satisfied with the answers I gave them on the very interesting subjects you have glanced upon, and which so peculiarly distinguish the orthodox member of the Established Church from those of our fellow Christians called Methodists. I cannot explain my own sentiments on the principal one better than in your own very proper and comprehensive terms, interpreting the article of predestination by the doctrines of the Bible; not the Bible by the articles, for it certainly will bear the sense of conditional, as well as absolute, predestination.' Dr. Rotherham's most elegant, and to me most satisfactory, Essay on Faith, leaves me nothing to add essential to this subject, when I acquaint you, that the sentiments and doctrines contained in that Essay, which so particularly relate to the principal points of dispute between us and the Methodists, entirely correspond with my own. I flatter myself much, this full and explicit account of myself will be sufficient proof to you, that I am incapable of any ungenerous reservations that might disappoint or deceive you. I could say more on the subject, but surely, good Sir, I need trouble you no further; yet there is one circumstance this observation reminds me to apprise you of at present, which I should have done before had I presumed you would have deemed it any material objection to my application. Perhaps the particular predilection I have ever had for my profession may have been increased by what to others may appear a personal nisfortune, but which I have never yet felt the weight of myself; it is an infirmity of hardness of hearing, which, as I have executed every part of the ministerial duty since the year 1772 without any inconvenience or impediment, and in that time have so long had the care of one of the most considerable and populous parishes in the diocese of York, after Wakefield and Halifax, I presume you will not think a circumstance operating to my prejudice, as it has never been hitherto felt or mentioned as such by any one else. This you must be sensible is better to be explained by actual experiment than favourably described on paper. I would not however have had you in the least disappointed in your ideas on the supposition of my having the fortune of being any ways connected with you. If, after this full representation, your sentiments should be decided in my favour, I can only repeat the assurance, that you will have no reason to repent of your partiality in my behalf; and if it should not be my happiness to acquire the confidence, attention, and good-will of your parishioners, I beg you, Sir, to be equally assured that I will not stay at Eyam to their prejudice and our mutual pain.

"A state of suspense you are very sensible is the most painful of all others; and I would be very glad to receive your earliest determinations, both on that and other accounts. My acquaint

A memoir of Dr. Rotherham will be found in the "Literary Anecdotes," vol. VIII. p. 193, and in the same volume, p. 229, another testimonial to his work mentioned above.

ance is very general, and most of my friends know I am not actually in service. I receive frequent overtures of their readiness to inquire for, and establish me, agreeably in the Church, which is the only employment I truly relish and shall attend to; and I expect every day some particular applications to be made to me, which I would willingly preclude entirely, by devoting my best endeavours to serve and represent Mr. Seward. I shall in any case remain, with great truth and respect,

"Reverend Sir,

"Your most obedient humble servant, P. CUNNINGHAM."

2. Conclusion of a Sermon preached by Mr. Seward, at Eyam, on Sunday, Nov. 19, 1775 * :

"I hope and trust that I shall return to you, and frequently address you from this pulpit; but in the mean time I have the greatest consolation and joy that I leave you under the care of so excellent a preacher, whose piety to God, whose delight in the performance of the duties of his office, whose amiable, engaging, courteous, and affectionate behaviour to the richer, and condescending, affable, and charitable treatment of his poorer neighbours, is a continued living sermon to us all, and has so endeared him to us already, that he is become our general friend, our delight, and our joy. Like holy Job, when the ear heareth him, then it blesseth him; and when the eye seeth him, it giveth witness to him.' One hearer telleth another' how rational and clear he is in his arguments, how affecting and convincing he is in his persuasions, and how zealous and devout in his prayers; and one neighbour' certifieth another' how cheerful and engaging he is in his common conversation, how candid and charitable in his opinions and characters of others, and how ready in shewing pity to all who are in the least distress. Think not that I have put so much of the pulpit duty upon him, since we have been here together, through idleness and indolence; no, it was that I would not disappoint so many longing ears that wished to hear him; it was that I rejoiced at the occasion of really preferring his sermons to my own, and of giving so eminent and worthy, though so young, a man, 'the right hand of fellowship.' Grey hairs may receive instruction from his lips, and the aged bow down to him; and that because he keepeth the commandments of the Lord, and delighteth in the law of his God. O may he long continue amongst us our happiness and our crown! may his moving instructions sink deep into all your hearts, and spring up into a harvest of virtue, piety, and goodness! and may the fruits of it be a plentiful treasure of happiness to himself! may his eye see it, and rejoice in the success of

* Communicated to the Gentleman's Magazine in 1785, probably by Mr. Seward.

his pious and zealous labours! There is one thing indeed that I have reason to fear, which is, that his health and strength may not enable him to perform, so diligently as he wishes, the more laborious part of his office, the frequent visitation of the sick, of private baptism of infants, particularly in the more distant parts of the parish, during storms of violent winds, rain, and snow. His constitution is tender and delicate, and has been weakened by too sedentary an application to his studies. Let me therefore intreat you all not to press him to this without real necessity, but to be cautious of endangering his health and life, as he is desirous of continuing to do you all the good offices in his power, and of promoting at all times your eternal, external, and internal happiness. May long-continued health, prosperity, and, above all, the blessings of a good conscience, attend both him and you! may I find my parish, at my return, if it please God to grant me a return to it, a seminary of piety, sobriety, charity, and every moral and christian virtue! and may the good seed which he sows amongst you with so diligent, so judicious, and so bountiful a hand, spring up to eternal life in all your hearts!"

