Doddridge's Theological Studies
Gratefully availiag himself of the timely offer of his ‘friend and pastor, the Rev. Samuel Clarke, Doddridge promptly returned’ to St. Albans, where he enjoyed such advice, instructions, and use of books, as might best tend to prepare him for his theological course of study at Kibworth in Leicestershire, at the academy of the celebrated Rev. John Jennings, author - of the learned work on “The Antiquities of the Jews,” highly esteemed by the ministers of that period. Of that excellent academy he became a member in October, 1719.
The academies, of the class conducted by Mr. Jennings, were founded on the broad basis of non-subscription to denominational formulas of faith, were accessible to persons of all lAeligious parties, and were resorted to even by such of the clergy and laity of the Establishment, as found the universities too expensive. Chaplains and tutors to families of rank were often educated in thes6 academies. No testimonial or qualification for entrance was demanded, but the evidence of possessing a good moral character, and the mastery of a prescribed amount of classical. and other preparatory studies. It must here be acknowledged as a great evil, and goes far to show the low state of religion at the time when Doddridge and others were raised up in the providence of God for its revival, that even among many of the Dissenters of England, personal piety was not then considered essential to an entrance on the duties of the ministry.
During his residence at Kibworth no one applied himself with greater diligence to study, to devotion, and to the*best improvement of time, than Philip Doddridge. Prom a paper, in which he kept an account of his pursuits, it appears that, besides attending and studying the academical lectures, and reading the authors to which his tutor referred in illustration of his lectures, he read in one half year sixty volumes, some of them large, and about an equal number in the same period subsequently. The manner in which he read deserves remark: it was not hasty and superficial, but with profound attention. Some volumes he took pains to abridge; from others he made large extracts in his commonplace-book; every remarkable interpretation or illustration of texts of Scrip’ture he transferred to his interleaved Bible. At this period he devoted himself to a more extended course of Greek studies, not only reading the Greek authors, but writing his own observations upon them, either for the illustration of the authors themselves or of the Scriptures, and selecting passages which might with advantage be introduced into his sermons. His ob — servations upon Homer were sufficiently copious to make a considerable volume.
How he was situated at Kibworth, Ms student-life, its employments, its joys and sorrows, are well described in the letters, or parts of letters, which we shall introduce in their appropriate order. To Mr. Clarke, his early patron, and his most trusted counsellor in after-life, he made frequent reports of his studies, and of his expenditures and wants, In return lie received valuable letters of counsel, and prompt attention was given to his pecuniary necessities.
Tx) the Rev. Samuel Clarke.
‘January 3, 1721. “In my last, sir, I sent you an account of the course of our public studies for this last half year, and you will perceive that they are of such a nature as to require a considerable exercise of thought, and that the references are generally long, and consequently- that we have less time for our private studies than we ever had in any of our former half years; however, I generally find about an hour &,nd a half in a day for the study of the Scriptures. The New Testament I read in the original without any commentator, but more of my time is spent in reading the Old, for I would willingly finish ‘Patrick’s Commentary ’ before it is taken from Kilworth, which will be in a few months. I have read all but the second book of Chronicles, Ecclesiastes, and Canticles; and design to begin ‘Lowth on Isaiah and Jeremiah’ when I have-done with these, and ‘Dr: Prideaux’s Connection,’ which I am now reading with a particular view ,to the prophecies. I do not entirely neglect the classics, though I have but little time for them. Since my last mention I have read some of Horace, with leader’s Commentary, and a few of TuUy’s delightful works. I am ashamed to think how little I am acquainted with the Greek, and heartily wish I had been more careful in studying it when I was wilh you at St. Albans. However, sir, that I might not forget the little I know, besides the New Testament, which I mentioned, I have read some portions of Socrates, Homer, Lucian, and Xenophon, since last Whitsuntide.
“In English, besides many other -works, I have lately read ‘Burnet’s Theory,’ which I took up with the expectation of meeting with some new philosophical discovery, in which respect, indeed, I was sadly disappointed. I am now reading ‘Lord Shaftesbury’s Works,’ which, as far as I can judge by the half I have dispatched, contain a strange mixture of good sense and extravagance.
“My good tutor continues to treat me with a great deal of kindness, and lets no opportunity slip of obliging me at home, or promoting my interest abroad. When I am speaking of his goodness, I cannot forget that I owe even that to you, who have placed and supported me here. I know, sir, that you do not like compliments, and I would never deal in them; yet still I hope you will give me leave to tell you, with a great feeling of plainness and sincerity, that if I did not frequently reflect upon the favors I have received from you, I could not keep on good terms with myself. I have nothing left to ask, but the continuance of your prayers that I may have the wisdom and grace to behave myself, both here and in the after-part of my life, so that neither you nor my other friends may have reason to repent the benefits you have done me.”
To the same.
“KiBWOETH, Dec. 13, 1721.” I am extremely pleased to find that you are so well satisfied as to my care in managing my expenses.
I acknowledge, sir, that you have always been very indulgent to me upon that head; and I think myself so much the more obliged to study frugality, lest I should seem to abuse your goodness and the confidence which you have in me. Besides, I know how difficult it is to obtain supplies, and am heartily concerned to think of the trouble you are at on my account; and yet, notwithstanding all my precaution, I find my stock decreases apace.
“As for my studies, we have almost finished Pneumatology and Ethics, and proceeded a good way in Critics. These Critics are an abridgment of a considera.ble book by Mr. Jones, on such subjects as the antiquity of the Hebrew language, its points, the Masora, Talmud, and Cabbala. We have several La-tin, French, and English versions of the Bible, and have continually large references to Prideaux, Buxtorf, etc. Our Ethics are drawn up by Mr. Jennings from Puffendorf and Grotius. Once a week we have a pQeumatological disputation, and consequently each of us makes in turn a thesis in a month. We have the liberty of choosing our own subjects; and mine have been, the seat of the soul, polygamy, and God’s prescience of contingencies; and I am now preparing one in defence of the soul’s immortality.”
To Mr. Hughes.
“KiBWOBTH, 1721.
“I think the Spectator somewhere tells us that no music is so sweet to a man as his own praise: methinks he should have excepted the pleasure that an honest and generous mind takes in hearing a friend commended. One thing I can confidently affirm, that though I passed the holidays very pleasantly, at least some of them, in the company of a very agreeable lady — and you know I was always an admirer of the sex — yet nothing gave me so much satisfaction as a few minutes’ conversation with Mr. Benyan, when the discourse turned upon you.
“He told me, among, other things, that you were making yourself master of the French language. I am heartily glad to. hear it, because it will give you an opportunity, of entertaining yourself with some of the finest writers in the world. Many of them had certainly very great genius, and were intimately acquainted with. the ancients, those great masters of eloquence and poetry. Of all their dramatic poets I have met with none that I admire so much as Racine. It is impossible not to be charmed with the pomp, eloquence, and harmony of his language, as well as the majesty, tenderness, and propriety of his sentiments. The whole ia conducted with a wonderful mixture of grandeur and simplicity, which sufficiently distinguished him from the dulness of some tragedians, and the bombast of others. One. of his principal faults is, that the jingle of his double rhyme frequently offends the ear. I have lately met with the Archbishop of Cambray’s Reflections on Eloquence, which I think one of the most judicious pieces I have ever seen. There are some fine criticisms at the end of it, which well dgserve your perusal.
“As for French sermons, they are, as far as I can judge, very much inferior to those of our English divines. Bourdaloue’s, though much regarded, appear to me little better than empty harangues. Cheminais’ are many of them very good y but I never met with any that are to be compared with those of M. Superville, the Protestant divine at Rotterdam: he especially excels in the beauty of his imagery, descriptions, and similes; and has some of the most pathetic expostulations I ever read.”
As a theological student, Mr. Doddridge at this period gave great attention to the study of the Scriptures, and of the best writers in practical divinity. “He furnished himself,” says Orton, “with Clarke’s ‘Annotations on the Old Testament,’ for the sake of many valuablelnterpretations, a judicious collection of parallel texts, and the convenience of a large margin on which to write his own remarks; and with an interleaved Testament. In these he inserted illustrations of Scripture, which occurred to him in reading, conversation, or reflection; together with practical remarks, which might be drawn from particular passages, their connection with others, or. the general design of the sacred writers; especially those which might not, on a cursory reading, appear so obvious, but op that account might be more striking and useful. He laid it down as an inviolable rule, to read some practical divinity every day. He labored assiduously to attain the gift of prayer. For this purpose he made a collection of proper expressions of supplication and thanksgiving, on common and special occasions, both from Scripture and devotional writers, that he might be qualified to perform this part of public service in a copious, pertinent, and edifying manner.”
In the cultivation of personal religion, he was pre-eminently faithful, assiduous, and earnest. Among Ms papers was discovered a solemn form of covenant with God, written and subscribed with his own hand about this period, wherein he not only states his views and resolutions concerning the care of his heart, and the management of his entire conduct, but devotes himself, his time, and abilities to. the service of God, for this life and the life to come. This covenant he expressed a purpose to read over solemnly, as in the presence of God, once a month, to ascertain how faithfully he had adhered to it, and to refresh bis recollections of the various duties and obligations to which he had pledged himself therein. [See “Rise and Progress,” chapter 17.]
We have also a delightful view of this young man’s student-life and character, in the rules which he framed for the regulation of his conduct, and which he inscribed in his interleaved Testament, for the convenience of frequent review, and of comparison with his daily practice.
RULES FOR THE DIRECTION OF MY CONDUCT
WHILE A STUDENT.
1. Let my first thoughts be devout and thankful. Let me rise early, immediately return to God solemn thanks for the mercies of the night, devote myself to hini, and beg his assistance in the intended business of the day.
2. In this, and every other act of devotion, let me: recollect my thoughts; speak directly to Him, and never give, way to any thing internal or external that may divert my attention.
3. Let me set myself to read the Scriptures every morning. In the first reading, let me endeavor to impress my heart with a practical sense of divine things; arid then use the help of commentators. Let these rules, with proper alterations, be observed every evening.
4. Never let me trifle- with a book with which I “have no present concern. In applying myself to any
work, let me first recollect what I may learn by it, and then beg suitable assistance from God; and let me. continually endeavor to make all my studies subservient to practical religion and ministerial usefulness.”
5. Never let me lose one minute of time, nor incur unnecessary expenses, that I may have the more to spend for God.
6. When I am called abroad, let me be desirous of doing good, and receiving good. Let me always have in readiness some subject of contemplation, and endeavor to improve my time with good thoughts as I go along. Let me endeavor to render myself agreeable and useful to all about me by a tender, compassionate, friendly behavior, avoiding all trifling and impertinent stories, and remembering that all imprudence is sin.
7. Let me use moderation at meals, and see that I am not hypocritical in prayers and thanksgivings at them.
8. Let me never delay any thing unless I can prove that another time will be more fit than the present, or that some other more important duty requires my attendance.
9. Let me be often lifting up my heart to God in the intervals of secret worship, repeating those petitions which are of the greatest importance, and a surrender’ of myself to his service.
10. Never let me enter into long schemes about future events, but in general refer myself to the divine care.
11, Let me labor after habitual gratitude and love to God and the Redeemer. Let me guard against pride, remembering that I have all from God’s hand, and that I have deserved the severest punishment.
12. In all my studies, let me remember that the souls of men are immortal, and that Christ died to redeem them.
13. Let me consecrate my sleep and all my recreation’s to God, and seek them for his sake.
14. Let me frequently ask myself what duty or what temptation is now before me.
15. Let me remember that, through the mercy of Ood in a Redeemer, I hope I am within a short space of heaven-
16. Let me frequently survey these rules, and my conduct as compared with them.
17. Let me often recollect which of thesp rules I have present occasion to practise.
18. If I have grossly erred in any one of these particulars, let me pot think it an excuse for erring in others.
A briefer series of practical directions drawn up about this time by Doddridgejsfor the government of his own conduct, is worthy of preservation.
1. Begin the day with God.
2. Be conscientious and diligent in the business of the day.
3. Be moderate and innocent in the recreations of the day.
4. Carefully remark and wisely improTe all providential dispensations.
5. Guard against the temptations of the day.
6. Govern your thoughts when alone. ’ **.
7. Guard your tongue when in company.
8. In every thing depend on the assisting grace of God. Whatever be the work ip’hand, whether sacred or civil, whether temple work, domeptic work, public work, or closet work, seek divine assistance.
9. Close the day with self-examination and prayer. Any one who shall conform, in a good degree, to
rules like these, is no common man; and yet we have reason to believe that Doddridge habitually, and with an unusual degree of success, made them the guide of his energetic, self-denying, and useful life. Deviations from one or another of these, there doubtless may have been; but it was a pledge of high excellence in all the grand and noble aims of life, that he set distinctly and visibly before him rules of such uncommon strictness, and that he applied his active and prayerful and persevering mind to the fullest exemplification of them in his daily life. An enlarged piety and philanthropy evidently had already possession of his heart, and constituted his grand principles of action.
In the latter part of his student-life, and in the earlier years of his ministerial course, it must be confessed, that his buoyant, gay, and social temperament
niS THEOLOGICAL STUDIES. 33
led him into a style of epistolary correspondence not in sufficient harmony with the rules by whicbhe had so earnestly purposed to govern his conduct.
When the Rev. Job Orton was about to undertake the office of biographer, Mrs. Doddridge, after the decease of her excellent husband, thus writes:
“We were neither of us strangers to the natural gayety of his temper, which sometimes cast a shade over his otherwise excellent qualities; and these things may perhaps be yet remembered by some when those may be overlooked and forgot. But mingled, as I fear you will find his early diaries and other papers with things of this kind, I doubt not but you will also there find those seeds of pi«ty which, by his indefatigable care, under the blessing of Heaven, were growing up and gradually improved, till they shone out with such bright and distinguishing rays; and amid his gayest scenes in early life, will there be discovered the foundations early laid for those important and extensive schemes of his future us6^fulness, many of which, by the divine favor, he ‘lived to execute, and others, and still more perhaps, were broken off.”
