_WHITEFIELD'S BOYHOOD._
1714 to 1732.
George Whitefield was born in the Bell Inn, Gloucester, on the
16th day of December (O.S.), 1714.
His genealogy, as given by his first biographer, Dr. Gillies, is
brief, but not without interest:--
"The Rev. Mr. Samuel Whitefield, great-grandfather of George,
was born at Wantage, and was rector of North Ledyard,[1]
in Wiltshire. He removed afterwards to Rockhampton, in
Gloucestershire. He had five daughters--two of whom were
married to clergymen, Mr. Perkins and Mr. Lovingham; and
two sons--Samuel, who succeeded his father in the cure of
Rockhampton, and died without issue; and Andrew, who was a
private gentleman, and lived retired upon his estate. Andrew had
fourteen children, of whom Thomas was the eldest.
[1] There is no North Ledyard in Wilts. Is Liddiard meant?
"Thomas was first bred to the employment of a wine-merchant
in Bristol, but afterwards kept the Bell Inn, in the city of
Gloucester. In Bristol he married Elizabeth Edwards, who was
related to the Blackwells and the Dimours of that city; by whom
he had six sons and one daughter.
"Elizabeth, the daughter, was twice reputably married at
Bristol. John lies interred with the family in St. Mary de Crypt
Church, in Gloucester. Joseph died an infant. Andrew settled in
trade at Bristol, and died in the twenty-eighth year of his age.
James was captain of a ship, and died suddenly at Bath. George
was the youngest of the family, and, at his death, left two
surviving brothers, Thomas and Richard.
"The father died in December, 1716, when George was only two
years old. The mother continued a widow seven years, and was
then married to Mr. Longden, an ironmonger in Gloucester, by
whom she had no issue. She died in December, 1751, in the
seventy-first year of her age."
So much for pedigree. Though Whitefield's ancestry was far from
aristocratic, it was not ignoble.
Nothing is known of the years of Whitefield's boyhood, except
what is furnished by himself. In the year 1740, he published an
octavo pamphlet of seventy-six pages, entitled "A Short Account
of God's Dealings with the Reverend Mr. George Whitefield, A.B.,
Late of Pembroke College, Oxford: from his Infancy to the Time
of his entering into Holy Orders." This was written on board the
_Elizabeth_, during his first voyage to America, and contains not
a few unguarded and objectionable expressions--expressions which
brought upon him the ridicule of his enemies, and which he himself
afterwards regretted. In 1756, he "revised, corrected, and abridged"
this imprudent publication; and, in the Preface, confessed that
"many mistakes were rectified," and "many passages, that were justly
exceptionable, erased."
In the present work, Whitefield, as far as possible, is made to
be his own biographer; and though, perhaps, it is scarcely fair
to print again what he himself erased, yet, as the sentences and
paragraphs which he subsequently omitted were the occasion of many
of the virulent attacks made upon him by his earliest opponents,
these attacks cannot be properly understood without the text from
which they had their origin.
Besides this, the publication in question is now extremely scarce.
Not one in a thousand of Whitefield's admirers has ever seen it.
It has never been re-published in its entirety since it was first
issued, in the year 1740. It exhibits, not only Whitefield's
honesty, but his weaknesses and faults, at the early age of
twenty-five; and, without it, the reader cannot have a full and
correct conception of Whitefield's character at the commencement of
his marvelous and illustrious career.
For such reasons, the pamphlet of 1740 is here given in its
completeness, without abridgment and without revision. The words and
passages, however, which he himself, in 1756, altered or erased,
will be marked by being enclosed in brackets, or by notes.
