The Danger of Spiritual Pride

If we fail on suitable occasions to declare what God has done for our souls, we shall be likely to offend our heavenly Father. But on the other hand, if we make such declarations, Satan will be likely to be present and tempt us to spiritual pride. Happy is the man, who can relate and extol God's gracious dealings with him, with such meekness and humility, as to furnish no entrance to evil.

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXVII.

The Measurement of Love

Go, count the sands that form the earth,
The drops that make the mighty sea;
Go, count the stars of heavenly birth,
And tell me what their numbers be,
And thou shalt know LOVE'S mystery;

No measurement hath yet been found,
No lines or numbers that can keep
The sum of its eternal round,
The plummet of its endless deep,
Or heights, to which its glories sweep.

Yes, measure LOVE, when thou canst tell
The lands where seraphs have not trod,
The heights of heaven, the depths of hell,
And lay thy finite measuring-rod
On the infinitude of God.

— Christ in the Soul (1872) XIII.

Seeking God's Will

The Life Power of the Blood

He  dies, and from His bleeding veins,
The fountain of His life-blood drains
To cleanse the stains of sins;
And nothing less than that dear tide,
Which flow'd from Jesus' bleeding side,
Can make us pure within.

But underneath that fountain lies
A fount, unseen by outward eyes,
Eternal from above;
Of which the blood is but the sign,
Which gives that blood its power divine;
The deeper fount of LOVE.

LOVE flows beneath the purple flood;
LOVE is the life-power of the blood;
LOVE, offering to be slain;
'T is LOVE that to thy heart applies
The emblem of its sacrifice;
And washes out thy stain.

And wouldst thou learn the heavenly art,
To bear about a holy heart,
Let  kindred love be thine;
The same dear love, which ever flows,
In tears and blood, for others' woes,
And makes thy life divine.

— Christ in the Soul (1872) XII.

Thou Giver of the Rising Light

I.
Thou Giver of the rising light,
Thou Author of the morning ray,
At whose command the shades of night
Are changed to bright and sudden day;
Thou too canst rend the clouded heart,
Enveloped in the shades of sin;
And let the light, that dwelt apart,
The glory and the gladness in.

II,
Oh God, our Father and our Friend,
Dark is the cloud, that wraps us now;
But not in vain our prayers ascend,
Nor hopeless at thy feet we bow.
'T is in the dark, distressing hour,
That thou dost hear thy people's cry;
And come and clothe them in thy power,
And hide them in thy majesty.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

Christ, Our Refuge

Dark is the watery way

Of life's tempestuous sea:

And none, Oh Christ, are safe, but they

Who put their trust in Thee,

Loud is the stormy wind;

The seamen are afraid;

But those shall strength and mercy find,

Whose souls on Christ are stayed.

The winds they do not fear,

Nor dread the thunder's noise;

The Savior's cheering voice they hear,

And evermore rejoice.

It  is our Savior's skill,

Our Savior's arm of might,

Which guides the tossing ship at will,

And puts our fears to flight.

Praise  to the Pilot's power,

Praise to the Pilot's hand,

That faithful most in danger's hour,

Shall bring us safe to land.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

The Secret Sign

They know Him by the secret sign,
Which to their souls is given;
'T is written there in light divine,
With characters from heaven.

They may not tell it; but 'tis there,
Forever deep impressed;
Nor grief, nor pain, nor sharp despair,
Shall rend it from their breast.

The child the parent's accent knows,
The accents ever dear;
Unlike the treacherous voice of foes,
That fills his heart with fear.

He runs to meet it; and it falls
In blessings and in joys;
And thus wh'ene'er the Savior calls,
His people know his voice.

They know him by the secret sign,
Which to their souls is given;
'T is written there in light divine,
With characters from heaven.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

A Desire for the Good of All that Exists

We have already said that love necessarily has its object. The object of pure love (and we regard this as an important remark) is existence;  all percipient and sentient existence whatever. So that love, in distinction from every appearance and modification of affection which is not true or pure love, may be defined to be a desire for the good or happiness of everything which exists. And, in accordance with this view, everything which has a being, from the highest to the lowest, whatever its position, whatever its character, the whole infinity of percipient and sentient existence, simply because it has such an existence, is the appropriate object of pure love.

