and his minute and tender attention to their circumstances and feelings, were bright evidences to all but himself of his ripeness for heaven." pp. 43—46. Mr. Wilson then proceeds to supply us with some of the dying expressions of Mr. Scott, which convey to our minds the most unequivocal testimony of a frame of mind the best suited to his circumstances, the most acceptable to God, and the most cheering to those deeply interested in his eternal welfare. It is perfectly true that indications of deep thought-of occasional perturbation-of an anxious searching, and launching forward as it were into the depths and obscurities of futurity-and of the heavy pressure of sin on the conscience, discover themselves in his dying declarations. It is perfectly true also that some clouds occasionally interposed, and veiled to his sinking eye, for the moment, the glories of the invisible world. It is true that his dying scene presents to us an individual walking rather in the twilight of enjoyment, where the sun and the shade were struggling together for victory, than in a region of unmixed happiness. But are not such thoughts and anxieties the natural accompaniments of every step of our pilgrimage; and, if finally dispersed by the light of faith, and hope, and Christian joy, does not their presence supply even a stronger evidence, to the byestander, of the safety of the individual, than their absence? Undisturbed serenity may be undisturbed delusion. A calin after anxiety is a victory after the bat. le-is the "palm" when the battle And such was the case of Mr. Scatt. At one time we find him speaking of death as " a new acquaintance, and a terrible one, unless Christ giveth us the victory, and the assurance of it." We find him saying at another, "This is heaven begun-I have done with darkness for ever-Satan is van quished-nothing more remains but is won. salvation with eternal glory-eternal glory."..." I am in full possession of my faculties-I know I am dying-I feel the immense, the Lord Jesus, receive my spirit, infinite importance of the crisis. Thou art all I want. Blessed be but one in the whole universe, and God there is one Saviour,-though "His love is as great as his power, And knows neither measure nor end." To a young clergyman he said"Count it an honour, without reward, in the midst of frowns and opposition, to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ to poor sinners, and to help to send his holy word all over the earth, by sea and by land. None but Jesus can do us good; nor can we do good to others but by him. I have suffered more this fortnight than in all my seventy-four years; and Christ has appeared to me a hundred, yea, a thousand times, if possible, more precious and glorious than ever; sin more hateful and evil; salvation more to be desired and valu ed; the love of Christ and the power of Christ infinitely greater More than all in Thee I find.' I have found more in Him than I ever expected to want." p. 53. To ourselves nothing can be more satisfactory than these extracts. They afford a close parallel to one of the most exquisitely affecting death-bed scenes presented to us in the annals of the church of Christ the death of Richard Hooker. They assure us that faith in the Redeemer is of power sufficient, not merely to perpetuate the repose of the already unruffled mind, or preserve the sunshine on which no clouds have gathered-but to calm the disquiet and to bind up the broken heart, to display to us, even when intensely occupied with the terrors of eternity, such visions of glory as shall gradually absorb our attention, disperse our fears, light up every dark spot in our hopes and enjoyments, and supply to the fainting soul large prelibations of the waters of life-of the stream which maketh glad the city of God. But we have no space to dwell much longer on this subject. It is impossible, however, to conclude without furnishing to our readers one or two quotations from the close of these able, spiritual, and affecting sermons. Mr. Wilson was not likely to quit such a topic without endeavouring to fix upon the consciences of his hearers some of the practical lessons which the subject is so admirably calculated to convey. How faithfully and powerfully he has discharged his office, may be judged from the single quotation which follows. We have preferred selecting a long and unbroken extract such as this, to presenting our readers with a succession of shorter extracts. "The scope of my text, and of the whole subject we have been consider ing, is not merely to support us against despondency, but to animate us to actual effort and redoubled exertions. It is not enough to bear up against rebuke and scorn, we must be excited to determined courage and holy intrepidity. 'I charge thee,' saith the Apostle, in the verses which introduce the text, before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine. For the time will come, when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts shall heap to themselves teachers, having itching years; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.' Such is the solemn exhortation which is followed and supported by the words of the text. The calmness, then, with which the Apostle and the venerable ministers of Christ in every age regard the approach of death, their gratitude in looking back on the period of their labours, and their triumph in anticipating their crown, are to encourage and animate us who survive, to renewed earnestness. The difficulties we may meet with are not to cool, but to quicken our zeal. Yes, my brethren, it is consoling, it is animating to see the examples of dying saints and ministers, to hear their last admonitions, to behold their noble courage, and to view their holy anxiety, not for themselves, but for us who are to succeed to their place and sustain their combat. Yes, fight, they have finished their course, my brethren, they have fought the they have kept the