TRUE COMFORT. "THE God of all comfort," 2 Cor. i. 3. Who has not, by accident or disease, been confined to the chamber of weariness and pain? And who, by the sympathies, attentions, and soothings of the tenderest friendship, has comforted you upon the bed of languishing, and made all your bed in your sickness? And who, when the graves were ready for you, and you said, "I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world," who comforted you by the return of ease, the reglowing of health, the renewal of your strength, the resumption of your liberty, so that all your bones said, "Who is a God like unto thee?" Has a friend rejoiced your heart by the sweetness of his counsel ? or has a minister been the helper of your faith and joy? The Lord gave him the tongue of the learned, that he should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary. God comforted you by the coming of Titus. The heathens made idols of every thing that afforded them relief and comfort; and thus they loved and served the creature more than the Creator. Let us not resemble them; but remember that whatever may be the medium of our comfort, God is the only source of it. Thus the instrument, instead of seducing us from God, will be a conductor to him; and the stream will lead us to "the Fountain of life." God will not give his glory to another; and we cannot affront him more than by substituting any thing in the place of him. This will provoke him to strike the idol that robs him of his praise out of the way; or cause him, by disappointing us in the moment of application, to say, "Am I in God's stead? If the Lord help thee not, whence should I help thee?” If we will not make him our trust, he will make that whereon we lean to smite us. He can take comfort out of all our possessions and enjoyments, so that in the midst of our sufficiency we shall be in straits. What Job calls his friends-" physicians of no value," "miserable comforters,”—will apply to all our dependences and expectations separate from God. Even in laughter the heart will be sorrowful. True comfort is to be found in God only; in the hope of his mercy; in the evidence of his friendship; in the freedom of his service; in the comforts of the Holy Ghost. But they who seek it in him shall not be confounded. He has insured strong consolation, to those who flee for refuge to this hope, by a promise confirmed by an oath; and what he promises he is able to perform. Nothing is too hard for the Lord. No depth of distress is below his reach. He can create comfort when there is nothing to derive it from. He can extract it out of the most unlikely materials. He can bring order out of confusion, strength out of weakness, light out of darkness. Sufferer! think of Him! It is his prerogative and delight to "comfort them that are cast down." Why should you faint or despond? Are the consolations of God small with thee? Does not He 66 say, I, even I, am he that comforteth thee?" Lord, I believe; help thou my unbelief. "Thou, which hast showed me great and sore troubles, shalt quicken me again, and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth. Thou shalt ¡ncrease my greatness, and comfort me on every side." JAY. REVEREND MATTHEW HENRY'S RULES FOR LET the difference which you put between the sabbath day and other days be from conscience, not from custom. Have an eye to Christ; remember it is his day; do all as unto Christ; mark the promise, Isa. lviii. 13, 14. Do your sabbath work in dependance on the Spirit: pray that the Spirit would help your infirmities, move upon the waters, stir the pool, and help you in. Prepare for the sabbath before it comes. Remem ber it, we read in the gospel of the preparation-that is, the day before the sabbath. I pity those who, by Saturday's market, cannot but too often be deprived of this. Do, however, as well as you can to set the house in order; especially set the heart in order; see that nothing be done on the Lord's day which might as well have been done the day before. God is gracious in his allowances; let us not abuse our liberty. Review the six days' work as God did; you will find all very bad. Renew repentance; I will wash my hands and begin the day with good thoughts. Wake with God; bid the sabbath welcome; go forth to meet it; think of Christ's resurrection; think of his waking early in the morning. Set God before you in all your sabbath work; do it as unto the Lord; see his eye upon you, and let your eye be upon him. It is the sabbath of the Lord your God; from him you are to hear, to him you are to speak; it is he with whom you have to do every day, especially this day. Fill up sabbath time with duty; be good stewards of it; redeem it; lose no part of it; it is all precious. Instruct your families in the things of God. You would not starve their bodies, do not starve their souls. Pray with them; let them not be doing your work when they should be doing God's, further than necessity requires. Let there be a manifest difference between that day and other days, in your houses. Go from one duty to another, as a bee from flower to flower. Remember the nature of the work; the necessity and excellency of it. Sabbaths come but seldom, therefore be diligent. Let all that is within you be at work, like all hands on a harvest day; attend to secret, family, and public ordinances; be more mild than on other days; show that you have laid by the world; keep it holy by employing it in holy work, or else you keep the sabbath no better than the brutes, for they rest. Holy work is to be done every day, but on this day it must be the work of the day; do common actions on that day after a godly sort; feed the body that it may be fit to serve the soul; take care it be not unfitted; eat and drink as those who must pray again. Works of necessity must