and soon promoted, until he became a confidential servant in the establishment. We mention these facts as striking instances of piety in youth, and of that strength and firmness of mind, which all who knew our departed friend will admit were his chief characteristics. If obituary notices are of any use, it must be to those who read them; and these facts we strongly impress upon the minds of our young friends, in order to shew them that piety in youth, especially that piety (the only true piety) which is attended with selfdenial and firmness to principle, and which considers that charity, or the love of the neighbour, is the principal object of all genuine religion, is not only the great safeguard of all virtue and happiness for eternity, but the only sure path to secure confidence and regard, and consequent prosperity and happiness in this life. Mr. Dearden, in his early life, connected study with piety; and the Word of God was the principal object of his meditation. In order to secure time for reading and study, he adopted for many years the plan of the Rev. J. Wesley, and allowed himself only six hours sleep out of the twenty-four; and thus before business commenced in the morning he had already devoted considerable time to devotion and study. In this manner he soon prepared himself, and became a useful and energetic speaker in religious meetings among the Methodists, and for more than twenty years he was one of the most active, energetic, and acceptable local preachers in that denomination of Christians. About twenty-six years ago, Mr. D. became acquainted with the Rev. James Bradley, who at that time was the minister of the New Church Society at Newcastle-upon-Tyne. After a short acquaintance with Mr. Bradley, Mr. D. expressed a desire to a mutual friend to know the religious principles of Mr. Bradley, having no doubt observed, in conversation with that gentleman, certain new ideas on religious subjects, which struck him as clear, scriptural, and edifying. Upon which, their mutual friend presented Mr. D. with a volume of Lectures, recently published by Mr. Bradley.* On reading these lectures, Mr. Dearden became convinced of the truths and doctrines of the New Church. No sooner were his convictions of their truth established, than he began to make them known to others, and to recommend to his numerous acquaintance and friends * See a review of these lectures in this perio dical for 1822, p. 121. the precious treasure he had discovered. With his studious and energetic mind, he was thoroughly conversant with all the dogmas of the prevailing orthodoxy, and accompanied by a most original and emphatic power of eloquence, he could present the most vivid contrast between the doctrines of the New Jerusalem and the dogmas of the old theology. So great was his power in this respect, as to be at times very impressive to all around him, and to convey to them the conviction which he felt himself of the great superiority of the doctrines of the New Church over those of the old. Mr. Dearden, thus convinced of the doctrines of the New Church, could not continue to preach under the garb of Methodism, and he consequently retired from the ministry, and devoted himself to the promotion, as far as in him lay, of the cause of the new dispensation. He was a most diligent reader of the writings of Swedenborg; and the "Arcana Cœlestia," during his long illness, was an unfailing source of edification, of consolation, and of spiritual strength in passing through the valley of the shadow of death. And the sole reason why he thus experienced so much edification in perusing that work, was because it was the medium of opening the eternal truths of the Word of God in so luminous and convincing a manner, as to be at once most edifying and consoling to his mind. For Mr. Bradley, through whose lectures, as we have seen, he was introduced to a knowledge of the New Church doctrines, he always entertained the highest regard. He had been successful in business; and the liberality which, as we have seen, he had in his youth considered to be essentially connected with genuine piety, he employed with increased affection to the support of all the institutions of the New Church, to which he was a liberal contributor. During the last few years of his life, he, together with his liberal friend, Mr. Edwin Moorhouse, of Ashton-under-Lyne, had the satisfaction of seeing a society established in that populous town, and a commodious place of worship opened, through their joint liberality, for the worship of the Lord according to the doctrines of the New Church. This place of worship, being within two miles of his residence, Mr. D. continued to attend as long as his health permitted. His long and painful illness he bore with great patience and resignation. To him "death was the continuation of life;" and he spoke of putting off the body as of putting Our departed friend, during his last ment might be made by which an object INDEX. ESSAYS, &c. &c. Address to the Members of the Sunday Address on a late Work on the Philo- Animal Kingdom of Swedenborg, 344 Are All Things created out of Nothing? Characteristics of Goethe, 328 Christian Remembrancer-Reviewers Re- Genius, 349 Idleness and Usefulness, 136 Jottings from Old Church Authors, 41 Man the ultimate of Order on which Clergy, on the Illustration peculiar to Mental State, the Changes of State, and Colour of the Blood, on the, 249 Concerning Merit in Good Works, 135 Correspondences, the Dependence of Lan- guage upon, 121, 172, 213, 266, 295, Divine Judgments, the Nature of the, 129 Education, remarks on Sunday School 210 Free-will, or the Free Choice of Moral the Means by which those Changes Minister and People, 161 Moral Culture, Materials for, 50, 180 Attack on the New Church at Winches- Jersey, 439 Brightlingsea, 78 Cape of Good Hope, 195 Certain Resolutions of the last Methodist Chalmers Dr. and the present State of Conference, General, 157 Conference, Forty-second General, 354 Leading Doctrines, the Four-Manchester Lectures at Hoxton, by the Rev. T. Lecture on the Trinity, at Aylesbury, by Malton, Yorkshire, 75, 116 Marriage, proposed Work on, 76, 116, 439 New Church Bazaar at Leeds, 40, 117, 196 Edleston's (Mr.) Publication on Marriage, New Church Soirée, Norwich, 40 399 Embsay, 198 Error Corrected in the translation of the New Publications, 78, 198 New Edition of the Index to the Arcana New Church Remembrancer and Guide New Church Society at Adelaide, Aus- New Church Tea Soirée at St. Heliers, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Rev. E. Madeley's New Jerusalem Church, Burnley, 318 New Church in Scotland, Fifteenth An- Opening of the New Church at Accring- Opening of a New Church Place of Proposals to publish in a separate form Monument to the Memory of the Re-opening of the Kersley New Jerusa- That Evil is No-thing, 473 Tombs and Monuments of Etruria, 155 Tripersonality in a New Point of View, 77 Vegetarian Movement, the, 158, 197 Re-opening of Rose Place Church, Liver- What is meant by Nothing, 438 pool, 197 Wivenhoe, 157 Rev. Thomas Goyder, proposal to erect a Wolfgang Menzel on Swedenborg, 359 Cave and Sever, Printers, 18, St. Ann's-street, Manchester. |