you will say, this is not the thing; and I acknowledge it. Prosperity in religion, and public usefulness, are objects incomparably more important than simply personal conveniences, and circumstantial advantages. I seem nearly at a stand with respect to the adjustment of plans for futurity. Whether I am to be a preacher or not, I cannot tell. I do preach, however, sometimes with great fertility, sometimes with extreme barrenness of mind; insomuch that I am persuaded that no man hearing me in the different extremes, could, from my preaching, imagine it was the same speaker. I never write a line or a word of my sermons. There are some advantages, both with respect to liberty and appearance, attendant on a perfect superiority to notes. Sunday evening (a very wet, uncomfortable night) I preached to about eighteen or twenty auditors, the greatest sermon I ever made. It was from Rev. x., 5, 6, “And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth, lifted up his hand to heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever and ever, &c., that there should be time no longer." I always know when I speak well or the contrary. . . . . The subject was grand; and my imagination was in its most luminous habit. I am entirely uncertain whether the people will wish me to stay any longer than the three months. I have no reason to think they much desire it. The world is still a wide place, my friend. . . . . XII. TO MR. H. HORSFALL. Newcastle, Oct. 2, 1792. By this time I suppose your woods, and fields, and gardens, have nearly lost their charms. Such scenes are just becoming dreary ; and I conjecture that your walks, whether solitary or with Mr. J. or G., are but short, or but few. The birds are assembled in flocks, and the trees are changing their color. Now you can moralize. You and I shall very soon experience a withering, languishing decline; and like nature around us, we too shall die. And surely with future prospects clear, it must be the highest felicity to quit this oppressed and clouded existence, and be transported into light and endless pleasures. "Through what new scenes and changes must we pass! Is the cell on the other side the orchard in a state as desolate and ruinous as it was when I saw it last? What a number of hours I have spent there! sometimes praying, sometimes attempting to study sermons, which at that period I felt a task of very great difficulty indeed. And many hours I have spent there in reveries, literary projects, calculations of improvement in a given future time, mortifying contrasts of the actual and possible improvement of time and advantages. My conduct to this moment has by no means realized the designs and hopes with which my breast has often glowed in that humble, but favorite mansion. The emotions of religion, of something like mental greatness, and of love, have alternately inspired and perplexed my bosom in that pensive recess, which is now, perhaps, left to those mysterious beings, who, like him that haunted it before, are peculiarly attached to a dark and melancholy solitude. . . . . At some moments life, the world, mankind, religion, and eternity, appear to me like one vast scene of tremendous confusion, stretching before me far away, and closed in shades of the most awful darkness;—a darkness which only the most powerful splendors of Deity can illumine, and which appears as if they never yet had illumined it. But still, life and the world were made for man; and I, as a man, am designing to try what they are, what they can yield, and to what great, important purpose they may be rendered subservient. Let us awake, my friend, and look around us, and ask ourselves, Whence we are coming, and whither we are going; and then each of us address himself, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." Let us survey the sphere in which we have to move, and inquire how far our efforts and our influence may be extended. I think we shall come at the point at last. We shall learn what is truth, what is duty, and what is happiness; and where the gracious assistance is to be obtained by which we shall be empowered to understand the one, and perform the other, and attain and enjoy the third. I have entirely lost myself; but I believe I am writing to H. Horsfall, and I hope two sheets will convince him that I am his friend, and that I wish him to be wise, and useful, and estimable. XIII. TO MR. H. HORSFALL. Newcastle, Oct. 2, 1792. A correspondent of genius and observation might give you an amusing account of Newcastle; but such qualifications are but in a small degree mine. The town is an immense, irregular mass of houses. There are a few fine uniform streets; but the greater number exhibit an awkward succession of handsome and wretched buildings. The lower part of the town, as being in the bottom of a valley, is dirty in an odious degree. It contains thousands of wretched beings, not one of whom can be beheld without pity or disgust. . . . . The general characteristic of the inhabitants seems to be a certain roughness, expressive at once of ignorance and insensibility. I know little of the dissenters in general. I was one evening lately a good deal amused at the Presbyterian or Scotch meeting, by the stupidity of their psalms-the grimace of the clerk-the perfect insignificance of the parson-and the silly, un meaning attention a numerous auditory. . . . . Bu, our meeting for amplitude and elegance! I believe you never saw its equal. It is, to be sure, considerably larger than your lower school; but then so black, and so dark !* It looks just like a conjuring-room, and accordingly the ceiling is all covered with curious, antique figures to aid the magic. That thing which they call the pulpit is as black as a chimney; and, indeed, there is a chimney-piece, and very large old fire-case behind it. There is nothing by which the door of this same pulpit can be fastened, so that it remains partly open, as if to invite some good person or other to assist you when you are in straits. My friend Pero, whom I have mentioned before, did me the honor one Sunday to attempt to enter; but, from some prudential notion, I suppose, I signified my will to the contrary by pulling-to the door, and he very modestly retired. Yet I like this pulpit mightily; 'tis so much the reverse of that odious, priestly pomp which insults your eyes in many places. I hate priestly consequence and ecclesiastical formalities. When I order a new coat I believe it will not be black. In such a place as this it would be unnatural to speak loud, and consequently there cannot be a great degree of exterior animation. I believe my manner is always cool; this is not so happy, I confess; but it is nature, and all nature's opponents will be vanquished. . . . . Paper fails-so here then concludes our letter; and I remain, much at your service, THE KNIGHT OF THE ENCHANTED Pen. XIV. TO MR. H. HORSFALL. Newcastle, Oct. 