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LETTER III.

Mr. Samuel Boyse to the rev. James Hervey

Reverend and dear sir,

For your tender admonitions and excellent advice, I am truly indebted to you; as they discover a generous and compassionate concern for my better part.-I bless God I have reason to hope, that the great work is not now to do; for of all the marks of infatuation I know amongst men, there can be none equal to that of trusting to a deathbed repentance.

I do not pretend to vindicate my own conduct;-nor can I ever forget the very Christian sense of my condition and misfortunes, which, notwithstanding all my misbehaviour, you have so pathetically expressed.-The follies of my youth have furnished a plentiful harvest of reflection for my latter years. I have been now for a long time, in a manner, buried from the world; and it has been my endeavour to spend that time in lamenting my past errors, and in pursuing a course of life void of offence towards God and man.

I have learned to trust in God as my only portion, and to bless him for his fatherly corrections. They have been much gentler than my demerit. By them I have been taught to know HIM and myself; his infinite mercy and goodness, and my own ingratitude and unworthiness so that I may truly say with the returning prodigal; "Father, I have sinned against Heaven, and against thee; and I am not worthy to be called thy son."

My health is in a very precarious state; and the greatest hopes of recovery I have, (which are very sorall,) arise from warm weather and the country air.

I thank God I am absolutely resigned to his holy and blessed will. I have seen enough of the vanity and folly of earthly things, and how insufficient they are to satisfy the desires of an immortal soul. I am sensible of my own wretchedness and nothingness; and that my only hope of salvation is through that blessed Redeemer, who died to save lost sinners.-This is my rock of hope against an approaching eternity.

May you, sir, long taste those true and unfading pleasures, which attend the practice of religion and virtue; and may you, by your shining example, be a means of turning many to righteousness! This is the sincere and ever-grateful wish of

Your most obliged, and faithful servant,

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you for your late tender instances of condescension and friendship. The comfort and advice, which you most kindly administer, are extremely acceptable; and I heartily pray God to give them their due weight. For my own part, I am, and I have long been, abundantly persuaded, that no system, but that of Christianity, is able to sustain the soul amidst all the difficulties and distresses of life. The consolations of philosophy only, are specious trifles at best; all cold and impotent applications indeed to the bleeding heart! But the religion of Jesus, like its gracious and benevolent author, is an inexhaustible source of comfort in this world, and gives as the hopes of everlasting enjoyment in the next.

I presume humbly to hope, that the Supreme Being will support me under my affliction; and I most earnestly entreat, that he will sanctify my sorrows to every gracious and good purpose.

What the mind feels upon so painful a divorce, none can adequately know, but they who have had the bitter experience of this sad solemnity. However, delicate and worthy minds will readily paint out to themselves something unutterably soft and moving, on the separation of two hearts, whose only division was their lodg ment in two breasts.

I am extremely indebted to your lady, for her kind sympathy with me in my sorrows; and the only return that I can make to herself and her consort, is my hearty prayer, that the dissolution of their happy union may be at a very distant period.

I am, with the highest esteem, dear sir,

Your most obedient, humble servant,

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relative to my dearest and most amiable parent, I flatter myself will be far from unacceptable to you. I collected them for my own private satisfaction, that the remem brance of a friend, now in glory, whom I so dearly loved, might excite me to be more earnest in pressing forwards to the same prize. But upon reflecting that they might be serviceable to others as well as myself; and prove an additional and well authenticated testimony

to the power of religion; I felt an inclination to communicate them to my friends.

My dear and honoured mother was born at Richmond in Surry, on the nineteenth of April, 1736. In 1759, she was married to Mr. Basil Woodd; who also was born at Richmond, in 1730, and with whom she had been acquainted from her infancy.

Such a union, cemented by long endearment, and by similarity of disposition, promised a scene of much temporal felicity but other events a mysterious Providence intended. In January following, my father, being from home on a visit, was seized with a violent fever; and ` he died on the twelfth of that month. So great a shock, on a mind of her sensibility, could leave no faint impression but it pleased God to support her in this severe trial; and on the fifth of August following she was delivered of a son. Providence wonderfully interposed in our favour; and both root and branch, though then apparently withering, were preserved together, as many years longer as she had then lived.

The afflictive circumstance of my father's death, proved an eventual blessing to her, though conveyed in the disguise of wo. By one stroke her mind was severed from worldly prospects; and she began more anxiously to seek the knowledge and love of the Creator. She had, from early life, been of a devout turn of mind, a strict observer of moral duties, and of the ritual of religion; but now, in the day of adversity, she became more deeply sensible of the insufficiency of her own righteousness, and the necessity of a Saviour. Pious friends who sympathized in her affliction, observed the spiritual concern of her mind, and availed themselves of this opportunity to bring her under the power of the Gospel. Ia

the spirit of true Christian friendship, they made her acquainted with sound, evangelical principles. She received them in faith and love; adorned them in her life; and found them her triumph in her dying hour.

From this period, the Christian motive of love to her Lord gave life and spirituality to her moral duties. Religious exercises became her soul's delight. She ordinarily retired three times in the day for private prayer; at morning, noon, and evening. Love to God led her, with cheerful feet, to the courts of the Lord's House: a privilege which she so highly valued, that she rarely permitted inclement weather, or the decay of her health, to interfere with it."

Though filial affection may be suspected of exaggera ting a mother's excellence, yet I must do her the justice to say, that in every department, in which I could observe her, she was a lovely ornament of religion; particularly, as a daughter, a mother, and a mistress.

As a daughter, she was very kindly attentive to her father, who died at the advanced age of eighty seven; and on his deathbed, acknowledged, in the most affecting manner, his long experience of her filial duty.

As a mother, I must repeat what you, my dear sir, have frequently said, that you never saw such an instance of maternal affection. This indeed is a subject, on which I hope I shall never think without heart-felt gratitude to her, and to God who gave me so excellent a parent. As I was her only child, and she a widow, she might, perhaps, lean to the side of over-indulgence. Yet, if my heart does not deceive me in trusting that I love the ways of God, I am indebted, through Divine grace, for that inestimable benefit, to her great and tender kindness, her uniform example, and particularly to her pious

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