of beings. Those days look beautiful in the remembrance; we feel shackled by the appointed studies; we long to breathe once more the free winds of heaven. Perhaps we are engaged in the dark lecture-room, and the sun beams in at the ancient window; it tells us of green grassy fields, and high hill-tops, and long shady woods, and straggling lanes, and mossy banks, and blossoming orchards, and bee-hives, and old ivied trees, and ancient halls, and tapering spires, and village-bells, and deep, deep tarns, and the blue-bell, and heather, and myrtle, and clear waters, and we long to behold them all again. Every spare moment is given to poetry and divine philosophy; their mighty and tremendous music enters the soul; the marvellous song deepens; scenes of ideal loveliness paint themselves on the visual organs; the heart burns with inextinguishable thought; we become etherealized; we live in another and fairer world; our spirit is big with the brightness and the glory of the future existence. And the silver bells have ceased, and we wake again to every-day life : Long let us stray, And ever, as we come to the shorn mead, The wanton year. See where apace she comes, A charming description of May! and how fresh and beautiful is this month! It is arrayed with the delicious hawthorn, and all lovely flowers, and enlivened with the music of a million happy creatures, who warble their notes in the sunshine. The smile of the King seems imaged in its cerulean sky, its green, transsparent earth, and its running waters. Nature is adorned with pristine innocence. The heath, with its golden furze; the hedges, with their white elders and wild honeysuckles; the fields, with their cowslips, and primroses, and violets; the river banks, with their blue forget-me-nots; the gardens, with their lilacs, and laburnums, and acacias; the orchards, with their apple and plum blossoms; and the shrubberies, with their myrtles, and laurels, and lignums, beam with beauty. There is a revelry of earth and sky. How nearly allied is May with all that we experienced in youth! How thrilling were those moments when the heart first awoke to the enchanting glories of creation! the earth seemed some divine abode, some spirit-dwelling realm. We thought not of sorrow; love alone reigned; it threw over all things an infinite meaning, an everlasting expression; the very air teemed with richest odours; the winds, the rolling, crashing thunders, the cataract, the heaving, swelling, dashing ocean, seemed fraught with majestic, imperishable, deep-toned harmonies. The world, with its thousand happy homes, broke in upon the soul as a dream; and as May came and went, a heaven of felicity pervaded all the soul. But, as summer wore on, our emotions became more spiritual, more ethereal, and the paintings of the fancy bore a deeper colouring. How sweet, on a quiet eventide, to saunter along the fine walks of an old garden, thinking of the past, the present, and the future; there is a melting of the heart; a soothing of the soul; materialism becomes vital, subtle; the melancholy music of other days rolls on the ear; forgotten faces reappear:— In such a silent, cool, and wholesome hour, Hurdis has one fine passage on the storm; its last few lines are exceedingly pleasing. The allusion to the family meeting in the morning after the midnight tempest, and their telling how fiercely flashed the lightnings, and how loudly the thunders rolled, and how furiously the winds blew, and how the driving rain dashed against the window panes, is beyond expression beautiful. Let me sit to see the lowering storm Collect its dusky horrors, and advance To bellow sternly in the ear of night; To see the Almighty Electrician come, Making the clouds his chariot. Who can stand When he appears? The conscious creature flies, And skulks away, afraid to see his God Charge and re-charge his dreadful battery. For who so pure his lightning might not blast, And be the messenger of justice? Who Can stand exposed, and to his Judge exclaim, "My heart is cleansed, turn thy storm away?" Fear not, ye fair, who with the naughty world Have seldom mingled. Mark the rolling storm, And let me hear you tell, when morning comes, With what tremendous howl the furious blast Blew the large shower in heavy cataract Against your window; how the keen, the quick, And vivid lightning quivered on your bed, And how the deep artillery of heaven Broke loose, and shook your coward habitation. The drying up of the storm is vividly depicted in the following lines; the scene is rendered almost visible; we see the clear blue sky, the sunny radiance, the rain-drops hanging on the branches, the leaves shaken by the fresh breeze; we almost feel the purer existence : At length the storm abates; the furious wind No longer howls; the lightning faintly gleams, And the retiring