This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1832 edition. Excerpt: ...from the ministry altogether; and, on the other, to discourage, depress and finally to ruin those who are in it already. That degree of talent which fits one, so far as intellectual endowments go, for a useful minister of the Gospel, is much rarer than many seem to imagine; and, humanly speaking, has its temporal prosperity in its own power. When other pursuits invite by the promise of not only a maintenance, but of gain, and even of opulence, it is idle, it is unreasonable, to hope that youth of talents, without fortune, whatever be their piety, will serve the church of God at the expense of devoting themselves to infallible penury, and all the wretchedness which belongs to it. They may desire, they may wish; and, in some instances, from that simplicity which never calculates or which flatters itself that something favourable " will turn up," they may venture: but in general, they must turn away with a sigh from the employment which, of all others, their hearts most long after. Let us not hear of self-denial, spiritual-mindedness, and a heroic indifference to worldly things, as characteristic of the true minister of Christ. Self-denial does not mean starving. The spirituality of the father will not stop the cravings of his children when they cry for food; nor is there any heroism in preferring tatters and a hovel to decent clothing and lodging, when they may be had. It is very convenient, no doubt, for men who are adding house to house, field to field, thousand to thousand, to harangue, in a religious style, on the necessity of a minister's imitating his master, " who had not where to lay his head;" when the practical inference from all this is in favour of their own pockets. They are wonderfully concerned for spirituality and self-denial to be...