146 TliiJ LAURISTINUS. 



very sweetly now applies to the writer, who is, as 

 I humbly and confidently trust, rejoicing with him 

 who was its original subject. ' Yes, with him the 

 bitterness of death is past : the ministration of 

 mortality is broken, and the liberated, the disem- 

 bodied spirit is with God, who gave it. Of what 

 consequence is it, my loved, my respected sister 

 and friend, how or when the earthly house of the 

 tabernacle we now inhabit is torn down, or dissolv 

 ed, when we know that we have a " building of 

 God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the 

 heavens," to remove to and occupy ? There is a 

 precatory, or optative expression in the Romish 

 Missal (service for the dead) with respect to a per- 

 son removed from time into eternity, which is not 

 as comfortable as the scriptural declarations are on 

 that important subject, ' requiescat in pace,' — may 

 he rest in peace ! This does not pour into the bleed- 

 ing, the grieving heart of a surviving friend, the 

 sweet, the refreshing, the sanative wine and oil 

 that is conveyed to a Christian's afflicted soul, by 

 that, heavenly voice heard by John, which pro- 

 nounced the dead to be blessed who died in the 

 Lord, "from henceforth" — from the instant of their 

 dissolution — enjoying, not wishing, waiting for, or 

 expecting, that " rest that remain eth for the people 

 of God." Knowing then, and being fully and 

 satisfactorily assured of this consolatory truth, that 

 the dead in Christ are blessed, that they are not 



