no trifling interest with him to consider, after every discourse that he has addressed to them, what impression it may have made upon their minds, what real good it has wrought; whether it has indeed reached their hearts, and whether one individual amongst them all is thereby more enlightened in spiritual knowledge, and more advanced in the way of life, than he was when he entered the house of God; and if he had reason to believe that the matter was left to his own arguments and persuasions alone, he would certainly have just cause to despond. For my own part, I freely confess that I should utterly despair if I thought that the profitable excitement of your interest in religion rested solely upon the force of my reasonings and exhortations; but when I consider that even if a Paul should plant and an Apollos should water, still it must be God that giveth the increase, and that God is able to make even the most insignificant instrument serve his purposes, I am inclined to hope that the truths of the gospel, however feebly set forth by me, may be enforced and applied to your hearts, through the Spirit of God, with a power and an efficacy, which the words themselves could never be expected to convey. Such, I trust, may in some instances be the result of my present endeavours; I trust that some among you will (by the

blessing of God upon the words spoken) leave this place with a more complete conviction of your need of divine assistance, than perhaps you brought with you; that a seed has been sown in your hearts which will in due time spring up into an overshadowing tree; that a little leaven has been hidden within you, which will hereafter leaven the whole lump; that you will this day pray devoutly for the gift of the Holy Spirit, and that he will in process of time pervade and quicken and invigorate your whole minds in such a way, that your bodies shall be of a truth the sacred temples of the Holy Ghost, that you shall experience what it is to live a truly spiritual life, that you shall evermore pray in the spirit, and walk in the spirit, and produce the abundant fruits of the spirit. In that case ye may " abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost;" for the word of God is certain, which promises that" if the spirit of him which raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall quicken (or reanimate) your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you."

T

SERMON XVII.

THE HOUSE OF MOURNING.

ECCLES. vii. 2,

It is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting; for that is the end of all men, and the living will lay it to heart.

You may remember, my brethren, that the subject on which I last addressed you, was the great uncertainty of life, and the consequent necessity of preparing for death. It seems almost, (nor do I know why it may not without presumption, be believed,) as if there were a providential design that led to the selection of that particular subject at the very time when it was about to be so strikingly illustrated, as it since has been, within the observation of all who heard the remarks then made. For since that period, no less than

T

four individuals have been called into the other world from the little society assembled together within the walls of our town; and in the very week that is past, four times have our streets exhibited the solemn spectacle of a funeral procession, attending the remains of the dead to the grave, which is "the end of all men." Nor is it unworthy of remark, that each of the four ages into which human life is commonly divided, has furnished its own example to enforce the great lesson of mortality which God has thus set before our eyes. Infancy, youth, manhood, and old age, have sent each a victim from its own class, thus combining, as it were, with one consent to press upon our minds the important admonition, that life in every stage is insecure. Oh, blind must be our eyes, if we do not perceive our danger, and hardened our hearts, if we do not provide against it! What young persons will now tell me that they have a long life in prospect, when they have seen the joyous days of youth so speedily brought to a close? What healthy persons will now dare calculate on the warning of a protracted sickness, when within our sight the most established health was unable to contend even for one little week with the messenger of death? When but a few Sundays ago, both the persons to whom I now more especially allude, formed