August 2, 1631, and so continued till the December following,, which was the last sermon that he preached.

Soon after he fell sick of his last sickness, and, perceiving it to increase, he sent for his son already mentioned, who lived at West Felton in Shropshire, fortynine miles from Ashby; he, with his wife, came to him with all convenient speed, January 13, and staid with him till his death.

Their company and attendance at that time (as always indeed) was very contenting and comfortable: And of his daughter-in-law (who was the person he himself proposed as a meet wife for his son, and in whom he always took great delight) he was heard, with affection, to express himself thus: "Never man had a kinder daughter"in-law."

His disease (though not understood to be so at the first) proved the scurvy, which, being a dull and melancholic distemper, indisposed him to speak much; yet, as he shewed wonderful patience through his whole sickness, so he used many holy and heavenly expressions to those that attended him, or came to visit him, who, as he was much beloved and honoured in the country, were not a few.

He suggested to some dear friends his fears, that wolves would, ere long, come in amongst them, and therefore earnestly exhorted them to continue stedfast in the truth which they had received. And having occasion to mention those words, 1 Tim. iii. 5. How shall he take care of the church of God? looking to his son, he said, "O son, 66 son, that care of the flock is the main thing!"

March 4, being the Lord's Day, he grew very weak. His son prayed with him many times that day; and whilst he was praying the last time, the father departed and slept in the Lord, between nine and ten o'clock that night, namely, 4th March 1631, being sixty-eight years and five months old. Thus he, who had so long diligently kept the holy rest of the Sabbath, did in the close of the Sabbath rest from his labours; and having glorified GoD often both in public and private on that day before, was at last on that day received into glory. Mr. Herring (his dear and familiar friend) being then at Coventry, was sent for the next day, and came and preached the lecture in Ashby church on Tuesday, March 6, in the morning, (Mr. Hildersham having ordered in his will that there should be no funeral-sermon at his burial) and then spake in a spiritual and affectionate manner, concerning the VOL. III. loss

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loss which that congregation, the country, and the whole church, had sustained by the death of Mr. Hildersham. In the afternoon of that day his body was borne by neighbouring ministers to the grave, accompanied by a great multitude both of ministers and others, who expressed much sorrow and lamentation.

He lived in Ashby for the most part (though often forced to remove his dwelling) of forty-three years and six months, with great success in his ministry, love and reverence of all sorts. He was very charitable to the poor himself, and earnest in exciting his auditors to contribute towards their relief. In few country congregations in England, the collections for the poor were so large, as they were on the quarter-days at his lectures.

Ashby sustained an exceeding great loss by his death; for he was the peace-maker amongst his neighbours, and the patron of the poor; wickedness was checked, and godliness cherished by his great care and wisdom. He was a friend to every one in a good cause; and it was his unwearied delight to be extensively useful in his day and generation.

He lived to a great age, considering that his pains in preaching weakened him so much; yet this happiness GOD vouchsafed to him, which was more than ordinary, that he outlived not his parts; but as his graces increased towards his end, so his abilities of invention, judgment, memory, and elocution, decayed not in his age. He left a precious memory behind him, and had (in the apostle's words) letters of commendation written in the hearts of many.

His Books, which we have already mentioned, will prove more durable monuments of his name, than that which his son erected for him in Ashby church. In Mr. Hildersham's Lectures on the fourth Chapter of St. John, there is prefixed an Epistle to the Reader by J. C. that is John Cotton of New England, who speaks in the highest terms of the Author, and of that performance. And of a Treatise on the Doctrine of the Lord's Supper, printed in 1608, Mr. Cotton gives the following testimony:- It hath been of singular good use to many poor souls, for their preparation to that ordinance. And in very deed, those questions and answers do more fully furnish a • Christian to the whole of that spiritual duty, than any other, in any language, that I know, in so small a compass. After these Lectures had been some little time published, Mr. Cotton received several letters from

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various parts, beseeching him to intercede with Mr. Hildersham to print the Sermons on the fifty-first Psalm, so far as he had preached them, and the remainder afterwards, when they were preached, and any thing else he had ready for the press. Mr. Cotton, therefore, in a letter to him from Boston, dated the third of February 1629, says, Since the Sermons already on part of the Psalm, [i. e. the fifty-first] do arise to a just and full volume, be intreated to hearken to the desires of so many at home and abroad, and give them leave to be doing good, whilst the rest are preparing. You have cause to love the Lord your GoD with all your might; and therefore, since those sermons might be shewingt your love to GOD in working his work, before their 'fellows, do not hold back any part of their service to the church for the present time.' This request Mr. Cotton likewise renewed in another letter of 23d July, in the same year.

