Your ShelfYour Projects

Untitled article

6%

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 21, 1856

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 8, No. 16.

Read the full edition

“BY AND BY.”

THERE’S music enough in these three words for the burden of a song. There’s hope wrapped up in them, an articulate beat of human heart.
By and by!
We heard it as long ago as we can remember, when we made brief but perilous journeys from chair to table, and from table to chair again.
We heard it the other day, when two parted that had been “loving in their lives,” one to California, and the other to her lonely home.
Everybody says it—some time or other. The little boy whispers it when he dreams of exchanging the little stubbed boots for those like a man.
The man murmurs it—when, in life’s middle watch, he sees his plans half finished and his hopes yet in the bud, waving in the cold, late spring.
The old man says it—when he thinks of putting off the mortal for the immortal, to-day for to-morrow.
The weary watch for the morning, and while away the dark with “by and by.”
Sometimes it sounds like a song; sometimes there is a sigh or a sob in it. What wouldn’t the world give to find it in almanacs—set down somewhere, no matter if in the dead of December—to know that it would surely come! But fairy-like as it is, flitting like a star-beam over the dewy shadows of years, nobody can spare it; and we look upon the many times these words have beguiled us, the memory of the silver “by and by” as like the sunrise of Ossian, pleasant but mournful to the soul.—Picayune.
But to no one is this expression sweeter than to the way-worn pilgrim. No one can use it more appropriately than he. To no other one does it contain so much music, or reveal so much glory. It is indeed full of hope to the worldly man as he looks forward and expects that by and by his condition in this life will be better than now. But the best condition here is subject to corroding cares, disturbed by perplexities, and overshadowed by fears. It is not so with the Christian. Aided by the gracious light of revelation, he extends his glance beyond the confines of this present state, into that glorious dispensation where God has pledged himself that all shall be perfect. He can there behold nothing to mar his perfect bliss; and more than all his eye cannot reach to the end of that state of blessedness, nor his mind comprehend its duration; and as he has the assurance from the lips of inspiration itself that by and by that haven of glory shall be attained, he feels a consolation in the words which others know not of.
The “by and by” of worldlings is at best uncertain. Their brightest visions may fade in a moment, their sweetest dreams vanish, and their clearest sky grow black with tempests; for death with his legions, is abroad in the world and may meet them at any step, and ten thousand ills, the hideous progeny of the curse, are thronging their very pathway. The hopes they expect to realize by and by are in the midst of perils, and they know not as they shall ever obtain them.
It is not so with the Christian. His prize, his inheritance, his rest, which he will by and by obtain are certain to the faithful. No ills of life, not even death itself can rob him of it; for he who has promised it is as high as the heavens from the earth above them all.
By and by we shall shout victory over all the evils to which we are subject here. We shall emerge from the cold vapors of this cold world which are so deadly to all spiritualgrowth; we shall pass from the night into the clear light of day; we shall exchange the storms of earth for the clear sunshine of glory; we shall cease our toils and enter into rest; we shall pass from the state of our humility to that of our exaltation; from our mourning to our rejoicing; from the night of weeping to the morning of joy.
By and by the ravages which death has made among the righteous shall be repaired; the treasures which he has torn from us and laid in the tomb will be restored to us again, and severed hearts shall be re-united.
These are some of the scenes to be realized by the Christians by and by. There is hope and consolation in these words; for they carry us forward to that state which shall be as though sin had never existed, and the curse had never blighted the handiwork of God.