CHARACTER OF WHITEFIELD AS A PREACHER--CENTENNIAL COMMEMORATIONS.
In suggesting a few of the CHARACTERISTICS OF WHITEFIELD'S
PREACHING, we are very greatly indebted to an excellent anonymous
writer in the London Evangelical Magazine for 1853. We consider as
among the reasons of his success, and as worthy of our imitation,
First, _the prominence given to the leading truths of salvation,
and the constant exaltation of Christ in them_. There needs no
minute inquiry, or great analytical care, to ascertain what was
the pervading theme of this popular minister: it was "Christ,
and him crucified," and the glorious truths that hover around
the cross, and derive from it their being and lustre. There was
no other subject, in Whitefield's estimation, that was worthy of
preëminence, and to unfold, elucidate, and apply it, was the great
design of his labors. He saw in it such a wonderful adaptation to
the necessities and condition of fallen humanity, that he stood in
the midst of its wants and woes with all the confidence of a good
physician who had a sovereign and sufficient remedy to propose.
He knew that there was no case which it could not meet, no moral
disease from which it would not recover, no spiritual need which
it would not supply; and therefore, however far gone men might
be from original righteousness, however hardened in sin, sunk in
iniquity, or however elevated by the delusions of a false morality
and fancied self-righteousness, he propounded this as the only and
all-sufficient antidote, at once to destroy and heal, to kill and
to make alive. As to the spurious production of a rationalistic
theory on the one hand, or the prescriptions of ceremonial virtue
and sacramental grace on the other, he knew them not. He saw at
once their hollowness and insufficiency, and would not mock the
necessities of our fallen nature, or aggravate the wounds which sin
had made by a proposal of them. His acquaintance with the human
heart was deep, and his knowledge of the different modifications
of the original disease was so great, that he despaired of relief
from any expedients save that which infinite Wisdom had devised, and
which "the gospel of the grace of God" revealed. Philosophy with
all its discoveries, and reason with all its powers, the law with
all its authority, and virtue with all its rewards, he knew could
only, like the priests and the Levites, have passed the patient by,
and left him to despair, till a greater than they should arrive,
and say, "I will come and heal you." On that adorable Personage,
therefore, and the wonders of his skill and love, he delighted to
dwell. Every sermon was full of Christ; every discourse was odorous
of him. From whatever part of revealed truth he derived his text,
and with whatever peculiar development of man's moral physiology he
had to do, there was something to suggest, to demonstrate the need,
or the suitableness, or the all-sufficiency of the Saviour of the
world. To set him forth, in the glories of his wonderful person, the
variety of his offices, the perfection of his righteousness, the
completeness of his atonement, and the plenitude of his grace, was
his perpetual aim. To these he gave continual prominence, at all
times, and in every place. There was no reserve, no equivocation, no
partial statement on such themes. It was a full, clear, consistent
gospel. From his lips the gospel gave no "uncertain sound." This
made him a welcome messenger of glad tidings to all. This gave him
a key to the hearts of many, who, as they stood around him, and
wondered at him, like those five thousand whom the Redeemer fed
with "five loaves and two small fishes," found all their appetites
suited, and all their necessities supplied. It was the magic power
which arrested them; the centre of gravitation which attracted them;
the bread of life which fed them. "As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness," so now was the Son of man lifted up by the
ministry of this his devoted herald; and far as the camp extended,
and wide as the circumference of poison and death was spread, the
wounded looked thereon and lived. A restorative virtue issued from
it. The hardest heart was softened. The most obstinate in rebellion
was overcome. The blindest saw. The moral lepers were cleansed.
The broken in heart were made whole, and the spiritually dead were
raised to life. "This was the Lord's doing, and it was marvellous in
their eyes." They beheld the man. They heard him preach. They felt
the power. It was because He was exalted among them who had said,
"I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me."
Secondly, _the glow of feeling, the melting compassion, which
pervaded his own soul_. Oh, it is supremely delightful and deeply
affecting to observe the tender affection and melting pathos with
which Whitefield propounded and proclaimed the precious truths and
everlasting verities of the gospel to his fellow-men. He stood
among them as one of their race, one of their number, conscious of
the common misery into which all had fallen, and weeping over the
miseries and ruin in which by nature they were alike involved. As
he opened up the treasures of infinite mercy, and the riches of
redeeming love to their view, he wept to think how long they had
been unknown or despised by many, and with what base ingratitude
thousands would probably still turn away from them. As one who
saw their immortal being in jeopardy, and their souls standing
on the verge of irretrievable ruin, he hastened, with joy in his
countenance and tenderness in his heart, to tell them of One who was
"mighty to save," and that "now was the accepted time, and now the
day of salvation." Not as one who had a cold lecture on ethics to
deliver, or a dissertation on philosophy to expound, or a problem
in mathematics to solve, did he proceed to such a work; but as one
who felt the weight of his great commission, and knew the worth
of never-dying souls. The evil of sin, the danger of impenitence,
the powers of the world to come, the glories of heaven, and the
unutterable miseries of the regions of woe, were visibly present to
his own mind; and of these, "out of the abundance of his heart," he
spoke to others. He could not be calm, he could not be apathetic on
such themes as these.
"Passion was reason, transport temper, here."
And with much of the melting tenderness of Him who wept over
Jerusalem, he spoke of these things to all that resorted to him.
What moving words did he utter on Blackheath hill, in the Tabernacle
pulpit, and on Kingswood mount! His vivid eye beamed with the glow
of tenderness, and his tears, as he spoke, oft-times moistened his
little Bible or bedewed the ground. In his printed sermons, which
doubtless are but feeble specimens of his free and fervent manner,
there are strains of tender pathos and impassioned oratory, which it
is almost impossible to read even now without being moved to share
in his feelings and in the emotions which they must have enkindled
around; and in the perusal of which we wonder not that, in all the
circumstances, the place in which he stood was a Bochim--a place of
weeping. Oh, the melting power, the exquisite pathos, the tender
expostulation of this preëminent man, and unrivalled preacher of the
gospel of our salvation! We wish we could catch them now--that all
preachers possessed them; that the rising ministry especially would
emulate him in these things. Whitefield showed his intense feeling,
not from the mere power of ratiocination, or from the poetic
memento, or for the sake of producing effect by the tears that were
unfelt, or which only flowed from the surface; but from the meltings
of a tender heart, influenced by a Saviour's love, and overflowing
with the commiseration of a benign compassion for dying multitudes
around. Doddridge's beautiful hymn,
"Arise, my tenderest thoughts, arise,"
one might almost think was written at Whitefield's side. The
tenderness of John, and the "weeping" of Paul, were blended in him
with the boldness of Peter. The love that agonized in the garden of
Gethsemane, and bled on the cross of Calvary, was largely diffused
through all his powers.
