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and sought to fill the minds of his hearers with it, as his own mind was filled with it. There were occasionally passages of great beauty, touchingly tender statements, stirring suddenly the deeper emotions of the heart; but the ordinary character of his eloquence was instructive and pleasing, rather than affecting or overpowering.

As a pastor, as we have already seen, he was in an uncommon degree faithful, affectionate, and assiduous. His heart overflowed with pastoral affection; and pastoral duty with him was not a task, but a delight. Finding his own happiness in the active promotion of the glory of Christ, and the prosperity of his church, and the welfare of his fellow-men, he sought to make his people partakers of his joy, and instruments of his pious benevolence. He instituted among them such societies as were calculated to strengthen and improve their graces, and to combine their energies in works of christian usefulness; and he had the satisfaction of seeing that "his labour was not in vain in the Lord." His congregation early took, and have steadily maintained, a prominent place in the front rank in all movements for the prosperity of religion at home and abroad.

But wide as was his sphere of pastoral labour, and well as he filled it, it by no means monopolised his interest, or absorbed his energies. As a public-spirited citizen, an enlightened philanthropist, a liberal patriot, a catholic Christian, and an ardent advocate and generous supporter of missionary enterprise, he had few equals, certainly no superior. His ready talents and pleasing address, the high place he filled, and the extensive popularity he had acquired, brought him into contact with persons of all religious denominations, and produced numerous applications for his personal and official services. His wide intercourse enlarged his views, refined his feelings, and gave a remarkable catholicity to a disposition naturally generous. He loved all the sincere friends of Jesus, and was prepared to admire their christian excellencies, and to aid them in the work of the Lord. He had drunk deeply into the spirit of that gospel which teaches goodwill towards all classes and kindreds of men, and which especially inculcates love to all that bear the image of Christ; and, therefore, whatever related to the progress of liberty, the assertion of the rights of conscience, and the improvement of the outward condition of the people-whatever seemed calculated to advance the interests of education and of piety, to raise the standard of morals, to check the prevalence of iniquity, and diminish the mass of human depravity and wretchedness-whatever sought, by scriptural means, to enlighten and convert the ignorant, to enlarge the boundaries of the church, and to subject the nations to the benignant rule of her King, by subduing them to the obedience of faith; found in him a willing, an able, an eloquent, and an untiring advocate. It would be difficult to specify a question involving the removal of those burdens that press on the people the revival of religion, or the spread of the gospel that has engaged the attention of the public mind, and called forth the efforts of benevolent and christian men during the last thirty years, with which the name of Dr Heugh has not been associated, and in the advocacy and settlement of which he has not taken an active and a most influential part.

As a public speaker, he was remarkably acceptable and effective,

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His correct taste and nice sense of propriety, his regard for truth and christian principle, placed him beyond the hazard of being hurried or betrayed into anything extravagant, inappropriate, or offensive. possessed the rare and very useful art of seizing important sentiments floating in the public mind, freeing them from the deleterious elements with which they are often mixed up, embodying them in terse and forcible language-illustrating, confirming, and adorning them, and then throwing them back, thus purified, upon his audience. Every one felt that these were his views, though he had never seen them so distinctly before; and he readily applauded the speaker who had expounded his sentiments in a manner so agreeable, and confirmed them by arguments so conclusive. And here it must not be overlooked, that in all places, and at all times, whether in the social circle or on the platform, Dr Heugh displayed that dignified courtesy which sat so naturally on him, and proved how compatible the graces of a polished manner are with the fervour of an honest advocate of truth, and the amenities of good breeding with the sanctities of the character of the christian minister.

We shall not venture to speak of him in the family-where he seemed to be, not merely the wise, pious, affectionate father, but the agreeable, almost the playful, companion of his children-nor as seen in the social circle, where his conversation was so lively, sparkling, and instructive -nor of him as a friend, warm, faithful, and generous; 66 no man," as Howe 66 says, ever better understood than he the ingenuities and delights of friendship; nor of him as a man of God, who set the Lord always before him," studied integrity of heart, and made the law of truth to guide his lips. The deep-toned, reverential, and affectionate feeling which breathed in all his public, and domestic, and social devotional exercises the striking, experimental remarks, going to the inmost principles of personal religion, which he so often made in his public discourses -his brilliant and consistent course of devoted usefulness-his living so obviously not to himself, but for the glory of God and the benefit of men-all these manifestations of godliness, closed by a death-bed so christianly serene, peaceful, and triumphant, prove that he was "created anew in Christ Jesus," that "by the grace of his Lord he was what he was," and that God" wrought in him to will and to do of his good pleasure."

