Son of a Bap­tist min­is­ter, Proud served Bap­tist church­es at Knip­ton, Fleet, and Nor­wich, Eng­land, before join­ing the Swe­den­bor­gi­an de­nom­in­a­tion in 1788. He went on to pas­tor in Birm­ing­ham, Man­ches­ter, and Lon­don. He pub­lished a vol­ume of 300 hymns in 1790, and a small book of hymns for child­ren in 1810. Ma­ny of his com­po­si­tions con­tin­ue to be used in Swe­den­bor­gi­an ser­vic­es. His obit­u­ary:

Died, on the 3d of Au­gust last, at his house, at Hands­worth, near Birm­ing­ham, the Rev. Jo­seph Proud, in the eighty-second year of his age. He was born on the 22d of March, 1745, at Bea­cons­field, in Buck­ing­ham­shire. His fa­ther was a trades­man of that place, who like­wise act­ed as a preach­er in the con­nect­ion of Gen­er­al Bap­tists, in which ca­pa­ci­ty al­so the sub­ject of this mem­oir be­gan to ex­er­cise him­self at a ve­ry ear­ly age. At about the age of thir­ty, he was sol­emn­ly set apart to the of­fice of the min­is­try, in that con­nect­ion, by or­din­a­tion. Of his his­to­ry from this time till his re­cept­ion of the doc­trines of the New Church, we are not pos­sessed of ma­ny par­tic­u­lars they found him, how­ev­er, in the year 1789, which time he was for­ty-four years of age, an ex­treme­ly pop­u­lar min­is­ter at Nor­wich; but at what time he went to re­side in that ci­ty, or how long he re­mained at Wis­beach, where he had been pre­vi­ous­ly sta­tioned, we have not heard. It is from this per­i­od, how­ev­er, that the New Church is in­ter­est­ed in him; and up­on her pro­gress in the world, his ac­cept­ance of her doc­trines, had, un­doubt­ed­ly, a ve­ry con­sid­er­a­ble in­flu­ence. The cir­cum­stanc­es at­tend­ing his em­brac­ing the truth were ex­tra­or­din­ary in a high de­gree: we will re­late then, as we have re­peat­ed­ly heard them from his own mouth.

The Cha­pel of which he was min­is­ter at Nor­wich was built by the late Mr. Hunt, of whom we gave some ac­count at p. 88 of our pre­sent vol­ume. Mr. Hunt him­self of­fi­ci­at­ed in the min­is­try, in con­junc­tion with Mr. Proud. In the year above-men­tioned, the late Mr. Ralph Ma­ther, who had pre­vi­ous­ly be­longed to the Quak­er-De­nom­in­a­tion, and a gen­tle­man still liv­ing, who had been one of Mr. Wes­ley’s preach­ers, hav­ing been brought to a know­ledge of the truth in the doc­trines of the New Church, and be­ing in­flamed with an ar­dent zeal to pro­mote its dif­fu­sion, un­der­took, at their own ex­pense, a mis­sion­a­ry jour­ney through Eng­land. When they came to Nor­wich, Mr. Hunt gave them per­mis­sion to preach in his cha­pel. On hear­ing then, Mr. Proud op­posed their doc­trines with the ut­most ve­he­mence, and made ev­ery ef­fort in his pow­er to pre­vent their suc­cess. Mr. Hunt was more fa­vor­a­bly in­clined, and held with the strang­ers sev­er­al con­fer­enc­es. This ren­dered Mr. Proud ex­treme­ly un­ea­sy; and one day, when he knew Mr. Hunt and the New Church Mis­sion­ar­ies were to­ge­ther, he burst into the room, and ex­hort­ed Mr. H., in the most stren­u­ous man­ner, to “have no­thing to do with those men or their doc­trines.” He used, we have heard him say, those ve­ry words. Im­me­di­ate­ly on his re­tir­ing (ac­cord­ing to our re­col­lect­ion of the an­ec­dote,—though Mr. Ma­de­ley (see his Ser­mon) seems to have un­der­stood this oc­cur­rence to have been some time af­ter­wards) he felt great agi­ta­tion of mind: a doubt rushed up­on him, that it might be pos­si­ble he was op­pos­ing the truth: he re­tired in­to a room by him­self, fell on his knees, and prayed de­vout­ly that he might ob­tain di­vine di­rect­ion, and be guide­d to a right de­ci­sion: he af­ter­wards opened his Bi­ble, when this pass­age met his eye: “Be­hold ye among the hea­then, and re­gard, and won­der mar­vel­ous­ly; for I will work a work in your days, which ye will not be­lieve, though it be told you” (Hab. i. 5): the words struck him pow­er­ful­ly: he took them as a re­proof of his in­cre­dul­i­ty and pre­ju­diced op­po­si­tion: he de­ter­mined, there­fore, to read the writ­ings of the New Church with a can­did mind: he did so and he was speed­i­ly con­vinced that the dis­cov­er­ies they con­tain are the work of the Lord in­deed.

