August 12th, 1823, she appeared in the very precincts of future glory; she lay in a state of heavenly composure, unable to speak, but looking unutterable things; and, in this state, meekly committed her departing spirit to the bosom of eternal mercy.

May that God, "with whom do live the spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord, and with whom the souls of the faithful, after they are delivered from the burthen of the flesh, are in joy and felicity," grant that all who read or hear this record of the triumph of his love, may, "with all those that are departed in the true faith of his holy name, have their perfect consummation and bliss in his eternal and everlasting glory, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."-Wesleyan Methodist Magazine.

MEMOIR OF THE REV. WILLIAM BEAUCHAMP,

OF MOUNT CARMEL, ILLINOIS.

"Should fate command me to the farthest verge
Of the green earth, to distant barb'rous climes,
Rivers unknown to song; where first the sun
Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam

Flames o'er the Atlantic isles; 'tis nought to me;

Since God is ever present, ever felt,

In the void waste as in the city full;

And where HE vital breathes there must be joy." THOMPSON. GREAT talents are particularly admired where they are applied to useful purposes; society in all ages has presented a grand contrariety of character; but it seldom happens that men of genius are disposed to bring all the faculties of the mind to bear on useful purposes of life, to relieve the sufferings of the human family. The brilliant orator, the intelligent writer, the inventive genius, is too frequently applauded and flattered, or traduced and his designs defeated. But where genius is combined with virtue, with a soul ennobled by the best of principles, the love of God, and the love of man, then benevolent actions become conspicuous, and we can with safety number such persons among the real benefactors of mankind.

The country which we here inhabit, settled by all descriptions of persons, gathered from almost all parts of the world; it is here that persons of distinction, of stability and influence, who can in any degree concentrate general affection, and by so doing give a cast to such society, as to bring "order out of confusion," and produce some degree of system among so disorganized a mass; when called off the stage of action, and whilst slumbering among "the clods of the valley," are long remembered by successive generations. Exertions for the accomplishment of such objects may fail, but in time they are always duly appreciated and remembered by the virtuous with gratitude. 3

VOL. VIII.

The settlements of the west, bending their course to the Pacific ocean, are like the progression of those who first peopled the earth; and although, before twenty years shall roll round, we may look for villages of American settlements, formed by those who have penetrated the defiles of the rocky mountains, and established themselves on the north west coast of the continent; yet the names of the "pioneers," like the names of the patriarchs of the east, will be held in remembrance; and it is believed none more so than one who is a teacher of righteousIn the populous state of human society there are tens of thousands of events which transpire and pass away like the "baseless fabric of a vision:" but the annals of a new country, like those of a new world, are "engraven on a rock," and are preserved from generation to generation. Their successes and reverses of fortune, the events of their life, anecdotes, and all in relation thereto, are open to full view; and for native shrewdness and intelligence, no people under the sun exceed those hardy sons of the west, who, in the process of a very few years, will form a mass of population composed of the greatest people for mental and physical powers, that have ever trod the earth. Such are their views of past, present, and future; seated as it were upon an eminence, they look back upon the east, and at one glance survey all the events in the history of their ancestors: When they look to the west, behold! a new world bordering on "that in which man first had a being, invites them forward.

William Beauchamp, the subject of this memoir, was born on the 26th day of April, 1772, in the county of Kent, and state of Delaware. His father, William Beauchamp, a respectable Methodist preacher, removed in the year 1788 or 89, to the western part of the state of Virginia, and settled on the Monongahela river, and after residing here six or eight years, again removed and settled on the little Kenhawa river, in Wood county, Virginia, where he and Mr. Rees Wolfe, another preacher, formed societies.

At an early period of his life, Mr. B. (the subject of this memoir,) had religious impressions made upon his mind; at the age of five years he was deeply awakened, and in the seventh year of his age experienced a change of heart. Having been provoked by one of his brothers, he gave way to anger, and for some time thought he had lost his religion. When about fifteen or sixteen years old his spiritual strength was renewed, and he then became a regular member of the church. Some time after he began to exhort. In Delaware, for a short time, he was sent to a seminary of learning, and acquired a knowledge of English grammar, and some knowledge of the Latin. In 1790, he taught school in Monongahela. At the age of nineteen, he began to preach. In the year 1793, in the 21st of his age, he left his

father's house on the Monongahela, and travelled under the presiding elder. In 1794 he joined the conference, and was sta tioned on the Alleghany encuit, which he travelled two years. The next year, 1796, he was appointed to Pittsburg circuit: in 1797 he was stationed in New-York, and in 1798 in Boston. From thence, in 1799, he was removed to Province Town, Massachusetts in 1800 he was stationed in Nantucket. A local preacher by the name of Cannon had preached in this place with considerable success; and as the prospects appeared flattering, he solicited the aid of the travelling ministry, and Mr. Beauchamp was sent to his help. He had not been in this station more than six months, before a society of between seventy and eighty members, was raised up; and before he left the station, a large and commodious meeting-house was built.