Ttese hints apply more particularly to some of the earlier portions of his correspondence, as it appears in the voluminous London edition; yet it may be affirmed, that the letters are well written, and that many of them display some of the finest qualities of thought, of style, and of moral excellence. Many even of his early letters show that, he had, while still a youth, formed habits of clear and vigorous reasoning on theological subjects.
Having pursued his studies for three years, under Mr. Jefiningfi, at Kibworth, he followed his tutor in his removal- to Hinckley in 1722, that he might complete his studies preparatory to being licensed to preach the gospel. His licensure took place just after he had completed his twentieth year. The following letters will form the best narrative of the circumstances connected with this period of his life.
To’ his Sister, Mrs. Nettleton.
“Hinckley, July 30, lt22.
“I preached my first sermon on Sunday morning
to a very large auditory, from 1 Cor.’ 16:22:- ‘If
any man love not the L’ord Jesus Christ, let hiln be
Anathema, Maranatha.’ It was a plain and practical
discourse, and cost me but a few hours study; but as
I had the advantage of a very moving subject, and a
good-natured, attentive people, it was received much
better than I could have expected. There was one
good old woman that was a little offended to see
such a lad get. up into the pulpit; but 1 had the good
fortune to please her so well, that as soon as I had
done, she told Mrs. Jennings that fehe could lay me
in her bosom.”
A happy result is reported of this first sermon:
“I find in his diary,” says Mr. Orton,” that two
persons ascribed their conversion to the blessing of
God attending that sermon, with which .he appears
to have been much affected and encouraged.”
To the itev. Samuel Clarke.
“Hinckley, Sept., 1722. “If I were to regard only my own personal convenience, I should very much regret our leaving Kibworth; for we have none of those agreeable retirements without doors that we had there,, as meadows, gardens, arbors, and grottos.
“As for the company in the town, it can but little interrupt my studies. If I expect elegant and polite entertainment, I must look for it within doors. Our neighbors are persons of an ordinary education, but some of them have native good sense, and many of them a great deal of piety; and they often take an unaffected prudent freedom in discoursing on religious subjects, which is very agreeable, and I hope may be improving.
“Mr. Jennings encourages the greatest freedom of inquiry, and always inculcates it as a law, that the” Scriptures are the only genuine standard of faith. We have gone through many important doctrines since Whitsuntide, such as the prefexistence and divinity of Christ, the Trinity, the nature of angels, the Adamie covenant, the imputation of the sin of our first parents, the satisfaction made by Christ, and the abolition of the Mosaic law. Once a week we make a thesis. I have already composed ’ two: one on the inspiration of the New Testamedt, the other on the absurdity charged upon the Mosaic history of the creation and fall.
“For ecclesiastical history we read Dupin’s Compendium. But then we take in the assistance of Le Clerc, Spanheim, and Bibliotheca Patrum. We have already gone through the first twelve centuries,”
To Mr. Hughes.
“September 22, 1722.
“We are settled at Hinckley, which is a populous place, and our number of pupils is considerably increased; but ho-w gladly would I exchange this newcompany for a few days or hours with you. Pardon these. expressions of a fondness which I cannot conceal.
“There are many dissenters in this town, who all treat me with a great deal of resptect. Some of them have natural good sense, but there is little politeness among them, and so one cannot expect -the more elegant entertainment of conversation. I am fixed in a very pretty little chamber, but I do not like it so well as my old garret at Kib worth, because it is more exposed to the noise of the house; and I have no opportunity of reading aloud, nor room to walk about in it. We are now in a great hurry of building, and I have no very delightful prospect; for if I look out at the window, I see nothing but lime and bricks, and sand and timber, the materials of our new meeting-place. And then for music I hear the noise of axes, the din of hammers, and the creaking of saws. I am so much entertained with these soothing sounds, that I could not but mention them; and hope that amidst all this harmony you will pardon a little nonsense.
“I beg that you will not delay writing, if you would not have me believe that you have forgotten the most affectionate of your friends, and the humblest of your servants.”
HIS THEOLOaiCAL STUDIES. 3T
To the same.
“Hinckley, 1722. “I do not know what character my friends may have given you of my sermons, but I am sure, if it be a very advantageous one, it will be my most prudent way to take care not to undeceive you by preaphing before you; for if I may be permitted to be any judge of my own performances, they will by no means answer your expectations. They are all upon the plainest and most practical subjects; and it is happy if they be at all calculated, as I am sure they were principally intended, to inform the judgment and awaken the consciences of the people, and to fix their resolution for a course of rational, steady, and indispensable piety. It is not because I despise the charms of eloquence, that I ha,ve entirely laid them aside, but because I know that I am not at all master of them, and so choose rather not to attempt them, than by an awkward imitation to darken the subject to the plainer part of an audience, without approving myself to the nicer judgment of the more’ polite. In short, I am grown very familiar with the old Puritans, and consequently I am a great favorite with the old women! Pray congratulate me on this good fortune, which is entirely beyond my expectation and my hope.”
To the Rev. Samuel Clarke.
“December 1, 1722.
“Mr. Jennings’ pupils never preach anywhere
out of the verge of their own congregation, till they
have been examined by a committee of the neighbor
ing ministers, who are chosen for that purpose at a
general county meeting. The time of this examination’s in the pupils’ choice. Now I leave it to your determination whether I shall be examined immediately after Christmas, or defer it to the last month of my course. Mr. Jennings is for hastening it, because he thinks, by preaching abroad, I may get a better acquaintance in the neighborhood. Kibworth is not yet provided with a minister, and they are pretty urgent for occasional supplies from our house. And then he thinks riding will be good for my health. I am sure there is at least one considerable objection to these arguments, and that is, that I have neither great-coat, boots, spurs, nor whip, nor so much as a Bible big enough to hold my notes; and so I am but poorly equipped for an itinerant preacher.
“I should be glad to hear in your next, how you intend to dispose of me after I have finished my course here: whether I am to spend a few months more with Mr. Jennings, or may hope to have my education carried on at some other place; whether, if neither of these plans can be brought about, I am to be fixed in a private family, and preach now and then, or am likely to be more constantly engaged. I should be very well pleased with any of the former, but have no inclination for the last, if it can conveniently be avoided.
“I do not know that I have ever been more frugal in my expenses, since I came to Mr. Jennings’, than I have been of late, and yet I have been forced, to take four guineas since the date of my last. One half guinea was spent in articles of dress, and the greatest part of another in necessary journeys; one to Leicester, to take the oaths and subscribe the articles * which cost me sis. shillings, and another to Mount Sorrel tb a meeting of ministers.
“I have made two theological theses — one about original sin, and the other on the worship of Christ and four more sermons: one on maintaining continual communion with God, Psa. 73:23; two on the omniscience of God, from Prov. 15:3; 1 Cor. 2:9; and the last on a regard to the invisible world, from 2 Cor. 4:18. The people were, generally speaking, calm and attentive; not bigoted to any particular subjects or phases, but heartily pleased, with the assurance of honesty and seriousness; and it is principally owing to this, that these plain, artless discourses have met with much better acceptance than I could have expected.
“Long lectures, disputations, and sermons do not leave us much spare time; but most of that which remains is spent in the Scriptures, and practical divinity, and some volumes of Boyle’s Lectures in vindication of revealed religion. The classics, the Spectator, essays, poems, and travels serve for the entertainment of our idle hours. I ask your pardon for detaining you so long, but I write the more at large that,! may not trouble you so often.”
to Miss Clarke.
“January 5, 1723.
“All my present happiness is treasured up in my
friends; and for that very reason, you cannot im-
* A legal qualification, .without which a non-conformist could not then preach in safety. agine how- frequently they discompose me. I feel their afflictions more than my own, and am tormented with a thousand imaginary fears upon their account, which my fondness, and not my reason, suggests. Every thing that looks like a slight or a neglect from them touches. me to the quick; and while I imagine they are out of humor, I am so far from being cheerful, that I can hardly be good-natured.
“And now, if the inordinatfe love of the most excellent creatures has so many fatal consequences, how just your reflections: If our souls are formed for live, let us learn to place our supreme affection upon our Creator; ior it is that alone which can afford us lasting satisfaction. And certainly, if we could persuade ourselves to love the blessed God as we ought, the happiness of this life, as well as the hope of the next, would be fixed ilpon the most solid basis; we should have all the transports of unbounded passion without any of its anguish and perturbation. He has no sorrow to be condoled, po unkindness to besuspected,Sio change to be feared. The united powers of the creation cannot give him one moment’s uneasiness, nor separate us one moment from his presence and his favor; but the dear object of our wishes and our hopes would be for ever happy, and for ever our own. We may converse with him in the most intimate and endearing manner, in every place and in every circumstance of life. Every affliction would then be light, and every duty would be easy. How ardently should we embrace every opportunity of doing something to testify our respect and aifection for him; and what a relish would it give to every common enjoyment of life to consider that it came from his hand, and that he sent it as a token of his love, and as the pledge of something infinitely more valuable. Death itself would he unspeakably desirable when we could consider it in this view — but as retiring with the best of our friends into a nobler apartment, to spend an eternity in his delightful presence, without the least interval of sorrow, absence, or indifference. It is a happy condition; but, alas, when shall we arrive at it? I have often thought that affectionate tempers, like yours and mine, are well turned for the most elevated devotion. But we cannot expect it, at least for any continuance, till we have regulated and subdued every meaner passion.
“I heartily join with you in lamenting the divisions of the London ministers, and beg that G-o’d would pour out a better spirit upon them, a spirit of lovfi and a sound mind — orthodoxy of temper, as well as orthodoxy of belief.”
To his Sister, Mrs. -Nettleton.
“January 26, 1723. “I really want company. This looks like a strange complaint in such a family as ours. But I will assure you that it is not without reason. Mrs. Jennings [with whom he boarded] is either busy or tired; and as for my fellow-pupils, some of them have but a moderate share of common-sense; some of them are of a very unhappy natural temper, and most of them are perfect strangers to every thing that looks like goodbreeding and politeness; so that,
42 PHILIP DeDDRIDGB.
though I keep upon very civil terms with all, I am intimate with nobody but Mrs. Jennings.
“I am to be examined to-morrow by a cojnmittee of ministers chosen for that -purpose at the general meeting. I know the temper of the men, and the nature of the thing so well, that I have no uneasy apprehensions about it.”
The above extract suggests an incident well related by Mr. Stoughton, who observes that in Doddridge, “unaffected courtesy was blended with literary refinement, and the poor student could hardly be mistaken for any thing but what he was, the polished gentleman. Overtaken one day by bad weather at Newport Pagnell, he called at the house of Mr. Hunt, the pastor of the Dissenting church there, when his son, struck with the interesting appearance and bland manners of the visitor, offered him the loan of a great-coat. Mrs. JIunt, good careful soul, questioned the wisdom of putting such generous confidence in an unaccredited stranger; but the son, who could read character better than the mother, replied, “I am. sure he is a gentleman and a scholar.” The answer was overheard by Doddridge, and he never forgot, this expression of his new friend’s trustfulness, and this reward of his owji courteous demeanor. An intimacy sprung up between him and young Hunt, who succeeded his father in the ministry of Newport. The town became a place of interest to Doddridge, and after he attained to celebrity, an opportunity offered for showing a practical concern for the welfare of the church. The meeting-house having been erected on an estate which was the property of one of the principal people in the congregation, no conveyance of the ground on which it stood had ever been made to proper trustees, and the owner of the estate becoming a bankrupt, it was seized by the creditors; this was in 1740. Dr. Doddridge then generously came forward and purchased the meeting-place of them, and conveyed it to proper trustees, and by his zeal and influence the money was soon raised.”
The subject of another portion of the last letter is more fully unfolded in the following one:
To the Rev. Samuel Clarke.
“January 28, 1723.
“I am very much obliged to you for the tender concern you express for me, and the excellent and seasonable advice which you give me. May I always so digest and retain it as ever to carry about with me an humble sense of my own insufficiency, a cheerful dependence upon the assistance of divine grace, and an affectionate concern for the glory of my Redeemer, and the happiness of my fellow-creatures. It is true that my good tutor, whom I shall always respect as one of my best friends, is always ready to give me such cautions and admonitions as he thinks necessary; -and he has that happy art, which -so few besides Mr. Jennings and Mr. Clarke possess, of giving the plainest and most sincere advice with all the good-nature and decorum that one could desire or imagine. However, sir, I hope you will not write the seldomer on that account. You may sometimes fall into reflections which I have not heard from him; and when it
U PHILIP DODDRIDGE.
happens otherwise, it will be a pleasure and an advantage to me to observe how exactly you concur in sentiment.
“One reason for my answering your letter soonei*, perhaps, than I should otherwise have done, is to transmit to you the following bill, which I received from Mr. Jennings presently after Christmas: ‘To ■Christmas, 1722, half-a-year’s board and tuition, eight pounds,, ten shillings; ‘Spanheim’s Elenchus,’ five shillings and thr«e pence; exchange of a Hebrew Bible, four shillings and sixpence; ‘Dupin’s Ecclesiastical History,’ ten shillings and sixpence; for a gown, one pound, fourteen shillings, and twopence; in money, three pounds, three shillings, and fivepence, payable to Mr. Clarke of London.’ The books are such as we read in our course; and which Mr. Jennings thought proper to provide for us himself. My old Hebrew Bible was in a very sad condition, as it had been used as a school-book before it came into my hands. In some places it was hardly legible, and therefore I dare say you will not blame my parting with it. My gown had lasted me two years, and had been” turned and mended several times, and was at first bu;t an ordinary calimanco of eighteen pence a yard, so that it was very necessary to have another. I am not aware of any considerable expense that could have been retrenched. I have always endeavored to avoid every thing that looks like extravagance; and you may depend upon it, shall continue to do so. I shall be obliged to be pretty often abroad this half-year; but I have some friends in the congregation who will sometimes accommodate me with their horses, and I hope that most of my journeys will pay their own charges.
