The Life And Testimony Of Fanny Batley

Gospel Standard 1854:

To report with propriety the Lord’s work on a human heart requires more than mortal powers or natural qualifications; and one attempting the work fears lest anything merely natural be called spiritual, or anything spiritual be called natural. It will readily be granted by the godly, that a line of distinction is not easily drawn at all times; but when anything appears proving itself to be the Lord’s work, it will be as readily granted that “flesh and blood hath not revealed it.”

The subject of the following memoir was the daughter of a widow, a member of the church of Christ at Manchester. Her father also was a member, and died in the faith.

Fanny was a Sunday scholar, and in her seventeenth year. She was always delicate, in her manners quiet and retiring, generally beloved by her companions, and, it is only just to add, was not the girl that ever said to her mother, “No, I won’t.” But with all this, no one ever thought that Fanny was a child of grace, though a child of many prayers.

It pleased God to lay his hand on her in affliction last year. After being confined to bed a few days, she said to her mother, “O mother, if I were to die now, what would become of my poor soul?” Her mother replied, “O my dear, if the Lord take you away, it will be in wisdom. All his works are done in righteousness and truth, and he cannot do but what is righteous.” After a considerable pause, she replied, “Yes, mother, I know that; but my poor soul! O what will become of my poor soul? O mother, I am such a sinner; what will become of me if I die? O that the Lord would give me repentance! I am a lost sinner! O that I could repent!” The mother, being overcome, retired for a time; but Fanny could not retire from a knowledge of sin, revealed by God the Holy Ghost. The holy law of God was manifested to her in its blazing vengeance against sin and against the sinner; and she found herself condemned already. The work deepened, and trouble of soul followed. Great darkness caused her to grope for something to lay hold upon; but no help could she find.

Her mother having returned, Fanny resumed the subject. “O, mother,” she said, “O mother, if I die now! If I die now, I must perish for ever. My heart is as hard as a stone. I cannot repent! O that I could repent! Mother,” she continued, “God’s people are a happy people, God’s chosen, God’s elect. O that little flock! They are safe in Christ; they cannot be destroyed; the Lord gives them repentance.” “Yes, my dear,” her mother replied; “and I hope the Lord will give you repentance also.” “No, mother,” she said, “not me. I am such a sinner. O mother, I wish I was like you, or like Mr.—— or like Mrs.——. O you do not know what a sinner I am. Will the Lord give me repentance? O Lord, soften my hard heart.”

To all who visited her she declared openly that she was a great sinner before God, and stated, without any reserve, that God would be just in damning her soul.

This went on for weeks, day after day, and night after night. When I first visited her, she was very ill indeed; and then her mother told me a little of what she had said; and I heard her speak the same things, but did not feel so much concerned at the time; for those who visit many sick beds, and often see what is called death-bed repentance, are taught to think slowly, and judge sparingly; so that at first I was not much moved.

On a second visit, I found her much worse. On entering the apartment, I heard her exclaim, “O for living water!” This was accompanied with a peculiar power to my heart, well known to the soul that looks for and seeks the power of God in the word. A portion of a sermon preached in the neighborhood had been repeated to her, in which the woman of Samaria and Christ’s living water had been noticed; and she was thirsting for living water, and seeking that she might find. I asked her if the living water Christ had to give would do her soul good. “I want Christ himself,” she replied; “but I am such a sinner; and, what is still worse, I cannot repent!” I said, “Do you feel that you are condemned before God for your sins, and that God is just?” “O yes, yes,” she replied; “God is just in my condemnation. I am a lost sinner. O that God would make my heart soft, and that I could repent! Whatever must I do? If death come now, I shall be damned, damned!” Here she was exhausted, and sank for a time into a kind of dozing sleep. I sat in solemn silence for a few minutes, watching the effects of the soul’s anxiety, manifest on almost every part of the body. This scene was soon broken up by her starting out of the slumber in terror. I prevented her, and said, “Fanny, if the Lord has given you such a knowledge of sin, and such a sense of your own guilt, he will surely give you repentance also, and bring your soul out of prison. You know Christ is to give deliverance to the captives, and open the prison doors, and say to such as sit in darkness, Show yourselves; and I do trust the Lord Jesus Christ will soon bring your soul out of prison, bless you with a sense of his mercy and love, and lead you into sweet gospel liberty; and I hope to hear you singing praises to his almighty name, though you are very low at present.” She gazed with astonishment, and for a few seconds remained silent, fixing her eye upon me, as if her whole soul had laid hold upon something really valuable; and then, with a peculiar firmness, she said, “O Mr. T., do you think God will?” I answered, “Yes; where God begins a good work he will not give it up, but carry it on to the end.” She replied, “this cannot be a good work. I am such a sinner, so vile. O for living water!” Looking earnestly at her dear anxious mother, who stood by, she cried out, “O mother, mother! O my poor soul! my guilty soul! O mother, pray for me, pray for me!” Let the reader judge of a mother’s feelings and of mine. These were indeed solemn moments to us, moments that threw me back to the time when the arrows of God’s wrath drank up my spirit, when I first hungered and thirsted after righteousness. My soul went out in real prayer to God that Jesus might be revealed in her soul the hope of glory. To look upon her was painful. Despair seemed to sit on that once pleasing countenance, and anguish in every expression. The fearful justice of God smote her into silence. Her mouth was indeed stopped before God. I now felt such a soul-union to her that nothing could dissolve, and experienced great sweetness in those words, “I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one,” (John 17:23,) and a pleading with the Lord that the prey might be taken from the mighty, that the lawful captive might be delivered.

