the work, having the appointment of all the scholars who should be employed in carrying forward this great undertaking." Vol. iii. p. 211.

Thus far all appeared in a fair train for a successful issue. Some of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal entered warmly into the project; and Dr. Clarke and Mr. Pratt corresponded with different learned men on the Continent, to induce them to help forward the work by their learning and talents, engaging them to promise to undertake different departments in the execution of the whole and several private gentlemen offered most munificently to come forward with their pecuniary aid, in order to bring about a work, not only of such magnitude, but also of such high importance and literary and national honour. Among these, Mr. Butterworth promised 5001. as a gift toward the expenses of the first volume. But the project failed; and though Mr. Pratt and his friend often endeavoured in succeeding years to revive it, their efforts were ineffectual. Dr. Clarke lays the whole of the blame to the Bishops. He says, that though he was willing and anxious to work with all his might in the laborious part of the business, advising, copying, collating, correcting the press, or whatever else was required; yet that he wished that the honour of the undertaking should be with the bishops and the clergy of the Established Church: he was willing, he says, to have worked “under the direction of the Prelates of our church;" and he adds, "a more willing slave they could not have found." But, for whatever reason, with one or two honourable exceptions, the Bishops could not be induced to stir in the matter, even so far as to give in their names as subscribers; and he complains, many years after, in a letter to the Duke of Sussex, that "the work was delivered into the hands of the Right Reverend Prelates, and there— it sleeps in peace." Still later, in 1825, writing to Archdeacon Wrangham, to whom his youngest son was curate, he says:

"I have often thought of urging my way to the foot of the Throne, and laying the subject before the King; there were several who would have introduced me, but I was afraid that the simple circumstance of my being only a lay preacher, might have injured the business I wished to promote. Never can a more favourable era recur; money would have amply been found, and labourers also, had the proper patronage appeared. Nothing was wanting but the suffrages of the bishops and clergy of England, and had they come forward, it would have been to the endless good of the Church, and to their lasting credit." Vol. iii. pp. 108, 109.

He adds, despairingly, "But enough of this now nearly hopeless subject; this is probably the last letter I shall write upon it." We will only remark, upon the whole of this narrative, that we do not believe that in the present state of the Episcopal Bench the same apathy would have been shewn; for we have now several prelates eminent for their attainments as Biblical scholars, who, we feel persuaded, would gladly assist, as far as in their power, in so important an undertaking; while others, less distinguished for literature, would not be less anxious to afford their patronage and recommendation. Nor would our nobility, we should hope, refuse their aid, if properly applied to. The venerable Lord Teignmouth evinced much zeal in the matter; and the Duke of Sussex-who entertained much personal regard and esteem for Dr. Clarke, introducing him to his most distinguished guests, and more than once returning his visits, revelling in the literary dainties of his library, and not disdaining the simple hospitalities of his table-afterwards lamented that he had not been made acquainted with the project, as he would have exerted himself to promote it. His Royal Highness's own invaluable collection of Bibles, and works connected with Biblical learning, shews how well he could appreciate the importance of such an undertaking. Dr. Clarke was eminently a man of peace. His Commentary, though highly learned, interesting, and valuable, abounding with new and important matter, and conscientiously devoted to the setting forth the truth

of God and the spiritual benefit of mankind, could not but involve a variety of controverted subjects, and some opinions which many other wise and good men did not consider tenable. In his connexion also with public institutions, and in the defence of the doctrines and discipline of his own peculiar body, as a member of the Methodist Society, he was often exposed to warm conflictions of opinion; but he rejoices, he says in one of his letters, that he never wrote a controversial tract, and he wished to "keep within his shell, and never to cross the waters of strife." One of the few occasions on which he entered into a discussion in print, occurred in an argument which he held with the late Rev. T. Scott in the pages of the Christian Observer for 1810; Mr. Scott having sent us some papers to shew that Dr. Clarke was wrong in supposing that our Lord and his disciples constantly used and made their quotations from the Septuagint version of the Old Testament, and not from the original Hebrew.

Whatever Dr. Clarke did, he did heartily, even to purchasing a rare book, or cheering at a public meeting. Take an example of each. The second relates to the Bible Society Meeting at Cambridge in 1811, where Dr. Clarke happened to be visiting on the business of the Record Commission; and the history of that memorable day is still so vivid, that we can excuse the worthy Doctor's enthusiasm.