thunder scarce is heard; The shower ceases, and the golden sun Bursts from the cloud, and hangs the wood with pearls, Fast falling to the ground; on the dark cloud His watery ray impressed, in brilliant hues Paints the gay rainbow-all is calm and clear; The blackbird sings. In 1792, our poet lost his favourite sister, Catherine; he felt that his family circle was broken into, and robbed of its sweetest member. This preyed deeply on his sensitive and affectionate heart; he felt the trial keenly. "She was a gem," so he writes to Cowper, "which had hung around my neck all the days of my life, and never lost its lustre." This dear and much-loved girl is the Margaret and Isabel of his poetry. How forcible and eloquent does his grief burst forth; but it soon breathes a sweeter and calmer note; he becomes more resigned; his lips speak a holier language; his sorrow is serene and gentle; no throbbing outbreak now; all quiet and all still : Yes, I was happier once, and fondly sung Nor fancied aught could have pleased me more. To his Creator warbles; warbles sweet, And not condemned, till some unfeeling boy His piece unheeded levels, and with shower Of leaden mischief his ill uttered song My God, have I arraigned thee? Let thy bow At mute affliction's solitary board: Summon Cecilia to an early grave, Yet will I bless thee; for to this harsh world Thou bounteous Author of all human bliss, Give me whatever lot thy wisdom deems Meet and convenient-pleasure, if thou wiltIf not, then pain-and be it sharp as thisMy heart, though wounded, shall adore thee still, From these specimens, and numberless others which might easily be adduced, we think with Southey, that Hurdis ought to have a place in every collection of the British Poets. He wrote in the cause of truth; and his life furnished the best commentary on his works. If his talents were not brilliant, they were far superior to many whose names are still mentioned with honour; but with this world he himself has done; his spirit has entered that vast and gigantic fabric where a thousand lyres breathe out their harmonies to the Invisible; there, exulting in the everlasting gush of song, and in the presence of unclouded Deity, he rolls out his anthem of all-delicious and purest sounds. EDWARD IRVING. To the memory of the great, and holy, and Titanic Edward Irving, we inscribe the contents of this paper; it is a token of our lasting regard and lasting admiration. He was the first man whom we learned to love: the story of his life affected us more strangely than the history of a Dante or a Luther: his was a marvellous tale. Hallowing are the feelings with which we gaze on the portrait of this magnificent man!-there it is, with his broad, expansive forehead, his dark, black curls, his wild, frenzied eye, his mild lips, his whole expression of a majestic and gigantic mind. We could look thereon for hours; it breathes so much splendour of intellect, and yet such deep and sincere holiness. No man ever possessed greater intellectual power with a larger share of true piety; he was a prince in mind and in heart-in thought and in feelings. Ah, he is a prince now among the thrones, dominions, and powers of the blessed world! His very look struck one as something above the common race; he was an immortal among mortals; he felt himself as the ambassador of the Holiest; he understood thoroughly the majesty of the ministerial character, and to this high but just regard may be traced many of his misfortunes. He knew that it stood alone and unapproachable; before it, kings and nobles were as beggars; it stripped society of its gilded follies, and laid bare the emptiness of its vanities; it had the eye of the Eternal; it looked on man as he is, and not as he is not; it had its station between heaven and earth; it was endowed with privileges greater than those of angels; it was God incarnate-God himself standing up and offering mercy and redemption to a fallen and a lost people; its every note was authoritativeits every intonation godlike; the splendours and the terrors of the Divinity alike upheld it; upon all its parts shone the full, unclouded glory of the Highest; to man it was not responsible-to none was it amenable but Jehovah; he was vouched to support and bless it to the end of time. Such was Irving's opinion of the legate's office; and it was not too lofty. Our author was essentially a poet-a great poet: the energy and beauty of everlasting truths glow throughout all his writings. We acknowledge that he is not always sustained, that he is oftentimes weak, and insipid, and even absurd; there are, doubtless, many inferior passages; his soul, at seasons, was divested of its majesty and its grandeur; but is not this common to all genius ?-is Massillon always eloquent?-is Fenelon ever winning and subduing?