CHAPTER I.

Antiquity of the Shirley Family--Saxon origin--Norman dignities--Royal alliances--Foreign crowns--British coronets--the Clanricardes--Battle of Aghrim--the Parkers--The Lord High Chancellor found guilty--the Levinges--Irish alliances--Birth of Lady Selina--her early character--First religious impressions--The grave of youth--Piety--Private prayer--Fashionable life--Marriage--The Huntingdon family--its ancestry--The Earl of Huntingdon--his character--“Tears of the Muses”--Self-righteousness--The Methodists--Lady Margaret Hastings--The light of Religious Truth--Force of Example--Conversion.

Selina, COUNTESS OF HUNTINGDON, the most extraordinary woman perhaps of an age fertile in extraordinary characters, and in many respects the greatest whom England has produced, was descended from the ancient and honourable house of SHIRLEY--a house as remarkable for a long successive union of piety with nobility, as for the rarely-equalled purity of its genealogical tree, one of whose ancient branches is coeval with the time of Edward the Confessor. All its intermarriages having taken place with the most ancient and illustrious English houses, many of its line having distinguished themselves in the military history of their country--it would be difficult to find a family more illustrious or better entitled to the claim of true nobility. The devotion and fidelity they have always borne to their Sovereign Princes are great and singular. Their high and renowned alliances joined them in a near degree of propinquity of blood to the Royal Stem of England, both Saxon and Norman; to those of France, Scotland, Denmark, Aragon, Leon, Castile, the Roman Empire, and almost all the princely houses of Christendom. Within the kingdom of Great Britain, they are connected with the most honourable and princely houses of the Barons of Berkeley, Dukes of Norfolk and Buckingham, Earls of Arundel, Oxford, Northumberland, Shrewsbury, Kent, Derby, Worcester, Huntingdon, Pembroke, Nottingham, Suffolk, Berkshire, and to most of the ancient and flourishing families of the nobility and gentry of the monarchy. Thus the living descendants of this illustrious house have the honour to issue from the blood of Emperors, Kings, Princes, Dukes, and some of the most renowned Earls. The lands and seigniories which they have held from the remotest period have added to their honour; but, above all earthly things, we hold their ardent and inextinguishable zeal for the advancement of the service of the Most High God, and their singular liberality towards the Church--for they have, at all periods, evinced the sincerity of their devotion by the great number of places of worship they have founded, built, re-edified, endowed, or enriched, with their means and revenue, in various parts of the kingdom.

The SHIRLEYS derive their descent from Sasuallo or Sewallus de Etingdon, whose name (says Dugdale, in his “Antiquities of Warwickshire”) argues him to have been of the old English stock; which Sewallus resided at Nether-Etingdon, in the county of Warwick, about the reign of Edward the Confessor, the seat of his ancestors for many generations before. After the Conquest, the lordship of Nether-Etingdon was given to Henry, Earl of Ferrars, in Normandy, who was one of the principal adventurers with the Norman Duke William, and was held under him by this Sewallus; to whose posterity, in the male line, it has continued to the present day.

