BOYS OF THE BIBLE. 29

have the opportunity, in London and Paris, in Berlin and
Vienna, but especially in Rome and Florence and Venice, to
see in churches, and galleries, and palaces, miles on miles of
pictures, the work of the greatest artists of a thousand years;
and while you would perhaps be a little disappointed in some
respects, you would be sure to be impressed with the fact that
the Bible has furnished these men of genius with more material
for their tasks than all the other books and histories in the
world beside.

The Bible is the grandest picture gallery in ae world.
What enchanting scenes it presents! Beginning with the
garden-home of the first parents of our race, and ending
with visions of the New Jerusalem, the City of God, standing
on foundations laid in jasper and sapphire, in amethyst and
emerald and gold; a city whose gates stand always open to
welcome the pilgrims of all ages and lands; a city through
which the river of the water of life is flowing, on whose
banks the tree of life waves its unfading blossoms and its
unfailing fruit for the healing and comfort of the nations.
These pictures in Genesis and Revelation stand at either end
of this great Bible gallery; but how can we speak of all
the pictures that go between? Pictures of the patriarchal
age; of those great peans when Israel came out of Egypt,
and followed Moses through the wilderness; of the eventful
times when Judges ruled in Israel, till Israel asked for a
King; of the Kings and the Kingdoms of Judah and Israel;
of the exile and the return; on to those greatest of all days,
when Jesus trod the blessed fields of Palestine and brought
the light of God to the darkened earth, and the love of God
to a weary, sinful world! Was ever picture gallery so
crowded with enchanting scenes? To a boy, seventy years
seems a large stretch of life to look forward to, but the