“Last Thursday my class-fellow Mr. Some and I were examined by his father, Mr. Bridgen, and^Mr. Norris, three neighboring ministers, remarkable for their affability, candor, and Catholicism; as well as their learning and good-sense. They were pleased to declare themselves thoroughly satisfied; and we are to receive a certificate of approbation and recommendation from all the ministers of the county next general meeting. In the riiean time we take our turns with two more for the supply of Kilworth.”
The habit of strict and conscientious economy, which we learn from these and numerous other letters was practised by Doddridge while dependent on the liberality of his generous patron, is deserving of notice and of commendation, and is worthy of being imitated by all in similar circumstances. It was not connected, however, either now or subsequently, with penuriousness.. He was accustomed, years before, to ‘divide with the poor peasantry, among whom his walks were taken, the little sums on hand, which others would probably have regarded it as a duty to expend upon their own increased comfort.
It may be also remarked that the gown worn by the non-conformist ministers at that day was often of a dark blue’’ color, in imitation of the color of the cloak used at Geneva — that famous asylum of the reformers, and gtrong-hold of the Protestant faith in the days of Calvin and afterwards. We are told that one of the family pictures represents Dr. Doddridge as wearing a gown of this sort, and a flowing wig. Let us here, once for all, encourage and instruct the poor student of our own day, by copying a few lines from the excellent widow of Doddridge, when writing to Orton his biographer, while preparing his memoir: “Some spice too, you will find I have sent, of his exact manner of keeping his accounts; to which permit me to add, that I have often heard him say that, fluring the years he was at school, and afterwards as pupil, he never contracted any debts, and though his income was small, he never wanted money, but at the close of every year had always some cash in hand — that he always made it a rule to content himself with the table kept for the family, and never spent any money either in wine or tea, or any other unnecessary expense.”
From the Rev. Samuel Clarke,
“St. Albans, 1723.
“Whatever acceptance you meet with as’ a preacher, I trust you will consider as an argument to en- ’ courage your endeavors after a still greater improvement of your talents.
“One thing that young ministers have particular reason to study is humility. Many are their temptations to vanity; especially if they have the. advantages of superior ability and acceptance. ‘Indulgence in this weakness will be a bar to the divine influence, for God resisteth the proud, but gives more and more grace to the humble. It also lessens a man very much in the eyes of judicious persons, wjio, whatever artful methods are taken, will still be able to diseern and despise it. It ordinarily also takes off from the vigor of a man’s ^ndeavors to make further advanV;es
mS THEOLOGICAL STUDIES. 43
to improve himself. It is good, therefore, to have our eyes very much upon our own defects, and to think how much we fall short of those excellent patterns which we should be always proposing for our imitation. Let us not value ourselves upon, nor be much concerned about, the opinions of men; but labor above all things for the divine approbation.
“It is also of great importance, in all our ministerial performances, to have continually in view one. great end, which is the advancement of the interests of religion, and the salvation of souls; and not only in the general, but in every particular ministration to awaken in our minds a very sensible concern about these matters.
“I continue to recommend you and your studies to the divine blessing; and heartily pray you may have the honor to 1)0 employed by our great Lord and Master considerably to advance his kingdom in the world; to see which will be an abundant recompense for whatever trouble I have been at ‘on your account.”
To Miss .Hannah Clarke.
“April 27, 1723.
“I have lately xeceived an invitation to settle at Kibworth, and Mr. Clarke has given his consent; but some things have since occurred that considerably perplex, and will at least retard the affair. I am at present in a very uneasj agitation of mind; and earnestly beg you, as a dear and Christian friend, to join me in prayer to that God who is the author of every good and perfect gift, that he would give me wisdom to direct my way, and providentially bring the affair to such an issue as may be most for his glory, and my improvement and usefulness.”
From Rev. Samuel Clarke.
“St. Albans, May 11, 1723.” I have received yours, in which you give me an account of the prospect you have of an invitation to settle at Coventry. The acceptance Providence favors you with, makes it necessary that you should be very much upon your guard against ebullitions of pride and vainglory, which are so natural to us all, and especially when we first come abroad into the world with advantage. Humility is the best ornament to valuabk gifts. The shade it casts upon them makes them appear the more lovely, and gives them a greater efficacy. Let your heart be full of a sense of those manifold defects which an inward acquaintance with yourself will easily discover. Have often before your eyes the nature and importance of the work you are engaged in, and the account you have to give, and you will then always find reason to say from your heart, with the blessed apostle, “Who is sufficient for these things?”
To the Rev. Samuel Olarke.
“May 25,1723. “I heartily thank you, good sir, for the excellent advice you give me relating to humility; and I must be extremely unacquainted with my own heart, if I thought I did not nCBd it. I am fully convinced in my own judgment, that popularity is in itself a very mean, as well as an uncertain thing; and that it is only valuable as it gives us an opportunity to act for God with greater advantage; and yet’ I find, by the little I have tasted, that it is. of an intoxicating natui-e. I desire not to be solicitous about it, and hope I can honestly say, that when I think I have been instrumental in making or promoting good impressions upon. the hearts of some of my hearers, it gives me a much nobler and more lasting satisfaction tha,n I ever had. in the approbation with which my plain discourses have sometimes been received.
“And now, sir, I cannot but refleeti as I very frequently do, that, under God, I owe this pleasure to the goodness of my friends, and to. your generosity and kindness. If God had not wonderfully provided for me by your means, instead of this honoralale and delightful employment which I am now entering upon, and which I should from my heart choose before any other in the world, I should in all probability have been tied down to some dull formal duties, in which I should not have had any of these advantages for improving my mind, or so comfortable a prospect for usefulness now and happiness hereafter. The only return I can make for- all this goodness, is my thanks and my prayers. You have certainly the greatest claim to them; and I hope, sir, you will continue to remember me in yours.”
To Miss Clarke.
“July 15, 1723.
“Great revolutions have happened in my little affairs since I wrote to you. On the first of June I removed from Hinckley, and am come to a little village in the neighborhood of Kibworth, where I am settled, and have laid aside all thoughts of going to Coventry, though I have been much solicited to do so
Doddridge. u since my coming hither. My settlemefit here is, on some accounts, pleasant, but on others, disagi:eeable enough.
“You know I love a country life, and here we have it in perfection. I am roused in the morning by the chirping of sparrows,- the cooing of pigeons, the lowing of kine, the bleating of sheep; and the neighing of horses. “We have a mighty pleasant garden and orchard, and a fine arbor under some tall shady limes, that form a kind of lofty dome, of which, as a native of the great city, you may perhaps catch a glimmering idea, if I name the cupola of St* Paul’s, And then on the other side of the house there is a large space which we call the wilderness, and which, I fancy, would please you extremely. The ground is a dainty green sward; a brook runs sparkling through the middle, and there are two large fish-ponds at one end. Both the ponds and the brook are surrounded with willows; and there are several shady walks under the trees, besides little knots of young willows interspersed at convenient distances. This is the nursery of our lambs and calves, with whom I have the honor to be intimately acquainted. Here I generally spend the evening, and pay, my respects to the setting sun, when the variety and beauty of the prospect inspire a pleasure which I know not how to express. I am sometimes so transported with these inanimate beauties, that I fancy that I am like Adam in Paradise and it is my only misfortune that I have none but the birds of the air and the beasts of the field for my companions. 1 am very frequently alone twenty-one hours in the twenty-four; and sometimes breakfast, dine, and suit Ijy myself. I cannot say that this hermit life, as multitudes would call it, is very agreeable to my natural temper, which inclines me to society. I am therefore necessarily obliged to study hard; and if it were not for that resource, my life would be a burden.”
To his Sister, Mrs.’ Nettleton.
“Stretton, August 25, 1723.
“I am now settled to my business; and while I am engaged, am easy enough; but at other times, am like a fish out of water. I have had so much good company at London and St. Albans, and especially at Hampstead, that I hardly know how to bear up under the loss of it; and the solitude to which I am condemned is a thousand times more disagreeable than it was a few weeks ago.
“I do not know how to express my concern for the ill state of your health. I am really sometimes afraid, and I speak it with a very sad heart, that I shall never see you any more; and God knows that, if I lose you, I lose the dearest friend I have in the world. 1 leave you, and all my other concerns, in the hands of that God -who will certainly do. that which is -best for us both; but I assure you, that if my prayers, and the prayers of a- great many excellent friends hereabout, can keep you a few years longer out of heaven, you will not be there very soon.”
To VLi. David Some. [Occasioned by the death, of his broftier Thomas.]
“October 22, 1723.” Dbab Sie — ^I -thought it would not be convenient to speak to you at Harborough, or to wait on you at Bowden, so soon after I came from Mount Sorrel, and therefore I take this way of assuring you that I sincerely condole with you upon that melancholy providence which you and your good family are now mourning under. Those transports of grief which you could not conceal when I saw you last, as well as the greatness of your loss, and the known tenderness of your temper, persuade me that it is not at all unseasonable to give you a caution against that excess of sorrow which too frequently prevails in the best of men,- when, like you, they are weeping over the dust of a dear relative and an amiable friend.
“I know, sir, that your own reason and good sense, and especially those religious principles which through the grace of God so apparently prevail in your mind, will furnish you with the noblest supports upon such an occasion, and therefore it is not needful, that I should particularly remind you of their importance. I only desire that you would turn your thoughts that vray, and instead of fixing them upon the aggravating circumstances of- your affliction, would lay your bosom open to those strong consolations which reason and grace are so ready to administer; otherwise, besides a great many other inconveniences that would attend their neglect, you may seem to overlook those comforts which God has still continued to you, especially in the lives of those excellent parents, whereas both mine were removed many years before I came to your age.
“Consider, jny dear brother, that you have an interest in an almighty Friend, a friend whom you can never lose, but who will stand by you and support you when all earthly comforts forsake you; and consider that you are hastening to a glorious and happy world, where you will meet with this lamented brother again, and for ever converse with him upon. terms of much greater advantage. When your heart is warmed with such reflections as these, you will see the highest reason to acquiesce in the divine determination, and to bless God for his compassion and goodness in providing such rich and reviving cordials for his mourning and afflicted children.
“Instead of indulging immoderate sorrow, let us be careful to learn those useful instructions which such an awful providence ia designed to teach. Let us learn not to amuse ourselves with the fond expectation of any certain happiness in this lower world, since God can so suddenly remove the dearest of our enjoyments, or even in a moment change our own countenance and send us away; for in that day all such thoughts will immediately perish. Let us rather be forming great and generous designs for the glory of God and the good of the world around us; and then, if Providence should see fit to remove us while we are young, our honest intentions shall be kindly rewarded, though we had not an opportunity of putting them into execution.
“As we see that neither youth, nor health, nor courage, nor the promise of the most extensive usefulness, could be any security to our deceased friend, let us be holding ourselves in a constant readiness for that important change, which may so soon surprise us; and let us with the utmost vigor and application be doing the work of Him who sent us into the world, while it is day, before the night comes, and darkness overtakes us, in which no man can work.
“P. S. Give me leave, good sir, to recommend to you an experiment which I have often tried myself, namely, to read over 1 Cor. 15:12-58. Consider, as you go along, that it is as certainly the word of the God of truth, as if it were pronounced by a voice from heaven, and apply this glorious promise of. a glorious resurrection to your brother and yourself; and I believe it will have a happy tendency to compose your mind, and awaken hope and joy. I was so impressed with it, when I heard it read over your poor brother’s grave, that really I could only weep that I was left behind. 2 Cor. 5:1-9, and 1 Thess. 4:13-18, are also very proper to be consulted upon such an occasion, and in the same view. My most humble respects to your good father and mother, upon whom I intend shortly to wait, at Bowden.”
No the S.ey. Samuel Glke..
“Btjeton, Oct. ,22, 1724. “I have at present a great deal of time for study, which I rejoice in as a great happiness. I have books enough to furnish me constantly with agreeable employment. At present my thoughts are principally taken up with divinity and the study of the Scriptures. I am going on with Mr. Baxter’s works, which r cannot sufficiently admire. I have been looking over his ‘Reasons for the Christian Religion,’ and I find a great many 6urious and important thoughts, which have not occurred to me in any of the Boylean Lectures which I have seen. I am now reading ‘Pearson on the Creed,’ and as I go along, compare it with Barrow, article by article, ^fter I have despatched these works, I intend to read ‘Burnet on the Thirty-nine Articles,’ which I have hitherto only consulted occasionally. As I consider the books I am .now reading very valuable, T go over them with a great deal of care and attention; take extracts of all the most curious passages, and compare them with Mr. Jennings’ theological lectures, that they may be ready for use, as I have occasion.
