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As we have reason to believe that an original Discourse, adapted either for parochial or family use, would be considered by many of our Readers as a desirable addition to the CHRISTIAN REMEMBRANCER, we have determined, for the future, to prefix to every Number of it such a Sermon, as from its simplicity of style and purity of doctrine might best answer the purpose for which it is intended.

SERMON ON THE NEW YEAR.

Psalm xxxix. 5.

Lord, let me know mine end, and the number of my days; that I may be certified how long I have to live. WHEN he wrote the Psalm from which these words are taken, David appears to have laboured under the deepest affliction both of mind and of his own feelings and conduct at of his Father and his God. My hody. The account which he gives the time, is a very remarkable one.

is not, indeed, a more painful feelng, than when the heart, full of knows not to whom it shall impart its own bitterness and sorrow, its troubles, nor upon whom it shall with David; destitute of every repose its grief. Such was the case earthly comforter and friend, he flies for consolation and support to a higher power, and pours forth his tears and his prayers into the boson

heart was hot within me, and while

Knowing how useless and how wick- I was thus musing, the fire kindled, ed are all clamorous and hasty com- and at the last I spake with my plaints, he determines to be silent, tongue. Lord, let me know mine give his enemies no advan- end, and the number of my days; tage over him. I said, I will take that I may be certified how long I

and

to

heed to my ways; that I offend not have to live.

These are not the

in my tongue, I will keep my mouth words of fretfulness or despair, but as it were with a bridle, while the the words of soberness and truth. ngodly is in my sight. But though He does not ask with idle curiosity he abstained from every expression, to know the exact day and hour on

of peevishness

which his life

his meaning.

shall end-that is not He only asks to be

might have innocently and reasonor desperation, he ably entered like righteous Job, so convinced of the shortness of his into a justification both of himself days, as to be enabled thereby the and of his God. Remembering, better to bear his present sorrows, however, from the example of Job, and to prepare for his future end. how liable, even in this respect, he This he asks, that he may be certiwas to be mistaken; he kept silence, fied how long he has to live; that from good words; but it he may know and feel how short a

yea, even

was pain and grief unto him. There space even the longest life affords REMEMBRANCER, No. 37.

B

for the exercise of piety and obedience, and that as he is certified of its shortness, so he may be certified of its value. This sense of the words agrees exactly with the translation of them as we find it in the Bible. "Lord, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days; what it is, that I may know how frail I am. The sum and substance, indeed, of his request, is contained in the last verse of the Psalm; an entreaty it is, in which he will be joined most earnestly by every one among us, who knows that he is a stranger only, and a sojourner upon earth, as all his fathers were. The entreaty is this, O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength, before I go hence and be no more seen. May God in his mercy grant that, in the case of every one of us, it may be so..

mec liate conaffairs of

What would be the
sequence of this?
the world around us would be im-
mediately plunged into utter con-
fusion. Who would sow, if he did
not hope to reap, who would labour
and toil if he was certain that he
should not enjoy the fruits? All
activity, all motive, all spirit, would
be destroyed; and in their stead
would succeed envy, jealousy, and
repining. Nor with respect to the
soul itself, would the change be for
the better. If a young man, in the
hope only of living fifty years, thinks
that he may safely spend the first
half of them in vice and folly, what
would he do if he was certain?
Would he not the more securely put
off his repentance and enjoy his sin?
How would the day of reformation,
year after year, be delayed; till at
length:in the agony of despair, even
with the time open before him, he
would imagine that it was too late.
On the other hand, if a young man

But many of us, however earn estly they would pray for this, would pray for something more...We pen. think that if we knew the precise...in the vigour of health and strength time of our end, and the exact number of our days, we should be the better and the happier creatures. We should not be the better, but the worse for this addition to our knowledge. It would make us more unhappy, more vicious, and more desperate. To shew this will be one of the chief objects of the present discourse. Let us consider then, First, the wisdom of God in hiding from us the exact time of our end.

Secondly, The mercy of God in giving us the means so to know our end and the number of our days as to apply our hearts unto wisdom.

First. God in his wisdom has hid from us the exact number of our days. Suppose now, for a moment, that the Almighty was to reveal to each of us the precise length of his existence suppose he was to reveal to one that he should live fifty years, to another that he should live ten, to another that he should live one, to another that this very night his soul should be required of him.

were assured that in one short year
his soul would be required of him,
how would his thoughts be drawn
off from his duty to man, and fixed
only upon his duty to God, he would
forget that both these duties should
be discharged together; in his
anxiety and alarm for his own hap-
piness, he would neglect those ex-
ertions by which he might encrease
the happiness of others.
wisely therefore, and most mercifully
to ourselves and to others, has God
concealed from our eyes the exact
measure of our life and number of
our days.

Most

But in return for this, God has given us the means so to know our end and the number of our days, as to apply our hearts unto wisdom.

The experience of every hour will teach us that our days are at best but a span long, and that every man living is altogether vanity. The term of our appointed time must conclude quickly, and it may conclude suddenly. How soon are the youngest and the strongest called

from this world to another, how rapid is their departure, how unexpected their summons! These are the warnings which a merciful God gives to us that remain, these are among the means which his wisdom employs to teach us how near our own end may be, and how short the number of our days. Guided by these awful lessons, let us apply our hearts to wisdom. Let the very uncertainty of life teach us to do the work of him that sent us, while it is day, for the night cometh, and quickly cometh, when no man can work.

