OF NO class of men can it be more truly said that the good they do dies with them, and that the evil lives—in the memory of men—than the country parson. Of the thousands of old rectors and vicars of past generations, how they have all slipped out of the memory of men, have left no tradition whatever behind them, if they were good! but the few bad ones did so impress themselves on their generation, that the stories of their misconduct have been handed on, and are not forgotten in a century.
In the floor of my own parish church, in the chancel, is a tombstone to a former incumbent. The name and the date have been ground away by the heels of the school-children who sit over it, but thus much of the inscription remains—
"... The Psalmists man of yeares hee lived a score,
Tended his flocke allone; theire ofspring did restore
By Water into life of Grace; at font and grave,
He served God devout: and strivd men's soules to save.
He fedd the poore, lov'd all, and did by Pattern showe,