History Of The “Gospel Standard”
Gospel Standard 1871:
By John Gadsby
Before a man sits down to write a history of any place or thing, he should be quite satisfied on two points: 1, That he is qualified for the work; and, 2, That people in general will believe he is so qualified; otherwise his labour will be in vain. Gibbon wrote “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire;” most ably written, but so tinctured with infidelity that we dare not put it into the hands of our children. Macaulay wrote a “History of England;” one of the most elegantly-written works in the English language; but his Essay on Lord Clive is so marred with partiality and bigotry that we turn from it with disgust. In one place he calls the immortal Huntington “a worthless, ugly lad,” a knave, a remarkable impostor, and a gaping clown; but the name of William Huntington will live in the hearts of thousands when that of Lord Macaulay, being written in the earth, or sand, will have been blown by the winds of heaven into deserved oblivion.
[In the “Gospel Standard” for Aug., 1856, is a Review by Mr. Philpot of Huntington’s “Posthumous Letters;” and in a note to that Review Mr. P. quotes Macaulay’s exact expressions; and most pointedly and truthfully describes Macaulay as he really was. Mr. P.’s concluding sentence runs thus: “How true it is that one sinner destroyeth much good. (Eccles. 9:18) Here is an instance how a popular writer can, by a couple of sentences, falsify truth, slander away the reputation of a servant of God, and associate in the minds of thousands the name of Huntington with superstition, knavery, and imposture.” Mr. George Doudney, son of Mr. Edward Doudney, one of whose letters appeared in this magazine last month, sent a copy of Mr. P.’s remarks to Lord Macaulay, calling his attention to the fact, amongst other things, that Huntington was not a lad at the time referred to, but the father of a family. Mr. D. concluded his letter to Macaulay thus: “As a historian and man of letters, exercising so wide an influence on opinion, I should wish to believe that your impartiality and justice to opponents and adversaries is sans rcproche; and should therefore esteem it a favour if you could give any explanation that would exonerate you from the blame bestowed on you by the reviewer.” To this Macaulay replied: “I admit that I ought not to have called William Huntington ‘a lad.’ ‘Young man’ would have been more correct. In a future edition I will make the alteration. As to the rest, I adhere to every word I have written. I am, I believe, as well acquainted with Huntington’s works as any of his disciples; and I am quite willing that anybody who, after reading his works, thinks well of him, should think ill of me. I should indeed be very sorry if the person who wrote the infamous note, at the bottom of p. 255, in the work which you sent me, did not think ill of me.” Such is the enmity of the human heart! I would not for a moment attempt to limit God’s sovereignty; but I can have no hesitation in saying that if Macaulay died with such sentiments in his heart, he is now reaping the reward of his enmity to God’s truth and servant. Macaulay refers, I believe, to Huntington no less than five times in his writings. I should much like to see the Review I have referred to given in the volumes with Mr. Philpot’s “Meditations,” about to be published.]
Now, as to the first point above, I think I may, without vain conceit, believe that I am qualified to write a “History of the ‘Gospel Standard,'” as, under God, I was the originator of it, and have been connected with it and in some degree watched over it from its birth. And as to the second point, though there may be individuals who may doubt my ability, as they would sneer at anything which was the production of my pen, I am well persuaded there will be thousands who will have no doubt upon the subject, and will read with interest what I may here write. Then again, as there are many who have never seen my face in the flesh, so there may be some who know little or nothing about me; and for the sake of these, I will, in the first place, give some account of myself. I do not mean in a spiritual way. This I have done in some measure in my little work on “Slavery, Captivity,” &c.; but more particularly in a temporal way.
I commenced business as a printer in Manchester in 1834. The Lord so abundantly blessed my labours that though I had only £100 to begin with, £50 of which, and no more, was given to me by my dear father, as, indeed, he could not, in justice to himself and others, spare more, for he was not one who hoarded up the riches of this world; I say, though I had only £100 to begin with, yet, with the assistance of friends, and subsequently by some money which came without having had to work for it, and with God’s blessing, in a few years I was in a position to pay nearly £150 a week in wages alone.
[One friend, a Mr. Blakeley, heard I had failed, and he waited upon me in all haste to offer me any amount of money he could command. I shall ever think of this with gratitude, though the report was not true.]
