Disappointment in Children.

"In a large family," people say, "there is generally a black sheep.' Sad to say this is often the case. Many parents have disappointments in their children, some greater, some less. The father and mother go to see their little ones asleep, and, as they bend over the innocent little heads in the sweet sleep of childhood, they plan a future for them which shall be all goodness and success. Alas! too often things turn out differently. Sometimes there is a terrible grief which brings the grey hairs in sorrow to the grave-sometimes it is some bad habit or evil course which causes deep anxiety and sleepless nights.

What comfort can we offer to such from

our holy religion? First, however much you love your child God loves it more. You would be less ready to forgive than God. You do not know as He does all the difficulties and temptations your child has had to meet, such as perhaps you never experienced in your time. You cannot tell what thoughts of penitence may have passed from it to God. The prodigal may be on his way home; and even if seemingly he passed. from this life without repentance or amendment, it may be that God, who is so just and so merciful, may in Paradise purify him from his sins and teach him truth and love. You have prayed so often and so earnestly for the wanderer, those prayers cannot be unheard or unanswered: some day you will see the result. Keep praying, keep hoping, and one day you will be united to the one whom you have loved long since and lost awhile."

For suitable Prayer see page 175.

K

Thoughts for those who have a

Loved One Insane.

PERHAPS no trial is harder to bear than this. When death takes our loved ones, at any rate we have the comfort of believing that they are at rest and peace in Paradise. But if their reason goes, we lose them without this compensation-often they turn with aversion from those they have loved most. What can help us in such a trial? First of all our absolute faith. God is love. We cling to that fact above all things. Therefore, though we may be absolutely unable to see it, there must be a meaning in this trial. Let us look at it in this way. God, for some purpose, allows the true self of our

dear one to be concealed and hidden by disease. The true self is there, but overlaid by delusions. It is a terrible but a passing thing. The time will come, perhaps in this life, when the veil will be withdrawn, and the old true self will appear again. At any rate death will restore all things.

Insanity is like a long painful dream, dreadful at the time, but not affecting the true self, the character, or the soul of the afflicted. We have still the endless hereafter to look forward to. These, then, are sources of consolation. (1) God knows best. (2) It is not the real self-that is for the present hidden. (3) There is the certain future to look forward to.

God, who can do all things, will help us through this trouble also.

For suitable Prayer see page 176.

Love Troubles.

VERY few people pass through life without what are called "love-troubles." Sometimes they pass soon, and are not very real or deep. In other cases they are very deep indeed, and leave scars which are life-long. People in such circumstances sometimes say that they can find very little comfort in the Bible. This is to a certain extent true in detail, but not in principle. Remember that this life is but a small part of our whole existence. There is the state of Paradise, and the perfect state of Heaven. Life here to us seems very often a tangle, and love at its best is limited and imperfect. But in a state where selfishness, imperfections of body