Chapter IV First Two Years at Madeley. from October 17, 1760, to November 22, 1762.
ALMOST of necessity, the life of a clergyman in a small country town is an uneventful and quiet one; and, therefore, the first ten years that Fletcher spent at Madeley were unmarked by stirring incidents, such as were perpetually occurring in the lives of his friends Wesley and Whitefield.
Madeley is a market town in the county of Salop. It is beautifully situated in a winding glen, through which the river Severn flows. In 1800, fifteen years after Fletcher’s death, it contained, according to the parliamentary returns, 291 houses, and 4,758 inhabitants. The church is dedicated to St. Michael; and the parish includes Coalbrook Dale and Madeley Wood, noted for their coal mines and their iron-works. Colliers and iron-workers at Madeley, in the days of Fletcher, were quite as ignorant and brutal as they were elsewhere. His mission was a trying one; and its burdensomeness was not lessened by the fact that there was not a single clergyman in the county of Salop who approved of his Methodist doctrines, or sympathized with his Methodist endeavours. Further, he was without parochial experience. He had preached for the Wesleys and for the Countess of Huntingdon; and, on a few rare occasions, he had been permitted to occupy the pulpits of the Established Church; but, notwithstanding the temporary assistance he had rendered to his Madeley predecessor, he had never held a curacy. In parish work he was a novice; but he was not dismayed. A few months before his induction, he had been with Berridge, who, with the exception of Mr. Hicks at Wrestlingworth, was as much without clerical sympathy and help in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Huntingdonshire, as Fletcher himself was now in Salop. Berridge had seen marvellous results of his denounced ministry, and why should not Fletcher see the same? Hence, on January 6, 1761, he wrote as follows to the Countess of Huntingdon:—
“I had a secret expectation to be the instrument of a work in this part of our Church; and I did not despair of being soon a little Berridge. Thus warmed with sparks of my own kindling, I looked out to see the rocks broken, and the waters flowing out; but, to the great disappointment of my hopes, I am now forced to look within, and see the need I have of being broken myself. If my being stationed in this howling wilderness is to answer no public end as to the Gospel of Christ, I will not give up the hope that it may answer a private end as to myself, in humbling me under a sense of unprofitableness.
“As to my parish, all that I see in it, hitherto, is nothing but what one may expect from speaking plainly, and with some degree of earnestness; a crying out, ‘He is a Methodist—a downright Methodist!’ While some of the poorer say, ‘Nay, but he speaketh the truth!’ Some of the best farmers, and most of the respectable tradesmen, talk about turning me out of my living as a Methodist or a Baptist. My Friday lecture took better than I expected, and I propose to continue it till the congregation desert me. The number of hearers at that time is generally larger than that which my predecessor had on Sunday. The number of communicants is increased from thirty to above a hundred; and a few seem to seek grace in the means. I thank your ladyship for mentioning Mr. Jones as a curate. There is little probability of my ever wanting one. My oath obliges me to residence, and, when I am here, I can easily manage all the business, and only wait for opportunities of oftener bearing witness to the truth.”[70]
Fletcher’s troubles were various. He was dissatisfied with himself; a visionary convert caused him anxiety; and many of his parishioners maligned him. Writing to Charles Wesley on March 10, 1761, he remarked:—
“I feel more and more that I neither abide in Christ, nor Christ in me; nevertheless, I do not so feel it, as to seek Him without intermission. ‘Oh wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from’ this heart of unbelief? Blessed be God, who has promised me this deliverance, through our Lord Jesus Christ!
“My new convert has, with great difficulty, escaped the wiles of the devil; who, by fifty visions, had set her on the pinnacle of the temple. Thanks be to God, she has come down without being cast headlong. I have had more trouble with her visions than with her unbelief. Two other persons profess that they have received the consolations of Divine love: I wait for their fruits.
“A few days ago, I was violently tempted to quit Madeley. The spirit of Jonah had so seized upon my heart that I had the insolence to murmur against the Lord; but the storm is now happily calmed, at least for a season. Alas! what stubbornness there is in the will of man; and with what strength does it combat the will of God under the mask of piety, when it can no longer do so with the uncovered, shameless face of vice! ‘If a man bridleth not his tongue,’ all his outward ‘religion is vain.’ May we not add to this, if a man bridleth not his will, which is the language of his desires, his inward religion is vain also? The Lord does not, however, leave me altogether; and I have often a secret hope that He will one day touch my heart and lips with a live coal from the altar; and that then His word shall consume the stubble, and break to pieces the stone.
“The question, which you mean to repeat at the end of the winter, is, I hope, whether you shall be welcome at Madeley? My answer is, you shall be welcome; for I have already lost almost all my reputation, and the little that remains does not deserve a competition with the pleasure I shall have in seeing you.”[71]
Notwithstanding his dejection, and the opposition he had to encounter, Fletcher continued to labour with unflagging diligence. To his Friday night lecture he now added the catechising of children on Sunday afternoons, but relieved himself of the toil of preparing a second Sunday sermon, by reading the sermons of other men. He also began to see a prospect of commencing services at Madeley Wood and at Coalbrook Dale. Hence, in another letter to Charles Wesley he wrote as follows:—
“Madeley, April 27, 1761.
“When I first came to Madeley, I was greatly mortified and discouraged by the smallness of my congregations; and I thought if some of our friends in London had seen my little company they would have triumphed in their own wisdom. But now, thank God, things are altered in that respect. Last Sunday, I had the pleasure of seeing some in the churchyard who could not get into the church.
“I began a few Sundays ago to preach in the afternoon, after catechising the children; but I do not preach my own sermons. Twice I read a sermon of Archbishop Usher’s; and last Sunday one of the Homilies, taking the liberty of making some observations on such passages as confirmed what I had advanced in the morning; and, by this means, I stopped the mouths of many adversaries.
“I have frequently had a desire to exhort in Madeley Wood and Coalbrook Dale, two villages of my parish; but I have not dared to run before I saw an open door. It now, I think, begins to open. Two small Societies of about twenty persons have formed of themselves in those places, although the devil seems determined to overturn all. A young person, the daughter of one of my rich parishioners, has been thrown into despair, so that everybody thought her insane, and, indeed, I thought so too. Judge how our adversaries rejoiced; and, for my part, I was tempted to forsake my ministry, and take to my heels; I never suffered such affliction. Last Saturday, I humbled myself before the Lord on her account, by fasting and prayer; and I hope the Lord heard my prayer. Yesterday, she found herself well enough to come to church.
“You will do well to engage your colliers at Kingswood to pray for their poor brethren at Madeley. May those at Madeley, one day, equal them in faith, as they now do in that wickedness, for which they (the Kingswood colliers) were famous before you went among them.