It is na­tur­al­ly to be sup­posed that this al­most mi­ra­cu­lous con­ver­sion of a pop­u­lar preach­er must have had a great ef­fect on the ris­ing for­tunes of the New Church. Yet a pro­phet is sel­dom much hon­ored in his own coun­try; and Mr. Proud ap­pears, at Nor­wich, to have met with lit­tle but op­po­si­tion and ill usa­ge. When, how­ev­er, a place of wor­ship was built, and opened un­der flat­ter­ing aus­pic­es, at Birm­ing­ham, and ano­ther, af­ter­wards, in Lon­don, in each of which, suc­cess­ive­ly, he was called to of­fi­ci­ate, his tale­nts found a sphere in which they could full­y ex­ert them­selves: and it will ea­si­ly be be­lieved that tal­ents for preach­ing such as he un­de­ni­a­bly pos­sessed, an­im­at­ed by the zeal, the hopes, the great ex­pec­ta­tions, which at that per­i­od filled all who had been brought to a know­ledge of the truth, must have pro­duced a pow­er­ful ef­fect up­on the pub­lic. At Birm­ing­ham, whither he went in 1791,—such was the ac­cept­ance with which he was heard, and such the mul­ti­tudes who flocked to hear him,—the pros­pect of suc­cess ap­peared at first un­bound­ed: but it was over­sha­dowed by ex­tran­e­ous cir­cum­stan­ces: the Tem­ple, as the build­ing they had erect­ed was, in our jud­gment, weak­ly and im­pro­per­ly de­nom­in­at­ed, fell, in two years, in­to the hands of strang­ers. A small­er one, how­ev­er, was speed­i­ly erect­ed, in­tend­ed on­ly as a tem­po­rary ac­com­mo­da­tion; in which Mr. Proud, af­ter spend­ing the in­ter­val, of on­ly seven months, as joint min­is­ter with the late Mr. Cow­herd at Man­ches­ter, re­sumed his du­ties, and at­tract­ed mul­ti­tudes far be­yond what the place would con­tain; in­deed, such, while at Birm­ing­ham, was his cel­e­bri­ty, that to hear “the great New-Je­ru­sa­lem preach­er” was thought a mat­ter of n­eces­si­ty by strang­ers vis­it­ing the to­ken; and the so­ci­e­ty ful­ly ex­pect­ed, had he re­mained, soon to be able to ob­tain as large and com­mo­di­ous a cha­pel as that which they had lost. But in 1797 he was in­vit­ed to the me­tro­po­lis, where he might na­tur­al­ly think his op­por­tun­i­ties of use­ful­ness would be still great­er; and there, al­so, be at­tracted great no­tice. A year or two from the pre­sent time, all Lon­don was in mo­tion to wit­ness the tal­ents of the cel­e­brat­ed Mr. Ir­ving, at the Cal­e­don­i­an Cha­pel, in Cross Street, Hat­ton Gar­den that same cha­pel was the scene of Mr. Proud’s first min­is­tra­tions in Lon­don; and we can state, for we con­tin­u­al­ly wit­nessed it, that the crowds which then pressed to ob­tain a hear­ing of Mr. Proud were not few­er than those which have more re­cent­ly flocked af­ter Mr. Ir­ving. Of the mat­ter of his dis­cours­es, a judgment may he formed from those which are in print: as com­po­si­tions, they were by no means fault­less; but they pre­sent­ed the lead­ing doc­trines of the New Church in a ve­ry strik­ing and con­inc­ing man­ner; and ex­posed the op­po­site er­rors with great strength and ener­gy; while in press­ing home mor­al con­sid­er­a­tions they were pow­er­ful­ly per­sua­sive; but his de­liv­ery, at the time of which we are speak­ing, not­with­stand­ing come pro­vin­cial­ism of ac­cent, cer­tain­ly did pos­sess an ex­tra­or­din­ary charm: his voice, look, action, and whole man­ner, were strong­ly cal­cu­lat­ed to ri­vet at­ten­tion, and to send home what he said look to the un­der­stand­ings and the hearts of his hear­ers. The con­se­quence was, that ma­ny who came to hear him be­came af­fec­tion­ate and stea­dy re­ceiv­ers of the doc­trines of The New Church; though it must al­so be con­fessed, that the at­tach­ment of ma­ny others was more to the man than the doc­trines, whence, af­ter a while they fell away.

