then a murmuring sound, which seems sweet music then. And have you not
fancied that you heard the harp of God playing in heaven? Did you not
conceive, that yon stars, that those eyes of God, looking down on you,
were also mouths of song--that every star was singing God's glory,
singing, as it shone, its mighty Maker, and His lawful, well-deserved
praise? Night hath its songs. We need not much poetry in our spirit,
to catch the song of night, and hear the spheres as they chant praises
which are loud to the heart, tho they be silent to the ear--the
praises of the mighty God, who bears up the unpillared arch of heaven,
and moves the stars in their courses....

If we are going to sing of the things of yesterday, let us begin with
what God did for us in past times. My beloved brethren, you will find
it a sweet subject for song at times, to begin to sing of electing
love and covenanted mercies. When thou thyself art low, it is well to
sing of the fountain-head of mercy; of that blest decree wherein thou
wast ordained to eternal life, and of that glorious Man who undertook
thy redemption; of that solemn covenant signed, and sealed, and
ratified, in all things ordered well; of that everlasting love which,
ere the hoary mountains were begotten, or ere the aged hills were
children, chose thee, loved thee firmly, loved thee fast, loved thee
well, loved thee eternally. I tell thee, believer, if thou canst go
back to the years of eternity; if thou canst in thy mind run back
to that period, or ere the everlasting hills were fashioned, or the
fountains of the great deep scooped out, and if thou canst see thy
God inscribing thy name in His eternal book; if thou canst see in His
loving heart eternal thoughts of love to thee, thou wilt find this a
charming means of giving thee songs in the night. No songs like those
which come from electing love; no sonnets like those that are dictated
by meditations on discriminating mercy. Some, indeed, cannot sing of