it is owing to the impious sloth of the Christian church; the criminal negligence of the disciples of Jesus is the cause. The voice of Providence in such a dispensation, the voice of Scripture, the voice of God is not, “forsake that country,” but “send more missionaries to help them.”.

What regard should we think to be due to the reasoning of him who would say, “Because John the Baptist was put to death in Judea, no more souls were to be saved there. Or because Christ was crucified, James slain with the sword, Stephen stoned, and the rest of the disciples banished from the country by perse. cution, an entire stop was to be put to the conversion of sinners in that land?” Myriads of souls were afterwards brought to the faith of Christ. Or because Peter was crucified, and Paul beheaded in the capital of the Roman empire, no more souls in that city were to be brought to the knowledge of the truth? For centuries afterwards the church at Rome was famous over all the Christian world. Banish then, my brethren, these false ideas of the divine sovereignty from your minds, for it has proved fatal to multitudes of souls.

3. We learn from this painful event, that many parts of the Divine government are beyond the ken of man. No words can more properly express this sentiment than those of Zophar, Job xi, 7, 8, 9; “Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is high as heaven, what canst thou do? Deeper than hell, what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea.” To which the words of David, Psa. cxxxix, 6, form a proper close: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me: it is high, I cannot attain unto it.” How applicable are these humiliating confessions to the conduct of Jehovah in the disposal of his servants, and the period of their lives. Were we permitted to govern

the world, the wicked would be swept away with the besom of destruction, but the righteous preserved alive: useless persons who are a burden to society we would remove by death, but spare all who were benefactors to mankind. The enemies of religion we should destroy; but its friends, and especially those who are active in promoting it, should live to three-score years and ten, or fourscore years. Missionaries among the heathen would be our particular care, and their days lengthened out to those of the patriarchs of old. But God removes some of them before they have lived out half their days. We would not

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our God.

do this. But are not we children of folly, and he infinitely wise and also infinitely good? In us goodness is but the drop of the bucket; it is in him the fathomless abyss of the mighty ocean. He cannot err nor do wrong: "His work is perfect and all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.”

Behold the mysterious way in which God disposes of his servants, displaying his sovereignty, but sovereignty under the direction of wisdom, rectitude, and love; for such is the sovereignty of

Some of them he continues to a good old age; for thirty, forty, or fifty years they labor in his vineyard; and when covered with gray hairs they are received into the joy of their Lord. He calls others away in the midst of their days: to all appearance they might have ministered with acceptance and usefulness for many years; but he commissioned his messenger to bring them home in the vigor of life. Others of his servants appear in the ardor of youth, peculiarly qualified for his service, just bursting forth to the surprise and delight of the church of God. He only shews them to the world, and then he takes them away. “See," as if he had said, "how exquisitely this vessel is formed for its Master's use," and while we gaze at the sight, he breaks it by the hands of death, and throws it into the grave. His all-sufficiency can do without it, his love receives the soul into heaven, wisdom decides that this is best; while to us sovereignty alone appears, for "Jehovah holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it.”

This dispensation presents to us the Lord Jesus Christ performing one and not an unimportant part of his office as king and head of his church. “I am, (says he) the first and the last; I am he that liveth and was dead; and þehold I am alive for evermore, amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” Misșionaries are the servants of Christ, and of all his servants they are most peculiarly the objects of his affection and care; for it is to them he peculiarly says, "Lo, I am with you always even to the end of the world.". As he walketh in the midst of the golden candlesticks, they are ever in his presence and in his sight. All his dispensations towards them are mercy and truth. Love shines forth in all his dealings, in every act, especially in the most important, and what act is more important than death? To remove a missionary by death is an act of infinite wisdom, of perfect rectitude, of most ardent love; and in perfect consonance with Christ's affection to his church, and compassion for the souls of men, and his earnest desire to have the heathen for his inheritance, and the uttermost ends of the earth for his possession. But while we behold the glorious Redeemer thus exercising his authority, we humbly cry to him: “Thy way, O Lord, is in the sea, and thy paths in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known!” We dare not say as Peter, “Bid us come unto thee.” If we attempt to enter the abyss, we shall be overwhelmed. We will stand on the shore, and adoring exclaim, “O the depth of the riches of thy wisdom and knowledge! How unsearchable are thy judgments, and thy ways past finding out!”

“But,” says one, “how can the death of John the Baptist, of Stephen, and of James be acts of wisdom and of love?” Nay, but who art thou, O man, that arraignest the Divine government, that findest fault with the acts of the Redeemer, and chargest him with a want of wisdom and of love to his missionaries? Rather confess thy ignorance, humbly bow before his throne, and be persuaded that in this act of calling his servants away which so much displeases thee, the Lord Jesus Christ is promoting his own glory, the happiness of his servants, the good of his church, and the conversion of the heathen.

