Mr. Foster had very long suffered from a chronic disorder of the bronchial glands, which indeed had obliged him, thirty-seven years before, to relinquish, amidst the regrets of his friends and hearers, the pastoral office at Frome, though it was afterwards for a time resumed elsewhere. Even in the prime of life he often endured much pain and local harm, in the discourses and prolonged conversat`ons which edified and delighted many. But in latter years he had been forbidden, on account of much more threatening symptoms, to speak at all in public. He submitted to this affliction, and the consequent disability for one chief kind of endeavour to be useful, I have reason to believe, with uncomplaining patience. When, about five weeks before his removal from the world, I visited our suffering friend for the last time, I had been apprised of an increase of illness, and difficulty of conversing, which would limit me to a short interview; yet had no apprehension, even after observing his changed appearance, that his spirit would so soon be summoned to its better home. He came down from his chamber to see me in the customary sitting room, and although his thin and pale looks indicated great debility, conversed in his usual manner. I think I noticed to him the blessing of having the intellectual powers so entirely unimpaired during illness; to which he answered, "It is a comfort even to understand what is read and heard." I then referred to the melancholy mental decay of the late distinguished Southey; on which Mr. Foster remarked, "No doubt his mind was worn out by the toil of building up many books; as if there were a want, a famine of books." "So it is" (he added with a smile), "there are men who even apologize for their errors and haste, and for not delaying in order to greater correctness, as if the world were labouring under a dearth of the article." I replied, Consider, dear sir, you are speaking to one of the culprits;" to which he rejoined, "No, hardly that, yet." I said to his daughter, who sat by, "We all wish Mr. Foster had been more a culprit." He then intimated, “Perhaps we may wish this at times, now that nothing more can be done;" adding, "Much has been omitted every way, partly from trifling. One feels that in the great concern of religion, much more might have been done." I observed, "All, however, no doubt, is for the best." To which our friend replied, "Yes, in the deep sense. These feelings of defect serve to humble us, and to show that in ourselves we are nothing." I said, "It is happy, sir, that you have good daughters near you. Even a son would not be able to afford such aid and solace." He answered, "Yes, indeed, they are very kind.” The following sentiment was also uttered by him with peculiar seriousness: "How dreary would old age and illness be without the great doctrine of the Atonement!" I left him, bearing with me a deep impression of that thought; but certainly not with the apprehension that in this world we should meet no more. It was however so appointed. He and many more whom we revered and loved are gone; and though some remain whom we dearly prize, what would life itself be without hope in the "glorious gospel," but an apparition, and departure, and oblivion of shadows? With what a tone of utterly cold and thoughtless unconcern do we sometimes hear the fact mentioned, even by professed Christians,-" he died:" "he is dead." Nay, in how cursory and unthinking a manner have we frequently named it ourselves! And yet the feeling of awful strangeness, of momentous novelty, which at times pervades us, when for an instant, we have had, as it were, realising flashes of that event as indeed at hand, is one which all earthly symbols of thought, spoken or written, are powerless to arrest, and image, and disclose. The silent, lonely transit of a conscious and reflective spirit-a being which is profoundly accountable to its Divine Author -from all connexion with this bodily life, and with this visible world, into a new mode of existence, unknown and unconceived and illimitable, must ever be the most mysterious and awfully deciding change on which our meditation can be fixed: and the solemnity of it is inevitably and justly heightened, in proportion to the greatness of the individual spirit's capacities and consequent responsibilities. How painful therefore the thought, that so many of the most powerful and expanded minds have, to all appearance, left this earthly state, without seeking a right and availing preparedness for the vast hereafter, by faith in the One. Sacrifice, and renovation from the Infinite Spirit. Remembering these with sadness and awe, we turn for a relieving contrast to the contemplation of those instances (with the hope that they may soon be far more multiplied) where the special and abounding grace of God has consecrated to his own service his highest intellectual gifts. As we meditate on these-and indeed on all the servants of God who have entered his rest, or will follow thither-the event, still so painful and awful in itself, is viewed rather in its peaceful and felicitous result; justifying a forcible and singular expression which I remember our friend once used to me. He had been referring to some gloomy facts and thoughts which cloud and darken the whole horizon of life; but then added-"there is however one luminary—it is the visage of Death." When we think how often, in our own age, genius has lamentably misused its treasures, by such productions and social communications as are remembered in life's last days with inexpressible sorrow,-it is indeed matter for high and solemn thankfulness, to review such a course as that of our departed friend; a course of resolved piety and genuine benevolence; a dedication from early life to the advancement of the religion of Christ: to dwell on his memory as a devoted servant and worshipper of that supreme Lord who has called him from us; one who deeply adored the Infinite Benefactor as revealed through his beloved Son, and really "endured as seeing Him who is invisible." Few spirits can have passed away from earth, endowed with more of intellectual grasp and penetration to meet the wonders and grandeurs of regions immense and untraversed:-few also I believe with a more profound persuasion, that as creatures, however endowed, admired, or dignified, "in ourselves we are nothing," but yet that, if true supplicants and recipients of the Divine grace, then, "life and death, things present, things to come, are ours:" since" we are Christ's, and Christ is God's." You will deeply feel with me, dear sir, how earnest should be our wish and prayer, that many more of those whose powers and acquirements might render them, in the happiest sense, "lights burning and conspicuous,”* may attain the same faith and devotion, the same humility and hope, instead of forgetting God, while idolizing the world and themselves. Believe me, Yours very sincerely, J. S. * John v. 35. Compare Phil. ii. 15 |