LETTERS FROM THE REV. G. H. NOBBS. 305 
reflected towards yourself, my well beloved and 
respected friend. 
" The remains of my beloved child are depo- 
sited with their kindred dust, the first-fruits of a 
family of eleven children. And should it please 
my heavenly Father to call the survivors from 
time into eternity, and they were graciously per- 
mitted to witness as good a confession as their 
departed brother did, I humbly believe I could 
bow with submission to the righteous mandate, 
and say, ' It is well.' 
" To that phase of the consistent professor's 
life, * the chamber where the good man meets 
his fate, I can revert with unmingled satisfac- 
tion. It has been my privilege to attend the bed 
of sickness among this community for twenty- 
seven years, and I have frequently had the 
unspeakable happiness to listen to the testimony 
of the dying believer ; to see death so robbed of 
its sting, that the soul, before quitting its frail 
tenement, seemed invested with an antepast of 
heaven. Such manifestations can by no means 
be construed into mental hallucinations, or trans- 
ient feelings of excited gratitude. For not to 
recur to the happy state of mind in which many 
of our immortals have entered the ' dark valley, 
here (I refer to my deceased child) was a young 
man prostrated in the prime of his days, and for 
many weeks standing on the brink of eternity, 
with a full and solemn view of his state deeply 
impressed on his mind, both from his own feelings 
and the conversation of his sorrowing but happy 
friends : yet he could, amidst the ravages 
and exhaustion of pulmonary consumption, so 
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