if any of yours should prove a Goliah-like trouble, yet you may say with David, ‘That God, who delivered me out of the paws of the lion and bear, will also deliver me out of the hands of this uncircumcised Philistine.’ Lastly, for those afflictions of the soul; consider that God intends that to be as a sacred temple for Himself to dwell in, and will not allow any room there for such an inmate as grief, or allow that any sadness shall be his competitor. And, above all, if any care of future things molest you, remember those admirable words of the Psalmist,—‘Cast thy care on the Lord, and he shall nourish thee.’”{3}
Two years later, when Herbert was in his thirty-ninth year, he was himself seized with quotidian ague, and for change of air removed to Woodford, in Essex, where his brother, Sir Henry Herbert, and some other friends were residing. At Woodford ho remained about a year, and by “forbearing drink, and not eating any meat,” he cured himself of his disorder, although a tendency to consumption now began to manifest itself. To counteract this tendency, he removed to Dauntsey in Wiltshire, a seat of the Earl of Danby. There, by a spare diet, moderate exercise, and abstinence from study, his health apparently improved. He therefore, in compliance with the long-expressed wishes of his mother, determined to marry and enter on the priesthood. The story of his courtship is curious. There resided near Dauntsey a gentleman named Danvers, a near kinsman of Herbert’s friend Lord Danby. Mr. Danvers had a family of nine daughters, and had often and publicly expressed a wish that Herbert would marry one of them, “but rather his daughter Jane than any other, because his daughter Jane was his favourite daughter.” “And he had often said the same to Mr. Herbert himself; and that if he could like her for a wife, and she him for a husband, Jane should have a double blessing: and Mr. Danvers had so often said the like to Jane, and so much commended Mr. Herbert to her, that Jane became so much a Platonic as to fall in love with Mr. Herbert unseen.” “This,” adds Walton, from whom we have been quoting, “was a fair preparation for a marriage; but alas! her father died before Mr. Herbert’s retirement to Dauntsey: yet some friends to both parties procured their meeting; at which time a mutual affection entered into both of their hearts, as a conqueror enters into a surprised city: and love having got such possession, governed, and made there such laws and resolutions, as neither party was able to resist; insomuch that she changed her name into Herbert the third day after this first interview.” The marriage proved eminently happy; for, as Walton beautifully says, “the Eternal Lover of mankind made them happy in each other’s mutual and equal affections and compliance; indeed, so happy, that there never was any opposition betwixt them, unless it were a contest which should most incline to a compliance with the other’s desires. And though this begot, and continued in them, such a mutual love, and joy, and content, as was no way defective; yet this mutual content, and love, and joy, did receive a daily augmentation by such daily obligingness to each other, as still added new affluences to the former fulness of these divine souls, as was only improvable in heaven, where they now enjoy it.”
About three months after the marriage, the rectory of Bemerton, in Wiltshire, fell vacant through the elevation of the incumbent, Dr. Curll, to the see of Bath and Wells. Through the influence of the Earl of Pembroke with the King, the living was offered to Herbert. Not without much prayer and fasting did he at last accept it. “And in this time of considering he endured, as he would often say, such spiritual conflicts as none can think but only those that have endured them.”{4}
At length, principally through the interposition of Laud, then Bishop of London, Herbert was prevailed upon to lay his presentation before the Bishop of Salisbury, who at once gave him institution. Walton tells an interesting story in connection with the induction. Being shut up in the church to toll the bell, as the law then required, he staid so much longer than the ordinary time that his friends became anxious, and one of them, Mr. Woodnot, looking in at the church window, saw him lie prostrate on the ground before the altar. Not for some time was it known that he was then setting rules for the government of his life, and making a vow to keep them.
And now commenced the most interesting period of Herbert’s life. The care of his parish became the engrossing topic of his thoughts. From repairing the parish church and rebuilding the parsonage house, he turned away to give rules to himself and his parishioners, “for their Christian carriage both to God and man.” How he laboured in his vocation, and how his labours were so blest, that, while the better class of his parishioners, and many of the neighbouring gentry, were attending on his daily ministrations in the church, “some of the meaner sort did so love him, that they would let their plough rest when Mr. Herbert’s saints’-bell rung to prayers, that they might also offer their devotions to God with him,”—we read in the quaint but eloquent page of Walton. Herbert’s chief if not sole recreation was music, “in which heavenly art,” says his affectionate biographer, “he was a most excellent master, and did himself compose many divine hymns and anthems, which he set and sung to his lute or viol; and though he was a lover of retiredness, yet his love to music was such, that he went usually twice every week, on certain appointed days, to the cathedral church in Salisbury; and at his return would say, that his time spent in prayer and cathedral music elevated his soul, and was his heaven upon earth. But before his return thence to Bemerton, he would usually sing and play his part at an appointed private music-meeting; and to justify this practice, he would often say, ‘Religion does not banish mirth, but only moderates and sets rules to it.’”
At length, after a residence at Bemerton of about two years, his health became so much impaired that he was forced to confine himself for the most part to the house. But still, in spite of his increasing weakness, he continued as formerly to read prayers in public twice a-day, sometimes at home and sometimes in the church which immediately adjoined. “In one of which times of his reading, his wife observed him to read in pain, and told him so, and that it wasted his spirits, and weakened him; and he confessed it did, but said his life could not be better spent than in the service of his master Jesus, who had done and suffered so much for him. “But,” said he, “I will not be wilful; for though I find my spirit be willing, yet I find my flesh is weak; and therefore Mr. Bostock{5} shall be appointed to read prayers for me to-morrow; and I will now be only a hearer of them, till this mortal shall put on immortality.’ And Mr. Bostock,” says Walton, “did the next day undertake and continue this happy employment, till Mr. Herbert’s death.”
A few weeks before his death, Herbert was visited by his friend Mr. Duncon, afterwards rector of Friar Barnet in Middlesex. To him, at parting, the dying man delivered The Temple, with instructions to place it in the hands of their common friend Nicholas Farrer, the “Protestant Monk” of Little Gidding, saying, as he did so, “Sir, I pray you deliver this little book to my dear brother Farrer, and tell him he shall find in it a picture of the many spiritual conflicts that have passed betwixt God and my soul, before I could subject mine to the will of Jesus my master; in whose service I have now found perfect freedom. Desire him to read it; and then, if he can think it may turn to the advantage of any dejected poor soul, let it be made public; if not, let him burn it; for I and it are the least of God’s mercies.” “Thus meanly,” adds Walton, who reports the words, “did this humble man think of this excellent book, of which Mr. Farrer would say, there was in it the picture of a divine soul in every page; and that the whole book was such a harmony of holy passions, as would enrich the world with pleasure and piety.”
The closing scene of this good man’s life cannot be better told than in the language of Walton. He had now become very “restless,” says Izaak, “and his soul seemed to be weary of her earthly tabernacle, and this uneasiness became so visible, that his wife, his three nieces, and Mr. Woodnot, stood constantly about his bed, beholding him with sorrow, and an unwillingness to lose the sight of him, whom they could not hope to see much longer. . . . . And when he looked up, and saw his wife and nieces weeping to an extremity, he charged them, if they loved him, to withdraw into the next room, and there pray every one alone for him; for nothing but their lamentations could make his death uncomfortable. To which request their sighs and tears would not suffer them to make any reply; but they yielded him a sad obedience, leaving only with him Mr. Woodnot and Mr. Bostock. Immediately
