Can we take part-have we already taken part, in this magnificent ovation and welcome? Are we now "looking unto Jesus?" looking to Him with the simple eye of faith;-"turning round" (as the word means) from everything else, that we may rest on Him alone, as all our salvation and all our desire?—"looking to Him from everything, looking to Him in everything, looking to Him for everything." While others are spoken of here, as being "ashamed and confounded all of them," can it be said of us, "They looked unto Him, and were lightened; and their faces were not ashamed?" (Ps. xxxiv. 5). Nor, if we are thus among "the saved" ourselves, can we rest satisfied with the possession of these spiritual privileges and blessings, without longing for the time when "all the ends of the earth" shall participate in the boon:—when Jew and Greek, Barbarian, Scythian, bond and free, shall join in that loud acclaim which is to welcome the Messiah-King to the throne of universal empire!

"Can we whose souls are lighted

With wisdom from on high;
Can we to man benighted,

The lamp of truth deny?

Salvation, O salvation,

The joyful sound proclaim,
Till earth's remotest nation
Has learnt Messiah's name.

Waft, waft ye winds His story,
And you, ye waters, roll,
Till, like a sea of glory,

It spreads from pole to pole.

And o'er our ransomed nature
The Lamb for sinners slain,
Redeemer, King, Creator,

In bliss returns to reign."

"IN THE MULTITUDE OF MY THOUGHTS WITHIN ME

THY COMFORTS DELIGHT MY SOUL."

"Bel sinketh down, Nebo croucheth;

Their images are carried on the beasts of burden, and drauglit

cattle (Delitzsch):

Their litters are laden: a grievous burden to the weary beast.
They stoop; they bow down together;
They cannot save the load (Alexander);
Even they themselves are gone into captivity.
Hearken unto me, O House of Jacob,

And all the remnant of the House of Israel,

Ye that have been borne by me from the birth,

Ye that have been carried from the mother's lap:

And even to your old age I am the same;

And to grey hair I shall bear you on the shoulder (Delitzsch):

I have done it; and I will carry,

I will carry and will deliver you.”

-ISAIAH xlvi. 1-4.

XIII.

Comfort ye,

comfort

ye my people,

saith your God."

"And even to your old age I am He and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you."

Old Age
Comforted.

-ISAIAH xlvi. 4.

WE have here another example of Isaiah's contrasted passages. 'Carry" and "bear" are the two emphatic words singled out for this antithesis. The idols of Babylon are, in the opening verse of the chapter, represented as being "carried away" as spoil from the conquered city: they are piled on the backs of camels and horses, dromedaries and elephants, and these beasts of burden are described as groaning under the load. The gold and silver images, the tutelary deities

of Chaldea, which should have proved the guardians of the city and the defence of the besieged, are themselves borne along by panting teams in the enemies' caravans (ver. 1)-"Their idols were upon the beasts of burden, and upon the draught cattle: your carriages (or litters) were heavy laden: they are a burden to the weary beasts." 'Not so,' says Jehovah, in ver. 3, "O House of Jacob, and ye remnant of the House of Israel." Not so is it with the God you serve. These dumb idols cannot 'carry' their votaries. They have themselves to be 'carried.' But, “I will 'carry' you." I have carried you "from the womb:" "and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you."

These words bring God before us, under the new but beautiful and tender image of a father bearing in his arms the child he loves. It is a repetition of the same emblem employed by Moses, in his wilderness address to Israel: "Thou hast seen how that the Lord thy God