ARTICLE LXXIV.

Norbourne Parish, Berkeley County.—No. 2.

In a previous article I spoke of Morgan's Chapel, in old Frederick county and parish, and of Morgan Morgan as lay reader there and elsewhere. The site of that chapel is near the dividingline between Frederick and Berkeley, and the family of Morgans has always been round about it. The foundation of the old chapel may still be seen in the graveyard, though two churches have since been built within a few paces of it. The following family sketch is taken from a pamphlet published many years since by the Rev. Benjamin Allen, and is so much better than any thing from my pen, that I shall make no apology for borrowing it:—

"MORGAN MORGAN.

"It is but justice to departed piety to hold up to the view of survivors its beauty and its value. Affection to the living also prompts us to depict the character of the Christian dead, in order that their holy examples may light others the way to happiness and peace. Actuated by these motives, we present our readers with an obituary of Morgan Morgan, a man by many of them respected and beloved already. Colonel Morgan Morgan, the father of him we propose to notice, was a native of Wales, whence he emigrated in early life to the then Province of Pennsylvania. There he married, and there his first son was born, in the year of our Lord 1715. Thence, about the year 1726, he removed to Virginia, to the place where his descendants now reside, in the county of Berkeley. He there erected the first cabin built on the Virginia side of the Potomac, between the Blue Ridge and the North Mountains. Of course the country was a wilderness, the dwelling-place of bears, wolves, and Indians. But in this wilderness did he find the God of the Christians present, for here, in the spirit of the patriarchs, did he wait upon Him, and here did he experience His providential care.

"In or about the year 1740, he-associated, as we are informed, with Dr. John Briscoe and Mr. Hite-erected the first Episcopal Church in the valley, at what is now called Mill Creek, or Bunker's Hill. In that building he had the satisfaction of seeing his son, Morgan Morgan, (who was born to him March 20, 1737,) perform the service of the Church as lay reader at the early age of sixteen. With the religious education of this son he appears to have taken peculiar care. He took him with him in his usual visits to the sick and dying. At seventeen, he induced him to act as clerk to the Rev. Mr. Meldrum, then rector of the parish at Winchester. He lived a pattern of piety and good citizenship until the advanced age of seventy-eight, when, under the roof of his son Morgan, he

breathed his spirit into the hands of his Creator. The close of his life was spent in close communion with his God, in fitting himself for the change at hand, and in impressing the precious Gospel on the minds of his descendants. When on the bed of death, so anxious was he for the pious walk of his children, that he thus expressed himself:-'I hoped I should have lived to see Morgan's children old enough to say their catechism and read the word of God; but I must depart.' One of his expressions, uttered with the greatest humility, was, Lord Jesus, open the gates of heaven and let me in.' He fell asleep in that Jesus, leaving on the countenance of death the smile of the triumphant soul. He died the 1st of November, 1766.

Was

"The mantle of the father was caught by the son. Morgan Morgan, the subject of our present notice, lived also a pattern of piety. He served his fellow-citizens in various public capacities. He officiated as clerk for the successive rectors of the parish, and as lay reader when there was no rector. He was the friend of the needy, and the comforter of the afflicted. any one sick with so contagious a disorder that their neighbours fled from them with alarm, Morgan Morgan was ready to attend their house of suffering, and to watch over their bed. In public ministrations, he officiated chiefly in his immediate neighbourhood, until within a few years of the close of his life, when, in consequence of the destitute state of the country generally, he was often called far from home to perform the religious duties proper for a layman. At length, from the frequency of those calls, he gave himself entirely to the work of a labourer in the vineyard. While the Church to which he belonged exists in this land, his labours will be remembered with gratitude. In a dark day, when desolation and death seemed brooding over her interests, he commenced a career of active exertion, which revived the attachment of her friends and kept her from descending to the dust. Though encumbered with the weight of years, and but a layman, he, by constant exhortation and incessant labours of love, through the blessing of God, impressed the minds of many of the young with the truths of the Gospel, and revived the spirit of piety generally in the land. Through Jefferson and Berkeley, and part of Frederick, Hampshire, and Maryland, his labours extended. He visited alike the mansions of the rich and the cottages of the poor,-everywhere acting in the spirit of a crucified Master. To the prosperous he was the messenger of warning, to the afflicted, of consolation. Many are there now living, who can testify to his faithfulness; many are there, we trust, in heaven, who have hailed him as their spiritual father. His course through this country may be traced by the fruits of his labour,-fruits that still arise to call him blessed. He died, as he had lived, in the faith of his Redeemer. He was buried at the Mill Creek Church, which was named, after him, Morgan's Chapel."

Mr. Morgan died in the year 1797. An excellent sermon was preached on the occasion by Dr. Balmaine, of Winchester. He does ample justice to his personal piety, his active zeal, and his evangelical views, as displayed in the sermons which he read. To the latter I can testify. I have a large number of the sermons which he used as lay reader, and have read not a few of them. They are faithful, and deeply experimental. He has evidently

compiled some of them from various authors, and adapted them to the occasions on which they were preached. By the notes on the outside leaf, they appear to have been preached at funerals, in private houses, on thanksgiving-days, on the first opening of Morgan's Chapel, and other special subjects. Had all the sermons preached in Virginia, from its first settlement, been like these, and all the ministers and readers been like Morgan Morgan, the history of the Church of Virginia would have been different from that which truth now requires it to be. So well calculated was he for the ministry, and so esteemed by the people whom he served, that they united in a letter of recommendation to some Bishop, (supposed to be Bishop Madison, not long before Mr. Morgan's death,) begging that he might be ordained as their pastor, notwithstanding his deficiency in human learning. The paper lies before me, and is very strong in his praise. His age, infirmities, and the distance to be travelled, prevented his application. The effect of his example and ministrations has been felt to this day, where his services were more frequent, and are to be seen especially among his own descendants, who have been among the chief supporters of the church at Mill Creek, or Bunker's Hill. At my last visit there, a few months since, the congregation was called to mourn the sudden death of one of his grandsons, William G. Morgan, who had followed the pious example of his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. I mention, as one of the effects of Morgan Morgan's example and exhortations upon his descendants and neighbours, that when Mr. Allen first visited the neighbourhood he found no difficulty, though twenty years after the death of this good man, in raising a large catechetical class, among whom were full-grown young men and women, repeating the Church catechism and hearing it explained. This my eyes have seen, in a public tavern at Bunker's Hill, the old church being unfit for use.

