Chapter XXVI · LAST DAYS ON EARTH. 1784–1785. (continued 2)

Human praise could not be higher than this; and yet even the Monthly Review, which had so often and so unjustly denounced the Methodists, in its notice of Wesley’s sermon, remarked:—

“Mr. Fletcher was one of the most considerable among the Methodist ministers of the Wesleyan division. We have long been acquainted with his good character; and we firmly believe that the high encomiums here passed on him were justly merited in their fullest extent.”^[642]

Scores of other eulogies have been written, but only four shall be added here, and these by persons who were well acquainted with the man of whom they speak.

The Rev. Joshua Gilpin’s elaborate biographical “Notes,” interspersed in Fletcher’s “Portrait of St. Paul,” are too numerous and lengthened to be introduced, but an extract from the last of them (the twenty-ninth) must be given:—

“On the day of Mr. Fletcher’s departure, as I was preparing to 568attend my own church, which was at the distance of nine miles from Madeley, I received a message from Mrs. Fletcher, requesting my immediate attendance at the vicarage. I instantly followed the messenger, and found Mr. Fletcher with every symptom of approaching dissolution upon him. I had ever looked up to this man of God with an extraordinary degree of affection and reverence; and, on this afflicting occasion, my heart was uncommonly affected and depressed. It was now in vain to recollect that public duty required my presence in another place. Unfitted for every duty, except that of silently watching the bed of death, I found it impossible to withdraw from the solemn scene. I had received from this evangelical teacher, in days that were past, many excellent precepts with respect to holy living; and now I desired to receive from him the last important lesson with respect to holy dying. And truly this concluding lesson was of inestimable worth, since so much patience and resignation, so much peace and composure, were scarcely ever discovered in the same circumstances before.

“While their pastor was breathing out his soul into the hands of a faithful Creator, his people were offering up their joint supplications on his behalf in the house of God. Little, however, was seen among them but affliction and tears.^[643] The whole village wore an air of consternation and sadness, and not one joyful song was heard among its inhabitants. Hasty messengers were passing to and fro with anxious enquiries and confused reports; and the members of every family sat together in silence that day, awaiting, with trembling expectation, the issue of every hour. After the conclusion of the evening service, several of the poor, who came from distant parts, and who were usually entertained under Mr. Fletcher’s roof, still lingered about the house, and seemed unable to tear themselves away from the place without a sight of their expiring pastor. Secretly informed of their desire, I obtained them the permission they wished; and the door of the chamber being set open, immediately before which Mr. Fletcher was sitting upright in his bed, with the curtains undrawn, they slowly moved, one by one, along the gallery, severally pausing as they passed by the door, and casting in a look of mingled supplication and anguish. It was, indeed, an affecting sight.

“And now the hour speedily approached that was to put a solemn termination to our hopes and fears. His weakness very perceptibly increased, but his countenance continued unaltered to the last. Mrs. 569Fletcher was kneeling by the side other departing husband, the medical attendant sat at his head, while I sorrowfully waited near his feet. Uncertain whether or not he was totally separated from us, we pressed nearer; but his warfare was accomplished, and the happy spirit had taken its everlasting flight.”

James Ireland, Esq., was one of Fletcher’s most loving and well-beloved friends. In an unpublished letter, addressed to Mrs. Fletcher, and dated “Brislington, November 6, 1785,” he says, Wesley had informed him he was about to write the “Life of Fletcher,” and had asked him to supply materials. In his reply, he had said, “I cannot assist you to write the life of my dear friend, though I have ever respected and honoured you.” Mr. Ireland adds, that whatever information he can furnish he will send to Mrs. Fletcher, and leave it to her to use as she thinks best. He then proceeds:—

“I have often felt that I would have divided my last shilling with Mr. Fletcher. We were once for months together, day and night; and when we parted, we both wept. Such a soul I never knew; such a great man, in every sense of the word. He was too great to bear the name of any sect. Mr. Townsend, with whom I lately parted, speaks of him as the greatest man that has lived in this century, and begs his life may not be penned in haste.”

In another unpublished letter, also addressed to Mrs. Fletcher, and dated “October 6, 1786,” Mr. Ireland wrote:—

“I never saw Mr. Fletcher’s equal. On him great grace was bestowed. What deadness to the world! What spiritual mindedness! What zeal for souls! What communion with God! What intercourse with heaven! What humility at the feet of Jesus! What moderation towards all men! What love for the poor! In short, he possessed the mind which was in Christ Jesus.”

