WORD.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.—Psalm cxix. 105.
For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, Thou knowest it altogether.—Psalm cxxxix. 4.
The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.—Isaiah, xl. 8.
Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.—Matthew, xii. 36.
Ill deeds are doubled with an evil word.
Shakspere.
Almighty Lord! the sun shall fail,
The moon forget her nightly tale,
And deepest silence bush on high
The radiant chorus of the sky;
But fixed for everlasting years,
Unmoved amid the wreck of spheres,
Thy word shall shine in cloudless day,
When heaven and earth have passed away.
Sir R. Grant.
Not words alone it cost the Lord,
To purchase pardon for His own;
Nor will a soul by grace restored,
Return the Saviour’s words alone.
Easy indeed it were to reach
A mansion in the courts above,
If swelling words and fluent speech,
Might serve instead of faith and love.
But none shall gain the blissful place,
Or God’s unclouded glory see,
Who talks of free and sovereign grace,
Unless that grace has made him free.
Cowper.
O happy they who know the Lord,
With whom be deigns to dwell,
He feeds and cheers them by His word,
His arm supports them well.
He helped His saints in ancient days,
Who trusted in His name;
And we can witness to His praise,
His presence sweetens all our cares,
And makes our burdens light;
A word from Him dispels our fears,
And gilds the gloom of night.
Newton.
There is a stream whose gentle flow
Supplies the city of our God;
Life, love, and joy, still gliding thro’,
And wat’ring our divine abode.
That sacred stream, Thy holy word,
That all our raging fear controls;
Sweet peace Thy promises afford,
And give new strength to fainting souls.
Watts.
When quiet in my house I sit,
Thy book be my companion still,
My joy Thy sayings to repeat,
Talk o’er the records of Thy will,
And search the oracles divine
Till every heart-felt word be mine.
O may the gracious words divine
Subject of all my converse be;
So will the Lord His follower join,
And walk and talk himself with me;
So shall my heart His presence prove,
And burn with everlasting love.
Oft as I lay me down to rest,
O may Thy reconciling word
Sweetly compose my weary breast!
While, in the bosom of my Lord,
I sink in blissful dreams away,
And visions of eternal day.
Rising to sing my Saviour’s praise,
Thee may I publish all day long;
And let Thy precious word of grace
Flow from my heart, and fill my tongue,
Fill all my life with purest love,
And join me to the church above.
C. Wesley.
Where deeds pull down, words can repair no faith.
Chapman.
A voice to light gave being:
To Time, and man his earth-born chronicler;
A voice shall finish doubt and dim foreseeing,
And sweep away life’s visionary stir;
The trumpet, (we intoxicate with pride,
Arm at its blast for deadly wars,)
To archangelic lips applied,
The grave shall open, quench the stars.
O silence! are men’s noisy years
No more than moments of thy life?
Is harmony, blest queen of smiles and tears,
With her smooth tones and discords just,
Tempered into rapturous strife,
Thy destined bond-slave? No! though earth be dust
And vanish, though the Heavens dissolve, her stay
Is in the word, that shall not pass away.
Wordsworth.
Why, thou never-setting light,
Is thy brightness veil’d from me?
Why does this unusual night
Cloud thy best benignity?
I am lost without thy ray,
Guide my wandering footsteps, Lord!
Light my dark and erring way
To the noontide of thy word.
Bowring, from the Russian.
I saw one man, armed simply with God’s Word,
Enter the souls of many fellow-men,
And pierce them sharply as a two-edged sword,
While conscience echoed back his words again;
Till, even as showers of fertilizing rain
Sink through the bosom of the valley clod,
So their hearts opened to the wholesome pain,
And hundreds knelt upon the flowery sod,
One good man’s earnest prayer, the link ’twixt them and God.
Mrs. Norton.