All things ours--God with all his communicable fulness--Christ with all his riches of grace and glory--heaven with all its clustering honors and immunities--who will not say: "Return unto thy rest, O my soul! for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee"? Ye who now like Lazarus have your evil things on earth, will you not hereafter with Lazarus be comforted in Abraham's bosom? Oh! what is poverty to you who are to inherit all things--heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ? What are toil and pain, reproach and persecution, the utter prostration of health, the loss of every living friend, and the burial of all you ever loved below, to you who look for your Lord's return from heaven, the renovation of the world, the redemption of the body, the immortal fellowship of the just, and the termination of all the sad vicissitudes of time in the blissful calm of eternal content? And those of you who are trying to content yourselves with these fleeting vanities! know ye not that your treasures will decay, your glories wither, and all the delights of sense perish with the world? What will you do when the ground dissolves beneath you, and the atmosphere around you becomes flame? A surer trust we proffer you, and a nobler felicity. Come and feed your famishing souls with the hidden manna of God, and slake your spirit's thirst from the fountain of living waters. Here, in the love of God--here, in the blood of Christ--here, in the assurance of pardon--here, resting upon the Rock of ages--here, anchored in a sure and steadfast hope--you shall learn at last the tranquil blessedness of true content! [1] Preached at Seneca Falls, N.Y., Aug. 12, 1883--the last actual pulpit-utterance of the author. XXII. "YE KNOW THE GRACE."[1] Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich.--2 Cor. viii. 9. To the rich, commonly, what is more terrible than poverty? So great, sometimes, their dread of it, that they seek to avoid or avert it by measures the most dishonorable and even the most desperate. Rather than be poor, many will practise the worst hypocrisies or commit the greatest crimes. For thirty pieces of silver, more than one Judas has sold his Saviour to the murderers and his own soul to Satan; and to escape the possible condition of Lazarus at his gate, many a Dives has slain himself in his palace. Horrified at such insanity, we scarcely wonder at the fear from which it springs. The noblest spirits quake at the thought of want, and a prospective reverse of fortune is enough to make the bravest quail.