He attended many conferences of the Protestants; and finding his pacific endeavours ineffectual, piously declared, "I am grieved, and not without reason, that we, to whom the Lord hath so bountifully revealed the other mysteries of his kingdom, have not been able, now in thirty-four years, to agree concerning this most sacred and most general mystery, which all Christians ought to understand as well as use." If there was one of the beatitudes of his divine Master which this amiable man bore in mind rather than another, it was the seventh : "Blessed are the peace-makers, for they shall be called the children of God."

LINES ON THE DEATH OF LORD B.

A TEAR, thou 'st sung, there was for all †,
A mourner o'er the humblest bier;
Thou who hast heard the fearful call,
"Prepare thee, for thy God is near.'
And O! wert thou prepared to meet
That eye His angels scarce may view`;
To stand before His mercy's seat,

The Great Almighty! pure and true?
The thief who on the cross expired,
Turned on the suffering God his eye:
A ray of faith his bosom fir'd,

Its light revealed the Saviour nigh!
We know that He, the Lord of all,

Will not disdain a sinner's prayer;
We read his answer to that call,
"To-day shalt thou be with me there ‡."
And could I find that thou hadst shown
One sparkle of that heavenly flame,
That thou hadst bowed before his throne,
Pleaded in his atoning name;

How gladly would I hail the light,

The gleam that on thy darkness broke,

With angels celebrate the sight,

And praise Him who that light awoke.
Thou wouldst not seek His balm for woe,
Thou mocked, not bowed, before His rod
What thou hast been we too well know→→→
And what thou art is known to God.

His mercy is for ever near,

His power is felt below, above?
Fain o'er thy grave I'd drop one tear,
And leave thee to thy Saviour's love.

Lines on the Death of Sir P. Parker,

t

;

MARY

Luke, xxiii. 43.

THE VILLAGE PASTOR, No. XII.

"At evening time it shall be light."
"O there's a night-time in the soul,
Where tempests rest and storm clouds roll;
The troubled spirit looks on high,
But thunder lowers along the sky;
It turns to earth and looks around,
But not a refuge there is found;
Frighted it turns its eyes within,
And sees a loathsome heart of sin;
It fain would bend in earnest prayer;
It would, but finds no solace there."

SUCH is the agonized state of
many a soul when conscience is
aroused, and the keen arrows of
the Almighty fasten within the
alarmed and in part subdued heart.
And such are sometimes the feel
ings and terrors of men whose
souls are desirous of giving them-
selves to the Lord, but who are
for wise purposes made to pass
through the fire and the water,
and to cry out, "All thy waves
and thy billows go over me!"
These are awful seasons; and
"O were it not that hope is given
To every soul beneath the heaven;
And were it not a Saviour's veins
Flow to assuage these deadly pains,
No soul could long endure the woe,
When all above and all below,
And all without, and all within,
Seem leagued to be the scourge of sin."

All this will apply to the next character and subject of my remarks. John N. was among the most profane young men in our village. There was but one who outstripped him in contempt of God, and in disregard of all things sacred and of good report. That companion who excelled him in transgression was cut off in the midst of his unhappy course, and called to the tribunal of a righteous Judge at a moment's notice. The same sovereign Lord who called one by a sudden death into his presence was pleased to spare the other; and, we trust, to grant him repentance unto life such as needs not to be repented of. A long, a lingering, and most painful complaint to his body was the harbinger of conviction of sin, and of con

version unto faith and holiness, and finally of salvation in heaven.

It will not be worth while to ga into particulars; it may suffice to state, that as his course had been notoriously evil, so were his con victions of sin deep, and his fears and sorrows many and lasting. Indeed, no Christian neighbour would have been satisfied with a light and transient repentance. A few general confessions of sin, and a few loose and vague cries for mercy, would have but ill accorded with his former life. It was, therefore, no small comfort to his pastor to see, from week to week and from month to month, more steady, deep, and growing signs of a broken and contrite heart. But there was at length a time arrived, when we all not only felt entirely satisfied as to the reality and depth of his repentance, but when we began to sorrow with him, and to implore the Lord to lift up the light of his countenance upon him. This, however, was still to be delayed; and more weeks and months passed away, and still saw us in vain endeavour to pour the oil of consolation into his wounded spirit.

"If any man be in Christ Jesus he is a new creature; old things are passed away, behold all things are become new." So hath the Holy Spirit declared; and it was the manifest exhibition of this change of heart evinced by its fruits in the words, temper, and actions of poor John, that had now for a considerable time satisfied every one but himself, that he who was once dead in trespasses and sins had been quickened by the same blessed Spirit through the application of the blood of Christ. His once boisterous and surly temper was now gentle as a lamb. That house of God, to which he had so rarely directed his steps, was now visited as often as its doors were open, and as long as his declining

strength would admit. No longer was he found as an idle reprobate lounger, holding filthy and profane conversation with his usual herd of base fellows, but you might sometimes see him standing without his cottage door, gently rebuking and kindly admonishing them to repent and forsake their sins. It need hardly be said, that this conduct, so proper and praiseworthy, brought on him the open curses and marked contempt of fools who made a mock at sin. But John bore all with real Christian meek ness. Almost or quite the last time he was able to get about sixty or eighty yards from his dwelling, a poor neighbouring serious woman found him standing against the parish pound wall weeping bitterly. On her inquiring into the cause, he replied, "O, neighbour, wherever I turn myself I see in every place something that reminds me of my former wicked ways and wicked companions. This is one of those places where you know I have so often cursed, and swore, and mixed with them, and the thoughts of these things cut me to the heart."

