ease respecting saving their souls. In conversation you are ever alert to introduce a word for your Redeemer's cause and God's glory. Your journies are like your visits, rendered useful for evangelical purposes and edifying practices. You eat and drink to support your strength, more ably to sustain the bodily evils of life, and be fitted for continual waiting upon God. Gluttony and drunkenness, and luxurious practices and habits, you abhor and avoid. Your hours of sleep are under scriptural regulations, and the demands of necessity in this particular are all that are to be attended to. You trim and cleanse your bodies because you wish to recommend to all that you yourselves are patterns of neatness, hoping to convince them that religion does not admit of negligence and inattention, with respect to decency of outward exterior. In short, it is the design of life to live with the affections, feelings, and habits under the influences of grace-setting before all the operative power of Christ's religion, by having the conversation in heaven, the heart established in grace, and the soul by faith built on the right foundation, Jesus Christ, where it is eternally safe. The soul lives upon Christ, and Christ lives in the soul; and the true end of life is, to know nothing but Christ and him crucified.

The termination of life to a believer in Christ is eternal gain. Death is his everlasting gain. Thus St. Paul having spoken of the design of life, also delights in the contemplation of its end, "To die is gain." Here disappointment, pain, sickness, and even death itself, are to be endured; there eternal certainty, ease, everlasting vigour, and never-ending life, will be for ever enjoyed in the kingdom of glory. Doubts and difficulties often distress the children of God on earth; but in heaven every thing shall be cleared up, and every seeming difficulty removed. Temptations often annoy the believer while here below, but there everlasting victory shall be enjoyed. He shall be freed from bodily encumbrance, fear, temptation, the world, Satan, self, and everything painful either to mind or body. He shall gain an eternal crown of glory, and sit with Christ on his throne. He shall be for ever with the Lord, never to be separated from him any more for ever. Lift up your heads, you doubting, desponding children of God; your redemption draweth nigh. Be not alarmed at the approach of death: it will terminate in your endless gain. You shall shortly chaunt the anthems of redeeming, triumphant love. If converted, you are eternally engraven on the palms of his hands who died for you; and nothing can by any means pluck you out of his hands. To die will be a happy introduction to your immortal souls into supreme enjoyment. A person who lives in Christ shall die in Christ, and have Christ for his portion for ever; thus to live is Christ, and to die is gain. Hence, in concluding this paper, we may each ask the other

What is the tendency of your lives? Are you living Christ or the devil?

If you are contenting yourselves with anything but Christ and salvation, death will be your immediate entrance into everlasting damnation and despair. Let your days and nights, your influence and talents, your time and money, be all employed in the service of God and Christ; and death

will be your final gain. Diligently watch; constantly and fervently pray; read and pray over your Bibles; cast all your cares on Christ, renouncing even creature and self-dependence, and the end of life here will be the commencement of inexpressible glory hereafter. Ever bear in mind the end and object of your creation-namely, God's glory. Let this be the ruling principle of all your feelings and actions; avoid hypocrisy as you would hell, for it undoubtedly leads to it; be sincere in your attachments to the doctrines of grace; let nothing draw you from the practices of holiness, for without you cannot be saved; trust not to your prayers, duties, repentance, or even to your faith; but let all your trust, confidence, and security be in Jesus Christ, and your lives shall be blessed, your deaths happy, and your bodies and souls shall be for ever in heaven.

CORRESPONDENCE.

GENTLEMEN,

To the Editors of the Gospel Magazine.

For thirty years I have been a reader of the GOSPEL MAGAZINE; and often has my soul been refreshed and confirmed in an experimental. knowledge of salvation by its clear and unctious statements of the truth which is in Jesus.

For more than forty years this work was conducted by that faithful man of God, the late W. Row, of Great Marlborough Street (who was the intimate friend of the uncompromising Toplady); when its pages were open to record the testimony of God's witnesses of every name who sought his glory in the dissemination of his own most precious Gospel.

