made upon St. Matt. viii. 1 :-When he came down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him. 1. That Christ went down as well as went up when he came down from the mountain; 2. That the multitude did not go hail fellow met with him, nor before him: for great multitudes followed him. But I shall end all with that very politick one that he makes upon St. Matt. xii. 47:-Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. But he answered and said, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? I discover now, says he, that Jesus is upon business. Lastly, suppose that you were not fully satisfied that pluralities were lawful or convenient, may I be so bold, Sir, I pray-what text would you choose to preach upon against non-residents? Certainly, nothing ever was better picked than that of St. Matt. i. 2 :-Abraham begat Isaac. A clear place against non-residents. For had Abraham not resided, but discontinued from Sarah his wife, he could never have begot Isaac."

Dr. Eachard goes so far as to state that the above style of preaching was common among the inferior clergy of the Church of England in the reign of Charles II., and he declares that a great scholar of our nation has affirmed-"That such preaching as is usual, is a hindrance of salvation, rather than the means to it. And what he intends by usual, I shall not here go about to explain."

There can be no doubt but the common indiscriminate practice of giving titles for orders was a very great evil of the time, and allowed the entrance into the church of a class of men "totally unfit in mind, and not ever likely to be worth two groats in body." This was a crying evil of the day, and Dr. Eachard faithfully deals with it as such. He seriously laments it, as we shall presently see.

"Where the ministry is pinched, as to the tolerable conveniences of this life, the chief of his care and time must be spent, not in an impertinent considering what texts of scripture will be most useful for his parish, what instructions most seasonable, and what authors best to be consulted; but the chief of his thoughts, and his main business, must be to study how to live that week? Where he shall have bread for his family? Whose sow has lately

pigged? Whence will come the next rejoicing goose, or the next cheerful basket of apples? How far to Lammas or Offerings? When shall we have another christening and cakes, and who is likely to marry or die? These are very seasonable considerations, and worthy of a man's thoughts. For a family can't be maintained by texts and contexts; and the child that lies crying in the cradle will not be satisfied without a little milk, and perhaps sugar, though there be a small German system in the house.

"But suppose he does get into a little hole over the oven, with a lock to it, call'd his study, towards the latter end of the week— you must know, Sir, there are very few texts of scripture that can be divided, at soonest, before Friday night; and some there be that will never be divided but upon Sunday morning, and that not very early, but either a little before they go, or in going to church;— I say, suppose the gentleman gets thus into his study: one may very near guess what is his first thought when he comes there, viz., that the last kilderkin of drink is near departed; and that he has but one poor single groat in the house, and there's judgment and execution ready to come out against it for milk and eggs. Now, Sir, can any man think that one thus racked and tortured can be seriously intent half an hour to contrive any thing that might be of real advantage to his people? Besides, perhaps that week he has met with some dismal crossings and undoing misfortunes. There was a scurvy-conditioned mole that broke into his pasture and ploughed up the best part of his glebe; and a little after that came a couple of spiteful, ill-favoured cows, and trampled down the little remaining grass; another day, having but four chickens, sweep comes the kite, and carries away the fattest and hopefullest of all the brood. Then, after all this, came the jackdaws and starlings (idle birds that they are!), and they scattered and carried away from his thin-thatched house, forty or fifty of the best straws; and to make him completely unhappy, after all these afflictions, another day that he had a pair of breeches on, coming over a perverse stile, he suffered very much in carelessly lifting over his leg. Now, what parish can be so inconsiderate and unreasonable, as to look for any thing from one whose fancy is thus checked, and whose under

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standing is thus ruffled and disordered. They may as soon expect comfort and consolation from him that lies racked with the gout and stone, as from a divine thus broken and shattered in his fortunes.

"But we'll grant that he meets not with any of these such frightful disasters, but that he goes into his study with a mind as calm. as the evening. For all that, upon Sunday we must be content even with what God shall please to send us. For, as for books, he is (for want of money) so moderately furnished, that, except it be a small Geneva Bible, so small, as it will not be desired to lie open of itself, together with a certain Concordance thereunto belonging; as also a book for all kinds of Latin sentences, called Polyanthea, with some Exposition upon the Catechism (a portion of which is to be got by heart, and to be put off for his own), and perhaps Mr. Caryl upon Pineda, Mr. Dod upon the Commandments, and Mr. Clark's Lives of Famous Men, both in church and state, such as Mr. Carter, of Norwich, that uses to eat such abundance of pudding; besides, I say, these, there is scarce any thing to be found but a budget of old stitched sermons, hung up behind the door, with a few broken girths, two or three yards of whipcord, and perhaps a saw and a hammer, to prevent dilapidations. Now, what may not a divine do, though but of ordinary parts and unhappy education, with such learned helps and assistances as these? No vice surely durst stand before him, and heresie affront him.

