the room, yet, round about her own station, she had cast a shadow and a cloud, and she shined to every body but herself."

By all who knew her, our departed friend was considered to be a bright example of the power of religion, and she exhibited, in no common degree, its tendency to improve and elevate the whole character, exalting the intellect, purifying the taste, giving a sacred and holy direction to all the active powers, and enabling her to endure protracted sufferings, as seeing him who is invisible. We all know that eminent excellence is unattainable, in any department, without a full dedication of mind to the pursuit in question. The experience of the Christian church presents no exception to this general rule. They who have been signalized for their attainments in the holiness and happiness of the Christian life, have usually, under the influences of Divine grace, been stirred up to make the care of the soul the prize of their high calling, the object of supreme concern. They have sought for this wisdom as for silver, and lifted up their voice for understanding, searching after it as miners dig for gold, or as those who would ransack the monuments of antiquity, or penetrate the recesses of the sepulchre, to possess themselves of hidden treasure.*

Thus anxiously did the subject of this memoir give herself to the word of God and to prayer, sedulously aiming to repress the tendencies of evil, and to cherish that which was good, opening her mind to the influence of the kind and generous affections, and stedfastly opposing those of a contrary character. Earnestly attached to the distinguishing doctrines of the Gospel, in their fulness, their freeness, and their consolatory influence as centering her hope in Christ alone, she was no less solicitous to exemplify their practical and holy influence. As Christ died for sin, she was anxious to die to it, and to have her life hid with Christ in God. Her various manuscripts attest her solicitude to prosecute, with undeviating assiduity, the great ends of the Christian calling. Her interleaved Bible, containing remarks of her own upon different passages, with criticisms from the writings of standard divines; her books of extracts from

• Prov, ii. 1-6,

various authors, upon widely different subjects, but principally religious, interspersed with her own observations; her readiness to seize opportunities for instructive and religious conversation; her love to the publie means of grace; and her steady attention to private religious duties, mark the habits of a Christian on the wing for heaven, and desirous, before her translation, to have this testimony that she pleased God. She had even begun the study of Greek, with a view to employ the long hours during which she was mostly a prisoner to the sofa, in contemplating the pure word of God as received from its original fountain.

All this, let it be recollected, was done, or attempted, in the midst of bodily pains and sufferings, arising from a complication of disorders, which would have paralyzed an ordinary mind, and furnished a temptation to indolence, and, perhaps, an apology for it, which few persons less active or less conscientious than herself would have been able to resist or decline. The following melancholy record, found in the last leaf of her Diary, originally written in pencil, disclosing the manner in which the greater part of two years was spent. when she was little more than thirty years of age, will illustrate what we mean. To us it is very affecting, like the faint memorials traced by the trembling hand of a prisoner upon the walls of his cell, to indicate the chief eras of his captivity; and, to those who know what bodily infirmity and suffering mean, will require no comment.

"March 10, 1820, took to my bed. May 3, Mr. Moody ( a medical gentleman) came from Bath. June 6, lay first on the plane. May 29, 1821, Dr. Gaitskell came. August 23, stood a minute, with assistance. September 8, walked with a stick and arm from the bed to the chair. September 11, dressed loosely for the first time; walked into the kitchen. September 23, walked to the Dove-vard door. September 26, removed the plane. March 13, 1822, went to Bath. June, returned."

But however great her sufferings, she repined not. The following extract, written on the twelfth anniversary of her marriage, shows how devoutly she referred to the wisdom of God in the appointment of her trials, and his mercy in the mitigation of them.

"When will these painful moments cease? when shall I live? Say, O my God, peace, be still. The elements are most tempestuous-deep calleth unto deep. Thy waves and billows are gone over me. Oh, God! dispel this gloom. Convince me of the sin even of a momentary murmuring. Have I not seen enough? Should not past days convince me that thou hast power to bring again from the very depths? What!-though this feeble frame, tottering, and even sinking, forbidding my temporal enjoyment, leaves the enemy of souls room to east his darts-shall I despair of deliverance if I ask it? I may, for a season, be in heaviness

But rise, my soul, and stretch thy wing, Thy better portion trace. Here is no continuance; by to-morrow's setting sun I may be happy-happy in God. Why, then, sorrow? a day will come when I know that I shall see the mercy of this affliction. God cannot err; he doth all things well; and though heaviness may endure for a night, he hath tenderly promised joy in the morning: like as a father pitieth his children (how infinitely above all earthly parent's pity), so the Lord pitieth them that fear him; he knoweth our frame, and remembereth that we are but dust. Thanks to his name, that while I write I feel the load departing, the shadows disperse, and I am once more resigned. Oh what melancholy hours! how tedious! these are not those hours that fly, but their every moment lingers as the dew-drop for the sunbeam. May they usher in a brighter day, in which my soul, divested of these worldly harpies, may live alone to God.

