THE MARTYR'S HYMN. CHORUS. WITH grateful heart we wake the song; FIRST SEMICHORUS. Behold the meek and gracious man, SECOND SEMICHORUS. *At his command the demons fly; FIRST SEMICHORUS. O'er Cedron's stream behold him go, SECOND SEMICHORus. Behold him in his glory shine FIRST SEMICHORUS. With thorns behold his temples bleed, SECOND SEMICHORUS. But, lo! he wears a glorious crown, CHORUS. Acquainted with thy power and love, FIRST SEMICHORUS. Behold him scourg'd, and doom'd to die, He bleeds, he groans, he breathes his last, SECOND SEMICHORUS. He lives, he ever lives on high, Him all the host of heaven adores, FIRST SEMICHORUS. He slumbers in the peaceful tomb, Here see the Man of sorrows lie, SECOND SEMICHORUS. His arm, omnipotent to save, FIRST SEMICHORUS. But he is distant in the sky, SECOND SEMICHORUS. He, ever présent, ever near, CHORUS. Acquainted with thy power and love, YUSEF. THE HARVEST. Ps. lxv. 11.-Thou crownest the year with thy goodness, and thy paths drop fatness. How suitable are these words to the present moment! In every part of the land, what striking, what manifold proofs do we behold of the loving kindness of the Lord! Well may we say, "Thou visitest the earth and waterest it: thou greatly enrichest it with the river of God, which is full of water: thou preparest them corn, when thou hast so provided for it. The pastures are clothed with flocks; the valleys also are covered over with corn; they shout for joy, they also sing." On every side we behold the yellow crops waving with rich luxuriance, or falling under the stroke of the reaper, or conveying with joyful acclamations to the stackyard and the barn. Here, then, we have another proof of the mercy and the faithfulness of our God. Of old he said, "Seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease;" and still he has not for gotten to be gracious; he has not in anger shut up his tender mercies. O what cause of indignation has been given in time past! What numerous provocations have arisen throughout our land! What profaneness and licentiousness! what murmuring and complaining! what forgetfulness of God and profanation of his sabbaths! and yet he still continues to be gracious-He crowns the year with his good ness. Nor is this the case merely with the bread that perisheth. He not only clothes our fields with the precious corn, but he offers to us better bread, even the bread which cometh down from heaven. The gracious offers of his Gospel are still vouchsafed. Pardon and peace are proclaimed through a crucified Redeemer! The hungry and the thirsty are still invited. One minister after another, as an ambassador of Christ, calls upon sinners to be reconciled unto God. Spirit and the Bride say, Come; and let him that heareth say, Come; and let him that is athirst "The come; and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." How often, indeed, are we com pelled to say, "The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light!" What diligence, and activity, and unwearied exertion are manifested in securing the precious fruits of the earth! All are ashamed of being slothful in harvest. Labour is then thought lightly of; from the early dawn to the latest evening, all are fully occupied. The large proprietor, and the little farmer, and the daily labourer, and the humble gleaner, are all in their several places diligently employed. Little is heard of the scorching sun or of the dewy eve; but a kind of cheerful contest is witnessed, who shall be the most assiduous and the most unwearied. And for what is all this diligence and all this industry exerted? Is it for the mere securing of those things which perish in the using? Shall the present provision for one single year call forth such zeal and ardour, and shall the abundant provision for a never-ending eternity be regarded with coldness and indifference? Well may the reapers which cut down our fields cry out, and rise up in judgment against us, if we neglect so great salvation. The husbandman has long patience; he toils, and ploughs, and sows, and waters, and, after all, receives but a scanty portion. Surely we, who have eternal life thus freely and abundantly proposed unto us, should at least manifest some portion of the same zeal and the same industry. Will you say, that the time of harvest is short, and that, during this, more active exertions should be made than can reasonably be expected in the greater and longer continued work to which the Gospel calls you? Before you advance such an excuse, consider how short your time may be. Did you indeed know that your lives should be continued for a certain time; that your day of grace should endure as long as life endured, and that at whatever hour you pleased you might return to God you could secure your own salvation, then perhaps your excuse might apply: but since your life is but a vapour which soon passeth away and is gone; since your day of grace is most short and uncertain; since God himself declares, that those who set at nought his counsels shall call upon him, and he will not answer, then surely it becomes us to arise with all diligence, and apply to our great and important work. Here, indeed, you shall not labour in vain nor spend your strength for nought. In an earthly harvest, those who endure the heat and the burden of the day receive but little, and are often deprived of their expected enjoyment even of that little, by sickness or death, or other unlooked-for calamity; but in the spiritual harvest there shall be no disappointment. You may sow in tears, but you shall reap joy. "He that now goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.” in O let us, above all things, fear lest at the last we should be compelled to say, "The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved." If the heat and burden of the day is over, let us now at least go forth and glean after the reapers. Our gracious Master will not reject those who come to him even at the eleventh hour. Let us then arise and be doing. Let us redeem the time, because the days are evil. Let us set before us the last great harvest-the end of the world; and with fervent prayer, and humble faith in a crucified Redeemer, and diligent study of God's word, and conscientious improvements of all the means of grace, let us earnestly seek to be accepted of God in that day. ` H.O. THE VILLAGE PASTOR, No. IV. HAPPINESS, such as this earth can produce, is graciously dispensed to some individuals, or, if you please, attained by a certain number of persons in every stage and gradation of society. It is, indeed, but seldom found where a misjudging world is so prone to look for it, I mean in the ranks of nobility and splendour; yet there are a few noble mansions beneath whose roof it sometimes tarries for a season, and makes glad the heart