“London, October 24, 1767. Supposing you made this addition to the motto of your coat of arms,—‘Nemo me impune lacessit?’ He who toucheth God’s people, toucheth the apple of His eye. That is a very tender part. I am glad your diocesan is expected soon. I have no expectation of his beating a retreat. ‘To arms! to arms!’ must be the watchword now. The company of the Son of Man is never so sweet as when He walks with us in the fiery furnace. Nothing can stand before an honest, truly Israelitish heart. Those who endeavour to entangle Christ’s followers in their talk, will, in the end, be entangled themselves.”
“London, November 14, 1767. All know my mind. Go forward, I think, is the royal word of command. We may then indeed have a Red Sea to pass through; but the threatening waves shall become a wall on the right hand and on the left. I am ashamed to find so many silenced by mere bruta fulmina.”
“London, December 1, 1767. You meet like apostles now; but, when they met between the time of our Lord’s death and resurrection, what trouble did they endure, for fear of the Jews? But be not discouraged. Continue instant in prayer. A risen, an ascended Jesus, will yet appear in the midst of you, renew your commission, and endue you with power from on high. O think of this, ye little college of cast-outs! Do not deny Him in any wise.”
On the day the last extract was written, the Earl of Buchan died at Bath. For some time, his lordship had been in declining health. In Bath, as long as his health permitted, he was a most regular attendant at the chapel of the Countess of Huntingdon, and was in the constant habit of hearing Whitefield, Wesley, Romaine, Shirley, Venn, Townsend, Fletcher, and other Methodist clergymen, who supplied the pulpit there. His death was most triumphant. A few days before its occurrence, Lady Huntingdon went to see him, at his particular request. As soon as he could speak, he said: “I have no foundation of hope whatever, but in the sacrifice of the Son of God. I have nowhere else to look,—nothing else to depend upon for eternal life; but my confidence in Him is as firm as a rock.” Among hislast sayings, were the words, “Happy! happy! happy!” Thus,—
—“on his dying lips,
The sound of glory quiver’d.”
“His lordship’s departure,” wrote Lady Huntingdon, “was not only happy, but triumphant and glorious.”
The event, to these grand old Methodists, was too important to pass unimproved. Whitefield was summoned from London; and, for five days, in the chapel of the Countess of Huntingdon, a series of services were held, which, probably, have no parallel. “The corpse of the late Earl of Buchan,” says Lloyd’s Evening Post, of December 16, “lay in state, at the Countess of Huntingdon’s chapel, from Sunday to Thursday night. Two sermons on the occasion were preached each day by the Rev. Mr. Whitefield and others.”
The story, however, will be best told in the words of Whitefield himself. To the Reverend Walter Shirley, Whitefield wrote:—
“Bath, Tuesday, December 8, 1767. The Earl of Buchan sweetly slept in Jesus last week. His corpse lies deposited in the chapel of good Lady Huntingdon, and is not to be removed till next Friday morning. There have been public prayers and preaching twice every day. The noble relatives constantly attend, and all is more than solemn. Great numbers, of all ranks, crowd to see and hear. The Earl died like the patriarch Jacob; he laid his hands on, and blessed his children; assured them of his personal interest in Jesus; called most gloriously on the Holy Ghost; cried, ‘Happy! happy!’ as long as he could speak; and then—you know what followed.”