FRIENDS’

REVIEW. ‘151

 

temperance ; and to temperance patience ; and
to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly
kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.
For if these things be in you and abound, they
make you that ye shall neither be barren nor
unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus
Christ: but he that lacketh these things is
blind.”

Ist mo. 27th, 1789, D. C., notes: “I have
been attending the three Monthly Meetings in
Philadelphia. On hearing their Queries an-
swered, things appeared to me much lower than
I believed they themselves supposed or were
sensible of. But there are many well concerned
young Friends among them, who I hope will be
preserved in the simplicity into which our
principles lead.”

About this time he writes to his eldest daugh-
ter, in answer to her expressions of ‘maternal
solicitude: “Care and. anxiety, my dear, are
the lot of every religious parent. it was once
mine over you: ’tis now your turn over your
children. Continue it, with breathings to Him
who can preserve, and who often does hear and
grant the request. Cares and exercises are
human allotment. As one ceases, others are to
be expected. Happiness is only to be looked
for in the next world. Let us so guard our
steps to the end, as to have cause to look for-
ward with joy, and leave the event of our labor
to Him who never fails to reward his faithful
ones.’

D. Cooper to Catherine Haines.

Dear Kitty,—By Amos (who came yesterda
for Jane Siddons,) I received from Polly [Mary
Allinson,] a letter giving account of thy bad
health. It occasioned a sigh. But dear Kitty,
though love may mourn, it cannotrelieve. Thou
hast early been taught the uncertainty of human
joy, and the wisdom of laying up treasure be-
yond the reach of time. In seasons of affliction,
this treasure appears indeed a pearl worth sell-
ing all to obtain. The giddy and foolish youth
may, in health, deride and scoff at the rustic
simplieity of innocency and virtue; but the

hour of distress undeceives them, and shows the
impaanc of true peace of mind; of the smile
of heaven. Affliction for the present is not

joyous but grievous; but the furnace is neces-
sary to separate the dross from the pure metal.
How precious, to those who make a right use of
trouble, are the promises: ‘“ Oh thou afflicted,
tossed with tempests and not comforted, behold
I will lay thy stones with fair colors, and la

thy foundations with sapphires: and I wil
make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of
carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones.”
And again: ‘I will give them beauty for ashes,
the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of
praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they
might be called trees of righteousness, the
| So of the Lord, that he might be glori-

 

The cup of life is a mixture of bitters and
sweets, of sorrow and joy. Our duty is to re-
ceive it without murmuring. Tis the lot of
all: vain indeed would it be to expect an ex-
emption. Then be not discouraged: lean on
the Saviour’s bosom: rest all thy cares with Om-
nipotence, nought then hast thou to fear: when
comforts come, receive them with a thankful
mind, and under affliction be not dismayed, for
the hairs of thy head are numbered, and without
thy heavenly Father’s notice not one of them
can fall.

In near love to you all, thy uncle,

Davin Cooper.

To the same.

Thou mentions, dear Kitty, thy occasion of a
large stock of patience, which I suppose is less
or more the case with the whole human race, so
that at times they have cause to wish they had
more. But there is ‘a state much more desirable
and worthy the Christian mind than bare pa-
tience: that is, a will truly resigned to the dis-
posal of our heavenly Father, whose dispensa-
tions are all in unerring wisdom. Leaning upon
his bosom, we cannot complain or murmur, but
with the Psalmist say: “ though thou slay me,
yet will I trust in thee.” Oh how this sweetens
every bitter: how it blunts the edge of every
grief; this is a state of mind I often breathe for,
and sometimes seem to possess: a treasure in-
deed to those who are ‘afflicted, tossed with
tempests and not comforted.” May thou and [
labor to possess it to the end, is the desire of thy

THE CHRISTIAN’S TRIUMPH.

Thomas Halyburton, when dying, expressed
his feelings thus: “Death is unstinged; the

Y | affectionate uncle,

 

curse of the holy law is done away; I bless

his name I have found him; I am taken up in
blessing him; I am dying, rejoicing in the
Lord; I long to be in the promised land; I
wait for thy salvation, O Lord; come, sweet
Jesus, take me by the hand; what means my
Lord to stay so long? Iam _ like to faint by
reason of his long delay ; sR once could not
have believed that I coul ive borne, and
borne cheerfully, this rod so long, This is a
miracle, pain without pain; and this is not
a fancy of a man disordered in his brain,
but of one lying in full composure. Oh,
blessed that ever I was born! Oh, if I were
where my Lord is! and yet, for all this strength
of faith and confidence, God’s withdrawing
from me would make me weak as water. I am
wonderfully helped beyond the power of nature;
though my body be much afflicted, yet my spirit
is untouched. In the Mediator there is all the
fullness of the Godhead, and it will never run.