heavy on every child of Eve, from the time he comes from his mother's womb until he returns into the womb of mother earth, for suffering and death knock with impartial hand at the peasant's cot and the palaces of kings. Consider the numberless diseases of childhood, the spiritual afflictions of maturity, and the miseries of the aged, when, like drowning men, they feel the last plank slipping from their grasp, and see the great ocean of eternity slowly but surely rising to engulf them. Life begins with a scream and ends with a moan, because there is in our hearts an aching void that nothing short of God can ever appease. True, we are sometimes happy, but our happiness is as that of one born with heart disease, who never having tasted the sweetness of relief, scarcely feels the bitterness of his pain. If we could see ourselves as we are, as the angels see us, we would weep for selfish pity, and the unbegotten babe would beg to be left in its nothingness forever. Still it is all God's mercy. We prodigals wander afar from Him and with the scourge of tribulation He drives us back. When miseries multiply, the blessed resolve: " I will arise and go to my Father " is easily made. It is only when he has become as wretched and forlorn as the blind beggar by the gates of Jericho that the sinner strains to hear the approaching footsteps of his Lord, and lifts his voice in that blessed prayer: " Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me." Not more true is this of the individual Christian than of the Christian Church, for whereas she thrives best under unremitting persecution, temporal prosperity has
