Page:Spiritual Reflections for Every Day in the Year - Vol 3.pdf/84

 love to Jesus Christ, the King and Lord of all. The whole heart, soul, and strength will be devoted to Him; and this affection will be exemplified in deeds of charity to all mankind.

A wilderness in its fertile state, means properly a tract of grazing land fit for the pasture of cattle. In this sense the Psalmist speaks of it: "The habitations of the wilderness distil, and the hills are girded with joy: the pastures are clothed with flocks: the valleys are covered with corn; they shout, they sing." (lxv. 12, 13.) As that which supplies the cattle with food, it denotes a state of natural goodness; the habitations of the wilderness being those tents and temporary erections which serve for shelter to the shepherds and herdmen, during the period that their flocks and herds are on the grazing land. Part of the year the wilderness may be described as a desert, in which scarce a blade of grass appears; but the remaining part, the wilderness and solitary places become glad, and the desert rejoices and blossoms as the rose. By cattle are denoted the affections of man's will; and by fowls of the heaven, the thoughts of his understanding; and when mountains, wildernesses, cattle, and fowls, are mentioned in a good sense, they denote the church and its members in a state of harmony and order, according to the several degrees of goodness and truth, whether natural, spiritual, or celestial, in which they are principled, all united in praising and glorifying the Lord.

This state is also described by the Psalmist: "Praise the Lord, ye mountains, and all hills, ye trees bearing fruit and all cedars, ye beasts and all cattle, ye creeping things and winged birds." (Psalm cxlviii.)