At one time she was insensible, and often so afflicted that she could not converse. I saw her once more in her trouble, the last Monday night before she died; and a soul-distressing scene it was to every beholder. It was evident she lay on the very brink of eternity. Her poor body was reduced to a skeleton, and the state of her mind was fearful, fearful indeed. She would lay for a time silent as death, and then suddenly cry out, “O Lord, O Lord! mercy, mercy! O my poor soul!” She had always been pleased when reading, and prayer had been attended to in her presence. But this visit, the scene was too heavy for vocal, audible prayer; but God read our hearts then. When about to leave her, I said to her that God would not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax, adding that I felt a firm trusting that ere long the Lord would appear. The night passed over, and a sad solemn night it was, all terror, law, wrath, condemnation, and guilt, and, indeed, a fearful looking for of fiery indignation to consume the guilty soul. O what an awful God the God of Jacob is! “A fire goeth before him. He made darkness his secret place; his pavilions round about him were dark waters and thick clouds of the sky.” He thundered in the heavens. “The thunder of his power who can understand?” “But,” says David, “he sent from above; he took me and drew me out of many waters.”

So did the Lord deal with the dear afflicted soul who is the subject of this narrative. The time was at hand when mercy was to be revealed, pardon granted, atoning blood experienced, and eternal love felt. About 7 o’clock on Tuesday morning, she lay still and speechless, one anxious friend alone watching by the bed side. She moved and said, “My Redeemer liveth!” and, attempting to turn herself, repeated, “My Redeemer liveth! O praise him; praise the name of the Lord Jesus! He hath delivered my soul from death, redeemed my soul from destruction! O send for Mr.——, and for Mrs.——, and tell them what the Lord has done. He is the God of salvation; and he is my God.” Her mother’s footsteps were soon directed towards the changed scene, feasting her astonished eyes on her redeemed child. Fanny said, “O mother, why do you weep? My soul is redeemed from hell; my sins are blotted out by the blood of Christ! Sing, mother, and let us extol his name together.” The mother replied, “O my dear, I am weeping for joy.” “Yes, mother; that’s right; yes, for joy.” Here she clasped her hands together, and repeated in an ecstasy,

“‘Christ is mine, and I am his; 

Centre, source, and sum of bliss; 

Earth and hell in vain combine 

Me and Jesus to disjoin.

“‘Thou my fortress art and tower; 

Having thee I want no more. 

Strong in thy full strength I stand; 

None can pluck me from thy hand.’

I visited her about 2 o’clock, and O what a change! She hailed my approach with a smile of supernatural welcome; and O how bright those eyes, how cheerful that countenance, which only a few hours before were dim and gloomy. Here I saw the soul that had gone forth weeping, bearing precious seed, now earning a sheaf of glory, and waving an offering of praise to our redeeming God. “O,” she exclaimed, “the Lord liveth! My Jesus has come. You said he would; but, O, I could not believe you; but I do believe Him. He is here! O, Christ is my Saviour! O mother,” she said, “I am only seventeen, and redeemed by blood. Ah, mother, many hundreds, yes, thousands, must suffer more than I, and be damned after all. O, God is my salvation.”

Having seen this, I left her and returned in the evening. In my absence she said many glorious things. She sang repeatedly,

“‘Yes; I shall soon be landed 

On yonder shores of bliss;

There, with my powers expanded, 

Shall dwell where Jesus is.'”

