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in such a case, the counsels and the urgency of Brooks will be deemed extreme or obtrusive-they will probably be dismissed till a more convenient season, or without any view to a future season at all. But pause, my dear young friend! Before you throw away the volume, turn to page 13, and read these words: "Ah, young men! if you do not begin to be good, those sins that are now as jewels sparkling in your eyes, will at last be millstones about your necks to sink you for ever." You cannot question that truth. How, then, are you to proceed with such an appeal pressing on the conscience? Do you silence it? or do you yield to its power? Do you choose the good part? or do you discard it? Then, be warned-it will perhaps be for ever!

Again, follow this volume to the chamber of a youth who is preparing to die. The friends of his folly have forsaken him now. That wasted form, that sunken eye, these solemn mementoes of mortality, are not welcome to those who forget that they must die. The dying one is therefore left alone with disease and death, with his conscience and his God. He has been learning, however, from "the Wonder

ful, the Counsellor." He has taken such a monitor as Brooks to his bosom. He hears him say, "Make Christ and Scripture the only foundation for your soul and your faith to build upon;" and add, "In all places and companies, be sure to carry your soulpreservers with you;" or continue, "Walk by no rule but such as you dare die by and stand by in the day of Jesus Christ." The heart of the dying youth is opened to receive such lessons, and he learns to say, in a far profounder sense than that of General Wolfe when wounded on the heights of Abraham, and who, when he was told that the enemy whom he had conquered were fleeing, exclaimed, "Thank God, I die happy!"

It is because this volume appears well fitted, through the ever-needed blessing, to produce such results, that it is now commended to the perusal of those among the young, nay, of all ages, who love their souls, who would be happy, and prepare to meet their God.

EDINBURGH, December, 1858.

W. K. TWEEDIE.

ΤΟ

ALL YOUNG PERSONS

THROUGHOUT THE NATION,

Especially those who begin to turn their Faces toward

Zion.

DEAR HEARTS,-A word spoken in due season, how good it is! It is often like apples of gold in pictures of silver. Many times such a word is sweet, precious, pleasing, and delectable, and strong in its operation.

A company of near friends dining together one Sabbath-day, one that was at table (to prevent impertinent discourse) said that it was a question whether they should all go to heaven or no, which struck them all into a damp, and caused every one to enter into a serious consideration with themselves. One thought, If any of this company go to hell, it must be I; and so thought another and another, and, indeed, so thought almost every one then present, as well servants that waited as those that sat at the table, as it was afterwards acknowledged; and (through the mercy and blessing of God) this

speech so wrought upon the spirits of most of them, that it proved the first instrumental means of their conversion.

I have my hopes, through grace, that this treatise, though it be sown in weakness, yet, by the blessing of the Most High upon it, it may rise in power, and be an instrumental means of the winning of souls to Christ, which is my highest ambition in this world. And therefore I have broke through all difficulties, and carnal reasonings, that might otherwise have stifled this babe in the womb, and kept it from ever seeing the light.

I have read of an emperor, that delighted in no undertakings so much as those which in the esteem of his counsellors and captains were deemed most difficult and impossible. If they said such or such an enterprise would never be accomplished, it was argument enough to him to make the adventure; and he usually prospered-he seldom miscarried.

I have never found greater and choicer blessings to attend any of my poor, weak labours, than those that have been brought forth into the world through the greatest straits and difficulties.

Valerius Maximus reports, that one telling a soldier going to war against the Persians, that they would hide the sun with their arrows, he answered, "We shall fight best in the shade." Nothing should

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