Summer’s Lessons in Kindness

WE praise and magnify Thy holy name, O Lord! for the fulness of riches with which this blessed earth has been dowered by Thee Would that we took more delight in Thy works, that we thought more of the unseen but eternal things which they shadow forth, that we might be led back through the beauty of this world to the beauty of Him Who made it. May the uprising of the fruits of the earth bring to mind the uprising of the Divine life, when we are breathed upon by God. May no outward thing pass from our gaze till it has filled our enraptured souls with some sweet lesson. May these fair summer days each bring their lesson, and may we, in going back to dreary winter, go back pious and content.

As we behold the skirts of the setting day, the golden glories of the sinking sun, may we think on the days of our life, passing all too quickly, without having brought us nearer to Thee, without having any promise of a golden setting. Yet, O Lord! some days have taught us love and mercy, some good, some charity; but would that each day as it passes could be made glorious by some sin struggled against, some deed of truth and kindness done; these things would be to us riches in the blessed life where Thou dost lay up for us all our good. Take Thou the little good of past days and make it great, take the evil and make it little, and for the future fill our hearts with Thy goodness, so that there may be room for nothing evil. Show us how ragged and poor is the righteousness of man; the righteousness of God, how glorious and true!

May these things sink into our hearts, bringing forth good fruit hereafter. These and all mercies we ask through Thy dear Son.—AMEN.