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SIR THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON, BART.

A STUDY FOR YOUNG MEN.

VOL. IV.

BY

THE REV. THOMAS BINNEY.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THIS Lecture has grown into a book. I greatly regret this, especially on account of the appearance it will have in comparison with the rest of the series. It will look like an assumption on my part, the thought of which is very painful to me. The plain fact is this: when I agreed to give a Lecture, it did not occur to me that it would have to be printed. I only thought of standing up and speaking for an hour or so, and I meant principally to have referred to the religious aspect of Sir Fowell Buxton's character. When, however, printing was understood to be included in the engagement, I set myself to go far more fully and minutely into the whole subject. I collected and arranged all the materials, and wrote, pretty much as it now stands, what makes the first twenty of the following pages, previous to the delivery of the Lecture. Since then I have written the rest; and, as the subject kept growing upon myself in interest and attractiveness, as I found it affording opportunities for touching on many things important to young men, and as the necessity was past for writing only as much as could be publicly read in a reasonable time, I kept on writing; and, as I sent away to the printer the copy as it grew, I was really not aware of the quantity I wrote. I must also acknowledge, that as I felt the subject to be of a sort fairly to admit of an experiment,-which many have long thought ought to be made,—namely, that of an attempt to combine, in books intended for the religious benefit either of the working classes, or of respectable educated young men, something of the ease and freedom, not to say lightness or grace, of popular literature, with the inculcation of serious moral lessons, the enforcement of religious habits, and the explanation of evangelical ideas and of the nature of the spiritual life, I was willing to try whether the thing could be done, or whether I could do it. As to the extent to which this has run, I can only add, that as I am conscious of having really laboured to make the book at once attractive and useful, and have found it a pleasant labour, both from the nature of the subject and my interest in young men, and as I believe that those for whom I have thus laboured will kindly receive and value the gift, if they and I are satisfied to bear between us the burden of this long discourse, I do not think that any one else has a right to complain. T. B.

SIR THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON, BART.

TOWARDS the close of the last century, about the year

1798, as it was drawing nigh to the Easter holidays, a respectable widow lady, neatly apparelled as a member of the Society of Friends- or with just, perhaps, a shade or two less than what was required by professional strictness-might have been seen on her way from London to Greenwich, where she had two or three of her sons at school. One of them was a lad

of some twelve years of age. He was bold and impetuous; rather of a violent and "domineering disposition;" he had been fatherless from his sixth year, and his mother had "allowed him to assume, at home, the position and airs of the master of the house;" "his brothers and sisters had to yield him obedience;" he felt himself rather encouraged "to play the little tyrant," and was not very reluctant to try the character. During the Christmas holidays previous to the time we refer to, "Master Fowell had been angry, and had struck his sister's governess;" and, to punish this outbreak, Master Fowell had been threatened with being left at school when his brothers should return home at Easter. Circumstances, however, led the mother to think she had better not carry the threat into effect, and so she went down to Greenwich to see the boy, and settle the matter with him. She received an answer combining in it something of heroism and something of hardihood; the latter, however, so predominating, that "she left him, resolutely, to his punishment." The boy did not stay very long at school

after this. He never made much progress there.

He got

other boys to do his exercises; and at fifteen returned home, and stayed at home, doing nothing but what he pleased; and what did please him was riding and shooting and boating, reading for amusement, or anything but work. He had good expectations of property, but some of these were blasted; and at two-and-twenty, with a wife and child, he would have given anything" for a situation of £100 a year, if he had had to work twelve hours a day for it." Now, let the principal points of that picture be attentively observed and kept firmly in remembrance, and then turn with me to another.

We will come down to within four years of the present time -to February 1845. Imagine yourselves standing before the residence of a country gentleman; a hall, with its lawn, and fields, and old trees; with its garden, and park, and woodlands; and all the other signs of the worldly wealth and the respectable social standing of its possessor. We will draw nigh, and enter, and observe. The owner of this fair domain appears to be the head of a numerous household. Sons and daughters, children and grandchildren, have sprung from him. Many of them are here. Everything in the house indicates substance, elegance, refinement; everything about its inmates education, talents, accomplishments, piety. But where are we now? Hush! Tread softly; we have approached and are entering the chamber of a dying man! The master of the mansion is nigh to his last hour, and all things seem to say to us, “ Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace." He is resigned, calm, hopeful, triumphant. He utters expressions of the most spiritual nature, indicating his familiar acquaintance with the truths of evangelical religion, and his deep experience of vital godliness. But his family have gathered about his bed. He has fallen asleep. All is over! What a deep, sacred silence has succeeded those last, lingering indications of life!-a silence broken at length by the brother

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