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PREFACE.
PREFACE.
“Jean Guillaume de la Flechere,” wrote Robert Southey, “was a man of rare talents, and rarer virtue. No age or country has ever produced a man of more fervent piety, or more perfect charity; no Church has ever possessed a more apostolic minister. He was a man of whom Methodism may well be proud, as the most able of its defenders; and whom the Church of England may hold in remembrance, as one of the most pious and excellent of her sons.” “Fletcher was a saint,” said Isaac Taylor, “as unearthly a
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INTRODUCTION.
INTRODUCTION.
EIGHTEEN years before his death, Wesley wrote the following letter to Fletcher, Vicar of Madeley— “ Dear Sir ,—What an amazing work has God wrought in these kingdoms, in less than forty years! And it not only continues, but increases, throughout England, Scotland, and Ireland; nay, it has lately spread into New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, and Carolina. But the wise men of the world say, ‘When Mr. Wesley drops, then all this is at an end!’ And so it surely will, unless, before God cal
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CHAPTER I. FROM FLETCHER’S BIRTH TO HIS COMING TO ENGLAND IN 1752.
CHAPTER I. FROM FLETCHER’S BIRTH TO HIS COMING TO ENGLAND IN 1752.
JEAN GUILLAUME DE LA FLECHÈRE was a descendant of one of the most respectable families in Switzerland; a family, in fact, which was a branch of an earldom of Savoy. After his marriage, Fletcher’s wife found in his desk a seal. “Is this yours?” she asked. “Yes,” replied the poor country parson; “but I have not used it for many years.” “Why?” “Because it bears a coronet, nearly such as is the insignia of your English dukes. Were I to use that seal, it might lead to frivolous inquiries about my fam
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CHAPTER II. FROM HIS COMING TO ENGLAND TO HIS ORDINATION. 1752 to 1757.
CHAPTER II. FROM HIS COMING TO ENGLAND TO HIS ORDINATION. 1752 to 1757.
AFTER the frustration of his hopes in Flanders, Fletcher, accompanied by other young gentlemen, embarked for England, for the purpose of acquiring the English language. At the Custom House in London they were treated with the utmost surliness. Of course their portmanteaus were examined,—never a pleasant operation, but sometimes less politely done than at others. In addition to this, their letters of recommendation were taken from them, on the alleged ground that “all letters must be sent by post
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CHAPTER III. FROM HIS ORDINATION TO HIS SETTLEMENT AT MADELEY. 1757 TO 1760.
CHAPTER III. FROM HIS ORDINATION TO HIS SETTLEMENT AT MADELEY. 1757 TO 1760.
FOR three years after his ordination, Fletcher was without a Church appointment. How did he spend this interval? Wesley says:— “He was now doubly diligent in preaching, not only in the chapels at West Street and Spitalfields, but wherever the providence of God opened a door to proclaim the everlasting Gospel. This he did frequently in French (as well as in English), of which all judges allowed him to be a complete master.” [20] As might be expected, Fletcher soon became a great favourite among t
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CHAPTER IV. FIRST TWO YEARS AT MADELEY. FROM OCTOBER 17, 1760, TO NOVEMBER 22, 1762.
CHAPTER IV. FIRST TWO YEARS AT MADELEY. FROM OCTOBER 17, 1760, TO NOVEMBER 22, 1762.
ALMOST of necessity, the life of a clergyman in a small country town is an uneventful and quiet one; and, therefore, the first ten years that Fletcher spent at Madeley were unmarked by stirring incidents, such as were perpetually occurring in the lives of his friends Wesley and Whitefield. Madeley is a market town in the county of Salop. It is beautifully situated in a winding glen, through which the river Severn flows. In 1800, fifteen years after Fletcher’s death, it contained, according to th
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CHAPTER V. THREE QUIET, SUCCESSFUL YEARS. 1762–1765.
CHAPTER V. THREE QUIET, SUCCESSFUL YEARS. 1762–1765.
IN the autumn of 1762 Methodism in London was in perilous confusion. Two years before, Wesley had appointed Thomas Maxfield, one of his first preachers, to meet a select band, who professed to be entirely sanctified. Some of the members of this band soon had dreams, visions and impressions, as they thought, from God; and Maxfield, instead of repressing their whimsies, encouraged them, so that their vagaries were soon regarded as proofs of the highest state of grace. Some of the preachers rebuked
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CHAPTER VI. TWO YEARS MORE. 1766 AND 1767.
CHAPTER VI. TWO YEARS MORE. 1766 AND 1767.