Nothing more distinguished the whole character and career of Dr Heugh than ever growing improvement-his path was, indeed, that "of the shining light, which shineth more and more to the perfect day." As a Christian-a minister-a man of general information and active usefulness, he seemed never to stand still. His schemes of usefulness widened his pulpit ministrations improved his whole christian character mellowed, up to the very last. Indeed, in some of these respects, the progress was so manifest as to excite, in some minds, the apprehen sion that he was not to be very long here he seemed ripening so fast for the world of ceaseless activity and unmixed holiness and love.

Estimating character by the rule of our Lord, that he is the greatest in the church who does most good to others, with the greatest sacrifice of selfish principle and objects, we must assign Dr Heugh a very high place indeed if we overrate him. His was a life of incessant and most

remarkable self-devotion, activity, and usefulness; and this has been affectionately demonstrated by the deep and wide-spread sorrow which his removal has occasioned. Who, in this congregation, does not mourn as for a venerated father, a near relation, a dear friend? What minister -what member of our denomination does not feel that " a prince and a great man has fallen" in the midst of us?—And that deep regret reaches far beyond the pale of our church-far beyond the limits of our land.

Our loss is, indeed, great; and it were unnatural-it were ungrateful not to mourn; but, while we mourn, let us give thanks to Him that made our departed friend what he was, and that enabled him to do so much for the prosperity and extension of the cause of Christ. Amid our tears, let us rejoice that he has honourably finished his course, having kept the faith; and that he now rests from his labours, while his works are following him.

Let us, in our various stations, seek to be followers of him, as he was of Christ; and encourage ourselves with the thought, that the grace which was so exceeding abundant in him, can strengthen us with all strength in the inner man, and enable us to emulate the career of honourable usefulness which he has closed-can make our life, like his, useful and ornamental to the cause of Christ—our death, like his, replete with abundant consolation, good hope, perfect peace, holy triumph to ourselves, encouragement to the saints, and glory to God.

Let this congregation bless God that they ever had such a minister, and that they have enjoyed the benefit of his labours and example so long. Let them be especially grateful that they have not been left like sheep without a shepherd by his death. Let them strengthen the hands and encourage the heart of their now sole minister, by persevering in the course of enlightened liberality and activity in the cause of Christ on which they have entered. Let them never go back- -never look back." He who turns back, turns back towards perdition." "Hold fast what you have attained, brethren: let no man take your crown." "Look to yourselves that ye lose not the things that your departed minister has wrought," but that he and you, at the gathering together at the coming of the Lord, may "receive a full reward."

MEMOIR OF THE REV. ALEXANDER BLACK OF MUSSELBURGH.

WE regret that some memorial of this venerable Father in the Church has not had an earlier place in our pages.

The following extracts are made from one of the Discourses preached to the congregation at Musselburgh on the Sabbath after his funeral. "Our Fathers where are they, and the Prophets, do they live for ever?" These questions are answered by the appearance of so many of us this day in the garb of mourners. Yes, piety, though it blunts the point, does not avert the dart of death. The wise and the good mingle with the base and the impious in the house of earth and silence. Were we left to our own judgments, we would fain reverse such an appointment. We would make, at least, many exceptions. We would

be loath, for instance, that our Spencers and our Martyns should be taken away, as we call it, prematurely to heaven. And we would: fondly retain in our pulpits those silvery-haired old saints, the music of whose beseeching eloquence, winning souls to Jesus, shall never leave our memories, and whose matured wisdom and example have shed a mostgenial and guiding light on our path and on our hopes.

