assignable natural cause. Perhaps it was necessary I should be suffered to feel this, that I might feel for others; for, certainly, no man can have any adequate sympathy with others, who has never thus suffered himself. I can feel for you, therefore, while I tell you that I think the affair with you is chiefly physical. I myself have brought on the same feelings by the same means. I have sat in my study till I have persuaded myself that the ceiling was too low to suffer me to rise and stand upright; and air and exercise alone could remove the impression from my mind!"" now and then steal in; but as they reported that they got no food,' the report did but strengthen the prejudices of their mistress. She could not enter into my motives. I was obliged to regard her conduct as Huss did that of the man who was heaping the faggots round him, O sancta simplicitas! She could not calculate consequences, and was unmoved even when I placed my conduct in its strongest light-Can you attribute any but the purest motives to me? Ought not the very circumstances to which I voluntarily subject myself by adhering to the plan you condemn, to gain me some credit for my intentions? Had I preached here, in the manner I preached elsewhere, you know that the place would have His taking the charge of St. JOHN'S CHAPEL is the most important event of his life, as it appears to have been the sphere for which he was peculiarly raised up and prepared by Pro-been crowded by the religious world. I should vidence. The circumstances attending his establishment of a serious and devout congregation in this place, mark the strength and simplicity of his mind; while they may show the necessity under which such men will sometimes be brought, of acting for themselves, with perfect independence of the whole body of their brethren. then have obtained from it an income of 2001. or 300l. a year, whereas I now sit down with little or no advantage from it, though I have a family rising up about me. God sent me hither to preach to this people, and to raise a congregation in this place; and I am proceeding in that system and way, which seems to me best adapted under God to meet the states of this people; and while I am doing this, I bring on myself temporal injury. I can have no possible motive to sacrifice the truth to a few blind Pharisees who will never, while I live, become my friends.' "I labored under this desertion of my friends for a long time: it was about seven years before affairs began to wear such an aspect, that my protectress and others allowed that matters had certainly turned out as they could not have foreseen. Several witnesses rose up of undoubted and authentic character, to testify the power of the grace of God. One circumstance will place the prejudice which existed against me in a strong light. A converted Jewess, who had been driven from her father's These circumstances he related to me as follows:-" When I married, I lived at a small house at Islington, situated in the midst of a garden, for which I paid 147. a year. My annual income was then only 80%., and, with this, I had to support myself, my wife, and a servant. I was then, indeed, minister of St. John's, but I received nothing from the place for several of the earlier years. When I was sent thither, I considered that I was sent to the people of that place and neighborhood. I thought it my duty, therefore, to adopt a system and a style of preaching which should have a tendency to meet their case. All which they had heard before, was dry, frigid, and lifeless. A high, haughty, stalking spirit charac-house on account of her sentiments, and was terized the place. I was thrown among men of the world, men of business, men of reading, and men of thought. I began, therefore, with principles. I preached on the divine authority of the sacred Scriptures. I dissected Saurin's Sermons. I took the sinews and substance of some of our most masterly writers. I preached on such texts as-If ye believe not Moses and the Prophets, neither will ye believe though one arose from the dead. I set myself to explain terms and phrases. My chief object was under-ground work. But, what was the consequence of this? An outcry was raised against me throughout the religious world. It was said, that, at other places, I continued to preach the truth; but that, at St. John's, I was sacrificing it to my hearers. Even my brethren, instead of entering into my reasons and plan, lay on their oars. My protectress turned her back on me. I hesitated, at first, to enter on so great a risk; but, with grandeur of spirit, she told me she would put her fortune on the issue if any benefit resulted from it, it should be mine, and she would bear me harmless of all loss. She heard me a few times, and then wholly withdrew herself, and even took away her servants. Some of them would a woman of great simplicity and devotion, refused to accompany a friend to St. John's, because, as she said, she could not worship there spiritually, and rather chose to spend the afternoon among her friend's books; in which employment, I doubt not, she worshipped God in the spirit, and was accepted of him. For my own satisfaction, I wrote down at large the reasons on which I had formed my conduct, for I was almost driven into my own breast for support and justification. One friend, indeed, stood by me. He saw my plan and entered fully into it; and said such strong things on the subject as greatly confirmed my own mind. The Church of Christ,' said he, must sometimes be sacrificed for Christ.' A certain brother preached a charity sermon; and in such a style, that he seemed to say to me, 'Were I here, you would see how I would do the thing.' What good he did, I know not; but some of the evil I know, as several persons forsook the chapel, and assigned his sermon as the reason; and others expressed themselves alarmed at the idea of Methodism having crept into the place. It was ill-judged and unkind. He should have entered into my design, or have been silent." About the middle of July, 1800, Mr. Cecil entered on the Livings of BISLEY and COBHAM | no other notion of Methodism than that it was in Surry. A few weeks after this I visited eccentricity. him with our dear and mutual friend Dr. Fearon. Here I saw him in a quite different situation from any in which I had seen him before, and was not a little curious to remark the manner in which he would treat a set of plain and homely villagers. Though he was repeatedly in great anguish during the day which we passed with him, yet his mind in the intervals was so vigorous and luminous that I have scarcely ever gathered so much from him in an equal time. 66 On this occasion, among other things which are recorded in his "Remains," he stated to us his views and feelings respecting his new charge. Bisley is a rectory. It is completely out of the world. The farmers in these parts are mostly occupiers of their own land. They crowded round me when I first came, and were eager to make_bargains with me for the tithe. I told them I was ignorant of such matters, but that I would propose a measure which none of them could object to. The farmers of Bisley should nominate three farmers of Cobham parish, and whatever those three Cobham farmers should appoint me to receive, that they should pay. This was putting myself into their power indeed, but the one grand point with me was to conciliate their minds, and pave the way for the gospel in these parishes. And so far it answered my purpose. I had desired the three farmers to throw the weight, in dubious cases, into the farmer's scale. After we had settled the business, one of the three, to convince the Bisley farmers that they had acted in the very spirit of my directions, proposed to find a person who would immediately give them 50l. a year for their bargain with me. This has given them an idea that we act upon high and holy motives." What a noble trait is this of his upright and disinterested mind! One might almost with confidence predict that such an introduction into his parishes was a presage of great usefulness. A minister has no right to wanton away the support of his family; but, having secured that, whatever sacrifices he may make with such holy motives as these, will be abundantly repaid; probably in the success of his ministry, certainly in his Master's approbation and the peace of his own bosom. Those sacrifices of what may be strictly his due, which a narrow and worldly man may refuse to make, though he entail discord and feuds on his parish, will be trifles to the mind of a true Christian minister. "I hardly think it likely that a man could have been received in a more friendly manner than I have been. About 500 people attended at Cobham, and 300 at Bisley. I find I can do any thing with them while I am serious. A Baptist preacher had been somewhere in the neighborhood before I came. He seems to have been wild and eccentric, and to have planted a prejudice in consequence of this in the people's minds, who appear to have had "While I am grave and serious, they will allow me to say or do any thing. For instance; a few Sundays since it rained so prodigiously hard when I had finished my sermon at Bisley, that I saw it was impracticable for any body to leave the church. I then told the people, that as it was likely to continue for some time, we had better employ ourselves as well as we could, and so I would take up the subject again. I did so; and they listened to me readily for another half hour, though I had preached to them three quarters of an hour before I had concluded. All this they bear, and think it nothing strange; but one wild brother with one eccentric sermon would do me more mischief than I should be able in many months to cure." A very strong instance of personal attachment to him occurred soon after he took Cobham. A stranger was observed to attend church every Sunday, and to leave the village immediately after service was over. Every new face there was a phenomenon, and of course the appearance of this man led to inquiry. He was found to be one of his hearers at St. John's, a poor working-man, whom the advantages received under his ministry had so knit to his pastor, that he found himself repaid for a weekly journey of fifty miles. Mr. C. remonstrated with him on the inexpediency and impropriety of thus spending his Sabbath, when the pure word of God might be heard so much nearer home. But we must approach the closing scene of this great man's life and labors. No