dark and overwhelming temptations, by the devil, in the wilderness. The deep concern in which your mind has been engaged augurs well to encourage these suitable dispositions. Meditate deeply on the value of the immortal soul, on the price paid for its redemption, on the multitudes around you who are daily sinking into hell under the pressure of guilt, and in a state of extreme moral pollution, with scarcely a single arm stretched out to relieve and restore. Let nothing satisfy you,—no degree of approbation by men,-nothing but evidence of deep concern being awakened in the careless mind about things eternal. Associate, as much as may be, with aged, experimental, humble Christians; bear with their infirmities, and comfort their hearts. In your intercourse with your brethren, young or old, resist every tendency on their part to take liberties with the talents or the conduct of the absent. In place of censuring, even where there is ground for censure, the more successful method of correcting evil, is silently, by our own practice, to shew them a better way. Man will sooner mend himself, by himself observing his own imperfections in the light of another's superiority, than by receiving reproof from others. I greatly wish you to be loved more than feared, and would rather that you were the author of Goldsmith's Deserted Village than of Lord Byron's English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, though ten guineas have lately been offered for a single copy.

"But the belman, for letters, will be here, and the homilies of to-morrow are yet unfinished. Your dear mother is overcome with joy, and is gone, I believe, to the Throne, to pour out her thanksgiving on your account. To your brother, for his kindness to you, our obligations are great; but it is not a painful feeling to be under obligations to a dutiful son. Write often, and fully, and frankly, to your affectionate father."

The last letters to this son which we shall lay before the reader, were written while he was

labouring under that illness which brought him to the grave. There is something very solemn in the tenderness which they breathe; and bitter as the disappointment of his hopes as to his son's long and honourable course in the ministry must have been, he bore it with entire submission. How beautiful is the allusion in the first letter to his own infirmity!-and how affecting was the thought, that he was his companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ!

"Salisbury Place, July 19, 1823.

"MY DEAR ALEXANDER,

"I am longing to hear from yourself. The voice of God is not equivocal in his heavy dispensation to father and son. Let us be deeply concerned to bring forth the fruits of righteousness, which is God's object in the visitation. As to myself, I can reasonably look for no return to former bodily or mental vigour. The shadows of the evening are drawing over me. But your constitution will, I trust, by the good Dr. Darling's care, be soon restored, and confirmed, and many years of usefulness secured to you. Exercise seems absolutely necessary for your recovery, and the prolongation of health; and if you could be aroused to avail yourself of them, you have delightful walks at Camberwell. The clouds with which it has pleased your heavenly Father of late to darken your outward estate, will pass away, and the day be restored. Your God is faithful, and will not suffer you to be tempted above what you are able to bear. If you can spare the strength necessary to the perusal of Scott of Aston Sandford's Life by his son, your faith in God in the darkest hour, your patience of hope, and your submission to trials, will, by the aid of the Holy Spirit, be augmented to a measure unfelt before. It has been my companion on my

couch and on the sofa for this fortnight; and I would not, poor as I am, exchange the delight of soul and spiritual benefit I think I have received, for much gold and silver. I have in my darker moods thought that God put it into my hand to prepare me for the close of my own poor and unprofitable life. May my latter end be like his, with all his fears, privations, and pains! No wonder his son's heart should be elevated while drawing the picture of such a father.

"Farewell: I do not know when I wrote so long a letter. Ever and affectionately yours."

I

"We are disappointed in not seeing you to-day. But you are acting very prudently. The thought of accompanying you, gladdens and supports our hearts. We shall feel comparatively at ease, during your journey, when I consider the ample assistance you will have. would come out myself to-day, but my preparations make it almost impossible; and it would only cause an unprofitable expenditure of feeling, which neither of us is very fit to endure. I have resisted hitherto as much as I can, because it would distress you. My soul goes to God for relief, and my fervent prayers for the spiritual health of your mind, and your perfect recovery, he will not despise. O be concerned to repose growing confidence in his love and faithfulness. Wait for his time of relief. Read the promises, and dwell on them in your thoughts. Farewell! the everlasting arms be underneath and around you!"

The death of this son was deeply felt in his father's house; but while Dr. Waugh was careful to apply to his own soul the consolations of religion, and to soothe his afflicted family, his heart bled for the widow, whose union with the friend

of her early years, with him whose genius, talents, and piety, she estimated so highly, and to whose happiness she was so devoted,—had been so speedily dissolved. He laboured by the kindest attentions to console her, entered with the most affectionate interest into all her plans, and was eager to shew, on every proper occasion, that he loved her and cared for her as if she had been his own child. The letter that follows is a beautiful expression of such feelings:

"Salisbury Place, July 18, 1825.

"MY BELOVED LOUISA,

"I pray God, by his good Spirit, to support your mind under the sad recollections which these anniversary days of your suffering and woe will awaken, and to supply you with the consolations which his sure promise is intended to convey to your bereaved heart, and which in some, though comparatively in very small, measure, will also be derived from the character of your dear husband, and the abundant evidence we have of his translation to the world of light and supreme blessedness. The rays of Tuesday morning's sun-' that blessed sun' that lighted him to heaven, I shall contemplate with deepest interest of soul, and bear you on my heart before the Throne, near to which the dear departed now adores. I hope soon to be there.

"Your Father in heaven sent for him sooner than we all fondly expected. But could we hear his voice, I think he would say to me and to you, • If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I am gone to the Father.' Let us walk in the steps of his pure and adoring piety, and in a short time we shall meet, to be separated no more. O! the thought is sufficient to fix the most wavering, to inspire with activity the most sluggish, and to make a martyr of a coward!

"I regret my distance from you, and that, owing to feebleness of body and incessant pressure of duty, or something that comes in the shape of duty, I am prevented from becoming acquainted with your mind, and its pious and useful stores, as I could wish. I can meet you, my dear child, however, at the throne of grace daily, and that is the most delightful and useful place of meeting. Intercourse with Him who fills the throne sanctifies the occasional intercourse of social life below. Farewell. Every purchased blessing be in your cup, and sweeten all its bitterness! Ever your affectionate father."

In another letter to the same relative, he mentions an incident that deeply affected him :

"I have just heard a tale of anguish which has deeply depressed my soul. A Miss, a worthy minister's daughter, of Orkney, aged seventy-one, of excellent character, was yesterday barbarously dragged to a spunginghouse, and to-night will probably be lodged in a prison. It might have been a daughter of my own. It is for her rent, which is 187. I got 51. for her, a month ago, from the excellent Alexander Gordon. I applied to Sir William Knighton to present her case to the king, but without effect. O that the Father of mercies would rend the heavens,-that firmament of iniquity which our crimes have made thick, hard, and lurid,—and pour down his good Spirit in rich effusion, as the spirit of sympathy, love, and beneficence, on human hearts!"

If the tenderness of his heart made him feel more pain than some others feel at the sight of a fellow-creature's misery, it gave him a higher degree of pleasure in their relief or their happiness than can be experienced by the cold and the selfish. And while he felt at times, though rarely, the mortification of soliciting in vain human