A FUNERAL SERMON.

"THOU HAST APPOINTED HIS BOUNDS THAT HE CANNOT PASS."-JOB xiv. 5.

THE repeated instances of mortality, with which we have been visited, while they call forth our sympathy, fill us with a profound sense of the mysterious sovereignty and supreme dominion of God. Though he clothes himself in darkness, yet he executes his judgments in righteousness. His path is in the mighty waters, and his footsteps are not known. His warning voice summons us to the tomb, and to the bar of eternal judgment. Let us remember that we too must die. Let us not deceive ourselves by imagining, that youth, or health, or strength; that virtue or learning, or mature age, can, one moment, secure us, against the arrest of death. Let your own experience impress this solemn truth on your hearts. Call to mind your late fellow student who now sleeps in dust. You saw him like yourselves in all the gaiety, sprightliness and bloom of youth; you saw him fall like the morning flower that bows its head in death. O consider that distinguishing goodness, that has spared you; remember your creator now in the days of your youth, and devote yourselves to him in a constant preparation for a future world. You know not how soon, or how suddenly you may be called to descend into the gloomy valley. Perhaps you are now treading at the horizon of time, just ready to step into eternity. If you would be prepared for this solemn event; if

you would leave the world with a hope full of immortality; submit yourselves to the Son of God; embrace his gospel; obey his commands; he has promised eternal life. "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life." "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall we appear with him in glory." "Our bodies shall then be fashioned like to his glorious body."

In affliction and distress, it is a difficult task to bend our minds to that submissive resignation, which a just view of God's character and government, dictates and religion enjoins. God is in all things to be viewed as the supreme and independent governor of all worlds; as infinitely wise and good in all his dispensations. With an impartial stroke he lays the monarch and the slave in the dust. Evil to an enormous extent and degree has prevailed and defaced the workmanship of God. Sin, the cause of all this ruin, has carried sorrow to the heart of every son and daughter of Adam." It is appointed unto men once to die." This sentence from the lip of eternal truth none can evade. Thus says Job, in the language of our text, "Thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass."

In all the afflictions which God is pleased to lay upon us, it is our duty to submit with humble and silent resignation. His language is, "Be still, and know that I am God!" In the instances of mortality which are multiplying around us, he teaches us the vanity of the world, extreme fragility of life; and the precarious tenure of all sublunary enjoyments. We are indeed the heirs of pain, disease and death. God has not left us without hope; for he hath abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light by the gospel." Here is a firm foundation for our hopes in life, in death and in eternity.

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Men have entertained various and opposite opinions concerning death. Some have considered it as the termination of existence, others as a removal from the present to a more happy or miserable state. Some have believed death to be the destruction of all sin, the oblivion of all sorrow, and the commencement of immortal beatitude. A few have believed death to be the suspension of existence till the resurrection. The opinions of men concerning this important subject are at best but

doubtful conjecture. which agitates the heart in a near prospect of dissolution. We tremble at that period which must lodge us in the gloomy mansion of death. A consciousness that our souls will survive our bodies; the ignorance and uncertainty in which we are involved as to the nature of our destiny; are the principal causes of our irreconciliation to our fate. But were the consequences of dissolution fully unfolded, is it not highly probable that our situation would be less eligible and more exposed to inquietude? Is it not reasonable to suppose that our blindness to the future is kindly given? May we not reasonably believe that God has disclosed as much of futurity as is conducive to our good and consistent with our nature as rational accountable creatures? Is it not probable that a full display of the just punishment of sin, would so far overpower and suspend the faculties of impenitent transgressors as to render them incapable of moral government? Is it not probable that a full display of the rewards of virtue, and the joys of heaven, would so highly exalt the expectations and desires of the righteous, as to render them unfit for the present world? God has undoubtedly revealed as much as it was consistent with wisdom and goodness to reveal. The scriptures uniformly connect misery with vice, and happiness with virtue. They clearly portray and define those qualifications which are essential to the possession and enjoyment of true felicity. Those whose hearts respond to the voice of inspiration, enjoy a high assurance, not of perpetual existence, but of perpetual happiness. The idea that death destroys our existence, is repugnant to reason and revelation. In the latter a constant distinction is made between body and spirit. God is styled "the God of the spirits of all flesh," Num. xxvii. 16. Paul speaks of the spirits of the just made perfect; Heb. xii. 23; and of the spirits in prison, 1 Pet. iii. 9. Job says, "there is a spirit in man." David says, "into thy hand I commit my spirit." Christ said to his disciples, "a spirit hath not flesh and bones." Stephen, when stoned to death, as he gave up the ghost, cried, "Lord Jesus receive my spirit." Paul speaks of being absent from the body and present with the Lord. From these expressions it is evident that the separate existence of the soul is taught in the scrip

They afford no relief to that anxiety

tures. Death therefore, ought to be considered as only a change in the manner of our existence; a change to which we are all liable, and, which we must sooner or later experience. For "it is appointed unto man once to die." From this and various other passages in the scriptures, it appears that men are subjected to death, by a divine constitution. It does not appear that man was ever intended for an immortal existence in this world. Such an existence here, however it might at first appear to gratify our wishes, would undoubtedly be inconsistent with our happiness and the benevolence of the Deity. I propose therefore from the words of the text,

I. First, to illustrate the general truth asserted in them. "The appointment of men unto death.

II. Secondly, to shew that this appointment is wise, just and good.

I shall then finish the subject with a few observations.

I. I am first to illustrate the assertion in the text, "The ap pointment of men unto death."

Man is a progressive changeable being. Though his existence is commensurate in duration with that of deity, yet it passes through a variety of states, and is subjected to great vicissitudes. Of all these the human birth, death and resurrection, are the most important. These three changes, considered in connexion with all their consequences, present the scene of man's existence in a rational and splendid point of light. We are apt to entertain unfavorable conceptions of some particular arrangements and providences of God, merely because we view them detached from the great scene of his administration. But if we survey all his ways and works in connection, we shall rest satisfied, that they are marked with the highest wisdom and goodness. The subjection of man to mortality, is an allotment of heaven. God's great plan in the government of the universe is fixed and immutable. In him there is no variableness nor shadow of turning. "Known unto him are all things from the beginning."

God