November 27

The meek shall inherit the earth. — PSALM xxxvii. 11.

Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. — MATT. v. 5.

WHAT is it to be meek? He who pronounced this beatitude said, "I am meek." To be meek, then, is to wear the yoke he wore, - - to submit to the will of the Father as he did. A mild manner, a sweet expression, a retiring disposition, are but the superficialities of meekness. Essentially, it is of the heart, not of the face. The Master was meek in self-assertion, as in self-devotion and self-denial. The same spirit spoke in the "nevertheless" of the court of Caiaphas as in the "nevertheless" of the garden of Gethsemane. Meekness is conformity to the will of God in perception, motive, choice, and act. What, then, is the blessedness of the meek? Is it that of the Dives who had not "where to bestow his goods"? Is the reward of submission to the will of God such an "inheritance of the earth" as can be measured by the acre, or counted in coin? The questions answer themselves. Such was not the reward of the Master's meekness. To "inherit the land" is a proverbial phrase. Every Jew understood it. After the conflict for Canaan, then its undisputed possession; so the people of God were "given rest as he promised them," and their fathers before them. The blessedness of the meek is restful self-possession in view of the soul's heritage in God. "The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance: yea, I have a goodly heritage." This is the song of the meek.

John Humphstone.

Lord, when I all things would possess,

I crave but to be thine;

Oh, lowly is the loftiness

Of these desires divine!

T. H. GILL.