“I have now before me another business, which takes up not a little of my time. I am drawing up, but only for my own use, a sort of analytical scheme of the contents of the epistles of the New Testament. I have already gone through the Romans, and the greatest payt of the first of Corinthians. I hope I now understand the connection of these parts of St. Paul’s writings a great deal better than I did before. But I am afraid I have frequently been mistaken, having often been embarrassed by the different views in which the same passage may be considered, There are indeed a great many difficulties which I have not yet been able to make my way through, at least to my own satisfaction; and where I have clearly seen the intended argument, I have found such objections against its validity as have been very perplexing, and will require a fuller examination, and about w;hich I shall be desirous ,of your thoughts. Upon the whole, I am ready to hope that this scheme, defective as it is, may be of some service to me, especially in helping me to open the connection of any particular view which I may have occasion to discourse from, without the trouble of a long previous examination. My plan is, to take in the sense of every clause; and so, as the thoughts lie thick, and the connection is very obscure, the contents are frequently as large as the chapter. I intend to contract them at last, and to form a second scheme, which will indeed be a kind qf skeleton, where I shall omit all illustrations, digressions, transitions, devotional reflections, and practical quotati6ns; and only exhibit in a very few words the propositions and proofs of the argumentative part of these writers. As I go along I make use of those four commentators which I have. I find Locke of far greater service to me than any of the rest. I own I cannot fall in with his exposition of many particular iexts; but I have very little to except against his general scheme, and his division of the matter, which seems to me to throw an additional light upon the whole.”
It is worthy of remark that we here discover the origin or basis of that great work, the “Family Expositor,” upon which more than twenty years were subsequently expended, in connection with other duties.
Scarcely had Doddridge entered on his regular ministerial duties at Kibworth, before pressing invitations were addressed to him to visit other much larger and wealthier churches, as a candidate for the pastorate. Congregations in the city of Coventry, at Pershore in “Worcestershire, and in London, all strove to obtain’ his labors, and many temptations of various kinds might have allured him away, had not a strong sense of duty compelled his continuance with his small and poor flock. Hife answer to all of thein was substantially the same: he was but in his twenty-second year, his mental furniture was comparafively small, and he needed much study and experience to prepare him for situations of so much importance and magnitude.
To his Brother, the Rev. John Nettleton.
“BuBTON, Dec. 8, 1724. “I received yours and my sister’s of November the 7th, with abundant satisfaction. The very superscription revived me, as it gave me ocular assurance that you were still in the land of the living; a fact of which I began to be in some doubt. I heartily accept your - apology, as I know both you and her too well to mistake your silence for unkindness. My temper does not incline me to uneasy suspicions, nor, will the agreeable and friendly manner with which you have always treated me, leave any room for them.
“I find it most useful to join reading and reflection, and would not entirely depend either on myself or others. I find there are many in the world who make a consider-able figure, not only as preachers, but as. writers, who subsist entirely upon transcribing other men’s thoughts. This is a degree of humility to which I have not yet attained. In short, I consider books as a food we ordinary sort of animals cannot live without; and yet we may possibly be overcharged, if we cram ourselves with more than we can digest. I have a pretty keen appetite, and would rather take up with any than with none; and yet, as I have a great variety at command, I am pretty nice in point of choice. I have lately been reading ‘Barrow’s Works,’ and ‘Pearson upon the Creed,’ which I have studied with great care. I have now before me ‘Burnet on the Articles,’ in which I meet with vefj agreeable entertainment.
“Baxter is my particular favorite. It is impossible to tell you how much I am charmed with the devotion, good sense, and pathos which are everywhere to be found in that writer. I cannot, indeed, forbear looking upon him as one of the greatest orators that our nation ever produced, alike with regard to copiousness, acuteness, and energy; and if he has described the temper of his own heart, he appears to have been so far superior to the generality of those whom we must charitably hope to be good men, that one would imagine God had iraised him up to disgrace and condemn his brethren, by showing what a Christian is, and how few in the world deserve the character.”
It is pleasant to see here how Doddridge had improved in his piety and theology during the three years which had elapsed since he wrote, “In practical divinity, Tillotson is my principal favorite, and next to him Barrow and Scott. We have some of Goodwin’s works in the library, and some of the great Dr. Owen’s; but you know I am not very fond of such mysterious men.”
In addition to the general rules of conduct which Mr. Doddridge had prescribed to himself at an earlier period, the following rules were laid down by him in regard to his ministerial duties at Kibworth:
“1. I will spend some extraordinary time in private devotion every Lord’s day, morning or evening, as opportunity may offer, and will then endeavor to preach over to my own soul that doctrine which I preach to others.
“2. I will take every second evening in the week, in which I will spend half an hour in devotional exercises on such subjects relative to the congregation as I think most suitable on that occasion,
“3. At the qlose of every week and month, I will spend some time in its review, that I may see how time has been improved, innocence secured, duties discharged, and whether I advance or lose ground in religion.
“4. When I have an affair of more than ordinary importance before me, or meet with any remarkable occurrence, either merciful or afQictive, I will set apart some tim& for contemplation and to seek God upon it.
“5. I will more particularly devote some time every Friday to seek God, on aCcpunt of those who ’ recommend themselves to my prayers, and to pray for the public welfare.
“6. In all the duties of -the oratory,.! will endeavor to maintain a serious and affectionate temper.
“I am sensible that I have a heart which will incline me to depart from God. May his Spirit strengthen and sanctify it, so that I may find him in such seasons of retirement, and that my heavenly Father may accept me here, and at length openly reward me through Jesus Christ. Amen.”
To his Sister, Mrs. Nettleton.
“Burton, February 17, 1?2.5. “I would not put you to so much confusion as would probably arise from the mention of the wordSi. brother and sister, which might perhaps -lead your thoughts to recollect a sort of distant relationship between us, that I once thought myself exceedingly Kappy in possessing. I therefore take the liberty -humbly to insinuate that a few lines from your fair hand in answer to two quarto pages which I sent you about a quarter of a year ago, would be exceedingly agreeable to
“Your most obedient servant,
To his Brother, the Rev. John Nettleton.
“BuKTON, Augttst 5, 1726. “I continue to spend an hour a day on Baxter, whom I admire more and more. And I spend another on Homer, which I read in the original, with Pope’s translation and notes. I have as yet read only to the end of the eighth Iliad; but, as far as I can judge, this is one of the finest translations in the English language, and what is very extrao’rdinary, it appears to th§ best advantage when compared with the original. I’liave read both carefully so far, and written remarks as I went along; and I think I can prove that where Pope has Omitted one beauty, he has added or improved four.”
The teev. Job Orton, Doddridge’s first and principal biographer, states that his remarks on Homer were sufficient to form a considerable volume.
“We seldom read the lives of distinguished servants of God without being impressed with the divine goodness in preserving them from death in seasons of imminent danger. Doddridge furnished no exception to this remark. In 1725 he had paid a visit to his sister in the neighborhood of London, and on his return, under the date of September 22, he wrote to her, describing the dangers in -vrhich he had been placed, and his remarkable deliverance. After telling her of# his being one afternoon thrown twice over the head of his horse, he goes on to say, “As we were going, on Thursday morning, from Newport’ to Bedford, I escaped a much greater danger, and desire to acknowledge it with hearty thanks to the care of Providence which preserved me in it. We were coming along in a narrow lane, and met with I know not how many wagons of coals. I was aware of the difficulty and endeavored to guard against it; but my horse being a little frighted at the ditch on one side, started and came too near the wagons on the other. There was a sudden turn in the road which I did not observe, which just at the time threw thq wagon on towards me, so that my foot was caught in one of the wheels and whirled round with it for a part of its course, and the other came so near me after. was entangled that all the lower part of my right side and my horse’s shoulder were covered with its dirt; and yet, through the goodness of God, I got not the least harm, not so much as a strain or bruise.”
To the Rev. Samuel Clarke.
“HAEBOEO0GH, June 11, 1726. “I generally spend two hours a day in the classics, one in Greek and the other in Latin. I have lately been reading some of the ‘Orations of Demosthenes,’ which gave me very agreeable entertainment. ‘Virgil’s neid’ charms me more than it ever did before I am wonderfully taken with the ease and elegance of ‘Pliny’s Epistles, and with, the description he gives of his own, temper and behavior, which seems to me very amiable and instructive. There are indeed some admirable epistles in the Latin, which one can hardly bear to read in English; for though thfi thoughts are retained, and the translation is sometimes almo.st literal, an” affectation of humor and drollery makes many passages mean and nauseous, which, in Pliny, are exceedingly pleasant, and yet perfectly elegant and genteel. I think this observation may be applied to most of the English translations of the comedies, especially to those from Terence.
“My very humble service waits upon your good lady. Pray assure her that there is no one woman in the world that can destroy my esteem for her sex, while she, and so many others whom I have the happiness of being acquainted with, are doing so much to establish and increase it. I am exceedingly obliged, sir, for the favor of your invitation to St. Albans. I’ am sure I do not want inclination to comply with it, but I am. chained down to the care of twa congregations which are for a while fallen into my hands, so that I hardly know whether I shall be able to break loose for one Lord’s day this summer. However, you may depend upon it that I will attempt it, if it be possible.”
To the Rev. Nathaniel Wood, D. D.
“June 11,1726. “Pray’ remember Philip Doddridge, or he will do his best to forget you.”
To Mr. Hughes.
“June 28, 1726. Midnight.” As for yours of the 30th of April, I have run it over so often that I can say a good deal of it by heart. I am essentially obliged -to you for your correspondence. You know that I am naturally of a social temper, and you continue, in the abundance of your humanity, not only to give me pleasure in perusing your letters myself, but enable me to entertain my friends by communicating them; for I read the greater part of th’em to all the persons of taste-and politeness with whom I am conversant, and they all seem to be charmed with the sentiments. Indeed, though they become perfectly familiar to me, I always read them with new pleasure, and am as much transported with the twentieth rehearsal as I am at the first perusal.
“You recommended Pliny. I immediately procured him, and there is seldom a day in which I do not read two or three of his epistles. I had before heard several very high encomiums upon him, but nothing gave me so lively an idea of his excellence as to obseirve the perfection to which you have arrived by studying him, for every letter of yours is a panegyric upon Pliny, tho;ugh you do not mention his name. Let me entreat you to go on thus to recommend him, and to increase those pleasing expectations with which I take him into my hand. However, take care you do not so far exceed him as to spoil my relish, for then you would rob me of one of the most elegant amusements of my life; nor can I imagyie how you would be able to mke me amends in any other way than by the frequency of your own letters.”
To the Rev. John Nettleton.
“Harboeough, June ‘9, 1726, )
Wednesday morning, 8 o’clock. J
“Deae Brother — ^I was up at five o’clock this morning, and I have been all this while studying the connection of a short section in the Romans and writing letters.. Nay, at this very moment Demosthenes is waiting to entertain me with one of his Philippics, and Virgil is bringing back .^neas to his camp, where I have long been waiting in pain for his absence. Dr. Tillotson has also prepared an admirable sermon, which he will quickly deliver in my chamber with his usual grace and sweetness. And then Gerard Brant will go on with his history of the Persecution of the Remonstrants, after their condemnation at the Synod of Dort. In the afternoon I expect to hear from Pliny, who generally favors me with two or three? epistles in a day, though a stranger and a heathen; while you, a Christian fninister and my brother, will hardly write once in a quarter of a year. Dr. Potter is instructing me in ‘Grecian Antiquities;’ but^I fear I shall hardly have time to speak with him to-day. However, I will, if possible, attend upon my tutor Cradock in the morning, who is lecturing on the epistles with great accuracy and solidity. Besides this, I have a little kind of a sermon to preach in the family, accordipg to my daily custom, and three or four letters to transcribe into shorthand.
“Now I will leave you, who are one of the greatest clerks I know, to judge whether all this business will leave me time to say any more than, How does my dear sister? Give my service to her.”
To the Key. Samuel Clarke.
“September -20, 1726. “Just as I -was writing this, good Mrs. Jennings came into my study. I know not what trifling occasion brought her hither, but I am sure it was a happy accident for me. I have now, for half an hour, been entertained with as much piety and good sense, and expressions of generous, undiseembled friendship, as could be crowded into so little time. She told me — what I am so much charmed with that I cannot conceal it from you, nor could I hear it, nor indeed can I write it, without tears — that she’ is ’ relying on my conversation and friendship as one of the greatest pleasures, of her life, and that she is often blessing God for the kind providence that brought me into her family.’ Do not- impute it to any vanity that I repeat this language, for I really think such a feeling has no part in the matter. She indeed thinks more favor&,bly of me by far than I deserve; but that mistake is my happiness. You, sir, that are blessed in the enjoyment of Mrs. Clarke, know the exquisite pleasure “of being esteemed by a woman of an amiable character; and as I rejoice that you have such a wife, so I am willing that you should take part in the satisfaction I have in the society of such a friend. With how much pleasure do I think that Providence has favored me with an opportunity of serving her in those interests which above all others are dear to her, the instruction of her children and her spiritual edification. As I question not that you are often praying for me, so I beg you would join with me in returning .thanks to that God -who has made such a gracious and indulgent provision for my happiness.
“While I am above in my study, I find such entertainment in my books that I think I should be happy though I lived in a wilderness, and had no human creature to converse with; and when I come down stairs, I am ready to forget that I have a study, and to think I might daily grow wiser, though evory book but my Bible were in another country. The lines are- indeed fallen to me in pleasant places; and T often think that two such friends as Mrs. Jennings and Mr. Clarke are more than one man can reasonably expect, and I heartily wish that I may be enabled to behave so that neither. you nor she may have reason to repent of that share in your esteem an4 affection with’ which you have honored your most obliged and most affectionate humble servant, To Hi. John Hassey.
“November 20, 1726.
“You urge me to send you some directions upon the mavagement of your studies.
“Let us remember, my dear friend, that we are to place our point of life, not in an attempt to know or do every thing, which will certainly lie as unsuccessful as it is extravagant, but in a care to do that well which Providence has assigned us in our peculiar sphere. As I am a minister, I could not answer it to God or my own conscience, if I were to spend a great deal of time in studying the depths of the law, or in the more enterta,ining though less useful pursuit of a nice- criticism of classical writers. I would not be entirely a stranger to these things, and there are twenty others I would just look into, although each of them alone, or indeed any single branch of either, might be the employment of a much longer life than I can imagine Providence has assigned to me. Should I suffer my few sheep in the wilderness to go astray, in an ignorance of their Bible and, in a stupid neglect of their eternal salvation, while I was too busy to reclaim them, God would call it but laborious idleness, and I must give up my account with shame and confusion.
