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THE

EVANGELICAL MAGAZINE

AND

MISSIONARY CHRONICLE.

FOR JANUARY, 1837.

MEMOIR OF THE LATE MRS. ANN LLOYD,
OF MALMSBURY.

THE lives and deaths of the faithful disciples of Christ, in successive ages, furnish a constantly accumulating testimony, often more affecting than the most elaborate arguments, in favour of Christian principles. The memorials of pious women are equally instructive with those of pious men, as they reveal the silent influence of the religion of the Gospel in forming the character, and sustaining the mind under circumstances, often of difficulty and trial, unknown and unsuspected by the world. These remarks might be amply illustrated by the religious history and experience of the late Mrs. Ann Lloyd, of Abbey House, Malmsbury, but, from our contracted space, we must be satisfied with merely indicating a few particulars. Her course is not the less worthy of notice from her having occupied a comparatively retired sphere. It is the great object of Christianity to train the mind, not merely for great crises and rare emergencies, but for those more simple and constantly recurring duties upon which the true value of character, and the proper happiness of society, must depend. These are what have been lost to the world by the prevalence of moral evil; and these are what Christianity proposes to restore.

Mrs. Lloyd possessed an early acquaintance with the leading truths of Scripture; but she soon found that a life of suffering, into which she was early initiated, required better consolations than a mere theoretical knowledge of Divine things ever gave, or can ever VOL. XV.

give.. Like many young persons religiously educated, though her convictions were in favour of religion, she was far from the experience, in early life, of its salutary and sanctifying influence. She found it difficult to relinquish the vanities of life to which her natural talents and mental vivacity strongly predisposed her; and though her outward conduct was exemplary, and her respect for religión great, yet she was painfully conscious of a melancholy destitution of the essential elements of the Christian character. Many, we fear, who are similarly situated, but, not so faithful to themselves as she was, are willingly selfdeceived by these exterior indications of good; they hope that, though they do not claim to be determinately religious, they, may be, considered as "not far from the kingdom of God," and are satisfied so to remain! Meanwhile the practical habit of their minds is averse from the exercises and engagements of the spiritual life; the unchecked power of evil gradually attains a larger ascendency over them; the world, with its cares and temptations, "its true and false enchantments," engrosses their supreme regard; and every succeeding month and year floats them to a greater distance from God, as the retreating tide bears the unmoored bark further and yet further from the shore. The fair promise of religious impression, in which they too securely trusted, proves, at length, to have been but like the deceitful bloom upon unsound fruit,—the

B

forerunner of an equally hasty decay; or like the false dawn of the East,only the prelude to still returning darkness.* This is an unhappy state of mind, as well as a dangerous one, for persons of this class, whilst dead to the consolations of a neglected Gospel, are often painfully alive only to its fears. They have light sufficient to reveal the extent of their danger, without having Christian principle enough to seek the refuge which the Gospel exhibits, or to surrender themselves to the only influences which can bring the soul to the enjoyment of solid satisfaction and rest. Consequently they have what the apostle calls "a certain fearful looking for of judgment," and are something like those who find themselves amidst a volcanic soil, the distant explosions announcing the unseen extended fires upon which they tread. Mrs. Lloyd afterwards looked back upon this period of her history with much concern, observing, "It was through many a year I stood upon a precipice so awful that I shudder at the recollection of my danger. Oh, what an arm was that which held me!" The following extract from her Journal shows her to have been at this time, though idolized by those around her, equally far from happiness and hope.

66

Again dawns the morning of another Sabbath, but obscured by dark clouds and showers of rain. How swiftly does time pass away, and yet we throw away our suns as made for sport!' Sabbath suns will, ere long, wax and wane no more. Very soon shall I close my eyes upon all terrestrial objects, and open them in eternity. Oh! eternity, eternity, awfully solemn, beyond expression, is this one word, in which the happiness or misery of millions and myriads is expressed. To be eternally happy, or eternally miserable, belongs to every individual upon the face of the globe. Yet, amidst these awful considerations, do I rest (or rather live), for I cannot say, under considerations so momentous, I rest; rest never will be mine here, in any degree, till I am assured of an interest in the great Re

