Of his work in Maryland he writes, that he found those who had never heard of redeeming grace. The harvest is promising. “Have Marylanders also received the grace of God? Amazing love. Maryland is yielding converts to Jesus; the Gospel is moving southwards.”
He frequently visited New Jersey (Princeton) College, and there won many young and bright witnesses for Christ. Hearing that sixteen students had been converted at a former visit, he again went thither to fan the flame he had kindled among the students, and says that he had four sweet seasons which resembled old times. His spirits rose at the sight of the young soldiers who were to fight when he fell.
Although at times prejudice ran high against the Indians, Whitefield espoused their cause as a philanthropist, and preached to them through interpreters at the Indian school of Lebanon, under Dr. Wheelock, where the sight of a promising nursery for future missionaries greatly inspired him. And at one of the stations maintained by the sainted Brainerd, he preached, found converted Indians, and saw nearly fifty young ones in one school learning a Bible catechism. In the Indian school at Lebanon he became so interested that he appealed to the public and collected £120 at one meeting for its maintenance. Wherever he went he saw the Redeemer’s stately steps in the great congregations which he addressed.
If there was any one point about which Whitefield’s interest centered in America, it was in the orphan asylum which he aided in establishing in Georgia. This was his “Bethesda.” The prosperity of the orphan home was engraved upon his heart as with the point of a diamond, and it was ever vividly present to him wherever he went. At one of his visits on parting with the inmates he says: “Oh, what a sweet meeting I had with my dear friends! What God has prepared for me I know not; but surely I cannot expect a greater happiness until I embrace the saints in glory! When I parted my heart was ready to break with sorrow, but now it almost bursts with joy. Oh, how did each in turn hang upon my neck, kiss and weep over me with tears of joy! And my own soul was so full of the sense of God’s love, when I embraced one friend in particular, that I thought I should have expired in the place. I felt my soul so full of the sense of Divine goodness that I wanted words to express myself. When we came to public worship, young and old were all dissolved in tears. After service several of my parishioners, all of my family, and the little children returned home crying along the street, and some could not avoid praying very loud. Being very weak in body I laid myself upon a bed, but finding so many in a weeping condition I rose and betook myself to prayer again, but had I not lifted up my voice very high the groans and cries of the children would have prevented me from being heard. This continued for near an hour, till at last, finding their concern rather to increase than to abate, I desired all to retire. Then some or other might be heard praying earnestly in every corner of the house. It happened at this time to thunder and lighten, which added very much to the solemnity of the night. * * * I mention the orphans in particular, that their benefactors may rejoice at what God is doing for their souls.”
It is evident that Whitefield had a very tender heart towards all children. One of his most effective sermons at Webb’s Chapel, Boston, was occasioned by the touching remark of a dying boy, who had heard him the day before. The boy was taken ill after the sermon, and said, “I want to go to Mr. Whitefield’s God”—and expired. This touched the secret place of both the thunder and the tears of Whitefield. He says, “It encouraged me to speak to the little ones, but oh, how were the old people affected when I said, ‘Little children, if your parents will not come to Christ, do you come and go to heaven without them.’” After this awful appeal no wonder that there were but few dry eyes.
Another remarkable evidence of the extent and power of the Revival, and of the versatility of Mr. Whitefield’s talents, is shown in the effect produced upon the negro mind. The intensest interest prevailed among even the poorest slaves. Upon one occasion Whitefield was very ill, and in the hands of the physician to the time when he was expected to preach. Suddenly he exclaimed, “My pains are suspended; by the help of God I will go and preach, and then come home and die!” With some difficulty he reached the pulpit. All were surprised, and looked as though they saw one risen from the dead. He says of himself, “I was as pale as death, and told them they must look upon me as a dying man come to bear my dying testimony to the truths I had formerly preached to them. All seemed melted, and were drowned in tears. The cry after me when I left the pulpit was like the cry of sincere mourners when attending the funeral of a dear departed friend. Upon my coming home, I was laid upon a bed upon the ground near the fire, and I heard them say, ‘He is gone!’ but God was pleased to order it otherwise. I gradually recovered. At this time a poor negro woman insisted upon seeing him when he began to recover. She came in and sat on the ground, and looked earnestly into his face; then she said, in broken accents: “Massa, you jest go to hebben’s gate; but Jesus Christ said, ‘Get you down, get you down; you musn’t come here yet; go first and call some more poor negroes.’” Many colored people came to him asking, “Have I a soul?” Many societies for prayer and mutual instruction were set up. Mr. Seward, a travelling companion of Whitefield,; relates that a drinking club, whereof a clergyman was a member, had a negro boy attending them, who used to mimic people for their diversion. They called on him to mimic Whitefield, which he was very unwilling to do; but they insisted upon it. He stood up and said:—“I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not, unless you repent you will all be damned.” Seward adds, “This unexpected speech broke up the club, which has never met since.”
