“‘Three years, nine months, and two days, I have possessed my heavenly-minded husband; but now the sun of my earthly joy is set for ever.’”
This is a very artless story; but it is not less valuable because of that. Mrs. Fletcher sent a copy to Charles Wesley, together with the following note:—
“Madeley, August 24, 1785.
“Dear Sir,—Enclosed you have an account of my feelings when I thought myself dying, as did most about me. I prayed for strength to do justice to my dearest, dearest love. I wrote it in one day, but could not go over it a second time. Take it, then, as it flowed from my full heart, without a second thought, and pray for your deeply distressed friend. I cannot find your brother. I wrote to him at first, but have got no answer.”[[640]]
Wesley, in his eighty-third year, was in the west of England, travelling and preaching with surprising energy. On the day of Fletcher’s death, he preached twice at Salisbury; then hastened to Shaftesbury, Castle-Carey, Shepton-Mallet, Taunton, Collumpton, Exeter, and Plymouth; then went right through Cornwall; and, on September 3, got to Bristol, in the neighbourhood of which city he spent a month. On October 3, he came to London; then made what he calls “a little excursion” into Hertfordshire, another into Oxfordshire, and a third into Norfolk. Here, at Norwich, on October 24, he found time to write a sermon on the death of Fletcher, which he delivered in London on November 6. The sermon was published immediately, with the following address “To the reader” prefixed[[641]]:—
“A consciousness of my own inability to describe, in a manner worthy of the subject, such a person as Mr. Fletcher, was one great reason of my not writing this sooner. I judged, only an Apelles was proper to paint an Alexander. But I, at length, submitted to importunity, and hastily put together some memorials of this great man: intending, if God permit, when I have more leisure and more materials, to write a fuller account of his life.
“John Wesley.
“London, November 9, 1785.”
The concluding paragraph of Wesley’s sermon must be quoted:—
“For many years, I despaired of finding any inhabitant of Great Britain that could stand in any degree of comparison with Gregory Lopez, or Monsieur de Renty. But let any impartial person judge, if Mr. Fletcher was at all inferior to them? Did he not experience as deep communion with God, and as high a measure of inward holiness, as was experienced either by one or the other of those burning and shining lights? And it is certain his outward holiness shone before men, with full as bright a lustre as theirs. But if any should attempt to draw a parallel between them, there are two circumstances that deserve consideration. One is, we are not assured that the writers of their Lives did not extenuate, if not suppress, what was amiss in them. And some things amiss we are assured there were, namely, many touches of superstition, and some of idolatry, in worshipping Saints, the Virgin Mary in particular. But I have not suppressed or extenuated anything in Mr. Fletcher’s character. For indeed I knew nothing that was amiss, nothing that needed to be extenuated, much less suppressed. A second circumstance is, that the Writers of their Lives could not have so full a knowledge of them, as both Mrs. Fletcher and I had of Mr. Fletcher, being both eye and ear-witnesses of his whole conduct. Consequently, we know that his life was not sullied with any mixture of either idolatry or superstition. I was intimately acquainted with him for above thirty years. I conversed with him morning, noon, and night, without the least reserve, during a journey of many hundred miles. And, in all that time, I never heard him speak one improper word, nor saw him do an improper action.—To conclude. Many exemplary men have I known, holy in heart and life, within fourscore years. But one equal to him I have not known: one so inwardly and outwardly devoted to God. So unblameable a character in every respect, I have not found either in Europe or America. And I scarce expect to find another such, on this side eternity.”