April 1 (Mary) seeth two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou?-S. JOHN xx. 12, 13. So spake the sweet angel voices to those devoted women whose love made them the last beside the cross of Jesus, and the earliest at His tomb. So spake the sweet angel voices, and their words roll to us with the Divine echoes of joy and hope over the interspace of nineteen hundred years. TH DEAN FARRAR. HE Paschal moonlight almost past, Alleluia. DR. J. M. NEALE. IT was not dark within! I deemed, at first, A lamp burned there, such radiance mild I saw The face-cloth. Coming closer, I espied Of that stone table where my Lord had lain. Tongues tuned to such a music as the tone Wherewith they questioned me:-'Why weepest thou?' SIR EDWIN ARNOLD. April 2 Behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel: and as they were affrighted, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead ?-S. LUKE xxiv. 4, 5. His appearance was as lightning, and his raiment white as snow.-S. MATT. xxviii. 3. IN other cases where we see two angels specially marked out as in attendance on our Lord, we may infer that Michael and Gabriel are designated. For the names of these two alone are prominent in Holy Scripture. And according to a very ancient tradition, traced back to Rabbinical belief, perpetuated as many such traditions were in the East, and thence handed on to Western Christendom, these two archangels personified respectively the judgment and the mercy of God, and were therefore fitly placedMichael, as the angel of Power, on the right hand; Gabriel, nearer to the heart, on the left hand. SMITH'S DICTIONARY OF CHRISTIAN BIOGRAPHY.' Like the shields of light Archangels bear, who, armed with love and might, Watch upon heaven's battlements at night. BUT look! the Saviour blest, Calm after solemn rest, A. A. PROCTER. Stands in the garden 'neath His olive boughs; Doth on His vesture play, And light the majesty of His still brows; While angels hang with wings outspread, Holding the new-won crown above His saintly head. JEAN INGELOW. April 3 Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the tomb? And looking up, they see that the stone is rolled back: for it was exceeding great. And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe; and they were amazed.-S. MARK xvi. 3, 4, 5. THE 'HE angels of sacred history are not impalpable impotencies, mere ideals. They are forces; they are thrones, principalities, powers. They touch and move the fountains of nature. They call fire from the rock and dews from the air, as in the case of the angel who appeared to Gideon. They hold in their hands the forces that throb and glow in earthquake and volcano, as in the case of the angel who procured the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. They control the mighty forces of disease and death, which they are commissioned to use, as in the judgment of pestilence sent upon the Israelites in the days of David and the plague which slew the first-born of Egypt, and the destruction of the Assyrian host, so vividly described by Byron. the New Testament we read of an angel putting forth physical exertion, as when one rolled away the stone from the door of our blessed Lord's sepulchre. Throughout the entire book of Revelation we see the angels move through the vision of the exiled apostle in numberless missions of providence and grace. DR. H. C. M'COOK. 'HE women sought the tomb at dawn of day, THE In And as they went they wept and made their moan: 'His sepulchre is guarded by a stone, And who for us shall roll the stone away?' But lo!—an angel robed in white array Had rent the rock and sat thereon alone. 'Fear not,' said he; 'the Lord hath overthrown The power of Death: I show you where He lay.' H |