tions, and distribute large alms upon the receipt of such mercies, as we in this irreligious generation are wont to take no notice of at all. But, if yet we will amend, let us consider how we obscure the glory of GOD, disparage the prayers of the Church, and show ourselves unworthy of the mercy received, if we do not cause open thanks to be given for our deliverance. Let us observe how base a temper it shows, to be craving and importunate till we get a mercy, and when we have it, to regard Him no more of whom we begged it. How shall it be known that GOD hath showed

mercy, or the prayers of the faithful prevailed? How shall any be encouraged to seek to GOD, or desire the Church's prayers hereafter, when the efficacy of both is smothered by thy vile ingratitude? We hear the petitions, but whether they be answered or no, we cannot tell, through the unworthiness of those for whom they are made. They have many of them obtained their base end; which was ease and health to enable them to serve the world or the devil as they did before: but GOD and His Church hear of them no more, till another sickness do arrest them, which when it comes to pass, it is very likely He will be deaf to the next entreaties, that was so little regarded for His former answers, and they who do not give thanks for the first recovery, deserve never to be heard the second time. Let us imitate therefore the best examples, and consider how holy David did not only pray in sickness to be delivered, but when his prayers were heard, he made psalms on purpose, and gave them to the choir, to be sung openly in the temple for his restoring to health; on which occasion the 6th and 116th, with some others were written. We have a form made ready, the good LORD grant us a heart rightly disposed when we are delivered, and then we shall never neglect to pay our solemn acknowledgments to the glory of GOD, the encouragement of the Church, and the procuring relief for ourselves, whenever we relapse into like distress."

Nor should you wait till your convalescence enables you to make your public offering of thanksgiving before returning your thanks and offering up your praises

to Almighty GOD. You will do well to desire the clergyman's attendance still, and beg his assistance in this devout act, that your recovery may be marked by as anxious a sense of your duty to return thanks to GOD, and show your gratitude for His infinite mercies in raising you up from the bed of sickness, as your illness was attended with an earnest desire to have the benefit of the prayers and ministerial care of the Church. A recovery from illness is often a progressive work, and during the time of your gradual improvement in strength, you may be unable to leave your home and attend the services of the Church, in which case how exceedingly beneficial may the visits of your spiritual guide prove, who can now assist you to strengthen the resolutions made in the period of fear, and under a sense of the alarming advances of death, and confirm those lively impressions of the vanity of earthly things, which his previous visits will, it is to be hoped, have implanted in your mind and spirit. This is a period of all others the opportunities of which are to be treasured up and made the most of, before any of that fervour of gratitude which the renewing mercies of GOD excite in you has been allowed to subside, and before the duties and cares of this life come thronging in to resume their wonted influence, and again begin to weaken the impression of spiritual realities.

It is with a view of meeting the necessities of that stage of recovery which has been above described, that intermediate state when the patient is rather recovering than actually convalescent, that the office for one under recovery has been provided.

The second instance of the Church's further care for the sick man is that she exhibits for him in a prolonged illness or confinement to the house from infirmity or when bedridden, and here the ministrations of the Church will be found in the highest degree beneficial, if they can be obtained by the sick man. Under circumstances of confinement the afflicted man, whatever may have been his feelings and habits before, will be drawn much to thoughts of Church communion and the blessed intercourse carried on in earth in the assemblies of the faithful. And if he

have been in the habit of neglecting divine worship and the solemn assemblies wherein GOD meets His people, he will now feel the reproach of his lost opportunities the more keenly, and if on the other hand, he have sought them heretofore with earnestness and great gladness of heart, he cannot but now cry out with the psalmist, 'My soul hath a desire and longing to enter into the courts of the LORD.' His yearning for the courts of the LORD in heaven above will naturally and almost unconsciously be mingled with desires and sympathies with the communion of saints on earth. This was a feeling exhibited in a very lively way by that learned and zealous pillar of the Church Dr. Peter Heylyn on his death bed. "As his time grew shorter and shorter," records his biographer,1 "he prayed with more vehemency of spirit, sometimes to GOD, sometimes to his SAVIOUR, and to the blessed COMFORTER of his soul, rejoicing exceedingly that he should live to Ascension Day, uttering forth most heavenly expressions, to the sweet comfort of others, and principally of his own soul, with a λnpopopia2 or full assurance of his salvation through CHRIST JESUS; which last unspeakable joy and consolation, above all other, GOD is [sometimes] pleased to bestow upon the faithful, and seal it to them with the earnest of His Spirit at the hour of death. At which time, his soul now ready to depart and be with CHRIST his SAVIOUR, one Mr. Merrol, a verger of the Church, coming into his chamber to see him, he presently called him to his bedside, saying to him, 'I know it is church-time with you, and I know this is Ascension Day; I am ascending to the Church triumphant, I go to my GoD and SAVIOUR unto joys celestial and to hallelujahs eternal;' with which and other like expressions he died upon Holy Thursday, A.D. 1662."