Thirdly, _the direct address of his ministry_. The characteristic
mode of his preaching, and the style of his public ministrations,
was, to direct his appeal to the hearts and consciences of his
hearers, and to "preach _to_ the people all the words of this
life." It was not an harangue _before_ them. It was not an oration
beautifully prepared, read, or delivered in their hearing, and
presented simply for their acceptance and admiration; but a
direct address, an affectionate appeal, a solemn and earnest
communication of the message he had received from God to them. Oh,
we have sometimes thought, what a marked difference there ought
to be between the ministrations of a servant of Christ to his
fellow-immortals, on things of eternal importance in which they are
personally and deeply concerned, and the delivery of a lecture from
the philosopher's desk, or even of a dissertation on theology from
the professorial chair. So thought the apostles. So thought the
prophets and public teachers of sacred mysteries of old. They had
the "burden of the Lord" to deliver, and it was _unto_ the people.
They had an embassy to execute, and it was by negotiating directly
with, and in the consciences of their hearers. Whitefield caught
their spirit, proceeded in their way, and did such mighty execution,
not by the mere symmetrical illustration of divine truth, but by
the direct presentation of it to their minds. They had not to ask,
"For whom is all this intended?" and, "Is it designed for us?" They
felt that it was. It came home to their consciences, and to their
very hearts. They could not transfer it to others, nor avoid the
application of it to themselves. Had the preacher called them by
name, which in his skilful delineation of character, he sometimes
virtually did, they could not have been more certain that he
intended it for them, and that it was at their peril to neglect or
pass it by. "I have a message from God unto thee," he substantially
said in every discourse he uttered, and the people were compelled
to believe it. "Go, and tell this people," said the divine voice
to Isaiah, "Ye hear indeed, but do not understand; ye see indeed,
but do not perceive." "Therefore," said Peter, "let all the house
of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus, _whom
ye have crucified_, both Lord and Christ." "Now then," said Paul,
"we are ambassadors for Christ; as though God did beseech _you_ by
us, we pray _you_, in Christ's stead, _be ye_ reconciled to God."
Such was the tenor of the apostolic ministry. Such the secret of
its mighty power and success. And such also was the characteristic
of the faithful and seraphic Whitefield, by which he knocked at the
door of many hearts, and those hearts were opened to him, to his
message, and to his Lord. His plan was that of heavenly wisdom; his
appeal was the same. "Unto you, O men, I call, and my voice is to
the sons of men." In him were verified the poet's graphic lines:
"There stands the messenger of truth; there stands
The legate of the skies: his theme divine,
His office sacred, his credentials clear.
By him the violated law speaks out
Its thunders; and by him, in strains as sweet
As angels use, the gospel whispers peace.
He stablishes the strong, restores the weak,
Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart,
And sues the sinner to return to God."
Fourthly, _his habitual dependence on the Spirit of God, and his
earnest aspirations for the manifestation of his power_. That he
was conscious of his own superior talents as an orator, and knew
how to employ them on sacred themes; that he skilfully wielded
all the weapons of a well-studied eloquence to gain access to the
human mind, and knew both how to alarm and how to persuade, and
could attempt both with as much success probably as any speaker,
either of ancient or modern times; that he had a large and minute
acquaintance with the powers and passions of the human soul, and
knew well when and how to touch the hidden springs of its energies
and actions; that he had a good amount of common and sacred learning
at his command, and like that Apollos whom among the early teachers
of Christianity he most resembled, was "mighty in the Scriptures;"
and that he delighted to expatiate on the wonders and glories of
redemption as a restorative scheme preëminently adapted to interest
and attract, to impress and rule our common nature--are facts open
to all who inspect his writings and accompany him in his labors,
and will be denied by none. But with all these, and amid all, in
every sermon he composed and delivered, and in his most impassioned
addresses to his hearers, there is manifested an underlying and
all-pervading dependence on the power and grace of the Spirit
of God, which was in character, if not in degree, meek, humble,
genuine, entire, like that of the most eminent apostle or adoring
saint at the foot of the divine throne. With him it was not merely a
sentiment, but a feeling; and that feeling constant and habitual, as
it was in him who in the review of his labors said, "I have planted,
Apollos watered, but God gave the increase." He knew that none but
the almighty Spirit could gain effectual access to the spirit of
man; and that not even a Melancthon, a Luther, or a Whitefield,
could make old Adam yield, unless constrained by a superior power.
