To His Father
June 13,
The effects of my last journey, I believe, will make me more cautious of staying any time from Oxford for the future; at least till I have no pupils to take care of, which probably will be within a year or two. One of my young gentlemen told me at my return, that he was more and more afraid of singularity; another, that he had read an excellent piece of Mr. Locke’s, which had convinced him of the mischief of regarding authority. Both of them agreed that the observing of Wednesday as a fast was an unnecessary singularity; the catholic church (that is, the majority of it) having long since repealed, by contrary custom, the injunction she formerly gave concerning it. A third, who could not yield to this argument, has been convinced by a fever and Dr. Frewin. Our seven and twenty conununicants at St. Mary’s were on Monday shrunk to five; and the day before, the last of Mr. Clayton’s pupils who continued with us informed me that he did not design to meet us any more.
My ill success, as they call it, seems to be what has frightened every one away from a falling house. On Sunday I was considering the matter a little more nearly, and imagined that all the ill consequences of my singularity were reducible to three, — diniinulion of fortune, loss of friends, and of reputation. As to my for time, I well know, though perhaps others do not, that I could not have borne a larger than I have; and as for that most plausible excuse for desiring it, “While I have so little I cannot do the good I would,” I ask. Can you do the good God would have you do? It is enough! Look no farther. Toy friends, they were either trifling or serious: if triflers, fare them well; a noble escape: if serious, those who are most serious are left, whom the others would rather have opposed than forwarded in the service they have done, and still do us. If it be said, “But these may leave you too; for they are no firmer than the others were:” first, I doubt that fact; but, next, suppose they should, we hope then they would only teach us a nobler and harder lesson than they have done hitherto: “It is better to tnist in the Lord than to put any confidence in man.” And as for reputation, though it be a glorious instrument of advancing our Master’s service, yet there is a better than that, — a clean heart, a single eye, a soul full of God! A fair exchange, if by the loss of reputation we can purchase the lowest degree of purity of heart! We beg my mother and you would not cease to work together with us, that, whatever we lose, we may gain this; and that, having tasted of this good gift, we may count all things else but dung and dross in comparison of it.