第42章 CURATE(1)

By Mr.Hare's account,no priest of any Church could more fervently address himself to his functions than Sterling now did.He went about among the poor,the ignorant,and those that had need of help;zealously forwarded schools and beneficences;strove,with his whole might,to instruct and aid whosoever suffered consciously in body,or still worse unconsciously in mind.He had charged himself to make the Apostle Paul his model;the perils and voyagings and ultimate martyrdom of Christian Paul,in those old ages,on the great scale,were to be translated into detail,and become the practical emblem of Christian Sterling on the coast of Sussex in this new age."It would be no longer from Jerusalem to Damascus,"writes Sterling,"to Arabia,to Derbe,Lystra,Ephesus,that he would travel:but each house of his appointed Parish would be to him what each of those great cities was,--a place where he would bend his whole being,and spend his heart for the conversion,purification,elevation of those under his influence.The whole man would be forever at work for this purpose;head,heart,knowledge,time,body,possessions,all would be directed to this end."A high enough model set before one:--how to be realized!--Sterling hoped to realize it,to struggle towards realizing it,in some small degree.This is Mr.Hare's report of him:--"He was continually devising some fresh scheme for improving the condition of the Parish.His aim was to awaken the minds of the people,to arouse their conscience,to call forth their sense of moral responsibility,to make them feel their own sinfulness,their need of redemption,and thus lead them to a recognition of the Divine Love by which that redemption is offered to us.In visiting them he was diligent in all weathers,to the risk of his own health,which was greatly impaired thereby;and his gentleness and considerate care for the sick won their affection;so that,though his stay was very short,his name is still,after a dozen years,cherished by many."How beautiful would Sterling be in all this;rushing forward like a host towards victory;playing and pulsing like sunshine or soft lightning;busy at all hours to perform his part in abundant and superabundant measure!"Of that which it was to me personally,"continues Mr.Hare,"to have such a fellow-laborer,to live constantly in the freest communion with such a friend,I cannot speak.He came to me at a time of heavy affliction,just after I had heard that the Brother,who had been the sharer of all my thoughts and feelings from childhood,had bid farewell to his earthly life at Rome;and thus he seemed given to me to make up in some sort for him whom I had lost.