death, because they violate the laws of health and life, and so come under the natural penalty; or because they persecute the Lord's people, and fall under the stroke of an avenging Providence; or because they commit some other outrageous offence that ranks under the class of a "sin unto death." The grass is cut down sooner than it would have been in other circumstances. "The fear of the Lord prolongeth days; but the years of the wicked shall be shortened." Prov. x. 27. "Bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days." Psa. lvi. 23. Ambitious Absalom, aiming at his father's throne, is cut down in the flower of his life. Nadab and Abihu, sons of Aaron; Hophni and Phinehas, sons of Eli, for setting light by priestly ordinances, drooped under visitations of fire and sword. Their half-lives knew no decline, but terminated suddenly at the midway point.

The days of good men are as grass. Death is due to the best men that live in virtue of the ancient decree that dust must return to dust. The voice that says, "Return, ye children of Adam," cannot be disobeyed. There is a sentence out against the whole race; that sentence cannot be revoked. The grass withers on account of the original offence. The first man's first sin introduced a deadly element into the human constitution. Spoiled in the stock, the most diligent endeavours of the noblest characters cannot live down the common doom. There never were but two individuals who "leapt the ditch into which all others fall." We are not sure that they were made exceptions on account of their superior virtue. It might be the Almighty's design to show the world that there was a road up to a brighter home, and that if they would keep in the path of obedience, He would take the rest up some time. Two solitary exceptions to the law of mortality warrant no man to hope that a high point of holiness will enable him to evade the stroke of death. The evening shade cannot forget to fall, nor the scorched grass to change its hue. "My days are like a shadow that declineth, and I am withered like: grass."—Psa. cii. 11. The days of the best sometimes come to an abrupt termination, and that, too, in the way of privilege. As the lives of the wicked are curtailed in wrath, those of the good are contracted in mercy. Some whose virtues are only in bud, are removed before they have time to appear full blown. Omniscience foresees the unkindly blasts that would sweep ruthlessly over them, and spares them. "The righteous is taken away from the evil to come.”—-Isa. lvii. 1. Abijah, a good child in a bad family, droops sooner than the rest who are the victims of justice. "And all Israel shall mourn for him, and bury him: for he only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found some good thing toward the Lord God of Israel in the house of Jeroboam." 1 Kings xiv. 13. Josiah, distinguished for religious zeal and royal

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virtues, died at thirty-nine, because the Lord had an old account to settle with the commonwealth which he could not adjust with so good a man on the throne.

When the lives of good men are extended by favour, they are still but as grass under protection. It is not cut down by disease or epidemic, by accident or judgment, yet it withers and dies. Hezekiah prayed death away by the space of fifteen years, but he died at fifty-four.

Another figure is added, in natural companionship with the grass, "As a flower of the field so he flourisheth." The flower is more pretentious than the common grass, as it displays fine tints. and shades of colour, and shapely leaves. Its stem and stamen and petals draw upon your admiration. You turn back again and again to look on it, and your pleasure increases as its beauty unfolds, till you come one day and find its stem broken or its leaves shed and scattered. You heave a gentle sigh and say, beauty is delicate and brief. The emblem of our mortality is not a garden-flower, protected with sheltering walls, screened with glass cover, and favoured with frequent visits and kindly attentions from the careful gardener. No! It is a field-flower, open to casualty, exposed to sun-blast and surly winds, or to the crusb of a careless foot, or last of all to the sharp edge of the mower's scythe. Thus the wild flower blooms without enclosure. But its elegance is no protection. The ruthless mower, at every sweep of his arm, lays grass and flowers in one undistinguished heap. He cannot waste his time to indulge in sentiment, or make distinctions between grass and flowers. Once severed from their stem, how soon they fade. Two days shew them in different condition. To-day they bloom from a living root; to-morrow they burn as fuel (Matt. vi., 30). Nay, in less time they are completely spoiled. "In the morning it flourisheth and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down and withereth." (Psa. xc., 6.) The flowers of the field share the common fate of the grass. The scythe cuts down both alike. There are no distinctions in death. Death walks into the wealthy mansion with as stately a tread as into the thatched cottage. The brother of low degree stoops to the stroke of mortality. The rich is laid low quite as soon, if indeed he does not droop earlier. "As the flower of the grass he shall pass away. For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth; so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways." (Jas. i., 10, 11.) The tenderness of childhood and the charms of youth are no bar to the action of death. He does much in the way of robbing cradles and breaking the indentures of the young apprentice. Personal endowments are no more protection than gifts of fortune. Beautiful Absalom, wise Solomon,

strong Samson, courageous Joshua, and praying Samuel, though they are not common grass-are but flowers of the field. The wind passes over them and they are gone. Hot or cold the wind is disastrous to them. If it be a burning wind it scorches their life, and if a cold wind it nips and blights them. "All flesh is as grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass." (Isa. xl., 6, 7.) When the Lord bloweth with His east wind the human flowers droop. "And it came to pass when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah that he fainted and wished in himself to die, and said it is better for me to die than to live." (Jon. iv., 8.) The east wind is the agent of death and destruction, and fatal to the life of man. "The east wind carrieth him away and he departeth." (Job. xxvii., 31.)

