cherous gentleman! The very best among us, after doing all he was commanded to do, must acknowledge himself an unprofitable servant,' inasmuch as he never could repay the price which was laid down for his soul. What then will become of him, who set up for a gentleman, and assumed a superiority over the other servants, only because he found means to riot in the fruits of their labour, while he almost wholly neglected his own duty, as if he took his master to be an idiot! If at any time, in obedience to a statute, he piddled at a formal performance, he did it with such a cold indifference to the success, with such a disregard to religion and its Author, and with so much the air of a gentleman about him, that the office proved useless and disgustful in his hands to the plain Christian, who could not forbear comparing his with the behaviour of Christ, when he washed the feet of his disciples. If a poor man uncovered in the rain, had the boldness to speak to him, his answer was like that of a Nabal, who was such a son of Belial, that a man could not speak to him.' This is but a faint picture of a servant turned gentleman. Howsoever other clergymen, and their wives, may think of this matter, I declare it utterly impossible for me ever to have been a gentleman. My father had ten children, and so scanty means for their support, that, had it been left to one only, it could have but barely raised him above indigence. And now, that I am undeservedly beneficed, it never enters in my head to consider myself in any other light, but that of a parish-charge; and now and then, in a hard year, as an illiberal treasurer of my parishioner's money for the relief of their poor. Lord, pity me, an unworthy servant; but had I been a gentleman, I should probably have been still more so. Was Peter, John, or Nathaniel, gentlemen? Or did any one ever hear of a gentleman going to be hanged for our religion? At least, if any one did, was he called a gentleman by the attending mob, those best judges and adorers of gentlemen? I shall readily own, there is a species of ambition, or call it pride if you please, which is so far from being culpable, that the Spirit of God applies to it, as an instrument within us of the noblest virtues, namely, the promise of 'eternal life to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory, honour, and immortality.' Here it is, that the true clergyman, laying his low foundation in humility, and working like a real labourer in Christ's vineyard, by bringing down the contumacious, by comforting the disconsolate, by instructing the ignorant; now by the terrors of the Lord persuading men,' and

then again by his promises animating them in their pilgrimage to a better life; and in all these by his charities, temporal and spiritual, as by so many miracles, wrought in the face of a selfish and hardened world, proves his mission from the fountain of all good. Here he soars far above the character of a gentleman, treads on his own and the pride of others, and rises so high above this world that its paltry gentlemen, nay, its lords and kings, had they the right sort of eyes, might, from their vale of misery, see his crown sparkling with stars, and a higher order of beings crowding round him, who, though encompassed with flesh and blood, hath fought the good fight of faith,' and is soon to hear the triumphant approbation of his master, 'Well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.' Now, what can the herald or the mob give, that does not become despicable in comparison with this? Why then should a parson stupidly wish to be a gentleman? But even in the present state of things, and far as mankind have degenerated into an admiration of worldly greatness, I will venture to say, that the character of a clergyman, well and uniformly supported, will not fail to attract from all around him a present degree of honour, far exceeding that of all the titles in this world. In a state of so base and so general an inattention to the duties of our function, and that so evidently arising from the pride we take in the worldly emoluments wherewith it is endowed, a conscientious clergyman, with but half the exertion required of him, might appear like a saint, at least of the second magnitude, in the first century of Christianity. A very moderate degree of goodness in himself, and of fidelity in the discharge of his duty, would, by its rarity, raise a clergyman, in these degenerate days, to credit and honour, above those of nobility itself, I mean in the esteem of all who have any right to establish the characters of others. This is an equally shameful and melancholy reflection. But I appeal for the truth of it to the few who have made the experiment. As to the censure and report of mankind in general, it will ever be of a piece with that which our blessed Saviour found it in the midst of his speaking, 'as never man spoke,' and doing as never man could do. Hear him on the subject of humility. He that humbleth himself shall be exalted; and he that exalteth himself shall be abased. If I your lord and master have washed your feet, ye ought to wash one another's feet.' The least among you shall be the greatest, and the greatest least. He understands little or nothing of the work