There was at that time no periodical to advocate the sentiments which had been for years dear to my father, and which were becoming increasingly dear to me, as my understanding became more and more enlightened and my heart more and more expanded. I therefore proposed to my father that he should assist me in the publishing of a magazine specially devoted to the supporting and advocating of those sentiments. At first he objected, fearing that, as a young beginner in business, with only a limited capital, I should suffer loss. My reply was that God had blessed my labours so far, and that I believed he would bless this work; that even if it did not pay its expenses, the loss would be made up some other way; and that, through the instrumentality of his pen, numbers would be blessed who could never hear his voice. So that, even if I should lose by it (as I did for some years), and the loss should not be made up, it would be of little consequence, as my income was already greater than my expenditure. At last he gave way, and drew up a prospectus.
The next question was, ”What name shall we give it?” And the “Gospel Standard” was fixed upon; not because it was ever intended to be set up as a standard to measure by, but as a standard, or banner, unfurled for the Gospel.
We commenced the work in Aug., 1835. I give the following from the first Address, which was, of course, written by my father:
“In our labours, we hope ever to keep in view the following things, and to vindicate them, in all their bearings, whether men will hear, or whether they will forbear:
“That there are Three Persons in the One-Undivided Jehovah, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; that each Person in this blessed Three-One God are equal, equal in power, and in glory, and in love to the church; the love of the Father being displayed in Election, the love of the Son in Redemption, and the love of the Holy Ghost in Regeneration and the glorious things arising therefrom, and connected therewith; that in eternity Jehovah, foreseeing every the most minute circumstance and event, chose to himself, in Christ, a people whom he is determined to save with an everlasting salvation, and who shall show forth his praise; while the rest, being left to the hardness of their hearts, must inevitably perish in their sins; that nothing short of the divine power and energy of God the Holy Ghost in the heart of a sinner will make him spiritually repent, all other repentance being, like Judas’s, fleshly; that wherever the blessed Spirit begins his work of grace in a sinner’s heart, he will perfect it, it being not in the power of Satan or men to wrest one soul from his hands; that his blessed Majesty will daily lead his quickened children into the mystery of the iniquity of their carnal nature, and into the glorious mystery of God in Christ, as suited to and designed for them, thus glorifying Christ in their hearts as all and in all, teaching them the deep things of God, and inspiring their hearts to bless the Lord Jesus Christ, that because he lives, they shall live also; that the imputed righteousness of Christ is absolutely necessary for the justification of a sinner, and his holiness for sanctification, fallen, ruined, guilty man, by nature as well as by practice, being utterly incapacitated from doing anything towards the salvation of his soul; that the gospel, which contains all the glory of all the laws that ever were promulgated from the throne of God, and in which harmonize all the glorious doctrines, promises, and precepts of the grace of God, is the only perfect rule of the believer’s life and conduct, everything else leaving him destitute of hope; that the ordinance of the Lord’s supper can only be scripturally administered to those who have been made to feel their lost and ruined state as sinners, and who, having been enabled to give a reason of the hope that is in them, and the answer of a good conscience toward God, have been solemnly immersed in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; and, finally, that the scripture, being the absolute, infallible, revealed word and will of God, is the only standard by which the faith of man can rightly be tried.”
The first article was also written by my father, signed “A Soldier,’ the text being Matt. 5:6:
“The righteousness intended here is not creature-righteousness, worth, or worthiness, for that is as the morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away; nay, at best it is but filthy rags, and its fountain unclean. Eternal truth declares that ‘all flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field, which withereth and fadeth away when the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it.’ But the righteousness the dear Lord has in view in this text is that blessed righteousness which is unto all and upon all them that believe, even the glorious Person and obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ; for ‘Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.’ This is that righteousness which justifies the ungodly; and when this glorious righteousness is received into the heart by faith, through the divine power of God the Holy Ghost, the soul will unite with the church of old, and say, ‘In the Lord have I righteousness and strength;’ not merely by him, or from him, but in him; and the Lord the Spirit solemnly says that ‘in the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory.’ God is determined that no flesh shall glory in his presence, but in the Lord alone. Therefore ‘Christ is made of God unto his people wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.’ Yea, ‘God hath made him to be sin for them, that they might be made the righteousness of God in him.’ Here it is the child of God stands acquit of all charge, and is viewed by the God of gods perfect and complete; for, by the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, all that believe are justified from all things, not partially, but fully and completely. Now, this blessed justification is all of free grace: ‘Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.’ It is on this glorious ground the apostle sends forth his God-glorifying, soul-supporting challenge, ‘Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.’ Here divine faith makes a solemn stand, and, with indescribable pleasure, makes its boast of the Lord, putting no confidence in the flesh. Let Christ be seen and received into the heart by faith, and the sinner may challenge earth or hell to bring him in guilty; for Christ is the Lord his righteousness.
