Towards the close of his life, he had, as he told Mr. Bidbanck, “many warnings of putting off his tabernacle.” With a view to his own consolation under those circumstances, and to the edification of his flock, he preached, in the mornings of the Lord’s days, a course of sermons upon the seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews. These were amongst his last discourses. They were heard with deep and affectionate interest, and having been taken down in shorthand from the lips of the preacher, were published soon after his decease. {144b} This little book was introduced to the christian world, by a short preface from the pen of Mr. Martin Finch, the minister of the Independent church at Norwich, {145} and dedicated to the deceased pastor’s bereaved flock, by Mr. Bidbanck. In these discourses, Mr. Ottee enlarged upon the parallel drawn by the apostle between the priesthood of Melchisedec and that of Jesus Christ, in an expository style, discovering much energy of thought combined with deep piety and an ardent desire for usefulness. Mr. Ottee was, emphatically, a _protestant nonconformist_. With him personal piety was, indeed, the first, the absorbing consideration. But protestantism held scarcely an inferior place in his esteem. On this subject his style, even through the mutilating medium of shorthand, rises to animation. “What prophet, or what apostle,” he exclaims, “said any thing for the worshipping of images? or what apostle, or what prophet, said any thing to warrant the praying in an unknown tongue? What prophet, or apostle, or penman of Scripture, hath said any thing concerning the sacrifice of the mass, for the living and the dead? Oh, filthy trash! What prophet, or apostle, or penman of the Scripture, hath said any thing concerning praying souls out of purgatory, or of having mass read for them? What prophet, or apostle, or Christ himself, said any thing of purgatory, or crossing themselves, or their childish crosses and beads? Of these popish superstitions God hath said nothing in all his word. And therefore the people of God must never meddle with these things; and if you be tempted or solicited to any ceremony, ask the question, Have Moses, or the prophets, or Christ, or his apostles, said any thing to this matter that you are so zealous for? O, search the Scripture; and what you find there, you are to practise in faith and in the fear of God. ‘_To the law and to the testimony_, _if they speak not __according to this word_, _it is because there is no light in them_.’” {147a}