Another remark must be added. What Whitefield says of his boyhood's
wickedness must be received with caution. To exalt the grace of God
in his conversion, he seemed desirous to magnify his own depravity
and sin. Without intentional exaggeration, he, perhaps, makes
himself worse than he really was. At all events, the following
extract from his preface deserves attention:--
"In the accounts of good men which I have read, I have observed
that the writers of them have been partial. They have given us
the bright, but not the dark side of their character. This, I
think, proceeded from a kind of pious fraud, lest mentioning
persons' faults should encourage others in sin. It cannot, I
am sure, proceed from the wisdom which cometh from above. The
sacred writers give an account of their failings as well as
their virtues. Peter is not ashamed to confess that, with oaths
and curses, he thrice denied his Master; nor do the Evangelists
make any scruple of telling us, that out of Mary Magdalene Jesus
Christ cast seven devils.
"I have, therefore, endeavoured to follow their good example. I
have simply told what I was by nature, as well as what I am by
grace. I am not over cautious as to any supposed consequences,
since none can be hurt by these but such as hold the truth in
unrighteousness. To the pure all things will be pure.
"As I have often wished, when in my best frames, that the first
years of my life might be put down as a blank, and had no more
in remembrance, so I could almost wish now to pass them over
in silence. But as they will, in some degree, illustrate God's
dealings with me in my riper years, I shall, as I am able, give
the following brief account of them."
After this exordium, which the reader will find useful in
interpreting what follows, Whitefield proceeds with the first
section of his autobiography.
"I was born in Gloucester, in the month of December, 1714. [My
father and mother kept the Bell Inn. The former died when I was
two years old; the latter is now alive, and has often told me
how she endured fourteen weeks' sickness after she brought me
into the world; but was used to say, even when I was an infant,
that she expected more comfort from me than any other of her
children. This, with the circumstance of my being born in an
inn, has been often of service to me in exciting my endeavours
to make good my mother's expectations, and so follow the example
of my dear Saviour, who was born in a manger belonging to an inn.
"My very infant years must necessarily not be mentioned; yet,
I can remember such early stirrings of corruption in my heart,
as abundantly convinces me that I was conceived and born in
sin,--that in me dwelleth no good thing by nature, and that if
God had not freely prevented me by His grace, I must have been
for ever banished from His presence.]
"I can truly say, I was froward from my mother's womb. I was so
brutish as to hate instruction, and used purposely to shun all
opportunities of receiving it. I can date some very early acts
of uncleanness. [I soon gave pregnant proofs of an impudent
temper.] Lying, filthy talking, and foolish jesting I was much
addicted to [even when very young]. Sometimes I used to curse,
if not swear. Stealing from my mother I thought no theft at all,
and used to make no scruple of taking money out of her pocket
before she was up. I have frequently betrayed my trust, and
have more than once spent money I took in the house, in buying
fruits, tarts, etc., to satisfy my sensual appetite. Numbers
of Sabbaths have I broken, and generally used to behave myself
very irreverently in God's sanctuary. Much money have I spent in
plays, and in the common entertainments of the age. Cards and
reading romances were my heart's delight. Often have I joined
with others in playing roguish tricks, but was generally, if not
always, _happily detected_. For this, I have often since, and do
now, bless and praise God.
"It would be endless to recount the sins and offences of my
younger days. They are more in number than the hairs of my head.
My heart would fail me at the remembrance of them, was I not
assured that my Redeemer liveth, ever to make intercession for
me. However the young man in the Gospel might boast how he had
kept the commandments from his youth, with shame and confusion
of face I confess that I have broken them all from my youth.
Whatever foreseen fitness for salvation others may talk of and
glory in, I disclaim any such thing. If I trace myself from my
cradle to my manhood, I can see nothing in me but a fitness to
be damned. [I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not.] If the
Almighty had not prevented me by His grace, and wrought most
powerfully upon my soul, quickening me by His free Spirit when
dead in trespasses and sins, I had now been either sitting
in darkness and in the shadow of death, or condemned, as the
due reward of my crimes, to be for ever lifting up my eyes in
torments.
"But such was the free grace of God to me, that though
corruption worked so strongly in my soul, and produced such
early and bitter fruits, yet I can recollect very early movings
of the blessed Spirit upon my heart, sufficient to satisfy me
that God loved me with an everlasting love, and separated me
even from my mother's womb for the work to which He afterwards
was pleased to call me.
