yet we have reason to regard as wise men, and possessed of the fear of God. Again, there is such deadly enmity in the world against God and His holy truth, that the just, who reflect His image and are witnesses for His truth, often get a curse instead of a blessing from many of their fellow creatures. And particularly is this the case in a man's own lifetime. Jeremiah says: "I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury, yet every one of them doth curse me;" and the other prophets met with similar treatment in their day. In after ages, when the tongue of Jeremiah was silent in the grave and men had nothing to fear from its holy denunciations, they could build and garnish his sepulchre, while they crucified his Lord, and would have swept his fellow servant Paul from the face of the earth, as one who was not fit to live.

Yet, in spite of the mistakes made by saints in their shortsightedness, and the calumnies scattered by the haters of the godly (for he that is upright in the way is abomination to the wicked), it remains a truth that the memory of the just is blessed, and those whose hearts are right with God find a blessing in treasuring up recollections of the godly dead. And, knowing this, we have felt a pleasure in preparing for publication a record of the life and labours of the late Septimus Sears.

The painful circumstances which attended his latter days have suggested to us the above reflec

tions, which we would affectionately commend to the notice of any reader on whose mind there may still be any impression unfavourable to the departed as a faithful man of truth. Vague reports produced similar impressions with respect to him on our own mind; but they vanished upon a closer acquaintance with him, and gave place to feelings of tender Christian love and most unfeigned esteem. Still the currency of such reports, and the bias which they have wrought in the minds of some sincere lovers of truth, have made us feel that a slight introductory sketch of his writings and ministry might suitably commence this little volume. It will not be necessary to go largely into details; for a concise account of his teaching remains to us in his own well nigh dying words, in an address to his church, which we quote in the following pages. Ponder it well, sincere Christian reader; and, laying aside the testimony of man, compare it with the inspired word of revelation. We believe that you will then see that the key to any uncomfortable suspicions that you may have lies not in the faulty doctrine or expressions of faithful Septimus Sears, but in one of the two reasons alleged above for the fact that the memory of the just is sometimes cursed instead of blessed, viz., the shortsightedness of saints and the malice of sinners.

As a writer and editor he is perhaps as widely known as any man of recent date in the Church of Christ.

For more than a quarter of a century he employed his pen for the good of souls, ever aiming to put pure truth before his fellow man; and in doing this he had an aptitude of expression which rendered his unassuming productions acceptable to young and old, rich and poor, learned and illiterate.

His earliest publications were a relation of that gracious work of the Lord upon his soul whereby he was brought from death to life, from darkness to light, and from the rigid bondage of the law into the sweet enjoyment of gospel liberty. He then stated in his own language the inward exercises of his heart, which found an echo in the hearts of others; and though it must be admitted that there was in his early writings a form of speech which savoured of harshness and excitement, and which in riper years he discarded, yet he never had to retract any part of that spiritual teaching which was indelibly stamped upon his heart by divine power. Indeed, however justly his words at that date called for criticism, none can have read his "Songs in Summer and Wailings in Winter" with any measure of gracious discernment without feeling that he knew the malady of sin, and that he had also, by saving faith, realised the efficacious remedy in the blood and righteousness of Christ. In his afflictions the Lord's testimonies were his delight and his counsellors, so that out of the eater came forth meat, not only in the shape of preached discourses, but in occasional or periodical tracts,

such as "Crumbs from Clifton Chapel," and a great variety of pamphlets and leaflets which found a way into many homes and hearts, where truth had not been heretofore known.

Nor was he merely a prose writer; he was wont to turn his thoughts into verse, for which he had a fair gift. As early as 1850 he published poems. and hymns entitled "Breathings of the Heart," and without claiming for them a place amongst high class poetry, we may say that they contained words of truth and soberness in a very creditable poetic form. His good wishes for the young, which he often expressed in rhyme, were ever replete with new ideas, so that in this particular line he had, perhaps, few competitors.

If he can be said to have favoured in his line of doctrine any class of men more than another, it was the Puritan writers; he had often read their works to profit, and therefore justly esteemed them, and imbibed their spirit. But as a preacher and teacher he followed no man. "What saith the Scripture?" was his inquiry, and they were ever his infallible rule and guide. He cared not to adopt words and phrases because they were used among the churches with which he was more immediately connected; but, daring to be singular, he drank water out of his own cistern, and running water out of his own well (Prov. v. 10), not the mere emanations of a well-cultivated and fertile mind, but the bubblings of a graciously exercised

heart, which taught his mouth, added learning to his lips, and enabled him, by means of his pen, to speak to the "regions beyond" him, where his voice never could have reached. His great concern was to obey the apostolic injunction, "Preach the Word." He felt the Bible to be God's Word, and desired that everyone might revere it as such; and while he knew well by his own experience that the Holy Ghost must wield that sword to cause it to divide "soul and spirit, joints and marrow," and to become "a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Heb. iv. 12), he also knew that, as a steward, he was required to be faithful; and therefore shunned not to declare all the counsel of God alike to sinner and saint, to professor and possessor.

The main points of his ministry which he recapitulates in the address above referred to, are the infinite and inflexible justice of God in His holy law; the awful consequences of the fall as seen in the spiritual death and total depravity of all men by nature, and in the eternal vengeance that must overtake all graceless sinners; the necessity of regeneration, repentance and faith; the glorious person of Immanuel, God with us, the representative at God's right hand of all the household of faith, the great covenant Head through whom God can be just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus; the love of Jesus as set forth in the free invitations of the Gospel to the sinful, the poor, the