the work which they find themselves called upon to perform. The church will see from the London and provincial press, that the distress in our district is still increasing, and that extended assistance from more fortunate localities will be of use. Yours truly, THOMAS PEMBERTON, Treasurer, Obituary. Left this natural world for a spiritual one, on the 24th of August last, in the 58th year of her age, Sarah, the beloved wife of Wm. Reader, Esq., Cullen-street, Fenchurch, London. She had been for many years, with her bereaved husband, a member of the New Church. As she had lived, so she died, in peace and good-will to all. Her end was peace. Having commenced her Sabbath on earth, she rejoiced at the prospect of continuing it in heaven. On Monday, the 6th October, at her residence in Penn-lane, Melbourne, Derbyshire, Mrs. Jane Haimes, relict of the late Mr. William Haimes, departed from the natural into the spiritual world, in the 87th year of her age. Mrs. Haimes was a native of the village. Her father was a farmer, a gentleman of great and deserved influence in the neighbourhood; but she had the disadvantage of losing the tender care of a most excellent mother in early life. Her parents were both of them active, respectable, and highly esteemed members of the general Baptist persuasion, and educated their family, consisting of two sons and four daughters, of whom the late Mrs. Haimes was the youngest, with conscientious care, in the principles of practical religion. She always spoke of them with the most affectionate interest and respect, and acknowledged how deep a debt of gratitude, under Providence, she owed to their watchful attention. Of the youthful years and experience of our late beloved friend little appears to be now, with certainty, known. She was a most dutiful daughter, and in the course of a few years after her mother's decease, became the housekeeper of her father until she married her late husband, of whom an obituary appeared in the Intellectual Repository, &c., for the month of October, 1854. He had also been trained in the same religious principles as herself, and they were both highly esteemed members of the same society. They had no family; but their attachment to each other throughout a long and probationary existence, was unimpaired, and their wellgrounded hopes of the restoration of the conjugal union in the blissful realms of heavenly purity and peace were cherished with fondness and certainty to the last. The history of that great religious change which came over her husband's mind, in consequence of his dissatisfaction with the tri-personal doctrine of the Godhead, is related in his obituary. For a time he accepted the Unitarian system, as it is called, by which he thought he could combine the unity and benevolence of the Divine character, and as presenting the only alternative of retaining any Christian faith. But, about forty years ago, during a temporary residence in London for the purposes of trade, he providentially met with the doctrines of the New Jerusalem Church, which solved all his doubts and dissipated all his perplexities. He found in the glorious doctrine of the sole and exclusive divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom centres a Divine Trinity of Essentials-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in One undivided Person, and in the sanctity of the holy inspired Word of God, as a revelation of His will and wisdom, evidenced by the unfolding of its spiritual sense, an inward satisfaction which no words could express, and a true key to all the mysteries of genuine religion. He realised by these marvellous verities the truth of the divine declarations-"I and my Father are One." (John x. 30.) "The words that I speak unto you are spirit, and they are life." (John vi. 63.) Mrs. Haimes, however, who never could adopt her husband's Unitarian sentiments, though overjoyed to find that he had so candidly accepted the doctrine of the Lord's supreme Divinity, was yet some time before she could understand and accept his new views. She nevertheless joined with him in worship, and on their return to Melbourne, in fitting up and opening a meeting room adjoining their house, for public worship according to the New Church, and which she continued to attend with increasing satisfaction as long as the feebleness of age would permit. Mr. Haimes succeeded in obtaining the services of a minister of rare intelligence, who resided among them for many years, so that all their mental difficulties were speedily removed. Distinguished through life for the meekness of her deportment, her unos tentatious benevolence, and the piety of her character, she was regarded with no common affection by all who had the privilege of knowing her. She was a regular and devout reader of the Divine Word, and adorned the doctrines of religion by a consistent conduct. Nothing, indeed, gave her greater pain and uneasiness than any lack of sincerity in the Christian profession. Her motto in all states, and her uniform advice to all was, that "the path of duty is ever the path of safety." She always entertained the most humble sense of her own unworthiness, and utterly renounced the idea of self-merit. She was often fearful that she was not so patient and resigned to the Divine Will as she felt she ought to be; but this arose from genuine humility. She gently breathed her last as if falling into a peaceful slumber. A short time previously to her decease, the remains of her beloved husband were removed, by permission of the Secretary of State, from the freehold ground belonging to the society, in which there had been no other interment, to the New General Cemetery at Melbourne. There the remains of our late dear sister were also deposited, on the 10th of October, the Rev. Edward Madeley, of Birmingham, officiating as minister, surrounded by sorrowing relatives and friends, but who yet were grateful to the Divine Providence that she had been spared so long, a bright example of Christian excellence, and desiring only that the close of our own probationary career may be cheered with the same hopes, and hallowed with the same confidence. "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them." At the first meeting of the society after the funeral, the members passed a unanimous resolution expressive of their devout gratitude to the Lord Jesus Christ, who in His good providence had conferred upon them so great a favour in sparing her so long, during her widowhood, for the worthy example she had so constantly set before them, and for the glorious hope of meeting again in another and a better world. Birmingham. E. M. Conference-Business versus Pleasure, Offence of the Cross, 462 275 Correspondence of Salt, 68 Danger of Open Communication with Devotional Meditation; No. I. (Psalm Difference between Divine and Human Divine Benevolence in the Little Things Editorial Note, 1 General and Particular Election, 533 God's Impartial Goodness, 503 Order the Basis of True Fellowship, Peace, 97 Peter's Power; or, Faith Triumphant, 121 Power of Habit, 309 Practical Essay, by an Old Man, 451 Primeval Wisdom; or, Triads, Myths, Purity and Holiness of Swedenborg's Religion, Philosophy, and Literature : Religious Problems of our Time, 19, Representative Character of Abraham, Bush (Mrs.) and her Children, 45, 95 255 141, 478 Adelaide, 384 America, 339 America and the War, 283 Address of Condolence to the Queen, Hyde's, (Rev. J.) Visit to Northampton, Kersley, Bolton, Nottingham, and Indexes to Swedenborg's Writings, 336 American Cyclopedia, Article on the Inquiries with Answers, 522 New Church in, 336 Appeal to the Benevolent, 478 Barbadoes, 45 Birmingham-New Church Bible So- Birmingham-Hockley-street Society, 576 Blackburn, 230 Blackburn, Distress in, 528 Blackburn-Sunday-school Sermons, 526 Bolton, 40 Brighton, 571 Bristol, 138, 527, 573 Ipswich, 576 |