triennial visitations, until he attained his eightieth year, when he delivered a final charge to the clergy, whom he had always addressed with the most kind and brotherly condescension. In his retirement he cultivated the acquaintance of his own kindred and early friends, and that of the gentry and nobility of his neighbourhood; and his hours of more complete privacy, were employed in a frequent correspondence with his nearer friends and relations; and it was when cases of affliction and distress formed the topics of his letters, that "the good bishop's Christian piety, religious feeling, and heavenly temper, shone most bright. He then poured forth his consolations in a strain of genuine eloquence, encouraging in others those hopes of a better state which he meekly cherished in him. self, and which grew stronger as his body decayed." Nor did he betray any impatience when he spoke of his own increased and increasing infirmities, nor any uneasiness, when he anticipated his dissolution, which happened in the ninetieth year of his age.

The following anecdotes exhibit in a striking light the benevolence and easiness of temper which distinguished this amiable prelate.

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"Persons were living within these ten years, who in their youth remembered the Bishop, among whom was Dr. Nash, the venerable historian of the county, who in his work has added his own testimony to the high character of the prelate, who he says lived in Worcestershire for eighteen years, beloved by every one. We are indebted to his authority for another instance of the liberality of Dr. Hough, when he was applied to by one of the managers of the county institutions; he proposed to give 500l.; the steward made some besitation about the means of procuring so large a sum, which the Bishop charitably construed into a donbt of its not being enough, and immediately doubled it. A similar donation of 1000%, which sum he always kept in his house in a wall in the cellar, was made by him for the building of the Church of All Saints in Worcester, where a bust of him is placed in gratitude for his munificent bencfaction. Acts of

kindness and beneficence towards indigent or distressed individuals, are also recorded by him, which prove that his charity was

not that of ostentation. Dr. Nash has also left us a beautiful trait of the great good humour and unruffled temper of the Bishop, which displayed itself in a striking manner on the accidental destruction of a favourite barometer by one of his visitors: the notice he took of the matter was confined to this simple observation: 'Do not be uneasy, Sir; I have observed this glass almost daily for upwards of seventy years, but I never saw it so low before.'

"This easiness of temper was by some thought to have been carried to excess, particularly in the partiality which he shewed towards his old and faithful servants. If this were a failing, it was one nearly allied to virtue, and an overflow of good feeling. Of these servants, particufarly his steward and his two brothers, he speaks in his letters with unvariable kindness, and he was pleased to notice them in his will, bestowing many marks of his bounty in testimony of their diligence, fidelity, and affection."" P. xxxviii.

The public virtue and private excellencies of Bishop Hough, are more generally known and appreciated than his literary acquirements, which are nevertheless of no inferior cast, although his modesty into action, beyond the necessary hardly allowed him to call them exigencies of his profession. Four charges and nine sermons, with the exception of the first preached at court, have been collected by Mr. Russell, and offer no unfavourable specimen of clear and forcible reasive exhortation. soning, and of earnest and impres

In the Charge delivered at the primary Visitation of the Diocese of Worcester, in 1719, the Bishop briefly shows the advantages which may be derived from the periodical meeting of the Bishops and Clergy, assembled for solemn visitation, and exhibits a view of the duties of the Clergy of the Church of England, which, if it is not original is always interesting, because it is always important.

"We are ministers of Christ....and as we are such in the Catholic Church, we must do all that in us lies to preserve

the unity of it. First, by labouring to suppress heresy, to banish and drive away, as the Office of Ordination expresses it, all erroneous and false doctrines that are contrary to God's word, whereby the unity of the faith is broken;' and secondly, by opposing all schismatical notions and doctrines, whereby unity in worship is destroyed. And whilst we are labouring to preserve the true Chris tian faith and the ancient apostolical discipline, we must remember that we have the happiness to be ministers in that part of the Catholic Church, where by the blessing and peculiar providence of God they have been maintained in the greatest simplicity of any other under heaven; that we are priests in the Church of England, and therefore have all the obligations that reason, conscience and interest can lay upon ns, to keep close to her sentiments; to preach the faith not only in substance but in words, as she has delivered it to us in her Liturgy and Articles; and to assert