In 1799 Mr. Proud re­moved from the Tem­ple, as it al­so was called, in Cross Street, to the still larg­er and more el­eg­ant cha­pel in York Street, St. James’s Square; where al­so he was at­tend­ed by large con­gre­ga­tions, es­pe­cial­ly in the evening; when, ex­cept in the mid­dle of the sum­mer, there sel­dom were fever than 1000 persons in the cha­pel. Here he continued fourteen years; and though during the latter part of the time the con­gre­ga­tions were not so numerous as at first, they always were very considerable. But at the expira­tion of that period, a greater rent being demanded in case of a re­new­al of the lease than it was thought poss­i­ble: to pay, the So­ci­e­ty re­moved to the small place in Lisle Street, Lei­ces­ter Square; a mea­sure which proved imprudent; for the con­se­quent dim­i­nu­tion of num­bers and of in­come be­came more than com­men­sur­ate with the dim­i­nu­tion of the ex­pen­di­ture: in con­se­quence of which, dif­fi­cul­ties aris­ing, Mr. Proud de­ter­mined upon re­tir­ing once more to Birm­ing­ham an event which took place in the year 1814. Great expecta­tions were en­ter­tained by the So­ci­e­ty in that town, of re­gain­ing, by his re­turn, all their for­mer pros­per­i­ty; but these hopes were sin­gu­lar­ly disap­point­ed. Mr. Proud was now in the seventieth year of his age, and, though not infirm, he had no longer the power of attraction which he once possessed. Thus the So­ci­e­ty at Birm­ing­ham, in­stead of in­creas­ing under his care, grew weak­er: and Mr. Proud grow­ing weak­er al­so, and un­a­ble to preach above once a day, and fre­quent­ly not at all, for some time before be en­tirely re­tired, it dwin­dled near­ly to the point of ex­tinct­ion; till its pre­sent min­is­ter was pro­vi­den­tial­ly sent to its aid, by whose ex­er­tions it has again re­cov­ered a great share of its an­cient pros­per­i­ty, and is now stead­i­ly on the in­crease.

