concerns ! Let a man become religious at whatever season of life, he is sure to find his heart pre-occupied by a host of corporeal appetites, which he can only buffet and starve into a surrender. He cannot pray, without having his holiest breathings disturbed and polluted by the demands of carnal desire and bodily appetite. He cannot converse with his conscience, without having the small still voice drowned amidst the loud clamours of the flesh. And aided, as these ceaseless efforts of the mere animal part of his nature unhappily are, by the treacherous and earthward tendency of the fallen soul itself, how can he fail to cry out with the apostle,' O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' Then the body imparts increased sensibility to the domestic and social affections. Our Lord assures us, that in the resurrection there shall be no marrying, neither giving in marriage;' an announcement which plainly implies that the affections which cement the marriage union and other domestic and social relations, are, at least in part, purely animal instincts which are not to survive our present bodily organization. The bitter griefs, therefore, which such affections cause us when they are lacerated by the loss of friends, must be due, in some measure, to the connection of the soul with a corporeal frame; and must fall to be added to the physical 'burden under which the believer has here to groan.' Nor are such griefs a small enhancement of the 'burden. The sorrow of an unconverted man for the death of a beloved relative, is often a slight and medicable wound compared with that of a Christian. The former, caring little about the eternal destiny of his departed friend, has nothing more than his own personal or family loss to sadden him. But the latter has often the added grief of fearful misgivings as to the everlasting state of the soul that has gone to its place. This to the believer is the point on which his sensibility is acutest. Nor indeed can he have a heavier burden, than a heart lacerated by doubts and apprehensions in regard to the salvation of one who was bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh. The child of God is thus encumbered with an 'earthly tabernacle,' which is in many ways a 'burden' to him; and being so, what wonder that he should look onward with wistful eye to the time when his spirit shall be set at large, and enshrined in a new and glorious habitation? The hope of enlargement were itself enough to excite earnest longings for the dissolution of this material frame. But it is his privilege to anticipate not merely deliverance from the drag of a vile body, but investiture with a glorified one. Hope leads him onward to the resurrection, and shows him a house prepared for the eternal residence of his soul, which is as much adapted to develope, as his present crumbling tabernacle is to restrain and cripple his faculties! Once invested in this raiment of paradise, he shall never more know what it is to sorrow, or to suffer, or to die; to labour after what he cannot attain, or undertake what he cannot achieve. The will to do good shall not prove fruitless for want of the power; nor the purpose of holiness remain unexecuted from lack of adequate organs to give effect to it. What a blessed hope! Who would not cherish it? Who would not consent to go out of the body, and leave all the passing attractions of this earthly scene, in order to realize it? Death indeed lies between us and our rest-death! from which nature shrinks with instinctive recoil. But ought we not to forget and overleap the fear of death, in the anticipation of the blessedness which thus stretches away on the farther side of it? Death though a painful way, is still the way to heaven; and what though the valley be dark, when its termination opens upon Emmanuel's broad and pleasant land! TWENTIETH DAY.-EVENING. 'My flesh also shall rest in hope: for thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption,' Psal. xvi. 9, 10. ST PETER, in his sermon on the day of pentecost, offers the following commentary on these words: Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day. Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne; he seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption.' The language of the psalmist is thus the language of Christ himself, in the prospect of that resurrection and glorification which were to follow his sufferings and death. As the curse to which Christ submitted as his people's substitute, included the infliction of the mortal stroke which consigns the body to the grave and the soul to a separate state of existence, so it was indispensable, in order to the mated till the resurrection; the effects of the curse are not finally removed till the resurrection; the end of the Redeemer's mediation is not completely attained till the resurrection: nor can their hope therefore be turned into full fruition, so long as that glorious event is only in the distance. Indeed, the state of departed spirits, blissful as it is, cannot properly be an object of lively hope. We can form no definite idea of the happiness of a spirit abstracted entirely from matter; and the gospel would have done little to endear the prospect of another world, had it merely told us that our souls were to exist in a state of completion of his vicarious work, that his body should die, and his soul go forth into the invisible world deprived of those material organs which are essential to its perfect activity and well-being. But this subjection to the power of death was to be but temporary. It was the only remaining effect of the curse which had to be endured, and consequently the immediate precursor of his release and reward. The curse being fully exhausted, it was impossible that he could be holden of the bonds of death. Divine justice had then no alternative but to loosen these bonds-to re-unite his soul and body-and by awarding him the public honours of a resurrection, to acknow-widowhood from their material organs. ledge and proclaim the perfection of his sacrifice, idea of a resurrection, however, there is every and the glory of his character as a Saviour. All