those indeed who have lived to this present world, and to whom death and judgment present but images of terror: to tell those who have trained up their children, and confirmed their friends, in their own vain and worldly pursuits: to tell such that they shall shortly meet their departed friends at the bar of God, is but to tell them that they shall be doubly damned: that they shall not only bear their own burden, but also that the blood of those souls whom they have seduced into, or confirmed, in vice or worldliness, shall be required at their hands; and that they shall hear throughout eternity the cutting reproaches of those, to the promotion of whose best interests they were deeply pledged, and might have been effectually instrumental, yet to whose ruin they have mainly contributed. But to those who have faithfully endeavoured, by precept and example, to train up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord: and to lead their best-loved friends into religious ways of pleasantness, and paths of peace to those whose loyal hearts beat with fidelity and allegiance to their Saviour; and who, in the anticipation of His advent in glory, can hear without alarm the heavens pass away with a great noise, and see the elements melt with fervent heat, and the earth and all that is therein burn in the universal conflagration of things created to such it is a deep consolation, as the grave closes upon the mortal remains of a much loved friend, to know, upon the authority of God's own word, that when they themselves enter into the joy of their Lord, and sit down at the marriage supper of the Lamb, this Christian friend shall, with them, be a partaker of the heavenly kingdom, a guest at the same feast of love.

:

We are now about to commit that body to the grave, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope, not only as our wisely cautious liturgy expresses it generally, "of the resurrection to eternal life," but I trust I may in this particular instance say, of her resurrection to glory, honour, and immortality. And oh my friends, suffer not this solemn scene to pass away without producing upon your minds a suitable impression. Every funeral which you witness must exercise some influence. It must soften or else harden your heart. Every friend or acquaintance upon whom you see the grave close, and whose place in your social or domestic scene knows him no more, forcibly appeals to the hearts and understandings of the survivors; and, like every other means of grace, as it is rejected, or received, becomes a savour of life or of death. As you now return to your respective homes from this last earthly home of man, as in the silence and stillness and darkness of the coming night you lie down upon your bed, that image of the grave; and resign your exhausted body to the oblivious repose of sleep, that image of death; and, by natural faith, expect the dawning of another morning, that image of the resurrection; ere you again become the subject of those "lesser mysteries of death," calmly meditate upon the present scene. Ask your own consciences the important question, If the decree has gone forth,-if the summons were now addressed to me, "This night thy soul shall be required of thee," how am I prepared to meet it? If you are advanced in years, your call next is probable,—the old must die. If you are still in the bloom and flower of youth, that corpse, "though dead, speaketh :" it warns you that youth is no shield against the arrows of death, that the young too may die. Does then your happy spirit answer with the CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 44. 3 N

evangelist, "Amen, even so come, Lord Jesus?" If not, why? since Jesus promises to be with His people in the valley of the shadow of death, and to lead them through it into green pastures, and by still waters of comfort. Whence then this dread of the grave and gate of death, through which all God's people pass, by a glorious and happy resurrection, into realms of unfading bliss? Whence, but from that lurking, unslain enmity of the carnal mind against the will, the ways, the holiness, the people, the presence of God? Be assured that as bodily pain, the sentinel of natural life, indicates bodily disease, so the dread of death indicates something wrong within,-some item unsettled in the great account for eternity. Trace this slender but infallible clue through all the chambers of imagery, all the labyrinths of a deceitful and deceived heart, and it will discover to you some legal scruple, some unbelieving fear, some worldly vanity, some cherished lust, some root of bitterness springing up within, which, like a hidden cancer, eats away your comfort, and defiles your soul. If it be a sin of unbelief, "take, read," God's word: let in upon its dark haunt the daylight of gospel truth, and immolate it before the altar of the Saviour's cross. If it be some worldly, sensual, or malignant passion, drag the foul monster from his gloomy den, and hew in pieces this Agag before the Lord. Purge the temple of God from every pollution of flesh and spirit, and invoke by prayer the indwelling of the God of peace and purity. God is pledged to prayer: ask the indwelling Spirit, and it shall be given you. We, says our blessed Lord, will come unto you, and make our abode with you. God will come, not in awful majesty, as when He went through the wilderness, when the earth shook, and the heavens dropped, at the presence of the Lord: not as when He came down upon Sinai, wrapped in blackness, and darkness, and tempest; while He emitted from his clouded presence thunderings, and lightnings, and voices: not in scaring convictions of conscience: not as a consuming fire, an angry and a jealous God:-but God will come, as once in flesb, meek and lowly, gentle and beneficent; descending into the soul, as upon the wings of a dove, in sweet influences and holy aspirations, like the silent dews which softly, imperceptibly, steal upon, refresh, and fertilize the earth. O! cherish and honour this Divine Visitant. Often, in the prayer of devout meditation, take sweet counsel with Him. Listen to his still small voice. Yield to his gracious influences. Resign your will to his. Without compromise or reluctance obey his dictates. Follow, as he guides, into all truth. Walk in the fear of the Lord, and you will walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost. Walk with God in the liberty of love, and the peace of God will rule in your heart. In your whole conversation abhor that which is evil, and cleave to that which is good. Exercise yourself in maintaining always a conscience void of offence towards God and towards men. Blessed, says our Divine Master, are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Cultivate this purity, and you will be enabled, with the steady eye of an unclouded and unvacillating faith, to "look unto Jesus," in whom death has lost its sting, and the grave its victory.

