Recognitions at the Judgment.
By E. Harris
ALL will be ineffably solemn. Many will be full of joy and others full of bitterness. Think of Cain, the first murderer, meeting the martyred Abel; and all murderers and the victims of their cupidity or hatred; heroes and despots meeting the millions who were slain in their battles or on whose neck they forged the yoke of oppression; popes and inquisitors confronting those whom they had murdered in the dark dungeon, on the rack, at the stake and elsewhere; iron-hearted oppressors standing by the side of the slave, on whom they had inflicted every injury that pride, anger and lust, could invent or perpetrate; rumsellers staring their slaughtered victims and the long train of widows and orphans; seducers and the victims of their falsehood, treachery and crime; false teachers and the souls they had led down to perdition; ungodly parents, and the children whom they ruined forever. Alas! what recognitions of woe will occur on that day. But there will also be recognitions of gladness. The pious parent will meet with the redeemed child. The godly wife will there recognize her sainted husband. The emancipated from slavery, poverty, sorrow and sin, will there meet and bless those who prayed and laboured in their behalf. The Sabbath advocates, the watchmen in Zion, will there meet with immortal gems which they by God's blessing plucked from the mire of ignorance and crime. The missionary and the redeemed from paganism; the faithful pastor and the blood-washed flock: all the chosen ones of God who have been instrumental in turning souls to righteousness, will there recognize those saved ones. But how soon will all eyes be turned away from each other to look without a glass between, on the adorable Judge and Saviour. Yours, knowing that by strict obedience we shall receive a crown. E. HARRIS.