a permanent influence upon our temper and behaviour. And O let us never forget the unmeasurable debt of gratitude, which we owe to our Divine Master, who, by his death and resurrection, has fixed our hopes upon a foundation, strong as the truth of HIM who cannot lie. His words are indeed the words of eternal life. Be it our wisdom and our happiness to believe them with our whole hearts, and to find in them that consolation, which the world cannot give. Then will the death of our fathers cease to be the subject of melancholy and despondence. Our very regrets will become soothing; our very losses, edifying; and even when the angel of destruction shall level his dart at our own breast, we shall lift up our heads with joy, because our redemption is drawing near. SERMON 175 SERMON VII. ON THE DEATH OF A CHILD. 2 Samuel, xviii. 33. And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept; and as he went, thus : he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son! NEVER did parental sorrow vent itself in more pathetic accents, and never was it excited by a more unworthy object. Were the history unknown, it would be natural to conclude, that this affecting lamentation had been uttered over the grave of early worth, snatched too soon from the embraces of paternal love. Had the aged monarch lost a son, distinguished among his companions, for opening talents and amiable dispositions; endeared to his own heart by filial obedience, and by the unequivocal unequivocal promise of future excellence; then indeed we should have entered, with willing sympathy, into the very depths of his distress. For if any affliction calls, more than another, for the solace of commiseration, it is that which arises from the untimely death of a virtuous child. The event which drew forth the lamentation of the text, was of a very different kind; an event which was regarded by the subjects and friends of the royal mourner, as the only means of saving himself, of securing his crown, and of ridding the world of a monster. Yet for this monster, steeped as he was in guilt of deepest enormity; for this rebellious son, who had employed his talents and accomplishments in stealing from a king the hearts of the people; who had polluted the bed of a father in the sight of Israel and of the sun, and had fallen justly in an atrocious attempt to seize a father's throne by destroying a father's life ;-for this monster, behold the aged monarch weeping in bitterness of soul, and refusing to be comforted! How shall we account for an excess of grief, thus thus seemingly unreasonable-for tears thus shed, in superfluous abundance, over a profligate; a rebel, and a parricide? It may not be altogether unprofitable to inquire briefly into the probable causes of a sorrow, which at first sight must appear, not only extravagant, but almost impious; which, however, upon more mature reflection, may perhaps be deemed excusable, in consideration of the source from which it flowed. And what source could this be, but that all-pervading affection, which preserves and unites the elements both of animal and moral life? What a wonderful sway does this affection exercise even over the brute creation! It gives activity to the sluggish, forethought to the improvident, and courage to the timid. In man it is refined by that sensibility, which other creatures share not. It is cherished and strengthened by that reason, which unhappily it sometimes overthrows; and it ceases to act, only when the heart in which it lives has ceased to beat. What but this all-commanding impulse of nature could have suggested a lamentation so exquisitely tender, so deeply N deeply plaintive, as that of the text; an impulse under which the aged monarch, forgetting the rebel and the parricide, exclaimed, with the unavailing repetition of inexpressible anguish, “O my son, Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom my son, my son!" There is in this word son, so fondly dwelt upon, a combination of endearments, which hardly any other word contains, and of which a parent only can form an adequate conception. It is the origin of a joy, with which no stranger intermeddleth, or of a sorrow known only to a parent's heart. It carries in it a magic spell, which melts into tenderness the most ferocious temper; which conjures down the most legitimate resentments; which softens the cry of vengeance into accents of pity, and which triumphs, in many instances, even over the great law of self-preservation. Is it for nothing, that the God of nature has implanted this unconquerable instinct in the human breast? Assuredly, so strong a feeling indicates a strong necessity. And what, indeed, but such a feeling, could induce us to undertake, |