Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 5.djvu/93



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LTHOUGH it was against my knowledge or advice, that you entered into holy orders, under the present dispositions of mankind toward the church, yet since it is now supposed too late to recede, (at least according to the general practice and opinion) I cannot forbear offering my thoughts to you upon this new condition of life you are engaged in.

I could heartily wish, that the circumstances of your fortune had enabled you to have continued some years longer in the university, at least till you were ten years standing; to have laid in a competent stock of human learning, and some knowledge in divinity, before you attempted to appear in the world: for I cannot but lament the common course which at least nine in ten of those, who enter into the ministry, are obliged to run. When they have Rh