“The thought, my friend, may be applied, with a very little variation, to you. It is in the capacity of a tradesman that you are to serve your family and country, .and, in them, your God; and therefore, although I would not have so fine a genius discouraged from entertaining itself with the refined pleasures of a student, yet it would be imprudence towards yourself and an injury to the world to- spend so much time in your closet as to neglect your warehouse, and to be so much taken up with volupies of philosophy, history, poetry, or divinity, as to forget to look into your ledger. But above all, sir, let it be your constant concern that study may not interfere with devotion, nor engross that valuable time which should be consecrated to the immediate service of your God. God is the Father of our spirits, and it is upon, this sacred influence that they depend for an improvemeflt in knowledge as well as in holiness. Now if we are abandoned by Him, our genius will flag, and all our thoughts become languid and confused; and it will be in vain that we seek the assistance of books: for when He ceases to act loj them, the most sprightly writers will appear dull; the most perspicuous obscure, and the most judicious trifling j whereas, if we entertain a continual regard to Him in the constant exercise of lively devotion, we shall engage Ms assistance and blessing in our studies, and then our success will quickly appear to ourselves “and to others; the most difficult task will be easy, and we shall dispatch more in an hour than we could otherwise have done in a day.
“But, what is still more desirable, when we are conversing with God we are preparing for that world of light where our capacity will be most gloriously improved; where we shall be surrounded by the wisest and best society, who will be opening daily new scenes of knowledge, and where God will reveal fresh objects by a more direct influence upon our spirits than any which we have hitherto known in our brightest or seren«st moments. Let us he diligent and zealous in the service of mir God, and we shall he excellent scholars a, thousand years hence; while those who have made the greatest improvement in human knowledge, living in the neglect of God, are forgotten, or rather, are consigned to the gloom of everlasting darkness. Let us remember that by every hour which we unduly take from God to give to our books, we forfeit some degree of future happiness, which m%ht have been the reward of that hour had we spent it aright. And when we consider that knowledge is a part of the happiness of heaven, we shall certainly find that, in the long run, we lose a great deal more than we gain by such sacrilegious encroachments, even though ‘our studies should succeed much more prosperously than we have reason to expect.”
To Mi. Greorge Hughes.
“November 2t, 1726. “I begin with petitioning you for a favor, -which I hope to obtain without much difficulty. Nothing can conduce more to our present tranquillity and future happiness than a steady and affectionate belief of a continual force in the principles of natural and revealed religion; and I have found my faith in them “much confirmed by an examination of those p’aris of the subject by which the patrons of infidelity have endeavored to destroy it. An atheist or a deist is a monstrous kind of creature, wiich in the country we only, know by report; but I infer that you gentlemen of the town meet with them too frequently. Now I desire, sir, that if you should hear any of them reflect upon religion in general, or Christianity in particular, as an irrational enthusiasm, you will please inquire into their reasons for such a censure; and if you find any thing new or curious in them, do me the favor to transmit them to me. I shall be glad to pursue the thought as far as I can7 and will most cheerfully submit my reflections to your examination and amendment.
“Besides this, sir, I desire that you would favor me with an account of any book which you think of value, or which bears a character in town; and I, on the other hand, will freely communicate my sentiments as to any that I have an opportunity of perusing. “I have no room to add any thing but my most affectionate wishes and prayers that the divine favor may attend us both in every circumstance of our present and future existence, and that there may be the same security to you as there is to me that the correspondence we are entering into will be managed so as may be most conducive to our mutual entertainment and improvement. ‘We are to answer to Gad for the time we spend in vyriting to each other, as well as in other employments and amusements. May we be able to give up this account with comfort and cheerfulness, as having devoted our common friendship principally to the service of that most indulgent Benefactor to whom we are obliged for all its pleasures.”
To the Rev. Mr. Hughes.
“November 30, 1726.
“I have not time to mention the books I have lately read, and will only tell, you that I have gone over the three volumes of Burnet’s History of the Reformaition with a great deal of care. I likewise read the records at the end, if they seemed to promise any thing curious, and was exceedingly entertained by several. Hardly any thing charmed me more than the letters at the end of the first volume, which passed between the most celebrated reformers in England and at Zurich. You will hardly believe it, but I assure you it is my settled judgment, that JewelL writes with almost as much simplicity, elegance, consistency, and spirit, as Pliny himself; indeed, there seems to be a very remarkable resemblance in their manner.
“I return your sermon, and will reform so much upon your late admonition, as not to say a word by
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way of panegyric.; and it ia a happy rebuke that delivers me from a task to which my capacity is by no means equal. I must, however, add, that when I read it last night, by way of taking my farewell, it kept me awake, as the victories of Miltiades did Themistocles.
“I likewise send’ you my sermon, which I have left Master Arthur Jennings to transcribe from my notes. It was preached in my usual way, and has little to recommend it to your approbation. I send it to you to be examined and corrected, and then returned. If you would see it to the best advantage, let Mr. Wood read it at some leisure hour. He heard it, and oan witness for me that it is just as I delivered it. I have this comfort in sending it to you, that the best judges are always the most candid, and that your friendship will so dazzle your eyes that you will either find or make beauties.”
To the Kev. Samuel Clarke.
“I have lately been reading th& three folios of Burnet’s History of the Reformation in England, with more pleasure than I can express. He appears to be one of the most masterly writers; he always retains a sense of the dignity of his subject, and writes with a majesty worthy of it. He does not study the ornaments of style, but expresses himself with plainness and propriety, and always appears to have a most sincere regard to truth, even when it is least honorable to the character of the bright hero of his history. The third volume is a supplement to the former, and contains many valuable passages. He there corrects all the mistakes which in thirty years he had discov-T2. PHltiP DODDRIDGE.
ered in the former parts, and states them with an air of candor that establishes his character for veracity oil the Surest foundation, and reflects honor on the other parts of his performance, of which it -would, not otherwise be susceptible. The records which he throws into the appendix are admirable testimonials of the truth of his history, and illustrate the circumstances of many facts and characters.
“I have been reading ‘Lucretius ’ with much care. He is indeed, as he is commonly esteemed, a charming poet, but he is a most contemptible philosopher; nor have I yet met with a writer whose descriptions are finer, and whose arguments were meaner. I think he was no fitter to write ‘De Rerum Natura,’ than a fine landscape painter would be to compose a treatise on anatomy. Creech’s. translation’ is so sorrily done, that I should wonder. at the applause it has met with in the world, if I did not know it is a common thing to give a character of a translation without comparing it with the original.
“1 have lately read ‘Howe on the Spirit.’ There are many very useful observations in it. He everywhere breathes a most excellent temper; and I think one may see more of the man, and of his way of preaching by this than by any other of his works which I have yet perused.”
To the Lady Russell.
April 10.
“It grieves me to be the messenger of such news
as will afflict Lady Russell; but Mr. Some wishes me
to inform your ladyship that it has pleased God to
remove my dear friend, his son, in the aftnopn of
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yesterday. He had lain several days in a very comfortable and cheering frame of mind; and a few minutes before his death, expressed a very cheerful hope of future glory. He has appointed me to preach at his funeral, -which -vrill be on Wednesday, from Psalm 73:26, ‘My flesh and my heart fail, but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever;’ a passage vshich he often repeated with great pleasure in the near view of an eternal world.
“To reflect that GrOd is the portion of our friends who are sleeping in death, and that he will be our everlasting portion and inheritance, is certainly the noblest support under such afflictions — a support of which I question not that your ladyship has often felt the importance; and yet, madam, though this consideration may moderate our sorrows, it will not entirely silence or dispel them. For my own part, though I have been in daily .expectation of my friend’s death for several months together, yet rt strikes me more deeply than I can easily express, and gives me for the present a disrelish to all those employments or thoughts which do not immediately relate to that world to which he is gone. Yet, in the midst of my sorrow, it is with pleasure that I reflect on the goodness of God in continuing to- me so many other excellent friends, and among them the good Lady Russell, who is an extensive blessing to the world, and an ornament to that exalted station in which providence has placed her. May mankind be as ready to imitate your character as they are to applaud it, and then I shall hardly be able to wish them any greater good.”
To Mrs. Hannah Clarke.
“April 19, 1727.
“On Lord’s-day evening, as I returned from Kibworth, I called to see a dear and intimate friend, Mr. David Some, who used frequently to accompany me thither, and who had been for a considerable time iij a delirious state, vrhen, to my unspeakable grief, I found him dead. It is impossible for me to express how much it struck my mind. Never have I seen in any person of his age, which was only twenty, such an agreeable mixture of piety, wit, learning, honor, politeness, sweetness of temper, modesty, prudence, universal charity, and the most endearing friendship: in one word, he had every quality that could adorn the Christian, the scholar, or the man. You will then easily believe that he must have been unusually beloved in life and lamented in death.
“What can you then imagine me to have felt, who was of all others, except his parents, his most intimate companion and friend? We were brought up together at Mr. Jepnings’, and in the same class, and we there formed a most endearing friendship, which has been ever since increasing. He ijsed to accompany me to Kibworth on the Lord’s day, and surely he could not receive more advantage from the best of my sermons than I did ever from his conversation on the way. -I could not forbear making repeated visits to the corpse while it yet layunburied; and though, from a bloom and regularity of beauty which I have seldom observed, it has withered to a skeleton, yet I hardly knew how to leave it, but could have dwelt for hours together on those dear cold lips. When I
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followed <|im to the grave, I almost thought I should have shared it with him, for I was nearly strangled in striving to repress those external marks of inward anguish which might seem indecent in one of my sex and character; but all my efforts were vain, and while I was in the church I could not forbear bursting into such a flood of tears as I have never shown upon any other occasion. My spirits were so exhausted with sorrow, that I should have been utterly unfit for social conversation for the rest of the evening: how hard then was my task, when I was obliged to go from his grave into the pulpit, and to preach to one of the most numerous auditories I ever saw. You will be surprised to hear, that while I was preaching I did not shed a tear; yet I think I could have died to restore him to the world,. which has sustained so inexpressible a loss- by his death.”
Among the ministers in the neighborhood of Kibworth with whom Doddridge had already formed a ministerial friendship, was the Rev. Thomas Saunders, who had settled as pastor of the Congregational church at Kettring, in 1721. He was a lineal descendant from the martyr of the same name, who was burnt in the reign of the bloody Mary, and was himself in early life a servant of tiiie Lord Jepus. He labored with much success at Kettring till 1736, when, at the age of forty-two years, he was called to his gracious and eternal reward. We shall often meet with him as the correspondent and counsellor of Doddridge.
To the Rev. Thomas Saunders.
“December 2, 172J.
“How was it possible for you to write such a letter as I received last night? You are always kind and good, and always more partial in favor of my character than any other person I know in the world; and to tell you the plain truth, I would have you continue to be so; for if it were not for that happy partiality, you would hardly think me worthy of your friendship. You can never displease me by expressions of tenderness, for I love you so well that I would have as much of your heart as one creature ought to have of another’s, and I look upon your fond regard as my glory.. But, my dear friend, you must forbeaJ” these expressions of unreasonable esteem.
“I have this morning been humbling myself before God for the pride of my heart. It follows me whithersoever I go: into my study, into the conversation of my friepds, and what is most dreadful of all, into the presence of my Maker — of that God whojs the fountain of all perfection, from whose hands I have received all, and from whom I have deserved an aggravated condemnation. Such is the subtilty of this insinuating mischief, that I can recollect instances in which I have been proud of having exposed the deformity of pride with success, while perhaps it was only another instance of my degeneracy to imagine that I had so succeeded, Why then must your complaisance add fuel to a fire which I sometimes fear .will burn up all my grace and my religion? How hard is it to keep self in self-subjection. This you
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have taught me as well as man can teach it, but God alone can make the excellent lesson effectual. I can not lay a scheme for the honor of my God and the benefit of the world, but self intrudes itself, and tht sometimes to such a degree as to make me doubt whether the governing principle be not wrong, and whether many of my most valuable actions and designs be not spkndida peccata. Alas,, such is your.’ pious and excellent ’ friend.
“You compliment me on the learning and accuracy of my views. How are you deceived 1 I have hardly looked’ into many of the most excellent treatises of the ancient and modern commentators, and have only dipped into some others so far as to see that there was a great deal that I waiP not capable of comprehending, at least without a long course of preparatory study. There is hardly a chapter in the Bible which - does not puzzle me, nor, in short, any considerable subject of human inquiry in which I do not perceive both my ignorance and my weakness.
“Were there any thing which could seem a just excuse for my vanity, it would indeed be, that you and some other such excellent persons profess not only to love, but to respect me; but I am persuaded, nay, I certainly know it is only because a great portion of my ignorance and folly lies hid; otherwise you would all but pity or despise me. And when I consider your humility in admitting me to such an intimate friendship, and in thinking so honorably of me, I see the greater reason to be abashed at the reflection that I have learned no more of that amiable grace, with sa,» bright an example before me, and in one whom I love
SO well that it might be expected that I should imitate him with a peculiar pleasure.
“Let me beg your pity and your prayers; love me as well as you can, but pray that I may deserve your affection better.”
From the Kev. Samuel Clarke.