When the Magazine was commenced in 1796, there was no other periodical work in the kingdom which circulated the truth, clearly and fully, to the refutation of false doctrines and heresies, and the inculcation of practical godliness, upon pure Gospel principles. And though I rejoice to know there are now other channels opened for the pure streams of unmixed truth, yet, surely, it must afford the highest gratification to the lovers of old and tried principles, to encourage and countenance by their contributions a periodical that once stood alone in its uniform testimony for God; and according to its original motto "In doctrine showing uncorruptness."

With many sincere followers of Christ I deeply deplore the low state of the true Church; the visible departure from the good old way; the substitution of a form of godliness for the power; human assent for the faith of the operation of God, a presumptuous confidence in the letter of Scripture, for the genuine experience of contrition, humility, and scriptural affection; and the unscriptural novelties of general redemption, as substituted for the distinguishing doctrines of personal election,

particular redemption, regeneration or effectual calling, &c., &c. But with earnest prayer that the present conductors of this work may be kept under the special guidance of the Holy Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ; and that it may ever answer to its original design, I beg to submit the following quotation from an address written expressly for this work by a clergyman of the Church of England, and published in the Number for December, 1796 :

"A WORD TO THE LOVERS OF TRUTH.

"In these days of blasphemy and rebuke, of infidelity, heresy, and error, and of impiety and immorality, their inseparable concomitants-in this awful period of remarkable declension, in some of the once zealous advocates of the truth, from the purity of the Gospel; and the lamentable indifference of the greater part of the professors of orthodoxy, respecting the progress of unadulterated, pure, Christian verity: the few friends of the truth, 'as it is in Jesus,' whose hearts tremble for the ark of the Lord, united at the throne of grace, for the revival of genuine religion, by the pouring forth of the spirit of truth, to discover its beauty, glory, and importance, to the religious world, and so make men valiant for the truth. Jer. ix. 3. The God of truth heard their supplication, and, in the commencement of this year, the GOSPEL MAGAZINE made its appearance. The perusal of the first Number, exhibiting the plan, and presenting a specimen of the work, afforded the most refined pleasure and satisfaction to all who read it with a taste for the whole counsel of God,' and pure, unmixed divinity.

It filled their souls with heavenly joy, mingled with tears of gratitude and thanksgiving to the prayer-answering God. Though the writer of these lines was not so happy as to hear of this publication, till the month of July, yet, at length, he shared in the pleasure and profit which this celebrated work is calculated to convey to every pious mind. No earthly acquisition, profit, or advantage, could yield him a thousandth part of that exalted transporting pleasure, which he experienced in reading the first five Numbers of the GOSPEL MAGAZINE.

The materials are the very best; none of your flimsy compositions, which are neither law, nor Gospel, but sterling truth, in all its brilliancy and glory. A vein of pure uncorrupted divinity runs through this work, with pleasing variety, such as does honour to the heads and hearts of those engaged in it, and cannot fail of giving edification and comfort to every class of readers. In a word, the materials bring this periodical work up to its character, or title, 'A GOSPEL MAGAZINE.'

By carrying out these principles, avoiding all unprofitable controversy, and boldly maintaining in love the WHOLE TRUTH OF THE GOSPEL, under the sacred anointing of the Holy Ghost, this work cannot fail to glorify God, and to advance the spiritual prosperity of his peculiar people. And thus it will justify the remarks of its long-tried and efficient Editor, who said "It is not conducive to set up a party, or to display the fallacious tenets of a sect. It is regulated by one single motive-a dissemination of truth. It is like a watchman sent out to descry all secret machinations, and to sound the alarm, not by an empty clamour

of boisterous zeal, but by vigilance and activity consistent with the momentous post to which it is appointed."

Wishing you much success and the broad seal of Jehovah's approbation, I remain yours to serve in the unity and sympathy of Jesus,

As your work may possibly fall into the hands of some who are more or less exercised upon the subject of Infant Salvation, I will endeavour, with your permission, to communicate to them, through the medium of your pages, the support my own mind has lately experienced in moments of solemn and painful bereavement.

