Section 456
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ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 425 heavens, are also displays of what are here, and that Jerusalem above, and that heavenly Sion, and that city of the living God beyond our earth, in which are the innumerable choirs of angels and the assembly of the first born written in heaven, extol their Maker and the universal Sovereign of all, with praises and hymns inexpressible. These surpass our comprehension, neither would any mortal tongue be adequate to declare that glory. ' For eye hath not seen, and ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive those things which God hath prepared for those that love him.' Of which things as we are already made partakers in part, let us never cease, men, women and children, small and great, all collectively at once, and with one breath, and one mind, to proclaim and to celebrate the author of such great mercies to us. * Who forgiveth all our sins, and healeth all our infirmities, who redeemeth our life from destruc tion, and crowneth us with lovingkindness, who filleth our soul with good things. For he hath not dealt with us according to our sins nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our iniquities from us. As a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him.' Rekindling such views now, and for all fu ture times, in our minds, and beside the present festivity, and this illustrious and most glorious day, contemplating God as its author, and the universal author of all festivity, night and day, in every hour and with every breath that we draw, let us love and adore Him with all the powers of the soul. And now rising, with the most earnest expression of our love and devotion, let us beseech Him, that he would continue to shelter and save us as those of his flock until the end, and grant us his peace for ever, inviolate and immoveable, in Jesus Christ our Saviour, through whom the glorybe to Him through all ages. Amen." 3H