[022]

Monday. Third Week in Advent.

Right judgment.

Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.--John vii. 24.

       The night
Wanes into morning, and the dawning light
Broadens, and all the shadows fade and shift!
I follow, follow,--sure to meet the sun,
And confident that what the future yields
Will be the Right,--unless myself be wrong.
Longfellow.

Shadows there are who dwell
  Among us, yet apart,
Dear to the claim of God
  Or kindly human heart;
Voices of earth and heaven
  Call, but they turn away,
And Love, through such black night
  Can see no hope of day.
And yet--our eyes are dim
  And thine are keener far;
Then gaze till thou can'st see
  The glimmer of some star!

The black stream flows along,
  Whose waters we despise,--
Show us reflected there
  Some fragment of the skies!
'Neath tongled thorns and briers
  (The task is fit for thee)
Seek for the hidden flowers
  We are too blind to see!
Then will I thy great gift
  A crown and blessing call;
Angels look thus on men,
  And God sees good in all.
A. Procter.

Such as everyone is inwardly, so he judgeth outwardly.
Thos. A Kempis.

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[023]

Tuesday.

Right judgment.

Neither cast ye your pearls before swine.--Matt. vii. 6.

Deliver not the tasks of might
   To weakness, neither hide the ray
   From those, not blind, who wait for day,
Tho' sitting girt with doubtful light.

Make Knowledge circle with the winds;
   But let her herald, Reverense, fly
   Before her to whatever sky
Bear seed of men and growth of minds!

Watch what main-currents draw the years;
   Cut Prejudice agaenst the grain;
   But (gentle words are always gain)
Regard the weakness of thy peers!
Tennyson.

                 O Good and Great,
In Whom, in this bedarkened state,
I fain am stuggling to believe,
Let me not ever cease to grieve,
Nor lose the consciousness of ill
Within me;--and refusing still
To recognise in things around
What cannot truly there be found,
Let me not feel, nor be it true
That, while each daily task I do,
I still am giving day by day
My precious things within away
(Those Thou didst give to keep as Thine)
And casting,--do whate'er I may,--
My heavenly pearls to earthly swine!
Clough.

Seeing ye thrust the word of God from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of etrnal life, lo, We turn to the Gentiles.
Acts xiii. 46 ( R.V.)

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[024]

Wednesday.  Third Week in Advent.

Right judgment.

Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts?--James ii.4

Thou hast done well, perhaps,
  To lift the bright disguise
And lay the bitter truth
  Before our shrinking eyes.
When evil crawls below
  What seems so bright and fair,
Thine eyes are keen and true
  To find the serpent there:
And yet--I turn away--
  Thy task is not divine,--
The evil angels look
  On earth with eyes like thine.

Thou hast done well, perhaps,
  To show how closely wound
Dark threads of Sin and Self
  With our best deeds are found;--
How great and noble hearts
  Striving for lofty aims
Have still some earthly chord
  A meaner spirit claims;--
And yet--although thy task
  Is well and fairly done,--
Methinds for such as thou
  There is a holier one.
A. Procter.

Shall one like me
Judge hearts like yours?
Browning.

He that well and rightly considereth his own works will find little cause to judge hardly of another.
Thos. A Kempis.

There is no place where earth's sorrows
   Are more felt than up in heaven;
There is no place where earth's failings
   Have such kindly judgments given.
Faber.

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[025]

Thursday.

Right judgment.

Ye shallnot be afraid of the face of man; for the judgment is God's.--Deut. i. 17.

Time was when I believed that wrong
   In others to detect,
Was part of genius, and a gift
   To cherish, not reject.
Now better taught by Thee, O Lord!
   This truth dawns on my mind--
The best effect of heavenly light
   Is earth's false eyes to blind.
Faber.

The world is full of Judgment-Days, and into every assembly that a man enters, in every action he attempts, he is gauged and stamped.
Emerson.

What from this barren being do we reap?
    Our senses narrow, and our reason frail,
Life short, and truth a gem which loves the deep,
    And all things weigh'd in custom's falsest scale;--
Opinion an omnipotence whose veil
    Mantles the earth with darkness, until right
And wrong are accidents, and men grow pale,
    Lest their own judgments should become too bright,
And their free thoughts be crimes, and earth have too much light!
Byron.

He's loved of the distracted multitude,
Who like not in their judgments, but their eyes.
Shakespeare.

     The best men, doing their best,
Know peradventure least of what they do:
Men usefullest in the world are simply used;
The nail that holds the wood must pierce it first,
And he alone who wields the hammer sees
The work advanced by the earliest blow.
E. B. Browning.

Judge not; that ye be not judged.

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