This minister of Christ, because of his essential worth and the distinguished position he was destined to win for himself in the Canada connection, first in its narrower and afterward in its broader acceptation, deserves more space than the greater number.

He, like his friend Mr. (now Dr.) Wood, came to us from New Brunswick. He was the son of a New England physician, in which country Samuel himself was born; but as Dr. Rice settled in New Brunswick (Woodstock) while his children were yet young, this son grew up with British ideas very strongly ingrained within him; although the higher part of his education was obtained in an American institution.

There is reason to believe that he pursued an optional course, and that whatever related to commerce enlisted the supreme interest of his eminently practical mind. Whatever may be said of his natural birth, British ground was the place of his spiritual birth. Fredericton, the captial of New Brunswick, was the spot, and if I have been rightly informed, his friend, the Rev. Arthur McNutt, was the instrument. This change occurred when he was about nineteen years of age.

In two short years from the time of his conversion he was out of the itinerant work, proclaiming the gospel of the grace of God. His early ministry was bestowed on some of the most trying circuits in the Eastern Provinces, and that ministry was characterized by zeal, laboriousness, adventurous daring, and great success.

His appointments before coming here had been as follows: Mirimachi, St. Johns South, Sackville Wesleyan Acadamy, and St. Johns West, in which he remained four years; giving him, in all, ten years' ministeral experience before coming to Canada West.

What mark he was destined to make in this Province the future page of this history will show.

...from the minutes of the 1847 Wesleyan Methodist Conference in Toronto C.W.

1880...On the occasion of his transfer to the Toronto Conference, the following resolution, moved by Dr. Sanderson, and seconded by Rev. William S. Griffin, was unanimously adopted by the Conference by a rising vote..."This Conference cannot allow the occasion of the departure of the Rev. Dr. Rice from this to the Toronto Conference, with a view of occupying a distant field of labour and of responsibility, without placing upon record its high appreciation of the ability, fidelity and zeal which have distinguished our beloved brother in the various positions of trust and responsibility occupied by him. His wisdom in the councils of the Church, his sympathy with his bretheren, will not be forgotten by us, any more than his indefatigable and successful efforts in the cause of female education. We part with Dr. Rice with great regret, and pray God to be with him in the future, as in the past, and to make the remainder of his life even a greater blessing to the Church of his affection than the past of his useful life has been."