providence had brought his affairs to a determination, that prince would shelter them from the fury of Saul, which might otherwise have proved fatal to them, as it had just before done, to the priests of the Lord. Perhaps this was the pious reflection of David, about the time his parents were to remove; When my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up: As if he should have said, " Though an host of my enemies be encamping against me, and the nation be rising in arms to oppose me; and though I be forced to dismiss my aged parents, at a time when I have the greatest occasion for their prudent advice, and their tender consolations; yet this is my comfort, that God is with me: He will supply what I lose in them; he will take me up, and nourish me as his own child, when their parental tenderness can afford me no farther support. The words will naturally afford us these two plain remarks, which, with the improvement of them, will be the foundation of the present discourse. I. The dearest of our relatives, and the most valuable of our friends, may possibly forsake us. II. When good men are abandoned by their dearest friends, they may find more in God, than they have lost in them. When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up. I. The dearest of our relatives, and the most valuable of our friends, may possibly forsake us. You see David speaks of it, as at least a supposable case, with regard to himself, that not only his followers, his companions and his brethren, but even his father and his mother might forsake him. All the intimacy of relation, all the endearment of affection, could not secure him from being deserted by them. And this may be our own case-our friends may abandon us through their own unkindness,-or God may remove them by the stroke of his providence. 1. Our dearest friends may abandon us through their own unkindness. It is the remarkable saying of one, who had made many serious reflections on this head; * 66 "If you put so much confidence in any friend, as not to consider, that it is possible he may become your enemy, you know man but little, and perhaps may be taught to know him better to your cost." Change of cir Mr. Baxter. cumstances, contrariety of interest, our own mistakes, the misrepresentations of others, and sometimes mere caprice, and inconstancy of temper, render those indifferent, and perhaps averse to each other, who were once united in the bonds of the most endearing friendship: Nay, it is certain, that sometimes an immoderate and ungoverned fondness on both sides, may not only justly provoke God to disappoint our hopes from each other; but may prove, in its natural consequences, an occasion of mutual disgust, and perhaps of separation. For, when the mind labours under this disorder, it contracts a kind of sickly peevishness, which turns every trifling neglect into an offence, and every offence into a crime; so that men find the extremes of love and hatred more nearly connected, than they could once have believed. Sudden fear will drive away some friends when we are in danger; and a much meaner principle will lead others, who, in better days, have called themselves our friends, to abandon, and, perhaps to censure us, when, we are reduced to low circumstances, and so have the greatest need of their assistance. Such is the vanity of human friendship: And I will add, that neither, on the one hand, the sincerity of our affection, nor the worth of our character, nor the urgency of our affairs; nor, on the other hand, the former appearance of goodness in them, nor the highest obligations of gratitude; nor yet the nearest ties of blood or alliance, can secure us from disappointment in this tender article. David and Job, under the Old Testament, and Paul, and even his blessed Master, under the New, though all such excellent persons, were forsaken, and in several respects injured, by their friends; nay, I may say as to most of them, by pious friends too. Such treatment therefore may we meet with from ours, even from those to whom we are related in the bonds of nature as well as affection.-What union can be more strict and endearing, than that of marriage? Yet you know, Job complains while he was in circumstances which might have drawn tears from the eyes of a stranger, that his wife seemed to have forgot, not only the tenderness of her sex, and the intimacy of her relation, but even all sense of common humanity towards him: My breath, says he, is strange to my wife, though I intreated her for the children's sake of mine own body*.-From whom could we expect greater tenderness, than from parents to their children, especially from mothers to their infant offspring? Yet God expressly declares, what has indeed been seen in some amazing * Job xix. 17. instances, that this may fail. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the child of her womb? The little tender creature, that she has borne in her body, that she has been used to lay in her bosom; the poor innocent that never offended her, that has all his dependence upon her; whom nature would therefore prompt her most resolutely to defend, most tenderly to cherish; can she forget it? Yea, they may forget, saith the Lord*: This strange case may happen; it may happen in repeated instances. Thus may our dearest friends, and even our parents themselves, abandon us through their own unkindness. But be they ever so constant and affectionate, it is certain, 2. They may be taken away from us by the stroke of divine providence. Whilst we are in the most delightful manner conversing with our friends, God may bring us into such circumstances, that we shall see ourselves obliged in duty to quit the dearest of them, possibly even contrary to their judgment and advice, as well as their importunate intreaties; or they may see themselves obliged, on the same principles, to quit us; so that we may seldom have the opportunity of seeing