"Too late! What do you mean?" I asked, tremblingly. "He is dead!" "Dead?" "Yes, his end was dreadful. A week ago last Thursday night he was sitting, conversing with his wife, when, she says, something internal seemed to break, sounding like the running down of a clock. Instantly he sprang to his feet, exclaiming, 'My time has come!' then sinking on his knees, he cried to God for mercy. His shrieks were heard by neighbors living far away. In a few moments all was over,—he had breathed his last!" The intelligence smote heavily on my heart, filling me with an agony almost too keen to be borne. "Oh," I cried, "would that I had yielded to the Spirit, and not lingered to question and doubt. Oh, that I had spoken one word to him concerning his need of Christ!" I then related, with shame and confusion of face, all my exercises in relation to the deceased. "Strange," said my friend; "but that man talked much about you the last week or two, and always in your favor. He uttered not a word against your preaching. I know not but he would have welcomed any thing you might have said to him." He had heard something of the gospel those two Sabbaths; he had not scorned what he heard; united intercession had been made for him; he had cried for mercy at last; there was a gleam of comfort in these reflections, but oh, what would I not have given to have had some testimony from his own lips that he had renounced atheism, and cast himself on this grace of the compassionate Saviour! Christian reader, our fathers and mothers in Israel believed in the office-work of the Holy Spirit; believed that he moved on the hearts in which he dwelt to special labor for perishing souls. Have we not wandered away from their simple, scriptural faith, and thus grieved the Holy Comforter, and become unfruitful in the work of the Lord, till it is to be feared that this blood of souls may be found on our garments? Oh, if you would never know the bitter sorrow that to this day overwhelms me, as Memory recalls that poor skeptic, yield to the heavenly guidance, and fear not to speak when the Spirit prompts. "NOT IN VAIN." "MY first sermon," said a pastor, "what a vivid recollection I have of it!" A ministerial acquaintance who was to spend the Sabbath from home, on exchange, had invited me to ride with him to his appointment. On arriving, he said,— "I shall depend on you to preach half the day." The afternoon was left for me to improve. There was a heavy rain, and few ventured out, for which I felt more and more thankful as the services advanced. My discourse, partly written and partly extempore, sounded to my own ears like the "foolishness of preaching" indeed; and with an inward resolution never again to commit the folly of speaking from the sacred desk, I went home mortified, humbled, and desponding.