"Evening. This day recalls many a pleasing and many a painful thought: twelve years are passed since I became the wife of the tenderest of husbands; for on that day which united us in the tenderest of bands-we did not think of the coming sorrows, our hearts were light-the sun shone splendidly, and we dreamed not of a storm: what would have been my feelings had I thought of the anxious years I was about to inflict on the dear object of my warmest regard. How wise is a concealed futurity! We have not our days of ease embittered by the approach of pain either mental or corporeal-'Tis wisdom all.'"

With the hope of allaying her disorders, we find her, under medical di

rection, visiting Cheltenham in 1819; at Bath in the years 1822 and 1823; at Cirencester, on a visit to her mother, in November, 1823; and at the Isle of Wight in May, 1824. From the lastmentioned date to her decease she was principally confined to her own chamber. During her visits at Bath, whilst under the care of Dr. Gaitskell, she availed herself of all opportunities in her power, though these were not numerous, of hearing Mr. Jay; and has left her recorded testimony, as numerous sufferers besides have done, to the pleasure and advantage with which she listened to the faithful and consoling ministrations of that eminent divine.

One great evidence of personal piety is found in active concern to bring others to the knowledge of the truth, and especially those who come more immediately under the sphere of our influence. We may suspect the religion that terminates wholly in self, or which is so narrow and contracted that the circumference seems to touch the centre. Religion may be often assumed where it is not; it can scarcely be hidden, for any great length of time, where it actually is. "The ointment bewrayeth itself" by its own odour. Goodness is, in its very nature, communicative. "The wisdom from above," among its other attributes, "is full of mercy and good fruits." It dissolves the ice-rock of selfishness in the bosom, and causes the winter of the soul to be succeeded by a new and nobler spring. Love to God and love to man, like two kindred flames lighted at the same moment, and supplied from the same source, will always characterize and distinguish those who are born of God. "We cannot but speak of the things we have heard." This indication of the genuineness of her Christian principle shone conspicuously in the character of our departed friend. "Stars teach, as well as shine. A good man seen, though silent, counsel gives." Not that she was obtrusive in her zeal; quite the contrary. "She watched for souls." Her sick room was a school of religious edification to those who could sympathize with her order of feeling. The souls of servants, so inconsistently neglected by many mistresses of families who call themselves Christians, were precious in her estimation, and their morals were kindly, but carefully, watched over. Her pen was employed when her tongue could not speak.

Draughts of letters have been found since her decease, addressed to her servants, to her honoured parents, to her husband, to her neighbours, to her husband's friends, enjoining upon them an attention to the things belonging to their peace. On one occasion she availed herself of the medium of the public press, and, in the columns of the "Bath and Cheltenham Gazette," addressed an able letter (for she had considerable taste in literary composition), under an assumed signature, advocating an attention to the condition and the interests of servants. The most tender allusions are found in her Diary to the state of mind of her mother, who appears to have been mournfully averse from religion, and whom she earnestly implored, but apparently in vain, to seek the blessings of salvation. But the most frequent references are to her husband, expressive of her intense solicitude for his salvation. We envy not those who can read the following touching letter without emotion, written to be delivered to him after her decease, which is here inserted, not without his permission, in the hope that it will prove useful to others.

"MY DEAREST EARTHLY LOVE,—An appellation you have long borne, but which, when these lines shall meet your view, will have been dissolved, and I shall have left you in a world of disappointment and sorrow to prosecute your journey alone. How manifold are the interests which now hang on this thought-now, at the moment of your reading, how changed!!! Will you follow me? Oh, my love, leave all for Christ;-what is a man profited, &c. &c. The thought of a final separation has made me shed many tears, has been, at times, agonizing. This you have known; suffer it not, I entreat you; you cannot know what true happiness means, so far as it can be known, in such a world as this, unless you are a sincere follower of Christ: and would you not possess a blessing, within your reach, so rich and exhaustless? Oh, my dear, my best earthly friend, the sweet kindly thrown into my bitter cup of earthly suffering, the undeviating friend, I charge you, by every tender tie which has bound us on earth, to meet me in heaven. You know the world has many allurements, but they MUST be given up: do it immediately and unreservedly. Let solitude be found rather a recreation; it should be such; it has yielded the sweetest