He seemed to stand in the valley of vision among the dry bones, as
the prophet did, and while he addressed them with something like a
prophet's power, he had no expectation or hope of success until the
wind of heaven came down and blew upon them. Therefore he prophesied
to it as well as to them. "Come from the four winds, O breath, and
breathe upon the slain, that they may live," was often the mighty
cry of his soul, before preaching, while preaching, and after
preaching. It seemed to be his joy, his only, his all-sustaining
confidence, that he lived under "the dispensation of the Spirit,"
and wrought in a day, and preached upon a theme, in connection with
which "the ministration of the Spirit" was to be "glorious," by his
wonderful works of conviction, conversion, and sanctification, among
the children of men. To that Spirit, as the glorifier of Christ, he
often devoutly and earnestly appealed. Sometimes, in the midst of
an unusual flow of tender and eloquent address to his hearers on
his favorite theme of the glories and grace of his divine Master,
he would pause in solemn silence, and lifting up his hands and his
voice to heaven, and carrying the hearts of his audience with him,
invoke aloud the descending and all-consuming fire. The present God
was acknowledged and felt. The word came "in demonstration of the
Spirit and of power." And while the habitual aim of his preaching
was to exalt "Christ Jesus the Lord," and while he reasoned, and
opened the Scriptures, and taught and alarmed or invited his
hearers, in the most touching strains of urgent remonstrance and
tender entreaty, to accept now "the great salvation," the inward
state of his soul was that of entire reliance on the presence and
coöperation of the Holy Spirit of God. To him were sent up his most
intense aspirations. In all the records of his success, to that
Spirit the honor is always ascribed. "Not I, but the grace of God
which was with me," is the grateful acknowledgment he makes in the
review of every field occupied and every triumph won. And thus it
was that the fabric of his ministry, and of all his ministrations,
in the multitudinous labors which he directed against the kingdom
of darkness and of Satan in his day, was like the mystic vision
which Ezekiel saw, _instinct with life_. The spirit of the living
creatures was in the wheels. "When this went, those went; when this
stood, those stood; when this was lifted up from the earth, those
were lifted up." It was all life. A living preacher; a living theme;
a living power, giving life, and spreading it all around. Therefore
it was that life followed in the region of death, and at his coming
the desert rejoiced, and the wilderness blossomed as the rose.
"Dry bones were raised, and clothed afresh,
And hearts of stone were turned to flesh."
By preaching such as we have now attempted to describe, thousands
and tens of thousands were gathered to Christ. "An exceeding great
army" stood up. Slumbering churches were awakened, religion was
revived, and "righteousness and praise" were caused to "spring forth
before all the nations." And as this apostolic man surveyed the
amazing scene, and glanced at the wide circumference of his labors,
in the British Isles and in the New World, he might have exclaimed,
as one before him had done, "Now thanks be unto God, who always
causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savor of
his name by us in every place." "Through mighty signs and wonders,
_by the power of the Spirit of God_, from Jerusalem round about to
Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ." "For I am
not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God to
salvation; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." Who, in the
remembrance of Whitefield and his times, will not long for their
return, and exclaim, "Awake, awake; put on strength, O arm of the
Lord; awake, as in the ancient days." "O that thou wouldest rend
the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might
flow down at thy presence, as when the melting fire burneth, the
fire causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine
adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence!" Spirit
of the living God, descend and replenish with thy power all our
souls, our ministry, our temples, our land.
In estimating the character of Whitefield, it should be observed
that _he dealt with his hearers, individually and collectively, as
immortal beings_. To use the language of Isaac Taylor, "he held
MAN as if in the abstract, or as if whatever is not common to all
men were forgotten. The most extreme diversities, intellectual and
moral, differences of rank, culture, national modes of thought, all
gave way and ceased to be thought of; distinctions were swept from
the ground where he took his position. At the first opening of his
lips, and as the rich harmony of his voice spread its undulations
over the expanse of human faces, and at the instant when the sparkle
of his bright eye caught every other eye, human nature, in a manner,
dropped its individuality, and presented itself in its very elements
to be moulded anew. Whitefield, although singularly gifted with a
perception of the varieties of character, yet spoke as if he could
know nothing of the thousands before him but their immortality and
their misery; and so it was that these thousands listened to him.
"No preacher whose history is on record, has trod so wide a field as
did Whitefield, or has retrod it so often, or has repeated himself
so much, or has carried so far the experiment of exhausting himself,
and of spending his popularity, if it could have been spent, but
it never was spent. Within the compass of a few weeks he might
have been heard addressing the negroes of the Bermuda islands,
adapting himself to their infantile understandings, and to their
debauched hearts; and then at Chelsea, with the aristocracy of rank
and wit before him, approving himself to listeners such as the
lords Bolingbroke and Chesterfield. Whitefield might as easily have
produced a Hamlet or a Paradise Lost, as have excogitated a sermon
which, as a composition, a product of thought, would have tempted
men like these to hear him a second time; and as to his faculty and
graces as a speaker, his elocution and action, a second performance
would have contented them. But in fact Bolingbroke, and many of his
class, thought not the hour long, time after time, while, with much
sameness of _material_ and of language, he spoke of eternity and of
salvation in Christ.... Floods of tears moistened cheeks rough and
smooth; and sighs, suppressed or loudly uttered, gave evidence that
human nature is one and the same when it comes in presence of truths
which bear upon the guilty and the immortal without distinction."
* * * * *
The Rev. Dr. James Hamilton of London has admirably delineated
Whitefield, in a passage which must be admired by all who read
it: "Whitefield was the prince of English preachers. Many have
surpassed him as sermon-makers, but none have approached him
as a pulpit orator. Many have outshone him in the clearness of
their logic, the grandeur of their conceptions, and the sparkling
beauty of single sentences; but in the power of darting the gospel
direct into the conscience, he eclipsed them all. With a full and
beaming countenance, and the frank and easy port which the English
people love--for it is the symbol of honest purpose and friendly
assurance--he combined a voice of rich compass, which could easily
thrill over Moorfields in musical thunder, or whisper its terrible
secret in every private ear; and to this gainly aspect and tuneful
voice he added a most expressive and eloquent action. Improved by
conscientious practice, and instinct with his earnest nature, this
elocution was the acted sermon, and by its pantomimic portrait
enabled the eye to anticipate each rapid utterance, and helped the
memory to treasure up the palatable ideas. None ever used so boldly,
nor with more success, the highest styles of impersonation: as when
he described to his sailor-auditors a storm at sea, and compelled
them to shout, 'Take to the longboat, sir!' His 'hark, hark!' could
conjure up Gethsemane with its faltering moon, and awake again the
cry of horror-stricken innocence; and an apostrophe to Peter on
the holy mount would light up another Tabor, and drown it in glory
from the opening heaven. His thoughts were possessions, and his
feelings were transformations; and he spoke because he felt, his
hearers understood because they saw. They were not only enthusiastic
amateurs, like Garrick, who ran to weep and tremble at his bursts
of passion, but even the colder critics of the Walpole school
were surprised into momentary sympathy and reluctant wonder. Lord
Chesterfield was listening in Lady Huntingdon's pew when Whitefield
was comparing the benighted sinner to a blind beggar on a dangerous
road. His little dog gets away from him when skirting the edge of
a precipice, and he is left to explore the path with his iron-shod
staff. On the very verge of the cliff this blind guide slips through
his fingers and skims away down the abyss. All unconscious, the
owner stoops down to regain it, and stumbling forward--'Good God,
he is gone!' shouted Chesterfield, who had been watching with
breathless alarm the blind man's movements, and who jumped from his
feet to save the catastrophe.