But the option is not granted to us. Blessed be God, it is not. Hơ keeps the cause in his own hand, and binds up the death as well as the life of believers with his own plans of mercy. They do service to the church and to the world not only in living moments, but in dying ones "For none of us liveth to himself, and none of us dieth to himself." In other words, every christian man, and, still more, every christian minister, is a public character. He is the prepared instrument by which public purposes of usefulness are to be accomplished. Even when he has been bereft of those corporeal powers of exertion which gave prac tical effect to his mental energies, even when these mental energies themselves have been impaired, and present to the eye of tender pity the wreck of a once busy or commanding mind, even then, how impressive and salutary to observers, has been the exhibition of the passive graces of the christian and the ministerial character,-of faith with its eye in heaven, of hope with heaven beaming through its countenance, and of love creating a heaven by its smile. The principles which a long life has been spent in publishing and recommending, have often received, when the "soul was in departing," an additional and powerful attestation, such as has settled the wavering, cheered the desponding, and won the hearts of strangers to the truth. In short, the whole of a believer's life is taken up into the divine system of benevolent agencies, nor is his death excluded. "For whether we live, we live unto the Lord, or whether we die, we die unto the Lord; whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's." Do not such views tend to sanction the commemoration of departed worth? Have we not, indeed, in this matter, the authority of the very highest example? For when John the Baptist had fulfilled his course," and when "the disciples took up the body and buried it and went and told Jesus," He thus publicly pronounced his eulogium, “He was a burning and a shining light." Such meditations as these must be in harmony with the feelings that now pervade this assembly. The revered and beloved man who sustained, in connexion with this church, the pastoral office for more than half a century,-who retired from active duty some five years ago, and was followed into his retirement with your affectionate remembrances, has at length, at an age far beyond that usually allotted to man, been gathered to his rest. Two days ago the sepulchre opened to receive him, and multitudes whom formerly he had loved, and who had loved him, thronged about the place, and had their hearts stirred by the tender associations of the past. From the circumstance of my having had no personal acquaintance with him, except during the short time I have been among you, I feel that I am very ill qualified to do justice to his acknowledged worth, or even to my own sense and estimate of it. my heart will take no denial. I must answer its demand (and it is met, I am sure, by a similar demand from many a heart around me), by speaking to you for a little, of his blameless life and his peaceful death.

But

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Mr Black was born at Dunfermline, on the 30th June, 1764. His father was connected with the Antiburgher congregation at Cairneyhill, and his mother with the congregation of that honoured man of God, Ralph Erskine. Both parents are said to have been remarkably godly persons, and the blessing of a covenant God pertains peculiarly to the seed of the righteous." They are "beloved for the fathers' sakes." And often have they "found grace" in answer to earnest prayers, whose "memorial" as well as they who presented them, had been long before the throne."

Of Mr Black's first impressions of divine things,-of the "rise and progress of religion in his soul," I am unable, with any certainty or particularity, to speak. But that religion had laid fast hold of him, and that as he advanced in life, it acquired a constantly growing influence over him, no person, acquainted with his character, could doubt. The grand thing to ascertain in the case of any one is, not how he became religious, but the reality of the work by its precious fruits. Now, in mind as in nature, all growth must be mysterious. We can perceive only that things have grown. We have not eyes to trace them in their growth. With the very first and simplest element of saving. truth, which a pious mother introduces into the infant mind, the blessed Spirit may commence his silent, secret, gentle agency. There may be a series of successive impulses of which the subject of early religious tuition is himself hardly conscious, and which remain hid from the observation of others, but which contribute gradually to prepare the heart for the victorious efficacy of that by which it is ultimately won. From his earliest years, the decided bent of Mr Black's mind seems to have been to the christian ministry; and though, in a country like ours, the consecration of the person to this service is by no means a sure test of the consecration of the heart to God himself, there is every reason to believe that such was its origin with him. Having passed through the regular course of preparatory study in the university of Edinburgh, where he carried some of the most honourable rewards of merit, he was admitted in 1784, to the Divinity Hall of the Associate Synod. For three years he studied under the celebrated Mr Brown of Haddington, and for one year under his much-loved and learned successor Dr George Lawson of Selkirk, after which, at the age of twenty-four, his ministerial career began. On the 27th of August, 1788, he was ordained at Musselburgh, in the place of worship where the congrega tion then met,-a place which, I know, was the scene, in memory to him, of many a melting recollection, and of which, I trust, it "shall: be said, when God writeth up the people," that some of yourselves were "born there."

I have often heard mention made of his first text after his ordination. 1 Cor. ii. 2, "I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified." Never having had the happiness to hear him preach, I can only ask those of you who often did so, to "bear him record," how, having adopted at the outset of his ministry, he imitated in its future course, the apostolic determination. To preach "Christ crucified," is indeed to preach "the truth." Not to preache Him is to utter mere vanity. Oh will you agree" with me, dear friends, to "ask" of God, that with inviolate and entire fidelity, I may

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