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man has gone home." And they mean by this no more nor less than that he has gone to heaven.

Indeed, there is heavenly meaning and heavenly music in this monosyllable,—Home. There is meaning in it which the universal human mind perceives, and music which the universal human heart feels. Home is the hallowed spot to which our fondest affections cling; the centre of our strongest attachments, our sweetest remembrances, our brightest hopes, our purest joys. Everything dear to the heart of a good man, everything most serene and peaceful in life, everything pleasant or even tolerable in death, clusters around this word. The soldier in the camp, the sailor on the seas, the traveler in foreign lands,—how does his eye kindle and his pulse quicken at the bare mention of this word! As sings the poet:

"Who that in distant lands has chanced to roam,
Ne'er thrilled with pleasure at the name of home?"

"Very often," says Dr. Sears, "when the eyes are closing in death, and this world is shutting off the light from the departing soul, the last wish which is made audible, is, 'to go home.' The words break out sometimes through the cloud of delirium; but it is the soul's deepest and most central want, groping after its object, haply soon to find it as the clogs of earth clear away, and she springs up on the line of swift affection, as the bee with unerring precision shoots through the dusk of evening to her cell."—Foregleams of Immortality, p. 128.

Yes: Among all the deep wants of our nature, among the strong yearnings of every good man's heart, none are deeper or stronger than the want of, and the yearn-