J. M. H.

DR. CHALMERS ON THE CORN-LAWS AND FREE TRADE.

For the Christian Observer.

WE remarked in our Number for June, page 379, that "No less a man than Dr. Chalmers-an advocate for liberal measures-wrote a volume to prove that restrictions upon the importation of corn are, on the whole, wise and useful." We alluded to his work published in 1832, entitled, "Political Economy, in connexion with the mora state and moral prospect of Society;" our recollections of which were to the effect that the author wished to refute those speculatists who anticipate a vast amount of physical and social benefit to a nation from emigration, free trade in corn, cottage allotments of land, or the increase of manufactures, independently of moral, religious, and provident habits, by shewing that population always tends to press upon the means of subsistence; and that increase the quantity of food as we may, the increased number of consumers will be as scantily supplied as their predecessors, unless the people are so trained that they acquire virtuous and thriftful habits, and learn to depend, under the blessing of God, upon their own exertions, instead of recklessly casting themselves into the gulf of pauperism. In the course of his arguments he denounces cottage allotments, spade husbandry, "home colonization," and the like (see the passages quoted by a correspondent in our volume for 1832, page 574-580) as mischievous fallacies. The labouring classes, he considers, will, in the long run, be worse off than if no such intended alleviations had been devised; for the partial addition to the supply of food, he argues, will fall far short of the increase of population, and thus land the next generation in accumulated wretchedness. The importation of food from abroad, in exchange for manufactures, he also shews, will not prove an adequate or permanent remedy; the staple articles of human subsistence being so weighty and bulky, that they cannot be imported from distant lands to such an extent as will keep up with the increased demand for them caused by the extension of population in flourishing manufacturing districts. Our home growth, he says, must be the main dependence of the people; and the sanguine predictions of some political economists, as to what might be gained by importation, he considers fallacious; and whatever partial benefit may arise, he argues, will not only be temporary, but will prove ultimately mischievous, if the people be not brought under such a system of moral and religious training as will counteract the temptations to improvidence caused by momentary plenty. He thus opposes the notion that a free trade in corn, in return for manufactures, will diminish permanently the distresses of a reckless population; and he also urges the policy and the duty (for he will not sever them) of maintaining our great civil and religious institutions inviolate; of fostering an agrarian rather than a mercantile spirit; and of regarding the land as the chief interest of the nation. The volume is essentially conservative.*

*Thus he says, for instance: "There is a waywardness of innovation which might carry ruin and overthrow in its train, and of this the legis ature will have to beware. They

should meddle not with the national debt, save in an equitable adjustment of the taxes; else they will pass a sentence of confiscation on one set of proprietors to the enrichment of another

Dr. Chalmers has, however, the faculty of expressing himself so strongly and largely upon a portion of his topics, that his reader is sometimes in danger of carrying away general impressions, forgetting the guards and limitations with which he qualifies his statements. Thus his remarks on "free trade" are, throughout, an appeal against the lofty notions of some of the political economists. For example:

"We are not of the number of those who rate very high the economic advantages of the system of free trade. It will not much, if at all, enlarge that wealth which is in the hand of merchants, though, by its means, we may perhaps obtain a greater abundance of foreign commodities at the same cost, or obtain them cheaper than before. There will thus be a certain, though, we ap prehend, a small addition to the enjoyment of consumers-which, in spite of the constant preference given by mercantile economists to the means over the end, to the benefit of producers over the benefit of customers, is really, after all, the great and only end of commerce. We can even imagine a slight extension given by means of free trade, to agriculture-in as far as we may possibly, through it, obtain at a cheaper rate, either some of the materials of husbandry, or some of those articles which enter into the maintenance of husbandmen."

From a general recollection of such passages in his writings we might have said that Dr. Chalmers is not a very warm advocate for 'free trade;" and yet in the very next sentence we read:

"Notwithstanding this our humble estimate of the advantages of free trade, in an economical point of view, there are certain attendant moral benefits, if we may so term them, which render the adoption of the system one of the best and wisest achievements of an enlightened national policy."