"And the place thereof shall know it no more." This clause is borrowed from a sacred poem, in which it occurs unmistakably several times. See Job vii. 8-10; viii. 18, 19; xx. 9. The spot which the field-flower adorned is left vacant, or it is supplied by another that graces the situation better, or it may be not so well. Whether his successor excels him or comes short breaks not his quiet rest. He has no competition. He bloomed his time, and shed around him the perfume with which he was gifted. Let the next flowers that spring where he drooped bloom lovelier if they can. When a good, useful man is gone from his place, and we revere his memory, there is no need to despond about the succession. His pen may fall into more cunning hands. His mantle may pass to one double-gifted with the spirit of prophecy. Another head may wear the crown as well. Another counsellor may give as wise advice. Let all successors cherish an emulative zeal. With equal gifts they should excel. Those who foreran us have laid a foundation on which we may build, have opened the breach for us to rush in at, have prepared a stage on which we may perform our part. We do well to think of them. The recollection of their virtues will inspire us. Their faults, which we canvass in soft-spoken words, or cover in kindly silence, are beacons of admonition. Though they are done with us, we are not done with them. Their place knows them no more-they do not appear in pulpit or class-room, in Sabbath-school or committee, at desk or counter. They have no share in the plots and politics of the world, or in the plans and purposes of the Church. Their voices are hushed, and their hands are still. But we protest against the idea of their having no influence amongst us. If, in their life-time, their wisdom counselled us, if their knowledge instructed us, if their glowing virtues inspired us, if their bright

example improved our ideal of goodness, they are with us still, though not visibly, effectively. Good men die, but their good actions-never!

II.-God's mercy is ancient and perpetual. This second proposition is in happy contrast and connection with the first. So far as punctuation is concerned, we seem to have gained a complete sense. The adversative "but," which immediately follows, preserves the continuity. Man's life is frail and perishing, but, not so God's mercy. He has His eye on the successive generations of men, and never withdraws His favour from those who humbly seek it.

Isaiah and Peter vary from David. They say, the Word of the Lord endureth; whereas, he says, His mercy and His righteousness endure. As Peter takes pains to say that the preached gospel is the Word, the agreement is well preserved. The gospel is the Word, and the Word is the history of God's mercy, and a demonstration of His righteousness.

Our thoughts about the mercy of the Lord will easily divide into particulars—its nature, duration, and objects.

Its nature.-Mercy is love or goodness exercised in relation to guilt or misery. It is spoken of sometimes as relating simply to suffering, irrespective of moral offence. Properly, it has respect to an offender against rectitude, and only in a secondary way to suffering, which is the outcome of sin. Mercy is touched with men's misery, and seeks its removal by putting away their sin. The medium of mercy is the Lord Jesus Christ. "The mercy promised to the fathers," as reserved for their distant heirs, came upon them through Him long prior to the payment of the ransom. The sinful nation was graciously forgiven and delivered out of its miseries so often as the people broke down into penitence induced by their suffering. When they repented the Lord repented, being touched to tenderness by their tears and cries. Systematic theology and philosophic thought disallow such an idea. Yet the Bible warrants it, and uses it freely as the readiest way of showing the nature of mercy to the popular mind. "Return, O Lord, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy servants."-Psalm xc. 13. "And he remembered for them his covenant, and repented according to the multitude of his mercies." Psalm. cvi. 45." Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a pleasant child? for since I spake against him, I do earnestly remember him still therefore my bowels are troubled for him; I will surely have mercy upon him saith the Lord." Jer. xxxi. 30. Though so tenderly expressed and so readily exercised, mercy is doubly guarded from licentious abuse by reaching men through a costly atonement, and requiring of them penitence for the past and future amendment. Let us look at—

Its date or duration." From everlasting to everlasting."

Applied to the immeasurable reach of the divine existence, which is an ocean without a shore, this expression gains our immediate assent. So Psa. xc. 2; “From everlasting to everlasting, thou art God." It is, indeed, a strain upon our conception. The puzzle deepens when we think of everlasting mercy. The forward "everlasting," of which we are heirs expectant, is easy and welcome. The backward "everlasting," of which the Deity himself was the sole occupant, is inconceivable, especially as the sphere of mercy. There were no objects for the exercise of it then, none till man was made within the sphere of time. After his great fault and deep fall, mercy, latent before, woke into action. Had infinite wisdom seen good, it might have had a manifestation sooner, for there were early delinquents. In that case, even, it could not have been in actual exercise from everlasting. Because God foresaw men's guilt and misery, and was moved on the foresight to provide a remedy, it is fit that His compassion be represented as endowed with the infinitude of His own nature, rather than be measured by the finite objects on whom it rests. "His mercy is everlasting."-Psa. c. 5. "The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love."-Jer. xxxi. 3. The merciful love of God is not subject to caprice or change. Your erring nature may oblige the infinite love at times to frown on you. Even then it is true to its purpose, and will subordinate your suffering to your good. "For a small moment have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee saith the Lord thy Redeemer."-Isa. liv. 7, 8. So we read of an "everlasting covenant," "everlasting consolation," "everlasting joy," and "everlasting life."

Its objects. "Upon them that fear him." Three successive times within this psalm the objects of mercy are thus distinguished, ver. 11, ver. 13, and here. The indiscriminate and unconditioned exercise of mercy, regardless of its influence on conduct, would be subversive of all rule and government. Those who do not fear him are welcome to begin and have pardon offered to induce them. "But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared."-Psa. cxxx. 4.

"Upon them that fear him"-actually and veritably upon them, experienced and enjoyed in sweet assurance. What is upon us is something in close contact, whether pleasant or painful. Mercy being upon us signifies effect and participation. It is not upon all men. It is open and offered and proffered to all, and is exercised towards the most reckless in the way of forbearance, even when they are blind to the fact, and when they spurn its offers. In this wide sense all men are its objects. "The Lord is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works." (Psa.