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and the importance of their salvation. This, under the agency of the eternal Spirit, whose assistance every faithful minister may with confidence expect, will supply a closeness of appeal to arrest the attention-furnish topics of diseoarse to inform the judgment, and animated expostulations to warm the heart. When the blaze of genius and of oratory is extinguished, this will continue with a steady flame. And whilst many, his acknowledged superiors in talent and in literature, are left behind, the preacher in whose breast it glows will be conducted to scenes of extensive usefulness, and the enjoyment of an honourable renown.

Mr. Spencer now became the topic of general discourse, the subject of universal inquiry. His name spread far and wide. His danger became daily more and more imminent. Letters pressed upon him, filled with flattery-invitations arrived at the academy from all parts, for his services; and he appeared, as a friend, who witnessed his sudden and extraordinary elevation, observed, like one standing on the brow of a precipice, amid the most violent gusts of wind. Disapprobation cannot be expressed in terms too strong of the conduct which is usually adopted by the religious public towards their favourite, and especially their youthful preachers. And the censure which may, in a lamentable degree admit of universal application, falls with pre-eminent propriety on the professors of religion in the metropolis and its neighbourhood. There, indeed, by the constant accession of fresh objects, to the sphere in which they move, such a love of novelty-such a fondness of variety-such a taste for something per

petually original-is excited and constantly fed that whatever is uniform and solid, in the ministry of their established and experienced pastors, while it secures the attention and regard of the judicious and discerning, is too often neglected as stale and insipid by the more lively and enlightened class of hearers. A new name is announced on the cover of a Magazine, or from the pulpit of some celebrated chapel, and thither the unstable multitude direct their steps. They sit in solemn judgment on the preacher's manner-his appearance-his action, and his voice; for amongst too many, alas! it is to be lamented, that the solemn truths which he delivers are but secondary objects of regard. If there should be nothing striking in his manner-nothing melodious in his voice,-nothing singular in his appearance-nothing peculiar in his system-and nothing particularly favourable in the circumstances of his introduction to the pulpits of the metropolis, there he may continue his appointed period, and when it has expired, return to the peaceful village or the quiet town, where it is his lot to labour

"The world forgetting-by the world forgot."

On the other hand, with this class of hearers the preacher who secures their admiration instantly becomes their idol. As if irresistibly impelled to extremes, they lavish on him the warmest eulogies and adulation, often too palpable to be endured. Forgetting that he is a man of like passions with themselves, they heap their honours on his head as though he could remain insensible to the plaudits they bestow, and perfectly superior to the influence

of every principle of pride. The following lines of the inimitable Cowper too well express the sentiments which in these remarks must suggest them. selves to every thinking mind, not to obtain insertion here:

"O Popular Applause! what heart of man
Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms?
The wisest and the best feel urgent need
Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales;
But swell'd into a gust-who then, alas!
With all his canvass spread and inexpert,
And therefore heedless, can withstand thy power?
Praise from the rivell'd lips of worthless bald
Decrepitude, and in the looks of lean
And craving Poverty, and in the bow
Respectful of the smutch'd artificer,

Is oft too welcome, and may much disturb
The bias of the purpose. How much more
Pour'd forth by beauty splendid and polite,
In language soft as Adoration breathes ?
Ah spare your Idol! think him human still.
Charms he may have, but he has frailties too.
Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye admire.”

But the preaching of Mr. Spencer, even in his earliest discourses, was not of that light and meretricious kind which may secure the temporary* ad

* I believe that general experience will justify the observation, that however attendant circumstances may contribute, in the first instance, to render an individual popular, nothing but sterling worth can secure its perpetuity; and whenever the preaching of a popular minister has endured, without injury to his reputation, the ordeal of a ten or twenty years trial, he may safely be regarded as possessing an excellence superior to any thing his manner could exhibit. But I feel the delicacy of the topic I have thus ventured to introduce;

miration of the wandering and unsettled. It possessed much of the solid,the experimental, and judicious; and this secured him the attention and esteem of those, whose approbation any man would esteem it an honour to possess. But this only tended to heighten his danger. God, however, gave him grace equal to his day. His letters during his popularity in London breathe the same spirit of humility as that which marked his earlier correspondence; and a piety seldom surpassed in fervour and sincerity tended to preserve him steady in the midst of that tempestuous sea, upon whose billows, though young and inexperienced, it was his lot to ride.

Numerous and pressing however as were the invitations from different parts of the metropolis and its neighbourhood, yet Mr. Spencer did not preach again in London (except in the work-houses, which the students regularly supplied, and also once in a small chapel in Hackney Road) antil September. In the meanwhile his talent for preaching had ample exercise in various parts of the country, which during this period he was allowed to visit. So that, from January 7th to September 8th he preached no less than sixty times. The following are the principal places which were then favoured with his labours :-Roydon, Godmanchester, Ripton, Bunting

and gladly refer to illustrations of the same subject by more experienced and far abler hands.-See Fuller's Life of Pearce; and Jay's Life of Cornelius Winter. Books in which examples, the one of more public, the other of more retired, but not less transcendant excellence, seem to live before us for our instruction. To every student for the Christian ministry they must prove an invaluable treasure.

ford, Hertford, Dorking, Rumford, Harlow, Royston, Hadham, Hays, Chigwell, and Mill-Hill. At all these places the attention he excited was considerable, and the impression he left remains with the people to this day.*

Mr. Spencer's second sermon at Hoxton chapel was delivered on the evening of Thursday, September 8th. It confirmed the opinion of his excellence produced by the first. His text was, Acts x. 36, He is Lord of all.'

The general sentiment of approbation and delight at first excited by his youthful appearance and his extraordinary pulpit talents, was now deepened and established, and he began to preach pretty extensively in the pulpits of the metropolis and its neighbourhood. On Sunday, September 18th, we find him in the pulpit at Holywell Mount chapel, and ou the Sunday following in that at Kennington chapel ; and on the afternoon of Sunday, December 13th, he supplied the chapel in Old Gravel Lane, Wapping.† During the autumn of this year he also visited sereral parts of the country immediately surrounding London; and he preached, among other places, at Upminster, Upsom, Guildford, Roydon, and High Wycombe.

With respect to the wisdom and propriety of permitting such extensive public labours, in one so

* For specimens of his early pulpit compositions, see Appendix, No. II.

†The church assembling in Old Gravel Lane formerly sat under the ministry of the late Rey. Noah Hill, but now enjoy the pastoral care of the Rev. Mr. Hooper, one of the tutors in the college at Hoxton,

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