The Rev. Dr. James Hamilton of London has admirably delineated Whitefield, in a passage which must be admired by all who read it: "Whitefield was the prince of English preachers. Many have surpassed him as sermon-makers, but none have approached him as a pulpit orator. Many have outshone him in the clearness of their logic, the grandeur of their conceptions, and the sparkling beauty of single sentences; but in the power of darting the gospel direct into the conscience, he eclipsed them all. With a full and beaming countenance, and the frank and easy port which the English people love—for it is the symbol of honest purpose and friendly assurance—he combined a voice of rich compass, which could easily thrill over Moorfields in musical thunder, or whisper its terrible secret in every private ear; and to this gainly aspect and tuneful voice he added a most expressive and eloquent action. Improved by conscientious practice, and instinct with his earnest nature, this elocution was the acted sermon, and by its pantomimic portrait enabled the eye to anticipate each rapid utterance, and helped the memory to treasure up the palatable ideas. None ever used so boldly, nor with more success, the highest styles of impersonation: as when he described to his sailor-auditors a storm at sea, and compelled them to shout, 'Take to the longboat, sir!' His 'hark, hark!' could conjure up Gethsemane with its faltering moon, and awake again the cry of horror-stricken innocence; and an apostrophe to Peter on the holy mount would light up another Tabor, and drown it in glory from the opening heaven. His thoughts were possessions, and his feelings were transformations; and he spoke because he felt, his hearers understood because they saw. They were not only enthusiastic amateurs, like Garrick, who ran to weep and tremble at his bursts of passion, but even the colder critics of the Walpole school were surprised into momentary sympathy and reluctant wonder. Lord Chesterfield was listening in Lady Huntingdon's pew when Whitefield was comparing the benighted sinner to a blind beggar on a dangerous road. His little dog gets away from him when skirting the edge of a precipice, and he is left to explore the path with his iron-shod staff. On the very verge of the cliff this blind guide slips through his fingers and skims away down the abyss. All unconscious, the owner stoops down to regain it, and stumbling forward—'Good God, he is gone!' shouted Chesterfield, who had been watching with breathless alarm the blind man's movements, and who jumped from his feet to save the catastrophe.
"But the glory of Whitefield's preaching was his heart-kindled and heart-melting gospel. But for this, all his bold strokes and brilliant surprises might have been no better than the rhetorical triumphs of Kirwan and other pulpit dramatists. He was an orator, but he only sought to be an evangelist. Like a volcano where gold and gems may be darted forth as well as common things, but where gold and molten granite flow all alike in fiery fusion, bright thoughts and splendid images might be projected from his pulpit, but all were merged in the stream which bore along the gospel and himself in blended fervor. Indeed, so simple was his nature, that glory to God and good will to man had filled it; there was room for little more. Having no church to found, no family to enrich, and no memory to immortalize, he was simply the ambassador of God; and inspired with its genial piteous spirit—so full of heaven reconciled and humanity restored—he soon himself became a living gospel. Radiant with its benignity, and trembling with its tenderness, by a sort of spiritual induction a vast audience would speedily be brought into a frame of mind—the transfusing of his own; and the white furrows on their sooty faces told that Kingswood colliers were weeping, or the quivering of an ostrich plume bespoke its elegant wearer's deep emotion. And coming to his pulpit direct from communion with his Master, and in the strength of accepted prayer, there was an elevation in his mien which often paralyzed hostility, and a self-possession which made him amid uproar and confusion the more sublime. With an electric bolt he would bring the jester in his fool's cap from his perch on the tree, or galvanize the brickbat from the skulking miscreant's grasp, or sweep down in crouching submission and shamefaced silence the whole of Bartholomew fair; while a revealing flash of sententious doctrine, of vivified Scripture, would disclose to awe-struck hundreds the forgotten verities of another world, or the unsuspected arcana of their inner man. 'I came to break your head, but, through you, God has broken my heart,' was a sort of confession with which he was familiar; and to see the deaf old gentlewoman who used to mutter imprecations at him as he passed along the streets, clambering up the pulpit stairs to catch his angelic words, was a sort of spectacle which the triumphant gospel often witnessed in his day. And when it is known that his voice could be heard by twenty thousand, and that ranging all the empire, as well as America, he would often preach thrice on a working-day, and that he has received in one week as many as a thousand letters from persons awakened by his sermons, if no estimate can be formed of the results of his ministry, some idea may be suggested of its vast extent and singular effectiveness."
