I cordially sympathize with you in regard to that desolation of society and friendship to which you seem to be doomed. I wish some agreeable acquisitions of this kind may illuminate the pensive shade; but if not, is it not a gracious hand that has marked your destiny? Wait, then, till you see it accomplished, when unquestionably you will discover, with an exultation of gratitude and joy, that "all things have been done well." The friendliest wish I can form for you is, that the less you enjoy of worldly felicities, the more you may obtain of the divine; that if God withholds from you any of his created blessings, it may be to give you more abundantly Himself; in short, that "the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ may be with you." Oh, it is happy to be entirely resigned to the will of God; willing to travel by any path his wisdom appoints, through the vale of life and tears; or at one word, when he shall call, to haste away with willing flight into his presence, to mingle with the sweet and endless society there. "In his presence is fulness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore."

XXXIII. TO THE REV. DR. FAWCETT.

Battersea, Jan. 15, 1800.

DEAR SIR,―The pleasure with which I address one of my earliest and best benefactors, is mingled with a painful regret for having disappointed any of his hopes; but is mingled too with a reviving confidence that it will not be a final disappointment. As a proof that the unfortunate wanderer has not lost entirely his interest in your friendly regards, your letter was extremely grateful to me. But what shall I say of the long time that has passed without an acknowledgment from me of a favor so little expected, and cordial to my feelings as one of the days of returning spring? It were vain to attempt apology. I could plead only that each successive week I have intended to write to you, but that a certain fatality of procrastination, to which I have long been subjected in respect of writing, has prevailed over me here too. It is more manly to confess than to extenuate. Yet it grieves me much that appearancos do warrant an imputation of such ingratitude as I am certain I can never feel; and I will entreat you, dear sir, to lay aside in this one case the ancient rule of judging of the heart by the conduct. The sincere, unalterable respect with which I always think of you, assures my own mind that I have some claim to such an exception. I am very sorry for the conduct which leaves my assertion to stand the solitary testimony in my favor. Memory often recalls, with a sentiment of pensive but grateful interest, the season of my life which was passed under your immediate care; and those instructions, those kind anxieties, those prayers, and that example, of which the effect, I trust, cannot be lost to the latest moment of my life, no, nor in that eternity beyond. Will you accept from even me the wish that your cares may not fail of a happy success, and an

abundant reward? But of their reward they cannot fail; that is indepen dent even of their success; it will be conferred by Him who knows and approves the hearts of his faithful servants, while sometimes his wisdom denies to their efforts the desired effect.

I receive with pleasure, but not without diffidence of myself, your congratulations on a happy revolution of my views and feelings. Oh, with what profound regret I review a number of inestimable years nearly lost to my own happiness, to social utility, and to the cause and kingdom of Christ! I often feel like one who should suddenly awake to amazement and alarm, on the brink of a gloomy gulf. I am scarcely able to retrace exactly through the mingled dreary shades of the past, the train of circumstances and influences which have led me so far astray; but amid solemn reflection, the convictioǹ has flashed upon me irresistibly, that I must be fatally wrong. This mournful truth has indeed many times partially reached me before, but never so decisively, nor to awaken so earnest a desire for the full, genuine spirit of a disciple of Jesus. I see clearly that my strain of thinking and preaching has not been pervaded and animated by the evangelic sentiment, nor, consequently, accompanied by the power of the gospel, either to myself or to others. I have not come forward in the spirit of Paul, or Peter, or John ; have not counted all things but loss that I might win Christ and be found in him. It is true indeed that this kind of sentiment, when strongly presented, has always appealed powerfully to both my judgment and my heart; I have yielded my whole assent to its truth and excellence, and often longed to feel its heavenly inspiration; but some malady of the soul has still defeated these better emotions, and occasioned a mournful relapse into coldness of feeling, and sceptical or unprofitable speculation. I wonder as I reflect ;-I am amazed how indifference and darkness could return over a mind which had seen such gleams of heaven. I hope that mighty grace will henceforward for ever save me from such infelicity. My habitual affections, however, are still much below the pitch that I desire. I wish above all things to have a continual, most solemn impression of the absolute need of the free salvation of Christ for my own soul, and to have a lively faith in him, accompanied with all the sentiments of patience, humility, and love. I would be transformed,-fired with holy zeal; and henceforth live not to myself, but to Him that died and rose again. My utmost wish is to be a minor apostle; to be a humble, but active, devoted and heroic servant of Jesus Christ; and in such a character and course, to minister to the eternal happiness of those within my sphere. My opinions are in substance decisively Calvinistic. I am firmly convinced, for instance, of the doctrines of original sin, predestination, imputed righteousness, the necessity of the Holy Spirit's operation to convert the mind, final perseverance, &c., &c.

