If to have maintained the principles of national order and of public justice-if to have resisted the voice of clamour and the blandishments of popular applause-if this be the reproach of our Church, well may we, in the language of the Apostle, "glory in our infirmities." To whatever obloquy or insult they may be exposed, the sacred Order, I trust, will never sacrifice the line of conduct which the Gospel has marked out, to meet the ebbs and flows of worldly opinion, or the suggestions of secular interest.

How soon indeed the Providence of God may call us to severer trials than these, he only knoweth. It is thus that, at once in severity and love, he warns both Churches collectively, and ministers individually, that his kingdom is not of this world. Instead of this august and solemn assembly, uniting the most exalted, both of Church and State in one pious feeling, one holy service, and one labour of love; soon perhaps "the ways of Zion may mourn, because none come to her solemn feasts-all her gates may be desolate her priests may sigh, her virgins be afflicted, and she herself may be in bitterness."

Whatever trials, however, it may please the Almighty in his wisdom to send, or in his mercy to avert, still in the poverty and destitution with which the family of many a minister of the Gos

pel is now visited, is the Redeemer pleased most unequivocally to shew, that neither his kingdom, nor his reward, are of this world.

The objects which on this day claim our regard, are the widows and orphans of those who have laboured faithfully in the vineyard of the Lord, and are now gone forth to meet theirr eward. Had the same assiduity, zeal, and ability, which they displayed in their sacred calling, been expended in any other profession, they might not have been now the supplicants of your bounty. In the destitution of their orphan children, we trace the consequence of no needless luxury nor unprofessional dissipation; but in most cases, the sad effects of sudden and untimely death. And when it is remembered to how very few of the Clergy, out of the actual revenues of their profession, it is allowed to make a reasonable provision for their families, surely their want will not be counted as a reproach. In the life, in the death, in the poverty of such men, we recognize "the marks of the Lord Jesus."

Of the children, who on this solemn occasion, now plead for your support, many were born in the hopes of a happier lot. By one awful stroke they became at once "poor and fatherless," and the "joy of their heart was turned into mourning." But the Almighty, though he has afflicted,

has not forsaken them. In the charity of the more opulent part of his Church the voice of the Almighty speaks as in the words of the Prophet, "Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them alive."

The fathers of these orphans have often, out of a scanty income, provided for the wants of their lay brethren in Christ; and now, in the persons of these their representatives, they implore from the same order, a return of their charity and love. Many are the children of the lower ranks whom these men have largely contributed to educate in the faith and fear of God, and now they entreat the same care and assistance in the education of

their own. To place the sons and the daughters of such parents in situations, where they may be protected from the dangers which destitution might entail upon them, and to give them the means of learning an honest, though a subordinate profession, is the great object of this day's solemnity to effect. The fathers of these children were, in their life-time, "the messengers of the Churches, and the glory of Christ, shew them therefore the proof of your love." And if as ministers of the Gospel such men were worthy of our regard while they laboured upon earth, they have yet a higher claim upon our gratitude and reverence, now they are dissolved, and are with Christ in Heaven.

Here then, in this sacred charity, as in the communion of saints, are united the living and the departed members of the Redeemer's kingdom; those who are now at rest with God, and those who are waiting for their appointed change. Here, in the bounty which we bestow on their representatives now on earth, we are exalted in our thoughts, our affections, and our hopes to the spirits of just men made perfect in heaven."

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May that Redeemer in whose service the fathers of these orphans were content to labour, and with whom after all their earthly struggles they now rest in peace-may that Redeemer accept and bless your bounty. "For inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these,” the children of his servants and his brethren,

done it unto him."

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ye have

SERMON XXIII.

ST. LUKE ix. 56.

The Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.

SUCH was the answer of our Lord to his disciples, when under the sanction of his authority, they would have invoked the Divine vengeance upon the inhospitable Samaritans, and would have "commanded fire to come down from heaven and consume them." It was not only to repress the risings of a selfish and vindictive spirit, but to display the real character, and to announce the special purpose of his Gospel, that the reply was made. The wanton sacrifice of life which the disciples had proposed, was in direct contradiction to the whole tenor of that dispensation, which the Redeemer came from heaven to promulgate. It was the object of that dispensation, not only to disarm the grave of its final victory, but to give a value to human life, which it never before possessed; to supply both to in

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