Excerpt from The Life of the Rev. Thomas Scott, D.D., Rector of Aston Sandford, Bucks: Including a Narrative Drawn Up by Himself, and Copious Extracts of His Letters Others may view, not without jealousy, a person who, by his own showing, was once "far off" from God and from goodness, represented as eminently brought nigh; distinguished by the divine blessing, and by great usefulness in the church of Christ. The real and well informed Christian, however, will regard the mighty change with far other feelings: and to all descriptions of persons his family and friends would say, If we glory in our revered relative, it is not in what he was by nature, but in what he became by divine grace: or, to express the sentiment in terms which would have been still more consonant to his own principles and feelings, We "glorify God in him." Some may perhaps object to the full disclosure that is made of those circumstances of his history and character, which always humbled him in his own sight, and which may tend to abase him in the view of worldly or pharisaical persons. There remained however not much of this nature to be added to the confessions of The Force of Truth: his supplemental narrative, included in this volume, was all written in the same unreserved style: and it appeared to me that it would be unworthy of his biographer, as it would certainly have been contrary to his own wishes, to attempt any suppression of what neither could nor needed to be concealed. It is more than possible that the publication of so detailed a story, concerning a clergyman of humble station, may appear to many a proceeding altogether calling for - perhaps scarcely admitting of - apology. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.