From this Sewallus descended, in a direct line, Sir HENRY SHIRLEY, Bart., who was sheriff of Leicester in the last year of the reign of James the First. He married, in 1615, Lady Dorothy Devereux, the youngest of the two daughters of that great but unfortunate favourite of Queen Elizabeth, Robert, Earl of Essex, and sister and co-heiress to her brother, the last Earl of Essex. By this alliance, the Earls Ferrars quarter the arms of France and England with their own; the Earl of Essex having been maternally descended from Richard Plantagenet, Earl of Cambridge, grandson to King Edward III., and grandfather to King Edward IV., and also from Thomas Plantagenet, Duke of Gloucester, youngest son of Edward III. Sir Henry Shirley had, by the Lady Dorothy Devereux,[2] two sons and one daughter, Lettice,[3] who married William de Burgh, Earl of Clanricarde. His eldest son, Charles, died unmarried about the year 1649; and Sir Henry Shirley was succeeded by his son, Sir Robert Shirley, who, for his loyalty to Charles I., was imprisoned[4] in the Tower of London, by Oliver Cromwell, where he died during his confinement, not without suspicion of poison. It was his singular praise to have _done_ the best in the worst times, and to have _hoped_ even in the most calamitous circumstances. By his wife, Catherine, daughter of Humphrey Okeover, Esq., of Okeover, in the county of Stafford, he had two sons: Sir Seymour Shirley, his successor, and Sir Robert, afterwards Earl Ferrers;--also two daughters: Catherine, married to Peter Venables, Baron of Kinderton; and Dorothy, to George Vernon, Esq., of Sudbury, in Derbyshire. The only son of Sir Seymour Shirley, by the Lady Diana Bruce, daughter of the Earl of Aylesbury, surviving his father but a short time, the title of Baronet devolved on his uncle, Sir Robert Shirley, _the grandfather of Lady Huntingdon_; which Sir Robert Shirley, FIRST EARL FERRERS, was born at East-Sheen, in Surrey, during his father’s confinement in the Tower; and on December 14, 1677, his Majesty King Charles II., taking into consideration that this Sir Robert Shirley was grandson and heir to Lady Dorothy Devereux, the younger of the two sisters and heirs of Robert Devereux, the last Earl of Essex of that family, and that the issue male of the elder sister and co-heiress, the Lady Frances, who married William Seymour, Marquis of Hertford, was then extinct, was pleased to confirm unto him and his heirs the ancient Baronies of FERRARS of Chartley, Bourchier, and Lovaine; which honour had been in abeyance between the Ladies Frances and Dorothy Devereux, and their descendants, from the decease of their brother, the Earl of Essex, without issue. Sir Robert Shirley being so declared LORD FERRARS OF CHARTLEY, &c., was introduced into the House of Peers, January 28, 1677–8, and took his place according to the ancient writ of summons to John de Ferrars, his lineal ancestor [February 6, 27th Edward I.] He was Master of the Horse and Steward of the Household to Queen Catherine, consort of King Charles II., and was sworn of the Privy Council to King William [May 25, 1699]. In the reign of Queen Anne, he was again sworn of the Privy Council [November 25, 1708], according to the act for the union of the two kingdoms; and on the 3rd September, 1711, was advanced to the titles of VISCOUNT TAMWORTH and EARL FERRARS, by reason of his descent from the ancient and noble family of Ferrars.

His Lordship was twice married, and had a family of _twenty-seven_ children. His first Countess was daughter and heiress to Lawrence Washington, Esq., of Caresden, in Wiltshire, who, dying October 2, 1693, was buried at Stanton-Harold; he married, as his second wife, in August, 1699, Selina, daughter of George Finch, Esq., of the city of London. This Lady Ferrars died March 20, 1762. Robert Shirley, the eldest son, was created Earl Ferrars, but died before his father. He had been twice married; first, to his cousin, Catherine, daughter to Peter Venables, Baron of Kinderton, who dying in her nonage, he married, secondly, Anne, daughter of Sir Humphrey Ferrars, heiress to her grandfather, John de Ferrars, Esq., of Tamworth Castle, last heir male of the Barons Ferrars of Groby. She bore him three sons, Robert, Ferrars, and Thomas, and a daughter, Elizabeth. Robert became, by his father’s death, heir-apparent to his grandfather, and was elected Knight of the Shire for the county of Leicester in the last Parliament called by Queen Anne. He survived both his brothers, and likewise died of the small-pox in the life-time of his grandfather, July 5, 1714, unmarried, leaving his sister Elizabeth, married, in 1716, to James Compton, Earl of Northumberland, his heir; she died March, 1740–1, leaving an only daughter, and heiress, Charlotte, Baroness Ferrars, first wife of George, Marquis Townshend.

Earl Ferrars departed this life on the 25th of December, 1717, and was succeeded in his title and estates by his second son, the Honourable Washington Shirley, who took his seat in the House of Peers as Second Earl Ferrars. His Lordship was father to Lady Huntingdon, and was born June 22, 1677, and named Washington, after his mother, the daughter and heiress, as we have said, to Lawrence Washington, Esq., by Eleanor, sister to Sir Christopher Guise, Bart., of Hynam Court, in the county of Gloucester. Lord Ferrars was a nobleman of great honour and probity, and a lover of justice; the affability and benevolence of his disposition, and the goodness of his understanding, made him beloved and esteemed throughout his life. The respect and veneration paid to him while he lived, and the universal lamentations at his death, are ample testimonies of a character not easily to be paralleled.

