JUVENILE MUSIC. Furnished for this work by LoWELL MASON, Professor in the HYMN. "We come with voice of song." Allegro. d. We come with voice of song, Before thy presence, Lord; Look # on this youthful Sabbath throng,And teach us from . . . . thy word. SABBATH SCHOOL VISITER. VOL. VII. SEPTEMBER, 1839. No. 9. Man's Destiny. It cannot be, that man was made When death's strong arm is on him laid, Is his eternal home. It cannot be, that life so fair, Cast up by waves of ocean, where Else, why those aspirations high, Like angels leap above the sky, Why is it, that the radiant bow, And stars, that hold their festive dance Why move they on in bright durance, VOL. VII. 17 And beings, beautiful and bright, To our embraces given; Who, like the beams of morning light, They make earth seem a heaven. O why must these by death's fell blow It is that we are born to share Far richer than earth's treasures, where There is a sky so pure and deep, No cloud their glory shades. And where those beings fair and bright, Quick pass, like shadows of the night, Saxonville. "I can't make you mind.” M. R. B. Such were the words that fell from the lips of a mother, after having made several fruitless attempts to secure obedience from her little child! And yet that mother wonders what can be the reason her child will not mind. Does she not know, that the very utterance of those words, before her child, was a virtual surrender of parental authority? That child may now go through life, even making himself vile, and no mother's authority be exercised to restrain him. Samuel and Eli; or the first Blush. The child Samuel ministered to the Lord at Shiloh before Eli, the priest, and was approved both in the sight of God and of man. For he served the Lord with a pure heart, and was obedient, and increased in wisdom. But the sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were wicked children, who inquired not after the Lord, and their sins were very great. And they stood one day under a tree before the house of their father Eli; and Samuel was with them, girded with a linen ephod. But Hophni and Phinehas spoke wicked, indecent words with each other, in the hearing of the child. Then Samuel blushed deeply, so that his countenance glowed, as the evening sky, when the sun has set. And thus blushed the boy for the first time. For he had never heard a wicked word out of the mouth of any one before. But the wicked boys laughed at him and mocked him, because he had blushed at their language. And Samuel turned away his head and wept. Then Eli, who had observed all this, stepped up to the boy and said, "My son, why weepest thou?" Then answered Samuel, "Thy sons Hophni and Phinehas used wicked words before me, and it grieved my heart and caused a fiery heat, I know not why, in my face,-and they mocked me. Then Eli embraced the child, pressed him to his heart and raised his voice and said, "Ah, my son, weep not; and let not their scorn trouble thee. Thou art the chosen of the Lord,—but what rejoices me on thy account, fills my soul with grief on account of my own sons. For they have corrupted the flower of their youth, so that it can never produce good fruit." And Eli wept over his sons, until his eyes were dim; and they caused him nothing but heart-breaking. But Samuel rejoiced the heart of the priest Eli, and walked upright before the Lord. A. "This little hand," said Whitefield, holding it up before his eyes, as he was preaching in the field, while the sun was pouring his beams over the world, "this little hand hides from my eyes the glorious sun," The Bible. The report, at the last anniversary of the Essex North Bible Society, was read by the Rev. L. F. Dimmick, of Newburyport. It is so excellent, and most of it so appropriate for the Visiter, that we have procured it for the benefit of our readers. and The Bible is God's great gift to man;-the Bible, the grace which it reveals. On this fact is based the duty of those who possess it, to communicate it to the destitute. The Bible is frequently brought to view on its own pages, as of the highest value. The writers, who were the channel of its communication to the world, often. pause to dwell on its excellences and its uses. "My doctrine," says one, "shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew; as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass. "" As the rain and the dew are to vegetation, giving life and beauty, so is the Bible to the intellectual and moral world, imparting to it the richness and adornment appropriate to its nature. The Bible being a revelation from God, communicated by holy men, who wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, is the source, and only adequate source, of instruction on the highest themes in which man has an interest. The Bible alone reveals God in the fulness of his glory. The Bible alone reveals the government of God in its universality and results. The Bible alone shows to man himself as he is, immortal, fallen, with an eternity of retribution before him. The Bible alone makes known salvation for our sinful race. This alone can point and say, "Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." Nature, indeed, affords instruction, to some valuable extent, on some of these topics. But, even in these cases, in order to the fullest satisfaction, the Bible is the glorious sun, under whose light the book of nature must be read. The Bible is "a light shining in a dark place," to which the world is directed "to take heed, till the day dawn, and the day-star arise in their hearts;”—in man's pilgrimage to eternity, "a light to his feet, a lamp to his |