faith;' they have now escaped from the prison of the flesh, and are departed to their joy and their crown. We are left for a time in the burden and heat of the contest. But we have the same Sa viour, the same cause, the same proport as they. Every dying servant of mises, the same grace for our sup Christ adds his testimony to all who have gone before, that the fight in which we are engaged is good and honourable and glorious. Let us then 'gird up the loins of our minds.' Let us run our race with increased speed, and fight in the combat with tenfold vigour. Let us not only do more for the welfare of souls, but do it with more wisdom, more self-denial, more cheerfulness, more compassion, more watchfulness, more love and devotedness to our Lord. To this end, let us catch the mantle of each departing saint, and copy the particular excellencies which marked his character. Let us learn address and judgment and acuteness and originality in our public discourses from one; strength and vigour of faith from another; kindness and tenderness from a third; pastoral zeal from a fourth; interior knowledge of the heart from a fifth; generous compassion for the state of mankind from a sixth; whilst from all we learn spirituality, abstraction from the world, love to the Saviour, faith, humility, joy, activity in improv ing our opportunities, in redeeming time, and walking circumspectly in our whole conduct. In this view, let the example of the venerable person now more particularly before us, teach us determination of soul in serving God, comprehensive views of every branch of truth, and unwearied diligence in "The revered and beloved names of Cecil, the two Milners, Newton, Robinson, Venn, Buchanan, will instantly occur to most of my readers; to which, whilst the pen is in my hand, I must add that of Richardson-whose departure has followed close on that of the subject of these sermons." occupying with our talents. O my brethren, let us be more determined for God. We are half-hearted, timid, irre solute, alarmed at the opinions of others. Let us begin to be more decided in religion, more bold, more intent on our work, more fixed in fighting the holy fight, more eager in rauning the sacred race, more jealous in keeping the deposit of the faith; in short, more entirely constrained by the love of Christ, to live not unto ourselves, but unto Him that died for us and rose again. And lest this fortitude should be in any re spect misdirected, let us take comprehensive views of truth, let us embrace every part of the revealed doctrine, let as never be satisfied till we are cast, as it were, into the whole shape and form and lineament of the Scriptures, even as the melted metal falls into the mould and receives the most delicate lines of the intended impression. Let us not imagine that we can fully understand a divine scheme in all its parts or indeed in any of them-and let us there fore be more and more solicitous to copy minutely and scrupulously all the separate truths as they lie in the inspired volume, not deterred by the charge of inconsistency, but boldly following where revelation leads, and leaving difficulties to be reconciled in a future and brighter world. Zeal, my brethren, without this gentle yielding to all the slightest touches of the Divine word, may do almost as much harm as good. We never can expect a revival of pure religion till God in his holy book is more honoured, and man in his fallible systems less. And I look upon it as the harbinger of a better day for the universal church, that it seems to be the conviction of the most eminent persons, in common with our departed and esteemed friend, that the Bible is the true point of union, and that this book itself, and not certain propositions deduced from it, is to be the source and model of a scriptural theology. But let us further endeavour to imitate the extraordinary diligence in improving «*These remarks are not designed to reflect on the scriptural and moderate Articles of Religion by which our own or any other Protestant church endeavours to keep out the intrusion of heresy, and to perpetuate a succession of pure evangelical ministers. Something of this kind seems a necessary part of discipline in every church." his talent, which marked our excellen friend. An indolent man can do nothing valuable. It is an active and conscientious industry in study, in prayer, in visiting the sick, in composing sermons, in ruling our households, in doing all the good and undoing all the evil we can, that must form an eminent minister. Let us then in this respect also deny ourselves, form determined habits of activity, cut off all trifling pursuits, abridge secondary engagements, and give ourselves to a painful and diligent discharge of our duties. No one knows to what God may call him if he is deter mined in his religion, scriptural and comprehensive in his sentiments, and diligent in his course of conduct. Let us then arise and be doing. Let the crown of righteousness, and the repose of heaven, and the approbation of our Judge, reconcile as to a life of toil and difficulty; or rather let them make such toil and difficulty our delight and our joy. Let nothing that we have hitherto done satisfy us; but, forgetting the things which are behind and reaching forth to those things which are before, let us press towards the mark of the prize of our high calling of God in Christ Jesus.'" pp. 72-78. ་ If our readers estimate this ad÷ dress according to our standard, they will feel that there is in it a flow of heart, of zeal, of love, to say nothing of energy and of eloquence, which it would have been wrong in us to interrupt.