42 OUR HYMNS :
benefit to him. "Thus," he says, "without any means but books, was God pleased to resolve me for Himself." Baxter s education was carried on by tutors, from whose neglect he some times suffered, and he did not enter either of the Universities ; yet he gave early promise of future eminence.
When he was in his nineteenth year, he was induced to try his success as an attendant at Court. But the Court of Charles I. was no place for a man of Baxter s religious training and tenden cies, and he soon left it. At the age of twenty-three, he became head master of the Grammar School at Dudley, Worcestershire. He had previously occupied for a short time a similar position at Wroxeter. He also received a theological training ; and having at that time no scruples about Conformity, was episcopally ordained. When he had been three-quarters of a year at Dudley, he went to be assistant minister at Bridgnorth, in Shropshire. There he remained one year and nine months, and then removed to Kidderminster, in Worcestershire. This town had petitioned the Long Parliament against its minister, who, knowing the weak ness of his case, compromised it by receiving Baxter as his curate. It was in 1640 that, after one day s preaching, Baxter was unani mously chosen. When the civil war broke out he withdrew for a time to Gloucester, and then to Coventry ; but at length, for purposes of Christian usefulness, he accepted the appointment of chaplain to one of Cromwell s regiments. In this capacity his labours were unremitting.
After a time, the sickness from which he had sometimes suffered increased upon him so much that he was obliged to desist from his duties as a military chnplain, and remain for months resting at the houses of his friends. During this period he wrote his world-renowned work, the " Saints Everlasting Rest." The design was formed at the house of Sir John Cook, Melbourne, Derbyshire, and a great part of it was executed at the seat of Sir Thomas Rous, at Rons Lench, iu Worcestershire. The author was very ill,- and had few books at hand, but he found " that the transcript of the heart hath the greatest force on the hearts of
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