Lady Huntingdon’s mother was descended from a family of great respectability and antiquity, seated at Parwick, in the county of Derby, as early as 1561. Her great grandfather, Richard Levinge, Esq., of Parwick, married the aunt of Thomas Parker, an eminent lawyer, who rose to the dignity of Lord High Chancellor and Earl of Macclesfield. It was an extraordinary instance of the fallibility of human virtue, that this every way distinguished character, one of the great ornaments of the Peerage, who had so long presided at the administration of justice, should himself be arraigned as a criminal on charges of corruption. He was tried at the bar of the House, and unanimously pronounced guilty; in consequence of which he was removed from his high office and fined _thirty thousand pounds_, as a punishment for his offence. He was the second Lord Chancellor of England impeached by the grand inquest of the nation for corruption of office; and, like his great predecessor, Lord St. Alban’s, found guilty of the charge. The prosecution was carried on with great virulence; and though rigid justice demanded a severe sentence, yet party zeal and personal animosity were supposed to have had their weight in that which was passed upon him. His Lordship’s son succeeded, as second Earl of Macclesfield; and his only daughter, Lady Elizabeth Parker, married Sir William Heathcote, of Hursley, in the county of Southampton, Bart. Upon the male descendants of this lady the honours of her father are entailed, in default, at any period, of the direct male line.

Her Ladyship’s grandfather, the Right Hon. Sir Richard Levinge, Knight, of Parwick, Recorder of, and member for, Chester, having attained great eminence at the English Bar, was appointed, in 1690, Solicitor-General in Ireland and Speaker of the House of Commons. He was created a Baronet of that kingdom by Queen Anne, October 26, 1704; he was a man of good judgment and great integrity; and set himself with great application to the functions of his important post. In 1711, Sir Richard was nominated Attorney-General, and in 1720, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. A few years after his removal to Ireland he purchased the estate of High Park, now Knockdrin Castle, in the county of Westmeath, the present residence of the Levinge family. Sir Richard married, first, in 1680, Mary, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Gawen Corbyn, of London, Knt., by whom he had three sons and three daughters; the eldest of the latter, Mary, married Washington, Earl Ferrars; the second, Dorothea, married first Sir John Rawdon, of Moira, and afterwards, Dr. Charles Cobb, Archbishop of Dublin; the third, Grace, married Edward Kennedy, Esq., of Mullow, in the county of Longford.

Sir Richard Levinge married, second, Mary, daughter of the Hon. Robert Johnson, one of the Barons of the Exchequer in Ireland, by whom he had one son, who died July 13, 1724, and was interred in St. Mary’s, in Dublin. His eldest son, Sir Richard, succeeded to him as the second Baronet. He was for many years member of Parliament for Blessington, and died November 2, 1731, without issue. Lady Levinge survived him till the 25th of February, 1747. She was a daughter of Sir Arthur Rawdon (brother of Mary, Countess of Granard, and nephew of Edward, Earl Conway), by Helena, daughter and heiress to Sir James Graham, third and youngest son of William, Earl of Monteith and Airth, in Scotland. The title devolved upon Sir Richard’s brother, Sir Charles Levinge, whose grandson, Sir Richard Levinge, the present representative of the family, married the eldest daughter of Lord Rancliffe, and has a very numerous family. Miss Selina Levinge, sister to Sir Richard, married the Rev. Henry Lambert Bayley, of Ballyarthur, in the county of Wicklow; and Miss Anne Levinge espoused the Rev. William Gregory, second son of W. Gregory, Esq., Secretary of the Civil Department in Ireland, and grandson, maternally, of William, first Earl of Clancarthy, and nephew of the present Archbishop of Tuam.

