my remarks on this fubject; but in my apprehenfion it is a thing of fo fericus a nature that I cannot forbear obferving upon it. I wish you to answer the following queftion to your own confcience; Is there any thing in the fettlement of a Minifter of the gofpe over a people that affords them occafion for vain mirth? Seriouf no more reafon to expect a literal | refurrection of the faints at the commencement of the millennium, than the Jews had to expect the real coming of Elijah in his own perfon, before the appearance of the Meffiah. The coming of John the Baptift, in the power and fpirit of Elias, anfwers the prediction concerning that event: But not more fo than a figuratively confider and thoroughly exrefurrection anfwers to the account of the martyrs living and reigning with Chrift in the millennium, HEMERA. A Letter from Shaphan to his Sifter. Belfaft, April 30, 1802. DEAR SISTER, W HEN I heard of the death of your pious and faithful paftor, I heartily fympathifed with your good people in their affliction. They fuftained a great if not an irreparable lofs. A plain and faithful preacher of the gofpel is a bleffing highly to be prized. I felt an anxious concern for you, as a fociety, left you should be as fheep without a fhepherd, divided, fcattered and loft. But I was happy in lately receiving intelngence that you had refettled the gofpel miniftry among you, and are now in the full and peaceable enjoyment of Christian ordinances. I have, however, been fince acquainted with a particular circumftance, which has excited many painful fenfations, and, in my view, obfcured the profpect of your profiting under the miniftrations of your prefent teacher. I learn that you and feveral other young ladies and gentlemen together with your minifter fpent the evening following the day of Ordination in a dance. I expect to meet your disapprobation in amine this fubject before you reply, and I am perfuaded your anfwer will exprefs my own opin ion. At any time, and particularly at the close of his ordination fo lemnities, was the ball room ye minifter's proper place? He had just been inducted into the facred work of preaching the gospel of Chrift. The paftoral care of the Church and the religious inftruc tion of the people he had just taken upon his hands. Hundreds of immortal fouls had just been committed to his charge, a charge moft folemn and important. All his comfort, fupport, fidelity and fuccefs in the work must be de rived from God; for "who is fufficient for these things." This people who, as to their spiritual concerns, are entrusted with him, he is one day to meet at the bar of our common Judge. And if any perifh through his neglect or bad example, their blood will be required at his hand. This being his fituation, would it not have been fuitable, was it not his indifpenfible duty, to have retired to his clofet for ferious reflections upon the folemn tranfactions of the day, for felf examination and fecret prayer? Inftead of meeting numbers of his people at the unhallowed place where thoughtless mortals fport upon the brink of destruction, and where the folemnities of the past day would be banished from his mind, he fhould have been commending his people to the grace of God which can keep them from the evil and prepare them for glory. He fhould have been afking wifdom from a bove that he might be directed in. to truth and duty and praying God that he would strengthen, encourage and animate him in his work, and render him highly ferviceable to the interefts of religion. Something like this is the duty of every minister in his fituation, and he would not have neglected it had he poffeffed the true fpirit of his office and felt the weight and folemnity of his charge. I ferioufly fear that his heart is not engaged in his facred employment, and that he will do you more injury by countenancing folly, than he will do you good by all his inAtructions. But waving further obfervation upon the conduct of your Minifter, I will take the liberty to remark upon the merriment of the company at large. And I must tell you that I think it to have been very unfuitable, efpecially at that particular time. I fuppofe that you will be ready to offer fomething in way of excufe, and perhaps will fay, it was a joyful occafion and your amufements were defigned as an expreffion of your joy. I am ready to confefs that the fettlement of a godly Minifter over a people is a joyful event, and with joy and thankfulnefs to God fhould their hearts be filled. Joy confifts in thofe agreeable fenfations excited by the obtainment of fome defired good. The good obtained in this cafe, we will fuppofe to be a pious and faithful minifter of Chrift. Now in all your mirth, did you once think of the divine goodness in giving you a religious teacher to feed your minds with knowledge and underftanding? Was your mirth defigned to express your gratitude to the great head of the Church for the recent tokens of his favor? Did you once think of God, of his perfections, of his governing providence, or your ob ligations to him? Put thefe queftions to your companions, and I prefume, that from their own conviction, they will be constrained to fay that facred things were wholly banished from their minds, and that it was not their moft diftant thought