Having adduced proofs that Whitefield was ipso facto a Dissenter, the article proceeds:—
"He runs about the world, preaches, prays, exhorts, expounds, and does what he lists, where he lists, and how he lists; sets at nought his diocesan wherever he comes; and does all, not only independently, but, in defiance of him. This is your Church of England minister! An independent churchman! A perfect original! The first of the kind! He has thrown off the liturgy of the Church of England, and gives the people nothing but his extempore effusions in its stead. He not only uses, but magnifies and extols, at a great rate, extempore prayer, to beget in people a disesteem of all forms."
The writer then adverts to Whitefield's patronising the preaching of Howell Harris, the layman, and says:—
"The Dissenters are fond of him; but not a man among them has the grace to go out into the highways and hedges, and compel poor sinners to come in. None of them ever would, or will now, supply, in his absence, his place, in Moorfields, or on Kennington Common. Not they. They would never so much as sit, like some of ours, in their proper habits, while he was preaching, some on his right hand and some on his left, to do him honour before the people. But they would breakfast, dine, and eat a little supper with him. They would partake of his entertainments, or entertain him themselves in their own houses, and treat him most courteously, not only to engage him to speak handsomely of them in his journals, but to encourage him; to clap him on the back, and bid him go on in the glorious work he had undertaken. But let them take care. Proximus ardet. Enthusiasm runs like wildfire, and, though it begins in the Church of God Established, it may not stop there, but may run among, and consume their own churches."
Among the London newspapers, the Weekly Miscellany was the most rabid of Whitefield's opponents; but, occasionally, others of them had slashing articles against the young evangelist. For instance, the Craftsman, of September 8, in a serio-comic article, propounds "A Scheme of a new Court of Judicature, in which Methodists are to preside." The members of the court were to be four-and-twenty in number, "with an archon at the head of them: the first archon to be the most excellent and industrious Mr. Whitefield, or, in his absence, the ingenious Mr. Wesley; and the four-and-twenty to be chosen from among the Methodists on Kennington Common." They were to be provided with food and clothing; the clothing of each member was to cost £2 6s. 81⁄2d. per year; the diet 23⁄4d. per day; and the stipend was to be £2 a year, which would "be sufficient to buy them books of devotion."
Besides attacks like these in the public papers, Whitefield was severely censured in private conversation and correspondence. The Rev. William Law was a man of distinguished piety and talent; and his writings had been of eminent service to Whitefield and his friends. Again and again, they sought his counsel; and, speaking generally, he had always shewn them kindness. But even Mr. Law now turned against the young evangelist. On August 10, Charles Wesley waited upon him, and wrote:—
"He blamed Mr. Whitefield's journals, and way of proceeding; said he had had great hopes that the Methodists would have been dispersed, by little and little, into livings, and have leavened the whole lump. Among other things, he said, 'Were I so talked of as Mr. Whitefield is, I should run away, and hide myself entirely.' 'You might,' I answered, 'but God would bring you back like Jonah.'"[246]
Dr. Warburton, an attorney's son, born at Newark-upon-Trent, was now rising into fame. He had recently published the first volume of his great work on "The Divine Legation of Moses," and, twenty years afterwards, was made bishop of Gloucester. In two letters, to the Rev. Mr. Birch, one dated "September 16, 1738," and the other, "September 10, 1739," Warburton says:—
"I have seen Whitefield's Journal, and read it with great curiosity. The poor man is quite mad. His honesty, as you say, is very conspicuous. The best way of exposing these idle fanatics would be to print passages out of George Fox's Journal, and Ignatius Loyola, and Whitefield's Journals, in parallel columns.[247] Their conformity in folly is amazing. One thing was extremely singular in Loyola: he became, from the modestest fanatic that ever was, the most cold-hearted knave, by the time his Society was thoroughly established. The same natural temperament, that set his brains on a heat, worked off the ferment. The case was so uncommon that his adversaries thought all his fanaticism pretended. But, in this, they were certainly mistaken. The surprising part of all was, that his folly and knavery concurred so perfectly to promote his end. If I be not mistaken in Whitefield, he bids fair for acting the second part of Loyola, as he has done the first."[248]
Another private letter, by a very different personage, will be read with interest. The celebrated Countess of Hertford, afterwards Duchess of Somerset, writing to the Countess of Pomfret, then on the continent, remarks:—