and dignity of his fucceffors; fimple in his manners, zealous for the honour of God, self-denying amidst a frivolous and diffipated Court, vigilant, energetic, and bold in all difficulties and dangers.

In the fame temper of mind Ken advanced to the fame ftation. His offices of Fellow of Winchefter College, Prebendary of the Cathedral, and Chaplain to the Bishop were not occupation enough for a mind intent on bringing men to Christ. He could not rest without fome parochial charge; and having before served the neglected diftrict of St. John in the Soke, he still found it without a pastor and the hearts of the people turned from the Church by the contentious spirit of Anabaptifts. With the consent of his Bishop he undertook the gratuitous cure. His difregard of money was a prominent feature in his character; the fulfilment of the paftoral office was the one fimple defire that governed his actions,—" well done, good and faithful fervant" the one reward he looked to.

To the poor of St. John's, therefore, he devoted his best energies. The influence of his love, and zeal, and knowledge of the human heart, were heightened by the fervour of his eloquence. If by any powers of the Christian orator he might move men to holiness, he would fain employ them all in the great cause. He did not therefore undervalue this accomplishment; but followed the footsteps of the most pious and laborious Fathers and confeffors of the primitive Church. Their impaffioned oratory was not addreffed to the feelings of their hearers to rouse them to mere religious excitement, and tranfient impulse, but to fever their tenacious grasp on worldly things,-to call them out

of the din of emulations and ftrife, and the absorbing cares of a fecular life. Vehement, ftern, perfuafive, and loving, they alternately shook men "by the terror of the Lord," and melted them by the mercies and hopes of the Gospel.

St. Chryfoftom, whofe eloquence was compared to a golden river, every where praises St. Paul for his skill in moving men's hearts to the fear and love of God. "Thus inftructed," he fays, " and walking in the steps of his master, Paul hath varied his discourse according to the need of his difciples, at one time ufing knife and cautery, at another applying mild remedies," &c. And thus alfo Ken omitted no force of perfuafion to awaken his hearers from their dull infenfibility, and to draw them out from fin and fchifm. He reaped the rich reward of his labours in gathering many into the bofom of the Church.

(

If one might be tempted to give in its fulness his expofition of the Sacrament of Baptism in his Practice of Divine Love,' published many years afterwards, it would exhibit his view of its vital efficacy, and the power of his eloquence to bring men to a juft fenfe of its bleffedness. There is not, perhaps, in our language a more valuable teftimony to the doctrine of Regeneration in that Holy Sacrament, as "raifing us from a death unto fin, to a new life, and breathing into us the breath of love." "In this Laver of Regeneration (he fays) we are born again by Water and the Spirit; by a new birth unto righteousness: that as the natural birth propagated fin, our fpiritual birth should propagate grace. Christ in our Baptism doth give us the holy spirit of love, to be the principle of a

new life in us, to infuse into our fouls a fupernatural, habitual grace, and ability to serve and love Him. It was His compaffionate love, that when we were conceived and born in fin, of finful parents, when we fprung from a root wholly corrupt, and were all children of wrath, made us, in our Baptism, children of His own Heavenly Father by adoption and grace: when we were heirs of Hell, made us heirs of Heaven, even joint heirs with His own felf of His own glory."

The inhabitants of the Soke crowded to the Church of St. John, to hear the words of wisdom that flowed from the lips of their humble Curate, as in a later period, when he became a Bishop, the Courtiers of the palace thronged the Chapel of St. James's to receive his more authoritative lessons. The word of God cannot return to Him void; His Kingdom must in the end stretch forth on the right hand and on the left, for they have a spiritual life. Ken was the happy inftrument of contributing to this great defign of unity by converting many of his fectarian hearers to the Church of England, especially amongst the Anabaptists, whom he convinced of their errors, making them to become as little children, himself baptizing them into the congregation of Chrift's flock.t

Such were his unwearied patience and charity in his paftoral cares; the kindeft of men towards others, himself mortified to all worldly pleasures, and afraid of nothing fo much as a foft luxurious life, he was

Ken's Expofition of the Church Catechism. 2nd Edition, 8vo. 1686, p. 136.

+ Hawkins, p. 4.

disciplined to untiring exertions for the spread of divine truth. He feemed to realize Bishop Taylor's prayer: "Oh give me the spirit of mortification and humility, that I may be gentle to others, and fevere to myself." His biographer, Hawkins, describes that "in the evening, when he loved to enjoy the fociety of his friends, he was fo worn down with the exertions and fatigue of the day, that with difficulty he kept his eyes open; and then seemed only to go to rest with no other purpose than the refreshing and enabling him with more vigour and chearfulness to fing his Morning Hymn.”. "-" And that neither his ftudy might be the aggreffor on his hours of instruction; or what he judged his duty, prevent his improvement; or both interrupt his clofet addreffes to his God, he ftrictly accustomed himself to but one fleep, which often obliged him to rise at one or two of the clock in the morning, and sometimes fooner; and this grew fo habitual that it continued with him almost till his laft illnefs."*

CHAPTER V.

His

Ken's Manual of Prayers for Winchester Scholars Morning, Evening, and Midnight Hymns - The Original Melody of the Hymns -The Court of Charles II. at Winchefter.

W

E may well believe that Ken, as a Winchefter boy, had fet a good example to others: and now, as a Fellow of the College, his defire to preserve the scholars from the fascinating power of the world, and to train them to holiness, prompted him to compofe a Manual of Prayers for their daily ufe. He could not offer a more lasting memorial of his attachment to thofe early scenes of his youth, or of his care for future Wykehamists. It is a meffage to them of earnest love: it warns them of the deceitful pitfalls that furround their path, and allures them to virtue by every holy motive, and by the most eminent examples of early piety recorded in the scriptures. "Do but confider," he fays, "how welcome a young convert is to God: it was to young Samuel that God revealed Himself, and that at such a time too, when the word of God was precious and very rare, to fhow how much God honoured a young prophet; and you know that St. John, the youngest of all the difciples, is the only perfon of all the twelve, who was permitted to lean on our Saviour's bofom at the laft fupper, as dearest to Him in affection, and who is emphatically called the difciple