Sidor som bilder
PDF
ePub

He was as affable as he was generous. Stiff, rigid obstinacy formed no part of the constitution of his mind. He was meek, gentle, and flexible; "easy to be entreated," and at the same time steadfast in the right. He was courteous and kind towards his fellow-men, so much so, that he would frequently win the esteem of those who were opposed to the cross of Christ, and make his very enemies be at peace with him. Such was his urbanity of manners that he was universally beloved by his circle of acquaintances. Hard hearts were reduced to tenderness, and stubborn spirits made to bend before his condescending kindness. The secret of this lay in his affectionate soul. He loved God with all his heart, and his neighbour as himself. He was loving in his family, in the church, and in the world. I have often seen the tears of sympathy streaming forth from his eyes, and rolling down his cheeks. He loved his family and friends ardently. "God knows," he wrote, "that I dearly love you all, and I believe I am dearly loved by you." The following brief address which he wrote for the Sabbath School children, is not only a further development of this principle of his nature, but also a proof that he had a presentiment of his death

April 21st, 1854.

My dearly beloved children.-I had a great desire to address you once more before I left for the Baltic, but you know I had not an opportunity of doing so, The last time I spoke to you I had only four minutes to do it in, and that I employed in beseeching you, for my sake, for your own soul's sake, and above all for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, to give your hearts to God. And now I would address you from that portion of scripture contained in 1 John ii. 18. "Little children it is the last time." I beseech you ponder these words in your minds. Had I spoken to you on them before I left, it might have been the last time we should all have met in the little chapel, which is dear to me by a thousand ties; and now we are separated, it may be the last time I shall ever address you-the last time the Almighty will warn you the last time His Spirit will strive with you the last time you will have an opportunity of calling on him-the last time you may be offered mercy and grace through Jesus. Oh! then, let me entreat you in all affection, to seek the Lord while he may be found, and call upon him while he is near, lest he should say unto you, ' Because I have called, and ye refused, I have stretched out my hand and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh ; when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind, when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call and I will not answer, they shall seek me daily but they shall not find me. How inconceivably awful, my dear children, should Jesus, who loves you, and waits to do you good, be forced by your ungrateful conduct to speak to you thus!

[ocr errors]

Dear children, I love you all, therefore in love I would advise you to Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when you will say, we have no pleasure in them.' You are all dear to me, and I should be most happy to meet you again on earth, but that may never be. We are a

it may

long way apart, and ere this address be read to you, the hand that pens be stiff in death. Now as I love you dearly, and as Jesus loves you still more, I hope you will love him, and dwell together in love, unity, and peace. Let your affection for one another be not in word only, but in deed and in truth. You know if we say we love God, and hate our brother, we are liars, and the truth is not in us. My little dears I have no greater joy than to hear that you walk in the truth. Little children, keep yourselves from idols, and abide in the Lord, that when he shall appear, you may have confidence and not be ashamed.

6

May the God of all grace be with you, and keep you, and bless you, so that when you depart this life you may die in peace, and your happy spirits be carried by angels to Abraham's bosom! Then you will eternally sing, Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving and honour, and power, and might, and dominion, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever. Amen.

Farewell,

W. HERRING.

His zeal for the Lord was intense, but tempered with judgment, or in other words "according to knowledge." When at home, he was ever prepared to think, and speak, and work for God; and when abroad, he was not less so. He was willing to spend and be spent for Christ; and his zeal was not as a metcor which flames for the moment and then passes away, but like the bright luminary which rules the day, steady and constant. It was a holy flame, burning on the altar of his heart. It was infused by the Holy Spirit, fanned up by the breeze of heaven, and therefore it burnt with an inextinguishable blaze. He carried about with him a living sense of the value of his soul, of the exceeding sinfulness of sin-of his fallen condition as a sinner of the efficacy of the Saviour's blood,—of the felicity of heaven and the wretchedness of hell. This gave an earnestness to his looks, his tones, his gestures, and his actions, such as clearly evinced that he was intent on working out his salvation with fear and trembling.

