speechless, to signify if he had inward peace and satisfaction as to his eternal state, by lifting up his hand, he readily lifted up his hand, and soon after fell asleep, May 24, 1707, the last of the London ministers ejected by the act of uniformity. His body was carried to the burying place in Bunhill Fields, followed by a numerous train of

'true mourners.

The next Lord's day after the interment, his funeral sermon was preached by Dr. Williams, from 2 Cor. i. 12. For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of GoD, we have had our conversation in the world. This character, said the doctor, belonged much to, and was exemplified as plainly in, our worthy brother deceased, as in most. Thus whilst in the world he evidenced that he was not of it, and spent his life and labours in preparing himself and others for a better, to which he is now gone. Ministers, even the most holy and useful, must die as well as others. All flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away, but the word of the Lord endureth for ever; and this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.

His Works. "I. A Sermon concerning Assurance, in the Morning Exercise at Cripplegate, 4to. 1661. II. A spiritual Antidote against sinful Contagion (a Cordial for Believers, with a Corrosive for the Wicked) in dying Times, 8vo. 1665. III. A Treatise concerning the Lord's Supper, 12mo. 1665. IV. Directions how to live after a wasting Plague. 8vo. 1666. V. A Rebuke for Sin, by GOD's burning Anger, 8vo. 1667. VI. The young Man's Instructor, and the old Man's Remembrancer. 8vo. 1673. VII. Captives bound in Chains, made free by Christ their Surety: Or, The Misery of graceless Sinners, and their Recovery by Christ their Saviour. 8vo. 1674. VIII. A Sermon concerning Prayer, in the Supplement to the Morning Exercise. 1674. IX. The Novelty of Popery: A Sermon in the Morning Exercise against Popery. 4to. 1675. X. The Lord's last Sufferings shewed in the Lord's Supper. 12mo. 1682. XI. A Call to delaying Sinners. 12mo. 1683. XII. A Sermon of eyeing Eternity in all we do; in the Continuation of the Morning Exercise. 4to. 1638. XIII. A Scheme of the Principles of the Christian Religion. 8vo. 1688. XIV. The Swearer silenced: Or, The Evil and Danger of Profane Swearing and Perjury demonstrated. 12mo. 1689. XV. Love

to

to Christ necessary to escape the Curse at his coming, 8vo 1693. XVI. Earthquakes explained, and practically improved, 8vo. 1693. XVII. The Mourner's Directory, 8vo. 1693. XVIII. A plain Method of Catechizing, 8vo. 1698. XIX. The Saints' Convoy to, and Mansions in Heaven, 8vo. 1698 XX. A Complete Body of Practical Divinity; being a new. Improvement of the Assembly's Catechism, fol. 1723."

HERMAN WITSIUS,

D. D.

THE celebrated Dr. Marck of Leyden, in his Latin oration delivered at the interment of Witsius, gave the most full account of his life; from which account the following memoir is chiefly extracted.

This excellent man of GOD, and of true science, was born at Enchuysen in West Friesland, on the 12th of February 1639, of religious parents, who devoted him to GOD even from before his birth. He was named Herman from his mother's father, who was a most pious minister at that place for above thirty years. He came (as it is called) before his time, and this premature birth had well nigh cost both mother and son their lives. In consequence of this, he was, when born, so uncommonly small and weakly, that the midwife, and other women present, concluded he must die in a few hours. But, herein, GoD disappointed their fears, and (for what can make void hist purposes?) raised this puny infant, afterwards, into a very great man, (not in body, for he was always spare and thin): A man of vast intellectual abilities, brightened and improved by deep study, and whose fame diffused itself throughout the whole Christian world, by his useful, numerous, and learned labours.

His parents, after this danger, took particular care of his education, and were obliged to be extremely tender of his health. Above all, they endeavoured (and their endeavours were crowned with success equal to their largest wishes) to bring him up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord: Teaching him, ere he could speak distinctly, to

lisp out the praises of GoD, and unfold his wants in prayer before the throne of grace. In the sixth year of his age, he was entered at the public school of his native town, to learn the rudiments of Latin. There he continued three years; at the end of which space, his mother's brother, the learned Peter Gerhard, took him to his own house, and under his own immediate tuition.

Under the care of his good uncle, Witsius made so rapid a progress in learning, that, before he was fifteen years old, he could not only speak and write the Latin language correctly, and with some degree of fluency, but could also readily interpret the books of the Greek Testament, and the orations of Isocrates, and render the Hebrew commentaries of Samuel into Latin: At the same time giving the etymology of the original words, and assigning the reasons of the variations of the pointing grammatically. He had, likewise, now acquired some knowledge of philosophy; and had so far made himself master of logic, that when he was removed to the university, he needed no preceptor to instruct him in that art. He learned also, while he continued with his uncle, Walrus's and Burgersdicius's Compendiums of Ethics: Which latter author he plied so diligently, that he could at any time repeat by heart the quotations cited by him from any of the ancient writers, whether Greek or Latin. He acquainted himself, too, with the elements of natural philosophy and metaphysics; and, as his uncle always kept him usefully employed, he was likewise master, and that almost by heart, of Windelin's Compendium of Theology: The good man deeming it an essential and special part of his duty to make his nephew, from his earliest youth, intimately versed in matters of divinity.

His uncle himself had, from his own childhood, been inured to sanctify the ordinary actions and offices of life, by sending up ejaculatory aspirations to GOD, suitable to the business he was about; in order to which, he had made his memory the store-house of some more eminently useful and familiar texts of Scripture, both of the Old and New Testament, which related or might be accommodated to every part of common life; so that, when he lay down, rose up, dressed, washed, walked abroad, studied, or did any thing else, he could repeat apposite passages from the holy Scriptures in their original languages of either Hebrew or Greek; thereby, in a very eminent manner, acknowledging God in all his ways, and doing whatsoever