Having thus brought the history of the ministers and churches of Norbourne parish to the time when, by God's blessing, a new order of things commenced, I now proceed to make mention of the chief instrument by which the revival was effected. On Christmas eve, in the year 1814, a little after dark, there entered into my house a gentleman who introduced himself to me as Mr. Allen, from New York, with letters of introduction from Bishop Moore and Dr. Wilmer, certifying that he was a candidate for Orders, and wished employment in the valley as a lay-reader. Although the roads were in their worst condition, much rain having fallen, he had in two short days walked from Alexandria to my house, about sixty

miles. Carrying him with me to the Old Chapel the next day, we met with Mr. Beverley Whiting and his sister, Miss Betsy, from Jefferson county, who had, as they and others near them afterward did, come about fifteen miles to church through bad roads. Into their hands I consigned Mr. Allen, on a horse which I had lent him. In just two weeks he returned in high spirits. He had itinerated through the whole of Jefferson and Berkeley counties, found out all the principal families who were still attached to the Church, established at least twelve places for service, and received a kind invitation from Mr. Whiting and his sister to bring his little family to their house and make it a home for the present. To Alexandria he immediately returned, where his wife and infant were, and without delay, in a spell of bitter cold weather in the month of January, brought them up in a road-wagon of Mr. Whiting's, on its return from Alexandria, to which it had carried a load of flour. Mr. Whiting's was his home for a considerable time,-for years indeed; and even after a parsonage was provided his visits to that abode of hospitality were frequent and long. From this time until the year 1821, with feeble health, the pressure of debt upon him, a growing family, he perhaps rode as great a distance, preached as often, studied his Bible as much, and prepared as many things for the press, as any man of his day. No one had a better opportunity than myself of knowing this, for I had often to go the rounds with him, doing more duty from necessity than I ever did before or have done since. Sleeping in the room with him, often I have seen him watch the morning light with his little Bible, and reading it when others were sleeping. I have travelled with him, and seen that Bible, or some other book, in his hand on horseback, and during any little spare time in private hours busy with his pen in preparing something for the press. While thus itinerating in these counties, and also in the adjoining county in Maryland, he was conducting a little paper called the "Layman's Magazine," and actually abridged and published the History of the Reformation, by Burnet, in a small volume, and compiled a history of the whole Church in two octavo volumes. All this he did while, like an honest man, he was paying his debts out of a small salary and the scanty profits of these publications, if indeed there were any. For nine years he thus laboured, contracting his sphere, though not his diligence, by the introduction. of one or two ministers into some of the numerous places he had taken in charge, when he was called to St. Paul's Church, Philadelphia, being the next choice to Bishop McIlvaine. His labours in such a congregation and city were of course not diminished. He

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again issued a religious magazine, and engaged in every plan for promoting Sunday-schools, infant-schools, Bible-classes, missionary societies, and all such things, being especially interested in Bishop Chase's college in Ohio. His house was the Bishop's home. The increase of Episcopal churches in Philadelphia soon attracted his mind. At a time when a narrow and selfish policy kept ministers and vestries in a state of fear and trembling whenever a new church was talked of, lest its establishment might somewhat interfere with their monopoly, his large soul, disdaining all petty considerations, determined on at least one other church, under the patronage of St. Paul's. Mr. Bedell was about leaving North Carolina, and wished some situation in the North. Mr. Allen, learning this, immediately determined to secure him for Philadelphia, and proposed it to a few friends. Alarmed at the thought of such a great work, they shrunk back from it; but Mr. Allen persevered and succeeded, and St. Andrew's Church was the result. While Mr. Bedell was collecting the congregation and the house was rising up, Mr. Allen insisted that he should use St. Paul's during a part of each Sabbath. Some of his people and friends were alarmed, and predicted that the popularity of Bedell would ruin Mr. Allen's prospects, and diminish, if not destroy, St. Paul's congregation. But nothing of this kind moved such a man. His reply was, "Let me decrease, so the Church increases." By God's blessing on such a Christian course, both increased, though Mr. Allen's pulpit-talents were only of the moderate order. At length, under the pressure of mental and bodily labour, his health so failed that a voyage to Europe was resorted to. But it was only used by him on his way to England, in England, and on his return, as an occasion for greater efforts in his Master's cause and for the souls of men. Providence found work for him in a foreign land, and gave him favour with the most zealous of the Christian philanthropists in England. It may be safely affirmed that, within the same short period, no minister from this country had ever attracted more attention, and had, and zealously used, more opportunities of promoting the welfare of all religious and benevolent societies, than Mr. Allen. Even the Society of Quakers felt the influence of his zeal in behalf of Sunday-schools, and to this day speak of him as "that wonderful man." After these dying labours, which were like the last notes of the swan, he returned toward America in a vessel which, by contrary winds, was detained nearly one hundred days on the deep, the crew suffering for provisions. Mr. Allen's grave was the great deep, as though no narrow sepulchre was fit for one of so large a soul.