Here the loved are ever dying,
And the loving live to weep!

"Let me go! I fain would follow,
Where I know their steps have passed--
Far beyond life's heaving billows,
Finding home and heaven at last!
While my exiled heart is pining
To behold my Father's face,
They, in His own brightness shining,
Beckon me to that blest place!

"Let me go! I hear them calling,
'Ho! thou weary one,--come home!'
Words which on mine ears are falling,
Wheresoever my footsteps roam,
I can catch the far-off murmurs
Of life's river, sweet and low,
Calling, from earth's bitter waters,
Unto me--O let me go!"

Gentle reader! seek that better land. Let your home be a preparation for,
and a pilgrimage to, a home in heaven. You are now in the wilderness beset
on every side by enemies. Go forward! You are now in the deep vale,--in the
low retreats of pilgrim life. "Friend, go up higher!" "Be thou faithful
unto death, and you shall receive a crown of life." Be patient in
tribulation. The storms that swell around your pilgrim home will soon
subside, and a cloudless sky will burst upon you; the winter gloom and
desolation will soon pass away; and "sweet fields arrayed in living green
and rivers of delight," will spread out themselves before your enraptured
vision. Remember that "the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to
be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." In a few years at
most the conflict shall end, and sighing grief shall weep no more; the
wormwood and the gall will be exchanged for the cup of salvation; the armor
and the battle-field will be exchanged for the white garment, the crown and
the throne. Soon your typical homestead shall be exchanged for your
antitypical home; and we shall unite in the home-song of everlasting
joy,--the song of, "unto Him that loved us and washed us in His own blood,
to Him be praise and glory and dominion forever!"

Let the hope of soon entering that happy home, stimulate you to increased
ardor in the cause of your Master. Methinks, some who will read these
pages, have snow-white locks and wrinkled brows and faded cheeks; and these
tell you that soon your pilgrim journey will be ended, your tent-home
dissolved, and your staff laid aside; and oh, if you have made God the
strength of your heart and your portion forever, you shall welcome death
with joy; yea, you will now be anxious to lay aside these garments of toil
and conflic