"You inquire after me. I am of an infirm and uncomfortable state of health and indeed, I never knew firm health long together in my life. Yet, bless God, at almost sixty-five, I am able to go through as much work, either in my study or the pulpit, as ever I did, except in moving from place to place......I almost wish could have you Air and exer for a patient under your nervous debility. cise, however, are the most universally successful remedies. Desks, and counting houses, and studies, and endless application, and anxious care, on the one hand, and indolence on the other, are the great sources of these maladies. Except in the depth of winter, I work as a labourer, two or three hours every day in my garden, to counterbalance the application of my study. Let nothing hinder you from using exercise to the very border of wearying yourself, and in the open air. This is my prescription: and no good physician will refuse to set his name to it...... "I am, dear sir, "Yours faithfully and affectionately, No. X. LETTERS TO THE REV. DR. RYLAND. 1809-1819. "Aston Sandford, June 24, 1809. "I SENT. off two missionaries this week, who are going to Sierra Leone; both excellent men, and one of them of considerable talents. He has married a wife of my congregation. Our parting, both in preaching and praying, in public and in the family, has been almost beyond any scene I ever witnessed. I cannot but hope that a blessing, in answer to the prayers of numbers, will attend them.-I have two more with me, most decided characters, who are studying Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Susoo, (do you not stare at my talking in this manner?) with the express purpose of being qualified to translate the Scriptures, or part of them, into the African languages. I have devoted much of my time to this object; excited to emulation by the examples of your missionaries in India. ......You will remember our conversations on the subject of missions at Northampton: and now, I think the close of my life is likely to be especially devoted to promote that object, respecting which we then conversed and prayed. We have before seen his practical sympathy with one missionary institution, conducted by Christians of different denominations from his own, under its losses; the next letter will shew him acting a similar part towards another. It relates to the destruction, by fire, of the Baptist Mission printing establishment in the East Indies. "I WRITE this in great haste, just to inform you that, immediately on receiving the affecting news of the calam ity which has befallen your printing establishment at Serampore, I determined to address my little company on the subject; and to raise a small sum as a testimony of brotherly sympathy, and cordiality to the cause in which your honourable corps in the east is engaged. I perhaps flattered myself that my opening the way might induce others, even in the establishment, to do the same on a larger scale. The subject, as involving so much concerning translations, languages, printing, &c. was not quite favourable to my efforts; yet I obtained considerable attention. The result however was not quite adequate to my expectation. I thought we should reach 201.; but we got only 15l. 6s. 7d. This I shall take care to pay into the hands of those appointed to receive such contributions, when I know who they are: but I thought that probably the information might be of some little use, and give some encouragement to expect assistance from every quarter; for it is the common cause of Christianity, and also of oriental literature-which some will properly appreciate, who, I fear, care little for Christianity.......Some delay to the attempts to give the inhabitants of the east the Scriptures, each in his own language, will be occasioned; but depend upon it, as your correspondent Marshman expresses it, the devil will repent of having done it, as far as it was his doing: for I cannot doubt that, by exciting exertions among persons of different sentiments on our minute disputed points, it will tend to increase brotherly love, and make way for all striving together for the faith of the gospel with more combined efforts. "Believe me, my dear sir, "Your sincere friend and brother, "Aston Sandford, April 28, 1813. "MY DEAR SIR, "I WAS from home attending the annual meeting of the Uxbridge Auxiliary Bible Society, by particular request, when your letter arrived. ......What I saw and heard there was truly animating, and led me to think that very great good indeed will in England arise from this admirable institution. Two admirals spoke in a manner so genuinely Christian, that I could not but admire it. Lord Gambier was in the Chair, and he closed the meeting with these words, O that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men! The other admiral was next under him in command at the bombardment of Copenhagen. He in a style of animated exhortation stirred up the large assembly, not only to contribute liberally, as a pleasure and a privilege, to circulate the Bible; but to study it themselves carefully, and to read it in their families, as the best bond of domestic harmony. I thought at first he had been a preacher; and I said to myself, If a preacher he is an uncommonly good one. The whole was pecularly animating and edifying." "Aston Sandford, Dec. 3, 1814. ! "I DO most heartily rejoice in what your missionaries are doing in India. Their's is the most regular and best conducted plan against the kingdom of darkness, that modern times have shewn; and I augur the most extensive success. More genuine Christian wisdom, fortitude, and disinterested assiduity, perseverance, and patience appear, than I elsewhere read of. May God protect and prosper May all India be peopled with true Christians !—even though they be all baptists. If you read the Registers of our society, you will find that our prospects. are opening both in India and Africa. I trust a similar plan of translating and dispersing will soon be adopted in Africa, by some who were under my care. The Lord is doing great things, and answering prayer every where.” "Aston Sandford, Jan. 9, 1815. "I HAVE lately, and indeed for several years, bestowed a great deal of pains in reading various books in the Greek language; and am certainly far more competent to speak on the subject of diminutives, &c." (such as Barri(w,)" than I was and in revising my note on Matthew iii, I will, should I be spared, take your criticisms also into consideration, and alter or soften whatever I may judge needs it. Further than this I cannot say.” This I insert as a proof of the consideration, with which what appears upon the subject in the Commentary must be understood to have been written. '66 DEAR SIR, "Aston Sandford, Oct. 23, 1815. "I AM, like you, little at leisure for writing letters: yet I also often think of you, and of your situation, both in respect of your most important society, and of the interests of vital, holy, evangelical religion in your connexion. I hope you have many coadjutors; but, except Satan be dead or asleep, you must expect many opponents; for every thing which either feeds the pride, or fosters the sloth or worldliness of human nature, will always, till the grand and universal pouring out of the Holy Spirit, be better received among men, even men professing Christianity and many particular truths of Christianity, than the humbling holy truth as it is in Jesus. But be of good cheer: Magna est veritas et prævalebit : or rather, as my poor folks at Ravenstone used to say, 'Well, after all, God is above the devil.' Go on and prosper, and strive earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints, and for the grand essentials of the gospel; and, while less will be done than you perhaps once expected, more will eventually be done than at other times you supposed. "The tendency of the religion in London and its vicinity, among the evangelical body, is strongly towards antinomianism.......I do however think that in other parts, in our connexion, antinomian Calvinism is not the general danger: but rather such a shyness about Calvinism as greatly darkens the glory of the gospel. Yet still, most certainly, vital Christianity is far more deeply, and practically, and widely inculcated by the clergy than it was thirty years ago......My thirty, and more than thirty years have been spent in opposing antinomianism and self-righteous religion. The most permanent and extensive means has been and will be the Exposition: but I must soon take off my armor.". I would here observe that in a letter of a later date, October 19, 1818, he, on the one hand, expresses a less favourable opinion of the views of many of the "Calvinistic evangelical clergy," and, on the other hand, considers "scriptural principles as awfully exploded under the obnoxtous name of Calvinism." "Aston Sandford, Aug. 12, 1819. "In respect of the new set of antinomians,* I have no doubt from the self-conceited spirit that prevails among * Those who have been called Seceders. |