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DEATH-CERTAIN IN HIS APPROACH.

Oh, then, ere the turf or tomb
Cover us from every eye,

Spirit of instruction come,

Make us learn that we must die!"

CHAPTER IV.

Death-terrific in his aspect.

As pale and wan as ashes was his look,
His body lean and meagre as a rake,

And skin all withered as a dried rook,
Thereto as cold and dreary as a snake,
That seem'd to tremble evermore, and quake;
All in a canvas thin he was bedight,
And girded with a belt of twisted brake,
Upon his head he wore a helmet light,

Made of a dead man's scull, that seem'd a ghastly sight.
SPENSER.

Of all the evils which sin and the curse have brought into the world, death, perhaps, is the most formidable. What, think you, must have been the emotions of our great progenitors, when first they saw his defacing hand on the countenance of their beloved Abel,-when they hung in

silent suspense over the breathless corpse,-when every avenue to the senses was closed, and all was cold and motionless as the frigid marble? They had felt the bitter effects of transgression in their removal from Eden, the seat of pure and uninterrupted bliss, and in the toils and sufferings to which they had been doomed in a wild and barren desert; but neither the loss of Eden's bliss, nor the various natural evils to which they were exposed, would be so appalling in their aspect, as the visage of this ghastly monsterDeath. Habit, indeed, has somewhat softened to us its terrors, and rendered it more familiar to our view. We daily hear of the triumphs which death has made over our neighbours and connexions, and are surrounded by the sad memorials of departed worth. And yet we cannot anticipate its approach to ourselves, nor see its ravages on others, without feelings of dismay and concern.

The Israelites in the wilderness have in all ages been considered as typical of the church of Christ. On their departure from Egypt, Canaan was promised to them for a possession; and they were commanded to drive out the original inhabitants, who, by their sins, had forfeited the divine favour; to build them cities and plant vineyards. The land of promise was emphatically called "a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys

and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig-trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass." And yet between this country, so rich in temporal good, and the dreary desert they had left behind, Jordan, swollen by the melting of mountain snows, rolled her rapid and boisterous tide. The scenery around was wild and mountainous; and the margin of the river well wooded by trees, which had become a covert for beasts of prey. In addition to this, the waters of Jordan were bitter, and emptied themselves into the dead sea: so that every thing contributed to affright the approaching stranger, and render the passage difficult and alarming.

And between the desert of this world and the celestial Canaan rolls the dark river of death; and none can pass from the one to the other without fording its cold and swelling flood. As the Christian pilgrim slowly descends to its dreary banks, he is startled by the sound of the enemy; or alarmed by the hollow murmur of the stream; or terrified by the threatening cloud. All around wears a cheerless and forbidding aspect; and faith alone can penetrate the gloom, and chase away the mists, which conceal the heavenly Canaan from his view. No sooner does he dip his foot in the waters of this Jordan, than

G

a sudden trembling creeps through all his bones; the stream runs high; he starts back; and

"Lingering--shivering on the brink,
He fears to launch away."

To depraved human nature death has always been a formidable enemy, and is, therefore, justly called "the king of terrors." His form is ghastly and emaciated; he is armed with cruel and deadly instruments; and the horse on which he rides is wan and pale. Usually he is preceded by fierce and cruel diseases, with intense pain and suffering. Some, indeed, are mercifully spared those corporeal sufferings, and that mental anguish, by which others are long and painfully exercised. The manner of their departure is so sudden and easy, as rather to resemble a translation, than the ordinary act of dying. At one moment, they are surrounded with all the advantages and comforts of life, and the next, overwhelmed with all the awful realities of eternity. The wheels of nature stop, and its vital springs break and dissolve, without any visible marks of previous derangement. But by far the greater part of the human race arrive at their last long home by a rugged and dreary course. The tempest howls dismally around their frail tabernacle, and is felt through all its joints and crevices; and the pins which hold together the