Hill, Sir Richard

Hill, Sir Richard one of a family distinguished for piety, eccentricity, and usefulness, son of Sir Rowland Hill of Hawkestone, was born in 1733, and was educated at Westminster School and Magdalen College, Oxford. "In youth he was subject to deep religious impressions; he endeavored to remove them by dissipation on! the Continent," but they were only deepened. On his return he sought advice from Fletcher of Madeley, and was converted. He became a zealous promoter of Methodism. When the "Methodist students" were expelled from Oxford, he wrote, in rebuke of that intolerant measure, a large pamphlet, entitled, Pietas Oxoniensis: a full Account of the Expulsion of Six Students from St. Edmund's Hall (Lond. 1768, 8vo). When the Calvinistic controversy arose among the Methodists, Hill took sides against Wesley and Fletcher, and wrote a number of virulent Letters to Mr. Fletcher (answered in Fletcher's Checks to Antinommiancism). He also wrote, against Wesley, The Farrago Double Distilled: a Review of Wesley's Doctrines; The Finishing Stroke, and other pamphlets, answers to which may be found in Fletcher, as above, and in Wesley, Works, vol. vi. He afterward found better employment in writing An Apology for Brotherly Love, against Daubeny's Guide. (Lond. 1798, 8vo), and Letter to Mr. Malan on his Defense of Polygamy. He preached as occasion demanded in dissenting chapels, and was an active and useful Christian throughout his life. He died in 1808. See Rose, Genesis Biog. Dictionary; Wesley, Works. 6:144 sq.; Stevens, History of Methodism, vol. 2, ch. 1 and 2; Sidney, Life of Sir Richard Hill (Lond. 1839, 8vo).