ever, be interested in planning how what he has begun may be safely continued. If he be the father of a family, he will provide with a wise solicitude, as far as possible, for every contingency. He will dispose of matters now, as if he could see what will happen after his departure. On the other hand, all that is vain or frivolous, every vile pleasure, gambling, cruelty, harsh language to wife or child, trickery in business, social snobbishness, all the base traits that disfigure human conduct, he will now recoil from with horror, as being incongruous with the solemn realization of his condition. The frank facing of death, therefore, has the effect of sifting out the true values of life from the false, the things that are worth while from the things that are not worth while, the things that are related to the highest end from those related to the lower partial ends. The precept, "Live as if this hour were thy last," is enjoined as a touchstone; not for the purpose of dampening the healthy relish of life, but as a means of enhancing the relish for real living, the kind of living that is devoted to things really worth while. As such a test it is invaluable. The question, "Should I care to be surprised by death in what I am doing now?"--put it to the dissipated young man in his cups, put it to the respectable rogue--nay, put it to each one of us, and it will often bring the blush of shame to our cheeks. When, therefore, I commend the thought of death, I think of death not as a grim, grisly skeleton, a King of Terrors, but rather as a mighty angel, holding with averted face a wondrous lamp. By that lamp--hold it still nearer, O Death--I would read the scripture of my life, and what I read in that searching light, that would I take to heart.