In the years 1916 and 1817, Mr. Proud exerted a portion of his remaining strength in vi­sit­ing, under the aus­pic­es of the Man­che­ster Miss­ion­ary Society, a number of the Societies of the New Church; and was made an instrument of edifica­tion to mu­lti­tude. At Der­by, in par­ti­cu­lar, his preach­ing was highly ben­e­fi­cial: and from on­ly a very few individuals, meeting with child­ren in a Sun­day school, a considerable body of affectionate receivers of the doctrines arose, and grew into respectable Society.

Great must have been the trial, to a man long accustomed to pop­u­larity, like Mr. Proud, on ex­per­i­enc­ing the contrast between the little success which at­tend­ed him on his last set­tling at Birm­ing­ham and the almost idolatry with which he was fol­lowed when he ex­er­cised his min­is­try there be­fore: but the resigna­tion with which he bore it does him the highest honor, and evinces that his main object has not his own glory, but that of his Heavenly Father. Placed in extraordinary situa­tions, it is not to be wondered at, if, like the Apostle of old, he passed through evil report and good report. Ma­ny, we know, expected to find him a mo­del of more than hu­man per­fect­ion and it is not sur­pris­ing if, on be­ing disap­point­ed in their un­rea­son­a­ble expecta­tions, some un­der­rat­ed his real merits. In his pri­vate char­ac­ter he was al­ways ir­re­proach­a­ble; and the sin­cer­i­ty of his re­li­gious feel­ings is evinced abun­dant­ly by the man­ner of his con­ver­sion to the truth, as re­lat­ed above. He em­braced it al­so, when he had no pros­pect of any re­sults from it but dis­tress and per­se­cu­tion: he knew loot but that by dis­solv­ing his con­nect­ion with the Bap­tists he should lose his very means of su­bsis­tence; and such, for a time, threat­ened to be the re­sult. Though always of fru­gal ha­bits, he had been able to make but lit­tle pro­vi­sion for his old age; — £300. in the four per cents, and the small house in which he lived, form­ing the whole of his property. But for fur­ther state­ments re­specti­ng his per­son­al char­ac­ter, see our ex­tracts above from Mr. Ma­del­ey’s Ser­mon, and the Ser­mon it­self.

Mr. Proud was the Author of ma­ny pub­lica­tions, some of them of a very use­ful char­ac­ter. At the head of these is his Hymn-book, which, considered as the work of one man, and pro­duced in a ve­ry short per­i­od (the Sermon says, on­ly three months!) is a truly ex­tra­or­din­a­ry per­for­mance. His last work, The Aged Minister’s Last Legacy, is, in our judgment, the least valuable: it exhibits, in no small de­cree, the weak­ness of old age. Had he had more ad­van­tag­es from ed­u­ca­tion, he had na­tive tal­ents which would have made him as em­i­nent as a writ­er as he was as a speak­er.

He was twice mar­ried, and had by his first wife thir­teen child­ren; most of whom died young, and the one or two that remained were not comforts to him. His second wife, to whom he had been unit­ed, we be­lieve, about for­ty years, sur­vives him, but in a state of great in­fir­mi­ty. The im­me­di­ate cause of his re­mov­al was an at­tack of chol­era mor­bus, which car­ried him off af­ter an ill­ness of on­ly be­tween three and four days.

He was called, like the Apos­tle Paul, and almost as mi­ra­cu­lous­ly, from a state of op­po­si­tion to the New Church to be one of her most em­i­nent pro­mot­ers. Ma­ny liv­ing have rea­son to bless his name, and will have in eter­ni­ty. To eter­ni­ty he is gone, where, on­ly, he can have his reward.

Lyrics

1. Built by Jehovah’s Hand
2. Come in, Thou Blessed, Honored Lord
3. Down from the Worlds of Radiant Light
4. Great God, We Give Thee Praise
5. Hark! The Skies with Mu­sic Sound
6. I Love the Lord, He Heard My Voice
7. I Love the Voice Divine
8. Jerusalem, Arise
9. Now Blessing, Honor, Glory, Praise
10. O God, My Heavenly King
11. Thou Art the Mighty King of Kings