Dorothy Levinge, one of the three sisters of the Right. Hon. Sir Richard Levinge, Bart., married Henry Buckston, Esq., whose ancestors had been seated at Bradborne, in Derbyshire, for several centuries. His descendant, the Rev. German Buckston of Bradborne, is the present representative of that family.

LADY SELINA SHIRLEY was the second of the three daughters and co-heiresses of Washington, second Earl Ferrars, and was born August 24, 1707. Her eldest sister, the Lady Elizabeth, was married to Joseph Gascoigne Nightingale, Esq., of Enfield, in the county of Middlesex, and Mamhead, in the county of Devon; and the youngest, Lady Mary, to Thomas Needham, Viscount Kilmorey, of the kingdom of Ireland, nephew to the Earl of Huntingdon. His Lordship dying Feb. 3, 1768, without issue by Lady Kilmorey, who died August 12, 1784, was succeeded by his next surviving brother, John, tenth Viscount, grandfather of Francis, present Earl of Kilmorey. Lady Elizabeth Nightingale had a son, named Washington Nightingale, who died, unmarried, in 1754; and a daughter, Elizabeth, sole heiress to her father and mother, who was married to Wilmot, Earl of Lisburne, an Irish Peer, and died May 19, 1755, in giving birth to Wilmot Vaughan, second Earl of Lisburne. On the death of Sir Robert Nightingale, Bart., one of the directors of the East India Company, who died, unmarried, in 1722, the family estates devolved upon his cousin, Robert Gascoigne, Esq., second son of the Rev. Joseph Gascoigne, of Enfield; and the baronetcy lay dormant for three quarters of a century, until it was claimed, in 1797, by Lieut.-Colonel Edward Nightingale, father of the present Baronet. But the eldest son of Mr. Gascoigne had assumed the name of Nightingale previous to his marriage with the Lady Elizabeth Shirley, in 1725, who was interred with him in Westminster Abbey, where a well-known and unrivalled monument by Roubilliac is erected to their memory.

Lady SELINA’S mind, even in very early infancy, was of a serious cast. When she was only nine years of age, the sight of a corpse, about her own age, on its way to the grave, induced her to attend the burial. There the first impressions of deep seriousness concerning an eternal world took possession of her heart, and with many tears she earnestly implored God, on the spot, that whenever he should be pleased to take her away, he would deliver her from all her fears, and give her a happy departure. She often, afterwards, visited that grave, and always preserved a lively sense of the affecting scene she had there witnessed.

Though no correct views of evangelical truth had hitherto enlightened her Ladyship’s mind, yet even during her juvenile days she frequently retired for prayer to a particular closet, where she could not be observed, and in all her little troubles found relief in pouring out the feelings of her heart to God. When she grew up and was introduced into the world, she continued to pray that she might marry into a serious family. None kept up more of the ancient dignity and propriety than the house of Huntingdon: the family possessed a sort of decorum which she perhaps mistook for religion. With the head of that family she accordingly became united on the 3rd of June, 1728. His Lordship was descended in a direct line from Francis, second Earl of Huntingdon, who married Catherine, eldest daughter and co-heiress to Henry Cole, Lord Montacute, son and heir to Sir Richard Cole, Knight of the Garter, and Margaret, Countess of Salisbury, daughter to George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence, brother to Edward IV., and heiress to her brother Edward, Earl of Warwick, who was the last heir male of the Royal House of Plantagenet. Talent and piety adorned the Hastings family: Lord Hastings, the uncle of Lord Huntingdon, was a nobleman of great learning, and of so excellent a disposition, that no less than ninety-eight elegies were made on him, and published under the title of “Lacrymæ Musarum; the Tears of the Muses:” among which was Dryden’s first essay.

The house of Huntingdon has produced many bright examples of religious females, who consecrated their endowments to the service of God. Of this number was the Lady Elizabeth Langham, the lady of Sir J. Langham, Bart., and aunt to Lord Huntingdon, of whom an interesting account has been preserved in “Burder’s Memoirs of eminently Pious Women.” His Lordship’s sisters, particularly Lady Betty and Lady Margaret Hastings, were women of singular excellence.