touches need to be added to the affecting picture which Mrs. Cecil has drawn of his gradual descent to the grave. I will only subjoin here some remarks on his VIEWS and FEELINGS with respect to that Gospel of which he had been so long an eminent and successful minister. HIS VIEWS of Christianity were modified, as has been seen, by his constitution and the circumstances of his life. His dispensation was to meet a particular class of hearers. He was fitted beyond most men to assert the reality, dignity, and glory of religion-as contrasted with the vanity, meanness, and glare of the world. This subject he treated like a master. Men of the world felt that they were in the presence of their superior-of one who unmasked their real misery to themselves, and pursued them through all the false refuges of vain and carnal minds. While this was the principal character of Mr. Cecil's ministry for years, at that place for which he seems to have been specially prepared; yet he was elsewhere, with equal wisdom, leading experienced Christians forward in their way to heaven; and, latterly, the habit of his own mind, and the whole system of his ministry, were manifestly ripening in those views which are peculiar to the Gospel. No man had a more just view of his own ministry than he had; nor could any one more highly value the excellence which he saw in resist. God is saying to me, 'You have not been doing my work in my way; you have been too hasty. Now sit down and be content to be a quiet idler; and wait till I give you leave again to go on in your labors." 2. A consciousness, that, in trouble, I run to God as a child." These evidences Mr. C. illustrated even in his diseased moments before his death. On that afflicting dispensation I shall make no remarks of my own, as I think nothing can be added to what my friend, his successor, has so well said in the second of his funeral sermons, and which is here subjoined. others, though it was of a different class from his own. "I have been lately selecting," he said to me, "some of C-'s letters for publication. With the utmost difficulty I have given some little variety. He begins with Jesus Christ, carries him through, and closes with In respect to his PERSONAL COMFORT, he had him. If a broken leg or arm turns him aside, said “Î have attained satisfaction as to my he seems impatient to dismiss it as an intrusive state, by a consciousness of change in my own subject, and to get back again to his topic. I breast, mixed with a consciousness of integrity. feel as I read his letters-Why, you said this Two evidences are satisfactory to me: in the last sentence! What, over and over 1. A consciousness of approving God's plan again! What, nothing else! No variety of of government in the Gospel. view! No illustration! And yet I confess, that, when I have walked out and my mind has been a good deal exercised on his letters, I have caught a sympathy-It is one thing, without variety or relief; but this one thing is a TALISMAN!'-I have raised my head-I have trod firmly-my heart has expanded-I have felt wings! Men must not be viewed indiscriminately. To a certain degree I produce effect in my way, and with my views. The utter ruin and bankruptcy of man is so wrought into my experience, that I handle this subject naturally. Other men may use God's more direct means as naturally as I can use his more indirect and collateral ones. Every man, however, must rather follow than lead his experience; though, to a certain degree, if he finds his habits diverting him from Jesus Christ as the grand, prominent, only feature, he must force himself to choose such topics as shall lead his mind to him. I am obliged to subject myself to this discipline. I frequently choose subjects and enter into my plan, before I discover that the SAVIOUR Occupies a part too subordinate; I throw them away, and take up others which point more directly and naturally to him." In his last illness he spoke with great feeling on the same subject: "That Christianity may be very sincere, which is not sublime. Let a man read Maclaurin's sermon on the Cross of Christ, and enter into the subject with taste and relish, what beggary is the world to him! The subject is so high and so glorious, that a man must go out of himself, as it were, to apprehend it. The apostle had such a view when he said, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. I remember the time, even after I became really serious in religion, when I could not understand what St. Paul meant-not by setting forth the glory of Christ, but by talking of it in such hyperbolical terms, and always dwelling on the subject; whatever topic he began on, I saw that he could not but glide into the same subject. But I Now understand why he did so, and wonder no more; for there is no other subject, comparatively, worthy our thoughts, and therefore it is that advanced Christians dwell on little else. I am fully persuaded, that the whole world becomes vain and empty to a man, in proportion as he enters into living views of Jesus Christ." His FEELINGS on religion, as they respected his submission to the divine will, were admirably expressed by himself:-" We are servants, and we must not choose our station. I am now called to go down