SIR J. E. SMITH. 



07 



author inculcates the doctrine of a constantly superin- 

 tending Providence, as well as the advantage, and even 

 the duty of contemplating the works of God. " This/' he 

 says, is part of the business of a sabbath-day, as it will 

 be, probably, of our employment through that eternal rest, 

 of which the sabbath is a type." Archbishop Tennison 

 is recorded to have told Dr. Derham, that " Mr. Rav 

 was much celebrated in his time at Cambridge for 

 preaching solid and useful divinity, instead of that enthu- 

 siastic stuff which the sermons of that time were gene- 

 rally filled Avith." Two of his funeral discourses are 

 mentioned with particular approbation ; one, on the 

 death of Dr. Arrowsmith, master of his college \ the 

 other, on that of one of his most intimate and beloved 

 colleagues, Mr. John Nid, likewise a senior fellow of 

 Trinity, who had a great share in Ray's first botanical 

 publication, the ' Catalogus Plantarum circa Cantabrigiam 

 nascentium,' printed in 1660, which may be considered 

 as the prototype of his ' Synopsis,' hereafter m^entioned. 

 Indeed, before this little volume appeared, its author had 

 visited various parts of England and Wales, for the 

 purpose of investigating their native plants, as he did 

 several times afterwards ; nor were his observations con- 

 fined to natural history, but extended to local and general 

 history, antiquities, the arts, and all kinds of useful 

 knowledge. His amusing Itineraries were published 

 along with his life by Dr. Derham, and a few letters to 

 that gentleman, by the care of Dr. George Scott, e.s,.s., 

 in 1760, under the title of ' Select Remains of the learned 

 John Ray, m.a., &c.' Ray's first botanical tour occu- 

 pied nearly six weeks, from August 9th to September 

 18th, 1658. On the 23d of December, 1660, he was 

 ordained both deacon and priest at the same time, by Dr. 

 Sanderson, then bishop of Lincoln. In 1661 he tra- 

 velled with Mr. Willughby into Scotland, returning by 

 Cumberland and Westmoreland ; and the following year, 

 with the same companion, he accomphshed a more par- 

 ticular investigation of Wales. How critically he studied 