to perform a fervice to the king of heaven by their carnal feftivity. Suppofing that inftead of attending to the amusements of folly, you had all united in thankful prayer and joyful praise to God, would it not have been more becoming and better fuited to your circumftances? This would have been a pleafing and animating fpectacle; a gracious God would have hearkened and heard it, and written for you a book of remembrance. But perhaps you are not yet convinced but that the ordination of a minifter affords occafion for vain mirth. If you are not, I fear that you never feriously con templated the folemn place in which you ftand under the preached gofpel, according to which you are to be judged and for its faithful improvement you are to account to God. Taking the Bible for the rule of your faith, you will not queftion the follow. ing statement; that if your minifter prove a true minifter of the gofpel, he will be unto God a fweet favor of Chrift, in them that are faved and in them that perish. To the one he will prove the favour of death unto death ; and to the other the favour of life unto life. And if not a ger true minifter of Chrift, he is a blind leader of the blind, and both he and his people are in danof deftruction. Yes, dear Sister, the gofpel never leaves a perfon as it finds him. It makes him either the better or the worfe. Every fermon your minifter deliv. ers and every prayer that he makes in your hearing, or where you might conveniently attend, will ferve to raise you higher in glory, or fink you deeper in woe. Though an unfpeakable privilege, it is a very folemn thing to fit under the droppings of the fanctua God and implored a bleffing upon his labors that the profiting of his people, as well as of myself, might appear unto all men. Notwithstanding my remarks upon what I think your folly, yet you share in my best wishes and ardent affection. My heart's defire and prayer to God are, that your minifter may give heed to himself and his doctrine, that he may fave both his own foul and them who hear him. Yours, &c. SHAPHAN. ry. You my Sifter, together with Second Letter from Shaphan to his your companions and minifter, are advancing in life and as rapidly haftening to the day of judgment. Think not that you will be an Sifter. Belfaft, June 6, 1803. DEAR SISTER, unconcerned fpectator of the tranf- with a fecond letter. You I concern you as your teacher. In every portion of your life you are forming matter of account at the dread tribunal of God. And be intreated to ponder upon the words of our Savior as he upbraided the cities which repented not at his preaching. "Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee Bethfaida for if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in fackloth and afhes. But I fay unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment than for you" once took the Connecticut Evangelical Magazine. I learn you have discontinued taking it; not because you are unable to meet the expence, or find it difficult to procure it, for a poft paffes your door every week; but on account of fome objections in your mind to the publication itself. This is one general remark you make upon it; "that it contains too many frightful ftories”: by which, I fuppofe, you mean the accounts given in the Magazine of the ficknefs and death of thoughtless, diffipated and deiftical characters.. But upon what principle do you make thefe accounts an objection Perhaps you may ask what line to the Magazine? You must eiof conduct would have been fuit-ther fuppofe that they are mere able for you at the time of which fictions, or elfe that they are prowe are speaking? I think, that ductive of bad effects, when made if I had been in your cafe, I public. fhould have retired to my closet for ferious meditation, and, in prayer, fhould have thanked Chrift for his afcenfion gift, commended my fpiritual guide to the grace of Now, with regard to the falfity of thefe accounts, I would obferve; that the Editors, having given to the public their names, would not ftate, as matter of fact, what they had any reason to believe was falfe. This would be | inconfiftent both with their feelings and principles, if honeft men, and they would also hazard, if not destroy, their reputation as men of truth and integrity. Miferable indeed would be the plea, that tho' thefe accounts were merely the creatures of imagination, yet the Editors thought they might ferve to alarm ftupid and vicious finners, and therefore publifhed them. This is doing evil, that good may come; a thing that well deferved the fevere reprehenfion of the Apostle Paul. When notice is given that accounts are fictitious, there is no impofition upon the public; but there is a grofs and unpardonable impofition, when stated as matter of fact, with a defign that they fhould be thus received. And how could men, who have any juft apprehenfion of God's character and of the principles of his government, expect to fucceed in doing good, by fuch unworthy and bafe means as falfehood and impofition? Again: The Editors have in formed me, perfonally, that the accounts referred to contain an honeft ftatement of facts. I had it not as common information: but I had the most folemn affurances, under full conviction that they were true. You will