Curtis A. Weyant, Charles Franks, and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team.
[Illustration: John Fletcher]
FLETCHER OF MADELEY
BY BRIGADIER MARGARET ALLEN
THE SALVATION ARMY PRINTING WORKS,
ST. ALBANS.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
I. AT THE CASTLE
II. IN THE MANOR HOUSE
III. EARLY ADVENTURES
IV. A SWEET GIRLHOOD
V. A NEW LIFE
VI. GIVEN UP TO THE FIGHT
VII. TURNED FROM HOME
VIII. THE TERN HALL TUTOR
IX. THE VICAR OF MADELEY
X. AN ALARMED PARISH
XI. THE VICAR'S SERMONS
XII. SCANTY ENCOURAGEMENTS
XIII. THE ORPHAN HOME
XIV. A SEEKER AFTER GOD
XV. SANCTIFIED LETTER-WRITING
XVI. AN UNFORTUNATE PURCHASE
XVII. THE COLLEGE OF TREVECCA
XVIII. A PEN OF POWER
XIX. FAILING HEALTH
XX. BY THE SHORES OF LAKE LEMAN
XXI. A WONDERFUL WEDDING
XXII. LIFE AT MADELEY
XXIII. "GOD IS LOVE!"
XXIV. EXTRACTS FROM FLETCHER'S LETTERS
XXV. EXTRACTS FROM FLETCHER'S WRITINGS
INTRODUCTION.
BY COMMISSIONER RAILTON.
There is a great difference between a red-hot man and a Red-hot
Library book. We have no desire at all to pander to the common idea of
our day that "it does not matter what you belong to," by any of these
books. Very little reflection will show anyone the immeasurable
distance between the sort of clergyman this book describes and the
mere leader of formalities holding a similar position in these days of
ease and self-satisfaction.
John Fletcher was a marvel, if viewed only on his bodily side. At a
time when clergymen had far more opportunity than they have even
to-day to retire into their own houses and do nothing for the world, he
pressed forward, in spite of an almost dying body, to work for God
daily, in the most devoted manner. That he was able to continue his
labours so long was simply by God's wonder-working mercy. We cannot
judge him because he remained in the strange position (for anyone who
cares about God or souls) in which he was found. No other sphere was
perhaps possible for him at that time. It must not, however, for that
reason be imagined that the Salvationist can conceive of a red-hot
life mixed with the reading of prayers out of a book, or the teaching
of any poor soul to turn to such heathenish folly.
We can gladly take whatever is red-hot out of such a life without
allowing ourselves to be poisoned in any respect whilst so doing. But
it seems necessary, at the very outset, to call attention to this,
lest at any time it should be argued that, after all, the Salvationist
life is no better, in our opinion, than the stiffest and most formal
specimen of Christianity.
About this fervent soul, whose wife was one of the few preaching women
of her century, there could have been little voluntary formality, and
if he was able to exist amidst the framing that others had set up for
him, it may be an encouragement to anyone who is shut out for a time
from the free, happy worship that God desires, and left with no
alternative but to be content with "Divine services" where God's
wishes are too often made of no effect by the arrangement of man.
But what will be the Salvationist's condemnation if, with all the
opportunities he has to cultivate the utmost freedom in prayer and
service, he never attains to that intimacy with God, that delight in
communion with Him, that power to force others into God's presence,
which John Fletcher's life discloses to us?
The mere thought of Fletcher, if you read these pages carefully, will
ever bring back to you an impression of nearness to God and
companionship with Him which is scarcely conceived of in our day
amongst the majority of those who ought to lead men to the Father. Do
not let us excuse ourselves for any lack of that communion which must
be His continual delight. If we prjde ourselves upon our repudiation
of forms of worship that men have invented, and glory in the
manifestations of Christ at the street corner and in the public-house,
to which we have become accustomed, let us take care that we do not
grieve Him by contentment with the general action of The Army or of
the Corps, or of the Brigade, in the absence of any close contact
between our own souls and God or the lost.
This book will be useless unless it brings us continually right up to
the personal questions which it is so eminently calculated to raise:
Am I on such terms with God as this man was? Can He equally reckon
upon my continual obedience and faithfulness? Is He sure to hear and
answer me also? Do I share with Him that agony for souls, that
inexhaustible pity and love which will never let one perish, for whom,
by any extremity of sacrifice, I can do anything? Do I breathe out the
breath of God upon those with whom I come in contact, making the world
feel that I have no harmony with any of its aims or inclinations, but
that I really belong to Heaven?
