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Farrar, Abraham Eccles

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an English Wesleyan minister, was of a family somewhat distinguished in clerical lists. His father (John) was a Methodist minister, who died in 1837; his younger brother was president of the British Conference in 1870, and is the author of Dictionary of the Bible and other valuable works; his elder son, Wesley, entered the Wesleyan ministry in 1846, and his youngest son is canon of Durham and author of the Critical History of Free Thought. Abraham E. was born at Sowerby. a village overhanging the vale of Todmorden, April 20, 1788. From 1797 to 1801 he was at the Kingswood School. Soon after his return home he gave his heart to God. He was articled to an attorney at Sunderland, but in 1807 was received into the ministry. His first field was Holderness, where this talented and refined young man was subjected to all the humiliating trials that mobs and persecuting rectors made the order of the day with the early Methodist preachers (Stevens, Hist. of Methodism, 3:211 sq.; Smith, Hist. of Wesl. Meth. 2:451 sq.). He served the Church faithfully, and was intrusted by it with important offices. While the fire of youth was still burning upon the altar, and the gravity of age and the maturity of intellect gave evidence of long years of usefulness, he was suddenly called away. On April 1, 1849, in great pain, he preached an anniversary sermon in the East London Circuit, and died one week thereafter. Farrar was amiable, courteous, diligent, and sympathetic. He had a mind of critical, reflective, and analytical power. He wrote, The Condemner of Methodism Condemned (1814): — Religious Instruction of Children Enfobrced (1820): — The Juvenile Bible-class Book (1825): — The Benefits of Messiah's Advent, a sermon (1842): — Sketches of Popular Antiquities for the Young (1850). See Minutes of the British Conference, 1849; Stevenson, City Road Chapel, page 322; Wesl. Meth. Mag. 1849, pages 543, 986; 1853, page 305; Wesleyan Takings, 1:346.