"But the glory of Whitefield's preaching was his heart-kindled
and heart-melting gospel. But for this, all his bold strokes and
brilliant surprises might have been no better than the rhetorical
triumphs of Kirwan and other pulpit dramatists. He was an orator,
but he only sought to be an evangelist. Like a volcano where gold
and gems may be darted forth as well as common things, but where
gold and molten granite flow all alike in fiery fusion, bright
thoughts and splendid images might be projected from his pulpit,
but all were merged in the stream which bore along the gospel
and himself in blended fervor. Indeed, so simple was his nature,
that glory to God and good will to man had filled it; there was
room for little more. Having no church to found, no family to
enrich, and no memory to immortalize, he was simply the ambassador
of God; and inspired with its genial piteous spirit--so full of
heaven reconciled and humanity restored--he soon himself became a
living gospel. Radiant with its benignity, and trembling with its
tenderness, by a sort of spiritual induction a vast audience would
speedily be brought into a frame of mind--the transfusing of his
own; and the white furrows on their sooty faces told that Kingswood
colliers were weeping, or the quivering of an ostrich plume bespoke
its elegant wearer's deep emotion. And coming to his pulpit direct
from communion with his Master, and in the strength of accepted
prayer, there was an elevation in his mien which often paralyzed
hostility, and a self-possession which made him amid uproar and
confusion the more sublime. With an electric bolt he would bring the
jester in his fool's cap from his perch on the tree, or galvanize
the brickbat from the skulking miscreant's grasp, or sweep down in
crouching submission and shamefaced silence the whole of Bartholomew
fair; while a revealing flash of sententious doctrine, of vivified
Scripture, would disclose to awe-struck hundreds the forgotten
verities of another world, or the unsuspected arcana of their inner
man. 'I came to break your head, but, through you, God has broken
my heart,' was a sort of confession with which he was familiar; and
to see the deaf old gentlewoman who used to mutter imprecations
at him as he passed along the streets, clambering up the pulpit
stairs to catch his angelic words, was a sort of spectacle which the
triumphant gospel often witnessed in his day. And when it is known
that his voice could be heard by twenty thousand, and that ranging
all the empire, as well as America, he would often preach thrice
on a working-day, and that he has received in one week as many as
a thousand letters from persons awakened by his sermons, if no
estimate can be formed of the results of his ministry, some idea may
be suggested of its vast extent and singular effectiveness."
* * * * *
Very admirably has a writer in the North British Review compared and
contrasted Whitefield and Wesley. He says, "Few characters could be
more completely the converse, and in the church's exigencies, more
happily the supplement of one another, than were those of George
Whitefield and John Wesley; and had their views been identical,
and their labors all along coincident, their large services to the
gospel might have repeated Paul and Barnabas. Whitefield was soul,
and Wesley was system. Whitefield was a summer cloud which burst at
morning or noon a fragrant exhalation over an ample track, and took
the rest of the day to gather again; Wesley was the polished conduit
in the midst of the garden, through which the living water glided
in pearly brightness and perennial music, the same vivid stream
from day to day. After a preaching paroxysm, Whitefield lay panting
on his couch, spent, breathless, and deathlike; after his morning
sermon in the foundry, Wesley would mount his pony, and trot and
chat, and gather simples, till he reached some country hamlet, where
he would bait his charger, and talk through a little sermon with the
villagers, and remount his pony and trot away again. In his aërial
poise, Whitefield's eagle eye drank lustre from the source of light,
and loved to look down on men in assembled myriads; Wesley's falcon
glance did not sweep so far, but it searched more keenly and marked
more minutely where it pierced. A master of assemblies, Whitefield
was no match for the isolated man. Seldom coping with the multitude,
but strong in astute sagacity and personal ascendency, Wesley could
conquer any number one by one. All force and impetus, Whitefield
was the powder-blast in the quarry, and by one explosive sermon
would shake a district, and detach materials for other men's long
work--deft, neat, and painstaking, Wesley loved to split and trim
each fragment into uniform plinths and polished stones. Or, taken
otherwise, Whitefield was the bargeman or the wagoner who brought
the timber of the house, and Wesley was the architect who set it up.
Whitefield had no patience for ecclesiastical polity, no aptitude
for pastoral details--with a beaver-like propensity for building,
Wesley was always constructing societies, and with a king-like
craft of ruling, was most at home when presiding over a class or a
conference. It was their infelicity that they did not always work
together--it was the happiness of the age, and the furtherance of
the gospel, that they lived alongside of one another."
CENTENNIAL COMMEMORATIONS.
When a century had elapsed from the commencement of Whitefield's
public labors, it was deemed desirable by many in England to
hold public services of a devotional and practical character, in
celebration of the event. Especially was it designed that such
celebrations should have a reference, as far as possible, to
advance open-air preaching. The first services of this character
were very properly held in the Tabernacle, London, on May 21, 1839,
and well do we remember with what intense interest, in common with
thousands, we attended them. Ministers and laymen of at least
four religious denominations assisted in them, and eloquently
discoursed on subjects illustrating the grace of God in connection
with Whitefield, but still more intent were they on benefiting the
present and future generations of men. Dr. Campbell delivered a
sermon on the character and labors of Apollos, illustrated by those
of Whitefield; the late Dr. Cox discoursed on the genius and labors
of Whitefield; the late Rev. John Blackburn described the past and
present state of religion in England; and the Rev. John Young, LL.
