“One sabbath morning (says the pastor) a singular lapse of memory befell me, which I had never before and have never since experienced. When I rose from sleep I could not recollect any portion of the discourse which I had prepared on the day before; and, what was most strange, I could not even remember the text of the prepared sermon. I was perplexed, and walked out before breakfast in Kensington Gardens. While there a particular text occurred to my mind; and my thoughts seemed to dwell on it so much that I resolved to preach from that without further attempting to recall what I had prepared, a thing which I had never ventured to do during all my ministry. “From this text I preached, and it was ‘Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.’ I preached with great liberty, and in the course of the sermon I quoted the lines: ‘Beware of desperate steps! the darkest day— Live till to-morrow—will have passed away.’ “I afterwards learned that a man in despair had that very morning gone to the Serpentine to drown himself in it. For this purpose he had filled his pockets with stones, hoping to sink at once. Some passengers, however disturbed him while on the brink, and he returned to Kensington, intending to drown himself in the dusk of the evening. On passing my chapel he saw a number of people crowding into it, and thought he would join them in order to pass away the time. His attention was rivetted to the sermon, which seemed to be in part composed for him; and when he heard me quote the lines alluded to, he resolved to abandon his suicidal purpose.” Another incident deserves relation: “A bricklayer came one evening drunk, yet towards the close was impressed. The next Sunday he came again, and I noticed him as one of the two young men who had behaved rudely the Sabbath evening preceding; but he had been cut to the heart. ‘I,’ said he to himself, ‘am the man intended.’ He soon fell ill, when the good work deepened. He is now consistent.” Dr. Leifchild left a list of thirty-two persons to whom he had been useful, and under each name a notice of particulars connected with it. {49} There lived in one of the stately houses in Kensington Gore a gentleman, commanding in person and polished in manners, who was drawn towards the Dissenting pastor, though he had no affection for Dissenters. “He laughed at _them_ and liked _him_. He was a staunch churchman, but came occasionally to the chapel, where, as also in other places, he might be distinguished by the flower always fastened in the buttonhole of his coat.”