her attendant woes, fucceeds: when death fnatches a bofom friend or dear relative from our embraces, how difficult to adopt the language of the good old Prieft? It is the Lord's will-let him "do what feemeth him good."

The recollection of former profperity, and of all the fpiritual and temporal bleffings which an Indulgent Heaven had with profusion showered on our heads, ferves only to give additional weight to the prefent load of grief, and deepen the melancholy that clouds and oppreffes the foul. The eye of Sorrow is perpetually looking back, and lamenting the lofs of objects, in which the mistaken mind had fondly centered all its felicity. It rarely ventures to fend forth one eager look into the region of Hope. It deems it impoffible to turn a prefent distress into a prefent bleffing: and can never conceive, that darkness itself should be the very substance through which the Light

M 3

Light of Heaven must again be rendered vifible to the benighted heart.

In the moment of Job's defpondency, under the fevere trials with which he was vifited, he would have reasoned and fpoke far otherwife than he did, had it fuited the purposes of Heaven to unveil at that moment the fecret defign of his present affliction. Had he difcerned the Angel that was "riding in the whirl"wind,"-had he beheld "the hand that "directed the ftorm," he would doubtlefs have changed the language of his exclamation :—O my foul, he would then have faid, though thou art not "months paft, as in the days when "GOD preferved thee;" yet have I a fecret hope, that thou wilt foon feel again his Reviving Prefence, and praise him for greater bleffings than thou haft heretofore received.

66 as in

Indeed,

Indeed, my brethren, the moft feemingly fevere difpenfations, if we could raise our thoughts, for a few moments, above the confiderations of flesh and blood, would appear to be dispensations of mercy. Medicines, you know, are feldom sweet or palatable :-and yet, would you not thank your phyfician for administering them, when he knows they are neceffary for the recovery of your health? And canft thou then, O Chriftian, repine, or be diffatisfied with thy SAVIOUR, for mingling the bitter draught of affliction, when he forefees, that thine everlasting falvation, perhaps, depends upon the remedy? Every thing that ties thee to the world, keeps thee at a diftance from CHRIST. Can thy SAVIOUR more effectually testify his affection for thee, than by breaking these cords, and thus leffening thine attachment to the world?-Cease, therefore, to repine at thy lofs!-Be not caft down or difquie

ted!-Thy God hath not forfaken theehe is only preparing thee for better times" Hope thou therefore in him, "for thou shalt yet praise him, who is "the health of thy countenance and thy GoD."

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Laftly, The world in which he lives, and the men with whom he is obliged to converfe, adminifter new causes of forrow and difquietude to the fincere Christian. The fecret treachery of pretended friends, or the open malice of avowed enemies, the general disrespect and contempt with which virtue is treated, and the honours and encouragement which are given to vice, all confpire to wound his breaft, and even to render him less pleased than he wishes to be, with the fociety of his fellowcreatures. For who that has the leaft fpark of zeal for the honour of his GOD, can bear to hear his Name blaf

phemed,

phemed, and his religion ridiculed; to fee his precepts violated with impunity, and his ordinances neglected and despised? And yet to oppose these prevailing enormities, to testify an abhorrence of them by private reproofs, or public cenfures, is fometimes deemed rudeness and impertinence. Yea, fuch is the fad degeneracy of mankind, that if we would be truly religious, now-a-days, we must dare to be fingular.

But be not thou discouraged, thou Child of GOD! Though thou art placed in the midst of a crooked and perverfe generation, and haft reafon to fay, with David, "Wo is me, that I am con"ftrained to dwell with Mefhech, and " to have my the tents habitation among "of Kedar!-O that I had the wings of

a dove, for then would I flee away, "and be at rest!"-though integrity, uprightness, and the fear of GOD should

be