The very day my fourth child entered upon its earthly career, and just as I was congratulating myself upon its arrival, and upon the joy and gladness which lit up the countenances of its little predecessors, my youngest boy was taken seriously ill. The doctor was called; and though, in answer to my earnest inquiries, he assured me there was no cause of apprehension; yet, from the moment of its attack, my mind was impressed with the idea that I should lose him. No pen can portray, nor can any but a parent understand, the conflicting feelings which, from the moment the little sufferer was seized, agitated my bosom. I was seated at the dinner-table, when, without any previous indication of illness, he fell back in a fit into the arms of an attendant. The usual restoratives were instantly applied-he was plunged into a hot bath; and never shall I forget my agonizing feelings as I stood anxiously awaiting the result. In a few minutes my sweet boy was restored, and, with the exception of a little langour, appeared to resume much of his wonted animation.

Still, notwithstanding the doctor's assurance of there being no danger —that the child would surely do well, my mind had received a warning, from the effects of which it could not readily escape. I was conscious that my heart had been in a cold and thankless state-that it had wandered far from God-that it had forsaken the fountain of living waters, and had hewn out unto itself cisterns which now, to my sorrow, had proved broken cisterns, that could hold no water. Conscious of this, I was led at once to recognise a Father's chastening hand; and the fervent prayer of my heart was, not so much that the child should be spared as that the purpose, will, and pleasure of the Almighty should be accomplished; that he would bow my stubborn will to his-not his to mine; and that, above all, he would sanctify the affliction that what

:

ever were the result, whether the life of my dear child were spared or taken, a sense of what the chastising hand of an offended God and Father could do, should have a becoming influence upon my heart, and that my soul might be brought, under the operation of the blessed Spirit, to kiss the rod to despise not the chastenings of the Almighty, and to faint not when I was thus justly rebuked of him.

My naturally-stubborn and rebellious heart was thus, step by step, brought into a submissive frame. Another, and another fit, at distant intervals, succeeded the one previously described, and again and again was my mind influenced by alternate hopes and fears.

At length, when engaged in business, at some distance from my home, a friend called and said, that another fit had seized the little sufferer. My child-my sweet, engaging boy-was no more!

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I will not agitate the reader, nor open afresh the wound in my own bosom, by depicting my return home-the agony of my spirit as I fell prostrate upon my dear departed child-nor my first interview with its mother and little brother and sisters. I have already said much more than I intended upon the loss itself; my object was rather to set forth and describe, to the best of my ability, the goodness, faithfulness, and love of God, in strengthening, supporting, and comforting his people under every affliction wherewith he, in his infinite wisdom, sees fit to visit them. The rod is in a Father's hand; he useth it not in sport; He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men." But there are certain periods in which He sees it needful to lay upon his sons and daughters his afflictive, chastening hand; at the same time, he never, never forgets their frame, but remembers they are dust and therefore is pleased, sooner or later, to accompany every stroke of his hand with some sweet promise of his own most faithful word; such as, "If my children forsake my law, and keep not my commandments, then will I visit their sins with a rod, and their iniquities with stripes; nevertheless (Oh, that blessed nevertheless!), my loving-kindness will I not take from them, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail." "No temptation (or affliction) shall happen unto you but what is common to men; and with every temptation I will make a way for your escape.' Oh, Christianfearful, timid believer-be not dismayed nor discouraged, since the word of promise is set over against, opposite to, and by the side of every affliction, temptation, or sorrow, with which thou canst possibly be exercised.

We may compare God's dealings with his family to a tradesman's account-book; if on the one page be set down, according to the Christian's fears, and at the suggestion of unbelief, a long catalogue against him, like so many large amounts for which the day of payment must come, and he sees not how to meet them; let him but be enabled to look with the eye of faith on to the other page, and there will he discover promise after promise, exactly suited to his need; and by and by, when the page of life is filled, and the Christian is called to balance his books, and give account of his stewardship, he will find the promissory notes of his gracious God and Father in Christ Jesus, have all been so strictly honoured as to leave a balance in his favour; so that neither Death,