“Mr. Hill has written me a very obliging letter, to engage me to accompany the elder of my pupils to Switzerland; and if I had any other country than the place where I am, I should, perhaps, have been tempted to go. At present, however, I have no temptation that way, and I have declined the offer as politely as I could.”[72]
The case of the young woman just mentioned was to Fletcher a great trial. In a letter written to Lady Huntingdon[73] on the same day as the foregoing letter to Charles Wesley, he states, that, previous to this, reports had been spread that he drove the people mad, and he had borne such scandals “patiently enough,” but this “glaring instance,” which seemed to confirm the rumours circulated against him, had thrown him into “agonies of soul.” To a great extent, Fletcher had yet to learn a lesson which the Wesleys and Whitefield had long ago been taught: “If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you” (1 Peter iv. 14).
The scandals were continued; and even the pulpit was used in lampooning the Madeley preacher. Hence the following, addressed to Charles Wesley:—
“Madeley, August 19, 1761.
“I know not whether I mentioned to you a sermon preached at the Archdeacon’s Visitation. It was almost all levelled at the points which are called the doctrines of Methodism, and, as the preacher is minister of a parish near mine, it is probable he had me in his eye. After the sermon, another clergyman addressed me with an air of triumph, and demanded what answer I could make. As several of my parishioners were present, besides the churchwardens, I thought it my duty to take the matter up; and I have done so by writing a long letter to the preacher, in which I have touched the principal mistakes of his discourse, with as much politeness and freedom as I was able; but I have had no answer. I could have wished for your advice before I sealed my letter; but, as I could not have it, I have been very cautious, entrenching myself behind the ramparts of Scripture, as well as those of our Homilies and Articles.
“I know not what to say to you of the state of my soul. I daily struggle in the Slough of Despond, and I endeavour every day to climb the Hill Difficulty. I need wisdom, mildness, and courage; and no man has less of them than I.
“As to the state of my parish, the prospect is yet discouraging. New scandals succeed those that wear away; but ‘offences must come.’ Happy shall I be if the offence cometh not by me. My churchwardens speak of hindering strangers from coming to the church, and of repelling them from the Lord’s table; but on these points I am determined to make head against them. A club of eighty working men, in a neighbouring parish, being offended at their minister, determined to come in procession to my church, and requested me to preach a sermon for them; but I thought proper to decline doing so, and have thereby a little regained the good graces of the minister, at least for a time.”[74]
The preacher, at the Archdeacon’s visitation, was the Rev. Mr. Prothero;[75] and the “long letter” to him may be found in Fletcher’s collected works (vol. viii.), where it fills twenty-eight octavo pages, and is entitled a “Defence of Experimental Religion.” It is dated “Madeley, July 25, 1761.”
Mr. Prothero’s “elegant sermon,” as Fletcher terms it, seems to have consisted of two parts: a defence of revealed religion against Deists and Infidels; and a warning against religious superstition and enthusiasm. The first part gave Fletcher “exceeding great satisfaction,” and the design of the second part was good, for, as Fletcher remarks, “It is the duty of a preacher to keep the sacred truths committed to him, as well from being perverted by enthusiasts, as from being crushed by infidels. Boasting of communion with God, and peculiar favours from heaven, is hurtful to the cause of Christ, when people’s lives show them to be actuated by a spirit of delusion; and setting up impulses in the room of repentance, faith, hope, charity, obedience, has done no small mischief in the Church of God.”
But, while Fletcher praises Mr. Prothero for “the goodness of his design,” he passes strictures upon the execution of it. He condemns Mr. Prothero for “representing, in general, that virtue, benevolence, good-nature, and morality, are the way to salvation;” and shows, that according “to the Word of God and the teaching of our Church,” sinners are saved by the exercise of faith in Christ. He objected to Mr. Prothero’s doctrine, that, by nature, and without the assistance of Divine grace, man “has the same power to enter the paths of virtue as to walk across a room.” He censured the way in which the preacher discountenanced the doctrine of the necessity of the new birth; and he maintained, at great length, that to “set aside all feelings in religion, and to rank them with unaccountable impulses,” is not consistent with the teachings of the Bible, and with the Liturgy, Articles, and Homilies of the English Church.
Soon after this, Fletcher was in another trouble. Hence the following letter written to Charles Wesley:—
“Madeley, October 12, 1761.
“My Dear Sir,—You have always the goodness to encourage me, and your encouragements are not unseasonable; for discouragements follow one after another with very little intermission. Those which are of an inward nature are sufficiently known to you; but some others are peculiar to myself, especially those I have had for eight days past, during Madeley wake.
“Seeing that I could not suppress these bacchanals, I did all in my power to moderate their madness; but my endeavours have had little or no effect. You cannot well imagine how much the animosity of my parishioners is heightened, and with what boldness it discovers itself against me, because I preached against drunkenness, shows, and bull-baiting. The publicans and maltmen will not forgive me. They think that to preach against drunkenness, and to cut their purse, is the same thing.
“My church begins not to be so well filled as it has been, and I account for it thus: the curiosity of some of my hearers is satisfied, and others are offended by the word; the roads are worse; and if it shall ever please the Lord to pour His Spirit upon us, the time is not yet come. The people, instead of saying, ‘Let us go up to the house of the Lord,’ exclaim, ‘Why should we go and hear a Methodist?’
“I should lose all patience with my flock if I had not more reason to be satisfied with them than with myself. My own barrenness furnishes me with excuses for theirs; and I wait the time when God shall give seed to the sower and increase to the seed sown. In waiting that time, I learn the meaning of this prayer, ‘Thy will be done.’
“Believe me your sincere, though unworthy, friend,
“J. Fletcher.”[76]
Fletcher’s faithful preaching offended the publicans, and, judging of his sermons in general by the following specimens, it is not surprising that his preaching offended others. The extracts are taken from a sermon delivered in the month of December 1761, and first published in the Dublin edition of the Methodist Magazine for 1821 (pp. 249–258).[77] The text was, “Thou shalt speak My words to them, whether they will hear or whether they will forbear, for they are most rebellious” (Ezek. ii. 7). After challenging his congregation to assert their innocence, Fletcher proceeded:—
“Supposing you never allowed yourself to dishonour the name of God by customary swearing, or grossly to violate His Sabbaths, or commonly to neglect the solemnities of His public worship; supposing, again, that you have not injured your neighbours in their lives, their chastity, their character, or their property, either by violence or by fraud; or that you never scandalously debased your rational nature by that vile intemperance which sinks a man below the worst kind of brutes; supposing all this, can you pretend that you have not in smaller instances violated the rules of piety, of temperance, and of chastity? Does not your own heart prove you guilty of pride, of passion, of sensuality, of an excessive fondness for the world and its enjoyments; of murmuring, or at least secretly repining, against God under the strokes of an afflictive Providence; of misspending a great deal of your time; of abusing the gifts of God’s bounty to vain, and, in some instances, to pernicious purposes; of mocking Him when you have pretended to engage in His worship, drawing near to Him with your lips while your heart has been far from Him? Does not your conscience condemn you of some one breach of the law at least? and by one breach of it, does not the Holy Ghost bear witness (James ii. 10) that you are become guilty of all, and are as incapable of being justified before God by any obedience of your own, as if you had committed ten thousand offences? But, in reality, there are ten thousand and more to be charged to your account. When you come to reflect on all your sins of negligence, as well as on your voluntary transgressions; on all the instances in which you have failed to do good when it was in your power to do it; on all the instances in which acts of devotion have been omitted, especially in secret; and on all those cases in which you have shown a stupid disregard to the honour of God, and to the temporal and eternal happiness of your fellow-creatures; when all these, I say, are reviewed, the number will swell beyond all possibility of account, and force you to cry out, ‘I am rebellious, most rebellious; mine iniquities are more than the hairs of my head!’ They will appear in such a light before you that your own heart will charge you with countless multitudes; and how much more then that God, ‘who is greater than your heart, and knoweth all things’?”
