Warm and showery. Exercises as usual. Evening an hour at the Mansion.

I have to record only a repetition of the exercises usual in my Sunday, first with my daughter and then at meeting and at home. The day was rainy so that the attendance was thin. I heard Mr. Lunt preach first from James 5. 11. “Ye have heard of the patience of Job.” This was a discourse written as far as I could judge in consequence of a suggestion of my Wife in conversation the other day, that Job did not deserve his character for patience. He went on to consider the character of Job, his trials, the reproaches of his Wife and reasoning of his friends and finally his own submission, the character of his complaint being rather the anguish of suffering nature than repining or murmurs. He cited as a parallel case, the cry of the Saviour on the Cross which he regarded as quite as valuable a historical trait as any in the Testament.

The afternoon sermon was from that remarkable verse in Genesis. 49. 4. “Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel.” The dying address of Jacob to his first born whose crime had probably been the result of a fluctuating character. Mr. Lunt made it’s application to religion which he affirmed to be unstable when not firmly based upon faith. Both these sermons were very good and deserved a better audience.

I read one by Dr. Chandler from the English Preacher, from Micah 4. 5. “All people will walk, every one in the name of his God.” Upon the natural tendency of man to superstition or the worship of idols. The rain was not constant but so frequent that I only went to my father’s. My mother was unwell upstairs. Spent an hour with her and returned.