What is true of the River Nile that its fountain is hid and obscure but its fall or influx into the mid land sea eminently known is applicable to many learned men the places of whose birth generally are either wholly concealed or at the best uncertain, whilst the place of their death is made remarkable. For as few did take notice of their coming out of their attiring house so their well acting upon the stage commanded all eyes to observe their returning thereunto. But this general rule takes not place in the present subject of our pen. Mr Henry Smith was born at Withcock in Leicestershire of gentile extraction which however shall not be insisted on, seeing that he who is rich of himself needs not to borrow any lustre from another, yet were it the more allowable for us to dwell awhile on the honour of his parentage seeing he himself would not sojourn there declining all notice of such accidental advantages.
He was bred in the famous University of Oxford where he was condus before he was promus that is he filled himself so that he might in due time pour out to others. Nor did he proceed to a divine per saltum as so many do nowadays, I mean leaping over all humane arts and sciences, but furnished himself plentifully therewith. On the other side he was none of those who in the university wither on the stalk they grow on and out of idleness, bury their talents in the ground putting them out because they will not put them out that is extinguishing their abilities because they will not employ them. But he was resolved to improve to his utmost in the ministerial calling for the glory of God and the converting of souls. There he triumphed over the temptation wherewith many had been overcome.
Plentiful was his estate for the present and for the future he was heir apparent to a large patrimony. (Sir Roger Smith of Emundsthorpe in the County of Leicester lately deceased was his younger brother). Preaching was presented unto him by some as fit for the refuge of a younger brother not for the choice of an heir and his rich relations might better advantage him in the lucrative profession of the law. But he was so far from falling or stumbling that he did not stop at these carnal considerations but easily trampled on them all. But a greater scruple troubled him as unsatisfied on the point of subscription and the lawfulness of some ceremonies. He was loth to make a rent either in his own conscience or in the church wherefore he resolved on this expedient not to undertake a pastoral charge but contented himself with a lectureship at St Clement's Danes without the Temple bar. It may truly be said of him "He was a peaceable man in Israel" for not withstanding his aforesaid scrupling at conformity and distasting the violent pressing thereof as by some passages in this book will appear he could unite with them in affection from whom he dissented in judgment. He disdained party and invectives, the symptoms of a sick wit, and if he chanced to fall upon a sharp reproof, he wrapped it up in such pleasing expressions that the persons concerned therein had their souls divided betwixt love and anger at the hearing thereof.
William Cecil, Lord Burleigh and Treasurer of England, to whom he dedicated his sermons, very favourably reflected upon him and he was often the screen who saved him from the scorching, interposing his greatnesse betwixt him and the anger of some episcopal officers. And it is an argument to prove the eminency of Mr Smith that so great a statesman as this Lord Treasurer set a character of such peculiar respect on him. Indeed, that lord was as thoroughpaced as any in England for the body of episcopal government but not for the wens thereof when some quiet Nonconformists were prosecuted to persecution by vexatious informers. In which cases, he often endeavoured to qualify the matter and rescued them from their violent adversaries.
To return to Mr Smith, he was commonly called the silver tongued Smith and that was but one metal below Chrysostom himself. His church was so crowded with auditors that persons of good quality brought their own pews with them, I mean their legs, to stand thereupon in the alleys. Their ears did so attend his lips, their hearts on their ears that he held the rudder of their affections in his hand so that he could steer them whither he pleased and he was pleased to steer them only for God's glory and their own good.
Take one instance of many, of the great prevalency he had with his auditory. He preached a Sermon on Sarah's nursing of Isaac and therupon grounded the general doctrine that it was the duty of all mothers to nurse their own children allowing dispensation to such who were unsufficienced by weaknéss, want of milk or any avouchable impediment. He pressed the application without respect of persons high and low, rich and poor, one with another taxing them for pride or laziness or both who would not do that office to the fruit of their own womb.
It is almost incredible how many persons of honour and worship, ladies and great gentlewomen, with whom his congregation was constantly crowded, were affected herewith so that I have been informed from such whose credit I count it a sin to suspect that they presently remanded their children from the vicinage round about London and endeavoured to discharge the second moiety of a mother and to nurse them whom they had brought into the world. I confess some conceived Mr Smith, because a bachelor, an incompetent judge hereof as unacquainted with feminine infirmities so that as St Augustine on another account was called durus pater infantum so Mr Smith might be termed durus doctor matrum. However, if all things be impartially considered, no just cause of exception can be found either with the doctrine or application.
The words of the wise, saith Solomon, are as nails fastened in a sure place and certainly this Smith had as great dexterity as any in fastening them in the judgments of his hearers by his solid reasons, in their fancies by his proper similitudes, in their memories by his orderly method and in their consciences by his home application.
Some fifteen years since I consulted the Jesses, I mean such who were counted old men in the parish of St Clement's Danes but could recover very little from them either of the time or the manner of his death save that they conceived it to be of consumption. I perused also the church register and found it silent concerning the date of his death but by exactest proportion of the time, his death may be conjectured to have been about the year 1600.
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