FRIENDLY VISITOR. No. LXVII. APRIL, 1824. VOL. VI. COTTAGE PIETY. MR. EDITOR,-As you have desired your brother to inquire into the truth of the little history of Betty, which he related to you, I beg leave to send you a simple statement, being the person who visited her. Poor Betty was one whom the Lord had chosen in the furnace of affliction, and she had indeed been refined therein. On one of my visits, after we had had much useful conversation, and as I was rising to leave her, she said, "I have something I should like to tell you." She, however, could scarcely get it out, as she was always very backward in speaking of her worldly concerns. I pressed her to proceed. She then said, "my husband has been off seeking work this three weeks; and has not returned, or sent me any money. On Saturday night, I had no bread, or coals, and no money in the house to buy any: neither was there any shop near, where I could expect to get credit. I knew not what to do. myself I felt little-my wants are few-but when I looked at my children, I own I was sorely tried; and I could not get courage to tell them, that I had nothing more for them. I tried to cast my care upon God and look to him. In the evening, a neighbour called in; and after staying a little while, she said, Betty, we fear you are very ill off; and though times are bad with us all, I have collected in the row fifteen pence for you; and I wish we could have done more.-Another woman shortly followed; and brought ninepence which she had gathered from my poor neighbours. After this, dare I ever D For doubt the faithfulness of the Lord? He has pro mised, bread shall be given thee, and thy water shall be sure. And have I not had the promise fulfilled? I ask for no more. On telling the children our condition, my little boy about six years old said, 'surely, mother, this bread is from the Lord, who must have put it into the hearts of these people to have brought you this money!" her Poor Betty had done her utmost to bring up family in the fear of the Lord. She tried to do good amongst her neighbours. Every morning she used to ask some of them in to her family worship; and when too ill to read herself, her eldest child read for her as she used to say, "if we do not begin the day with prayer and reading the Bible, we have no right to expect a blessing from God during the day." This labour of love, I trust, has not been lost. One poor neighbour owned to me, that before she came to live near Betty, she had never heard a chapter read in the Bible for years, or been in a place of worship. Indeed she said, the only time she used the name of God, was in blaspheming it. She is now constant at church; and as far as we can judge, truly in earnest in religion. I went to see Betty a few days before her death. Her husband and children were standing around her bed, expecting her departure every minute. She received me with much affection, and said, "I have been telling my friends not to be alarmed. There is no stranger coming to frighten them. I have been looking for death, as a friend, to release me from this body of sin. I thank God, that in my dying hour, I am enabled to confirm the truths I have so long experienced. I have nothing now to regret, but that I have spent so much time in folly and sin, and done so little for God. I shall soon be with the Lord; I have no doubts: indeed, I dare not doubt. Jesus will walk through the valley of the shadow of death with me." I said, "it is not dark to you."-" Oh! no, (she replied with great delight) the Lord is the light thereof." The last words that could be understood, were to the poor woman before named; to whom she said, grasping her hand, "prepare to meet my God.” SHORT SERMON. "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." The Apostle defines faith to be "the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen." And in the same chapter, he shews in a long list of instances, the power of this blessed principle The saints of God were sorely tried and afflicted; but faith upheld them. "These all died in faith; not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them." And indeed, my friends, the further we advance in our journey through life, the more we shall find our need of some strong principle to support us. We are sinking into the grave ourselves; and we have to lament the loss of dear relatives and friends; and how shall we bear it? We must walk by faith. The eye of faith must pierce through this dark world into futurity; and there fix upon that rest which remaineth. What a blessed principle then is faith! How shall we cherish and increase it? The apostle tells us "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." We must come then to the word of God, and make ourselves familiar with its accounts of heaven, in order to feed faith. Is our spirit disquieted within us, under the loss of some dear friend? We must not unduly dwell on the sufferings of those who survive, We must rather contemplate the now glorified state of the departed. If he died in the Lord, he is only gone home. He rests from his labours-he is taken from the evil to come-he has received the end of his faith, namely the salvation of his soul. Having washed his robes in the blood of Jesus in the church of this world, he now stands in the heavenly temple arrayed in white; and there the eye of my faith sees the palm in his hand in token of his victory over all his enemies; sees him fed by the Lamb, and drinking at the fountain-head of bliss. And there I hear him, no more crying over his sins and his sorrows, but singing hallelujahs before the throne. Yes, this is all real. The faith of it is grounded on the word of him who cannot lie. The Bible opens out the glories of heaven to our view in this lower world. Where then is room for weeping, save for ourselves, who still dwell in this Mesech? Thou, dear departed relative, I will even now follow thee with my halle lujahs, and bless God on thy account. I will think it a privilege to have thee safe in the arms of thy Saviour: nor will I be so selfish, as to wish thee back again into this world of woe. Stay in thy mansion; enjoy thy repose; and during the rest of my pilgrimage, I will forget my bereavement, in the view of thy happiness and moderate my mourning, with the thought that thou canst no longer weep. And must we ourselves die? Here let faith support us. Saved by Jesus, we die but to live. Death is the birth-day of our souls. Death is the door of heaven. The infirmities of age, or the workings of disease only hasten our happiness. We shall soon be with each other, and the Lord. How much does this imply! With each other! Yes, death cannot break the bonds of christian love. The chain may be so far extended, as to separate us for a season from each other's view; but it cannot break; we are still near in spirit; and soon we shall be united in a closer and more satisfying union, than we ever knew in this world. And, with the Lord!-Oh! what a prospect! Through rich mercy, we have tasted that he is gracious, and he is indeed precious to us; but his presence is faintly felt; and scantily enjoyed. He is only as a way-faring man, or a stranger, that turneth in to tarry for a night; but after death, as we shall become pillars in the temple, no more to go out; so the Lord will for ever dwell among us, will be our light and our glory.-Let us then comfort one another with these words. Let us daily renew our faith in the all-atoning blood of Jesus, thereby cleansing the conscience from guilt: and then the way will be cleared for the same blessed principle of faith to penetrate into heaven, and we shall calmly and peacefully witness death's ravages around us. CHRISTIAN PURPOSES. NO. IV. There was not any thing in the world after the fall of Adam, which did not in some measure bear a part of his punishment. All things did degenerate from their creation; and from that time became liable to corruption. The elements themselves became impure. The earth brought forth thorns and thistles. It had in it the wild beasts to molest it; and the water, that monstrous leviathan to disturb it. But Christ the Holy one came down from heaven, and sanctified the one, by walking to and fro upon it; and the other, by causing himself to be baptized with it. He purified the air, by suffering in it; and the fire, by sending his Holy Spirit in the likeness of it. Man, who was indeed that sour leaven, which corrupted the whole lump, was to be cleansed from his impurity, not with the fat of bulls and goats, nor with the ashes of an heifer, but with the precious blood of |