God fhould require my foul of me this night, I could hope for mercy from him. The bitter ago nies I underwent in this my first acquaintance with myself, were so far from throwing me into defpair of that mercy which is over all God's works, that it proved motives of greater circumfpection in my future conduct. The oftner I exercised myself in meditations of this kind, the lefs was my anxiety; and by making the thoughts of death familiar, what was at firft fo terrible and fhocking, is now become the sweetest of my enjoyments. These contemplations have indeed made me ferious, but not fullen; nay, they are fo far from having foured my temper, that I have a mind perfectly compofed, and a fecret fpring of joy in my heart ;-I taste all the innocent fatisfactions of life pure, as I have no share in pleasures that leave a fting behind them.

-Man but dives in death,

Dives from the fun in fairer day to rife;
The grave his fubterranean road to blifs.

Death is only terrible to us as a change of ftate. Let us then live fo, as to make it only a continuation of it, by the uniform practice of charity, benevolence, and religion, which are to be the exercises of the next life.

Fond

Fond foolish man would fain these thoughts de

cline,

And lose them in his bus'nefs, fports, and wine;
But canft thou lose them? Se'ft thou not each hour
Age drop like Autumn leaves, youth like a flow'r
Cut down; do coffins, graves, and tolling bells
Warn thee in vain? In palaces and cells,
The heights of life above, the vales beneath,
In towns and fields, we ev'ry where meet death.

In death's uncertainty thy danger lies.

As the tree falls, fo muft it lie; as death leaves us judgment will find us. If fo, how importunate fhould every one of us be to fecure the favour of the Almighty Judge, to be interested in the Redeemer's love, and among the number of his chofen people, before it is too late.

Be like a centinel, keep on your guard,
All eye, all ear, all expectation of
The coming foe.

In the death of others we may fee our own mortality, and be taught to live more and more in the daily expectation of, and preparation for that awful hour, to which we are all haftening as fast as

the wings of time can carry us. Seek then an intereft in the bleffed Redeemer.

Our birth is nothing, but our death begun.
As tapers waste that inftant they take fire.

Death is the end of fear, and beginning of felicity. Death is the law of nature, the tribute of the flesh, the remedy of evils, and the path either to heavenly felicity, or eternal mifery.

Eternity, that boundless race,

Which time himself can never run

(Swift as he flies, with an unwearied pace :) Which when ten thousand thoufand years are done,

Is ftill the fame, and ftill to be begun.

We always dream, the life of man's a dream,
In which fresh tumults agitate his breast;
Till the kind hand of death unlocks the chain
Which clogs the noble and afpiring foul;
And then we truly live.

ADAM's

ADAM'S ADVICE TO EVE,

TO AVOID TEMPTATION.

Woman! beft are all things as the will
Of God ordain'd them; his creating hand
Nothing imperfect or deficient left

Of all that he created, much less man,
Or aught that might his happy state secure,
Secure from outward force; within himself
The danger lies, yet lies within his pow'r :
Against his will he can receive no harm.
But God left free the will, for what obeys
Reason is free, and reafon he made right;
But bid her well beware, and still erect,
Left by fome fair appearing good furpris'd
She dictate falfe, and misinform the will
To do what God exprefsly hath forbid.
Not then miftruft, but tender love enjoins,

That I fhould mind thee oft, and mind thou me.
Firm we fubfift, yet poffible to fwerve,
'Since reason not impoffibly may meet
Some fpecious object by the foe fuborn'd,
And fall into deception unaware,

Not keeping ftricteft watch, as she was warn'd.
Seek not temptation then, which to avoid
Were better, and most likely if from me

Thou

Thou fever not; trial will come unfought.
Wouldst thou approve thy conftancy? approve
First thy obedience: th'other, who can know,
Not feeing thee attempted, who attest?
But if you think trial unfought may find
Us both fecurer than thus warn'd thou feem'st,
Go; for thy stay, not free, absents thee more;
Go in thy native innocence, rely

On what thou haft of virtue, fummon all,
For God tow'rds thee hath done his part, do thine.

LUXURY

T

VIEWED

IN A POLITICAL LIGHT.

O confider luxury in a political view, no re

finement of dress, of the table, of equipage, of habitation, is luxury in thofe, who can afford the expence, and the public gains by the encouragement that is given to arts, manufactures, and commerce. But a mode of living, above a man's annual income weakens the ftate, by reducing to poverty, not only the fquanderers themselves, but many innocent and induftrious perfons connected

with them.