_EARLY LIFE._
(1729-1750.)
John Fletcher was a Swiss by birth and education. His name was properly
Jean Guillaume de la Flechere. The origin of the anglicized form that
he afterwards adopted is thus explained by himself: "Soon after I came
to England my English friends, complaining of the length of my Swiss
name, began to contract it by dropping the French syllables of it. So
they called me Fletcher, and by that name I have been known among the
English ever since." He came of an old and respectable family, not
without distinguished connexions. His father had, in early life, held a
commission in the French army, but, retiring from the service in order
to marry, had returned to his native country, where he became a colonel
in the militia, and _Assesseur Baillival_, or assistant judge, of Nyon.
Here he resided in a fine old house in the outskirts of the town, not
rich, but possessing a modest fortune and considerable local influence;
and here John Fletcher, the youngest of eight children, was born on
September 12th, 1729.
Nyon is an old town dating from Roman times. It is about fifteen miles
from Geneva, on the northern shore of the lake, picturesquely placed
at the water's edge, with the Jura Mountains rising in the distance
behind, and the mountains of Savoy magnificently visible across the
lake in front. The passion for Swiss scenery had not then become common
and conventional. Some fifty years later Gibbon mentions it as of
recent origin, counting it "a misfortune rather than a merit that the
situation and beauty of the Pays de Vaud ... and the fashion of viewing
the mountains and glaciers have opened us on all sides to the
incursions of foreigners." Fletcher was not before his time with regard
to this most modern of sentiments or susceptibilities. There is little
trace of impressions made on him either by the grandeur or the
loveliness of his native scenery. In a letter written when, at fifty
years of age, he was revisiting Nyon, he invites a friend to come to
"this delightful country, and share a pleasant apartment, and one of
the finest prospects in the world in the house where I was born.... We
have a fine, shady wood near the lake, where I can ride in the cool all
the day, and enjoy the singing of a multitude of birds." And then he
adds, "But this, though sweet, does not come up to the singing of my
dear friends in England."
Fletcher received his early education at a school in Nyon, and was then
sent, with his two brothers, to the Academy, now the University, of
Geneva, where he spent seven years in diligent and successful study. On
leaving Geneva he spent some time at Lenzburg, chiefly for the sake of
learning German. In the scanty records of his youth there is a
remarkable succession of perils and hairbreadth escapes. Fletcher was
a bold and skilful swimmer, and on at least two occasions his
adventurousness nearly cost him his life. Once he swam with a companion
to a small, rocky island, about five miles from the shore of the lake.
They found it so steep and smooth that they could not land, and it was
not until they were completely exhausted by swimming round it that they
came upon a place where they could crawl ashore, and whence they were
rescued by a passing boat. The other adventure was still more perilous.
He was swimming in the Rhine, and was drawn unawares into the
mid-stream, where, he says, "the water was extremely rough, and poured
along like a galloping horse." After a long and desperate struggle with
the current, he was carried into a mill-race, and hurled among the
piles on which the mill stood. A blow on the breast made him senseless,
and he knew nothing more till he rose on the other side of the mill,
after being among the piles for twenty minutes, to find himself five
miles from the place where he had started. Another time, when he and
his brother were fencing with swords blunted with a kind of button
fixed upon the point, the button on his brother's weapon broke, and
Fletcher received a desperate thrust in the side that had well-nigh
killed him. These incidents have often been referred to as
illustrations of the Providence that directed his life; but they reveal
in addition elements of character that should not be overlooked. There
was nothing effeminate in him. On this point a mistake may be made. It
is possible to misinterpret the delicate features, with their rapt
expression, the almost excessive modesty, the language fuller charged
with emotion than is quite our English wont. But there was strength,
not weakness, beneath these often misread indications of character. The
natural man in John Fletcher was a soldier and an athlete, and these
qualities of manhood remained with him to the end, though turned to
higher issues and manifest in other forms than in these early years.
From childhood Fletcher had a tender conscience and a devout spirit,
and was exceptionally free from fault. He says, "I think it was when I
was seven years of age that I first began to feel the love of God shed
abroad in my heart, and that I resolved to give myself up to Him, and
to the service of His Church, if ever I should be fit for it." Years
afterwards there came for him a time of spiritual conflict, of
heart-searching, and deep repentance, from which he passed into the
clear light of reconciliation with God through faith in Christ; but his
conversion had this in common with Wesley's, that it crowned and
completed the piety of his youth. In both cases conversion was a
momentous, unmistakable epoch; but not by reason of any change from
reckless and ungodly living. It was one of those supreme events in the
history of the soul that has its foundations and beginnings long
before. Its relation to the past is not, outwardly at least, one of
contrast, and inwardly it is not wholly so. The continuity of the
spiritual life is not broken, but rather a stage is reached where the
discipline and endeavours of previous years, having served their end,
pass into a larger liberty and a more abundant life. "It pleased God to
reveal His Son in me," is the true account, not only of sudden
conversions, properly so called, but of that last act of grace which
brings devout and serious youth to the full knowledge of Him whom they
have long sought, and served while yet seeking.
