Page images
PDF
EPUB

TABULAR RECORD OF MORTALITY.

but for some time she resisted her convictions, and rejected, to some extent, the humbling doctrines of the Gospel. When, however, about eighteen years of age, she was on a visit to a friend, and had the opportunity of observing the patient endurance of trial manifested by one of the family: she felt that her unrenewed heart could not yield such fruit, and at once resolved to seek the converting grace of God. Though feeling after God, she was some time before she came right humbly to His mercy-seat; but He who does not "quench the smoking flax" continued the operations of His Spirit, until she was led earnestly to inquire, "What must I do to be saved?" And, at a public prayer-meeting, she was not ashamed to acknowledge her state, and gladly received the advice and assistance of the people of God. But though she was encouraged to hope in the Divine mercy, she did not at that time receive a sense of forgiveness. Continuing, however, her supplications in private, she was at length enabled to put a penitent trust in Christ. The Comforter soon appeared, and she rejoiced as a child of God. She immediately united herself to the church; and, until failing health compelled, was never absent from

her class. As long as strength permitted, she was most exemplary as a Sundayschool Teacher, Tract-distributer, and Visiter of the sick and poor; and, to her dying day, the Mission cause lay near her heart. A collector's box was on the table of her sick room, and she did all in her power to add to its funds. For more than thirteen years she was the subject of affliction. During the greater part of that time she was unable to attend those ordinances in which she had so much delighted; but, painful as was the dispensation, she was never heard to murmur: she rather expressed thankfulness that her heavenly Father had taken so much pains to correct the evils of her nature, and bring her near to Himself. Though her illness had been of such long continuance, no immediate danger was apprehended until a few weeks before her death. When apprized of it by her medical attendant, she evinced no alarm; and, though unable to converse much, always expressed her entire reliance upon the atonement of Christ, and her assured hope of heaven. She had long been like unto those who wait for their Lord, and died with the loved name of Jesus on her lips.

[merged small][graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][subsumed][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

H. T. & J. ROCHE, PRINTERS, 25, HOXTON-SQUARE, LONDON.

[merged small][merged small][graphic][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

In the year 1760 the Rev. John Fletcher was presented to the living of Madeley. The choice between that parish and another of twice the income was offered him. In the true spirit of self-denial, he decided for Madeley, because, as he said, "it has the most work, and the least pay." The income was only £100 per annum. There might be another reason for his choice, on the principle that of two vines a man would rather water the one which he has himself planted. John Fletcher, having already preached several times at Madeley, would naturally desire to cultivate what he had begun. The population of the parish was numerous; and, being principally employed in the coal and iron works of that district, its mental character was in keeping, for resolution and impulsiveness, with the VOL. V.-Second Series.-FEBRUARY, 1859,

D

34

THE OLD CHURCH AT MADELEY, SALOP.

rough and perilous toil of its every-day life. Unhappily, any direct evangelical agency did little more than hold its own existence. There were some respectable Quakers, harmless and unobtrusive; and some orderly Church Pharisees, content enough to allow the people to take their way to hell, if they might go their own to heaven. In such circumstances, that strength of character which always develops itself among our hardworking masses took the wrong direction; and, as a parish, Madeley was rank with all the profaneness, low vice, and insubordination attaching to a "people walking in darkness, and dwelling in the land of the shadow of death." To this unwalled, undrained, untilled vineyard of God, John Fletcher devoted himself. Knowing its moral condition, he reckoned on scorn, neglect, and hatred from both sinner and saint; but, having tasted the cup of salvation himself, he resolved to offer it to the lips of all his parishioners. He would try by the grace of God to enlighten and convert them all; to make known the mystery of God in Christ to the very darkest and the most abandoned of his people. Despising ease, voluptuousness, and empty fame, he addressed himself to the lonely toil, unmarked and unsung, of an evangelical village Clergyman, bent upon the instruction, the conversion, the present and eternal weal of his charge. And as Gideon of old time was led to the camp of "the Midianites and all the children of the east," who "lay along in the valley like grasshoppers for multitude," that he might, in the very presence of the host, gather strength and faith against them for their overthrow; so was it the Pharisaism of some, and the defiant ungodliness of many, and the requisite labour and self-consuming care for their salvation, which challenged this man to become their Pastor. This consecrated him Vicar of Madeley.

At that time, he was in the prime of manhood; he was scholarly and talented; his patron, Baron Berwick, was influential and generous. But John Fletcher accepted Madeley not as a sojourn until a better benefice should open, nor as a stepping-stone to preferment ;-he took it home like a bride to his heart for life. On a future occasion, when asked by a Chancellor what he desired in reward for good service rendered to Government, he answered, "Nothing, but more grace ;" and when John Wesley pressed him to itinerate, he replied, "My journey is a short one, from my study to my pulpit; from my pulpit to the grave."

John Fletcher was a diligent student of the Bible. Therein he beheld the reflection of the Divine character; but he also saw therein the reflection of his own character, and that of every man about him. God was holy, man was sinful. He looked again, and he saw "God reconciled" through Jesus Christ. Now, every Minister intent upon saving souls begins either by preaching "God reconciled," or man a sinner. If with the former, he will melt the hearts of many; if with the latter, he will break some, and harden others. His choice of method may be affected in part by his own expe rience. This was manifest in the earlier period of Fletcher's ministry. His personal conviction of sin had been poignant; his transgressions were surveyed in detail, his iniquity was weighed, he found it "heavier than the sand of the sea;" he traced the fruits downwards to the root; he cut open the

JOHN WESLEY'S USE OF THE PRESS.