This was plain speaking, but very characteristic of the preaching of the Church of England Methodists. Space will permit only one other extract from this sermon.
“And now, sinner, think seriously with yourself what defence you will make to all this? Will you fly in the face of God and that of your conscience so openly as to deny one of the charges of rebellion, yea, of aggravated rebellion, I have advanced against you? Have you not lifted yourself up against the Lord of heaven? Have you not sided with His sworn enemies—the world and the flesh? What part of your body, what faculty of your soul, have you not employed as an instrument of unrighteousness? When did you live one day before God with the dependence of a creature, the gratitude of a redeemed creature, the heavenly frame of a sanctified creature? Nay, when did you live one hour without violating God’s known law, either in word, or thought, or action? Have not you done it almost continually by the vanity of your mind and the hardness of your heart, if not by the open immorality of your life? And, what infinitely aggravates your guilt, have you not despised and abused God’s numberless mercies? Have you not affronted conscience, His deputy in your breast? Have you not resisted and grieved His Spirit? Yea, have you not trifled with Him in all your pretended submissions or solemn engagements? Thousands are, no doubt, already in hell whose guilt never equalled yours; and yet God has spared you to see almost the end of another year, and to hear now this plain representation of your case. And will you not yet consider? Shall nothing move you to shake off that amazing carelessness and stupid disregard of your salvation? Will you never begin to ‘work it out with fear and trembling’? Will you slumber in impenitency till eternal woes crush you into destruction? Is death, is judgment, is the bottomless pit so distant that you dare put off from week to week the day of your conversion? You have read in God’s Word that there is mercy with Him that He may be feared; but where did you read that there is mercy with Him for those who fear Him not? Show me such a place; I shall not say anywhere in the Bible, but in any book written by a moral heathen. And yet you hope you can be saved in this way.
“Sinner, despise me here if thou wilt; call me here an enthusiast, and laugh at the concern I feel for thy perishing soul; but hereafter thou wilt do me justice, clear me before the Lord Jesus, and acknowledge that thy blood is upon thine own head, that thou art undone because thou wouldst be undone, because thou wouldst take neither warning nor reproof.”
To give the reader a further idea of the faithfulness and searching character of Fletcher’s preaching at this early period of his Madeley ministry, the subjoined extracts are given from sermons preached during the first three months of 1762.
In January, 1762,[78] he delivered a discourse upon the words, “Ye will not come unto Me, that ye might have life;” in which he described “four classes of sinners who will not come to Christ that they might have life;” and proved “that unbelief, or not coming to Christ for life, is the most abominable and damning of all sins.” One brief extract on the latter point must suffice:—
“Unbelief is a sin of so deep a dye that the devils in hell cannot commit the like. Our Saviour never prayed, wept, bled, and died for devils. He never said to them, ‘Ye will not come unto Me, that ye might have life.’ They can never be so madly ungrateful as to slight a Saviour. Mercy never wooed their stubborn, proud hearts as it does ours. They have abused grace, it is true, but they never trampled mercy underfoot. This more than diabolical sin is reserved for thee, careless sinner. Now thou hearest Christ compassionately say in the text, ‘Ye will not come unto Me,’ and thou remainest unmoved; but the time cometh when Jesus, who meekly entreats, shall sternly curse; when He who in tender patience says, ‘Ye will not come unto Me,’ shall thunder in righteous vengeance, ‘Depart from Me, ye cursed; depart unto the second death,—the fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ In vain wilt thou plead then as thou dost now, ‘Lord, I am no adulterer; I am no extortioner; I used to eat at Thy table; I was baptized in Thy name; I was a true churchman; there are many worse than I am.’ This will not admit thee into the kingdom of Christ. His answer will be, ‘I know you not; you never came to Me for life.’”
Plain preaching such as this was not likely to please the easy-going Pharisees of the age in which Fletcher lived, any more than it is likely to be popular among the same class of people at the present day. To utter such truths required courage then; and it requires courage now. Fletcher, one of the gentlest of human beings, possessed this courage.
No doubt there were many occasions when his sermons were full of the richest comfort to those who had truly repented, and unfeignedly believed Christ’s holy Gospel; but he never failed faithfully to fulfil an Old Testament commission, binding upon the ministers of God throughout all time: “Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show My people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins” (Isa. lviii. 1).
At the risk of wearying the reader, further extracts must be given, exemplifying Fletcher’s fearless fidelity.
On January 4, 1762, England declared war against Spain; and, a few days after, proclamations were issued for a general fast to be observed in England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, in the month of March.[79] Fletcher, as a loyal Churchman, preached on this occasion;[80] his text was Ezek. xxxiii. 7–9. After a few preliminary remarks respecting the king’s “pious proclamation,” he proceeds to say,—
“We must attack, unmask, and overthrow vice with holy violence, and strike at the heart of sin with the boldness of John the Baptist, and in the spirit of Elijah. Without any apology for my plainness, I shall endeavour to convince the wicked man both of his wickedness and danger.”
Fletcher begins with “practical atheists”
“Thousands there are, who, by gross ignorance, shameful neglect of instruction, and abominable contempt of godliness, are in the front of the battle, and next to the prince of darkness. Their heart is darkened by the mists of pride and the clouds of presumption, and they are such utter strangers to their want of spiritual light and divine grace, that they seldom or never call upon God for help with any solemnity. The unhappy heathenish families who are of that stamp meet regularly every day to eat, drink, and make provision for the flesh; but how seldom do they meet to read and pray. You will find almost as much godliness among the wild Indians as among these practical atheists. But why should I call them atheists? They have many gods. The world is their god; pleasure is their god; vanity is their god; money is their god; their belly is their god; to some or other of these idols, they sacrifice their hearts and their time. As for the God of heaven, the great and eternal Jehovah, they put Him off with a careless attendance on His public worship on Sunday morning, if the weather suits them; and it is well if to this they add sometimes the babbling over of the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed, which, after all, in the manner in which they do it, is no better than a solemn mockery of the Saviour, whom they constantly crucify afresh. Do you belong to such a heathenish, prayerless family? If you do, suffer me to deliver my soul by telling you, that you are the very first person to whom I am bound to say, ‘Thou shalt surely die.’ Read your sentence in Psalm lxxix. 6. What! shall the indignation of the Lord fall upon prayerless families among the heathen, and shall it pass by the nominally Christian, but prayerless family to which you belong? No, no; the Judge of all the earth will do right; He will repay you to your face.”
