the future, heard the sound of many a fall, caught the hiss and cry of
uneasy consciences against the "sign"; he saw the gleam of the sword,
and the wounded mother's heart; he saw the revelations of good and of
evil which the child would surely effect. One might not unnaturally
conclude that these presentiments were of the day--of that very hour.
He had hitherto walked and dwelt in the light of consolation; he had
dreamed his tranquil dream "_beside still waters_." But in this moment
of contact with God, he was made strong to see the darkness which is
never absent from the azure of truth--"a deep, but dazzling darkness."
So to young Samuel came the sorrowful vision of the fall of the house
of Eli; so to the old prophet-saint now glittered the gleaming arrows
of truth. But neither scorn nor wrathful eloquence moves him, in view
of what he saw: he simply accepts this burden of the Lord, and bears
it, without murmuring or exulting. He sees the "_fall and rising again
of many in Israel_"; it is God's will: let His will be done! "_A sword
shall pierce through thy own soul also_": bow, mother-heart, to the
purposes of God's heart of love! "_In peace_" this servant of the Lord
still stands; "_in peace_" he departs. Blessed are they whom darkling
truths may grieve, but not distract; whom stormy revelations beat upon,
but cannot shake. They live in the house founded upon a rock.

What presentiment of his nation's doom came to him in that moment of
clearer insight, of more candid intercourse with truth? "_The thoughts
of many hearts_"--"the uneasy working of the understanding in the
service of a bad heart":--how much was revealed, how much was
mercifully concealed? We cannot tell; but strength was given him to
bear the gleam of the vision, and still wait. "_O rest in the Lord;
wait patiently for Him_." He saw the Child go out of the Temple; and
if, for a moment, a breath as of a chill wind smote his soul, he
retired into the deeper consolations of God, where the sun smites not