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is like open wickedness in a minister of the gospel; it prevents all the good he might otherwise have done, and produces evil which no repentance, no exertions, can repair.

"When obliged to inflict punishment, let it be seen that justice occupies the first place in your breast, and a dignified clemency the second; act the part of a friend, and a father, not of an illiberal, unfeeling tyrant.

"Neither covet nor avoid pop ularity. Be apt to distrust your own talents in governing, when brought into competition with those of your neighbours. If they are better qualified to hold places of trust, be willing that they should be preferred.

Al

ways remember that the man who is elevated by the intrigues of a faction, is never respected by his friends, nor by his enemies; and what is worse, he seldom does his duty as a wise and faithful magistrate.

"Never fall into the foolish error of considering less important offices as dishonourable. View the man, who does this, as possessed of a weak mind, and as worthy of no office, of no confidence. Rectitude of conduct, and a just sense of dignity, will render any office honourable.

"Remember your respective paths of office. Meditate upon them by night and by day. Consider the engagement into which you have entered, as it really is; an engagement which Jehovah, the Lord God of Hosts, is called to witness, Resolve to act agreeably to this momentous obligation. If this be not your intention, stand off. "Procul, O proful, este profani." Touch not

the holy thing with polluted hands. You had better withdraw like cowards from the performance of your duty, than imprecate upon yourselves that divine vengeance, which you are predetermined to deserve.

"Consider yourselves as always responsible to your country. Tho' she may not be able to detect and punish, you are still responsible. You are entrusted with a charge of more value than any worldly possession; a charge of incalculable importance to the present generation, and to posterity: you are to purify the public morals; you are to guard our youth against the numerous temptations, which lie in wait to devour them. Like the great Roman magistrate, consider your country as addressing you in the most solemn and impressive manner. Let each one of you hear the "quid agis, Marce Tulli," as applied to himself, and let him ponder well how he shall return a satisfactory answer to this most sacred demand of his country.

"Above all, consider yourselves as responsible to God. He instituted civil government; he has given rules for the regulation of your conduct; he has appointed you his vicegerents on earth; and as your conduct shall prove, so will be your allotments in the day of retribution. If you connive at iniquity; if you violate your oaths; if you barter your salvation for a "mess of pottage," for a miserable gust of present popularity; if you enlist under the arch revolter, and assist in withdrawing men from allegiance to God, destruction is even now uncovered to receive But if you strive to co-op

you.

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NOTWITHSTANDING the warnings of philosophers, and the daily examples of losses and misfortunes, which life forces upon us, such is the absorption of our thoughts in the business of the present day, such the resignation of our reason to empty hopes of future felicity, or such our unwillingness to foresee what we dread, that every calamity comes suddenly upon us, and not only presses as a burden, but crushes as a blow,

There are evils, which happen out of the common course of nature, against which it is no reproach not to be provided. A flash of lightning intercepts the traveller in his way; the concussion of an earthquake heaps the ruins of cities upon their inhabitants; but other miseries time brings, though silently, yet visibly, forward, by its own lapse, which yet approaches unseen, because we turn our eyes away; and they seize us unresisted, because we would not arm ourselves against them, by setting them before us.

That it is vain to shrink from what cannot be avoided, and to hide that from ourselves, which

must some time be found, is a truth, which we all know, but which all neglect, and perhaps none more than the speculative reasoner, whose thoughts are always from home, whose eye wanders over life, whose fancy dances after motions of happiness kindled by itself, and who examines every thing rather than his own state,

Nothing is more evident than that the decays of age must ter. minate in death. Yet there is no man (says Tully) who does not believe that he may yet live another year; and there is none who does not, upon the same principle, hope another year for his parent, or his friend; but the fallacy will be in time detected; the last year, the last day, will come; it has come, and is past— The life, which made my own life pleasant, is at an end, and the gates of death are shut upon my prospects!

The loss of a friend on whom the heart was fixed, to whom every wish and endeavour tend, ed, is a state of desolation in which the mind looks abroad, impatient of itself, and finds nothing but emptiness and hor ror.

The blameless life, the artless tenderness, the native simplicity, the modest resigna tion, the patient sickness, and the quiet death, are remembered only to add value to the loss; to aggravate regret for what cannot be amended; to deepen sorrow for what cannot be recalled.

These are the calamities by which Providence gradually disengages us from the love of life. Other evils fortitude may repel, or hope mitigate; but irrepara ble privation leaves nothing to

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exercise resolution, or flatter expectation. The dead cannot return, and nothing is left us here but Langrishment and grief.

Yet, such is the course of nature, that whoever lives long must outlive those whom he loves and honours. Such is the condition of our present existence, that life must one time lose its association, and every inhabitant of the earth must walk downward to the grave alone and anregarded, without any partner of his joy or grief, without any interested witness of his misfortunes or success. Misfortunes, indeed, he may yet feel, for where is the bottom of the misery of man! But what is success to him, who has none to enjoy it? Happiness is not found in self-contemplation; it is perceived only when it is refected from another.

