again deciphered, as the spring flowers shall put forth, as the singing of birds shall come, and as the voice of the turtle shall be heard in the land.

If these thoughts on the subject of flowers and flower seeds should appear to you to be worthless, let them be blotted out with more worthy speculations, and I shall be glad to have called forth in your mind more profitable reflections than those which have occurred to my own.

A FEW CLOSING REMARKS.

To me the thought is pleasant, that my homely observations may, possibly, be received in a kindly spirit, and be instrumental, not only in calling forth some of the best affections of the heart, but also in directing many a worn and weary spirit where true joys are alone to be found. Alas! we are poor purblind mortals, and oftentimes fill up our minds with vain desires never to be realized. I must leave the matter to unfold itself. It becomes me now, however, to take a glance at the course I have pursued, and honestly to confess some of my manifold infirmities.

It would be a strange thing if any one could express his opinions, as freely as I am accustomed to express mine, without, now and then, offending the prepossessions or prejudices of his friends: how far my trespasses extend in this particular it might be hard to say; but if I knew that any remark of mine had ever called forth an angry feeling, or ruffled the temper of any one of my readers recklessly, thoughtlessly, or without having their good in view, it would be to me a source of very bitter regret.

It would hardly become an old man, who, in his experience with the world, has seen so much of the blessedness of a virtuous course, and the misery of evil ways, to be backward in reproving evil even in the thing in which he himself is faulty. Often have I, with unsparing hand, drawn a bow at a venture, to strike another's faults, when the shaft might, with equal justice, have been directed against my own; indeed, a sense of my own failings has often dictated my advice to others.

But not content with waging warfare against actual sin, I have often taken an arrow from my quiver to urge it home against bad habits, churlish dispositions, and thoughtless behaviour; in doing this, I may, at times, have been a little severe, but we have all something to forgive, and you must forgive me.

With shame, also, I acknowledge a disposition to prate about myself, which I fear is too common among old folks. I have said more of myself than I ought to have said, and thought more highly of myself, than I ought to think. This is pitiful pride in an old man who ought to know, and, indeed, does know, the worthlessness of all his productions, and that man in his best estate is altogether vanity.

There is yet another failing that all must have observed in me, a bad habit of passing too suddenly from the grave to the gay, from the lively to the severe. The natural buoyancy of my thoughts renders me continually liable to this infirmity: let my friends lay hold on what is solid in my remarks, and forgive any thing like levity.

These are failings in Old Humphrey, but the worst of all his faults is yet to be named, and that is, that he has not, in a straightforward, right-on course, more constantly dwelt on spiritual subjects; he has beat about the bush, too often contenting himself with an occasional allusion to godliness. Few and far between have been his earnest appeals to your consciences in spiritual affairs: he has followed the will-o'-the wisps of his own imagination; and has been too much like the thermometer, that accommodates itself to the temperature of the atmosphere that surrounds it. Oh for a godly sincerity, an uncompromising integrity in all things!

Now I am about to take my leave, a sense of my deficiencies oppresses me. I could blush to think of the little that I have done, where I ought to have done much of the lightness of my language, where it ought to have been weighty! I feel at this moment that an old man has no busi

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ness to amuse himself in blowing bubbles and balancing straws, when all the best energies of his heart and soul should be devoted to the service of his Redeemer. Pass by, then, all that you have found in me undeserving of regard, my censurable pride, and my foolish levity; and if my pen has ever been that of a ready writer in divine things, if ever a single sentence has escaped me, adapted to make you wiser and better, let it not be forgotten. "Consider what I say; and the Lord give thee understanding in all things," 2 Tim. ii. 7.

In the midst of all my errors and light-heartedness, I have that abiding conviction of the goodness of God, and that love for the Redeemer in my heart, which I would not be deprived of for all that this world has to bestow. Come, then, let us strive together, running the race that is set before us with increased alacrity, in the service of our common Master. Let us cling more closely to the cross of Christ, and seek more earnestly for the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit, that, purged from worldly dross, we may be made meet to be partakers of the glorious inheritance prepared for God's people, through Him who has loved us, and given himself for us, and died for us, that we might live for ever.