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the distinction I made in my last, between the specious professor, and the true believer, between him whose faith is his sunday-suit, and him who never puts it off at alla distinction. I am a little fearful sometimes of making, because it is a heavy stroke, upon the practice of more than half the Christians in the world.

My dear Cousin, I told you I read the book with great pleasure, which may be accounted for from its own merit, but perhaps it pleased me the more, because you had travelled the same road before me. You know there is such a pleasure as this, which would want great explanation to some folks, being perhaps a mystery to those, whose hearts are a mere muscle, and serve only for the even circulation,

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W. C.

LETTER IX.

To Lady HESKETH.

Sept. 4, 1765.

Though I have some very

agreeable acquaintance at Huntingdon, my dear Cou

sin, none are so agreeable as the arrival of your Let

man, and the daughter quite of a piece with the rest of the family. They see but little company, which suits me exactly; go when I will, I find a house full of peace and cordiality in all its parts, and am sure to hear no scandal, but such discourse instead of it, as we are all better for. You remember Rousseau's description of an English morning; such are the mornings I spend with these good people, and the evenings differ from them in nothing, except that they are still more snug and quieter. Now I know them, I wonder that I liked Huntingdon so well before I knew them, and am apt to think, I should find every place disagreeable, that had not an Unwin belonging to it.

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This incident convinces me of the truth of an observation I have often made, that when we circumscribe our estimate of all that is clever within the limits of our own acquaintance (which I at least have been always apt to do) we are guilty of a very uncharitable censure upon the rest of the world, and of a narrowness of thinking disgraceful to ourselves. Wapping and Redriff may contain some of the most amiable persons living, and such as one would go to

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Wapping and Redriff to make acquaintance with. You remember Mr. Gray's stanza,

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I have for some time past imputed your silence to the cause, which you yourself assign for it, viz. to my change of situation; and was even sagacious enough to account for the frequency of your Letters to me, while I lived alone, from your attention to me in a state of such solitude as seemed to make it an act of particular charity to write to me. I bless God for it, I was happy even then; solitude has nothing gloomy in it, if the soul points upwards. St. Paul tells his Hebrew converts,

"Ye are come (already come) to Mount Sion." To an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly of the first-born, which are written in Heaven, and to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant. When this is the case, as surely it was with them, or the Spirit of Truth had never spoken it, there is an end of the melancholy and dullness of life at once. You will not suspect me, my dear Cousin, of a design to understand this passage literally. But this however it certainly means, that a lively faith is able to anticipate, in some measure, the joys of that heavenly society, which the soul shall actually possess hereafter.

Since I have changed my situation, I have found still greater cause of thanksgiving to the Father of all mercies. The family with whom I live, are Christians, and it has pleased the Almighty to bring me to the knowledge of them, that I may want no means of improvement in that temper, and conduct, which he is pleased to require in all his servants.

My dear Cousin! one half of the Christian. world would call this madness, fanaticism, and folly: but are not these things warranted by the word of God, not only in the passages I have cited, but in

many others? If we have no communion with God here, surely we can expect none hereafter. A faith that does not place our conversation in Heaven; that does not warm the heart, and purify it too: that does not in short, govern our thought, word, and deed, is no faith, nor will it obtain for us any spiritual blessing here, or hereafter. Let us see therefore, my dear Cousin, that we do not deceive ourselves in a matter of such infinite moment. The world will be ever telling us, that we are good enough, and the world will vilify us behind our backs. But it is not the world, which tries the heart, that is the prerogative of God alone. My dear Cousin! I have often prayed for you behind your back, and now I pray for you to your face. There are many who would not forgive me this wrong, but I have known you so long, and so well, that I am not afraid of telling you how sincerely I wish for your growth in every Chrisgrace, in every thing that may promote and secure your everlasting welfare.

tian

I am obliged to Mrs. Cowper for the book, which, you perceive, arrived safe. I am willing to to consider it as an intimation on her part that she would wish me to write to her, and shall do it accordingly. My circumstances are rather particular, such

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