and most profitable moments which thousands have spent on earth. You may think it unnecessary, since you mix comparatively little with the world, thus to urge solitude upon you; but it is converse with your own heart, and with God, which can alone render it either desirable or profitable; and is the only kind of occasional seclusion from active life which is of vital importance, and which I am anxious to impress on you as imperative. You can now look only on the mortal remains of one whom, for near thirty years, you have not ceased to protect and love. The last look you will take may recall to your mind many of the painful scenes through which we have passed together. Perhaps you may think few have had heavier trials; but endeavour to reckon the mercies which have followed us, the greatest of which has, doubtless, been secured to the now departed spirit by the very painful discipline with which it has been exercised. Oh, my dear love, how often have I sighed and wept at the thought of leaving you these are now for ever past; I shall no more do either on your account; may you now do it yourself, on account of sin; and may weeping and sighing speedily terminate in that settled peace of God which passeth all understanding. And have I bade you a last earthly adieu? Must I no longer be permitted to hold terrestrial converse with so dear an object? It is now over; the word is gone forth; and soon the changed remnant of mortality will be hid from your sight. Will you then forget the anxiety, the care, the love, of your departed wife? No, you have not such a heart. Adieu, then, my dearest earthly friend; remember that my anxiety and care were directed chiefly to your immortal interest. Let us meet again.

"ANN LLOYD."

Of the closing hours of this excellent woman it is sufficient to say that they were in perfect consistency with the tenour of her life, and the uniform character of her religious experience. Her prevailing state of mind, though marked by her characteristic humility, was replete with peace, and hope, and tranquil joy. Some time before her decease, apprehending the hour of departure to be near at hand, she made an effort, at different intervals through the day, to write, in pencil, a letter to her valued friend at Cambridge, taking a last and

affecting farewell, and requesting a reply from him by the next post, though scarcely expecting to live till she should receive it. Her letter most impressively referred to the deep solemnity which pervaded her spirits in the immediate prospect of making the great transition from time to eternity. She seemed absorbed with the thought that one so unworthy should be called to mingle with the sinless intelligences before the throne of God, with prophets, apostles, and martyrs; but, most of all, she was impressed with a sacred and tender awe in the sublime anticipation of standing before the eternal archetype of infinite purity and perfection,-a God of spotless truth and sanctity. Yet this was not the fear that hath torment, but allied in its degree to the emotion of bending and adoring seraphs, who veil their faces with their wings in the presence of the thrice Holy One; for her hope, full of immortality, remained stedfast and unshaken to the last, being founded, as she repeatedly expressed it, on the rock, Christ.

When the actual crisis approached, it was observable that the fear of death, to which, through life, she had been sometimes subject to bondage, having accomplished its destined end, was completely done away, and death came upon her without a cloud, like the bright, calm, majestic sunset of an autumnal day. "At eventide it was light." Some of her latest expressions, rich in sentiment and spirituality, which her friends regretted they did not copy at the time, turned upon the deep sense she enter tained of her own demerit, and her trust in the all-sufficient grace of Christ. "How can I, who am so unworthy, expect to find mercy with him? and yet I can; there is mercy, and mercy for me. Here is firm footing, here is solid rock, and all is sea beside." Awaking up at five in the morning, she asked what time it was, and being told, said, "What, no later? but I shall not die today, for this day will be given me to tell what God has done for me. He has snatched me as a brand from the burning. He has done all things well. It is well for me that I have been afflicted. I can look back upon this bed of suffering in times past, and say, with pleasure too, all my pains are turned to joy, and they have proved good to my soul. And now, also, I can say, that that religion which has supported me in

life supports me in the hour of death. I have had my doubts and I have had my trials, but they are all gone by. I have got beyond the reach of all, and I have a better prospect in view. O, the precious blood of Christ! That blood shall never lose its power till all the ransomed church of God-all, not one lost-shall be saved-for ever saved, 'to sin no more. I want no other foundation. Christ is my only refuge. Did all the world know his goodness, all the world would yield to him the tribute of its love."

Enough may be gathered from these broken and detached observations, imperfectly remembered, to perceive the enviable state of her mind, which rendered her dying chamber a memorable spot to those who entered it, and impressed upon all the connexion which subsists between a life of devotion and a death of peacefulness and triumph. Thus was the prayer, contained in the beautiful lines found in her handwriting, and apparently her own composition (for she sometimes expressed her feelings in harmonious numbers), completely realized:

"Give me that hope which will remain

When the death-pillow bears my head;
When every hope is reft in twain,

And every earthly joy has fled."

