Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Sermons Prayers volume 2.djvu/334

88 things that our hands find to do, by fire-side and field-side, in school, or shop, or house, or ship, or mart, or wheresoever thou summonest us in the manifold vocations of our mortal life. We bless thee for the joys which we gather from our toil, for the bread which strengthens our live bodies, for the garments and houses which shield us from the world without, for all the things useful, and the things of beauty, both whereof are a joy to our spirits.

We thank thee for the dear ones thou givest us on earth, called by many a tender name of friend, acquaintance, relative, lover or beloved, wife or husband, parent or child, and all these sweet societies of loving and congenial souls. We thank thee for the joy which we take in these our dear ones, whilst they are near us on earth, and when in the course of thy providence it pleases thee to change their countenance and send them away, we thank thee still for that transcendent world whereinto thou continually gatherest those that are lost in time, and are only found in eternity, and if reft from our arms are taken to thine, O thou Infinite Father, and Infinite Mother too. We thank thee that for all sorrows there is balm and relief, that this world which arches over our head, invisible to mortal eye, is yet but a step from us, and our dear ones, looking their last on earth, are born anew into thy kingdom of heaven, and enter into glory and joy which the eye has not seen, nor the ear heard, nor our hungering hearts ever fully dreamed of in our highest thought.

We thank thee, O Lord, for thyself, thou Transcendent World, who embracest this material earth and this human spirit, putting thine arms around all, breathing thereon with thy spirit, and quickening all things into vegetative, animative, or human life. We thank thee that whilst here on earth, not knowing what a day may bring forth, nor certain of our mortal fife for a moment, we are yet sure of thine almighty power, thine all-knowing wisdom, and thy love which knows no change, but shines on the least and the greatest, on thy saint and on thy sinner too. We thank thee for the perfect providence wherewith thou governest the world of material, of growing, or of living things; we bless thee that thine eye rests on each in all its history, that there is no son of perdition in all thy