I was taken last Thursday morning to breakfast with him his house at Kensington, by an East India man, who is likewise surely a great saint.It was a heart-healing meeting of many of the godly, which he holds weekly in the season; and we had such a warsle of the spirit among us that the like cannot be told.I was called upon to pray, and a worthy gentleman said, when I was done, that he never had met with more apostolic simplicity-- indeed, I could see with the tail of my eye, while I was praying, that the chief saint himself was listening with a curious pleasant satisfaction.
As for our doings here anent the legacy, things are going forward in the regular manner; but the expense is terrible, and I have been obliged to take up money on account; but, as it was freely given by the agents, I am in hopes all will end well; for, considering that we are but strangers to them, they would not have assisted us in this matter had they not been sure of the means of payment in their own hands.
The people of London are surprising kind to us; we need not, if we thought proper ourselves, eat a dinner in our own lodgings; but it would ill become me, at my time of life, and with the character for sobriety that I have maintained, to show an example in my latter days of riotous living; therefore, Mrs.Pringle, and her daughter, and me, have made a point of going nowhere three times in the week; but as for Andrew Pringle, my son, he has forgathered with some acquaintance, and I fancy we will be obliged to let him take the length of his tether for a while.But not altogether without a curb neither, for the agent's son, young Mr.Argent, had almost persuaded him to become a member of Parliament, which he said he could get him made, for more than a thousand pounds less than the commonprice-- the state of the new king's health having lowered the commodity of seats.But this I would by no means hear of; he is not yet come to years of discretion enough to sit in council; and, moreover, he has not been tried; and no man, till he has out of doors shown something of what he is, should be entitled to power and honour within.Mrs.Pringle, however, thought he might do as well as young Dunure; but Andrew Pringle, my son, has not the solidity of head that Mr.K-dy has, and is over free and outspoken, and cannot take such pains to make his little go a great way, like that well- behaved young gentleman.But you will be grieved to hear that Mr.K-dy is in opposition to the government; and truly I am at a loss to understand how a man of Whig principles can be an adversary to the House of Hanover.But I never meddled much in politick affairs, except at this time, when I prohibited Andrew Pringle, my son, from offering to be a member of Parliament, notwithstanding the great bargain that he would have had of the place.
And since we are on public concerns, I should tell you, that I was minded to send you a newspaper at the second-hand, every day when we were done with it.But when we came to inquire, we found that we could get the newspaper for a shilling a week every morning but Sunday, to our breakfast, which was so much cheaper than buying a whole paper, that Mrs.Pringle thought it would be a great extravagance; and, indeed, when I came to think of the loss of time a newspaper every day would occasion to my people, I considered it would be very wrong of me to send you any at all.For I do think that honest folks in a far-off country parish should not make or meddle with the things that pertain to government,--the more especially, as it is well known, that there is as much falsehood as truth in newspapers, and they have not the means of testing their statements.Not, however, that I am an advocate for passive obedience; God forbid.On the contrary, if ever the time should come, in my day, of a saint-slaying tyrant attempting to bind the burden of prelatic abominations on our backs, such a blast of the gospel trumpet would be heard in Garnock, as it does not become me to say, but I leave it to you and others, who have experienced my capacity as a soldier of the word so long, to think what it would then be.Meanwhile, I remain, my dear sir, your friend and pastor,Z.PRINGLE.
When Mr.Snodgrass had perused this epistle, he paused some time, seemingly in doubt, and then he said to Mr.Micklewham, that, considering the view which the Doctor had taken of the matter, and that he had not gone to the playhouse for the motives which usually take bad people to such places, he thought there could be no possible harm in reading the letter to the elders, and that Mr.Craig, so far from being displeased, would doubtless be exceedingly rejoiced to learn that the playhouses of London were occasionally so well employed as on the night when the Doctor was there.
Mr.Micklewham then inquired if Mr.Snodgrass had heard from Mr.Andrew, and was answered in the affirmative; but the letter was not read.Why it was withheld our readers must guess for themselves; but we have been fortunate enough to obtain the following copy.