The false dawn. Subah kanzib, the lying or false dawn, is a phenomenon common in these eastern countries, consisting in a brightness which appears from an hour to half an hour before the true dawn commences. It may be some optical deception depending upon the refraction of the sun's rays, even when he is considerably below the visible horizon.-Frazer's Kuzzilbash.

deemer; nor a permanent rest till I get beyond these rolling spheres, and dwell in the presence of him who wept that man might smile, who bled that man might never die !'....I had this evening the most awful views of death and eternity. The thought of a separation from a husband inestimably dear came with such force as almost to overwhelm me. A separation, final and irrevocable, appeared in all its horrors, for I seemed certain I could not live many days. This was the first idea that struck me; but, agonizing as it was, it gave place to one still more so, that of being for ever and for ever miserable. I never recollect any feelings so rending, my heart seemed torn asunder. I retired to bed only to weep, but I could not look to him from whom alone peace is obtained: neither could I adequately see my own vileness and depravity..... If after all these warnings, sent in so much mercy, from the hand of a Father both kind and good, yes, infinitely so, I should at last be found unprepared, how awful, beyond expression, is the thought! What could I plead that judgment should not pass? Plead? Ah, nothing, nothing. Oh, my soul, lose not this solemn thought, that soon, very soon, thine everlasting doom will be fixed; and that now, yes, now, this moment (for the next may be eternity's), is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation."

But God appears to have had designs of mercy towards her, and proceeded to work out those designs in his own inscrutable way. The worldly blossom was to be blighted, that the spiritual one might be set; and a cloud was thrown over the prospects of life, that the lights and consolations of a higher world might shine upon her spirit. She had not long entered the marriage relation, which took place when she was in her eighteenth year, before symptoms of that malady appeared from which she never recovered. Her residence was then fixed at Malmsbury, in Wiltshire, in the house immediately adjoining the venerable ruins of the once magnificent abbey, which is one of the attractive objects in that county to the antiquary and man of taste. In the same house, the celebrated Hobbes, the Philosopher of Malmsbury, as he is called, is said to have lived. At the back of the house the seclusion is perfect, and the view exhibits one of those rich and fertile prospects, in the selection of which the

ancient monks and churchmen were proverbial for their skill and judgment. Here, happy in the husband of her choice, with an eye to discern the beauty of the sylvan scenes around her, and a heart to prize the comforts of her lot, she spent years of bodily suffering, which were to be mercifully alleviated by the consolations of piety. There is reason to believe, from her Diary and other writings, that it was the shock which her health received that first disposed her to more serious thoughts upon religious subjects. It was about this time that the Rev. S. Thodey, now of Cambridge, visited Malmsbury, at the request of the Rev. W. Jay, to supply, for a few Sabbaths, the vacant pulpit, residing for some weeks with Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd; and it was to his ministry, combined with his private conversation with her upon the topics of personal religion, that she invariably ascribed her first decided, and, as they happily proved, permanent religious impressions. She maintained, till the close of life, an occasional correspondence with him upon points connected with her Christian experience; and some other letters written under the pressure of suffering, and in the immediate prospect of death, furnish ample proofs of the power of Christianity to sustain the mind in the darkest hours of human calamity.

To this grateful change in her religious history she refers, in her private writings, with much interest, under date May 7, 1819.

"I am as a wonder unto many Surely the hand of the Lord is mighty to save. This weak frame still holds out another year; and though for these mne years past the hand of affliction has pressed so heavily as to lead me to suppose that each would be the last, yet am I preserved to see my twenty-ninth birth-day, the happiest of my life, for now I trust I can say that I do love the Lord. The last letter I received from my dear friend, Mr. T. (with an enclosed tract, most beautifully written by Robert Hall), was the means employed to awaken my languor and indifference to the momentous concerns of the soul, which I sincerely pray may not, as heretofore, be as the morning cloud and early dew, but may abide with me continually to cheer my oft gloomy path.

'Oh, who could bear life's stormy doom
Did not thy wing of love

Come sweetly wafting through the gloom,
The peace-branch from above?'

"In the mercies of the past year I account my acquaintance with Mr. T. as none of the smallest. He has been a spiritual guide to me when I could have received no support from any other earthly source: and I am sure, so long as I live, I shall have cause to bless God that he ever came to Malmsbury. May every blessing he needs, from the best source, continually abide with him to support and strengthen him to perform the pleasure of his Lord."

