A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life - pocketboek

a Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life was first published in 1728, when he had been resident tutor for a time in the house at Putney of Edward Gibbon. He accompanied his pupil, a son of the same name, who became father to the great historian, to Cambridge in 1727 and when this son went abroad, he returned to the Gibboil household. According to Gibbons Autobiography, Law drew the portraits of Flavia and Miranda in the Devout Life from the two daughters of the house, Catherine and Hester. But, as Leslie Stephen pointed out, he would hardly have done this while himself still a member and spiritual adviser of the family. Moreover, he had ample opportunities of meeting the Flavias and Mirandas of his day. On accompanying young Edward Gibbon to Cambridge, Law was already well acquainted with the University, for he had graduated there, and become fellow of Emn anuel College in 1711. Laws Three Letters to the Bishop of Bangor, in 1717, were the first distinct sign he afforded of his intellectual quality and his unique powers as an independent religious thinker. In 1726 appeared his Absolute Unlawfulness of the Stage Entertainment also his Practical Treatise on Christian Perfection, which confessedly influenced John and Charles Wesley, both of whom afterwards visited him at Putney. But they were temperamentally out of sympathy with his mysticism, and they parted company with him definitely as time went on. It was in 1740 that Law settled at Kings Cliffe, where, with the aid of Mrs. Hutcheson, widow of a disciple and friend, and Miss Hester Gibbon, he proceeded Editors Note to carry out in downright every-day practice the ideas of the Serious Life. Here the rules were homely, hospitable, austere, and simple and charity to the poor, practices of extreme generosity, kindness to animals, and attention to the smaller virtues, proved the absolute reality of Laws own Call. The life at Kings Cliffe was not unlike that of the household at Little Giddings described in John Inglesant. Law latterly had come much under the influence of Jacob Boehme, but the mystics had profoundly appealed to him from the first. His Way to Divine Knowledge, which was by way of preamble to a new English edition of the works of Boehmc, appeared in 1752. We must not forget Dr. Johnsons tribute to the Serious Call that it was the first occasion of his thinking in earnest of religion after he became capable of rational inquiry. William Law was born in 1686, and died in 1761 at Kings ClifFe. The foll wingis the complete table of his published works -Letters to Bishop of Bangor, 1717-1719 Fable of the Bees, 1724 Unlawfulness of Stage Entertainments, 1726 On Christian Perfection, 1726 A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, etc., 1728 The Case of Reason, or Natural Religion, etc., 1731 On the Lords Supper, 1737 Answer to Dr. Trapps Discourse, 1740 The Spirit of Prayer, 1749 Christian Regeneration, 750 Where shall I go . . . to be in the Truth, letter to a friend, 1750 The Way to Divine Knowledge, 1752 The Spirit of Love, 1752 Confutation of Warburtons Defence of Christianity, 1757 Of Justification by Faith and Works, 1760 Letters on Important Subjects, and on Several Occasions, 1760 Address to the Clergy, 1761 Letters to a Lady inclined to enter the Church of Rome 1731-z, 1779 Collected IVorks, g vols., 1762. A SERIOUS CALL TO A DEVOUT AND HOLY LIFE CHAPTER I Concerning the nature and extent of Christiandevotion. DEVOTIO i N s neither private nor public prayer but prayers, whether private or public, are particular parts or instances of devotion. Devotion signifies a life given, or devoted, to God...