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REFLECTED LIGHT-----------------------
Near Death Testimonies of Some Old Time Believers
-------------------------------DR. CHALMERS

From An Antique Book in Webmaster's Library - Editor Unknown
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OH! wondrous change! the purest word
By mortal wisdom breathed or heard,
The brightest dream that can entrance
A raptured Saint, or martyr's glance,--
Are all too weak and worthless things
E'en to uphold what then must feel,
To whom heaven's glories now reveal
More than the harp of David sings.
Yes, in a moment, vast the change
That must around thy spirit range,
Here circled its divine excess
Of all which can the glorious bless!
While o'er thy manumitted soul,
Transcending all the Church hath known
Since Christ ascended to his throne,
Voices and visions grandly Stole.--MONTGOMERY.

"Each day he read and prayed with Mrs. ______. Taking her daughter aside on the last day he was at Whitfield, he took down his Bible, opened it, and said, 'come and look here.' He then followed with his finger every word, as he read the tenth verse of the fiftieth chapter of Isaiah, 'Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God!'

"He went out, . . . . into the garden behind his house; sauntering round which, he was overheard by one of his family, in low but very earnest tones, saying, 'O Father, my heavenly Father!' On returning to the drawing-room, he threw himself into his usual reclining posture. His conversation at first was joyous and playful; a shadow passed over him as some disquieting thought arose-- but a light spread over his face as he said, 'that disquietness lay light upon a man who could fix his heart on heaven.' 'I am fond,' he said, 'of the Sabbath. Hail sacred Sabbath morn!'

"During the whole of the evening, as if he had kept his brightest smiles and fondest utterances to the last, and for his own, he was peculiarly bland and benignant. I had seen him frequently,' says Mr. Gemmel, at Farlie, and in his most happy moods, but I never saw him happier. Christian benevolence beamed from his countenance, sparkled in his eyes, played upon his lips.' Immediately after prayers he withdrew, and bidding his family remember that they must be early tomorrow, he waved his hand, saying, 'A general good night.'

Next morning before eight o'clock, Professor MacDougall, who lived in the house adjoining, sent to inquire about a packet of papers which he had expected to receive at an earlier hour. The housekeeper who had been long in the family, knocked at the door of Dr. Chalmers' room, but received no answer. Concluding that he was asleep, and unwilling to disturb him, she waited till another party called with a second message, she then entered the room-- it was in darkness; she spoke, but there was no response. At last she threw open the window shutters, and drew aside the curtains of the bed. He sat there, half erect, his head reclining gently on the pillow; the expression of his countenance that of fixed and majestic repose. She took his hand, she touched his brow; he had been dead for hours: very shortly after that parting salute, he had entered the eternal world. It must have been wholly without pain or conflict. The expression of the face, undisturbed by a single trace of suffering, the position of the body so easy that the least struggle would have disturbed it, the very posture of arms, and hands, and fingers, known to his family as that into which they fell naturally, in the moments of entire repose-- conspired to show that, saved all strife with the last enemy, his spirit had passed to its place of blessedness and glory in the heavens.

Servant of God, well done!
Rest from thy loved employ;
The battle o'er, the victory won,
Enter thy Master's joy.' "

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