mately connected with it, and viewed with peculiar advantage from it.

OUR GOD is the first of these objects: with Him we feldom form any clofe acquaintance till we meet him trouble.He commands filence now, that He may be heard; and removes intervening objects, that He may be feen. A SOVEREIGN DISPOSER appears, who, as Lord of all, hath only refumed what he lent;-whofe will is the law of his creatures; and who exprefsly declares his will in the prefent affliction. We fhould feriously confider that all allowed repugnance to the determinations of his government (however made known to us) is SIN ; and that every wish to alter the appointments of his wifdom is FOLLY ;-we know not what we afk. When God dif covers himself in any matter, those who know him, will keep filence before him*.

Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty inftru&t him?-How just was the reply; Behold I am vile !-what 'fhall I anfwer thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth.'*

This filent fubmiffion under trying difpenfations, is variously exemplified as well as inculcated in the fcriptures. An awful inftance of fin and forrow occurs in the family of Aaron his fons difregarded a divine appointment, and there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them; but Aaron held his peace.t-Eli, in fimilar circumstances, filenced his heart with this fingle but fufficient confideration, "It is the Lord."-David under a ftroke which he declares confumed him, obferves, "I was dumb, I opened not my mouth becaufe THOU didft it."§-And Job, when ftript of every comfort, bleffed

* Job. xl. 2, 4.

+ Lev. x. 2, 3. 1 Sam. iii. 18. § Pf. xxxix. 9.

the

the name of him who took away, as well as gave.*-Whatever be the nature of your calamity, may it be attended with fuch an humble and childlike fpirit as thefe poffeffed !

But the Sovereign Difpofer is alfo the COMPASSIONATE FATHER. Among other inftances of his tenderness, you may have obferved the peculiar fupports he affords under peculiar trials.-Let us mark, and acknowledge, the hand which mingles mercy with judgment, and alleviation with diftrefs.-The parents I have just mentioned loft their children under circumstances far more diftreffing than yours;-The defire of your eyes (if not the idol of your heart) was, perhaps, almost a ftranger ;-you strove hard to detain it, but He, who took the young children into his arms and bletfed them, took yours; and, taking it, seemed

*Job i. 21,

to

to fay, what I do thou knoweft not now, but thou shalt know hereafter;*-patiently fuffer this little one to come unto me, for of fuch is my kingdom † compofed :-Verily I fay unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father! -"If I take

away your child, I take it to myself"Is not this infinitely beyond any thing you could do for it ?-Could you fay "to it, if it had lived, thou shall weep

no more, the days of thy mourning "are ended? §-Could you fhew it any

66

thing in this world like the glory of "God, and of the Lamb? ||—Could you "raife it to any honour here like re"ceiving a crown of life? ¶"

The voice of a Father of mercies and a God of all comfort** fpeaks as diftinctly in the death as in the birth of

*John xiii. 7.

+ Matth. 14.

Matth. xviii. 10. § Ifa. xxx. 19. || Rev. xxii.23.

James i. 12.

**2 Cor. i. 3.

an

an infant. A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping; Rachel, weeping for her children, refused to be comforted, because they were not. Thus faith the Lord, refrain thy voice from weeping and thine eyes from tears, 'for there is hope in thine end, faith the Lord, that thy children shall come again to their own border.*-It is not the will of your heavenly Father that one of thefe little ones fhould 'perish.t'

Is it a pious friend that has just yielded up his breath? The fame voice feems to fay, turn from him, or rather 'turn from his clay,-his faded gar

ment, He himself is taken from the 'evil to come; He is entered into 'peace. I'

When the able Minifter, the exem

* Jer. xv. 17. + Matt. xviii. 14. a. lvii. 1, 2.

plary