In the following year, 1801, he located, and on the 7th of June he married Mrs. Franeis Russell, widow of Mr. A. Russell, who perished at sea. Her maiden name was Rand. She was among the most excellent of women. Not only her parents, husband, and children," rise up and call her blessed," but also all that know her. In 1807 brother B. removed from Nantucket where he married, and settled near his father, in Wood county, (Va.) on the little Kedhawa, and the old gentleman, about this time, died. Brother B.'s family, his children and step-children, were small he had continued at this place, beloved and usefully employed, until some time about the last of December, 1810; when the writer of this memoir, passing through this district of country, for the first time saw him. This first interview will never be forgotten: it was on the Sabbath preceding new-year's day. Having been licensed to exhort, the writer had attempted nearly about the first time, to preach at Marietta the week preceding, with some success; many were awakened, and several professed to get religion. He accompanied the young people to a quarterly meeting at the Rev. Rees Wolfe's, on little Kenhawa, then considered an obscure part of the country. Here he was introduced as a preacher; it was a vain attempt to plead to the contrary, or to insist upon a denial; brother Wolfe called him forth, and informed him that there was an old preacher there of considerable eminence, and that they two must preach, and that the writer might choose whether to preach before or after him, as the circuit preacher had failed to attend. Brother W. was asked to point him out; he did so, when the stranger caught the cast of his eye, and remarked to his friend W. that he was but a stripling in years, and inexperienced, and could not preach after that man. He was followed by brother B. from Romans xiii. 11. "For now is our salvation nearer than when we believed." The masterly manner in which he introduced the subject, the matter and order of his treating it, his fine turned periods, the purity of his language, his extensive and enlarged

ideas, his depth of thought, and all brought forth in a strain of eloquence, chaste and sublime, which with the spirit of the man, at once astonished and delighted him. Although at the first view brother B. appeared to possess nothing about him to attract attention, his appearance being that of a remarkably plain and humble man, yet some how or other, the stranger had caught a glance of his eye, that sure index of the mind, and soon proved that this organ of sense was not to be misunderstood.

In 1811, brother B. published in Marietta, Ohio, his "Essays on the Truth of the Christian Religion;" a work that would do honour to any Christian author. In the circulation of the work he was aided by some of the travelling preachers, particularly by his worthy and constant friend, the Rev. James Quinn, in whose name the copy-right was obtained. It did much good, and is to be found in the libraries of the most intelligent Christians of different denominations; and in parts where the name of Beauchamp is not known, has the writer found this work read and prized as the production of genius and piety.

Some time after this a correspondence commenced between the writer and his friend B. Several circumstances led to this correspondence. The writer of this memoir with a number of his religious friends and acquaintances had long lamented the prevalency of Arian and Pelagian doctrines, with which the Methodist societies at this time, in places, were much infested. The Rev. Samuel Parker, in 1811, 12, and 13, had travelled through the interior of Ohio. The distinguished talents of this minister of grace, connected with the sweet temper and disposition of the man, had enabled him to wield the sceptre of the gospel with such signal success, that those doctrines wherever he went, received a fatal blow to make the victory full and complete, a periodical publication was thought to be absolutely necessary; through which medium the doctrines of the church might be disseminated. Our Methodist Magazine had long since been discontinued, and no disposition appeared to be manifested to revive it. These circumstances had induced the writer upon his own responsibility to issue a prospectus for a periodical religious publication, to be published in Chillicothe, which was designed to batter down those absurd notions, so prevalent at this period. Brother B. was solicited to undertake it, and this, connected perhaps with other circumstances, induced him to remove to Chillicothe, Ohio, some time in the year 1815. The year following, 1816, that excellent periodical work "The Western Christian Monitor," was published monthly. Publications of this kind had sprang up in various parts of the United States, and the name of this forestalled; so that "Western" was added by way of distinction. In this publication brother B. was aided by the writer of this memoir, but more by compilations and selections than in original matter; and at his request brother B.

wrote a short commentary on the articles of religion of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which was published in numbers. The Monitor was extensively circulated, has done much good, and the bound volumes are now, and always will be, a valuable acquisition to any library. The infant state of the western country, the difficulties attending the distribution of the work, and worse than all, the very ill state of brother B.'s health at this time, all tended greatly to discourage him in the prosecution of it; and from these and other circumstances, which it is now needless to mention, at the end of the first year it was wholly discontinued.

While brother B. resided in Chillicothe, he became extensively known, and to the church in that place very useful; his persuasive eloquence, and his solid piety gained him many friends both among professors and non-professors, who were so generally impressed with a sense of his real worth, that his name is now, and will long be had in remembrance; and but little doubt is entertained that his labours in this place paved the way for that great and glorious revival of religion, which commenced soon after he left it to remove to Mount Carmel, in Illinois.

Those lucid intervals during the ministry of the writer's friends, Mr. Samuel Parker, and Mr. William Beauchamp, (the one immediately succeeding the other in Chillicothe,) in his associations with them around the country in different places, at various meetings, he now retrospects as the happiest period of his life! The tremulous motions of the late calamitous war had subsided, peace reigned, the gospel spread most astonishingly; and it was his delight to hear at one time Parker as the Cicero, and at another B. as the Demosthenes, of the church in the west. Pleasing, yet melancholy thought! their race is run, and these two ministers of the church have left us to mourn for ourselves! One slumbers in the valley of the Mississippi, the other sweetly (for the present) reposes on the heights of Peoli, in Indiana!

"Thus the men

Whom nature's works instruct, with God himself
Hold converse; grow familiar; act upon his plan;
And form to his the relish of their souls!"

[To be continued.]

MISCELLANEOUS.

LETTER

FROM THE DIRECTORS OF THE SCOTTISH MISSIONARY SOCIETY TO PERSONS PROPOSING TO OFFER THEMSELVES AS MISSIONARIES. DEAR SIR.-When our blessed Lord commissioned his disciples to go and preach the gospel of the kingdom, he said to them, "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves;