whom he examined in three chapters of the Bible, which they had studied during the preceding week. Added to all this, were the morning and evening devotions of the family.

Mr. Hutchinson having established a parochial library, which it is almost superfluous to say consisted of religious and instructive books, attended every Monday evening for one hour, in order to distribute and register the volumes. The succeeding hour he spent in superintending a writing school for poor children. On Tuesday evening he instructed the above-mentioned adults in writing and arithmetic, from half-past seven o'clock till nine. On Wednesday, at the same hours, he attended the young persons at the cotton-factory. Thursday was the lecture evening at the church. On the two remaining days of the week were no regular engagements; except that on the second Friday of the month he attended in the evening to arrange the concerns of an Association instituted for the triple purpose of aiding the funds of the Bible, Church Missionary, and Jewish Societies.

The

sums annually raised under his superintendence were very considerable;-a circumstance the more deserving notice from the fact that they arose chiefly from the small weekly contributions of persons in the lower classes of the com. munity.

Among minor instances of his various endeavours to effect good, may be mentioned his exertions to transfer the monthly meetings of the Friendly Society from the public-house to the school room. In this his success was only temporary, as it was idly pleaded that the sobriety of the regulation prevented the society's increase. He endeavoured also, though but with incomplete success, to abolish the Statute Fair, held for the ostensible purpose of hiring servants, but which only afforded an opportunity for sensuality and turbulence; and solicited, in the first instance personally, and in three succeeding years by letter, about two hundred of the neighbouring gentlemen and principal householders to employ their influence in restraining their dependants from perpetuating the mischief by their presence. His interference with the club and Statutes, which by many may be deemed a mat

This, after about one year's continuance, ceased in the summer of 1817; in consequence of the non-attendance of the subjects of instruction.

ter too insignificant to be inserted in more important details, is here brought forward as an illustration of a principle uniformly recognised by Mr. Hutchinson, that the regulation or abolition of local institutions becomes a powerful auxiliary in the spiritual improvement of a parish. The reformation, or the entire dissolution, of a corrupt institution or custom, was not, indeed, in his view, religion itself; but he was well aware that whatever had even the semblance of good bore a definable relation to the dearest interests of mankind.

Amidst the engagements above enumerated, Mr. Hutchinson redeemed time to write, in the twelve years of his ministry, upwards of one thousand ori-" ginal sermons; and, during the same space, he addressed his own congregation from the pulpit more than fifteen hundred times. Of the general tone of his preaching it is sufficient eulogy to assert, that it harmonized with the spirituality and practical cast of his private and pastoral character. In his sermons, although they were in themselves short, and delivered with many deliberative pauses, there was such variety and minuteness of detail as to make them co-extensive with the whole range of a Christian's duty towards God, his neighbour, and himself. Some departments of his public teaching will doubtless be considered original. He composed, for example, a series of sermons on the martyrs under the Marian persecution. In their history and "victorious agonies" he possessed indeed a certain degree of natural interest, from the circumstance of his being lineally descended, in the maternal line, from John Rogers, Prebendary of St. Paul's; one of the fathers of the English Church, and the protomartyr of those who suffered in Smithfield after the demise of Edward the Sixth. Not that the descendant of this leader of the noble army of the witnesses. of that period, derived from the claims of ancestry a more stedfast attachment to the memory and doctrines of the Reformers than he would otherwise have possessed; but he felt himself, as it were, personally interested, as one of the martyrs' posterity, in the perpetuity of their faith and character.

As to Mr. Hutchinson's manner in the reading-desk and pulpit, he was always earnest and serious; and sometimes impassioned and urgent to a degree which seldom appeared in his manner elsewhere; so that he seemed to reserve

his chief energies for the service of the sanctuary. If he were an enthusiast in any thing, he was so in his admiration of the liturgy; or, it might be more correct to state, that in the act of reading it the fervour of his devotion appeared instantly to kindle, and to glow through out with steady and undiminished ardour. It was observed, however, that at the celebration of the Eucharist his devotional feelings apparently reached their highest elevation: he then seemed to be "nigh spher'd in heaven:" and if we may so speak of a human instrument, he then communicated, to such as were like-minded with himself, earnest of everlasting pleasure.

Mr. Hutchinson visited the sick with persevering punctuality; and maintained, more or less, a pastoral superintendence over a population of thirteen hundred people. Some'deduction must be made from this number, by the consideration of a congregation of Dissenters existing in the parish; the members of which did not, of course, recognise his clerical claims. It is proper to state, in this connection, that although he far surpassed the generality of ecclesiastics in supporting the Established Church, he never watched for opportu nities of skirmishing with Non-conform ists in private; nor did he compromise the dignity of the pulpit by declaiming against their separation. In his opinion, the hours of public instruction were too short and unfrequent to be wasted in controversy; and particularly as the parties were very rarely present to hear themselves refuted. He had higher aims; and was conscious that the previous question should be determined, whether his hearers, of whatever communion, were really members of the Mystical Church. His actual opposition to Dissent manifested itself in endeavours to make the adherents of the National Establishment consistent with their own creed and acts of devotion; -to elevate the mere self-complacent Churchman into that state in which, according to the phraseology of his own service-book, he would be one with Christ, and Christ with him;" being perfectly assured that any union with the Church, short of this, would find and leave men far-oh how far! from the kingdom of God. In reference to this topic, it ought to be added, in justice to the memory of this excellent person, that when, in the earlier part of his residence at Tutbury, he was

tempted, in consequence of the hostile attitude assumed by Dissent, to make reprisals, the temptation was entirely resisted; though sufficiently powerful to disturb the composure of a man who, as the reader will have gathered from preceding notices, was always prepared to take up a strong position on the side of the hierarchy. Mr. Hutchinson was, however, too intimately conversant with the identity of human nature, under all its external varieties, not to be fully aware that men may also be mere, selfcomplacent Dissenters, and as far from the celestial inheritance as their formal brethren in the Establishment which they have deserted; and that many retire in disgust and consternation from the assumed corruptions of the Church, without forsaking themselves — their selfishness, intolerance, vanity, and worldliness of spirit.