— And, here, we cannot but observe how "stale, flat, and unprofit able," by the side of exhortations such as these, is the great bulk of those heartless, spiritless, and simpering conciones ad clerum, and archidiaconal or even some. times episcopal addresses, which so rapidly congregate in certain windows of the metropolis,-to be neither bought, read, nor minded by one in a million of the busy multitude. May the fact peculiarly impressed upon us in these sermons-that another eminent servant of God has fallen asleepthat another minister of Christ, after living well and dying happily, has gone to his reward, stimulate every member of the Christian church to occupy the void which perhaps long and faithfully laboured, had fewer rewards to bestow than worthy claimants of those rewards; that theological learning, and personal piety, and pastoral diligence were such mere drugs in the modern market as to invest their possessor with no peculiar claim to patronage;-that thousands of suitors were pressing around them, each of whom had fairly earued pre-eminence, each of whom carried along with him, as his title to preferment, not his skill in political economy, not his dexterity in the sports of the field, or his address in all the mazes of the dance or the chit-chat of the drawingroom, but a still more valuable commentary on Scripture than Mr. Scott's, constructed by the labours and patience of thirty years, and still more powerful efforts to defead the outworks, and add to the influence, of our common faith? How then would such a wanderer from distant and barbarous shores to the country of justice, and benevolence, and political purity, and moral wisdom, and orthodox religion, be astonished to learn that this banished and half-fed manthis man, neglected by his superiors in churcli and state, and even frowned upon by some of themthis man, destined to feed upon the husks when others were devouring the grain of ecclesiastical produce-was, in truth, nothing less than the best textuarist, perhaps, in Christendom, and the only living original commentator, at any length, on the whole volume of Scripture ? Would not such intelligence send him back to his country to search for that justice in its woods and wilds of which he found such small traces in the haunts of civilization and Christianity? But, suppose our barbarian visitor to seek for the solution of so strange a phenomenon, and to ask, what, after all, was the cause of the exclusion of this clergyman from all the rewards and distinctions of his profession, and to be told, that his offence was simply this; that he adhered closely and unequivocally to the formularies of the church of which he was the consecrated champion and advocate; that there being two in terpretations of which some of the more mysterious and difficult parts of these formularies admitted, he adopted that almost universally adopted two hundred years since, but now somewhat out of favour in certain elevated quarters; that his only crime, in fact, was a sort of half-way, guarded, and most practical and self-denying Calvinism; (although, in truth, it was not his Calvinism, but his accept ance of doctrines not exclusively Calvinistic, but acknowledged in common by pious men of various denominations in the Christian world, that constituted his chief offence): would not our unsophisticated savage justly raise his warwhoop against the conduct of those who could thus act towards a man who had so eminently served the cause of religion and of the church, because he chose to inculcate the doctrines of that church on others in the same sense in which he, in common with many of their framers, believed and subscribed them himself? And yet such is precisely the history of Mr. Scott. If he would have abjured the principles in which Usher, and Hall, and Hopkins, and Hooker lived and died, he might, perhaps, have risen to distinction and emolument in the church. But because he saw with the eyes of those illustrious men, heard with their ears, and lived in their spirit and temper, he was left to find his obscure and, as far as his governors were concerned, his cheerless way to the grave, without a single taste of those ecclesiastical bounties scattered so prodigally, from day today, on many a raw and unfledged aspirant to dignity and fortune. If we have spoken strongly on this subject, let us not be conceived to have for our object to beget or foster a spirit of prejudice against any particular man, or set of men. However disagreed on other points the persons among us who chiefly possess ecclesiastical patronage appear to concur in the plan of endeavouring, by a sort of degradation and a spare diet, to stint and starve men out of the genuine principles of the Reformation; an object in promoting which the Eighty-seven Questions of the Bishop of Peterborough will be found particularly useful. A more awful trust cannot be committed to any man than that of deciding who shall eat the bread of the sanctuary, and minister at its altars. May a merciful, God assist our governors in church and state so to discharge this solemn trust that their mode of discharging it shall not witness against them at the great day of account! The Application of Christianity to the Commercial and Ordinary Affairs of Life, in a Series of Discourses. By THOMAS CHALMERS, D. D., Minister of St. John's Church, Glasgow, Glasgow: Chalmers and Collins. London: Longman and Co.. 1820. We know of nothing which more eminently or beautifully illustrates the superintending providence of God, in the moral government of the world, than the appearance of certain characters in different ages, and at different intervals, whose talents and virtues are evidently calculated to produce powerful and beneficial effects on the civil and religious condition of mankind. If the general history of nations may be comprized in that of a few distinguished individuals who have exercised a predominant influence at particular periods of their progress, this is more especially true with respect to their moral and religious concerns. These have ever been intimately associated with the exertions of men of eminent ability and piety, whose labours have formed so many distinct eras in the ecclesiastical history of their cour |