upon our eyes; so that we may, if
we choose, walk on our own way, without turning aside to see and observe
them. And thus we do not see God, and do not, therefore, hide our faces
for fear of him, but go on, and feel no fear, till the time when we
cannot help seeing him. And it may be, that this time will never come
till our life, and with it our space of trial, is gone for ever.

Here, then, is our state, that God will manifest himself no more to us
in such a way as that we cannot help seeing him. The burning bush will
be no more given us as a sign; Christ will no more manifest himself unto
the world. And yet, unless we do see him, unless we learn to fear him
while he is yet an unconsuming fire, unless we know that he is near, and
that the place whereon we stand is holy ground, we shall most certainly
see him when he will be a consuming fire, and when we shall join in
crying to the mountains, to fall on us, and to the hills, to cover us.

Every person who thinks at all, must, I am sure, be satisfied, that our
great want, the great need of our condition, is this one thing--to
realize to ourselves the presence of God. It is a want not at all
peculiar to the young. Thoughtfulness, in one sense, is indeed likely to
come with advancing years: we are more apt to think at forty than at
fifteen; but it by no means follows that we are more apt to think about
God. In this matter we are nearly at a level at all times of our life:
it is with all of us our one great want, to bring the idea of God, with
a living and abiding power, home to our minds.

This is illustrated by a wish ascribed to a great and good man--Johnson,
and which has been noticed with a sneer by unbelievers, a wish that he
might see a spirit from the other world, to testify to him of the truth
of the resurrection. This has been sneered at, as if it were a
confession of the unsatisfactory nature of the evidence which we
actually possess: but, in truth, it is a confession only of the weakness
which clings to us all, that things unseen, which our reason only
assures us to be real, are continually overpowered by things affecting
our senses; and, therefore, it was a natural wish that sight might, in a
manner, come to the aid of reason; that the eye might see, and the ear
might hear, a form and words which belonged to another world. And this
wish might arise (I do not say wisely, or that his deliberate judgment
would sanction it, but it might arise) in the breast of a g