The society by whom Brainerd was employed | published, in 1746, Mirabilia Dei inter Indicos* or the Rise and Progress of a remarkable Work of Grace among a number of the Indians of New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The volume contains extracts from the journal of his labors, forwarded by him, commencing with his residence at Crossweeksung, June 19th, and extending to November 4th, 1749. A second part, entitled Divine Grace Displayed, covering the period from November 24th, 1745, to June 19th, 1746, was published a few months after.

His friend Edwards preached his funeral sermon, and, in 1749, published his life, chiefly composed of extracts from the minute private diary kept by Brainerd, in addition to his published journals, throughout his career, the last entry in it being dated only seven days before his death. It is a curious record of spiritual experience, tinged by a melancholy temperament, increased by a life which, although an active one, was passed in a great measure in a virtual solitude.

That his biographer was aware of the dangers with which a constant study of self is attended, is evident from his citation of the following passage by Thomas Shepard:

I have known one very able, wise, and godly, put upon the rack by him, who, envying God's people's peace, knows how to change himself into an angel of light, for it being his usual course, i the time of his health, to make a diary of his hourly life, and finding much benefit by it, he was in conscience pressed by the power and delusion of Satan, to make and take the same daily survey of his life in the time of his sickness; by means of which, he spent his enfeebled spirits, and cast on fuel to fire his sickness. Had not a friend of his convinced him of his erroneous conscience misleading him at that time, he had murdered his body, out of conscience to save his soul, and to preserve his grace.

The diary, however, forms a beautiful memorial of a life of self-sacrifice and devotion, of the pursuit of missionary enterprise among an unimpressible and savage people, whose minds he could only approach through the medium of an

tal, and distinguishing parts of religion and one who, by the temper of her mind, was fitted to deny herself for God, and to do good, beyond any young woman whatsoever, whom he knew. She had manifested a heart uncommonly devoted to God, in the course of her life, many years before her death; and said on her death-bed, that "she had not seen one minute for several years, wherein she desired to live one minute longer, for the sake of any other good in life, but doing good, living to God, and doing what might be for his glory."

*Mirabilia Dei inter Indicos: or the Rise and Progress of a remarkable Work of Grace, among a number of the Indians, in the Province of New Jersey and Pennsylvania; justly represented in a JOURNAL, kept by order of the Honourable Society in Scotland for propagating Christian Knowledge; with some General Remarks; by DAVID BRAINERD, Minister of the Gospel, and Missionary from the said Society: published by the Reverend and Worthy Correspondents of the said Society; with a Preface by them.

† Divine Grace Displayed; or the Continuance and Progress of a remarkable Work of Grace among some of the Indians belonging to the Provinces of New Jersey and Pennsylvania; justly represented in a JOURNAL kept by order of the Honourable Society in Scotland for propagating Christian Knowledge: with some General Remarks; to which is subjoined an Appendix, containing some account of sundry things, and especially of the Difficulties attending the Work of a Missionary among the Indians; by DAVID BRAINERD, Minister of the Gospel, and Missionary from the said Society: published by the Reverend and Worthy Correspondents of the said Society.

interpreter, as, although he bestowed much labor on the effort, he never thoroughly mastered their language. language. His journal bears no record of his bodily sufferings, but we know that he went to his task with a frame wasted by consumption, and pursued his painful journeys in all weathers, undisturbed by the unmistakable premonitions of death which accompanied his disease. He rode through the woods, raising blood and parched with fever, and his rest in the rude hut or wigwam was accompanied by wasting night-sweats, and yet, with all this, he was constantly reproaching himself for want of exertion.

The diary is not as full as could be desired in relation to his intercourse with the Indians, but is sufficiently so to show that he pursued a wise and judicious course in his ministry.

The pervading spirit of Brainerd's Journal is eloquently described by Edwards :