-is there no weakness in Bossuet's thundering denunciations, no stooping in his eagle flight?--is Robert Hall without one harsh note throwing some discord into his exquisite paragraphs?-is Chalmers fault L less? The magnificent outpourings, and the gorgeous outbreaks, and the sublime outbursts of the intellect and heart will not be perfect until we reach the invisible world; there these splendid gifts will be fully developed, and the rapt multitude will speak their applause in the deep-hushed silence. On earth, the purest oratory must necessarily be dim-the loftiest hymn feeble; but when Irving was himself, who so vast and infinite in his creations as he? There is an imperishableness about his every word; they breathe the richest intonations of the highest poetry-they are the swellings of the Divine mind-they cannot pass away, and be forgotten-they are the thoughts of a mighty one-they light up our existence with radiance-they dignify our manhoodthey sparkle with a celestial lustre-they burn with an inextinguishable brilliancy; it is the soft sighing of the falling zephyr, and the crash of ten thousand thunders. In his boyhood, Irving evinced little or no taste for learning-he cared not for books; climbing the mountain-height, and wandering down wild, narrow glens, and looking into the dark tarns, formed his favourite amusement and instruction. He loved to breathe the free air of liberty; creation taught him eloquence and beauty; the hymn of Nature was whispered in every breeze, and sung in every wild sweep of the tempest: he was aroused-he was stirred; he felt the mighty impulse; he yielded to the powerful influence. From that moment he aspired to be above his fellows; he knew that his proper sphere was to rule; henceforth he gave the energy of his herculean intellect to the study of man; he called around him the immortals, and held long and deep communion; his aspirations pointed onwards to the church; therein he found a resting-place for his spirit: the realities of the unseen world, the sublimity of the redemption, the mild meekness of the Saviour, the fatherly tenderness of God, the pure inspiration and teachings of the Comforter, the first breathing of repentance, the return of the wanderer to the fold, the gratulation of angels, were subjects that absorbed his soul; and he loved: then came a softened radiance, a mellowed lustre, over his majestic courage and tremendous conceptions. buted to the charm; his aspect, wild, yet grave as of one labouring with some mighty burden; his voice, deep, clear, and with crashes of power alternating with cadences of softest melody; his action, now graceful as the wave of the rose-bush in the breeze, and now fierce and urgent as the midnight motion of the oak in the hurricane; the countenance, kindling, dilating, contracting, brightening, or blackening with the theme-now attractive in its fine symmetrical repose, and now terrible to look at, in its strong lines, and glaring excitement, and an air of earnestness and enthusiasm which ever prevented the impression that it was a mere display; all this formed an unparalleled combination of the elements of Christian oratory.' But to this master-eloquence Irving added deep and fervent piety; whatever may have been his errors, they were errors of the intellect, and not of the heart; his whole being was devoted to the service of Jehovah; his entire existence was wrapt up in the Holiest; the sum total of his happiness was bound up in the fear of the Lord; his religion was soulinfluencing, spirit-exalting-withal, it gave him meekness, and gentleness, and long-suffering; his conduct was as pure as his intellectual stature was gigantic; his moral nature was as conspicuous as his endowments were brilliant; in all things he sought the guidance and the smile of the Everlasting; he was a man of unceasing prayer. "Some few of his contemporaries might equal him in preaching, but none approached to the very hem of his garment while wrapt up into the heaven of devotion; it struck you as the prayer of a great being conversing with God; your thoughts were transported to Sinai, and you heard Moses speaking with the Majesty on high, under the canopy of darkness, amid the quaking of the solid mountain, and the glimmerings of celestial fire; or you thought of Elijah praying in the cave in the intervals of the earthquake; and the fire and the still small voice: the solemnity of the tones convinced you that he was conscious of an unearthly presence, and speaking to it, not to you; the diction and imagery showed that his faculties were wrought up to their highest pitch, and tasked to their noblest endeavour in that celestial colloquy sublime; Years rolled away, and Irving was in the and yet the elaborate intricacy and swelling zenith of a London popularity; and he had pomp of his preaching were exchanged for