Gleaning

“ Send thy gladness, laughing rover,
All my sorrows o'er and over,
Till the strains of happy pleasure
Mingle in melodious measure;
It may give a transient glee
To condemn thy ways and sever,
But the sweets of melody
Thou wilt murmur on forever.
Bind my heart in silken chaining,
Till from thee is none remaining;
Clothe my soul in glad completeness
Of thy happiness and sweetness;
When the times are true, the soul
May not hunger for thy gladness,
But when surging sorrows roll
Thou alone shall banish sadness. ”

“ Strange that grief, and laments, and the humble petition of repentance, should fill us with delight—a delight that awakens these very emotions in the heart—and calls tears into the eyes, and yet which is dearer than any pleasure. ”

“ While I claim the god of glee.
Wisdom wearies, Love has wings -
Wealth makes burdens, Pleasure stings,
Glory proves a thorny crown -
So all gifts the gods throw down
Bring their pains and troubles after ”

“ Can I not, then, walk this earth in gladness, being risen from sorrow? Can I not eat with my brother happily, and with joy kiss my beloved, after my resurrection, celebrate my marriage in the flesh with feastings, go about my business eagerly, in the joy of my fellows? Is heaven impatient for me, and bitter against this earth, that I should hurry off, or that I should linger pale and untouched? Is the flesh which was crucified become as poison to the crowds in the street, or is it as a strong gladness and hope to them, as the first flower blossoming out of the earth’s humus? ”

“ Even at this distance I seem to hear you rasping it: 'Salvation, damnation, damnation, salvation!' And the jolly earth smiles in the perfect even-glow, and the corn ripples and laughs all round you, and one young rook (only fledged this year, too!) , after an excellent simulation of prostrate, heart-broken penitence, soars joyously away, to make love to his neighbour's wife. 'Salvation, damnation, damn——' A shifty wriggle of the road, and he is transformed once more. ”

“ Then, when thou hast finished thy work with us on earth, may we lift up our eyes towards thee with gladness and great joy, and go home to that world where all tears are wiped from every eye, and where sorrow and sighing shall come no more, but we shall shine in the light of thy love, and pass from glory to glory. ”

“ That songs of praise in sweetest tone
We may present before Thy throne.
To nought we've done, or e'er can do,
To Thee—to Thee alone is due
The praise, O fount of love!
We've earned destruction from Thy face,
Thou deal'st with us in love and grace.
Oh! may we meditate Thy grace,
Till heart shall burn and tongue shall praise,
And give angelic zeal,
That every throbbing pulse may be
A note of praise, O Lord! to Thee. ”

“ They are weeping, we are sure,
At the litanies of human groans ascending
From the crushed hearts of the poor.
III.
When the human rests in love upon the human,
All grief is light;
But who bends one kind glance to illumine
Our life-long night?
The air around is ringing with their laughter—
God has only made the rich to smile;
But we—in our rags, and want, and woe—we follow after,
Weeping the while.
IV.
And the laughter seems but uttered to deride us. ”

“ Blessing be shed upon thine inmost heart,
Joy, from kind looks, blue skies, and flowery sod,
For that pure voice of thoughtful wisdom sent
Forth from thy cell, in sweetness eloquent
Of love to man, and quenchless trust in God! ”

“ And at whatever time my pen ascribeth glory to any one of Thy names, methinks I can hear the voice of its lamentation in its remoteness from Thee, and can recognize its cry because of its separation from Thy Self. I testify that everything other than Thee is but Thy creation and is held in the hollow of Thy hand. To have accepted any act or praise from Thy creatures is but an evidence of the wonders of Thy grace and bountiful favors, and a manifestation of Thy generosity and providence. ”

“ Shut your ears to praise, when it grows loud: set your face like a flint, when the world ridicules, and smile at its threats. Learn to master your heart, when it would burst forth into vehemence, or prolong a barren sorrow, or dissolve into unseasonable tenderness. ”

“ He reads, he weeps, his prayers arise
To Him who hears a sinner's cries.
Sounds soft as music seem to roll,
Strong light is kindled in his soul,
While deep repentance, earnest prayer,
And grateful love are rising there ”

