some of the old divines was like digging for the precious ores, and that he always found a satisfactory account of the time thus employed.

"Mr. D. was a close student through life. He read and thought much, and his sermons and private instructions were calculated to form judicious Christians, not likely to give undue prominence to some truths to the neglect of others. Indeed, after an acquaintance of many years, the first and the last sentiment produced in our mind is this, that the character of his ministrations is expressed in those comprehensive words of St. Paul to Titus,

condemned."

Sound speech that cannot be

His equanimity and patience under personal and relative afflictions could not have escaped the parcular notice of those who were conversant with him. Under delicate and very sorrowful inflictions of Divine Providence, by which his tranquil home was disturbed, his fire-side enjoyments desolated, and all his pleasant things laid waste, he was never heard to murmur or repine. In manly firmness, and in Christian patience, he possessed his soul. It was indeed a subject of wonder to those who knew him best, that his spirit was sustained

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MEMOIR OF REV. A. DOUGLAS.

from day to day and from year to year under the protracted pressure of this peculiar cross. He beheld the cup of suffering as in the hand of a father, and he said with the calmness of an uncomplaining resignation, "Shall I not drink it?"

Over all his other graces and virtues, he wore the veil of unaffected humility. By the grace of God he was instructed not to think more highly of himself than was meet. He was not one of those who seek glory of men, who struggle for the uppermost room at feasts, who love greetings in the market places, and affect the chief seat in the synagogue. On no occasion did he thrust himself offensively in the foreground, or court the public gaze. In this modest, retiring, holy, and useful course he was enabled to endure unto the end, and has passed, as we confidently believe, to that world where patience terminates in enjoyment, humility is crowned, and faith receives the prize.

ADDRESS

AT

THE FUNERAL OF THE REV. A. DOUGLAS,

BY HIS CO-PASTOR AND SUCCESSOR,

THE REV. W. LEGG, B. A.

FATHERS, and Brethren in the ministry, Christian friends, I rise before you at this time with feelings of peculiar emotion; and had it not been the express desire of my departed father, I should not have stood before you on this solemn occasion, as it would have been far preferable to me, to have been sitting at the feet, and listening to the voice of some one of the numerous ministers who have now assembled, to pay their last tribute of respect to the memory of the dead.

About a month before his death, Mr. Douglas gave directions about his funeral, and assigned to me the part he wished me to take, and this he did with as much self-possession and calmness, as

when he sometimes requested me to take his turn at a prayer-meeting, or preach a sermon in his stead, displaying an elevation of mind, which I had never so fully appreciated in him before.

I do not stand here to eulogize the dead, but merely to offer that tribute to departed worth, to which the deceased was so justly entitled, and which may tend to stimulate us to follow his example, so that, at length, we, like him, may enter into the joy of our Lord. Such examples, it is meet for us to cherish, for heaven will not be obtained by a few languid desires; there must be the same active obedience, the offspring of the same lively faith. The living example is no more. Those mild features, that manly form, that used to soothe the heart, and satisfy the eye, are now lifeless; that countenance, which was wont to beam with benignity and intelligence, we have now shrouded from our view; that voice, from which issued instruction, satisfying to the most mature Christian, is now for ever silent. He has now done with all that concerns this mortal life, and is realizing, in their full extent, those joys on which, when here, he delighted to expatiate. Mr. D. was the child of godly parents, who early instilled reli

gious principles into his mind, and stored his memory with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, which accounts for that rich fund of holy writ and sacred poetry he possessed, and with which he illustrated and enforced his discourses.

He entered early into the ministry, which may be concluded was the case, from the lengthened period during which he sustained the pastorate here, besides having been previously engaged in the same work elsewhere. His ministerial course afforded an illustration of the motto, "I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." Faith was the grand connecting link of all his graces, from which emanated that holiness of life for which he was distinguished, and which shed such a mild lustre over the whole of his general deportment. The fervent and exalted piety, by which his devotional exercises were imbued, which has often led our minds, cherished as from a source of sweetest pleasure, very near to the footstool of the eternal throne, and which spread its sacred influence over the entire period of his closing scene with peculiar power, was piety springing from the firm faith of "the glorious gospel of the blessed God."