Baxter - Houston-Packer Collection BX5200 .B352 1835 v1

LIFE OF 'RICHARD BAXTER. 85 was made for triennial parliaments, to be elected by the people. Under this government, though royalists and republicans, prelatists and Presbyterians, Papistsand fanatics united in hating it, the peo- ple enjoyed order and prosperity till the death of the Protector. Wenow return to Baxter's' personalhistory, to theelucidation of which this survey of public events seemed necessary. " I have relatedhow, after my bleeding a'gallonof blood by the nose, that I was left weak at Sir Thomas Rouse's house, at Rous Lench, where I was taken up with daily medicines to prevent a dropsy ; and, being conscious thatmy time had not been improved to the service of God as I desired it had been, I put up many an earnest prayer, that God would restore me, and use me more suc- cessfully in his Work. Blessed be that mercy, which heard my groans in the day of my distress ; and gratified my desires, and wrought my deliverance, when men and means failed, and gave me opportunity to celebrate his praise. " Whilst I there continued, weak and unable to preach, the people of Kidderminster had again renewed their articles against their old vicar and his curate. Upon trial of the cause, the com- mittee sequestered the place, but put no one into it; but put the profits in the hands of divers of the inhabitants, to pay a preacher till it were disposed of. They sent to me, and desired me to take it, in case I were again enabled to preach'; which I flatly refused, and told them I would takeonly the lecture, which, byhis own con- sent and bond, I'held before. Hereupon they sought to Mr. Brum- skill and others to accept the place; but could not meet wit'rany one to their minds; therefore they chose oneMr. Richard Serjeant to officiate, reserving the vicarage for some one that was fitter. "When I was able, after about five months, to go abroad, I went to Kidderminster, where I found only Mr. Serjeant in possession ; and the people again vehemently urged me to take the vicarage ; which I denied, and gotthe magistrates and burgesses together into the townshall, and told them, that, though I was offered many hundred pounds per annum 'elsewhere, I was willing to continue with them in my old lecturer's place, which I had before the wars, expecting they would make the maintenance a hundred pounds a year, and a house ; and if they would promise to submit to that doctrine of Christ, which, as his minister, I should &liver to them, proved by the Holy' Scriptures, I would not leave them. And, that this maintenance should neither come out of their own purses. nor any more of it out of the tithes, save the sixty pounds which the vicar had before bound himselfto pay me, I undertook to pro- cure an augmentation for Mitton (a chapel in the parish) of forty pounds per annum, which I did; and so the sixty pounds and that

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