e homely words--how often read!
How seldom fully known:
"Which father of you, asked for bread,
Would give his son a stone?"

How oft has bitter tear been shed,
And heaved how many a groan,
Because thou wouldst not give for bread
The thing that was a stone!

How oft the child thou wouldst have fed
Thy gift away has thrown;
He prayed, thou heardst, and gavest bread--
He cried, "It is a stone!"

Lord, if I ask in doubt and dread,
Lest I be left to moan,
Am I not he, who, asked for bread,
Would give his son a stone?

--George Macdonald.

DENIAL

I want so many, many things,
My wishes on my prayers take wings,
And heavenward fly to sue for grace
Before the loving Father's face.

But He, well knowing all my need,
Kindly rebukes my foolish greed,
And, granting not the gift I ask,
Sets me instead to do some task--

Some lowly task--for love of him,
So lowly, and in light so dim,
My sorrowing soul must cease to sing,
And only sigh, "'Tis for the King."

And scarcely can my faith repeat
Her sad petition at his feet:
"These daily tasks Thou giv'st to me,
Help, Lord, to do as unto thee!"

Yet while his bidding thus I do--
I know not how, or why, 'tis true--
My thoughts to sweet contentment glide,
And I forget the wish denied.

And so my prayers he hears and heeds,
Mindful of all my daily needs;
Gracious, most gracious, too, in this--
Denying, when I ask amiss.

--Luella Clark.

A BLESSING IN PRAYER

If when I kneel to pray,
With eager lips I say:
"Lord, give me all the things that I desire--
Health, wealth, fame, friends, brave heart, religious fire,
The power to sway my fellow men at will,
And strength for mighty works to banish ill"--
In such a prayer as this
The blessing I must miss.

Or if I only dare
To raise this fainting prayer:
"Thou seest, Lord, that I am poor and weak,
And cannot tell what things I ought to seek;
I therefore do not ask at all, but still
I trust thy bounty all my wants to fill"--
My lips shall thus grow dumb,
The blessing shall not come.

But if I lowly fall,
And thus in faith I call:
"Through Christ, O Lord, I pray thee give to me
Not what I would, but what seems best to thee
Of l