George Whitefield: A Biography, with special reference to his labors in America. R Belcher
while others reposed on comfortable endowments, and lulled themselves, or were drawn by favorable breezes, into the cold elements of Arianism and Socinianism. As persons in the frozen regions are said to sleep longer and more soundly than others, so did they; and a more terrific blast of the trumpet of the gospel was required to rouse and awake them from their spiritual slumbers. Happily indeed for the world, and for the church in it, there were some exceptions. Watts and Guyse and Doddridge, and their pious associates in different parts of the land, were laborers together in "God's husbandry," and ceased not to cultivate it with affectionate faithfulness and care; and wherever their labors extended, the plants of grace grew and flourished. Darracott, "the star of the west," threw his mild rays over the vales of Somerset; and in the north also a few faithful men were found.
Nor have we even now said all that should be written as to the character of those times. The highest personages in the land then openly lived in ways contrary to the law of God, and no man rebuked them. Profligacy and irreligion were reputable and respectable. Judging from the description we have of men and manners in those days, a gentleman might have been defined as a creature who got drunk, gambled, swore, fought duels, and violated the seventh commandment, and for all this very few thought the worse of him.
Those too were the days when the men whom even kings delighted to honor were such as Bolingbroke, Chesterfield, Walpole, and Newcastle. To be an infidel, to obtain power by intrigue, and to retain it by the grossest and most notorious bribery, were considered no disqualifications even for the highest offices. Such men indeed were not only tolerated, but praised. In those days too, Hume, an avowed infidel, put forth his History, and obtained a pension. Sterne and Swift then wrote their talented, but obscene books; both of them were clergymen, but the public saw little inconsistency in their conduct. Fielding and Smollett were the popular authors, and the literary taste of high and low was suited by Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle, Joseph Andrews, and Tom Jones. These authors were ingenious heathen philosophers, assuming the name of Christians, and forcibly paganizing Christianity for the sake of pleasing the world.
Turning to Scotland, we find that the bold proclamation of the discriminating truths of the gospel which characterize the preaching of Knox, Welsh, and others, was being rapidly laid aside, and cold formal addresses, verging towards a kind of Socinianism were becoming fashionable. Old Mr. Hutchinson, minister of Kilellan, in Renfrewshire, who saw but the beginning of this sad change, used to say to Wodrow the historian, "When I compare the times before the restoration with those since the revolution, I must own that the young ministers preach accurately, and methodically; but there was far more of the power and efficacy of the Spirit and of the grace of God went along with sermons in those days than now. For my own part – all the glory be to God – I seldom set my foot in a pulpit in those days, but I had notice of the blessed effects of the word." It is true, that even then there were a few faithful witnesses for God in Scotland, such as the brothers Erskine, in the Secession church; but for the most part, coldness, barrenness, and death prevailed. The people knew not God, and were strangers to the life-giving influence and power of the gospel.
The Arianism of England had been carried to the north of Ireland, and finding a state of feeling suitable to its reception, it took root and grew up, so as to characterize a distinct section of the Presbyterian church, then and still distinguished by the name of the Remonstrant Synod. The south and west of Ireland were subjected to a blight not less withering, though of a different kind, and which continued much longer – continued, to a great extent, throughout the whole of the last century. The clergy were usually sons of the gentry, and accustomed to their sporting, drinking, and riotous habits. They had no preparation for ministerial duties but a college degree; and no education, either literary or moral, which had not been obtained among wild young men at the university. According to the interest which they happened to have, they passed at once from college to ministerial charges, and again mixed in all the dissipations of the districts where these lay. Ignorant of the truth, they and their congregations were satisfied with some short moral discourse. Many of the people were almost as ignorant of the Scriptures and scripture truth as the inhabitants of Hindostan. The Catholic priests meanwhile were at work among the people, and they had many to help them. The sick and the dying were watched; their fears were wrought upon; they were told of the power which the priests had, of the influence possessed by the Virgin, and much about the old church; and as soon as any seemed to give way, on whatever point, the priest was sent for, who plied them anew, and seldom failed in succeeding with the poor ignorant people. They were now ready to receive absolution; but he had farther conditions to propose. The whole family must submit to be rebaptized, or at least promise to attend mass – and this also was not unfrequently gained; the Protestant clergyman being all the while at a distance, neither knowing nor much caring what was going on. In this way great numbers of the lower and middle classes of the Protestants went over to the church of Rome. Throughout whole districts the Protestant churches were almost emptied, and many of those in rural districts were allowed to fall into ruins.
Of Wales it is not important at present to say much. From the middle ages downwards, great darkness and superstition had prevailed among its mountains. It is true that in the days of James I., a clergyman named Wroth, whose conversion to the truth had been remarkable, had labored with eminent zeal and success, but at the period of which we are now writing declension had succeeded. Within the establishment all was cold and dead; nearly every minister was ignorant of the Welsh language, a fact which also applied to several successive bishops, while the state of morals, among even the leaders of the hierarchy, was truly deplorable. An old Methodist simply but truly described the country at this period, and of his correct narrative we will here give a free translation.
The land, he tells us, was dark indeed. Scarcely any of the lower ranks could read at all. The morals of the country were very corrupt; and in this respect there was no difference between high and low, layman and clergyman. Gluttony, drunkenness, and licentiousness prevailed through the whole country. Nor were the operations of the church at all adapted to repress these evils. From the pulpit the name of the Redeemer was scarcely heard; nor was much mention made of the natural sinfulness of man, or of the influence of the Holy Spirit. On Sunday mornings, the poor were more constant in their attendance at church than the gentry; but the Sunday evenings were spent by all in idle amusements. Every Sabbath there was practised a kind of sport, called in Welsh Achwaren-gamp, in which all the young men of the neighborhood had a trial of strength, and the people assembled from the surrounding country to witness their feats. On a Saturday night, particularly in the summer, the young men and women held what they called Nosweithian cann, or singing eves; that is, they met together and amused themselves by singing in turns to the harp, till the dawn of the Sabbath. These things, with the performance of rustic dramas, would occupy sometimes the whole of the sacred day itself; while a set of vagabonds, called the Bobl gerdded, or walking people, used to traverse the villages, begging with impunity, to the disgrace alike of the law and the country. With all this social sprightliness, the Welsh were then a superstitious, and even a gloomy people. They still retained many habits apparently derived from paganism, and not a few of the practices of popery. Their funerals, like those of the Irish, were scenes of riot and drunkenness, followed by prayers for the release of the deceased from the pains of purgatory. Such was the superstition of the people, that when Methodism was first introduced among them, many of the peasantry expressed their horror of the new opinions by the truly Popish gesture of crossing the forehead; and when Wesley first visited them, he pronounced them "as little versed in the principles of Christianity as a Creek or Cherokee Indian." To this declaration he added the striking remark, that, "notwithstanding their superstition and ignorance, the people 'were ripe for the gospel,' and most enthusiastically anxious to avail themselves of every opportunity of instruction."
As an illustration of the truth of the remark we have just introduced from the discerning Wesley, we may mention an incident which occurred in 1736. At this period dissent itself was reduced so low in the country, that there were only six dissenting houses of worship in all North Wales. One Sunday, Mr. Lewis Rees, a dissenting minister from South Wales, and the father of Dr. Rees, the author of the celebrated Cyclopedia which bears his name, visited Pwllheli, a town on the promontory of Slëyn, in Caernarvonshire, and one of the few places in which the Independents still had a chapel. After the service, the congregation, collecting around him, complained very sorely that their numbers were rapidly diminishing, that the