the contemporaries of her early life are nearly all departed. She was married to Mr. Warren before she was converted to Christ. Indeed it was not until the month of June, 1816, when she must have been about 26 years of age, that she felt any deep anxiety about her salvation. She then vielded to an invitation to hear the Rev. T. Allin's "farewell sermon," at the end of his first appointment to Sheffield, where she dwelt. Until then she had listened only to the most hyper-Calvinistic ministry in the town, which it was her mother's pleasure to attend; but the sermon she then heard in Scotland-street Chapel was like a new Gospel to her; the style of the sermon, and the manner and spirit of the minister, also, were new to her. Her astonishment at what she heard was great, and was equalled only by her regret that church prejudices, maternal influence, and habit, had prevented her from attending such a ministry before. While listening to that sermon she made the important and alarming discovery that she was not safe, and that her previous peace had arisen from ignorance and indifference. A veil seemed to be now removed from her eyes. She was startled, humbled, and afraid. And yet she was glad that she was undeceived. With much emotion, and not without tears, she said to herself, and to her friend who had invited her, "What have I been doing to let such a man as this preach here for two years, and I not hear him before !" She could not hear the same minister there again, but she could hear the same message, and at once resolved that she would. She earnestly sought salvation, and through faith in Christ she soon found it; and, having found it, she soon became a teacher of the truth as it is in Jesus, as the leader of & class of young women. The Rev. W. Baggaly, writing of her, as a member of the Scotland-street church, says, "Old reminiscences carry me back to the old chapel in Scotland-street, Sheffield, about the year 1824 or 1825, when she was generally in her pew in the gallery on the lefthand side of the pulpit, at all the publie services. In the social means of grace she was found also with great regularity. And it was here that those talents by which she was distinguished in after life received their earliest developments. In the Friday evening ose prayer-meeting, and in the band-meeting on Saturday evening, she was generally ready to take an active and useful part. And oh, my dear brother (to the Rev. W. J. Townsend), were meetings! Would that we had more such in our day!' The place was usually crowded to the very door at those times, and, unless there in time, we had the privilege of standing outside; and many a time was it found good to be even there. In those meetings Sarah Warren was usually heard. She had a fine voice, a ready utterance, and ability to express herself most acceptably. Eminent piety enriched the details of her experience, whilst her power in prayer appeared to be irresistible. There were those who thought she was too noisy, but I liked such noise, and I still like it; and had we more of it now, our churches would soon attain to a much higher state of prosperity than we at present enjoy." Some time about the year 1825 or 1826, she, together with her husband and mother, removed to Birmingham, where she soon made her way to our little and unattractive chapel in Oxfordstreet, now happily disposed of. She was soon discovered to be a valuable acquisition, so that she was cordially welcomed, and soon she took deep root in the little church there. Her husband, sad to say, had no sympathy with her religious sentiments, for that misguided man professed to be an unbeliever in Christianity. Her mother profoundly loved Christ, and confided fully in him for eternal salvation. But her mother's creed was narrow, though the Saviour's love is infinite. She could not say, "Grace be with all them that love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity." Church prejudices and doctrinal stiffness were so strong in her that she would almost as soon have had "fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness" as with us. To her we were "merit-mongers," whose own good works, and not Christ, were to save us. So greatly did she misunderstand our doctrine, and so obstinately was she resolved not to understand it, that she abominated it; and, rather than hear it, she commonly travelled across the great town of Birmingham to Thorpestreet, where she might have her cherished prejudices fostered. belonged to a generation of wellmeaning Christians, which had strong faith and but little charity, and which hated Methodism as it hated Popery. She Here and there in the land, we still find a little church of like-minded narrowness and intolerance. I have myself been scornfully refused permission to pray in a family of self-supposed elect ones, lest, if I prayed with them, they should sin by "bowing down to my doctrine." But these mistaken zealots of former generations have left only a little seed behind them, for nearly all Christians have renounced the shocking dogma of eternal reprobation; and our great Calvinistic brethren have seen that, on the great doctrine of salvation, as the gift of God through faith in Christ, they and we are substantially one. Mrs. Warren became a member at Oxford-street almost as soon as she became an inhabitant of Birmingham, and soon afterwards she also received her office of class-leader, an office which she held until the time of her death. In the meantime, she and her mother agreed to differ. They held to different churches, but they also held to one and the same Christ. Though Mr. Warren was an infidel, he did not persecute his wife; nor did she take up and sustain the attitude of an assailant of her husband's dark, joyless, and fatal creed of negatives. She knew how and when to speak words of wisdom wisely; and knowing that his unbelief, like that of all unbelievers, arose not from insufficiency in Christian evidence, or from the incapacity of his judgment, but from the enmity of the carnal mind to God, she knew that argument would be lost upon his unwilling heart. She tried the influence of character, and the power of persuasion and of prayer. At last she induced him to accompany her to chapel on Sunday mornings for a year; and when, some time after, he received premonitory warnings of dissolution, his stubborn will and proud unbelief gave way. He then renounced his guilty spirit of error, and, in deep penitence, sought salvation through Christ, whom he had so long rejected, and who said, "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out." Mrs. Warren was always poor; but in her poverty she was always a pattern of cleanliness, neatness, industry, and economy. She found time for regular attendance at the house of prayer on week days as well as on Lord's days; and she had for many years the charge of two adult classes, and of a large Monday evening class of elder scholars. Indeed, all her classes were then large; and their largeness bore testimony to her competency as a Christian teacher, and to her diligence as a shepherd of the flock. Her juvenile meeting was sometimes crowded, and among the elders of the church, as among the young, she was an object of confidence, esteem, and love. She was useful to very many who are in heaven, or in the way to heaven. There was no finesse in her manners, nor did she wear an everlasting smile on her countenance; but with a candour, honesty, and outspokenness, which were always unmistakable, she combined a spirit of unaffected kindness, evenness of temper, and great charity. She was very straightforward, very discriminating, and very motherly. She was tried as gold in the fire; the gold was not highly burnished, it had no brilliancy to dazzle; but its value was soon patent to each one, and the fire revealed very little alloy. She was familiar with Holy Scripture, and had a free and ready utterance in quoting and expounding it. It was not easy to find faults in her, though ill-nature can give the name of vice to virtue, and represent good as evil. In her old age she was not childish, nor querulous, impracticable, nor fretful. She was a fine old woman in spirit; and when increasing infirmities rendered it inconvenient for her to have charge of more than one class, and to meet even that in the chapel vestry, a number of godly women, who valued her counsels, and who loved and revered her, held their weekly meeting around her own humble but comfortable fireside. Mrs. Warren pursued a long career of usefulness in connection with Oxford-street Chapel; and she was encouraged and comforted by knowing that, so far from labouring in vain in the Lord, there were very many instances in which precious seed sown by her hand sprang up unto life eternal, particularly among the young. Numbers, who formerly sat at her feet, now bless her memory. A few weeks before her death a married woman, now a church member, delighted her by saying that in her girlhood, and when a member of the juvenile class, which often filled the vestry, she received impressions from Mrs. Warren which led to her conversion to Christ; and a few days after Mrs. Warren's death a grateful message arrived for her from the Antipodes, in acknowledgment of the benefit received from her instructions many years before. For a few years before her death she was, in the gracious providence of Christ our King, favoured with a comfortable home in one of the Berdesley Alms-houses, which form three sides of a square, with a spacious area of beautiful gardens in the middle. Here she had a quiet refuge from all earthly care, in which, though a stranger to luxury, she was also a stranger to want. From thence she could not go forth as of old, in pastoral love, among her members; but thither they loved to resort to visit her, to hold precious fellowship as disciples of Jesus, and to worship him. She lived to see the Conference of 1859, when nearly all the men of mark and their families simultaneously forsook us, leaving our little church extremely weak, burdened with debts, and ready to die; but she, aided by her well-used staff, still assembled with the steadfast and faithful few, until a few months later, when the accession of the beautiful and spacious chapel in Moseley-street opened a new and happier prospect before us. Even then she clung to the old place with a degree of tenacious love, for precious memories hung around it, deserted, dilapidated, and burdened with debt beyond its worth as it was, and deteriorated as was the whole neighbourhood. She at first rather distrusted the movement which I promoted of union with Moseleystreet, but afterwards she regarded it with full approval, rejoiced in its complete success, and volunteered a donation, liberal for her means, towards meeting the legal costs of getting rid of old liabilities. But her weakness was so great that she was able to visit Moseley-street Chapel a few times only, and when she died she was but little known among our beloved new friends. From the many conversations I had with Mrs. Warren, and from having occasionally led the class in her house, I learned that her views of Christian truth were clear and sound; and that ber experience was that of a justified and holy Christian. Her obedience was not the "much-serving" of a selfrighteous spirit. She served the Lord with all her heart, because with all her heart she loved him, and she thus loved him because his love in Jesus Christ was revealed to her conscious ness, by the Holy Spirit, through faith. Worthiness formed no part of the basis of her hope, nor did unworthiness occasion doubt or fear. Unworthy as she felt herself to be before God, she was complete in Christ. In him her justification, adoption, peace, joy, hope, and meetness for heaven, were complete. Self formed no part of her religion. She was in Christ Jesus by faith, and Christ was in her, as her only hope, and as her King and Lord. She was in no sense an egotist, either as to merit or emotion, but she was in every sense a Christian. She lived by faith, which worked by love, which purified her heart, and which overcame the world and all sin and death. Christ was her all in all. She confided fully in him, loved him, adored him, rejoiced in him, obeyed him, became like him by his Spirit dwelling in her, and now she is with him in his eternal glory. His words became the vehicle of her thoughts. She was mighty in the Scriptures, and its "forms of sound words" were constantly interwoven in common conversation, like a thread of gold running through an ordinary texture. While her views were free from all vagueness and mistiness which are worse than darkness, they were expressed, not in the common phrases which are everywhere in vogue, but in her own language, which was simple and natural. All that she said showed her to be a strong-minded woman. No sophistry could move her from the hope of the Gospel. She refuted the sophist and the ritualist when she met one; and, such was her invincible firmness and decision, and energy of character, that, had she lived in times of persecution, she was a woman who would not have shrunk from martyrdom. One day the Puseyitical minister of the district, who claimed her as one of his parishioners, called upon her to instruct and exhort her. She soon told him that, "being justified by faith, she had peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ," and that she had the witness in herself by the Holy Spirit, that she was a child of God and an heir of heaven; and soon found that her pretentious instructor was a novice in the things of God. Thereupon she required him, as a professed theologian, to state what was meant by Paul in Rom. viii. 16, “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God." He answered that the witness of the Spirit is the witness of the word which he preached, and that the witness of our spirit is hearing the word, and, therefore, hearing him, the only authorized minister in the district. How lamentable that Gospel truth should thus be explained away by university graduates, who have high prestige in the land, and who minister in magnificent buildings! But this teacher of churchism aud ritualism was no match for his "parishioner;" he retired discomfited, and never repeated his visit. She well knew in whom she had believed, could give a good reason of the hope that was in her, and if she could not convince she could silence the gainsayer. She was no falterer. Irresoluteness and indecision formed no part of her character. Calin, quiet energy distinguished her. She clearly understood the truth as it is in Jesus, enjoyed its blessedness, and was competent to teach it, and did teach it successfully. Though Mrs. Warren was poor she was liberal. Her income was small, fixed, and certain; and she lived on less than the amount, so as to devote a given portion of it to the service of Christ. Importunity had no influence over her; example had no power. The proportion she devoted to the Lord was large. She could not possibly give more, and would not give less. How the Lord's money should be appropriated she judged for herself. Her contributions given through me were unsolicited. But her liberality was equal to that of most persons who were five times more able. Indeed if the wealthy gave like her, the Church would scarcely know what to do with the money. A "telling speech" could not tell much upon her, for she was actuated not by impulse, but by principle. She was not very emotional, and yet she loved deeply, not in word only but in deed. Her emotions were evenly balanced. A presiding power was always at the helm to guide her, and she was but little tossed to and fro by surface swells. She was steadfast and immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Had she been wealthy her liberality would have been more than princely; and had her lot been cast in "troublous times," such moral qualities as she evinced would have appeared magnanimous, and must have commanded great admiration. Possibly it may be inferred from the above that she was inelastic in spirit, that she evinced strength of mind rather than amiableness and gentleness of character, and that she was masculine and not womanly. I knew her only in her old age, when there was no youthful buoyancy-when life had lost all its romance and was a hard reality when her memory, like a living historian, constantly rehearsed the past to her, rather than the enchantress, hope, sang of the witcheries of life's bright future-when no merry laughs raug in her dwelling-when as a Christian she was of a ripened and mellowed character, and when she was a thoughtful, devout, and revered old woman. But I learn from others, who have known her long, that in her best days her zeal seemed to be quenchless, that her spirit was always on the wing of activity, that she was witty and good-humoured, a pleasant companion, a constant incentor to action and zeal in others, and an eminently happy, as she was also an eminently active and useful, Christian. be Our history in Birmingham has been somewhat chequered. We now have several handsome places of worship, but in times past it was not so. Rising families occasionally detached themselves from us, to unite with the strong; and new comers, of our own people, having visited our Oxfordstreet Chapel, and found it, though compact and well arranged, to small in size, to have a humble exterior, and to be in a low neighbourhood, shied off, held themselves aloof, and took sittings elsewhere. A long feud existed between the Oxford-street and Unett-street societies, and controversies and debts arose from time to time. A period of great prosperity was sometimes succeeded by one of declension. All this Mrs. Warren witnessed; but amidst it all she stood as firm as a pillar. Like some others she might have used the plea of worshipping nearer home," but she 66 never did so. She found one to be factious and another false, but, from principle and preference, she held fast to her own church, through all its vicissitudes. She never wavered. No offence drove her away, or chilled the deep calm fervour of her love. difficulties repelled her. Her steadfastness and help were always counted upon with confidence. In evil report and in good she stood fast in the Lord, No and fast in his church, so that it seemed as if, had she lived for ever, she would have dwelt among her own people." At one time indeed it seemed as if the chapel doors must have been shut. Indeed, all human hope seemed lost. Bat when she could hardly longer sav: There my best friends and kindred dwell-" for they, as with one mind, had fled; yet she did not flee, as I must record to her honour, and she could still sing "There God my Saviour reigns." At that critical juncture that Saviour took his own cause into his own hands, and opened a way by which we eventually obtained release from a chapel and a school, which, burdened as they' were with debt, were worth less than nothing, and brought about a union with a kindred church-to which that union was as necessary as to us-and to both has been, and gives promise to be, a great blessing; while it brings glory to Him who hath made twain one. Mrs. Warren attended our new chapel as often as she could, and she lived to see that the acquisition was the happiest event that had taken place amongst us during her long lifetime. But On the last Sabbath but one before she died she met her class as usual, in her own humble house, and on the very last she sat up to meet it, but the members held no meeting, deeming it unwise and unkind to permit her to tax herself with a work for which her strength was then unequal. She knew that the time of her departure was at band, but she hoped all things and feared nothing. She often told her friends that she should not recover, but always said, "It is all right with me. I have no wish to get better." she did not seem to be near to death when I last saw her, for she then sat in her chair as usual, and looked as usual, so that the announcement of ber death took me by surprise. Indeed, no one thought that death was so near. On the day before that on which she died one of her members said to her, how sad it would have been had she had to seek religion then, when she replied, "Yes, but that has been all right for a very long time." No raptures transported her spirit. Her death was no scene of triumph, in no sense a scene. I have no exclamations of joy or of victory to record. Her peace was perfect. No cloud, small even a human hand, was in the bright as 59 heaven above her. Her salvation was sure and certain. Her hope was firm as the rock of ages on which it was based. Her flesh failed, but it was the only failure she then knew. She was perfectly calm, and perfectly confident, for she was perfectly safe. She died gently; no paroxysm distressed her; she had no convulsive throes of mortal agony. She slept in Jesus, and thus gently breathed her life away, leaving a countenance undisturbed and unmoved, as if in peaceful sleep. "So fades a summer cloud away, So sinks the gale when storms are o'er, THOMAS EDWARDS, OF ECCLES. THOMAS EDWARDS was born at Tipton, in Staffordshire, in the year 1801, in which place he spent his childhood, and part of his youth. For some time he had no means of learning to read, but it pleased the Lord to put it into the heart of a good man to open his blacksmith's shop on the Sabbath-day, for the instruction of those boys who were willing to attend. To this humble school Thomas Edwards cheerfully repaired, and in a short time was able He also to read the Word of God. attended a small place of worship, where the Gospel was preached from a pulpit made out of a cob of coal. At twelve years of age he was strongly impressed with religious truth, and began to be in earnest about his soul's salvation. He attended a prayer-meeting, where he cried aloud for mercy, and like the publican, "went down to his house justified." He ran well for a time, but being young and inexperienced, he was allured and drawn aside by the power of temptation, and thus lost his sense of "sins forgiven." Still, the Spirit of God strove with him, so that he could not enjoy his pleasure in sin. In this unsettled state of mind he continued till fourteen years of age, when he was called to pass through a severe affliction, which resulted in the amputation of his leg. While suffering great pain, and his life was in jeopardy, his heart was deeply humbled, and he was led most earnestly to entreat the Almighty to spare his life, with the promise that it should be de voted to his service. After this mercy, circumstances led |