must expect to return, at no distant day, to the dust from which we were taken. We may be young. And yet youth, we must be well aware, is not always safe. We may be strong. And yet our utmost strength is easily laid low by death. We may be old, and so used to living, that we think less of life's speedy end. But the longer life has lasted, we ought to be so much the more sensibly aware that "the sepulchre” is “nigh at hand.”

I. This is the truth which I design now chiefly to inculcate. This is the lesson which may, I hope, be now profitably enforced, from the death of him whose last remains have been so lately committed to the grave. Need I mention his name? or shall I bid you look around, and behold his work? He who built for us this goodly church, this temple for Christian worship, he who gave it unasked, of his own free bounty, a gift to you, and to your children's children; his death it is that I would turn to your profit, to your growth in grace; and from his burial I would urge you to con

sider, that the sepulchre is nigh at hand also to yourselves. Here was one in the full vigour of his age, or as the Psalmist expresses it, in the midst of his days. (See Ps. 102. 24.) In rank, noble by birth, and raised higher by his service to the state, with talents which in any rank of life might have led to wealth and to nobility, with every means of doing good at his disposal, and with no slight desire, as his works bear witness, to use them as a trust, for which he was accountable to the Giver of all good things; how naturally might such an one have reckoned on some longer continuance, in a world where he had so many things richly to enjoy! And how great, to many of us, would have been the temptation, in such a case, to say within ourselves, “ Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry." (Luke 12. 19.) But in the midst of all that can make life desirable, the sepulchre, let us remember, is nigh at hand. And if there be any of us now tempted by the enjoyment of abundance, to forget

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how short our time is, let us lay to heart what God said to the rich man in the parable, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee." (Luke 12. 20.)

But it is not only "the rich man” "in his ways," (James 1. 11,) that is often cut off much sooner than he expects. They also who have the least of this world's wealth, they who fill in this world offices of least importance, who seem to do least of good to others, and to enjoy least of happiness themselves, these also are apt to reckon that they have here a continuing city; these are apt to forget that "in the midst of life we are in death." (Burial Service.) They perhaps meet with no great reverses. They commit perhaps, according to their own reckoning, no very grievous sins. They are not visited by any very signal dispensation of temporal or spiritual vicissitude. One day to them is like another day. One year is like another And they year. run out their whole three score and ten, if it please God so long to spare them, with scarce a thought that they are all

the while living close to the very edge of death. To day, we breathe. To morrow, for aught we know, we may breathe no more. To day, the pulse beats within our veins. To morrow, it may have ceased to move. To day, we follow to the grave our best loved friends. To morrow, it may be our turn to be laid in it ourselves. Oh how true it is, that life is but a vapour! Oh how certain, that the sepulchre is nigh at hand!

II. Let us next consider what the sepulchre is. It means the same as the grave. It is the place of burial. It is a space allotted for the body to repose in when dead, that it may return, without disturbance, to the dust out of which it was taken. There we lay our nearest relatives, our dearest friends, when it pleases God to call them hence. We cover them with shroud and coffin. We follow them with weeping eyes. And we read over them the sad avowal " man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live, and is full of misery." (Burial Service.) But what language

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can so forcibly affect us as the sight which there we see, as the things which there we have to do? The vault opened! or the grave dug out! The body lowered into it! The earth thrown down! And the sepulchre again closed up! Even so must we be buried ourselves, so covered, so left in cold and darkness, by the very friends who, whilst we are alive, and up to the very moment of our death, minister most kindly to our wants. Oh where in that moment will be our never dying souls? What will be then our portion for ever?

Remember what it is we bury; the body, not the soul. That which can feel no cold, no sense of solitude, no oppression from confinement, that which is now ready to decay, though it may have been so lately full of strength, beauty, and activity, this is all we bury, when our brother is interred. And this, oh this, is not our brother. No, he is departed. The spirit has returned to the God that gave it. The soul, this is the man. The soul, this was our brother. That which felt hope and fear, that which