As to the way in which these glorious ends are produced by so unlikely means, we must for the present rest satisfied with the assurance which he has given us,—“what I do thou knowest not now, but thou: shalt know hereafter."

SECOŅdly. Such dispensations of providence contain lessons of instruction fitted to influence the conduct of Christians in their various offices and situations.

1. By these instances of mortality missionaries are taught to labor with all their might. Those who preach the Gospel are in danger from the same temptations as their hearers. In the parable of the ten virgins it is mentioned, that “while the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept.” Missionaries need to be warned against lụkewarmness as much as any other disciple of Christ. While they continue in health, and enjoy outward prosperity, inordinate attachment to the world and languor in the discharge of the duties of their office may seize upon them as well as upon other ministers of the Gospel. Being in a foreign land, and viewing the inhabitants as people of a different lineage, they are not so deeply affected by the death of any of them as we are by the decease of the members of our congregation. But the death of a missionary, of a brother speaks to them with the voice of thunder: “Be ye therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” “Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves like unto them that wait for their Lord, that when he . cometh and knocketh, ye may open to him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching."

When the Lord Jesus Christ heard of the death of John the Baptist, he retired to a solitary place, no doubt for meditation and prayer, and the improvement of the mournful event. When missionaries hear of a brother's death, it rouses the soul to extraordinary feeling; and every power is awakened to the most serious consideration and fervent prayer. A train of profitable meditation succeeds: the evil of sin; the excellence of the Savior and his salvation; the worth of souls; the command of Christ to his servants to save them; the infinite importance of activity and zeal in the service of Christ; the uncertainty of life; the nearness of the eternal state; the unspeakable value of the heavenly glory; the death of a brother in the faith and hope of the Gospel: these prove a stimulus to exertion, they give wings to dependence, and furnish fuel for the fire of love. One man does the work of two, and does it with an energy which the people feel; and it has, through the Divine blessing, an unspeakably more powerful effect.

2. Young persons training up for the missionary service receive instruction of peculiar value from this event. Here are elder brothers gone down to the dust of death; and while with a sorrowful heart you look into their graves, and amidst your musing the fire burns, your hearts are hot within you, and you speak thus with your tongues, “such may be my lot. Soon after I set my foot in an heathen land, the unhealthiness of the climate may sow the seeds of disease in my mortal frame, and in a few months may bring me, as it did Jonathan Brain, to an early grave. Or after some years of incessant toil, when I have gained so much knowledge of the language as to be enabled to preach, and I am tasting the first joy of exhibiting before the eyes of the heathen the treasures of redeeming love, and inviting them to receive without money and without price gold tried in the fire that they may be rich, and white raiment that they may be clothed, and that the shame of their nakedness may not appear,' like George

Cran

my
constitution

may

be so enfeebled as to sink under debility; and when warm with the desire and hope of saving a multitude of souls, I may hear my Master say to me,'go thou thy way, for thou shalt rest, and shalt stand in thy lot at the end of the days.' Or if I am permitted to continue longer in life, and am engaged in the glorious work of translating the sacred Scriptures, going on with eagerness and delight, rejoicing in the progress, and looking forward with transporting pleasure to the time when I shall be able to present this inestimable gift to the heathen: in the midst of this service, the same fever which carried off Augustus Desgranges, may seize me, and consign me to death and the grave.”

Such reflections will, I trust, not be in vain. Will they not suggest the following purposes of the heart; “I see the uncer. tainty of life. Let the world be of less esteem in' my eyes than it ever was, and my soul be wholly crucified to it by the cross of Christ. As I may have but a short time to live, let me be entirely devoted to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and seek the highest eminence of personal religion. I will apply to my studies with the utmost vigor that I may be qualified for more extensive usefulness during the brief space of my earthly pilgrimage. I will from this day endeavor to do all the good that I possibly can, in every way and in every place; this shall be

my

business my

business when I am in my field of labor among the heathen; so that if I be called away by death in the midst of my days, or before I have reached the meridian of life, I may be able to present to my Redeemer souls saved by me, as evidences that I have not run in vain nor labored in vain; and which shall be my joy and crown of rejoicing in the day of the Lord?”

now, and

3. Important instruction is also conveyed to those who may have it in view to give themselves up to the missionary service. That there are many such in the churches of Christ I have the fullest confidence. Read here a lesson of no ordinary use. In conjunction with pure principles, considerations of an inferior nature are apt to mingle themselves in the minds of the disciples of Christ. While the young Christian is supremely influenced by a desire to promote the glory of Christ and the salvation of the heathen, other things may creep in imperceptibly, and have more weight in his determination than he is aware. The dignity of the office; the respectability of the station; the view of multitudes of converts listening with delight, and look