FLETCHER began the year 1766 in mournfulness, and yet full of love and loyalty to Christ. In a letter to Miss Hatton, he wrote:— “ Madam ,—This evening I have buried one of the warmest opposers of my ministry—a stout, strong young man, aged twenty-four years. About three months ago, he came to the churchyard with a corpse, but refused to come into the church. When the burial was over, I went to him, and mildly expostulated with him. His constant answer was, that he had bound himself never to com
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CHAPTER VII. TREVECCA COLLEGE: VISIT TO SWITZERLAND, ETC. FROM JANUARY 3, 1768, TO JULY 1770.
CHAPTER VII. TREVECCA COLLEGE: VISIT TO SWITZERLAND, ETC. FROM JANUARY 3, 1768, TO JULY 1770.
IN Fletcher’s letter to Lady Huntingdon, dated November 24, 1767, it is intimated that the Countess had suggested to Fletcher that a certain “Mr. Eastwood” could serve him as his village schoolmaster, and was anxious to do so, in order to have the benefit of Fletcher’s ministry. There can be no doubt that the name “Eastwood” is a mistake, and that “Easterbrook” was meant. Joseph Easterbrook was a son of the bell-man of Bristol, and had been educated at Wesley’s Kingswood School. [149] He was now
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CHAPTER VIII. COMMENCEMENT OF THE CALVINIAN CONTROVERSY. 1770 AND 1771.
CHAPTER VIII. COMMENCEMENT OF THE CALVINIAN CONTROVERSY. 1770 AND 1771.
DURING his absence from England, Fletcher wrote several letters to the masters and students of the Countess of Huntingdon’s College at Trevecca; [205] but none of these have been published, and, probably, none of them now exist. Immediately after his return, and before he had an opportunity of visiting the College, he indited the following remarkable epistle:— “To the masters and students of Lady Huntingdon’s College. “Grace, mercy, and peace attend you, my dear brethren, from God our Father, an
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CHAPTER IX. SECOND CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM 1771.
CHAPTER IX. SECOND CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM 1771.
WESLEY’S “Minutes” and Shirley’s “Circular Letter” created a commotion. The Rev. Walter Sellon had recently published his “Church of England Vindicated from the Charge of Absolute Predestination; as it is stated and asserted by the Translator of Jerome Zanchius” [Toplady] “in his Letter to the Rev. Dr. Nowell. Together with some Animadversions on his Translation of Zanchius, his Letter to the Rev. Mr. John Wesley, and his Sermon on 1 Tim. i. 10.” This not over-courteous publication was reviewed
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CHAPTER X. “THIRD CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1772.
CHAPTER X. “THIRD CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1772.
WHEN Fletcher finished his “Second Check to Antinomianism,” in “Three Letters” to Walter Shirley, he began a “Vindication of the Doctrine of Christian Perfection.” This, however, for a time, was laid aside; but was afterwards completed, and embodied in his “Last Check to Antinomianism.” The reason for this postponement was a somewhat sudden determination to write upon the Unitarian Controversy, which was now as prominent as the Calvinian one. A brief biographical episode will explain the matter
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CHAPTER XI. “FOURTH CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1772.
CHAPTER XI. “FOURTH CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1772.
THE issue of Fletcher’s “Third Check” was immediately followed by “A Review of all the Doctrines taught by the Rev. Mr. John Wesley; containing a full and particular Answer to a Book entitled, ‘A Second Check to Antinomianism. In Six Letters, to the Author of that Book. Wherein the Doctrines of a Twofold Justification, Free-Will, Man’s Merit, Sinless Perfection, Finished Salvation, and Real Antinomianism are particularly discussed; and the Puritan Divines vindicated from the Charges brought agai
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CHAPTER XII. “APPEAL“APPEAL TO MATTER OF FACT AND COMMON SENSE.” 1772.
CHAPTER XII. “APPEAL“APPEAL TO MATTER OF FACT AND COMMON SENSE.” 1772.
THE present chapter is a somewhat inconvenient break in the history of the Calvinian controversy; but in maintaining chronological order, the inconvenience cannot be avoided. Fletcher’s “Fourth Check to Antinomianism” was finished on November 15, 1772, and was published before the year was terminated. On a fly-leaf at the end of the first edition the following advertisement was printed:— “In a few days will be published, price two shillings, by the same author, ‘An Appeal to Matter of Fact and C
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CHAPTER XIII. WESLEY’S DESIGNATED SUCCESSOR: THE PENITENT THIEF: A DREADFUL PHENOMENON, ETC., ETC. 1773.
