"HE GIVETH SONGS IN THE NIGHT."
Gloriously the sun sinks behind the western hills. Half the sky seems
on fire, and the other half wreathed with light fantastic clouds. All
nature is beautiful--can I be sad? Nay; away with sadness, away with
sorrow; I will forget everything my strangeness, my blasted hopes, and
seek for happiness where happiness only is to be found, in the sacred
Oracles of God.--_July_ 14, 1852.
God sometimes speaks in earthquake and in storm,
But oftener in the "still small voice" of love:
He urges men as loving fathers plead.
God _is_ our Father, yet we shun his face
And hide ourselves when at the cool of day
He walketh in the garden!
How sweet the thought that God, our heavenly Father, is omniscient.
Our griefs are not hidden from him. He knows our hearts, and with all
this knowledge he is good--so tender, so pitiful! Oh, to love him as
he deserves! Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing his praises! Tell the
sick, tell the sorrowing, tell the broken-hearted of this God; tell
the wretched, the guilty, the wayward prodigal of this gracious
Father.