affection; and if any were absent, they were remembered. These petitions were answered in the conversion of all their children. The worthy couple were themselves sufferers from the unjust acts passed against the nonconformists; but their mutual affection tended to smooth the thorny path. They did, indeed, journey to heaven together. When all their children were married, and they were left alone again, they filled their house with the children of their friends. Some, who were orphans, they took charge of gratuitously; others they were induced to take at the earnest solicitations of their parents, who were desirous that they should have the benefit of Mr. and Mrs. Henry's pious counsel and example. Mr. Henry frequently remarked-"We must be doing something in the world while we are in it." Mrs. Philip Henry survived her husband, who died in his sixty-fifth year; but they are now reunited where partings are unknown. 29 MRS. WATTS, MOTHER OF DR. WATTS. MR. ISAAC WATTS, the husband of this lady, kept a highly respectable boarding-school, at Southampton. Isaac, who was their eldest son, was born in that town, July 17, 1674. Mr. Watts, who was a man of great worth, suffered from the persecutions of the times in which he lived. He was more than once confined in jail, for his non-conformist principles; and, during one of those seasons of imprisonment, his wife might sometimes have been seen sitting upon a stone, near the gate of the prison, with her infant, Isaac, in her arms, waiting for the opening of the prison doors. It is said that this boy was so fond of books, that, before he was able to utter his wishes distinctly, when any money was given him to spend, he would run to his mother, exclaiming, “A book -buy a book." In order to improve her husband's pupils in the art of composition, Mrs. Watts was in the habit of giving each of them a farthing, if they brought her a copy of verses, written during their play hours. When between seven and eight years of age, Isaac placed the following couplet in her hands : "I write not for a farthing, but to try How I your farthing writers can outvie." On another occasion, near the same time, when reading one of his poems, his mother expressed some doubts of its being his own composing; upon which he wrote the following acrostic, to convince her of its genuineness : "I am a vile, polluted lump of earth S o I've continued ever since my birth; Although Jehovah grace does daily give me, A s sure this monster, Satan, will deceive me! Come, therefore, Lord, from Satan's claws relieve me. Wash me in thy blood, O Christ, A nd grace divine impart ; Then search and try the corners of my heart; That I, in all things, may be fit to do Service to thee, and sing thy praises too." These early developments of genius induced several gentlemen of the town to offer to pay the expenses of Isaac's being sent to one of the universities; but he politely declined accepting them, saying, he was resolved to take his lot among the dissenters. In 1690, he was sent to London, to finish his education, under the care of the Rev. Thomas Rowe. He then returned to Southampton, and spent the years, 1695 and 1696, at his father's house, preparing himself for the ministry, by reading, meditation, and prayer. During this time he attended the meeting house of which his father was a Deacon. The hymns sung there grated very inharmoniously upon the ear of the young poet, and he mentioned his objections to his father, who immediately asked him if he could not remedy the evil. He, in consequence, wrote a hymn, which was so much admired that a second was asked for, then a third and a fourth, and so on until at length the whole volume of beau-tiful psalms and hymns now so commonly sung was composed. In his 24th year, Dr. Watts was chosen as assistant minister to Dr. Isaac Chauncy, of Marklane, London: he afterwards became pastor of that church. During a season of protracted illness he was invited to the house of his generous friend, Sir Thomas Abney, and the visit, which, (as he once told Lady Huntingdon) he meant to have lasted for one week, was extended to upwards of thirtysix years. The world is indebted instrumentally to the kindness and careful attentions of this family, for the prolonged usefulness of his life, his health being in so delicate a state, that the greatest care was was at all times necessary to enable him to prosecute his literary labours. He died beneath their roof, in 1748, deeply lamented by all the family. The following little anecdote is one amongst numerous instances of benefit, which have resulted from the most simple of his works, and we give it, because it illustrates maternal influence for evil as well as good:-"A wretched mother once heard her infant daughter lisping out the profane language she herself often used in her hearing. The woman started! 'What!' she exclaimed, am I not only going to hell myself, but leading my child there too?" At that moment some vague recollection of Dr. Watts's hymns for children crossed her mind. She had learned them in her childhood, but all such thoughts had been forgotten amid the scenes of sin and suffering, in which her after years had been passed. Now, however, she resolved that the first sixpence she got should be spent in purchasing a copy of those hymns for her child. She obtained it, and, on opening the volume, her eye fell on the following words : "Just as the tree cut down that fell, The Holy spirit applied this solemn truth to the poor woman's heart, and it was the means of her own conversion. |