We add Thomas Brooks to the ' Divines ' of the ' Puritan Period ' with no fear of contradiction when we claim for him a foremost place among the greatest of the later Puritans ; meaning thereby those who were m-cluded, and, as Thomas Fuller would have said, excluded also, by the 'Ejectment' of 1662. With the exception of John Bunyan, and perhaps, in separate minor works, of Richard Baxter, no writer of the 17th century has been so permanently and widely and variously represented in the living Literature of the 18th and 19th as the author of ' Precious Remedies against Satan's Devices/ ' The Mute Christian under the Smarting Rod/ 'Apples of Gold,' and 'Heaven on Earth:' but, unfortunately, he has been mainly represented and known by these four treatises, whereas his other and numerous writings have the same merits — if the word be not chill and poor — with these ; all passed through frequent editions in the outset, and have popularly gone out of sight, not as less weighty and vital, but capriciously and arbitrarily and mistakenly.
One immense advantage of Brooks over Sibbes is, that the whole of his many volumes, lesser and larger, were published by himself. He left nothing behind him to be thrust on the world as 'Remains' or postlmmous — a healthy self-restraint and wisdom which it had been well if others, even of our most illustrious Divines, ancient and modern, had exercised.
Tn submitting this first collective edition of the ' Complete Works' of Brooks to the public, I beg attention to these six things : —
(a.) Our text, in every separate treatise and tractate, is based upon the last ' revised and corrected' impression thereof that joassed under the eye of the author : an explanatory ' Note ' being prefixed to each, giving all needful information on the different editions. It may be mentioned that his collection of the original and early editions has cost the Editor fully £35, whereas the reprint will be furnished to the public for 25s.
(/3.) The whole is incorrupt, unmutilated, unchanged. Of this, John Foster the ' Essayist' may be allowed to speak. Writing to a friend for the works of Howe, and preferring the old edition, he charac- teristically observes : ' In the new one, I recollect the Editor engaged, as a favour to the readers, to make — and I suppose he did make — some little tinkerings of the long, involved, and grotesquely constructed sen- tences : a thing sufficiently wanted, I allow, for it is quite wonderful that such a man as Howe should have bungled so sadly in the manner of sentence-making. But, nevertheless, I should prefer having his paragraphs just as he had made them, to any Editor's rectification of them : a preference, however, which cannot be supposed to be felt by any gentleman of the literary form of Burder and Hughes, the Editors
and Correctors of Henry's Exposition.'1 We offer no ' tinkerings/ no 'rectifications/ no 'corrections,' no 'improvements.' Even in bringing the old arbitrary orthography into accord with modern usage, we have duly noted all peculiar or transitive forms of words. So that Thomas Brooks is here given genuinely, as he himself published his writings. His style as a whole, however, is accurate, and compact, and modern- like, save in occasional quaintnesses and outspokenness.
(y.) The whole of the Bible-texts and references have been carefully verified. Only those who have consulted the original editions are able to appreciate the toil involved in this: eighty percent, at least being in- accurate. The important classical and patristic citations and allusions have similarly been verified and supplemented. This does not apply to the well-nigh innumerable anonymous ' anecdotes/ ' sayings,' ' read- ings ;' though, even of those, a large proportion will be found to be traced and confirmed in our footnotes. Trite classical and other facts and names we have left as they occur.
(d.) In response to the appeal of the lamented Herbert Coleridge and the ' Philological Society,' we have marked all Shakespearian and other noticeable words and phrases. As in Sibbes, a Glossary will furnish a Reference-Index thereto.
(«.) For all foot-notes bearing my own initial, G., I am responsible : the rest belong to Brooks himself ; and I take this opportunity of calling special attention to them. They consist, for the larger part, of the margin-notes of the original and early editions, and will always repay perusal. Very often it will be found that, by his multifarious reading, he gives point to some argument or appeal, or illustration, by a racy saying of Luther, or a felicitous bit from a Father, or some apt anecdote, or quaint, however unreal, opinion of old science, or a flash of wit or play upon a word. So that he will be a loser who passes by these notes, which are as the dust-of-gold of a rich and brilliant mind. Brooks himself attached no little importance to them. Thus, in his ' Word to the Reader,' prefixed to ' Precious Remedies,' he observes : ' If in thy reading thou wilt cast a serious eye upon the margin, thou wilt find many sweet and precious notes that will oftentimes give light to the things thou readest, and pay thee for thy pains with much comfort and profit/ (Our reprint, page 9.)
It only remains that I notice the one representative of an ' edition ' of the Works of Brooks, and shew, by a recent reprint of a single book, how unworthily he has hitherto been edited.
(1.) The Rev. Charles Bradley, M.A., of Glasbury, Brecon, in 1824, issued two volumes (cr. 8vo.) containing, (1.) 'The Unsearchable Riches of Christ ;' (2.) ' Remedies against Satan's Devices ' [the golden Bible-
1 Letter to the Rev. Joseph Hughes, in Foster's 'Life and Correspondence,' Vol. i. pp. 420, 421. (Ed. 1852.)
word ' precious ' left out !] ; (3.) ' A Treatise on Assurance ' [i. e. Heaven on Earth] ; (4.) • The Mute Christian under the Smarting Rod;' (5.) 'Apples of Gold/
This has long been out of print, so that we do no prejudice to exist- ing interests when we characterise it as worthless, by its modernizations, and errors of omission and commission, beyond reckoning. A com- parison of any single page with our text will reveal such tampering with what Brooks wrote as is most discreditable and vitiatory. It is sadly-amusive to observe the thin things that are deemed ' improve- ments ' on our robust, outspoken Puritan.