"A catalogue of books having been sent to him late one evening, he immediately looked over it, and saw advertised for sale the first edition of Erasmus's Greek Testament; early on the following morning he went off to the bookseller's and purchased the work. A few hours afterwards, a well known literary character, the late Dr. Gossett, went also to Paternoster Row with the intention of procuring it, but the book was gone; finding by whom it had been bought, he called on Dr. Clarke, and requested a sight of it, observing, you have been very fortunate, Dr. Clarke, in having obtained this work; but how you got it before myself I am at a loss to imagine, for I was at Baynes's directly after breakfast, and it was gone.' But I was there before breakfast,' replied Dr. Clarke, and consequently, doctor, I forestalled you.'” Vol. iii. p. 319.

"I have to-day witnessed such proceedings as I never witnessed before. Here has been a meeting to form an Auxiliary to the British and Foreign Bible Society, Lord Hardwicke in the chair, supported by Lord Francis Osborne, the Dean of Carlisle, and several of the Professors, &c., of the University: the meeting lasted from eleven to nearly four o'clock; and such speeches I never heard: Mr. Owen excelled his former self: Mr. Dealtry spoke like an angel of the first order; and Dr. D. E. Clarke, the Russian traveller, like a seraph: every thing was carried nemine contradicente, and the meeting concluded in a blaze of celestial light. Every man seemed to swear that he would carry the Bible to all who never knew it, as far as the providence of God should permit him to go, and thus act up to his precept, in publishing Glory to God in the highest, and peace and good-will among men.' For myself, I have nearly broken my new staff with thumping, after having made my fists sore in pounding the table. I did not laugh and cry alternately, I did both together, and completely wet my new pocket-handkerchief through with my tears: between two and three hundred of the University young men were the first movers in this business." Vol. iii. pp. 286, 287.

In 1814 Dr. Clarke embarked upon a new sphere of charitable labour, having presided at the formation of the Methodist Missionary Society, and strongly pressed the object in speeches, in sermons, and in print. How zealously he exerted himself to the end of his days in this great work of Christian mercy, and how remarkably God has been pleased to bless his efforts and those of his colleagues, needs not be recapitulated. Dr. Clarke had long felt interested in missionary labours in connexion with the London Missionary Society, but he now applied himself with new diligence to the work as carried on by the body of Christians with which he was immediately connected. Among his other personal exertions in this cause, he received under his roof, and assiduously instructed for two years, two Budhist priests from Ceylon, and had the satisfaction of admitting them to baptism, after the fullest probation and approval.

His labours at length became too heavy for him any longer to sustain, and he was obliged to retire in ill health to an estate which he had purchased

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at a place called Millbrook, near Liverpool. The following is a portrait of him in his comparative retirement:

"The Wesleyan Conference had appointed him to the Manchester Circuit, whither he went to preach once a mouth, generally filling up the other Sabbath mornings either by preaching in Liverpool, or in one of the chapels not so far from his own residence. Nearly the whole population around Millbrook was Roman Catholic; the churches and chapels were from two to three miles from his own house; and as this was too distant for his family to go, he immediately erected a small chapel on his estate for the Methodist preachers to supply. At first only a few Protestant colliers and their families attended; and these, with his own family, the village school-mistress, shoemaker, and blacksmith, formed the congregation at Millbrook.

"Here Dr. Clarke not only enjoyed quietness and breathed pure air, but he engaged himself in agricultural pursuits, and thus in some measure lived over again the scenes of his youth. All the time he could spare out of his study was employed in superintending his farm and watching the progress of his young plantations, or in making agricultural experiments, some of which are to be found in their detail in the Notes of his Commentary on the New Testament. In these employments he had a sufficiency of amusement without its being a burden, and in them he took a lively interest: he was the first in the morning to minister to the hungry claimants in the farm-yard, nor did he ever forget or neglect their wants even in the severity of winter, despite the blowing of the wind or the falling of the snow; nor would he ever eat any thing thus reared under his own eye, from the fowl to the cattle. He delighted also in making improvements on his estate, and the order, neatness, and perfection to which he brought it, proved indeed that it was not the vineyard of the sluggard.

"The poor of the neighbourhood were his especial care: he supplied them with Bibles and Testaments, and instituted a Sunday-School, which was conducted by the members of his own family, assisted by the village school-mistress, where every Lord's-day from sixty to seventy male and female children were not only taught to read, but Dr. Clarke frequently himself went in to encourage the good and to exhort the disorderly; and as often as he did so, he interested all by some little tales which told plainly their own moral: the ill-clad children he marked also, and rested not till he could beg or procure the clothes necessary for their comfort. Many of these Sunday scholars were Roman Catholics, and as soon as the morning school closed they returned home, while the Protestant children remained during the performance of Divine worship, assembling again in the afternoon, which was entirely devoted to their instruction; and much moral good resulted to them from the education and instruction thus afforded." Vol. iii. pp. 328 330.