deep married his first and only love. Princes and simplicity; a profusion of scripture was used; nobles crowded to hear his thrilling eloquence: and never did inspired language become lips then came the full display of his fearlessness of more than those of Irving: his public prayers man; for sin and iniquity he reproved him; told to those who could interpret their lanhe shrank not from his duty as the commission-guage of many a secret conference with heaven; ed legate of Heaven; rank, to him, was a vain bauble; it presented no safeguard against his denunciation of wickedness; in the presence of the Eternal he knew of no distinctions-all the different grades of society were levelled there -crowns and coronets were thrown aside; his spirit scorned to flatter-the beggar and the peer alike trembled before his faithfulness; he felt the majesty and dignity of his sacred office; pride and vanity were banished, and the glory of his Maker alone filled his heart-its every pulsation beat to his praise. The splendid Gilfillan, speaking of his pulpit ministrations, says "His manner also contri they pointed to wrestlings all unseen, and groanings all unheard; they drew aside, involuntarily, the veil of his secret retirements, and let a light into the sanctuary of the closet itself. Prayers more elegant, and beautiful, and melting have often been heard; prayers more urgent in their fervid importunity have been uttered once and again-such as those which were sometimes heard with deep awe to proceed from the chamber where the perturbed spirit of Hall was conversing aloud with its Maker, till the dawning of the day,-but prayers more majestic, and organ-like, and Miltonic, never.' But to his oratory: how full of sublime poetry is this on the Day of Judgment: But come at length it will, when Revenge shall array herself to go forth, and Anguish shall attend her, and from the wheels of their chariot, Ruin and Dismay shall shoot far and wide among the enemies of the king, whose desolation shall not tarry, and whose destruction, as the wing of the whirlwind, shall be swift; hopeless as the conclusion of eternity, and the reversion of doom. Then around the fiery concave of the wasteful pit the clang of grief shall ring, and the flinty heart which repelled tender mercy shall strike its fangs into its proper bosom ; and the soft and gentle spirit which dissolved in voluptuous pleasures shall dissolve in weeping sorrows and outbursting lamentations; and the gay glory of time shall depart; and sportful liberty shall be bound for ever in the chain of obdurate necessity. The green earth, with all her blooming beauty and bowers of peace, shall depart; the morning and evening salutations of kinsmen shall depart; and the ever-welcome voice of friendship, and the tender whisperings of full-hearted affection, shall depart for the sad discord of weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth; and the tender names of children, father, and mother, and wife, and husband, with the communion of domestic love and mutual affection; and the inward touches of natural instinct, which family compact, when uninvaded by discord, wraps the livelong day into one swell of tender emotion, making earth's lowly scenes worthy of heaven itself-all, all shall pass away; and instead, shall come the level lake that burneth, and the solitary dungeon, and the desolate bosom, and the throes and tossings of horror and hopelessness, and the worm that dieth not, and the fire that is not quenched. Many have written on this subject, but none more powerfully than our author. It is big with coming wrath and coming woe; and the allusion to all the tender sympathies and tender ties of life renders the picture of despair and everlasting judgment more tremendous in its outlines. The oft-repeated fact is clothed with new force and sublimity; it is as original as it is striking; it is invested with a darker hue, and coloured with a blacker shade, than heretofore; it sweeps on, misery after misery, until it reaches the consummation of never-ending agony. With what beauty of thought, and chasteness of expression, has our poet depicted the deathbed of the good man : The man of God looks to the end of the race he has been patiently running, and beholds the goal at hand; he looks upon the recompence of reward which is await ing him, the prize of his high calling in Christ Jesus. The last enemy that he hath to overcome is Death; the king of terrors is to be met face to face. He cannot avoid the combat, if he would, and he would not, if he could. How often in the travail of his soul hath he exclaimed: "Woe is me that I am constrained to dwell in Meshech, and to have my habitation amongst the tents of Kedar! O that I had the wings of a dove, for then would I flee away, and be at rest!" How often hath he not said: "In thy presence is fulness of joy, and at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore. As for me, I shall behold thy face in righteousness. When I awake, I shall be satisfied with thy likeness.' And now that his conflicts are about to cease for ever, and his sorrows have an end, he lifteth up his head, because the day of his redemption draweth nigh. In vision, his spirit already winged to take its everlasting flight, discerneth the throne of God encircled by a ten thousand times ten thousand sons of light; in vision he mingles with the glorious throng; he tunes his harp to the heavenly theme, and sings the song of Moses and the Lamb. Sprinkled with the blood of sprinkling, which speaketh better things than the blood of Abel, he ascends in spirit to the Mount Zion, the city of the living God, making one with the innumerable company of angels and general assembly and church of the first-born, whose names are written in heaven. Ah! how does it grieve his soul to wake once again out of the trance of bliss, to open his eyes once again upon the cold, dull, blank realities of life. The syren world hath no longer any charms for him. He hath proved the falseness of her beauty; he hath seen the glory that excelleth, and hath no eye to look upon fictitious brightness. He hath seen the King in his beauty, and the land that is afar off: how shall he endure to soil his feet again with the base mould of the degenerate earth, to breathe any longer the polluted atmosphere of a world poisoned with sin, and full of the voices of sorrow! In this tabernacle he groans, being burdened. And when the grisly king shakes against him his terrible dart, he openeth his bosom to receive the stroke of grace, saying the while: "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" and, looking up to heaven, he takes his departure, saying: "Into thy hand I commend my spirit; for thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth!" The gentle putting off of mortality is exquisitely described in this passage: it is a sweet hymn to the power of death; it breathes the soft, soul-like melody of Bryant. We become in love with the mighty giant; he is divested of his terrors. It is a yielding up of our corruptible, decayed, diseased existence: it is the putting on of our immortal, everlasting being; it is casting away the dross; the receiving the pure, the fine gold. In the same exquisite and simple strain, is the following successful description: You have felt, or you have seen, the rapt enjoyment of an aged sire, making a round of his children in their several homes, beholding them blooming and rejoicing in the favour of the Lord, with their little ones encircling them like the shoots of the tender vine. No discords to heal, no sorrows to assuage, no misfortunes to lament in all that have sprung from his loins. What an emotion of paternal glory and pious thankfulness fills his breast!he looks round upon the numerous and happy flock, bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh, and the tear silently fills his eye, which he lifts to heaven, the seat of God, with a look that would say, Thou hast dealt bountifully with thy servant; now let him depart in peace. One such sight makes a parent forget the care and labour of a long life; one such emotion puts to flight all the fears and forebodings of a parent's heart; his soul is satisfied, the measure of his joy is full. This beautiful picture is enough to make one forget the turmoil of life, and to throw around the soul one glow of holy happiness. It is sketched and coloured with the true spirit of the poet; it deeply influences the heart; it appeals to the whole man; its tranquil bliss, its domestic sweets seize hold of the affections, and bind us with a magician's spell. The jarrings of a sinful world die away unheard; we joy to know and feel that there is such inexpressible blessedness in the cup of existence, such unutterable peace even in our lost and fallen condition. It is not all sorrow, it is not all grief; we have days and hours of sunshine. The tender sympathies of life yield us immea· surable felicity, and the more they are cherished and honoured, so much the greater will be their hallowed and soul-exalting power. The finer feelings of our nature play ever a melody to the mercy of the Eternal. How sweet is the following argumentation in support of the Spirit's operations; it is literally embued with all the deliciousness of poetry: If, then, the truth of God's presence and presidency in our worldly affairs finds for itself universal belief among Christians, though resting on revelation alone, and having no foundation either in sight or perception, upon what plea will they reject the doctrine of the Spirit's presence and presidency in the great world of grace, if it be found revealed with the same