laft, the only effectual facrifice for fin. So fhall you, and your nation, escape the destruction which hangs over you.-They harden their rocky hearts against all fenfe of pity. They urge their own deftruction. Let not then the eye of day behold fo black a deed. Let heaven hide its face from fuch a fight. They pierce thofe hands whofe falutary touch gave health and ftrength, and those feet which went about doing good. They ftretch him on the crofs. They stop their ears against the groans of fuffering innocence. But the inanimate earth feels, and fhakes with horror at the impiety of her inhabitants. The rocks burft in pieces, and nature is in agonies. The fleep of death is broken by the convulfion. The graves open their throats, and caft up the ghaftly dead. An unfeen hand rends the veil of the temple, and expofes the holy place, into which it was forbidden to enter. His agonies now grow stronger. His pangs redouble. The choirs of angels mourn the fufferings of their Prince. Hell is moved, and the dæmons enjoy a fhort triumph. Darkness covers the face of nature, and chaos feems ready to fwallow all. He calls on his God and Father, the witness of his innocence, and approver of his obedience. He prays for those by whofe murdering hands he dies. He raises his voice aloud. His ftrength is yet entire. But having finished the work, and the prophecies being accomplished, by his own original power over his own life, he refigns his foul foul into the hands of the fupreme Father of all, and, bowing his head, expires. He dies; and yet his murderers live. His death raifes a guilty world to life. Tremendous mystery! Not to be explained, till the veil of time be rent afunder, and eternity expose to view the amazing scene of Divine government, too vast for mortal comprehenfion. Glory to God in the highest! On earth peace, and good-will toward men! . A CONCLUSION. T laft I have, in great weaknefs, brought this long labour to a period. On reviewing the whole, I find it very neceffary to beg the candid reader's indulgence in favour of many deficiencies; though I hope he has not found in the work, any one fentiment, by which he may have run the hazard of his being deceived or mifled to his hurt. Whoever duly confiders the disadvantage, a writer labours under, who lives a life of conftant care and labour, without ever knowing what it is to have a vacant mind, and whose hours of study are only those few, which remain after eight or ten of almost every day in the week indifpenfably engaged in the laborious employment of teaching, and the other cares attending the charge of youth; whoever confiders this, and is, at the fame time, at all a judge of the difficulty of compofition; will, it is hoped, be inclinable to make allowances for any deficiencies, which may be at all pardonable. It may indeed be answered to this, That a person, whose way of life (exclufive of other disadvantages) neceffarily deprives him of that leifure and vacancy of mind, which are of fuch confequence to a writer, had better quit that province to thofe, whofe ftations allow them more leisure and freedom from care. Perhaps this affertion yet the gen may be in fome measure juft. And tlemen, who undertake the education of youth, do not in general fcruple to bestow some time in labouring for the public. The pious and learned Dr. Doddridge, lately deceased, is a remarkable inftance; who fo hufbanded the hours he chiefly borrowed from the refreshments of nature, as to be able to publish fix or eight times the bulk of this book. For my own part, had my circumstances in life been equal to the expence of printing this work, which never had been undertaken, if it had not been with a direct view to the advantage of the youth educated by me, who, I hope, will find it useful as an introduction to life, to ftudy, and to moral and religious knowledge; had my circumstances, I fay, been equal to the expence of printing this book, and giving it them gratis; I fhould not have troubled the public with it; nor do I intend ever more to undertake any work of fuch a fize. And now, before I lay afide my pen, I beg leave earnestly to requeft the reader, and efpecially, above all others, thofe for whofe fake this work was undertaken, to attend carefully to the If the few following serious remonftrances. reader has perufed the whole work, without receiving any benefit or improvement from it, he may profit by what still remains, by seriously examining himself in the following manner. "Hast thou confidered, O my foul, what thou and for what created? Doft thou habitu 66 art, I i 4 "ally "ally think of thyfelf as an intelligence capable "of immortality, and brought into being on purpose for endless and inconceivable hap"piness? Does the thought of an hereafter 66 engage thy fupreme attention? Is eternity "for ever in thy view? Doft thou faithfully "labour, wish, and pray, for the neceffary abili"ties and difpofitions for acting up to the dignity of thy nature, and the end of thy "creation? Or doft thou trifle with what is to "thee of infinite importance? Thou wouldst not furely fuffer thyfelf to be deceived out of thy "happiness? Thou wouldst not put out the eye "of thy reason, and rush headlong upon de"ftruction? Try thy prudence and fincerity, "then, by comparing the diligence thou useft, "and the care thou beftoweft, upon the things "thou knoweft thyself to be fincerely attached "to, with what thou think'ft fufficient for fecuring an eternity of happiness. Doft thou "rife early and fit up late, to get a wretched pittance of the perishing wealth of this world? "And doft thou wholly forget, that thou haft an "eternity to provide for? Is money thy first "thought in the morning, and thy last at night, " and the subject of every hour between? And "canft thou find no vacant moment for a thought about thy great intereft? Art thou "ever ready, and upon the catch, to feize the empty bubbles of life, as they float along the "ftream of time? And doft thou let flip the " only |