ries, I spoke to them about our Father, our commor Father We fe ta touch of brotherly affection. They faid they would fing to their father, as well as the birds; and followed me attempting to make fuch melody as you know is commonly made in thefe parts. I outrode them, but fome of them had the patience to follow me home, and faid they would fpeak with me; but the people of the houfe ftopt them, faying I would not be troubled with children. They cried and said, They were fure I would not fay fo, for I was their good brother. The next day when I heard it, I enquired after them, and invited them to come to me which they have done every day fince. I make them little hymns which they fing. Some of them are under fweet drawings; yesterday, I wept for joy, on hearing one fpeak of conviction of fin, and joy unfpeakable in Chrift which had followed, as would do an experienced believer in Bristol. Last Sunday I met them in the wood: there were 100 of them, and as many adults. Our firft Paftor has fince defired me to defift from preaching in the wood, (for I had exhorted) for fear of giving umbrage; and I have complied from a con currence of circumstances which are not worth mentioning I therefore meet : them in my father's yard.

In one of my letters, I promifed you fome anecdotes, concerning the death of our two great philofophers, Voltaire and Roffeau. Mr. Tronchin, the phyfician of the Duke of Orleans, being fent for to attend Voltaire in his illness at Paris, Voltaire faid to him, "Sir, I defire you would fave my life. I will "give you the half of my fortune, "my days only for fix months. "the devil, and fhall carry you

"me."

if you lengthen out If not, I fhall go to away along with

as full of himself He paid that atwhich the Chrif

Mr. Roffeau died more decently, as Voltaire was of the wicked one. tention to nature and the natural fun, tian pays to grace and the Sun of righteoufnefs. Thete are fome of his laft words to his wife, which I

copy from a printed letter circulating in thefe parts. "Open the window, that I may fee the green fields once more. How beautiful is nature! How wonderful is the Sun! See that glorious light it fends forth! It is God, who calls me.-How pleafing is death, to a man who is not confcious of any fin! O God! my foul is now as pure as when it first came out of thy hands: crown it with thy heavenly blifs!" God deliver us from felf and Satan, the internal and external fiend! The Lord forbid we fhould fall into the fnare of the Sadducees, with the former of those two famous men, or into that of the Pharifees with the latter. Farewell in Jefus. I. F.

James Ireland, Esq.
My dear Friend,

Nyon, Sep. 25th, 1778.

I AM just returned from an excurfion I made with my brother, through the fine vale in the midst of the high hills, which divide France from this country. In that vale we found three lakes, one on French ground, and two on Swifs; the largeft is fix miles long and two wide. It is the part of the country where induftry is most apparent, and where population thrives beft. The inhabitants are chiefly woodmen, coopers, watch-makers and jewellers. They told me, they had the best finging, and the best preacher in the country. I asked, if any finners were converted under his miniftry? They ftared, and asked, "What I meant by converfion?" When I had explained myself, they faid, "We did not live in the time of miracles."

I was better fatisfied in paffing through a part of the vale which belongs to the king of France. I faw a prodigious concourfe of people, and fuppofed they kept a fare, but was agreeably furprized to find that it was three Miffionaries, who went about as itinerant preachers to help the regular clergy. They had been there already fome days, and were three brothers who preached morning and evening. The evening fervice

opened by what they called a conference. One of the Millionaries took the pulpit, and the parish priest propofed questions to him, which he anfwered at full length and in a very edifying manner. The fubject was the unlawfulness and the mifchief of those methods, by which perfons of different fexes lay fnares for each other, and corrupt each others morals. The fubject was treated with delicacy, propriety and truth. The method was admirably well calculated to draw and fix the attention of a mixed multitude. This conference being ended, another Miffionary took the pulpit. His text was our Lord's defcription of the day of judgment. Before the fermon, all thofe who for the prefs could kneel, did, and fung a French hymn to beg a bleffing upon the word; and indeed it was bleffed. An awful attention was visible upon moft, and for a good part of the difcourfe, the voice of the preacher was almoft loft in the cries and bitter wailings of the audience. When the outcry began, the preacher was defcribing the departure of the wicked into eternal fire. They urged that God was merciful, and that Jefus Chrift had fhed his blood for them. "But that mercy you have flighted (replies the Judge) and now is the time of juftice; that blood you have trodden under foot, and now it cries for vengeance. Know your day-flight the Father's mercy and the Son's blood no longer." I have feen but once or twice congregations as much affected in England.

