“He panted for want of breath,” says Mr. Smith. “I asked him how he felt. He answered, ‘My asthma is returning; I must have two or three days’ rest. Two or three days’ riding, without preaching, will set me up again.’ Though the window had been half up all night, he asked me to put it a little higher. ‘I cannot breathe,’ said he, ‘but I hope I shall be better by-and-by. A good pulpit sweat to-day may give me relief. I shall be better after preaching.’ I said to him, I wished he would not preach so often. He replied, ‘I had rather wear out, than rust out.’ He then sat up in bed and prayed that God would bless his preaching where he had been, and also bless his preaching that day, that more souls might be brought to Christ. He prayed for direction, whether he should winter at Boston, or hasten southward. He asked for blessings on his Bethesda College and his family there; likewise on the congregations at the Tabernacle and Tottenham Court chapel, and on all his English friends.
“He then lay down to sleep again. This was nigh three o’clock. At a quarter to four he awoke, and said, ‘My asthma, my asthma is coming on again. I wish I had not promised to preach at Haverhill to-morrow. I don’t think I shall be able; but I shall see what to-day will bring forth. If I am no better to-morrow, I will take a two or three days’ ride.’ He then asked me to warm him a little gruel; and, in breaking the firewood, I awoke Mr. Parsons, who rose and came in. He went to Mr. Whitefield’s bedside, and asked him how he felt. He answered, ‘I am almost suffocated. I can scarce breathe. My asthma quite chokes me.’ He got out of bed, and went to the open window for air. This was exactly at five o’clock. Soon after, he turned to me, and said, ‘I am dying.’ I said, ‘I hope not, sir.’ He ran to the other window, panting for breath, but could get no relief. I went for Dr. Sawyer; and, on my coming back, I saw death on his face. We offered him warm wine with lavender drops, which he refused. I persuaded him to sit down and put on his cloak; he consented by a sign, but could not speak. I then offered him the glass of warm wine; he took half of it, but it seemed as if it would have stopped his breath entirely. In a little while, he brought up a considerable quantity of phlegm. I was continually employed in taking the mucus from his mouth, bathing his temples, and rubbing his wrists. His hands and feet were as cold as clay. When the doctor came, and felt his pulse, he said, ‘He is a dead man.’ Mr. Parsons replied, ‘I do not believe it. You must do something, doctor.’ He answered, ‘I cannot. He is now near his last breath.’[676] And indeed so it proved; for he fetched but one gasp, stretched out his feet, and breathed no more. This was exactly at six o’clock.”[677]
Thus died the most popular and powerful evangelist of modern times, on Sunday morning, September 30, 1770. “I shall die silent,” remarked Whitefield at the dinner table of Finley, the president of New Jersey College: “I shall die silent. It has pleased God to enable me to bear so many testimonies for Him during my life, that He will require none from me when I die.” Whitefield’s words were strangely verified. In this respect, his death was a contrast to that of his friend Wesley.
Whitefield was interred on Tuesday, October 2. “At one o’clock, all the bells in Newbury Port were tolled for half an hour, and all the ships in the harbour hoisted signals of mourning. At two o’clock, the bells tolled a second time. At three o’clock, the bells called to attendthe funeral.”[678] Meanwhile, a large number of ministers had assembled at the manse of Mr. Parsons, and had spent two hours in conversation respecting Whitefield’s usefulness, and in prayer that his mantle might fall on them and others. The pall-bearers were the Revs. Samuel Haven, D.D., of Portsmouth; Daniel Rogers, of Exeter; Jedediah Jewet and James Chandler, of Rowley; Moses Parsons, of Newbury; and Edward Bass, D.D.,[679] the first bishop of the Church of England in Massachusetts. The funeral procession was a mile in length. About 6,000 persons crowded within the church, and many thousands stood outside.[680] The corpse being placed at the foot of the pulpit, the Rev. Daniel Rogers offered prayer, in which he confessed that he owed his conversion to Whitefield’s ministry, and then exclaiming, “O my Father! my Father!” stopped and wept as though his heart was breaking. The scene was one never to be forgotten. The crowded congregation were bathed in tears. Rogers recovered himself, finished his prayer, sat down, and sobbed.[681] One of the deacons gave out the hymn beginning with the line,—
“Why do we mourn departing friends?”
