oH I THE YOUNG CLERGYMAN. 



as a married man, with a full and sincere determination to fulfil their 

 various duties ; but he was in some respects unfitted for their due per- 

 formance. Naturally good-humoured and convivial, and having ob- 

 tained his Fellowship almost as soon as his degree, he had never had 

 an opportunity of acquiring practical knowledge of the ordinary 

 affairs of the every-day world. Of the value of money he knew 

 nothing, and was consequently ignorant of that economy, without 

 which income is valueless, as a provision beyond the supply of our 

 immediate wants. 



The good, easy man had therefore husbanded no part of his 

 resources, so that, when he commenced his career of housekeeping, he 

 was nearly pennyless. Credit and high prices were of course the 

 order of the day, joined to great peculation from want of punctuality. 

 Thus he had a constant difficulty in meeting his expenditure, which 

 was attended by its customary shifts and sacrifices ; and these alto- 

 gether swallowed up the entire proceeds of his benefice beforehand. 

 So long as no pressing demands were made upon him, he believed 

 every thing to be going on right sat comfortably in his carved oaken 

 chair, and superintended his parochial affairs with dignity, tempered 

 by humour and liveliness. 



His life thus glided on happily and placidly, and three children 

 were born to him in his old age. His wife as well as himself pos- 

 sessed an equanimity of temper that guarded them from embittering 

 present enjoyment by useless calculations upon futurity. Satisfied 

 with the plenty of the day, they sailed smoothly along the stream 

 of existence, never dreaming, in the simplicity and singleness of their 

 hearts, that storms or shipwrecks could come athwart their passage. 

 Now and then, indeed, Mrs. Edwards, who was several years 

 younger than her husband, would remind him of the uncertainty of 

 life, and of the circumstance, that should any thing happen to 

 him, herself and his infant family would be plunged at once into 

 poverty. 



His long-continued habits rendered him unable to profit, or even 

 feel these admonitions. Not that he was selfish, or unwilling to de- 

 prive himself of certain comforts and indulgences which he now en- 

 joyed, but that an habitual indifference, joined to a deep though 

 erring sense of the goodness of his Divine Master, made him inca- 

 pable of understanding his proper position. Hence, in reply to his 

 wife, he would urge that the Great Being, to whose service his life 

 was devoted, would never desert the upright man, nor leave the 

 children of his servant to perish for want, " Besides," he went on 

 to say, " we are, my dear, stewards, placed by a bountiful God to 

 administer our wealth to the poor. We are sent as beacons by which 

 all classes of society may shape their course. Sociability, a free parti- 

 cipation of our enjoyments, and unbounded charity, I consider as 

 essential parts of our duties. It will be vain to preach doctrines of 

 love to our neighbour, and of peace and good-will to all mankind, if 

 our example does not coincide with our precepts." 



These were the opinions of this worthy man as to the duties of a 

 gospel minister ; and they were not suffered to slumber idly in his own 

 breast. To the poor amongst his flock, he was a liberal patron ; to 



