Page:Spiritual Reflections for Every Day in the Year - Vol 1.pdf/114

 perceive that there is an abundance of mercies in the Divine hand, over and above what finite man is able to receive. While we eat, the fragments increase; and when we acknowledge that all we now have, or may in future have, belong to the Lord, then it is that we gather up the fragments, so that nothing is lost.

HE crime of adultery, is, perhaps, one of the worst sins of which a human being can be guilty. It is destructive of the peace of society, of all happiness in families, and is the source of all that is bitter and hateful; indeed, it is so pernicious to the well-being of man, that it is strictly forbidden by one of the commandments of the Decalogue, "Thou shalt not commit adultery;" and to shew how opposite it is to the chaste delights of marriage and to conjugal felicity, we find that the Scriptures compare heaven to a marriage, while hell is said to be the receptacle of adulterers and fornicators. In the fact of the Scribes and Pharisees bringing the adulteress to the Lord that He might condemn her, we discover two things—the desire of the Jews to condemn and punish, and that of the Lord to have mercy and to pardon. There is no sin, however vile, which, upon sincere repentance, is beyond the Divine compassion and forgiveness.

The Pharisees in their accusation said, "Master, this woman was taken in adultery. Now Moses in the law commanded that such should be stoned: but what