Among Mr. Hutchinson's papers were found many memoranda relative to the cases of sick persons, designed, as it would appear, exclusively for his own use. There were also details of personal conferences on religious points with various individuals; and, besides these, some striking examples of the spiritual anatomy of his own heart. It might be calculated by some casnists, that a clergyman thus laborious, indefatigable, and vigilant over himself, must be well satisfied with the vigour and varied extent of his exertions; and that in the event of such endeavours becoming abortive, he would promptly charge the failure upon others. In point of fact, it was far otherwise. This faithful steward was ever dissatisfied with his own fidelity. When he spoke of himself— though this seldom occurred-his language, to such at least as could not sympathize with the religious sensibilities of a Christian, might easily have borne the appearance of affected humiliation. Whatever were the positive success of his ministry, his own expectations of communicating good, and especially when the more vivid impressions of life had passed away, were by no means sanguine. Experience instructed him to be cautious in expecting to gather fruit, even from the most luxuriant blossoms of profession. In several instances he had been bitterly disappointed; and he only followed the natural course of the human mind, if in his latter years he uttered accents of despondency, under circumstances where the same Gospel which discourages the

ardour of inexperience, forbids a surrender to unbelieving and unproductive despair. It is, however, certain, that the general strain of his public teaching, for some months previously to his last illness, was a kind of awful expostulation with his flock on the apparent unprofitableness of the spiritual relation subsisting between them. It was indeed inferred, from some expressions dispersed among his later sermons, that he regarded himself as having finished his commission. Whatever might have been his precise meaning, nothing was ever disclosed, either publicly or in private, beyond general lamentations respecting his having out-lived, in his own estimation, the prospects of usefulness.

His departure was unexpected and sudden, and the immediate effect on his parishioners was peculiarly impressive. Every thing seemed to suffer a pause; and the sensation touched the most insensible hearts. Not a few individuals felt themselves overtaken, as by the judicial displeasure of God; and, imputing the cause of his removal to their own unfruitfulness, acted in the spirit of those who once inquired, Lord, is it I? The external tributes of respect to his memory corresponded to this deepfelt conviction of the loss sustained. It was determined that a general mourning should be observed in the parish for six weeks; that the church should be hung in black at the public expense; that a suspension of business should take place, and the shops be closed, on the morning of his burial; and that the inhabitants generally should follow the funeral procession to the grave. The ceremonies of his interment on the appointed day were conducted with an affecting and unusual solemnity. "Devont men carried him to his burial, and made great lamentation over him." The feelings awakened by the discharge of this final duty were heightened by the circumstance of his remains being deposited in the same chancel, whither but a few years before he had assisted in conveying the only corruptible part of a friend of one spirit, one aim, one hope with himself; whom he had at tended in the last days of his militant state; and with whom, as we believe, he will enjoy the beatific visions of eternity. On the succeeding Sunday a funeral sermon was preached by the

The Rev. Jonathan Stubbs, of Uttoxeter. See the Christ. Observ. for 1810, pp. 796, and 820-826.

Rev. Edward Cooper, Rector of Hamstall-Ridware and of Yoxall,-the common friend of these exemplary men, now united in death. This discourse, distinguished by its author's characteristic seriousness, simplicity, and earnestness for the salvation of mankind, has been since published *, and generally circulated among the persons more inmediately interested in the doctrine, exhortations, and warnings deduced from its subject.

May the writer be permitted to sug. gest, that those among Mr. Hutchinson's survivors who, from whatever cause, have most reason to deplore this separation, should own the new obligation imposed upon them, of following his faith and patience. It is thus that he may yet live, and not in their merely human regrets, which, however "refined from passion's dross," are essentially only the sorrow of the world; but in their earnestly striving, as he strove, to enter in at the strait gate; and to discover and pursue the narrow path along which he marshalled their course to everlasting peace. Then he will neither have lived nor died in vain. If we go to his grave, it will scarcely be to weep there, but to perform an act of willing gratitude to God for having removed for ever his servant from the temptations, disappointments, and pains of mortality; and to breathe a prayer that He would "shortly accomplish the number of his elect, and hasten his kingdom." As far as we are thus familiarized with the hopes of immortality, we are gainers by every event which constrains us to look for our daily felicities beyond the limits of this state of existence; we are enriched by our very losses; we live by the death of our most endeared friends; and extend the communion of saints into the unseen world.

The early, and, as we call it, premature dissolution of such a man doubtless surrounds itself with a certain gloom and mysteriousness, which no sagacity of ours can penetrate; but the hour is hastening onward when the regular con

By Cadell and Davies, price 1s. Mr. Cooper's Sermon appears to consist with the character given of it by tains some particulars of Mr. Hutchinour correspondent in the text. It conson's ministry not to be found in the Memoir. We recommend it to general perusal; and especially to such persons as are professionally interested in

its details.

EDITOR.