THE Congregational Church in the village of Bocking must be classed amongst the largest and most effective of our churches, in a county where they are known to be large, numerous, and influential. As its present circumstances afford matter for devout gratitude, so its past history is replete with interesting details, which have been collected with great care and diligence, by an esteemed correspondent, to whom we owe many thanks for past communications; and, we doubt not, our readers will think the present narrative adds not a little to the amount of our obligations.

It is necessary to premise that the village of Bocking adjoins the market town of Braintree, and would be supposed, by most travellers, to be a hamlet of the but it forms a distinct parish, containing nearly 3000 inhabitants, and is a rural deanery; as it is, however, contiguous to Braintree, and, in fact, forms a lengthened line of street with it, our readers will easily understand how both names were formerly employed indiscriminate ly to describe the dissenting congregation there.

The first dissenting minister, of whom there is any record, as N. S. No. 43.

having preached at Braintree, was the Rev. Samuel Bantoft, D. D. who was ejected from the vicarage of Stebbing by the Act of Uniformity, in 1662, and doubtless found there a people ready to listen to his ministry; as the pious Mr. Argor had been also ejected from the vicarage of Braintree. Here Mr. Bantoft continued till the same unrighteous power which had driven him from his church, compelled him also to leave the town, where he had chosen to exercise his ministry as a Dissenter.* Nor were his enemies satisfied till they had obtained against him a sentence of excommunication; a punishment which, according to the law of Christ, excludes from the fellowship of the Christian church, but which, according to the laws of England, excludes from the privileges of civil society. As Mr. Bantoft was the only dissenting minister who appears to have laboured at Braintree, previously to the close of the seventeenth century, he may, with propriety, be regarded as the founder of this Christian church. But the sufferings of the minister do not seem to have

Nonconformist's Memorial, vol. i. article Stebbing, Essex. 2 X

shaken the steadfastness of the flock; for though we hear no more of nonconformity in the two parishes till 1700, we find, at that time, there was a small congregation of Dissenters, who assembled in a barn, near the White Hart Inn, Bocking, and who now invited a young clergyman, named Shepherd, who had lately, from conscientious motives, relinquished his benefice to be their pastor. Happily Mr. Shepherd complied with the wishes of the little flock, and from this period, through the goodness of the great Head of his people, a course of prosperity has attended this church.

Soon after the settlement of Mr. Shepherd, the old place of worship was found inadequate to the accommodation of the auditory, and the original foundation of the present spacious meeting-house, which stands near the entrance of the village of Bocking, from the town of Braintree, was laid in the year 1707. This building was denominated Braintree Meetinghouse, and its ministers were designated as the dissenting ministers of Braintree, till the year 1789, when an Independent place of worship was erected in the town of Braintree; since that period, the dissenting interest, of which we are speaking, has been correctly designated, according to its situation, in the parish of Bocking. When Mr. Shepherd had finished his lengthened and useful course, he was succeeded in his office by Mr. Joseph Pitts, who, after retain ing it for the space of four years, resigned his charge in the commencement of 1742, and removed to London. In the course of the year preceding this event, the celebrated Mr. Whitefield had visited the neighbourhood of Bocking, and had preached to many large and attentive congrega

tions. "At a common,* near Braintree, says the writer of his life, † upwards of ten thousand persons attended." Prosperous as, under the care of Mr. Shepherd, the church at Bocking had been, it was not surprising that they should now direct their attention to a young clergyman, whose preaching they approved, and whose sentiments, especially as separation from the church, without a real dissent, was then almost unknown, seemed to incline toward nonconformity. Accordingly the church invited Mr. Whitefield to be their pastor. But having probably, at this early period, unalterably determined on the course of itinerant labour, for which his disposition and talents were more adapted, he declined the offer.

That his refusal arose from no dislike to dissenting discipline, may be concluded from the opinion which he had previously expressed, but with which, it must be confessed, that his practice, after he had established a church,did not accord. "So far (is his language when addressing Mr. Ralph Erskine) from not setting a hedge about our Lord's garden, that was I called to it, I should set a much closer hedge than that which the associate presbytery are planting; I should inquire into the people's experiences before I admitted them to the Lord's table." But, though Mr. Whitefield did not gratify the church at Bocking by becoming their pastor, he did them, perhaps, as great a service by recommending to their choice one who possessed, in common with a large share of his friend's eloquence and zeal, a larger share of prudence and judgment, qualities of vital

Felsted Common.
+Whitefield's Life, p. 72.
Letters, vol. i. p. 317.

importance to a pastor, than perhaps fell to the lot of that great and excellent individual. The person recommended was Mr. Thomas Davidson, who commenced his labours here in 1742, and continued them with great acceptableness and success for a long course of years.