At Savannah, Charleston, and other southern cities, the Great Revival had a remarkable success. Josiah Smith, an Independent minister of Charleston, published a sermon on the character and preaching of Whitefield, defending his doctrines, his personal character, and describing his manner of preaching. Of Whitefield’s power he says: “He is certainly a finished preacher; a noble negligence ran through his style; the passion and flame of his inspiration will, I trust, be long felt by many. How was his tongue like the pen of a ready writer, touched as with a coal from the altar! With what a flow of words, what a ready profusion of language did he speak to us upon the concerns of our souls! In what a flaming light did he set our eternity before us! How earnestly he pressed Christ upon us! The awe, the silence, the attention, which sat upon the faces of the great audience was an argument, how he could reign over all their powers. Many thought he spake as never man spake before him. So charmed were the people with the manner of his address that they shut up their shops, forgot their secular business, and the oftener he preached the keener edge he seemed to put upon their desires to hear him again. How awfully—with what thunder and sound—did he discharge the artillery of heaven upon us! Eternal themes, the tremendous solemnities of our religion were all alive upon his tongue. He struck at the politest and most modish of our vices, and at the most fashionable entertainments, regardless of every one’s presence but His in whose name he spake with this authority. And I dare warrant if none should go to these diversions until they had answered the solemn questions he put to their consciences, our theatres would soon sink and perish.” Mr. Smith adds that £600 were contributed in Charleston to the orphan house.
The wonderful quickening which the Great Revival gave to benevolent and charitable enterprises deserves at least a passing allusion. Besides sending forth into mission work such men as David Brainerd, and even Jonathan Edwards himself, it also laid the foundation more securely of many of our Christian colleges, and of not a few of our orphan asylums. Whitefield founded his Bethesda upon a tract of land covering about 500 acres, ten miles from Savannah, and laid out the plan of the building, employed workmen, hired a large house, took in 24 orphans, incurred at once the heavy responsibilities of a large family and a larger institution, encouraged, as he says, by the example of Professor Francke. Yet on looking back to this first undertaking he said: “I forgot that Professor Francke built in a populous country and that I was building at the very tail end of the world, which rendered it by far the most expensive part of all his Majesty’s dominions; but had I received more and ventured less, I should have suffered less and others more.” He undertook to provide for his 40 orphans and 60 servants and workmen with no fears nor misgivings of heart. “Near a hundred mouths,” he writes, “are daily to be supplied with food. The expense is great, but our great and good God, I am persuaded, will enable me to defray it.” He spent a winter at Bethesda in 1764, and of the success of his orphanage he says, “Peace and plenty reign at Bethesda; all things go on successfully. God has given me great favour in the sight of the governor, council, and assembly. A memorial was presented for an additional grant of land consisting of about 2,000 acres, and was immediately complied with. Every heart seems to leap for joy at the prospect of its future utility to this and the neighbouring colonies.”
This great religious movement did not progress without stirring up much bitterness. It was even asserted by President Clap, of New Haven, that he came into New England to turn out the generality of their ministers, and to replace them with ministers from England, Ireland, and Scotland. “Such a thought,” replies Whitefield, “never entered my heart, neither has, as I know of, my preaching any such tendency.” It is said of one minister that he went merely to pick a hole in Whitefield’s coat, but confessed that God picked a hole in his heart, and afterward healed it by the blood of Christ. After one of his visits not less than twenty ministers in the neighbourhood of Boston did not hesitate to call Whitefield their spiritual father, tracing their conversion to his preaching. These men immediately entered upon a similar work, spreading the great awakening throughout that colony.
In the progress of this work under Whitefield and others, there were frequent outbursts of wit and grim humor. Thus when pastors were shy of giving Whitefield and his associates a place in their pulpits and the people voted to allow them to preach in their churches, Whitefield said, “The lord-brethren of New England could tyrannize as well as the lord-bishops of Old England.” The caricatures issued from Boston in regard to the work were designated as half-penny squibs; and a good old Puritan of the city said, “they did not weigh much.”