that form of government, which in all the essential parts of it the Church has been under from the beginning; to obey religiously her canons and rubrics; to perform punctually what she enjoins, and in such manner as she prescribes; and lastly, to conform our lives to her precepts, that, as she expresses it, we may be whole some and godly examples and patterns for the people to follow. We must further, as we are members of a national Church, contribute what we can to the honour, welfare, and interest of it: and in order to this, I promise myself that you, my brethren, will be nice and scrupulous on your parts, never to recommend any persons to me for holy orders, but such as you firmly believe, nay in some measure know to be fitly qualified; that you will faithfully inform me of such as you know neglect their duties, but especially of such as bring scandal upon their most holy pro fession and in short, that wherever the cause of religion in general, or of our established economy in particular, is concerned, you will remember that it is, and ought to be, our joint care; and never fail to give me your advice and assistance, that we may act together as effectually as we can for her service. Nor must we forget, that without shameful ingratitude, and falling justly under the imputation of wanting zeal for the interest of the Church, we cannot omit or lessen our care of her patrimony. It is our duty to see that the places of public worship be supported and well repaired, and if not beautifully adorned, yet at least decently and cleanly kept; that by terriers and other legal ways,

provision be made that parochial rights and dues be not diminished or encroached upon. And when the maintenance is small, it will become us to consider, what may be done towards the redress of this heavy grievance, this unfortunate circumstance of our otherwise happy Church, that it may appear we have a fellow feeling in the straits to which any of our brethren are reduced, and are truly members one of another." P. 3.

Without expatiating on the known duties of the Clergy, which are sufficiently expressed in the Office of Ordination, the Bishop proceeds to collect the means of discharging the great duty of defending the unity of the Church, from the method in which princes defend their secular estates. They calculate the force of the enemy; they dispose and ap ply their own force accordingly; they suspect the appearance of amity in their enemy, and they labour to prevent jealousy and misunderstanding at home. These re marks are briefly applied and shown to be consistent with the true policy of the Church in her militant state, and especially under the hostility of the Papists, which there was at that time the most reason to apprehend.

The Charge delivered at the Second Triennial Visitation, in 1722, is an enlarged paraphrase and commentary on the first Epistle to Timothy, with the spirit of whose instructions the Church of England is shewn to correspond. In this Charge the House of God is shown in opposition to the Romanists, and to their assumed claim of infallibi lity, to mean not the Catholic Church, but a particular Church, primarily, the Church of Ephesus with its dependencies, and by accommodation any national Church. It is well observed, that it is

...." owing to the wonderful wisdom and goodness of God, in putting his Church under such an economy as would oblige the officers of it to preserve the truth entire, many times in contradiction to their own principles and practices: for by giving the Apostles a co-ordinate power, the Churches they planted became (as to

jurisdiction) independent of each other; and by appointing a subordination of ministers in the respective Churches, they not only were mutually assisting to each other in preserving the truth, but were checks upon each other when any one of them made an attempt to deprave it." P. 35.

The Charge delivered at the third Triennial Visitation, in 1725, claims even now the most scrupulous attention, and a practical conformity with its valuable instructions. It opens with a high compliment to the character of the Clergy of the diocese of Worcester at that period, and of their order in the discharge of their sacred offices. Hence the Bishop proceeds to their several duties, of reading the prayers and administering the sacraments, in which he recommends a becoming decency, equally free from levity and from affectation; of catechizing and instructing of youth in the principles of Christianity, the neglect of which on the part of parents, resulting in ignorance and indifference, and the necessity of resorting to which, on the part of the Clergy, for the instruction both of the higher and the lower classes of society, are described with apostolical force and earnestness; the Bishop lastly adverts to the duty of preaching, which in its ordinary acceptation is not alone sufficient for the edification of the Church. To the neglect of catechizing, and to the popular delusion of the power of public preaching without a previous catechetical establishment of religious principles, may be traced many of the errors of our own day; much of the ignorance which disgraces, and of the infidelity which would destroy, much of the heresy which has corrupted, and much of the schism which has divided, and by division weakened the Church. In respect of the Dissenters, whom it is now hardly possible to avoid in the discharge of parochial duties, especially in the country, the Bishop recommends, that the Churchman hould labour constantly to main

