resources for mutual happiness. Feeling all that so intimate a union implies-confident in each other's characters-nobly independent, they stemmed the tide of fashion-they shewed themselves superior to their rank, and entered a magnanimous protest against that dissipation, that luxury, that selfishness, and that libertinism which have gone far to render the felicities of domestic life altogether obsolete in the higher circles. But the vision, however pleasing or valuable in its moral influence, was but for an appointed season, and it has vanished.

Sermon by John Keysall, M. A. F. S. A., preached in the Church of Bredon, Worcester.

ISAIAH, chap. xxvi. v. 9.

"When thy judgments are in the Earth, the inhabitants of the World will learn Righteousness."

IT hath seemed good to that omnipotent Being, whose hand holdeth the balance of the universe; and by whom

kings reign, and princes decree justice," (Coloss. chap. iii. v.. 10,) to visit this our land with a most awful, and most afflictive dispensation of his providence. He who in the execution of his inscrutable, but gracious purposes towards mankind, not unfrequently frustrates the best arranged schemes of human wisdom, and worldly policy, hath thought fit to remove from before our eyes, and to tear as it were from our very hearts, our amiable, accomplished, and beloved Princess, the presumptive heiress to the British crown, and the joy and expectation of the whole state: Her, in whom but a few days ago the fondest wishes, and the brightest hopes of the nation were concentered; and with respect to whom, nothing now remains to us, but the mournful remembrance of her virtues; and a deep and universal regret for her loss.

Sermon by Robert Aspland, preached at the Unitarian Church,

Hackney.

ISAIAH, chap. xl. v. 6, 7, 8.

"The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever."

THIS day exhibits in the eyes of the British public, as affecting a proof of the fadingness of all human glory, as ever struck the imagination, or melted the heart into tenderness. It was meet, as an act of sympathy with human nature, if for no other reason, that we should assemble to make use of so extraordinary an occasion of moral impressions and Christian reflections. Death is the same in itself to all mankind, and the spectacle is always solemn and admonishing; but Divine Providence sometimes in the course of ages sets it forth in such strong contrast to all that is held great and good to the human being in possession and expectation, that it would argue a want of both piety and humanity not to contemplate the awful scene, and to seek to better the heart by the mournful contemplation. Such a case is the recent example of mortality in the most exalted of our British families. Never, surely, was the hand-writing of Heaven more visible upon any human event, never was the inscription more plain, Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. It is seen and felt in all our dwellings, from the palace to the cottage; the sentiment is associated with our persons; and it this day reverberates in thousands of our houses of prayer.

Sermon by Thomas Bartlett, A. M,. preached at the Church of Kingstone, Kent.

ISAIAH, chap. xl. v. 6, 7, 8.

"The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The

grass withereth, the flower fadeth; because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the word of our God shall stand for ever."

NOT many hours are passed, since the honoured object of our mutual condolence stood elevated upon the pinnacle of earthly grandeur. The sole heiress of a kingdom great among the nations, we were fondly contemplating in her, the mother of a race of illustrious monarchs. We were vainly anticipating the period, when she would be no less securely seated on the throne of her ancestors, than enthroned in the affections of a loyal and 'grateful people; but, where are now our expectations-where are now our hopes?-Withered by the stroke that laid her low, they are decayed in her decay, and must be buried with her! O my brethren! cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; repose not your confidence in dust. and ashes, but seek your strength, your happiness, your all, from Him" by whom alone kings reign and princes decree justice."

Sermon by the Rev. John Davies, A. M., preached at NewBrentford.

Joв, chap. xxx. v. 23.

"I know thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living."

DID we but fully convince ourselves of the unspeakable importance of religion;-did we but place in one scale the momentous concerns of eternity, and in the other the fleeting nature of our present existence, blended with its trials and its sorrows; did we but reflect, that at every period of life, from the dawn of infancy, to the decrepitude of age, mortals have been hurried to their long home;—that every day of the year, and every hour marked upon the dial, have concluded to some the term of their probation;-such undeniable, and perhaps unwelcome truths, if they did not awake the mind to seriousness, might for awhile interrupt its repose.-Already may the tree be cut down, which is to bear you to your grave; though

with health in the countenance, and spirits buoyant with delight, soon may you become the solemn monitor of all whom your name can reach.

In the morning of youth; with an unspotted name; living in a state of connubial happiness, and with the 'delightful prospect of maternal endearments; in short, with every thing that could gratify a virtuous ambition, this illustrious personage might reasonably have looked forward to many years of life, and health, and joy. Though born to royalty, and with all the blandishments of a court at her command, she preferred the comfort of retirement; exhibiting the rare union of exalted rank, with unaffected piety, and practical benevolence. Happy in an alliance, entered into with the most cordial approbation of her own heart, and fondly anticipating the only event by which that happiness could be increased, behold her, called upon, in the hour of weakness and extremity, to renounce the completion of a mother's joy.—With humble resignation, and holy acquiescence to the will of heaven, she received the sad tidings of a lifeless child, and displayed, in her last moments, an unsubdued fortitude of mind, which religion only could inspire. To her might be applied the animated language of the dying saint, "The time of my departure is at hand: I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous Judge shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them that love his appearing.

Sermon by the Rev. T. Morell, preached at the Independent Meeting House, St. Neot's.

JER. chap. ix. v. 21.

"For Death- is entered into our palaces."

ENTER the lofty portals of that palace; pass through the long retinue of splendid but deserted apartments; draw nigh to that stately couch-that bridal death-bed-there lies, in

the cold embrace of death, a lovely, an illustrious Princess, whose heart, but yesterday, beat high with maternal expectations; whose bosom thrilled with a delight, which none but a mother can feel, while cherishing the fond, but, alas! visionary hope, of soon pressing to that bosom her first-born, a child, who might hereafter occupy the throne of a mighty empire! O! what is she now?—a pale, a breathless corpse― beauteous indeed in death, but yet bereft of life-utterly unconscious of the myriads of tears that have embalmed her memory, and which must long continue to flow-unconscious, too, of the presence of that illustrious mourner, who stands gazing with tearless eye on a form so dear, as if unwilling to believe that death has indeed robbed him of his earthly all, that that pulse has for ever ceased to beat, and that that hand can no more respond to his affectionate pressure. But I forbear,— grief like his is sacred, and must not be too rudely approached. May He who has inflicted the deadly wound, and whose prerogative it is to heal the broken in heart," graciously impart

divine consolations to the bereaved!

Sermon by the Rev. George Richards, A. M. F. A. S., preached at the Church of St. Mary Le Strand, West

minster.

MATTHEW, chap. xxv. v. 13.

"Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour when, the Son of Man cometh."

IN the midst of life, says our Liturgy, we are in death. The Scriptures throughout, inculcate the same solemn truth. Our existence is represented as a shadow that passeth, as a flower that fadeth, and as grass that withereth, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven. Even in its most extended state, it is described as but a span long. Its flight is rapid, like the path of an arrow through the air, and of a vessel