date. The following extracts contain the whole of it, with the exception of a few impurities.

The Definition of a Drunkard.

A Drunkard is the annoyance of modesty; the trouble of civility; the spoil of wealth; the destruction of reason. He is the brewer's agent; the alehouse benefactor; the beggar's companion; the constable's trouble. He is his wife's woe; his children's sorrow; his neighbour's scoffe; his own shame. In summe, a tubbe of swill; a spirit of sleep; a picture of a beast; a monster of a man.

The Evils attending Drunkennesse, hurtful to the Soul and Body.

Drunkennesse confounds the memory, dulls the understanding, distempers the body, defaceth the beauty, hurts the mind. It inflames the blood; it engenders unnatural thirst, a stinking breath, redness of the eyes. It diminisheth strength; it brings woes, sorrows, wounds without cause; corrupteth the blood, drowneth the spirits. It enricheth the carcasse with surfets; turneth blood into water; turns reason to poyson. It causeth vomiting and filthinesse. By excessive drinking, come dropsies, consumptions, and cold diseases, with untimely deaths. Many, by drinking healths to others, leave none to themselves. Drunkenness is a flattering devil, a sweet poyson, a delightsome sin, which, whoso hath in himself, hath not himself; and he that useth it, is not himself in the concrete, but sinfulness itself in the abstract; being a voluntary devil, the common shame of nature, and the prodigious disgrace of mankind.

Examples laid down in Scripture, shewing how drunkennesse made some fall by the sword, others became murderers, others being drunk, were murdered, betrayed; many destroyed in the middle of their sin, sporting, &c.

The Amalekites lay scattered on the earth, so that David slew them. 1 Sam. xxx. 16.

Ammon's heart was merry, so that Absolom's servants slew him. 2 Sam. xxviii. 29.

Benhadad, with fifty-two other kings, were by Israel overcome. 1 Kings xx. 16, &c.

Belshazzar's countenance fell down, and the Medes took his kingdom. Dan. v. 31.

David useth means to move Uriah to cover his sin committed. 2 Sam. xi. 13.

Elah was, by his servant conspiring against him, murdered. 1 Kings xvi. 9, 10.

Gaal, with his brethren, conspired against Abimelech. Judg. ix. 26, 27.

Herod, in his drunken banquet, caused John to be beheaded. Matt. xiv. 10.

The Israelites drank till they were thirsty. Hell was prepared for them. Isa. v. 12, 14.

Nabal's heart was merry, and suddenly died within him. 1 Sam. xxv. 36, 27.

The Philistines, sporting with Sampson, were, by the fall of an house, slaine, Jud. xvi. 26, 27, 28, 29, 30.

Priests and prophets stumble in judgment, and faile by vision. Isa. xxviii. 7.

The Corinthians profaned the Lord's supper by their immoderate drinking before. 1 Cor. xi. 21.

These fore-mentioned places of Scripture and examples, prove plainly the evil consequence of drunkennesse. Now follow threatnings and exhortations to drunkards.

Threatnings.

Wo to them that rise up early in the morning, to follow strong drink, that continue till night, the wine inflaming them. Isa. v. 11. Wo to them that are mighty to drink wine, and to men of strength, mingling strong drinke, which causeth men to erre, and to go out of the way, being swallowed up with wine and strong drink. Isa. v. 22. chap. xxviii. 7, 8. &c. Awake now, ye drunkards, weep and howle, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine, for it shall be pulled from your mouth. Joel i. 5, &c.

Exhortations.

The drunkard shall come to poverty, rags shall be his clothing. Prov. xxiii. 21. Wine is a mocker, and strong drink is raging, and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise. Prov. xx. i. Remember Christ's admonition, take heed of drunkennesse. Luke xxi. 34. Forget not Paul's and Solomon's counsel. 1 Cor. v. 11. Prov. xxiii. 20. Company not with drunkards, &c.; and know that no drunkard shall inherit the kingdom of heaven. 1 Cor. xxvi. 10, 11. Therefore he shall not be drunken with wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the spirit. Eph. v. 18.

A POET'S PETITION.

THE following petition was presented by John Cleveland, an English poet, of the seventeenth century, to Oliver Cromwell, when a prisoner in Yarmouth gaol for his attachment to the royal cause. Burnet calls it a humble petition; but it certainly cannot be considered as such: it was, however, an effectual one, and obtained Cleveland his release, by order of the Protector..

