MOODY, Joshua, clergyman, born in Wales in 1633; died in Boston, 4 July, 1697. William, his father, settled in Newbury in 1634. Joshua was graduated at Harvard in 1653, was ordained a minister of the Congregational church, 11 July, 1671, and began to preach about 1658. His regard for the purity and reputation of his church having brought upon him the enmity of Governor Edward Cranfield, he was imprisoned, but. was shortly released upon condition that he would preach no more in New Hampshire. On 23 May, 1684, he became assistant minister of the First church, Boston, and was invited to take charge of Harvard, but declined. During the witchcraft troubles in 1692, he opposed the unjust and violent measures toward the imagined offenders, and aided Philip English and his wife to escape from prison. His zeal in this matter occasioned his dismission from his church, and he passed the rest of his life in Portsmouth. He published "Communion with God" (1685)and an "Election Sermon" (1692). His four thousand and seventeenth sermon closes a manuscript volume of his discourses that is preserved in the Massachusetts historical society.