It will be seen from these, among other passages, that in citing Dr. Chalmers, a fair quotation may often convey but half his opinion.

set of proprietors, and these are exclusively the proprietors of the land. They should meddle not with the Church, save to commute its tithes, and virtuously to control its patronage; else they will inflict an irreparable blow on the moral and literary wealth of the nation; and that to the relief and enlargement of no one class but still of the landed proprietors. They should meddle not with the law of primogeniture; else they will institute a process, under which the state must wax feeble, and even our commercial great ness must disappear; our towns dwindling away, both in prosperity and in magnitude, and a numerous, but finally a wretched, agrarian population rising up in their room. Lastly, they should meddle not, either with the monarchy or the peerage; for both a vigorous executive, and a certain vis inertia of hereditary prejudice, are as indispensable to a right politics, as both the helm and ballast of a vessel are indispensable to a right navigation. In a word, instead of demolishing the frame-work of any of our existent machinery, we would have them but to guide and to animate its movements. And it is precisely because we stand in dread, lest, through the stages of our future history, the sail should predominate over the

ballast, so as to make the vessel of the state veer and vacillate with every wind of speculation, that we feel as if the national security were bound up, in our having more of an agrarian, and less of a mercantile parliament."

"We feel quite assured, of every land of law and liberty, that, with an order of men possessing large and independent affluence, there is better security for the general comfort and virtue of the whole, than when society presents an aspect of almost unalleviated plebeianism. And it is of the utmost importance to the argument, that the breaking down of this affluence would ultimately do nothing for the enlarged sufficiency of the lower orders. Whatever beneficent effects, then, can with justice be ascribed to the existence and secure establishment of such an affluence these we have all to the bargain. They form so much clear gain to the commonwealth; and though, at first sight, the whole good of it may appear to be absorbed by the children of fortune, there is, beside this absorption by, them, a reflection on the commonwealth at large-a secondary influence, that is felt throughout the extent of society, and which goes down to the very humblest of its members."

We find, in like manner, upon a reference to his volume, that our nine years' recollections of his general reasonings with regard to the effects of the importation of food from foreign lands, were more vivid than our remembrance of his specific statement with regard to the corn laws. We know not, indeed, that we have misrepresented him, for he offers the two following propositions :

"That it is not desirable that the commerce of Britain should greatly overlap its agricultural basis; and that the excrescent population, subsisted on corn from abroad, yield a very insignificant fraction to the public revenue.

"That, nevertheless, there should be a gradual relaxation of the corn laws, and ultimately a free corn trade-with the exception of a small duty on importation, for the single purpose of a revenue to government, by which to meet the expenses to which it is subjected, from the addition made by the excrescent to the whole population."

Here the substantive statement is, that "it is not desirable that the commerce of Britain should greatly overlap its agricultural basis;" and it is only as an admission and with a "nevertheless," that he adds that there should be "a gradual relaxation of the corn laws, and ultimately a free corn trade, with the exception of a small duty." These qualifying words, taken with his whole book, lead us to conclude that we were not wrong in regarding him, under all the circumstances of the case, at the present moment, as at least only a "gradual relaxer, which is in other words a partial and temporary restrictionist. We will however, in justice both to himself and to the argument, having so far touched upon the subject, transcribe what he writes upon it more at large. His pro and contra may furnish weapons for opposing combatants. It will be seen that he is strongly opposed to the opinion that a considerable degree of dependence upon foreign nations would not be a subject for alarm; and it was in juxta-position with the Duke of Wellington's similar argument upon this subject, that we happened to mention Dr. Chalmers; and we must confess that we still feel some difficulty in reconciling his conclusions; for if he considers the apprehended evil" to be so "serious" as his statements imply, it would seem to follow that some restrictions upon the trade in corn, are not only, as our recollections led us to suppose him to think, "wise and useful," at least for England for a time and under existing circumstances; but absolutely essential for the public safety, and not therefore to be rescinded even "gradually" or "ultimately." We will however quote his argument.

"For the sake of its moral benefit, we know of no achievement more urgently desirable than that of a free corn trade. There is not a more fertile topic of clamour and burning discontent all over the land; and, were it but effectually set at rest, we are aware of nothing which might serve more to sweeten the breath of British society. The interest of cheaper food, is not the only one concerned in the abolition of all those restraints which have been laid upon its importation. There is, beside this, a special interest felt, by that numerous class who are engaged in the business of export manufactures, or export merchandise. The limit of our imports determines the limit of our exports; so that when the one trade comes to its ne plus ultra, the other must also be brought to a dead stand. They mutually limit and determine each other. So that the advantage to our export commerce, from a further enlargement of our imports, opening, as it would, a fuller and freer exportation, and telling most favourably for this great branch of trade upon the foreign exchanges, is really one of the most urgent forces that is now operating on the side of an unrestricted corn trade. We shall therefore attempt a brief exposition of what we hold to be the leading principles, and the likely results of such a measure.

"First, then, though there should, on the event of an instant and total abolition of the corn laws, be such a reduction of price, as would translate the popu