To recur to Fletcher’s former letter to the Countess of Huntingdon.
He nominated James Glazebrook as a fitting candidate to be examined for admission into Lady Huntingdon’s intended college. As already stated, Glazebrook was a poor, hardworking collier. He was without money and without learning; but he had two of the three things by which Wesley tested the Divine call of his itinerants to preach; namely, “grace” and “gifts;” and Fletcher had no doubt that when the opportunity arrived, he would have the third—“fruit.” Wesley’s own definitions of these three words were:—
“Grace: a knowledge of God as a pardoning God; the love of God abiding in them; desiring and seeking nothing but God; and the being holy in all manner of conversation. Gifts: in some tolerable degree a clear, sound understanding; a right judgment in the things of God; a just conception of salvation by faith; and a degree of utterance so as to be able to speak justly, readily, clearly. Fruit: are any truly convinced of sin and converted to God by their preaching? As long as these three marks concur in any, we believe he is called of God to preach.”
Whether Fletcher adopted Wesley’s threefold test, and applied it to James Glazebrook, it is impossible to ascertain; but that his opinion of the young man was correct, subsequent events fully proved. Glazebrook was one of Fletcher’s converts. He was one of the first students at Trevecca college, if not the very first. There he distinguished himself equally by his superior abilities and his uncommon diligence. He allowed himself but little time for refreshment, rest, or recreation. His piety was as remarkable as his gifts and diligence. He was soon sent forth to preach, and his labours were attended with considerable success. For three years, he was thus employed in various parts of England. He then tired of the itinerant life, and desired the Countess of Huntingdon to procure him orders in the Established Church. With the assistance of Fletcher a title was obtained, and Glazebrook was ordained deacon by the Bishop of Lichfield, in December 1771. Soon after his ordination, he entered on the curacy of Smisby, in Derbyshire; after which he served the curacies of Rowley Regis, near Birmingham; Shawbury, Shropshire; Ravenstone, in Derbyshire; and Hugglescote, in Leicestershire. In 1777, he was ordained priest by Dr. Hurd, Bishop of Worcester. Two years later, he married the eldest daughter of Thomas Kirkland, Esq., M.D., of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, an intimate friend of the Countess of Huntingdon; and, soon after his marriage, became minister of St. James’s, Warrington. Ultimately, Lord Moira presented him to the vicarage of Belton, a village in Leicestershire, whose living even now is not worth more than about £180 a year. Here he continued till the time of his decease; and here, as well as at Warrington and other places, he was made the honoured instrument of “turning many to righteousness.” Besides his ministerial labours, he wrote and published a “Treatise on Extemporary Preaching,” “Letters on Infant Baptism,” an “Answer to Gilbert Wakefield’s Treatise on Baptism,” and, after his death, his family published a volume of his sermons, which was well received by the public. Such, in brief, was the history of Fletcher’s convert and protegé. Further particulars concerning him may be found in the Evangelical Register for 1836.
The other matter, requiring attention, in Fletcher’s letter to Lady Huntingdon, under the date of November 24, 1767, is his reference to the conversations he had had with her ladyship upon the “Manifestations of the Son of Man to the heart,” and the fact that he had devoutly studied this mysterious subject for “many hours,” and had put his thoughts “upon paper.” This important manuscript was not published until after Fletcher’s death. The editor of his collected works, in a brief preface, says:—
“For the Letters on the Manifestation of Christ, the reader is obliged to Mrs. Fletcher. When they were written, or to whom they are addressed, is uncertain; but, from the beginning of the first letter, the decayed state of the manuscript, and the extreme smallness of the character, which could scarcely have been legible to the author in his latter years, they are supposed to have been the first essay of a genius afterwards so much admired. The reader is requested to remember that the pious author wrote only for himself and his friends; that these sheets want his perfecting hand; and that the editor thought himself entitled to take no liberties.”
From this preface, it is evident that the editor was not acquainted with the foregoing letter to the Countess of Huntingdon; and it may be added, that there is no need for the apology, that the “sheets want” Fletcher’s “perfecting hand.”
The Letters are six in number, and fill fifty-three octavo pages in Fletcher’s collected works.[[148]] It is extremely difficult to give, in a brief form, the substance of these important papers; and yet the task must be attempted, because the subject is one of great interest and because the Letters seem to have been among the earliest of his compositions, that were afterwards published.
His object is clearly stated in his opening paragraph:—
“When I had the pleasure of seeing you last, you seemed surprised to hear me say, that the Son of God, for purposes worthy of His wisdom, manifests Himself, sooner or later, to all His sincere followers, in a spiritual manner, which the world knows not of. The assertion appeared to you unscriptural, enthusiastical, and dangerous. What I then advanced to prove that it was scriptural, rational, and of the greatest importance, made you desire I would write you on the mysterious subject. I declined it, as being unequal to the task; but, having since considered that a mistake here may endanger your soul or mine, I sit down to comply with your request; and the end I propose by it is, either to give you a fair opportunity of pointing out my error, if I am wrong, or to engage you, if I am right, to seek what I esteem the most invaluable of all blessings,—revelations of Christ to your own soul, productive of the experimental knowledge of Him, and the present enjoyment of His salvation.”