The duties which all of us in our respective stations have to discharge, will teach us also to know our end. If high and low, rich and poor, have each a task to perform, and each an account to give, will they not each inquire what is the time allowed them for their work, and what is the day on which their stewardship must be resigned? Let a man once seriously think of his duty, and he will think also of his end. He that knows how much he has to do, will number well the days which are given him to do it. Be they many or be they few, he will take care that they shall all be well employed; and that when the Lord cometh, however suddenly, he shall not find him sleeping.

But the greatest of those means which the Almighty has given us of

Disease and pain, disappointment and sorrow, are also among the means which the Almighty uses to bring us to a knowledge of our latter end. While all things go smoothly on, we are little inclined.. to believe that they will ever cou-knowing our end and the number of clude; the greater our enjoyments are, the longer we think that they will last, and in our prosperity we say that we never shall be removed; O death, says the son of Sirach, how bitter is the remembrance of thee to a man that liveth at rest in his possessions, unto the man that hath nothing to vex him, and that hath prosperity in all things. Most merciful then is the Almighty in these his dispensations of affliction and pain, that wean our souls from the seductions and the vanities of the world, and direct our eyes to that better country, to which we are all fast travelling. When the judgments of God are in the earth, then it is that men will learn righteousness. And under tribulation and sorrow the thought of his latter end will be a thought of comfort to every Christian soul. Then it is that he will number his days with satisfaction and joy; he will see how short the space of his earthly trial is, and how everlasting is his reward. Heaviness may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morn ing; in that eternal morning which shall hereafter rise and shine upon every suffering servant of God.

our days, is his Holy Word. There are the promises, there the prospects,. there. the hopes which unite things present to things future, earth to heaven, time to eternity. There it is that we are certified how long we have to live, not in this short and troublesome world, but in the kingdom of God, and in the presence of the Lamb. By faith we know that our end in this life is but our beginning in another; by faith we know that death is but the stream that divides the wilderness in which as strangers and pilgrims we now wander, from the Canaan of our everlasting inheritance. Here we have no abiding city, but we seek one above, whose maker and whose builder is God. This is our real end, for this, by the grace of God, let all our days be numbered, that whether our Lord shall call us sooner or later, we may ever be prepared to obey. Knowing then the end, and the number of your days let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord. Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching: and if

he come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. At no time do these thoughts come home with more seriousness to our souls, than at this season, when by the blessing of God, we are passing from one year to ano. ther. By years our short span of life is measured, by years our day's are numbered. And surely we must see the wisdom and adore the mercy of God in thus directing our thoughts, at stated intervals, to that end to which we are all approaching.

we give of the talent committed to our charge? Have we improved ou minds as we ought, in useful know. ledge, have we strengthened them as we ought, in the faith of th Gospel? What progress have w made in our duty to God or te man in the course of the departed year? In what are we better thi day, than we were this day twelve month? Have we prayed with mor earnestness, have we attended the holy Sacrament more often, hav we thought more seriously of ou latter end? Have we increased in The passage from one year to our charities, have we become kinde another is a sort of stand in the neighbours and better friends? Wha pilgrimage of our lives-it is a pro- bad habit have we subdued, wha jecting point from which a prospect Christian virtue have we cultivated may be taken, both of what is past In one word, are we better?—for i and of what is future. It is well we are not better we are worse then that we should take due ad-qur hearts are more hardened, ou vantage of this wise and merciful.feelings more insensible. dispensation; that we should mark: the flight of our lives and pause and look backwards and forwards, and consider how our account stands for the days that are gone, and how it may stand for those which are to come. A year is at all times a very considerable portion of our existence; but how soon is it gone! To the youngest of us it does not appear long, but as we proceed onward in life, it will appear shorter and shorter. For we compare each succeeding year not with itself alone, but with the whole space of our lives which is past. The larger then the portion of time which we have already gone through, the shorter will the next approaching interval appear. We all from experience know the truth of this; and we often with a sigh lament that every year appears to pass away quicker than the last. How much then does the value of every moment that remains, increase upon us, when we know with what fearful. haste even the longest life is rolling onward to eternity.

The year is past-how has it been spent-To what purpose has it been applied? What account can

The year is past, and we ar now entering into another, of which who among us can be assured tha he will be permitted to see the end How many, even among ourselves who were present with us at the beginning of the departed year, hav been summoned, before its conclu sion, from life to death, from tim to eternity. Let these things teach us to know our end and the numbe of our days, how small it must be how much smaller it may be. Th days of our years are but three scor years and ten, but how few, com paratively how very few, arrive a that period. How many are cut of from the land of the living in the vigour of manhood, in the flower o their youth, and in the pride o their strength.

May we all, as we retire to ou chambers and are still, consider how soon we also must pass away and be gone; and how our years are bring ing to an end as it were a tale that is told. And when we thus retire, may the Father of mercies influence those moments and those thoughts, on which perhaps our lo in eternity itself may depend. May he, in whose hands are the issues

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