thing to kindle hope and excite desire. The this, accordingly, Christ foresaw. And so glad- felicity of an embodied soul in a material headening was the prospect to his suffering spirit, ven, falls in some degree within the range of our that for the joy thus set before him he cheerfully conceptions and sympathies. And in proportion endured the cross, despising the shame, and as we feel the burden of a polluted soul, and the exultingly exclaimed, even in the hour of his bitter clog of a vile body, we cannot but long for the agony, Therefore my heart is glad, and my arrival of the time when the perfected spirit tongue rejoiceth.' shall be united to a glorious and incorruptible body. This hope of a joyful resurrection which cheered the Redeemer in the prospect of death, may be warrantably entertained by all his followers. For, by raising the Head from the grave, God has given a decisive pledge that he will also raise the members. Not only is the believer's soul united to Christ, and treated by God as a part of Christ, but his body participates equally in the mystical union. His very dust is dear to God on Christ's account. Nor in truth can Christ himself be said to be fully risen from the dead, until the body of every one of his people is clothed in the glory of the resurrection. Believers, indeed, are not authorised to calculate on as brief a detention under the dominion of mortality as their Master. Their flesh must see corruption, and their souls remain—it may be for long ages-dissevered from their material vehicles. Yet eventual resurrection in an embodied state is secured to them. And it is not less their privilege, than it was his, to rise superior to the fear of the last enemy, through 'the sure and certain hope' of a blessed resurrection. TWENTY-FIRST DAY.-MORNING. In the For if we believe that Jesus died, and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him,' 1 Thes. iv. 14. FAITH in Christ Jesus-a full belief of his divine nature and dying love-forbids every doubt of the fulfilment of his gracious purposes towards those who have trusted in his name. Has he indeed expiated sin by his death on the cross in our stead, and risen from the grave in our nature? and shall he fail in any respect, in carrying out the glorious purpose, for which he came into the world and became obedient unto death; 'even to bring many sons unto glory? Shall he return without them, as if foiled in his plan, or failing in his love? If we believe either in his purpose or his power to save, we can never admit any such unworthy apprehensions into our minds. He shall see of Not that the happiness of believers is all deferred the travail of his soul, and be satisfied.' He shall till the resurrection of the just. No! Death bring with him a multitude, which no man can introduces their souls immediately into glory. number. His glory is essentially concerned in The intermediate state, though in itself a fruit the result. They that believe in him shall be of the curse, has been turned into a bless-raised by his might, through his merits, and in ing by Christ's passage through it; and in it his likeness. 'Because he lives, they shall live therefore their souls may enjoy, in the presence also,' as to their immortal souls; and as he rose of their Lord, a prelibation of the felicity from the sepulchre, they shall rise also as to their reserved for them at the redemption of the mortal bodies. His resurrection is at once the body. Still their happiness is not consum- proof, the pledge, and the pattern of theirs. 'Ile dead. 'As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.' All mankind, by the Lord's interposition, being placed under a dispensation of mercy, shall be raised from the grave and brought forth for judgment; but to those only who are one with him by faith, can this hath abolished death;' and no part of their nature | repair all the ruins of the fall. By man came shall be left under its power. Now is Christ death, by man came also the resurrection of the risen from the dead and become the first-fruits of them that slept.' 'Christ the first-fruits, and afterwards they that are Christ's, at his coming.' The general harvest shall correspond to that which was first gathered. They that are his shall be like him-conformed to his image in all parts of that nature which he hath assumed-resurrection be spoken of as indeed a blessing. ransomed, renewed, raised up and exalted to heavenly places. They shall be changed as spirits into the same image, as by the Spirit of the Lord;' and their 'vile bodies shall be fashioned like unto his own glorious body. Nor does this follow merely as a truth-'a part of the truth as it is in Jesus,' which we receive and rest upon by our faith in him: it follows also, as a consequence of that faith in him by which they live. Believers, by their faith, become one with him in whom they believe; and are united with him as the vine with its root, as the members with the head. As his mystical body, they are animated by his life-giving Spirit; they are bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh;' and this connection nothing can destroy, not even the stroke of death. Their bodies shall be raised up as his was; rendered spiritual and incorruptible as his own now is; fitted for the occupations and enjoyments of his heavenly mansions; brought together with him to be where he is, and to see him as he is. This resurrection of the body, of the same body, though dissolved into its elements, and dispersed in the dust, is indeed a great mystery, and is declared to us as a mystery. The manner of it is not revealed, and is not an object of our faith. It is the fact only that is made known, and with which we are concerned. Our belief of this fact is at once resolvable into our belief of the power of God. It is not an incredible thing, that God should raise the dead; that he can give, as he hath said that he will give, to every one his own body as easily as he gave to that body its first existence. God hath both raised up the Lord, and will raise up us also by his power.' As believing, then, that Jesus died and rose again, so may we be assured that those who