Clergymen and Doctors: Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches.Anonymous
History
Clergymen and Doctors: Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches.
Anonymous
Clergy; Medicine -- Anecdotes; Medicine -- Humor; Pastoral theology -- Anecdotes; Physicians
Even in Berkeley, Jenner was pursued with ridicule and suspicion; but
he went quietly on his rounds, waiting confidently till the storm was
laid, plashing through the Gloucestershire lanes in the garb that an
acquaintance has thus described:--"He was dressed in a blue coat and
yellow buttons, buckskins, well-polished jockey-boots, with handsome
silver spurs, and he carried a smart whip with a silver handle. His
hair, after the fashion, was done up in a club, and he wore a
broad-brimmed hat." But Jenner, says Mr. Jeaffreson, found also
compensation for all the ridicule and opposition "in the enthusiastic
support of Rowland Hill, who not only advocated vaccination in his
ordinary conversation, but from the pulpit used to say, after his
sermon to his congregation, wherever he preached, 'I am ready to
vaccinate to-morrow morning as many children as you choose; and if you
wish them to escape that horrid disease, the small-pox, you will bring
them.' A Vaccine Board was also established at the Surrey
Chapel--_i.e._ the Octagon Chapel, in Blackfriars Road. 'My Lord,' said
Rowland Hill once to a nobleman, 'allow me to present to your Lordship
my friend, Dr. Jenner, who has been the means of saving more lives than
any other man.' 'Ah!' observed Jenner, 'would that I, like you, could
say--souls.' There was no cant in this. Jenner was a simple,
unaffected, and devout man. His last words were, 'I do not marvel that
men are grateful to me; but I am surprised that they do not feel
gratitude to God for making me a medium of good.'"
ANGEL-WORSHIP.
A now obsolete ecclesiastical custom in Scotland was, Dean Ramsay says,
that the minister should bow in succession to the heritors or
proprietors in the parish, who occupied the front gallery seats; a
custom, when the position of the heritors was tolerably well matched,
that led to an unpleasant contest at times as to who was entitled to
the precedence of getting the first bow. A clever and complimentary
reply was made by Dr. Wightman of Kirkmahoe, when rallied on one
occasion for neglecting this usual act of courtesy one Sunday. The
heritor who was entitled to, and always received, this token of
respect, was Miller of Dalswinton. One Sunday, the Dalswinton pew was
filled by a bevy of ladies, but no gentleman was present; and the
Doctor--perhaps because he was a bachelor, and felt a delicacy in the
circumstances--omitted the usual salaam in that direction. A few days
after, meeting Miss Miller (who was widely famed for her beauty, and
afterwards became Countess of Mar), she rallied him, in presence of her
companions, for not bowing to her on the Sunday. The Doctor immediately
replied, "I beg your pardon, Miss Miller; but you know, surely, that
angel-worship is not allowed by the Church of Scotland;" and, lifting
his hat, he bowed low and passed on.
BUNYAN'S SUCCESSFUL AND PRESISTENT PREACHING.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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