deemed him too legal; and while his exaggerations of the power of God in his dealings with man, confounded what God CAN do with what he actually does, divested omnipotence of wisdom, destroyed free-will, and approached the precincts of Calvinism, the Calvinists still regarded him with coldness.

XXIII. Cadogan derived his descent from a noble family, and was gifted with classical attainments; but having had a "Lois and an Eunice for his mother and grandmother, he felt a desire, in early youth, after an experimental KNOWLEDGE in divine things." Having obtained the living of St. Giles, in Reading, he brought this experimental knowledge to bear, by throwing into the fire a petition of his flock for his retaining a worthy curate. O! St. Paul, where was thy text,

Knowledge puffeth up; but charity edifieth?" He afterwards obtained the rectory of St. Luke's, Chelsea, where he began by paying attention to the duties of his profession; visiting the poor, catechizing the young, and promoting the hallowing of the Sabbath: but he soon rose superior to these early prejudices, and "renouncing selfdependance, rejoiced in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free." If this signify a liberty to do nothing, or any thing, provided we rely on Christ, the case of Cadogan was the re

*Cecil's Memoirs of Cadogan.

verse of that of Job, whose latter end was better

than his beginning.

Cadogan coincided in opinion with Romaine, concerning Hutchinsonianism and the Hebrew points. He died in 1797; and his widow, true to his teaching, cultivated the friendship of Mr. Marsh; who became his successor in Reading, as feeder of the ever-burning lamp.

Decoetlegon became assistant chaplain to Madan, in 1773, and attracted crowds to the Lock. He evinced sentiments of steady loyalty; chiefly in two sermons, on the Test Act, and King Charles's martyrdom. His discourses abounded in argument and illustration; but his manner, though earnest and impassioned, partook of pert, French vivacity. Tall and erect in person, and, in the beginning of a sentence, solemn in manner, he gradually stooped his body, and quickened his utterance, till at the close he was nearly unintelligible. He is said to have courted the smiles of the fashionable, by those adulatory softenings of serious truths, which rather lull than } alarm; and a caricature exhibited him, as announcing a place in the other world,-which he would forbear to mention, otherwise than by a periphrasis, to an audience so elegant and polite. He died 1797; and in the year following, a volume of his sermons was published, to which his life was prefixed.

* Nichols's Anecdotes.

XXIV. Another devoted champion of Evangelism was Erasmus Middleton, who continued in vicious habits till the age of twenty-two; when, becoming alive to a sense of sin, he joined himself to a company of Wesleyans. After some private tuition, he entered at Edmund Hall, the regular porch of Calvinism; and by filial disobedience in pursuing this course, "proved," says Middleton, "the truth of our Lord's words, 'I am come to set a man at variance with his father.' Thus, by disobeying a commandment, the first with promise, we invest ourselves with the sanctity of fulfilling a prophecy; and a doctrine fit for extreme cases and times of persecution is made an universal rule. Self-deceit! how subtle is thy cozenage!

Within the Hall was formed a club of six young men, who prayed, expounded the Scriptures, and sang hymns in a private house. These, by reason of their Methodism and irregular behaviour, were visited with expulsion, in 1768; one head of a house alone, observing, "that since this severity was exercised on those who had too much religion, it would be but equal-handed justice to enquire next into the conduct of others who had too little." In consequence of this measure, "Macgowan's Shaver," a piece of coarse and vulgar satire, was produced; of which the effect was to repel the sympathy of some persons, who had regarded the sufferers as treated with undue

rigour. The act of expulsion, however, was intended as a check to that general spirit of Evangelism and self-appointment, which threatened to destroy the unity of the church.

Middleton, one of the expelled members, being now destitute, felt the blow severely; but Fuller, a dissenting banker, maintained him at King's College, Cambridge; and after receiving orders in Ireland, he served a Scotch Episcopal chapel at Dalkeith. Here a sister of Sir Robert Grierson's "found her heart opened," and, by establishing a female praying society, found the way to open the heart of her pastor. They made a clandestine marriage: the lady too fulfilling the prediction, of setting child at variance with parent. A hopeful couple, and well matched!

In perusing the biography of the Evangelicals, we can hardly fail to observe, first, a frequent early addiction to those gross vices, which rarely mark the conduct of those who receive a religious and regular education; and which, contrasted with the succeeding extreme of strictness, may wellincline minds that have passed through both states, and know nothing of the slide of a less marked amendment, to preach the doctrine of instantaneous and involuntary conversion. Secondly, we are struck with a singular mixture of worldly success with, spiritual zeal; which seems to lend some colour to a common insinuation, that these professed despisers of the world are by no means for

getful of the main chance. Thirdly, self-willedness and disobedience to parents stands very prominent in the Evangelical character; encouraged by a fanatical notion, that all the domestic ties are to be dissolved on every common occasion, for the sake of religion; and that occasions of dissolving them are to be hailed, and even courted, as conferring the honour of fulfilling prophecy. Lastly, the sanctimonious character of Evangelism is strangely blended with its loves; while its loves are not unfrequently the establishment of superior connections; the ladies having here the merit of stooping to conquer.

Middleton, removing to London, became curate to Romaine, and afterwards to Cadogan; consoling himself under the privations of a limited income, by remembering that man doth not live by bread alone. His wants were, however, more substantially supplied, by the hand of delicate friendship, which deposited viands at the door in the evening; and as he gathered in this manna, "he thought of Elijah, to whom ravens brought bread and flesh." After struggling with poverty, he obtained the living of Turvey, in Bedfordshire, where he composed his Biographia Evangelica; a whim of his own, embellished with portraits, which brought him to the brink of poverty once

more.

XXV. Eyre, another of Cadogan's eléves, was unalterably stamped a Methodist at the age