Ho-ward, Bezaleel, D.D., a Unitarian Congre- gational minister, ^vas born at Bridgewater, JIass., Nov. 22, 1753. He entered Harvard College in 1777, and, after graduation in 1781, engaged in teaching, pursuing at the same time a course of theological study. In 1783 h j was appointed tutor at Harvard. In November, 1784, liL' was called as minister to the F"irst Church and Soci- ety iu Spriiigtield, !Mass., and was ordained Ajiril 27, 1785. He continued in this position until Sejitcmber, 1803, when impaired health obUged him to discontinue his work; but his resignation was not accepted by the Church until Jan. 25, 1809, when his successor was or- dained. In 1819 he associated himself with a new Uni- tarian Church Av'hich had been fonned from members of his old congregation, and he continued with them till his death, Jan.'iO, 1837. In 1824 Harvard College con- ferred the degree of D.D. upon him. The Rev. Daniel Waldo, in a sketch of Dr. Howard (in Sprague's Annals of the Am. Pulpit, viii, 181 sq.), says that the theological views of Dr. Howard had been Arminian until his latest years, when he came to believe " the sole supremacy of
the Father. He, however, held to the doctrine of tlie atonement, in the sense of propitiation or expiation, with the utmost tenacity ; and he regarded the rejection of it as a rejection of Christianity. His views of the character of the Saviour were not, perhaps, verj- accu- rately defined; he seemed to regard him as a sort of eternal emanation from Deity; not a creature in the strict sense, on the one hand, nor yet the supreme (iod on the other." He published a sermon delivered at the ordination of the Rev. Antipas Steward (1793). (J. H.
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Howard, John, one of the most eminent of modern Christian philanthropists, was born at Hackney in 172G. His father a|)prenticed him to a wholesale grocer, but tlied ^vhen his Sf)n was about nineteen years of age, leaving him in possession of a handsome fortune, and young Howard, who was in weak health, determined to make a tour in F'rance and Italy. On his return he took lodgings in Stoke Newington, where his landlady — a widow named Loidore — having nursed him careful- ly through a severe illness, he, out of gratitude, married her, though she was twenty-seven years his senior. She, however, died about three years after the marriage, and he now conceived a desire to visit Lisbon, with a view to alleviate the miseries caused by tlie great earthquake in 175G. On his voyage he was captured by a French privateer, carried a prisoner to Brest, and subsequently removed into the interior, but was finally permitted to return to England on the promise of inducing the gov- ernment to make a suitable exchange for him. This was effected, and Howard retired to a small estate lie possessed at Cardington, near Bedford, and there, in April, 1758, he married IMiss Henrietta Leeds. It is mentioned as a characteristic trait that he stipulated before marriage " that, in all matters in which there should be a difference of opinion between them, his voice should rule." For seven years he was chiefly engaged in the task of raising the physical and moral condition j of the peasantry' of Cardington and its neighborhood by erecting on his own estate better cottages, establishing schools, and visiting and relieving the sick and the des- titute ; in his benevolent exertions he was assisted by his wife. She died ]March, 17G5, and Howard from that time lost his interest in his home and its occupations. He lived some years at Cardington in seclusion, then made another Continental tour, and in 1773 was nomi- nated sheriff of Bedford. The sufferings which he had endured and witnessed during his own brief confine- ment as a prisoner of war struck deep into his mind, and, shocked by the misery and abuses which prevailed in the prisons under his charge, he attempted to induce the magistrates to remedy the more obvious of them. The reply was a demand for a precedent, and Howard at once set out on a tour of inspection. But he soon fomid that the evil was general, and he set himself dili- gently to work to inquire into the extent and precise nature of the mischief, and, if possible, to discover the true remedy for the evil. He visited, in two journeys, most of the town and county jails of F:ngland, and ac- cumulated a large mass of information, which, in !March, 1774, he laid before the House of Commons. This was the commencement of prison reform in England. Once actively engaged, he became more and more devoted to this benevolent pursuit. He travelled repeatedly over the United Kingdom, and at different periods to almost every part of Europe, visiting the most offensive iilaces, relieving personally the wants of the most wretched objects, and noting all that seemed to him important either for warning or examine. The first fruit of these labors was The ^tate of the Prisons iu IjKjlamJjind Wales, with an Account of some Forei'jn Prisons (1777). "As soon as it appeared, the world was astonished at the mass of valuable materials accumulated by a private unaided incUvidual, tlirough a course of prodigious la- bor, and at the constant hazard of life, in consequence of the infectious diseases prevalent in the scenes of his inquiries. The cool good sense and moderation of his