greatest vanity I was preserved from profaneness and the grosser
evils of the world, which rendered me acceptable to persons of the
best note in that country then. I often waited on the Lord Wenman
at his house, Thame Park, about two miles from Crowell, where I
lived; to whose favour I held myself entitled in a twofold respect,
both as my mother was nearly related to his lady, and as he had been
pleased to bestow his name upon me, when he made large promises for
me at the font. He was a person of great honour and virtue, and
always gave me a kind reception at his table, how often soever I
came. And I have cause to think I should have received from this
lord some advantageous preferment in this world, as soon as he had
found me capable of it (though betwixt him and my father there was
not then so good an understanding as might have been wished), had I
not been, in a little time after, called into the service of the
best and highest Lord, and thereby lost the favour of all my
friends, relations, and acquaintance of this world. To the account
of which most happy exchange I hasten, and therefore willingly pass
over many particularities of my youthful life. Yet one passage I am
willing to mention, for the effect it had upon me afterwards, which
was thus.

My father being then in the Commission of the Peace, and going to a
Petty Sessions at Watlington, I waited on him thither. And when we
came near the town, the coachman, seeing a nearer and easier way
(than the common road) through a corn-field, and that it was wide
enough for the wheels to run without damaging the corn, turned down
there; which being observed by a husbandman who was at plough not
far off, he ran to us, and stopping the coach, poured forth a
mouthful of complaints, in none of the best language, for driving
over the corn. My father mildly answered him, "That if there was an