Few men in this generation remember when Mr. C. H.
Spurgeon was not preaching, yet he was only fifty on June 19th ; and, if his gout would leave him alone, might be a leading figure in his community thirty years hence. He began preaching at sixteen, being almost as young as Leo X. when be became a Cardinal. He was congratulated on his birthday by representa- tive members of all Protestant denominations, and many eminent persons, including Mr. Gladstone ; and presented with a purse of £4,500, which, as usual, he immediately distributed for different charitable purposes. In conversation with an inter- viewer, he stated that he had not modified his opinions ; but experience has told on him unconsciously, as it does on other men, and his final remark showed more width than, we fancy, he would have displayed twenty years ago. He said we must "never forget that pure religion before God and the Father is this—to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep ourselves unspotted from the world." That is not pre- cisely Calvinism, Mr. Spurgeon.
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