Introduction

Biography

In ear­ly life he re­ceived deep re­li­gious im­pres­sions from the teach­ings of a pi­ous mo­ther, yet he would not al­low them to in­flu­ence his life. On the con­tra­ry, he harden­ed his heart against them.

From his ear­ly years, work­ing at a forge, he passed his lei­sure hour in the so­cie­ty of ev­il com­pan­ions; but the pray­ers of his mo­ther fol­lowed him. When twen­ty-two years of age, while in a pub­lic house, his con­science was awak­ened, and he was led to see his lost con­di­tion.

Shortly af­ter, at Wal­sall, near Birm­ing­ham, the truth was still more deep­ly im­pressed up­on him by a ser­mon preached by Rev. John Bra­dford, cur­ate of Frils­ham, Bed­ford­shire, one of La­dy Hunt­ing­don’s preach­ers; but still he did not find ac­cept­ance with God.

Anxious days fol­lowed, but at length, while at his forge, the dark­ness passed from his mind as he was me­di­tat­ing up­on the words of Isa­iah, Arise, shine, for thy light is come.

With his con­ver­sion there came a call to the Gos­pel min­is­try, and he spent a few months at La­dy Hunt­ing­don’s col­lege in Tre­vec­ca, Wales. For sev­er­al years he de­vot­ed him­self to ev­an­ge­li­cal work in dif­fer­ent parts of the coun­try.

In Sep­tem­ber 1794, hav­ing adopt­ed Bap­tist views, he ac­cept­ed a call to the pas­tor­ate of the Bap­tist church in Clax­ton, Norfolk. Here he had a long and use­ful min­is­try. He died…hav­ing been a preach­er of the Gos­pel for more than six­ty-four years.

From 1803, to 1809, he wrote much in po­et­ry and prose for the Gos­pel Ma­ga­zine. A few years be­fore his death his prose con­tri­bu­tions to the Ma­ga­zine were brought to­ge­ther in a vol­ume en­ti­tled The Truth as It Is in Je­sus. His Hymns and Spi­ri­tu­al Po­ems, with a brief mem­oir, were col­lect­ed and pub­lished in 1861, by Mr. Da­ni­el Sedg­wick. Some of his po­et­ry, says Dr. Hat­field, has great mer­it.

Burrage, pp. 114–15