due improvement. It remains only that we henceforth stedfastly endeavour to improve them. Then shall we never in any instance minister in vain. Great as is the difficulty of holiness, we shall never fail to make manifest its beauty in at least one of the congregation. The minister may preach perhaps to many without success. He may pray; and perhaps many will not join in his prayers. But there is always one, whom if he make not more devout by every prayer he utters, and more wise unto salvation by every sentence that he preaches, truly it is his own fault!

Let us then take heed to ourselves, and to our doctrine. Let us watch that we hold the right faith, and teach it diligently, and practise it abundantly. For consider how great will be our gain, how glorious. is the reward set before us: "Thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee. What an honour to be put on a sinful child of Adam, to be reckoned instrumental in the salvation of his brethren! What an escape, to be saved ourselves!

O merciful Saviour, praised be thy name, for our deliverance! To Thee be all the glory, in the salvation of those, whom we in any wise help to deliver!

SERMON III.

AFTER THE FUNERAL OF THE EARL OF

DUDLEY.

THE SEPULCHRE NIGH AT HAND.

JOHN 19. 42.

"There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.”

SEVERAL things relating to the burial of our Saviour are carefully set down in the Gospels. This must be on purpose to make us the more sure that He was truly dead; and also to leave no room for doubt, that He did truly rise from the grave. Amongst other circumstances, we are told in the text, that the sepulchre, in which He was buried, "was nigh at

hand." It was near to the place where the friends of Jesus had embalmed his body. It was near to the spot where He had been crucified. Hence also it was near to the city of Jerusalem, within reach of the observation of his enemies. And this might help to convince the unbelieving Jews, that there was no truth in the report, which the rulers set on foot, "his disciples came by night, and stole him away." (Matt. 28. 13.)

But there is mentioned in the text a reason for laying Jesus in a sepulchre so nigh at hand: "because of the Jews' preparation day." This means, that it was the day before their sabbath. And "that sabbath day was an high day." (Ver. 31.) They took so much the more pains to be prepared the day before. And would it not be well for us also, to spend the day before our sabbath as a day of preparation; with a view to our better spending the day following? If we would make the Lord's Day a day of diligence in our heavenly calling, let us not make the day next before it a day of more than

usual drudgery in our worldly work. To this last day of the Christian week let us allot less of labour, rather than more; and go to rest on this night of our preparation somewhat earlier, rather than much later; that so we may be more wakeful on our sabbath morning, may arise more refreshed in body and in mind, and may be more ready for this best of our employment upon earth, the work of prayer, and praise, and 'meditation on the will of God.

And further, we may hence take occasion to consider the whole period of this present life, as our day of preparation for the life which is to come. Heaven is our etérnal sabbath. It is the rest appointed for both body and soul, at the end of all we have to do on earth. "The night cometh, when no man can work.” (John 9.4.) Let us therefore so employ the time which we now have, that when we awake from the darkness of the grave, we may behold God's presence in righteousness. (See Ps. 17. 15.) To us also the sepulchre is " nigh at hand." We

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