Lest then the sick man should feel his isolated condition too severely, and lest he should suffer, in this time of peculiar trial, from any lack of those benefits and blessings which are to be derived from religious.

1 Life of Heylyn prefixed to his History of the Reformation, Eccl. Hist. Soc.

2 Heb. vi. 11; x. 22.

H

ministrations, the Church will come, in a manner to him, and the minister of GOD, who is the appointed representative of the Church, will be instrumental in conveying to the afflicted man's soul the blessed feeling that still he has a part in the privileges of the saints of the LORD, and is yet counted as one among them. He should therefore very earnestly implore the clergyman to visit him in his affliction, as frequently as may be, and, if possible, induce him to fix times for his visits and to administer the Communion to him as often as the communicants at the parish church are privileged to receive it. That the Church has under her consideration the cases of persons in this condition may be seen from the wording of the 71st Canon, where provision is made for the administration of Holy Communion to those "who are so impotent that they cannot go to the church," as well as to those who are " dangerously sick." And, as it has been elsewhere remarked, "since1 the Church thus sanctions the administration of the Holy Communion to those who are so impotent as that they cannot go to church, it is evident that she contemplates also such offices being afforded to them by her ministers, from time to time, as shall in some measure supply to them the lack of the other public services of the Church, from which they are by the visitation of GOD withheld."

The observations which have been already made2 concerning the duty of almsgiving in other instances of private Communion are equally applicable here. To use the words of the Visitatio Infirmorum, "And that nothing may be wanting which is calculated to realize the fact of Church membership fully to the infirm person in this period of his loneliness and separation from public assemblies," the bed-ridden and infirm should be instructed that "the same privilege in respect to almsgiving is open to him, as he was wont to enjoy when he communicated publicly in the Church. Though this practice is not enjoined by any rubric in the office for the Communion of the sick (for the Church may have wise reasons for the omission, such as, for instance, the fear of seeming to make it com1 Visitatio Infirmorum, cxlvii. See pp. 135-9.

pulsory), it is notwithstanding obvious that she could not have meant to refuse the offerings of those who might be willing to make them at this most fitting opportunity."

It remains, in speaking of this subject, only to express the hope that the office for one in a prolonged illness will prove of service to those who are called upon to experience this peculiar form of trial by an all-wise and provident GOD, discerning what is best for each of His creatures, and Who according to our necessities dispenseth out His divine remedies for the diseased soul.

In the event of the disorder progressing with every symptom of a fatal termination, and leaving but small hope of recovery, the ministrations of the Church have but to be continued with the periodical use of Holy Communion and suitable prayer, and meditation in harmony with that prayer appointed for a sick person when there appeareth but small hope of recovery, and to be consummated by that most solemn office which the English priest is to perform for the sick man, the commendation of his soul to Him That gave it.

The promise of GOD is with the labours of His servants, at this time, especially to bless them. By long practice with the sick and dying soul have they learnt what is most fitted for it at this critical season; they will not apply the word of GOD at random, or with a weak and failing hand, but will "rightly divide the word of truth." With ready facility will they adapt their teaching and their prayers to the present emergent and special necessity, whatever it may be. With the unction, bestowed from above, will they strengthen the sinking body and soul; at one time counselling to acts of patience, at another leading on the dying man to look the terrors of death straight in the face, and arming the soul to its conflict with the last enemy, by making it contemplate Him Who is Victor over death and hell; opening now to view the blessedness of beatified spirits and the inconceivable glories of heaven and the wonders of the celestial and glorified body, and causing the soul to yearn after the pure joys of communion with immortal beings; and now instructing