2. Resolution of being one of his people,

doing him allegiance.

III. Adoration and prayer.

IV. Setting a watch over my own infirmities and passions, over the snares laid in our way. Perimus licitis.*

DAY EMPLOYMENT.

There must be an employment, two kinds. I. Our ordinary calling, to serve God in it. It is a service to Christ, though never so mean. Coloss. iii. Here faithfulness, diligence, cheerfulness. Not to overlay myself, with more business than I can bear.

II. Our spiritual employments: mingle somewhat of God's immediate service in this day.

Refreshments.

I. Meat and drink; moderation, seasoned with somewhat of God.

II. Recreations. 1. Not our business. 2. Suitable. No games, if given to covetousness or passion.

If alone.

I. Beware of wandering, vain, lustful thoughts: fly from thyself, rather than entertain these. II. Let thy solitary thoughts be profitable: view

I have still chosen, rather to forbear what might be probably lawful, than to do that, which might be possibly unlawful: because, I could not err in the former; I might, in the latter. If things were disputable, whether they might be done, I rather chose to forbear; because the lawfulness of my forbearance was unquestionable.'- Hale's Works, ii. 262.

the evidences of thy salvation; the state of thy soul; the coming of Christ; thy own mortality;.. it will make thee humble and watchful.

Company.

Do good to them. Use God's name reverently. Beware of leaving an ill impression, of ill example. Receive good from them, if more knowing.

Evening.

Cast up the accounts of the day. If aught amiss, beg pardon. Gather resolution of more vigilIf well, bless the mercy and grace of God that hath supported thee.

ance.

These notes have an imperfection in the wording of them, which shows they were only intended for his privacies. No wonder a man who set such rules to himself, became quickly very eminent and remarkable.

*

Noy, the attorney-general, being then one of the greatest men of the profession, took early notice of him, and called often for him, and directed him in his study, and grew to have such friendship for him, that he came to be called Young Noy.'

He, passing from the extreme, of vanity in his apparel, to that of neglecting himself too much, was once taken, when there was a press for the king's service, as a fit person for it; for he was a strong and well-built man: but, some that

* Born, 1577. Died, 1634.

knew him, coming by, and giving notice who he was, the press-men let him go. This made him return to more decency in his clothes, but never to any superfluity or vanity in them.*

Once, as he was buying some cloth for a new suit, the draper, with whom he differed about the price, told him he should have it for nothing, if he would promise him a hundred pounds, when he came to be Lord Chief Justice of England. To which he answered, That he could not, with a good conscience, wear any man's cloth, unless he paid for it;' so, he satisfied the draper, and carried away the cloth. Yet, the same draper lived, to see him advanced, to that same dignity. †

While he was thus improving himself in the study of the law, he not only kept the hours of the hall constantly in term-time, but seldom put himself out of commons, in vacation-time; and continued, then, to follow his studies, with an unwearied diligence; and, not being satisfied with the books writ about it, or to take things upon trust, was very diligent in searching all records. Then did he make divers collections, out of the books he had read; and, mixing them with his own observations, digested them into a commonplace book which he did with so much industry

Let thy apparell be decent, and suited to the quality of thy place and purse: too much punctualitie, and too much morositie, are the two poles of pride.' - FR. QUARLES.

† A similar story is told of Pope Sixtus V., by his historian Gregorio Leti.

and judgment, that an eminent judge of the King's Bench borrowed it of him, when he was Lord Chief Baron. He unwillingly lent it, because it had been written by him before he was called to the bar, and had never been thoroughly revised by him, since that time; only, what alterations had been made in the law, by subsequent statutes and judgments, were added by him as they had happened: but, the Judge, having perused it, said, that, though it was composed by him so early, he did not think any lawyer in England could do it better, except he himself would again set about it.

He was soon found out, by that great and learned antiquary Mr. Selden;* who, though much superior to him in years, yet came to have such a liking of him, and of Mr. Vaughan,† who was afterwards Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, that,

* John Selden, born, 1584.: died, 1654. Of this great man's attainments, it were superfluous to speak: his life, properly told, would be a complete history of the learning of his time. Lord Clarendon says, that Mr. Selden was a person, whom no character can flatter, or transmit in any expressions equal to his merit and virtue. He was of such stupendous learning, in all kinds, and in all languages, as may appear from his excellent and transcendent writings, that, a man would have thought, he had been entirely conversant among books, and had never spent an hour, but in reading and writing yet, his humanity, courtesy, and affability, was such, that he would have been thought to have been bred in the best courts, but that his goodnature, charity, and delight in doing good, and in communicating all he knew, exceeded that breeding.'

Towards the close of life, he began to see the emptiness of mere human learning and owned, that, out of the numberless volumes which he had read and digested, nothing stuck so close to his heart, or gave him such solid satisfaction, as a single passage out of St. Paul's epistle to Titus, . . chap. ii. 11–14. Sir John Vaughan: very learned in the law, and well versed in the politer parts of learning. But his chief recommendation to the good opinion of posterity, unquestionably was, that he enjoyed the friendship of two such men, as Hale and Selden. He was born A.D. 1608., died A.D. 1674.

as he continued in a close friendship with them while he lived, so he left them, at his death, two of his four executors.

It was this acquaintance, that first set Mr. Hale on a more enlarged pursuit of learning, which he had before confined to his own profession; but, becoming as great a master in it, as ever any was, very soon, he, who could never let any of his time go away unprofitably, found leisure, to attain to as great a variety of knowledge, in as comprehensive a manner, as most men have done in any age.

He set himself much, to the study of the Roman law; and, though he liked the way of judicature in England by juries, much better than that of the civil law, where so much was trusted to the judge,.. yet, he often said, that the true grounds and reasons of law were so well delivered in the Digests, that a man could never understand law, as a science, so well as by seeking it there; and, therefore lamented much, that it was so little studied in England.

He looked on readiness in arithmetic, as a thing which might be useful to him in his own employment; and acquired it, to such a degree, that he would often, on a sudden, and afterwards on the Bench, resolve very hard questions, which had puzzled the best accountants about town. He rested not here; but studied the algebra, both speciosa and numerosa; and went through all the other mathematical sciences, and made a great collection of very excellent instruments, sparing no cost to