the temporary nature of all earthly joy. What is this world, with all its riches, honours, pleasures and connections, without God for ever? What with his blessed presence, can we want, that is good for us? Though our house be not so with God, he hath made with us an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure. We may well add, “This is all our salvation and all our desire ;" and with the prophet Habakkuk, “ Although the fig-tree should not blossom, yet we will rejoice in the God of our salvation." Oh, how divine is that religion, that presents such truths to the mind! how solacing are its comforts! Let us look forward to the bright morning of the resurrection, which will turn all our sorrow into joy: then shall our companions in the faith and patience of Jesus Christ appear with him in glory. How wondrously changed their forms! No more corruption; no more tendency to disease or death; no possibility of any future separation; shining forth in all the perfections of unfaded beauty, spotless purity, and immortal honour. The unfolded mystery of redemption, and the glory of their Saviour, will open, and show them such resplendent surveys of grace and greatness, as shall more than satisfy them with regard to past events; the most overwhelming and confounding, will fill them with eternal admiration. I trust you will not be offended at the freedom and earnestness, with which a friend, more than ever concerned for your best interests, has written.

Be assured, I sincerely wish for you, health, prosperity, and every good thing.

I

FROM ***, ON THE DEATH OF HIS

FATHER.

How the world falls to pieces all around,
And leaves us but the ruin of our joys!

MY DEAR S.,

March 20th, 1837.

HAD just taken up my pen this morning, to write to you, when I received your letter. And has my poor father indeed breathed his expiring sigh? And am I, in this world, to see him no more?—no more to be gladdened by his smile?-no more to hear his instructive voice?-But, I will restrain myself, and endeavour to pour out my heart in thankfulness that I have been blessed with such a father, a father who was so indulgent, so enlightened, so upright, so generous, in whom the richest moral and intellectual qualities were so harmoniously blended,-whose mind was so fruitful in expedients for doing good,— and who endeared himself, so far beyond the common lot, to all who knew him, making "every place a home, and every home a heaven," and raising the song of praise in the abodes of sorrow.

He is not lost, but gone before. Oh, no! He is not lost. The hour that shall restore him to our embrace is at hand. Yet a little while, and this dream of life will be over with us all; then, if faith and repentance have been in lively exercise, we shall meet him again;-yes, we shall meet him again, and dwell with him for ever.

Now he is taken from amongst us, it soothes and comforts me more than words can express, to think that I recently visited him. When I left him, he appeared to me to be upon the threshold of eternity. I felt that he was giving me his blessing for the last time; it went to my inmost soul. The awful solemnity of that moment will never, never be forgotten.

Assure —, of my sincere, grateful attachment. It has been her privilege to render the declining years of my beloved father's pilgrimage, his best, his happiest years; and she has a sweet, an appropriate reward in her own bosom.

I am persuaded, my dear S., that you will fondly cherish the remembrance of one whose delight it was to watch over you, and who, from the days of your earliest childhood, has been every thing to you. He has bequeathed to you his fine example. Lay it up, I beseech you, I earnestly beseech you, among your choicest, your most precious treasures. It will furnish you, as often as you muse upon it, with fresh encouragements to a life of virtuous and useful activity.

I long to write to you on another subject naturally dear to you, and interesting to me :—but my father, my poor father is gone!

mingles her tender regards with mine to you

all; and I remain, my dear S.,

Ever most affectionately yours,

INFINITELY great and blessed God, who inhabitest eternity! Clouds and darkness are round about thee: We cannot comprehend thy ways, or fathom thy mysterious counsels: but we can approach thee in the belief that although thou turnest man to destruction, and sayest," Return, ye children of men," thy perfections are unchangeable, thy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and thy dominion shall have no end. The sovereign Arbiter of events, thou sittest on the circle of the earth, and judgest the nations; and all thy works are done in truth.

Thine ear is ever open unto our cry. Out of the depths of affliction we can lift up our hearts to thee. We can lay our cares and our anxieties at the foot of thy throne, persuaded that thou carest for us, and that if we seek thy face in prayer, thou wilt give peace and rest unto our souls. Thy loving-kindness and forbearance have never forsaken us; and in

thee alone, when we labour and are heavy laden with grief, we find our help.

We would gratefully own thy wisdom and goodness in all the vicissitudes with which our lives are checkered. We thank thee, the universal Parent, who hast fixed the bounds of our habitation, for the pure and exalted pleasures of domestic love, nor least of all for the happy hours which we have spent in the society of those whom thou didst raise up to rejoice in our joys and to sympathise in our sorrows, but who have finished their earthly course, rich in faith and full of hope, and are now beyond the reach of death.

Thou chastenest us with trouble, thou takest away the desire of our eyes, to remind us that upon earth there is nothing either permanent or sure; to admonish us that we are born for immortality, and that this world is not our home. We gratefully acknowledge that in our severest trials thou hast not forgotten to be gracious, but hast left us the consolations of memory and of hope, which are neither few nor small. We adore thy name for ever, that thou hast sent Jesus Christ into the world, to bring life and immortality to light, to seek and to save those that were lost. We bless thee for the assurance that He who was once despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, will appear again in majesty and power, to deliver thy children from the bondage of the grave, and to lead them, with songs of rejoicing and salvation, to thine everlasting presence.

Increase our faith, merciful God! and strengthen