it, or by any other misconduct. The contrary practice, he said, was bribing them to behave ill.

He much lamented to see parents so often inverting the proper course to be pursued, leaving their children almost without restraint when young, and then attempting to impose too severe restrictions upon them Each error was highly pernicious;

when grown up. the combination of the two, of most ruinous consequence.

A lady who was for a considerable time resident in his house, and who has very successfully brought up her family by rules principally derived from him, mentions in a letter two circumstances which particularly struck her in his management: one was his "never resenting misconduct in any way when the contest was over. I used to admire," she says, "his being so soon kind again to the offender. This I judge to be important, though it may seem trivial.” The other was, "his plan of letting his authority go by imperceptible degrees, as his children grew up. In this," she remarks, "he excelled, I am ready to say, even his management in childhood: and the observation of many unhappy cases, arising from a contrary course, has convinced me of its great importance. He would have been a wise father, even had he not been a religious one; just views were so obvious to his wise mind. I think the dissatisfaction, which you tell me he expresses in the close of his narrative, arose from his not having had great opportunity of comparing his plan with those of others, and of observing how miserably many children have been brought up. There is however a great improvement, at least in

my circle. I take the opportunity of speaking of him in every company into which I go, when there is a young mother present.'

The same friend notes the following rules as laid down by him. "Fix authority under four years old. -The only way of dealing with children is to convince them,If I do not do as I am bidden I shall suffer for it.'-Never let an offence pass unnoticed under the fatal idea, that they will know better when they are older."

With these rules may be combined the following observations of a young person, who passed a considerable time under his roof. "One thing which struck me much in his behaviour towards young persons was this: he never teazed and worried them about little things. The contrary conduct gives to many parents the appearance of always finding fault; renders their children uncomfortable in their presence, and destroys all confidence. When I had been at Aston two months, I had more confidence in Mr. S. than many sons can ever feel towards their own fathers. Another thing was, that he steadily showed his disapprobation of things in proportion to their contrariety to God's law, and not to the effects which. happened to follow from them. For example: a child is doing what is forbidden, as throwing stones: little notice is perhaps taken till he breaks a window, and then he is punished for the mischief he has done, and not for his disobedience. This Mr. S. not only condemned, but he never seemed to be betrayed into it."

CHAPTER XVIII.

HIS WORKS-HIS THEOLOGY-CONCLUSION.

"THE characteristic excellency of his witings," Mr. Wilson says, "is a calm, argumentative, determined tone of scriptural truth; a clear separation of one set of principles from another; a detection of plausible errors; an exhibition, in short, of a sound, comprehensive, adequate view of Christianity; such as goes to form the really solid divine. His motto may be conceived to have been, Knowing that I am set for the defence of the gospel."

I. On my father's first work, the Force of Truth, and on his principal work, the Commentary on the Scriptures, Mr. Wilson has spoken with sufficient copiousness in what has been already inserted from his sermons.

I may be allowed however to remark it, as showing a very different state of feeling upon such subjects from that which now exists, that a narrative so striking in itself, as the Force of Truth exhibits, and one so strongly tending to support what, amid unceasing obloquy and opposition, are contended for as the great doctrines of the reformation and of the holy scriptures, should for a long time have attracted so little attention. Ten years, it has been seen, passed before a thousand copies were sold. Yet, several years before that period had elapsed, it had been translated into a foreign language and published on

the continent.

I subjoin a well known instance of the effect of the work on a character which has much interested the public mind. "About this time Mr. Piggott, the curate of St. Mary's, Nottingham, hearing what was the bent of his (Henry Kirke White's) religious opinions," namely, inclining towards deism,'" sent him, by a friend, Scott's Force of Truth, and requested him to peruse it attentively; which he promised to do. Having looked at the book, he told the person who brought it to him, that he could soon write an answer to it; but about a fortnight afterwards, when this friend inquired how far he had proceeded in his answer to Mr. Scott, Henry's reply was in a very different tone and temper. He said, that to answer that book was out of his power, and out of any man's, for it was founded upon eternal truth; that it had convinced him of his error; and that so thoroughly was he impressed with a sense of the importance of his Maker's favour, that he would willingly give up all acquisitions of knowledge, and all hopes of fame, and live in a wilderness, unknown, till death, so he could insure an inheritance in heaven. A new pursuit thus opened to him, and he engaged in it with his wonted ardour." I

To what Mr. Wilson has said concerning the Commentary, I would annex the opinion expressed by the late Rev. Andrew Fuller-". I believe it exhi bits more of the mind of the Spirit in the scriptures, than any other work of the kind extant:" and the following testimony borne by the author of the "Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures." Having quoted Mr. Southey's Life and Remains of H. K. White.

I

Wilson's account of the work, Mr. Horne adds: "To the preceding just character of this elaborate Commentary, the writer of these pages (who does not view all topics precisely in the same point of view with its late learned author,) deems it an act of bare justice to state, that he has never consulted it in vain on difficult passages of the scriptures. While occupied in considering the various objections of modern infidels, he, for his own satisfaction, thought out every answer (if he may be allowed the expression,) for himself, referring only to commentaries in questions of more than ordinary difficulty: and in every instance-especially on the Pentateuch-he found in Mr. Scott's Commentary brief but solid refutations of alleged contradictions, which he could find in no other similar work extant in the English language."

The only observation which I shall myself make relates to the leading principle of interpretation adopted in the work, which appears to be of this kind; that every passage of scripture has its real, literal, and distinct meaning, which it is the first duty of a commentator, whether from the pulpit or the press, to trace out and explain; whatever application he may think fit subsequently to make of it: and that, speaking of the scriptures generally, the spiritual meaning, is no other than this real meaning, the actual intention of the passage, with its fair legitimate application to ourselves. The author looked, therefore, with a very jealous eye upon the whole scheme of accommodation so much in favour with many persons, which takes a passage often without even a reference to its connexion and real purport,