THE
SHEEPFOLD AND THE COMMON.
THE
SHEEPFOLD AND THE COMMON:
OR,
WITHIN AND WITHOUT.
VOL. I.
"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me."—John x. 27.
"Them that are without God judgeth."—1 Cor. v. 13.
BLACKIE AND SON:
GLASGOW, EDINBURGH, LONDON, AND NEW YORK.
———
MDCCCLXI.
GLASGOW:
W. G. BLACKIE AND CO., PRINTERS,
VILLAFIELD.
PREFACE.
This Work was originally published, above thirty years ago,under the title of the Evangelical Rambler. It has long beenout of print; and its republication at the present time has beenrecommended, as calculated to assist in arresting the progressof some popular errors and dangerous institutions, and in aidingthe advancement of truth and social happiness. This opinionwas strengthened by a knowledge of the fact, that, accordingto the most accurate calculations, from sixty thousand to ahundred thousand copies of the Work, under its original title,were issued from the English press, whilst in America it obtainedan equally extended circulation; and from the still moreimportant fact of the Author having received, from a largenumber of persons, assurances, both by letter and personalinterviews, of their having derived their first religious impressionsand convictions from perusing its pages. A new andthoroughly-revised Edition is, therefore, now issued, under thetitle of "The Sheepfold and the Common," as being moredescriptive of the aim and intention of the Work than its formername.
The object of the Work is to afford instruction and amusement,conveyed by a simple narration of the events of every-daylife. In constructing his story, the Author has availed[vi]himself occasionally of the conceptions of his fancy, and at othertimes he has crowded into a narrow compass facts and incidentsculled from an extended period of his history; but reality formsthe basis of every narrative and of every scene he has described.He has departed from the