In the private duties of his office, he was as exemplary for his diligence. He spent much time in visiting the sick, and conversing with them about eternal things. To the poor he was a compassionate friend; and as God had given him abundance, he was exceedingly liberal in supplying their temporal wants. In every relation, domestic, civil, and sacred, he shone as an eminent pattern of Christian virtue; not an individual in Exeter was more respected for excellence of character and conduct.

Full fifty years did George Trosse labour in the harvest of our Lord Jesus Christ; and all that time was as eminent for piety and zeal, as he had been before for impiety and excess. At last his merciful dismission into the joy of his Lord arrived on the eleventh of January, in the year one thousand seven hundred and thirteen. It was the Lord's-day; he had been preaching Christ's Gospel, and on his way home was seized with a fainting fit. When he was a little recovered, a friend deeply affected with his situation, exclaimed, "why did you preach when you was so ill?" "A minister," he replied, "should die preaching." When they had carried him to his house, he put himself into a posture for prayer, and expired. He was in the eighty-second year of his age.

He published but little. The principal fruit of his studies was reaped by his people in his discourses from the pulpit; and the result of his labours will be seen in the precious souls saved by his ministry, which shall be his joy and crown of rejoicing in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ.

JOSEPH STENNETT.

This excellent man was born at Albington, in the year one thousand six hundred and sixty-three. Edward Stennett his father, by espousing the cause of parliament in the civil wars, incurred the severe displeasure of his relations; and by his principles as a dissenter, afterwards exposed himself to many and painful sufferings. He was a man of eminent piety, and a zealous minister of Christ; and he practised as a physician for the support of his numerous family.

His son Joseph, trained up from childhood in the ways of religion, was early brought to the saving knowledge of the truth. The following evidence of this was found among his papers after his death: "0 God of my salvation, how abundant was thy goodness! O invaluable mercy! Thou didst season my tender years with a religious education, so that I sucked in the rudiments of Christianity as it were with my mother's milk, by the gracious admonitions and holy discipline of my godly parents. This was an antidote sent from heaven against the corroding poison of sin: this made conscience speak, while my childish tongue could but stammer: this is a branch of thy divine bounty and goodness, for which my soul shall for ever bless thee."

Having gone through a course of classical education at Wallingford, he applied himself to the French and Italian tongues, became a critic in the Hebrew, studied the liberal sciences, and made considerable progress in philosophy. Quitting the country for London, in the year one thousand six hundred and eighty-five, he employed himself for five years in the

education of youth: and, constantly eager in the pursuit of useful knowledge, that he might understand men as well as books, he carefully cultivated the acquaintance of persons eminent for wisdom and goodness.

By the solicitations of his friends, he was at last prevailed on to appear in the pulpit; and preaching a lecture occasionally at a meeting-house in Devonshiresquare, he was taken notice of by a congregation of seventh-day baptists, who met there for worship, but afterwards removed to Pinner's-hall. They had some time before lost their valuable pastor, Francis Bampfield, who ended his days in Newgate for the testimony of Jesus; and considering Mr. Stennett as a suitable successor, they requested him to undertake the pastoral charge of their little church. Being of the same sentiments as to the duty of observing the seventh day of the week as the Christian Sabbath, he accepted their invitation, and was ordained in the year one thousand six hundred and ninety one. Though their outward circumstances were such, that they could not do much towards the support of his family, he could never be induced to leave them; but continued their faithful and affectionate pastor to the day of his death.

Besides his labours among his own people, he usually preached to other congregations on the first day of the week. His biographer records the following circumstance as to his manner: "it was his practice to carry into the pulpit some short hints only, consisting of the heads of his discourse, and references to texts of Scripture. He committed things only and not words to memory: those were abundantly supplied in the course of speaking."

His eminent worth was noticed by the public; and he had considerable offices of preferment in the established church. But to him conformity had no charms: "I bless God," said he to a friend, “I can hardly allow these things to be called temptations; because I never felt in my mind the least disposition. to enter into any treaty with them."

The

In the year one thousand seven hundred and thirty, his health visibly declined; and afflictions crowded thick upon him, and wore down his earthly frame which was at best delicate and feeble. physicians recommended the air of the country, and it was tried, but without success. Feeling the day of his departure draw near, he called' his children around him, and gave them those last counsels which might be expected from the departing breath of so wise and good a man. His latter end was peace, and his hopes of future blessedness, lively and firm. To a friend, who made enquiry as to the state of his mind under the pressure of bodily distress, he answered, "I rejoice in the God of my salvation, who is my Strength and my God." He departed this life, the eleventh of July, in the year one thousand seven hundred and thirteen, in the forty-ninth year of his age.

Mr. Stennett displayed a taste for poetry, of which his metrical version of Solomon's Song, and his sacramental hymns furnish no unfavourable specimen. His friend, Mr. Tate, the poet laureat, bore this honourable testimony: "Mr. Stennett has the happiness to be a good poet, without being a slave to the muses." His thanksgiving sermon, for the victory at Blenheim, was so much relished by queen Anne, that she ordered him a gratuity out of the

privy purse, with thanks for the pleasure she had received in the perusal.

Like many of his dissenting brethren, he was a strenuous friend of civil liberty; and no wonder that those, who had bitterly felt in dungeons, and loss of goods, the cruel lash of despotism, were taught to prize the sweets of freedom, and to regard it as one of the first of earthly blessings. They had learnt its value from its loss in the reigns of the Stewarts; and they had learnt it still more in William's reign, from the enjoyment of its numerous privileges both in civil and in sacred life, both in the house of God, and in their own.

By his talents, Mr. Stennett rendered himself exceedingly useful to his denomination, and was very highly respected by them. In their public concerns, he was most commonly called to take the lead. The address, which the baptist ministers delivered as a body, congratulating king William on his preservation from the assassination plot, was drawn up and presented by him.

Though a peaceable man, he was engaged in disputes with the quakers, the antitrinitarians, and the nonjurors. He had likewise a controversy with Mr. Rassen on baptism. After his death, his works were collected, and published in five octavo volumes, to which is prefixed an account of his life.

As a mark of the esteem in which he was held by

The advocate for arbitrary power, we will engage to free from his mania, in the space in which the sun runs his annual course. Confinement in a damp and gloomy dungeon, not unfrequent scourgings, and repeated and heavy fines, will, in less than a twelvemonth, complete the cure. He will come out the friend of liberty and of mankind.