fruit. Graces and gifts, like the choicest collection of flowers, displayed their beauty, and yielded their richest fragrance. The Sun of Righteousness shone with splendour upon them, and love glowed from soul to soul. Sinners of every age and station bowed to the sceptre of mercy; and the Beloved came down to take of his pleasant fruit. It may be truly said of such a people, that the beauties of celestial spring, the genial warmth of summer, and the copious harvest of autumn, have been by them happily enjoyed. Now the blast of winter is spread around. The trees that were adorned with foliage, with flowers, and with holy fruit, bear the very image of death. Who can take delight in walking here? A congregation in such a state afford an unwelcome sight indeed! To such may the Lord send a reviving spring, and grant them renewed tokens of his redeeming love!

FAMILIES too, as well as Churches, are subject to painful vicissitudes. They may have their lively spring and their fruitful summer; prosperity in trade, the charm, ing sweets of friendship, children blooming under the most endearing prospects of usefulness, and health enjoyed under ten thousand bounties of indulgent provi dence! Yet, ah! how soon may their bright sky be over. cast, and the cold hand of adversity, like the nipping frost, prove the harbinger of dreary winter! Such vicissitudes attended the family of Job. His earthly comforts gone; his children slain; and he himself removed from a bed of ease to the loathsome dung-hill. So fleeting, so uncertain, are all transitory enjoyments. How many excellent families, like Job, have painfully experienced a change from the genial warmth of earthly comforts to the dark shades of woe!

I shall now show you, that as in the natural world winter is productive of advantage, so likewise the uncomfortable winter state of the Christian may eventually prove beneficial. Were there no winter, spring, summer, nor autumn would display such a great variety of beauties; for the earth itself would lose those rich stores of nourishment and fertility to which even the winter so copiously contributes. David, viewing the Divine economy of nature, with sublime adoration exclaims, The day is thine, the night also is thine: thou hast prepared the light of the sun. Thou hast set all the borders of the earth: thou hast made summer and winter. It is far from our wish to charge God with being the author, or dictator of our sinful revoltings; these, with humility and shame, we take to ourselves. But he is graciously pleased, by the dispensations of his providence and grace, to overrule the various vicissitudes of our lives, and cause them to work together for our good. As the recollection of the frowning skies of winter makes us more ardently rejoice in the return of spring, so a consciousness of our follies makes the bright manifestations of Emmanuel's love more welcome and rejoicing to our hearts. In the cold season of winter many noxious vapours are dispersed, and insects destroyed, which otherwise would devour the fruits of the earth. Such is the utility of afflictions; they are made subservient to the correction of our tempers and vile passions, which are equally injurious to us as they are offensive to God. This is the season when the husbandman prunes his trees, lopping off the decayed branches in order to their greater fertility. Our Saviour hath assured us, that every branch in him that beareth fruit, his heavenly Father purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.—The trees of the forest, that

often bend under the winter storm, are said to take deeper root in the earth, and to shoot their fibers far and wide, so that on the returning spring their branches spread afresh, and wave their heads with greater beauty. Not less so the people of the Lord have ever found, that so far from the various storms of life proving their destruction, they fail not to take deeper root in humility, and grow more abundantly useful on the return of a merciful spring.-Although Christians in their winter state may exclaim, "When will these dark days and gloomy nights of adversity be over ?" they may rest assured, that as there have never been winters without succeeding springs, the Lord will not forsake them, but in tender mercies will revive them with his love. There would be no need of the winter graces of faith and patience, if it were summer with us all the year. Let these remarks encourage you who know the Lord, and be assured that the changes to which the Christian life is subject are overruled for your best interest.

I cannot close this discourse without giving you one other lesson of instruction which the subject of winter is calculated to afford. The season of winter is a most striking emblem of the state of the dead. Look on yon trees which were once laden with delicious fruit, now bending beneath the weight of snow! See how the stream that flowed with majestic ease, is now bound in cold fetters, and forbid to move! The earth, so lately covered with corn, with grass, and with flowers, is now one scene of devastation! Who can cause the trees again to bud, the stream to flow, and the earth to spring and bear its richest verdure? None but God. And he displays this power to us on each returning spring. Does it, then, seem a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead?

Does the Lord annually produce such an astonishing change in universal nature, and cannot he raise your bodies from the dust of death? Most assuredly he will. The dead in Christ shall arise first. If indeed you are the Lord's, be exhorted to live in prospect of this great event. Your flesh shall rest in hope. Those that sleep in Jesus, will God bring with him. the change! The winter of mortality shall pass away. A state of holiness and bliss shall unfold its stores. Sin shall cease, and misery be abolished. Storms shall beat, and winter pierce no more; but light and joy, like one unbounded spring, for ever, ever bloom.

Then, how great

THE PURE LANGUAGE.

ZEPH. iii. 9.

For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve him with one consent.

A wonderful teacher is Christ,
Instruction he'll wisely impart
To all who recline on his breast,
To every teachable heart.

O give us a knowledge divine
Of every fruit in thy word;
And may we triumphantly join

To praise our adorable Lord.

THOSE who are conversant with the Old Testament cannot but perceive, that while God exposed the wickedness of men, he revealed, through the promised Messiah, the blessings of redemption and reformation. It is equally obvious, that the figurative language used to express such dispensations of mercy are in great variety. Such as liberty for slavery; the fruitful field for a barren wilderness; a state of moral light for gross darkness. On the perusal of Zephaniah's prophecy, we see described the dege neracy of that age by their conversation; but God, in the words of our text, promises to all his people a display of his goodness, by turning to them a pure language; not only for their moral reformation, but for the worship of his holy name. I shall now attempt to explain this valuable promise, in hopes that the Lord may graciously fulfii it in the experience of all who hear me.

Language is the communication of our ideas and sensa