On Sarurday 17th May 1823 a young man who had been exhibiting extraordinary conduct in the street was brought before the magistrates at the Exeter Guildhall. His name was Josiah Stonelake, He came from Bovey Tracey and Contable Howard had found him distributing religious tracts, Josiah said that he had been with the Lord, and that the speedy destruction of the world had been communicated to him.
"....previous to getting into this state of religious frenzy he had been the mate of a most respectable Devonshire mercantile house, in the Newfoundland trade. The unfortunate young man's violent conduct soon rendered retraint necessary, but consistent therewith, every humane attention was paid him, and , under proper attention he has been conveyed to his friends."
It would seem that for some in every generation the end of the world is nigh. Josiah Stonelake was wrong about the speedy destruction of the world. His information came from the Lord; two hundred years later it comes from the scientists and is therefore perhaps a tad more reliable.
I am aware that, as I write, there are frenzied young men and women, not just millenarians, extraordinary and violent in their conduct, on the streets of Exeter every day and night. No one seems to pay them any attention, never mind proper attention. Is this progress or regression?
Source The Western Times, 24th May 1828.
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