The National Register. — London, England, 1813-07-18 00:00:00

438 I. ~ Ttilt NA THE MINISTERIAL. CHARACTER OF THE LATE REV. WILLIAM HUNTINcTON, S. S. OP NEW PROVIDENCE CHAPEL, GRAY'S-INN-LANE. , 'Tis moral grandeur marl the mighty ; Now little they who think aught great below ! All our ambitious death deti•ats but one, AU Li that it crown•. YouNo*. J JP , IP sa../.. . EWA has :ascended ; hut, were is the Elisha to whom his mantle bas itevolved ? Aithotigh satisfied that he was " beloved of his Ged,' • sent as . 4 api opliet on iwir earth, and ' not without honour,' eveo 'in hiq own country, and in his own house,' WILLIAM HUNTI NG oN does not appear to have found, .amidst the various schools of prophets and during a long We, -one qual6fied to supply his vacated eminence. lie hai ictt flOOne like* •to kr.etbd in his steps. I praised . the dead, saith the Y. , iirle man, which are already dead, #4OIC than the tiring which are gat digit e. Huntington has constituted an era in lhe modern church, notm Wt. *tainting his peculiarities and eccentiicities ; a circumstance tha t would alone render his decease an event not destitute of importance, While together with the names of Whitfield and Wesley, however, the UMW of linutington, althotph, otherwise antagoniit to the lat ter celebrated preacher, seems likely to be commemorated in future times, still, unlike both of those preachers, he, having established no germinating bodies, has died without making any religious provision for the contionance of that congregation whose founder he putably was. Choosing that his " doctrine and reputation should stand and together,"—tleit '' it never " shonla " he the Coal lie:aver and Co." t —isolated in our world of profession, through the whole of his life, he has, finally, left his flock as sheep having no shepherd. With hint, therefore, all dies. Cease from man, whose breath is in his nogrils ; for wherein is he to be accounted fill WILLIAM HUNTINGTON, S.S. (whose family-name was origi nally- Hunt :), %vas born iu the Will of Kent, about the year 1733. His parenti4e most have been miserably abject, since, says he, I was eery fond of feeding my little ones, when I had wherewiffai to teed them ; beeaiu'e Pk new how much I had suffered when voeng, through my parents' poverty." Am.ther of his , tisadvamages he at- tributes to Iris birth place. Being, he adds, " none of the most polite - parts of the world, I retained a good deal of my provincial dn.le et ; and many of my expicssions, to the ears of a grammarian, soundrd very harsh and uncouth." " When I was about scven years of age." says Mr. H." I l!card person say—tha; 60 , .1 took notice of children's sins ! The wonder_ (iii ~ %ot- k ings of my mind, upon these wolds I shall not descant (in ; neither shall I me titiifil the tua::y trials I undcrueti - t a t the b ar a r m y own cow cience, while the impression thielt upon my mmd. I also remember to lime once heard a person say,-that all timings were pos. sibie with God ; which words 1 secretly t: easnred up, rind pondered *Vitle, hereafter, tlw !Rev. Huntington's Epitaph on him sett', dictated by him, a few days prior to his decease, uhenee these exprOAintis ate literally taken. t Dod cation to fly. Bahl; of Faith. References will in fit ire be made to thi4. p.uduction, without troubling the reader with their dc • koot l / 4 -ledgelit. " lii. teal tvirt-e was. Hunt, and not liiintinLrion; but havina the tw o foitinte to find there w•ts an illegniuinte chi ri sworn to . h i m, he . maje ea;a:le trio his [votive Ware, and then 'li g e(' his na me . This mas previously to hi, Clsiou, impressions : yet, let me ask, wilt n the eon , ictinn Of'in wit., hrotiOn home to I.IS heart, wou'd he not 114ve return! crql 011, deceit, it he Larl been a truly converted luau ?"—Cor rispourfccc:' with Onesintits. This attecriore y,l veil•A% . 