he was forever gone, there was much deep distress among the inmates. And some of you can tell with what touching pathos they chanted his requiem when he was gathered to the dust. Truly, he "sowed by the side of all waters," and in every land the seed is now blossoming, or the harvest is white. May his mantle fall on all those who inherit his wealth, and on the inhabitants of this place which inherits his name.

All who have known him are well aware that he was remarkable for his prompt and fixed decisions. He saw all that he cared to see of a matter, almost at a glance, and his line of action in regard to it was determined as soon. And when a point was thus settled, it was of no use to attempt to change him; his heart was fixed. This is a quality that implies a mind of no ordinary power-it is not safe for weaker minds to act altogether in this way. Their decisions would too often prove rash and hurtful, and require to be reviewed. But in regard to the great governing principles of life, it is safe and it is wise to imitate him. The sooner these principles are fixed with a decision that neither life nor death, nor time nor eternity can change, the better. It is interesting to imagine how such a mind as that of Mr. Phelps must have acted in that season of religious awakening with which his piety commenced. He had been taught before, that he needed to know the power of divine grace upon his heart, and he believed it; but it remained for him to contemplate eternal things in that strong and clear light that brings them near, and makes them real; "to taste the word of God, and the powers of the world to come," and feel that the great question of life and death was pressing for a decision and could not be delayed. There were thoughts of God and of Christ; of the soul and of death; of the judgment and of eternity; of heaven and of hell; of a life of piety, and a life of sin; and now was to be made the decision that was to turn the scale for the one side or the other. What inward heavings, what tumult of soul, what struggles, what conflicts convulsed his soul at that hour! But there was a mind that had a perception of the great, the noble, and the true; even in the things of this world, he was disposed to turn away from whatever seemed trivial or narrow or small, and give his preference to that which had the aspect of greatness, and gave promise of large and important results. How then must the grand and mighty conceptions of religion, of God and eternity, have engrossed his powers, and expanded before the vision of his soul, until they filled all the field of his view, and shut this present world away from his thoughts! Methinks I can penetrate the workings of his mind at that hour. "Here," said he, "is something worth living for; an object vast enough for the largest ambition of man; an object grand enough for the whole of life, and for the life to come. Now I see man divested of his littleness; if sin has made him little, God has made him great; the soul is great; its Redeemer is great; eternity is great; the inheritance

and glories of heaven are great; I will not waver, my heart is fixed; I will live for God; I will seek the glory of his kingdom; I will have respect unto the recompense of the reward." Here is the true explanation of his willingness at that time, to give up for the cause of God, the whole of that little pittance which he had toiled so long to gain. He had given his soul to God; there was no wavering, no indecision, no half consecration; he had made a transfer of himself-the entire man, to the kingdom of Christ; and what now were a few dollars and cents? There was needed that element of stern, inflexible decision in his piety; without it, the world as he encountered it, would have broken his anchorhold, and torn him loose from God and from heaven. But by the grace of God, that decision of character that never faltered in other things, made him unwavering here. It reached on through the whole of life; it will never be shaken while eternity rolls.

Doubtless all who are before me, will be interested to know, if his death" became him, like his life." Without opening the door of that room in which weakness and decay are doing their work upon his manly frame, and the near anticipation of the closing scene is taking hold upon his soul, I may say, in reply, with no qualification or reserve, there is nothing to be witnessed there, that is not the appropriate fruit of such a life as his. He has always been a man of action rather than of words. He has never been forward to speak of his own exercises and feelings, but has chosen to manifest them rather by his works. But he has always loved the cause of Christ, the meetings for prayer, and the songs of Zion, and the communion of God's people, and he loves them still. He exhibits no raptures, no ecstacies, no out-bursting triumphant joy: but all is calm and peaceful, betokening a staid and implicit faith in the Saviour of the world. He builds no hopes upon his past good works, his charities, his bequests:* he knows

* The distribution of his property was in keeping with his character for benevolence; large sums being given to charitable and religious objects, which amount to a total of over half a million of dollars. After providing liberally for his widow, he gives $100,000 to each of his 6 children, $10,000 to each of his 22 grand-children, and an additional $5000 to each of them, to be paid by the executors, with the injunction from him to use the increase of this fund sacredly for benevolent purposes, and transmit to their heirs with the same injunction, and after making several bequests to rela tions, has left the following sums to various benevolent objects, providing for their payment by instalments during a term of years:

To the American Bible Society $100,000; to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, $100,000; American Home Missionary Society, $100,000; to literary and theological education in Liberia, Africa, subject to the control of the executors, $50,000; Union Theological Seminary, N. Y., $5,000; Institution for the Blind, $5,000; N. Y. State Colonization Society, $5,000; Auburn Theological Semina ry, $3,000; Half Orphan Society, Fourth av. $1,000; Colored Orphan Society, $1,000; Congregational Church, Simsbury, Conn., for use of the poor, $1,000.

In addition to the above, Mr. Phelps, just previous to his death, placed in the hands of his son $100,000, the interest to be used at his discretion for the spread of the Gos pel, and the principal eventually to be invested equally for the benefit of the American Bible Societies, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. This disposition of Mr. Phelps' property, including the amount given to each of his twenty

he has but given to God his own. He knows they are all too insignificant and too worthless to avail anything as a price for the favor of God, and a heavenly home. He speaks of himself, again and again, as "a poor lost sinner, having no hope but in his Redeemer's blood." And he speaks thus because he feels that it is true. No man on earth could have embued his mind with such convictions, if there had not been something within to respond to them. He felt that there was no hope for him, but in the redemption that was wrought by Christ Jesus: but there he found hope, assurance, and rest for his soul. There was nothing in that chamber of sickness, that seemed like doubt:* he knew in whom he had believed, and was persuaded that he would keep that which had so long been committed to him.

