All evil, in fact the very existence of evil, is inexplicable until we refer to the paternity of God. It hangs a huge blot in the universe until the orb of divine love rises behind it. In that apposition we detect its meaning. It appears to us but a finite shadow as it passes across the disk of infinite light.

Influence is exerted by every human being from the hour of birth to that of death.

Whatever may be our condition in life, it is better to lay hold of its advantages than to count its evils.

Under the shadow of earthly disappointment, all unconscious to ourselves, our Divine Redeemer is walking by our side.

A life of mere pleasure! A little while, in the spring-time of the senses, in the sunshine of prosperity, in the jubilee of health, it may seem well enough. But how insufficient, how mean, how terrible when age comes, and sorrow, and death! A life of pleasure! What does it look like when these great changes beat against it--when the realities of eternity stream in? It looks like the fragments of a feast, when the sun shines upon the withered garlands, and the tinsel, and the overturned tables, and the dead lees of wine.

Ostentation is the signal flag of hypocrisy.

The angels may have wider spheres of action, may have nobler forms of duty; but right with them and with us is one and the same thing.