“December 18,1727. “As to th proposal of your teaching academical learning, though I doubt not that the furniture you now have, together with what you might acquire in a few years of continued study, would abundantly qualify you to undertake it, yet as God has given you a genius and abilities peculiarly fitted for the pulpit, it seems most desirable that you should be in a situation where those talents may %e improved and employed io the greatest advantage, and which would, in all probability, be rattier obscured by the other course of life. If therefore Providence should open a way for your settling in London, or any other considerable town, I think it should not be Rejected for the sake of any views of the other sort.”
To Miss Horseman.
“December 20,. 1727.
“I have just received the melancholy news of your accident, and the sad consequences with which it has been attended; and indeed I cannot set myself to any other business until I have taken a few minutes to tell yon how sehsibly 1 aympathize in your sorrows.
“I knew that my friendship for you was both sincere and tender, but I was not fully apprized of its degree, until it pleased God to visit you with the affliction which now lies so heavily upon you, and gives you a title to the compassion of strangers, and how .much more to that of your friends. But alas, how vain is the compassion of human friends in a case like yours; and indeed friendship, when left to herself, too frequently can only sit down and weep over the calamities which she knows not how to relieve. Therefore, madam, I would most importunately recommend you to the compassion of that God who can raise you out of all your sufferings, and can even make your affliction the means of your happiness. How happy should I esteem myself if I might be in any degree an instrument in his hand of promoting so excellent a service as the spiritual improvement of this afflictive providence.
“Permit me, madam, humbly to attempt it, and hastily to mention a few serious hints, which I imagine may be peculiarly suitable to your present circumstances.
“Allow me then to urge that submission to the Divine will which becomes us under every chastisement. But this is, no doubt, your frequent reflection and discourse. I am folly persuaded, madam, that you do not allow yourself to murmur and repine against the Lord who smiteth you. But pardon me if I inquire whether you be not too ready to forget your obligations to live and praise. I consider it as one of the greatest defects in the character of some good people, and as the foundation of many visible irregularities, that they do not more delight in the contemplation and praise of God. Too much is this excellent work neglected in the midst of health and prosperity; but when affliction comes, and especially when it comes in so fearful a form as this which has lately visited you, a Christian is too ready to imagine that it is enough to be quiet and resigned, and that he is fairly excusedfrom such delightful exercises of soul, which seem unsuitable to so gloomy a season. But let us learn to correct so unreasonable a thought, and surely a little reflection may teach us so to do.
“With regard to your present circumstances — ‘you are exercised by an injury, the anguish of which may probably exceed the imagination -of those who have not known it by experience; but is it not a just foundation of joy and of praise that your life is still prolonged? It is ttue that your behavior, so far as I have had the opportunity of observing it, has been such as could not deserve so much as the tenderest reproof “of friendship; but you will humbly acknowledge, what indeed no human creature can deny, that an omniscient and holy God has seen many offences, even in a life which to men has appeared most unexceptionable and most amiable. And you are not to learn that the smallest violation of his sacred law may justly expose us to all the miseries of a future state. And 4s it not then a matter of praise, that you are yet in the land of the living, and within the reach of pardon and hope? Nay, I do verily believe that through divine grace you are already in a staie of reconciliation and favor with God, and in the way to everlasting happiness; and when you think of the glory that shall be revealed, and think of your own interest in it, surely your heart might overflow with thankfulness and joy, though your present agonies were multiplied upon you. These, madam, are noble resources of consolation, which should not be forgotten in your most painful moments — that God is your Father, Christ your Saviour, and heaven your eternal inheritance.
“But further, when you attentively survey the present painful dispensation, you will. certainly find that there is a miKture of mercy in it; and is not that mixture of mercy in a proportionable degree a matter of praise? You have suffered deeply; but had not mercy interposed, you had not survived to have been sensible of that suffering. A very small alteration in the circumstances of your fall might have mafde it fatal to your life. You are made to possess days of anguish, and wearisome nights are appointed unto you; but does not an indulgent Providence surround you with comforts, which assuage your sense of that distress? I need not insist upon those. instances which so grateful a heart cannot overlook. You recollect the piety and tenderness of your excellent parent; you observe the respect and affection of many other agreeable and valuable friends; you review that affluence of worldly possessions which, -through the divine goodnesSj is flowing in upon you, and furnishes you with the most judicious advice, the most proper remedies, and the most agreeable accommodations and entertainments which your present circumstances can require or admit; and in the- force of these united considerations you will own that it is reasonable, even now, to praise the Lord, who is daily loading you with benefits, and vastly overbalances your affliction, with mercy.
“But what if I should proceed still further, and maintain not only that it is your duty to praise God for his other mercies, though he has afflicted you, but even to praise him for this affliction, as in itself a mercy. I should then say no more than the Scripture warrants, when it exhorts us ‘.in every thing to give thanks,’ and tells us that ‘all things work together for good to them that love .God.’
“I know, madam, and I persuade myself that you seriously consider that the interests of the soul are vastly more valuable than those of the body. Now it is certaifi that such a calamity as this may be the means of great improvement and advantage- to your soul. It may wean your heart from the world, and fix it upon God; it may make you a more lively and zealous Christian, and consequently more happy and useful in this life, and more gloijious throughout the ages of eternity. And if it has a tendency to promote so exalted an end, you have certainly reason to bless God for it, though it be attended with some trying circumstances; as you would approve and be thankful for the setting of a broken bone, though it were a very painful operation, since it was so subservient, and indeed so necessary, to the future pleasure and usefulness of life.
“As all afflictions have, by the divine blessing, a tendency to lead the mind into serious reflections; so every particular trial has its own peculiar advantages,- which it is proper for us to study while we are under its pressure.
“That I may give my dear and excellent friend all the assistance I can, I will mention some heads of religious conteinplation which oeciir to my thoughts as peculiarly proper to be dwelt upon while we are actually in pain. And if it please God to impress them deeply upon your mind, you will find that it will be worth your while, to have borne the smart of an affliction which may prove so instructive and beneficial.
“1. It is now peculiarly proper to consider how insupporfably dreadful the wrath of God must be. If one drop of the divine displeasure, or a single stroke, which, he inflicts in love upon his child, be sufficient to throw us into so much distress, Oh, what must it be to fall into the hands of God, as an irreconcilable enemy, and to stand the shock of that horrible tempest wMdh he shall pour out upon the finally impenitent? If it be so difficult to bear the disorder of one single limb, when other circumstances around us are just as we could wish them to be, and the tenderest friends are. doing their utmost to support us under our sorrows, what must it be to dwell for ever in that region of horror, when every member of the body anid every faculty of the soul shall become the seat of torment, and every surrounding creature and circumstance conspire to aggravate and inflame it? Fly, Oh my soul, from so dreadful a condemnation; abhor the thought of any thing which might expose thee to it; and adore the riches of that redeeming love, by which thou art delivered from going down into the pit.
“2. Another very proper reflection in our hours of pain may be, how rich was the love of Jesus Christ, who would endure so much suffering for our salvation.
Do I find it, you will say, so difficult a matter to bear up under my present anguish, though only one member of my body suffers? what then did my Savionr feel when he was expiring under the agonies of the cross? What was it to have the tender est parts of his body pierced with thorns and with, nails, and to be stretched out upon the cross, as on a rack, until almost every joint was dislocated, which you know, madam, was th* common pain of crucifixion- besides all that intolerable torment which threw him into a bloody sweat, where no human cause of ^gonj was near him. Little, my Redeemer, little can I conjecture of the bitterness of thiae agonies from the pain I now feel; but since what I now feel is so acute and so grievous, let me take a few moments from my sorrows and my groans to admire and celebrate thy inconceivable love, which bore that sorrow which was infinitely more dreadM,
“3. “When we feel ourselves. in pain, it- is peculiarly proper to reflect on the great mercy of God in having formerly given us so much ease. How many have been continued in life while surrounded with innumerable calamities and accidents, which might not only have been painful but mortal to me; and in this present year, how many days and how many weeks have there been in which I have enjoyed uninterrupted ease, or rather, how few hours and moments have there been in which I have felt even the slightest uneasiness. If God has changed the dispensation of his providence towards me, may I feel the value of that mercy of which I was then so insensible. Let me now praise him for that ease and comfort which I formerly enjoyed, but underTalued; since it might probably be the design. of this- present affliction to rebuke my former insensibility, and recoTer that tribute of praise which I had neglected immediately to pay.
“4. When we feel pain taking hold of us, we may reflect how much reason we have to pity the pains and the sorrows of others. I have too often been forgetfut of them when absent, and have been too negligentjn praying for them, though perhaps their case hag been attended with very lamentable circumstances. Now I know, by my own experience, a part of what they felt, and perhaps no more than a part. Let me learn then, after the example of my Redeemer, by my own sufferings, to sympathize with my brethren m this; and let me impart such compassion to them as I now desire from those who are around me.
“5. When we, are under pain of body, it is proper to reflect how vain is every thing in this world, and how infinitely preferable an interest in the Divine favor. One such day, indeed, as many of those which you have lately passed, may serve better than a thousand arguments to convince you of this fact. How has the accident of. a moment impaired your relish for many entertainments which were before exceedingly agreeable. Those things in which the greater part of mankind place their supreme happiness, are little or nothing in these afflictive moments. The delicacy of food, the ornaments of dres, nay, even the conversation of friends, are not now what you esteemed them a few days ago. But you find, madam, that your God is still the same; and that the thought of your interest in him grows more and more delightful, in proportion as the charms of created objects fade and disappear. Yet, when your health and strength are completely restoi-ed, as I pray they may speedily be, may not’ created vanities again grow too charming, and’tenfpt your heart to forgetflilness of God? But then, madam, I hope you will recollect the vievr in which they appeared in the days of weakness and of pain; and the more carefully you attend to such considerations now, the more likely will you then be ta recollect them with advantage.
“6. In your present affliction, it is peculiarly proper for you to think of that heavenly world which is, I verily believe, the great object of your hope, and may, through grace, be your eternal inheritance. All the storms and troubles of life should but force us inta that blessed harbor. And I am persuaded that our views of heaven would be more affecting, if we were to consider it as a place where we shall be free, not only from afflictions in general, but from that particular affliction which al present lies so heavily upon us, and is therefore apprehended in all its aggravations. It is indeed delightful, under such sorrows, to reflect upon that world where pain shall never come. my soul, dwell upon the thought, and in that view breathe after it, and rejoice in its expectation.
“If these thoughts, which appear so proper in your present circumstances, be seriously attended to and pursued, you will soon perceive their a’dvantage. Your heart will come like gold out of a furnace of
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fire, ‘purified- seven timesj’ and, upon the -whole, you will reap such happy fruits, both for time and for eternity, from this calamitous event,-that you will up longer have room to question whether it be not the proper subject pf your praise.
“I am surprised to see, that before I was aware my letter has swelled into a s6rmon.. But I find in this, as in other instances, that it is easy to speak out of the abundance of the heart; which I am sure I ever do, when I give an utterance to my sentiments of friendship towards you. There is perhaps a plainness and freedom in what I have written, which, to some other persons, I might think necessary to excuse: but I will not make any apology to you; for I am sure you have so much good sense as to see, and so much candor as to believe, that this freedom proceeds only from respect and tenderness.
“I am, dear madam, your most affectionate and
humble servant,
To Mr. Whittingham.
[On hiff entertaining some doubts conoeming the Chiistian Religion,]
“Haeboeoush, Feb. 18, 1728.
“It was with a great deal of pleasure that I saw the name of my very agreeable fciend Mr. Whittinghain at the bottom of a letter I received on Wednesday morning; and I am not at all- ’ disgusted at th§, subject’ he proposes to be debated in our future correspondence.
“It does not ‘terrify me’ to-hear that a person whom I sincerely love, and for whose character I have the. truest regard, has entertained some doubts which he cannot entirely get over, concerning a book which his earKest instructors recommended to him as the word of God. It is certainly the duty of every rational creature to bring his religion to the strictest test, and to retain or reject the faith in which he has been educated, as he finds it capable or incapable of a rational defence. I perfectly agree with Lord Shaftesbury in his judgment, that religion .has not so much to fear from its weighty adversaries who give it exercise, as from its fond nurse who overlays it out of an excess of tenderness. I therefore do not only allow, but entreat you to urge all your strongest ob-. jections to Christianity, and lo represent them in the most forcible light; and if then, upon the whole, I am convinced in iny judgment that they are more than balance to those arguments which support it, I will frankly confess myself a deist, and rather throw myself on Providence, and the charity of my new brethren, than purchase the most” comfortable maintenance at so dishonorable a price as contradicting the conviction of my conscience, and speaking lies in the name of the Lord. On the other hand, I must entreat you, sir, to enter upon the inquiry with a solemnity and composure of mind answerable to its awful importance; remembering that we are searching into a matter in which our views for immortality are concerned — those pleasing, or dreadful views, before which all the .hopes and fears that relate only to this transitory life fade away and disappear, like twinkling stars in the blaze of the meridian sun; considering, also, that if it be really true that God has sent his own Son into the world to recover a race of degenerate creatures at the expense of his own blood, and to fix them in a state of everlasting perfection and glory, it must be infinitely fatal to desert- his religion, and to treat him like an impostor, without the most serious and impartial examination. Nay, though, after all, Christianity should only prove an agreeable dream, yet, as it pretends to the authority of the Supreme Being, and is supported with arguments which have at least some plausible appearance, it will argue a want of reverence to Him, and consequently may expose us to His high displeasure to reject it lightly, before we clearly see into the falsehood of its pretensions. Persist therefore in your resolution to weigh the question in an impartial balance, and avoid a precipitate judgment. Above all, let me indulge my friendship to you so far as to remind you of what a person of your wisdom cannot but know, that our faculties are. weak, and that we are exceedingly apt to be imposed upon by false representations. Let that fact engage you to humility, and so to depend upon divine illumination, and earnestly pray to the God of truth that he. will not suffer you to fall into error, but will guide your reason in such a manner as may establish your mind in an unshaken tranquillity.
