CHAPTER XVII. THE SOLITARY WORSHIPPER. "Bless the Lord, O my soul."-Psalm ciii. 22. THE Christian's soul is the noblest priest; it has the greatest mercies to sing and to celebrate. The absence of the rational soul would spoil all. Its single note is more musical than the harmony of the stars. "My son, give me thy heart," is an essential in praise. This admits of no substitute. The absence of the heart would be the absence of fire from the altar. Its presence is indispensable; its upward look is more beautiful before God than all the faces of the adoring cherubim. One living heart in our song outweighs all instruments in value. Yet men are apt to look least at this, and therefore to supersede or overwhelm it by accompaniments more impressive to human ears and eyes, but utterly worthless before Him who demands "spirit and truth in our worship." Let us never merge the individual in the multitude, or suppose that the absence of the multitude renders unacceptable the still small voice of the solitary worshipper. The heart is a sublime temple, the affections are noble choristers; and that inner oratorio rises to heaven and reaches the throne, and is heard above the seven thunders, and is more welcomed than the hosannas of angels. I have already stated that we should appreciate the skill displayed by our medical practitioners, and the use of the medicines they have prescribed, in the recent epidemic. We may, too, appreciate in their place, all the effects of wind and weather, and heat and cold; or if there be any other means to which atheistic theorists have had recourse, in order to get rid of the conviction that God sent the plague and God dismissed it; but our conviction need not be less strong, that it was God in his own glorious sovereignty our Father," "whose mercy reacheth unto the heaven," who sent the pestilence, that it might point out, as I have already told you in a former chapter, what was the reason of the chastisement, and so lead us to recollect what we had too much forgotten, and to Q retrace the steps we have taken in the wrong direction, and return to duty, to sacrifice, to love. We met before to deprecate what seemed the anger of God. This day we meet to commemorate the goodness of God. Let us praise and thank Him for having sent the pestilence, though it has swept away so many of our people, and made desolate so many homes in the midst of us. Its pale finger has pointed out our culpable neglect. And if this visitation should have the effect of leading us, not only to relieve the physical wants of the poor, but also to give them that which will make them rich indeed, and happy indeed, and noble indeed; then we shall have reason long to thank God for the terror in 1849; the loss of the few may prove the safety of the |