"But cannot a clergyman chuse rather to lie upon feathers than an hurdle, but he must be idle, soft, and effeminate? May he not desire wholesome food and fresh drink, unless he be a cheat, a hypocrite, and an impostor? and must he needs be void of grace, though he has a shilling in his purse after the rates be crossed? and full of pride and vanity, though his house stands not upon crutches, and though his chimney is to be seen a foot above the thatch? Oh, how prettily and temperately may half a score children be maintained with almost twenty pounds per annum! What a handsome shift a poor, ingenious, and frugal divine will make, to take it by turns, and wear a cassock one year, and a pair of breeches another? What a becoming thing is it for him that serves at the altar to fill

the dungcart in dry weather, and to heat the oven and pull hemp in wet? And what a pleasant sight is it to see the man of God fetching up his single melancholy cow, from a small bit of land that is scarce to be found without a guide? or to be seated upon a soft and well-grinded pouch of meal? or to be planted upon a pannier, with a pair of geese or turkeys bobbing out their heads from under his canonical coat, as you cannot but remember the man, Sir, that was thus accomplished? or to find him raving about the yards, or keeping his chamber close, because the duck lately miscarried of an egg, or that the never-failing hen has unhappily forsaken her wonted nest?

"That constitution of our church was a most prudent design, that says, that all who are ordained shall be ordained to somewhat; not ordained at random to preach in general to the whole world, as they travel up and down the road, but to this or that particular parish. And no question the reason was to prevent spiritual pedling and gadding up and down the country with a bag of trifling and insignificant sermons, inquiring who will buy any doctrine? so that no more might be received into holy orders than the church had provided for. But so very little is this regarded, that if a young divinity intender has but got a sermon of his own or of his father's, although he knows not where to get a meal's meat, or one penny of money by his preaching, yet he gets a qualification from some beneficed man or other, who perhaps is no more able to keep a curate than I am to keep ten footboys, and so he is made a preacher; and upon this account I have known an ordinary divine, whose living would but just keep himself and his family from melancholy and despair, shroud under his protection as many curates as the best nobleman in the land has chaplains.

"Now, many such as these go into orders against the sky falls, foreseeing no more likelihood of any preferment coming to them than you or I do of being secretaries of state. Now, so often as any such as these, for want of maintenance, are put to any unworthy and disgraceful shifts, this reflects disparagement upon all that order of holy men.

"I am almost confident, that since the Reformation nothing has

more hindred people from a just estimation of a Form of Prayer and our holy Liturgy, than employing a company of boys or old illiterate mumblers to read the service. And I do verily believe, that at this very day, especially in cities and corporations (which make up the third part of our nation), there is nothing that does more keep back some dissatisfied people from church till service be over, than that it is read by some ten or twelve pound man, with whose parts and education they are so well acquainted, as to have reason to know, that he has but just skill enough to read the lessons with twice conning over. And though the office of the reader be only to read word for word, and neither to invent and expound, yet people love he should be a person of such worth and knowledge as it may be supposed he understands what he reads. And although for some it were too burthensome a task to read the service twice a day, and preach as often, yet certainly it were much better if the people had but one sermon in a fortnight or month, so the service was performed by a knowing and valuable person, than to run an unlearned rout of contemptible people into holy orders, on purpose only to say the prayers of the church, who perhaps shall understand very little more than a hollow pipe made of tin or wainscot.

"The next thing that does much heighten the misery of our church as to the poverty of it, is the gentry's designing not only the weak, the lame, and usually the most ill-favoured of their children, for the office of the ministry, but also such as they intend to settle nothing upon for their subsistence; leaving them wholly to the bare hopes of church preferment. For, as they think, let the thing look how it will, it is good enough for the church; and that if it had but limbs enough to climb the pulpit, and eyes enough to find the day of the month, it will serve well enough to preach and read service. So, likewise, they think they have obliged the clergy very much, if they please to bestow two or three years' education upon a younger son at the university, and then commend him to the grace of God and the favour of the church, without one penny of money, or inch of land. You must not think that he will spoil his eldest son's estate, or hazard the lessening the credit of the