Hopeful and cheerful, in thy blood will reign
A melancholy damp of cold and dry

To weigh thy spirits down, and last consume
The balm of life."

You cannot realize that you are ever to undergo so great a physical change, nor be readily persuaded that you are one day to become so indifferent to the things on which your heart is now placed; much less be induced to prepare for that greater change than even old age effects. But if you have any regard for your highest good, you will listen to the counsels of the heavenly oracle:

"Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth,

While the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh,
When thou shalt say, 'I have no pleasure in them;'
While the sun, or the light,

Or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened,

Nor the clouds return after the rain:

In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble,

And the strong men shall bow themselves,

And the grinders cease because they are few,

And those that look out of the windows be darkened.
And the doors shall be shut in the streets,

When the sound of the grinding is low,

And he shall rise up at the voice of the bird,

And all the daughters of music shall be brought low;

Also, when they shall be afraid of that which is high,
And fears shall be in the way,

And the almond-tree shall flourish,

And the grasshopper shall be a burden,

And desire shall fail; because man goeth to his long home,
And the mourners go about the streets:

Or ever the silver cord be loosed,

Or the golden bowl be broken,

Or the pitcher be broken at the fountain,

Or the wheel broken at the cistern.

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was,

And the spirit shall return to God who gave it."

What a change must that be! How important to avail one's self of the lights, and succours, and consolations of the Word of God, so that, as we advance on our pilgrimage, "his statutes may be our songs;" and that, when we put off this earthly tabernacle, we may "rejoice in the hope of the

glory of God," and leave behind us the memory of the righteous!

Profane history records not unfrequent instances of kings and heroes calling their sons and servants around them, and delivering to them their last charge; but we must go to the sacred oracles to hear of men who died worshipping God and Blessing others. Who expects that an unbeliever will die as Jacob died? Was it ever told of a dying infidel, that he called his children around him that with his last breath he might bless them in the name of God? I have never heard of but one of this class who showed any concern for the religious welfare of his child. When the daughter of a believing mother was told that her father (who had been an infidel, and opposed to her studying the Bible) could not recover from his sickness, she threw her arms around him and solicitously asked, "When you are gone, shall I hold to your views, or follow my mother's creed?" His breast heaved, the tear started, and with a quivering lip, though with convulsive energy, he exclaimed, "Not mine, not mine! your mother's!"

But such an instance tends only to confirm our position. How is it possible that an infidel should die with praises and blessings on his lips? In whom does he believe? on whose promises does he rely? to whom does he pray, if he presumes to pray at all? When doubts are gathering round him like portentous clouds; and Conscience is awaking in her supremacy; and the tremendous suspicion steals over his soul that, after all, Christianity is true; when the dread thought comes home to him that the next instant he may stand before the bar of an offended God, a naked, guilty, helpless spirit! must he not be too much absorbed in his own condition to think of others? Cursed himself, feeling that he is lost, already damned! must he not be in any other frame of mind than fit to praise and bless?

Perhaps unbelief has hardened his heart; or, it may be, the indomitable pride of opinion, the stubborn reluctance of depraved nature to renounce what we have lauded, and espouse what we have despised, seals his lips in desperate silence. But if his misgivings be too poignant to be concealed, and he must give utterance to his resistless convictions of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood, which, like lightning through the

midnight sky, have flashed over his dark soul, how does he express himself but in the bitterness of his remorse, or in the groans of his despair! How does he curse himself for the sentiments he had taught, for the example he had set to his household, and curse those, too, who seduced him from the faith, and entrapped him in the snares of the pit! Perhaps he curses God, and dies!

This is no picture of our imagination: I might refer to the recorded curses and blasphemies which have escaped the lips of dying infidels, could we not readily conceive that such must be the feelings of a man who, when hanging over the grave, awakes to the conviction that he had believed a lie, lived only to work out his own damnation!

Not so may a Christian die. Convinced, by his life-long experience, of the Divine goodness, and having the most implicit confidence in the mercy of God through Jesus Christ, no dark thoughts can brood over his mind, no malign feelings rise in his heart. Full of praise and gratitude, he would be the medium of diffusing that peace which he himself enjoys. Blessed himself, his prayer is that God would bless others. Knowing now, from his own consciousness, that

"Jesus can make a dying bed

Feel soft as downy pillows are,"

how solicitous is he that all should embrace the Saviour whom he has found! Knowing, too, how closely the ties of nature bind us to him, he would even prepare our minds for his own approaching end.

Tell me not of the free thoughts and blithesome emotions of infidelity: who but the dying Christian can say any thing to strengthen the hearts and wipe away the tears from the flowing eyes of surviving relatives? From the nature of his creed, we expect that he will bless us with his parting breath, and beckon us on to the heaven whither he is going, and hence, when we know that a Christian is called to die, our only apprehension is, lest some turn in his disease, before death ensue, preclude the expression of his views and feelings. What an argument, this, for Christianity! Let infidelity rest in its objections: that is the religion for me which will

best sustain me, when my head is bowed on the bed of death, fill my heart with praise and my lips with blessings when family and friends come around my couch to receive my last adieu!

What Christians most need is, not more evidence of the truth of Christianity, but more of its benign and heavenly spirit. God grant that, when we come to die, we may be enabled to say, not that we believe, but, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against the last day;" and that "there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing."

He will be with bring you at last "So it was:

"I die," said the Patriarch, "but God shall be with you, and bring you into the land of promise." His presence will more than make amends for my absence. you through life, in the hour of death, and to the heavenly Canaan, whither I am going. long since did Joseph sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. And thus will it be with the descendants of pious parents, if they follow in the steps of their fathers, and "hold fast the beginning of their confidence steadfast unto the end." Ere long we shall be reunited to them in another and better world.

How great, then, must be the power of faith, which can so impart sobriety to youth and cheerfulness to age, vigour to moral principle and perseverance in Christian duty, guidance to the living and hope to the dying! which can so nerve the soul for its dire encounter with the last enemy, rendering it calm and steadfast during the solemnities of exchanging worlds, enabling it to part with earth without reluctance, and to look forward into eternity with the even serenity of trust; which, at the last gasp of nature, can inspire it with sentiments of praise toward God and good-will to man!

And did the old man die? Yes; "the fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?" All these, however, died in faith: and could we gather into one view "all the declarations of faith in God, all the gratulations of conscience, all the admonitions and benedictions to weeping

friends," all the beams of opening glory that have irradiated the countenances of God's people as they have successively fallen asleep in Jesus, our hearts would respond to the sentiment, " Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!"