Year: 1875

We are breaking our hearts over our Dead,


that the Gospel is most precious. Ah, If this
Door world be all, if the narrow horizon, which


shuts in our earthly view, be the boundary OF


our being, if the grave swallow US up for


ever, and there be no life beyond it, then


what satire is man upon the works of God.


Is the light of reason finally quenched when


man has fretted his brief hour upon this


earthly stage? When life's htful f-ver is over,


does he carry all his proud knowledge to


hide it beneath the ground? Do these sweet


affections shoot forth their tendrils, knittin
to every object which they touch. only to be


smothered beneath the marble slab of the
tomb?


| Who can answer these questionings of the
Soul, as we kneel beside our Dead in the anguish
of the parting? Blessed be the unseen hand
which in these Scriptures, lifts the curtain
from the grave, and reveals the life to come
Through the long prospective We behold the
far-off City Of our God, with its gates Of pearl
and streets of gold, with its crowns and hsrps.
| Sweeter than the dreams of angels are the
| voices of our own Departed, swelling there
the great anthem Of praise to Him who has
( redeemed them with his blood" and "maae
| them Kings and Priests unto God" 1t is not
death, when these mount upward in their
chariot of fire, and their pure spirits veil
| their ravished eyes before the glories
of the Eternal Throne. And the Grave, my
brethren, is but the dark and narrow passage
through which the body itself shall 60 up, ct
length, into the brightness of the Upper day.
1t must sleep there for time, but it is only
steep-the deep, dreamless sleep IN which the
head forgets to ache and the heart throbs no
moro with anguish. The Bible speaks only Of
it as sleep to the Believer " Them also which
sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him" He,
who has "-abolished death and brought life
and Immortality to light in the Gospel" went
down into the grave on their behalf and sane
tilted it as the bed in which his weary saints
should sleep for time. Soon He shall call,
and they will answer Him. The risen body
shall be tenanted again by its own spirit, and
they shall be "forever with the Lord"


Even the old Heathen could not endure the
darkness of the Sepulchre; and the funeral
lamp, fed With oil by faithful hands, burned
day and night in their gloomy vaults But
we need no such feeble ray to disperse for US
the gloom of the grave. The hope of glori-
GUS resurrection shines with a steady and
Heavenly radiance upon "lhe dead in Christ
The grave is neither dark nor lonely; for the
Holy Ghost keeps an eternal vigil over their
sleeping dust, to quicken it into life again at
the dawn of the morning. For the trumpet
shall sound, and the dead shall be raised in
corruptible." "Flesh and blood" we know.
can not inherit the Kingdom of God"
This "natural body" must be transfgured
into the spiritual body" 1t is permitted,
therefore, to return to the dust from which it
was taken, that by new creation 60 it may
be fashioned like unto His glorious body" in
whose perfect image they shall at length arise.
In our anguish, we behold it "sown in cor
roption. it shall be raised in interruption
'.t is sown in dishonor, it is raised IN glory;
it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power;
it is sown natural body, it is raised spirit
ual body" $50 when this oorruptibie shall
have put on interruption, and this mortal
shall have put on immortality, then shall be
brought to pass the saying that is written,
Death is swallowed up in victory" They Who
shave borne the image Of the earthly, now
bear the image ofthe Heavenly ly"-"every man
in his own order, Christ the first fruits, after
ward, they that are Christ's, at his coming"


Mysterious as is this truth of the R4surrec-
ton, God has planted grand prophecy of it
in the instincts and affections Of our nature.
We can not make them dead whom we have
truly loved on earth. To US, at least, they
still live: and they come back to us, to our
waim and loving thought they come back with
the well rem embered form, and we Can almost
see the old sparkle Of the eye, and hear lin
the tones which once thrilled US through and
through. 1t is not wholly an act Of memory;
for those earthly forms sre now strangely
transfgured to Us. Death has laid upon them |
his sanctifying touch, and they are glorified
with beauty suoh as they never had before |
Every carnal thought toward them is gone for.
ever. Every feeling of our soul is spiritu-
allied as to them. They seem to be
still our own, and We blend them with all the
memories of the past, and the current
sweeps on ia its old channel of association
az before. Yet, with it all, they appear SO
sacred, as beings that come from another
world whose light shines through them and
makes them radiant with glory. And SO they
take their place in the innernost chamber OF
our hearts, and auide with US as a living
Presence. Oh, how we turn aside from the
cold, hard world, that we may commune with
them in the awful stiffness of our love! We
need no speech: but We spread over them the
sacredness OF pure and spiritual affection;
and the sense of their presence to our
thought is like benediction which is
breaihed upon US from Heaven. CoulI this
be, if all beyond the grave is bank2 Is
there not here an evidence of the life un-
broken, which in the Great Beyond puts on
the robe of glory? H IS not God in this
sanchfed remembrance, built a prophecy of
the glorious Resurrection into the very
structure of our affections, which shall pro-
tect and redeem us from that cold skeptcism
of the supernatural and the spiritual which
calculating and materalist.c philosophy is
always suggesting?


1 may not lift the veil from the sorrows
which are covered beneath the mourning of
this bereavement. These venerable parents-
oh, it is SO hard to suffer when the elasticity
OF the spirit is broken, and we are too old to
wear out the scar of fresh grief These
brothers and these sisters-how they shiver
in the cold shadow which the tomb throws
upon their youthful hearts And He, the
chief mourner OF them all-leave him alone
with his memories and with his God % tho