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hymns rise above controversy. John Bowring, the Uni tarian, writes the devotional “In the Cross of Christ I Glory,” and Bonar, a staunch Galvinist, writes: “O Love of God, how strong and true! Eternal, and yet ever new, Uncomprehended and unbought, Beyond all knowledge and all thought!
us, but it was his expressed wish that his correspondence should not be made public. His reticence on this point is beautifully expressed in his poem, entitled “The Everlast ing Memorial,” a few lines of which we quote: “Needs there the praise of the love-written record, The name and the epitaph graved on the stone? The things we have lived for, let them be our story, We ourselves but remembered by what we have done. “Not myself, but the truth that in life I have spoken, Not myself, but the,seed that in life I have sown, Shall pass on to ages; all about me forgotten, Save the truth I have spoken, the things I have done. “So let my living be, so be my dying; So let my name lie, unblazoned, unknown; Unpraised and unmissed, I shall still be remembered; Yes,—but remembered by what I have done.” His old age was quiet and peaceful—a suitable ending for a life so active and militant. In August, 1889, he passed to his reward, at the ripe age of eighty-one. The funeral, conducted by Dr. Theodore Cuyler and Principal John Cairns, occurred on a day when there was a tre mendous downpour of rain, but the church was crowded with those who were eager to do honor to the man who had preached the Word so long and faithfully and who “attuned more voices to praise than any Scotchman of the century.” “Broken Death’s dread hand that bound us, Life and victory around us, Christ the King Himself hath crowned us, A h ! ’tis heaven at last!” has a vastly fuller and richer message. We have the help of God’s Word interpreted to us by God’s Spirit to give us a true understanding of what would otherwise be hidden from our minds. With this help, let us seek to read the language of the heavens. By day, the language of the heavens speaks to us of the sun and all its splendor. How dependent we are upon the sun ! Without the sun the earth in its present form would not last five minutes. The sun is our source of light, power, and life. In a very real sense it is a source of healing for mankind. Without the sun, all our days would be night, and darkness would reign over us. But when I look up at the sun and think how dependent upon it I am, the Word of God teaches me that Jesus is my sun (Malachi 4 :2). “But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings.” How dependent I am upon Jesus! Without Him my Christian life would not last five minutes. Jesus is my source of wisdom, power and life. There is healing in His wings for me. Without Him all my days would be night, and gloomy darkness would reign over me. How dependent we all are upon Jesus, the Sun of Righteous ness ! As the old hymn says:
“O Love of God, our shield and stay Through all the perils of the way; Eternal love, in Thee we rest, For ever safe, for ever blest!”
It is here seen that when the devout heart is moved to poetic expression, Wesley’s line is beautifully illustrated, that “the love of God is broader than the measure of man’s mind.” There were two seemingly conflicting elements in this rugged character. He was gentle and loving as a friend, and in his home circle and pastoral relations. But as Dr. Cuyler said, “Behind that benign countenance was a spirit as pugnacious in ecclesiastical controversy as that of the Roman Horatius.” His hymns, however, are a truer touchstone of his real character than his controversial tendencies and activities. And the incongruity that some have seen in the fact of such tender hymns being written by one who at times showed the opposite traits, is readily understood when we remember that real music and devo tional poetry are foreign to strife, and lift the soul to a new spiritual level where human differences disappear with the new perspective. Dr. Bonar went to Chalmers’ Memorial Church in Edinburgh when fifty-eight years of age and rounded out his wonderful ministry of over half a century. It is often regretted that no memoir of this choice soul has been left "The heavens declare the glory o f God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor lan guage; Their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world .”—Psalms 19:1-4. R. V. ¡^¡ggg^HE heavens are like a vast choir of singers— singing the glory of God. They are a great host (SurSS of finely finished products of a master architect, all of them labeled, “God is our Maker.” They TMA v are as a huge army of people speaking forth by J-ALL day and by night a message of knowledge. Their language is not like the dialects of earth, for there is no audible sound nor word spoken, and yet this language of the heavens can be understood by all the peoples of the earth. What is the message declared unto men by the lan guage of the heavens? To the unsaved of earth it points to the Creator and declares His eternal power and God head. “For the invisible things o f him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse” (Rom. 1 :20). To those of us who have surrendered our wills to our Maker, it
¿k* The Language of the Heavens B y R ev . F red H. W ight ( Banning, Calif.)
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