D., urged the propriety, duty, and necessity of open-air preaching.
In addition to these sermons, several admirable speeches were made,
and every thing was marked by a spirit of earnest devotion. A small
volume, containing the sermons and speeches, was printed, and put
into extensive circulation.
About the same time, a number of ministers of the Congregational
order met in a central town of Gloucestershire, when one of them
suggested, that "as the present year was the centenary of the Rev.
George Whitefield's labors in reviving the apostolic practice of
open-air preaching, it might be desirable to commemorate them by a
special religious open-air celebration. It was further remarked,
that Whitefield was a native of Gloucester; that as many ministers
present presided over churches instituted by his ministry; that
as Stinchcombe hill, in the very centre of the county, presented
a most beautiful and eligible spot for a public meeting; and as
upon its summit, a century ago, Whitefield himself had preached and
showed the glad tidings of the kingdom of God, it seemed a duty to
improve the opportunity it offered of addressing, on the gracious
persuasives of the cross, a large concourse of persons, many of whom
might never hear the gospel, and of promoting in the county the
revival of evangelical religion, which God so highly honored his
devoted servant in commencing in our land."
The suggestion was most cordially received, arrangements were made,
and, July 30, 1839, though the weather was unfavorable, the meeting
was attended by at least seven thousand persons. A large preaching
stand was erected for the ministers, nearly one hundred of whom
were present. Sermons were preached by the Rev. Drs. Matheson and
Ross, and by the Rev. Messrs. T. East, J. H. Hinton, and J. Sibree;
and addresses were given, and the devotional exercises led by many
others. The services were solemnly impressive. The late Josiah
Conder, Esq., wrote two hymns especially for the occasion, which are
well worthy of preservation; we therefore transfer them to our pages.
I.
How sweet from crowded throngs,
Zion, ascend thy songs,
With choral swells through echoing aisles!
Where brethren, brethren meet,
These songs rise doubly sweet,
From humbler rooms or loftier piles.
But here, not made with hands,
A nobler temple stands;
Here, 'mid thy works, O God, we bow,
Where all around, above,
Proclaims thy power and love;
Oh, tune our hearts to praise thee now.
We bless thy gracious care,
For many a house of prayer,
Where saints may meet with conscience free,
To keep thy simple rites,
In which thy church delights,
And unforbidden, wait on thee.
But now, beneath the sky,
We raise our songs on high,
To Him who gave all nature birth;
While the free air wafts round
To distant vales the sound--
Praise to the Lord of heaven and earth.
So to the mountain air
The Saviour breathed his prayer;
So 'mid green hills or deserts rude,
The poor he meekly taught,
And gracious wonders wrought,
Or fed the famished multitude.
So did apostles teach;
So did our Whitefield preach;
These hills have heard his fervent prayer:
Oh, let the saving word
Throughout our land be heard,
Free as the light, and open as the air.
II.
Where is the voice of Whitefield now?
Where does his mantle rest?
Oh, for Elisha's from the plough,
With kindred zeal possessed!
Apostles of heroic mould,
With love seraphic fired,
Divinely called, like those of old
At Pentecost inspired!
Oh THOU, our Head, enthroned on high,
By whom thy members live,
Wilt thou not hear our fervent cry,
The holy unction give?
In all the plenitude of grace
Thy gifts of might bestow;
And by us, Lord, in every place,
Thy saving virtue show.
This Christian land with error teems,
The blind by blinder led;
The sophist weaves his Atheist schemes;
Wide has the poison spread.
Arise, O Lord, send forth thy word;
Thy faithful heralds call;
And while the gospel trump is heard,
Let Satan's bulwarks fall.
Free, pure, and vital as the light,
GOD'S message to our race;
Like genial gales the SPIRIT'S might,
Sovereign, mysterious grace.
Breathe forth, O wind, and to new birth
Quicken the bones of death;
Regenerate this withered earth;
Give to the dying breath.
It is pleasant to add to this account, that satisfactory evidences
were given that some, during these services, were brought to the
saving knowledge of "the truth as in Jesus." And it may be mentioned
as a singular circumstance, that an old man one hundred and three
years of age attended on this occasion, who had been carried in his
mother's arms to this same spot to hear Whitefield preach just a
century before.
The last centenary service to which we shall make reference, is the
one held at the _Bristol_ Tabernacle, November 25, 1853. The sermon
on _The Character of Whitefield_, by the Rev. John Angell James, was
from the text, "This one thing I do." Phil. 3:13. In it he said:
"We hear much in our days about the adaptation of the gospel to
the age. There is no word I more hate or love, dread or desire,
according to the sense in, or the purpose for which it is used,
than this word _adaptation_ as applied to preaching. Now, if by
adaptation be meant, more philosophy, and less Christianity; more of
cold abstract intellectualism, and less of popular, simple, earnest
statement of gospel truth; more profound discussion and artificial
elaboration addressed to the learned few, and less of warm-hearted
appeal to the multitude, may God preserve us from such adaptation,
for it is high-treason against truth and the salvation of souls. But
if by this be meant a stronger intelligence, a chaster composition,
a sterner logic, a more powerful rhetoric, a more correct criticism,
and a more varied illustration, but all employed to set forth the
gospel as comprehending those two great words, _redemption and
regeneration_, let us have it; we need it; and come in ever such
abundance, it will be a blessing.
"Adaptation! the gospel is adaptation, from beginning to end, to
every age of time, and to all conditions of humanity. It is God's
own adaptation. It is he who knows every ward of the lock of
man's nature, who has constructed this admirable key; and all the
miserable tinkering of a vain and deceitful philosophy can make no
better key, nor can all the attempts of a philosophizing theology
make this key better fit the wards of the lock.
