moment exclaiming thus, in her solitude, "O my child, would God the grave had covered thee, whilst thou wert yet in reputation, and comparative innocence! Alas! that thou shouldest have lived to disgrace thyself, and bring down thy widowed mother's grey hairs in sorrow to the grave!"

I remember to have read, or heard somewhere, the following anecdote. A widowed mother had an only son, who while yet a youth, was seized with an alarming illness. Her heart was in the greatest tumult of grief at the prospect of his removal. She sent for her minister to pray for her child's recovery. It was his preservation from death that was to be the subject of the minister's petitions, rather than the mother's submission to the will of God. Like a faithful pastor, he begged her to controul her excessive grief and solicitude, and resign her son to God's disposal: but to no avail: it seemed as if she neither could nor would give him up. Prayer was to pluck him from the borders of the grave, whether God were willing to spare him or not. Her son lived: the mother with ecstatic joy, received him back, as from the borders of the tomb. He grew to adult age; but it was to die in circumstances ten thousand times more afflictive to the mother's heart, than his earlier removal would have been. As he came to manhood he turned out profligate, extravagant, dishonest. His crimes became capital; he was detected, tried, convicted, and sentenced to be hanged: and seven years from the day when that minister prayed for his life,

he had to visit this wretched mother, to be with her, and comfort her, if, indeed, her heart could receive consolation, on the day of his execution. Oh! widow is there not a heavier calamity than the death, in ordinary circumstances, of an only son? I would not for a moment suggest that it is probable your son would have come to this: but it is possible: or if not to this, yet to something that would have embittered all your future days. Would not this distressed woman, look with envy upon others whose children had died in honour and reputation, and think their affliction not worthy of the name, compared with hers? Would she not look back with deep compunc

tion upon her own rebellious grief and unwillingness to give up her child at the will of God?

Before I close this chapter, I would suggest, that as the death of an only child removes from your widowed heart, the last hope or object of a terrestrial nature, that seemed to give interest to earth, or occupation upon it, you should look for objects of another kind: even such as are spiritual, heavenly, and divine. Seek, then, not only for a richer enjoyment of personal religion, as the chief source of consolation, but cherish a warmer zeal for its diffusion, as the bes: and happiest occupation that can employ your faculties, or your time. Now that God has taken from you your son, adopt the cause of his Son. Consecrate yourself afresh to the interests of evangelical piety. What have you now to do on earth; what is left: for you to do; what can you find to do;

but diffuse by your property, if you possess much, and by your personal labours, if you are in health, the benefits of the gospel, the blessings of salvation, to those who are destitute of them? Live, now, wholly for God, and the salvation of the human race. Soften the weight of your cross, by making known the glory of the cross of Christ. Instead of retiring into seclusion, to nourish woe, to leave your sorrow to prey upon your heart, or to let life fret itself away amidst the indolence of grief, rouse your spirit for holy action. Let your loss be the gain of others, by your employing your leisure for their benefit. Freed from every tie that bound your soul to personal or relative objects, feel at liberty for doing good to others. Active benevolence is the best balm for such wounds as yours. Allow yourself no leisure for dark and melancholy thoughts to collect, or for busy memory to torment you with distressing recollections. Your departed child wants not your property; give it to God; nor your time, nor your solicitude; give them to God. In pitying the sorrows of others, you will find a sweet solace for your own. Occupy your lone heart, and hours as lonely as your heart, with schemes of mercy, and purposes of beneficence. If your affliction shall lead to such a result, you may then say of active benevolence, that it is one of

The best reliefs that mourners have,
And makes their sorrows blest.

CHAPTER V1

ANNA THE PROPHETESS.

A pattern for aged widows.

And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser: she was of a great age, and had lived with an husband seven years from her virginity; and she was a widow of about fourscore and four years, which departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day. And she coming in that instant, gave thanks likewise unto the Lord, and spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem. And when they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth. And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon him. Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the Passover."-Luke ii. 36-41.

THE Holy Spirit of God, while he passes over in silence the names of mighty kings and potentates,

with all their civil and military achievements, their battles and their victories, writes the life, and pronounces the eulogy of a poor and pious aged widow of whom the world knew little and cared less, to preserve her memory to the end of time, and to show how grateful to him such a kind of life is. Anna was one among the few who, in that dark degenerate age, preserved the light of true piety from being quite extinct, and who waited for the consolation of Israel. Having lost her husband, after a short union of seven years, she continued a widow ever afterwards; and was eighty-four years of age at the time of our Lord's birth. Gifted with the spirit of prophecy, she delivered the messages of God to the few who were disposed to receive them, and spake of Him that was to come, who should bring deliverance for his people. Her abode was in one of the dwellings which surrounded the temple, and her sole employment devotion. She had long been dead to the world, and the world to her; and, with her heart in heaven, she had neither interest nor hope upon earth. It was her privilege, as it was of good old Simeon, before she closed her eyes on things terrestrial, to see Him of whom the prophets spake. Having uttered her gratitude that the light had not departed from her eyes, till she had seen the Lord, she confessed him before others, and.commended him to their regards. Happy saint, to see this new-born Saviour as the star of thy evening; thou hast lived to good purpose, in thus having thy existence prolonged, to welcome to