beauty! Behold her branches which suffer for thy name, and give them deliverance or patience. Let no weapon, that is formed against thy church, prosper: and let all tongues that speak against her be confounded. Let her gates be always open, and glorify the house of thy glory; let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand, that he may guard this plant which thy right hand hath planted. Give thy justice to the king, and thy righteousness to the king's son. Season thy seminaries with thy truth; and bless the house of Levi, and bless the house of Aaron. Turn thy countenance to thy first love, the Jews; and take not thy candlestick, from thy chosen, the Gentiles; that having one Shepherd we may be one flock; and having one faith, we may be one church; and having one heart to please thee, we may have one voice to praise thee, here militant in the kingdom of grace, and hereafter triumphant in the kingdom of glory.

THE MOURNER.

HIS CALAMITY.

FOR stoicism to rejoice at funerals, and lament at births of men, is more absonant to nature than to reason. Too self-indulgent nature would preserve herself on any terms; but wellinstructed reason holds a being but an ill pennyworth, purchased on condition of so long a misery. Who knows himself a man, needs seek no further for a cause to mourn: for what is man

but a sampler of weakness, the spoil of time, the may-game of fortune, the image of inconstancy, the balance of calamity, and what besides, but phlegm and choler? His birth is a painful coming into the world; his life, a sinful continuance in the world; his death, a dreadful going out of the world. His birth brings him into the shop of sin; his childhood binds him apprentice to sin; his youth makes him free in sin; his full age trades in sin; his old age breaks him; his last sickness arrests him; and death casts him into prison. The pleasure he takes is to displease his God; his business is to disturb his neighbour; his study is to destroy himself. His best labour is but vanity, and the fruits of that labour are vexation of spirit: his mirth is a short madness; his sorrow a long torment; his recreation is a formal antic; his devotion an antic formality; his course of life is a quotidian ague, whose cold fits are sloth and charity, whose hot fits are wrath and concupiscence; his pleasures are but airy shadows to beguile him; his honours are but frothy pleasures to betray him; his profit is but golden fetters to beslave him; the effect whereof is sin, the end whereof is death. In brief, he that would learn to be a mourner, let him remember that he is a man. O my soul, is this the pleasure that this world promises? Is this that happiness which the great promiser affords? Had man no hopes of greater happiness than earth can give, how more unhappy were he than a beast! What happiness can counterpoise his sorrow? what mirth can countervail his misery ? what comfort is there in this house of mourning

Where then shall I repose my trust? on whom shall my crushed hopes rely?

Darest thou believe the word of truth? Hark what the word of truth has said:

Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Matth. v. 4.

This is my comfort in my affliction, for thy word hath quickened me. Psal. cxix. 50.

Proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance to comfort all that mourn. Isaiah, lxi. 2.

I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow. Jer. xxxi. 13.

Thou which hast shewed me great and sore troubles, shalt quicken me again, and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth; thou shalt increase my greatness, and comfort me on every side. Psal. Ixxi. 20, 21.

HIS SOLILOQUY.

MISERY is the badge of mortality, and mortality the lot of man. He that views himself impartially, needs seek no subject for a tear. Yet, O my soul, hadst thou not seen thine own misery, how more miserable hadst thou been! Hadst thou been hoodwinked to thy corruptions, hadst thou been blind to thine infirmities, had thy filth been painted over with vanity, how had the way to thy redress been blocked up! how hadst thou stumbled at thyself, and fallen at thine own destruction! O my soul, it is a great part of safety to see a dan

ger; a good step towards health to discover the disease; a fair progress towards happiness to behold thine own misery. But evils discovered and no more, grow sharper by the discovery: he only uses a foreseen danger that endeavours to avoid it; he profits by a discovered disease that labours to amend it; he takes benefit by prevised misery that strives to eschew it. Being fairly warned, my soul, be thou as strongly armed. Dost thou plead weakness? be courageous, and thou shalt be victorious; does sadness cool thy courage? be patient, and thou shalt be comforted; remember thou art militant: dost thou find thyself timorous? strengthen thyself with resolution; dost thou find thyself spent? fortify thyself with prayer.

HIS PRAYER.

O GOD, that hearest the sighing of a contrite heart, and bottlest up the tears of a repentant eye, bow down thy gracious ear, and hear the torments of a grieved breast; look on my tears, and read in them what my closed lips are even ashamed to utter. Thou madest me free, but I have lost my freedom by my rebellion; thou madest me like thyself, but I have blurred thine image by my sin; thou madest me clean and holy, but I have wallowed in the mire of my own corruptions; thou madest me for thy glory, but I have lived to thy dishonour; thou madest me a man, but I have made myself a worm and no man. Lord, I see the misery of my own condition, and without thy mercy I am worse than nothing: but thou art gra

cious and of great compassion, and thy truth endures from generation to generation. Lord, thou hast promised joy to those that grieve, and comfort to them that mourn; in full assurance of thy gracious promise, úpon my bended knees, I humbly sue for thy seasonable performance! Strengthen me, that I may endure this night's sorrow, and let the joy of thy good Spirit cheer me in the morning; let me not grieve like those that go into the pit, nor let my mourning be like theirs that have no hope; let not the vain comforts of the world please me, nor the dead pleasures of the earth rejoice me; make me a willing prisoner to my grief, until thou please to shew thyself the God of consolation; sanctify my sorrows to me, and direct my mourning to the right object; open the flood-gates of mine eyes, that I may weep bitterly for my offences; dissolve my head into a tide of tears, that thou mayest wash away the filth of my corruptions; let nothing stop the current but the assurance of thy love; and let my furrowed cheeks be dried in the sunshine of thy favour. Accept, O God, of this wet sacrifice of tears, and let my groaning be a peace-offering for my trespasses. Look at thy right hand, and for his sake that sits there, grant these my petitions, firmly grounded on thy promise and his merits; that my sad soul, being relieved by thy mercy, may receive endless comfort, and thy name, eternal glory.