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We think that when a man dies he has done with the world, and that the world has done with him. That view, how, ever, needs revision. There is much about a man that cannot be put into a coffin. Keats left for his epitaph, "Here lies one whose name was writ in water." The names of men are generally so writ, but the life and character are impressed on society deeply, indelibly. We cannot properly speak of the immortality of bad influence; yet that influence spreads and persists to a distressing extent. But we can speak confidently about the immortality of the influence of the good. Abel being dead yet speaketh; we are not told that Cain does. It is a reassuring thing to know that the good which men do is not buried with their bones. Not only do remarkable saints influence posterity beneficially; all saints do so, although it may be in a less degree. We find it easy to believe that the men influence posterity whose deeds are emblazoned in history, whose books are in the libraries, whoso monuments are in the minster, but we are slow to believe in the posthumous life of the obscure and unknown. Yet the immortality of influence is just as true in regard to the humble as to the illustrious. Nature perpetuates the memory of the frailest and most fugitive life, of the simplest and most insignificant action and event. The rolling pebble, the falling leaf, and the rippling water of millions of years ago left their sign in the rocks. The minute creatures of the primeval world built up the strata on which we live, and affecting traces of their being and action are palpable everywhere. All this is going on still; every flash of lightning is photographed, every whisper vibrates for ever, every movement in the physical world leaves an imperishable record. Let us not, then, be anxious lest we should be forgotten. A secret law renders the lowliest life immortal. This gives a new view of the duration of life. We plaintively speak of human life as a dream, a flower, a shade. But the doctrine of the immortality of influence puts the subject in another light. We gain a new view of the seriousness of life. Confined to threescore years life appears insignificant; yet in the light of immortality of influence it appears unspeakably solemn. There is no circle to our influence but the horizon; we are alive to the coming of the Son of Man. We must wait for the last day before we are finally judged. Why? Because men do not close their account with the world at their death; our influence reaches to the last day, and therefore only then can the full and final verdict be given.

(W. L. Watkinson.)

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KJV: Surely he shall not be moved for ever: the righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance.

WEB: For he will never be shaken. The righteous will be remembered forever.