I have had occasion to read his diary over and over, and very particularly and critically to review every passage in it; and I find no one instance of a strong impression on his imagination, through his whole life; no instance of a strongly impressed idea of any external glory and brightness, of any bodily form or shape, any beautiful majestic countenance. There is no imaginary sight of Christ hanging on the cross with his blood streaming from his wounds; or seated in heaven on a bright throne, with angels and saints bowing before him; or with a countenance smiling on him; or arms open to embrace him: no sight of heaven, in his imagination, with gates of pearl, and golden streets, and vast multitudes of glorious inhabitants, with shining garments. There is no sight of the book of life opened, with his name written in it; no hearing of the sweet music made by the songs of heavenly hosts; no hearing God or Christ immediately speaking to him; ror any sudden suggestions of words or sentences, either of scripture or any other, as then immediately spoken or sent to him; no new objective revelations; no sudden strong suggestions of secret facts. Nor do I find any one instance in all the records which he has left of his own life, from beginning to end, of joy excited from a supposed immediate witness of the Spirit; or inward immediate suggestion, that his state was surely good, that God loved him with an everlasting love, that Christ died for him in particular, and that heaven was his; either with or without a text of scripture. There is no instance of comfort from any sudden suggestion to his mind, as though at that very time directed by God to him in particular, of any such texts as these; "Fear not; I am with thee;"-"It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom;"-" You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you;"-"I have called thee by thy name, thou art mine;"-" Before thou wast formed in the belly, I knew thee," &c. There is no supposed communion and conversation with God carried on in this way; nor any such supposed tasting of the love of Christ. But the way in which he was satisfied of his own good estate, even to the entire abolishing of fear, was by feeling within himself the lively actings of a holy temper and heavenly disposition, the vigorous exercises of that divine love which casteth out fear.

Edwards's Life was abridged by John Wesley, and published in England. A second and smaller abridgment was made by John Styles. In 1822, the original work was printed at New Haven, with the addition of the Journals published during Brainerd's lifetime, and which were

omitted by Edwards as being already accessible to the public, under the editorship of Sereno Edwards Dwight.*

INDIAN SUPERSTITION.

When I was in this regiont in May last, I had an opportunity of learning many of the notions and customs of the Indians, as well as observing many of their practices. I then travelled more than an hundred and thirty miles upon the river, above the English settlements; and, in that journey, met with individuals of seven or eight distinct tribes, speaking as many different languages. But of all the sights I ever saw among them, or indeed any where else, none appeared so frightful, or so near a kin to what is usually imagined of infernal powers, none ever excited such images of terror in my mind, as the appearance of one who was a devout and zealous Reformer, or rather, restorer of what he supposed was the ancient religion of the Indians. He made his appearance in his pontifical garb, which was a coat of boar skins, dressed with the hair on, and hanging down to his toes; a pair of bear skin stockings; and a great wooden face painted, the one half black, the other half tawny, about the colour of an Indian's skin, with an extravagant mouth, cut very much awry; the face fastened to a bear skin cap, which was drawn over his head. He advanced towards me with the instrument in his hand, which he used for music in his idolatrous worship; which was a dry tortoise shell with some corn in it, and the neck of it drawn on to a piece of wood, which made a very convenient handle. As he came forward, he beat his tune with the rattle, and danced with all his might, but did not suffer any part of his body, not so much as his fingers, to be seen. No one would have imagined from his appearance or actions, that he could have been a human creature, if they had not had some intimation of it otherwise. When he came near me, I could not but shrink away from him, although it was then noon day, and I knew who it was; his appearance and gestures were so prodigiously frightful. He had a house consecrated to religious uses, with divers images cut upon the several parts of it. I went in, and found the ground beat almost as hard as a rock, with their frequent dancing upon it. I discoursed with him about Christianity. Some of my discourse he seemed to like, but some of it he disliked extremely. He told me that God had taught him his religion, and that he never would turn from it; but wanted to find some who would join heartily with him in it; for the Indians, he said, were grown very degenerate and corrupt. He had thoughts, he said, of leaving all his friends, and travelling abroad, in order to find some who would join with him; for he believed that God had some good people some where, who felt as he did. He had not always, he said, felt as he now did; but had formerly been like the rest of the Indians, until about four or five years before that time. Then, he said, his heart was very much distressed, so that he could not live among the Indians, but got away into the woods, and lived alone for some months. At length, he says, God comforted his heart, and showed him what he should do; and since that time he had known God, and

Memoirs of the Rev. David Brainerd: Missionary to the Indians on the borders of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania: chiefly taken from his own Diary. By Rev. Jonathan Edwards, of Northampton. Including his Journal, now for the first time incorporated with the rest of his Diary, in a regular Chronological series. By Sereno Edwards Dwight. New-Haven: Printed and published by S. Converse. 1822. + Shaumokung, on the Susquehanna.