In 1824 Dr. Clarke returned to London, wishing to be near his children, most of whom had settled there; but the air of the metropolis not agreeing with him, he soon removed to an estate which he purchased, called Haydon Hall, at Eastcott, a quiet secluded spot about sixteen miles from London, where he passed the remainder of his days. He was, however, fully occupied his preaching, his charitable labours, and his studies, allowed him little relaxation; and, as if he had not already sufficient on his hands, he was ever fertile in discovering new calls to exertion. Scarcely had he concluded his great work, his Commentary, which he brought to a close in 1826, before he undertook a laborious missionary visit to the Shetland Islands, the inhabitants of which were in a state of great religious destitution, the Established Church of Scotland not having provided instruction by any means adequate to their necessities. Some Methodist missionaries had already entered upon this field of labour, and with such encouraging success, that Dr. Clarke determined to go much further; sending out additional missionaries, and building chapels, school-houses, and dwellings for the preachers; so that every inhabitant of the remotest crag should, if possible, have access to the means of spiritual instruction. The matters necessary to carry into effect this design, occupied many of his most anxious hours to the close of his life: he wrote, he preached, he printed he consumed, he says, whole reams of paper in petitionary letters to his friends, some of whom came forward munificently to assist his efforts; and he even visited these stormy islands a second time to promote the object. From his letters and note-book while engaged in these visits, as well as during many other extended journeys which he took at different periods of his life in England, Ireland, Wales, and Scotland, we might

collect a variety of interesting notices; but for these we must refer to the volumes before us: we will only weave in a few specimens.

In the course of his travels, Dr. Clarke sometimes met with aged persons who had known him under the character of the "boy preacher," and could scarcely be persuaded that the respectable portly personage now before them was their old friend. "What! be this he!" said one old man, "the tidy little boy, that fifty years agone myself and many other young ones went all about the country to see and hear, under whom I and several others were convinced of sin, and by the grace of God continue to this day!" He once met with a woman who had heard him fifty years before deliver the very first sermon he ever preached. The old people were in raptures that "the little boy," that used so long ago to visit and pray with them, was now come again, after a lengthened absence. The past they connected with the present, and half a century was lost. . O, my dear, how glad I am that you are come again! how glad I am to hear you once more." He went on one occasion to visit the tombs of his forefathers; in alluding to which he gives us the following characteristic specimen of Irish church repairing.

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"In my younger days I well remember the large tombstone of one of my godmothers as standing inside the altar rails: it was high, and of white marble, with the inscriptions all in gilt letters; now it stands some yards out in the church-yard. I inquired of the sexton the meaning of it, to which he replied, that several years ago that end of the church having long been in a bad state of repair, the walls had eventually fallen in, and to save expense, they had simply thrown up a wall, at the end of the fracture: thus of course shortening the church some yards, and excluding the really handsome monument of my godmother, Mrs. Henderson." Vol. iii. p. 52. None of his views of Irish management are very flattering. Thus he says:

"The Irish, as far as my observations have extended, are utterly adverse to improvement in every thing relative to domestic economy. They build houses, and for want of due repairs permit them to fall into ruins: they will suffer the rain to fall upon their very beds, rather than put themselves to the trouble of mending the thatch. When a window is broken, they thrust in a rag, or a whisp of straw; when farther broken, they put up a slate, or thin stone, against the aperture: when farther broken still, they supply the place of the glass with mason-work: and thus they proceed, till in multitudes of cases not one vestige of the window remains.

"I have remarked this procedure of indolence and carelessness in all its stages. I have seen the windows in the process of gradual abolition; and in perhaps a thousand cases I have seen the whole window blocked up, and this even in cabins, and where there was no taxation, and the window was essentially necessary both to the light and comfort of the inhabitants. It is the same with the house itself: if the wall be shaken, it is scarcely ever repaired, and the ruin proceeds, till at length the house falls hence there are more ruins of houses in Ireland than perhaps in any country in the world. The same reprehensible spirit appears in their clothing: there is no stitching in time to save nine.' But notwithstanding all these things, it is impossible not to esteem and love this people: their frankness, simplicity, cheerful ness, good nature, friendly disposition, unparalleled hospitality, and enduring patience under privations of various kinds; together with their love of learning, or rather their desire to learn, and their hunger after literary information, render them amiable in the sight of all who have any intercourse or connection with them." Vol. ii. pp. 395, 396.