Humility of soul was another trait in his character. I think I may safely say that I never met with a man who possessed more humbling views of himself than he did. He was willing to sit, not only at the feet of Jesus, but at the feet of any who could instruct him in the lessons of salvation. He has often been admired for his humble, childlike, simplicity, and was often scen trembling beneath a sense of his weakness and unworthiness. Herein was his strength. With the apostle Paul he could say, "When I am weak then am I strong." God resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble. To that man will Ilook who is of a humble and a contrite heart and that trembleth at my word. By the grace of God he was what he was, and in this grace re resolved to remain. His mind was made up. His character was formed. He had counted the cost, and was prepared for the worst. Hence he wrote, "I hardly know how is I have been drawn to the little chapel, but I certainly do feel much interested in it and the people. I suppose we must say it is by lovingkindness. One thing I know, I have put my hand to the plough, and let the consequence be

I care

what it may, I cannot think of looking back. I do not care what any one thinks of me, or what they may choose to call me. not for jeers or anything else, so that I may be able to stand firm till my change come." The purpose was fixed, and by divine assistance he stood firm and resolute therein. He stood by faith in the Son of God, who loved him and called him to the glory of his grace. Decision of character is of great importance in soul-concerns. For want of it thousands are as changeable as the wind, and as unstable as water, and cannot excel. "A double minded man is unstable in all

The world was no

his ways." Such was not the case with our departed Brother. He had but one mind, and that was the mind of Christ. He was a good man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost. longer worthy of him, therefore God took him. The disease that terminated his earthly existence was erysipelas, which was occasioned by a blow on the leg. After suffering severely for some weeks, he was invalided home, but died on his passage back, July 3rd, 1854, and was buried in the mighty deep. His death was improved to an overflowing congregation, from Ps. xxxvii. 37. Mark the perfect man &c. He died in peace. The person who was with him in his illness, and who watched .over him in his last moments, assured me that he died very happy. What a consolation this to surviving relatives and friends! What a credit to christianity! The good man's death gives religion a worth, a beauty, and a force, which nothing else can impart. Many seem pleased to live without it, but when they come to die their feelings are changed on the subject. Oh it is one thing to live and another to die. Death how solemn! Eternity how awful! Reader are you prepared for these? Do not defer the answer to this question. If our dear brother could return from the still chambers of death and address you on this subject, I am sure he would urge you to an immediate decision for God. And although you hear not his voice, yet he is speaking to you in the deep-toned silence of the tomb. And as the massy waves are rolling o'er his slumbering dust, they are sending forth on the wings of the wind a warning to us all, Set your house in order for you shall die and not

live.

For the consolation of his wife and three children whom he has left behind to lament their loss, I would say,-" Sorrow not even as others, which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him," &c., 1 Thes. iv. 13-18. His body was not laid out in state; he was not followed to his grave by a large retinue of obsequious attendants; he did not go down to the tomb highly perfumed; all this was too mean for him. He is embalmed in the memory of the good, and is gone down to the grave lamented by all who knew him. "The memory of the wicked shall rot, but the righteous shall be had in everlasting rememberance." It is of no consequence whatever where the body lies, so that the soul is happy in the realms of glory. Who can tell from what evils the Lord has taken our dear brother. What a happy change it must have been to his quiet mind, to be transported from the seat of war, to the region of perfect and eternal peace; to be removed from a scene of toil and suffering, to the world of consummate rest and joy!" "There is no pain among

the blessed."

"Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them."

WM. ROWE.

MEMOIR OF ADELINE MARY GRACE LEITH.
By T. HILLMAN.

"ALL flesh is grass, and the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field; the grass withereth, the flower fadeth; because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it; surely the people is grass." Such is the emphatic declaration of scripture concerning man. How striking the figures employed to show forth the weakness and imbecility of poor fallen humanity. "Grass!" "Flower of the field!" For a short time green, gay, beautiful, then withers, fades, disappears. This declaration is not merely directed to a people inhabiting some remote corner of our globe, or to any particular nation; but to every nation, tongue, and kindred. As all have sinned, so death has passed upon all men, and wherever we discover the footprints of man, there we behold the great leveller, who brings to the ground every one, altogether regardless of rank, age, or sex.