distinctness? There ought, therefore, to be no preliminary objection taken to it upon the grounds of its not being perceptible, but the Scriptures should be searched whether it be so or not. Rather, upon the other hand, because it is not perceptible, we should entertain it as more akin to the other operations of God your Saviour, the habitations of dismal cruelty, endless days and nights of sorrow, shall be your doom. Could I lift the curtain which shrouds eternity from the eye of time, and disclose the lazar-house of eternal death, what sleeper of you would not start at the chaos of com and luxury, little dreamt that he was to awaken in torment, and crave a drop of water to cool his tongue. What business has any forgetter of God with any better fare? There is no purgatory to purge away the spiritual dross your spirits are encrusted with, and make you clean for heaven. It is not true, that after a season of endurance, the prince of the bottomless pit will hand you at length into heaven. Without holiness no man can see God: without Christ, no man can attain to holiness. Yet, conscious that you are unholy-deriving no mediation from Christ-deceiving yourselves with no respite nor alleviation of punishment-here you are, listless, lethargic, and immovable! of the invisible God; for, exalting your thoughts a little, conceive the ways of God; look abroad over the world, and what do you behold? Noiseless nature putting forth her buds, and drinking the milk of her existence from the distant sun. Where is God? He is not seen, he is not heard. Where is the sound of his footsteps?-mingled grief? Dives, surrounded with his eastern pomp where the rushing of his chariot-wheels?-where is his storehouse for this inhabited earth?-where are the germs of future plants, the juices of future fruits?-and where is the hand dividing its portion to every living thing, and filling their hearts with life and joy? Lift your thoughts a little higher, behold the sun,-doth he, when preparing to run his race, shake himself like a strong man after sleep, and make a rustling noise, and lift up his voice to God for a renewal of his exhausted strength? Doth the pale-faced and modest moon, which cometh forth in the season of the night, make music in the still silence to her Maker's praise? Do the stars in their several spheres tell to mortal sense the wondrous stories of their births? Again, turn your thoughts inward upon yourselves, and say if your manly strength did grow out of infant helplessness, with busy preparations and noisy workmanship, as the chiselled form of man groweth out of the quarried stone? In the still evening, when you lay you down wearied and worn out, doth your strength return during the, watches of the sleepy and unconscious night by noise and trouble, as a worn-out machine is refitted by the cunning workman? Tell me how intelligence grows upon the unconscious babe: where are the avenues of knowledge, and by what method does it fix itself? Faithful, we have said, and fearless were Irving's pulpit ministrations; take this as a specimen : If you get not the soul's attachments to the world loosened before death, there will ensue such a rending and agony upon your departure, as no loss of country, of wife, or children can be compared with; and if you take not a cool forethought of the future, nor prepare to meet it, there will come such a brood of fears, such a wreck of hopes, as no improvident spendthrift ever encountered. Oh, if the loss of fortune can so agitate the soul, and the loss of fame, the loss of a child, a wife, or a friend-if any one of these things can make the world seem desolate, what conceivable agony, when all fortune, family, friends, and fame shall have left you, to dwell alone in a waste, empty, yawning void of grief and disappointment! Ye sons of men, if these things are even so, and ye tread every moment upon the brink of time, and live upon the eve of judgment, what avails your many cares and your unresting occupations? Will your snug dwellings, your gay clothing, and your downy beds give freshness to the stiffened joints, or remove the disease which hath got a lodgment in your marrow and in your bones? Will your full table and cool wines give edge to a jaded appetite, or remove the rancour of a rotted tooth, or supply the vigour of a worn down frame? Will a crowded board, and the full flow of jovial mirth, and beauty's wreathed smile and beauty's dulcet voice, charm back to a crazy dwelling the ardours and graces of youth? Will yellow gold bribe the tongue of memory and wipe away from the tablets of the mind the remembrance of former doings? Will worldly goods reach upwards to heaven, and bribe the pen of the recording angel. that he should cancel from God's books all vestige of our crimes? or bribe Providence, that no cold blast should