ingenious refinings and manifold subdivisions,
so much in favor at that day, but
which must have been bewildering enough to
the hearers.

"The division of this text," said the Reverend
Preacher, "is made to my hands by the
meeting of this congregation. Three parties
are visible in the premises which discover
three parts legible in the words. Imo. The
Dead—Shee! The Mourners—all wept!
The Preacher—Weep not!"

So short a text promised but scanty
entertainment. Yet, how much has the tortuous
Divine already contrived to extract from it.
But it will bear further dissection; for it
must be recollected that "these parts upon
review are like those sheep, Cant. 4, whereof
every one bears twins. In the Dead is
considerable 1° Her Person; 2° Her Condition.
In her Person, her age, short! her sex,
wretched!" Thus is the chart mapped out,
and after a short respite the Preacher goes
back to take up his first point, forgotten,
perhaps, by this time, intending "in the
beginning to speak of a woman brought to
her death, which is the first Party—Shee!"
Then is "Shee" introduced and dwelt on for
many pages, in the course of which occurs a
strange legal metaphor relating to the great
Judgment Day—viz., "because the Angel
makes an affidavit that time shall be no
more." He must have been partial to such
legal figures; for, further on he reminds
them that "the guilty and the innocent do
lie in like custody, till the great Assize and
Gaol Delivery." After all, Death has not so
many terrors, if we but look at it in the
proper light: for "grant our lives to be a
span long, yet is that life but as a span
forced from a gouty hand—the farther it
reacheth, the more it troubleth its owner."
Death brings with it sure release from
tribulation and sorrows; and, above all, what is
no light blessing, certain delivery from
ugliness! "For," exclaims the Preacher,
"how precious were it to those that like the
elephants loathe to see their own face!"
Whether, in a Natural History point of view,
these animals have such repugnance to their
own reflection, may perhaps be doubted;
but it must have fallen ungratefully on the
ears of such as were tolerably ill-favoured.
Different degrees of sorrow for the departed
—some bearing their loss æquo animo—
others "weeping carnation tears" and "pickling
up the memory of dead friends in the
brine of their own eyes." Not long after he
falls into an ingenious piece of musical
illustration drawn from Cathedral chanting.
"Observe," says he, "that Anthem which
Isay (Isaiah) hath set for a Christian
parentation to be sung at the grave. The Dead
Man shall live—(that is the Leading voice by
the Prophet)—together with my dead body
he shall arise (that is the Counter Tenor sung
by Christ). Awake and sing ye that dwell
in dust (that is the chorus, sung by the
whole Quire)." Sparkling here and there,
are gems of purest water and bright poesy.
Returning once again to "The Party—Shee,"
he says of her finery: "When she spake
wisdom dictated and wit delivered. She hung
her language at your ear, as jewels, much
of worth in a small bulk!" With him a
dream is but "a fairy round of chimerical
semblances—a dance of phantasies." The
deceased lady's happy art, in hitting the
juste milieu of the mode, is also worthy of
mention: "her attire" being "neither sordid
nor curious—not too early in, nor too late
out of, fashion—counsel worthy the attention
of all Provincial Lionnes."

The character of the late Mr. John Moulson
has been happily epitomised in a bold
scrivenery metaphor. "He copied out his
life the old way of Christianity, and writ so
fair after the primitives that few now can
imitate his hand."

In the year sixteen hundred and seventy-
eight, the body of Sir Edmond Berry Godfrey,
one of his Majesty's Justices of the Peace,
was found lying in a field pierced with many
wounds. Great was the excitement, as all
the world well knows, on the discovery of
this "barbarous murther," and Doctor Oates
and Master Bedloe being at that time busily
at work, it was concluded that this must be
more of the Papists' bloody work. Meantime
the body of the knight—after being exposed
for some days—was committed to the earth
"with strange and terrible ceremonies," as
Mr. Macaulay has written it; and the
Reverend William Lloyd, D.D., Dean of
Bangor, one of his Majesty's chaplains in
ordinary, Vicar of Saint Martin's-in-the-
Fields, delivered an inflammatory discourse in
his own church. On which occasion "Our
Friend" had a fair share of space allotted to
him, and the discourse itself has attained a
questionable notoriety from the fact of a
Christian Divine choosing so solemn an
occasion for exciting the party-passions of
his hearers.

"He was," says the dean, invoicing, as it
were, the deceased knight's perfections,
"born to be a Justice of Peace: his
grandfather, his father, his elder brother
were so before him. The two last were also
Members of Parliament. His great grandfather
was a Captain, which was considerable
in those days..... Our friend could
have no great estate, being the tenth son of
his father, and his father was a younger
son of his grandfather. So that, though his
father had a plentiful estate, and his
grandfather one of the fairest in his country, yet
but a small portion of these could fall to his
share."

Here are genealogical details in abundance,
proving young Godfrey's prospects, on
starting in life, to have been cheerless
enough. In spite of such discouragement,
he attained to high station and honours, and
to what in the dean's eyes is his greatest