ly to prove but
unsuccessful physicians." But when we begin to reform our pastorate to
that pattern, we are soon compelled to set down such entries in our
secret diary as that of Thomas Shepard of Harvard University: "Sabbath,
5th April 1641. Nothing I do, nay, none under my shadow prosper. I so
want wisdom for my place, and to guide others." Yes; for what wisdom is
needed for the place of a minister like John Gifford, John Bunyan,
Richard Baxter, and Thomas Shepard! What wisdom, what divine genius, to
dive into and divine the secret history of a soul from a twinge of
conscience, even from a drop of the eye, a tone of the voice, or a
gesture of the hand or of the head! And yet, with some natural taste for
the holy work, with study, with experience, and with life-long expert
reading, even a plain minister with no genius, but with some grace and
truth, may come to great eminence in the matters of the soul. And then,
with what an interest, solemn and awful, with what a sleepless interest
such a pastor goes about among his diseased, sin-torn, and scattered
flock! All their souls are naked and open under his divining eye. They
need not to tell him where they ail, and of what sickness they are nigh
unto death. That food, he says, with some sternness over their sick-bed,
I warned you of it; I told you with all plainness that many have died of
eating that fruit! "We must be ready," Baxter continues, "to give advice
to those that come to us with cases of conscience. A minister is not
only for public preaching, but to be a known counsellor for his people's
souls as the lawyer is for their estates, and the physician is for their
bodies. And because the people are grown unacquainted with this office
of the ministry, and their own necessity and duty herein, it belongeth to
us to acquaint them herewith, and to press them publicly to come to us
for advice concerning their souls. We must not only be willing of the
trouble, but draw it upon ourselves by inviting them hereto. To this end
it is very necessary to be acquainted with practical cases and able to
assist them in trying their states. One word of seasonable and prudent
advice hath done that good that many sermons would not have done."

4. As he went on pounding and preparing his well-approved pill, the (at
the bottom of his heart) kind old leech talked encouragingly to the
mother and to her sick son, and said: "Come, come; after all, do not he
too much cast down.