“The Rev. Henry Venn, after reading Wesley’s “Life of Fletcher,” wrote as follows to Lady Mary Fitzgerald:—

“Yelling, March 3, 1787. Mr. Fletcher’s humility was so unfeigned and so deep, that when I thanked him for two sermons he had one day preached to my people at Huddersfield, he answered as no man ever did to me. With eyes and hands uplifted, he exclaimed, ‘Pardon, pardon, pardon, O my God!’ The words went to my very soul. Great grace was upon this blessed servant of Christ.

“Love to man and bowels of mercies displayed in him a noble imitation 570of his Incarnate God. He indeed thought a day lost, and could find no rest in his soul, unless he was doing good to the bodies and souls of men.

“Love to the Lord.—How did it govern and flourish in dear Mr. Fletcher! His admirable consort tells us, he scarcely was awake in the night a moment without lifting up his soul to God in holy aspirations.

“I have seen Mr. Fletcher, for six weeks together, under a hectic fever, sometimes spitting blood, when night after night he could rest very little—well pleased to suffer—never complaining, never but cheerful. Once, when I asked him how he did, ‘Oh!’ said he, ‘how light is the chastisement I suffer! How heavy the strokes I deserve! I love the rod of my heavenly Father!’ Like his Saviour, he could continue in prayer, in the wood, all night long; and, like Him, lie prostrate on the ground, pleading for grace to fulfil his ministry.”^[644]

Between Fletcher and Joseph Benson there was a most intimate and confidential friendship. Benson, in a letter to Wesley, wrote:—

“As to drawing the character of that great and good man, Mr. Fletcher, it is what I will not attempt. I have been looking over many of his letters, and observe in them all, what I have a thousand times observed in his conversation and behaviour, the plainest marks of every Christian grace and virtue.

“Perhaps, if he followed his Master more closely in one thing than another, it was in humility. He was constantly upon his guard lest any expression should drop, either from his lips or pen, which tended to make anyone think well of him; either on account of his family, or learning, or parts, or usefulness. He took as much pains to conceal his excellences, as others do to show theirs.

“He was a man of a serious spirit, one that stood at the utmost distance from levity of every kind. Though he was constantly cheerful, as rejoicing in hope of his heavenly inheritance, yet he had too deep a sense of his own wants, and the wants of the Church of God, as also of the sins and miseries of mankind, to be at any time light or trifling.

“In hungering and thirsting after righteousness, he was peculiarly worthy of our imitation. He never rested in anything he had either experienced or done in spiritual matters. He was a true Christian racer, always on the stretch for higher and better things. Though his attainments, both in experience and usefulness, were far above the common standard, yet the language of his conversation and behaviour always was, ‘Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfected; but I follow after, if by any means I may apprehend that for which I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.’ He had his eye upon a full 571conformity to the Son of God; or what the Apostle terms, ‘the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.’ Nor could he be satisfied with anything less.

“He was meek, like his Master, as well as lowly in heart. Not that he was so by nature, but of a fiery, passionate spirit; 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.^[645] And he did not want provocation, and that sometimes in a high degree; especially from those whose religious sentiments he thought it his duty to oppose. But none of these things moved him: no, not in the least degree. The keenest word he used was, ‘What a world, what a religious world we live in!’ I have often thought the testimony, that Bishop Burnet bears of Archbishop Leighton, might be borne of him with equal propriety: ‘After an intimate acquaintance of many years, and after being with him by night and by day, at home and abroad, in public and in private, on sundry occasions and in various affairs,—I must say, I never heard an idle word drop from his lips, nor any conversation which was not to the use of edifying. I never saw him in any temper, in which I myself would not have wished to be found at death.’ Any one, who has been intimately acquainted with Mr. Fletcher, will say the same of him: and they who knew him best will say it with the most assurance.

“Hence arose his readiness to bear with the weaknesses, and forgive the faults of others: which was the more remarkable, considering his flaming zeal against sin, and his concern for the glory of God. Such hatred to sin, and such love to the sinner, I never saw joined together before.

“He never mentioned the faults of an absent person, unless absolute duty required it. And then he spoke with the utmost tenderness, extenuating, rather than aggravating. None could draw his picture more exactly than St. Paul has done, in the thirteenth chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians. ‘He suffered long and was kind; he envied not; acted not rashly; was not puffed up; did not behave himself unseemly; sought not his own; was not easily provoked; he thought no evil; rejoiced not in iniquity, but rejoiced in the truth; he covered all things; believed all things; hoped all things; and endured all things.’ It would be easy to enlarge on all these particulars, and show how they were exemplified in him; but, waiving this, I would only observe, that, with regard to two of them, kindness to others, and not seeking his own, he had few equals.

