IN THE MERITS OF THE

REDEEMER OF

MANKIND!

END OF LETTERS FROM THE DEAD TO THE

LIVING.

MORAL LETTERS.

MORAL LETTERS.

LETTER I.

FROM A YOUNG LADY IN HER LAST ILLNESS

TO A FEMALE FRIEND.

Learn hence, ye lively and engaging fair,
To make your MINDS your chief and greatest care;
For Death, ere long, will close the brightest eyes,
But heaven-born virtue never, NEVER dies.

My dear and much-loved friend,

You will be surprised, and, I doubt not, grieved to learn, that this is the last letter you will ever receive from me, the fatal complaint which has long preyed upon me, having brought me to the brink of the

grave. Yes, Maria, the grave! that last and lonely dwelling, which terminates the vain pursuits of mortals. But to the dying Christian the veil is raised; death appears not arrayed in terrors, but seems a gentle smiling seraph, who guides, through the gloomy valley, the exhausted pilgrim soul; beckons her on, with friendly gesture, to the realms of everlasting joy, and disappears.

Believe me, Maria, life, with all its fleeting pleasures; fortune, with all her choicest blessings; youth and beauty, with all their valued attractions,-would fail to lure me back (had I a choice) to the world, onwhich, in a few hours, mine eyes will close forever!

My flesh shall slumber in the ground,
Till the last trumpet's joyful sound;