THE TRANSITORINESS OF ALL EARTHLY THINGS.

 THE TRANSITORINESS OF ALL EARTHLY THINGS. All nature echoes the message of the grass. The winter snow falls lightly, and lies in its white purity - mystic, wonderful - over all the land; but too soon it soils, and browns, and sinks, and passes all away. The spring flowers that come, responsive to the low sunshine and the gentle breath, are so fragile, they stay with us only such a little while, and then they pass away. The summer blossoms multiply and stand thick over the ground, and they seem strong, with their deep rich colouring; and yet they too wither and droop and pass away. The autumn fruits cluster on the tree branches, and grow big, and win their soft rich bloom of ripeness; but they too are plucked in due season, and pass away. The gay dress of varied leafage is soon stripped off with the wild winds; one or two trembling leaves cling long to the outmost boughs; but, by-and-by, even they fall and pass away. Down every channel of the hillsides are borne the crumblings washed from the everlasting hills, as we call them, that yet are passing away. And man - does he differ from the things in the midst of which he is set? Nay; he is but flesh. "He fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not." It is even true of man's work. All the glory, all the goodliness, of man's genius and enterprise and effort - it is all as the "flower of the field." Man's strength, and wisdom, and riches, and learning, and beauty, and science, and art, all are subject to decay; the "moth and the rust eat into them, and the thief steals them away." It is even true of the very forms and modes in which one man strives to bless and help another. The forms are not the principal things; they are but the temporary human stamp; and God may remove or change them to make us feel our entire dependence on him. J T

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