sleep in Jesus God will bring with him,' in their bodies as well as in their souls. As he brought back their Lord and Head, so will he bring with him all that are his, as in fact a part of himself; as not only his purchased property, but as his own proper body, from which he shall never more be disjoined. The great Redeemer came into the world to destroy all the works of the devil, to do away with all the consequences of sin, to Of all such he is more especially the representative and the forerunner; and they shall all go whither the forerunner is for them entered,' and in the same nature with which he entered. As, in consequence of their relation to Adam, they received the taint of mortality in their bodily frames, and so became subject to death; so, in consequence of their relation to Christ, shall they receive the power of an endless life, and be raised up in their mortal frames in the image of God, in which they were at first created; yea, even in more than its original brightness. "The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwelling in them now as his temples, shall also quicken their mortal bodies, and bring them forth as temples restored from their ruins, and rendered meet for his service in heavenly places. Waiting for this redemption of their bodies, and their full manifestation as the sons of God, they rest in peace as on their beds, as in a sleep. Immediately after their departure from the body their souls have passed into glory; 'but their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves,' as in a quiet chamber which he hath consecrated for their use, by making it for a season his own resting place in their nature. Their bodies, therefore, are not to be viewed as cast forth, as done with and thrown away, as a mere mass of corruption; but, having been once the habitation of his Spirit, they are still embalmed by a preserving principle, which shall cause them to spring up from the dust of the earth more glorious than ever. Thus, like seed sown in the ground, they, properly speaking, do not die, but rather pass through a quickening process, and are prepared to spring up again under the lifebreathing power of an eternal spring. There is then nothing to distress the feelings, in thinking of those who have died in the Lord, or in waiting the dissolution which awaits our own mortal bodies. They are then laid in the silent grave, as on a bed of repose, about to take a sleep for a season. They are sensible of no lapse of time, no weariness, no inconvenience or injury whatever; but pass, as it were, a short night in safe seclusion and peaceful slumber, till called forth by the morning of the resurrection, refreshed, renewed, refined, and reunited to their immortal spirits, but willing to save, we may confidently say in in blessedness unspeakable and unalloyed through his name to them that are dead in sin, yea, to eternal ages. Then shall be fulfilled the saying, 'death is swallowed up in victory;' and then shall be heard the unceasing song of praise, "thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.' the vilest of them all, that they may inherit, as Such especially is the language of the event here related, of the words here recorded, 'I say unto thee, thou shalt be with me in paradise.' Unto whom was this gracious promise made, and made so freely and so fully, without any reserve or restriction, and with so much readiness and compassion? To the thief on the cross-to a poor condemned, deserted, and dying malefactor, in the last hour of his existence, in the lowest extremity of wretchedness. Here we behold a suppliant at the throne of grace, who had no worthiness to recommend him as any grounds of his acceptance, who had wrought only evil in his place, who had nothing to say for himself before his judge, and who could only pray to be remembered in mercy. Here we read of the gracious declaration of the mercy which he sought, granted without any delay, without any condition, without any abatement; granted to the fullest extent, and beyond what he presumed to seek. Not only was he remembered in mercy, not merely released from In these few words, spoken in such circumstances, how bright a display is presented to us of the glory and grace of the Redeemer; of the glory of his power to save to the uttermost, and the riches of his grace to all who come unto God by him. At such a moment, when he appeared most destitute of all power to save himself, and was taunted on that account by one of the abjects of the earth; when nailed to the ignominious cross, and sinking under the rage of his enemies; deserted by every earthly friend, and accounted of men to be forsaken also and stricken of God; yielding up his life, and ceasing from all farther contest, as one utterly discomfited and overcome by a strength superior to his own; even at such a moment does he speak of possessing a king-punishment, not merely encouraged to hope for dom and bestowing a place in paradise. Then indeed it was that his right hand got him the victory, and gained kingdoms for his disposal, even in his fall, dealing the mortal blow to the adversary, and saying of his mighty work, 'It is finished.' Then it was that he 'spoiled principalities and powers, and made a show of them openly, triumphing over them, even on the cross.' In the assurance of this triumph from that very cross, and while yielding up the ghost, did he utter these memorable words, 'Verily I say unto thee, To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.' Truly, the weakness of God is stronger than men. "Though the Lord, as man, was crucified through weakness, yet he liveth by the power of God, and liveth as God for evermore, to bestow eternal life on as many as God hath given him.' But here we behold, more especially, the riches of his grace, in that, as soon as he receives the power to save, he forthwith proceeds to exercise it, and freely to bestow his crowns of life. Not only may we say, in regard to the merits of his death, and the power of his resurrection, "That all who sleep in Jesus God will bring with him; but, in the assurance of his being not only mighty some favour, not merely raised to a portion of enjoyment, but received at once to the blessedness of heaven, and to the presence of his Lord: To-day thou shalt be with me in paradise.' We have read in the clearest language, or rather we witness in actual exemplification, the most gracious truth, the most consoling assurance to a fallen and sinful world, the inexhaustible compassion of the divine Redeemer, even to the most evil and unworthy of mankind, whenever they cast themselves on his mercy, and commit their spirits to his hand. Let no one ever despair of that mercy, either in his own case, or in the case of others, however long they have delayed, however heinously they have sinned. In the salvation of sinners nothing is imposible for divine mercy to grant, for divine mercy to accomplish. At no time is repentance too late, or the prayer of faith unavailing. Every thing in this case, and in the whole strain of the blessed gospel, conspires to prove the consoling truth to men, that when God pleases, he can enlighten the darkest minds, and soften the hardest heart, and humble the proudest spirit, and cleanse the most polluted soul; and thus plant holy fear, repentance, faith, love, and every hea- | of a holy life. Let all this be duly kept in mind, venly affection in that breast, which before was not, indeed, as his work of merit, procuring his occupied by the vilest abominations.' To this admission into paradise, but as the way of his premiracle of mercy then we must look, in our con-paration, making him meet for its blessedness; cern for the most hardened, that we may clearly and, while any think of being saved as he was, see the power of God's grace, and the proof of its let them think also of being sanctified as he was. unseen working for the conversion of lost souls. Let all hear, also, from these words of the To this miracle of mercy we must point the eye Saviour, a loud call both of encouragement and of those who have grown old in sin, and delayed of urgency, thus to prepare for his presence: repentance to the last hour; and remind them To-day thou shalt be with me in paradise.' always that the same Saviour is still ready to How solemn the admonition thus conveyed in pray for them, and the same Spirit still able to one brief impressive word, and yet how consolapacify them; 'that the same Lord over all is rich tory to all who listen aright to its friendly voice. unto all that call upon him.' 'Whosoever shall How short may be the passage, how speedy the call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.' transition from time to eternity? This day, this Neither, however, let any one madly pervert night, may the soul of any one be required to this singular instance of heavenly grace, by delib- meet the Lord in judgment, to remain with him erately delaying to turn unto God, in the hope in paradise, or to pass on to outer darkness. In of experiencing a similar act of his sovereign a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, may the mercy. There is one such case recorded in his sinner be summoned to receive his final condemword, that no soul may despair of his mercy, nation, and the saint be invited to enter upon his when brought at last to seek it in sincerity and heavenly rest. How awful and how urgent the in faith; but only one such case recorded, that no call thus given to watchfulness, to diligence, to soul may presume upon his mercy, while now patience, to daily waiting for the Lord. "What refusing to seek it, or rather rejecting its gracious manner of persons ought we to be in all holy offer in his word. Not that the Lord will ever conversation and godliness! how diligent that we refuse to hear a similar prayer, but that the sin- may at last be found of him in peace, without ner may never have the time, or the power, or spot, and blameless.' the heart to offer a similar prayer. Let all take every encouragement from this case; but let them take, for their instruction, the whole case. indeed, the one thief on the cross dying penitent, and heard in his dying prayer; but see also the other, equally near to the Saviour, and equally in need of his grace, dying hardened, and only blaspheming in his death. Let all learn in time to fear, that a thoughtless death is the ordinary issue of a thoughtless life. Let all rejoice in such a trophy of divine grace, encouraging them to draw near; but let no one pervert it into a temptation of the devil, enticing them to stand afar off. See, Let us look still farther into the whole of this case, and see that while the Redeemer is ready to save, he is also resolved to sanctify; that while pardoning the sinner he puts away also the power of sin. Before he here said, 'To-day thou shalt be with me in paradise,' he first previously prepared the departing spirit for the enjoyment of paradise. Here we see, in the penitent thief, a true sense of his own sin, a sight of the Saviour's excellence, an open avowal of his own faith, a compassionate concern for a fellow-sinner, a desire to be with Christ, and a humble prayer for his favour; all those essential graces, in short, in embryo, which might have expanded in time into all the duties TWENTY-SECOND DAY.-MORNING. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me,' Psal. xxiii. 4. THERE is a fear of death which all men instinctively feel, and are naturally formed to feel, and are in all reason warranted to feel. Viewed merely as the loss of life, and as a separation from all that we love in life, as the painful dissolution of the mortal frame, and our final entrance into the world of spirits, we naturally shrink from every appearance of its awful form, from every apprehension of its immediate approach. This dread of what may be termed the stroke of death;' the act of dying-the hour of departing, this dread of dissolution, is intimately interwoven with man's present being, and is, in fact, essential to the preservation of his earthly existence; and, however much it may at times be overcome by the power of strong or sudden emotions, it is the deliberate sense of mankind, that death is one of the greatest evils, which, either as an injury or a penalty, they can inflict upon a fellow-creature; |