Her anticipations of early death, however, were not realized, as it pleased God that the shadow should go back upon the sun-dial for fifteen years. But from this period there was a visible growth in the peace and satisfaction of her mind. There were two things by which, from the time of her conversion to her death, she was eminently distinguished; by her anxious efforts to avail herself of all the means which her affliction permitted, to promote her own growth in grace, and her great concern for the progress of religion in the minds of others. Her efforts to promote her own advancement in the religious life, to cultivate the virtues and graces of the Christian character, and to secure her intellectual improvement, as well as confirm her devotional habits, were constant and unremitting. We find extracted in her note-book, Jeremy Taylor's beautiful description of the Countess of Carberry, which might, in its leading particulars, with almost literal exactness, be applied to herself. "She was early at her repentance; and towards the latter end of her days grew so fast in religion as if she had had a revelation of her approaching end; and therefore that she must go a great way in a little time, her discourses were more full of religion, her prayers more frequent, her charity increasing, her friendship more communicative, her passions more under discipline, and so she trimmed her lamp, not knowing that her night was so near, but that it might shine also in the day-time, in the temple, and before the altar of incense. Though she had the greatest judgment, yet, as if she knew nothing of it, she had the meanest opinion of herself, and, like a fair taper, when she shined to all

a

forerunner of an equally hasty decay ; or like the false dawn of the East,only the prelude to still returning darkness.* This is an unhappy state of mind, as well as a dangerous one, for persons of this class, whilst dead to the consolations of a neglected Gospel, are often painfully alive only to its fears. They have light sufficient to reveal the extent of their danger, without having Christian principle enough to seek the refuge which the Gospel exhibits, or to surrender themselves to the only influences which can bring the soul to the enjoyment of solid satisfaction and rest. Consequently they have what the apostle calls " certain fearful looking for of judgment," and are something like those who find themselves amidst a volcanic soil, the distant explosions announcing the unseen extended fires upon which they tread. Mrs. Lloyd afterwards looked back upon this period of her history with much concern, observing, "It was through many a year I stood upon a precipice so awful that I shudder at the recollection of my danger. Oh, what an arm was that which held me!" The following extract from her Journal shows her to have been at this time, though idolized by those around her, equally far from happiness and hope.

66

'Again dawns the morning of another Sabbath, but obscured by dark clouds and showers of rain. How swiftly does time pass away, and yet we throw away our suns as made for sport!' Sabbath suns will, ere long, wax and wane no more. Very soon shall I close my eyes upon all terrestrial objects, and open them in eternity. Oh! eternity, eternity, awfully solemn, beyond expression, is this one word, in which the happiness or misery of millions and myriads is expressed. To be eternally happy, or eternally miserable, belongs to every individual upon the face of the globe. Yet, amidst these awful considerations, do I rest (or rather live), for I cannot say, under considerations so momentous, I rest; rest never will be mine here, in any degree, till I am assured of an interest in the great Re

The false dawn. Subah kanzib, the lying or false dawn, is a phenomenon common in these eastern countries, consisting in a brightness which appears from an hour to half an hour before the true dawn commences. It may be some optical deception depending upon the refraction of the sun's rays, even when he is considerably below the visible horizon.-Frazer's Kuzzilbash.

deemer; nor a permanent rest till I get beyond these rolling spheres, and dwell in the presence of him who wept that man might smile, who bled that man might never die !'....I had this evening the most awful views of death and eternity. The thought of a separation from a husband inestimably dear came with such force as almost to overwhelm me. A separation, final and irrevocable, appeared in all its horrors, for I seemed certain I could not live many days. This was the first idea that struck me; but, agonizing as it was, it gave place to one still more so, that of being for ever and for ever miserable. I never recollect any feelings so rending, my heart seemed torn asunder. I retired to bed only to weep, but I could not look to him from whom alone peace is obtained: neither could I adequately see my own vileness and depravity..... If after all these warnings, sent in so much mercy, from the hand of a Father both kind and good, yes, infinitely so, I should at last be found unprepared, how awful, beyond expression, is the thought! What could I plead that judgment should not pass? Plead? Ah, nothing, nothing. Oh, my soul, lose not this solemn thought, that soon, very soon, thine everlasting doom will be fixed; and that now, yes, now, this moment (for the next may be eternity's), is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation."

