MERCEIN, Thomas Fitz Randolph, clergyman, born in New York city, 27 November, 1825; died in Sheffield, Massachusetts, 15 September, 1856. His father, Colonel Thomas R. Mercein, was for some time a member of the legislature, and comptroller of the city. The son was intended for the ministry of the Presbyterian church. He entered Columbia when he was fourteen years old, but left in his second year on account of his health, and subsequently united with the Methodist Episcopal church, in which he was licensed as a preacher, and served eleven years as a pastor, chiefly in the state of New York. Besides numerous contributions to the periodicals of his denomination, he published "Natural Goodness" (New York, 1854); "The Wise Master Builder"; and " Childhood and the Church," a posthumous work (1858).