should proclaim Him; He undertook not this great and important work, relying solely on Himself; but spent the whole of the preceding night in prayer.

At the very moment He declared, "I am the resurrection and the life; He that believeth in me though he were dead, yet shall he live, and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die;" at the very moment when He thus asserted His divinity, and His power over the living and the dead, He yet performed not His stupendous miracle in the resurrection of Lazarus, without previous prayer to the Almighty; and for the confirmation and instruction of the spectators, cried not "with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth!" until He had lifted up His eyes and said, Father, I thank thee, that thou hast heard me." And when He was about to enter upon the closing scene of life, and was suffering sorrow more poignant than any other sorrow, with which the Lord afflicted Him in the day of His fierce anger; the timid followers of an oppressed Master, were left to pass those hours in

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forgetfulness, which were devoted by Him to agonizing and earnest prayer.

Yet while we thus see an uniform recurrence to this stay and comfort of His soul, we find that He ever postponed it, if the active duties of benevolence claimed His attention. In like manner, also, in imitation of our great Exemplar, we may not indulge our calmer feelings, nor are even permitted to fulfil this tranquil duty, if, in the exercise of our several callings, it would interrupt an opportunity of extending the glory of God, or promoting the welfare of man. In such a case, personal sanctification must, for the time, yield to the higher claims of universal charity; the love of self must be subservient to the love of all; and the promotion of our own peace to the extension of the Redeemer's kingdom. The mere hearers of the word are not just before God, but the doers of the word shall be justified; and "not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven."

Be it remembered then, that, while prayer is the most efficacious means of promoting our personal holiness, and is to be regularly and fervently offered, whenever an interval occurs from our higher and more important duties; yet may we not be so totally engrossed in a selfish concern for our own salvation, as to be negligent or careless of the salvation of others. He, who of all men was most frequently found in secret communion with God, was also beyond all others, active in going about doing good; and those only are true Christians, and acceptable followers of their divine Master, who in the faithful exercise of one duty, so wisely regulate their time, as to leave opportunity for the performance of all.

SERMON X.

ON THE VISITATION OF THE SICK.

JAMES V. 14.

"Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the Church, and let them pray over him."

AMONG the multiplied discouragements of the clergyman's office, this is one; he is too well aware, that his addresses from the pulpit are by many regarded as mere matters of course; as a brief space allotted to the preacher, to descant on some religious subject, to which his hearers may listen with indifference or review with criticism; and whose lives will remain innocent, though his advice be unheeded, and his instruction be forgotten. He is oppressed with a painful conviction, that the words

of the Almighty by the mouth of His prophet, are applicable in the present day; "They come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: and, lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hatli a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument for they hear thy words, but they do them not.”

Let me now implore, that such a feeling may for once be banished, and that the following discourse may be received in the same spirit it is offered; for there is, perhaps, no field of his exertions in which he meets with so many and such severe disappointments, as in his visitation of the sick. Of all his duties, while that may be reckoned as attended with the greatest difficulty, and as being of the first importance; it is also accompanied, in but too many instances, with the least degree of satisfaction to himself, and the least benefit to others.

Of its importance no one will doubt, who believes that sickness is a season, when