Carey, William

a celebrated English Baptist mi ionary, B. at Paul ers bury, North amp tons hire, 1761. His father kept a small school in the village, and apprenticed his son to a shoemaker at Hacklet on, where his earnest inquiries into religious subjects attracted the notice, and soon obtained him the friendship of, the Rev. Thomas Scott, of Raven stone. He joined a congregation of Baptists, and in his 20th year began to preach, which he continued for two years, when he was publicly baptized in the river Nen. In 1787 he was intrusted with the charge of a congregation at Leicester; where, persevering in his benevolent object of converting the heathen, he induced other ministers to join him; and, in 1792, they formed themselves into a Baptist Mi ionary Society at Kettering. C. was nominated to go upon their first mi ion, and India was selected as the most desirable field for the commencement of his zealous efforts. He arrived in Bengal in 1794, but had the ill fortune to lose all his money and effects by the sinking of a boat in the river Hooghly. After patiently enduring severe toils and privations for three years, (during which period, however, he acquired the Bengalee tongue,) C. preached publicly; but as the East India Company were opposed to his object of forming an establishment inland, in 1799 he proceeded to the Danish settlement of Serampore. This little mi ionary settlement, consisting of four preachers only, with their wives and families, rapidly increased; a school was opened, and type being sent from England, a translation of the Scriptures was printed in the Bengalee language. C. having made himself a complete master of the native language, was, in 1801, appointed by the governor profe or of Sanskrit and other Oriental languages at the college of Fort William, Calcutta. He had many difficulties to contend with, both from the prejudices of the natives, and the political views of influential individuals at home. He, however, never relaxed in the work he had begun, but translated the Scriptures into several of the Indian languages, and lived to witne the succe of his ardent exertions for their di emination among the native tribes. D. 1834.