of man. In our search after happiness, we shall, however, more generally find it tenanting the abodes of those whose state and condition in life is equally removed from the paralyzing influence of want and poverty, and from the intoxicating charms of power and riches. In a state of great affluence and worldly honours, it is very difficult for a soul to walk humbly with its God; and amidst all the trials of cold and hunger, of pain and wretchedness, which abject poverty often brings to the sufferer's dwelling, it is no easy duty to exercise resignation and contentment. Yet that grace which is all-sufficient is occasionally found in its full exercise; on one hand guiding the individual through abundance, and on the other conducting him through want and poverty; sanctifying both poverty and riches; making all things work together for good to the present and future happiness of the respective individuals, and promoting His glory who is the Author and Giver of every perfect gift. The benevolent mind will often consider how the Almighty formed man in his own image, and so constituted the nature and dispositions of all the animate and inanimate portions of his works as to pronounce the whole " very good." In the original construction and constitution of the world and its creatures, there was no room for AUGUST 1822. complaint, because there was no pain, or want, or even inconveniency, to be contended with. That enviable state of things is, however, passed away, and now man is born to sorrow and trouble; he journeys through the world as a weary traveller, and brings his years to an end as it were a tale that is told. But are there no seasons of refreshment? no circumstances of a cheering nature to light up the gloom of his pilgrimage here on earth? Yes, there are these blessings to be attained; and some in every class of society do actually partake of and enjoy them. No small part of the felicity of angels, and of the spirits of just men made perfect in heaven, arises from the manifest and unceasing blessedness of all around them. And as we drink into that mind and temper which makes the fallen children of Adam meet for the inheritance o. the saints in light, we shall feel ourselves advanced in happiness whenever we discover and contemplate the happiness of our friends and neighbours as they are contending with the various and adverse difficulties of this probationary state. This must be the general feeling of every renewed mind. And should the Christian philanthropist discover, as sometimes he may, a portion of this happiness where he least expected to find it, it will produce a sensation of soul, faint indeed, but somewhat resembling that which angels feel when a sinner repents, confesses, and forsakes his iniquities. "A certain portion of cheerfulness of spirits, and a tolerable share of Gospel faith and Gospel practice," are the grand requisites to the enjoyment of happiness beneath the sun. Wherever you separate these, there you injure the individuals. Wherever they exist, there you find a truly enviable character. PP It is quite possible for a soul to be in possession of the last of these excellencies, and consequently to be in a state of safety, while destitute of the first: this, as far as the eternal destiny is concerned, leaves all well; but so long as a man is the subject of constitutional or accidental depression of spirits, he is for the time being incapable of happiness. The gloomy cloud that overshadows him will eclipse those cheering rays which otherwise would beam on his soul, and give life and animation to all his thoughts and actions. Again, it is not enough that the understanding be well informed, that the mind assents to all the leading doctrines of the Gospel; there must be some good portion of a corresponding practice, or that peace of God which passeth all understanding will not keep the heart and mind through Jesus Christ. So long as a professor of the Gospel walks carelessly, so long as his tempers are unsanctified, and his passions and appetites not brought into subjection, his soul will be far from peace. The honest and good heart, which receives the seed and brings forth fruit, some thirty and some sixty fold, is a state of mind which believes, and loves, and obeys, according to its light and strength, and means and opportunities. This is a safe state; but it may be coupled to a constitutional depression of spirits, and be therefore in great measure a stranger to happi ness. Should it, however, bless any individual who at the same time is favoured with a portion of natural cheerfulness of spirits, that individual cannot but be happy. It will neither be in the power of adversity or prosperity to throw many dark clouds over such a soul. Its pathway will occasionally be strewed with thorns, but a constitutional cheerfulness of spirits will always prompt it to look at the fairest side, and enable it to extract much of the venom from every little wound which the thorn or the brier may inflict. And when some great and almost overwhelming calamity occurs, the world will see that a Gospel faith, working by love and purifying the heart, can lift the mourner's head above all the swellings of the torrent, and sooner or later enable him to go on his way rejoicing. In one of those vallies, or dells, which run through and beautify our parish, stands a cottage in a kind of natural excavation. A little garden stretches on in one part of the front and round one end, and bushes and cherry-trees fill up the excavation at the other extreme; while it is overtopped on the back part by the neighbouring bank. At a distance of not more than five hundred yards in front rises the opposite heath, over which the topmost boughs of a beech wood are just visible above the wild thyme and anthills which shut out from the cottager's view all the kingdoms and nations of the earth, and all their glories and deceptions, their enchantments and their honours. The building is low, and in poor repair; but its situation is so strikingly romantic, that it cannot fail to attract the notice of every stranger as he passes down from the high land on either side of the valley. The stormy wind that blows furiously in mid-winter along the elevated heath, and roars through the beech woods that adorn the surrounding country, can reach this dell cottage with but a faint murmur. Its lowly structure, and its secluded situation, ensure its safety in seasons of elemental danger, while more lofty and magnificent buildings are shaken to their very foundations. And as it is with the cottage, so it is with a part of its inmates. Those political and polemic storms which sweep over many provinces, and create and convey wretchedness and ruin to multitudes, reach not the tenants of Ber dell. They never heard of those de |