82

Is  our  nineteenth-century  Christianity,  in  all  which
concerns  our  likes,  in  that  habitual  every-day  course  of
life  whereby  we  are  pleasing  or  displeasing  God,  our
standard  of  what  is  right  or  wrong,  like  that  which  our
Lord  left  on  earth  for  us  to  follow  ?

83

God  speaketh,  but  it  is  with  us  to  hearken  or  no.  It
is  much,  nay,  it  is  everything,  not  to  turn  away  the  ear,
to  be  willing  to  hearken,  not  to  drown  His  Voice.
'  The  secret  of  the  Lord  is  with  them  that  fear  Him.'
It  is  a  secret  hushed  voice,  a  gentle  intercourse  of
heart  to  heart,  a  still  small  voice,  whispering  to  the
inward  ear.  How  should  we  hear  it,  if  we  fill  our  ears
and  our  hearts  with  the  din  of  this  world,  its  empty


Short  Passages.  27


tumult,  its  excitement,  its  fretting  vanities  or  cares  or
passions,  or  anxieties  or  show  or  rivalries,  and  its
whirl  of  emptiness  !  A  loud  voice  will  often  not  reach
an  occupied  heart.  The  Voice  of  the  Son  of  God  in
the  flesh,  though  it  waked  Lazarus  from  the  dead,
reached  not  those  whose  ears  and  minds  were  filled
with  love  of  the  praise  of  men.