35

heart, and found it altogether corrupt,dark as night, harder than adamant. He sought happiness in religious dutifulness, and found none; he sought for it in self-mortification, and found none. He became not a Monk, but an ascetic; he said not, "The further from man the nearer to God," but he fled from himself. He humbled himself; he fed on little besides vegetables, bread, and water. At length, hearing the Methodists, he learned the way of faith in Jesus Christ, and was forgiven. But the hour of his conversion was not remarkable; the action of his mind at that crisis was indefinite; and yet not because his peace was transcendent, or his joy ecstatical. He was simply "at rest" in Christ.

Of the two modes of preaching, John Fletcher selected-man a sinner. His first text was both text and motto for the future: "Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God?" Filled with jealousy for God's authority, with awe of His holiness, and with a sacred horror of the evil and misery of sin; in his parish-church, every Lord's day, in dwelling-houses on week-day evenings, and from house to house, he "ceased not to teach" and exhort men to "flee from the wrath to come." For a long time, however, this faithful Minister might have said, "All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people." He cried, "Repent," but they repented not; and until they repented, it were vain to say, "Believe-obey." The state of ignorance, infidelity, and immorality into which the people of England had sunk between the reign of Charles the Second, and that of George the Second, is a dark blot on the page of our ecclesiastical history; and although that night is spent, and the day of evangelical teaching is come, yet here and there clouds of darkness linger over our land.

The natural temper of John Fletcher was sanguine. When converted, he continued his habits of frequent fasting and hard fare. He was scrupulously religious in conventional phrase, he had ever been highly honourable and strictly moral. He was a gentleman all over; and now, coming at once into contact with a hard imbruted race of colliers, he might well at first be shocked, and his preaching be characterized by fidelity rather than by mercy. At this stage of his ministry, the profane hated him, and the polite declared him to be "a monster."

JOHN WESLEY'S USE OF THE PRESS.

PART II.-TRACTS.

FOREMOST among the blessings secured for our world by the art of printing, is found the facility afforded for reaching the mind and heart of the masses by means of cheap books. The Protestant Reformers, especially, largely availed themselves of the press for the publication of innumerable pamphlets on the controversies of their day. But the discovery of the true value and use of a "Tract" belongs to a yet more recent period. The press had been for some time vigorously worked, it is true, as an engine of power in arousing attention to various topics; but, as an instrument of charity for the benefit of the poor, its employment was scarcely recognised, till the commencement of the last century.

36

JOHN WESLEY'S USE OF THE PRESS.

A considerable measure of religious activity is observable at that period ; and numerous societies for the reformation of manners earnestly endeavoured to check vice and to instruct the ignorant. In 1701, "The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge" was founded; proposing, amongst other things, "to disperse, both at home and abroad, Bibles, and tracts of religion." Fifty years later, a society, having a wider basis and freer action, and supported by Christians of various denominations, was established, entitled, "The Society for Promoting Religious Knowledge among the Poor." These societies may have been somewhat cumbersome in `their movements; but they were highly respectable and useful. It was not, however, till a much later date, that "Tract Societies," as such, came into existence. Mrs. Hannah More, Mrs. Rebecca Wilkinson, of Clapham, Mr. Simeon, of Cambridge, and others, just before the close of the last century, together with the founders of the "Religious Tract Society," (1799,) appear to have awoke up, somewhat suddenly, to the importance of a brief and plain medium of instruction; and to have recognised a principle, and moulded into shape and system a usage, to which for fifty or sixty years before John Wesley had given practical expression, and which throughout his lengthened life he laboriously and efficiently sustained.*

A Chaplain to Cranmer apologizes for a supposed defect of a Catechism he had published, because it was "smal in quantitie," although it extended to 540 pages of small folio. Montgomery, however, affirms that "it is a fact, not obvious perhaps, but capable of perfect proof, that knowledge in all eras which have been distinguished as enlightened, has been propagated more by tracts than by volumes." And John Wesley expresses the same truth, in his own laconic style, when he says that "a great book is a great evil." This opinion may be safely taken as the guide to very much that Wesley wrote. And not only were his numerous tracts small in quantity, correctly speaking, but they were written in a style remarkably adapted to their purpose. "The unwearied experience of fifty years has shown the conductors of the Religious Tract Society how difficult it is to obtain the help of "plainness of diction," "even to a limited extent." By John Wesley, however, from principle and habit, as stated in a previous paper, this style of composition was uniformly adopted.

[ocr errors]

The great object at which Wesley aimed in the issue of his tracts is plainly declared by their character and bearing. Thoughts,-Serious Thoughts, Advices,-Addresses, Short Addresses,-Calm Address,— Seasonable Address,-Compassionate Address,- Dialogues,— Short Accounts, Remarks,- his Word to a Sabbath-breaker,-to a Swearer,to a Drunkard, to a Street-walker,-to a Smuggler, to a Condemned Malefactor, to a Protestant,-to a Freeholder,-a Word in Season,Remarkable Providence,-Providential Event, &c., &c.,-all indicate the godly design and practical tendency of these writings. On many occa

* It was not very generous or just in the author of the "Jubilee Memorial" of the Religious Tract Society, whilst looking to the ends of the earth to discover tractwriters, &c., and making honourable mention of every one who had appeared to interest himself in tract-distribution, to pass over the name of John Wesley in perfect silence,

« EelmineJätka »