“His kindness to others was such, that he bestowed his all upon them: his time, his talents, his substance. His knowledge, his eloquence, his health, his money, were employed, day by day, for the good 572of mankind. He prayed, he wrote, he preached, he visited the sick and well, he conversed, he gave, he laboured, he suffered, winter and summer, night and day: he endangered, nay, destroyed his health, and in the end gave his life also for the profit of his neighbours, that they might be saved from everlasting death. He denied himself even of such food as was necessary for him, that he might have to give to them that had none. And when he was constrained to change his manner of living, still his diet was plain and simple. And so were his clothing and furniture, that he might save all that was possible for his poor neighbours.

“He sought not his own in any sense: not his own honour, but the honour of God, in all he said or did. He sought not his own interest, but the interest of his Lord, spreading knowledge, holiness, and happiness, as far as he possibly could. He sought not his own pleasure, but studied to ‘please all men, for their good to edification;’ and to please Him that had called him to His kingdom and glory.

“But I do not attempt his full character. I will only add, ‘He was blameless and harmless, a son of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation: shining among them as a light in the world.’”

Both Wesley and Benson insert this eulogium in their lives of Fletcher; but Wesley adds:—

“I think one talent wherewith God had endued Mr. Fletcher has not been sufficiently noted yet. I mean his courtesy; in which there was not the least touch either of art or affectation. It was pure and genuine, and sweetly constrained him to behave to everyone (although particularly to inferiors), in a manner not to be described: with so inexpressible a mixture of humility, love, and respect. This directed his words, the tone of his voice, his looks, his whole attitude, his every motion.

“‘Grace was in all his steps, heaven in his eye,

In all his gestures sanctity and love.’”

The entry of Fletcher’s death, in the register of Madeley parish church, is a brief obituary:—

“Memorandum.

“John Fletcher, Clerk, died on Sunday evening, August 14, 1785. He was one of the most apostolic men of the age in which he lived. His abilities were extraordinary, and his labours were unparalleled. He was a burning and shining light; and as his life had been a common blessing to the inhabitants of this parish, so the death of this great man was lamented by them as a common and irreparable loss.

“This little testimony was inserted by one who sincerely loved and honoured him.

“Joshua Gilpin, Vicar of Rockwardine.”

573The inscription on his tombstone was written by his widow, and is as follows^[646]:—

“Here lies the Body of

THE REV. JOHN WILLIAM DE LA FLECHERE,

Vicar of Madeley,

Who was born at Nyon, in Switzerland,

September the 12th, 1729,

And finished his course, August the 14th, 1785,

In this Village;

where his unexampled labours

will long be remembered.

He exercised his Ministry for the space of

Twenty-five Years,

In this Parish,

with uncommon zeal and ability.

MANY BELIEVED HIS REPORT, AND BECAME

HIS JOY AND CROWN OF REJOICING;

WHILE OTHERS CONSTRAINED HIM TO TAKE UP

THE LAMENTATION OF THE PROPHET,

‘ALL THE DAY LONG HAVE I STRETCHED OUT MY HANDS

UNTO A DISOBEDIENT AND GAINSAYING PEOPLE:

YET SURELY MY JUDGMENT IS WITH THE LORD,

AND MY WORK WITH MY GOD.’

“‘He being dead, yet speaketh.’”

Another monument of Fletcher must be mentioned, erected in Methodism’s “Westminster Abbey”—the sacred old chapel in City Road, London. It is placed on the right-hand side of the communion table, immediately under a monument of Wesley. The sculpture at the top of it is a representation of the Ark of the Covenant. At one side are volumes, inscribed with the words, “Checks,” and “Portrait of St. Paul.” At the other side 574is an expanded scroll, with the motto, “With the meekness of wisdom.” At the bottom is a dove, hovering over pens and a roll of paper. The inscription on the tablet, composed by the Rev. Richard Watson,^[647] is as follows:—

“Sacred to the Memory of

THE REV. JOHN WILLIAM DE LA FLECHERE,

Vicar of Madeley in Shropshire;

Born at Nyon, in Switzerland, the xii. of September,

A.D. MDCCXXIX; Died the XIV. of August, MDCCLXXXV.