This is a great truth, and one which, it must be admitted, is difficult to be realized by those who have not an instinct of perception and of affirmation in their own purified hearts. Those who are the subjects of this exalted feeling sincerely desire the happiness of all those, whoever or whatever they may be, who are capable of enjoying happiness while, at the same time, it may be so, that they disapprove and perhaps even hate their character; and, accordingly, they love the evil as well as the good, sinners as well as saints.

We  have a striking illustration of the nature of pure love in the case of the Savior. He loved sinners. "He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." It was not for angels, but for erring men, that he  died. He bowed his head upon the cross for those that persecuted him, reviled him, slew him. He loved men, not because they were good, for such they were not, and certainly not because they were evil, because evil can never be the foundation of love, but because they were existences, — percipient and moral existences. He  saw them created with the elements of an eternal being, but destitute, in their fallen state, of those attributes which would make that being a happy one. He saw them destitute of truth which they might possess, of holiness to which they were strangers, the enemies of God when they might be his friends, the heirs of hell when they might be the heirs of heaven. He loved them, therefore, not because they were good, but because they had a sentient, and especially because they had a moral, existence. It was their existence and not their merit; it was what they were capable of being, and not what they were, which brought him down from heaven.

— edited and adapted from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 4, Chapter 1.

God's Life in Humanity

From God all things come. To God, as the universal originator and governor, all things are in subjection. In ascertaining what God is, we necessarily ascertain the position and responsibilities of those beings that come from God, and are dependent on him. The life of his moral creatures, so far as it is a right and true life, is a reproduction, in a finite form, of the elements of his own life. "God created man in his own image. In the image of God created he him." (Genesis 1:27.) The Savior, in speaking of himself, in his incarnate state, says, "I am in the Father, and the Father in me." (John 13:11.) God, in carrying out and perfecting the great idea of a moral creation, subjects the infinity of his being to the limitations of humanity, and reproduces himself in the human soul. So that man's life may truly be described, as God's life in humanity.

Nor, in the strict sense of the terms, can any­ thing but the DIVINE LIFE, or the life of God in the soul, be called life. Those who have gone astray from God, just so far as they have lost the divine life, and have sunk into the natural life, are dead. Hence, the expressions of the apostle: — "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins." (Ephesians 2:1.) The eternal vitality, the breath from the Infinite, the life of God in the soul, ceases to be in them. And being dead, by the absence of God as an indwelling principle, they must be recreated, or born again, by his restoration. It is not enough, that provision has been made, in the death of Christ, for man's forgiveness. Forgiveness, it is true, has its appropriate work. It cancels the iniquity of the past; but this is not all that is necessary. It is not without reason, that the learned Schlegel commences his profound work on the philosophy of history by saying, that "the most important subject, and the first problem of philosophy, is the restoration in man of the lost image of God." The immortal nature must be made anew, must be re-constituted, if we may so express it, on the principle of life linked with life, of the created sustained in the uncreated, in the bonds of divine union.

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 1, Chapter 1.

Oh, Send One Ray Into My Sightless Ball

Oh, send one ray into my sightless ball,
Transmit one beam into my darkened heart!
On thee, Almighty God, on thee I call,
Incline thy listening ear, thine aid impart!
In vain the natural sun his beams doth yield,
In vain the moon illumes the fields of air;
The eye-sight of my soul is quenched and sealed,
And what is other light if shades are there?
Beyond the sun and moon I lift my gaze,
Where round thy throne a purer light is spread,
Where seraphs fill their urns from that bright blaze,
And angels' souls with holy fires are fed.
Oh, send from that pure fount one quickening ray,
And change these inward shades to bright and glorious day!

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 3, Chapter 5.