“The wicked is often known, to others and to himself, by his injustice, oppression, cruelty, deceit, and unfair dealing. Did you ever make a prey of the poor and helpless? Are you like the horse-leech, crying, ‘Give, give,’ still wanting more profit, and never thinking you have enough? Do you take more care to lay up treasures on earth than in heaven? Have you got the unhappy secret of distilling silver out of the poor man’s brow, and gold out of the tears of helpless widows and friendless orphans? Or, which is rather worse, do you, directly or indirectly, live by poisoning others, by encouraging the immoderate use of those refreshments, which, taken to excess, disorder the reason, ruin the soul, and prove no better than slow poison to the body? If your business calls you to buy or sell, do you use falsehood? do you equivocate? do you exaggerate or conceal the truth, in order to impose upon your neighbour, and make a profit of his necessity or credulity? If any of these marks be upon you, God’s word singles you out, and drags you to the bar of Divine justice to hear your doom in the text, ‘The wicked shall surely die.’ O, see your danger; repent, and make restitution! Why should you meet the unjust steward in hell, when you may yet follow Zaccheus into heaven?”
“There is another fearful sin, which has in it no profit, no pleasure, no, not sensual sweetness enough to bait the hook of temptation. The only enticement to it is the diabolical disposition of the wicked man, and the horrid pride he takes in cutting a figure among the children of Belial. I speak of oaths and curses,—those arrows shot from the string of a hellish heart, and the bow of a Luciferian tongue, against heaven itself; these are some of the sparks of hell-fire, which, now and then, come out of the throat of a wicked man. Do they ever come out of thine? A year ago, I laid before you the horror of that sin, and besought you to leave it to Satan and his angels, and to act no more the part of an incarnate devil. Have you strictly complied with that request? Has not heaven been pierced with another fiery dart? Have not good men, or good angels (if any attend you still) shuddered at those imprecations, which you have used, perhaps without remorse?”
“But, perhaps, your conscience bears you witness that you are not a swearing Christian, or rather a swearing infidel. Well; but are you clear in the point of adultery, fornication, or uncleanness? Does not the guilt of some vile sin, which you have wickedly indulged in time past, and perhaps are still indulging, mark you for the member of a harlot, and not the member of Christ? Do you not kindle the wrath of heaven against yourself and your country, as the men and women of Gomorrah did against themselves and the other cities of the plain? If you cherish the sparks of wantonness, as they did, how can you but be made with them to suffer the vengeance of eternal fire? Do not flatter yourselves with the vain hope, that your sin is not so heinous as theirs. If it be less in degree, is it not infinitely greater in its aggravating circumstances? Were these poor Canaanites Christians? Had they Bibles and ministers? Had they sermons and sacraments? Did they ever vow, as you have done, to renounce the devil, and all the sinful lusts of the flesh? Did they ever hear of the Son of God sweating great drops of blood, in an agony of prayer, to quench the fire of human corruption? O acknowledge your guilt and danger, and, by deep repentance, prevent infallible destruction.
“I cannot pass in silence the detestable, though fashionable, sin, which has brought down the curse of heaven, and poured desolation and ruin upon the most flourishing kingdoms,—I mean pride in apparel. Even in this place, where poverty, hard labour, and drudgery would, one should think, prevent a sin which Christianity cannot tolerate even in kings’ houses, there are not wanting foolish virgins, who draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and betray the levity of their hearts by that of their dress. Yea, some women, who should be mothers in Israel, and adorn themselves with good works as holy and godly matrons, openly affect the opposite character. You may see them offer themselves first to the idol of vanity, and then sacrifice their children upon the same altar. As some sons of Belial teach their little ones to curse, before they can well speak, so these daughters of Jezebel drag their unhappy offspring, before they can walk, to the haunts of vanity and pride. They complain of evening lectures, but run to midnight dancings. O that such persons would let the prophet’s words sink into their frothy minds, and fasten upon their careless hearts: ‘Because the daughters of Sion are haughty, and walk with stretched-forth necks and wanton eyes, the Lord will smite with a sore the crown of their head, and discover their shame: instead of well-set hair, there shall be baldness, and burning instead of beauty.’”
These abbreviated extracts of Fletcher’s descriptions of “the wicked” are followed by his directions to humble themselves before Almighty God; to confess their sins with deep sorrow, and to return to the Lord with prayer and fasting; to meditate on the universality, commonness, and boldness of the nation’s wickedness; to begin a visible and thorough reformation; and to seek personal salvation in Christ. The bold preacher cries:—
“From the gilded palace to the thatched cottage, our guilt calls for vengeance. Wickedness is become so fashionable, that he who refuses to run with others into vanity, intemperance, or profaneness, is in danger of losing his character, on one hand; while, on the other, the son of Belial prides himself in excesses, glories in diabolical practices, and scoffs with impunity at religion and virtue. O England! England! happy, yet ungrateful island! Dost thou repay fruitfulness by profaneness,—plenty by vanity,—liberty by impiety,—and the light of Christianity by excesses of immorality?
“As you regard the prosperity of the king, the good of our Church, and the welfare of our country;—as you would not bring a private curse upon yourself, your house, and your dearest friends;—as you value the honour of Almighty God, and dread His awakened wrath;—as you would not force Him to make our land a field of blood, or to break the staff of our bread, and send famine, pestilence, popery, or some other fearful judgment among us;—I pray you, I beseech, I entreat each of you, my dear brethren! as upon my bended knees,—in the name of our Lord Jesus, and by those bowels of Divine mercy against which we have madly kicked in times past, and which, nevertheless, still yearn over us,—I entreat you not to rest in outward humiliation and reformation. Christians must go one step beyond the Ninevites. O seek then, with all true Christians, a righteousness superior to that of the Scribes and Pharisees. Seek it in Christ. Never rest, till you are sure of your interest in Him; till you feel the virtue of His blood applied to your hearts by the power of His Spirit. Without this, all the rest will stand you in little stead.”[81]
This, in truth, was thunder and lightning preaching,—no doubt greatly needed then, as, indeed, it is greatly needed now; preaching likely to give offence, but the faithfulness of which God always honours, and crowns with marked success. It raised up against Fletcher bitter enemies; but it was the means of converting not a few of his godless parishioners.
One of these was Mary Matthews, who, listening to the reproaches cast upon Fletcher, was greatly prejudiced against him. At length, she went to hear him. Mary thought herself very good, but Fletcher showed she was very vile. For two years, she was an earnest penitent, and then, by faith in Christ, found peace with God. Mary was brought before magistrates for opening her little house, in Madeley Wood, for preaching, but she continued faithful; and, in 1788, passed away to heaven, her last words being, “I am almost at home. Farewell! God bless you! God for ever bless you!”