Fletcher's student life seems to have been wholly free from the vices
which, both then and now, are too generally counted venial, or even
natural and reasonable, in youth. His subsequent self-upbraidings were
deep enough, but they must not be misunderstood. When he says, in a
letter written to his brother in his 26th year, "My infancy was
vicious, and my youth still more so," the reference is not to open,
actual sins, but to that ignorance of the true Christian life which,
apprehended in its full significance, appears to the regenerate
conscience as the one root-evil. His confessions have little in common
with those of Augustine, or Bunyan, or John Newton. The most particular
allusion they contain is the following: "I formed an acquaintance with
some deists, at first with the design of converting them, and
afterwards with the pretence of thoroughly examining their sentiments.
But my heart, like that of Balaam, was not right with God. He abandoned
me, and I enrolled myself in their party. A considerable change took
place in my deportment. Before, I had a form of religion, and now I
lost it; but as to the state of my heart, it was precisely the same. I
did not remain many weeks in this state; the Good Shepherd sought after
me, a wandering sheep. Again I became professedly a Christian; that
is, I resumed a regular attendance at church and the communion, and
offered up frequent prayers in the name of Jesus Christ. There were
also in my heart some sparks of true love to God, and some germs of
genuine faith; but a connexion with worldly characters, and an undue
anxiety to promote my secular interests, prevented the growth of these
Christian graces."
It had been Fletcher's desire as a child to become a Christian
minister. This object was still kept in view during his studies at
Geneva, and appears to have been approved by his family; but as he
entered his twentieth year his views underwent a considerable change,
the notion of entering the ministry was abandoned, and he sought a
military career instead. One or two reasons may be assigned for this
change. He feared he was unfit for the ministry. Though outwardly of
blameless life, he felt, as the time for ordination drew near, his need
of true faith in Christ and love to God, and shrank from an office for
which these were the first requisites. Further, a doctrinal difficulty
disclosed itself. "I was disgusted by the necessity I should be under
to subscribe the doctrine of predestination"; and while thus
religiously and doctrinally disturbed, the influence of certain friends
combined with his own inclination to suggest that frequent resource of
the more adventurous youth of Switzerland, military service in some
foreign army. Fletcher's father had served the king of France, why
should not he take service under the king of Portugal, who was about to
send troops to Brazil? Accordingly, disregarding his father's
remonstrances, but following his example, he made his way to Lisbon,
raised a company of his countrymen, doubtless by the method embodied in
the proverb, "Pas d'argent, pas de Suisse," and received a captain's
commission in the Portuguese service. This kind of professional
soldiership, for which no patriotism or devotion to a noble cause could
be pleaded, did not shock the general conscience in Fletcher's day. It
presented no difficulty to his own. That such a vocation is in our own
day generally condemned, being barely tolerated under the most
extenuating circumstances, is an illustration of progress in morals and
religion,--one of many that may be set over against some discouraging
aspects of the times.
Meanwhile Fletcher is waiting in Lisbon for a remittance from home
which does not arrive. His parents disapprove of this
Portuguese-Brazilian venture, and refuse to send him money. But his
mind is made up, and with or without money he will go. An unlooked for
hindrance, however, prevents. A servant waiting upon him at breakfast
let fall a kettle of hot water, and so scalded his leg as to lay him
helpless in bed. In the meantime the ship sailed for Brazil without
him, and was never heard of again.
On his recovery he returned to Switzerland, there being no further
prospect of employment in the Portuguese service. But his desire for
military life was unabated. His uncle and eldest brother were in the
Dutch service, and in a little while he received word that his uncle
had procured a commission for him. He at once set out for Flanders, but
before he could join the army the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, in
October, 1748, entirely altered the situation. Troops were disbanded or
sent home, and the uncle on whom his hopes depended left the service,
and died soon afterwards. With his death Fletcher's hopes were entirely
destroyed, and he abandoned all thoughts of becoming a soldier.
The first well-marked stage of his history was now completed. He had
reached manhood. He had received the best education that his age and
his country afforded. In temperament he was active and ardent, in
spirit serious and devout; and though he had declined from his early
piety, he was entirely free from the follies and vices so easily
learnt, and so readily condoned, at college and in camp. It was
impossible to say how a life with such preparations would open out.
That its promise was fair, and even noble, might well be judged; but
that it should find at once the supply of its own deepest want, and the
sphere for the employment of its powers, in a foreign country, and in
connexion with a religious movement wholly unknown in Switzerland, and
unsanctioned either by Church or society in England, was among the
things that could not possibly be foreseen. Lives like Fletcher's, when
they lie complete before us, are luminous in the linked succession of
divinely directed steps; the overruling Providence is so manifest that
nothing which takes place surprises us; but, followed in their natural
order, the determining events are unforeseen, they come in unlikely
forms and from quarters whence they could not be expected. From Swiss
Moderatism Fletcher was to pass into the bosom of English Methodism.
The student reared in the school of Calvin and Beza was to be the
apologist of Evangelical Arminianism. He was to become, not
"Captain, or colonel, or knight-in-arms"
in Portugal, Brazil, or Flanders, but "Vicar of Madeley." But of all
this he knew nothing;--how could he?
"I know that the way of man is not in himself:
It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps."
* * * * *
"Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me."