“ As tears are sometimes the gentle dew that falls upon and refreshes the drooping flowers of life, so prayer is the concentration of the golden rays of light that color and beautify the re-animated [272] petals, sending into the heart once filled with desolation and despair the freshness of a new life, and driving out the dying fumes that arise from the withered flowers where fond hopes lie buried. Softly came this gentle influence into the soul of her who under the shadows was kneeling and praying! ”

“ The God of glory thundereth! still louder is His voice,
Bidding the sinner tremble, and the pure in heart rejoice.
Yes, yes, the sinner trembleth, for his day of grace is o’er,
The Bridegroom hath arisen, and closed is mercy’s door ”

“ The youth who goes seeking for pleasure,
The preacher who dares talk of God,
All priests with their creeds and their croaking,
All doubters who dare to deny,
The gay who find aught to wake laughter,
The sad who find aught worth a sigh,
Whoever is downcast or solemn,
Whoever is gleeful and glad,
Are only the dupes of delusions -
We are all of us--all of us mad. ”

“ In this world below,
Balance not the gladness
Thou in heaven shalt know,
When thy gracious Saviour,
In the realms above,
Crowns thee with His favour,
Fills thee with His love.
Der Leidensweg.
Welchen der Herr lieb hat, den züchtiget Er; Er stäupet aber einen jeglichen Sohn den Er aufnimmt.
Gott, Den ich als Liebe kenne,
Der Du Krankheit auf mich legst,
Und des Leidens Gluth erregst,
Dass ich davon stöhn und brenne:
Brenne doch das Böse ab,
Das den Geist bisher gehindert,
Das der Liebe Regung mindert,
Die ich öfters von Dir hab. ”

“ Ye are given to us as faithful companions 'mid life's joy and sternness! At the child's first griefs on its faithful mother's breast, ye already penetrate the little heart, and turn the grief to gladness. ”

“ Each laborious step which galls his wounded feet in rough and untrodden paths pours a drop of balm into his troubled soul, and the journey of many a weary day brings a nightly relief to his anguished heart. Will you dare call this enthusiasm, ye crowd of pompous declaimers? Enthusiasm! O God! thou seest my tears. Thou hast allotted us our portion of misery: must we also have brethren to persecute us, to deprive us of our consolation, of our trust in thee, and in thy love and mercy? ”

“ Whom thou disdained to seek for glory's goal."
Two blending paths beneath God's arching skies
Lead straight to Pleasure. Ah, blind heart of youth,
Not up fame's height, not toward the base god's goal,
Doth Pleasure make her way, but 'neath calm skies
Where Duty walks with Love in endless youth. ”

“ Though I recognize and firmly believe that no description which any except Thyself can give of Thee can beseem Thy grandeur, and that no glory ascribed to Thee by any save Thyself can ever ascend into the atmosphere of Thy presence, yet were I to hold my peace, and cease to glorify Thee and to recount Thy wondrous glory, my heart would be consumed, and my soul would melt away. ”

“ And yet their consolations do not incline them to lightness; but are attended with solemnity, and with tears, and brokenness of heart. And in this respect some of them have been surprised at themselves, and have with concern observed to me, that “when their hearts have been glad,” “they could not help crying for all.”
Upon the whole, here are all the evidences of a remarkable work of grace that can reasonably be looked for. May the great Author maintain and promote the same here, and propagate it every where, till “the whole earth be filled with his glory!” ”

“ VOICE of unseen spirits.
⁠Bright clouds float in heaven,
⁠Dew-stars gleam on earth,
⁠Waves assemble on ocean,
⁠They are gathered and driven
⁠By the storm of delight, by the panic of glee!
⁠They shake with emotion,
⁠They dance in their mirth. ”

“ Is giving not a necessity? Is receiving not- pitying?"
O my soul, I understand the smiling of your melancholy: your over-abundance itself now stretches out longing hands!
Your fulness looks forth over raging seas, and seeks and waits: the longing of over-fulness looks forth from the smiling heaven of your eyes!
And verily, O my soul! Who could see your smiling and not melt into tears? The angels themselves melt into tears through the over-graciousness of your smiling. ”

“ The joy too of all, when one has prevailed; the whole Mountain shakes with joy, and a psalm of praise rises, when one soul has perfected repentance, and got its sin and misery left behind! I call all this a noble embodiment of a true noble thought. ”

