you told me, he would love God too, and that he would feel better in his mind and heart. I have striven to tell him all, but he does not understand me well enough, and I wish you to tell him about Jesus Christ." After hearing with intense interest their narratives as to each other's conduct, I spread out before John the plan of salvation, essentially as I had done a few weeks previous before his wife. When I got through, I asked him, "How does this plan appear to you?" His reply was, "It is the very one for me; I can now cordially embrace it." I prayed with them, and when we rose from our knees John seemed a changed man. fore he left my study he felt that he could rejoice in Christ as his Saviour. Be Not long after, they professed their faith in Christ, and although for years beyond the bounds of my ministry, I believe they lived to adorn that profession; and their conversion may be traced up as a means, under God, to the Aurora Borealis. How plainly this narrative teaches the following truths :The means of God for impressing the minds of sinners, and leading them to Himself for pardon and salvation, are exhaustless. A clear understanding of the plan of salvation through a Saviour, of its freeness and fulness, of its sovereign efficacy when truly relied on, is the only sure way of securing peace to the anxious sinner. How important that the believing wife should labour for the salvation of the unbelieving husband; and the believing husband for that of the unbelieving wife! A word to the reader of this narrative. Are you a careless sinner? If the Aurora so impressed the mind of this woman, what will be your impression when the elements shall melt with fervent heat, when the earth with all that it contains shall be consumed? Are you an anxious sinner? Then Jesus died for sinners; and He died for you, because you are a sinner. To be saved, you have only to believe upon Him. Are you a Christian? Then rise from the perusal of this narrative with the resolution to labour for the conversion of some soul, as this woman laboured for the conversion of her husband, so that yours may not be a starless crown. What his Book said to him on New E began it on New Year's Day, and was still bending "A pleasant title truly!" exclaims some reader of the many thoughts, words, works, and advices put forth at this season by friends who love to celebrate and commemorate either the advent or departure of the years as they come and go. "A time to die!" Why, a time to be born would be a more suitable subject; let us leave a time to die to the future. See old Father Christmas himself, who, with his accumulated snows of eighteen hundred and seventy-five years to account for, comes holly-crowned, robin-redbreast laden, and robed in garments that goodwill has made his particular investiture and life-long property. Ah! stop, my friend. I would say to you what the damsel said to the denying Peter, when his courage forsook him in the hour of temptation: "Thy speech betrayeth thee."1 "How so," do you ask? For this reason you say that old Father Time, or Christmas as you call him, has to account for his years-words that have a very solemn meaning-meaning nothing less than this, that he is a steward, and when reckoning time comes, has to lay before his Lord and Master an account of how, when, and where he laid out the precious talent committed to his keeping (remember, 1 Matt. xxvi. 72, with Mark xiv. 66-71, and Luke xxii. 56; John xviii. WHAT HIS BOOK SAID TO HIM ON NEW YEAR'S DAY. only to his keeping or charge; not as his own property, to be lavished, hoarded, or expended as he might choose), and you have to do precisely the same; you have to render a minor account every 31st of December for examination on the 1st of January; and these minor accounts are carried on to swell the final account that the hand of death gives in at the judgment-seat, when each and all of us are called to stand before the great white throne. I think we shall now agree that a time to die is not wholly inappropriate to the new year; neither, as the sequel will show, so gloomy a subject as you may deem at a glance are the four words, "A time-to-die !" He is still reading. Let us look over this student's shoulder, and follow him as he thus reads: I. One looked within a book and read- Then slowly to himself he said, "What doth this doleful writing say? A time to die!" Clouds were chasing each the other, through the bright cerulean sky; Clouds were fading in the ether, till they seemed to fade and die. II. One looked within a book and read He paused, and sadly raised his eye, "What saith it then ?-a time to die !" Bright, beautiful young buds did seem, lying each beneath the sky, Smiling to a golden beam that passed them as it shone on high. Brooklets by their side did glance, murm'ring each one in reply, With a tuneful utterance, sweet birds-" There is a time to die !" 1 Rev. xx. II. III. One looked within a book and read, Then paused, and gazing up did sigh, As sadly to himself he said, "What! that same voice-a time to die!" Autumn leaves were falling round-autumn leaves all pale and sere, Falling, falling to the ground, whirling, whirling there and here. IV. One looked within a book and read 'Twas on this New Year's DayThen pausing, to himself he said, "All things must fade and pass away." Winds were calling one the other; wind to wind did loud reply, With hollow voice told each the other, "Oh! there is a time to die." Wave to wave did madly rave, as each stifling voice did cryLost beneath their ocean grave-"There is, there is a time to die!" V. One looked within a book and read- 66 Ah, yes! there is a time to die!" An infant on its mother's breast slept beneath her watchful eye, And sweetly smiled from out its rest, dreaming of a time to die! Children in a graveyard straying, looked upon a tombstone nighAs they looked they ceased their playing, they saw, they read-"A time to die!" VI. One looked within a book and read, As slowly to himself he said, "Must youth and beauty also die?" On a bier with beauty laden, with a sad and tearful eye, WHAT HIS BOOK SAID TO HIM ON NEW YEAR'S DAY. VII. One looked within a book and read He paused and to himself did sigh As slowly to himself he said, "What saith it there?--a time to die!" Old men, very old and grey, to themselves did deeply sigh, VIII. One looked within a book and read, And gazing downward deep did sigh, "For all is there a time to die!" Sinners looking terrified, with a loud and bitter cry, IX. One looked within a book and read, And gladness glistened in his eye, "A time to die!" Dear reader, do you now agree with me that the thought of "a time to die" is by no means unsuited to New Year's Day? A new era of time presents a new opportunity to prepare for that which even the voice of nature warns us must occur to all of us. The passing seasons all have the same voice, and say to us that which the student's book said to him, "A time to die!" The fading flowers, the passing sunbeams, the wailing winds, the sinking waves, all utter the universal, sad cry, "A time to die!" The infant's grave, the young girl's grave, the young man's grave, the old man's grave, all have the same silent, yet all-speaking voice, "A time to die!" And can there be a period when the |