One of our minifters being ill, I ventured a fecond time into the pulpit laft Sunday; and the Sunday before, I preached fix miles off to 2000 people in a jail yard, where they were come to fee a poor murderer two days before his execution. I was a little abufed by the Bailiff on the occafion, and refused the liberty of attending the poor man to the fcaffold where he was to be broken on the wheel. I hope he died penitent. The day before he fuffered, he faid he had broken his irons, and that as he deferved to die,

he defired new ones to be put on, left he should be tempted to make his escape a second time.

You afk, What I defign to do? I propofe, if it be the Lord's will, to fpend the winter here, to bear my teftimony against the trade of my countrymen, which Voltaire defcribes thus

Barbares, dont la guerre eft l' unique metier,

Et qui vendent leur fang a qui veut le paier.

In the Spring, I shall if nothing prevents return to England with you, or with Mr. Perronet, if his af fairs are fettled, or alone if other ways fail. In the mean while, I rejoice with you in Jefus, and in the glorious hope of that complete falvation his faithfulnefs has promifed, and his power can never be at a lofs to beftow. We must be faved by faith and hope till we are faved by perfect love, and made partakers of heavenly glory.

I am truly a ftranger here. Well then, as ftrangers let us go where we shall meet the affembly of the righteous gathered in Jefus. Farewell in him, you and yours. I. F.

James Ireland, Esq.

My dear Friend,

Nyon, Feb. 2d, 1779.

I AM forry to hear that you are still tried by illnefs; but our good heavenly Father will have us to live with one foot on earth, and the other in the firrup of our infirmities, ready to mount and pafs froin time into eternity. He is wife; his will be done, his name praifed, and our fouls faved though it be by the fkin of our teeth!

I am better, thank God, and ride out every day when the flippery roads will permit me to venture, without the risk of breaking my horfes legs and

my own neck. You will ask me how I have spent my time: I pray, have patience, rejoice, and write when I can; I faw wood in the houfe when I cannot go out, and eat grapes, of which I have always a basket by me. Our little Lord Lieutenant has forbidden the minifters to let me exhort in the parfonage, because it is the Sovereign's houfe. My fecond brother has addreffed a memorial to him, in which he informs him, that he will give up neither his religious nor civil liberty, and will open his houfe for the word of God; and accordingly we have fince met at his houfe. On Sunday we met at the young Clergyman's, who, on his part, writes against the conduct of the clergy; but I fear we fence against a wall of brass. However, I am quite perfuaded that Providence calls me to leave a teltimony to my French brethren, and it may be of fome ufe when I fhall be no more. I have been comforted by feeing the Apology of a minister at Yverdon, who was perfecuted in the beginning of this century under the name of Pietift. I have got acquainted with a faithful minifter of Geneva, but he dares no more offer me his pulpit than my brother-in-law at Laufanne.

The Lord was not in the forwardness of the young man I mentioned. It was but a fire of straw; and he has now avoided me for fome weeks. Several young women feem to have received the word in the love of it, and four or five grown up ones; but not one man except the young hopeful Clergyman I mention, who helps me at my little meetings and begins to preach extempore. I hope he will ftand his ground better than he, who was fuch an approver when you were here, and is now dying after having drawn back to the world.

The truths I chiefly infift upon, when I talk to the people who will hear me, are thofe which I feed upon myfelf as my daily bread-"God our Maker and "Preferver, though invifible, is here and every where. "He is our chief good, becaufe all beauty and all "goodness centers in, and flows from him. He is