"Rulers within the circle of their government have a claim to that which is said of the Deity, they have their centre everywhere, and their circumference nowhere. It is in this confidence that I address to your highness, as knowing no place in a nation is so remote as not to share in the ubiquity of your care; no prison so close, as to shut me up from partaking of your influence. My lord, it is my misfortune, that after ten years of retirement from being engaged in the difference of the state, having wound myself up in a private recess, and my comportment to the public being so inoffensive, that in all this time, neither fears nor jealousies have scrupled at my actions; being about three months since at Norwich, I was fetched with a guard before the commissioners, and sent prisoner to Yarmouth; and if it be not a new offence to make enquiry where I offended, (for hitherto my faults are kept as close as my person,) I am induced to believe, that next to the adherence to the royal party, the cause of my confinement is the narrowness of my estate; for none stand committed, whose estate can bail them: I only am the prisoner, who have no acres to be my hostage. Now, if my poverty be criminal (with reverence be it spoken), I must implead your highness, whose victorious arms have reduced me to it, as accessary to my guilt. Let it suffice, my lord, that the calamity of the war hath made us poor; do not punish us for it. Whoever did penance for being ravished? Is it not enough that we are stript so bare, but it must be made an order to a severe lash? Must our scars be engraven with new wounds? Must we first be made cripples, then beaten with our crutches? Poverty, if it be a fault, is its own punishment; who suffers for it more, pays use upon use. I beseech your highness put some bounds to our overthrow, and do not pursue the chase to the other world. Can your thunders be levelled so low as our grovelling conditions? Can that towering spirit, that hath quarried upon kingdoms, make a

stoop at us who are the rubbish of those ruins? Methinks
I hear your former achievements interceding with you not to
sully your glories with trampling on the prostrate, nor clog
the wheels of your chariot with so degenerous a triumph.
The most renowned heroes have ever with such tenderness
cherished their captives, that their swords did but cut out
work for their courtesy: those that fell by their prowess sprung
up by their favours, as if they had struck them down, only to
make them rebound the higher. I hope your highness, as
you are the rival of their fame, will be no less of their virtues.
The noblest trophy that you can erect to your honour, is to
raise the afflicted. And, since you have subdued all oppo-
sition, it now remains that you attack yourself, and with acts
of mildness vanquish your victory. It is not long since, my
lord, that you knocked off the shackles from most of our party,
and by a grand release did spread your clemency as large
as your territories. Let not new proscriptions interrupt our
jubilee. Let not that your lenity be slandered as the ambush
of your
further rigour: for the service of his majesty (if it be
objected), I am so far from excusing it, that I am ready to
allege it in my vindication. I cannot conceive fidelity to my
prince should taint me in your opinion; I should rather ex-
pect it should recommend me to your favour. Had not we
been faithful to our king, we could not have given ourselves
to be so to your highness: you had then trusted us gratis,
whereas now we have our former loyalty to vouch us. You
see, my lord, how much I presume upon the greatness of your
spirit, that dare prevent my indictment with so frank a con-
fession, especially in this, which I may so justly deny, that
it is almost arrogancy in me to own it; for the truth is, I was
not qualified enough to serve him: all that I could do was
to bear a part in his sufferings, and give myself up to be
cherished in his fall. Thus my charge is double, my obe-
dience to my sovereign, and what is the result of that-my
I want of a fortune. Now, whatever reflections I have on the
former, I am a true penitent for the latter. My lord, you see
my crimes! As to my defence, you bear it about you! I
shall plead nothing in my justification but your highness'
clemency, which, as it is the constant inmate of a valiant
breast, if you graciously please to extend it to your supplicant
in taking me out of this withering durance, your highness
will find that mercy will establish you more than power, though
all the days of your life were as pregnant with victories as
your twice auspicious third of September.

Your highness' humble and
submissive petitioner,

J. C.

SCOTTISH PULPIT ELOQUENCE.

THE following singular specimen of Scottish pulpit eloquence, in the seventeenth century, is extracted from an old tract, entitled "A Sermon preached in St. Giles Kirk, at Edinburg, commonly called Pockmanty* Preaching, by Mr. James Row, some time Minister of Strowan." The tract is published without date, but its contents appear to determine the time when the sermon was preached to have been in the year 1643, when the solemn league and covenant was formed at Edinburgh by the persuasion (according to Hume) of Sir Henry Vane, one of the commissioners from the English parliament, then at open war with the misguided Charles. The text is from Jeremiah xxx. 17: " For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the Lord; because they called thee an outcast, saying, this is Zion, whom no man seeketh after."

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The preacher thus commences and anatomises his discourse: "I need not trouble you much by telling you what is meant by Zion here-ye all ken it is the poor kirk of Scotland; for the kirk of Scotland is wounded in her head, in her hands, in her heart, and in her feet. First, in her head, in the government; 2dly, in her hands, in the discipline; 3dly, in her heart, as in the doctrine; 4thly, in her feet, as in the worship." The first of these general divisions was naturally susceptible of subdivision, and the preacher displayed much quaint ingenuity in pointing out in what respects the kirk had been affected in each of her five senses, particularly in that of hearing, "by the bringing in of the organs," since which she has become "as deaf as a door nail." door nail." After discussing the second and third general heads, Mr. Row proceeded as follows:

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Now I come to tell you she is wounded in her feet, and that I call the worship of the kirk of Scotland. The kirk of Scotland was a bonny trotting nag, but then she trotted sae hard that never a man durst ride her but the bishops, wha, after they got on her back, crosslanged her, hapshacked her; and when she became a bonny pacing beast, they took great pleasure to ride on her; but their cadging her up and down from Edinburgh to London, and it may be from Rome too, gave her sik a het coat, that we have these twelve months bygone been stirring her up and down to keep her fra foundering: yea, they made not only a horse, but an ass, of the kirk of Scotland. How sae quo' ye? What mean ye by this? I'll tell you how they made Balaam's ass of her: ye ken 'well

*Portmanteau.