Another was Mary Barnard, who lived to the age of ninety, was very lame, but always crawled to Madeley church when the weather would permit. Totally without education herself, she had a son who became a Methodist local preacher. Her death occurred in 1797, and her last message to Fletcher’s widow was,—“The covenant is signed and sealed between my Lord and me. I am His by a marriage bond; and He is mine. And now I set to my seal, that the blood of Jesus cleanses from all sin.”[82]
Such conversions were among Fletcher’s encouragements; and he greatly needed them. His preaching saved some, but offended others. In one of his unpublished manuscripts, dated “Madeley, February 28, 1762,” he notes a somewhat remarkable occurrence:—
“Last Sunday, only one objection was made against the doctrine I preached in this church, and that, I think, was a poor one, as it was supported by no argument and no Scripture. The sum of it was this, ‘It is hard to say that one breach of the law brings a man under the curse, and exposes one out of Christ to the damnation of hell.’ To this I answer by four arguments.
“The first is taken from matters of fact in the Word of God. By one sin, and by the offence of one, condemnation came upon all men, namely by the one sin of Adam’s eating the forbidden fruit. And a more awful example you have in the sudden destruction of Ananias and Sapphira his wife for having told one single lie.
“The second argument is taken from common sense, which tells us that one leak in a ship unstopped will sink it in time, as certainly as a hundred; one piece broken out of a glass makes it a useless glass, as much as if it was dashed into twenty pieces; one stab of a dagger through the heart kills a man as much as a hundred would. And so one sin uncancelled by Christ’s blood will as surely destroy an unconverted man as a hundred, though his destruction will not be so terrible as that of him who has committed a hundred.
“The third argument is taken from the exactness of human laws and the practice of earthly judges. They all condemn a man for one single offence. If one can be proved it is enough. Let a murderer kill one man, he is to be hanged as well as if he had killed a hundred. Let a highwayman take one pound from one single person, the law condemns him for a felon, and sends him to the gallows, as well as if he had taken a thousand pounds from a thousand different travellers. The law of the land, to the breach of which the penalty is annexed, is as effectually broken by one act of felony as by a hundred; and the law of God is as much, though not so heinously, broken, by one sin as by a hundred: consequently the law of God curses and damns for one sin as well as for a hundred.
“The fourth argument is taken from Deuteronomy xxvii. 26, ‘Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this law to do them.’ Also, Galatians iii. 10, ‘Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.’ And James ii. 10, ‘Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.’ He violates the law, despises the law, incurs the punishment threatened.”
Passing by Fletcher’s arguments and logic, this fugitive manuscript is of some importance, as intimating not only that objections were made to Fletcher’s doctrines, but also that he was accustomed publicly to notice and answer them in his parish church.
Fletcher had other troubles besides those arising from objections to his teaching. In his Fast-day sermon, preached on March 12, 1762, he had cried:—
“‘Because of swearing the land mourneth.’ If the prophet of old had lived in our degenerate days, he would have added, ‘Because of perjury the land groaneth.’ To go no farther than the place we inhabit, how many of us, who have been entrusted with public offices, have wilfully broken the oaths administered unto us? How many open and notorious drunkards, fighters, sabbath-breakers, blasphemers of God’s Word, and cursers of men, have escaped deserved censure, I shall not say by the accidental neglect, but by the downright perjury of officers?”
This bold accusation stimulated one of Fletcher’s young parishioners to put the law in force against one of the culpable parish officers; by which act the young man brought himself into trouble, and also Fletcher, who protected him.
Further, in the small house of Mary Matthews, built upon the rock in Madeley Wood, Fletcher had begun to hold preaching services; the congregation assembling there had been called “the Rock Church;” and Mary Matthews had been fined £20 for permitting such assemblies in her humble dwelling. Fletcher refers to these incidents in the following letter to Charles Wesley:—
“Madeley, May 16, 1762.
“Since my last, our troubles have increased. A young man having put in force the Act, for suppressing swearing, against a parish officer, he stirred up all the other half gentlemen to remove him from the parish. Here I interposed, and, to do so with effect, I took the young man into my service. By God’s grace, I have been enabled to conduct myself, in this matter, so as to give them no handle against me; and, in spite of all their cabals, I have got the better of them.
“What has greatly encouraged them is the behaviour of a magistrate, who was at the first inclined to favour me, but afterwards turned against me with peculiar malevolence, and proceeded so far as to threaten me and all my flock of the Rock Church with imprisonment. Hitherto, the Lord has stood by me, and my little difficulties are nothing to me; but I fear I support them rather like a philosopher than a Christian. We were to have been mobbed with a drum last Tuesday, at the Rock Church; but their captain, a papist, behaved himself so very ill, that they were ashamed of him, and are made peaceable for the present.”[83]
Fletcher wrote to this persecuting papist the following letter, which is now for the first time published:—
“Sir,—The indecent and profane manner in which you broke upon those of my parishioners who came to me for private exhortations at Mrs. Matthews’, lays me under an absolute obligation to present you at Ludlow Court as a person notoriously guilty—1, Of drunkenness; 2, of cursing; 3, of disturbing me in the discharge of the private labours of my ministry; 4, of profane disregard to the Liturgy of the Established Church; 5, of want of respect for the Royal Family, openly intimated in indecent interruption while I prayed for them, and obliging me to get up from my knees and make you go out of the room before I could conclude the collect in peace; and 6, of cursing, and making game of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity.
“Though I told you upon the spot, that you should be informed of for your profane behaviour, I think it my duty to acquaint you of it more particularly, that you may prepare your answers to the above mentioned charges.
“I assure you, Sir, that malice, or any private pique, is entirely out of the question. I heartily wish you well, and am ready to do you any service but that of sacrificing the interests of religion and virtue to open profaneness and immorality.
“The following considerations weigh much with me to make me insist on the churchwardens putting you in their presentment; and they will, I hope, convince you that I act only according to the dictates of Christian prudence.
“1. Most of the things laid to your charge were grown into habit before they broke out in my presence. It is not the first time that you have been seen in liquor, and been heard to use profane expressions, and to make sport of the things of God, and turn my labours into ridicule.
“2. So public an offence absolutely demands a public punishment, and the officers, whom I have informed of your behaviour, must be perjured if they present you not, and an irreparable blow will be given to the honour of religion and morality.
“3. The regard I have for our Church, and the peace of the parish, obliges me to resist in you the persecuting spirit of opposition your Church is so noted for.
“4. Part of my business here as a clergyman of the Church of England is to withstand the propagation of your dangerous principles, and to oppose the increase of the blind persecuting zeal which some seem to breathe after you. If you are suffered openly to excite that profane zeal with impunity, how will your misled companions be confirmed in their errors. If you, who have so many laws to curb you, can offend with impunity, how daring will others grow in wickedness.
“5. A person of note in the parish has lately undergone the severity of the law for part of the above-mentioned charges. What intolerable partiality would it be in the officers and me to take no notice of you who are guilty of the whole.
“Lastly. If I do not get you presented, I shall for ever deprive myself of the liberty of repressing profaneness, immorality, and persecution in my parish. Every drunkard, every swearer, every railer, etc., etc., will (and not without reason) say to me, ‘You could spare Mr. Haughton, who was notoriously guilty of our errors; why should you be stricter with Protestants than with Papists?’
