France, against the desire of his father: He is my father, (said he,) and he must be obeyed. All the virtues harmonize, and are connected with one another this firm and resolute spirit in the prosecution of duty, was united with great sympathy and compassion towards persons in affliction and distress. They were consoled by his tenderness, assisted by his advice, and occasionally relieved by his bounty. His spiri tual discernment and religious experience, directed by that Divine influence which he valued above all things, eminently qualified him to instruct the ignorant, to reprove the irreligious, to strengthen the feeble minded, and to animate the advanced Christian to still greater degrees of virtue and holiness.

In private life, he was equally amiable. His conversation was cheerful, guarded, and instructive. He was a dutiful son, an affectionate and faithful husband, a tender and careful father, a kind and considerate master.-Without exaggeration, it may be said, that piety and

virtue were recommended by his example; and that, though the period of his life was short, he had, by the aid of Divine grace, most wisely and happily improved it. He lived long enough to manifest, in an eminent degree, the temper and conduct of a Christian, and the virtues and qualifications of a true minister of the Gospel.

PART II.

His writings-the time and motives of their publi cation-and a brief description of their contents.

ROBERT BARCLAY's first appearance as an au

of his year

age.

The

thor, was about the 22d work bears the following title: Truth cleared

' of calumnies: wherein a book entitled "A

dialogue between a Quaker and a stable "Christian" (printed at Aberdeen, and, upon good ground, judged to be writ by William Mitchell, a preacher near it) is examined, and the disingenuity of the author in his representing the Quakers is discovered; their case truly stated, cleared, demonstrated, and the

..

objections of their opposers answered, according to truth, scripture, and right reason.' The title page bespeaks the intention of the work; and it may be only necessary to add, that the

dialogue to which it is an answer, seems to have 'been the result of a controversy that had long been maintained between the friends in Aberdeen, and some of the clergy; the latter having endeavoured to represent them as holding doctrines injurious to religion. The reader may find in Barclay's Truth cleared of Calum'nies,' some of those leading points of the doctrine of Friends, handled in a concise manner, which are more diffusely treated in some of his subsequent works. To this book was added, in the same year, a postscript, entitled

Some things of weighty concernment, pro'posed in meekness and love, by way of que"ries to the serious consideration of the inhabitants of Aberdeen; which may also be of use to such as are of the same mind with them elsewhere in this nation.' The ques tions are twenty in number. Some of them pointedly relate to the controversy on foot; others are of a more general nature; and all

are worth the perusal of such as engage in religious disputes.

Wm. Mitchell, the supposed author of the anonymous Dialogue,' having thought fit to reply to our author's Truth cleared from Calumnies,' gave him occasion to publish in 1672* his piece called William Mitchell Unmasked or the staggering instability of the pretended stable Christian discovered; his omissions observed, and weakness unveiled, ' in his late faint and feeble animadversions, by 'way of reply to a book entitled "Truth "cleared of Calumnies;" wherein the integrity ' of the Quakers' doctrine is the second time 'justified and cleared from the reiterated cla6 morous, but causeless calumnies of this cavil'ling catechist.' From such a title, a closer conflict might be expected; and this we find was the case. William Penn in his preface to Barclay's works, speaking of this book, observes`

*At the age of 24.

F