seven times refined.

Thanks to the name of

you

the LORD, for his gracious help afforded all in this time of peculiar need and distress. Oh, what a wonder-working God is our GOD! How mysterious and unsearchable are his ways! He giveth none account of any of his matters. Who dares say to him, What doest thou? That such a useful, important, and valuable life on many accounts should be taken away, when so many seem to remain indeed as mere cumberers of the ground! I thought of you, my dear- with your dear

and honoured mother, as those who would be bereaved indeed by this truly melancholy event: and though no earthly friend can make up your loss, or the loss you will all sustain, consider the weeping widow! the tender babes! (Oh, how my bowels yearn over them!) Yet let me tell what you know by sweet and happy experience. Our GOD is omnipotent to save; in temporal as well as spiritual distress, his compassionate

you what

ear is always open to the cries of the needy, his hand is not shortened at all that it cannot save. Blessed be God, our dear

knows where to carry her burden. Many there are, who are exercised with such almost heartbreaking providences, yet know not where to seek relief. What a signal instance of mercy, that she should be so wonderfully supported! I admire the goodness of the LORD displayed in such a resignation of mind as you mention, and pray that it may be continued even to the end. The LORD be with, bless, and support you through the whole of the trying scene! I know not how my eyes could endure it. Heartily indeed do I wish that it may be sanctified to the accomplishment of those ends which he had in view; so that it may be hereafter said of him, as it was of Sampson, that more were slain by his death than in his life. May many stout hearted proud Pharisees be brought low, and the more moral be led to see the beauty and the

excellency of vital godliness, which was so exemplified in the general deportment of our dear deceased. Let us also be earnest that the awful providence may be sanctified to our own souls: may it be a fresh lesson to us, of the uncertainty of all human pursuits, so that we may learn to rejoice with trembling over our dearest and nearest connexions, and set our hearts more undividedly on things above.

Now, my dear

and

what can I say more? Oh that I may be the happy instrument of saying one word to alleviate the distress of your dejected mind! Will you write to me again? I shall be very anxious to hear how it is with and how our dear friends were carried through the solemnities of the funeral; and if you can find your mind collected to give me the particulars of the affliction, which terminated the life of our valuable, you will further oblige me, as I know next to nothing about

his illness, and did not indeed learn that he was so bad till the night before I heard of his death. Pray, my dear

make my

kindest and most affectionate love to all the afflicted; tell them we sympathize with, and pray for, them night and day. Accept my best thanks for both your kind letters.

kind and great attention to my letter. It was, I confess, a great satisfaction to me to hear, though so melancholy were the tidings. Ah! truly I can conceive, though perhaps but in a small degree, what you must all have felt. I can realize matters far better than if I had never been at, or participated in the felicity of that once united and

happy family.

Our memory, though too

treacherous where we most of all need its assistance, scarcely ever fails in those melancholy instances, to trace events and recal past circumstances, to the grief and disquietude of our minds. I do well remember his christian-like deportment in all relations; I can call to mind his person, his method, manner, and matter of conversation, familyprayer, &c, as though it were but yesterday I saw or heard him; and can sometimes scarcely reconcile my mind to the idea, that I shall never more see or hear the voice of one I so truly esteemed. But again, Righ"teous is our GOD in all his ways," (good when he takes as when he gives) and holy in all his works; let us remember this, and never open our mouths against him.

I am sorry you should repeat apologies about the length of your letter: I took it exceedingly kind that you devoted so large a portion of your time to my service. I must