“I flatter myself that these reasons will convince you that I am led by Christian prudence and a calm resolution to oppose triumphing profaneness, and not at all by any private views or uncharitable motives. And, wishing that, if you are convicted, the course of human laws may lead you to the harbour of temperance and piety,
“I remain, Sir, your humble and obedient servant,
“J. Fletcher.”
Of course, opinions differ as to the expediency of trying to make men moral by Acts of Parliament; but there can be no doubt of Fletcher’s Christian sincerity in the action he took against Mr. Haughton. His effort, however, was a failure. Writing to Charles Wesley, in the month of July, 1762, he said:—
“Your letter arrived some days too late, to prevent my taking a false step respecting the papist in question. Three weeks ago, I went to Ludlow to the Bishop’s visitation, and I thought the occasion favourable for my purpose; but the churchwardens, when we were on the spot, refused to support me, and the court has paid no regard to my presentation. Thus I have gained some experience, though at my own cost. The sermon did not touch the string with which I was whipped at the last visitation; and I afterwards had the boldness to go and dine with the Bishop.
“Many of my parishioners are strangely disconcerted at my bringing my gown back from Ludlow. With respect to the magistrate I mentioned to you in my last, because he acted as judge of the circuit two years ago, he now believes himself as able a lawyer as Judge Foster; but, for the present, he contents himself with threatenings. I met him the other day, and, after he had called me Jesuit, etc., and menaced me with his cane, he assured me that he would soon put down our assemblies. How ridiculous is this impotent rage!
“I have attempted to form a Society, and, in spite of much opposition and many difficulties, I hope to succeed. I preach, I exhort, I pray; but, as yet, I seem to have cast the net on the wrong side of the ship. Lord Jesus, come Thyself, and furnish me with a Divine commission!
“For some months past, I have laboured under an insuperable drowsiness: I could sleep day and night; and the hours which I ought to employ with Christ on the mount, I spend like Peter in the garden.”[84]
Poor Fletcher’s troubles continued and increased. A month later, he wrote again to Charles Wesley, as follows:—
“I have still trials of all sorts. First, spiritual ones. My heart is hard; I have not that contrition, that filial fear, that sweet, humble melting of heart before the Lord, which I consider essential to Christianity.
“Secondly, the opposition made to my ministry increases. A young clergyman, who lives in Madeley Wood, where he has great influence, has openly declared war against me, by pasting on the church door a paper, in which he charges me with rebellion, schism, and being a disturber of the public peace. He puts himself at the head of the gentlemen of the parish (as they term themselves), and, supported by the Recorder of Wenlock, he is determined to put in force the Conventicle Act against me. A few weeks ago, the widow who lives in the Rock Church, and a young man, who read and prayed in my absence, were taken up. I attended them before the magistrate, and the young clergyman with his troop were present. They called me Jesuit, etc.; and the magistrate tried to frighten me, by saying that he would put the Act in force, though we should assemble only in my own house. I pleaded my cause as well as I could; but, seeing he was determined to hear no reason, I told him he must do as he pleased, and that, if the Act in question concerned us, we were ready to suffer all its rigours. In his rage, he went the next day to Wenlock, and proposed to grant a warrant to have me apprehended; but, as the other magistrates were of opinion that the business did not come under their cognizance, but belonged to the Spiritual Court, he was obliged to swallow his spittle alone.
“Mr. Madan,[85] whom I have consulted, tells me the Act may be enforced against the mistress of the house, the young man, and all who were present. The churchwardens talk of putting me in the Spiritual Court for meeting in houses, etc.; but what is worst of all, three false witnesses offer to prove upon oath that I am a liar; and some of my followers (as they are called) have dishonoured their profession, to the great joy of our adversaries.
“In the midst of these difficulties I have reason to bless the Lord, that my heart is not troubled. Forget me not in your prayers.”[86]
All this braggart persecution seems to have ended in threats. Fletcher wrote again to Charles Wesley, on November 22, 1762:—
“The debates about the illegality of exhorting in houses (although only in my own parish) grew some time ago to such a height, that I was obliged to lay my reasons before the Bishop; but his lordship very prudently sends me no answer. I think he knows not how to disapprove, and yet dares not approve this methodistical way of procedure.”[87]
Such is a bird’s-eye view of Fletcher’s ministry and ministerial trials during the first two years after his appointment to the living of Madeley in 1760. As an earnest evangelical clergyman of the Church of England, he almost stood alone. Shropshire had produced one like-minded minister; but he, the Rev. Mr. Hatton, was now in the Isle of Man. To this gentleman, Fletcher, in his solitude, wrote as follows:—
“Madeley, August 4, 1762.
“Rev. Sir,—There are so few of our profession in this county who are not ashamed of the cross of Christ, and of the Homilies and Articles of our Church, that it gave me no small pleasure to hear you are not led away with the generality into dry empty notions of morality and formality,—the two legs on which fashionable religion stalks through this so-called Christian land. May the Lord Jesus convince us daily more and more, by His Spirit, of sin in ourselves, and of righteousness in Him! May we, in the strength of our dying Samson, pull down the buildings of self-righteousness, though the consequence should be to see all our hopes of preferment and esteem buried in the ruins! May we never be led to preach another Gospel than that of Christ! ‘He that believeth shall be saved; he that believeth not shall be damned’ (Mark xvi. 16).
“I hope, Sir, you will not be discouraged. Regard not the wind, but sow your seed early and late; and the Lord of the harvest will give the increase, as seemeth best to His heavenly wisdom. I meet with many trials in my parish, but our faithful Lord opens always a door for me to escape; and so He will for you.
“I should be thankful to Providence, if your way should be made plain into this neighbourhood. You owe yourself to Shropshire in particular; and no county needs hands for the spiritual harvest more than this does. I pray that the Lord of the harvest may thrust you among us.
“I bespeak a sermon when you come to Salop; trusting that you will not be ashamed to bear witness to the truth as it is in Jesus, from so despised a pulpit as that of, dear Sir, your affectionate and weak fellow servant in the Gospel,
“J. Fletcher.”[88]
Fletcher longed for clerical sympathy and co-operation; but he had to wait for them. In all respects his position was a trying one. The Rev. Mr. Gilpin, who afterwards was well acquainted with him, writes:—
“Celebrated for the extensive ironworks carried on within its limits, Madeley was remarkable for little else than the ignorance and profaneness of its inhabitants, among whom respect to man was as rarely to be observed as piety towards God. In this benighted place, the Sabbath was openly profaned, and the most holy things contemptuously trampled under foot; even the restraints of decency were violently broken through, and the external form of religion held up as a subject of ridicule.
“Immediately upon his settling in this populous village, Mr. Fletcher entered upon the duties of his vocation with an extraordinary degree of earnestness and zeal. He saw the difficulties of his situation, and the reproaches to which he should be exposed by a conscientious discharge of the pastoral office; but, as a steward of the manifold grace of God, he faithfully dispensed the word of life, according as every man had need; instructing the ignorant, reasoning with gainsayers, exhorting the immoral, and rebuking the obstinate. Not content with discharging the stated duties of the Sabbath, he counted every day as lost in which he was not actually employed in the service of the Church. As often as a small congregation could be collected, he joyfully proclaimed to them the acceptable year of the Lord, whether it were in the church, in a private house, or in the open air.”