as he ought to do. Prayer was now his almost constant employ; and death and judgment were contemplated with less and less of his former terrors. He began to tell of having occasional refreshing seasons, wherein his soul was enabled to trust and not be afraid; and in his general conversation to express a hope, that he should yet be saved. Thus the light and peace of the Holy Spirit gradually broke on his once troubled and tempestdriven soul; and as he drew nearer to his end, and his bodily sufferings daily and dreadfully increased, the consolations of the Lord increased also; until he frequently said, that this was the happiest, nay the only happy part of his whole life.

(

He now could and did desire to depart, nothing doubting but that for his soul it would be far better. This was that blessing which he and his Christian neighbours and his pastor had long been praying for; and which, though deferred for a season, came in good time, as another illustration of the text, "At even time it shall be light." The end of this young man was It was for several weeks after most satisfactory. The greater this that his sufferings of body con- part of his former days had been tinued to increase, and he was not given to Satan; those that followed only confined to his bed, but often were days of affliction of body, of unable to turn himself. But severe deep repentance of soul, of many as the pains of his scrophula were, fears, nay, almost of despair in his the anguish of a wounded spirit, mind; but the concluding part of and his fears and apprehensions of his life was blessed with faith, God's anger, were greater. One hope, and peace in the Lord Jesus thing, however, could not escape Christ. He lay for some time in a our notice; and that was, the tender sensibilities of his mind, and affectionate feelings of his heart, whenever we discoursed on the loving kindness of that Saviour who suffered and died for sinners. Indeed; for some time before his death his terrors began to subside; and the theme of his complainings and cause of his tears were not so much the dread of eternal vengeance, as that his heart was so hard that he could not love Christ

NOV. 1824.

state of natural exhaustion and in-
sensibility, and departed in a gentle
slumber in the twentieth year of
his age. O that men would praise
the Lord for his goodness, and be
more ready to declare the wonders
that he doth to a world of rebel
sinners! For how oft do we find
these renewed instances of his rich
and tender mercies.

"How often has the gloom which spread
Around the Christian pilgrim's head,
And darkened all his earthly way,
Like Israel's beacon-cloud by day;

3 &

Changed as the hour of death drew nigh
To flame that streamed along the sky,
And lit his footsteps through the night
With holy fire and heavenly light."

These were the instances which

I produced as illustrations before I brought forward that of the widow's own experience. There was, however, very soon after another happy instance, which I shall here add to the foregoing.

Rebecca C. was one of the most rosy and healthful looking young women in our parish. Her character stood higher than that of many of her neighbours. As a single woman, she had conducted herself with modesty and propriety, and as such was married to a young man of our parish about half a year before I became resident. But with all this commendable moral conduct, she, by her own after-confession, was living completely as without God, and without a Gospel hope in the world. The account she often, in her latter days, gave of herself was, that she considered herself good enough, or at least much better than many; and that as to repentance towards God, or faith in or knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, she really knew nothing. She had no manner of concern about her soul or a future state. She felt the necessity and duty of maintaining a decent character in the world; but as to maintaining a humble walk before God, she never once employed a thought on the subject. She went most Sundays to church in the afternoon, but neither understood why she went thither nor what she heard; but as she generally sat in the gallery, she told me, with much simplicity, how earnestly she watched the clergyman turn over the pages of his sermon book, and how glad she felt herself when the blank in the page bespoke the conclusion of the discourse and of the service near at hand. When I one day asked her why, in such a state of mind, she went to a place of worship at all?

she said, that "some how or other she did not feel satisfied if she stayed entirely away; yet by the time the service had lasted a quarter of an hour, she got so weary and so anxious to be away, that she always kept her eye on the sermon book to watch the appearThe ance of its concluding page." remainder of the Sabbath was then spent in walking about, or in visits to her neighbours; and as to the whole of the week between the Sabbaths, she gave that entirely and exclusively to those thoughts and labours which were to provide for the body. Such was her account of herself when the Lord had made her a new creature. And here let us pause one moment to notice how much this account would describe the state of thousands of our more decent and moral young women. Should any such ever cast an eye on these pages, let them learn from Rebecca C. that it is possible to maintain a fair character in the world, to conduct themselves with modesty and decorum among men, and even to appear every Sabbath at the house of God, and yet all this while to be utter strangers to that knowledge of themselves, of Christ Jesus, and of the way to escape eternal wrath, which alone maketh wise unto salvation. May the Lord open such readers' eyes, and give them to see, that there is but a step between their souls and everlasting death.

All

To return to the subject of these remarks. It was but a very little while after I came to her parish before the Lord directed the word home with power to her heart, and, to use her own words, " It seemed now quite a different thing. the week long she reckoned on the Sunday and on the Thursday evening services; and she thought the time so long between them, that when at church she was as much afraid of the signs of concluding the service, as formerly she had