“Every sober and rational deist must own there is no enthusiasm in such advice; and if it be pursued, and the whole tenor of your life be agreeable to such principles, I am confidently persuaded you will never be undone by speculative mistakes.
“With regard to your future letters, I must desire you to let me kno-w, in the first place, how far your scruples proceed; whether they extend only to the inspiration of the Scriptures, which is all that your letter imports; or whether they relate to the truth of the facts on which Christianity is built, or to the whole system, of divine revelation? I take it for granted in this letter, that you believe the existence and perfections of God, and in the certainty of a future state; but if your doubts extend to these points also, it is evident that they must be examined in the first place, before we can proceed with the other questions to any purpose.
“I have nothing further to. add, but that I desire the cause of religion may not suffer by my incapacity, to defend it to the greatest advantage; and that after all I shall have said, if you remain unsatisfied, you would have recourse to some other more competent correspondent.”
From Mr. Whittingham.
“London, Jan. 3, 1728.
“I received your kind and generous letter, which I had answered sooner, but that I have lately been informed of the bad consequences arising from a gentleman’s corresponding with his friend freely on this subject, whose letters were found in the closet of that friend after his decease. It is for this reason that I omit subscribing my name to thiSj and desire, by the same post that brings your reply, you would inclose it, not in your answer, but in a blanii cover, directed to me as below.
“I WQuld offer, by way of apology for the defects you will find in the’method of my reasoning, or the unaptness of the expression’s that I may make use of, that disputation is what I am the greatest novice in, and that my pen has hitherto been only employed in the quaint style that is used in business; but knowing yout good-nature, why do I make excuses?
“I agree with you that the premises must be first settled before we can argue to advantage. I do therefore own that there is a Being of infinite perfection, the origin and cause of all things, whom I call God. But that the authors of the several books contained in the Old and New Testaments were inspired by Him, I am not so clear in.
“I shall not inquire into the evidence which supports the several facts related in them; it being perhaps impossible, at this distance of time, to come to a fair view of the circumstances on which the proof of them depends. My objection lies against the whole scheme” of what is called the divine revelation.
“1. I argue from the perfections of God’s nature, that he would not make such a revelation to his creatures which they had not faculties to examine. Now this examination, I apprehend, must be made by comparing what is said to be revealed with the natural notions which we cannot but entertain of the divine perfections.
“2. From the same perfections in the nature of the divine “Being, I infer that nothing, can belong to Him which is either capricious or malicious. If, therefore, any thing is ascribed to H-im which can proceed from nothing but a disposition either partial, cruel, or vindictive, I am taught by the aforesaid natural idea of Him, to reject it.
“Now, because the scheme before us contains things of the above-mentioned kind, it wants, with me, the most proper inducement to a belief of its authority. For however a thing may appear attested by human evidence,- in relation to God, I can pay no respect to it, if its principles are unworthy of God.
“Now the assumed revelation in question, if I understand it, sets forth that God did, by design, create a race of creatures who he knew would offend him; for which offences he designed everlastingly to punish them; excepting some few, whom, for no other reason than his own good will and pleasure, he resolved to save, by sending his own Son to die for them, having the rest to feel the effects of his vengeance to aM eternity.
“3. A- being capable of this, I cannot think benevolent, consistently with any natural ideas of goodness or justice; nor can I pay him the true worship of love and esteem. I may, indeed, as the Indians are represented to adore the devil, stand in awe and fear of such malevolence, lest it should destroy me.
“If you can prove to me/^hat I have mistaken the. scheme, or that it is agreeable to the best notion man can form of a Deity, then shall I own that a considerable objection is removed.
“So, begging your answer to this as soon as your convenience will permit, together with your compliance with the request I make in the beginning of it, I remain, dear sir, your most humble servant.”
HIS THEOLOtJICAL STUDIES. 93
To Mr! “Whittingham.
“Harboeough, Jan. 16, 1’728.
“I shall endeavor to conform to the directions you give me as to the management of your letters; and have accordingly sent back the first which I received. I hope you will pardon me that I keep the other a few days longer, till I have leisure to answer it more fully than my affairs will now permit me to do. The apology you make for a confusion of thought, and impropriety of expression, is so very needless, that I shall’ take no further notice of it, than to tell you that I rejoice in the hope of seeing those admirable talents which God has given you, employed at length in the defence of that revelation which you now scruple to admit.
“I very readily acknowledge that you have fallen on a considerable difficulty in the Christian scheme. You seem to apprehend that our assumed revelation represents God as a cruel or a capridom being. As I am directly of the contrary opinion, I propose very carefully to consider all that you have urged for the proof of your assertion; -but as tHis will require rather more leisure than some other circumstances will at present allow me to bestow upon it, I must beg your patience for about a fortnight; and I rather choose thus to trespass upon it than to offer- any loose and indigested thoughts on so important a subject and to so ingenious a correspondent.
“At present I shall content myself with offering a remark upon a hint which you drop in the preface, which appears to me of far greater -importance than you, sir, seem to be aware of.
“When you decline inquiring into the evidence which supports the several facts related in Scripture, it is with this insinuation, that it may perhaps be impossible at this distance of time to collect a fair view of the circumstances on which the proofs of such facts must depend; and so you seem to take it for granted, as a first principle, that there is no external evidence in support of .Christianity which can give sufficient satisfaction to an inquisitive mind; and that therefore, by a natural consequence, you have nothing to do but to consider it as an hypothesis and so may be fairly excused in rejecting it without any further inquiry, if you can fix upon it any one unanswerable difficulty.
“Xhis, sir, is a very easy way pf thinking; but pardon me if I say that I apprehend it to be a mistake of the utmost importance. I have, indeed, some right to say that your supposition is very ill-grounded, for it has been one great business of my life, for several years, to inquire into the evidence of those facts which you suppose incapable of any convincing evidence at all; and I do faithfully assure you that the more I have examined thenHf the more reason I have found to believe them, and that I have never met with any thing in the most celebrated writings of Jews or Deists which has been able to overturn them,
“I hope you will not imagine that I say this to persuade you to rest upon my judgment, and believe it on my word; that would be a faror which it would be as shameful for me to ask as for you to grant, but I imagine the declaration I have made will be to you, who think so much better of my understanding than it deserves, an engagement not to throw by the examination in this indolent way, on a presumption that it is impossible to come at any satisfaction ia it.
“I imagine that nothing could-be more proper in the present circmnstances than for you to consider, with the utmost seriousness, what our most celebrated divines have said upon the subject. It is the happiness of the present age to abound with some of the most learned and judicious defences of Christianity which the world has ever seen. I would not trouble you to peruse them all, but Dr. Clarke’s Sermons at Boyle’s Lectures, Mr. Chandler’s Discourses upon the Miracles, and Mr. Butler’s, which he calls the Reason of Christ and his Apostles Defended, are so short and so plain that lhey may easily be per used, in about a fortnight, or at most a month; and I imagine that from any one of them, and much more from all, you will find arguments which no Deist can possibly answer to the satisfaction of a diligent and impartial inquirer. I am at least confident of this, that a man of your candor will readily allow, on that examination, that the arguments for Christianity are not despicably weak, but that there are some difficulties in rejecting it which a serious and prudent man will not easily get over. Now as you, sir, are a rational creature, and certainly angwerable to God for your conduct in this most important affair, it must be your concern to embrace that side of the question which, on the whole, is loaded with4he least. difficulty and supported by the best evidence; and it is the principal design of this letter to remind you of this duty.
“If you still urge that you cannot yield to any evidencei in a case pregnant with unanswerable dififi-
culties,-! entreat you to review that matter a little more attentively. Yon firmly believe the existence of a Grod, whom you think of as a being infinitely perfect. Now I am confident that I could propose a catalogue of difficulties relating to several of the divine attributes, which must certainly belong to a selfexj stent being, which it is not in the power of human reason to solve, and which are perhaps beyond the understanding of any creature. I am sure they are to me far more considerable than any difficulties peculiar to Christianity; yet we believe in the exist!- ence of God, notwithstanding this mixture of obscurity and ignorance, because the difficulties of the atheistical Scheme are greater than those; and I do persuade myself that you will readily allow, on the same principle, that if the evidence of Christianity be really important, it ought in like manner to take the place of Deism, though there may be twenty unaccountable peculiarities in the scheme.
“To make you more sensible of the jtistice of this reasoning, which I fear is too generally forgotten, give me leave to mention one case which is So nearly allied to the objection you urge against Christianity as to be on that account peculiarly proper on -this occasion.
“Suppose yourself to have existed before the creation of this lower world, in some heaVenly region where you had only been acquainted with purity and happiness, and seen God shine forth upon his creatures with the beams of the mildest and most uninterrupted benevolence. Imagine that in these circumstances you had met with another spirit of the like character’ and condition with yourself, who had brought you the
HIS THEOLOGICAL STUBIES. 9T
news of the creation of the earth, and who, after having described it in all the original perfection in which. it” appeared when it came immediately out of the hand of God, had presented you with two different plans for the conduct of Providence towards the human race which was then rising to take possession of .this delightful abode.
“Imagine that in the first pf these plans you had seen every thing beautiful and every thing glorious, and this beauty and glory permanent and unfading. Suppose it had represented mankind as flourishing in immortal vigor, surrounded by all the ornaments and pleasures of which earth can be the scene, and man a thousand times happier than any external accommodations could make him, in the just poise and. regulation of his passions, and a constant obedience to the dictates of reason. Suppose it had represented all the inhabitants of the peopled world as of one language and of one heart, all overflowing with mutual benevolence to each other, every one consulting the happiness of all, and all animated by the most lively gratitude and love to the great Author of their being and, their felicity, and consequently always regarded by him as his children; defended from the assaults of every thing that might either injure or seduce them, and in one word, continued through a long succession of ages in all the pleasures of innocence and paradise till they were transported by some gentle and delightful passage to nobler abodes, there gradually to improve in perfection and glory through. all the ages of an eternal existence.
“Suppose that the other scheme had represented mankind in a state of degeneracy, .confusion, and misery. Imagine that in surveying the plan, you had seen some numerous nations of savage barbarians, who appeared to retain little more than the shape of men; and thousands more lost in superstition, and debasing the faculties of the rational nature in the vilest and most stupid idolatry. Suppose you beheld the desolation of war in one country, of famine in another, and of pestilence in a third; or perhaps all these united calamities prevailing on the same unhappy spot; and besides all this, had discovered by far the greater part of mankind, in the most temperate climates, the most civilized nations, and the most peaceful times, neglecting and perhaps despising religion and violating all the plainest preots of humanity, every one eagerly pursuing his own private interests with all the restless anxieties of hope and fear, desire and sorrow, and each in subserviency to the mean design of supplanting and defrauding, annoying and reviling all whom he apprehends to stand in his way. In one word, imagine that you saw, in this mental picture, all that irregularity and meanness, that villany and torment, which you cannot but see in your extensive acquaintance, or within the circle of your own intelligenee.
“And then imagine that after this attentive review -your companion had left it to you to judge which of these schemes would probably have taken place under the government of a Being infinite in power, in wisdom, and in goodness; can you believe that you would have hesitated one moment about it 1 You would, no doubt, have been ready to laugh with indignant scorn at any one who could imagine that God would prefer the latter to the former; and yet you see, upon the whole, that he has preferrkd it; unless you will say he could not prevent misery and sin; and then the dispute turns upon another footing, quite different from the present question.
“The plain consequence of this is, that it uridoubt- ‘edly appears that in fact a scheme which has very great difficulties attending it exists; may not then another, which merely in idea appears very improbable, nevertheless be a true scheme, and ought it therefore to be rejected merely on account of its difficulties without examining the evidence which accompanies it? This observation,’ as well as the instances by which I have endeavored to illustrate it, has a peculiar weight in questions relating to the divine government,- when, if we are not distracted with an arrogant conceit of ourselves, we must allow that there may very probably be a great many things which lie entirely beyond our present reach.
“You will easily see that the tendency of this reasoning is only to engage you in that inquiry which I before recommended. I heartily wish you success in it.”
To the Rev. Thomas Saunders.
^” Haebokough, Nov. 1728.
“Mr. Some” informed me some time ago that you desired an account of Mr. Jennings’ method of academical education, and as I was one of the last pupils my dear tutor sent out, I suppose he thought I might have his scheme fresh in my memory, which is the only reason I can give for his applying tame to write to you on the occasion.
leO PHILIP DODDRIDGE.
“Our course of education at Kibwoi-th was the employment of four years, and every half year we entered upon a new set of studies, or at least changed the time and order of our lectures.
“The first half year we read, geometry or algebra thrice a week, Hebrew twice, geography once, French once, Latin prose authors once, classical exercises once. Our academical exercises were translations from some of the Latin authors into English, or froin English into Latin. Many passages in the Spectators and Tattlers, both serious and humorous, were assigned to us upon those occasions. For Hebrew we read Bythner’s grammar.
“The second half year we” ended geometry and algebra, which we read twice a week. We read logic twice, civil - history once, French twice, Hebrew once, Latin poets once, exercises once, .oratory opce. We had a collection of readings on the subject of every lecture, which frequently employed us in our closets for two or three hours, and we were obliged to give an account of the substance of these references at our next lecture. We were often, set to translate Tillotson into Sprat’s style, and vice versa. At other times we used to reduce arguments which were delivered in a loose, and perhaps a confused manner, into a kind of algebraic form, by which the weakness of many plausible harangues would very evidently appear at the first glance. Our other exercises were “principally orations, of which the materials were suggested by Mr. Jennings himself, or from some books to which we were referred. ‘Bacon’s Essays’ were often used on this occasion, and our exercises were a kind of comment on some remarkable sentences which they contained. On Tuesday nights we used to spend an hour in reading the Bible, sermons, or poems, j)urely to form ourselves to a just accent and pronunciation. One would hardly imagine if one had not heard the alterations which three or four of these evenings have made in a youth’s reading.
