are sitting about the hearth-stone on the shores of arctic Iceland, others are singing in the shady verandahs of Hindostan; some within the bounds of our own broad land, are playing with ever-blooming flowers of a tropical climate, and others, like the little flocks of this highland neighborhood, are looking abroad over the pure white snows. Scarce a child of them all, in every land where Christmas Hymns are sung, whose heart is not merrier than upon most days of the year. It is indeed a very beautiful part of Christmas customs that children come in for a share of our joys to-day; the blessing and approbation of our gracious Lord were so very remarkably bestowed on them, that we do well especially to remember their claims in celebrating the Nativity; at other festivals they are forgotten, but their unfeigned, unalloyed gayety help, indeed, to make Christmas merry; and their simple, true-hearted devotions, their guileless Hosannas, must assuredly form an acceptable offering to Him who Himself condescended to become a little child, and who has said, “Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” Other religions have scarcely heeded children; Christianity bestows on them an especial blessing; it is well, indeed, that they rejoice with us to-day.
Merry Christmas! The words fall idly, perhaps, from too many careless lips; they are uttered by those who give them no deeper meaning than a passing friendly salutation of the moment; and yet every tongue that repeats the phrase, bears unconscious witness to the power of the Gospel—those good-tidings of great joy to all mankind. From the lips of the most indifferent, these words seem to carry at least some acknowledgment of the many temporal benefits which Christianity has shed over the earth,
