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What a fine picture of the genuine man, the Christian gentleman! A heartless blockhead-and wooden heads have usually hearts to correspond-would have laughed at the poor man's perplexities; a dandy would not have soiled his fine clothes; a mere sentimentalist would have gone home and written a sonnet; and the magistrate or clergyman, conservative of his dignity, would, commander-wise, have directed the packman what to do, or at best would have sent to his assistance the first labourer he met. But the rector of Bemerton was a good Samaritan. After the canonical coat was off, there still remained a hero-that next thing to a saint-the man who loves his neighbour as himself, and who feels that whatsoever in itself is right, is always sufficiently respectable. What made the action all the more beautiful was the performer's rare refinement. Born in the ancestral castle of Montgomery, the brother of a peer, himself for many years the frequenter of the court, the guest and favourite of the king, he had withal, what courtiers sometimes lack, a noble mind, and it was within a palatial, princely homestead that his fancy lived and moved. On this occasion he was on his way to the cathedral to enjoy a feast of music-possibly composing a stanza for "The Temple," as he paced across the plain; and it is one of the rarest and loveliest combinations when practical beneficence co-exists with an exquisite idealism-when, on a moment's warning, the seraph can become the ministering spirit, and from amidst the music of the spheres he can at once descend to such deeds of mercy as are needed on our world's highways.

The incident is an epitome of Herbert's pastoral life, and it is the key to most of his poetry, in which the beauty of holiness is made to invest the most common objects and actions, and in which this world and the next are joined together in a blessed harmony.

In keeping, too, with such a life, was his departure out of it. He had reached his fortieth year, and on the Sunday be

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fore he died, he rose suddenly from his bed, and, calling for his lute, he said

"My God, my God,

My music shall find Thee,

And every string

Shall have his attribute to sing."

Then, tuning the instrument, he played and sang

"The Sundays of man's life,

Threaded together on Time's string,

Make bracelets to adorn the wife

Of the eternal glorious King.

On Sunday heaven's gates stand ope;
Blessings are plentiful and rife,

More plentiful than hope."

And thus, as Walton records, "he continued meditating, and praying, and rejoicing till the day of his death." On that day he said to his friend, Mr Woodnot, who had come from London to see him, "My dear friend, I am sorry I have nothing to present to my merciful God but sin and misery; but the first is pardoned, and a few hours will now put a period to the latter." Mr Woodnot reminded him of the church which he had rebuilt, and his many other deeds of beneficence, to which the dying Christian replied, "They be good works, if they be sprinkled with the blood of Christ, and not otherwise." Afterwards he appeared to be in great agony, and when his wife asked what ailed him, he said, "I have passed a conflict with my last enemy, but have overcome him by the merits of my Master, Jesus." His last words were, "Lord, forsake me not, now my strength faileth me; but grant me mercy for the merits of my Jesus. And now, Lord-Lord, now receive my soul;" words which were hardly uttered when his spirit passed away.

Herbert was born April 3, 1593. He studied at Cambridge, became a Fellow of Trinity, and was chosen public orator to the University, in which office he obtained the notice and the

friendship of King James. He was inducted to the living of Bemerton, near Salisbury, April 1630, and died in the spring of 1633. Agreeably to his own request, he was buried with the singing service for the dead, by the singing-men of Sarum, and his funeral took place on "the 3d of March 1632," o.s.* His brother was Lord Herbert of Cherbury, well known as one of the earliest and ablest of the deistical writers of England.

In the preface to his own "Poetical Fragments," Richard Baxter says, "I know that Cowley and others far exceed Herbert in wit, and accurate composure. But (as Seneca takes with me above all his contemporaries, because he speaketh things by words, feelingly and seriously, like a man that is past jest, so) Herbert speaks to God like one that really believeth a God, and whose business in this world is most with God. Heart-work and heaven-work make up his books." Had Herbert been less like Cowley, it would have fared better with his fame during these last generations; but within the last twenty years there has been a remarkable revival of his old renown. For this he is mainly indebted to that devotional feeling, at once cheerful and serious, which runs through all his compositions, and to those fine scintillations of fancy which brighten every page; and readers who are magnanimous enough to forgive in an old author the faults of his own period, will be richly rewarded in "holy Herbert's" gentle wisdom, and in the multitude of his quaint and happy memorabilia.†

Public Worship.

Restore to God His due in tithe and time;

A tithe purloin'd, cankers the whole estate.

* Willmott's Lives of Sacred Poets, p. 276.

Herbert's Works are now rendered of easy attainment, by the careful and almost immaculate reprints of the late Mr Pickering. Of "The Temple" there is a sumptuous edition, exquisitely illustrated by Birket Foster.

HERBERT.

Sundays observe: think when the bells do chime,
'Tis angels' music; therefore come not late.

God then deals blessings; if a king did so,
Who would not haste, nay give, to see the show?

Twice on the day His due is understood,
For all the week thy food so oft He gave thee.
Thy cheer is mended; bate not of the food,
Because 'tis better, and perhaps may save thee.
Thwart not th' Almighty God; O be not cross.
Fast when thou wilt; but then 'tis gain, not loss.

Though private prayer be a brave design,
Yet public hath more promises, more love;
And love's a weight to hearts, to eyes a sign.
We all are but cold suitors; let us move

Where it is warmest. Leave thy six and seven;
Pray with the most; for where most pray, is heav'n.

When once thy foot enters the church, be bare.
God is more there than thou: for thou art there
Only by His permission. Then beware,

And make thyself all reverence and fear.

Kneeling ne'er spoil'd silk stocking: quit thy state:
All equal are within the church's gate.]

Resort to sermons, but to prayers most:
Praying's the end of preaching.

Stay not for the other pin.

A joy for it worth worlds.

O be drest;
Why, thou hast lost

Thus hell doth jest

Away thy blessings, and extremely flout thee,

Thy clothes being fast, but thy soul loose about thee.

In time of service seal up both thine eyes,

And send them to thy heart; that, spying sin,
They may weep out the stains by them did rise.
Those doors being shut, all by the ear comes in.
Who marks in church-time others' symmetry,
Makes all their beauty his deformity.

77

Let vain or busy thoughts have there no part;
Bring not thy plough, thy plots, thy pleasure thither.
Christ purg'd His temple; so must thou thy heart.
All worldly thoughts are but thieves met together
To cozen thee. Look to thy action well,
For churches either are our heaven or hell.

Judge not the preacher, for he is thy judge:
If thou mislike him, thou conceiv'st him not,
God calleth preaching folly. Do not grudge
To pick out treasures from an earthen pot.
The worst speak something good: if all want sense,
God takes a text, and preacheth patience.

He that gets patience, and the blessing which
Preachers conclude with, hath not lost his pains.
He that by being at church, escapes the ditch,
Which he might fall in by companions, gains.
He that loves God's abode, and to combine
With saints on earth, shall one day with them shine.

Jest not at preachers' language or expression:
How know'st thou but thy sins made him miscarry?
Then turn thy faults and his into confession:
God sent him whatsoe'er he be: O tarry,

And love him for his Master: his condition,
Though it be ill, makes him no ill physician.

None shall in hell such bitter pangs endure,
As those who mock at God's way of salvation.
Whom oil and balsams kill, what salve can cure?
They drink with greediness a full damnation.
The Jews refused thunder; and we folly.
Though God do hedge us in, yet who is holy?

The Holy Scriptures.

O book! infinite sweetness! let my heart
Suck every letter, and a honey gain,
Precious for any grief in any part,

To clear the breast, to mollify all pain.

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