Prayers and Meditations.
��another. I did it only once, so far as it might be lawful for me.
I then prayed for resolution and perseverance to amend my Life. I received soon, the communicants were many. At the altar it occurred to me that I ought to form some resolutions. I resolved, in the presence of God, but without a vow, to repel sinful thoughts to study eight hours daily, and, I think, to go to church every Sunday z , and read the Scriptures. I gave a shilling, and seeing a poor girl at the Sacrament in a bedgown 2 , gave her privately a crown, though I saw Hart's hymns 3 in her hand. I prayed earnestly for amendment, and repeated my prayer at home. Dined with Miss W. 4 went to Prayers at church ; went to Davies's, spent the evening not pleasantly. Avoided wine and tempered a very few glasses with Sherbet 5 . Came home, and prayed.
I saw at the Sacrament a man meanly dressed whom I have always seen there at Easter 6 .
��ing to Chetwood (History of the Stage, ed. 1749, p. 41), a company of players went to Jamaica in 1733. They acted the Beggars' Opera. Within the space of two months they buried their third Polly.
1 See post, where he records on April 6, 1777: 'I have this year omitted church on most Sundays, intending to supply the deficience in the week. So that I owe twelve attendances on worship.' See also Life, i. 67, n. 2 ; iii. 401.
2 Bedgown is not in Johnson's Dictionary. Dr. Murray defines it as ' I. A woman's night-gown or night-dress. 2. A kind of jacket worn by women of the working class in the north.'
3 Hymns composed on Various Subjects. By J. Hart. London
1759-
In the Preface, Hart describes his ' Experience ' his sins and * the Clouds of Horror with which he was overwhelmed till Whitsunday 1757 ;
��when ' he says, ' I happened to go to the Moravian Chapel in Fetter Lane, where I had been several times before ... I was hardly got home, when I felt myself melting away into a strange Softness of Affection . . . Thenceforth I enjoyed sweet Peace in my Soul.' In the hymn entitled The Author's own Confession (p. 40), he says :
- I strove to make my Flesh decay
With foul Disease and wasting
Pain.
I strove to fling my Life away, And damn my Soul but strove
in vain.'
This Hymn-book was so popular that in 1811 it reached its twentieth edition.
4 Miss Williams. He often dined in a tavern, though he always took tea with her. Life, i. 421.
5 Johnson defines Sherbet as ' the juice of lemons or oranges mixed with water and sugar.'
6 Post, p. 35.
Almighty
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