he received an impression in his fourth year, from the death of his younger brother, an infant of a year old, which was never effaced. He had loved his little brother as ardently as his tender years would permit; and well knowing the strength of his affection, his parents had concealed the fact of the child's death, for a season, fearing the effect it might have upon his sensitive mind. The concealment, however, could not long be practised upon such a mind; he insisted on knowing what had become of his brother; and when told that he was dead, his heart was overwhelmed with anguish; he retired into a solitary place; wept in the bitterness of grief; pondered the mighty thought of the immortality of the soul; and anxiously longed to know if his beloved brother had gone to be happy in an invisible state. The touching imagery of this scene was never effaced from the recollection of young Edward; it was a grand epoch in his spiritual history, by which his mind was ever afterward disposed to receive impressions of unseen and eternal realities. His tender childhood appears to have been blameless in a degree very uncommon in the early development of our fallen nature. So little was conscience burdened with the memorial of juvenile delinquencies, that only two such instances stood recorded on its faithful tablet; and so faithful was its witness on the side of God, that they were dwelt upon with as much frequency, and with as much emotion, as was the death of his little brother. The offences committed by him, consisted in his taking the name of God in vain; and the terror of mind awakened at the remembrance of his guilt was, to use his own vivid description, as if "a dagger had pierced his heart.” At the age of five he was sent to a neighbouring school, where he remained for four years, spending only his Sabbaths at home. His teacher was an elderly female, who ranked so high in her calling, that she had under her care the grandchildren of those whom she had taught the magic power of their A B C. "In this school," said her distinguished pupil, "a scrupulous attention was paid by our aged governess, to a set of prayers for night and morning, the Church Catechism, and Collects for the Sundays and holy-days, which made some good impressions on my mind. When conscious of having offended God in the day, my customary atonement was, to repeat a larger portion of my prayers at night, from the stores of memory, and, through fear of mistake in the recital, to go over the same things two or three times, especially for some greater offence." In 1759, Mr. Williams was removed to another school, where he might acquire a knowledge of writing and arithmetic. Here |