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PREFACE`:
and the affectionate honours
which
you
now
pay
their
memory, give
nee
further assurance
that
this
is
your aim,
and
your
glorious
ambition.
And
that
you may ever keep
in mind
their
example and
your duty,
you have commanded
me
to
make
public these discourses,
which were
framed
on
the
occasion
of their decease.
You
well know,
Sir,
I
am
no friend
to
loose panegyric,
nor
am
I
'wont
to bestow
it
on
the
dead or the
living.
What
I
have written
of
the late
Sir
John Hartopp at
the end of the
second discourse,
ie,the
first
attempt that
ever
I
made of
concluding
a funeral
sermon with
a
distinct
and
particular character
of the deceased, through the
whole
space
of twenty-three years of my
ministry
;
and surely the world
will
not
envy
nor
detract
from
the
just
honours
of
a
name
so
much
belov-
ed. As for
the lady, your mother,
she
affected
retirement
to
such a
degree,
that
it
would have placed
her
in a wrong
light to have drawn
out
her virtues at
length, and
set
them to public
view. I
have
there-
fore only interspersed a
few
hints
of her
eminent
piety,
as
the
text
and
argument
led me
into them
:
And
indeed this
is
the
utmost
that
I
have
ever done
before
on
such occasions.
I
have much reason to
ask
pardon
that
I
have
so
far enlarged these
discourses, and
especially the
last;
for I
hate
the
thoughts of making
any thing
in
religion heavy
or
tiresome
:
But
having
entertained
my-
self
many a time with some of these meditations on
the business and
the
blessedness of
Separate
Spirits,
I
took this
opportunity
of shewing
them to the world, enshrined
in
the lustre
of
two such
naines
as
adoru
any
title
-page.
To
render the reading of them yet more agreeable
to yourself and to
all your friends,
I
have cast them into
distinct
sections,
that
my
rea-
ders
may leave
off
almost where they please, and
peruse
so
much
of
them
at
one
time
as
suits their present inclination and convenience.
You know,
Sir,'
I
pretend
to
no
authority
to pronounce effectual
blessings upon
you
;
but
you
will
accept
the sincere
good wishes
of
a
than
that
loves
you,
and
is
zealous
for
your
felicity
in
the
upper
and
lowerlvorlds.
Muy the
best of
mercies descend daily
on
yourself,
your
lady,
and
your little
offspring
!
May the closet,
the parlour,
and public
assemblies, be
constant
witnesses
of
your
piety
;
and the house where
n
Sir John Hartopp
dwells, be a house of
prayer
and
of praise
in
every
generation,
nor
thename
be
extinguished
in
your
family till
the hea-
vens be
no More
!
May,
the ladies,
your
sisters,
live
happily
under
the
sweet influence of
that mutual
affection
that
has
been
always
remark-
ably
cultivated
amongst
you!
Their
interests are
your care
:
And
I
am
well
persuaded
that
their
solicitude and
tender
concern for
your
welfare,
will
ever deserve and
find
such
returns
of love, as
I
have
long
observed
with
delight
!
May the prayers
of your progenitors
in
past
ages
he
answered
in
hourly
benefits
descending
on
you
all, and
be
fruit-
ful of
blessings
in ages
yet
to:come
!
Such
a
lovely scene, with such a
long and
joyful prospect,
will
advance the satisfactions
of
nay
life,
and
give
pleasure
even in a dying
hour;
to
him who had once the
honour
to
to
your
affectionate
monitor,
and
must ever
write himself,
SIR,
Your
obliged, humble servant,
;Lay
9, I722.
I. WATTS.