"Adaptation! was not the gospel in all its purity and simplicity
adapted to human nature as it existed in commercial, scholastic,
philosophical Corinth? And did not Paul think so when he determined
to know nothing there, but 'Christ, and him crucified?' Was it not
by this very gospel, which many are "beginning to imagine is not
suited to an intellectual and philosophical age, that Christianity
fought its first battles, and achieved its victories over the
hosts of darkness? Against the axe, the stake, the sword of the
gladiator, and the lions of the amphitheatre; against the ridicule
of wits, the reasoning of sages, the interests, influence, and craft
of the priesthood; against the prowess of armies, and the brute
passions of the mob, Christianity, strong in its weakness, sublime
in its simplicity, potent in its isolation, asking and receiving
no protection from the sceptre of the monarch or the sword of the
warrior, went forth to do battle with the wisdom of Greece and the
mythology of Rome. Everywhere it prevailed, and gathered its laurels
from the snows of Scythia, the sands of Africa, the plains of India,
and the green fields of Europe. With the gospel alone she overturned
the altars of impiety in her march. Power felt his arm wither at her
glance. She silenced the lying oracles by the majesty of her voice,
and extinguished the deceptive light of philosophy in the schools,
till at length she who went forth forlorn and weeping from Calvary
to the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, ascended, upon the ruins of the
temples, the idols, and the altars she had demolished, to the throne
of the Cæsars, and with the diadem on her brow, and the purple on
her shoulders, gave laws to the world from that very tribunal where
she had been dragged as a criminal and condemned as a malefactor.[3]
[3] See Dr. John M. Mason's Funeral Sermon for Mrs. Graham.
"Adaptation! is not justification by faith the very substance of the
gospel, and was it not by this doctrine that Luther effected the
enfranchisement of the human intellect, from the chains of slavery
which had been forged in the Vatican; achieved the liberation of
half Europe from the yoke of Rome, and gave an impulse to human
thought and vital Christianity which has not yet spent itself, and
never will, till it issues in the jubilee of the nations and the
glories of the millennium?
"Adaptation! did not Whitefield move this kingdom almost to its
centre, and equally so our then great transatlantic colony to
its extremities, fascinating alike the colliers of Kingswood and
the citizens of the metropolis; and by this mighty theme enable
myriads to burst the chains of sin and Satan, and to walk abroad
disenthralled by the mighty power of redeeming grace?
"Adaptation! is not this gospel now proving its power in heathen
countries to raise the savage into civilized man, the civilized man
into the saint, and in this ascending scale of progression, the
saint into the seraph?
"And yet, with these proofs of the power of the gospel to adapt
itself to every age of the world, and to every condition of
humanity, there are those who want something else to effect the
regeneration of mankind. 'And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all
men unto me.' So said the Saviour of men. The cross is the great
moral magnet for all ages and all countries, to draw men from
barbarism to civilization, from sin to holiness, from misery to
happiness, and from earth to heaven; and it were as rational to say
the loadstone had lost its original power of polar attraction, and
the mariner's compass is an old, stale invention, and must now be
replaced with some new device, better adapted to the modern light
of science, as to suppose that the doctrine of the cross had become
effete, and must give way to some new phase of theological truth.
"I now consider the _manner_ in which Whitefield carried out his own
purpose into action. '_One thing I do_:' and _how_ did he accomplish
it?
"Never was the joyful sound sent over the world by a more
magnificent _voice_. All his biographers labor, as do the
historians of Greece in describing the power of Demosthenes, to
make us understand his wondrous oratory. Perhaps, after all, that
which gives us the most vivid idea of it is, not the _crowds_ it
attracted, moved, and melted, but that it warmed the cold and
calculating Franklin, and fascinated the philosophical and sceptical
Hume. Heaven rarely ever gave, or gives to man the faculty of speech
in such perfection. But what is particularly worthy of notice is,
that he trusted not to its native power, but increased that power
by assiduous cultivation. His matchless elocution was not only an
endowment, but an acquirement. If he preached a sermon twenty times,
he went on to the last improving his method of delivering it, both
as to tones and action; not for theatrical display--no man was
ever more free from this--but to carry out his 'one thing'--_the
salvation of souls_. He knew, and deeply and philosophically entered
into the meaning of that text, 'Faith cometh by hearing;' and he
also knew that attentive hearing comes by the power of speaking.
With such a theme as the gospel, with such an object as salvation,
with such an aim as eternity, and such a Master to serve as Christ,
he would not give utterance to such subjects, and for such purposes,
in careless and slovenly speech. He studied to be the orator, that
he might thus pluck souls as brands from the burning. In this let us
imitate him. Of all our faculties, that of speech is perhaps least
cultivated, yet is most susceptible of cultivation, and pays best
for the pains bestowed upon it. My brethren, speech is the great
instrument of our ministerial labor. Our assault upon the rebel town
of Mansoul is to be carried on, and our entrance to be effected,
to use the language of Bunyan, at ear-gate. The tongue, rather
than the pen, is the weapon of most of us. For the love of souls,
let us endeavor to be good speakers. With the loftiest themes in
the universe for our subjects, do, do let us endeavor to speak of
them in some measure worthily. It is an instructive and astounding,
and to us humiliating and disgraceful fact, that the stage-player,
whether in comedy or in tragedy, takes ten times more pains to
give effective utterance to his follies, vices, and passions, for
the amusement of his audience, than we do to eternal and momentous
truths for the salvation of ours. The stage seems the only arena
where the power of oratory is much studied. Should this be?
"A few characteristics of Whitefield's manner deserve emphatic
mention and particular attention, as connected with the execution
of his one great purpose. The first I notice is _solemnity_. He
never, as did some of his followers, degraded the pulpit by making
it the arena of low humor and wit; abounding in anecdote, and even
in action, he was uniformly solemn. His deep devotional spirit
contributed largely to this, for his piety was the inward fire
which supplied the ardor of his manner. He was eminently a man of
prayer; and had he been less prayerful, he would also have been less
powerful. He came into the pulpit from the closet, where he had been
communing with God, and could no more trifle with merry humor at
such a time than could Moses when he came down from the mount to the
people; or than the high-priest when he came out from the blazing
symbols of the divine presence between the cherubim in the holy of
holies; or Isaiah when he saw the Lord of hosts, high and lifted up,
with his train filling the temple. Happily the age and taste for
pulpit buffoonery is gone, I hope never to return.
