cheek of departed excellence, and is shed on those eyes which are now, indeed, closed in death, but which once sparkled with holy joy, or wept with holy sorrow. Behold such a family kneeling around the mortal remains of a pious and deceased parent, adoring the Almighty for favoring them so long with such a teacher and such a guide, and praying, now that he is gone, that they may be enabled to follow him as he followed Christ! How suitable to such

an occasion are the words of our Church in her Communion Service! "We also bless thy holy name, for all thy servants departed this life in thy faith and fear; beseeching thee to give us grace so to follow their good examples, that with them we may be partakers of thy heavenly kingdom. Grant this, O Father, for Jesus Christ's sake, our only Mediator and Advocate."

Time would fail us to point out the blessedness of such a family, as, one after another, they fall asleep in Jesus, and are gathered to their fathers. Their remembrance is sacred and honorable ;-honored by the

righteous, and frequently even by the wicked;-honored as those who were the children of God, the light of the world, the benefactors of mankind, and the ornaments of the church. Yes, verily, such honor have all God's saints.

How different, my brethren, how widely different, the state, the comforts, and the prospects of the household uninfluenced by the religion of the Bible and the love of the Saviour! Wealth, beauty, and accomplishments are the chief object of desire and pursuit. Dissimulation and hypocrisy, toward particular persons or to meet particular ends, are early instilled into the mind, even as forming a part of a good education. Conscience is termed scrupulosity, and real religion misrepresented as enthusiasm. God's worship is despised; his Name profaned; his grace rejected. Such a family may be fashionable; but they are not pious, and therefore not happy. They possess no fixed principles to direct their conduct, and have no shelter to repair to, when the storm gathers, or bursts with fury on them.

They despise God, his word, his ministers, and his beloved Son! The humble contrite saint who resides near them, they regard, not only with indifference but with scorn. They ridicule the weakness of that human intellect which bows with holy submission to the assertions of revealed truth; and they treat, as the deluded victim of fanaticism, the pious disciple who dares to confess Christ before men, or to testify the solid comfort he finds in the religion of Jesus. The oft-refuted arguments, or rather sophisms, of ungodly men, against the history and doctrines of the Gospel they are always ready to produce, to stagger the young Christian, or to confirm the sceptic in his infidelity, or to raise the laugh against Christianity; that most horrible laughter! more becoming the inhabitants of the infernal regions than man redeemed by the blood of the cross. Prosperity to such characters is only the instrument of evil, and the right hand of iniquity. Wealth is employed against the honor of Him who gave it, and power is used to oppose the cause and the interests of religion.

Such a family is exposed, in common with others, to the pains and sufferings, the losses and bereavements, incident to this mortal state. But, alas! they know nothing of the supporting and comforting influences of Divine grace. When called to surrender their friends and relatives to the stern demand of death, there is no cheering hope of meeting again in a better world, no delightful anticipations of heavenly enjoyments and eternal glories. As a family they despised God, and as a family they shall be lightly esteemed. But how lightly esteemed we cannot fully know, till the sounding of the trumpet, the resurrection of the dead, and the final judgment of mankind. At that solemn period how utterly contemptible, and how truly worthless will such persons appear! They shall seethe righteous man stand in great boldness before the face of such as have afflicted him, and made no account of his labors. When they see it they shall be troubled with terrible fear, and shall be amazed at the strangeness of his salvation, so far beyond all that they looked for. And they, repenting and groaning for

anguish of spirit, shall say within themselves; this is he whom we had sometimes in derision, and a proverb of reproach: we fools accounted his life madness, and his end to be without honor. How is he numbered among the children of God, and his lot among the saints! *"

And now, my brethren, allow me solemnly to ask you, Are you thus honoring God as individuals, and in your families? Whatever be your rank or station, be it known unto you, this day, that the subject we have been considering is of infinite moment to you all. What then are your views, what your feelings and conduct in this matter? Have you seen the infinite importance of personal and of domestic piety? Alas! what shall a man be profited if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul; or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? We stand not here to flatter the rich or the great, or men in office and in power,

* The reader is requested to observe, that this passage is taken from the Apocrypha, and not from the canonical books of the Sacred Scripture. It occurs in the fifth chapter of the Wisdom of Solomon, ver. 1-5.