tried to serve him; and loved all men, be they who they would, so as he never did before. He treated me with uncommon courtesy, and seemed to be hearty in it. I was told by the Indians, that he opposed their drinking strong liquor with all his power; and that, if at any time he could not dissuade them from it by all he could say, he would leave them, and go crying into the woods. It was manifest that he had a set of religious notions which he had examined for himself, and not taken for granted, upon bare tradition; and he relished or disrelished whatever was spoken of a religious nature, as it either agreed or disagreed with his standard. While I was discoursing, he would sometimes say, "Now that I like; so God has taught me;" &c., and some of his sentiments seemed very just. Yet he utterly denied the existence of a devil, and declared there was no such creature known among the Indians of old times, whose religion he supposed he was attempting to revive. He likewise told me, that departed souls all went southward, and that the difference between the good and the bad, was this: that the former were admitted into a beautiful town with spiritual walls; and that the latter would for ever hover around these walls, in vain attempts to get in. He seemed to be sincere, honest, and conscientious in his own way, and according to his own religious notions; which was more than I ever saw in any other Pagan. I perceived that he was looked upon and derided among needless noise about religious matters; but I must most of the Indians, as a precise zealot, who made a say that there was something in his temper and disposition, which looked more like true religion, than any thing I ever observed amongst other heathens.

But alas! how deplorable is the state of the Indians upon this river! The brief representation which I have here given of their notions and manners, is sufficient to show that they are "led captive by Satan at his will," in the most eminent manner; and methinks might likewise be sufficient to excite the compassion, and engage the prayers, of pious souls for these their fellow-men, who sit "in the regions of the shadow of death."

JAMES MCSPARRAN.

THE REV. JAMES MCSPARRAN, of the church of Narraghansett, was one of the pioneer band of English clergymen whose influence is often to be noticed in cementing the foundations of American progress. His family was from the north of Ireland, having emigrated from Scotland. He had a good classical education, and came a missionary to Narraghansett, in Rhode Island, from the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, in 1721. The next year he married Miss Harriet Gardiner, a lady of the place. He was intimate with Berkeley during the residence of the Dean at Newport. In 1736, he visited England, and returned with the title of Doctor of Divinity, from Glasgow. His pulpit exercises in the church of St. Paul's were of an eloquent character, if we may judge from the sermon which he delivered on the 15th March, 1740, when war, pestilence, and an unusually protracted and severe winter oppressed the country.* In 1747, he preached an eloquent sermon before the convention of the Episcopal clergy, in Trinity Church, Newport, which was printed. He asserted the

*Large portions of the sermon are printed in Updike's Hist Narr. Ch. 191–201.

claims of his Episcopal order in another discourse which was printed at Newport, in 1751, The Sacred Dignity of the Christian Priesthood Vindicated. In 1752, he wrote an historical tract of merit, America Dissected, which was published at Dublin, in 1753. It is in three letters giving an account of the "English American Dominions," beginning with the Bermudas and Georgia, and proceeding northerly to Newfoundland.* It was his intention to publish an extended history of the colonies, especially of New England; and it was supposed he had completed a history of the Narraghansett country, but no such work has been found among his papers. He died at his house, in South Kingstown, Dec. 1, 1757, having sustained manfully a career of many difficulties.

THE COLD WINTER, 1740-1.

The elements have been armed with such piercing cold and suffocating snows, as if God intended the air that he gave us to live and breathe in should become the instrument to execute his vengeance on us, for our ingratitude to his goodness, and our transgression of his law. We may contemplate to our comfort the wisdom and power of God in the beautiful structure of the heavens, and his wise sorting of the seasons, for the benefit and delight of man. But as no human skill can count the number of the stars, nor call them by their names, so exceeds the utmost art of astronomy, for either extreme heat or extreme cold, otherwise than by the distance of the sun; yet what we see have variations and vicissitudes that do not always correspond to that cause. It is no small comfort to consider God's care to provide food for the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and to supply their starving importunity. And our gratitude grows, as we are assured all this is ultimately intended as a kindness and bounty for the souls of men. But how, of late, has the grazier groaned to see the severity of the season, to hear his herds and his flocks making moan for their meat; and after a few fruitless complaints uttered in accents peculiar to their kind, drop down and die, and disappoint the increase and expectation of the spring.

With what amazement do we behold and can ill endure God's sudden and intolerable cold, that proceeds from the breath of his nostrils! The snow that looks so white, innocent, and light, as if it would bear down and oppress nothing, yet we see it hides and covers the earth from the warmth and light of the sun; and thus does also the ice turn rivers into rocks, and the sea (as it were) into dry land. We see the fluid element, which yielded to the smallest force, become so hard and rigid, that it resists the impression of the traveller's foot, and the weight of beasts and burthens with a firmness superior to the driest land.