be done with a sabbath frame of heart; pray against that which may take you off from your sabbath work; be much in praise; sing praises. Carry the sabbath with you to the week; let it relish with all your converse; you have many thoughts of the world on sabbath days, have as many thoughts of God on week days. Every sabbath day think much of heaven, have it in your mind, have it in your eye; that is the general assembly, get ready for it. A BRIGAND. SEVERAL of the carbonari of Piedmont are confined here: it is also the prison of that villain Mingrat, the curé of St. Quentin, (Isère,) who, after murdering, with circumstances of horrible aggravation, a woman, one of his parishioners, fled from justice, and escaping across the frontiers, felt himself safe in Piedmont, where the clergy never suffer publicly for their crimes: he is now kept in the fort of Fenestrelles, rather for protection than punishment. Our guide, upon hearing me relate the affair of St. Quentin's, confirmed the report of the practice of this infamous injustice. He said, that recently, near Caluso, a traveller was left for dead by a brigand, who had stopped and robbed him; the poor victim was, however, taken up and cured of his wounds. On entering the church to make acknowledgment for the mercy of his life being spared, he saw, in the Romish priest officiating at mass, his assassin. He immediately went out and gave information to proper authorities, who cautioned him of the danger of charging a priest with the crime; he was positive, and stated that he had some money about him when he was robbed, curiously marked, which he described. After the service, the priest was arrested; beneath his canonicals was the very dress in which he had made the attack, and the marked money, which he had been afraid to pass, was found upon him. The priest was ordered into confinement, but neither publicly tried nor punished.-Brockedon's Excursions in the Alps. THE REFINER. SOME time ago, a few ladies were reading the third chapter of Malachi: "Behold I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me," &c. One of the ladies gave it as her opinion, that the fullers' soap and the refiner of silver were only the same image, intended to convey the same view of the sanctifying influences of the grace of Christ. "No," said another, "they are not just the same image; there is something remarkable in the expression in the third verse: He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.'" They all said, that possibly it might be so. This lady was going into the town, and she promised to see a silversmith, and report to them what he said on the subject. She went, without telling him the object of her errand, and begged to know the process of refining silver; which he fully described to her. “But do you sit, sir?" "Oh! yes, madam, I must sit, with my eye steadily fixed on the furnace; since, if the silver remain too long, it is sure to be injured." She at once saw the beauty, and the comfort too, of the expression, "He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver." Christ sees it needful to put his children into the furnace; but he is seated by the side of it. His eye is steadily intent on the work of purifying; and his wisdom and his love are both engaged to do all in the best manner for them. Their trials do not come at random; the very hairs of their head are all numbered. As the lady was returning to tell her friends what she had heard, just as she turned from the shop door the silversmith called her back, and said that he had forgot to mention one thing; and that was, that he only knew that the process of purifying was complete by seeing his own image in the silver. When Christ sees his image in his people, his work of purifying is accomplished. EXTRACT FROM HILARY. "STABLISH thy word unto thy servant, who is devoted to thy fear." The prophet here shows a perfect knowledge of mankind, with regard to the mode in which the word of God generally is received by them; namely, without the least awe and reverence. They treat the divine scriptures as a story, which is told rather to afford them rest and relaxation from care, than as a means of securing to them lasting benefit. They trifle with the words of God-which shall not pass away though heaven and earth pass away-with a flippancy which borders on irreligion. Are men altogether so forgetful of their infirm natures, as to suppose that they need not the assistance of a physician? No, brethren; there is but One who is free from infirmity, One in whom no guile was found, namely Christ. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom; therefore, let all those who are unwilling to incur the imputation of folly, receive his word with trembling and fear. HILARY. UNION TO CHRIST. LET us sum up all in this, Whatsoever grace or gift is in Christ Jesus; whatsoever pre-eminence he hath above angels and men ; whatsoever he purchased, he purchased by his obedient life, and patience in death; there is nothing of all that, but the soul may be admitted to fellowship in it, by its union with him by faith; have him, and have all that he hath. Faith makes him yours, and all that he hath is a consequential appendix to himself: the word of the gospel offers him freely to you with all his benefits, interests, and advantages; O that our hearts may be induced to open to him. Now, being thus united to Jesus Christ, that which I would persuade you next to, is a personal communion; that is, a suitable entertainment of him, a conjunction of your soul to him by love, and a combination of all your endeavours henceforth to please him. It is certain, that true friendship is founded on a conjunction and harmony of souls by affection, by which they cease to be two, and become in a manner one; for love makes a kind of |