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In the same Epistle to the Reader, Mr. Cotton mentions a letter that Mr. Hildersham wrote to a gentlewoman upon the subject of Separation, which, falling into the hands of one Johnson, a noted separatist, it was printed, with Johnson's answer to it, without Mr. Hildersham's privity or consent: Which (says Mr. Cotton) hath so strongly and clearly convinced the iniquity of �ས that way, [of Separation] that I could not but acknowledge in it both the wisdom of GOD, and the weakness of the separatist; his wisdom, in bringing to light such beam of the light of his truth, by the hand of an adversary, against the Author's mind; and the weak'ness of the other, to advance the hand of his adversary, 'to give himself and his cause such a deadly wound in open view, as neither himself nor all his associates can 'be able to heal.'

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Dr. Preston [for an account of whom, see Vol. II. p. 460.] having obtained a perusal of his Lectures on John iv. in MS. returned them with the following letter:

"I will say to you faithfully and ingenuously what I' think, without adding a word more than my own heart "is persuaded of. First, in general, for putting them to "the press, I do not only think that they are worthy of it, but, so far as any intreaty of mine might prevail, I "should press you to it, as depriving God's church of a very great benefit if you should refuse. In particular, besides the profitableness of the matter, these two things I observe in the reading of it: First, throughout

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the whole carriage, there appeareth a continued strength ' (that I may so call it) without any failing or deficiency, without any inequality, unevenness, or deformity of some parts with the rest. Secondly, It is press and "succinct (though large) the things choice and pertinent, and thoroughly depending each on other. In brief, so ' it is, there is nothing that need be added, and nihil quod 'amputem. So that, when I went about to take out some things for my own use briefly, I could not almost tell what to leave out. To say all in a word, Sir, I • do think it is such as will answer to your name, and such as men would look for from you. There are very 'few writings, but wherein we commonly see some failings in these two particulars which I mentioned. Besides, the method I much like, as very judicious; which hath not ruled you, but you it, in a seasonable changing it, as your matter lieth; so casting the frame of it, that it extorteth not more than is necessary from you, nor cutteth off any thing that you would deliver: Which one precise, uniform method, strictly kept, often doth. I hope it will be a good help to ministers when they read it, and bring the method of doctrine and uses into more credit.'

He had one excellent son, Mr. Samuel Hildersham, of whom Mr. Matthew Henry makes honourable mention in the life of his father, Mr. Philip Henry. He died at Birmingham, in April 1674, aged eighty.

JOHN DOWNE, B. D.

THIS excellent person was born about the year of our

Lord 1570, in Devonshire, and descended of a creditable and religious parentage. He was brought up in a liberal manner, first in the country, and then in the University of Cambridge. Here he took his degree of Bachelor in Divinity, and was admitted ad eundem in Oxford, in July act, 1600. He was fellow of Emanuel college in Cambridge, to which he was an honour by his piety and learning, and from which he went forth to be a light in the world.

It was esteemed a kind providence, that, among others who afterwards proved eminent in the church, he had for an early contemporary the famous Bishop Hall; and for an uncle, by the mother's side, Bishop Jewel, the pattern of his age for sanctity, piety, and theology, and whom Mr. Downe proposed to himself as an example of imitatation: He could scarce have chosen a better among

mere men.

Had his means been answerable to his worth, he had not lain in such obscurity as he did; but had doubtless moved and shined in a far higher and more extensive sphere. He was first presented by the master and fellows of his college to the vicarage of Winsford, in the county of Somerset, where he continued for a while; but afterwards became rector of Instow, in his own country, a small parish, lying just in the angle where the river Taw and Turridge meet, and afterwards fall together into the Severn. It was worth about a hundred pounds a-year; but it was the more valuable, he used to say, because his patron did not live there, which is very true at all times, unless patrons should happen to be good men: Otherwise, they corrupt the poor, and hinder the minister in any just concern for their spiritual welfare. A rich man in a country parish is either the greatest blessing or the heaviest curse contained in it.

Though he had no great income, yet God so blessed him with competent means, that he lived contentedly, brought up his children in a decent manner, furnished himself with a fair library, relieved the poor, and was not wanting to his kindred, that stood in need of his help. And for hospitality, he was constant in it; entertaining his friends and such as came to visit him, in as cheerful and plentiful a manner as became his circumstances and condition. But upon these things I will not insist, (says Dr. Hackwell, who himself was a very learned and pious man) chusing rather to come to those which are more proper for him, his intellectual, his moral, his civil, his spiritual wisdom, and (above all) his turning many to righteousness.

As to his intellectual wisdom: the sharpness of his wit, the fastness of his memory, and the soundness of his judgment, were in him, all three, so rarely mixed, as few men attain them single in that degree he had them all. His skill in the languages was extraordinary, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, Spanish, and (I believe) Italian. His knowledge in the liberal arts and sciences

was