SEEM 3LIILI VPATII A BLESSING TO THE SAINTS. 235 tion. When you labour and groan under sins and temp- tations, under pains and sorrows, remember Christ has appointed death to be his officer for 'your relief. It is like the porter that opens the door of his repository, the grave, where your bodies shall take a sweet slumber till the resurrection-day ; and it is appointed also to open the gates ofheaven for your spirits, and to let them intoa world of unknown felicity. Death has so many things belonging to it, which are afflictive to nature, and formidable to the eye of sense, that we have need of all manner of assistance to raise our souls above the fear of it. . The very thought of dying makes many a christian shudder, and sweat, and tremble, and awakens all the springs ofhuman infirmity; O may the grace of faithgain a more glorious ascen- dency in our souls ! We should often meditate on such doctrines as these, which place that dreadful thing death in the most easy and pleasing light; we should behold it as changed from a curse into a blessing, and numbered among our treasures. Christians should accustom them- selves to look at it through the glass of the gospel, which casts fair colours upon what is in itselfso dark and for- midable. The gospel is that glass which discovers to us the flowery blessings that grow in that gloomy val- ley, and gives a fair and delightful prospect of those-hills of paradise and pleasure that lie beyond the grave. Why should we let this blessed gospel lie neglected, and live still in bondage to the fear ofdying ? THE RECOLLECTION. " Come now, and let us learn by this discourse, to shame ourselves out of these weaknesses, these unrea- sonable fears. Let us talk to our own souls in the lan- guage of faith. Why, Omy soul, why art thou afraid to let this body die ? Hast thou not endured labours and trialsenough, and art thou unwilling to come to the end of them ? Hast thou not yet been tempted enough? Hast thou not been foiled too often, and too often thrown down in the conflict ? Think of thy many wounds of conscience, the bruises of thy spirit, the defilement ofthy garments, and the loss of thy purity and thy peace. Canst thou bear, that all these should be repeated again and again? Art thou unwilling this war should have an end ? Art thou afraid of victory and triumph ? What 2
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