“It was a common thing, in his parish, for young persons of both sexes to meet together for what was called recreation; and that recreation usually continued from evening to morning, consisting chiefly in dancing, revelling, drunkenness, and obscenity. These licentious assemblies he considered a disgrace to the Christian name, and determined to exert his ministerial authority for their total suppression. Frequently he burst in upon them with a holy indignation, making war upon Satan in places peculiarly appropriated to his service.”
“His enemies wrested his words, misrepresented his actions, and cast out his name as evil; but whether he was insulted in his person, or injured in his property; whether he was attacked with open abuse, or pursued by secret calumny, he walked amid the most violent assaults of his enemies, as a man invulnerable; and while his firmness discovered that he was unhurt, his forbearance testified that he was unoffended.”
“Had he aimed at celebrity as a public speaker, furnished as he was with the united powers of learning, genius, and taste, he might have succeeded beyond many; but his design was to convert and not to captivate his hearers; to secure their eternal interests, and not to obtain their momentary applause. Hence his ‘speech and his preaching were not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.’ He spake as in the presence of God, and taught as one having Divine authority. There was an energy in his preaching that was irresistible. His subjects, his language, his gestures, the tone of his voice, and the turn of his countenance, all conspired to fix the attention and affect the heart. Without aiming at sublimity, he was truly sublime; and uncommonly eloquent without affecting the orator.”[89]
Such is the testimony of a gentleman who, for a season, lived in Fletcher’s house, and for many years lived in the neighbourhood of Fletcher’s parish. It would be worse than foolish to add anything to it, except the remarks of Fletcher’s friend and first biographer, John Wesley:—
“Mr. Fletcher settled at Madeley in the year 1760, and from the beginning he was a laborious workman in his Lord’s vineyard. At his first settling there, the hearts of several were unaccountably set against him, insomuch that he was constrained to warn some of these that if they did not repent God would speedily cut them off. And the truth of these predictions was shown over and over by the signal accomplishment of them.[90] But no opposition could hinder him from going on his Master’s work, and suppressing vice in every possible manner. Those sinners who endeavoured to hide themselves from him he pursued to every corner of his parish by all sorts of means, public and private, early and late, in season and out of season, entreating and warning them to flee from the wrath to come. Some made it an excuse for not attending church that they could not awake early enough to get their families ready. He provided for this also. Taking a bell in his hand, he set out every Sunday at five in the morning, and went round the most distant parts of the parish, inviting all the inhabitants to the house of God.
“Yet, notwithstanding all the pains he took, he saw for some time little fruit of his labour; insomuch that he was more than once in doubt whether he had not mistaken his place; whether God had indeed called him to confine himself to one town, or to labour more at large in His vineyard. He was not free from this doubt when a multitude of people flocked together at a funeral. He seldom let these awful opportunities slip without giving a solemn exhortation. At the close of the exhortation which was then given, one man was so grievously offended that he could not refrain from breaking out into scurrilous, yea, menacing language. But, notwithstanding all his struggling against it, the Word fastened upon his heart. At first, indeed, he roared like a lion; but he soon wept like a child. Not long after, he came to Mr. Fletcher in the most humble manner, asking pardon for his outrageous behaviour, and begging an interest in his prayers. This was such a refreshment as he stood in need of. In a short time, this poor broken-hearted sinner was filled with joy unspeakable. He then spared no pains in exhorting his fellow-sinners to flee from the wrath to come.
“It was not long after, when, one Sunday evening, Mr. Fletcher, after performing the usual duty at Madeley, was about to set out for Madeley Wood, to preach and catechise as usual. But just then notice was brought (which should have been given before) that a child was to be buried. His waiting till the child was brought prevented his going to the wood; and herein the providence of God appeared. For at this very time, many of the colliers, who neither feared God nor regarded men, were baiting a bull just by the meeting-house; and, having had plenty to drink, they had all agreed, as soon as he came, to bait the parson. Part of them were appointed to pull him off his horse, and the rest to set the dogs upon him. One of these very men afterwards confessed that he was with them when this agreement was made; and that afterwards, while they were in the most horrid manner cursing and swearing at their disappointment, a large china punch-bowl, which held above a gallon, without any apparent cause (for it was not touched by any person or thing) fell all to shivers. This so alarmed him that he forsook all his companions, and determined to save his own soul.”[91]
1. Dr. Whitehead’s “Life of Wesley,” vol. ii., p. 355.
2. Cox’s “Life of Fletcher,” p. 140.
3. Gilpin’s “Account of Fletcher.”
4. Arminian Magazine, 1794, p. 219.
5. The elder of these sons died on coming of age; the younger became M.P. for Shrewsbury, and afterwards for Shropshire. In 1784, he took his seat in the House of Lords, as Baron Berwick. The title still exists. The old Tern Hall has long been called Attingham House.—Debrett’s “Peerage” and Wesley’s and Benson’s “Lives” of Fletcher.
6. The long letter from which the foregoing is extracted was first published in 1826, in a “Life of Fletcher” in the French language, and printed at Lausanne. In the same year, Mr. Benson printed it as an appendix to the ninth edition of his “Life of Fletcher.” In 1839, it was inserted in the Wesleyan Methodist Magazine. The extract is partly taken from Benson’s translation and partly from that in the magazine.
7. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher,” p. 17.
8. Letter to Mons. H. L. de la Fléchère, 1786, p. 13.
9. Gilpin’s Translation of “The Portrait of St. Paul.”
10. Meaning the war then raging.
11. Arminian Magazine, 1793, p. 411.
12. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher,” 2nd edit., p. 366.
13. Gilpin’s note, in “Portrait of St. Paul.”
14. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher.”
15. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher.”
16. “Thirteen Original Letters, written by the late Rev. John Fletcher. Bath, 1791,” 12mo, p. 3.
17. Methodist Magazine, 1798, p. 93.
18. Gilpin’s “Portrait of St. Paul.”
19. Wesley’s “Works,” vol. ii., p. 376; and vol. vii., p. 415.
20. Wesley’s “Works,” vol. vii., p. 415.
21. Tyerman’s “Life of Wesley,” vol. ii., pp. 286, 289.
22. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher,” 2 edit., p. 320.
23. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher.”
24. Benson says, “He also preached twice in St. Alkmond’s Church in Shrewsbury.”
25. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher.”
26. Thomas Walsh, one of the most remarkable of Wesley’s Itinerants. To say nothing of his piety and usefulness, Wesley declared him to be the best Hebrew scholar he had ever met. He died two years after the date of Fletcher’s letter.
27. “Thirteen Original Letters, written by the Rev. J. Fletcher, 1791,” p. 8.
28. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher,” 2nd edit., p. 38.
29. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 231.
30. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher.”
