tion of personal sin; which appears to have lain at the root of his personal religion, and his ministerial activity.

"I freely confess, that I find so much of the old man remaining, and working in me; and that Satan hath such power over me at times, that I really am often at a loss what to make of myself. Sometimes I think, there is nothing in me but sin and misery, darkness and confusion; at other times, I verily believe myself the greatest hypocrite that ever existed. At all times, I may well adopt the appellations the pious martyr, J. Bradford, gives himself in some of his letters- The most miserable sinner; hard hearted, unthankful,' T. C. The painted hypocrite' T. C. Though I have not, through mercy, ever been permitted to fall into any one gross act of scandalous sin, yet I have not the least doubt, but that I am in fact a much greater sinner, than ever the thief on the cross was; for he never sinned against so much light, so much grace and amazing goodness, as I have, and daily do and I am sure, if I ever enter heaven, I shall be a much greater monument of grace and love, than he is. Indeed, I am astonished and amazed at the Lord's continual patience towards me; and how he bears with me, a rebellious creature, so long! But, at the same time, what would appear very strange to those who had not experienced the same thing, I am not in general, much troubled with doubts and fears; though in myself I have every imaginable reason for both, yet the infinite fulness, competency, and all-sufficiency of Christ's salvation, leave no room for either. At the sight of his wonderful salvation, all my wants are supplied, all my doubts solved, and all my fears vanish at once. Had I the united guilt of all the world upon me, what could I require more. Sometimes, I really fear my confidence is only presumption; but still, how can I doubt, when there are infinite reasons, all the reasons that God himself can give, to believe”?—p. 95–6.

In the midst of so many beautiful and edifying extracts from his diary and letters, it is hard to know what to select. We fix upon the following, to show the tendency of his mind towards the formularies of our church; and his willingness to be fed by the food there provided.

"The following petition in the litany, Bath dwelt a good deal on my mind, all this day- O Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world, grant us thy peace.' I am fearful of taking peace, or receiving it, from any but Christ; or in any way but having my sins taken away. I believe much of the ease and quietness of my mind, daily, procreeds rather from false peace and carnal security, than from the peace derived from Christ. Time often wears off guilt; and accusations of conscience frequently die away. Attention to other things often drives my sins into obscurity and forgetfulness; and hence proceeds my peace of mind. This, I fear, has been the case too often. I see and feel the danger of such things. The artifices of Satan, and the deceitfulness of my own heart, can find no means more fatal and ruinous to my soul. Hence proceeds my daily neglect of Christ, more or less. I am healed without him, and therefore he is not sought after. I hope to be, above all things, watchful against this ruinous evil, in future. I will endeavour to keep my sins in mind, in all their guilt; and to have a continued feeling sense of what is due to them, till the Lamb of God takes them away, and grants me his peace.-p. 155.

These extracts will suffice, to give an idea of the personal character and individual religion, of Mr. Charles, fitting him for use

fulness in the ministry, in any sphere, and making him an ornament and strength to any church. He served curacies in different places; but his heart's desire was for his countrymen, his kinsmen according to the flesh. He wished to spend, and to be spent, for Wales. He appears to have been blessed in his ministry; but he found the offence of the cross had not ceased. His preaching, his activity, and his zeal, gave offence; and by degrees, he found it difficult to obtain employment. In August, 1783, he gives the following account of his situation, as connected with a church in the neighbourhood of Bala.

"I told you, I believe, that I was engaged to serve a church in this country. When I served it for two Sundays, a long letter was sent to me, genteely excusing my attendance for the future. Since that time, I have been assisting Mr. Lloyd, who is but in poor health. However, last Sunday, the whole parish, with two or three of the principal inhabitants at their head, came to me, and accosted me in a rougher strain than I ever have been accustomed to before. They insisted on my preaching no more in their church, for, they added, 'You have cursed us enough already.' I took every care, that nothing but the plain simple truth should give offence; nor is there any thing else laid to my charge. What the Lord means to do with me, I know not; but I hope I shall know soon. I am comfortable and easy in my mind; and, through mercy, am willing to be where, and do what, he pleases. I am happy to think, that I am not at my own disposal. He is my mas ter, and I desire to be disposed of by him, as his servant, according to his own will." -p. 107.

He remained for some time after this, without employment, The following extract will show his mind under this dispensation, and prove the attachment of this good man, to the Established Church; and will clearly throw the blame of his departure from it, on other shoulders than his own.