A MAN EMINENT FOR GENIUS, ELOQUENCE, AND THEOLOGICAL LEARNING;

STILL MORE DISTINGUISHED FOR SANCTITY OF MANNERS, AND THE VIRTUES OF PRIMITIVE

CHRISTIANITY.

ADORNED WITH ‘WHATSOEVER THINGS ARE PURE, WHATSOEVER THINGS ARE LOVELY,’

AND BRINGING FORTH ‘THE FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT,’ IN SINGULAR RICHNESS AND MATURITY.

THE MEASURE OF EVERY OTHER GRACE IN HIM WAS EXCEEDED BY HIS DEEP AND UNAFFECTED

HUMILITY.

OF ENLARGED VIEWS AS TO THE MERIT OF THE ATONEMENT,

AND OF THOSE GRACIOUS RIGHTS WITH WHICH IT INVESTS ALL WHO BELIEVE,

HE HAD ‘BOLDNESS TO ENTER INTO THE HOLIEST BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS,’

AND IN REVERENT AND TRANSPORTING CONTEMPLATIONS,—THE HABIT OF HIS DEVOUT AND

HALLOWED SPIRIT,—

THERE DWELT AS BENEATH THE WINGS OF THE CHERUBIM,

BEHOLDING ‘THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE FACE OF JESUS CHRIST,’ AND WAS ‘CHANGED INTO

THE SAME IMAGE;’

TEACHING BY HIS OWN ATTAINMENTS, MORE THAN EVEN BY HIS WRITINGS, THE FULNESS OF

EVANGELICAL PROMISES,

AND WITH WHAT INTIMACY OF COMMUNION MAN MAY WALK WITH GOD.

HE WAS THE FRIEND AND COADJUTOR OF THE REV. JOHN WESLEY,

WHOSE APOSTOLIC VIEWS OF THE DOCTRINES OF GENERAL REDEMPTION, JUSTIFICATION BY

FAITH, AND CHRISTIAN PERFECTION, HE SUCCESSFULLY DEFENDED,

LEAVING TO FUTURE AGES AN ABLE EXPOSITION OF ‘THE TRUTH WHICH IS ACCORDING TO

GODLINESS,’

AND ERECTING AN IMPREGNABLE RAMPART AGAINST PHARISAIC AND ANTINOMIAN ERROR,

IN A SERIES OF WORKS, DISTINGUISHED BY THE BEAUTY OF THEIR STYLE, BY FORCE OF

ARGUMENT,

AND BY A GENTLE AND CATHOLIC SPIRIT; AFFORDING AN EDIFYING EXAMPLE OF ‘SPEAKING

THE TRUTH IN LOVE,’

IN A LONG AND ARDENT CONTROVERSY.

FOR TWENTY-FIVE YEARS, THE PARISH OF MADELEY WAS THE SCENE OF HIS UNEXAMPLED

PASTORAL LABOURS;

AND HE WAS THERE INTERRED, AMIDST THE TEARS AND LAMENTATIONS OF THOUSANDS,

THE TESTIMONY OF THEIR HEARTS TO HIS EXALTED PIETY, AND TO HIS UNWEARIED EXERTIONS

FOR THEIR SALVATION:

BUT HIS MEMORY TRIUMPHED OVER DEATH;

AND HIS SAINTLY EXAMPLE EXERTS INCREASING INFLUENCE IN THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST,

THROUGH THE STUDY OF HIS WRITINGS, AND THE PUBLICATION OF HIS BIOGRAPHY.

IN TOKEN OF THEIR VENERATION FOR HIS CHARACTER,

AND IN GRATITUDE FOR THE SERVICES RENDERED BY HIM TO THE CAUSE OF TRUTH,

THIS MONUMENT WAS ERECTED BY THE TRUSTEES OF THIS CHAPEL, A.D. MDCCCXXII.”

575No wonder that Wesley desired and requested Fletcher to be his successor; and no wonder that, while among his numerous publications there is only one biography written by himself, that conspicuous exception is “A Short Account of the Life and Death of the Rev. John Fletcher.“

Fletcher was distinguished for his genius; his learning; and his biblical and theological knowledge; but let all Methodists, throughout the world and as long as Methodism lasts, remember, in all their church-meetings and church-appointments, that “Wesley’s Designated Successor” was pre-eminently,—“A Good Man, and Full of the Holy Ghost and of Faith.”

THE END

Hazell, Watson, and Viney, Printers, London and Aylesbury.

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