OF The Life, RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCES, AND LABOURS IN THE GOSPEL, OF JAMES GOUGH, Late of the City of Dublin, deceased. T Compiled from his original Manufcripts, by his brother A NEW EDITION. HIGH WYCOMBE: Printed by T. Orger, and fold by DARTON and HARVEY, Gracechurch❤ Of literary fubjects, history hath been ranked amongst the most improving and interesting: and, I think, it may be allowed this rank of precedence, fo far as it leads by illuftrious or pious examples, to virtue or good conduct in life; or by a detection of vicious characters, expofeth the deformity of vice, and the ill confequences thereof, as leffons of caution, against the evils we are to avoid. Yet the general fcope of hiftory, being mostly relative to the actions of the great and powerful, unfolding the violent, or the crafty measures, whereby worldly power hath been acquired; and the policy whereby it is supported and maintained; doth not in general abound with patterns for the private man to form himself by; and too feldom exhibits fuch, as the good man could copy after, without departing from his character. Every man cannot rife to confpicuous stations in life, or attain the abilities requifite to fill them with reputation to himself, and advantage to the community: but every man may attain to (that which is infinitely beyond them) the favour of his creator, by yielding obedience to his revealed will, and his divine commands. It is not every man's bufinefs to copy the Statefman, the Hero, or the Philosopher; but it is every man's most interesting concern, to live fo in this world, as to obtain everlafting happiness in the next. That hiftory therefore or biography, which describes the lives of such, as have steadily directed their course thro' this world to a better, in the right line of piety towards God, and goodness of heart and life among men, seems in an especial manner to claim our ferious, and attentive perufal; particularly where these good men themselves, from a view of being still helpful, and serviceable to mankind, when they fhall be no more among them in this state of mutability, leave behind them lively monuments of their experience of the work of fanctification, and faving grace in them: reciting not only the actions and occurrences of their lives; but the internal motives of those actions, and the effect of thofe occurrences on the state of their minds: unfolding the gradual operation of the grace of God, for their redemption from evil, and shewing forth the fruits of the spirit, out of a good conversation: herein leaving the evident prints of their footsteps to lasting felicity, for their survivors to trace the path to the like glorious inheritance. Of this kind of Biography we have had several tracts published in our fociety, divers of which having perused with much fatisfaction and advantage, as being thereby animated to an ardent defire of treading the fame path to bleffedness, and tracing the foofteps of the flock to the fhepherd's tent; I am induced the more readily to forward the publication of the following sheets, and the more earnestly to recommend them, with other compofitions of the like nature, to the folid attention of my friends, and particularly to the youth of this generation. Whom I could wish to be well apprized, that our reading and study, as well as every other occupation of our lives, is most properly and most profitably employed in the purfuit and acquifition of those virtuous difpofitions, whereby we may please our maker, fill up our stations in life with propriety, and be good examples in our generation, and that it is a matter of important confequence to all, but efpecially to this age of inexperience, to be very careful, and well directed, in the choice of the books they read, as well as the company they familiarly affociate with, that they be fuch as may make profitable impreffions upon them: these filent companions of the closet communicate a good or evil influence, according to the fubjects they treat of, and the manner in which they are treated, with a fecret but powerful effect on the tender mind, and the apostle's obfervation, that "Evil communications corrupt good manners"* is in my opinion, applicable to corrupting books, as well as corrupting compani ons. 46 From the clear fenfe they had of the pernicious tendency of fuch compofitions, our friends both in a private and collective capacity, have been frequently concerned to recommend a care in parents and guardians to prevent, and caution youth and others to restrain their inclination in the reading of "Such books as tend to leaven the mind into vanity, prophaneness, and infidelity;"† under which description are comprized, "Plays, novels and romances, and all those which have a tendency to “lead the mind from piety, and to oppose or reject "the divine authority of the holy fcriptures:" and this licentious age, which hath produced an inundation of fictitious compofitions of the former kind, romances and novels in abundance, presents an occafion to reinforce the caution to our young friends, to beware of touching the unclean thing, left their minds be imperceptibly defiled thereby. For fuch writings being adapted to the depraved taste of an indolent luxurious generation, they seem more calculated for a diverting entertainment, or the † See Yearly Meeting's Epiftles, 1723, 1762, &c. |