Mrs. Lloyd died at Malmsbury, in Wiltshire, May 23, 1834, in the fortyfourth year of her age, having been born at Ross, in Herefordshire, May 7, 1790. Her brother, who died before her, the Rev. Mr. Garlick, succeeded the eminent and excellent Rev. Cornelius Winter, at Painswick, Gloucestershire.

At the request of her husband and friends, her funeral sermon was preached by the Rev. S. Thodey, from Heb. ii. 15. The Rev. John Burder, of Stroud, whose friendship she greatly valued, attended at the funeral, and delivered an impressive address to the mourning survivors in the chamber of death, which is still gratefully remembered.

We have only to regret that, from the necessary limits of our space, it has been impracticable to give longer extracts from her Diary and Letters, which possess excellence of no ordinary kind. This record, however, brief and inadequate as it is, will not have been written in vain, if it tend to endear the name and grace of Christ, and the consolations of his Gospel, to any who are called to follow her in the path of grief

and sadness; and if it prompt to the diligent use of those moral means, so successful in her case, by which a harvest of immortal joy may be reaped from a seed-time of tears. "Wherefore let

them that suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to him, in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator." Cambridge. S. T.

"Ir is said to be the custom, in some nations, to mourn at the birth of a child, because of the anticipated evils which it is destined to endure in this vale of tears. This is, doubtless, to form a false estimate of human life, in which, on the average, pleasure far predominates over pain; and surely the contrary custom, of rejoicing when another rational and immortal creature is brought into existence, is much more justifiable. But I am not certain that the same principle will apply to the birth of a new year. There are so many recollections of past delinquencies and omissions, and of lapses that can never be repaired, to unite with anticipations of the future, so much to regret as well as to fear, that the thoughtless levity with which this first day of another annual cycle is generally ushered in seems to be altogether misplaced. We should certainly do what is at once more reasonable and more edifying, were we to spend the first hours of a new year in solemn meditation, both on the past and on the future.

"But in such an exercise, while there is cause of self-accusation and of sorrow, there is also ground for gratitude, for hope, and for enjoyment. The protecting care of an overruling Providence is a fruitful source of these feelings, whether we regard external Nature, or reflect on our own individual experience of the guidance and protection of a Father's unseen hand. It is to the former of these subjects that the peculiar nature of this work seems at present to call our attention.

"When Nature is in the sleep of winter, all seems dreary, and desolate, and hopeless. Day after day the sun, whose beams had shed light and life over the world, takes a shorter and a lower path in the heavens; his brightness and warmth decrease; chilling blasts sweep the plain; the flowers fade; the leaves fall; the grass no longer springs for the cattle; the sound of music is hushed; the earth becomes rigid; the surface of the waters is converted into crystal; the

snow descends, and covers all with its cold and cheerless mantle.

66

Nature, however, is only in a state of repose. Rest was necessary to recruit her exhausted strength. But, during her repose, the hand of him who 'slumbereth not' has been working in secret. The germs of future plants and flowers have been wonderfully preserved: insects, reptiles, birds, and beasts have all partaken of a Father's care; and his rational creatures have been enabled, by employing the higher powers with which he has gifted them, to provide for the supply of their more numerous necessities and comforts.

"And now a new scene appears. The sun has changed his course, and begins again to take a wider circuit in the heavens. Soon his warmth, and glory, and genial influence will return. Nature will burst anew into life, and beauty, and joy. The husbandman will once more ply his labours, while hope cheers his toil, and

The lark, high pois'd,

Makes heaven's blue concave vocal with his lay; } and, all around, the cattle browse on the tender herbage as it rises, and the bleating lambs play amidst the flocks scattered over the neighbouring hills.

"As the year advances, summer will again begin to smile, and will cast from her green lap a profusion of flowers. The seed thrown into the bosom of the earth will germinate and grow; the tender blade will rise and shoot, sometimes watered by the rain and dew; sometimes cherished by the genial heat of the sun's direct rays; sometimes shaded from his too fervid beams by the gathering clouds, and refreshed by the morning and evening breeze.

"At last comes autumn, crowned with plenty. The orchards teem with golden fruit; the full ears of yellow grain wave in the fields; the busy reaper sings as he toils; the farms are filled with food for man and beast, and the hopes of the husbandman are fulfilled. Amidst a thousand varied and most bountiful preparations for the sustenance of animal