Memoirs of the Rev. Samuel J. Mills

Next to the devotions of the closet, and the perusal of the Holy Scriptures, there are few means of advancement in the divine life better adapted to their end, than a familiar acquaintance with the lives of godly men. If Religion appears lovely when portrayed merely in the simplicity and amiableness of her principles, how much more lovely when exhibited in the purity and benevolence of her conduct. When we see something more than right views and holy dispositions; when we behold not the portrait, but the living features of her excellence; her image sinks into the soul. Few can rise from the Biography of such men as Xavier, Beveridge, Baxter, Brainerd, Edwards, and Fuller, without deep and vivid impressions of the worth of piety, and of the importance and feasibility of eminent attainments. Who that has traced the footsteps of some favoured child of mercy through all the toil and discouragement of the Christian life — that has seen his heavenly spirit — that has witnessed his piety toward God and his ber.eticenee toward men — that, with delighted admiration, has pursued his path to the threshold of

IB lO MLMOIRS OF THL LATE

heaven; has not been eager to catch his faHins: mantie, and bless the Father of mercies for raising up men to shine as lights in the world, and to shed a lustre through a long hue of succeeding generationsfso inconsiderable portion of tins hnllowed fe’ding will, it is believed, be excited by contemplating the character of the late Sa.ailkl J. Mills, if any man has a claim that his real character should be exhibited, and the extent of his usefulness impartially developed, this claim belongs to the subject of these Memoirs. While few men have more merited public applause and gratitude, few of such eminent usefulness have received less than he. These we know were not the rewards he sought; but it is not the less delightful, nor the less dutiful, that they should be the tribute we pay.

It was the privilege of this beloved man to be the child of pious parents. He was the son of a venerable clergyman, “whose praise is in the churches,” and who is now the Pastor of a respectable congregation in the town of Torringford, in the county of Litchfield, State of Connecticut. His mother was the daughter of Samuel Robbins, of a respectable family originally from Weathersfield, in Hartford county, in the same State. She was a woman of very exemplary character and pre-eminent piety, and one whose memory is embalmed in the hearts of all who knew her. Samuel was their third child, and was born the 21st of April, 178;^.

Could we without sacrilege enter the sanctuary of a mother’s bosom, we might whisper a tale that would account for the distinguished usefulness with which God has condescended to favour some of the best of men. Many a godly mother can say, — “I have had peculiar sohcitudes respecting this child. Even before its birth, I dedicated it to the Lord; and then engaged that it should be unreservedly devoted to his glory. And when the little immortal was committed to my arms, with many prayers and tears did I renew my engagements, till it was strongly impressed on my mind, that God had heard my cry and accepted my offering.” This is somethitig more than fiction in relation to Mr. Mills. A plant so early watered might be expected to enjoy the most patient care and unremitting tenderness in its progressive maturity. “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it,” is a maxim’ too full of obligation and encouragement, to have been so long lost sight of by too many of the Christian Church. It is a precious thought, that God has engaged to preserve a church in the world from the children of believing parents. What pious parent will not be inspirited in his duty, when he surveys the children of his care, and remembers that it was once said, “Of such is the kingdom of heaven!”

The chiltihood and youth of Mr. Mills were chiefly spent under his father’s roof, in the possession of the most faithful instructions, and of the best kind. When quite a child, his mind exhibited no coinmc^ sensibility to the concerns of religion, and was easily and sometimes deeply affected with his neglect of his religious opportunities, and his ruined condition as a sinner. These impressions gradually wore away,

until the year 1798, when they were revived, and his attention powerfully arrested, during a season of the outpouring ot the Holy Spirit upon his native town*. This revival of religion took place about the time of a very general ‘’ outpouring” upon the churches of New -England. A minister of eminence, and who was once selded in Connecticut, informed the writer that he distinctly recollects of standing one day at his own door, and enumerating upward of seventy congregations, that lay under his eye, and that were contiguous with each other, who, that same year, were visited with seasons of refreshing from the divine pr.’sence. Not lar from one hundred and fifty congregations in New-England enjoyed at that time the like blessing.

Young Mills was then fifteen years of age. Naturally very retired and incommunicative, he was least of all disposed to say much concerning the exercises of his own mind. But such were his views of his own sinfulness, so severe his distress, and so bitter his opposition to God, that he would sometimes ‘’break out in expressions of unyielding rebellion.” With nothing was his dissatisfaction more painful, than the discriminations of the divine fivour in showing mercy to those who were around him, while he himself was apparently left to obduracy and ruin. He had beheld many of his comp mions in years and in sin, together with an elder brother, a sister and a

* For a narrative of t’lis work of grace, from the pen of the father of Mr. Mills, reforaiice may be had to the Conn. Evum. Ma<^. vol. 1.

niece, all residing under the same roof, and all that remained of his father’s descendants, rejoicing in hope, and united to the visible Church; while he himself obtained no relief from his agony, but remained in ‘• the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity.” Such was his state of mird for many months, and such it continued, when the revival began to decline, and when it was gone by! Two full years he remained in this dismal frame of mind, still refusing to bow at the footstool of mercy; and, to adopt his own sentiment, “at heart still cursing the day in which he was born.” But he had seen too much of his own vileness to relapse into a state of unconcern. With some apparent mitigation of his distress he left his father’s house for a neighbouring town, to take charge of a farm that had been bequeathed him by his maternal grandmother. His letters during this period, convince us that there was much in this absence from the bosom and prayers of his endeared family, to increase his apprehensions, that he should at last be an exile from God’s presence, and an outcast from the community of his people. In November, 1801, he returned home with the view of spending the winter at an Academy in the town of Litchfield, about twelve miles off, but with no repose to his depressed and troubled mind. On the morning of his departure for Litchfield, ever anxious for her son, and never more than now, his mother took an opportunity of inquiringinto the state of his mind, and begged him to make an ingenuous disclosure of his feelings. For a moment he was silent and wept; but his heart was too full, long to suppress the emotions produced

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