"I am now waiting to see what the Lord will do with me; making use of every means in my power, to procure some place in the Established Church to officiate; not for the sake of any emoluments I might have, but from a principle of conscience. I can live independent of the Church; but I am a churchman on principle, and therefore, shall not on any account leave it, unless I am forced to do so. But you can well conceive, how disagreeable and uncomfortable it is, to be doing nothing. I never felt before, in the same degree, the force of the expression, Woe is unto me, if I preach not the Gospel.'”— -P. 192.

After this, he appears to have had employment in two curacies, for a short time. The latter was at Llanymawddwy, fourteen miles south of Bala; from which he was at length dismissed by his rector, on the complaint of some in the parish, who disliked his preaching. We cannot help transcribing the sentiments of his biographer, on this occasion.

"Being once more deprived of the opportunity of exercising his ministry, Mr. C. felt no small perplexity of mind. If he was pre-disposed to leave the Church, he would have done so before now; but the truth appears to be, that he contemplated such an event with sorrow. The many passages which occur in his letters, written at this time, respecting self-denial, and resignation to the will of VOL. IX. 2 E

God, were evidently occasioned by what he was foreseeing would, in all probability, be the final issue of his repeated disappointments; and we may easily conceive, that to quit a Church, whose doctrines he cordially approved, and which commanded general respect, and to be connected with a despised people, was a step which required no small degree of self-denial. In doing this, he had also to go against the current of former habits and prepossessions. An application to the bishop of the diocese, was made about this time; of what nature it was, we are not able to learn; his letters only allude to such a thing having been made. Every influence which his wife's family and his own friends could command, was exerted in his behalf."

We are forced to be somewhat tedious, perhaps, upon this part of Mr. Charles's history; but we desire that his separation from our church, may appear in its right point of view. If ever we are to be taught by experience, we may here learn the evil to our Church, of excluding from it, or not anxiously keeping in it, men of piety and talent. We have often mourned over the mass of dissent which separates now, almost the whole population of Wales, from the Established Church. We know that the labours of Mr. Charles, in a late period of his life, mainly contributed to this effect; and we wish churchmen really to see where the fault lay, and to whom the blame of this weakening of our Church, is to be attributed. We are bound to say, as impartial judges, that it was not at the door of Mr. Charles. We desire to hold out the facts which this memoir presents to us, as a warning to our ecclesiastical rulers, that they may use their diligence, to have the good work done within the establishment; and not by their coldness or hostility, throw it without the pale of the Church. We must beg the attention of our readers, to a few more ex

tracts.

"There are no tidings of a church; but all friends here, seem to give me up for the chapels in Wales; whilst at the same time, they are much satisfied with my conduct in waiting so long. All I can say is, that I desire, I hope sincerely, to be where the Lord would have me to be. I cannot carry a guilty conscience about me any longer, which I must do, if my days are consumed in vanity.....I am in a strait between two things-between leaving the Church, and continuing in it. Being turned out of three churches, without the prospect of another, what shall I do? In the last church I served, I continued three months; there the Gospel was much blessed, as to the present appearance of things; the people there are calling on me with tears, to feed them with the bread of life. What shall I do? Christ's words continually sound in my ears- Feed my lambs.' I think I feel my heart willing to engage in the work, be the consequences what they may. But then I ought to be certain in my own mind, that God calls me to preach at large. This stimulates me to try all means to continue in the Church, and to wait a little longer to see what the Lord will do. I thank God I want nothing but to know his will, and strength to do the same. The Gospel spreads here, and thousands flock to hear it; and I believe thousands in all parts, have received it in its power. I tremble lest the Lord should find me unfaithful, when I see so much work to do. I often think I hear my dear Master saying to me, Why standest thou here all the day idle?' This thought is still sharpened, when I consider that the night is coming on apace, when no man can work."-p. 208.

During the interval of his being first out of employment in the Church, and his beginning to labour in another connexion, he was led to begin that system of instructing the children, which became such an instrument in his hands. His clear mind would not allow him to be wholly unemployed. The ignorance which prevailed among the young people of Bala, excited his sympathy; he invited them to his house to give them religious instruction, and to catechise them. He had them together on the Sunday evenings; his mode of treating them was peculiarly kind, affectionate, and attractive: the love and tenderness with which he addressed them, often melted them into tears. His house became too small to contain those who attended: he was offered the use of the Chapel by the Calvinistic Methodists, who were then, and for a long time after, connected with the Church of England. This offer he accepted, and there he instructed and catechised the numerous children who attended,-the work was the delight of his heart. This was in fact the commencement of the Sunday Schools, being anterior in time to any established in England.