''Tis pitiful to count a gain when you should woo a soul.'
It was the stamp and impress of eternity upon his preaching, that
gave Whitefield such power. He spoke like a man that stood upon
the borders of the unseen world, alternately rapt in ecstasy as he
gazed upon the felicities of heaven, and convulsed with terror as
he seemed to hear the howlings of the damned, and saw the smoke
of their torment ascending from the pit for ever and ever. His
maxim was to preach, as Apelles painted, for eternity, and he
said, if ministers preached for eternity, they would then act the
part of true Christian orators. And tell me, my brethren, what are
all the prettinesses, the beauties, or even sublimities of human
eloquence--what the similes, metaphors, and other garniture of
rhetoric--what the philosophy and intellectualities which many in
this day are aiming at, to move and bow and conquer the human soul,
compared with 'the powers of the world to come?'
"But there was another characteristic of Whitefield's manner, and
that was its _tenderness_. Our Lord, as to his humanity, was a man
of sorrows, and therefore of tears; so was Paul, so was Whitefield.
Perhaps the latter somewhat too much so, at any rate far too much so
for any preacher but himself, and with him the fountain of his tears
was somewhat too full and flowing. But Oh, what an apology for this,
and what a stroke of pathetic eloquence was that appeal when on one
occasion he said, 'You blame me for weeping, but how can I help
it, when you will not weep for yourselves, although your immortal
souls are on the verge of destruction, and for aught I know you are
hearing your last sermon, and may never more have an opportunity
to have Christ offered to you.' Man is an emotional as well as an
intellectual creature, and sympathy is one of the powers of our
physical and mental economy. The passions are of an infectious
nature, and men feel more in a crowd than in solitude. The adage of
the ancient elocutionist is still true, 'If you wish me to weep,
weep yourself.' Whitefield's tears drew forth those of his audience,
and his pathos softened their hearts for the impressions of the
truth. It is forgotten by many preachers that they may do much by
the heart, as well as by the head. We are not the teachers of logic,
mathematics, metaphysics, or natural philosophy, which have nothing
to do with the heart, but of religion, the very seat of which is
there; and _we_ address ourselves not only to the logical, but to
the æsthetical part of man's complex nature. By argument, I know
we must convince, but we must not stop in the judgment, but go on
to reach the heart, and we ourselves must feel as well as reason.
_Clear, but cold_, is too descriptive of much modern preaching. It
is the frosty moonlight of a winter's night, not the warm sunshine
of a summer's day. A cold preacher is likely to have cold hearers.
Cold! What, when the love of God, the death of Christ, the salvation
of souls, the felicities of heaven, and the torments of hell are the
theme? Enthusiasm here is venial, compared with lukewarmness.
"Need I say that _earnestness_ was characteristic of Whitefield's
preaching? Yes, that one word, perhaps, more than any other in our
language, is its epitome. An intense earnestness marked its whole
career, and was carried to such a pitch as to subject him, as did
that of Paul, to the imputation of madness. The salvation of souls
was so entirely the one thing that engrossed his soul, his time,
his labors, that not a step deviated from it. Every moment, every
day, was an approximation to it. His devotions, his recreations,
if any such he had, his journeys, his voyages, his sermons, his
correspondence, were all referred to this one end. His exertions
never relaxed for a moment, and he, with his great compeer Wesley,
made the trial so seldom made, what is the utmost effect which, in
the way of saving souls, may be granted to any one preacher of the
gospel in any age or country.
"What may not be done, and is not done by earnestness? It gives
_some_ success to any error, however absurd or enormous, and to any
scheme of wickedness, however flagrant and atrocious. What is it
that has given such success to popery, to infidelity, to Mormonism?
_Earnestness._ And shall the apostles and advocates of error be
more in earnest than the friends of truth? Whitefield often quoted
Betterton the player, who affirmed that the stage would soon be
deserted if the actors spoke like the preachers. And what _would_
empty the play-house, that is, dulness and coldness, _does_ often
empty the meeting-house. 'Mr. Betterton's answer to a worthy
prelate,' says Whitefield, 'is worthy of lasting regard.' When asked
how it is that the clergy, who speak of things _real_, affected
the people so little, and the players, who speak only of things
imaginary, affected them so much, replied 'My lord, I can assign but
one reason--we players speak of things imaginary as though they were
real, and too many of the clergy speak of things real as though they
were imaginary.' It is not always so. Many a preacher, even in our
own day, by the unaffected earnestness of his manner, carries away
his audience upon the tide of his own feeling. They hear what he
says, they see what he feels, his eye helps his tongue, the workings
of his countenance disclose the feelings of his heart; his manner is
a lucid comment upon his matter, breaks down the limits which words
impose upon the communication of ideas, and gives them not only an
apprehension of the meaning, but a sense of the importance of his
subject, which unimpassioned language and manner could not have done.
"I name but one thing more as characteristic of this great man,
and which it would be well for us to imitate, and that is, his
_dauntless courage_. See him not only facing mobs, defying threats,
and even lifting up his pulpit amid the wild uproar of a London
fair, the boldest achievement that a speaker ever accomplished, but
holding on his noble career unterrified, and working amid the storm
of obloquy that came upon him from so many quarters. Who that has
ever read, can ever forget Cowper's exquisite description of him?
"'LEUCONOMUS--beneath well-sounding Greek
I show a name a poet must not speak--
Stood pilloried on infamy's high stage,
And bore the pelting storm of half an age,
The very butt of slander, and the blot
For every dart that malice ever shot.
The man that mentioned him at once dismissed
All mercy from his lips, and sneered and hissed.
His crimes were such as Sodom never knew,
And perjury stood up to swear all true;
His aim was mischief, and his zeal pretence,
His speech rebellion against common-sense:
A knave when tried on honesty's plain rule,
And when by that of reason, a mere fool.
The world's best comfort was, his doom was passed,
Die when he might, he must be damned at last.
Now truth, perform thine office, waft aside
The curtain drawn by prejudice and pride,
Reveal--the man is dead--to wondering eyes,
This more than monster, in his proper guise.
