]
They then went on to expose the abuse of public relations of experiences:
"But this is the misery, the more meek and fearful are hereby kept out of
God's house, while the more conceited and presumptuous never boggle at
this, or anything else. But it seems there is a gross corruption of this
laudable practice which the author does well to censure; and that is, when
some, who have no good intention of their own, get others to devise a
relation for them." [Footnote: _Idem_, p. 9.] They even dared to
intimate that it did not savor of modesty for the patriarch "to think any
one of his sermons, or short comments, can edifie more than the reading of
twenty chapters." [Footnote: _Idem_, p. 15.] And then they added some
sentences, which were afterward declared by the venerable victim to be as
scurrilous as other portions of the pamphlet were profane.
"We are assured, the author is esteemed more a Presbyterian than a
Congregational man, by scores of his friends in London. He is lov'd and
reverenced for a moderate spirit, a peaceable disposition, and a temper so
widely different from his late brothers in London.... Did our reverend
author appear the same here, we should be his easie proselites too. But we
are loath to say how he forfeits that venerable character, which might
have consecrated his name to posterity, more than his learning, or other
honorary titles can.
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