JOHN CHURCH, better known as the Obelisk Parson, it appears, was abandoned by his parents, when he was scarcely six weeks old, and left exposed in a basket, with little covering to protect him from the inclemency of the weather, on the steps of St. Andrew’s Church, Holborn. In this pitiable state he was found by the overseers of the parish, and sent to the Foundling Hospital; and it was from this circumstance he derived the name of CHURCH. Here he remained until he was nine years old, when a complaint to the Governor’s having been made against him by the nurses that he was addicted to improper and disgusting practices, it was thought prudent to apprentice him out at that early age, in order to prevent the morals of the boys being corrupted from so dangerous an example. He must have quitted the hospital at an earlier age than usual, from his evident illiteracy, and the badness of his writing. In general the boys from this institution are distinguished as good scholars. Church was accordingly placed out as an apprentice to a carver and gilder, in the neighbourhood of Blackfriar’s Road; but before his time of servitude had expired, he married, and abruptly quitted his master. For a short period he followed his business, and worked for a composition ornament maker, in Tottenham-Court-road; but being of an artful disposition, of lazy habits, and with much hypocritical cant, he at length succeeded in imposing upon several religious persons his great anxiety and desire to become a minister of the Gospel. It appears, he commenced his _pretended_ religious career, by taking upon himself the office of a teacher of a sunday school, at that time established in Tottenham Court-road. Thinking that preaching was a more lucrative employment than that in which he was engaged, this hypocritical wretch, together with two other young men, who were also candidates for the gown, hired a garret in Compton-street, Soho, in order to acquire the method of addressing a congregation with confidence. He made a rapid progress in dissimulation, and even at this early period of his religious studies, he laughed in his sleeve at the credulity and ignorance of those persons who were induced to listen to his _pious_ harangues. An old chair was the substitute for the pulpit. He now began, as he termed it, “to gammon the old women.” Good luck procured him the notice of old Mother Barr, of Orange-street, who being interested in his behalf, allowed him the use of a room of her’s, in which he treated her and a few choice labourers in the field of piety, with his rapturous discourses. From this he used to hold forth more publicly. He became acquainted with one GARNET, of notorious memory, who procured him the situation of a preacher at Banbury. It was at this place that he first became obnoxious. But before we proceed further, it may be necessary to inquire by what authority such a man as CHURCH presumed to take upon himself the functions of a minister of the gospel.