sweeter fruits of daily living...

Do any of you use a daily devotional? I went to the Boston Athenaeum yesterday-a beautiful New England Morning-and found three specimens of AUA Daily Devotional, all from the latter half of the 19th century. "Day unto Day," "Daily Praise and Prayer." and "Alter at Home" (a collection of Prayers and Collects.) Today, the preface and the May 29th entry from "Daily Praise"  compiled by Rush Rhees Shippen.

"The spirit shrinks from too weighty an encumbrance of letter and form ; and the neglect of daily prayer in the home is doubtless partly due to the formalism with which it has been burdened. The trellis is not the vine; much less is it the fruit. Yet the trellis has its value if it serves to lift the vine from the earth into the fresh air and gracious sunlight that shall quicken it to bear more ample and luscious fruit. With its slight framework of ritual, may this book of "Praise and Prayer" help our souls to rise " Daily " into the celestial atmosphere, where the Holy Spirit shall inspire that life more abundantly, the best expression of which is found in richer, sweeter fruits of daily living."

(and the sweet fruit for May 29th...)

HEAR the right, O Lord ; attend unto my cry, give ear unto my prayer, that goeth not out of false lips.
Let my sentence come forth from thy presence; let thine eyes see what is right.
Prove my heart; visit me in the night; try me, my thoughts shall not vary from my speech.
Show thy loving-kindness, O thou that savest by thy right hand them which put their trust in thee.
Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the shadow of thy wings.
As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.

True Sun ! upon our souls arise,
Shining in beauty evermore ;
And through each sense the quickening beam
Of the eternal Spirit pour.

Rule thou our inmost thoughts ; let no
Impurity our hearts defile;
Grant us a true and fervent faith ;
Grant us a spirit free from guile.

O GOD, our everlasting hope, who holdest us in life, and orderest our lot: we ask not for any prosperity that would tempt us to forget thee. As disciples of one who had not where to lay his head, may we freely welcome the toils and sufferings of our humanity, and seek only strength to glorify the cross thou layest on us. Every work of our hand may we do as unto thee; in every trouble " trace some lights of thine ; and let no blessing fall on dry and thankless hearts. Redeeming the time, may we fill every waking hour with faithful duty and well-ordered affections, as the sacrifice which thou hast provided. Strip us, O Lord, of every proud thought; fill us with patient tenderness for others, seeing that we also are in the same case before thee ; and make us ready to help, and quick to forgive. And then, fix every grace, compose every fear, by a steady trust in thine eternal realities, behind the changes of time and the delusions of men. Thou art our Rock: we rest on thee. Amen."

Blessings