"I had some early convictions of sin; and once, I remember, when
some persons, as they frequently did, made it their business
to tease me, I immediately retired to my room, and kneeling
down, with many tears, prayed over that psalm wherein David so
often repeats these words--'_But in the name of the Lord will I
destroy them._' I was always fond of being a clergyman, and used
frequently to imitate the ministers reading prayers, etc. Part
of the money I used to steal from my parent I gave to the poor,
and some books I privately took from others, for which I have
since restored fourfold, I remember were books of devotion.
"My mother was very careful of my education, and always kept me
in my tender years [for which I never can sufficiently thank
her] from intermeddling in the least with the public business.
"About the tenth year of my age, it pleased God to permit my
mother to marry a second time. It proved what the world would
call an unhappy match as for temporals, but God overruled it for
good. [It set my brethren upon thinking more than otherwise they
would have done, and made an uncommon impression upon my own
heart in particular.]
"When I was about twelve, I was placed at a school called St.
Mary de Crypt, in Gloucester--the last grammar school I ever
went to. Having a good elocution and memory, I was remarked
for making speeches before the Corporation, at their annual
visitation.[2] But I cannot say I felt any drawings of God
upon my soul for a year or two, saving that I laid out some
of the money that was given me, on one of those forementioned
occasions, in buying Ken's 'Manual for Winchester Scholars'--a
book that had much affected me when my brother used to read it
in my mother's troubles, and which, for some time after I bought
it, was of great benefit to my soul.
[2] St. Mary de Crypt is a parish in the city of Gloucester, and
is so called from a large vault under the body of the church.
In connection with the church, and on the north side of it,
stands St. Mary de Crypt School, founded by "John Coke, Esq.,"
and his "Lady Joane Coke," about the beginning of the sixteenth
century. The master of the school had to be chosen by the mayor,
the recorder, and the senior aldermen of the city. In 1712, two
years before Whitefield's birth, a salary of £30 a year was
allowed to the head-master, and £16 a year to the usher. There
was also an annual allowance to several magistrates of the
city for visiting the school once a year; the mayor and four
burgesses of Worcester were made overseers, with an allowance of
seven nobles for their charges; and if the mayor and magistrates
of Gloucester were guilty of neglect, they had to forfeit £10
to the mayor and magistrates of Worcester. The school also had
two exhibitions for the maintenance of two scholars at Pembroke
College for eight years--the scholars to be elected by the
mayor, the six senior aldermen, and the head-master of the
school. (" Ancient and Present State of Gloucestershire," by Sir
Robert Atkyns, 1712; and "The Gloucester Guide," 1792.)
"During the time of my being at school, I was very fond of
reading plays, and have kept from school for days together to
prepare myself for acting them. My master, seeing how mine and
my schoolfellows' vein ran, composed something of this kind for
us himself, and caused me to dress myself in girl's clothes,
which I had often done, to act a part before the Corporation.
The remembrance of this has often covered me with confusion of
face, and I hope will do so, even to the end of my life.
["And I cannot but here observe, with much concern of mind, how
this way of training up youth has a natural tendency to debauch
the mind, to raise ill passions, and to stuff the memory with
things as contrary to the Gospel of Jesus Christ as light to
darkness, heaven to hell. However, though the first thing I had
to repent of was my education in general, yet I must always
acknowledge my particular thanks are due to my master, for the
great pains he took with me and his other scholars, in teaching
us to speak and write correctly.]
"Before I was fifteen, having, as I thought, made a sufficient
progress in the classics, and, at the bottom, longing to be set
at liberty from the confinement of a school, I one day told my
mother, 'Since her circumstances would not permit her to give
me an University education, more learning I thought would spoil
me for a tradesman; and, therefore, I judged it best not to
learn Latin any longer.' She at first refused to consent, but my
corruptions soon got the better of her good nature. Hereupon,
for some time, I went to learn to write only. But my mother's
circumstances being much on the decline, and being tractable
that way, I from time to time began to assist her occasionally
in the public-house, till at length I put on my blue apron and
my snuffers,[3] washed mops, cleaned rooms, and, in one word,
became professed and common drawer for nigh a year and a half.
