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and to the public benefit; when I fhall be ready to communicate my relations to the authors of fuch collection.

And here it may not be amifs to take notice, how excellent a pastor of a parish my father was, even after the lofs of his fight; his great infirmities of body; and his lameness: nay, even when, for about fix weeks, his hearing was almost intirely lost alfo. During which times, he ftill continued officiating and preaching twice every Lord's-Day. He alfo, before his want of fight hindered him, used to go yearly to the feveral families in his parish, to catechife the children, and inftruct, or if occafion was, to reprove the grown perfons, in a free and familiar manner and particularly, to fit the younger perfons four times in the year for their first communion. Which method he alfo continued when he had loft his fight, with only this difference, that he sent for the feveral families to his own house for the fame purposes. Nor was there any more than one family which refufed to come. The mafter of which family was afterward fo fenfible of the good influence of fuch private inftructions, that when I once came into that country, and, as ufual, gave the parishioners of Norton a fermon, he lamented to me the negligence of the incumbents, after my father's death; and complained, that fince that time, they could not govern their children and servants as they did before, and would I thought have gone down on his knees, that I might have had the living, and done as he did.

My father chiefly depended on Dr. Hammond's Paraphrafe and Notes on the New Testament, (who was ten years rector of that very parish of Penfeburst in Kent, which I was offered about fix years ago;) which work I ufed to read to him, and which work was in those days the great ftandard of the fenfe of the text among the middle fort of our divines, nay,

almoft

almoft among all the preachers of the church of England; till at laft Grotius's reputation greatly prevailed against his, and generally against that of all our other commentators. Altho' I cannot but fay, that how great foever Dr. Hammond's reputation was with me, when I was young, and Grotius's and bifhop Patrick's, &c. when I was of middle age; yet in the laft thirty years, I have discovered so much greater light, by the moft frequent perufal of the two or three firft centuries of christianity, and by a clofe attention to originals, that I cannot but look upon all fuch commentaries as at present much lefs confiderable. But this by the way only.

My father performed all parochial duties himself, in faying the prayers, pfalms, and leffons, and preaching every Lord's Day twice, and adminiftring both Baptifm and the Lord's Supper by heart. (To which laft he admitted me at fourteen years of age) excepting the office of matrimony, which he left to others. Nor did this extraordinary diligence in his function please several of his neighbouring clergy: Who, as ufual, thought it to be, as it really was, a tacit, but severe reproof of their own negligence. As to which excellent character, I have now by me an original petition of the parishioners of Norton and neighbouring gentry, to the Lord Protector, before the death of Mr. Gabriel Roffe, his father-in law, who was then about eighty-feven, to beg of him not to fuffer Mr. Whifton to be taken from them, when Mr. Roffe fhould die, as they were greatly afraid he should be. Tho' I fuppofe the petition was never prefented: the reason of which I do not know. I also remember what my father told me, that after the restoration, almoft all profeffion of seriousness in religion would have been laughed out of countenance, under pretence of the hypocrify of the former times, had not two very

excellent

éxcellent and ferious books, written by eminent. Royalifts, put fome ftop to it: I mean The whole Duty of Man; and Dr. Hammond's Practical Cate chifm: (The latter of which I fometimes read in evenings to my pupils, when I was a tutor.) I also remember his obfervation on Mr. Hoard's book concerning God's Love to Mankind, as the firft that began to fet afide the Calvinifts unhappy fcheme of election and reprobation in England, which till then was the current opinion of the members of the church of England, as it is ftill the doctrine of her thirty-nine articles.

I farther remember, that when the bill for the exclufion of the duke of York was in agitation, my father was fo fearful of popery, that he wished fuch a bill were lawful: but did not think it was fo. Which fear of popery had fo great an influence upon him, that it had almoft prevented his confent to my being bread a scholar, in order to my being a clergyman; which yet he greatly defired; for fear the popifh religion fhould come in, and I fhould become a popifh prieft: against which religion I had then read fo many proteftant books, that I was in very little danger of ever embracing it.

I remember alfo, that fome time before his death, great numbers of French refugees came over hither, at the revocation of the edict of Nantz, 1685. This fo greatly affected him, that confidering them as confeffors for religion, as they really were, he preached feveral fermons to his fmall parish, to excite them to an uncommon liberality on that occafion. In particular, he told them from the pulpit, which I myself heard, that he intended himself to give them fix pounds. By which means I believe the parish of Norton made up a greater fum than perhaps any other in the kingdom, of no larger wealth and magnitude.

Now

Now it ought here to be mentioned, that my father was acquainted with that most eminent diffenter and moft vigilant paftor, Mr. Richard Baxter, and had a great esteem for him, and his practical writings infomuch that he caufed me to learn his fmall catechifm, of xii articles by heart. And certainly, as Mr. Baxter put a great stop to the folly of the Antinomians, who in the times of anarchy were ready to over-fet the majority of weak, but zealous christians; fo, had he been as well verfed in the original writers of the two or three firft centuries, as he was in the schoolmen, his parts were fo confiderable, that he afforded very great light to the christian world. Nor indeed by the by, could I ever prevail with myself to preach against our diffenters, even when my principles were very different from theirs; on account of that seriousness of piety, which I found in many of them. Nor do I at this day approve of one party of chriftians preaching against another, where they are not allowed to plead for themselves; but think they had better all of them look into their own errors, and leave them and all of them unite upon the only wife foundation, the original fettlements of primitive christianity.

;

As to my father's death, it was after a moft christian manner. For when he faw it approaching, he said, he was not afraid to die. And calling for us his children, he gave us all a folemn charge for leading a religious life, and caution'd us not to meet him at the day of judgment in an unregenerate state; and then folemnly prayed with us, and for us. A few hours after which, he slept in the Lord, the beginning of January, 1685-6, in the 63d year of his age, and lies buried in the chancel of Norton: with only this original infcription, now worn our, Depofitum Jofie Whiston, bujus Ecclefia Rectoris, and had his funeral fermon preached by Dr. Grey.

As

As to my mother, Katherine Roffe, the youngest child of Mr. Gabriel Roffe, fhe was baptized January 19, 1639-40, and died December 1, 1701, at near 62 years of age. She was a very good, fincere, religious woman, who took great care of her hufband under all his infirmities, and of us, a numerous family of children. We had been ten in all; but fix fons and one daughter lived to be grown men and women. The youngest of whom, Daniel by name, befides myself, is ftill alive, and is ftill no more than a curate at Somerfham, under the Regius Profeffor of Divinity of the university of Cambridge: his fincerity obliging him not to fign the 39 Articles for farther preferments, and never to read the Athanafian Creed: For refufal to read which he was once in danger of expulfion from his curacy, But by Dr. Clarke's interpofition with a noble peer in that neighbourhood, it was prevented. He has, I believe, compofed more fermons, and those not bad ones, than any other clergyman in England; I have heard him fay, above 3000 in number. But his principal and most ufeful work is, his Primitive Catechifm; which, when I had myself greatly approved and improved, I publish'd under the title of a Prefbyter of the Church of England, and ftill infert it among the catalogue of my own writings, as I have long made use of it, and of it only in my Catechetic Inftructions, inftead of our other more modern compofitions, which feem to me quite inferior to this, as it is wholly taken out of the Bible, and the Apoftolical Confiitutions: but what opinion my brother had of those Conftitutions, I fhall here give the reader in his own words, taken out of his letter to me, not dated, but written about A. D. 1715, as follows:

Dear

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