each other, and enjoying the pleasure of mutual converse. But the severest trial is, when God sees fit to remove them by death. When that awful messenger gives the summons, we must part, though ever so desirous of continuing together. None can by any means deliver his brother from going down to the grave, nor give to God a ransom for himt, though he should offer his own life under that view. Our Fathers, where are they‡? And, I may add, where are many of our brethren of the same age, and once in the same stations of life with ourselves? What multitudes of them are already removed by death! Perhaps more than are left behind. We have followed them to the grave, we have left them in the dust, and Their places that knew them, know them no more§: And if we are not quickly taken away ourselves, we must expect, that our breaches, will soon be multiplied upon us; and that nothing will remain of those dear creatures, whom we now behold with tenderness, and with transport, but a mournful remembrance that we once enjoyed them, and a despair of recovering them again, till we meet in the eternal world. Isa. xlix. 15. Psal. xlix. 7, 8. + Zech. i. 5. § Job. vii. 10. I will only add one very obvious reflection upon this head, and then proceed to the next. May the dearest of our friends so soon forsake us? Then how careful should we be, that we do not value them too highly, and love them too fondly? We find in scripture, that the inconstancy, and the mortality of human nature, are each of them urged as an argument against trusting in man. Thus we are cautioned to Take heed every one of his neighbour, and not to trust in any brother, for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbour will walk with slanders*. And elsewhere we are bid to Cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted off? And how indeed can we reckon on any thing as certain, which is suspended on so uncertain a life? The words of Solomon are applicable to friends, as well as to riches, when he says, Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? for they make themselves wings, and flee away, often swiftly and irrecoverably, as an eagle towards heavent. To set them up as idols therefore, in the place of God, is the readiest way to provoke him to remove or imbitter them; and then our Own iniquity, in this respect, will correct us§. Our confident expectation from them will increase our perplexity and our shame, if they should forsake us through their own unkindness; and our excessive fondness for them will add new pangs to the agonics of a last separation. One way, or another, they will prove Broken reeds, that will not only fail and sink under us, but will go into our hand and pierce it|| with a wound, which will be deep and painful, in proportion to the stress with which we have leaned upon them. On the whole, then, let us love our friends heartily, but let us love them cautiously, as changeable, and as mortal creatures; and from a conviction, that it is possible they may forsake us, let us make it our greatest care to secure an interest in such consolations, as may be a support to us when they do. Which leads me to the second observation: II. That when good men are abandoned by their dearest friends, they may find more in God, than they have lost in them. So David, in the text, declares his assurance, that when his father and his mother forsook him, then the Lord would take him up; i. e. would approve himself a friend and a father to him. And if we be christians indeed, we may promise our • Jer. ix. 4. † Isai. ii. 22. Prov. xxiii. 5. § Jer. ii. 19. Isa. xxxvi. 6. selves all that tenderness and care from him, which David, and other saints of old, expected and found. He hath said to every one of us, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee*; and for our peculiar support under the loss of the dearest and most useful relatives, he has more particularly added, A Father of the fatherless, and a Judge of the widows, is God in his holy habitation+. When our friends are dead, we are generally more sensible of their value, than we were before: But let the tenderest heart, under the immediate impression of this severe calamity, set itself to paint the character of a departed friend in all its most amiable colours; let it reckon up all the advantages, which fondness could have taught it to hope for; and I will answer for it, that all this, and a great deal more, is to be found in God. Let the dejected orphan, that is even now weeping over the dust of a parent, yea, of both its parents, say, what these parents, in the greatest supposable advantages of cha racter and circumstance, could have done for its support, and its consolation; and the complaints of the most pathetic sorrow shall suggest thoughts, which may serve in a great measure, to answer themselves, and to engage the mind joyfully to acquiesce in the divine care, though deserted by the best of parents, or any other friends, however hopeful or useful. "Alas," will a dutiful and affectionate child be ready to say, in such a circumstance, " do you ask, what my parents were? They were my dearest, my kindest, my most valuable friends-Their counsels guided me ;-their care protected me ;-their daily converse was the joy of my life ;—their tender condolance revived me under my sorrows;-their liberal bounty supplied my necessities. Is it to be inquired, what they were? Say rather, what were they not? And now they are gone, where must I seek such friends? And how justly may I say, that my dearest comforts and hopes lie buried with their precious remains." Let us more particularly survey each of these thoughts, and consider with how much greater advantage each of these particulars is to be found in the paternal care and favour of God. 1. Could your parents have advised you in difficulties and plexities? God is much more able to do it, per You will perhaps say, "Our poor giddy unpractised minds |