3. Rev. P. CUNNINGHAM to the Rev. THOMAS SEWARD. "MY DEAR SIR, Eyam, Dec. 21, 1775. "Under what planetary auspices our correspondence first began I know not; to judge from its effects in general, I would hope, without imputing any thing to dreams or judicial astrology, that every circumstance of the benignant kind was combined in its commencement, and that its longer continuance will have no other than the happiest influence on every object within the sphere of our mutual concern. I have just been gazing at the stars with all the admiration of an amatore of the great works of nature; you will not therefore wonder at my beginning this letter in the style of an astronomer. The finest and most welcome frost imaginable has just succeeded the late most unwholesome weather. I always used to look up with fresh delight to the noblest 'declarations of the glory of God;' but here the Heavens seem to glow with uncommon splendour. Certainly this is not a mere vision of my romantic fancy, for Brydone, when he ascended Mount Etna and slept in the Spelonca dei Capreoli,' which is far from being the highest region of the mountain, was struck much in the same manner that I am on these Ætnas of the North of England, I mean with respect to elevation. In return for the prospect from my windows at Deal, where I not unfrequently behold the sun rising from the bosom of the deep like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,' &c. I have certainly gained a clearer view of the calm firmament,

'When it glows with living sapphires,
And where the River of Bliss, through 'midst of Heaven,
Rolls o'er elysian flowers her amber stream.'

"Nor is it merely from this occasional ocular demonstration that I discover myself to be in a more elevated situation than of late. My heart almost daily tells me so, for such is the true language of its emotions on continually receiving from such numbers of your parishioners the most affecting and expressive demonstrations, that my continuance in my present station is essential to their happiness and contentment. One grasps my hands so vehemently, as a mark of cordiality, that it is a mercy for me neither the gout nor the rheumatism are lodged there; another takes them ' con amore religioso, alle labbre; a third prays for a blessing on my head as I go along the street; a fourth sends me a bottle of magnesia alba, expressing fears for my studious life, and a fervent wish that it may in any measure contribute to the preservation of the health of so, &c. &c.; a fifth cries; a sixth offers me 40s. a year to teach his tenth or eleventh son Latin for two hours in the day; a seventh,—but I dare proceed no farther in this practical commentary on the elevation both of my situation and my feelings; however, these simple instances may make my dear spiritual father smile; they not unfrequently tempt me to the reverse. The conclusion that I cannot help drawing from the whole is this: Inveni portum ; spes et fortuna, valete!' Would the acquisition of .400 per annum, and every other splendid circumstance, have been able to afford me the heart-felt joy I experience in my present Post of Honour,' though it is so private a station!' It is very true, I am very few degrees richer than Aristides or Sir Francis Walsingham were when they died. I do not believe either had so much left, if as much, as was sufficient to defray their funeral expences; but, there is that scattereth and yet increaseth,' &c. and however differently more contracted and sordid minds may think of the resolution I have taken, to bury myself in the Peak of Derbyshire instead of rising to wealth and splendour,' I am very certain that I am many degrees nearer the summit of my best and ruling ambition where I am than I should have been in any other sphere or situation of my life. I know that when I die, my grave will be watered with many a tear of grateful remembrance and affection; I know that my memory will be blessed by those that survive me here; and the thought that these will one day give a still brighter testimony to my endeavours, to make them internally, externally, and eternally happy,' enables me to look back on all my past misfortunes as · blessings in disguise" that conducted me hither; to look down with indifference on what the world calls fortune and greatness, and to look forward with more serenity and consolation than ever to that reward that fadeth not. In the words

of the late Dr. Hough, Bishop of Worcester, I can very truly say: 'I may not perhaps have chosen the most likely employment to thrive by, but I depend on a Master who never fails to recompense those who trust in Him above their hopes.' These being my unalterable sentiments, you may imagine, Sir, that any difference between them and my father's will not make any impression on me to the prejudice of what I see to be my duty, a conduct perfectly in unison with my declarations. I have had no tidings from Deal since those which were communicated to you at Eyam. My time is so effectually engrossed by such a variety of duties, engagements, and literary pursuits, that it is impossible for me to be the regular correspondent to my family; their entire leisure leaves them without excuse in failing to be to me. Had any sinister incident happened, some of my friends at Deal would most undoubtedly have apprized me of it. I sent the extract of your Sermon, that did me such signal honour to my father and sister for their perusal. I thought it also the most explicit and expressive testimony of my gratitude and lively sense of the Archbishop of York's former condescension and kindness to me that could possibly be presented to his Grace; in this manner, therefore, I have made very lately my acknowledgements to him, and taken my final leave. This, too, will convince you, I have no intention to trouble his Grace for any future favours that might effect my residence at Eyam.

"I have been several times interrupted, and this is generally the case when I am writing either letters or sermons, before I could get thus far in my epistolary conversazione. In these intervals see the mutability of human things; the keen salutary frost is already succeeded by the same drisling, dark, unwholesome weather, of which we have had our share, though not of the electrified kind, as well as the inhabitants of Lichfield. Both brick and stone walls, in every house in the country, have been loaded with dew-drops, innumerable as those of the morning, which the sun

Impearls on every leaf and every flower.'

"The old and young declare they never remember this to have happened in their houses before. Colds, head-aches, and pectoral complaints have been very general; but not so fatal as the influenza has been at Derby, Sheffield, Bristol, and other great cities, who cannot boast, amidst their various attractions and advantages, of the pure marble air,' as Milton calls it, that we breathe most generally at Eyam, who, like the Kenites of old, have our nests and dwelling-places in the rocks. I thought myself invulnerable by escaping so long; but yesterday I was taught, by a very severe cold in my head, to say: ''Let not him that girdeth on his harness boast himself as he that putteth it off. However, by good care and precaution I am amazingly better to day, and shall learn to be very heedful in future, as