Matthew 5:8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. He says, "I am not conscious of any desire within which shall go half-way to meet the allurements of sin; no little rivulets of half-indulgence which have eaten the sand from under my walls." Oh, how weak is guilt, how strong is purity! I have seen the hawk flap out of the top of tall hemlocks at my coming in the pasture. "Why, hawk, I'll not shoot you; it is but a walking-stick I carry in my hand." "All! yes, but I think it may have a ball in it." And he sails high above the village steeple. "Nay, hawk," says the steeple, "I'll not hurt. I'm but the finger pointing to your Maker." "Ah! but I think you are a trap." He even parts company with the harmless sparrow, for the sparrow " may be a snare." Not so the dove. It lives in the cornice of men's dwellings, and nods good morning to the children in the chamber crib; it touches the foot of the housemaid as she shakes her cloth of crumbs; it rests up in the steeples of old churches, and the Sabbath bell, far from being a fright, is but the signal for the cooing chorus to begin. The man of pure heart is blessed with peaceful self-respect. He is not happy who cannot respect himself. And no man can respect himself who is living in more or less constant communion with bad thoughts and evil pictures of imaginatian. Suppose we grunt that we are not altogether responsible for our thoughts, but, by the complications of daily life, before we know it we have planned a sin; or, by Satan's foes beleaguered, we are thrust upon by pictures of iniquity. Still my proposition is true, that no such life could be a happy one. Could the master of a strong house be at peace, even if bolts and bars and granite strength kept all his foes at bay; if, ever and anon, the mob thrust the death's head at his windows? Aye, more, could he respect-himself if, now and then, as impure hearts do, he showed a face for parley, or cautiously, yet surely, invited one of the red-shifted horde within, to see how ha looked near by? The sunflower might say of wasps, and hornets, and bees: "Why do they pester me, and so hang about? " and the wasps would reply: "You enter-rain us, sir; you have what we love." And so the judge within man, true to his heaven-given instinct, makes reply to him pestered by bad thoughts: "There's something, sir, about you that these buzzards love!" I saw by Lake Leman the old castle of Chillon. Up above, the royal, tapestry-hung apartments of the Duke of Savoy and his gay bride; down below, the dungeon where Bonnivard was chained; where creeping things crawl forth to ogle at the visitors, and instruments of torture are; and I wondered if never, in some scene of revelry above, the groans of martyrs rose to stir the arras on gorgeous walls. There are those we meet in social life, the rooms of whose souls which are open to friends are fair as a palace. But alas! who shall tell us of the secret kept unseen? Not so pure heart. I do not pretend to say that ever on this earth we are freed from all solicitations of evil; but there is many a soul so " blessed" that, when winged thoughts of sin come flying to the windows, God's angel rises up, and draws the shutters to; when disturbing thoughts of hate, revenge, avarice, and pride draw near, God's angel meets them at the outer gate, and bids them all begone. (E. J. Haynes.)Pure heart is "blest" in his relations with his fellow-man. Pure Heart is blest because he knows no envy of another's success jealousy at another's praise. Dear, simple old heart, it never occurs to him that there is any less of summer's sun for him because a million others bask in its beams. O King Great Heart! thyself no man's enemy, thou thinkest no man thine, but dost beam upon the world like the October sunset upon the harvest fields. "He shall see God." How? Thus. Mozart and his friend, the royal huntsman, went forth arm-in-arm to the fields. The wind came up heavily through the copse of trees. "Look!" says the hunter, "it will startle a hare!" "Listen!" says Mozart, "what a diapason from God's great organ!" A ]ark rose on soaring wing, with its own sweet song. "Look!" says the gamester. "what a shot!" "Ah!" says Mozart, "what would I give could I catch that thrill!" There be dull souls who cannot see nor hear. Are they sick? "Oh! what misfortune!" Are they bereaved? "Some enemy hath done this!" Are they well and prosperous? "Good luck!" Not so Pure Heart. He can see God's hand in every sorrow chastening for good; God's face in every blessing; God's smile in the morning light, the blossoming harvest, and the evening shade; His heart is attuned. (E. J. Haynes.) Parallel Verses KJV: Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. |
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