Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 1 EXCEPT THE LORD BUILD THE HOUSE, THEIR LABOUR IS BUT VAIN THAT BUILD IT. Psalm cxxvii. i. The Psalmist expresses with a fervour and power, greater perhaps than has ever been felt or found utterance in any other age or country, the longing of the soul after God and the desire to live always in His presence. All that is good upon earth is His work; men only succeed in proportion as they obtain His favour; the best of them is that they are His servants. They have a feeling of repose and security when they meditate upon Him; they are raised above the accidents of this life when they are able to say, ' Lord, Thou hast been our refuge from generation to generation.' The law of God (not the five books of Moses, for they were not as yet collected), but the ideal of law, the highest truth and rule of life which he was capable of conceiving, was to the Israelite what the idea of good or beauty was to the Greek 1 Preached at Balliol in October, 1870; the Master's first sermon after his election. The re-building of the college was then in progress. philosopher. Perhaps they neither of them exactly knew what they meant, -- for such thoughts cannot easily be defined, -- but they meant something purer and higher and holier than they found in themselves; they were trying to rise out of themselves that they might rest in God and the truth. By the help of their God the Israelites of old seemed able to do everything, without Him nothing. The victory in battle was only given them because the Lord fought for them: they were only safe while He was watching over them. ' As the hills stand about Jerusalem, so standeth the Lord about them that fear Him.' In the darkness of the night, on the great waters, in the valley of the shadow of death, ' I will fear no evil, for Thou, Lord, art wit...