not doubt that the Editors have the means of afcertaining their truth. Once more: The Editors have affured me that they have in their poffeffion the real names of thofe perfons, whofe licentious principles and practice, and whofe unhappy and affecting end have been defcribed in the Magazine; and not only their names, but alfo the particular places of their abode. They decline inferting fuch accounts as have been mentioned, until they know the name of the perfon, if not his place of refidence. Further, there may be a number of witneffes brought to prove the truth of thofe facts that are stated in the biographical sketches published in the Magazine. If you will believe a brother, and I hope you have never found reafon to difbelieve him, you are already convinced that these "frightful ftories," as you term them, are folemn truths. Being true, what objection can you have to their being made public? What pernicious effects will they produce? To fee thoughtlefs men and youth so much alarmed in the hour of death, you cannot fuppofe, will have a tendency to render others negligent of their | fpiritual concerns. To be affured that vicious characters have come to an unhappy end, and in their laft moments deeply lamented their folly, cannot, in your opinion, encourage and embolden the diffolute in their vices. You can-" not believe that an honeft and credible account of an entire renunciation of deiftical principles by the dying infidel, the forrow and felf-condemnation with which he reflected upon his unreasonable incredulity and contempt of the Saviour, and his frank acknowledgment that Christianity affords the only fupport and the only | hope to a dying finner; I fay, you cannot believe that fuch an account will encourage infidelity amongst the wavering, or enliven the hopes and complete the triumph of the confirmed deift. If neither thoughtleffnefs, immorality, profanenefs nor infidelity receive encouragement or fupport from thefe accounts, what is their injury? I prefume you will thus answer my query: They ferve to terrify people and difturb their minds." But let me afk, who are the people they terrify? what is their character? They are not the humble, the poor in fpirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Not they that mourn for fin ; fer they fhall be comforted. Not the merciful; for they shall obtain mercy. Not the pure in heart; for they fhall fee God. Not the peace-makers; for they are the children of God. Not the upright; for the end of that man is peace. Not the believer; for he that believeth-fhall be faved. Not the godly-thofe who make religion the great bufinefs of their lives, who have much to do with their bibles, with the Sabbath, public worship and fecret prayer-who love, and strive to ferve faithfully, God and their fellow-mortals; for godlinefs hath the promife of the life that now is and of that which is to came. Men of this temper and life are not filled with fuch diftreffing fears for themfelves; for God, by promifes, has given them reason to hope for better things. Then, who are the people that are thus frightened with such accounts? Are they not fuch as fuftain the character of those whose unhappy and alarming exit from the world is prefented before them? Those who are fecure in fin, deftitute of goodness in heart, morality in life, and void of religious principle? And have not such men reafon to be alarmed, efpecially, when they hear of their companions in vice coming to fuch an awful end? Is it not better for them to be aroused from their dangerous flumbers before the impending evils actually come, when there will be no hope of escape? You cannot fuppofe that the thoughtless youth in the purfuits of folly is in a place of fafety or in the way to heaven. You have more juft idea of religion than to fuppofe that men of loofe morals have a title to gofpel promifes. And as to the deift, you know he is grofsly inconfift ent, madly incredulous, and wholly without a rational hope of a bleffed immortality. If this be granted; fuch men need be alarmed at their ftate and it is the dictate of benevolence to use all fuitable means to awake them from their fleep, and to perfuade them to repentance by the terrors of the Lord. And are not fuch folemn facts as are stated in the Magazine calculated for this purpofe? Is it not fuited to alarm young people, who neglect their fpiritual concerns and give themfelves to vanity, to read of a fellow-youth, who wet his death-bed with tears of forrow for his negligence of religion and his devotion to the amusements of folly? Has it not a tendency to check the vỏtaries of vice and render them feriously confiderate, to read of the unhappy end of profane and immoral men? How they were convinced of fin, felt their desert of endless mifery, and horribly trembled at the approach of death? Do not the universalist and infidel tremble for themselves, when they read how their brethren in fentiment renounced their favorite doctrines, in the near view of eternity, as delufions of the devil; and how they cried to that Saviour whom they once defpifed, O Lord have mercy upon our fouls, or we perish! I prefume you are ready to join with me in faying, that this is the natural tendency of thofe accounts in the Magazine to which you object. And I feri |