text,updated_at,metaphor,created_at,context,theme,reviewed_on,dictionary,comments,provenance,id,work_id
"Next follow the Psalms, with which you cannot be too conversant. If you have any taste, either for poetry or devotion, they will be your delight, and will afford you a continual feast. The Bible translation is far better than that used in the Common Prayer Book: and will often give you the sense, when the other is obscure. In this, as well as in all other parts of the scripture, you must be careful always to consult the margin, which gives you the corrections made since the last translation, and is generally preferable to the words of the text. I would wish you to select some of the Psalms that please you best, and get them by heart; or, at least, make yourself mistress of the sentiments contained in them: Dr. Delany's Life of David will show you the occasions on which several of them were composed, which add much to their beauty and propriety; and, by comparing them with the events of David's life, you will greatly enhance your pleasure in them. Never did the spirit of true piety breathe more strongly than in these divine songs; which, being added to a rich vein of poetry, makes them more captivating to my heart and imagination than any thing I ever read. You will consider how great disadvantages any poems must sustain from being rendered literally into prose, and then imagine how beautiful these must be in the original. May you be enabled, by reading them frequently, to transfuse into your own breast that holy flame which inspired the writer!--to delight in the Lord, and in his laws, like the Psalmist--to rejoice in him always, and to think ""one day in his courts better than a thousand!"" But may you escape the heart-piercing sorrow of such repentance as that of David, by avoiding sin, which humbled this unhappy king to the dust, and which cost him such bitter anguish, as it is impossible to read of without being moved. Not all the pleasures of the most prosperous sinner could counterbalance the hundredth part of those sensations described in his Penitential Psalms; and which must be the portion of every man, who has fallen from a religious state into such crimes, when once he recovers a sense of religion and virtue, and is brought to a real hatred of sin: however available such repentance may be to the safety and happiness of the soul after death, it is a state of such exquisite suffering here, that one cannot be enough surprised at the folly of those, who indulge in sin, with the hope of living to make their peace with God by repentance. Happy are they who preserve their innocence unsullied by any great or wilful crimes, and who have only the common failings of humanity to repent of: these are sufficiently mortifying to a heart deeply smitten with the love of virtue, and with the desire of perfection. There are many very striking prophecies of the Messiah in these divine songs; particularly in Psalm xxii: such may be found scattered up and down almost throughout the Old Testament. To bear testimony to him is the great and ultimate end, for which the spirit of prophecy was bestowed on the sacred writers:--but this will appear more plainly to you, when you enter on the study of prophecy, which you are now much too young to undertake.
(pp. 59-64)",2011-06-16 16:44:40 UTC,"""May you be enabled, by reading them frequently, to transfuse into your own breast that holy flame which inspired the writer!""",2011-06-16 16:44:40 UTC,"Volume I, Letter 2","",,"",pp. 29-31 in PGDP,Reading,18685,6939
"Don't think me insolently pert upon old people. Believe me, a virtuous and wise old age is the object of my sincerest reverence and highest esteem. I confess the great advantage which experience gives to a good understanding, and the happy opportunities which that calm season of life allows for the greater progress of virtue, and for a more uninterrupted attention to the duties of religion. I think it is reasonable to suppose, that as it is the grand business of our lives to endeavour to rise by degrees to that stale of excellence and happiness which is the ultimate end of our being, he who has made this his vocation, and has spent his life in pressing forward to the prize of his high calling, will be nearer the attainment of perfection in an advanced age, than he who has but begun his race can be, with whatever ardour and diligence he sets out. But yet, my dear Sir, you who have by an amazing strength of thought and penetration, and unwearied observation, gained so much more knowledge of the world, and of the human heart, than the longest life gives to others; whose zeal for doing good, whose benevolence and friendship have all the warmth of youth, though guided by maturest judgment; who have too much real dignity to need to usurp upon our respect, or to exact that deference to your years which is due to your wisdom and virtue; you, I say, may speak impartially on this subject, and I may tell to you, without fear of offending, my observations on those who claim our acquiescence in all their opinions, from their superiority of years and experience. And you will shew me where my observations are false, and teach me how to make the best use of those which are true. What shall I think of human nature, and how shall I avoid dreading the continuance of my life, lest, instead of improving, I should be more and more corrupted by the world; more selfish, more ungenerous, more contracted in my views, more earthly in my affections, when I see those who in their youth had hearts capable of delicate sentiments, who were open, generous, sincere, and benevolent, gentle, cheerful, and agreeable in their tempers, innocent in their manners, and unaffected in their piety; when I see these very people, in an advanced age, grown cold to all tender and good affections; close and designing; covetous and mean; insensible to the pains of others, and slow, if not unwilling, to relieve them; rigid in their precepts, yet self-indulgent, full of reverence for themselves, and of contempt for youth, peevish, imperious, tyrannical, and self-conceited, yet manifestly weak in judgment, and dull of apprehension? I am sure you must have known instances of such who, in the early part of their lives, obtained, and perhaps deserved, the former character, sunk into the sad, the pitiable state I have described, in their last stage. Is it that a long commerce with the world does indeed corrupt the heart; and extinguish by degrees those sparks of light, those inclinations to good, which were implanted in our minds? Or is it rather to be attributed to the seeds of original evil, which grow with our years, and overspread the whole soul? But though there are some instances of this melancholy change for the worse, there are doubtless many of improvement and reformation; therefore perhaps this observation may be to no purpose here, unless it shews that a superiority of years does not always give real superiority; and that parents are sometimes the less qualified to judge of the real good and happiness of their children for being so much older than they, for having lost the tenderness and sensibility of their hearts, without adding much to the strength and capacity of their heads.
(p. 62-5)",2011-06-27 18:21:18 UTC,"""Is it that a long commerce with the world does indeed corrupt the heart; and extinguish by degrees those sparks of light, those inclinations to good, which were implanted in our minds?""",2011-06-27 18:21:18 UTC,"","",,"","",Reading,18822,6983