“On Sunday last, in the afternoon, we were greatly alarmed. A fire broke out in a Sugar-baker’s work-house, to which a part of my brother’s dwelling-house joins. We were all confusion and consternation; almost smothered with smoke; and crowded by the mob. Three engines, playing from various parts of our house, and several others, pouring in water from other quarters, by the blessing of God, kept under the raging element; and, in a few hours, extinguished it. It put me in mind of that tremendous day, when ‘the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements melt with fervent heat, and the earth with all the works therein be burnt up.’”[196]
The accident was alarming; and, to use the words of Hervey himself, “in order to avoid the fire, he had to wade through water,” and caught a cold and fever, which seriously shook his enfeebled health, and confined him to his chamber several weeks.
It has been already mentioned, that, Whitefield prevailed on Hervey to have his portrait taken. Early in the year 1752, a mezzotinto engraving was published;[197] and the following was addressed to the Rev. Mr. Nixon,[198] Rector of Cold-Higham, in Northamptonshire, who had put together eight lines, which he wished to be printed beneath the likeness:—
“I am obliged to you for the favour done me by your letter, and for the honour done me by your verses, to be engraved under my mezzotinto picture. I should have acknowledged both these obligations sooner, if my print-seller had not been dilatory in publishing the picture, which is now transmitted to Dr. Stonehouse, and desires your acceptance. I cannot forbear thinking, that, what is called honour, is a little capricious and whimsical. I, for my part, had taken my final leave of her; expected none of her favours; and was become familiarly acquainted with contempt. How is it then, that, she singles out a person, whose name has long been struck out of her list; and bestows her caresses upon a mean creature, who has been used to sit on the dung-hill? O! that it may be for the glory of Christ’s grace, Christ’s wisdom, Christ’s power! May I serve to the Sun of Righteousness, as a cloud is subservient in the firmament; which, though all-gloomy in itself, exhibits a rainbow; and, thereby, shows the world what beautiful colours are combined in that magnificent luminary.
“You are pleased to inquire after my little work. Dear Sir, add, to your kind inquiries, a prayer to God, that, it may be executed under the anointings of His Spirit, and appear (if it ever appears) under the influence of His blessing. My late sickness laid an absolute embargo upon it, for a considerable time; and has so shattered my feeble constitution, that, I proceed like a vessel which has lost its rigging, and is full of leaks.”
Hervey was, in part at least, a Calvinist. Wesley, on the other hand, was an Arminian; and, in 1751 and 1752, published two of his most convincing and cogent pamphlets, namely, “Serious Thoughts upon the Perseverance of the Saints,” and “Predestination Calmly Considered.” It would not be rash to say, that, both were unanswerable, though Hervey thought differently. On the first, he was thoroughly opposed to his friend Wesley; on the second he was dubious. Hence the following:—
“Miles’s Lane, March 24, 1752.
“Mr. Wesley’s last piece I have not read through. I can’t say, I am fond of that controversy. The doctrine of the perseverance of Christ’s servants, Christ’s children, Christ’s spouse, and Christ’s members, I am thoroughly persuaded of. Predestination and reprobation I think of with fear and trembling. And, if I should attempt to study them, I would study them on my knees.”
Hervey was now employed in writing his able and beautiful controversial pamphlet, entitled, “Remarks on Lord Bolingbroke’s Letters on the Study and Use of History; so far as they relate to the History of the Old Testament, and especially to the case of Noah, denouncing a Curse upon Canaan; in a Letter to a Lady of Quality.” The great infidel had died on November 15th, 1751; and his book, which had been published posthumously, had created a painful sensation. Hervey completed his “Remarks” on April 22, 1752; though they were not published for some time after: indeed, originally, they were not intended for publication at all. Lady Frances Shirley, having read Bolingbroke’s bad book, wrote to Hervey, asking his opinion concerning it; and the “Remarks” were, in the first instance, nothing more than a private letter to the “Lady of Quality” just mentioned.[199] The pamphlet is a successful attempt to refute a few of Bolingbroke’s bold and unauthorized assertions, namely: 1. That, “the Old Testament is no sufficient authority for chronology from the beginning of time.” 2. That, in the Holy Scriptures, instead of history, we have “a heap of fables; which can pretend to nothing but some inscrutable truths, and therefore useless to mankind.” 3. That, the Scriptures are “full of additions, and interpolations, and transpositions.” 4. That, Noah “was still drunk when he denounced a curse upon Canaan; for no man in his senses could hold such language, or pass such a sentence.”
A wiser man than Lord Bolingbroke once wrote:—