[3] In those days gas was a thing unknown, and of course candles
required "snuffers."
"[But He who was with David when he was following the sheep big
with young, was with me even here. For] notwithstanding I was
thus employed in a common inn, and had sometimes the care of the
whole house upon my hands, yet I composed two or three sermons,
and dedicated one of them in particular to my elder brother. One
time, I remember, I was much pressed to self-examination, and
found myself very unwilling to look into my heart. Frequently I
read the Bible when sitting up at night. Seeing the boys go by
to school has often cut me to the heart. And a dear youth, now
with God, would often come entreating me, when serving at the
bar, to go to Oxford. My general answer was, 'I wish I could.'
"After I had continued about a year in this servile employment,
my mother was obliged to leave the inn. My brother, who had been
bred up for the business, married; whereupon all was made over
to him; and, I being accustomed to the house, it was agreed that
I should continue there as an assistant. [But God's thoughts
were not as our thoughts.
"By His good Providence] it happened that my sister-in-law and I
could by no means agree; [and at length the resentment grew to
such an height, that my proud heart would scarce suffer me to
speak to her for three weeks together. But notwithstanding I was
much to blame, yet I used to retire and weep before the Lord, as
Hagar when flying from her mistress Sarah--little thinking that
God by this means was forcing me out of the public business, and
calling me from drawing wine for drunkards, to draw water out
of the wells of salvation for the refreshment of His spiritual
Israel.]
"After continuing for a long while under this burden of mind, I
at length resolved, thinking my absence would make all things
easy, to go away. Accordingly, by the advice of my brother and
consent of my mother, I went to see my elder brother, then
settled at Bristol.
"Here God was pleased to give me great foretastes of His
love,[4] and fill me with such unspeakable raptures,
particularly once in St. John's Church, that I was carried out
beyond myself. I felt great hungerings and thirstings after the
blessed Sacrament, and wrote many letters to my mother, telling
her I would never go into the public employment again. Thomas
à Kempis was my great delight, and I was always impatient till
the bell rang to call me to tread the courts of the Lord's
house. But in the midst of these illuminations, something surely
whispered, 'This will not last.'
[4] "Great sensible devotion,"--Edit. 1756.
"And, indeed, so it happened. For--oh that I could write it in
tears of blood!--when I left Bristol, as I did in about two
months, and returned to Gloucester, I changed my devotion with
my place. Alas! all my fervour went off: I had no inclination to
go to church, or draw nigh unto God. In short, my heart, though
I had so lately tasted of His love, was far from Him.
"However, I had so much religion left, as to persist in my
resolution not to live in the inn; and therefore my mother gave
me leave, though she had but a little income, to have a bed upon
the ground, and live at her house, till Providence should point
out a place for me.
"Having now, as I thought, nothing to do, it was a proper season
for Satan to tempt me. Much of my time I spent in reading plays,
and in sauntering from place to place. I was careful to adorn
my body, but took little pains to deck and beautify my soul.
Evil communications with my old schoolfellows soon corrupted
my good manners. By seeing their evil practices, the sense of
the Divine presence[5] I had vouchsafed unto me insensibly wore
off my mind, and I at length fell into abominable secret sin,
the dismal effects of which I have felt, and groaned under ever
since.
[5] "All sense of religion."--Edit. 1756.
"[But God, whose gifts and callings are without repentance,
would let nothing pluck me out of His hands, though I was
continually doing despite to the Spirit of Grace. He saw me with
pity and compassion, when lying in my blood. He passed by me;
He said unto me, Live; and even gave me some foresight of His
providing for me.
