5. And as if all that were not enough, and more than enough, to commend Mr. Prywell to us--to our trust, to our confidence, and to our imitation--his royal certificate continues, 'One that looks into the very bottom of matters, and talks nothing of news, but by very solid arguments.' The very bottom of matters--that is, the very bottom of his own and other men's hearts. Mr. Prywell counts nothing else worth a wise man's looking at. Let fools and children look at the painted and deceitful surface of things, but let men, men of matters, and especially men of divine matters, look only at their own and other men's hearts. The very bottom of all matters is there. All wars, all policies, all debates, all disputes, all good and all evil counsels, all the much weal and all the multitudinous woe of Mansoul--all have their bottom in the heart; in the heart of God, or in the heart of man, or in the heart of the devil. The heart is the root of absolutely every matter to Mr. Prywell. He would not waste one hour of any day, or one watch of any night, on anything else. And it was this that made him both the extraordinarily successful scout he was, and the extraordinarily sober and thoughtful and judicious man he was. O yes, my brethren, the bottom of matters, when you take to it, will work the same change in you. 'Two things,' says one who had long looked at his own matters with Mr. Prywell's eyes--'two things, O Lord, I recognise in myself: nature, which Thou hast made, and sin, which I have added.' My brethren, that recognition, that discovery in yourselves, when it comes to you, will sober you as it has sobered so many men before you: when it comes to you, that is, about yourselves. That discovery made in yourselves will make you deep-thinking men. It will make common men and unlearned men among you to be philosophers and theologians and saints. It will work in you a thoughtfulness, a seriousness, a depth, an awe, a holy fear, and a great desire that will already have made you new creatures. When, in examining yourselves and in characterising yourselves, you come on what some clear- eyed men have come on in themselves, and what one of them has described as 'the diabolical animus of the human mind'--when you make that discovery in yourselves, that will sober you, that will humble you and fill you full of remorse and compunction. And if in God's grace to you, that were to begin to be wrought in you this week, there would be one, at any rate, eating of that bread next Lord's day, and drinking of that cup as God would have it.
6. 'A man that is no tattler, nor raiser of false reports, and that talks nothing of news, but by very solid arguments.' Mr. Prywell was more taken up with his own matters at home, far more than the greatest busybodies are with other men's matters abroad. His name, I fear, will still sound somewhat ill in your ears, but I can assure you all the ill for you lies in the sound. Mr. Prywell would not hurt a hair of your head: the truth is, he does not know whether there is a hair on your head or no. This man's name comes to him and sticks to him, not because he pries into your affairs, for he does not, and never did, but because he is so drawn down into his own. Mr. Prywell has no eye for your windows and he has no ear for your doors. If your servant is a leaky slave, Prywell, of all your neighbours, has no ear for his idle tales. This man is no eavesdropper; your evil secrets have only a sobering and a saddening and a silencing effect upon him. Your house might be full of skeletons for anything he would ever discover or remember. The beam in his own eye is so big that he cannot see past it to speak about your small mote. 'The inward Christian,' says A Kempis, 'preferreth the care of himself before all other cares. He that diligently attendeth to himself can easily keep silence concerning other men. If thou attendest unto God and unto thyself, thou wilt be but little moved with what thou seest abroad.' At the same time, Mr. Prywell was no fool, and no coward, and no hoodwinked witness. He could tell his tale, when it was demanded of him, with such truth, and with such punctuality, and on such ample grounds, that a conviction of the truth instantly fell on all who heard him. 'Sirs,' said those who heard him break silence, 'it is not irrational for us to believe it,' with such solid arguments and with such an absence of mere suspicion and of all idle tales did he speak. On one occasion, on a mere 'inkling,' he woke up the guard; only, it was so true an inkling that it saved the city. But I cannot follow Mr. Prywell any further to-night. How he went up and down Mansoul listening; how he kept his eyes and his ears both shut and open; what splendid services he performed in the progress, and specially toward the end, of the war; how the thanks of the city were voted to him; how he was made Scoutmaster- general for the good of the town of Mansoul, and the great conscience and good fidelity with which he managed that great trust--all that you will read for yourselves under this marginal index, 'The story of Mr. Prywell.'