“ These two states of mind, both of them the natural operations of any deep faith, may co-exist and blend into one another, so as that the gladness is sobered, and chastened, and made manly and noble; and that the sorrow is like some thundercloud, all streaked with bars of sunshine, that pierce into its deepest depths. The joy lives in the midst of the sorrow; the sorrow springs from the same root as the gladness. ”

“ Lest on virtue's steeps he tire, Joy the tedious path beguiles. High on faith's bright hill before us, See her banner proudly wave! Joy, too, swells the angels' chorus,— Bursts the bondage of the grave! ”

“ You cannot believe too much concerning your Lord; let not Satan cheat you into contentment with a meagre portion of grace when all the granaries of heaven are open to you. Glean on with humble industry and hopeful confidence, and know that he who owns both fields and sheaves is looking upon you with eyes of love, and will one day espouse you to himself in glory everlasting. Happy gleaner who finds eternal love and eternal life in the fields in which he gleans! ”

“ I will see you with joy, part from you with regret, grieve in your griefs, enter with zeal into your concerns, interest myself in your honour and welfare, and endeavour, with all my little power, to contribute to your comfort and satisfaction.—Is your heart so differently constituted from every other human heart, that an affection, thus ardent and sincere, excites in it no grateful, and soothing, emotions? ”

“ Let us set a jealous watch over our hearts that self-absorption, or denominationalism, or envy do not make the sight a pain instead of a joy; and let us remember that the eye-salve which will purge our dim sight to behold the grace of God in all its forms is that grace itself, which ever recognises its own kindred, and lives in the gladness of charity, and the joy of beholding a brother's good. ”

“ This is the Love of Glory, a sentiment which lurks in every stage and sphere of life,—with the young, the middle-aged, and the old,—with the lowly, the moderate, and the great,—under as many aliases as a culprit,—but, in all its different forms and guises, having one simple animating essence, the passion for the approbation of our fellow-men. ”

“ When I sometimes offer up supplications with strong crying to God to bring down my spirit into the dust I endeavor calmly to contemplate the infinite majesty of the most high God and my own meanness and wickedness, or else I quietly tell the Lord, who knows the heart, I would give Him all the glory of everything if I could. ”

“ And therefore should we all—like consecrated priestesses,—go forth:—forth to suffering and to shame, with the laughter of Spring, and its cry Evoë! love for love, joy for joy, pain for pain,—welling up from our hearts! ”

“ The glee of a score of untainted bosoms was heard in light and airy voices, which danced among the trees like sunshine become audible; the grown men of this weary world as they journeyed by the spot marvelled why life, beginning in such brightness, should proceed in gloom, and their hearts or their imaginations answered them and said that the bliss of childhood gushes from its innocence. ”

“ If we knew the hard, stern struggle Of the one who fell, Toiling on 'mid grief and trouble That none but God can tell, Our thoughts, perhaps, would be kinder, Our help more pitiful— Be of God's love a reminder To the tempted soul. ”

“ And I wholly misdoubt, you perceive,
⁠That laughter must always prove gladness.
Are you sure it is grief when a tear starts?
⁠Can you trust smiles of mirth in all places?
If aught can be falser than human hearts,
⁠It must surely be human faces! ”

“ And the joy and the bliss that it is to Him, and the thanks and the worship that we shall have therefor, it passeth the understanding of creatures, as to my sight.
For prayer is a right [2] understanding of that fulness of joy that is to come, with well-longing and sure trust. Failing of our bliss that we be kindly ordained to, maketh us to long; true understanding and love, with sweet mind in our Saviour, graciously maketh us to trust. ”

“ Oh! when the heart is full, when bitter thoughts
Come crowding thickly up for utterance,
And the poor common words of courtesy
Are such a very mockery, how much
The bursting heart may pour itself in prayer! ”

“ Let your faces wear the glory and the sunshine of a smile.
"Teach the symbol to your children, pass it down through all the years.
Though they know their share of sadness and shall weep their share of
tears,
Through the ages men and women shall prove their faith in Me
By the smile upon their faces when their hearts are trouble-free."
The good Lord understood us when He sent us down to earth,
He knew our need for laughter and for happy signs of mirth ”