I complete my fourscore and three this day. A considerable excess on the years commonly allotted to Adam's children. Moses reckoned the "days of our years as threescore years and ten; and if, by reason of strength, they he fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow" (Psalm 90:10). No doubt this, in the general, describes a protracted life in its decadent stage, "when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men bow themselves" (Ecc. 12:3); but I am bound to say these conditions are mercifully mitigated in my own case thus far, so that, though daily reminded by unmistakable symptoms that I am an old man, I enjoy a fair degree of bodily health, and my principal sorrow is such as…

Instead of this month continuing (as intended) my notice of more of the godly ministers of past days, I will tell a little of our very old friend, who has just closed a ministry of upwards of sixty years honourably, steadfast in the faith to the end, and extensively useful. Mr. Thomas Jones, of Broseley, Shropshire, who was called home on July 4th, in the eighty-ninth year of his sage. Born in a humble cottage at Bridgenorth, March 4th, 1795, and his mother dying in his early childhood, he was cared for by her mother, but had no early advantages of education; and after the custom of those days, and that mining, quarrying, and clay-working district, had to be inured to early toil. When some…