Mr. Davidson was assisted by several young ministers in succession. During the latter part of his course, he was especially desirous to associate with himself a young minister, whose knowledge and talents would prevent the more intellectual of his auditory from seeking the gratifications of taste at the expense of purity of doctrine, (a sacrifice which was too frequent amongst the younger dissenters of the day,) and yet, who would sup. ply all with the unadulterated truths of Christianity. In Mr. John Thorogood, a young minister, who had recently left the Academy at Homerton, and who became assistant at Bocking in 1776, and co-pastor in 1783, Mr. Davidson found a man to his wishes.

The venerable pastor retained an overflowing auditory till his death in 1788. And though the formation of another congregation in the adjoining town of Braintree, in some degree diminished the auditory of his co-pastor and successor, Mr. Thorogood, he retained a numerous and respectable congregation till his death in 1801. He was succeeded in the following year by the present minister, Mr. Thomas Craig, under whose care this religious interest has prospered greatly. There is a pastoral house connected with it, besides a numerous Sunday school and a day school for ninety children, who are clothed as well as educated, and for whom a convenient school-house has been erected. The meeting-house was considerably enlarged and improved in

1818, and in the following year a still farther enlargement was effected, by the addition of a second tier of galleries for the accommodation of the schools.

Having thus conducted our rea. ders through the general history of this church, we shall proceed to present them with the biographical notices of its successive pastors. REV. THOMAS SHEPHERD, M. A.

The Protestant dissenters are not much indebted to some clergymen, who of late years have, in common with orthodox sentiments,* professed a bona fide dissent. Imperfectly acquainted with the ramifications of the Christian profession, or retaining the prejudices while they relinquished the communion of their former years, they have stood aloof from the men whose prudence would have tempered their zeal, and whose knowledge of theological and biblical science would have improved their minds; and, imperfectly acquainted with theological subjects, and with theological writers, they have considered acknowledged truths as their own discoveries, or they have diverged into eccentricities, first of opinion, and then of practice, which have dishonoured themselves and their supposed connections. Of a very different description were Messrs. Rastrick, J. Spademan, and many other clergymen, who in the earlier days of dissent embraced nonconformity. Amongst these estimable individuals, Mr. Thomas Shepherd holds a distinguished place. William Shepherd was the father of this eminent minister, and, he as well as his son, was first a clergyman of the establishment, and after

*The writer expresses himself thus, because some clergymen who have dissented in several places, how mistaken soever in their views, have been highly respectable in their characters.

wards the pastor of a dissenting church.

The elder Mr. Shepherd was minister of Tillbrook, in Bedfordshire, and conformed on the passing of the act of Uniformity in 1662. He is said to have been a faithful minister of Christ, and an eminent blessing to the people of his charge. But his character and his successes, instead of diminishing, only increased the opposition and contempt, which are frequently the portion of the truly active minister of a national establishment. With many excellent men in subsequent periods, he found the visitations to be seasons of trial; for the discipline which should have been directed to the excitement of ministerial diligence and fidelity, was too often the instrument of conveying oblique reflections on the motives and endeavours of a man, who was only singular in doing good. At length, impelled by the persecutions of his enemies, and the convictions of his mind, he relinquished his connection with the established church, and be came the pastor of a congregation of dissenters at Oundle, Northamptonshire. His final earthly remove was to Kettering, when he succeeded Mr. Maidwell as pastor of the Congregational Church there. The subject of this memoir, Mr. Thomas Shepherd was born in the year 1665, and is supposed to have been educated at one of the English Universities. At an early period of his life he took orders in the National Church, and for some time officiated at St. Neots, in Huntingdonshire. His next and final situation in the establishment was in Buckinghamshire, where he was presented with a living, which his convictions did not permit him long to retain.

As Mr. Shepherd relinquished his connection with the National Church soon after his induction to a living, it is probable that the

renewal of subscription induced an inquiry how far he was justified in professing before God, and before man, his ex animo belief of every thing contained in the Thirtynine Articles and the Book of Common Prayer; but, however this might be, Mr. Shepherd's dissent, at such a period, was an ho nourable testimony to his integrity, and an indication that he considered himself as continually repeating his subscription so long as he ate the bread and conducted the services of the endowed church.

But, though Mr. Shepherd relinquished his old connection at no very distant period from the time of his preferment, he does not appear to have acted with unbecoming precipitation. With great propriety he entered into spondence with his brethren on the subject, a part of which he afterwards published, and which the writer of this article greatly laments his inability to obtain.

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The event to which we are now referring, appears to have taken place towards the close of the seventeenth century; for in the year 1697, we find him preaching as a probationary to the Presbyterian congregation, formerly assembling in Poor Jewry Lane, (now Jewry Street,) Aldgate, and by a majority of one vote, Mr. Shepherd was elected to be pastor, but through some dishonourable artifices, "the election was overruled." A prudent minister would not accept a charge to which he was elected through so small a majority; but it would not have been surprising if so scandalous a proceeding, in a community of Dissenters, had produced a change of feeling in a convert to their views. But Mr. Shepherd appears to have

*Protestant Dissenting Magazine, vol. 6. p. 467. W. Wilson's History of Dis senting Churches, vol. i. p. 55.