IV. The child's death will be no waste, IF HEARTS BE SOFTENED BY THE AFFLICTION, reminded of God's covenant, of the sin that has caused death, and of the uncertainty of life. If taught not to make any earthly thing a portion or an idol, if affection is directed to the other world where the soul is, Christ is, and where God is gathering his own one by one. If parents are more impressed that repentance and faith are required of them, if they would join their child again, and hear it speak to them from the other world. Sin makes the impassable gulf.

Exercise unfaltering trust in God. Thank him for the loan of the child, and that through Christ you can rejoin it in that land where parting shall be no more.

A

EARLY PIETY.

REV. J. W. McCREE.

He

Thou art my trust from my youth.-Ps. lxxi: 5. RECKLESS child is never a happy child. should be pleasant, docile, open-hearted, courteous, humble, willing to do the least things patiently, waiting for the time when he shall, by Divine grace, do the greatest things. That the young may be brought to trust in Christ, they should be treated by the aged with great kindness and love. It may be fitting on this solemn occasion tɔ say :

I. They should patiently answer their inquiries. Think what a world of wonders this is to the juvenile mind. How full the Bible is-teeming with things unknown to the youthful soul. Try to satisfy its eager, palpitating questions. Every one who will do this in a wise, genial spirit will have a rich reward.

II. They should not frown upon the laughter of the

young. Why should not the young laugh, not too much, nor too long, nor out of place, but when it is timely and innocent, then should the old bear with it and share in it.

III. They should sympathize with the struggles of the young. Some young people have a hard life. Godless parents, homes without flowers, music, beauty or love. Fathers never kiss them, mothers never pray for them. Cold walks to work, low wages, tedious hours, blustering nights. Who would not pity, help and love them and show them all possible kindness?

IV. They should rejoice when they rejoice. If they are merry, singing for joy, garlanding themselves with roses on birthdays, they should not throw "wet blankets" over their glossy heads and smiling faces. While they love and wed and laugh, the aged should not begin to prophesy evil concerning them, but turn the water into wine at the marriage, bless the feast and be merry, and show that God's people are the gentlest, the sweetest and the best.

V. The aged should seek the salvation of the young. No parent should rest until all his family are converted and in the church of Christ-until even the very lambs of the flock are "safe in the arms of Jesus"-His forevermore.

Some of the young never grow old. Their voices ring no more out of cots. Their fect patter no more to the door. Their little graves rise amid green grass and the heavens shelter their spirits. Wherefore, comfort yourselves. There is comfort for us this day, when the departed could say, "Thou art my trust from my youth." Then death is the gate of life, earth leads to heaven, where the young are crowned with knowledge and joy, where all are immortal and glorious and hare pleasures forevermore

THE LESSONS OF GOD'S ROD.

BY REV. G. D. MAGREGOR.

Hear ye the rod and who hath appointed it.-MICAH vi: 9.

GOD employs many instruments for the instruction

of His children. Scripture, daily blessings, Providence, a remarkable Providence as that of the sudden death of a young man.

I. This solemnly speaks to us of the brevity and uncertainty of human life. This lesson is often sounded in Our ears and addressed to our hearts. But this neglected truth is now loudly proclaimed, not to rob the young of the sunshine and joy natural to young hearts, but to urge them so to live that to them death shall have no terror and no sting.

II. This speaks to us of the disappointment of the brightest hopes. This has often been the theme of the moralist, the poet and the preacher. Now it has had an impressive illustration. Hopes are all quenched in death and buried in an early grave. Have you a hope which entereth into that within the veil? If death comes then you will have a prize of infinite worth substituted for one only of finite value. No merely earthly hope can defy death or bloom beyond the grave. Let Christ be the trust and stay and He will endow with a hope full of immortality.

III. This event speaks to us of the mystery of Providence. A mystery in such a death at such a time. What power for good possessed! What service might not such a mind have rendered to God and man! A promising life abruptly ended, while thousands of the weak and worthless are permitted to live in uselessness and in vice. But the Judge of all the earth will do right, even though the rightness of this procedure docs

not reveal itself at once to our feeble reason. We see but a small portion of God's complicated plan—the merest outlines of His picture. In heaven the hopes of the believer will find a richer fruition and his powers a nobler service than earth could afford.

IV. This event speaks to us of the worth of a Christian faith. "We sorrow not as those who have no hope." The foundation of this hope is the knowledge that the departed lived and died trusting in Him who is the Resurrection and the Life." 66 Merely to remember that he had many amiable qualities, etc., would not be enough, but the confidence that he was an humble disciple of Christ cheers and sustains and casts a brightness over the grave. Learn.the transcendent worth of a Christian faith. It supports the dying, comforts the bereaved and gives a certainty of a blessed reunion. Delay not to exercise faith, but be ye also ready.

THE FUNERAL TRAIN AT NAIN.

REV. GEBLER.

LUKE Vii: 11-17.

THE spring season of the year, full of renewal of life, beautifully accords with this incident in to-day's Gospel. Two processions of human beings meet each other at the gates of Nain; out of the village comes the train of death, a corpse in the van; the procession of life approaches toward it; in the van is the Prince of Life, Jesus Christ; the latter does not give way, but conquers the former. The funeral procession is changed into a mass of happy persons, and with the cheerful followers of the Lord from a group of blessed worshippers. I. The funeral train which is met by Christ.

II. The manner in which the Lord approaches this train.

III. The result.

I. The procession comes from Nain, which means "pleasantness." This entire beautiful earth is only a world of death. The corpse is that of a young man-no human energy can defy death. The mother is a widowDeath is a cruel prince. The accompanying people can do nothing but sympathize. This funeral train is a picture of devastation and sorrow, and the impotence of man in opposition to this power of destruction-where Christ has not yet come, e. g., heathen nations. And even now, what deep immorality and fear of death where Jesus is not known and trusted! Man without Christ is spiritually dead.

II. The Lord beheld and pitied the widowed mother. Thus He looks yet on every one whom the stroke of death casts into deep sorrow. He speaks to her. Thus He comforts us likewise in His word. He touches the bier, He does something. And thus, in our day, we become acquainted with circumstances which take place against all human expectation, and which are proofs of the continuous power of the living Christ.

III. "He that was dead sat up and began to speak. Although He does not show His power in this wise any more, yet He shows it in different ways.

(a) Christ stops deaths-this is shown in the history. of nations which accept Christ (e. g., cannibalism in Sandwich Islands).

(b) He awakens us from spiritual death.

(c) He helps us to overcome the terrors and agony of death.

(d) He will raise up all the dead at the last day.

"And he delivered him to his mother." Many a spiritually dead lost son has Christ restored to his parents