FOR ASCENSION-DAY.

PSALM Viii. Domine, Dominus noster.

1. O LORD our Governour, how excellent is Thy Name in all the world: Thou that hast set Thy glory above the heavens !

How surpassing great is the glory of that Almighty Lord Who has made heaven and earth, and rules over and governs the things which He has made. His Name, as the Creator of the universe, is unceasingly magnified by all His works, which He has disposed in their order, according to His own all-wise will. 'O let the heavens and the earth bless the Lord: praise Him and magnify Him for ever.' But it is not only in the material creation that His wonders are displayed; the marvels of His grace in redemption are mightier than the marvels of His wisdom. in creation. Here we see only a portion of His glory; its perfection is above our sight. The excellence of His love is greater than the excellence of His providence and His power. His glory which is manifested in Christ, Who hath ascended into heaven, is loftier than the firmament, and shines more brightly than the stars.

2. Out of the mouth of very babes and sucklings hast Thou ordained strength, because of Thine enemies that Thou mightest still the enemy, and the avenger.

LXX. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings

Thou hast perfected praise. [Also St. Matth. xxi. 16.]

And this is one of the marvels of His glory, that He has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the wise. When the Son of God was first manifested to the world, the holy Innocents of Bethlehem bore witness to Him by their deaths, although they knew Him not; while Herod, who might have known Him, sought His life. And again, when the Son of man came in His triumph of humility to His own city of Jerusalem, the little children cried around Him, 'Hosanna to the Son of David,' while the Pharisees and rulers were silent, in enmity and rage. They confessed Him with their lips, though they could but understand in part the words they said; and He was pleased to accept their witness, and by it to confound those His enemies, who, thinking themselves wise, had become both fools and sinners. Thus, in the defenceless weakness of the Innocents of Bethlehem, was God's strength established, and by the unconscious tongues of the children in the temple was God's praise perfected; and thus are Christians taught that by simplicity, and innocence, and meekness, can only the enemy of souls be quelled.

3. For I will consider Thy heavens, even the works of Thy fingers the moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained.

With the same feelings with which David of old, keeping his father's sheep by night upon the plains of Bethlehem, looked upon the firmament of stars above his head, aye, and with still deeper

feelings of awe and wonder, may we look upon the heavens now. Their beauty, their immensity, their unerring regularity, make us feel and know that there is but one hand which could have planned their order, but one finger which could have pointed to them the paths in which they should go. And yet this visible universe is but a small part of His created works; there lies within it and beyond it another universe,-invisible, spiritual, eternal. And this inner and spiritual universe is so set over against the outer world, that the visible heavens are to the mind of faith but a suggestion of the angels and archangels who surround the throne of God; the moon walking through the night in brightness is but a reflection of the Church of Christ in this world; and the stars which are scattered in the skies, like dust beneath the feet of God, are but shadows of those degrees of immortal shining in which the saints and the elect shall be arrayed before the throne of Christ.

4. What is man, that Thou art mindful of him and the son of man, that Thou visitest him?

Compared with the starry immensity of heaven, how insignificant we seem; compared with its cycles of ages, how minute is our term of years! What is man, whose strength is weakness, and whose end is death, that amid the complication of unnumbered worlds, God should think of him? What is the fallen child of Adam, sunk in selfishness and bound in sin, that He should leave the angels and the powers

above, and come down to dwell with him,-yea more, to suffer and to die with him?

5. Thou madest him lower than the angels: to crown him with glory and worship.

Heb. Thou hast made him less for a little while than the Elohim, i. e. the gods: [See Gen. iii. 5.]

Thou hast crowned him with joy and honour.

What the first Adam lost for us, the second Adam won back for us, and greater glories too. The first was indeed placed but a little lower than the angels, he was formed in the image of God, and made a living soul; but from that state he fell, he covered himself with shame and sin, and became subject unto death. It was to that fallen race that the second Adam came; He Who was the Lord of angels became the Son of man. God took man's nature; God became man; and 'Jesus, having been made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, is crowned with glory and honour, that He by the grace of God should taste death for every man.' It was through impatience at being less than the spiritual powers, that man disobeyed and fell: 'Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.' It was through patience and suffering that he was redeemed by Him Who said,-I will be as man, to know good and evil.

6. Thou madest him to have dominion of the works of Thy hands and Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet;

:

The second Adam was made a quickening spirit. 'The Lord from heaven' died, and rose again, He ascended into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. He covered our sinfulness with His righteousness; He overcame death by life; He raised our earthliness into heaven, and in Him the lowest nature of all was placed above all. What man lost, Christ regained. All created things are again put in subjection to the second man. Both this world and that which is to come, both things seen and unseen, all life, all power, all glory, are His. He must reign until He has put all things under His feet; until His foes and ours,—sin, and hell, and death, the last enemy that shall be destroyed,—are subdued and trampled down by Him, and by us in Him.

7. All sheep and oxen : yea, and the beasts of the field;

8. The fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea and whatsoever walketh through the

paths of the seas.

To man before his fall was given 'dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing which moveth upon the earth.' So in the same way Christ, the Son of man, Who is risen and ascended, is Lord of all. Above all, He is the head of His Church, and all her differences of administrations' are His and come from Him. His are the souls of those who