And now, brethren, all this activity is over. She rests from her labours, and her works do follow her. But there is a great void left in this neighbourhood. A gap is made and the responsibility of filling it is thrown on the survivors. It is well, therefore, for us all to remember that our own night-time is rapidly advancing. On how many well known to those here present has it already closed! How many workmen for God are already in their rest! Let your mind look back to one of the Meetings of the Bible or Church Missionary Society some fifteen or twenty years ago. On how large a proportion of those who were then the active labourers has the night already closed! There you might have heard that manly and energetic labourer for God, Sir Fowell Buxton, in full vigour pleading for God and men, but his night is come: and my own dear father by his side, full of sterling, high principled, Christian zeal; but his night too is come: and the faithful pastor of the little flock at Gresham, always ready to take a part on such occasions, but his night is come: and our zealous friend from Sherringham, who rejoiced to co-operate in every such enterprise, but her night is come: and the two Cottage Ladies united in the strong bond of sisterly affection, and acting together with a sacred unanimity for God, but now their suns have both set, they now rest as they once lived, together, and the night has closed in on almost the whole of that noble company. But there were present likewise young men, just rising into life, and just beginning to put forth their powers; and time has now done its work with them. Some, indeed, it has cut down, so that their sun has set even at noon; but for the most part it has had the effect of placing them where their fathers then stood. Their own brows are becoming furrowed, and their own hairs grey. They have already reached the afternoon of life. The shades even of evening are beginning to appear among those who were then lads and listeners. And now that they have been this day called to follow to the grave almost the last of a whole generation of faithful labourers passed away, the lesson spoken to them from the tomb is surely that conveyed in the text, “I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.” But in speaking of this sacred work we must not lose sight of the paramount importance of a personal work in our own soul. It would be, indeed, an awful thing to be compelled to acknowledge, “They made me the keeper of the vineyards, and mine own vineyard have I not kept;” to preach to others, and yet oneself to be a cast away; to work as a philanthropist, and perish as an unconverted man. We should take, therefore, a most imperfect view of the subject, if we were to neglect the consideration of the personal work within.