Boreas has so far entered into the chambers of the south, that he hath sealed up the sun and intercepted his dissolving influence; and southern snows are signs of that planet's impotent efforts to regain his usurped dominions. The great luminary that rules the day, has now advanced and displayed his banner on this side of the Line, yet so faint are his armies, though innumerable, and each atom harnessed in fire, that they cannot force the frost to give ground, nor dissolve the intrenchment of snow. No arm that is not almighty can melt or open what

*It is printed at the close of Updike's Hist. Narr. Ch. 483533.

Orion has shut up, bound in bands, and hardened; or freeze and make fast what the Pleiades have loosed and softened; the first being the constellation, which in the Omnipotent's hands beget and begin the winter; as the other are the orbs that attend the advancing Spring.

How many sad remembrances do remain, to remind us of the past winter? The husbandman and the mariner, the rich and the poor, have already sensibly felt its bad effects, and though the dissolved rivers have opened their mouths, returned to their channels, and offer their usual administrations to navigation, fishing and commerce; yet alas! are not the cattle now corrupting in the fields, and that after they have consumed most of the corn that might have maintained us to that time?

Famine of food, which though (blessed be God,) we do not yet feel, we have, notwithstanding, some reason to fear. Whatever second causes concur to occasion a scarcity of food, nature becomes the hungry man's executioner and tormenter, racking him with an impatient and importunate appetite, when there is nothing to allay or relieve it.

JONATHAN MAYHEW.

JONATHAN MAYHEW, a great-grandson of Thomas Mayhew, the first minister at Martha's Vineyard, was born on that island, where his father maintained the ministry which had been held in his family since the time of the progenitor of whom we have spoken, October 8, 1720. He was graduated with distinction at Harvard, in 1744, and in 1747 was ordained pastor of the west church, in Boston, where he remained until his death, on the ninth of July, 1766.

On the 30th January, 1750, he preached a ser mon bearing on the execution of Charles I., which was remarkable for its independent views on the duties of rulers and the limits of allegiance.

In 1763, the Rev. East Apthorpe,* one of the Missionaries of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, published "Considerations on the Institution and Conduct" of that society, in reply to an attack upon it which had appeared in a local journal, after the death of the society's missionary at Braintree, charging the association with a departure from its duties in supporting a clergyman of the English Church in a settlement where other provision for religious instruction had been made. His pamphlet was taken up by Dr. Mayhew, who published Observations on the Charter and Conduct of the society. A controversy ensued in which many of the New England clergy took part, the anticipated introduction of bishops naturally heightening the warmth of the discussion on both sides of the question.

Dr. Mayhew early embraced the popular side in the revolutionary struggle, and took an active part in the movements which preceded the con

*East Apthorpe, the son of Charles Apthorpe, a merchant of Boston, was born in 1733, and educated at Jesus College, Cambridge, England. He was appointed, in 1761, missionary at Cambridge, Mass., by the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts. He returned not long after to England; was made vicar of Croydon, in 1765; rector of Bowchurch, London, in 1778; and in 1790, having become blind, exchanged these livings for a prebendary's stall. He passed the last years of his life at Cambridge, England, where he died, April 16, 1816. In addition to his productions on the Episcopal controversy, he was the author of Discourses on Prophecy, at the Warburton lecture, Lincoln's Inn, 2 vols., London, and an answer to Gibbon's account of the causes of the spread of early Christianity.

test, by his discourses and personal influence. His sermon on the Repeal of the Stamp Act, in 1766,

Jonathar Mayhai

shows that he brought all his energy to the service of his country, and in common with his numerous other printed discourses, displays vigor of mind. and eloquence.

A "Memoir of the Life and Writings of Rev. Jonathan Mayhew, D.D., by Alden Bradford," appeared at Boston, in 1838.

In his theological views he differed from the majority of his Congregational brethren, inclining to those of the Unitarians.

FROM "THE SNARE BROKEN," A THANKSGIVING DISCOURSE PREACHED AT THE DESIRE OF THE WEST CHURCH IN BOSTON, N. E., FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1766; OCCASIONED BY THE REPEAL

OF THE STAMP ACT.