As to the doctrine of the divinity of Christ, I do not deny that I had once some degree of doubt, but not such a degree ever as to carry me

anything near the adoption of an opposite or different opinion. It was by no means disbelief; it was rather a hesitation to decide, and without much, I think, of the vanity of speculation. But for a long while past I have fully felt the necessity of dismissing subtle speculations and distinctions, and of yielding a humble, cordial assent to the mysterious truth, just as and because the scriptures declare it, without inquiring "How can these things be?" Even at the time I refer to, I had not the slightest doubt respecting the doctrine of the atonement. I have always, without the interval of a moment, deemed it a grand essential of Christianity. How still more emphatically welcome it becomes as one discovers more of one's own heart! I deem it probable that my views on this and other subjects were invidiously misrepresented to you and some more of my friends. I have witnessed in many instances, with a disgusting recoiling of the heart, an astonishing promptitude to impute heresy to a man whose expressions have varied from the common phraseology, or whose conclusions have been cautious, and not in the tone of infallibility.

Within the last year I have drawn from experiment, example, and reflection, very important lessons respecting the best manner of preaching, as to diction, elocution, kind of illustrations, introduction or rejection of humorous ideas, &c. The altogether of the manner I would choose, if I could seize it all at once, would be very different from my former style. From unfavorable habits of mind, and inauspicious public situations for the most part, I have acquired a disadvantageous elocution, which I fear will cost me considerable pains to correct. I have felt this particularly in my occasional public services about London, in which I have not in general felt free and happy, except in the missionary preaching in the villages, in which I have frequently been engaged. I have been so much occupied with the Africans since I came hither, and so gratified to prolong my stay within the advantages of the metropolis, that I have not yet begun to inquire after a regular station for preaching. Every consideration, however, and particularly the duty of making a renewed zealous effort for public good, calls me now to make the inquiry. I have as yet thought but of one or two individuals to whom I can write. I have a transient engagement or two that will take up part of the spring. I thank you for the pleasure with which I read your book. It appears to me a just, elegant, and forcible exhibition of the grand principles of vital Christianity.

My eyes are still not sound. Some of the symptoms, both from their nature and continuance, give me considerable apprehension. Mr. Greaves has given me ample details respecting the combined families, in which I am glad to find there is so much health and happiness.

Will you present my best respects to my old friend Mrs. Fawcett, who surrenders to advancing age, it seems, none of her energies, and to young Mr. and Mrs. F.? In writing once to Mr. Greaves, and repeatedly to Lanes, I felt it would be a capital indecorum to mention in the

slight way of making compliments, persons to whom I had promised, and still owe, I don't know how many sheets. If ever your time should allow, as your thoughts suggest, another friendly notice, I shall be so much the more gratified to receive, as I have not the remotest claim to expect, such a communication.

I am, dear sir, Yours, with great respect,

XXXIV. TO MRS. R. MANT.

J. FOSTER.

Near Bristol, Feb. 17, 1801.