very low, but I must not "During the whole period of his last illness, a space of nearly three years, the state of his mind fluctuated with his malady. Every one who has had opportunities of observing the operation of palsy, knows, that without destroying, or, properly speaking, perverting the reasoning powers, it agitates and enervates them. Every object is presented through a discolored medium. False premises are assumed, and the mind is sometimes more than usually expert in drawing inferences accordingly. In a word, the whole system is deranged and shattered. An excessive care, and irritation, and despondency, are produced, under the impression of which the sufferer acts every moment, without being at all aware of the cause. His morbid anxiety is, besides, fixed on some inconsiderable or ideal matter, which he magnifies and distorts; while he remains incapable of attending to concerns of superior moment, and any attempts to rectify his misapprehensions quicken the irritation, and increase the effects of the disorder. "Under this peculiar visitation it pleased God that our late venerable father should labor. The energy, and decision, and grandeur of his natural powers, therefore, gradually gave way, and a morbid feebleness succeeded. Yet even in this afflicting state, with his body on one side almost lifeless, his organs of speech impaired, and his judgment weakened, the spiritual dispositions of his heart displayed themselves in a remarkable manner. He appeared great in the ruins of nature; and his eminently religious character manifested itself, to the honor of divine grace, in a manner which surprised all who were acquainted with the ordinary effects of paralytic complaints. The actings of hope were, of course, impeded; but the habit of grace, which had been forming in his mind for thirty or forty years, shone through the cloud. At such a period there was no room for fresh acquisitions. The real character of the man could only appear, when disease allowed it to appear at all, according to the grand leading habits of his life. If his habits had been ambitious, or sensual, or covetous, or worldly, these tendencies, if any, would have displayed themselves; but as his soul had been long established in grace, and spiritual religion had been incorporated with all his trains of sentiment and affection, and had become like a second nature, the holy dispositions of his heart acted with remarkable constancy under all the variations of his illness; so that one of his oldest friends observed to me, that if he had to choose the portion of his life, since he first knew him, in which the evidences of a state of salvation were most decisive, he should, without a moment's hesitation, select the period of his last distressing malady. 66 Throughout his illness, his whole mind, instead of being fixed on some mean and insignificant concern, was riveted on spiritual objects. Every other topic was so uninteresting to him, and even burdensome, that he could with reluctance allow it to be introduced. The value of his soul, the emptiness of the world, the nearness and solemnity of death, were ever on his lips. He spent his whole time in reading the Scripture, and one or two old divines, particularly Archbishop Leighton. All he said and did was as a man on the brink of an eternal state. "His humility, also, evidently ripened as he approached his end. He was willing to receive advice from every quarter. He listened with anxiety to any hint that was offered him. His view of his own misery and helplessness as a sinner, and of the necessity of being entirely indebted to divine grace, and being saved as the greatest monument of its efficacy, was continually on the increase. "His simplicity and fervor in speaking of the Saviour were also very remarkable. As he drew nearer to death, his one topic was-Jesus Christ. All his anxiety and care were centred in this grand point. His apprehensions of the work and glory of Christ, of the extent and suitableness of his salvation, and of the unspeakable importance of being spiritually united to him, were more distinct and simple, if possible, than at any period of his life. He spake of him to his family, with the feeling, and interest, and seriousness of the aged and dying believer. "His faith, also, never failed. I have heard him with faltering and feeble lips speak of the great foundations of Christianity with the fullest confidence. He said he never saw so clearly the truth of the doctrines which he had been preaching, as since his illness. His view of the certainty and excellency of God's promises in Christ was unshaken. "The interest, likewise, which he took in the success of the Gospel, was prominent, when his disease at all remitted. His own people lay near his heart; and, when a providence had occurred which he hoped would promote their benefit, he expressed himself with old Simeon, 'Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.' "The principal effect of his distemper was in throwing a cloud over his comfort; yet, in producing this, the spiritual tendency of his mind appeared. His diseased depression operated, indeed, but it was in leading him to set a high standard of holiness, to bring together elevated marks of regeneration, and