Theophilus, ninth Earl of Huntingdon, was the eldest son of Theophilus, seventh Earl, by his _second_ marriage, and was born at Donnington Park, November 12, 1696, and was baptized on the 20th of the same month. He succeeded his half-brother George, eighth Earl of Huntingdon, February 22, 1704–5; and at the coronation of George II., October 11, 1727, carried the sword of State. His Lordship’s mother, Frances, Countess of Huntingdon, was daughter and sole heiress to Francis Levison Fowler, Esq., of Harnage-Grange, in the county of Salop, and granddaughter of Lord Kinderton, who had married Lady Catherine Shirley, sister to Robert, first Earl Ferrars.

Lord Huntingdon’s exemplary character, his marriage and issue, are set forth in an elegant inscription from the pen of Lord Bolingbroke, on a monument erected to his memory[5] by Lady Huntingdon, in the church of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, where he lies interred.

Such was the noble Earl to whom the Lady SELINA SHIRLEY was united “in love’s inviolable bonds;” and his Lordship well knew how to value the treasure which Providence had given him, in a woman of such exalted merit and amiable qualities, and accordingly made it his study to repay the felicity with which she crowned his life. He considered himself possessed of the greatest possible addition to his earthly happiness, and from the period of his marriage was uniformly an attentive and affectionate husband, which character he maintained with a becoming mixture of dignity and affection till the day of his death. His esteem for her was equal to that affection, and he often declared that time increased it--that her life and actions rendered virtue amiable, and that in her society he found his greatest happiness. Nor could any one be happier than herself in such a partner; for whom, the longer she knew him, she had the greater reason to bless God: indeed, the venerable Countess continued to the last moments of her protracted life to express the highest veneration and affection for his memory; and, but a short time before her death, she discovered how incapable she was of forgetting him, by shedding fresh tears at every mention of his name.

Lady Huntingdon was, unquestionably, formed for eminence. Her tender age exhibited a fine dawn of her mature excellence; and she gave early presages of proving highly useful and ornamental to society, if permitted to arrive at those years necessary for maturing the powers of the human mind. Her endowments were much above the ordinary standard. She possessed a highly intelligent mind, an extraordinary quickness of apprehension, a brilliant fancy, a retentive memory, a strong clear understanding, and a sound judgment, much improved by reading, conversation, deep thought, and observation. Her knowledge of mankind, even at an early age, and her penetration into the characters of those with whom she was acquainted, were admirable. Though she was obliged, from her situation in life, to mix with others in fashionable amusements, an attachment to them, or to the ornament of dress, was not the foible of her discerning and contemplative mind. Though not a regular beauty, she possessed a large portion of the charms of her sex: her person was noble, commanding respect--her countenance was the living picture of her mind, and united in it, in a happy combination, both the great and the condescending. This engaging exterior was animated by a soul, lively and ardent in its pursuits, and enriched with those qualities which the world most highly commends and esteems.

At a very early period of life, Lady Huntingdon discovered an elevated turn of mind: she was impressed with a deep sense of divine things--a feeling which had a powerful influence on her conduct, in leading her to read the word of God with great diligence. She manifested an extraordinary turn for religious meditation; and repeatedly felt the most awful convictions of the certainty and eternal duration of a future state. Her conversation was modest, and her whole conduct marked with a degree of rectitude not usually to be found in early life. After her marriage, she manifested a particularly serious deportment; and though sometimes at Court, yet, in visiting the higher circles, she took no pleasure in the fashionable follies of the great. At Donnington Park she was the _Lady Bountiful_ among her neighbours and dependents; though, as she herself afterwards felt and declared, going about to establish her own righteousness, she endeavoured, by prayer, and fasting, and alms-deeds, to commend herself to the favour of the Most High. For, notwithstanding the early appearance of piety in Lady Huntingdon, it is evident she continued for many years a perfect stranger to the true nature of that Gospel which is the power of God to every one that believes. She aspired after rectitude, and was anxious to possess every moral perfection--she counted much upon the dignity of human nature, and was ambitious to act in a manner becoming her exalted ideas of that dignity. And here her Ladyship outstripped the multitude in an uncommon degree: she was rigidly just in her dealings, and inflexibly true to her word; she was a strict observer of her several duties in every relation of life; her sentiments were liberal, and her charity profuse; she was prudent in her conduct, and courteous in her deportment; she was a diligent enquirer after truth, and a strenuous advocate for virtue; she was frequent in her sacred meditations, and was a regular attendant at public worship. Possessed of so many moral accomplishments, while she was admired by the world, it is no wonder that she should cast a look of self-complacency upon her character, and consider herself, with respect to her attainments in virtue, abundantly superior to the common herd of mankind. But while the Countess was taken up in congratulating herself upon her own fancied eminence in piety, she was an absolute stranger to that inward and universal change of heart, wrought by the gracious operations of the Spirit of God, by which new principles are established in the mind, new inclinations are imparted, and new objects pursued.

