knew him deeply deplored. On the following Lord's day, however, though unable to preach in the morning, he would dispense the Lord's supper to his flock. The service was unutterably solemn. He felt himself on the borders of eternity-on the threshold of heaven, and, as he gave to his attached flock the memorials of his Saviour's death, he spoke with that tenderness and pathos, which dissolved his whole church in tears. In the evening he preached his thirty-fifth annual sermon to the young. Nothing could dissuade him from the attempt. He loved the young; and he was anxious that his last appeal on earth should be made to them. "He preached on the hopeful youth falling short of heaven, and then went home to die, breathing out his life in a gentle and peaceful manner, on the 11th of January, 1830, in the sixty-fourth year of his age."-" So gentle was his exit, that not a sigh or struggle informed his surrounding friends when his happy spirit took its flight, and 'the weary wheels of life stood still."'"*

The death of this truly distinguished minister of Christ created a sensation, among all ranks in the town of Mauchester, most creditable to human nature: and made an equally powerful impression in the Metropolis. From the commencement of the London Missionary Society, he had been wont to pay an annual visit to London at the anniversary meetings in May; by which he had become well known to hundreds of devoted Christians, who regarded him with profound veneration, as a humble, devoted, and consistent servant of Christ. It was not a mere act of formal compliment, but a sincere homage to departed worth, when the Directors of the London Missionary Society passed the following resolution:

"With deep and unfeigned regret, the Directors of the London Missionary Society have received the intelligence of the death of the Rev. William Roby, of Manchester, who has been connected with the operations of the Society from the first, as one of its founders, and most zealous supporters; whose personal and ministerial services, both at Manchester and elsewhere, have often conferred the most important benefits on the Society; and from whose church some of its most valued missionaries have gone forth to labour among the heathen. The Directors most sincerely sympathise with the widow of their departed friend, with the bereaved church and congregation, and also with the various religious institutions in the county of Lancaster, which have been deprived of his efficient and influential labours."

Mr. Roby's funeral bore ample testimony to the universal respect and esteem in which he was held. "The procession consisted of about fifty clergymen and gentlemen, all attired in

* Imperial Magazine for February, 1830.

deep mourning, with hatbands and scarfs. Among these were several clergymen of the Established Church, and a great number of Dissenting Ministers, not only of the town and neighbourhood, but from distant parts of the country. The four beadles of Manchester were in attendance, in their official dresses." Dr. Raffles delivered the funeral oration, and was at times so deeply affected, as scarcely to be able to proceed with his address. It was a truly eloquent and pathetic delineation of the exalted worth of the "man of God," over whose mortal remains it was delivered; and betrayed, in every sentence, the profound attachment of the preacher to one whom all loved and admired.

Mr. Roby was a man of rare endowments for the work of God. To piety the most profound, he added soundness of judgment and practical wisdom but seldom to be met with. His counsels were always confided in, as dictated by calm reflection and matured experience. His self-government was so perfect, that through a long career of public usefulness he was never known once to commit himself. Yet he never seemed to know the strong points of his character; and walked in humility and self-diffidence all the days of his life. His friendships were most sincere and devoted, and inspired unusual confidence and love. No man was ever more entirely trusted. Young ministers, in particular, looked to him as the guide of their path. The writer once heard Dr. M'All say, that he owed all his success in life to the tender friendship, and fatherly counsels, of Mr. Roby.

In domestic life, Mr. Roby was pre-eminently happy. United to one who sympathised in all his public labours, but who never interfered with the discharge of them, he found in his home and at his own fire-side, all the solace of domestic love and friendship.

Mr. Roby was an author to some extent, having published no fewer than twenty-three separate pieces, most of them single sermons or pamphlets. His controversial tracts with Socinians, Catholics, Swedenborgians, and other enemies of the pure gospel of Christ, were well written, and eminently useful. But his "Lectures on the principal Evidences, and the several Dispensations, of Revealed Religion, familiarly addressed to young People," may be regarded as the work which will carry down his name to posterity, as a theologian of no mean rank in the age in which he lived.

Dr. Bennett has well said, that "he was a fine specimen of that race which swelled and adorned the ranks of Dissenters during the last period of their history; men who were not descended from the Nonconformists, but called out of the Establishment by the power of Evangelical preaching, which made them first Christians; then, by a slow process, Dissenters; and, at last, successful propagators of dissent, for the sake of its connexion with the salvation of men, and the honour of Christ."

MEMOIR

OF THE LATE

REV. GEORGE LAMBERT.

OF HULL.