"One morning, as I was reading a play to my sister, said I, 'God
intends something for me which we know not of. As I have been
diligent in business, I believe many would gladly have me for
an apprentice, but every way seems to be barred up, so that I
think God will provide for me some way or other that we cannot
apprehend.'
"How I came to say these words I know not. God afterwards
showed me they came from Him.] Having thus lived with my mother
for some considerable time, a young student, who was once my
schoolfellow, and then a servitor of Pembroke College, Oxford,
came to pay my mother a visit. Amongst other conversation,
he told her how he had discharged all college expenses that
quarter, and received a penny. Upon that my mother immediately
cried out, 'This will do for my son.' Then, turning to me, she
said, 'Will you go to Oxford, George?' I replied, 'With all
my heart.' Whereupon, having the same friends that this young
student had, my mother, without delay, waited on them. They
promised their interest to get me a servitor's place in the same
college. She then applied to my old master, who much approved of
my coming to school again.
"In about a week I went and re-entered myself, [and being grown
much in stature, my master addressed me thus: 'I see, George,
you are advanced in stature, but your better part must needs
have gone backwards.' This made me blush. He set me something to
translate into Latin; and though I had made no application to my
classics for so long a time, yet I had but one inconsiderable
fault in my exercises. This, I believe, somewhat surprised my
master then, and has afforded me matter of thanks and praise
ever since.
"Being re-settled at school, I spared no pains to go forward in
my book.] God was pleased to give me His blessing, and I learned
much faster than I did before. But all this while I continued in
[secret] sin; and, at length, got acquainted with such a set of
debauched, abandoned, atheistical youths, that if God, by His
free, unmerited, and especial grace, had not delivered me out
of their hands, I should long since have sat in the scorner's
chair [and made a mock at sin]. By keeping company with them,
my thoughts of religion grew more and more like theirs. I went
to public service only to make sport and walk about. I took
pleasure in their lewd conversation. I began to reason as they
did [and to ask why God had given me passions, and not permitted
me to gratify them? Not considering that God did not originally
give us these _corrupt_ passions, and that He had promised help
to withstand them, if we would ask it of Him. In short, I soon
made a great proficiency in the school of the devil. I affected
to look rakish], and was in a fair way of being as infamous as
the worst of them.
"But, oh stupendous love! God even here stopped me, when running
on in a full career to hell. For, just as I was upon the brink
of ruin, He gave me such a distaste of their principles and
practices, that I discovered them to my master, who soon put a
stop to their proceedings.
"Being thus delivered out of the snare of the devil, I began
to be more and more serious, and felt God, at different times,
working powerfully and convincingly upon my soul. One day in
particular, as I was coming downstairs, and overheard my friends
speaking well of me, God so deeply convinced me of hypocrisy,
that, though I had formed frequent but ineffectual resolutions
before, yet I had then power given me over my secret and darling
sin. Notwithstanding, some time after being overtaken in liquor,
as I have been twice or thrice in my lifetime, Satan gained his
usual advantage over me again,--an experimental proof to my poor
soul, how that wicked one makes use of men as machines, working
them up to just what he pleases [when by intemperance they have
chased away the Spirit of God from them].
"Being now near the seventeenth year of my age, I was resolved
to prepare myself for the holy sacrament, which I received on
Christmas Day. I began now to be more and more watchful over my
thoughts, words, and actions. I kept the following Lent, fasting
Wednesday and Friday, thirty-six hours together. My evenings,
when I had done waiting upon my mother, were generally spent
in acts of devotion, reading 'Drelincourt on Death,' and other
practical books, and I constantly went to public worship twice a
day. Being now upper-boy, by God's help, I made some reformation
amongst my schoolfellows. I was very diligent in reading and
learning the classics, and in studying my Greek Testament, but
was not yet convinced of the absolute unlawfulness of playing at
cards, and of reading and seeing plays, though I began to have
some scruples about it.
"Near this time, I dreamed that I was to see God on Mount Sinai,
but was afraid to meet Him. This made a great impression upon
me; and a gentlewoman to whom I told it said, 'George, this is a
call from God.'
