these. This want of dependence, is likewise for want of the things mentioned, July 29.-Remember to examine all Narrations, I can call to mind; whether they are exactly according to verity.

Wednesday night, Aug. 28. When I want books to read; yea, when I have not very good books, not to spend time in reading them, but in reading the scriptures, in perusing Resolutions, Reflexions, &c., in writing on Types of the Scripture, and other things, in studying the Languages, and in spending more time in private duties. To do this, when there is a prospect of wanting time for the purpose. Remember as soon as I can, to get a piece of slate, or something, whereon I can make short memorandums while travelling.

Thursday, Aug. 29. Two great Quærenda with me now are: How shall I make advantage of all the time I spend in journeys? and how shall I make a glorious improvement of afflictions.

Saturday-night, Aug. 31. The objection, which my corruptions make against doing whatever my hands find to do with my might, is, that it is a constant mortification. Let this objection by no means ever prevail.

Sabbath Morning, Sept. 1. When I am violently beset with worldly thoughts, for a relief, to think of Death, and the doleful circumstances of it.

Monday Afternoon, Sept. 2. To help me to enter with a good grace, into religious conversation; when I am conversing on morality, to turn it over by application, exemplification or otherwise, to christianity. Vid. Aug. 28 and Jan. 15.-At night. There is much folly, when I am quite sure I am in the right, and others are positive in contradicting me, in entering into a vehement, or long debate upon it.

Saturday, Sept. 7. Concluded no more to suffer myself to be interrupted, or diverted from important business, by those things, from which I expect, though some, yet but little profit.

Sabbath Morning, Sept. 8. I have been much to blame, for expressing so much impatience for delays in journeys, and the like.

Sabbath Evening, Sept. 22. To praise God, by singing Psalms in prose, and by singing forth the meditations of my heart in prose. Monday, Sept. 23. I observe that old men seldom have any advantage of new discoveries, because they are beside the way of thinking, to which they have been so long used. Resolved, if ever I live to years, that I will be impartial to hear the reasons of all pretended discoveries, and receive them if rational, how long soever I have been used to another way of thinking. My time is so short, that I have not time to perfect myself in all studies: Wherefore resolved, to omit and put off, all but the most important and needful studies.*

The remainder of the Diary is on a subsequent page.

CHAPTER VIII.

His Tutorship.—Sickness.-Invitation to Northampton.-Personal Narrative continued.-Diary concluded.

IN Sept., 1723, he went to New-Haven, and received his degree of Master of Arts, when he was elected a Tutor in the College. About this time, several congregations invited him to become their minister; but, being fond of study, both by nature and habit, and conscious how much it would promote his own usefulness, in his profession, he wisely declined their proposals. As there was no immediate vacancy, in the office of Tutor, he passed the ensuing winter and spring at New-Haven, in study, and in the occasional discharge of the active duties of his profession, and in the beginning of June, 1724, entered on the instruction of a class in the College.

The period of his tutorship, was a period of great difficulty. For a long time, before the election of Mr. Cutler to the office of Rector, the College had been in a state of open revolt against the legal government, and, as we have already seen, had withdrawn from New-Haven. Two years after his election, in Jan. 1721, there was an universal insurrection of the students, which, though after considerable effort, apparently quieted, resulted in a state of extreme disorder and insubordination, beyond any thing, that had been known before.* In 1722, Mr. Cutler, one of the Tutors, and two of the neighbouring ministers, renounced their connexion with the Presbyterian Church, and publicly declared themselves Episcopalians. The shock, occasioned by this event, was very great, in the College, in the town, and throughout the colony; and a series of controversies grew out of it, which lasted for many years. In consequence of this, the offices of these gentlemen were vacated, and the College was left, for four years, without a Head: the Trustees residing, by turns, at the College, and each, in rotation, acting as vice-rector, for a month. Fortunately however for the institution, during this bereavement, it had three gentlemen, in the office of Tutor, of distinguished talents and scholarship, and of great resolution and firmness of character:-Mr. William Smith, of the class of 1719, and chosen Tutor in 1722; Mr. Edwards;

These facts are particularly mentioned, in a letter from Mr. Edwards to his father.

ous.

and Mr. Daniel Edwards, his uncle, class-mate and room-mate, who was chosen in Sept. 1724. On these three gentlemen, all of who were young men, devolved, almost exclusively, the government and instruction of the College; yet, by their union, energy, and faithfulness, they introduced among the students, in the room of their former negligence and misrule, habits of close study, and exact subordination; and, in no great length of time, rendered the institution, beyond what it had long been, flourishing aud prosperThe late President Stiles, who, though a member of College a considerable time after this period, was personally acquainted with the three gentlemen, and knew well the history of their administration, has left an eulogy on the three united, of the highest character. "The Honourable William Smith, the Honourable Daniel Edwards, and the Rev. President Edwards, were the pillar Tutors, and the glory of the College, at the critical period, between Rector Cutler and Rector Williams. Their tutorial renown was great and excellent. They filled and sustained their offices, with great ability, dignity, and honour. For the honour of literature, these things ought not to be forgotten."

sor.

In Sept. 1725, immediately after the commencement, as he was preparing to set out for his father's house, he was taken suddenly ill, at New-Haven; but, hoping that the illness was not severe, and anxious to be at home if he was to be sick, he set out for WindThe fatigue of travelling, only increased his illness, and he was compelled to stop at North-Haven, at the house of the Rev. Mr. Stiles, where he was confined, by severe sickness, about three months during the greater part of this time, his mother was constantly with him. Her husband, writing to her on the 20th of October, begs her to spare herself. "I am afraid, you are taking too great a burden on yourself, in tending your son, both day and night. I beg of you, therefore, not only to take care of him, but of yourself also. Accept, rather, of the kindness of the neighbours, in watching over again, than outbid your own strength, which is but small, by overdoing." She could not leave him, till about the middle of November; and it was some time in the winter, before he could go to his father's house. In this sickness, he speaks of himself, as having enjoyed new, and most refreshing, manifestations of the presence and the grace of God.

After he had held the office of Tutor, upwards of two years, with the highest reputation, he received proposals, from the people of Northampton, to become their minister. Many circumstances conspired, to prompt his acceptance. He was familiarly acquainted with the place, and people. The Rev. Mr. Stoddard, his grandfather, a man of great dignity, and of singular weight and influence in the churches, in consequence of his advanced age, stood in need of his assistance, and wished him to be his colleague. His parents, and his other friends, all desired it. The situation was,

in itself, respectable, and the town unusually pleasant. He therefore resigned his tutorship, in Sept. 1726, and accepted of the invitation.

government

Those, who are conversant with the instruction and of a College, will readily be aware, that the period, of which we have now been speaking, was a very busy portion of Mr. Edwards's life; and, if they call to mind the circumstances of the institution, and the habits of the students, when he entered on his office, they will not need to be informed, that the discharge of his official duties, must have been accompanied with constant care, and distressing anxiety. It is a rare event in Providence, that so heavy a responsibility is thrown, publicly, on three individuals so young, and so destitute of experience, and of the knowledge of mankind; and the business of instruction and government, must have occupied their whole time, and exhausted their whole strength.

In such a state of things, it was not possible, that he should find the same leisure, for christian conversation, for retirement and spiritual contemplation, as he had found in New-York. There, his business was, chiefly, to enjoy: here, it was to act. There, the persons, with whom he came in contact, continually, even as members of Christ's family, were possessed of uncommon excellence here, they were a very perverse part of a very different family. There, his attention was drawn, by the objects around him, to heavenly things: here, it was necessarily confined, almost all the time, to this world. There, when retiring for prayer, and heavenly contemplation, his mind sought communion with God, in all its energy and freshness: here, when it was worn out by toil, and exhausted by perplexities. The change in the current of thought and feeling, must, therefore, have been great; and, (so much is the mind prone to measure its religious state, by the amount of daily enjoyment, and so little, by the readiness to encounter trials, and to perform laborious and self-denying duties,) it is not surprizing, that he should have regarded this change, as evidence of perceptible and lamentable declension in religion. Such, he in fact regarded it; as we shall find, both from his Narrative and Diary; yet, it is by no means certain, that his views of the subject were altogether correct.

The young Christian has usually a season of leisure, given him in the Providence of God, in which to become acquainted with the members of that family, into which he has lately been introduced, and with those objects, with which, as a spiritual being, he is thenceforward to be conversant. His time and his strength are given chiefly to the Scriptures, to prayer, to meditation, and to religious conversation; and he is delightfully conscious, that his communion is with the Father, and the Son Jesus Christ, through the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, as well as with "the whole famVOL. I.

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ily, both on earth and in heaven." The design of this is, to oper to him his new state of existence, to enable him to understand its relations and duties, and to give him an earnest of better things in reversion. It is a most refreshing and happy period of his life; and, were he designed for contemplation merely, might well be protracted to its close. But, as we are taught most explicitly, in the word and providence of God, his great worth lies in Action-in imitating Him, whose rule it was "I must do the work of him that sent me, while it is day;" and whose practice it was-that "he went about doing good." The Scriptures are given by the inspiration of God, and are profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness,-Wherefore? that the man of God may be perfected, being thoroughly furnished unto every good work. Probably no year in the life of Mr. Edwards, was spent more usefully, than that in which he was occupied, with his associates, in laying the foundation of sober habits, and sound morals, in the seminary now entrusted to their care. Probably in no equal period, did he more effectually serve God, and his generation. And if, in its progress, he found less of that enjoyment, which grows out of spiritual contemplation; he must have had the more delightful consciousness, that, in the midst of great difficulties and crosses, he had honestly endeavoured to serve God, and to perform his duty.

There may therefore be reason for doubt, whether the change in his feelings, of which he speaks, in the succeeding parts of his Narrative and Diary, was not a declension in this particular species of religious enjoyment, necessarily growing out of the circumstances in which he was placed; rather than a declension in the life and power of religion."

"I continued," he observes, "much in the same frame, in the general, as when at New-York, till I went to New-Haven, as Tutor of the College: particularly, once at Bolton, on a journey from Boston, while walking out alone in the fields. After I went to New-Haven, I sunk in religion; my mind being diverted from my eager pursuits after holiness, by some affairs, that greatly perplexed and distracted my thoughts.

"In September, 1725, I was taken ill at New-Haven, and while endeavouring to go home to Windsor, was so ill at the North Village, that I could go no farther; where I lay sick, for about a quarter of a year. In this sickness, God was pleased to visit me again, with the sweet influences of his Spirit. My mind was greatly engaged there, on divine and pleasant contemplations, and longings of soul. I observed, that those who watched with me, would often be looking out wishfully for the morning; which brought to my mind those words of the Psalmist, and which my soul with delight made its own language, My soul waiteth for the Lord, more than they that watch for the morning; I say, more than they that