for it; and that you may be so, would urge you to make your peace with your offended God, through that Saviour who is "able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him." There is but this one way of life, and this one way of being prepared for death. "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." By his death he conquered death; so that all who believe in him, and love him, and obey him, shall through him have the victory. He himself invaded the territories of death, and conquered him in his own domains. He was a sojourner with him for a while, but he broke the bondage, and thus became mighty to save. "I," says he, " am the resurrection and the life; if a man believe in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." What a day will that be, when the same voice of the archangel and trump of God, that shall open the sepulchres of the earth, shall also reach these deeper tombs of the sea, where the proud waters have, for so many ages, closed over the dust of men, and they shall come forth-they that have done good to the resurrection of life, they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation! Monuments of marble cannot hold them there; these sunken rocks of adamant, washed by the waters of a thousand. centuries, cannot hold them here; when his voice thus penetrates the earth, and agitates the ocean.

Dying man! you may not live ever to witness such another scene; to weave the shroud, and cast into the sea another of your shipmates. You yourself may be the next that shall be committed to this grave of waters. Your name may stand first in death's commission, though you put far away the evil day. You may think

he will come late, but God may send him early. You may not reach the end of your voyage, before the voyage of life is over. Yet, yourself may be the least prepared to die; the least acquainted with God's holy word, the most thoughtless and hardened, the most wicked and profane. You know not when the time of your departure shall come; yet you live as though you would spin out the thread of life to a lengthened old age. There may be but a step between you and death; yet you boast yourself of to-morrow, and instead of being awake and in earnest, in order to be prepared to die, put far away the evil day, as though the thought of it were too painful to be endured. Could your departed shipmate rise up from the bosom of the sea, and once more address you, what would he say? Would he not rebuke you for this thoughtlessness? Would he not tell you, that all that the word of God teaches you of that vast eternity, where his immortal soul now dwells, is sober reality? If he has made a happy exchange of earth for heaven, and is now numbered with those holy and happy beings who have entered into the kingdom of God, to go no more out; would he not say, "O, strive to enter into the streight gate, and come up hither?" And if he died in his sins; if, when death knocked down his earthly tabernacle, and called his trembling spirit away beyond the reach of mercy and of hope, and consigned it to its dreadful doom, never to be relieved, and never to come to an endwould he not beg and beseech you not to do as he has done, and come to that place of torment?

Nothing is more unwise than to expect to live a long time in the present world. It was not made for any one to live In a long while. It is a dying world-the

land of the dying, and not the land of the living. That land of the living stretches far away beyond the horizon of this world. It is a mighty continent that has no horizon and no shore. It has no sun and no sea; earth and sea are there passed away, and the Lord God is the light of it, and the Lamb its glory. Death will introduce you to it, if you are prepared for his coming, and can die in peace. Friends will not weep for you then, as one who lived without God, and died without hope. No one will then say of you, "Good for that man if he had never been born." You yourself will forever bless God that he gave you being, and made you acquainted with his Son. And though his wise providence has not determined your residence on the earth among the rich, or the learned, or the powerful, yet will you remember all the way in which he has led you with eternal thanksgiving and praise. You will magnify him, that his grace could so abound toward the chief of sinners; and though your allotment on the earth has been amid storms and hardship, you will labors, and "serve him day and night in his temple." The rest will be the sweeter for all your toil; the sky more tranquil for every storm; the crown the brighter for every cross. Through death and the grave, then, look forward with hope, with delight, to that holy and blessed world, where no want will remain to be supplied, no danger to be averted, no sin to pollute, no sorrow to sadden; where the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall feed you, and lead you in green pastures and by the still waters; and God shall wipe away all tears from your eyes. May God Almighty bless you, and give testimony to the word of his grace, for his name's sake! Amen.

then rest from your

SERMON XVII.

RESTRAINING PRAYER.

JOB XV. 4. And restrainest prayer before God.

THE duties of religion are made up of those we owe to God and our fellow-men. Among those we owe to God, prayer holds a place of high and acknowledged importance. God is the hearer of prayer. No man can be a Christian, or can ever become one, who does not seek to become so by prayer. No man who is a Christian already can grow in grace, be encouraged in his duty, strengthened in his hopes, or comforted in his trials, who cannot often say with the Psalmist, "Blessed be God who hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me.”

Yet what multitudes are there who "restrain prayer before God!" Some pray very irregularly; some seldom pray; some never pray at all.

If we search for the secret cause of restraining prayer, we shall find it in a prayerless heart; if the heart were right, men could no more live without prayer than without their daily bread. They would be irresistibly drawn to the mercy-seat by cords of love; they could not be happy without habitual fellowship with their Father who is in heaven. But there are causes for restraining prayer which are more definite than this general one, and which we shall employ a few moments in specifying.

1. In the first place, there are those who feel that they do not know how to pray. They sometimes try, but are discouraged; they have neither the grace of prayer, nor the gift. They cannot give utterance to their requests, and know not indeed what requests to utter. They can speak to their fellow-men, but cannot address the great and holy God. They are shut up whenever they attempt to do so. They are not in the habit of it; it is altogether out of their line of business; and were they to attempt it, it would be such a novelty, that they would be startled at the sound of their own voice. They often take the name of God in vain, but it is very difficult for them to speak of him, or to him, in earnest. They are often heard profanely to call upon God to damn them; but know not how to lift their eyes to heaven, and like the publican in the parable, smite upon their heart and say, "God be merciful to me a sinner!"

2. There are others who restrain prayer, because they are not satisfied with their prayers. They cannot make a good prayer, nor pray as well as others. They have not found in their prayers that aliment to a proud and self-righteous heart, which they looked for. Good men also there are, who restrain prayer because they have little or no comfort in the exercise. The spirit of adoption does not always rest upon them, whereby they say, Abba, Father! They cannot always fix their minds upon the duty in which they are employed; nor upon God their portion. Their hearts are sluggish and cold, nor are their desires and affections moved, as they hoped they would be, in fellowship with their Maker. They do not enjoy these strong inducements to prayer, and the devil tempts them, and