By inference, rather than directly, this life is a tremendous
confirmation of the old faith. John Fletcher gained all he had because
he believed the Bible just as it stands. He knew from his own
experience and from daily intercourse with Him that the promises it
contains come direct from the mouth of God, and not from the "sublime
imagination" of some Jew poet, as the contemptible deceivers of our
day would have us believe. If there were any delusion about that old
Book, then John Fletcher was one of the most pitiful specimens of a
degraded superstition this world ever contained. But where, amongst
all the applauded doubt-preachers of our day, is there to be found a
man of love and prayer and power approaching to this one?
Do not let us be discouraged as to the possibility of a life as holy
as this amidst the circumstances of our rushing warfare. John Fletcher
was, after all, only a thorough disciple of Him who had not where to
lay His head. None of us are called to live amidst denser crowds, more
hurry, worry, or contention of any sort than was the daily lot of our
Heavenly Master. This book would draw us farther from Him, not nearer,
if it only made us thirst for retirement and stillness, for hours of
meditation or privacy. It is, not the imitation of Fletcher, but the
imitation of Christ to which these pages are meant to call us. Most of
us may never possess many of the charming traits of this most refined
gentleman. We may perhaps suit God's purposes amidst the rough crowd
all the better for that. But, depend upon it, close intercourse with
the Nazarene is as possible amidst the throngs of London, or Glasgow,
or New York, or Madras, as it was in the alleys of Jerusalem or
Capernaum, and intimacy with Jesus is, after all, the one thing
needful for every disciple.
But whoever is red-hot will ceaselessly be thinking and planning for
the worst; that is to say, not only for those commonly called the
worst, whose wild career of sin strikes all decent people with horror,
but for the far more seriously in danger, who turn their very religion
into a form or an amusement, and care nothing for any real intercourse
with God. These are the people perhaps most difficult of all to get
at, the people whom we shall never be likely to make any impression
upon unless we combine with the greatest possible activity an
intensity of spiritual heat and power of which we suppose Fletcher was
one of the grandest specimens the world ever had. Do not let us resent
or run away from any reproach as to our own comparative coldness and
inefficiency which this story may bring to us. How much better to
writhe and be aroused under any such reproofs now than only to awake
to them when life is slipping away! Alas! for the readers who shall
close this book without resolving to be as holy and useful as God
commands us all to be!
LONDON, _April_, 1905.
THE LIFE OF JOHN FLETCHER.
CHAPTER I.
AT THE CASTLE
In the nursery of a fine old Swiss castle, on the shores of Lake
Leman, stood a small boy of seven, confronted by his white-capped
nurse.
"You are a naughty boy!" she exclaimed. "Do you not know that the
devil is to take away all naughty children?"
The little fellow opened wide his clear, truthful eyes, into which
there crept a deepening look of trouble--trouble rather than fear; big
tears rolled down his pinafore, and when tucked away for the night,
Jean Guillaume De La Fléchère crept out of his cosy cot, sank upon his
knees, and began the first real prayer of his life: "O God, forgive
me!" Nor would he be interrupted until the inward sense of pardon
comforted his sorrowing little heart. Many years later he described
this time as the shedding abroad of the love of God within him.
Colonel De La Fléchère's family mansion commanded as fine a view of
Swiss scenery as could be found in the neighbourhood. "Hill and dale,
vineyards and pastures, stretched right away to the distant Jura
mountains. At a few paces from the château was a terrace overlooking
Lake Leman, with its clear blue waters and its gracefully curved and
richly-wooded bays. On the right hand, at a distance of fifteen miles,
was Geneva, the cradle of the Reformation in Switzerland; on the left,
Lausanne and the celebrated Castle of Chillon. High up in the heavens
were Alpine peaks, embosoming scenes the most beautiful; and not far
away was Mont Blanc, 'robed in perpetual and unsullied snow.'"
(Tyerman.)
In this earthly paradise the little Jean received his first
unconscious training, breathing not only the clear mountain air into
his lungs, but a no less important atmosphere of refinement, of
culture, and of nobility into his mental and moral being.
He was devoted to his mother, who could never say he wilfully
disobeyed her. One day, however, she deemed him lacking in reverence
for her, because, when rebuking a member of the family over-sharply,
John turned upon her a long look of evident reproof. She promptly
boxed his ears, but was more than mollified when the boy lifted his
clear eyes to hers, brimful of tenderness, and said simply, "Mother,
when I am smitten on one cheek, and especially by a hand I love so
well, I am taught to turn the other also."
It was not priggishness, but submissive affection, and she read it
aright.