CHAPTER XIII. WESLEY’S DESIGNATED SUCCESSOR: THE PENITENT THIEF: A DREADFUL PHENOMENON, ETC., ETC. 1773.
TO preserve chronological order, another chapter must be interjected before the history of the Calvinian controversy is resumed. In the month of January, 1773, Wesley sent to Fletcher the remarkable letter with which the present work commences. He wished Fletcher to relinquish his vicarage, and to put himself into training to become, after Wesley’s death, the “ωροεστως” of the Methodists. Wesley’s health, apparently, was failing. He was full of anxiety. “The body of the preachers,” he wrote, “ar
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CHAPTER XIV.“THE FINISHING STROKE,” “THE CHRISTIAN WORLD UNMASKED,” “MR. RICHARD HILL’S THREE LETTERS.” 1773.
CHAPTER XIV.“THE FINISHING STROKE,” “THE CHRISTIAN WORLD UNMASKED,” “MR. RICHARD HILL’S THREE LETTERS.” 1773.
AFTER this long and awkward interruption, there must now be a return to the wearisome Calvinian controversy. Early in the year 1773, Mr. Richard Hill published an 8vo. pamphlet of 57 pages, with the title, “The Finishing Stroke: containing some Strictures on the Rev. Mr. Fletcher’s Pamphlet, entitled Logica Genevensis, or a Fourth Check to Antinomianism.” “The Finishing Stroke!” remarked the Monthly Review for March, 1773. “No—we are afraid not! We shall certainly have more last words from Shrop
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CHAPTER XV. “FIFTH CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1774.
CHAPTER XV. “FIFTH CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM.” 1774.
IN a characteristic letter addressed to Ambrose Serle, Esq., and dated “January 11, 1774,” Augustus Toplady observed:— “Mr. Fletcher may fire off as soon as he pleases. The weapons of his warfare can never wound the truths of God, any more than a handful of feathers can batter down my church tower. I shall, however, be glad to see his performance when it appears. Mr. Shirley told me, when I was last at Bath, that Fletcher is to succeed Pope Wesley, as commander-in-chief of the Societies, if he s
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CHAPTER XVI. FURTHER PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1774.
CHAPTER XVI. FURTHER PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1774.
IN Lloyd’s Evening Post for March 2, 1774, there appeared the following advertisement:— “ In the Press. An Equal Check to Pharisaism and Antinomianism; and the Scripture Scales to weigh Gospel Truth; both by the Rev. Mr. John Fletcher, Vicar of Madeley, Shropshire.” “ The Scripture Scales ,” however, were published separately, and not until the year was ending. First of all, Fletcher issued a 12mo. volume of 264 pages, entitled, “The First Part of an Equal Check to Pharisaism and Antinomianism,
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CHAPTER XVII.PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1775.
CHAPTER XVII.PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1775.
ON November 12, 1774, Fletcher wrote:— “The author of the ‘ Checks ’ has promised to his readers an answer to the Rev. Mr. Toplady’s piece, entitled, ‘ More Work for Mr. Wesley .’ [314] His reason for postponing the finishing of that part of his ‘ Logica Genevensis ’ was the importance of the ‘ Equal Check ,’ which closes the controversy with Mr. Hill. He saw life so uncertain, that, of two things which he was obliged to do, he thought it his duty to set about that which appeared to him the more
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CHAPTER XVIII. PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1776.
CHAPTER XVIII. PUBLICATIONS IN THE YEAR 1776.
EXCEPT his posthumous works, the remainder of Fletcher’s writings were issued during the next two years, 1776 and 1777. These will be briefly noticed in the present chapter. During the last four years, his antagonists had been Walter Shirley, Richard Hill, Rowland Hill, and John Berridge. Now he encountered three others—Augustus Montague Toplady, the well-known Vicar of Broad Hembury, in Devonshire; Caleb Evans, an eminent Baptist minister at Bristol; and, in connection with Mr. Evans, the celeb
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CHAPTER XIX. CORRESPONDENCE IN 1776.
CHAPTER XIX. CORRESPONDENCE IN 1776.
FLETCHER’S health was failing; and no wonder. Wesley writes:— “He was more and more abundant in his ministerial labours, both in public and private; not contenting himself with preaching, but visiting his flock in every corner of his parish. And this work he attended to early and late, whether the weather was fair or foul; regarding neither heat nor cold, rain nor snow, whether he was on horseback or on foot. But this further weakened his constitution; which was still more effectually done by hi
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CHAPTER XX. PUBLICATIONS AND CORRESPONDENCE IN 1777.