We know little of the state of departed souls, because such knowledge is not necessary to a good life. Reason deserts us at the brink of the grave, and gives no farther intelligence. Revelation is not wholly silent; "there is joy among the angels in heaven over a sinner that repenteth;" and surely the joy is communicable to souls disentangled from the body, and made like angels.

Let hope, therefore, dictate, what revelation does not confute, that the union of souls may still remain; and that we, who are struggling with sin, sorrow, and infirmities, may have one part in the attention of those who have finished their course, and are now receiving their re

ward.

These are the great occasions which force the mind to take

refuge in religion. When we have no help in ourselves, what can remain, but that we look up to a higher and greater power? And to what hope may we not raise our eyes and hearts, when we consider that the greatest Power is the best?

Surely there is no man, who, thus afflicted, does not seek succour in the gospel, which has brought life and immortality to light! The precepts of Epicurus, which teach us to endure what the laws of the universe make necessary, may silence, but not content us. The dictates of Zeno, who commands us to look with indifference on abstract things, may dispose us to conceal our sorrow, but cannot assuage it. Real alleviations of the loss of friends, and rational tranquillity in the prospect of our own dissolution, can be received only from the promise of Him in whose hands are life and death; and from the assurance of another and better state, in which all tears will be wiped from our eyes, and the whole soul shall be filled with joy. Philosophy may create stubbornness, but religion only can give patience.

SAM. JOHNSON.

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A Funeral Oration, pronounced in the chapel of Dartmouth University, on the death of ELIPHA LET HARDY, a member of the junior class, who died at Hanover, Jan. 2, 1806, aged 19 years. By JOHN BURNHAM, a classmate. Hanover. M. Davis. 1806.

Ir is the occasion of this ora

tion, which renders it worthy of public notice. The young man, whose death is here deplored, was endued with remarkable intellectual powers, and engaged, with singular diligence and the most flattering prospect of success, in the pursuit of useful knowledge. His regular and amiable deportment, and the rapid

progress he made in the various branches of learning, gained the love and esteem of all who knew him, and excited the hope, that he would be an ornament to the cause of virtue, and a great bless ing to the world.

The following paragraph in the oration, descriptive of the exercises of his mind in his last

sickness, deserves particular no

tice; and leads us to entertain very favourable ideas of the theo, logical views of the writer, as well as of the penitence and submission of his deceased class

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his astonished view the ocean of de

pravity which exists in the human heart. Deeply impressed with a sense of the rectitude of God's holy law, he was convinced that the punishment of sinners was just. Brought at length to bow to the sceptre of Jesus, he gave satisfactory evidence to those around him, that he was the subject of regenerating grace. When the agonies of his mind had impaired the health of his body,...still he spake with the most profound reverence of God and religion; declaring repeatedly, he had no wish the divine law should suffer that he might be saved. Here was evinced that cordial submission to the decrees of Heaven, which constitutes the true Christian."

The youth and inexperience of the writer must be an apology for some incorrect thoughts and expressions, for some uncouthness and harshness in his figures, and for the incoherence of the several parts of his oration.

The Messiah's Reign, a sermon' preached on the Fourth of July, before the Washington Society, by JAMES MUIR, D.D. Pastor af the Presbyterian Church at Alexandria. Snowden. Alexandria.

THIS short sermon is founded on the following prophetic description of Christ's reign by the prophet Micah. "He shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off, and they

shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. But they shall sit every man under his vine, and under his figtree; and none shall make them afraid." The author's plan is to consider these words in their aspect to the Messiah's appear

ance; to the tendency of the goshel; to the revolution which has taken place in this country; and to the events, which we have reason to believe are hastening forward to their completion. Under each of these heads we find very pertinent remarks. The author is so happy, as not to lose sight either of the text, or of the occasion. We observe a beautiful ease of language, which is natural to one who is blessed with ease of thought. The characteristic trait of the composition is a lively, forcible brevity. In some sentences there is a transposition approaching the air of poetry.

The following specimen shows the author's manner.

In the concluding address"Mankind are branches of the same family. Turn to the East or West, to the North or South; traverse the globe from pole to pole. Wherever you meet a human being, you meet a brother or a sister. This Christiani. ty teaches and enforces in the strongest language. The heart of the patriot....glows with a warmth communicated from Scripture. That ineglected, that despised, that persecuted book has scattered the seeds of patriotism, and cherished their growth.

"All and each can do something for the benefit of society. Few, it is true, can enlighten the nation, or manPretensions to age public affairs. this by those whose ignorance and weakness are too apparent to be Like denied, tend to confusion. Phaton, in the heathen mythology, who unwisely seized with his feeble grasp the reins of his father's fiery steeds, they bring themselves into danger, and expose their fellow-men to dreadful calamities. God fits men for different purposes. Let each know his place. He may be an expert mechanic and a useful farmer, who would prove a most miserable statesman."

The author cannot close without seizing the opportunity to recommend the missionary ob

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