4, 1792. . . If I were with you, I should set you an example of temperance, which you will find it a piece of self-denial to imitate. "He that needs least is likest the gods," said Socrates, you know; and I have only to wish that Socrates were now alive, to be convinced it is possible for others to carry philosophy as far as himself. If Socrates and I, and the Delphic oracle, had flourished all at the same time, would not the last have made a difficulty which of the two should be pronounced the wisest of men? or, at least, should not I have come in for the second place, if superior age and experience had at last given one step of precedence to my brother sage? So far I had written on Thursday last, when the genius-enchanter who has of late presided over my pen, and who sometimes inspirits it with fancy, and sometimes loads and trammels it with dulness, struck it The sombre appearance was owing, in part, to the old oak wainscoting; the pulpit also was of the same material. At one end of the room, the figures "1485" rudely carved, probably marked the date of its erec tion. with such a cold and deadly charm that I could write no farther. "Tis now Monday—and I have heard nothing from you or from Brearley. You are, to be sure, the most niggardly class of correspondents that ever lived; but as I love to assert independence, I will show that I can write whether you do or not. Odd fellows that you are—perhaps when I see you again, you will not speak neither. But I promise you I will make up your deficiencies; when I open my mouth in earnest, I assure you none of you bachelors shall be able to close it. I'll trumpet your characters with a vengeance! You shall hear how eloquently, and how sarcastically too, I can inveigh against stupidity, and insensibility, and unmeaning gravity, and important reserve, and all your ridiculous characteristics. Depend on it, I shall spread your virtues to the sun, and constrain even yourselves to behold them. I am always glad when I can catch a subject to talk about, and fortunately, in this respect, I shall be at no loss the next time I see you. Every trait of the face, every mo tion of the lips, every oddity in dress, and every word you pronounce, will afford me some curious thought; and thus I shall be able to tease you on every side with incessant remarks, some of which you shall not be able to understand, and others you will not like. Such treatment faithless and idle correspondents always deserve, and such politeness they shall always find me fairly disposed to exhibit. . . . . Last week Mr. Fishwick and I rode to Tynemouth. We had two most noble horses, which carried us about nine miles an hour. I could boast of having nearly" drawn empyreal air," since sometimes in the course of the ride I had almost got above this atmosphere of ours. You would have been highly pleased with the grand view of the sea which I that day enjoyed. . . . . Hearing nothing from you, I am entirely left to indulge my conjectures. I may continue to wonder whether you are alive or dead; whether you are tracing the paths of learning forward or backward; whether you are asleep or awake; whether you are married or free; whether you remember me or have forgotten me; whether you wish any more letters, or you had rather see a ghost; in short, whether you are the same man I once knew and esteemed, or, as H. Horsfall, you exist no more. A fine young man, the son of Mr. Whitfield the Baptist preacher, of whom you have heard, has just been with me here in my chamber for a long time, and a most agreeable evening we have passed. He is a youth about twenty, of worthy principles and character, and of an ingenuous, sensible, and affectionate spirit. He has been recounting to me the scenes of past life, and pensively recalling several tender affairs. the subject of the uncertainty of future prospects, our feelings seem very similar. . . . . My quarter of a year will soon be finished; I know not what will be the result-I know not what I wish to be the result. .... On XV. TO MR. H. HORSFALL. Newcastle, Oct. 10, 1792. No letter from Mr. Horsfall: I am left, therefore, to proceed without interruption. 'Tis true I have nothing of consequence to say; but there are some people to whom it is all the same whether one talk like a man of sense or a fool. They can hear a parson showing away in powder and ruffles-the quack doctor haranguing on diseases and pills-the veteran “shouldering his crutch, and telling how fields are won "—the barber edging his razor with his jests-the young lady giving new interest to a tender subject by the remarks which her feelings promptand the old wench telling a story of weddings and of witches,—all with the same undisturbed tranquillity and dulness. Virtue may triumph, or wickedness blaspheme; distress may supplicate and weep; injured innocence may remonstrate; industry may reprove, or gratitude may bless; the philosopher may reason, and the idiot may rave;—what is it all to them? The curious and the novel cannot seize attention; the grand finds no upper story above the kitchen-apartments of their minds; the tender cannot awaken torpid sensibility; and the pathetic rebounds a league from their shielded hearts. All that I mean by this bustling page is, that there are some to whom it signifies nothing whether one write or speak sense or nonsense. Mind, I do not say that you are one of them. I only mean to say, that idle, inattentive correspondents deserve to be punished twice a week with a nonsensical discourse on non sense. I have just received a most pleasing letter from Mr. Hughes. He is still unmarried, and still the only tutor of the Academy. He flatters me by telling me that he feels the loss of me. I still admire him as much as ever. Each letter I have received from him indicates that energy of mind which genius alone can inspire. I shall to the end of life congratulate myself on having become acquainted with him. If I have attained any enlargement of ideas, I am in a very great degree indebted to him for the advantage. I should be most happy to see him again. . . . . Do you read novels still? I sometimes think I will read no more; so many of them are romantic, and so many insipid. Besides, is there any such thing as learning the art or the science of feeling? I think the person who, without reading novels, would not be amiable and worthy, will never become such by reading them. I am too little in the habit of leading anything; I must reform my plan. You recollect the waving motion I used to have in reading or studying. I have it still, and I find it very injurious to my breast, but I know not how to get quit of it. I am anxious to be free from every disagreeable habit. How desirable a thing it is to be unexceptionable in all points. I hope it will not be long before I see you. The wintry season, I am afraid, will prevent the repetition of the midnight ramble. Really it was |