Читать книгу The Great Revival of the Eighteenth Century: with a supplemental chapter on the revival in America онлайн

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John Gambold, although ever an excellent and admirable man, lived the life rather of a secluded mystic, than that of an active reformer. He became a minister of the Church of England, but afterwards left that communion, not from any dissensions either from the doctrines or the discipline of the Church, but simply because he found his spiritual relationships more in harmony with those of the Moravians, of whose Church he died a bishop. We presume few readers are acquainted with his poetical works; nor are there many words among them of remarkable strength. The Mystery of Life is certainly pleasingly impressive; and his epitaph on himself deserves quotation:

“Ask not, ‘Who ended here his span?’

His name, reproach, and praise, was Man.

‘Did no great deeds adorn his course?’

No deed of his but showed him worse:

One thing was great, which God supplied,

He suffered human life—and died.

‘What points of knowledge did he gain?’

That life was sacred all—and vain:

‘Sacred, how high? and vain, how low?’