MY DEAR FRIEND,-When I left you about Christmas, it would have appeared, in looking forward, a long time to have delayed writing to you till past the middle of February; but in looking back the time seems wonderfully short. This difference between the appearance of the past and of the future seems unfavorable to happiness, which I think would be more befriended by prospect appearing short, and retrospect appearing long. It looks but a short period since I quitted Chichester as a residence; but to look forward over the dim and shadowy field of so much time to come, seems a very long anticipation. However, my dear friend, though the train of future days seems in the prospect-vision to stretch out to a strangely protracted length, they will soon be gone. I congratulate you and myself that life is passing fast away. What a superlatively grand and consoling idea is that of Death! Without this radiant idea, this delightful morning-star, indicating that the luminary of Eternity is going to rise, life would, to my view, darken into midnight melancholy. Oh! the expectation of living here, and living thus, always, would be indeed a prospect of overwhelming despair! But thanks to that fatal decree that dooms us to die-thanks to that gospel which opens the vision of an endless life, and thanks, above all, to that Saviourfriend who has promised to conduct all the faithful through the sacred trance of death into scenes of paradise and everlasting delight! I have the most assured persuasion that you, my dear friend, are destined, at no very remote period, to make this sublime transition; and shall not this divine prospect console you for all you have lost and suffered, and animate you to triumph over every desolate feeling by which you are environed? If you are fatigued in life's journey—if the scene and the persons through which you pass are inhospitable-see yonder, the palace divine, the angel-friends, and the region of ever-blooming flowers are nigh! It is not far to go; be patient, go on, and live for ever.

With musings like these my mind is familiar. Everything that interests my heart leads me into this mingled emotion of melancholy and sublime. I have lost all taste for the light and the gay; rather, I never had any such taste. I turn disgusted and contemptuous from insipid and shallow folly, to lave in the stream, the tide of deeper sentiments. There I swim, and dive, and rise, and gambol, with all that wild delight

which would be felt by a fish, after panting out of its element awhile, when flung into its own world of waters by some friendly hand. . . . . I have criminally neglected regular, studious thinking for many years: I must try whether it is now too late to resume a habit so essential to solid wisdom and real strength of mind. I have certainly learnt much from various society, and have in some degree improved my powers of social communication; but I feel in a most mortifying degree some mental and moral deficiencies, which I know that nothing can correct but a rigid discipline, which will absolutely require the seriousness of solitude. My greatest defects are in regard to religion, on which subject, as it respects myself, I want to have a profound and solemn investigation, which I foresee must be mingled with a great deal of painful and repentant feeling. What a serious task it is to confront one's self with faithful truth! and see one's self by a light that will not flatter! But it must be done, and the earliest season is therefore the best. At the last tribunal no one will regret having been a habitual and rigorous judge of self. It is an unhappy and enormous fault to live on amid uncertainties respecting the state of one's mind, and with occasional eclipses of those delightful hopes which shine from the other world. I must therefore assemble all my convictions around me, and finally settle the great account I have with God.

....

XXXV. TO THE REV. JOSEPH HUGHES.

Downend, March 18, 1801.

MY DEAR FRIEND,-You gained nothing by your affected formality of address. What was the use of substituting Sir for Friend, when amid the plaudits of the circle to which I repeatedly read your letter, I could so easily explode its commencement by the proud feeling with which I said, "The writer of this is my friend?" Your first sentence was meant as a vulture's beak; I thus brake it in an instant.

I should have been still more proud of this luminous friend, if he had been so luminous as to leave me no refuge in the consciousness of his mistaking my character; if his faculties had been so powerful as to be just, though that justice had been in a language ten times more severe. While I acknowledge his strong sight, I feel that he chases me by moonlight, which allows me to squat in a shade where he cannot find me. If he were not my friend, how I should laugh to see him pass by in pursuit of his own shadow; but as he is my friend, I had rather suffer by his possessing an unerring sense. I have had several occasions of knowing that you do not understand me entirely; there is both good and evil in my heart, which you have not seen. There is yet an apartment or two in the interior of my mind, into which you have not quite sagacity enough to penetrate, nor quite candor enough for me to admit you.

This deduction from your intellectual force still leaves me to admire