The mind, I sup

tribute as much to our happiness, as to the glory of God. But, though I fear the state of my mind is not more distinguished by the grace of faith than when I left Boston, I do not feel the same anxious solicitude about my family which I did then. pose, cannot be strongly exercised on one subject, when it is constantly and powerfully affected by many separate and remote interests. I have been passing so rapidly from one scene to another, and have felt so many different emotions, since I left home, that I have scarcely had an opportunity to be anxious. While I was at New London, my time was entirely occupied with attentions to our sick father; and since I left that place, I have been scarcely less engaged.

I fear, my dear friend, that I shall return, knowing that I have done little or no good on my journey. Were it not that I do not like speaking about myself, I could fill my sheet with an account of my great stupidity and unfruitfulness. But it would do no good. And, as such complaints are often mistaken for humility, it is, perhaps, well to make them but seldom. To our Christian friends we may, to be sure, speak of our spiritual sorrows, without much danger of being misunderstood. I believe Christians, in general, are lamentably deficient in living the religion they profess. It is easy to talk; it is not difficult to profess: but to do, to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God, is quite another thing. When we compare our feelings with the experience of prophets and apostles, how faint a resemblance do we find! And yet, religion is the same now as ever-the demands of God as universal, and our obligations as great and binding.

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TO A FRIEND AT N. H.

New London, August 4, 1818. My dear E., When I took up my pen, I hesitated for a moment, whether my letter should be from Boston or New Haven. Inclination for the latter prevailed. I will not say New Haven friends were never so dear to me as now. That were idle. But I may say, that I feel an awakened interest in them at present, which a long separation from them had, perhaps, somewhat blunted. I think an occasional visit to a place we have once loved, and which is the residence of early friends,. is desirable, to keep alive, if not the enthusiasm of youthful attachments, those warmer endearments of the heart, by which it discriminates some places, and some persons, from the rest of the world.

I have been thinking, my dear friend, about the weakness of your eyes. I am sorry you should be tried in this way upon your first setting out in life. And yet, if you are a Christian, God loves you infinitely better than I do; and he might prevent it, if he chose. Now if he does not prevent it, he sees that you could not do without this trial. When you can, he will remove it. O how sweet is the reflection, that the work of the Lord is " perfect;" that all his ways are faithfulness and mercy; that all his dispensations shall work together for good to them that love him!-As to this world, we shall both experience many interesting, and perhaps what may be deemed adverse, vicissitudes. But, if they ripen us for a place at God's right hand, it is well, While we can look at the things which are not seen, and eternal, every burden will be lightened, every sorrow sweetened. If we are Christians, we are pass ing through a wilderness to heaven; and though God

may give us many precious comforts here, it is but a wilderness still. I long habitually to view it so; to rea-> lize my mercies, to enjoy them rationally; but to feel that while I am at home in the body, I am absent from the Lord.

September 5. At Boston. O how time flies! And how many painful scenes have I passed through since I last wrote in my journal! I have been particularly tried in the death of Mrs. C., a member of our church, a woman very dear to my heart, and a lovely Christian. I have also been seven weeks in Connecticut, to visit my husband's sick, and, I fear, now dying father. We left him, better. But he is again worse; and Mr. Huntington has been again called to him, and is now there. I am expecting every day, either to hear that his father is mending, or to receive a summons to New London. I have been somewhat dejected in mind, of late, from another cause. My husband's health is feeble; and the fear that he will have to leave Boston, or soon die under his labours here, has hung as a heavy weight upon my heart.

And now, what shall I say? Constituted, as I am, with strong feelings, susceptible nerves, and a heart prone to forebode evil, what should I do without reli gion? This, I often feel, is the only anchor that holds me from drifting into the gulf of despair. Oh! if the religion of Christ were false, as the infidel tries to make us think, what would become of me? Now, when labouring with grief, and at times ready to sink, the precious truths of the Gospel are sometimes sent to my mind, for my relief, with an efficacy altogether superior to any other sources of consolation. I pillow my aching head on its precious promises, and I find rest. Oh my God, why dost thou thus fly to my relief? Why,

wretch that I am! am I not left to my idols? Break, oh break, hard, stony heart, at the long-suffering of thy God.

And now Lord! I would trust thee for the future. I would hate and forsake the sins which separate my soul from thee. Blessed Redeemer! wilt thou not strengthen the creature that longs to serve thee more faithfully?

TO A FRIEND IN BOSTON.

New London, September 10, 1818. My dear H., I arrived here in safety, on Wednesday evening. Our father is more comfortable than I expected to find him, though, pretty certainly, approaching his end. His mind is, as usual, perfectly quiet; and his death is likely to be as peaceful, as his life has been exemplary. I think we can sometimes see the good effects of such a uniform, consistent life of piety, in this world, in a gracious reward, corresponding in its nature to the course of life pursued. Although salvation is neither wholly nor in part of works, is it not likely that a careless, worldly life, most commonly obscures and darkens the spiritual prospects, even of the Christian, in his last moments?

October 5. At Boston. My husband is again in New London. His father has gone to his rest. And it is glorious. Oh! to be accounted worthy to enter into that rest! But now is the time for working. Those who diligently do the will of God, may safely leave the disposal of their final state with him. I know that my heart is, beyond all expression, deceitful. But I do long to be able, day by day, to stir myself up to take hold on God in Christ, to keep near to him, to live him, and to glorify him in my body and spirit which are his.

upon

TO A SISTER-IN-LAW, AT N. Y.

Boston, October 12, 1818.

THOUGH all the children must feel the loss of your excellent father, yet dear mother and E.* are the sufferers. Death seems to be almost another thing, where an immediate view of all with which a departed friend was connected is constantly presented to the eye. Yet it is indeed, in itself, heart-rending to behold the vacancies which the hand of death makes in a family, and remember, that the places which once knew the absent one, will know him no more for ever. But if we loved God more, and had more faith, we should not be so much affected by these things.

Is not the state of your dear father an enviable one? I think I do feel that it is. Who can tell what blessedness it is to be perfectly delivered from sin, to be admitted to the immediate and perfect vision of God; and, what is more, to be made complete in his likeness? Who can tell what blessedness it is to cast off that body of death which cramps and clogs all our spiritual efforts in this life, to have a sanctified understanding, enlarged so as to know even as we are known?

And is all this a cunningly devised fable? Oh no, The Christian knows that his Redeemer liveth; and that, if his hope of being a Christian is not a false one, he shall see him as he is. Christianity pours a flood of light into the dark valley of the shadow of death; tells the soul, about to leave all it loved here, of better friends and better joys in heaven; and enables it to say, Thanks be to God, who giveth me the victory, through Jesus Christ my Lord!' And shall we not labour and pray, that this religion may become universal ?

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* A sister-in-law, residing with her widowed mother, at New London.