come sweeping over our garden and lay it desolate? or abrogate that eternal law by which sin and sorrow, righteousness and peace are bound together? Will they lift up their voice and say, wickedness shall no more beget woe, nor vice engender pain, nor indulgence end in weariness, nor the brood of sin fatten upon the bowels of human happiness, and leave, wherever their snakish teeth do touch, the venom and sting of remorse? And when that last most awful hour shall come, when we stand upon the brink of two worlds, and feel the earth sliding from beneath our feet, and nothing to hold on by, that we should not fall into the unfathomed abyss; and when a film shall come over our eyes, shutting out from the soul for ever, friends, and favourites, and visible things-what are we, what have we, if we have not a treasure in heaven, and an establishment there? And when the deliquium of death is passed, and we find ourselves in the other world under the eye of Him that is holy and pure, where shall we hide ourselves, if we have no protection and righteousness of Christ? It is sure as death and destiny, that if you awake not from this infatuation of custom and pleasure at the calls Men and brethren! is this always to continue, or is it to have an end? If you are resolved to brave it out, then make ready, for a proof to make nature shudder and quake to her inmost recesses. Can ye stand and brave Omnipotence to do his utmost? In this world, where power is muffled with mercy, there are a thousand inflictions which ye could not brave. Could ye stand all that was laid upon patient Job?-possessions, sons, daughters, health reaved away; then hope benighted, and the light of heaven removed, and fellowship of friends, and almighty displays of power and wrath? The hardy band of Roman soldiers-and who so stout-hearted as Romans!-swooned every man of them at the sight of one of God's visions. What could ye, were God's judgment-seat displayed, his justice no longer restrained, and his retribution no longer delayed; every fleet minister of execution ready harnessed at his post, and hell opening wide its mouth, insatiable as the grave, and grimmer than the visage of death. Arraigned, selfcondemned, singled out of every crime, solitary, unbefriended, one among thousands; life's pleasures at an end, the world's vision faded, God's anger revealed, sentence passed, judgment proceeding, and the pit opening its mouth on you as the earth on Korah's company, to receive you quick. Can you stand this?-can you think to brave it? Then, verily, ye are mad, or callous as the nether millstone. Do you disbelieve it then?-do you think God will not be so bad as his word? When did he fail? Did he fail at Eden, when the world fell? Did he fail at the deluge, when the world was cleansed of all animation, save a handful? Did he fail upon the cities of the plain, though remonstrated with by his friend, the father of the faithful? Failed he in the ten plagues of Egypt, or against the seven nations of Canaan; or, when he armed against his proper people, did ever his threatened judgments fail? Did he draw off when his own Son was suffering, and remove the cup from his innocent lips? And think ye he will fail, brethren, of that future destiny from which to retrieve us, he hath undertaken all his wondrous works unto the children of men? Why, if it were but an idle threat, would he not have spared his only-begotten Son, and not delivered him up to death? That sacred blood, as it is the security of heaven to those who trust in it, is the very seal of hell to those who despise it. Disbelieve, you cannot-brave it out, you dare not: then must you hope, at some more convenient season, to reform. So hoped the five virgins, who slumbered and slept without oil in their lamps; and you know how they fared. Neither have you forgotten how the merchant, and the farmer, and the sons of pleasure, who refused the invitation to the marriage feast of the king's son, were consumed with fire from heaven. What is your life, that you should trust in it?-is it not even a vapour that speedily passeth away? What security have you that Heaven will warn you beforehand, or that Heaven will help you to repentance whenever you please? Will the resolution of your mind gather strength as your other faculties of body and mind decay?-will sin grow weaker by being awhile longer indulged in?-or God grow more friendly by being awhile longer spurned?-or the gospel more persuasive by being awhile longer set at nought? I rede you, beware of the thief of time, Procrastination! This day is as convenient as to-morrow; this day is yours, to-morrow is not; this day is a day of mercy, to-morrow may be a day of doom. We must remember that this was addressed to the numberless magnates who crowded to hear him. Their rank, their wealth, their beauty, |