11 the sole view of bi ,, gropltical illustration, and withcstt the least de•igit to rli , partige the churueter of the I)eivirted Minister of Providence Chapel ; .who, if it be fact, would doubtless Class it ati,ong those " lollies of, iris youth," for one o f winch 4, t u rty puuudi: ut true tiate, " dcAuttuded" of hire. lONA REGISTER. JULY M. in my heart." These sentences, which open his Bank of Faith, not only exhibit the origination of Huntington's religious impressions, bat also ieular views respecting faith, which, e‘in at this early 1 e. o 1, specially included temporal Isle sings : 'cy, says he, " as I had great desire at that time to live in the capa"ity of an errand• bay with all-slain gentleman in the place, (being very pooey brought up, and know i ng much the want of the common Tr cesraries of liti) it c-me into my mind, the, if all things were po sibte with God, it was possible for him to send me to live as a servant hay with Squire Cook, fie ugh, at the same time, he had a boy who I believed was n 1 ell approved•of." His idea of faith was eventually :,Ir.ligthened by his .obtaining tl.e place, contrary to all probability; and thought, after this event, he " was still pursued with deistical principles that God took no notice of onr proceedings." yet, upon tic recovery of his eldest surviving daughter from an almost hopeless state cf illness, some few years after, in answer to his prayers, he was" if fiTtnally convinced that all things were possible with God." After various menial services, and "having wandered about some years in this solitary way, set king rest and finding none," al though favoured with providential 2tupports, from time to time,. in the midst of pleasure pursued in order to stifle the sense of therria Mr. Huntington married; and took ready-fornii-lied /edgings, at Mortlake, in Surrey. Hese "it so happened,* says Mr. H "t: at 1 tell lame, having received a wrench in my loins, which rendered me incapable of labour for many days. Daring this time our n.o ney was ail gone; and we were strangers in the place, having been in it but about half a year. After I began to recover a little, there fell a deep snow on the ground, which prevented me working for many days. Here, Providence suffered us to know what it was to want. We had one child, about 'five or six months old, which was our first-born. It happened one morning early, that my wire asked me for the tinder-box, seemingly in a went fright, (lying out— ' I wonder the poor child has not waked all night.' She then lighted the candle, and took up the child ; -and behold it was dead, and as black as a coal ! Here Providence, nevertheless, appeared again; For, about three or four months before this happened, a gentleman, in whose gardeni at times had wrought, desired sue to look after his horse in the country, while he Was in town, for which I was to have one shilling per week. The vet y day on which the child died, this gentleman came (Town limn London, and I got my money of him, for looking atter the horse, which just served to bury the poor inhint. My lameness, poverty, 'listless of mind, sofkrings of my wiF., loss of my child, sense of God's wrath, were the most coo. pleases! distresses I had ever felt. From this time, spiritual eon. victions began to plough ro sleep in my heart as to make way for the Word of etc' oal Life; which, at length, brought me experimentally to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom lie heath sent." His fire was yet hard. For sonic years before his marriages all his personal effects, we are informed by him, used to he carried in his hand, or over his shoulder, in one or two handkerchiefs; arid even after he Married, for some few years, he used to carry all his goods upon his shoulders, in a large sack. "My dame anti I," says Mr. Huntington, recording these things, " now kept house at a very cheap rate—two shillings and sixpenr-c per week carried us through tolerably well. We soon saved upwards of twenty s hil. ;jogs, with which, on the Saturday night, 1 set eft to Kiogston (lie now fir e d at Ewell) (iron Thames, to get sonic of my clothes out of pawn, leaving money in the hands of my dame to get halt a bivati of barley. It so happened that the apparel which I went to redeem came to so much, with the ioterest, that I had not any money left to bring home. This was agi eat timid to us ; because our poor lit tle girl (his eldest living mw), who had been but lately w emit's!, had nothing to carry her through the week lint bare barley cakes; j and r though we would cat barley, I could not incluse to see her live on that only.. On the Monday following, indeed,.l went to work § I found that the•small pittance of eleven shillings per week (as I paid two shAllings end sixpence for a furnished place) would amount but slowly towards the getting my eiutiteA out of pawn ; whence it came into my mind to search my bible, to gee if aNy instruction fur WU}