["Still I grew more serious after this dream; but yet hypocrisy
crept into every action. As once I affected to look more rakish,
I now strove to appear more grave than I really was. However, an
uncommon concern and alteration were visible in my behaviour,
and I often used to find fault with the lightness of others.
"One night, as I was going on an errand for my mother, an
unaccountable but very strong impression was made upon my heart
that I should preach quickly. When I came home, I innocently
told my mother what had befallen me; but she, like Joseph's
parents when he told them his dream, turned short upon me,
crying out, 'What does the boy mean? Pri'thee hold thy tongue,'
or something to that purpose. God has since shown her from whom
that impression came.]
"For a twelvemonth, I went on in a round of duties, receiving
the sacrament monthly, fasting frequently, attending constantly
on public worship, and praying often more than twice a day in
private. One of my brothers used to tell me he feared this
would not hold long, and that I should forget all when I came
to Oxford. This caution did me much service, for it set me
upon praying for perseverance; and, under God, the preparation
I made in the country was a preservative against the manifold
temptations which beset me at my first coming to that seat of
learning.
"Being now near eighteen years old, it was judged proper for
me to go to the University. God had [sweetly] prepared my way.
The friends before applied to recommended me to the master of
Pembroke College. Another friend took up £10 upon bond, which
I have since repaid, to defray the first expense of entering;
and the master,[6] contrary to all expectations, admitted the
servitor immediately."
[6] Dr. Adams was now master of Pembroke College. This amiable and
excellent man was the friend of Dr. Johnson, and died at Gloucester,
Whitefield's birthplace, where a monument is erected to his memory,
with the following inscription:--"Sacred to the memory of William
Adams, D.D., Master of Pembroke College, Oxford, Prebendary of
this Cathedral, and Archdeacon of Llandaff. Ingenious, Learned,
Eloquent, he ably defended the truth of Christianity; Pious,
Benevolent, and Charitable, he successfully inculcated its sacred
precepts. Pure, and undeviating in his own conduct, he was tender
and compassionate to the failings of others. Ever anxious for the
welfare and happiness of mankind, he was on all occasions forward
to encourage works of public utility and extensive beneficence. In
the government of the College, over which he presided, his vigilant
attention was uniformly exerted to promote the important objects of
the institution; whilst the mild dignity of his deportment inspired
esteem, gratitude, and affection. Full of days, and matured in
virtue, he died January 13, 1789, aged 82."
Thus ends Whitefield's history of his own boyhood. His confession of
youthful wickedness is more minute than profitable. It was scarcely
wise for a young evangelist of twenty-five, who had attained an
unexampled popularity, and thereby brought upon himself the rancour
of envious observers, to print such an enumeration of juvenile
sins and follies. Indeed, the wisdom of doing this may be justly
questioned in any case. A man may and ought to confess to God; but
he is under no obligation to confess to men like himself. As already
stated, the foregoing details would not have been reproduced in the
present work, had it not been that this was necessary to exhibit
the imprudent ingenuousness of the youthful preacher, and to show
that his own unguarded writings fairly exposed him to some of the
bitter pamphleteering with which he was soon attacked. Augustine
had written similar Confessions, and so also had Jean Jacques
Rousseau; but the world is none the better because Augustine and
Rousseau made the world their father confessor. Whitefield's enemies
were not slow to use the advantage against him with which he had
furnished them; and, even nine years after the publication of his
pamphlet, he had to pay a penalty for some of its well-meant, but
inconsiderate expressions. "Mr. Whitefield's account of God's
dealings with him," said Dr. Lavington, Bishop of Exeter, "is such
a boyish, ludicrous, filthy, nasty, and shameless relation of
himself, as quite defiles paper, and is shocking to decency and
modesty. 'Tis a perfect jakes of uncleanness."[7] The reader, with
the "account" unabridged before him, can easily form an opinion of
the truthfulness, or rather free-tongued censure, of Whitefield's
episcopal castigator. Whitefield assigned a reason for what he did;
and, though the sufficiency of that reason may not be admitted, yet
all will give Whitefield credit for sincerity and good intentions,
and no spiritually minded man will laugh at the penitential spirit
which the confessions unquestionably evince.