In acting thus, Lady Huntingdon was by no means singular. It is the faith of multitudes in the present day, who call themselves Christians, but who, by presuming to compare their own imaginary good deeds with the all-perfect and only justifying righteousness of the Saviour, as the ground of their acceptance before God, make void, as far as in them lies, all the glorious designs of Jehovah’s free and sovereign mercy in man’s salvation.

Nothing short of the depravity of our fallen nature can account for our obstinately persisting in the notion, that the sinner can do anything towards reconciling himself to the favour of the Most High and Most Holy; forgetting that the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, being in all respects consummate and glorious, cannot want, and will not admit of, any works of the sinner as auxiliary to his justification. For, “by the obedience of _one_, many are made righteous.” And, “to him that worketh not, but believeth in Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted to him for righteousness.”

He who made the heart, and He alone, can change it. A truth this, to which the experience of every true believer bears an additional testimony, and which is confirmed by the express authority of the Word of God. “Without me (says the Saviour) ye can do nothing.” And he says again, “No man _can_ come unto me except the Father, which hath sent me, _draw_ him.” If ever the sinner is converted to God, and pursues heavenly and divine objects, it must be through the power of the Holy Spirit, by whom he is “created anew in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that he should walk in them.” This gracious change Lady Huntingdon now experienced, for which thousands and tens of thousands will have abundant reason to bless God to all eternity. The manner in which it was brought about, and the mighty effects produced by it, it now becomes the province of her biographer to relate.

Mr. Whitefield, Mr. Ingham, the Wesleys, Mr. Hervey, and others, the great revivers of heartfelt and serious religion, had now awakened great attention in the land, and were branded with the name of _Methodists_. As they all set out with professions of strict adherence to the Church of England, the distinguishing tenets of her Articles and Homilies were particularly enforced by them. As this was utterly unlike the manner of preaching which then chiefly obtained, they attracted numerous audiences; and the lively manner of address, as well as the matter of their discourses, exceedingly struck the hearers with their novelty, as well as importance. Nothing awakened greater attention to their preaching, than their quitting the universal habit of _reading their sermons from a book_, without any animation, and addressing extempore discourses to the congregations where they ministered.

The multitudes that followed them were much affected; a great and visible change was produced in the minds of many; the attention paid to these ministers, and the blessings evidently attendant on their labours, roused them to vigorous and increasing exertions: they were always at their work, preaching wherever they could find admittance into the churches, and, perhaps--for they were human--not a little flattered by the popularity attending their ministrations. Some wild-fire could hardly fail to mingle with the sacred flame--whilst the sensation created by their preaching was inconceivable. Roused by opposition and encouraged by success, the Methodists continued to extend their influence and spread their name over various parts of the kingdom. The churches being incapable of containing the crowds which flocked after them, they took to the fields, and preached everywhere. Their congregations under the canopy of heaven were prodigious--sometimes, indeed, riotous and insulting, but, in general, solemn and attentive. By these labours a flood of Gospel light broke upon the nation--societies increased by thousands, and their ministry was blessed, to the great revival of religion, wherever they itinerated. Men more laborious than these leaders were, have hardly appeared since the days of the apostles: they repeatedly travelled over a space more than the circumference of the globe--wherever they moved, they were as a flame of fire, and left behind them a train of evangelical light. They were in preaching unwearied--two, or three, and frequently four times a-day, and this sometimes in places many miles distant from each other; and notice having been previously given of their coming, thousands awaited and welcomed them, heard them with reverence, and received them as angels of God. By their instrumentality many Church ministers were awaked from the lethargy which had beset them, and amazing multitudes were called to the happy experience of the salvation of Jesus by their labours, and added to the church of such as shall be everlastingly saved.

