Fear not, the prospect of the realms of woe

Shall mar thy bliss, or thence sad thoughts arise

To blunt thy sense of heavenly ecstasies.
There, if thy heart with warm devotion glow
Meet for thy place, 'twill solace thee to know
No friend of thine, 'mid those keen agonies,

In that dark prison-house of torment lies;
For none is there but is of God the foe,
And alien thus from thee. The ties of blood,
And earth's most sacred bonds, are but a twine

Of gossainer, compared with what is owed

To Him, the Lord of all! On Him recline; He shall thy heart of every care unload,

He bid thy day with cloudless lustre shine.

MANT,

CHAPTER XIII.

The Doctrine of Beavenly Recognition in its Practical

Effects.

Our dying friends come o'er us like a cloud,
To damp our brainless ardours; and abate
That glare of life, which often blinds the wise.
Our dying friends are pioneers, to smooth
Our rugged path to death, to break those bars
Of terror and abhorrence, nature throws
'Cross our obstructed way; and thus, to make
Welcome as safe, our port from every storm.

YOUNG.

"WHAT good?”—though this is not the most important question to be asked in the investigation of a doctrine, it nevertheless deserves some consideration, in bringing our minds to a conclusion in respect to its merits. If a doctrine have a good practical tendency, it is a presumption in its favour. Error has no such tendency. It is of the earth, earthy. It always tends to lead the mind and heart towards the seen, the material, the temporal. It tends to beget a cold and sceptical indifference towards the future, and the eternal. It does not increase the warmth of our feelings towards realities that lie beyond the reach of sense. Error is necessarily negative, and of course destructive. It leans not on faith, but on sight. Hence it always comes to an end by running out into

fruitlessness.

The best service it renders to man is when

all its effects die out of his heart.

Truth is fruitful in good; and we have the Saviour's own authority for applying to this doctrine, as to all others, the test: "By their fruits ye shall know them.” If the fruit is good, the doctrine must be good and true. We have, therefore, a twofold object in view, in introducing this concluding chapter, on the practical tendencies of this doctrine; while, on the one hand, it will add another argument in favour of its truth, it will also aid us in making a useful application of it.

We would earnestly ask, what bad influence the belief of this doctrine can have on those who hold to it? We can think of none. We can, however, think of many good influences which it sheds over the heart. This tree yields only good fruit. We can say of it, as the spouse did of Christ, the tree of Life: "I sat under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste." As the strongest influences are always most gentle and silent, we can only describe them in their most prominent features, leaving the mind to fill out the more delicate and lovely details of the picture.

I. A warm faith in this doctrine has a tendency to elevate, strengthen, and purify all our earthly affections. In this busy, bustling, and jostling life, where self-interest and worldliness are such prominent factors, there is great danger that friendship and love be regarded as mere matters of earthly convenience. Amid these mercenary influences the higher affections of the soul become gradually carnalized, and are soon valued, like all things of earth, merely for their present use. Even kindred are

often cast coldly away, because they are deemed unprofitable in an earthly point of view. After the manner of Ephraim, "lovers are hired," who love while it yields advantage to them, and cease when the pay ceases; or are themselves dismissed when no more needed. Thus there is a strong tendency to hinge the friendships of life upon the low motives of prudence and policy.

Is it not quite natural that such debasing tendencies should appear, where ties of friendship and even of kindred are supposed to end with earth? Of what use can that be, which begins and ends on earth, but to serve earthly purposes? If friendships do not extend beyond. the grave, it is difficult to prove that they are any more worthy of being cherished than other interests which contribute only to earthly convenience and profit. How degrading, however, is this to those ties which are so much praised in poetry, music, eloquence, and religion? Just as intellect is degraded when it is not animated by a life and light from heaven, so friendship, when confined to this life, is but as a crazed wanderer, who for our attention returns us only an idiot's meaningless gaze.

How elevating to our affections, on the other hand, is the thought that friendships are eternal if pure; that the ties we form on earth, on virtuous and holy principles, will continue through death, and be made perfect and permanent in heaven! This makes the cultivation of friendship a high aim. Even the pursuit of knowledge, so far as it has merely this world in view, and is unsanctified by religion, is low compared with this! for "charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there

be knowle lge, it shall vanish away." All our intercourse with our friends will be more holy and heavenly, if we regard them as those who shall be ours in heaven as well as upon earth. "The addition of a good friend or relative will be the addition of one who will share with us the joys of immortality; who will enter with us into the city of the living God, and be our everlasting companion in glory."

The sentiment uttered by the pious Baxter, in relation to this subject, commends itself as true, to all who are truly pious, and who cannot be content to love what must remain on earth and die. "I must confess, as the experience of my own soul, that the expectation of loving my friends in heaven principally kindles my love to them on earth. If I thought that I should never know them, and consequently never love them after this life is ended, I should in reason number them with temporal things, and love them as such. But I now delight to converse with my pious friends, in a firm persuasion that I shall converse with them for ever; and I take comfort in those of them that are dead or absent, as believing I shall shortly meet them in heaven, and love them with a heavenly love that shall there be perfected."

II. Not only will the belief in eternal friendship elevate, and refine our social affections, and cause us to love our friends more tenderly and more holily, but it will induce us also to see the importance of forming only pious friendships. There is a strange recklessness in this respect, prevailing. Not only are many of the common friendships of life formed without any reference to religion, but even marriage-if such "unequal yokings" can be called mar