more remote the grave may seem, the deeper appears its mysterious solemnity. The further we plunge, too, into worldliness, the more depressing is the chill produced by sudden anticipations or imaginations of our latter end. It is necessary that it should be so, lest all thoughts of eternity should be lost. Even when the steps are turned towards heaven, the same cloud must be suffered to retain more or less of its darkness, lest the heart, still too frail, should forget its own manifold dangers. During our exposure to temptation, we need the humility, the caution, the vast seriousness of spirit which such a dread must maintain; to number our days must persuade us to apply our hearts to wisdom. But, when this necessity is past; when the prize is no longer at hazard; a strong and victorious faith sees nothing in death which should inspire anxiety. A certain human weakness remains, like that with which a painful operation is anticipated; and very often, too, distrust of itself struggles in the heart against confidence in God. Still it is generally observed, that good men feel and declare, sometimes even with surprise, that the apprehensions which they have shared with others, and which have, more or less, haunted them through life, are much alleviated, or quite dissipated, as the hour of departure draws on.

Almost all Christian pastors may have heard from some aged believer, yet in health, the declaration of a readiness to bid the hour of death a perfect welcome. Such Christians have spoken of lying down, night after night, with the thought that they might never wake, and with entire willingness that any slumber should be the slumber of the grave. The prayer of Bishop Ken, which they have often repeated, has been fulfilled:

"Teach me to live that I may dread
The grave as little as my bed."

There are many examples of piety in appearance not less elevated, at a far earlier period of life; but it may be doubted whether this absence of all anxiety is so completely seen in any to whom their age and health permit the thought that their end may be distant. It seems one appointed effect of the approach itself. For, in the aged and the young alike, the mortal sickness, in its later stages, often clears away every alarm.

The excellent Sir William Forbes, the biographer of Beattie, uttered this: "Tell those," said he, "that are drawing down to the bed of death, from my experience, that it has no terrors; that, in the hour when it is most wanted, there is mercy with the Most High; and that some change takes place which fits the soul to meet its God." When the loyal Earl of Derby came to his execution, although he had said in previous times, that he could die in fight, but knew not how it might be on the scaffold, he now said that he could lay his head on the block as cheerfully as on his pillow. "Let my people know," said the pious Archdeacon Aylmer, "that their pastor died undaunted, and not afraid of death I bless my God that I have no fear, no doubt, no reluctation, but an assured confidence in the sinovercoming merits of Jesus Christ." So said President Finley, "Give my love to the people of Princeton; tell them that I am going to die, and that I am not afraid of death." "Oh, do not fear to die," said Mrs. East, in dying; "you will find the word of God sure; all will be fulfilled, and you will find it so." Doubtless the aspect of death is softened by exquisite suffering before its arrival: “I were miserable," said Donne, "if I

might not die." In the venerable Mr. Adam, of Wintringham, under severe infirmities, it became great weariness of life. While his attendants were moving him, he said, "If I could be sensible what these persons are doing when they place me in my coffin, it would be one of the most agreeable impressions I have ever known." But it is infinitely more than this when one can say, like Halyburton, "I, a poor, weak, timorous man, once as much afraid of death as any; I, that have been many years under the terror of death, come now, in the mercy of God, and by the power of His grace, composedly and with joy to look death in the face." This change is what has been named "dying grace, kept for a dying hour." St. Ambrose said, in words. which other saints, like Jewel, have made their own, that he "neither had so lived as to be ashamed to remain, nor, when he remembered the goodness of his divine Master, was he afraid to die." A pious clergyman, half an hour before he died, whispered, "The fear of death is quite taken away." Another expressed a slight anxiety at the very fact that his awe had so departed. A venerable divine of New England, just before his end, declared that he was conscious only of an awfully solemn and intense curiosity to know the great secret of death and eternity. So spake the philanthropist Howard, "Death has no terrors for me." William Jones, of Nayland, who had always looked forward with trembling, said joyfully in the hour of dissolution, that, if this were death, he had never conceived of death before. So said the pious Lady Glenorchy, almost as her last words, "If this be dying, it is the easiest thing imaginable."

It often appears, that exactly those from whom constitutional courage or philosophic firmness could least

be expected, go down into the valley of death with most complete triumph over their past apprehensions. In the recollections of many, some such example of a dying friend will occur with convincing power and tenderness. They tell us that this absence of fear is no fruit of nature, of habit, or of strenuous effort; but the gift of Him who gave to death its terrors, when He made it the doom of sin; and who takes those terrors away, when sin is blotted out through the blood of the Lamb.

XLIX.

Conversion on the Bed of Death.

"Thou didst bear away from earth
But one of human birth;
The dying felon at thy side, to be
In Paradise with thee."

MILMAN.

THAT the approach of death should sometimes be attended by very mighty effects on the human character, is not only not surprising, but quite unavoidable. That these effects should sometimes issue in that inward transformation through which a sinner, till then impenitent and unsanctified, might be made meet for an inheritance with saints in light, would seem, to one who has observed the power of events over the soul, rather probable than wonderful. If the contemplation of death at a distance so often leads men to earnest thought, to prayer and to God, as mighty, at least, might be the contemplation of death at hand. No Christian could well deem a deathbed repentance impossible, even if he should doubt its acceptance.

But its acceptance, or the possibility of its acceptance, can now be doubted by no Christian. One instance is given by Holy Scripture; and it was under circumstances which were plainly designed to teach that, on this side of the grave itself, no mortal shall assign limits to the mercies of his Saviour. The malefactor on the cross blasphemed even after he hung in