OF THE REV. SAMUEL J. MILLS. LATE MISSIONARY TO THE SOUTH WESTERN SECTION OF THE UNITED STATES, AND AGENT OF THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. DEPUTED TO EXPLORE THE COAST OF AFRICA. BY GARDINER SPRING, D.D. PASTOR OF THE BRICK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, IN THE CITY OF PRINTED FOR FRANCIS WESTLEY, 10, Stationers' Court, and Ave Maria Lane. 28.36 GB h 니 ھا ا PREFACE. Of every kind of knowledge that can prove gratifying or useful to mankind, the knowledge of virtue and religion is unquestionably the most important. To diffuse this, is the object at which every friend to the well-being of society will aim, and he gladly embraces every means within his reach that will assist him in his undertaking. At one time he will simply exhibit the principles upon which the present and future happiness of men are founded, leaving them to make their own way to the heart; and, by their intrinsic excellence and importance, obtain the reception of the wise and good. At other times he will take pains to explain and enforce those principles, employing every argument that the most enlightened judgment, and the most enlarged philanthropy can suggest. But, perhaps, of all the methods by which pure and undefiled religion may be recommended to the attention of mankind, Biography may be classed amongst the most efficient. In the lives of good men we see the principles we profess in the powerfully constraining influence they exercise over the conduct and behaviour. Religion becomes, as it were, personified, and appeals, even to our senses, in language too energetic to be resisted. The claims which she prefers, unbelief may be ready to suggest, are too extensive, and too minute to be complied with. But when, in some eminent example, we behold a conduct regulated by those very claims, and a character formed upon the principles we have imagined rigid, even to excess; our unbelief has been silenced, and we have felt irresistibly constrained to be "followers of them, who, through faith and patience, inherit the promises." Biography, too, confines the attention to one particular object, more than which the human mind is incapable of grasping at one time. The impression, consequently, will be more vivid and lasting. We feel, not as though introduced to a gallery of pictures, the multiplied beauties of which, confuse and bewilder us; but, as if contemplating a single specimen of the artist's skill, by which we are enabled to discern the admira * ble disposition of light and shade, and the share, which every stroke of the pencil contributes, to the general effect. We are not as in a public company, the cheerfulness and intelligence of which are certainly delightful, and improving; but we are made to taste the endearments of particular friendship, which constitute a felicity of a far higher order. Hence it will follow, to use the language of an eloquent writer, that "whilst general histories of mankind may afford satisfaction and improvement, yet the history of particular persons, if executed with fidelity and skill, while it exercises the judgment less severely, so it fixes down the attention more closely, and makes its way more directly and more forcibly to the heart." With these views the "Memoirs of the Rev. S. J. Mills," are sent forth to the public, under the deepest conviction that they will be read with the liveliest interest, and will prove an extensive blessing. The life of such a man offers the most satisfactory and incontrovertible argument for the truth and excellency of the Christain religion. What other system could produce such a combination of excellencies as were united in this estimable man? Let Infidelity contemplate the picture, and blush when she is told that the character of Mills was formed on those very principles which she ridicules and contemns. |