How long it was before Mr. C. had finally made up his mind to connect himself with the Methodists, is not known. It was towards the end of the year 1784, or the beginning of the next, that he commenced preaching among them. His own views of this step may be collected from letters which many years after he wrote to a clerical friend, who was under circumstances somewhat similar to his. The following are extracts, and show, that even as late as 1810, his views were not changed with regard to the church.

"In reply to your favour, I have but little to say; I feel for your perplexity; but I have no doubt, that if you look up simply to the Lord, he will graciously direct you in the way you should go-but it is not for me to determine. You are much wanted in the establishment, if suffered to continue in it, and suffered to be faithful. On the other side there is work enough for you out of the Church, if called and gifted to proceed on the itinerant plan. As you are already in the Church, I think you ought to continue in it, if not forced out of it. When I began to itinerate, it was because they would not employ me in the Church in this country. I intended removing to England as soon as circumstances admitted it, without being in any degree deteriorated by a few excursions on the itinerant plan. I got by degrees so far into the work, that 1 could not conscientiously recede and leave it."-p. 212.

With the utmost sincerity, we profess ourselves attached members of the Establishment: we see her excellencies, and we love her as a pillar and ground of truth; but we are ready to acknowledge her faults, to grieve over them, and confess them as we would our own; and we are forced to assent to the language of Mr. C's. biographer.

"The conduct pursued towards this faithful servant of God, was wholly unjustifiable as well as impolitic. Zeal in the cause of his Master seems to have been every thing laid to his charge. The doctrines he preached, even to his very last days, were those of the Church....But the manner in which Mr. C. was treated, was not only unjust, but impolitic also. The Church of Rome would never have been so unwise and regardless of common prudence as to shut its doors against such men as Mr. C. To what are we to attribute the vastness of dissent in the present day;

and to what else as to its main cause, but to the scowling and oppressive treatment which Mr. C. and others met with from the bishops and clergy. They blindly thought to silence them, by preventing them from being employed in the Church. How could it be supposed that men who had the great objects of their office so much at heart, could have been thus silenced. The command to preach the Gospel, is of greater authority than any human interdiction. God must be obeyed rather than man: not to repress, hut to encourage zeal, diligence, and faithfulness, is the way to promote the true interests of the Church, Happily for our times, a different course is generally pursued; zeal and diligence are not only encouraged, but even practised by many of those who rule over us. May their labours be abundantly blessed." p. 215.

We have now to follow Mr. C. in his course as a dissenting minister. From the increasing quantity of his labours, he seems to have been obliged to discontinue his journal; he has left therefore no written account of his long and toilsome journeys, nor of his frequent preachings, nor of the trials, difficulties, and hardships which he endured in "wandering up and down" (as he expresses it) through this cold and barren country, to preach the everlasting Gospel.

The benefits of his labours are visible by the great increase in the number of the people with whom he connected himself, in superior Scriptural knowledge, and in the improved practice to which they have attained, and especially in the effects every where made throughout the country, to teach children not only to read, but to understand the truths of the Bible. The final results of his labours will only be known on the great day of account. Mr. Charles having now enlarged the field of his labours, set himself with much industry to ascertain the real state of the country. He made enquiries wherever he went, and the result was most appalling. The prevailing ignorance as to religion was to an extent scarcely conceivable in a country which was professedly Christian. Having acquired a knowledge of the religious state of the community at large, he felt anxious to provide some remedy. The plan he thought of was the establishment of circulating Schools. This idea was probably suggested by what had been done some years before by the Rev. G. Jones of Llanddowror, Carmarthenshire, who, through the liberality of a lady, Mrs. Beran, formed a considerable number of circulating Schools in different parts of Wales.

"Mr. C. bad two difficulties to surmount, and they were not small difficulties— to raise money to support the Schools, and to procure teachers: the latter was as great as the former, which appears evident from the measures to which he resorted: some of the first teachers he taught himself. We have been particularly interested in the details of these exertions; they remind us so continually of the state of Ireland, of the remedy it stands in need of, and of the difficulties that oppose themselves to that desirable object: he had every thing to contend with in Wales which we have to contend with in Ireland, except one gigantic enemy, POPERY. He had to struggle against poverty, ignorance, and a neglected, but loved native language. An account of the commencement of this work, of its progress, and of some of its blessed fruits, shall be set before our readers in Mr. C's. own wordss-we give extracts from letters, written many years afterwards, giving an account of these things,