several concerns. Their hospitality was such, as I have not experienced elsewhere, either before or since. Their entertainments were frequent, and manners friendly. Their refinement was in that middle state, which is equally removed from the gross familiarity of my Worcestershire friends, and from the flimsy intercourse of fashionable life. This was the general character of the people, from whom I received repeated proofs of real friendship, and instances of attachment which will ever hold a place in my remembrance.

Such were the agreeable circumstances in my condition and had all other parts of it corresponded with these, I should, probably, have remained in it to the present day, or, at least, I should not have quitted it with disgust. The drudgery of the parish duty, almost all of which fell to the lot of the curate, was so great as to be, to any man given to reading and study, nearly intolerable. There were prayers once every day throughout the year, and very frequently twice and the occasional duty, which in so large a parish must always be oppressive, had received an additional weight from the pusillanimity or thoughtless compliance of my predecessors. In this place it had become the business of the curate to run all over the town,

at the call of any idle gossip, for the purpose of giving children private baptism. For this class of visits no hour was deemed unseasonable, and no weather unpleasant: at noon or midnight, in the sunshine or during a storm, the demand was made indiscriminately, and was urged in the peremptory language of compulsion, though the urgency of the case was never certified and not always pleaded. Against a practice so directly contrary to the order of the church, so different from the custom generally established, so utterly destructive of the comfort of the minister, and altogether so needless in the neighbourhood of a church, at first I made a spirited remonstrance; but being at length weary of repeating old arguments, and exposing the same absurdities, I gave up the contest, and determined to bear every burden which might be imposed on me, in the hope that the term of my hardships would be short: spe finis dura ferentem. I wished, indeed, to merit the thanks of my successor, by making his employment less laborious than I had found it: but rights once established are not easily laid aside, and bigotry will always quote precedents in the support of

error.

This cure I had very early determined to resign, as soon as I could do it without appear

ing to be fickle: I retained it, therefore, fifteen months; nor were the smiles of the corporation, who were the patrons of the living, a sufficiently powerful inducement with me to alter my resolution. Accordingly I took a house in the neighbourhood with the view of being employed in private tuition. After waiting a year, in which time two young gentlemen only were offered to me for instruction, I thought the prospect of success very unpromising, and resolved no longer to be the sport of caprice or vulgar criticism, but to accept the first easy curacy which might present itself. This happened to be situated in the fens of Lincolnshire, from which place my narrative is written. Scarcely had I come hither, when several letters arrived from gentlemen, who were desirous of placing their sons under my care but my scheme of life was altered, and their proposals arrived too late. In my present situation there is little to raise my admiration or delight. I have an eye capable of deriving pleasure from the beauties of nature; but here, wherever I look, I see nothing during half the year but an extended plain of waters: I am not averse to social intercourse; but here I am doomed to uninterrupted solitude. Wearied, however, with disappointments and restlessness

of change, I have given up the pursuit of happiness, and will content myself with intercepting her as she may come into my way. In this place I have now resided forty months, and am in my thirty-eighth year. Thus am I struggling with the difficulties of life, when I ought to be enjoying its comforts.

How dangerous a propensity is this love of change? In almost every situation into which fortune has thrown me, I might, by patience and perseverance, have acquired a competency; but, like the eager husbandman, I have never waited till the fruits of my labour have attained maturity, but have pronounced the soil barren, which has not been immediately productive.

I am, sir, &c.

Lincolnshire, April, 1793.

MUTABILIS.

THE COUNTRY SPECTATOR, No. 28, April 16, 1798.

No. CLXII.

Thou captivating simplicity! 'tis thine at once to effect what all the artifices of rhetoric, with all its tropes and figures, tediously and vainly labour to accomplish. From our admirable translation of the Bible an English writer may select a diction better suited to raise the sympathy of grief, than from the most celebrated models of human composition.

KNOX.

I AM not so much surprised at your fondness for the writings of Sterne, as disappointed at finding your praise so vague and indiscriminate. It is time for you to learn that, in this world, the good and the bad are so intimately blended together, that there is no possibility of finding either the one or the other pure and unadulterated. No man is so perfect, but there is something about him that might be amended; and none are so bad, but we may find something belonging to them that merits applause. The great business of candid criticism is, to separate the chaff from the corn, and neither to approve nor condemn by the lump.

Few writers are better calculated for captivating youthful minds than Sterne. Throughout his whole works there are interspersed many lively sallies of wit, many happy strokes of hu