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relief; they force no invidious and humiliating comparisons between themselves and their benefactors. They are less likely to sink in their own estimamation, or to suspect that they are the object of contempt, even to their superiors, when they perceive that numbers are at the same instant partaking of the same succour, which is afforded to themselves. They hear no insulting reproaches; they see no proud look, they meet day after day with those exertions for their welfare-with those soothing inquiries-with those deliberate, tender, and anxious attentions, which are not to be found in sudden and transient acts of charity. They know that their cases are entrusted to the care of professional men, whose wisdom is indisputable, and whose kindness is disinterested. They know that generous and good men have by pecuniary contributions provided for their succour in the melancholy hour of pain and sickness. They feel, too, that no abject submission, no base compliances are required from them when their health is restored, and when they return to the bosom of their beloved families. By these and similar considerations, charity is yet more endeared to those who are the objects of it; and the consciousness of supplying such endearments, must enhance the value of benevolence thus exercised in the estimation of the benevolent themselves.

Well am I aware that allusions to local circumstances are not always adapted to the solemnity of the sanctuary. Cases, however, may arise which the good sense, and the good feelings of my audi2 x

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ence would perhaps induce them to consider as reasonable exceptions to the common rule. Something surely you will allow to the attachment which your preacher has formed to the place of his nativity-to the sweet remembrance of innocence in childhood, of playfulness in boyhood-and to a thankful sense of the resources which, through paternal kindness, were supplied to him for the culture of his understanding, and the regulation of his moral habits in a very flourishing school, and at a learned university. And surely that attachment will be higher in your esteem when it affords aid to the general principle of benevolence, especially where the goodly fruits of it are more immediately diffused over scenes justly endeared to us by our earliest and fondest recollections. Perhaps I may with still greater confidence appeal to another principle, more active and more hallowed, which you have all experienced, and the value of which you will instantaneously feel when I pronounce the name of it, filial piety. In this town my venerable parent lived for many years, and was honoured with the approbation of the most distinguished families in the neighbourhood. In this town he with great success and great celebrity alleviated the sharpest sufferings to which human nature is exposed. Near to this town are deposited the remains of what in him was mortal. Upon his intellectual endowments, and his professional skill, it might be improper even for a son to expatiate; and indeed there are now before me persons in every class by whom I shall be anticipated in every statement, however correct, and in

every commendation however ardent. But upon the present occasion I may, without presumption, expect your assent and your sympathy, when I remind you, that the institution in favour of which we are this day assembled, owes much to his sagacity and his activity for its origin and its prosperity-that the results of his experience and his benevolence are manifest in the regulations which he proposed-that this salutary influence has extended from year to year—and that in consequence of his counsels, and his exertions, your own wisdom, your own compassion, and your own generosity have been directed more judiciously, and employed more effectually. Let me then express my humble and pious hope, that the aged and the infirm, the orphan and the widow, the afflicted in mind and the diseased in body, who have found relief from this institution, will raise their grateful voices, and plead in the behalf of their benefactor and my parent, when in common with them, with myself, and with all who now hear me, he shall stand before the tribunal of his heavenly Judge.

Every enlightened and candid hearer will be disposed to pardon me for confessing, that in the enlarged science, and improved practice of medicine, I must feel an additional interest from my near relation to a person, who, for the good of others, hath ministered the gift which he is conscious of having received from God, and who, I should hope, is not more adorned by his connections with the rich and powerful, than by his affability and humanity to the humble and the poor.

My Christian brethren, with every advantage of accumulating experience, and well regulated system, you make yourselves the instruments of God's ordinary providence by the performance of those very actions, which accompanied the extraordinary and miraculous exertions of power in our blessed Redeemer. He, at a word, cleansed the leper, he gave sight to the blind, he caused the deaf to hear, and the lame to walk; and, let me ask, are not these the very offices to which our own efforts are directed? Do we not apply all the human means in our power for lightening those kinds and those degrees of misery, which attracted so large a share of notice from the Son of God, and the relief of which cast an amiable, as well as a venerable air over the whole extent of his character? Shall we not appear ourselves his faithful disciples, if, according to the ability given to us, we so far manifest our love one towards another, as he manifested his love to the suffering part of our fellow-creatures. We are astonished at the emanations of his power, when the winds and waves obeyed his voice; but our astonishment is mingled with affection and gratitude when we read that he went about doing good-that he cured many of their infirmities-that when they brought to him persons taken with divers kinds of sickness he restored them to health-that he declared the restoration to be the recompence of faith in many an humble suppliant-and that in addition to other miraculous qualifications bestowed upon his Apostles, he gave them power to expel evil spirits, or as the Scripture language has been under

stood by the more learned expositors, to remove melancholy, frenzy, and other frightful disorders of the mind, and to cure bodily diseases. Here, indeed, he sets before us a train of lovely actions, by the performance of which we shall really and visibly follow his steps. Difficult it may be for us to keep ourselves quite unspotted, as Christians, from the world. It may be yet more difficult to imitate his patience and humility when he was buffeted, when he was scourged, and when he submitted to a painful and ignominious death upon the cross. But no such plea of difficulty can be urged for our insensibility or negligence in the delightful office of Christian benevolence. It is not difficult, but easy, for every man to visit the fatherless and the widow in their affliction. It is easy for the poorest among us to utter that good word which maketh glad the heart of man, when racked with disease and pining sorrow. It is easy for the widow to offer that mite which most assuredly will be registered in the book of God. It is yet more easy for the rich and the powerful to reserve some portion of their treasures for the benefit of many unhappy beings, who from institutions like our own can meet with effectual succour. The money which we so employ might have been squandered in trifling amusements, or in riotous licentiousness, or in ostentatious superfluities, and though largely granted to the relief of our afflicted brethren, it will leave us more than a sufficient supply for all the sweet enjoyments which smooth our passage through this vale of tears.

To conclude the institution in behalf of which I

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