Their case is under consideration. It is probable, that when they have been instructed more perfectly into the nature and divine import of gospel ordinances, they will be received to baptism. We cannot say, as is often said on such occasions, that this revival commenced among the professors of religion; or, that there appeared generally a spirit of prayer in the church. Yet there were some who appeared to have the cause of God at heart, and to be "grieved at the afflictions of Joseph.'

Our assembly, though large, has been remarkably still and solemn. No instance of disorder or noise among those under concern of mind has appeared, or of extravagant joy in those who obtain. ed relief. The subjects of the work, in every stage of it, made a very modest, but solemn appearance. They have seldom spoke, except when called upon to relate the exercises of their minds. This they have done very willingly, but in rather a low tone of voice. They have been clearly convinced of We have met, comparatively speak their totally depraved and ruined state; ing, with but little opposition. All, genand their utter inability to help themerally appeared convinced that the selves. It has been very convincing, work was of God. I have not seen one and truly a matter of joy, to hear them instance of irreverent or disrespectful in the most humble and solemn manconduct at any of our meetings, or bap-ner, confess that they had never formtizing seasons. All have appeared friendly and solemn.

We have a very respectable number of singers, mostly young, who have always conducted with much decency and decorum.-The awakening appeared early among them, and they are almost all now members of the church.

We have heard no disputing about the ordinance of baptism; no subject of this work, that I know of, has had any doubts concerning it. The work has visited some families of our Congregational brethren, and the parents have consented with apparent cheerfulness, that their children, who had once been baptized, as they supposed, should be baptized and unite with us: and none have joined any other church.

ed any correct idea of religion, and had no will or agency in the work which was effected in their hearts ;-and then, with souls expanding with gratitude, and countenances beaming with joy, ascribe all the praise to rich and sovereign grace. Many, who have trusted in the Universal and Arminian schemes, have abandoned their errors, and been made to rejoice in that grace which reigns through righteousness unto eternal life.

The work is still progressing-May it spread until the whole earth shall be full of the knowledge of God: So prays your brother, &c.

SOLOMON GOODALE.

Bristol, Dec. 29th, 1817.

Obituary.

MRS. ANN BARNWELL.

THE Summer and Autumn of 1817, will be a memorable date in the his tory of many places in the Southern States. During that period, it will be recollected, that pestilence and death were impressive, and prevailing parts, in the order of every day. In frequent instances the standards of society were demolished by the arm of desolation, and its pillars broken down from the church of God. The dignity and ornament of numerous communities were swept into the dust, whilst the emblems of unavailing sorrow, were assumed.

On no place was the visitation more signal, than on the town of Beaufort, S.C. This town has existed for near a century, and previous to the last afAictive season, had been deemed uncommonly healthy. It was then, how

ever, doomed to suffer under the pressure of a more awful judgment, than its annals had ever witnessed. Death advanced with a persevering step, and seemed determined to exhibit his gloomy features in every house. So general was the calamity, that individuals were engrossed to such an extent by their own solicitudes and miseries, as to forget what was due to others, and therefore the usual offices of sympathy and friendship were in a great degree precluded.

Among those who happily passed from the conflicts of the present state, to the triumphs of realized hope, is to be numbered Mrs. ANN BARNWELL. As she was not among the earliest victims to the prevailing disease, she had an interval of health, during the distress

348

ing period, for the further display of
her exalted benevolence in ministering
to the necessities and afflictions of oth-
ers. After a course of laborious vig-
ilance and anxiety in attending the
sick, and in seizing every occasion to
recommend the consolations of Christ,
she was herself called to her long de
sired reversion. Her loss is felt, and
lamented by a numerous circle of
friends who had long admired the un-
common brilliancy of her Christian
course, and the sublime tendencies of
piety in which she soared towards heav-
en. Enriched with the knowledge of
salvation, and matured in the lively
experiences of a devotional life, she
appeared to all to have gone through
the prescribed limits of her probation,
and to be awaiting, in the quietness of
faith, the rewarding benediction of her
Lord. Her's was the spirit which
rested not upon the mouldering confines
of earth, which could find, in the sound
of worldly joy, no according notes to
the higher melodies of the soul, which
could not be restrained from its holy
aspirations, by the weight of its slug-
gish tenement, nor diverted from its
superior flight, by the fascinations of
secular delight. Her religion was
communion with her God, her life was
the expression of an elevated sense of
his mercy, and her individual acts,
successive exemplifications of a spirit
bowing to heavenly authority. Her
way was marked not by the command-
ing boldness of unexpected elevations,
nor by the stern gloom of distressing
depths, but by that engaging uniformity
which the mind views with steady and
unvarying delight. Her's was the
happy faculty to blend religion, not on-
ly with the great occasions of exist-
ence, but with that minute series of
events, which must fill up the greater
part of every life. Her attainments in
divine knowledge, and her acquaint-
ance with her own heart had furnished
her with an unusual promptitude in
giving instructive solutions for all that
was mysterious and complicated in
the arrangements of Providence. And
whilst spirits with less perceptible tra-
ces, of the divine image, than that
which she bore, would be urged by im-
petuous emotions to the disquietude of
repining grief, she could meet, with the
smile of submission,-events which
were most adverse to favourite antici-
pations. With her it seemed to be an es-
tablished concession, that the sufferings
of time were as much the gift of the
Lord, and the privilege of his people, as
the joys and comforts which they so
readily accepted at his hands. Of
several very trying visitations, the writ-

er of this has known her to speak, not with the indifference of a heart which was at ease, because it had not been lacerated; nor yet in the supineness of a sensibility which was not tortured because it had not bled; but with that interesting grace of enlightened resig nation, which felt whilst it adored.

