To himself—“thanks be to God who gave him the victory”—death was preceded by no terrors, and accompanied by no sting. Its bitterness was past before it was tasted, and he felt “the bliss” without “the pain of dying.” It has indeed terminated his labours, which he pursued with deep and increasing interest and delight. It has terminated his accustomed intercourse with earthly scenes and earthly friends. It has terminated a life to which he naturally and instinctively clung. But it has not terminated the existence of his spirit, nor its communion with God, nor its conformity to his image, nor its joy in the light of his countenance. Oh, no! He is absent from the body, but he is present with the Lord. He is gone to the spirits of the just made perfect. He has renewed his communion with many of the members of his church, which death had for a while suspended. He is with Watts, and Doddridge, and Fuller, and Ward, and Hall, and “the general assembly and church of the first born” in those celestial mansions, where all is perfection, and harmony, and love. He is in the pursuit of knowledge with ampler capacities and ampler means than any he possessed on earth. And, above all, he is with Christ—surrounded by the light and glory of his presence—sitting at his feet to receive knowledge and joy from his instructions, and deriving, from the fountain of his mercy, degrees of happiness as large as his desires, and as lasting as his immortality. But whilst his decease has thus been productive of perfect and eternal blessedness to himself, it has been productive of mourning and bitterness to you. The voice which has often instructed, and admonished, and comforted you, is now silent in the dust. The heart which was so full of kindness, and which yearned over you with such paternal anxiety and love, has ceased its beatings. The eyes which beamed upon you, and wept over you with unutterable tenderness, are extinguished in the grave—and you are “sorrowing most of all that you shall see his face no more.” Some of you have lost the companion of your youth, with whom, for more than forty years, you have taken sweet counsel, and walked to the house of God in company. Some of you have lost a father in Christ, whose instrumentality first awakened you to a conviction of your guilt and danger, and then calmed your fears and soothed your agitations, by directing you to the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. All of you have lost a wise and affectionate friend, who was able to advise you in difficulty, to sympathize with you in sorrow, and to comfort you with the consolations with which he was comforted of God. And, by this sad stroke, I too have lost a father and a brother, with whom, for more than fifteen years, I have associated in this city, and to whose example and kindness I owe much as a minister of Jesus Christ. We have often conversed together freely on many subjects, even on those in which we