period of his life, perhaps, was he more useful. He was a great blessing to the scattered people of God in this hour of darkness; and, through his instrumentality, very many of the ignorant and thoughtless were led to embrace the Saviour.

After the death of Charles, and the accession of James II., the oppressive enactments against the Nonconformists were repealed, and liberty of conscience partially restored. Mr. Heywood, being once more allowed the free exercise of his ministerial functions, built a chapel, and collected a congregation at Northowram, in the vicinity of his former field of labor. Here he remained as pastor until his decease. But though he was now settled over a regular charge, yet, during the long season of his ejectment, he had become so attached to itinerant work, that he never afterwards laid it aside. While statedly ministering to his own people on the Sabbath, he spent a large portion of the week in missionary labors among the destitute. From a statement of his biographer it appears, that principally during the last seventeen years of his life, besides his regular work on the Lord's day, he preached on week days more than 3000 Sermons, and travelled in preaching excursions more than 30,000 miles. And his labors were as eminently blessed as they were abundant. Many thousand

souls, it has been computed, were brought, through his means, to a saving knowledge of Christ. So powerful and lasting, indeed, was the impression produced by his ministry, that although nearly two centuries have since passed away, his memory is still reverently cherished through all the region over which he once scattered "the seed of the kingdom." Thus toiling incessantly in his Master's service to the last, he died, full of hope and peace, May 4th, 1702, in the seventy-third year of his age, and fiftysecond of his stated ministry.

Mr. Heywood was twice married. His first wife was Miss Elizabeth, daughter of Rev. John Angier, a distinguished minister at Denton. By her he had two sons, John and Eliezer, both of whom became useful ministers of the gospel. After six years of great domestic happiness, she was removed from him by death. His second wife was Miss Abigail Crompton, of Breightmet, near Bolton. She proved a faithful and affectionate companion, and contributed greatly to his support and comfort during the harassing persecutions to which he was subjected.

Our author published, at different times, several valuable treatises, on religious subjects. In 1827 these were collected and reprinted in five volumes 8vo, with an extended memoir of his life, labors, and

sufferings. The work now reissued was the earliest of his publications. It was written while he was an exile from his home, fleeing from hamlet to hamlet to escape the blood-hounds of a persecuting Hierarchy; and, as might be expected, it is richly fraught with those precious truths, which formed the consolation of his own heart amidst his wanderings and trials. In revising it, the editor has deemed it expedient so to modify the language as to render the work more generally useful to our own times. Some change has also been made in the arrangement of subjects. The part which treats of Meditation, appeared originally in the form of an Appendix. It is now incorporated into the body of the book, with such alterations and additions as seemed necessary to adjust it to its new position. Here and there, too, a paragraph has been inserted to improve the connection, or greater expansion given to a thought too briefly stated. With these exceptions, the ideas are precisely the same as in the original work. While, in the mere choice of words, and structure of sentences, the editor has felt himself at liberty to make any changes which in his judgment appeared desirable, he has endeavored scrupulously to preserve the main scope and spirit of the author. Should any lover of antique phraseology complain of the freedom which he has thus taken, he can only say,

that his object has not been to gratify the curious, but to benefit the Christian Public at large. And he is persuaded that, to the mass of readers, the book will be far more acceptable in a form of expression to which they are accustomed, than if clothed in the obsolete garb of by-gone centuries.

The work has never before been issued in a form adapted to general circulation; and it is now most earnestly commended to the devout perusal and study of the children of God. It contains nothing of a denominational character. It is not controversial; nor is it doctrinal, abstractly considered. It deals wholly with those great topics of vital religion, in which Christians of every name are alike interested. And its exhibition of these topics is marked by a depth of pious feeling, and an experimental knowledge of the workings of grace in the soul, very seldom to be found. It may not, indeed, possess all that logical analysis, and that close consecutiveness of thought, by which more modern writings are characterized; but it possesses, what many modern writings lack-eminent spirituality, and a thoroughly evangelical tone. In these respects, it is worthy to take its place by the side of the devout treatises of Bunyan, and Flavel, and Baxter. Works of this description are greatly needed at the present day, when, amidst

he rush of events, and the constant calls to outward activity, there is a strong tendency to neglect the culti vation of inward holiness. The editor has found the labor, which he has bestowed on the book, more than compensated by the good which it has done his own soul. And it is his earnest prayer and hope that it may prove equally instructive and quickening to all into whose hands it shall come.