Christ came to do, who does not know, that he set himself to invert a wicked and miserable world; for our conviction, miraculously to change or suspend the nature he had impressed on things here below; for our conversion, to change that sinful nature which the enemy, by the infusion of lust and pride, had given us; to turn the good things of the world, as we call them, when we make them temptations to sin, into evil things; and the evil things, poverty and affliction, into good things; to bring about in us the happy miracle of reformation; and, in a word, that the 'first might be the last, and the last, first,' that is, that pride might be brought low, and humility raised, that old things might pass away, and that all things might become new.' For this purpose, he was here as one that serveth.' For this purpose, he chose out the meanest of mankind to teach the world; the 'foolish things to confound the wise; the weak things to confound the mighty, that no man might glory in His presence! What then comes of the gentleman in thee, O thou clergyman? Art thou better than Peter or Nathaniel? Art thou greater than Christ? Hath his poverty opened a scene of riches and luxury to thee? Hath his humility raised thee to pride, and made a gentleman of thee? Poor unfaithful and despicable fool! The time approaches fast when thou shalt bewail, probably too late, thy gross mistake, in eternal poverty and abasement. Get out of thy palace, sell thy coach, give to the poor, and take up thy cross.' I know it is pleaded by many among us, that, to attract respect from the upper orders of men, and veneration from the vulgar, the clergy ought to be gentlemen; and that the cause of religion, now miracles are ceased, cannot be well supported, without this veneration, and that respect. What then! Cannot God maintain his own cause, but by borrowing aids from a wicked world, and even from the devil? The clergyman, actuated by this monstrous opinion, mean the gratification of their own pride, and by no means the cause of religion, which never was, never can be supported by aids so foreign to itself, nay, so directly opposite to its very nature and principles. If the love of God and piety, if humility, sequestration from the world, charity, and diligence in the discharge of duty, in its preachers, cannot effect the blessed work we have in hand, how idle, how impious is it, to depend, on pride and secularization, which it is the business of God's word and of all our sermons to beat down, and eradicate from our own and the minds of all our hearers? Is not this sawing down the

VOL. VI.

branch on which we sit, to rest our feet on the weeds below? After all, if the character of a gentleman, as now held up to the world, carried in it any thing of religion and sanctity, which it certainly does not, but the very reverse, somewhat from thence, I mean affability and beneficence, might be adopted into that of a elergyman, of no little use to the sacred ends of our calling. As matters are at present, nothing good is to be hoped for from a mixture so heterogeneous.

149. A man disposed to do some little good now and then, may be permitted to effect it. But if he attempts to go much farther, and to execute some great and excellent purpose, though wholly for the benefit of other men, he must expect to be opposed. He that would live godly,' not to say godlike, in this present world, must look for persecution.' When therefore you undertake somewhat of uncommon eclat in goodness, let it be your prudence to conceal, if you possibly can, under some low and selfish design, your grand intention. If this may not be, the instant you have accomplished your noble purpose, fly from your country, or hide yourself in some obscure corner of it, that you may escape from the eye and tongue of envy. Either be not righteous overmuch, for why wilt thou destroy thyself?' or fly for your life, as if you had committed murder. This concealment from your left hand of what your right hand is doing, will help to prevent the vanity in you which the applause of a few good people might be apt to excite, and may screen you from that envy, which will do no good nor suffer others to do it, unrevenged. The precaution, here given, could not have been used by our blessed Saviour, because his mission required, that all his actions should lie open to the view of mankind, and that he should suffer death as a consequence of them. But as you perhaps are not called to such consequences, you will do well, I believe, not to draw them on yourself by an insult on other people. You are allowed to be 'as wise as a serpent,' if you are but 'as harmless as a dove.' If you would go farther than mere harmlessness, and be great in goodness, the wisdom of a thousand serpents and foxes will be necessary to your safety. The author of the old Whole Duty of Man, aware of what I have been saying, put it out of the power of mankind to discover him as the giver of that, and such other performances, as never came from the hand of any other uninspired writer; and hath done ten times more good, by not being known to do any, than even by the excellence itself of

his works. Contemporary, with him, there was another, who, by silence and secrecy effected the greatest miracle of profane history, properly so called; I mean General Monk. This man, greatly qualified for military service, was sent by Cromwell to command an army in Scotland, where, at least a severe degree of execution was expected of him; and he had the address so to manage matters, as not wholly to disappoint his employer, and yet to make himself exceeding popular among the Scotch. Cromwell had, at the same time, two other armies, of considerable force in England, and one of them quartered in and about Londou. All these armies had taken the solemn league and covenant, and were violently, both by religious, and political prejudices, imbittered against the king, and the old constitution, in the church and state. With an army thus disposed, Monk, under God, effected the restoration at once, as well of the constitution, as of the king, in spite of both the other armies, but not till after the death of Cromwell. He took care, by degrees, to weed the army in Scotland, of such officers, as were most outrageously attached to the republic, and replace them with others of a cooler disposition, and more devoted to himself; and, afterward, set out with his army on a march for London. Most people thought he had his eye on the crown, or at least on the protectorship; it was however impossible for any body to penetrate into his designs. Taciturnity had ever made the most distinguishing part of his character, and now seemed to make the whole. One of the armies, which lay northward in England, went aside from his route; and the other, retiring from London, left it open to him, and the superior army under his command. Here the citizens, long disaffected to the king and constitution, but now tired out with the arbitrary tyranny of a usurper, whom they themselves had largely contributed to set up, wishing for any thing rather than a continuance of that tyranny, carried much higher by Cromwell, than by any of their kings, even by the conqueror; and the rump of a parliament, disgusted at the insignificance to which they had been reduced by an armed force at the discretion of the usurper; without much difficulty acceded to the intentions of Monk, then unmasked, to call home the king, and re-establish the constitution, king, bishops, liturgy, and all. All parties, whereof there were three, outrageously hating one another; and all sects, whereof there were thirty or forty, all furiously inspired, now seeing the sword pointed the contrary way, now weary of