Sympathy with Christ in self

I had intended and expected to visit Jacksonville, and I regretted not being able to do so. I had thought much of seeing again the venerable instructor of my youth, to whom more than to any other individual do I feel my obligations for those maxims and precepts which contributed so much to form my character. When I entered Phillips Academy I was already a professor of religion, and perhaps I possessed a little of it; but earnest and spiritual religion, benevolence as an active, living principle, and sympathy with Christ in self- denying effort to save men, were but little understood in my native place. The hints, therefore, which you dropped from day to day, the views you expressed, the exhortations and appeals you made to our consciences, together with the deep religious feeling you manifested in every thing, were all new to me. They were indeed spirit and life to my soul, and they waked up within me new thoughts and purposes, the influence of which I feel to this day. A blessed place was that academy to me, as it has been, I doubt not, to many others. To have seen your face, therefore, once more in the flesh, and, bowing the knee with you in prayer, to have joined in those fervent supplications with which many of your former pupils were so much edified, would indeed have been very gratifying; but it was not permitted.

Away from five beloved children

I am now on my return to my field of labor in the East, and we have already passed the Western Islands. This our second departure from our native land was much more trying to us than was our first, for we had now to tear ourselves away from five beloved children whom we left behind. May this painful separation be greatly blessed both to them and to us. To your prayers do we commend them, together with ourselves and our work. And may your own life be long preserved, that you may still for many years be a blessing to your friends! and that in the important sphere you now occupy you may be as useful to ten thousands of the children’s children as in times past you have been to the children themselves.

It is not probable that we shall ever meet again here; but no matter, for we are almost there. Time seems short, and eternity near; and this is just as it should be. May we daily feel the powers of the world to come, and be as strongly attracted thither as we are swiftly carried thither on the wings of time!

Christian love to all your dear children, and best wishes for all their children.

Your affectionate pupil,

W. GOODELL.

To the Rev. Dr. Anderson, Secretary of the Board tour packages bulgaria, he wrote from the ship, on reaching Malta: —

MALTA, Sept. 5, 1853.

Separation from our beloved children

MY DEAR BROTHER, — To the day of our second departure from our native land we had looked forward with much ap-prehension; and we had long prayed that all the circumstances of it, and especially of our separation from our beloved children, might be ordered in great mercy and kindness. And God, “ who is rich in mercy,” heard our prayers, and sustained and comforted both their hearts and ours far beyond what we had expected. May He grant also abounding grace, that this separation, though now so painful, may be greatly sanctified both to them and to us, and to all our other dear relatives and friends, and thus prove a much richer blessing to us all that our presence with them could have proved. And in the same great mercy and kindness may He order all the circumstances of our re-entrance into our field of labor in the East, of our continuance in it, and of our final departure from it, together with our removal from all these earthly scenes.

Renewedly would we now consecrate our unworthy selves, and the poor remnant of our days, to the blessed service of Christ; and had we a thousand to devote, we would not reserve one of them for mere self-gratification.

To be connected with IIis great kingdom is to be con- nected with that which is not only great and good, but everlasting, and “of the increase of which there will be no end.” And to be connected with it in this very way of extending its humanizing, saving influences among whole races and communities of men who “ heretofore were not a people,” and “had not obtained mercy,” though it be attended with many privations and hardships, and much self-denial, is yet a work which the sons and (laughters of the church should esteem as a privilege exceedingly great and precious.