As all are by nature alike, in a moral and spiritual sense, equally guilty and vile, weak and worthless, so divine grace is a kind of leveller of distinctions, and is no respecter of persons or classes. Though not many women wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called; yet, to show the sovereignty, and power, and riches of divine grace, God is pleased sometimes to select the monuments of his mercy from among the wealthy and noble, and to show that he is no respecter of persons, but is rich in mercy to all that call upon him. The sisters of Lord Huntingdon were women not more distinguished by rank than by general excellence of character. From motives of curiosity some of the Ladies Hastings were induced to attend the preaching of the first Methodists, and there the Lord met them with the blessings of his grace. Under this ministry they were given to see the insufficiency of their own righteousness and the method of salvation on which they had been resting, and were made willing to receive the Lord Jesus Christ as the foundation of their hope and trust. Then “what things were once gain to them,” they, with St. Paul, “counted loss for Christ. Yea, counted all things but loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus their Lord.” They soon joined themselves to the people of God, and never appeared to be ashamed to own whose they were, or whom they served.

Salvation to one of a family, to one of a city, is often but the prelude of salvation to the whole house, and to hundreds in that city. When the streams of mercy begin to flow through such channels, who can say how many different directions they may take, and how far they may ultimately extend? Upon the important result of one conversion, no man is able to calculate; and, therefore, it is said--no doubt with some reference to the truth of this remark--“that there is joy in the presence of the angels over _one_ sinner that repenteth.” All who are themselves brought near to God by the blood of the cross, will be earnestly concerned for the salvation of others, especially their own kindred; and they will estimate the success of their labours for the accomplishment of this object as the highest joy in time, and their crown of rejoicing in that day when the Lord of Hosts shall make up his jewels. No sooner did the Lord Jesus Christ manifest himself to the woman of Samaria, than she went into the city to proclaim the glory of his name, and many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him through her testimony. Lady Margaret Hastings was the first who received the truth as it is in Jesus; and the change effected by the power of the Holy Spirit on her heart soon became visible to all. Considering the obligations she was under to the sovereign grace of God, she felt herself called upon to seek the salvation of her fellow-creatures, and the promotion of their best and eternal interests. Next to her own soul, the salvation of her own family and friends became her care. She exhorted them faithfully and affectionately, one by one, to “flee from the wrath to come;” and the Lord was pleased to make her the honoured instrument of Lady Huntingdon’s conversion, as well as of many others of her family.

Conversing with Lady Margaret one day on this subject, Lady Huntingdon was exceedingly struck with a sentiment she uttered, “_that since she had known and believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, for life and salvation, she had been as happy as an angel_.” To any such sensation of happiness, Lady Huntingdon felt that she was, as yet, an utter stranger. The more she examined herself, and considered the subject, the more she was convinced of the momentous truth. This conviction caused many reflections to arise in her mind; and beginning also to see her sinfulness and guilt, and the entire corruption and depravity of her whole nature, her hope of being able to reconcile herself to God by her own works and deservings, began gradually to die away. She sought, however, by the most rigorous austerities, to conquer her evil nature, and dispel the distressing thoughts which continually engrossed her mind. But, alas! the more she strove, the more she saw and felt that all her thoughts, words, and works, however specious before men, were utterly sinful before Him who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity.