Brethren, ye have been called unto LIBERTY; only use not LIBERTY for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve oneanother.-AP. PAUL.

We have never known so quick and general a transition from the depth of sorrow to the height of joy, as on this occasion; nor, indeed, so great and universal a flow of either, on any other occasion whatever. It is very true, we have heretofore seen times of great adversity. We have known seasons of drought, dearth and spreading mortal diseases; the pestilence walking in darkness, and the destruction wasting at noonday. We have seen wide devastations made by fire; and amazing tempests, the heavens on flame, the winds and the waves roaring. We have known repeated earthquakes, threatening us with speedy destruction. We have been under great apprehensions by reason of formidable fleets of an enemy on our coasts, menacing fire and sword to all our maritime towns. We have known times when the French and Savage armies made terrible havock on our frontiers, carrying all before them for a while; when we were not without fear, that some capital towns in the colonies would fall into their merciless hands. Such times as these we have known; at some of which almost every "face gathered paleness," and the knees of all but the good and brave, waxed feeble. But never have we known VOL. I.-10

a season of such universal consternation and anxiety among people of all ranks and ages, in these colonies, as was occasioned by that parliamentary procedure, which threatened us and our posterity with perpetual bondage and slavery. For they, as we generally suppose, are really slaves to all intents and purposes, who are obliged to labor and toil only for the benefit of others; or, which comes to the same thing, the fruit of whose labor and industry may be lawfully taken from them without their consent, and they justly punished if they refuse to surrender it on demand, or apply it to other purposes than those, which their masters, of their mere grace and pleasure, see fit to allow. Nor are there many American understandings acute enough to distinguish any material difference between this being done by a single person, under the title of an absolute monarch, and done by a far-distant legislature consisting of many persons, in which they are not represented; and the members whereof, instead of feeling, and sharing equally with them in the burden thus imposed, are eased of their own in proportion to the greatness and weight of it. It may be questioned, whether the ancient Greeks or Romans, or any other nation in which slavery was allowed, carried their idea of it much farther than this. So that our late apprehensions, and universal consternation, on account of ourselves and posterity, were far, very far indeed, from being groundless. For what is there in this world more wretched, than for those who were born free, and have a right to continue so, to be made slaves themselves, and to think of leaving a race of slaves behind them; even though it be to masters, confessedly the most humane and generous in the world! Or what wonder is it, if after groaning with a low voice for a while to no purpose, we at length groaned so loudly, as to be heard more than three thousand miles; and to be pitied throughout Europe, wherever it is not hazardous to mention even the name of liberty, unless it be to reproach it, as only another name for sedition, faction or rebellion?

*

The REPEAL, the REPEAL, has at once, in a good measure, restored things to order, and composed our minds by removing the chief ground of our fears. The course of justice between man and man is no longer obstructed; commerce lifts up her head, adorned with golden tresses, pearls, and precious stones. All things that went on right before are returning gradually to their former course; those that did not we have reason to hope will go on better now; almost every person you meet wears the smiles of contentment and joy; and even our slaves rejoice as though they had received their manumission. Indeed, all the lovers of liberty in Europe, in the world, have reason to rejoice; the cause is, in some measure, common to them and us. Blessed revolution! glorious change! How great are our obligations for it to the Supreme Governor of the world! He hath given us beauty for ashes, and the oil of gladness for the spirit of heaviness. He hath turned our groans into songs, our mourning into dancing. He hath put off our sackcloth, and girded us with gladness, to the end that our tongues, our glory may sing praises to him. Let us all, then, rejoice in the Lord, and give honor to him; not forgetting to add the obedience of our lives, as the best sacrifice that we can offer to Heaven; and which, if neglected, will prove all our other sacrifices have been but ostentation and hypocrisy, which are an abomination to the Lord.

Having been initiated in youth in the doctrines of civil liberty, as they were taught by such men as Plato, Demosthenes, Cicero, and other renowned

in a duodecimo of about five hundred pages. They are principally occupied with The Journal of his life and travels in the service of the Gos