to require decisive evidences of a spirit of faith and adoption. The acuteness of his judgment then argued so strongly from these false premises, that he necessarily excluded himself almost entirely from the consolation of hope. If I may be allowed a theological term-the objective acts of faith, those that related to the grand objects proposed in the Scriptures on the testimony of God, such as the work of redemption, the person of Christ, and the virtue of his blood, remained the same; nay, were ripened and strengthened as his dissolution approached but the subjective acts of faith, those which respected his own interest in these blessings, and which gave life to the exercises of hope, rose and sunk with his disease. He was precisely like a man oppressed by a heavy weight; as the load was lightened, he began to move and exert himself in his natural manner; when the burden was increased, he sunk down again under the oppression. "About a year before his death, when his powers of mind had for a long time been debilitated, but still retained some remnants of their former vigor, his religious feelings were at times truly desirable. His intellectual powers were, indeed, too far weakened for joy; but there was a resignation, a tranquillity, a ripeness of grace, a calm and holy repose on the bosom of the Saviour, that quite alarmed, if I may so speak, his anxious family, under the impression that there appeared nothing left for grace to do, and that he would soon be removed from them, as a shock of corn cometh in its season. Even when his disease had made still further progress, as often as the slightest alleviation was afforded him, his judgment became more distinct, his morbid depression lessened, and he was moderately composed. It was only a few weeks before his dissolution that such an interval was vouchsafed to him. He then spake with great feeling from the Scriptures, in family worship, for about half an hour; and dwelt on the love, and grace, and power of Christ, with particular composure of mind. I had the happiness of visiting him at this season. He was so much relieved from his disease, as to enter with me on general topics relating to religion, and to give me some excellent directions as to my conduct as a minister. In reply to various questions which I put to him, he spake to me to the following purport: I know myself to be a wretched, worthless sinner,' (the seriousness and feeling with which he spake I shall never forget,) having nothing in myself but poverty and sin. I know Jesus Christ to be a glorious and almighty Saviour. I see the full efficacy of nis atonement and grace; and I cast myself entirely on him, and wait at his footstool. I am aware that my diseased and broken mind nakes me incapable of receiving consolation; but I submit myself wholly to the merciful and wise dispensations of God.' "One or two other interesting testimonies of the spiritual and devoted state of his heart may be here mentioned. A short time before his decease he requested one of his family to write down for him in a book the following sentence: None but Christ, none but Christ, said Lambert dying at a stake; the same, in dying circumstances, with his whole heart, saith Richard Cecil.' The name was signed by himself, with his left hand, in a manner hardly legible through infirmity." Such was Mr. Cecil. I sincerely regret that some masterly observer did not both enjoy and improve opportunities of delineating a more perfect picture of his great mind. I have, however, faithfully detailed the impressions which his character made on me during a long course of affectionate admiration of him; nor have I shrunk from intermingling such remarks, as every faithful observer must find occasion to make while he is watching the unfoldings of the best and greatest of men. CHRISTIAN PARENTS, and particularly CHRISTIAN MOTHERS, may gather from the history and character of our departed friend every possible encouragement to the unwearied care of their children. While St. Austin, Bishop Hall, Richard Hooker, John Newton, Richard Cecil, and many other great and eminent servants of Christ, have left on record their grate ful acknowledgments to their pious mothers, as the instruments, under the grace and blessing of God, of winning them to himself, let no woman of faith and prayer despair respecting even her most untoward child. Mr. Cecil's MERE ADMIRERS should feel what a weight of responsibility his ministry and his character have laid them under. They gave him the ear, but he labored for the heart. They were pleased with the man, but he prayed that they might become displeased with themselves. They would aid him in his schemes, but he was anxious that they should serve his Master. How soon must they meet him at that judgment-seat before which all must appear, to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether good or evil! His SINCERE FRIENDS are called to imitate his example-to follow him as he followed Christto live above this vain world-to sacrifice every thing to the honor of Christ and the interests of eternity-to bear up under pain and weariness and anxiety, leaning on Almighty strength; till they join him in that world where weakness shall be felt no more! JOSIAH PRATT. |