He loved the world that hated him; the tear
That dropped upon his Bible was sincere:
Assailed by scandal and the tongue of strife,
His only answer was--a blameless life;
And he that forged, and he that threw the dart,
Had each a brother's interest in his heart.
Paul's love of Christ, and steadiness unbribed,
Were copied close in him, and well transcribed.
He followed Paul--his zeal a kindred flame,
His apostolic charity the same.
Like him, crossed cheerfully tempestuous seas,
Forsaking country, kindred, friends, and ease.
Like him he labored, and like him, content
To bear it, suffered shame where'er he went.
Blush, calumny! and write upon his tomb,
If honest eulogy can spare the room,
Thy deep repentance of thy thousand lies,
Which, aimed at him, have pierced the offended skies;
And say, Blot out my sin, confessed, deplored,
Against thine image, in thy saint, O Lord.'
"What but a guilty cowardice is it, a false and pusillanimous shame,
that keeps us in these days from some novel and bolder method of
aggression upon the domain of darkness? Are we not wanting here in
that moral courage which would make us, when conscious of doing
right, indifferent to the stare of the ignorant, and the wonder
of the timid; to the shaft of ridicule, and the malignant censure
of the cynic? How enslaved are we by the fetters of custom, or
restrained by the trammels of conventiality! How little are we
disposed to go out of the usual track, even in saving souls! Very
few are disposed to imitate the boldness, ingenuity, and novelty
of that noble-hearted brother,[4] who hired a disengaged theatre
in the city where he dwelt, and for four months preached there to
listening and well-behaved crowds, the gospel of salvation; and for
his reward had very many given to him, who are his joy now, and will
be his crown of rejoicing in the presence of Christ at his coming.
Who can see Paul on Mars-Hill, addressing himself to the sages and
their followers of all sects, and preaching to them a doctrine so
repugnant to the mythology of the temple and the philosophy of the
schools, as Christ, the last judgment, and the resurrection of the
body, without being impressed with the moral courage of such an act?
It is this spiritual heroism that is wanted in our modern preaching,
and indeed, which was no less needful when the Methodistic company
commenced their preaching.
[4] The Rev. Richard Knill of Chester, formerly a missionary in
India, and afterwards in Russia, since deceased.--B.
"Nor is it only in this unwillingness to go off from our own
ground for saving souls that our guilty cowardice is seen, but in
the disposition to shirk the more solemn and searching truths of
revelation. Are we not giving way too much to the fastidiousness of
modern taste and refinement, which is craving after smooth things;
which desires the sentimental, the picturesque, the imaginative, but
turns with disgust from the solemn, the alarming, the awakening? Are
we not too gentle and courteous to mention such a word as 'hell'
to modern ears polite? Are we not too fearful to break in with the
thunders of a violated law upon those who are at ease in Zion? I do
not ask for a gross, revolting method of describing the punishment
of the wicked, as if the preacher delighted in harrowing up the
feelings of his audience. This is as disgusting as if, in order
to keep men from crime, our judges and magistrates were ever and
anon giving a minute detail of the process of an execution, and the
convulsive pangs of an expiring wretch suspended to the beam of the
gibbet. We ask not for a harsh, scolding, and denunciating style of
preaching; but we do want more of the unflinching boldness, and the
dauntless courage, which, are necessary to fidelity, and absolutely
essential to him who would win souls to Christ. It is too generally
forgotten, that our Lord Jesus, who was incarnate love, was the most
solemn and awful of all preachers. He whose gentle spirit so often
breathed out itself in invitation, and whose compassion melted into
tears, at other times robed himself in terror, and uttered the most
alarming peals of divine indignation. What we need for our ministry
is this mixture of tenderness and solemnity, which entered so deeply
into the ministry of Christ, and was so characteristic of his
servant, whose labors we this day commemorate and commend."
* * * * *
Hear also the Rev. John Glanville, the present successor of
Whitefield in the Tabernacle at Bristol: "And such preaching _must
continue_, if the world is to be saved. Nothing but this is suited
to man's necessities; nothing else can meet man's miseries. The
battle must be fought with the old, well-tried, but not worn-out
weapons. God has provided them, and we must use them. We require
nothing else; the world has not outgrown the old gospel, so as to
need something new to soothe its sorrows and satisfy its wants.
"Not that ministers can now produce the effect Whitefield did. He
was a man standing alone. The charm and power of his preaching
have never been explained. It was all fire and flame, shooting
out red-hot thunderbolts against the citadels of sin. It was an
undivided soul, solemnly consecrated to one object--an entire life,
zealously employed in one thing. As he preached, every feature
spoke, the whole man became vocal, and the truth of God stood out
in its full proportions and beauty, in the bright and broad daylight
of heaven. So unreserved was his self-consecration, that every thing
was deemed impertinent which obtruded upon, or interfered with the
one great end of his existence. He lived in communion with God--more
in heaven than on earth. He was much at the foot of the throne,
and got his strength there; he prevailed with men, because he had
prevailed with God. His whole soul was filled with life, and fired
with love, from being in habitual contact with the cross.
"And _we_ must pursue the same course, and try to do the same thing.
We have the power, and we must bring it forth and use it. God has
given the machinery, and it is for us to set it in motion. The
world is perishing, and we must save it; it is dying, and we must
give it life. God from his eternal throne calls us--Christ from his
bleeding cross speaks to us--voices from the abodes of sin, and the
regions of despair, sound in our ears. And we all, as ministers and
as members, must rise up in the vigor of piety and the fervor of
prayer. We must rise up from the slumbers of selfishness, and tear
off the fetters of the world, and act as those who believe in the
existence of an eternal heaven and an eternal hell, and that all
souls will be found in the one or in the other--as those who have a
great work to do, and but a short and uncertain time to do it in.
Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord; awake, as in the
ancient days, in the generations of old."
* * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.
Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as
printed.
Missing page numbers are page numbers that were not shown in the
original text.
Mismatched quotes are not fixed if it's not sufficiently clear where
the missing quote should be placed.
The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the
transcriber and is placed in the public domain.