tion issue from beneath it. Before it, angels touch their harps of living melody, and saints, in sweet response, breathe forth to the listening heavens their grateful songs. The breezes of Paradise waft the symphony, and the bending sky directs it to the earth. The redeemed of the LORD, catch the distant sound, and feel a sudden rapture. "Tis the voice of departed Friendship-friendship, the loss of which they mourn upon the earth, but which they are now assured will be restored in the heavens: from whence a voice is heard to say, "Fear not ye, death cannot injure you; the grave cannot confine you: through its chill mansion, CRACE will conduct you up to glory. We wait your arrival-haste, therefore, come away" All this Christianity will do for you. It will do more than this: It consecrates the sepulchre, into which your bodies, already touched by death, will presently descend. There, mouldered into dust, your flesh shall rest in HOPE. Nor will the season of its humiliation last for ever. Christianity, faithful to her trust, appears for its redemption. She approaches, and stands before the tomb: She stretches out her sceptre and smites the sepulchre-Its mossgrown covering rends assunder, She cries to the silent inhabitants within it-Her energizing voice echoes along the cold, damp vaults of death, renovating skin and bones, and dust and putrefaction. Corruption puts on incorruption, and mortal immortality. Her former habitation, thus refined and sublimated by the resurrection, the exulting soul reenters, and thenceforth the measure of her joy is full. Here thought and language fail me. Inspiration itself describes the glories of futurity by declaring them indescribable. Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive the things which are prepared for the people of GOD.-What ideas are these! How must the soul exult at the prospect, and swell with the amazing conception! As Christianity exhibits the most enrapturing motives to the practice of virtue, so it urges the most tremendous considerations to deter from vice. She declares, solemnly and irrevocably declares, "That the wages of sin are DEATH." And to enforce her declaration, points to the concluding scene of nature: When, amidst a departing heaven and a dissolving world, the Son of MAN shall descend, with the voice of the archangel and the trump of GOD, to be glorified in his saints and take vengeance on his enemies! Such is the Gospel...and here I rest my observations........At this affecting crisis, my beloved pupils, THIS GOSPEL I deliver you. It is the most invaluable gift; and I solemnly adjure you to preserve it inviolate for ever. To whatever part of GOD's creation you may wander, carry this with you. Consult it in prosperity; resort to it in trouble; shield yourselves with it in danger, and rest your fainting head on it in death. More efficacious than the fabled "ring of Amurath," it consecrates its keeper; preserves his life, and eternizes his memory. While you prize and preserve this gift, which I now entrust to you, your happi, ness is secure. The world may be convulsed around you, the elements dissolve, and the heavens depart, still your happiness is secure.......But should you ever, in an hour of rashness, be tempted to cast it from you; remember, that with it, you cast away SALVATION. 'Tis the last hope of sinful, dying man. This gone...all is lost! Immortality is lostand lost also is the soul which might otherwise have inherited and enjoyed it. Under these impressions, go forth into the world-and may GOD go with you. Committing you to his care, and with a heart full of parental solicitude for your welfare, I bid you an affectionate and final FAREWELL. J |