SERMON XIII.

THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS.

NUMB. XXIII. 10.

"LET ME DIE THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS, AND LET MY LAST END BE LIKE HIS."

THERE are two things which, provided we could establish them on good evidence, would go far, with all considerate minds, to settle the question as to the value of practical godliness. The one is the pleasure which it yields during life, and the other the advantages which accrue from it at death. Now I know not more competent and unexceptionable witnesses to the former than the persons who have led a godly life; and if you were to take their solemn depositions on their death-bed, though some of them might be disposed to express themselves with great diffidence as to their future prospects, yet you would find all of them ready to bear witness that the happiest hours which they spent on earth were those which they devoted to religion; and that their only regret was that the things of God and eternity had not occupied more of their time and attention. Thus far "wisdom is justified of her children.” And with respect to the second point—the advantages of religion in death-can you, my brethren, direct me to a witness more worthy of credit than an ungodly man, in the possession of health and the pursuit of riches? Well, then, you have the testimony of such a man in the text, bearing directly on the question, expressed in the most decided manner, and filling up the only blank which the humility or the timidity of some of

the former class of witnesses had left in the evidence: "Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his."

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It was God's usual method (and it became him) to convey the knowledge of his will to the church by "holy men." Not that their character constituted the ground on which their messages were to be received; for our faith must rest on the authority of God, and not on the goodness or wisdom of men. But, on the other hand, their good qualities are not to be altogether overlooked. They believed, and therefore spake." They enquired and searched diligently into the things revealed to them, and imparted them with lively impressions of their truth, necessity, and importance. They staked their own eternal interests upon them. Knowing the terror of the Lord, they persuaded men to flee from coming wrath, and comforted others with the consolations wherewith they had themselves been comforted. In this respect they added, as it were, their own personal testimony to that of the Spirit of God, under whose inspiration they spake and wrote. But it pleased God, for holy and wise reasons, sometimes to communicate portions of his mind by men of an opposite character; such as Caiaphas under the New, and Balaam under the Old Testament. The latter seems to have been a man of great gifts, and held in high reputation in his age. He was one of those without the pale of the Israelitish commonwealth, who, as appears from the history of Job, still retained the knowledge of the only true God. But he held the truth in unrighteousness. Knowing God he glorified him not as God, and instead of being thankful for the gifts conferred on him, sought only to make gain of them. His heart was so exercised with covetous practices, that the dumb ass on which he rode rebuked the madness of the prophet, while he ran greedily in the way of error. Permitted by Heaven to visit the King of Moab, under an express injunction to say nothing but what God should bid him, he had recourse to every art of divination and enchantment to procure such a response as would entitle him to the rich presents by which Balaak sought to inflame his avarice. Yet into the mind and mouth of this godless man was the Almighty

pleased to put his precious word; and while he prevented it from being corrupted or contaminated in passing through such an impure channel, he glorified himself by constraining one of the greatest adversaries of his people to predict their future felicity, and repeatedly to bless them in the hearing of that prince who had hired him, by the most tempting offers, to

devote them to destruction. What has been said of the benediction which Balaam pronounced on the people of Israel, is applicable to his declarations respecting the death of the righteous man. It involves a twofold testimony. We have in it the testimony of the Spirit of God, under whose inspiration he spake for the time. In this view it coincides exactly with the voice which the beloved disciple heard from Heaven, saying, "Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord; yea, saith the Spirit." But we have also the testimony of a man who was himself estranged from the life of God, and an enemy of all righteousness. And you know that a favourable testimony from an enemy is of all others the strongest.

The text is not a mere figurative description of the blessedness of a righteous man's departure. It has a different character from the rest of the inspired oracle. It is "aside" from the prediction. It is more personal than prophetic. It resembles, though breathing a different spirit, the parenthetic exclamation of the dying patriarch, when announcing the fates of his children, "I have waited for thy salvation, O God." It is an ejaculatory prayer, in which the feelings of the man are blended with the raptures of the prophet. Though in a trance his eyes were open; the divine efflatus did not suspend his consciousness; the prophet felt that he was a man; and while he described in ecstasy the prospects of the people whose God was Jehovah, and saw that the latter end of the righteous is peace, his heart was delighted, ravished, softened—the fascinations of sin seemed to lose their charm, he felt for the moment as if he could have renounced "the wages of unrighteousness," and without coming to the choice of suffering affliction with the people of God, he expressed an ardent wish to be numbered with them in their death. Nor, my brethren, was this peculiar to Balaam. There are many instances still of godless men,

who in moments of serious thought, and particularly when bending over the sick-bed, or standing at the grave of a saint, breathe the sigh of the text: "Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.”

Three things claim our attention in the text there is a comfortable truth held forth, the desirableness of the death of the righteous-an important caution given us as to our exercise in reference to this;-and a deeply interesting subject of examination as to the character of those whose death is desirable.

I. Of the desirableness of the death of the righteous. Here we shall view the event in the light of God's word, not confining ourselves to those points which excite the wishes of worldly men, who are strangers to the mystery of that change which death produces on the godly. The Spirit of God intended to lead our minds to prospects beyond those which struck the shortsighted eye of Balaam. On the other hand, we shall confine ourselves to those things which belong to the righteous man's death as such; separating whatever may be common to it with that of others, and leaving out of view what may be the peculiar and distinguishing privilege of some saints in their last moments.

It was the contrast between the righteous and wicked at death, which, darting across the mind of Balaam, drew from him the exclamation in the text. But we are not to conceive of this as lying in the external nature or circumstances of the death of the two classes of men. In both it is a disruption of the component parts of human nature; the soul quits the body, which is laid lifeless in the grave, and becomes the prey of worms. The death of either may be effected by the same diseases or calamities-by a fever, a consumption, or an apoplexy-by a shipwreck, a sudden fall, a stroke of lightning, an earthquake-by the violence of man, or the visitation of God. Nay, the bodily sufferings of the dying saint may be more protracted and agonizing than those of the ungodly, who in this sense may be said to "have no bands in their death.” It is in the moral character of the event, and in the relation

which it bears to eternity, that the contrast properly consists. If there were nothing after death, as the object of hope or fear, there would be no ground for the wish in our text—no difference between the death of a righteous and a wicked man, or rather no difference between the death of both and that of a beast; for it might then be equally said of them all that they are perished and extinct for ever.

"Lazarus died; the rich man also died, and was buried."* Here no difference is to be perceived, or if there be any, it is on the side of the worldly man, who had fared sumptuously during life, and was honoured with a funeral after his demise. But look after them with the eye of faith." The beggar was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom; the rich man lifted up his eyes in hell, being in torments. And beside all this, between them there was a great gulf fixed"—their several states of happiness and misery were irreversibly and unalterably determined for ever. Such is the contrast delineated by the compassionate Saviour of men, delineated parabolically indeed, but in a parable which presents a striking and unexaggerated picture of the awful reality. "Thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things, but now he is comforted and thou art tormented." "He is comforted:" All the evil things he endured are forgotten, or, if recollected, serve only to enhance his joys. "Thou art tormented:" All thy good things are gone, and the memory of them serves only to aggravate thy misery. From this general description, who can hesitate in his choice between deaths which have such different issues?

"Now he is comforted, and thou art tormented." Observe, my brethren, nothing is said of the comfort of Lazarus, or the torment of Dives, on his deathbed. This suggests another point which we mean to set aside in stating the contrast, and in making up our judgment as to the preference.

There are wicked men who have had the flames of hell kindled in their conscience before leaving this world, and have been fearfully distracted in consequence of their sins being set

* Luke, xvi. 22.