Very admirably has a writer in the North British Review compared and contrasted Whitefield and Wesley. He says, "Few characters could be more completely the converse, and in the church's exigencies, more happily the supplement of one another, than were those of George Whitefield and John Wesley; and had their views been identical, and their labors all along coincident, their large services to the gospel might have repeated Paul and Barnabas. Whitefield was soul, and Wesley was system. Whitefield was a summer cloud which burst at morning or noon a fragrant exhalation over an ample track, and took the rest of the day to gather again; Wesley was the polished conduit in the midst of the garden, through which the living water glided in pearly brightness and perennial music, the same vivid stream from day to day. After a preaching paroxysm, Whitefield lay panting on his couch, spent, breathless, and deathlike; after his morning sermon in the foundry, Wesley would mount his pony, and trot and chat, and gather simples, till he reached some country hamlet, where he would bait his charger, and talk through a little sermon with the villagers, and remount his pony and trot away again. In his aërial poise, Whitefield's eagle eye drank lustre from the source of light, and loved to look down on men in assembled myriads; Wesley's falcon glance did not sweep so far, but it searched more keenly and marked more minutely where it pierced. A master of assemblies, Whitefield was no match for the isolated man. Seldom coping with the multitude, but strong in astute sagacity and personal ascendency, Wesley could conquer any number one by one. All force and impetus, Whitefield was the powder-blast in the quarry, and by one explosive sermon would shake a district, and detach materials for other men's long work—deft, neat, and painstaking, Wesley loved to split and trim each fragment into uniform plinths and polished stones. Or, taken otherwise, Whitefield was the bargeman or the wagoner who brought the timber of the house, and Wesley was the architect who set it up. Whitefield had no patience for ecclesiastical polity, no aptitude for pastoral details—with a beaver-like propensity for building, Wesley was always constructing societies, and with a king-like craft of ruling, was most at home when presiding over a class or a conference. It was their infelicity that they did not always work together—it was the happiness of the age, and the furtherance of the gospel, that they lived alongside of one another."
CENTENNIAL COMMEMORATIONS.
When a century had elapsed from the commencement of Whitefield's public labors, it was deemed desirable by many in England to hold public services of a devotional and practical character, in celebration of the event. Especially was it designed that such celebrations should have a reference, as far as possible, to advance open-air preaching. The first services of this character were very properly held in the Tabernacle, London, on May 21, 1839, and well do we remember with what intense interest, in common with thousands, we attended them. Ministers and laymen of at least four religious denominations assisted in them, and eloquently discoursed on subjects illustrating the grace of God in connection with Whitefield, but still more intent were they on benefiting the present and future generations of men. Dr. Campbell delivered a sermon on the character and labors of Apollos, illustrated by those of Whitefield; the late Dr. Cox discoursed on the genius and labors of Whitefield; the late Rev. John Blackburn described the past and present state of religion in England; and the Rev. John Young, LL. D., urged the propriety, duty, and necessity of open-air preaching. In addition to these sermons, several admirable speeches were made, and every thing was marked by a spirit of earnest devotion. A small volume, containing the sermons and speeches, was printed, and put into extensive circulation.
About the same time, a number of ministers of the Congregational order met in a central town of Gloucestershire, when one of them suggested, that "as the present year was the centenary of the Rev. George Whitefield's labors in reviving the apostolic practice of open-air preaching, it might be desirable to commemorate them by a special religious open-air celebration. It was further remarked, that Whitefield was a native of Gloucester; that as many ministers present presided over churches instituted by his ministry; that as Stinchcombe hill, in the very centre of the county, presented a most beautiful and eligible spot for a public meeting; and as upon its summit, a century ago, Whitefield himself had preached and showed the glad tidings of the kingdom of God, it seemed a duty to improve the opportunity it offered of addressing, on the gracious persuasives of the cross, a large concourse of persons, many of whom might never hear the gospel, and of promoting in the county the revival of evangelical religion, which God so highly honored his devoted servant in commencing in our land."
The suggestion was most cordially received, arrangements were made, and, July 30, 1839, though the weather was unfavorable, the meeting was attended by at least seven thousand persons. A large preaching stand was erected for the ministers, nearly one hundred of whom were present. Sermons were preached by the Rev. Drs. Matheson and Ross, and by the Rev. Messrs. T. East, J. H. Hinton, and J. Sibree; and addresses were given, and the devotional exercises led by many others. The services were solemnly impressive. The late Josiah Conder, Esq., wrote two hymns especially for the occasion, which are well worthy of preservation; we therefore transfer them to our pages.
I.