Mrs. Barnwell was the exemplary Christian. In the mildness of an unassuming splendour, she was conspicuous in rendering the tribute of visible homage to the precepts and injunctions of her heavenly Master. "There is one who adorns the doctrine of God her Saviour," was the concurring testimony of all her acquaintances. Her first care was to understand the will of God, and next to this was her strenuous and persevering activity, in minute, as well as comprehensive compliances. Her devotional bias was to be seen at all times; as well in the numerous circle which her pre-eminent worth had drawn, around her, as in more retired conversations, with a select few. The position which she had taken, was an eminence from which she was unwilling to descend, to hold further intercourse with an unsubstantial scene of empty pleasures. In the light of her example there was a steadiness, which was the evident result of that inward fervour of affection, that gives to the path of the just, a brightness, improving into perfect day. Her works of benevolence were not a few shining marks, placed at distant and solitary intervals in the tenor of her life, but the unbroken lustre of an ascending series, of which heaven was to be the consummation. The readiness and liberality, with which she contributed to pious designs, was frequently proved by the writer of this sketch, who deeply feels, and regrets so great a loss to the church as that occasioned by her death.

If there was any one quality for which Mrs. Barnwell was remarkable, it was that practical, and experimental unction of grace, which gave a most happy sweetness to her general deportment. It is admitted that a constitutional suavity of disposition has often appeared to possess all the evenness and serenity of Christian equanimity.

But it must always be observed, that such dispositions, however delicately wrought, are, both in principle and in practice, different from the temper of one under

divine influence. The latter can assign a reason for all the placid movements of conduct; the foriner has a mildness which is the mere quiescence of nature, and consequently possesses no moral dignity; the one has

a gentleness of spirit, the result of deep and searching convictions of the meanness and depravity of human nature, whilst the other has only that which a happy organization of the intellectual and perceptive faculties may produce. Under the agitations of life, the one is calm, through patience, the other through indifference. That excellency of disposition, for which Mrs. Barnwell was distinguished, should not be regarded as a trivial attainment. It holds an important rank in the list of graces. It is a rare thing to find in the general temper of religious professors, even the essentials of that equanimity, which should be a prominent feature in all. It is more usual to cbserve haste and petulance, under adverse occurrences, instead of quietness and sobriety; to remark the deformity of a ruffled sensibility, instead of the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which in the sight of God is of great price. Of such a disposition, the subject of these observations was an eminent example. In this respect, she long stood as an interesting pattern to those around her. At all times and under all circumstances, she had an identity of character which testified her predominant sense of all the proprieties of the Christian life.

ity." Mrs. Barnwell had a new edition of this work published of late years, and thus made a most acceptable addition to the means of religious improvement among her acquaintances. The spirit of her excellent mother seemed to have rested on her, and she passed through the vale of life to the sixty-third year of her age, in the spirit and exercise of "Living Christianity."

She delighted in frequenting the house of God. The ministration of the word, and the administration of the ordinances, had attractions for her far beyond all things with which this world can address the senses. Those who had the pleasure to address the congregation, of which she was a part, were compelled to remark the profound reverence with which she waited on the Lord. Those sermons which contained the clearest expositions of that doctrine, on which the name of Christ had stamped a peculiar lustre, were obviously the most dear to her. At the same time she was ever ready to receive impressive exhortations to duty from the pulpit, and would not charge a legal spirit upon the preacher. She could well understand that the necessary proportions of the Christian ministry would be destroyed, it doc. trines were insisted on to the neglect of duties, or duties to the neglect of doctrines. The word of Christ was food to her, whether it conveyed the joyful representation of the believer's privi leges, or the authoritative injunctions of her divine Master. Hence she seldom heard sermons with which she was not satisfied, and often heard those with which she was pleased.

For the eight or ten last years of her life, she was a most exemplary member of the Beaufort Baptist church. As she had entered this church from a high sense of duty, it was her constant care to maintain a spirit and conduct suitable to her distinct and open professions. As she had deliberately resolved to die under the name of a Baptist, so her dignified deportment accorded well with that refined and independent persuasion of truth by which genuine Baptists should be gov erned. She could appreciate the truths of the gospel with a discerning sense of their spiritual force. She knew that there was a responsibility upon the station of every individual in a church, and hence was an active observer of every thing which belonged to her sphere. During an interval of the church's being destitute of a pastor, she united with a few pious friends in fix-munity, which saw that a mother in Ising a certain day in every week for rael had left them, and was gone to her fasting and prayer, that God would again give them his word and ordinances, and revive his work among them.

Her father was the Rev. Mr. Hutson, one of the first pastors of the Presbyterian church at Stoney Creek, Prince-William-Parish, S. C. Her mother is well known to the religious world as the subject of that interesting biography, entitled, "Living Christian

The last moments of this distinguished Christian, were such as her previous history would have induced us to anticipate. Her desire to depart and be with Christ, was the obvious and triumphant inclination of her soul. She exulted in the light of that festal morn which was to introduce her spirit to the surprising ecstasies of celestial joy. The visions of final bliss which spread a glow of reposing brightness over her visage, exhibited a striking contrast to the affliction and gloom of that com

rest.

DIED in Haverhill, on the 8th ult. much lamented, the Rev. WILLIAM BATCHELDER, pastor of the Baptist church in that place, aged 50. His remains were interred on the Tuesday following, with every mark of respect. At two o'clock, P. M. the corpse w

Ordinations.

"Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian."

Acts iv. 20. WHAT? but almost convinc'd ! and