retired into the country. Dr. Samuel Stennett distinguished himself both as preacher and minister. As preacher, he was a neat composer of sermons, recommended to his hearers by a very affectionate delivery; as a writer, he was author of two octavo volumes of Sermons on Personal Religion; a volume on the Domestic Duties; another on the Parable of the Sower: he also wrote with good temper on the Baptismal Controversy; and published, likewise, on the Inspiration of the Scriptures. These are admirable in their kind, moderately Calvinistic, but marked by good sense, benevolence, and piety. Soft and tranquil was the evening of his days. He had a poetical talent, and with the effusions of his muse would entertain his company. His country residence was a neat cottage at Muswell Hill, near Highgate, where I annually visited him. Here he received his friends with ease, and treated them with a cheerful hospitality. The gentleman, the scholar, and the Christian, he was an ornament of the religious community.

90.

ANDREW KIPPIS, D. D. F. R. S. AND S. A.
DIED 1795.

RELIGIOUS differences are a mighty cause of the disputes and aversions that have taken place in the earth. In consequence of religious differences,

ANDREW KIPPIS, D. D. F. R. S. AND S. A. 255

mankind have been ready to view one another in a light peculiarly odious, and to cherish the most unfriendly, and even the most malignant sentiments. The quarrels that have arisen from this origin have been always too generally prevalent; and it is, alas! to be feared, that they will continue to prevail for ages yet to come. The effects of a temper of this kind must be extremely bad, if we consider the matter in a moral and religious light.

And now, if my voice could be heard, I would ardently and affectionately call upon the bigots and persecutors of the globe, no longer to violate the rights of conscience, but to grant to every man the privilege of worshipping his God and Father, in the manner that is agreeable to the dictates of his own mind. Be persuaded, since ye are disciples of the same Master, to live in love, even as Christ also loved you; and do not permit any differences in religious sentiments to interrupt the harmonious agreement with which it behoves you to march on in the road that leads to the mansions of glory. In short, let each of us, in our several stations and connexions, be studious to cultivate the sentiments of universal meekness, good-will, and benevolence; and let us constantly attend to the mighty arguments and motives to this purpose, which are set before us in the Gospel. If thus we be careful not to fall out by the way, we shall enjoy the truest satisfaction which the present life can afford, and shall be preparing for the realms of complete concord and blessedness! Sermons.

ANDREW KIPPIs was born, 1725, at Nottingham; he was descended, on both sides, from ministers ejected by the cruel Act of Uniformity. His father was a silk hosier, but, he dying early, the son was transferred to Sleaford, Lincolnshire, where he received his grammar education. At the age of sixteen he became a pupil for the ministry under Doddridge at Northampton. Upon the close of his studies he was invited to Dorchester and Boston, but, in 1746, chose the latter situation. In 1750 he removed to Dorking, Surry, where he succeeded Mason, author of the Treatise on Self-Knowledge. Here he remained only three years; for, in 1753, on the death of the Rev. Obadiah Hughes, he fixed his residence at Westminster, where he died, September 20, 1795, in the seventy-first year of his age. He had been active through life as minister, tutor, and writer. In the academies of Hoxton and of Hackney he taught with talent and respectability; he was also member of the Society of Antiquaries, and of the Royal Society. His grand work was the BIOGRAPHIA BRITANNICA, which, alas! he left more than half unfinished. What he has done is executed with diligence and impartiality. Such was the suavity of his disposition, that he was, in his biographical sketches, more apt to dwell on the virtues than to expose the frailties of mankind. A friend telling him that the sarcastic Horace Walpole reproached him with a love of indiscriminate panegyric, the biographer replied, "Tell him to wait till I come to his Father's life, he may then have rea

son to alter his opinion!" As the honest patriot, Dr. Kippis would have reprobated the corrupt statesman destroying the liberties of his country. He published separately the Lives of Captain Cooke and of Dr. Pringle; he also printed a volume of excellent SERMONS, as well as numerous pamphlets. Dr. Abraham Rees, who preached his funeral sermon, expatiates on his mild and gentle temper, his polished manners, his graceful address, and the variety of his accomplishments. I knew him well, received from him marks of friendship, and am happy in paying this tribute of respect to his philanthropy.

91.

STEPHEN ADDINGTON, D.D.

DIED 1796.

PAUL reviewing what he had been and done, he could not but be astonished that such a sinner against Christ should be forgiven. "Nevertheless," says he, "though my character and conduct had "been so offensive and provoking, I obtained "mercy," &c. He was now willing to acknowledge his obligations to that, though he imagined he had no need of it before, even while committing acts of the most violent outrage which could be offered against Christianity and Christians. In these, while a Pharisee, he gloried; and upon what principle? That on which a bigotted Papist persecutes all whom

he stigmatizes as HERETICS, pretending therein to serve God and his church. But will that justify him before the tribunal of his righteous Judge, or even the cool and impartial opinion of sober sense? What sentiments must Saul have entertained of the Divine Being, if he could suppose him to be well pleased with a man, who cuts another's throat, stones him to death, burns him at the stake, or tortures him on a rack, because his religious sentiments do not exactly coincide with his own, or on account of his worshipping God in a place and posture, in a mode and dress, different from those he has been most accustomed to? The prejudices of education, however early imbibed or strongly rivetted, cannot vindicate any man in such a spirit and conduct, much less one of Saul's talents and literary knowledge. Far from attempting to justify himself therein after his conversion, he owned his guilt, and wept over it! Life of Paul.

STEPHEN ADDINGTON was born about the year 1730, near Harborough, Leicestershire; his pious parents, discovering in him a love of learning and of religion, early devoted him to the service of the sanctuary. He was placed under the care of the great and good Doddridge, who treated him as his own son, whilst the pupil ever retained the profoundest regard for his memory! Indeed, his application and good conduct must have recommended him to any tutor, for he was more than usually intent on improvement. His exercises in the ministry