CHAPTER XX. PUBLICATIONS AND CORRESPONDENCE IN 1777.
IN the year 1777, Fletcher terminated his controversy with the Calvinists. He wrote:— “To the best of my knowledge, I have not fixed one consequence upon the principles of my opponents, which does not fairly and necessarily flow from their doctrine. And I have endeavoured to do justice to their piety, declaring, again and again, my full persuasion that they abhor such consequences.” His publications, in 1777, were the following:— 1. “The Doctrines of Grace and Justice equally essential to the pu
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CHAPTER XXI. A LONG RETIREMENT. 778–1781.
CHAPTER XXI. A LONG RETIREMENT. 778–1781.
WHEN the travellers arrived at Dover, Fletcher wrote as follows to his hospitable friends at Stoke Newington:— “Ten thousand blessings light upon the heads and hearts of my dear benefactors, Charles and Mary Greenwood! May their quiet retreat at Newington become a Bethel to them! Their poor pensioner travels on, though slowly, towards the grave. His journey to the sea seems to him to have hastened, rather than retarded, his progress to his old mother—Earth. May every Providential blast blow him
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CHAPTER XXII. LITERARY WORK DONE IN RETIREMENT.
CHAPTER XXII. LITERARY WORK DONE IN RETIREMENT.
FLETCHER’S long seclusion from public life is well described in two lines of the poet Thompson: The four and a-half years, during which he was away from Madeley, were spent in great weakness, but not in idleness. To say nothing of the works he published, while he remained in England, namely, his “Answer to the Rev. Mr. Toplady’s ‘Vindication of the Divine Decrees;’” his “Vindication of the Rev. Mr. Wesley’s ‘Calm Address to our American Colonies;’” his “American Patriotism;” his “Doctrines of Gr
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CHAPTER XXIII. THE FIRST THREE MONTHS AFTER FLETCHER’S RETURN TO MADELEY. 1781.
CHAPTER XXIII. THE FIRST THREE MONTHS AFTER FLETCHER’S RETURN TO MADELEY. 1781.
FLETCHER recommenced his ministry at Madeley on Sunday, May 27, 1781. [502] During his absence of four years and a-half, religion, in his parish, had not prospered. In a letter to his hospitable friend, Charles Greenwood, at Stoke Newington, he wrote:— “Madeley, June 12, 1781. I stayed longer at Brislington than I designed. Mr. Ireland was ill, and would nevertheless come hither with me; so that I was obliged to stay till he was better. And, indeed, it was well I did not come without him; for he
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CHAPTER XXIV. FLETCHER’S MARRIAGE. 1781.
CHAPTER XXIV. FLETCHER’S MARRIAGE. 1781.
FLETCHER spent a happy month among the “elect” ladies of Methodism in the North of England; to wit, Miss Bosanquet, Hester Ann Rogers, Sarah Crosby, and their friends; and, on his return to Madeley, he had to correspond with two others in the south, Miss Perronet and Lady Mary Fitzgerald. To the former he wrote as follows:— “ My Dear Friend ,—You want ‘some thoughts on the love of God;’ and I want the warmest feelings of it. Let us believe His creating, feel His preserving, admire His redeeming,
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CHAPTER XXV. TWO YEARS OF MARRIED LIFE AT MADELEY. 1782 AND 1783.
CHAPTER XXV. TWO YEARS OF MARRIED LIFE AT MADELEY. 1782 AND 1783.
IN a letter to an aristocratic friend in London, Fletcher began the year 1782 as follows:— “January 1, 1782. I live, blessed be God, to devote myself again to His blessed service in this world or in the next, and to wish my dear friends all the blessings of a year of jubilee. Whatever this year brings forth, may it bring us the fullest measures of salvation attainable on earth, and the most complete preparation for heaven. “I have a solemn call to gird my loins and keep my lamp burning. Strangel
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CHAPTER XXVI. LAST DAYS ON EARTH. 1784–1785.
CHAPTER XXVI. LAST DAYS ON EARTH. 1784–1785.
FLETCHER took a profound interest, not only in Sunday Schools, which were being opened in various places, but in an institution which has long been the greatest of which the Methodists can boast. In 1783, Dr. Coke and a few of his friends drew up “A Plan of the Society for the Establishment of Missions among the Heathen.” This curious and most interesting document is too long to be inserted here. Suffice it to say, there is reason to believe that Fletcher was one of Coke’s counsellors. It has be
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