“The third half year we read mechanics, hydro statics, and physics twice; Greek poets once; history of England once; anatomy once; astronomy, globes, and chronology once; miscellanies once; and had one logical disputation in a week. Our logical disputations were in English, our thesis in Latin, and neither the one nor the other in- a syllogistic form. One of the class made the thesis, each of the rest read an exercise, which was either in prose or in verse, in English or Latin, as we ourselves chose. I think English orations were most common, and turned, I believe, to the best account.
“The fourth half year we read pneumatology twice a week, the remainder of physics and miscellanies once, ‘Jewish antiquities’ twice. ,. Our Pneumatology contained an inquiry into the existence and nature of God, and into the nature, operations, and immortality of the human soul, on the principles 6f natural reason. This, with our divinity, which was a continuation of it, was by far the most valuable part of our course.
“The fifth half year we read ethics twice a week, critics once, and had one pneumatological disputation. Our ethics were a part of pneumatology: the principal authors referred to were Grotius and Puffendorf. Our, critical lectures were not criticisms upon any particular texts, but general observations relating to the most noted versions and editions of the Bible.
“The sixth half year we read divinity thrice a week, Christian antiquities once, miscellanies once, and had one homily on a Thursday night. In divinity, we had references to authors of all opinions,,but Scripture was our only rule. Our homilies were discourses delivered from a pulpit. They were confined to subjects of natural religion, and we had no quotations from the Scriptures otherwise than for illustration, most of our citations being taken from the ancient poets and philosophers. They cost us abundance of pains, and were reviewed by Mr. Jennings before they were delivered.
“The seventh half year we read divinity thrice, ecclesiastical history once, had one sermon,, and one theological disputation. Mr. Jennings examined our sermons himself; we preached them to our own family, and sometimes to the peoplfe in his hearing.
“The last half year we read divinity once a week, history of controversies once, miscellanies once, and had one theological disputation. These miscellanies were a second volume, containing a brief historical account of the ancient philosophy, the art of preaching, and the pastoral care; on which heads Mr. Jennings gave us very excellent advice, with some valuable hints on the head of non-conformity. We preached this last half year either at home or abroad, as occasion required, and towards the beginning of it were examined, by a committee of the neighboring ministers, to whom that office was assigned at a preceding general meeting.
“Mr. Jennings never admitted any into his academy till he had examined them as to their improyement in school learning, and on their capacity for entering on the course of studies which he proposed. He likewise insisted on satisfaction as to their moral character, and the marks of a serious disposition.
“The first two years of our course we read the Scriptures in the family from Hebrew, Greek, or French into English. Mr. Jennings drew up a scheme which comprehended the whole of the New Testament, and the most useful parts of the Old, by which we proceeded. He expounded about ten lessons in a week, sometimes in the mornitg, and sometimes in the evening. On those days when he did not expound, we read the lessons over again which had been formerly expounded, and so went over the most important parts of the Scriptures twice, at a convenient distance of time. These expositions were all extempore, but very edifying; and it is with a great deal of satisfaction that I often review some hints which I sometimes took of them.
“Once a month, on a Friday before the Lord’s supper, we laid aside all secular business to attend to devotion. Those who thought proper, as several did, observed it as a fast. About ten in the morning we all met, and Mr. Jennings gave us a lecture which he had carefully prepared for the purpose j he wrote it out in long-hand, and allowed us to transcribe it if we thought fit. I have copies of all of them, which I set a great value upon. His two discourses of ‘Preaching Christ, and ‘Experimental Preaching,’ were composed and delivered on such an occasion, and the subjects of the text were accommodated to our characters and circumstances of life.
“Every evening an account was taken of our private studies. We repeated to him immediately after prayer something which we had met with, which we judged most remarkable! By this means all enjoyed some benefit from the studies of each. It engaged us to read with attention, and the reflections our tutor made, and the advices he gave were well worth our observation and remembrance. “We were obliged to talk Latin within some certain bounds of time and place. If any case of difficulty happened we examined into it, and often had long ple&dings on both sides, and at last the cause was determined by the votes of the majority. The time of these debates was immediately after we had given an account of our private studies.
“Every Lord’s-day evening Mr. Jennings used to send for some of us into the lecture-room, and discoursed with each apart about inward religion. The discourse was generally introduced by asking us what we observed as most remarkable in the sermon. He took this opportunity of admonishing us of any thing he observed amiss in our conduct, and. he always did it in a most engaging manner. After this we met at seven for family prayer. Before prayer one of us either repeated the sermon we had heard, or read some portion of a practical writer which we ourselves chose. And then, after singing and prayer, Mr. Jennings examined those of the first class in the ‘Assembly’s Larger -Catechism,’ in wHch he gave us a historical account of the belief of other parties of Christians relating to the several articles which are matter of controrersy.
“Mr. Jennings allowed us the free use of his library, which was divided into two parts: the first was common to all, the second was for the use of the Seniors only, consisting principally of books of philosophy and polemical divinity, with which the Juniors would have been confounded rather than edified. At our first entrance on each we had a lecture, in which Mr. Jennings gave us the general character of each book, and some hints as to the time and manner of perusing it. We had fixed hours of business and recreation. After. reading, expounding, and singing, one of the pupils went to prayer; immediately after prayer we took breakfast; then the first class went into the lecture, and the rest afterwards in their turns. Bach lecture began with an examination, by which Mr. Jennings could easily judge of our care or negligence in studying the former. Lecturing generally employed Mr. Jennings the greater part of the forenoon. Lnmediately after lecture we went in to our studies. At twelve we dined; at two we generally retired to our closets again, but were not confined to that hour, for the times of private study were left to our own -choice. At seven we were called to supper, immediately after which one of the classes had a lecture. At half past eight we were called to reading, exposition, and singing; afterwards Mr. Jennings himself prayed in the family. Accounts of private studies, cases, and conversation employed us till 5* about ten, when we generally retired to bed. Thursday morning was always vacant.”
Here would seem to be a fitting place to introduce an account of the entrance of Doddridge upon the work of a theological tutor, adopting as his model the excellent and laborious course of .his own theological instructor, which is so well portrayed in the preceding tetter to Mr. Saunders; but it is a matter of much interest to inquire into tiae habits which he had already formed as a preachetr. There is the fullest evidence that he was a thoroughly honest and sincere man. He earnestly sought to avoid the reproach, “Physician, heal thyself.” What he preached to others he preached as solemnly to himself,, and thus pursued the best course for attaining great power and influence over the minds of his hearers, and thus also did he preeminently qualify himself for the laborious and useful post of a theological instructor. He became a model preacher and pastor.
Under date of July 23, 1727, his papers contain this ijateresting record of private refkcfimis:.
“I this day preached concerning Christ as the physician of souls, from Jer. 8: 22; and having, among other particulars, addressed to those sincere Christians who; through the neglect of a gospel remedy, are in a bad state of spiritual healthy it is evident to me, upon a serious review, that I am of that .number. Therefore, with humble shame and sorrow for my former indifference and folly, I” would now sincerely attempt a reformation. To this purpose I would re-Solve, “1. That I will carefully examine into my own soul, that I may know its constitution, and its particular weakness and distempers.
“2. I would apply to Christ, as my Physician, to heal these diseases, and restore me to greater vigor in the service of God.
“3. I would remembcK that he heals by the Spirit j and would therefore pray for his influences to produce in me greater dffvotion, humility, diligence, gravity, purity, and’steadinesa of resolution.
“4. I would wait on him in the study of the Scriptures, in prayer, and the Lord’s supper, ‘Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make mie .clean.’ Thou hast given me a degree of bodily health and vigor far superior to what, from the nature of my constitution, I had reason to expect; yet I here record it before thee, that I desire spiritual health abundantly more.
“I would also consider my concern in this subject as a minister. God, has provided a remedy. He has appointed me to proclaim, nd in some measure, to apply it. Yet many are not recovered; and why? I can appeal to .lfee that I have faithfully warned them. I have endiSavored to speak the most important truths with aJl .possible plainness and seriousness; but I fear, 1. 1 have not followed them sufficiently with domestic and. personal exhortations. 2. I have, not been sufficiently careful to pray for the success of my ministerial labors. It has been rather an incidental thing than matter of solemn request. ^3. I have lived so as to forfeit those influences of the Spirit, by which they might have bSepi rendered more effectual. I resolve, therefore, for the time to come, to be more close in applying to them in their own houses, to pray for them more -frequently, to set a greater value on the cooperating Spirit, and take care to avoid every thing which may provoke Him to withdraw himself from my ministrations. Such caution may I always maintain; and Oh, may the health of iny people be recovered.”
“Not. 12, 1727. I preached tMs day from these words, ‘I know you, that you iave not the love of God in you.’ I endeavored to fix on unconverted sinners the charge of not loving God, and described at large the character of the Christian, in several expressions of that assertion. My own h«art convicted me of being deficient in many of them. I humbled myself deeply before God; and do now, in the divine. strength, renew my resolutions as to the following particulars:
“1. 1 will endeavor to think of God more frequently than I have done, and to make the thoughts of him familiar to my mind in seasons of leisure and solitude.
“2. I will labor after xommunion with him, especially in every devotion through this week. For this purpose I would recollect my thoughfe before I be- in, watch over my heart in the duty, and consider afterwards how I have succeeded.
“3. I will pray for conformity to God, and endeavoi* to imitate him in wisdom, justice, truth, faithfulness, and goodness.
“4. I will rejoice in God’s government of the world, and regard his interposition in all my personal concerns.
“5. I will pray for zeal in my Master’s interest, and will make the adyancement of his glory the great end of every action of life.
“6. I will cultivate a peculiar affection to Christians as such.
“7. I will study the divine will, and endeavor to practise every duty.
“8. I will be diligently on my guard against every thing which may forfeit the favor of God and provoke his displeasure.
“I resolve particularly to make these things my care the ensuing week, and hope I shall find the benefit of it, and perceive a-t the close that my evidences of the sincerity of my love to God are more stable and flourishing than they at present are.”
The method of faithful dealing with his own soul, in respect to the discharge of personal and official responsibilities, as developed in the extracts just furnished, prepares us to anticipate a corresponding fidelity in promoting the spiritual interests of all who came within the sphere of his appropriate labors. Accordingly, we learn that he was assiduous in availing himself of every opportunity of doing good, and that he sought such opportunities. The children and servants of the family with whom he boarded were objects of special religious care. On the Sabbath he generally conversed with them in private upon their spiritual interests and obligations.
One fact relating to Doddridge should be told as a hint to” not a few Christian ministers of the present time. He made it a standing rule never to refuse to preach, however comparatirely unprepared; whenever he was solicited to do so, believing that every such invitation was a call from his great Master to attempt to do good. He used to say, that if on any occasion he was asked to preach merely by way of compliment, he always did so, thus practically, teaching his friends not to ask for his services when they did not really desire them.
He was conscientious and exact in making the most of time, and anxious to avoid the waste of it in frivolous pursuits or in indolence. Through the year it was his practice to rise at five o’clock, and to this valuable habit he ascribed a good part of the proficiency which he made in learning and in his performances as an author. See Family Expositor: note on Rom. 13: 13. He is often found expressing deep sorrow and humiliation befo;re God in reviewing those hours in. which he may have made some unnecessary visits, or visits in which he had neglected to introduce conversation of a profitable character; and also in reviewing the hours which he had not turned to as good account as seemed desirable and proper.
To guard against a waste of time in ‘future, he formed at the beginning of every year a well-digested plan of reading and of business, of subjects upon which he would prepare discourses, and -of methods of doing good among his people. At the end of every month he, compared his conduct and attainments with the plan laid down, noted deficiencies, examined causes of. failure, and roused himself to new resolution to accomplish what he bad purposed. On New-year’s day, and on his own birthday, he instituted a more careful and solemn review of the manner in wMch the intervals of his time had been occupied, exciting him to humiliation, on the one hand, over any failures which he might thus discover, and to gratitude on the other, so far as he had accomplished any part of his extended scheme of useful labor- and acquisition. These two days of the year he was accustomed to appropriate entirely to careful self-examination and closet devotion. He reviewed the record which he regularly kept of any particular favors of divine Providence which he had received, of the sins and infirmities in whiteh he had indulged, and of the prominent events in his personal history and experience. This led to a renewal of his solemn covenant and resolution to endeavor in future to conduct himself more agreeably to the views of duty now entertained.
Before he set out on a visit among his friends, or undertook a journey, it was his custom to inquire of himself respecting the opportunities that might thus be offered him of doing good, so as to prepare himself to use them; also respecting the temptations which he might encounter to his disadvantage, so as to arm himself to meet them. On his return home he examined himself upon the behavior which he had pursued, to ascertain wherein he had erred, land wherein he had conformed to what was -right — following these investigations with appropriate acts of humiliation and of gratitude before God.
In 1729 Mr. Doddridge began to preach at Market-Harborough and Kibworth alternately, having resided for “some years at the former place. His talents and acceptableness as a preacher became known to several congregations much larger than those by whom his services as a pastor were importunately Solicited. It is highly interesting to read those portions of his correspondence which relate to invitations which he received, as we have already stated, friom London, from Coventry, from Nottingham, and else where, and to discover the enlightened and conscientious regard to his highest usefulness which is therein displayed. The application made subsequently by an important congregation in Northampton, and some of his correspondence relating to it, will be considered hereafter, when we shall have laid before the reader some of the circumstances connected with his entrance upon the arduous duties of a theological tutor, which occurred about the same .period.