country village, soon brought upon him a pulmonary complaint, which closed his valuable life in August, 1823. Upon a mind less alive than Dr. Good's to the kindlier sympathies and emotions, the circumstances of the long affliction of an endeared relative could not but operate powerfully. Besides these, there were brought into exercise the new feelings occasioned by the birth of grandchildren; new alternations of hope and fear, of delight and anguish, resulting from the vicissitudes of their health, and rendered doubly interesting by the peculiar state of their parents :-and thus was supplied, as I cannot but believe, precisely the discipline which was necessary to effect Dr. Good's entire confirmation in Christian principles, and induce him cordially to yield all his faculties "a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God." The subsequent afflictive events, in which he was called to share, served but to free him more from secular adhesions, to quicken his activity in the heavenly course, and to prompt him to the augmented exercise of Christian benevolence, in various channels of usefulness. Well do I recollect his unusual delight in announcing to me the decision of his beloved son-in-law to devote himself to the ministry of the gospel, and the strong interest with which he related many particulars of intellectual and providential discipline, some of them very striking, which issued in that decision. To Dr. Drake, and other friends, his letters were dictated by equally pleasurable emotions. But the gratification was not of long continuance. Mr. Neale took orders in April, or May, 1822. In May, 1823, Dr. Good, in writing to Dr. Drake, thus expresses himself "We have now removed from Caroline Place, to No. 80, Guilford Street. But our entrance into this new residence is marked with a gloom that I am much afraid will hang heavy on the few years that Providence may yet allot to me. Our dear and incomparable Mr. Neale, who you know married our beloved Susanna, is at this moment an inmate in it, labouring under a hectic fever, which, I am very fearful, will cut him off in the midst of life, of an exemplary service to God in the church, of the utmost utility to the poor and the parishes in which he has been employed,-himself and his wife, beloved, perhaps, more than ever couple were before. He will leave me to-morrow, for a house in the vicinity of London; but I cannot let him go far. We are thus overwhelmed with grief; but we endea vour to yield to the rod and Him who hath appointed it. Mr. Neale himself is in a frame of mind that any man might envy, ill as he is, and my dear Susanna has strength found her to be able to nurse him night and day. Adieu, my dear friend!-of your condolence we are all sure." In another letter to the same friend, written within four months of that from which the preceding is extracted, Dr. Good thus pours out his feelings on the event which terminated all his solicitudes, and those of his family, on acount of Mr. Neale. "Guilford Street, August 18th, 1823. "My dear Friend, "When I received your last kind letter, I was daily expecting the close of my dear and most excellent sonin-law's sufferings, and had already tried, but with little success, the plan you suggested, which, in truth, we were obliged to discontinue, in consequence of its increasing the exacerbation. "The conflict is now over-he has entered into his rest; having expired, as you may probably have seen by the newspapers, on Friday the 8th instant. "The last text he preached from, when he had no idea of any serious illness, was, "To me to live is Christ, but to die is gain." It was within a few hours afterwards that he was attacked with an hæmoptysis. His whole heart was in his ministry;-and the simple, unvarnished, but most impressive character, of his pulpit oratory, was calculated, with God's blessing, to work wonders among the highest as well as the lowest. classes. "Under these circumstances, the alarming sickness with which he was attacked, might naturally, perhaps, be called a mysterious dispensation.' But he would never allow such a term to be employed,—for it never was made use of, he said, without betraying something of a latent murmur. "He suffered much at times, and the pain alone was sufficient, and especially towards the close of the struggle, to throw him into severe perspiration—but his remark was, 'My Saviour sweated drops of blood for me,' and this upheld him.-It was a severe conflict to break off his strong attachment to his beloved children—and his still more beloved wife; and yet at last he was enabled to make a total surrender of himself to the will of God, and for months had his conversation in heaven,' far more than on earth. Yet, all the kindliness of his heart, and all the fine taste of his genius, accompanied him to the latest moment: less than eight-and-forty hours before his dissolution, he told his dear wife, with a faltering voice, that, as he had not written her any lines for a long time, if she would bring him a pencil and a piece of paper, he would give her some; when he wrote off one of the most beautiful devotional odes I have ever seen. During the night before his departure, it was observed by Mrs. Good, who sat up by him, that she was fearful the night had been tedious to him; he replied, 'I shall have a long and a glorious day.' He spoke propheticallyand the prophecy was fulfilled. "What, my dear friend, are all the splendour and the pageantry of the world, compared with the sublime and solemn scenes to which I have thus been an eye-witness?-Surely these are foretastes of that 'fulness of joy,' and those 'pleasures for evermore,' which are reserved at the right hand of God, for those who are favoured with so beatific a vision. They give, if it were wanted, a fresh and energetic stamp of reality to the glorious manifestation of the gospel, and shew us for what we were born-and the more important lesson how this high destiny may be attained. My earnest prayer is, that the lesson may be lost upon no one within its sphere-and with the feeble powers of my own pen, I would enlarge that sphere, if possible, throughout the universe:-and I would address it to you, my dear friend, as importunately as to myself. "We are all in great grief, as you may suppose, and especially my beloved daughter-but we are upheld by a thousand consolations, that fall to the lot of but few. "Farewell, my dear friend, for the present; and believe me ever, шп affichoehly of cur I may now, in farther illustration of Dr. Good's religious sentiments and feelings, select a few pieces from his devotional poetry: leaving them to make their impression, not on account of the elevation of the language, or the sublimity of thought; but as proofs of the genuine emotion of a soul attuned in unison to the most touching and awful subjects, as well as of a complete subjugation of mind and heart to truths long resisted, but at length received in all their energy, and exemplified in all their purity. ON EASTER DAY, 1819. "Truly this was the Son of God." Matt. xxvii. 54. "Yes, this was the Son of God. "Tis for man he bears the rod : Earth and skies are veiled in grief; Man alone shews unbelief. ""Tis finish'd."-Through creation's bound Fly, O fly, triumphant sound! ""Tis finish'd!" Heaven transported sings; ""Tis finish'd!" Earth re-echoing rings. |