tain his own ground, that he should cultivate extensive charity, that he should exhibit a good example, against which there shall be no exception, and that he should not give way to unwarrantable concessions and compliances. The practical application of these rules may be followed by little of popular admiration and applause, but it will even in the present day fix and secure the respect and esteem of the Dissenters themselves, as was seen in the last illness of Mr. Taylor of Dedham, than whom no man more strictly acted the part of a Churchman, and who nevertheless received the public prayers of the Dissenters in his own neighbourhood and the constancy of whose administrations was commended from their pulpits.

The Charge delivered at the fourth Triennial Visitation, in 1728, exhibits the nature and practice of charity in its application to Deists, to Heretics, to Schismatics, to men of profligate and men of careless habits, and to those who are members of the household of faith, whose several conditions and claims upon Christian benevolence are justly and forcibly described.

The Sermon " on Christ's Kingdom" was preached at Worcester, and the preacher shows that Christ, by calling himself a king, would have given offence to the Romans, and by denying his royal character, would have exasperated the Jews. His kingdom is explained of religious influence in the heart, and of the Church in its militant and triumphant state, nor was it deemed necessary to insist on the more doubtful doctrine of Christ's personal reign upon the earth. This kingdom of Christ was originally established, and must ever be supported by, persuasive preaching and exemplary practice.

In the Sermon " on God's Judgments," is proved the weakness of the several arguments, which in order to invalidate the moral law of God, have been collected from the

consideration of human nature, from the mercy of God, and from the alleged disproportion between sin and its punishment. That public sins bring down the judgments of the Almighty may be clearly seen in war, in pestilence, and in the debi. litating energies of vice.

The third Sermon is " on the Resurrection of the Body." St. Paul, in his elaborate discourse on the resurrection, 1 Cor. xv. argued in refutation of philosophers who admitted the immortality of the soul, but despised the body; and for the instruction of such as could not understand the resurrection on which St. Paul insists, because even the immortality of the soul was denied by some, and where it was admitted it was not sufficient without the resurrection of the body. In the prosecution of his argument, the Bishop naturally adverts to our Lord's argument for the resurrection, from the title under which God spake to Moses at the bush:

"How does this prove the resurrection of the body? God is their God, and he is not the God of the dead. What then? Does this prove any thing more than that the souls of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, do live, or exist? Are we not sure that their bodies are dead and dissolved? And would not God be their God, and the God of the living too, though they should never rise again? This has occasioned some commentators to say, that our Saviour levelled his argument at that opinion of the Sadducees, that there was neither angel nor spirit; and that this being the ground of their disbelief of the resurrection of the body, he thought it enough to remove the foundation of their scruple; and it is plain, say they, it was enough, for the Sadducees found nothing to reply. But this will not satisfy, for our Lord plainly asserts it to be an argument for the resurrection of the body; and it is below the dignity of his reasoning to make it no more than an argument ad hominem, which sort of arguments are of sufficient force, indeed, to silence the adversary, but do not always prove the point. His meaning, therefore, and the force of his argument must be this: that the souls of the patriarchs did, as appeared from that text, exist in a separate state; that all separate souls were in

an incomplete, imperfect state, and therefore it must, by a necessary consequence, follow, that there should come a time when

their souls and bodies should be united, and made as perfect as their natures would admit." P. 153.

In the practical improvement of the argument the Bishop maintains, that Christ has not encouraged the hope, nor are the principles of his religion adapted to the attainment, of temporal happiness: the nature of real and false happiness is often overlooked; and while the Christian is not excluded from this world's good, if he seeks it in moderation and in subordination to higher purposes, he has, in the hope of more permanent happiness, a motive of patience and resignation under all the changes and chances of mortality.

The points on which the Bishop insists, in the Sermon "on Worldly Cares," are,

"First, That the most necessary cares of this life, even those that are employed in the support of life itself, are not in their own nature subservient to our spiritual interests.

"Secondly, That where they are suffered to grow and multiply upon us, they are prejudicial and, in the end, fatal to it.