All who saw her were astonished. I called about 9 in the evening, and found her still standing firm on Christ, the Rock of ages. Clasping her hands firmly together, she exclaimed, “O precious Christ! Come, Lord Jesus, come and take me.” I said, “Fanny, he will come at the right time; his time is best.” “Yes,” she said, “his time is best; but, bless him, I want him to come; I want to fly to his arms. O he has redeemed me.” She beckoned me to her; put her hand to my face, and said, “O I do love the Lord’s people, because they are Christ’s, bought with his blood. O preach Jesus to them, and pray for them! They are safe; and I am safe; none can pluck me from him; neither sin, nor death, nor hell. O this great salvation!” She said, “If I were to live, I would become a member of the church; but, O no, the church above, the church above, I am going to join.” I said, “Would you not wish to live a little longer here on earth?” “O no,” she replied; “what is earth to me? What are pearls, gems, diadems, crowns, worlds? Nothing but Christ for me. Though I am deaf, and cannot hear, (her disease caused deafness,) I can see as well as any of you, and I can see Jesus, my Saviour, by faith. O the tempter!” she said, “he is trying me again; but what can his power do when Jesus is here? Let him come and try his strength; if he come when death comes, Christ is my strength.'” Here she sang out these words:

“‘I’ll praise my Maker with my breath; 

And when my voice is lost in death, 

Praise shall employ my nobler powers.

My days of praise shall ne’er be past, 

While life, and thought, and being last, 

And immortality endures.'”

And I sung the piece with her to the end, and found it good. After this, she said to me, “I hope you will bury me; and when you do, tell the Lord’s people to look to the Lord, to seek instruction from him, and he will give them all things they need; and tell the Sunday scholars to read the Bible, and do as they are told. But,” she added, “poor things, what can they do!? They can do nothing; they are ignorant, and they do not know it. O the Lord’s mercies to me! What shall I do my Saviour to praise? O that death might come and draw his grey hand over my brow, and dim these eyes. I can smile at death and say, Victory over him.” I now took my final farewell of her, and in sweet confidence left her, fully satisfied that the Lord was her Shepherd. She said to her mother, “Tomorrow my body will be dead, and laid on this bed, and you looking at it, and others looking at it; and my soul will be in glory, basking in his arms.”

The friend in attendance during the night, wished to move her a little for ease, when she said, “Do you think it will prolong my life.” He replied, “No.” She said, “If you think it will, do not move me.” Then she said, “Lord, thou hast granted me one great favor; and, Lord, now I want another; and that is, that thou, O Lord, wilt take me to thyself this night.”

The medical gentleman in attendance called after the Lord, the great Physician, had been. She looked at him, and said, “O Sir, I am past your skill. Christ is my Saviour. He is my Physician;” and she so opened her mind to him, that he was obliged to turn his face to the wall, as many others had done.

The night passed over in praying, and praising, and holding communion with the Lord Jesus. She said to her mother, “O mother, these feeble knees, and these poor aching arms, and this poor chest of mine, and this head, now mind, mother, they shall be like him on the morning of the glorious resurrection.” Being much distressed with a pain in the side, she said, “If this pain come suddenly, so that I cannot speak when death comes, I will fix my arms like this, (showing the position,) and I shall move, my hands, that you may know that the Lord is in my soul.” During, the night, she sang parts of several hymns, and all the 483rd. She sang till her voice could scarcely be heard. It brings to my mind those wondrous words, “And again they sang, Hallelujah!” She did, indeed, begin the song of the redeemed on earth. The joys of her soul were such at times, that with uplifted hands and stretched out arms, she almost rose from the bed in holy ecstacy.

“No human aid could work this change, 

Or give despairing guilt this peace;

‘Tis God’s own work, to nature strange, 

And proves itself the work of grace.”

She sung with astonishing pleasure,

“‘There shall I bathe my weary soul, 

In seas of heavenly rest;

And not a wave of trouble roll 

Across my peaceful breast.'”

And the whole of hymn 474 was sung by her again and again with sweet delight.

Towards morning, Wednesday, the 17th of January, she became more quiet. The body sank; strength failed; and at 7 o’clock she breathed her last, without a struggle, or even a sigh.

Thus died Fanny Batley, a plant of God’s right hand planting.

“The bud just opened on this gloomy west, 

And saw this dreary desert as it past.”

A. B. T.

Manchester