[7] "Enthusiasm of Methodists and Papists compared." Part II.
As in the case of many others, Whitefield's boyhood was a strange
admixture of sin and penitence. At intervals, we find the boy a
liar, a petty thief, a pretended rake, a dandy, and almost an
infidel; and then we find him spending his scantily collected pence
in buying the manual of Bishop Ken; composing sermons; delighting
in Thomas à Kempis; reading books like Drelincourt's "Christian
Defence against the Fears of Death;" promoting a reformation
of manners among the boys in the school of St. Mary de Crypt;
religiously watching over his own thoughts, words, and actions;
praying in private; worshipping in public; receiving the sacrament
once a month; and, during Lent and at other times, frequently
fasting for eighteen hours together. The Oxford Methodists, of whom
perhaps he had never heard, were now approaching the very climax of
their ascetic practices; and the quondam tapster of the Bell Inn,
Gloucester, by a strange experience, was prepared to join them. Bad
companions had nearly ruined him; but now his companions were to be
of another sort.
In the midst of all his wickedness and youthful frolics, Whitefield
displayed an undauntedness which helped to make him what he
afterwards became. His educational advantages were not great. Unlike
the Wesleys, his home was not favourable to his mental improvement.
The public-house in which he was born and bred was widely different
from the Epworth parsonage. Practically he was fatherless whilst
the Wesley brothers had for a father a man who, though sometimes
improvident in attending convocations and in the publishing of
books, had, in learning, but few superiors, and, as a clergyman of
the Church of England, was excelled by none. Whitefield's mother
was, evidently, an affectionate, sensible, and worthy woman;
but, in most respects, immeasurably inferior to Susannah Wesley.
Besides having had the unspeakable advantages of their Epworth
home-education, John Wesley was privileged to spend five years and
a half at the Charterhouse, London; and his brother Charles about
the same length of time in the equally famed school of Westminster.
On the other hand, Whitefield had no education, worth mentioning,
until he was twelve years old; from twelve to fifteen he spent in
the school of St. Mary de Crypt, partly in acquiring learning and
partly in acting plays; from fifteen to seventeen, he was chiefly
employed as tapster in his mother's tavern; and then came the
turning-point of his existence. After listening to the story of
the poor servitor of Pembroke College, who, by serving others, had
paid all his college expenses, and had saved a penny, Whitefield's
mother said, "George, will _you_ go to Oxford?" "Yes," said George,
"with all my heart." And, within a week, he was again at the school
of St. Mary de Crypt; and, within a year, an undergraduate of an
Oxford college. George's decision, prompt action, and hard-working
ambition displayed pluck, not unworthy of the man, who, in later
years, braved brutal mobs with heroic boldness, and who, when the
present comforts of oceanic travelling were things unthought about,
again and again crossed the turbulent Atlantic; and, constrained by
the love of Christ his Saviour, tramped American woods and swamps,
seeking sinners, and trying to save them.
One other fact is noticeable. From childhood George Whitefield was
an orator. A hundred and fifty years ago dramatic performances
appear to have been an important part of the education of the
public schools of England. Thus it was in the Westminster School,
where Charles Wesley was "put forward to act dramas," because of
his lively cleverness; and thus it was at St. Mary de Crypt,
Gloucester, where Whitefield, on account of his "good elocution and
memory," was "remarked for making speeches before the Corporation
at their annual visitation;" and where the master of the school
composed dramatical pieces in which Whitefield and his schoolfellows
might display their histrionic genius and powers. The marvellously
exciting eloquence of Whitefield was not so much an acquirement as a
gift of nature; and this helps to explain his inordinate delight in
theatrical literature, previous to his conversion.
_WHITEFIELD AT COLLEGE._