But God appears to have had designs of mercy towards her, and proceeded to work out those designs in his own inscrutable way. The worldly blossom was to be blighted, that the spiritual one might be set; and a cloud was thrown over the prospects of life, that the lights and consolations of a higher world might shine upon her spirit. She had not long entered the marriage relation, which took place when she was in her eighteenth year, before symptoms of that malady appeared from which she never recovered. Her residence was then fixed at Malmsbury, in Wiltshire, in the house immediately adjoining the venerable ruins of the once magnificent abbey, which is one of the attractive objects in that county to the antiquary and man of taste. In the same house, the celebrated Hobbes, the Philosopher of Malmsbury, as he is called, is said to have lived. At the back of the house the seclusion is perfect, and the view exhibits one of those rich and fertile prospects, in the selection of which the

ancient monks and churchmen were proverbial for their skill and judgment. Here, happy in the husband of her choice, with an eye to discern the beauty of the sylvan scenes around her, and a heart to prize the comforts of her lot, she spent years of bodily suffering, which were to be mercifully alleviated by the consolations of piety. There is reason to believe, from her Diary and cther writings, that it was the shock which her health received that first disposed her to more serious thoughts upon religious subjects. It was about this time that the Rev. S. Thodey, now of Cambridge, visited Malmsbury, at the request of the Rev. W. Jay, to supply, for a few Sabbaths, the vacant pulpit, residing for some weeks with Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd; and it was to his ministry, combined with his private conversation with her upon the topics of personal religion, that she invariably ascribed her first decided, and, as they happily proved, permanent religious impressions. She maintained, till the close of life, an occasional correspondence with him upon points connected with her Christian experience; and some other letters written under the pressure of suffering, and in the immediate prospect of death, furnish ample proofs of the power of Christianity to sustain the mind in the darkest hours of human calamity.

To this grateful change in her religious history she refers, in her private writings, with much interest, under date May 7, 1819.

"I am as a wonder unto many Surely the hand of the Lord is mighty to save. This weak frame still holds out another year; and though for these nine years past the hand of affliction has pressed so heavily as to lead me to suppose that each would be the last, yet am I preserved to see my twenty-ninth birth-day, the happiest of my life, for now I trust I can say that I do love the Lord. The last letter I received from my dear friend, Mr. T. (with an enclosed tract, most beautifully written by Robert Hall), was the means employed to awaken my languor and indifference to the momentous concerns of the soul, which I sincerely pray may not, as heretofore, be as the morning cloud and early dew, but may abide with me continually to cheer my oft gloomy path.

'Oh, who could bear life's stormy doom
Did not thy wing of love

Come sweetly wafting through the gloom,
The peace-branch from above?'

“In the mercies of the past year I account my acquaintance with Mr. T. as none of the smallest. He has been a spiritual guide to me when I could have received no support from any other earthly source: and I am sure, so long as I live, I shall have cause to bless God that he ever came to Malmsbury. May every blessing he needs, from the best source, continually abide with him to support and strengthen him to perform the pleasure of his Lord."

Her anticipations of early death, however, were not realized, as it pleased God that the shadow should go back upon the sun-dial for fifteen years. But from this period there was a visible growth in the peace and satisfaction of her mind. There were two things by which, from the time of her conversion to her death, she was eminently distinguished; by her anxious efforts to avail herself of all the means which her affliction permitted, to promote her own growth in grace, and her great concern for the progress of religion in the minds of others. Her efforts to promote her own advancement in the religious life, to cultivate the virtues and graces of the Christian character, and to secure her intellectual improvement, as well as confirm her devotional habits, were constant and unremitting. We find extracted in her note-book, Jeremy Taylor's beautiful description of the Countess of Carberry, which might, in its leading particulars, with almost literal exactness, be applied to herself. "She was early at her repentance; and towards the latter end of her days grew so fast in religion as if she had had a revelation of her approaching end; and therefore that she must go a great way in a little time, her discourses were more full of religion, her prayers more frequent, her charity increasing, her friendship more communicative, her passions more under discipline, and so she trimmed her lamp, not knowing that her night was so near, but that it might shine also in the day-time, in the temple, and before the altar of incense. Though she had the greatest judgment, yet, as if she knew nothing of it, she had the meanest opinion of herself, and, like a fair taper, when she shined to all

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