The year 1854 will live long in the memory of thousands; it has indeed been an eventful year. Thousands entered upon it with joyful hearts, and sunny prospects; but long ere the knell announced the year departed, they withered like grass of the earth. We only make a passing remark on the demon war, which has been raging on the many thousands, who on the battle field have kissed the earth, who in terrible agonies closed their eyes in death, and are now in the spirit world. The pestilence as well as war has been raging; it has visited our sea-girt Isle; thousands have fallen by its stroke: the rich, the poor, the young, the middle aged, the man and woman of hoary head, have through its power been brought suddenly to the gates of death.

Nor has its commission been to those outside the church only, it has been within her pale, and many of Christ's members have been taken from the Church on earth to the Church in heaven; and one of that number is the subject of the following brief memoir, who for nearly a quarter of a century, was a member of the Bible Christian Connexion.

ADELINE MARY GRACE LEITH, whose maiden name was HARRIS, was born at Chatham, in the county of Kent, November 22nd, 1812. Concerning the spiritual condition of her parents, and her own early history, the writer knows but very little. When very young she went to London and engaged in service, where she was favoured with the company and counsel of a pious fellow servant, a member of the Wesleyan Church, at whose invitation she attended the house of prayer, and received good impressions. The Spirit of the Lord moved upon her heart; it was softened, and to some extent subdued; and though she did not then become decidedly pious, those impressions were never effaced. How often does God use the feeblest instrumentalities for the carrying on of his work. When we

invite a neighbour, or an acquaintance, to the house of God who knows but what it may be the means of his eternal salvation ?

In the year 1828, she was united in marriage to Mr. Alexander Leith, of Chatham, who for several years, both before and after marriage, served in the British navy. After retiring to rest one evening, Mr. Leith thought he heard a low murmuring sound, and desiring to know what it was, he left his bed, opened the door softly and listened. What did he hear? He heard a pious woman who was occupying a part of the house, breathing out her soul to God in prayer. Blessed sound! it was heard in heaven. This praying disciple not only offered prayer for herself, but likewise for those who had retired to rest, that they might turn away from all sin, and know God as a God of love. Both heard this prayer, and felt as though a two-edged sword had entered their souls. The pious woman above referred to, was a member of the Bible Christian society; and in compliance with her invitation, Mrs. Leith accompanied her to Union Street Chapel, and so highly appreciated the service, that from that time both herself and husband, regularly attended that place of worship. A few weeks passed away, and our sister was brought more fully to see her depravity, and distance from God. She not only saw her sins, but felt their burden; and was continually sighing for deliverance; and one Sabbath evening in the prayer-meeting she cried aloud to God for mercy. She did not that evening obtain a clear sense of forgiveness, but in a few days she was enabled to lay hold of the hope set before her in the gospel, and received an assurance that she was born of God. Her views of the Saviour and of the great atonement were not faint views; she saw the way of salvation clearly; her faith in the atoning blood was strong; she did not doubt in her heart, but held the promises with a firm grasp; and as in days gone by she had had a clear sense of her sinfulness, so now she had an evidence equally clear that hat her sins were all forgiven. O happy state! and how applicable the song of the immortal Wesley,

"What a mercy is this! What a heaven of bliss,
How unspeakably happy am I

Gather'd into thy fold. With thy people enroll'd
With thy people to live and to die!
All honour and praise, To the Father of grace,
To the Spirit and Son I return!

The business pursue He hath made me to do,
And rejoice that I ever was born."-

As love to mankind, and labouring for their good, is an evidence of our love to God, we shall see that this fruit was brought forth by our departed friend. Immediately after her conversion she joined the Church in Union street, became an efficient teacher in the Sabbath school, and toiled, exhorted, prayed, and put forth her energies to lead the youthful immortals to the fountain of living waters. Blessed employment!

In a short time her sphere of labour extended beyond the narrow bounds of a Sabbath school room; her name appeared on the Circuit plan; and she went forth beseeching sinners to be reconciled to God. When she appeared before a public assembly it was evident she felt VOL. XX. THIRD SERIES.

S

« FöregåendeFortsätt »