8vm MÉMO/RS OF DR.- wA4TS. Ye servants of the Most Nigh God, who shew mito us the way Of salve: tion ! Peace be within the walls of your churches, and prosperity within yourdwelliug.hOuses*." One greatman after celebrating the just praises of Dr. Watts's talents, after acknowledging hewas such as every christian church would rejoice to adopt, descends to the miserable littleness of cautioningthe world against his non-conformity, as if that were a diminution of his literary, or a blot upon his theological reputation. A melancholy proof how far a philosophic mind may sometimes be debased by a churlish bigotry ; the very spirit that gave birth to all the persecutions which harrassed and oppressed the present established church when she dissented from the church of Rome, and to which we may ascribe all the animosities which divide and degrade those who only deviate in questions of a circumstantial disciplinesince that period. In Dr. Watts were combined all the excellencies which form a complete re- verse of a party zealot, and if a. meek and lowly mind could shield the memory of any man from the envenomed influence of this passion, his non- conformity had never been mentioned but with a view of recommendingthe virtues by whichhe so greatly adorned it. As an author no man's posthumousclaim upon the gratitude of the church and of his country, canbe urged with a more imperative tone: The natural strength of his genius, whichhe cultivated and improved by a very consider- able acquaintance with the most celebrated writers, both ancient and modern, had enriched his mind with a large and uncommon store of just sentiments, and useful knowledge of various kinds. His soul was 'too noble and large, to be confined within narrow limits, he could not be contentto leave any path of learninguntried, nor rest in a total ignorance of any science, the knowledge of .which might be for his own improvement, or might in any way tend to 'enlarge his capacity of being, useful t0 others. Though that which gave hint the most remarkable pre- eminencewas the extent and sublimity of his imagination: how few have excelled, or even equalled higt:in quickness of apprehension, and solidity of judgment:. and having also a faithful memory to retain what he collected from the lalsouss of others, he was ableto;pay it back again into the common treasury of learning with a large increase. It is a question whether any authorbefore him ever appearedw th reputationon such avariety of subjects, as he has done; both as.a- prose-writer, and a poet. However this we may venture to says that there is no man now living of whose workssomany have been dispersed, both .at homeandabroad, that are in such constant use, and translated into such a -variety of languages; many of which will remain more.dumble monuments of hisgreat talents, than any representation we can take of them, though it wereto begraven on pillarsof brass j. His excellent friend, Dr. Doddridge, in his dedication of his Rise and rromess ((Religion in the Soul; congratulates him, " that while condes- cending to the htimble work of forming infant minds to the first rudiments of religious knowledge by his various Catechismsand Divine Songs, hewas also daily reading lectures of logic and other useful branches Of philosophy to Studious youth, and this not only in private academies but in the most celebra- ted seats of learning, not merely in Scotland, and in our American colonies, Robinson. . t Jennings,
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