A Reply to Dr. Vaughan's "Letter on the Late Post-Office Agitation"

by James Roberts Pears

VII. That it is of infinite importance that every man should hear the Gospel, which is the power of God unto salvation to them that believe.

VIII. That the Lord’s-day is especially set apart, under Divine sanction, for the hearing of the word, and for the turning the mind of men from the things of the world to God.

IX. That it is better for “sixty thousand letters” to be burned, unopened, than for one Post Office Clerk to perish in hell for ever.

I can venture, Sir, to tell the world that your mind is quite made up on all these points. And the world will wonder that you should hitherto have failed to use all your faculties and influence for the deliverance of those poor men, whom the requirements of a godless or thoughtless multitude have shut up in the Post Office from the sound of the Gospel.

You have told us most truly of the effects of six days’ worldly excitement. “Who has not found himself, at the end of the week of hard work, or of abounding excitements, left cold and almost lifeless towards God? Who has not found himself, at such a time, so tied and bound with the chain of this world, that, without some change, some voice coming and speaking to him, whether he will hear or no, he could not shake off the yoke with which he is fettered?” [13]

And what must be the effects of months and years uninterrupted by one real Sabbath from such excitement and fatigue? Practical men know the effect,—they have seen one after another demoralized, degraded, brutalized, in this life. And what can they hope is to follow in the next? A liberally-minded man is disgusted at the idea of wearing out the life of his horse, using him up—as men say. What do you think of wilfully employing fellow men in a work, which wears out physical energy and moral sense,—which uses up body, mind, and soul,—and consigns the poor exhausted wretch to destruction? But I am met by these words, “that attendance, you will observe, is voluntary.” [14] And I read them with feelings of the most hearty sorrow, that such words could have fallen from the pen of a brother in the ministry of the blessed Gospel of Love—from his pen—for I am sure that your heart never conceived them—your head never weighed them—and yet what was a mere specious afterthought of Mr. Hill’s, is put prominently forward by yourself—their attendance voluntary—their ignorance voluntary too?—their ungodliness voluntary too?—their eternal ruin voluntary too? One moment’s thought would have made you tremble at the consequences of this defence. Multitudes of the young prefer a course of idleness and folly which will inevitably lead to ruin. Let them alone! You observe that it is purely voluntary. Multitudes of our hearers prefer to live according to the lusts of the flesh—let them alone! . . . their destruction is entirely voluntary. The hardened reprobate, who seduces the simple country girl by gratifying her taste for finery and idleness, may attempt to throw off the guilt by the cruel retort that she was willing to sin; but he only calls forth a double portion of indignation and contempt from every honest man by the cold-blooded, false-hearted insult. And yet he is guiltless in comparison with a man, who could deliberately see his fellow man destroying his hopes for eternity, and sacrifice his soul for a trifling stipend; could make use of the poor wretch’s suicidal labor for his own little convenience, and satisfy his conscience with the thought that the man was willing.

No, Sir, no man who has ever heard your name will suspect for a moment that you ever weighed the expression you were borrowing; and what I have written, I have written not for yourself, but for many who need to be warned of the guilt of their ordinary habits; who need to be taught that man can indeed form no calculation of the innumerable minute causes which combine to produce the destruction of a soul; but that the infinitely wise God sees every part of the load which presses downward the poor sinner, and attributes with unerring accuracy every particle, however imperceptible to us, to the hand which cast it upon the perishing wretch. But I must submit to you that the inadvertent advocacy of this measure lays you under an obligation to make an honest effort to remove moral evils, which you now see that you have unintentionally encouraged.

If any one thing is essentially our business above all others, it is to resist, by the Word of the Lord, the will of the man who chooses his own destruction. And surely we may be content, if any men, to submit to the vulgar retort, and mind our own business; for what can be a more glorious office, than that of a messenger who comes from God, to entreat the rebels, over whose head the sword of vengeance hangs, “be ye reconciled to God.” Are we not called upon to use every means to turn the sinner from the error of his ways? In season out of season; by argument and example; by reproof and entreaty; by patience and by love, to endeavour to deliver our fellow sinners “from darkness into light, from the power of Satan unto God?” And if God has indeed put us in trust with the Gospel, we can testify that we also once were such, willing to serve divers lusts and pleasures, walking according to the flesh, never turned willingly to God, but converted by the sovereign efficacy of His grace.

I must not, however, close this letter without a few words on “the minute,” in which you appear to place such entire confidence.

You ask, “May we not be permitted to learn the object of a measure from its author? Are we justified in imputing to any man, I do not say motives which he disavows, but motives of which he professes the very opposite, and against which his own previous and subsequent acts obviously militate?” and I conclude, that you would imply your own belief that the purpose of Mr. Rowland Hill was to relieve as many persons as he could from labor on the Lord’s-day.