Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Mass.) 1828-1830, 1828-09-02
MORAL.
FOR the LANCASTER GAZETTE.

exactly understand the objections which
YOUR correspondent Senex makes to my
communication. As far as can compre-
bend, I will attempt to answer, him.
thank him that he gives me credit for seri-
Gus and laudable intentions, and thinks my
piece calculated to make solemn impress
sions. acoald thank him, too, for kind and
friendly animadversion, did think his either
friendly or kind. AS it is, | confess it seems
to me rather captious criticism.
The observations / sent you were first
occasioned by the death of young man,
whom had the happiness to call my friend.
They were written with the hope Of assuag-
ing my own grief, and to express my SYM
pathy in the sufferings of a lady, "whose
lover and friend had been put far from her,
and her acquaintance into darkness"
took the two letters of Sulpitius and John
son, because the contrast between them
seemed to me strong enough for the pur-
pose of popular illustration. My piece was
first sent to the printer without any title
and the title, which seems so far from being
Justified, was preixed by him. | do not
agree with Senex in thinking it inappro-
pirate.
The idea which Senex has of the letter
Of Sulpitius, is just enough. | differ from
him in his notion of DIR. Johnson's. John
son says that the life of his correspondents
mother was useful, wise, and innocent; her
death resigned, peaceful, and holy. do
affirm that such phrase could not be used
of any christians death in christian coun-
try, without implying very strong allusion
to the gospel of our Saviour. The death Of
an unbeliever might be resigned, and posi-
bly, peaceful, like that of Hume for example,
but it could not be holy. The collected
calmness of mere human courage might give
to the unbeliever, who had led virtuous
life, resignation and peace; but when we
add the term holiness, we necessarily in
clude christian resignation state of hope
| and Joy, which points the sufferer, with a
sure aim, to the happiness of another world,
and opens to his fading vision and closing
ear, sights Of superhuman transport and
sounds Of complete and enduring melody.
I do not think that any heather philosopher
has spoken in this manner concerning death.
What is meant by their speaking acuangeli-
cally'' do not know. They have not spo-
ken, they could not speak, either in the let
ter or the spirit of the gospel of Christ. !
refer your correspondent to the writings Of
Cicero generally, in particular to the pas
sage in his treatise on Old Age, beginning
I. death is not to be lamented, because i'm
mortality follows" He viii there see how
far one of the best and finest minds which
ever appeared on earth was from speaking
erangelicaHy Of futurity. Cicero there tells
US so much of the hopes of another life, that
you almost feel that his heart was kindling
with the sure and certain hope But he
ends with telling You, that after all it was
but delightful dream. Think, too, of So
crates, another of the great lights of anti
guilty, with his last breath ordering sacri-
fee to heather god
/ spoke Of the consultations christianity
gives us on the death of friends, and Senex
regrets that ] did not add plons, Religious
friends" The addition seems to me wholly
unnecessary. 1t may be that we are ac-
customed to speak of the departure of those
dear to us as the commencement of eternal
happiness and truly we should sorrow as
those without hope, if we thought otherwise.
do not mean to deny the doctrine that vice
brings misery both here and hereafter, and
among the sufferers may be some Of those
we lament. But it well becomes us to be
cautions whe:i we apply this doctrine in par
ticular cases. Even of the worst man who
ever lived, we have, think, no right to say
that his sins have forever cut him off from
felicity. We cannot know the force Of the
temptation to which he yielded. We have
not heard the prayer of penitence which he
may have breathed. To the mercy of the
all-knowing and most merciful God must his
destiny be left. 1t is ercusGbte, it is natural
at least, to hope that the friends whom we
lament are happy, that the virtues of which
we mourn the deprivation have blossomed
on earth only to bloom and bear fruit il
q purer sky. Far from me and. from my
friends be the horrible fear that in the first
burst of our grief the subject of it NAV also
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