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John Fletcher.

CHRISTIANITY did for the Rev. JOHN FLETCHER all that it can do for an inhabitant of this earth. It fulfilled in him every precept of the decalogue, and every beatitude of the sermon on the mount. Whatever the gospel makes a duty he performed, whatever it promises as a privilege he enjoyed. In life and death he may have had a few equals, but no superior throughout the Christian age. His life was like the sea of glass in the Apocalypse, and his death like the same sea "mingled with fire."

He was born at Nyon, in Switzerland, Sept. 12th, 1729. Like every boy that has ever grown to manhood, he was frequently in imminent peril. At one time he was practising the art of fencing with his brother, who nearly killed him by a thrust of his sword, which split the button on the point of it, and entered his side. At another time, he fell from a high wall, and was barely saved by a bed of mortar which broke the violence of his fall. Once he was swimming in deep water, when a long hair-ribbon, becoming loose, twisted about his person, and nearly drowned him. One evening, in company with four others, he foolishly swam to a rock five miles from the shore, where they all nearly perished, not being able for some time to raise themselves out of the water. At another time he was carried

by the rapids of the Rhine a distance of five miles, when his breast struck one of the piles that supported a powdermill, and for twenty minutes he floated senseless under the mill. Mr. Wesley believed that the preservation of his life among the piles was a miracle wrought by the power of angels. It was at least a manifest instance of a special providence, which, when human wisdom and strength can do no more, "keeps our soul in life." And who can distinguish this from a miracle?

Mr. Fletcher was educated principally at the University of Geneva, where his uncommon abilities bore away prize after prize from young gentlemen who were nearly related to the professors. Having accomplished the usual course, and gained the honours of the first class, his father wished him to enter the ministry. From his childhood he had secretly desired the holy office; but about the time of leaving the university, he changed his mind in favour of a military life. His parents remonstrated, but he persisted. He had learned to tremble at the thought of touching the ark, and preferred the dangers of the camp to the responsibilities of the Church. His parents were grieved and refused their consent. He started for Lisbon, and procured a commission in the Portuguese navy. A few days before the ship sailed, a maid, while spilled the hot tea on his foot. and was never after heard of. indebted to the blunder of an awkward girl! Yet,

serving him at the table, The ship left without him, How much the Church is

"There's a Divinity that shapes our ends,

Rough-hew them as we will."

He returned from Lisbon, accepted a commission in the Dutch army, and immediately set out for Flanders; but

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