PREFACE.

THE perusal of the letters and papers of the late BISHOP HOBART, undertaken with a different view, have led to the following narrative. It may be that in the publication of it, the author, or rather the editor, for letters constitute the main portion, has overrated the interest of the reading public in a life already before them, and a character which, whatever be its excellencies, has long been familiar to the members of his own communion, while to those beyond, it can hardly be said to offer such claims as render the biography of public men at all times justifiable.

In the face of all these difficulties the editor has ventured to publish, and can now only state the feelings which have led him to it. When he began the perusal of those early letters, they seemed to him but as boyish effusions, of but little value, and no interest beyond the family circle to which they related; but as he proceeded in his task, their number and minuteness began to give life to the picture they presented; one by one the features of character came forth, until by degrees they embodied themselves into a beautiful portraiture of an affectionate and generous youth-full of ardour and native piety, and devoted to every noble and benevolent pursuit.

To the biographies here alluded to, viz., ' A Memorial of Bishop Hobart,' by the Rev. J. F. Schroeder; and the larger Memoir' prefixed to his Works,' by the Rev. W. Berrian, D.D., the editor would take this opportunity of making his acknowledgments for several facts and statements, the original authorities for which were not in his pos

session.

This is the editor's first apology, since, if these impressions be just, such a picture faithfully given cannot be without both interest and value Virtue and piety want no reflected lustre from a great name; they are themselves the pure gold, and truth and sincerity the only stamp they need to give them currency.

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The inclination thus excited to publish, a further consideration converted into resolution. It was this: Bishop Hobart's character was in one respect greatly misunderstood by those who knew him only in his public course. The untiring energy with which he devoted himself to official duty, was reputed by many to be personal ambition and the unyielding firmness of his opinions as a Churchman, turned into an argument against his vital piety as a Christian. The native humility of his heart, the depth of his devotional feelings, the evangelical tone of his retired piety, were matters either wholly unknown, or else placed to the account of professional duties. Now the correction of such false opinion is a debt due alike to the reputation of Bishop Hobart, and to that of the Church over which he presided; and in no way perhaps can it be more effectually done, than by the exhibition of him in the simplicity and open sincerity of youth; in days when there were no ambitious ends to gain, or professional proprieties to support, and in which neither fear nor favour can be supposed to have operated, to blind the judgment of those around him as to his real character. If we then find him as a boy, what he afterward was as a man, active, ardent, fearless, and devoted; fervent in feeling, but wise in action, bold in duty, but childlike in piety, yielding in matters of expediency, but uncompromising in principle, gathering around him wherever he went an attached circle of friends and followers, and using his influence over them to the wisest and best of purposes-that of advancing them in knowledge and

virtue, and above all, in that holy faith, which from a child appears to have been his own guide and instructer; and if all this be found not in the recollections of partial friends, but in original documents which personal affection has preserved, then may we fairly answer all such doubts as to the genuineness of his virtues, by an appeal to the unpretending, but unsuspected narrative of his 'Early Years.'

With this explanation the work is respectfully submitted.

Columbia College, October 15th, 1834.

EARLY YEARS

OF BISHOP HOBART.

JOHN HENRY HOBART was born at Philadelphia, September 14th, 1775, being the youngest son of Enoch and Hannah (Pratt) Hobart. The time and place of his birth connect his name with the charter of our Political Independence, and as well observed by his earliest biographer, (Rev. J. F. Schroeder,) 'his strong patriotic attachments in after life, his great fearlessness in the defence of truth, and all the prominent features of his character, mark him a worthy child of the Revolution.' His ancestry, it may be added, was also of the same strain, fervent in spirit, and ardent in the cause of liberty. The founder of the family in this our western world, was an eminent leader among the Pilgrim fathers of New-England,-Edmund Hobart, of Hingham, county of Norfolk, (England,) who in 1633 quitted his native land, with wife and children, to seek, or rather to found in the wilderness a more peaceful home than England then afforded to non-conformists; while the feelings of the unwilling emigrant appear in his bestowing upon his new resting-place the title of his native village; the town of Hingham, Plymouth county, Massachusetts, deriving from him both its name and first settlement. Of colonies thus planted, the success obviously depends upon the good influence of wives as well as husbands in this respect the town of Hingham was fortunate, such at least is the testimony of Cotton Mather. 'Both he and his wife,' says that simple-hearted narrator, in speaking of Edmund Hobart, 'were eminent for piety, and even from their youth feared GoD above many,

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