"Thirdly, By way of inference, that, therefore, we ought to change the object of our cares, think less of ourselves and more of other people, make their welfare our business and concern, and this would certainly yield us fruit in another life."—

P. 176.

The conclusion of this discourse is conceived in a style of unusual boldness for a courtly audience, and suggests inquiries which, in every age of luxury and folly, and in every class of society, from the prince to the peasant, it is necessary to institute, but not pleasant to resolve.

"Since our worldly cares are so dangerous, what shall we say to those who are perpetually employed in the pursuit of their vices and gratifying their passions? If necessary food scarce deserves our thoughts, what shall we say to those that study the art of gluttony, that count it an

accomplishment to understand (as they call it) good eating, are more solicitous about dressing than obtaining the meat, and value a dish more for the novelty than the wholesome nourishment it affords ? What shall we say to that unreasonable expence of time which their servants are at in providing and ordering before, and themselves after, it appears at the table? What shall we say to that profuse charge which the bare disguising of their meat amounts to, where so much pains are taken to disguise what God had blessed, and to render wholesome diet uneasy to the stomach, only that it may more gratefully touch the palate as it passes? Do these men think they are laudably em. ployed, or that this is not taking thought for the body in its most criminal sense? It is carrying their thoughts infinite degrees beyond what our Saviour seems here to apprehend; and how lightly soever they may esteem of this sin, this despicable, and unmanly vice, it will behove them seriously to consider what St. Paul says to the Philippians concerning some carnal Christians of that time, and how far his words are applicable to themselves; Many walk,' says he, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you weeping, that they are enemies to the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.'

"If the kingdom of God and his righteousness is to be our first and chiefest care, what shall we say to those that never admit him into their thoughts? Whose whole life is spent in the pursuit of folly, shifting the scene from one vice to another, and

whose most innocent intervals are idleness and impertinence? Nay, what shall we say to those that do despite to the name and

worship of God? That laugh at revelation because they know not how it is conveyed, and ridicule religion as a politic contrivance? That degrade the Son of God him→ self because they cannot comprehend the mystery of his godhead, and insolently set up their own wisdom against the testimony

of the eternal word?.....

"The third and last inference I shall

make is, that if contemplation be the true

and proper business of the other life, for which we must prepare ourselves in this, by withdrawing, as much as we can, from sensible objects, and being ready and disposed when God shall call us to enter upon that state, how utterly incapable do people render themselves of the place who never accustom themselves to think at all? There are such shadows of men in the world that never think seriously, that never think

usefully; that are still mighty busy without real business; restless and unquiet, yet always idle; hurrying from one place and company to another without any premeditated design or occasion: they keep their minds constantly upon the flutter, in a perplexed sort of motion, that has no peculiar tendency, and the main business, after all, is only to shun themselves, to keep those uneasy inmates their consciences from setting their sins and follies before their eyes. I hope none that hear me this day fall under this character: if they do, I am sure the greatest part of what I have said is very unseasonable and inapplicable to them. I would recommend business, worldly business, to these rather than none at all; and I do not question but he that exercises his thoughts regularly and coherently, thongh the subject may not be altogether such as one would wish, is much nearer heaven than a thoughtless, careless man; for he that uses to think will sometimes think right: and if God, at such a time, shall please to afford him the grace of repentance, he is already naturally disposed for the business of another life; but the other renders bimself an unfit person even for grace to work upon; he has brought his mind to a senseless inactivity, so as neither to apprehend wherein the dignity of its nature (consists) nor prosecute those ends for which it was created. P. 190.

In the Sermon "on the thirtieth of January, before King William," the Bishop alludes distantly and indistinctly to the conduct and character of Charles I. and shows that a kingdom is divided by divisions between the king and people, or by factions of the people under pretence of religion. These factious are justly attributed to pride; to an imaginary necessity of propagating opinions; to a belief that they are deserted who cannot apprehend the alleged importance of the doctrines propagated; and to the officious intrusiveness of wicked men.

There is a Sermon " on the Abundance of Riches," showing how they are expended, how they expose to temptation, prevent reproof, and perplex the pursuit of eternity. The inferences are, Think not of posthumous charity; Be watchful; Take no care for riches.