THE YOUNG CLERGYMAN. 583 



*' Let us not think this hard to us is given 



A world within ourselves, surcharged with love 



And manifold delights a second Heaven ! 

 Let us extol God's bounty let us prove 

 How grateful is our task to trim this grove, 



To prune these growing plants, and tend these flowers : 

 Ev'n were this hard, thy presence would remove 



All sense of toil and pain, and gild the hours 



With happy thoughts, and give me never-tiring powers." 



Thus answer'd Eve, in low and tuneful voice : 



" O thou, for whom I live ! in whom I J m bless'd ! 

 My head ! my guide ! doubly may I rejoice, 



Since I have God and thee above the rest ! 



Thou nobly gifted, and with power impress'd, 

 Canst worship God alone I Him and thee. 



Thanks, praises, prayers, are swelling in my breast : 

 Low thus I bend and thus on suppliant knee 

 Pour out my thanks to God my soul to thee!" 



THE YOUNG CLERGYMAN. 



CHAPTER I. THE RECTOR. 



" Tell me, on what holy ground 

 May domestic peace be found ?" 



COLERIDGE. 



THE exceeding beauty of many of our old country parsonage- 

 houses, with their tall chimnies, cool porches, various-sized windows, 

 pointed gables, slanting roofs, and irregular structure, joined to their 

 solemn repose and their extreme neatness, give them an air almost 

 devotional, and they are in admirable keeping with the life and 

 character of a Christian pastor. It is these houses, together with the 

 neighbouring primitive and antiquated churches, that give one great 

 charm to the rural districts of our favoured country. Many soothing 

 and delightful trains of feeling are always excited by them, and 

 their pure repose conies closely home to those religious sensibilities 

 which are implanted in all our hearts. 



In one of these mansions, James Edwards had taken up his abode, 

 when about fifty years of age. Upwards of twenty years he had 

 lived as a Fellow in one of our most noted colleges ; and when he 

 had been presented with the living, he had at once exchanged his 

 locality and his state of celibacy, and a love-engagement, of a 

 standing as old as his Fellowship, had been at last fulfilled. 



Mr. Edwards entered on his new vocations as a parish priest, and 