WHEN the London Missionary Society was formed, the subject of this memoir, George Lambert, had been for six-and-twenty years the beloved and devoted pastor of a church and congregation, which had been gathered under his own ministry, in the town of Kingston-upon-Hull. Those who enjoyed his ministry had given proof of the profit they derived from it in the works of faith and labours of love by which they were already distinguished. Trained to habits of benevolent exertion, as well as of holy meditation, they were prepared to enter with him into those more enlarged operations for the spread of the gospel, to which clearer views of duty and responsibility were beginning to direct the awakening church. The part which he himself took in the work, according with the devotional and pastoral habits, was rather that of the intercessor with God, and the leader of his own flock into wider fields of contemplation and labour, than of the public or general advocate. So far as the operations of his mind can now be ascertained, on a subject which then appeared to some startling from its novelty, and to others utopian from its difficulties, there was neither excitement, nor doubt and indecision; but the calm dignified movement of one, whose habit it was to advance wherever God opened the way, deeming nothing impossible which had the authority of his command, but the security of his

promise. The equal steps of such an individual are, however, more difficult to trace and describe than is the course of one who is moved by the power of occasional, and sometimes it may be erratic impulses; as the light shining more and more unto the perfect day, furnishes fewer points for observation and remark than does the kindling meteor, and the eccentric comet. It is much to be regretted also, that materials which were once collected for a memoir of Mr. Lambert, and entrusted to one who knew him well, and whose hand could have drawn a full and faithful portrait, have been, by some unaccountable neglect or accident, irrecoverably lost, and a few fragments only remain to be here gathered up and preserved.

Mr. Lambert was born on January 31st, 1741-2, at Chelsea, on the borders of the parish of St. George's, Hanover-square. He was the only child his parents were permitted to rear. His own constitution in early life was feeble, and frequent attacks of disease seem to have produced that kind of thoughtfulness on the solemnities of death and eternity, which disqualifies for the innocent recreations of childhood, and generates a morbid and slavish fear. At nine years of age, when suffering in the smallpox, he distinctly heard the medical attendant pronounce his case to be hopeless, and the conclusion he immediately drew was, that hell would be his portion. On subsequent occasions, when fear drove him to prayer, his mother would endeavour to soothe his mind, not by the communication of gospel truth, but by commending, as though it were meritorious, the fervency he displayed. Indeed, whatever the tenderest affection might prompt in ministering to the wants of a feeble and suffering body, his parents knew not the remedy which the diseases of his mind required; and hence he had to struggle unaided through many difficulties in his early religious exercises. He was left to feel after God in the uncertainty and darkness of a troubled mind, instead of being taken cheerfully by the hand, and led to that Saviour, who says, "Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven."

In the seventeenth year of his age, the mind of Mr. Lambert was more effectually awakened to a concern for the salvation of his soul by the sudden death of a youthful companion. In a brief summary of his early life, written by himself, he thus refers to this event :

"Having been brought very low by a nervous fever, I was ordered by the physician into the country. I gained strength very fast, and was able to return to London in a few weeks. On the Lord's day following my return, I called upon an intimate friendwhen, to my great surprise, I was informed that he had been suddenly removed, and had been buried that day week. This roused my sleeping conscience. I stood amazed at the patience and kindness of God in sparing me. A sense of my ingratitude for his late deliverance, and a solemn view of death, judgment, and eternity, pressed with such weight upon my mind, that night and day I could get no rest. I was even afraid to close my eyes, lest I should wake in everlasting burnings. The sins of my life, and the opportunities I had neglected, were continually in my view, and there was no person that I knew to whom I could open my mind."

How desolate must be the feelings of a heart thus deeply conscious of its maladies, yet compelled to keep the whole burden of its wretchedness within itself! How dark and fearful the region around, when every object receives its form and aspect from the workings of a guilty conscience, and there is no ray of gospel light to direct the weary and solitary mourner to Christ! In this utter destitution of parental, ministerial, and friendly guidance, it is no cause for wonder that Mr. Lambert, in his earnest efforts to find a refuge for shelter and peace, should have taken the wrong path.

"I now resolved," says he, "upon a change of conduct. Duties were followed with the rigid severity of a pharisee. After some time spent in this course, I began to fancy that now I was in the favour of God. No pains were spared to establish a righteousness of my own. I prayed three times a day, read the Whole Duty of Man,' the 'Practice of Piety,' and several books of similar character."

With these dry places, the barren and monotonous walks of formalists and pharisees, the mind of Mr. Lambert, which was thirsting for wells of salvation, soon became dissatisfied. He was led to reflect more closely on his former course, and to reason, that though he might now perform his present duty, yet this rendered no satisfaction for past neglect, and that if former sins were not pardoned, he was still as far from the favour of God as ever. Referring to the exercises of his mind at this period, he relates one incident, which, though trivial in itself, throws a vivid gleam of light on the general state of religion at the time in question, as well as on the pitiable uncertainty of that peace which is built upon a legal basis. He had prepared himself, according to the directions given in the guide he had consulted, for the worthy partaking of the sacrament at church. There was prayer to be mentally repeated before receiving the elements, but, so few were the communicants, that before he had had time for this exercise, the bread was placed in his hand, and involuntarily conveyed to his lips. The order he had purposed in the service was deranged. One