31. Wesley himself not infrequently set out on his long journey to the north on Sunday.
32. It is difficult to determine what is meant by this; most likely Fletcher wished Thomas Maxfield to preach in the neighbourhood of Tern Hall. Five years afterwards, Maxfield left Wesley, and became an ordained clergyman of the Church of England.
33. Wesley’s Annual Conference was held in Bristol, in August, 1758.
34. Fletcher’s “Works,” vol. viii., p. 154.
35. Previous to becoming Wesley’s housekeeper, Sarah Ryan, Mary Clarke, and Sarah Crosby lived together, in a small house in Christopher Alley, Moorfields. It was here that Miss Bosanquet (afterwards Fletcher’s wife) formed an acquaintance with Sarah Ryan, in 1757. (See “Life of Mrs. Fletcher,” by Henry Moore, pp. 17–20.)
36. Wesley’s Journal.
37. “Minutes of Conference” (edition 1862), vol. i., p. 711.
38. Letters, 1791.
39. Letters, 1791, p. 83.
40. Morgan’s “Life of Walsh.”
41. Letters, 1791, p. 85.
42. Methodist Magazine, 1818, pp. 360–367.
43. Sidney’s “Life of Sir Richard Hill,” pp. 21–32.
44. Letters, 1791, p. 86.
45. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher.”
46.
“Thunder! strike! it is time; render me war for war!
In perishing, I adore the reason which incenses Thee.”
47. Letters, 1791, p. 88.
48. Dorothy Furley, the youngest daughter of John Furley, a Dutch and Turkey merchant, was born at West Ham in 1730. She was converted in early life, and became acquainted with the Countess of Huntingdon, Miss Bosanquet, the Wesley brothers, Miss Johnson, Mrs. Ryan, and many others of the first Methodists, by whom she was held in high esteem. In 1764, she was married to Mr. Downs, one of Wesley’s local preachers in London. After her husband’s death, she removed to Leeds, and died July 28, 1807. The written directions respecting her funeral concluded with these words: “Glory, glory, glory be to my gracious God and Saviour! I live in the full assurance of faith and hope that I shall see my Saviour’s face, and behold that glory which He had with the Father before all worlds, but which He left for my sake. To Him I owe all my salvation, here and to all eternity. To Him, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, be all honour, dominion, and majesty, now and through all ages! Amen. Hallelujah! Amen.”—Methodist Magazine, 1818, p. 222.
49. Letters, 1791, p. 91.
50. Letters, 1791, p. 95.
51. “Thirteen Original Letters,” by Rev. John Fletcher, 1791, p. 9.
52. Benson’s “Life of Fletcher.”
53. Letters, 1791, p. 98.
54. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 233.
55. An extract from Law’s “Christian Perfection,” first published by Wesley in 1740; the sixth edition appeared in 1759.
56. Wesley’s “Sermon on Salvation by Faith,” first published in 1738; and a tenth edition in 1756.
57. Charles Wesley’s well-known sermon, preached before the University of Oxford, on April 4, 1742.
58. C. Wesley’s Journal, vol. ii., p. 227.
59. Ibid., vol. ii., p. 231.
60. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 233.
61. Letters, 1791, p. 100.
62. Cox’s “Life of Fletcher,” p. 25
63. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 400.
64. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 234.
65. Cox’s “Life of Fletcher,” p. 32.
66. Letters, 1791, p. 106.
67. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 237.
68. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 238.
69. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 239.
70. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 240.
71. Letters, 1791, p. 107.
72. Letters, 1791, p. 109.
73. “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 241.
74. Letters, 1791, p. 111.
75. Methodist Magazine, 1821, p. 17.
76. Letters, 1791, p. 112.
77. Fletcher seldom wrote his sermons, and more rarely read them. More than one hundred and forty sermons of Wesley’s have been published, and at least sixty of Whitefield’s; but of Fletcher’s, who had much more leisure than either Wesley or Whitefield, only about a dozen. All the rest are mere outlines. The following are copied from Fletcher’s MSS., and have not before been published. They may be taken as fair specimens of Fletcher’s pulpit preparations and pulpit helps. They are skeletons of two sermons, preached from Matt. xxii. 36–39:— W “I. Why we must love God.
“II. How we must love Him.
“III. What we must do in order to love Him.
“He“He is our Creator, Preserver, Redeemer, Sanctifier. He commands us to love Him. Out of His love there is no happiness. Love of God contains all. He loved us first.
“With all our soul, heart, and strength. Above all things. More than our life, wives, children, estate, honour, ourselves.
“Be convinced we do not love Him. Abhor ourselves for our rebellion. Confess, repent, and believe. Keep a sense of our forgiveness. Pray to Him. Praise Him. Walk with Him. Seek but Him. Refuse all comfort unless we feel His love. Keep a constant communion with Him by seeing His glory in the face of Jesus Christ.
“How have we fulfilled this great duty? Try yourselves. Pray an hour by yourselves. If you do not love, you hate. What fury to hate all that is good, great, and lovely! What madness to set our love on creatures! It must fall with them. Love God in Christ. Look to Christ. Believe in Christ, to love God. If you do not love Him, you are in your lives in the devil’s state. You can no more go to heaven than the devil. Choose which you will love. The world calls. Let us give all for all.“
“Love thy neighbour. All men; though never so distant in place, different in opinions, interests. Because made by the same hand; partakers of the same nature; bought with the same blood; capable of the same happiness.
“As ourselves. Not judging; not thinking evil; not speaking evil; not defrauding; not coveting; doing them good; praying for them; honouring them
“Because all made in image of God. None but in something better than ourselves; none but is a child of God, or may become so.
“Put the best construction on words or actions, much more upon thoughts. Relieve necessities. This is imitating God. What we give is lent to God.
“Love universally, constantly, impartially, sincerely; from a sense of Christ’s love.”
78. Methodist Magazine, 1821, p. 651.
79. London Magazine, 1762, p. 48.
80. Wesleyan Methodist Magazine, 1822, p. 153.
81. Wesleyan Methodist Magazine, 1822, p. 222.
82. Methodist Magazine, 1800, pp. 219–223.
83. Letters, 1791, p. 114
84. Letters, 1791, p. 115.
85. The Rev. Martin Madan, who, before he became a clergyman, was a barrister-at-law.
86. Letters, 1791, p. 117.
87. Letters, 1791, p. 124.
88. Wesleyan Methodist Magazine, 1829, p. 175.
89. “The Portrait of St. Paul.”
90. Jonathan Crowther, President of the Methodist Conference in 1819, relates, in his unpublished autobiography, the following anecdote: “Mrs. Fletcher told me that one Sunday, after the forenoon service, Mr. Preston, a gentleman farmer near Madeley, very grossly insulted Mr. Fletcher in the churchyard, and evinced great enmity against his faithful ministry. In his sermon in the afternoon, Mr. Fletcher said, he had a powerful impression that before the next Sabbath God would give a signal mark of His displeasure against the enemies of His cause and truth. The week was drawing to a close; nothing remarkable had happened; but on Saturday night, Mr. Preston, when returning home from market in a state of intoxication, fell from his horse and died on the spot.”
91. Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher.”