But there is an olive leaf still for the family of God in the ark. It is the Saviour's promise, "I will come again and receive you unto Myself." To find it and bear it home is not granted to mere human reason, however keen of eye and strong of wing: the raven brought not the emblem of hope. It is the Dove, the Heavenly Comforter alone who brings to the waiting Church, to each weary individual heart, the pledge and promise of a glorious inheritance, when Christ shall return to throw wide open the bolted door, and bid His redeemed come forth to rejoice and to reign for ever!
Has the Dove, dear Reader, brought that olive leaf to your soul; have you rejoiced in the promise? Are you eagerly looking for Him, whom, not having seen, you have loved; and is His word, "I will come again," more precious to you than thousands of silver and gold? Well may the Christian, looking to the promise, adopt the language of the poet,— *
Oh! who could bear life's stormy doom,
Did not Thy Heavenly Dove
Come brightly bearing through the gloom
A peace-branch from above!
Then sorrow, touched by Thee, grows bright
With more than rapture's ray,
As darkness shows us worlds of light
We never saw by day.
* Slightly altered from Moore.
[IV.]
Abraham's Tent.
WE experience natural pleasure in visiting spots celebrated in history. Though corn may wave, and fruit ripen over the scene of some celebrated battle, we cannot look with indifference on the scene where was once held a world-famous struggle for freedom. No modern palace would have the interest which would be attached to the ruin of one which had been trodden by famous monarchs of old. Were there buildings remaining of which it could be said, "here Alexander planned his conquests;" or "there Cyrus administered justice;" we should regard such buildings, however crumbling and defaced, as places gilded by memories which time could never destroy.
But no palace of monarch, no fortress of hero, could ever wake in us such feelings of reverence as a tent of black goat's hair, such as those which the nomade descendants of Abraham now pitch on the sands of Arabia, if it could be certified to us,—"here dwelt the father of the faithful; he who in Scripture is called the friend of God. In that doorway sat the venerable patriarch in the heat of the day, when, raising his eyes, he beheld three mysterious visitors from Heaven stand before him. Behind yon curtain Sarah listened with eager interest to the conversation between her lord and the angel, laughing to herself at tidings which she would not at first believe. There also, when time had rolled on, she laughed with joy over the babe, the promised gift of God; the child from whom should descend a race as the stars in the sky or the sands by the sea for number. It was there that Abraham first embraced his Isaac, and blessed God for the fulfilment of that promise which faith had grasped, when the aged man had 'against hope believed in hope.'"