DESOLATION.

ANOTHER thought for the thoughtful.

Most persons, young and old, have a pleasure in visiting ruins. This inclination is somewhat romantic in youth, but in age it springs from graver and deeper emotions. When an old man gazes on a dilapidated mansion, a roofless church, a ruined abbey, a desolated palace, or a mouldering castle, it comes home to his heart. The ivy, the crumbling wall, the falling fragment, and the tottering tower, speak to his spirit in a language that he cannot but comprehend. They are monuments on which are graven his own mortality.

Old Humphrey has wandered in desolate places, while the hollow blustering wind and the voiceless solitude have alike impressed his mind with the solemn truth, that the ground was giving way beneath his feet, and all things fading around him. His latter end has been vividly brought before him, and his lips in a subdued tone have syllabled the words, "All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come," Job xiv. 14.

How impressive is the language of Holy Writ, when prophetically sketching the ruins of Babylon!

But

"It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation: neither shall the Arabian pitch his tent there; neither shall the shepherds make their fold there. wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there,” Isa. xiii. 20, 21.

"I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water and I will sweep it with the besom of destruction, saith the Lord of hosts," Isa. xiv. 23.

Not only Christians, but Turks, have been moved to solemn reflections by the influence of desolate places over the mind. It is said that when Mohammed, second emperor of the Turks, took possession of Constantinople in the year 1453, and thus put an end to the Roman name, the splendid palaces of Constantine in their desolation much affected him. For a season he mused in a melancholy manner on the fading nature of earthly greatness, and then broke out in the language of Arabian poetry-"The spider hath woven her web in the imperial palace, and the owl hath sung her watch-song on the towers of Afrasiab."

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THE DOORS BEING SHUT.

I HAVE been reading over the text: "Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you," John xx. 19. I have been reflecting on the circumstance of "the doors being shut," and some pleasant though somewhat fanciful thoughts have come across my mind.

Do you wish that Jesus would come into your heart, saying, "Peace be unto you?" Look well to it that the "doors" and windows are "shut;" for if your ears are open to take in all the vain babbling that prevails in Vanity Fair, and your eyes open to stare at all the fine things there set forth, your heart will soon be as full as the inn at Bethlehem, and there will be no room for Jesus. Either keep the doors and windows shut, or watch them carefully. It is cold work watching, especially when darkness is round you. MaRy a weary hour will you have while other merry-making; but when He comes, you

folks are

shall see that the morning Sun of Righteousness is better than the midnight lamp of revelry.

TRYING TIMES.

You may have seen, perhaps, a band of emigrants parting with their friends just as the ship was about to weigh anchor. Mothers hanging on the necks of their sons; brothers and sisters linked in each others arms; lovers as pale as agony could make them, clinging to one another bathed in tears; and white-headed old men and grey-headed old women spreading out their aged hands to their children on board, or clasping them in prayer on their bended knees, invoking the best blessings of the Almighty on those they were about to lose for ever! If you have seen these things, the tears, the lamentations, the blessings, the agony, the faintings, and the prayers, no doubt, sunk into your souls.

It is just possible, too, that you may have been present among the passengers of a ship in distress, when the mast has been carried away by the board, when a leak has sprung, and four feet of water been collected in the hold; when the vessel has struck on a rock, staving in her bows, tearing

away her keel, and beating about on the sharp crags, like a huge fish left by the receding sea upon the shallowy shore; and if so, you must have seen the wild rush of crew and passengers on deck, witnessed the heart-rending agony of old and young, and heard the mingled oaths and prayers, the fervent petitions and frantic ravings, of the bewildered throng in momentary expectation of overwhelming destruction.

Now these are trying times, and they bring to light whether we have been building on the sands or on the rock. It is in vain to deceive ourselves with false hopes, trusting to the strength of our minds and the influence of reason over us; for these things will no more support us in such seasons, than a leaky boat will preserve us in a storm. There is no cure for the sorrows of earth, save the well-grounded hope of the joys of heaven. If, when we part with our friends here, we have the assurance that we shall meet them hereafter, it will go far to mitigate our grief; and if, when we are tossed in the storm that threatens us and all around us with destruction, we can put our confidence in Him who said to the troubled

ocean, Peace, be still," Mark iv. 30, then only will our souls be sustained in peace.