Thomas Hicks Mudge

Thomas Hicks Mudge

a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, was born in Orrington, Maine, September 28, 1815. His parents removed to Lynn, Mass., in his childhood; and being early brought under religious influence, he was converted, and united with the Church in 1829. Soon after his conversion he was seized with the desire to preach the Gospel, and in order to qualify himself for this work prepared for college at Wilbraham Academy. After going through the college course at the Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn., where he graduated in 1840, and at the Union Theological Seminary at New York (class of 1843), he joined the New England Conference, and remained a member of it till 1857, when hie became professor of sacred literature at M'Kendree College, Lebanon, Ill. In 1859 he was transferred to the Missouri Conference, and stationed successively at Pilot Knob, Simpson Chapel, St. Louis, and Independence. At the outbreak of the rebellion he was obliged to leave the state, and sought refuge in Manhattan, Kansas, where he filled an appointment for a year; but joining the Kansas Conference, at the earnest solicitation of the Church was sent to Baldwin City. His health, however, failed, and he died there, July 24, 1862. Mr. Mudge was a close student, especially of the Word of God, and possessed much critical knowledge of the sacred text. For the exposition and illustration of it he collected, from American and foreign publishers, one of the most valuable private libraries of sacred literature in this country. His preaching was rich in thought, and pervaded by a spirit of deep piety. Many of his brief expositions of the Scripture lessons, before his sermons, were of themselves pithy discourses of great value. He had devised large plans of usefulness through the application of his ripe scholarship to the exposition of God's Word, but the little he had written was never considered of sufficient importance for publication. See Minutes of Annual Conferences, 1863, page 23.