“There are three meetings in my parish—a Papist, Quaker, and Baptist, and they begin to call the fourth the Methodist one—I mean the Church. But the bulk of the inhabitants are stupid heathens, who seem past all curiosity, as well as all sense of godliness. I am ready to run after them into their pits and forges, and I only wait for Providence to show me the way. I am often reduced to great perplexity; but the end of it is sweet. I am driven to the Lord, and He comforts, encourages, and teaches me. I sometimes feel that zeal which forced Paul to wish to be accursed for his brethren’s sake; but I want to feel it without interruption. The devil, my friends, and my heart have pushed at me to make me fall into worldly cares and creature snares,—first, by the thoughts of marrying; then, by the offers of several boarders, one of whom, a Christian youth, offered me £60 a year; but I have been enabled to cry, ‘Nothing but Jesus, and the service of His people;’ and I trust the Lord will keep me in the same mind.”[[69]]
In such a way and spirit did Fletcher begin his ministry of twenty-five years’ duration at Madeley. Comment on his simple and honest letters is unnecessary; it would be uninstructive meddling, which would try the reader’s patience.
CHAPTER IV.
FIRST TWO YEARS AT MADELEY.
FROM OCTOBER 17, 1760, TO NOVEMBER 22, 1762.
ALMOST of necessity, the life of a clergyman in a small country town is an uneventful and quiet one; and, therefore, the first ten years that Fletcher spent at Madeley were unmarked by stirring incidents, such as were perpetually occurring in the lives of his friends Wesley and Whitefield.
Madeley is a market town in the county of Salop. It is beautifully situated in a winding glen, through which the river Severn flows. In 1800, fifteen years after Fletcher’s death, it contained, according to the parliamentary returns, 291 houses, and 4,758 inhabitants. The church is dedicated to St. Michael; and the parish includes Coalbrook Dale and Madeley Wood, noted for their coal mines and their iron-works. Colliers and iron-workers at Madeley, in the days of Fletcher, were quite as ignorant and brutal as they were elsewhere. His mission was a trying one; and its burdensomeness was not lessened by the fact that there was not a single clergyman in the county of Salop who approved of his Methodist doctrines, or sympathized with his Methodist endeavours. Further, he was without parochial experience. He had preached for the Wesleys and for the Countess of Huntingdon; and, on a few rare occasions, he had been permitted to occupy the pulpits of the Established Church; but, notwithstanding the temporary assistance he had rendered to his Madeley predecessor, he had never held a curacy. In parish work he was a novice; but he was not dismayed. A few months before his induction, he had been with Berridge, who, with the exception of Mr. Hicks at Wrestlingworth, was as much without clerical sympathy and help in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Huntingdonshire, as Fletcher himself was now in Salop. Berridge had seen marvellous results of his denounced ministry, and why should not Fletcher see the same? Hence, on January 6, 1761, he wrote as follows to the Countess of Huntingdon:—
“I had a secret expectation to be the instrument of a work in this part of our Church; and I did not despair of being soon a little Berridge. Thus warmed with sparks of my own kindling, I looked out to see the rocks broken, and the waters flowing out; but, to the great disappointment of my hopes, I am now forced to look within, and see the need I have of being broken myself. If my being stationed in this howling wilderness is to answer no public end as to the Gospel of Christ, I will not give up the hope that it may answer a private end as to myself, in humbling me under a sense of unprofitableness.
“As to my parish, all that I see in it, hitherto, is nothing but what one may expect from speaking plainly, and with some degree of earnestness; a crying out, ‘He is a Methodist—a downright Methodist!’ While some of the poorer say, ‘Nay, but he speaketh the truth!’ Some of the best farmers, and most of the respectable tradesmen, talk about turning me out of my living as a Methodist or a Baptist. My Friday lecture took better than I expected, and I propose to continue it till the congregation desert me. The number of hearers at that time is generally larger than that which my predecessor had on Sunday. The number of communicants is increased from thirty to above a hundred; and a few seem to seek grace in the means. I thank your ladyship for mentioning Mr. Jones as a curate. There is little probability of my ever wanting one. My oath obliges me to residence, and, when I am here, I can easily manage all the business, and only wait for opportunities of oftener bearing witness to the truth.”[[70]]
Fletcher’s troubles were various. He was dissatisfied with himself; a visionary convert caused him anxiety; and many of his parishioners maligned him. Writing to Charles Wesley on March 10, 1761, he remarked:—
“I feel more and more that I neither abide in Christ, nor Christ in me; nevertheless, I do not so feel it, as to seek Him without intermission. ‘Oh wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from’ this heart of unbelief? Blessed be God, who has promised me this deliverance, through our Lord Jesus Christ!
“My new convert has, with great difficulty, escaped the wiles of the devil; who, by fifty visions, had set her on the pinnacle of the temple. Thanks be to God, she has come down without being cast headlong. I have had more trouble with her visions than with her unbelief. Two other persons profess that they have received the consolations of Divine love: I wait for their fruits.