A fuller account of his last hours we shall doubtless have, but it will not vary in its general tenor from this. They were the last hours of one whose testimony for Christ had been already given, in a series of benevolent and Christian acts that marked a long and resplendent pathway; a pathway which he had trodden for more than half a century with a true, and firm, and steady step. With that same step he advanced to the last milestone of his journey; he changed it not, till he came in sight of the mark, and clasped the goal. "The righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance." He lives beyond the term of life: his name and his influence cannot easily die.

I have endeavored to set forth something of the reasons which we have to cherish the memory of our late patron and friend; he deserved it at our hands, by his character; he deserved it by his worth; he deserved it by his example, by his acts, and by his gifts. There is no point of view, that does not af ford us ground for unfeigned satisfaction that the place we inhabit is so euphoniously linked to his memory. May his kindred never have occasion to complain that we have inherited his name only to disgrace it. That no such occasion may be given them, let us ever bear in mind, that the name of our village is a standing and emphatic rebuke of all that is low, and trivial, and unworthy of the true dignity of man. It is as if we beheld carved in huge capitals upon the rocky battlements of these hills, and written all over our public buildings, and our factories and stores-" Let not your life be consumed with trifles: aim at something that shall be worthy of creatures that were formed for immortality: be earnest, energetic, fearless men: let there be decision, wise and unflinching, in your personal, and in your public aims: aim at achievement: make your village a model village—a pattern of two grand children, makes the munificent bequest of $581,000, for religious and benevolent purposes.

* When his friends expressed to him their assurance that God would continue the supports of his grace to the last, and that the Saviour had prepared a mansion for him in heaven, he replied, not with a wish or a hope that it might be so, but with the full assurance of faith, in such utterances as these: "O yes, I know it; I believe it."

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external neatness and of moral. purity and loveliness: a village that shall not be wanting in outward adornments and attractions for the eye, but shall evince that man has caught some impulse from the beauty that nature has shed over the spot."

But let no natural or architectural grace that may pertain to it, outshine the spirit of enterprise or of virtue on the part of its inhabitants. Aim, especially, in point of intelligence and moral worth, at continual advancement. Stand committed to progress -progress in your schools, in your churches, in all your public interests-hold fast to them, and hold them up, as though you felt that their waning, or their downfall, would be your own.

Let the children and youth of your community be early imbued with noble sentiments and aims of life. Let them be taught to abhor idleness and ignorance, and "set their faces as a flint" against everything that tends to dissipation, corruption or vice. Inspire them with a love of enterprise and high intelligence: with the conviction that they can be something more than cyphers in the world, and the fixed resolve that they will. For their sakes, and your own, let the holy day of God be sacredly guarded and kept. Defend it as the stronghold of your own prosperity, and the last bulwark of religion among you. Let it find you, often as it comes, devoutly gathered in the sanctuary, and there let it remind you of the claims of the soul, of religion, and of God. Remember that death is before you as well as life, and that "after that is the judgment." Of all this, may the name of our village, associated, as it is, with such a history and such a character, most appropriately admonish us, as often as we give it utterance, and as often as we hear it. May the admonition be well heeded by us all, and by the generations that are to come: and guided by the example of one who "being dead yet speaketh," speaketh especially to us,-may it be ours to gain at last, an end as full of hope and immortality, as his.

SERMON DCXVI.

BY REV. CORNELIUS C. VAN ARSDALE, D. D.

COLLEGIATE PASTOR OF BLEECKER-STREET REFORMED DUTCH CHURCH,

NEW-YORK.

THE WISDOM OF WINNING SOULS.

"He that winneth souls is wise."- Prov. xi. 30.

The word of God plainly declares, and all its provisions and revelations are based on the fact, that man, as a spiritual and immortal being, in himself, is lost. In his natural estate, he is lost from the way of truth. Sin has darkened his mind, obscured its perceptions, and perverted its powers. He is lost from the way of peace. Struck by the objects of sense, and seeking his su preme good in the things of time, his soul remains unsatisfied, unblest. He is lost from God, the chief good, the only satisfying, the only enduring good. As sin has destroyed God's image in his soul, so it has alienated his affections from God; it has produced indifference, and coldness, nay even "enmity" in his heart towards God, his creator, preserver, and judge. Being thus lost from all communion and friendship with God, he is a wanderer from God, from the sweet joy and the sanctifying power of his love, and the blessed hope of his favor; he is the creature of vain desires and of unholy affections-and consequently to him a holy God is an object of dread; death, the king of terrors, and eternity, covered with gloom; for as he is lost from the way of spiritual peace here, so he is lost to the soul-cheering prospect of happiness hereafter he is lost from the way to eternal life, and is pursuing the way to eternal death. This truth, plainly implied in our text, and confirmed by observation and experience, is spread out clearly on every page of the inspired word; but it is only in the light of that inspired word that we can see revealed the full extent, and the appalling nature of that ruin in which man is involved by sin; how completely, how hopelessly and forever he is lost in himself. It is only in the light of that word, that we can form anything like an adequate idea of the appalling nature and effects of sin, or of the value of that soul which by sin is lost. Here we learn its exalted origin, its deep pollution, its awful guilt. We see what it is for a soul to be lost here, and to remain lost, and be lost forever. By this light we follow it through the darkness of death-we behold it at the bar of its holy Judge-we hear it condemned by his righteous law-we see it hurled from his lofty throne-hell opens to receive it-the fire that never shall be quenched is flaming around it-the worm that never dies is gnawing within it-damned spirits and fiends of