happiness when all below threatens to destroy it. A favour, that makes the 'possessor of it superior to all human disgrace, unmoved at reproach, satisfied under oppression, and welcoming the cross of Christ with all its ignominy. A due sense of the nature of this favour it was which wrought in Moses to 'count the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; (Heb. xi. 26.) greater honor than to be called the son of Pharoah's daughter.' (Heb. xi. 24.) This made the disciples of Jesus come from stripes and imprisonment, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name sake.' (Acts v. 41.) Now surely these must be paths of true happiness, that can thus make the soul to cease from man, to rejoice in tribulation, to enjoy itself independent of the world; honoured of God when most despised of man, and peaceful and easy, even when cast out as the filth and offscouring of all things.'

Thus here below, the soul which makes Christ its portion, his word its guide, his will its pleas ure, his grace its riches, his honour its ambition, his service its delight, holds on its way and waxes stronger and stronger;' enjoying the present sense of the divine favour, and happy in the assured hope of the 'glory, honour and im-mortality prepared for him in heaven.. (Rom. ii. 7.)

The happiness of the way of righteousness is yet more convincingly felt when death comes to put a final period to this mortal scene. This awful hour, that strips off the tinsel coverings of folly, stamps vanity on all beneath the sun, and shews the insignificance of time, and the importance of eternity, displays peculiarly the delights of the religion of Jesus. What can the

world in that day offer its foolish votaries? Will a party of pleasure suit the chamber of disease? or the songs of folly any more delight the ear that listens with restless impatience to the striking hour? What music will harmonize with dying groans? or what enjoyment can the brilliant or brocade afford, when the shroud is ready to supplant them? Will the sparkling bowl revive any longer, when the parched tongue begins to falter? or beauty kindle the unhallowed fire when death sits on the eye-lids, and chilling coldness begins to creep over the heart? Alas! too late! 'Vanity of vanities, all is vanity,' (Eccles. i. 2.) is now seen in characters too legible to be overlooked. The retrospect on a life spent in pleasure, in plays, and operas, and drums, and routs, and balls, and cards, and idle visitings, or those lower scenes of vanity which equally engage the vulgar mind; even these (supposing we are free from the grosser pollutions of the world) will till the soul with pangs of remorse and foreboding fears. Then shall we know what we have lost by neglecting Jesus and the ways of righteousness; and be made to feel, what before we would not attend to, that these were not the paths of real pleasure; were miserable comforts;. unable to abide the test of a dying hour. Ah pleasure, pleasure, (will such an one say) thou sorceress! thou destroyer of my soul! Thou once smiledst as with the charms of innocence, now I feel thee 'sting as a viper.' (Prov. xxiii. 32.) Where are thy promises of delight? Fool that I was to believe thee; and for the unsatisfying gratifications of sense, to reject the real joy which Jesus, that neglected Saviour, offered to give me at this hour. Now I am comfortless; I have trifled away my golden sands; I have forgotten God, and he hath forsaken me. How dearly have İ

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bought my vanities? The pleasures of sin were but momentary, but the pains of it are eternal.' Such reflections will often arise, and close the scene of vanity. And the dying hour will extort those confessions of truth from the conscience, in spite of the cruel kindness of friends and physicians, labouring to amuse and divert from these racking thoughts the soul which stands upon the verge of eternity.

But will riches bear that day's trial better? Ah! they who have put in the fine gold their confidence,' will find that it profits not in a day of wrath.' (Prog. xi. 4.) When death lifts his arm, and, swift as lightning, his winged messengers, disease and pain, enter the heart, vain is the hoarded treasure. See that generally esteemed happy man, who trusted in riches, stretched upon the bed of languishing; his body is panting for breath; his throat is parched; his heart flutters; his eyes grow dim; restless he turns, and turns again; sleep hath forsook his eyelids, pain tortures him every moment, and life's silver cord is loosing. What joy now can riches bring? Surround his dying bed with bags of gold, will they ålleviate the pains of the body, purchase a moment's respite from death, or silence the agonizing remonstrances of conscience? Alas! a golden god is a dumb idol, neither able to kill nor make alive, Then, where earth and only earth hath been the pursuit, what a wretched state must it needs be, to be torn from all men counted happiness, to leave this dear world behind them for ever, to go-ah, whither not to treasures laid up for them in heaven,' not to the place, where they have made themselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness;' but where that rich man went, who 'lift up his eyes in torment,' (Luke xvi. 23.) because in this life he had received

"his good things, and was rich in this world, but was not rich towards God." (Luke xii. 21.)

Now this is the boasted happiness of numbers; this the unutterable pleasure of dying worth so many thousand pounds. O the strange stupidity of man!

Nor will honour or esteem make our departure at all more satisfactory. What will it then avail you, that you have been caressed in the world when you are ready to leave it? If you have made distinction your joy, how will your pride be mortified when you go to the grave and mix with common dust, where no crouded levee attends you, unless the worms which cover you?

If learning hath been your idol, you will find no difference in death; the wise man dieth as the fool, and then all his thoughts perish.' (Eccl. ii. 16.) Nor will any of your attainments in science, your skill in languages, the refinedness of your taste, or depth of your penetration, in that day profit you more than they did the great Grotius, who with his dying lips is reported to have complained, Heu vitam perdidi operose nihil agendo; I have wasted my life in incessant toil, and have done nothing.'

What satisfaction will it be to you, that, after you are dead, your name should be engraved in the annals of fame, if it be not foundwritten in the Lamb's book of life? All your honours then will be as insignificant as the escutcheons on your coffin; and stand you in no more stead either to comfort your poor soul, or to acquit you before the God who is no respecter of persons. (Acts x. 34.)

Such thoughts perhaps may find their way to you at last, and cannot but produce self-condemnation and heart-rending anguish proofs too pregnant, that the ways which brought you hith

er, though strewed with flowers, were neither the paths of life below, nor of hope above.

But in that awful season, when all human comforts fail, the ways of righteousness, that were ever life and happiness, then peculiarly are endeared to us; for in the path-way thereof there is no death. The living image of God, the real christian sets like the western sun after its shining course, not lost in the ocean of the grave, but onward moves to illumine a new horizon.His pleasures upon earth were all spiritual; his chief joy was a reconciled God in Christ,' apprehended by faith as his covenant God, his everlasting portion: for this God, he says, is my God for ever and ever, he shall be my guide even unto death.' (Psal. xlviii, 14.) What wonder then, if, when he knows he is hasting to his blissful presence, to see him as he is, (1 John iii. 2.) face to face,' (1 Cor. xiii. 12.) his heart exults in the expectation? His highest joys here on earth were still imperfect; and, though infinitely superior to the poor joys of sense, unspeakably below what he hopes for in that kingdom, "where God hath prepared for those that love him such good things as pass man's understanding." (1 Cor. ii. 9.) He looks back on the past; (for the reflection is pleasing) and whilst with thankfulness he traces the evidences of God's love, adores the grace which he hath tasted; disclaims all merit, yet confident "in hope of the glory which shall be revealed, expects eternal life the gift of God in Jesus Christ." (Rom. vi. 23.) His present peaceful state amply repays all the labours of a life of righteousness; and if, instead of the comforts which have followed him all the days of his pilgrimage, he had never tasted ease before, he would confess that the paths which led him to such happiness in the pangs of death,