The Vicar's Sermons.
The Vicar of Madeley led no idle life. He started Friday evening
lectures; on Sunday afternoon he catechised the school-children, spent
many hours of every day in visiting the sick and poor, and hesitated
not at all to sit up whole nights with any who lacked attention. To
the careless landowners and farmers whom he failed to get into his
church he addressed the first of his published sermons, with a preface
which urged them to _read_ his message if they would not listen
to it.
With Fletcher there was no preaching against the absent wrong-doer, no
haranguing evil in the abstract, but there was never lacking a
definite and personal denouncement of present and personal sin. One
tremendous word loomed large before his hearers, nor could any
misunderstand when he talked about SIN, and the arousing thought was
pressed ever closer to them by his pointed use of the word YOU. Here
is an example:--
"Did you ever make a prey of the poor and helpless? Are you like the
horse-leech, ever crying, 'Give, give!' still wanting more profit, and
never thinking you have enough? Do you take more care to heap up
treasure on earth than in Heaven? Have you got the unhappy secret of
distilling silver out of the poor man's brow, and gold out of the
tears of helpless widows and friendless orphans? Or, which is rather
worse, do you, directly or indirectly, live by poisoning others, by
encouraging the immoderate use of those refreshments which, if taken
to excess, disorder the reason, ruin the soul, and prove no better
than slow poison to the body? If your business calls you to buy or
sell, do you use falsehoods? do you equivocate? do you exaggerate or
conceal the truth in order to impose upon your neighbour, and make a
profit of his necessity or credulity? If any of these marks be upon
you, God's word singles you out and drags you to the bar of Divine
justice to hear your doom in the text, '_The wicked shall surely
die_.' Oh, see your danger; repent and make restitution! Why should
you meet the unjust steward in Hell, when you may yet follow Zacchaeus
into Heaven?...
"Perhaps your conscience bears you witness that you are not a swearing
Christian, or rather a swearing infidel. Well, but are you clear in
the point of adultery, fornication, or uncleanness? Does not the guilt
of some vile sin, which you have wickedly indulged in time past, and
perhaps are still indulging, mark you for the member of a harlot, and
not the member of Christ? Do you not kindle the wrath of Heaven
against yourself and your country, as the men and women of Gomorrah
did against themselves and the other cities of the plain? If you
cherish the sparks of wantonness, as they did, how can you but be made
with them to suffer the vengeance of eternal fire? Do not flatter
yourselves with the vain hope that your sin is not so heinous as
theirs. If it be less in degree, is it not infinitely greater in its
aggravating circumstances? Were these poor Canaanites _Christians_?
Had they Bibles and ministers? Had they sermons and sacraments? Did
they ever vow, as you have done, to renounce the devil and all sinful
lusts of the flesh? Did they ever hear of the Son of God sweating
great drops of blood, in an agony of prayer, to quench the fire of
human corruption? Oh, acknowledge your guilt and danger, and by
deep repentance prevent infallible destruction!"
Faithful and fearless utterances such as these made him famous, but
not popular: inconsistent professors resented them deeply; open
sinners raged at the unsparing denunciations which they could not fail
to appropriate, yet out of the latter class came some of Fletcher's
best and most encouraging converts.
Much of his success in getting men to listen to unpalatable truths lay
in his gentleness of manner and rare humility of mind, but "gentlest
of human beings" as he has been described, he had the courage of a
lion in fight, and for his Master's sake he knew no palliation of
unrighteousness, even though his truth-telling made the bitterest of
enemies.
_By nature_ Fletcher was not a meek man; he had "a fiery
passionate spirit," says one of his biographers, "insomuch that he has
frequently thrown himself on the floor, and lain there most of the
night bathed in tears, imploring victory over his own temper. And he
did obtain the victory, in a very eminent degree. For twenty years and
upwards before his death no one ever saw him out of temper, or heard
him utter a rash expression on any provocation whatever.... I never
saw him in any temper in which I myself would not have wished to be
found at death."
A friend who lived for some time in his house writes thus:--
"His enemies wrested his words, misrepresented his actions, and cast
out his name as evil; but whether he was insulted in his person or
injured in his property; whether he was attacked with open abuse or
pursued with secret calumny, he walked amid the most violent assaults
of his enemies, as a man invulnerable, and while his firmness
discovered that he was unhurt, his forbearance testified that he was
unoffended."
To a man with talents trained as were his, with a power of expression
which could melt into uncommon eloquence when he chose, with learning
to illuminate, judgment to balance his effects, and extreme quickness
of perception to adapt illustration and appeal to any audience,
Fletcher might have made for himself a mighty name. Instead of this,
"his design was to _convert_ and not to _captivate_ his
hearers; to secure their eternal interests, and not to obtain their
momentary applause.... He spake as in the presence of God, and taught
as one having Divine authority. There was an energy in his preaching
that was irresistible. His subjects, his language, his gestures, the
tone of his voice, and the turn of his countenance, all conspired to
fix the attention and affect the heart. Without aiming at sublimity,
he was truly sublime, and uncommonly eloquent without affecting the
orator."