both sat still as statues. The hymn was given out, the music sounded, and she began to sing; but no sooner had she opened her lips to sing than, in a flood of tears, she buried her head in her hands, and wept for gladness and triumph. She was far from her native land; the ocean was between her and her home; she was yet to abide in a foreign country for many months; but to receive that news was enough. It overwhelmed her. It overwhelmed me also. And before the sun went down, yea, before the sun was at the noon, the other tidings came of the defeat of Gettysburg; and then my cup ran over. No man can tell how victoriously I walked. At the Grand Hotel, where I staid, was a large collection of men to whom my name was not savory, and who had been accustomed to gather themselves in the great court when I came down, and by every mute demonstration to show contempt for me, and to send many contemptible messages by the servants to me (which I never received, although I heard of them afterwards); and no sooner (I was wicked!)-no sooner had I learned the double glory than I went back to the hotel and walked out into that court to see my adversaries; and alas! they were not therenot one of them.

It was when I was tossing upon the sea, off the harbor of Charleston, that we were spoken, in 1865, and the tidings were communicated to us from another ship, "Lee has surrendered;" and the wild outcry, the strange caprices and exultations of that moment, they never will forget who were present. We were far off from the scene of war; we saw no signs nor tokens; it was as if the heaven had imparted it to us; but oh, what gladness, what ecstacy there was in that news no man can know but those who have suffered as we had suffered. It was a whole life-time that we lived in those four years-yea, a hundred life-times. A man might live twenty centuries, and not in all of them have as much experience as was crowded into those dark four years. And yet, when the tidings of victory came, all the past was as nothing; and ever since the thunder of cannon, the clash of swords and the groans of the wounded have been dying out and receding further and further, till they have well nigh gone. Wounds that could not well be healed have become less and less sensitive, and our whole land is steadily coming together, and being knit together, in spite of hindrances, and in spite of the many things that would better not have been; and before ten years have rolled around the great flame of war which has passed over us will have been well nigh forgotten.

So, only let me know that after the conflicts of every kind in this life-all jarrings, all disputes, all superstitions, all cruelties, all idolatries, all unfaiths or unbeliefs, all crimes, all vices-only let me know that after these, I shall stard and look back upon time, and shout, "Thou art worthy, Lord God Almighty, because thy judgments are just and true, and all nations shall be gathered under thee," and I am content. The darkness shall be but as a troubled night. The day comes, and where is the night? where are its dreams?

Now, then, we have part and lot in that blessed song. They who have gone before us are singing now. My mother's voice has not been still for these years and years. My little children have not been songless. They whom I have taught in my long ministry, and who have gone home before me, have not sat waiting dumb and empty. Those whom you all have known, thrice ten thousand, ten thousand times ten

thousand, who have gone up, are to-day in the plentitude of that heavenly vision; and we who are lingering and waiting may rise through the ministration of the imagination, through these gorgeous symbols, through this magnificent drama which foretokens the struggle and the victory, and may join in singing that great song of Moses and the Lamb-the song of redemption-the song of the healing of the nations-the song of the destruction of evil and the triumph of good; and through long suffering, through many defeats, through the steady growing power of goodness and its final ascendency, all darkness shall be swept from the universe, and there shall not be a pang, nor a sorrow, nor a wandering soul; but God shall be glorified, and shall sit supreme, with his whole. household around him, blessing and blessed forevermore.

May you so live that now, beforehand, the joy, the cordial, the blessed strength and stimulus of this anticipated victory, may comfort you on your way. May tears be staid, or may they flow for medicine. May sorrows be healed, or may they be sanctified. May your faith and patience be augmented. Look up, look beyond; and whatever other things you may draw out of this Book, of pleasure and of joy, do not forget this: that there is a living picture hanging over the church and over time, proclaiming this grand and comforting truth,-"Goodness shall triumph, evil and the Devil shall be exterminated, and God shall seem lovely to every living thing."

PRAYER BEFORE THE SERMON.

BEHOLD us yet struggling in the darkness or in the twilight, our Father. Thou that sittest in the midst of joy and victory-hast thou forgotten? Thou that hast known tears, and sorrow, and deathhast thou forgotten? Blessed be thy name, O Lord our God, that there is nothing that thou dost forget except our sins. All our wickedness is ever present with thee. All our desires and all our failures bring thee to our succor. For thou art a present Help in time of trouble; and thou seest how the course of time doth sweep us. Helpless we are cast down upon the river of life, unable to resist, swept by it, whirled in eddies hither and thither, and often precipitated down narrow and dark ways: but we are never lost to thy sight; we are never lost to thy power and thy government. We are controlled by thee as much in the darkness as in the light. Thou art IIe that walkest upon the sea, and in the night, and upon the shore, and in the twilight. Thou art in the city, and thou art in the wilderness. Thou art in heaven, and thou art upon the earth. Wherever there is need, there is divine supply.

We rejoice in thy greatness. We cannot understand it. We are often perplexed in attempting to measure thee by the analogies of human life. We strive to conceive of thee by the patterning of our nature upon thine. All that we can do is to find some things that we discern as through a glass, darkly; and yet, they are things so full of glory, and so surcharged with all hope-inspiring elements, that we rejoice éven to see thee through a glass as darkly. But the vision waits. There are those, innumerable, who behold thee face to facc. There are those in thy presence who have gone forth from our families. We have also our forerunners from this brotherhood. From every one of our households have passed out those who have gone before. And they all are with thee, rejoicing. We are left behind to fulfill yet something of duty-some portion of the destiny that has been appointed unto us. Thou art serving these, often in ways that are to us unknown; and thou wilt yet call us home; and we shall rise into the land of victory, and of joy, and of honor evermore.

Now, be pleased to help us, that, though we may not leave our tasks, and lay aside our burdens here, to go up and rejoice there, we we may rise in thought, and by faith take some refreshment.

Visit the lost. Find those that have gone forth. May they taste the joys that leave behind no sorrows, realize the blessedness of eternal victory, and come back to live again as if they had waked from pleasant dreams of the night that linger through the day, and cheer and comfort us.

Take away our sordidness. May we not have a feeling of sc'. tude to thee. Fill us with that interpreting filial love which shall make thee transcendently beautiful, and which shall draw us along the ways of duty by that which is sweet and noble, and not by Scourging fear.

We pray that thou wilt grant that we may more and more abound, in the Christian life, in all honor, in all truth, in all fidelity, in courage, in hopefulness, in activity, and in accomplishment there