Isai. xxxviii. 14. 0 Lord, I am oppressed: undertake for me!
THE time of death is an awful season to every child of man : but it may be more or less terrible, according to circumstances. There may, in that hour, be such manifestations of God's presence vouchsafed to the soul, and such bright prospects of a glorious immortality, as altogether to divest death of its sting, and to render it an object of intense desire. On the other hand, there may be such darkness of mind, or anguish of body, or such urgent considerations of a personal or domestic nature, as may exceedingly em- bitter the thoughts of approaching dissolution. The account which we have of Hezekiah's feelings on an occasion like this, fills us with deep commiseration. His disorder was so violent, that he expected every day to be his last ; and God seemed to him like a lion, likely to break all his bones, and to devour him every instant. Hence " he mourned as a dove ; and his eyes failed with looking upward : " and in utter despair of help, except from God, he poured out the prayer which we have just read, " O Lord, I am oppressed : undertake for me ! " There were in his case some peculiar reasons for deprecating with more than common earnestness the impending stroke : for he was but in the middle age of life ; and hoped to proceed with the work of reformation which he had successfully commenced through the whole nation. In the event of his removal too, he had no son to suc- ceed him : and he feared that the people, just beginning to return to the Lord their God, would immediately relapse into all the idolatries, from which he had strenuously exerted himself to reclaim them. To this chiefly we trace the extreme desire which he ex- pressed for the prolongation of his life, and the over- whelming agony with which, in the words before us, he committed his cause to God.
But here we see,