Milton, Locke and Hoadley, among the moderns; I liked them; they seemed rational. Having earlier still learned from the Holy Scriptures, that wise, brave, and virtuous men were always friends to liberty; that God gave the Israelites a king [or absolute monarch] in his anger, because they had not sense and virtue enough to like a free commonwealth, and to have himself for their king; that the Son of God came down from heaven to make us "free indeed;" and that "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;" this made me conclude that freedom was a great blessing. Having, also, from my childhood up, by the kind providence of my God, and the tender care of a good parent now at rest with Him, been educated to the love of liberty, though not of licentiousness; which chaste and virtuous passion was still increased in me, as I advanced towards and into manhood; I would not, I cannot now, though past middle age, relinquish the fair object of my youthful affection, LIBERTY, whose charms, instead of decaying with time in my eyes, have daily captivated me more and more. I was accordingly penetrated with the most sensible grief, when, about the first of November last, that day of darkness, a day hardly to be numbered with the other days of the year, SHE seemed about to take her final departure from America, and to leave that ugly hag, Slavery, the deformed child of Satan, in her room. I am now filled with a proportionable degree of joy in God, on occasion of HER speedy return, with new smiles on her face, with augmented beauty and splendor.-Once more, then, Hail! celestial maid, the daughter of God, and, excepting his Son, the firstborn of heaven! Welcome to these shores again; welcome to every expanding heart! Long mayest thou reside among us, the delight of the wise, good, and brave; the protectress of innocence from wrongs and oppression; the patroness of learning, arts, eloquence, virtue, rational loyalty, religion! And if any miserable people on the continent or isles of Europe, after being weakened by luxury, debauchery, venality, intestine quarrels, or other vices, should, in the rude collisions, or nowuncertain revolutions of kingdoms, be driven, in their extremity, to seek a safe retreat from slavery in some far distant climate; let them find, O let them find one in America under thy brooding sacred wings, where our oppressed fathers once found it, and we now enjoy it, by the favor of Him, whose service is the most glorious freedom! Never, O never may He permit them to forsake us, for our unworthiness to enjoy thy enlivening presence! By His high permission attend us through life AND DEATH to the regions of the blessed, thy original abode, there to enjoy forever the "glorious liberty of the sons of God!"-But I forget myself; whither have I been hurried by this enthusiasm, or whatever else you will please to call it? I hope your candor will forgive this odd excursion, for which I hardly know how to account myself.

JOHN WOOLMAN.

"GET," says Charles Lamb, in one of the Essays of Elia, "the writings of John Woolman by heart, and love the early Quakers."

The result is not unlikely to follow, even if the reader stop short of the thoroughness of study recommended. John Woolman's writings are

proceed to some consideration of this which may emphatically be called a portion of his works.

66

Having often felt a motion of love to leave some hints in writing of my experience of the goodness of God," he in the thirty-sixth year of his age addressed himself to the task.

John Woolman

He was born in Northampton, Burlington county, West Jersey, in 1720, and before the age of seven "began to be acquainted with the operations of Divine love." He remembered sitting down once on his way from school, and reading the description of the new heavens and new earth in the Book of Revelation, and by this and like exercises he was preserved from acquiring the habit of using ill language and other evils.

He records an early case of conscience.

A thing remarkable in my childhood was, that once going to a neighbour's house, I saw, on the way, a robin sitting on her nest, and as I came near she went off, but having young ones flew about, and with many cries expressed her concern for them; I stood and threw stones at her, till one striking her, she fell down dead: at first I was pleased with the exploit, but after a few minutes was seized with horror, as having, in a sportive way, killed an innocent creature while she was careful for her young: I beheld her lying dead, and thought these young ones for which she was so careful, must now perish for want of their dam to nourish them; and after some painful considerations on the subject I climbed up the tree, took all the young birds, and killed them; supposing that better than to leave them to pine away and die miserably and believed, in this case, that scripture proverb was fulfilled, "The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel." I then went on my errand, but, for some hours could think of little else but the cruelties I had committed, and was much troubled. Thus He whose tender mercies are over all his works, hath placed a principle in the human mind which incites to exercise goodness towards every living creature; and this being singly attended to, people become tender-hearted and sympathizing; but being frequently and totally rejected, the mind becomes shut up in a contrary disposition.

As he advanced to the age of sixteen, he found himself losing his childish purity. In his own words, "I perceived a plant in me which produced much wild grapes." A fit of sickness, "from which I doubted of recovering," brought serious thoughts to his mind, and with advancing years he became more and more weaned from the world.

He remained with his parents, "and wrought on the plantation" until his twenty-first year, when "a man in much business at shop-keeping and baking asked me, if I would hire with him to tend shop and keep books." Accepting this proposal, his employer furnished a shop in Mount Holly, a few miles distant, where Woolman lived alone. He was troubled at first by the visits of