Some of the people sang, and some wept, and others sang and wept alternately. The coffin was then put into a newly prepared tomb, beneath the pulpit; and, before the tomb was sealed, the Rev. Jedediah Jewet delivered a suitable address, in the course of which he spoke of Whitefield’s “peculiar and eminent gifts for the gospel ministry, and his fervour, diligence, and success in the work of it.” “What a friend,” cried Jewet, “he has been to us, and our interests, religious and civil; to New England, and to all the British colonies on the continent!”[682] After this, another prayer was offered, and the immense crowd departed, weeping through the streets, as in mournful groups they wended their way to their respective homes.[683]
The sensation occasioned by the sudden decease of the “man greatly beloved” was enormous. The people came in crowds, begging to be allowed to see his corpse. Ministers of all denominations hastened to the house of Mr. Parsons, where several of them related how his ministry had been the means of their conversion. Two days before his death, he had preached at Portsmouth, and one of his hearers was a young man named Benjamin Randall, then unconverted, and also cherishing a dislike to Whitefield. “O how wonderful he spoke!” wrote Randall. His soul inflamed with love, his arms extended, and tears rolling from his eyes—with what power he spoke!” At noon on Sunday, a stranger was seen riding through the streets of Portsmouth, and crying at the different corners, “Whitefield is dead! Whitefield is dead!” Young Randall heard the announcement. It pierced his heart. He afterwards wrote: “It was September 30, 1770—that memorable day! that blessed day to Whitefield! that blessed day to me! A voice sounded through my soul, more loud and startling than ever thunder pealed upon my ears, ‘Whitefield is dead!’ Whitefield is now in heaven, but I am on the road to hell. He was a man of God, and yet I reviled him. He taught me the way to heaven, but I regarded it not. O that I could hear his voice again!” Whitefield’s death led to Randall’s conversion. He became a Baptist minister, and founded the Free-Will Baptist denomination, which now numbers sixty thousand church members, more than a thousand ministers, two colleges, and one theological seminary; and also has its weekly periodicals, its Quarterly Review, and its flourishing missions in India.[684]
The effect of Whitefield’s death upon the inhabitants of Georgia was indescribable. All the black cloth in the colony was bought up. The pulpit and desk, the chandeliers and organ, the pews of the Governor and Council in the church at Savannah were draped with mourning; and theGovernor and members of the two Houses of Assembly went in procession to the church, and were received by the organ playing a funereal dirge.[685] A sum of money also was unanimously voted for the removal of Whitefield’s remains to Georgia, to be interred at his Orphan House; but the people of Newbury Port strongly objected, and the design had to be relinquished. Forty-five years later, however, when a new county was formed in Georgia, it received the name of Whitefield, in memory of his worth and useful services.[686]
Jesse Lee, in his “History of the American Methodists,” (page 36,) remarks: “Mr. Whitefield had often felt his soul so much comforted in preaching in the Presbyterian meeting-house at Newbury Port, that he told his friends long before his death, that, if he died in that part of the world, he wished to be buried under the pulpit of that house. The people, who remembered his request, had it now in their power to grant it; and they prepared a vault under the pulpit, where they laid his body.” During the last hundred years, thousands of persons have visited that vault; and, as time flows on, the numbers still increase. The Christian’s Magazine, for 1790, inserted a startling letter, written by “J. Brown, of Epping, Essex,” to the following effect:—
“In 1784, I visited my friends in New England, and, hearing that Whitefield’s body was undecayed, I went to see it. A lantern and candle being provided, we entered the tomb. Our guide opened the coffin lid down to Whitefield’s breast. His body was perfect. I felt his cheeks, his breast, etc.; and the skin immediately rose after I had touched it. Even his lips were not consumed, nor his nose. His skin was considerably discoloured through dust and age, but there was no effluvium; and even his gown was not much impaired, nor his wig.”