A dangerous illness having, soon after, brought her to the brink of the grave, the fear of death fell terribly upon her, and her conscience was greatly distressed. She now perceived that she had beguiled herself with prospects of a visionary nature; was entirely blinded to her own real character; had long placed her happiness in mere chimeras, and grounded her vain hopes upon imaginary foundations. It was to no purpose that she reminded herself of the morality of her conduct; in vain did she recollect the many encomiums that had been passed upon her early piety and virtue. Her best righteousness now appeared to be but “filthy rags,” which, so far from justifying her before God, increased her condemnation. The remorse which before attended conscience, on account of sin, respected only the outward actions of her life; but now she saw her “heart was deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked--that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God;” and that “the thoughts of man’s heart are only evil, and that continually.” When upon the point of perishing in her own apprehension, the words of Lady Margaret returned strongly to her recollection, and she felt an earnest desire, renouncing every other hope, to cast herself wholly upon Christ for life and salvation. From her bed she lifted up her heart to her Saviour, with this important prayer, and immediately all her distress and fears were removed, and she was filled with peace and joy in believing.

Now the day began to dawn--Jesus, the Sun of Righteousness, arose, and burst in meridian splendour on her benighted soul. The scales fell from her eyes, and opened a passage for the light of life which sprang in, and death and darkness fled before it. Viewing herself as a brand plucked from the burning, she could not but stand astonished at the mighty power of that grace which saved her from eternal destruction just when she stood upon its very brink, and raised her from the gates of hell to the confines of heaven; and the depths from which she was raised, made the heights which she reached only the more amazing; she felt the Rock beneath her, and from that secure position looked with astonishment downward to that horrible pit from which she was so mercifully delivered--and upwards, in ecstacy, to that glory to which she should be raised. The “sorrow of the world, which worketh death,” was now exchanged for that godly sorrow which worketh repentance unto life; and “joy unspeakable, and full of glory,” succeeded that bitterness that comes of the conviction of sin; she enjoyed, already, a delightful foretaste of heaven. Her disorder from that moment took a favourable turn; she was restored to perfect health, and, what was better, to newness of life. She determined thenceforward to present herself to God, as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable, which she was now convinced was her reasonable service.

This mighty change began at her Ladyship’s heart, and extended its salutary influence to all the sublime faculties of her mind, and the whole tenor of her outward conversation. Her understanding was renewed in knowledge. The stubbornness of the will was broken, and changed into a passive acquiescence in the sovereign will of God. “Her carnal mind, which was enmity against God,” was subdued by the superior influence of Divine grace. All offences at the Gospel plan of salvation died away; for, when the veil of unbelief that covered her heart was rent, it then “turned to the Lord,” and from that moment she learned “to count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus her Lord.” The eye of her understanding being illuminated, and her heart enraptured with a view of matchless excellency, she was ready to exclaim, “Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee!” The desire of her soul was to him, and to the remembrances of his great name and glorious salvation. Believing in Jesus, as the Scripture hath said, she found in him a well of consolation, “springing up unto everlasting life.” All her wanderings were at once happily terminated--her doubts were removed, her tears were dried up, and she rejoiced in hope of the glory of God, whom she contemplated, in all his amiable and august perfections, with delight and wonder; and enraptured with a view of him as reconciled to her in the Son of his love, she gave vent to the fulness of her heart in the most glowing affections of gratitude and astonishment. Her conversion, in which the hand of God was so conspicuous, was not imaginary, but real. It not only influenced her sentiments, but extended to her conduct, and was productive of the most salutary effects. No sooner was her heart surrendered to God, and her alienated affections restored to their original claimant, than outward fruits appeared in her conversation: her renovation introduced new light into her understanding, and new desires into her heart and affections, and produced its effect upon her temper; not wholly to eradicate its constitutional peculiarity, but to sanctify, and render it subservient to the glory of God and the good of souls. Reason resigned its pretensions to the sacred authority of revelation: her intellectual powers were extricated from the darkness of nature, and brought by the irradiating Spirit of God into the bright region of light and liberty. Whom she had found a Saviour, Him she was unalterably determined to follow as a Guide: He possessed the supreme affection, reverence, and homage of her heart--was the centre of its wishes, and the spring of its comforts. A great cloud of witnesses are ready to testify, that from her earliest acquaintance with the truths of the Gospel, the venerable and elect Countess of Huntingdon continued, through every stage of her protracted pilgrimage, to walk worthy of her high vocation, “growing in grace, and adorning the doctrine of God her Saviour in all things.”