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 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; 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, God then deals blessings; if a king did so, Twice on the day His due is understood, Though private prayer be a brave design, Where it is warmest. Leave thy six and seven; When once thy foot enters the church, be bare. And make thyself all reverence and fear. Kneeling ne'er spoil'd silk stocking: quit thy state: Resort to sermons, but to prayers most: Stay not for the other pin. A joy for it worth worlds. O be drest; 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, 77 Let vain or busy thoughts have there no part; Judge not the preacher, for he is thy judge: He that gets patience, and the blessing which Jest not at preachers' language or expression: And love him for his Master: his condition, None shall in hell such bitter pangs endure, The Holy Scriptures. O book! infinite sweetness! let my heart To clear the breast, to mollify all pain. |