of her numerous family, she was tenderly concerned; in seasons of prosperity warning them of their duty and their danger; and amidst the visitations of sorrow, pointing out to them their safety, if they would but be faithful to themselves, under the government of a Being whose nature and whose name is Love. As "Abraham commanded his children and his household after him that they should keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment,' so she left it in solemn charge with me to urge it upon her children and descendants, as her last request, that when it should please her Heavenly Father to take her from them, and her eye could watch over them no longer, they would continue to cherish a forbearing, mild, and compassionate spirit towards each other, and live together in harmony,-that they would seek their happiness in religion as the only spring of happiness to a frail and sinful creature,-and that they would never, for the sake of pursuing either the business or the amusements of the world, neglect the duties of the Lord's day, or the ordinances of the Lord's house. These were her impressive and affecting injunctions entrusted to me, as I beheld her stretched upon her lowly couch in the arms of death. I have fulfilled her wish and I speak both to your understandings and to your hearts when I say, I persuade myself that now her head is laid in the dust, while you bewail the loss of a venerable and indulgent mother, and a warm and disinterested friend, will remember, in your struggles between prin

you

* Gen. xviii. 19.

ciple and temptation, her dying testimony to the cause of God and goodness.

"Hear her, at least, Oh hear her from the grave!"

Before the close of her earthly sojourn, she was called to pass through scenes of oppressive languor and lingering decay. Her eyes grew dim, and the weight of years pressed heavily upon her. She breathed her prayer,-" Cast me not off in the time of old age: forsake me not when my strength faileth." "She raised her voice unto the Lord, and he answered: she cried, and he said, Here I am."* In the calm and sacred retirement of her chamber, secluded as she was from the ordinary occupations and pleasures of society, her thoughts were doubtless often employed in conversing with her Maker and with her own heart-in reviewing with humble and adoring gratitude, the path along which the hand of God had led her-in calling to remembrance the images of those dear companions of her way who had entered into their rest before her-in meditating on the unnumbered blessings that were still spared to her-in reflecting on the vanity of fleeting enjoyments and earthly hopes-in mourning over the infirmities of her nature-in surveying “the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, of the love of Christ which passeth knowledge,"+—and in looking forward to the mighty change which she was soon to undergo.

These are the exercises and contemplations which

* Isaiah lviii. 9.

+ Ephes. iii. 18.

alone can support and enliven old age; and these were the holy musings that poured the balm of peace upon her soul, and enabled her, in the near approach of the last awful trying hour, to express her perfect readiness to bid this world adieu, and to depart.

Thus she descended into “the valley of the shadow of death."* The ancients had a proverbial saying, that "it was good to grow old in Sparta ;" so severe were the laws in that community against disobedience to parents. The friend who has been taken from among us, found it good to grow old in Britain—in a land where the gospel of truth and love is proclaimed, and where its holy influence is felt: for, blessed be God! her feeble tottering steps were supported by that filial piety, ever watchful, ever assiduous, than which the eye cannot rest upon an object more attractive,-which always brings with it its own appropriate reward,‡—and which must now be among the sweetest reliefs of sorrow" to those who mourn in Zion."§

Ps. xxiii. 4.

+ It was a common observation among the Jews, that “ a child ought rather to labour at the mill, than suffer his parents to want."-" Vel in pistrino laborare filium debere, ut parentibus subveniat." How beautifully does Dr. Ogden express the same noble sentiment! "I do not condescend to mention," says he," that your parents may be in want; they must not be so while you have any thing, though it were only strength to maintain them by your labour."-Ogden's Sermons, vol. ii. p. 133. ed. 1788.

"He that honoureth his father, shall have joy of his own children."-Ecclus. iii. 5.

Isaiah lxi. 1.

"Behold the hour cometh when all that are in their graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live."* Then our venerated sister will find it of more avail to have been faithful to her family, and upright and kind to her fellowcreatures; to have lived in the fear of God and to have sat, like Mary, at the feet of Jesus and heard his words," than to have shone in the circles of the fashionable and the gay, to have revelled in all the gratifications of pleasure or ambition, to have been “clothed in purple and fine linen, and to have fared sumptuously every day.”‡

From her example let us learn how respectable and happy old age may be rendered, by giving up the heart in early youth to God. It is religion which can bring to the aged, consolations more cheering than all the enjoyments that time has taken from them, and make "the desert blossom as the rose."§ It is religion which, when the leaves are falling and the winter is gathering, can lead the thoughts to those green pastures and those still waters where there is everlasting spring for the holy and the good. It is religion, and religion only, which can disarm death of its terrors, and gild the closing hour with the radiance of immortal glory.

Let those whose shadows lengthen as the day goes down, be desirous of possessing the faith and imitating the patience of our departed sister. Then, amidst the desolations of time and the ravages of the

* John v. 25. Luke xvi. 19.

+ Luke x. 39.

§ Isaiah xxxv. 1.

destroyer, they will feel that they are neither friendless nor alone.

To us, who statedly assemble beneath this roof, God has again spoken. Again echoes from the tomb fall upon our ears. Another of our fellow worshippers is gone! Oh! let us think on that day, when in slow and solemn procession our cold remains will be borne along the streets,-when the careless or sympathizing multitude will assemble around the new-made grave, and when the friends who love us will find a vacancy in their home and in their hearts; because" the place that once knew us, knoweth us no more. Perhaps that day is near! A few-it may be but a few-more suns shall rise and set, a few more mornings break, a few more evenings spread their shades-and it will be present! Are we endeavouring so to live, as that our dying pillow may be calm and peaceful, that our prospect into an eternal world may be cloudless and happy, that we may leave behind us a claim to fond regret, and that at length an entrance may be ministered unto us abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ!"+

66

"Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching."

* Psalm ciii. 16. + 2 Pet. i. 11.

Luke xii. 37.