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When God would set fast a beautiful thought, He plants it in a tree. When He would put it afloat, He fashions it into a fish. When He would have it glide the air, He moulds it into a bird. The prophet was out of doors, thinking of the impenitences of the people of his day, when he heard a great cry overhead. He looks up, and there are flocks of storks, and turtledoves, and cranes, and swallows, drawn out in long line for flight southwards. As is their habit, the cranes had arranged themselves into two lines, making an angle — a wedge — splitting the air with wild velocity; the old crane, with commanding call, bidding them onward, until the towns, and the cities, and the continents slid under them. The prophet, almost blinded from looking into the dazzling heavens, stoops down and begins to think how much superior the birds are in sagacity about their safety than men.

I. THEY MINGLE MUSIC WITH THEIR WORK. The most serious undertaking of a bird's life is this annual travel. Naturalists tell us that they arrive weary and plumage ruffled, and yet they go singing all the way, the ground the lower line of the music, the sky the upper line of the music, themselves the notes scattered up and down between. I suppose their song gives elasticity to their wings, and helps on the journey. Would God that we were as wise as they, mingling Christian song with our everyday work. A violin, chorded and strung, if something accidentally strike it, makes music; and I suppose there is such a thing as having our hearts so attuned by Divine glory that even the rough collisions of life will make heavenly vibration. Some one asked Haydn why he always composed such cheerful music. "Why," he said, "I cannot do otherwise. When I think of God, my soul is so full of joy that the notes leap and dance from my pen." I wish we might all exult melodiously before the Lord. The Church of God will never become a triumphal Church until it becomes a singing Church.

II. THEY FLY VERY HIGH. During the summer, when they are in the fields, they often come within reach of the gun; but when they start for their annual flight southward they take their places mid-heaven, and go straight as a mark. The longest rifle that was ever brought to shoulder cannot reach them. We fly so low that we are within range of the world, the flesh, and the devil. So poor is the type of piety in the Church of God at this day that men actually caricature the idea that there is any such thing as a higher life. Moles never did believe in eagles. But because we have not reached these heights ourselves, shall we deride the fact that there are any such heights? I do not believe that God exhausted all His grace in Paul, and Latimer, and Edward Payson. I believe there are higher points of Christian attainment to be reached in the future ages of the Christian world.

III. THEY KNOW WHEN TO START. If you should go out now, and shout, "Stop, storks and cranes, don't be in a hurry," they would say, "No, we cannot stop. Last night we heard the roaring of the woods bidding us away, and the shrill flute of the north wind has sounded the retreat. We must go." So they gather themselves into companies, and turning not aside for storm or mountain top, or shock of musketry, over land and sea, straight as an arrow to the mark, they go. And if you come out this morning with a sack of corn, and throw it in the fields, and try to get them to stop, they are so far up that they would hardly see it. They are on their way south. You could not stop them. Oh! that we were as wise about the best time to start for God and heaven. I was reading of an entertainment given in a king's court, and there were musicians there with elaborate pieces of music. After a while Mozart came and began to play, and he had a blank piece of paper before him, and the king familiarly looked over his shoulder and said, "What are you playing? I see no music before you." And Mozart put his hand on his brow, as much as to say, "I am making it up as I go along." It was very well for him; but, oh! we cannot extemporise heaven. If we do not get prepared in this world, we will never take part in the orchestral harmonies of the saved. Oh! that we were as wise as the crane and the stork, flying away, flying away from the tempest. Some of you have felt the pinching frost of sin. You feel it today. You are not happy. There are voices within your soul that will not be silenced, telling you that you are sinners, and that without the pardon of God you are undone forever. Oh! that you would go away into the warm heart of God's mercy. The southern grove, redolent with the magnolia and cactus, never waited for northern flocks as God has waited for you. Another frost is bidding you away: it is the frost of trouble. Where do you live now? Oh, you say, "I have moved." Why did you move? You say, "I don't want as large a house now as I used to want." Why do you not want as large a house? You say, "My family is not so large." Where have they gone to? Eternity!

(T. De Witt Talmage.)

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KJV: Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the LORD.

WEB: Yes, the stork in the sky knows her appointed times; and the turtledove and the swallow and the crane observe the time of their coming; but my people don't know Yahweh's law.