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little Eddie, as he sat in his mother's lap, leaning his head upon her
encircling arm.

The clouds had gathered about the horizon, and assumed many beautiful
and fantastic shapes. Some of them were gorgeously coloured with the
rays of the departing sun, and were shaded from the most delicate rose
to the darkest, richest crimson. As the sun receded farther and
farther behind the green hills, they grew darker and darker, and the
imaginative boy had seen fancied ships with their sails spread;
steam-vessels with clouds of smoke rolling from their chimneys;
mountains piled upon mountains; trees, birds, and many other wondrous
things which filled his infant mind with admiration.

Soon the stars twinkled forth, and they awoke a new interest. At first
they appeared one by one, as if timidly venturing to look down upon
our beautiful planet, and when fully assured that the king of day had
disappeared, they came forth faster and more numerously, till the
whole heavens were bespangled with their glittering brightness. Then
their companion, the moon, came slowly up, shining with a soft and
mellow light, a new beauty in the "blue wilderness of interminable
air."

Eddie had long gazed silently before he uttered the exclamation,
"There are ever so many beautiful things up in the sky!" and I suppose
he had many thoughts which it would have been pleasant for his mother
to know. He did not often sit up so late that he could see the stars.

Eddie is not the only one who has been charmed with the glowing
sunset, the gray twilight, or the starry firmament. David loved to
look upon the works of God. In one of his psalms, he says, "When I
consider the heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars
which thou hast ordained, what is man, that thou art mindful of him,
and the son of man, that thou visitest him!" It was astonishing to
David, that God, who was so infinitely superior to man, and who had
given such proofs of his power and greatness in the creation of the
heavens, should condescend to notice him, to provide for his minutest
wants, and to protect him from danger. I suppose this psalm was
written in the night, when the sweet singer of Israel had been looking
at just such a sky as drew from Eddie his exclamation of admiration.

I often think, as I look abroad, how wonderful it is that God has made
every thing so beautiful. We need never be weary in studying his
works. The more we learn of them, the more we realize his g