“Well Master Jackson,” said his Minister, walking homeward after service, with an industrious labourer, who was a constant attendant; “well Master Jackson, Sunday must be a blessed day of rest for you, who work so hard all the week! And you make a good use of the day, for you are always to be seen at Church!” “Aye Sir,” replied Jackson, “it is indeed a blessed day; I works hard enough all the week; and then I comes to Church o' Sundays, and sets me down, and lays my legs up, and thinks o' nothing.”
“Let my candle go out in a stink, when I refuse to confess from whom I have lighted it.”2 The author to whose little book3 I am beholden for this true anecdote, after saying “Such was the religion of this worthy man,” justly adds, “and such must be the religion of most men of his station. Doubtless, it is a wise dispensation that it is so. For so it has been from the beginning of the world, and there is no visible reason to suppose that it can ever be otherwise.”
2 FULLER.
3 Few Words on many Subjects.
“In spite,” says this judicious writer, “of all the zealous wishes and efforts of the most pious and laborious teachers, the religion of the bulk of the people must and will ever be little more than mere habit, and confidence in others. This must of necessity, be the case with all men, who from defect of nature or education, or from other worldly causes, have not the power or the disposition to think; and it cannot be disputed that the far greater number of mankind are of this class. These facts give peculiar force to those lessons which teach the importance and efficacy of good example from those who are blessed with higher qualifications; and they strongly demonstrate the necessity that the zeal of those who wish to impress the people with the deep and aweful mysteries of religion, should be tempered by wisdom and discretion, no less than by patience, forbearance, and a great latitude of indulgence for uncontrolable circumstances. They also call upon us most powerfully to do all we can to provide such teachers, and imbue them with such principles as shall not endanger the good cause by over earnest efforts to effect more than, in the nature of things, can be done; or disturb the existing good by attempting more than will be borne, or by producing hypocritical pretences of more than can be really felt.”
CHAPTER C.
SHEWING HOW THE VICAR DEALT WITH THE JUVENILE PART OF HIS FLOCK; AND HOW HE WAS OF OPINION THAT THE MORE PLEASANT THE WAY IN WHICH CHILDREN ARE TRAINED UP TO GO CAN BE MADE FOR THEM, THE LESS LIKELY THEY WILL BE TO DEPART FROM IT.
Sweet were the sauce would please each kind of taste,
The life, likewise, were pure that never swerved;
For spiteful tongues, in cankered stomachs placed,
Deem worst of things which best, percase, deserved.
But what for that? This medicine may suffice,
To scorn the rest, and seek to please the wise.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH.