ERRONEOUS VIEWS OF DEATH.

CHRISTIANITY was designed to introduce into the world new views and feelings concerning death. We seem to see its character and office typified in the visit of Jesus to the house of Mary and Martha, on occasion of the death of their brother. It was a house of affliction. Wailing and lamentation were heard in it, as they are, at one time or another, in all the dwellings of this world. But our blessed Savior approached it in a calm consciousness that he was commissioned with a doctrine and clothed with a power that would triumph over death; that death, in fact, was not the end nor the interruption of existence; that death indeed was only death in appearance, while in reality the spirit's life is progressive,

ever continued, immortal. What less do his words import than the annunciation to the world of this new view of mortality? "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me, shall never die"-shall die not, at all, forever! The apostles, in like manner, evidently considered themselves as commissioned to teach new views of death. They taught the Christian converts to "sorrow not as others who had no hope." They represented the coming of Christ as designed to "deliver those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage."

Christianity, we repeat, was designed to introduce into the world new views of death and futurity. But in this, as in several other respects, we apprehend that it has made as yet but a feeble impression upon the mass of those who have received it. They have not yet partaken of the cheerfulness, tranquillity, and triumph of

him who "has abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light in the gospel." They have not so "lived and believed" in Jesus as triumphantly to feel that they "shall never die !" There is more, we are tempted to say, of heathen despondency and dread among us, than of christian hope and trust.

We shall speak of this subject not without solemnity and the tenderness due to a theme so affecting-of these we can scarcely fail-but we shall not speak of it with an awe that forbids us to reason upon it. We shall speak of death as those who, God helping, do not fear it with any excessive and unreasonable dread. We believe that it is the great course of nature, the appointment of God, a wise and good appointment, and that it is to be met with pious submission, calmness, and trust. We believe in One, who has destroyed "the power of death;" who has come to deliver us from this very fear that has struck so deep a horror into the world, who has unfolded to us the bright

and exalting hope of an endless and blessed life.

The dread which is felt of this event has manifested itself in many popular impressions of the most erroneous and indefensible, as well as painful, character.

There prevails an erroneous or an exaggerated idea of many of the circumstances that attend the dying hour.

In particular, it is thought that this final event passes with some dreadful visitation of unknown agony over the departing sufferer. It is imagined that there is some strange and mysterious reluctance in the spirit to leave the body; that it struggles long to retain its hold, and is at last torn with violence from its mortal tenement; and in fine, that this conflict between the soul and the body greatly adds to the pangs of dissolution. But it may be justly presumed, from what usually appears, that there is no particular nor acute suffering; not more than is often experienced in life; nay, rather, that there is less, because the very powers of

suffering are enfeebled, the very capacities of pain are nearly exhausted. Death is to be regarded rather as a sleep than an acute sensation, as a suspension rather than a conflict of our faculties. Our Savior once said in relation to this event, "Our friend Lazarus sleepeth." The martyr Stephen, we are told, "fell asleep," though he died amidst the blows and shouts of murderers. And the Scripture denominates the pious dead, "those who sleep in Jesus." Death is the sleep of the weary. It is repose, the body's repose, after the busy and toilsome day of life.

We have all witnessed perhaps the progress of this change; and what was it? Let our senses and our understanding answer; and not our imagination. What was it, but gradually diminishing strength, feeble utterance, failing perception, and total insensibility? The change, as it passed before us, may have been attended with accidental circumstances of mental experience or bodily sensation; but the change itself, death considered as