: MR. HUNT AS A PREACHER. 181 preaching the gospel. In the year 1769 he began to preach with uncommon acceptance: the approbation he met with encouraged him to continue till providence, after some time, opened the way for his settlement at Boston, September 25, 1771: where he continued his public labours, with great acceptance both to his own congregation and the people of the town in general-till the fatal 19th of April last. Indeed his public services as long as he lived everywhere met with singular approbation; he was truly a "workman that needed not to be ashamed." In prayer he was peculiarly copious, grave and solemn, with an unusual variety and pertinency of sentiment and language: and perhaps in no part of public exercise did he more excel than in this. As a preacher he was eminent; his compositions were correct, manly and elegant; his sermons were rational, judicious and instructive-enriched with striking and important sentiments-adorned with a variety and noble turn of thought-enlivened by a strong animated and delicate stile recommended by a delivery remarkably grave, deliberate and emphatical with a pathos and energy becoming the pulpit, and calculated to give every idea he meant to convey, its full weight upon the mind. His imagination was lively and conducted with judgment. He had a ready invention, with a singular dexterity in collecting well judg'd images and metaphors, and contrasting ideas and expressions so as to engage the hearer. A lively and beautiful imagery usually appeared in all his compositions. He appeared fully possessed in his own thoughts of what he aimed to express; and to endeavor to convey it to the understanding and heart of his hearers; so that he usually commanded the attention of his auditors in an uncommon degree. It ever appeared to be his principal concern in his public discourses, to do good: he was solicitous to instruct the mind and affect the heart; not merely to please; but to please in order to profit; not to amuse his hearers with the empty sound of language or the speculations of philosophy, but to "feed them with that knowledge and understanding" which should save their souls. He loved and he preached the peculiar doctrines of the gospel as they were understood by the fathers of this country, but with a most agreable openness and candor of mind. The doctrine of redemption thro' a mediator and atoning sacrifice he was particularly attached to, and dwelt much upon it in the course of his life; and it was the hope and comfort of his heart in death. Mr. Hooker, towards the close of his sermon, spoke very sympathetically of the Old South Church, and of the almost unexampled trials through which, within a few years, it had been called to pass: With great pleasure, was it in my power, I should now address my self to the bereaved flock, broken and scattered and without a shepherd; — driven by cruel violence far from their own homes;— their house of prayer, which they left behind, vilely prostituted to the most disgraceful uses ;· their beloved pastor now cut off by death; when he was far from any of his flock, and none of them near him to close his eyes or follow him to the grave—such is the disposal of the only wise God. The dealings of Providence have been peculiar of late years towards that church and congregation. Though they have been from the beginning favored with a bright series of burning and shining lights, whose praise is still in all the churches; yet of late they have been bereaved in a very uncommon manner. Mr. Hunt is the sixth pastor of that church, that has been separated from it within seventeen years. Two were dismissed yet living: He is the fourth that has been taken away by death in that time; Mr. Prince in the year 1758 — Mr. Cumming in 1763; Dr. Sewall in the year 1769: — last of all this our deceased friend and servant of Christ, whose remains we are now to commit to the dust. And now the church and congregation itself, together with the rest of that miserable town, is scattered abroad to the four quarters of the country. But Christ the redeemer of his people still lives and reigns and has all power in Heaven and in earth given into his hands. Pity them, O thou compassionate head of the church, and "gather them in thine arms and carry them in thy bosom " and return them to their own habitation; and again send forth laborers into thine harvest. This afflicted church had indeed seen "the hope of man" destroyed. We cannot doubt, however, that in this, the darkest hour in its history, and in its dispersion, many of the members were able to make their own, the words of the psalmist: "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance and my God.” Oft dwell my thoughts on those thrice happy days, By Jordan's banks with devious steps I stray, In rapid floods the vernal torrents roll, And dash my shatter'd bark from shore to shore. MAD A.D. CHAPTER V. 1776-1799. REHABILITATION. HE British troops took their departure from Boston on Sunday the 17th of March, 1776, and the gates of the town were immediately thrown open to the army under General Washington. The siege had lasted less than a year, but it left marks of desolation which were not easily effaced. Hundreds of houses had been pulled down, many more had been damaged, much personal property had been destroyed, and many families were reduced from affluence to poverty. The summer that followed the evacuation was a sickly one, and the inhabitants who had escaped before or during the siege were slow to return. The Provincial Congress which had been in session at Watertown did not remove to Boston until November 12.1 One who on the afternoon of the 17th of March landed "at the bottom of the Common, near the high bluff which was taken 1 The first issue of the Boston Gazette, town, was on the 4th of November, after its return to Boston from Water- 1776. A SCENE OF DESOLATION. 185 away a few years ago to make Charles Street," recorded long afterward in the Columbian Centinel the impressions made upon him during his first walk through the desolated town: On crossing the Common, we found it very much disfigured, with ditches, and cellars, which had been dug by the British troops, for their accommodation when in camp. To our great regret, we saw several large trees lying in the Mall, which had been cut down that morning. We were informed that the tories were so exasperated at being obliged to leave the town, that they were determined to do all the mischief possible, and had commenced destroying that beautiful promenade; but it being told to some of the Selectmen, they went in haste to General Howe, and represented the circumstance, who kindly sent one of his Aids to forbid the further destruction of the trees, and to reprimand the tories for their conduct. General Howe could not but feel some degree of grateful regard and sympathy for the people of Massachusetts, as they had erected a monument in Westminster Abbey to the memory of his brother, whose urbane and gentlemanly deportment had gained the esteem and respect of the Massachusetts forces, and who was killed in a battle with the French and Indians in 1758. The Mall was originally laid out with only two rows of trees, a third was added a few years before the war, which we found were all cut down for fuel, together with the intire fence which surrounded the Common, as was also a large magnificent tree which stood on the town's land, near the school-house, in West Street, of equal size with that which now stands in the middle of the Common, both of which I suppose to be aboriginals. On passing into the town, it presented an indescribable scene of desolation and gloominess, for notwithstanding the joyous occasion of having driven our enemies from our land, our minds were impressed with an awful sadness at the sight of the ruins of many houses which had been taken down for fuel - the dirtiness of the streets - the wretched appearance of the very few inhabitants who remained during the siege the contrast between the Sunday we then beheld compared with those we formerly witnessed, when well-dressed people, with cheerful countenances, were going to and returning from Church, on which occasion Boston exhibits so beautiful a scene but more especially when we entered the Old South Church, and had ocular demonstration that it had been turned into a riding-school, for the use of General Burgoyne's regiment of cavalry, which formed a part of the garrison, but which had never ventured to pass the barriers of the town. . . . All these circumstances conspired to fill the mind with sombre reflections. But amidst the sadness of the scene, there was a pleasing satisfaction in the hope that men capable of such atroci |