Dr. Clarke, however, adds, that there is a most marked difference between the districts in which Protestantism prevails and those under Popish influence; and he challenges the most careless or bigoted traveller to disprove his assertion, that, whereas in Protestant districts the people are happy and cheerful and industrious," throughout the whole Roman Catholic districts the land is ill cultivated, hedges and fences are universally neglected, and the inhabitants are worse clothed, worse fed, discontented, gloomy, and suspicious."

Few incidents in Dr. Clarke's numerous journeys pleased him more than a visit he once made to Epworth in Lincolnshire, the native place of his

revered friend Mr. Wesley. The clergyman of the village shewed him the parsonage built by Mr. Wesley's father, the venerable Samuel Wesley. It is a large old-fashioned house, well suited for a patriarchal family of nineteen children, with which Mr. Wesley was blessed. Dr. Clarke preached at the Methodist Chapel, and was much pleased with his auditors.

"A more genuine, simple-hearted, affectionate people I have rarely seen; your mother was quite delighted with them: being a sort of islanders-for their place is in the island of Axholme, and their town far removed from any other-they are so circumstanced, that they can have but little intercourse with their more refined, but distant neighbours: they have but little polish, but no boorishness in their manners: they appear to possess great good nature, simplicity, and sincerity, together with much humility; and their universal and singular modesty, gives a tone, and strangely speaking energy to their whole conduct. They retain the manners of the better part of the peasants of two hundred years ago. I shall not soon have so much solid satisfaction among any people. I did not tell you I had got a pair of fire-tongs, which had belonged to old Mr. Samuel Wesley, and which were bought at the family sale : there is also an old clock, which I rather think I shall have, and for which I left a commission. It is one of the old school, pulls up with a string, and goes (when it can) twenty-four hours at a time. One of the friends had sawed me off a small part of one of the branches of the sycamore tree, planted by old Mr. Wesley, and which I shall carefully bring with me. Another friend presented me with a drawing of the church another has given me a nice view of the parsonage-house: I have also got an extract from an ancient Terrier, which minutely describes the old house which was burnt down about 1700. That which now stands is the second house which old Samuel Wesley built; for his house was twice burnt down. It will surprise you to hear, that their ancient parsonage-house, in which old Samuel Wesley himself lived, and in which several of their children were born, was constructed of timber and mud, and plastered without, and covered with thatch. We left Epworth yesterday: properly speaking, we had no road for upwards of forty miles, but travelled through fields of corn, wheat, rye, potatoes, barley, and turnips, often crushing them under our wheels. In all my travels, I never saw any thing like this: I feared we were trespassing, but the drivers assured us that there was no other road." Vol. ii. pp. 405, 406.

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We have been somewhat surprised, in reading these volumes, to observe Dr. Clarke's great popularity as a preacher, and in particular the powerful effect of his charity sermons. Thus, on one occasion, at Halifax, the crowd, he says, forced open the pews and occupied the chapel, so that the rich were excluded, and the poor filled their seats. He trembled for the collection; and this feeling was not a little increased when he went into the vestry, and saw a basket brought in, containing apparently about forty pounds' weight of copper, without a shilling, sixpence, gold, or paper among it. However, when that and the collection plates were reckoned, there were four-score and three pounds, sterling. It argues well, both for the heads and the hearts of the poorer classes of the Methodist community, that such a preacher as Dr. Clarke should have been thus prized by them ; but the secret of his popularity is soon solved, and we will give the solution in his own words:

"The only preaching worth any thing, in God's account, and which the fire will not burn up, is that which labours to convict and convince the sinner of his sin, to bring him into contrition for it, to convert him from it; to lead him to the blood of the covenant, that his conscience may be purged from its guilt,-to the spirit of judgment and burning, that he may be purified from its infection,-and then to build him up on this most holy faith, by causing him to pray in the Holy Ghost, and keep himself in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life: this is the system pursued by the Apostles, and it is that alone which God will own to the conversion of sinners: I speak from the experience of nearly fifty years in the public ministry of the word: this is the most likely mode to produce the active soul of divinity, while the body is little else than the preacher's creed. Labour to bring sinners to God, should you by it bring yourself to the grave." Vol. iii. p. 37. "After having now laboured with a clear conscience for the space of fifty years, in preaching the salvation of God through Christ to thousands of souls, I can say, that is the most successful kind of preaching which exhibits and upholds, in the clearest and strongest light, the Divine perfection and mercy of the infinitely compassionate and holy God, to fallen man;-which represents Him to man's otherwise hopeless case, as, compassionate as well as just; as slow to anger, as well as quick to mark