“Well, blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after this righteousness, for they shall be filled. Now, no one will ever hunger and thirst after this righteousness till the Holy Ghost has quickened his soul, and brought him to feel that he is a sinner before the heart-searching God; that his sins have been committed against a righteous God; that he has no righteousness of his own, nor any power to work one out; and yet, that without a righteousness perfectly adequate to the requirements of law and the demands of justice, he must for ever perish. To describe the various workings of mind and the feelings of such a soul, under the heart-rending tortures of the awful nature of sin, and the holiness and inflexible justice of God, as revealed in the law, would fill a volume. Suffice it, therefore, to say, that night and day he hungers and thirsts for that righteousness which justifies the ungodly. A religion which consists of creature goodness, creature duties, and creature piety, will not do for him. He proves that both duty-works and duty-faith fail him, and leave him a lost sinner, without help and without hope. He therefore sighs, and groans, and cries for mercy, pardoning mercy, justifying mercy, in the Person, blood, and obedience of Christ. Nothing short of this will satisfy his hungry soul. He can in very deed enter into the feelings described in the first part of Isa. 41:17: ‘When the poor and needy seek water.’ He feels that he is poor, wretchedly poor, and very needy; for he needs all that is necessary to make him righteous and holy in the sight of God; and though he has sought this in a variety of ways, still he can neither see nor feel anything in himself, nor of himself, but sin and loathsomeness. With deep concern, he has earnestly sought the water of life, but cannot find it; so that his tongue faileth for thirst, and he appears at times unable to speak the feelings of his heart to either God or man. Hungry and thirsty, his soul fainteth within him. Well, in this desert land, in this waste, howling wilderness, the Lord, in his own blessed time, is graciously pleased manifestatively to find him, and to lead him about, and to instruct him; yea, and he will keep him as the apple of his eye.
“Now, the Lord of the house says such souls are blessed; and indeed it is no small blessing to know their poverty, feel their need, and be sensible of their own helplessness. There are a people who say that they are rich and increased with goods, and have need of nothing, and know not that they are wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. These are not spoken of very favourably by the Lord of the house; but the poor and needy, who seek water and can find none, are blessed of the Lord, yea, and in the Lord, for in him they have all spiritual blessings; and the Lord has promised them, saying, ‘I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them. I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water.’
“They shall be filled; not with self-righteousness, but with Christ and his glorious righteousness. The blessed Spirit shall reveal Christ in their hearts the hope of glory; then their souls will enjoy a sweet measure of the work and effect of the righteousness of Christ, which are peace, quietness, and assurance for ever. They shall find that Christ is unto them a peaceable habitation, and here they have rest; and having thus tasted that the Lord is gracious, and feasted upon his blood, love, and obedience, they will joyfully unite with the Psalmist, and say, ‘Because thy loving-kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise thee. Thus will I bless thee while I live; I will lift up my hands in thy name. My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips.’
“Thus they that hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be abundantly satisfied with the fulness of God’s house, and shall drink of the river of his pleasure; for ‘with the Lord is the fountain of life.’ The time shall come when they shall say, ‘O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.’ Their mouth shall be filled with praise and with the honour of God. Blessed be the name of our adorable Three-One God, he filleth the hungry with good things, while the rich lie sendeth empty away; and when body and soul are transformed into the image of Christ in glory, then in very deed they will be filled with all the fulness of God, and eternally enjoy the blessedness of being blessed in and with Christ, and filled with his righteousness.”
I shall not weary my readers by many remarks of my own; but content myself by selecting a few more of the pieces in the earlier Nos.
The next article was “On the Religion of the Day;” and the next, “The Ministry not without Trials,” by Mr. Tiptaft. That dear and good man may be seen in every sentence. It was addressed to my father:
“Beloved of the Lord, I yesterday received your kind letter, inviting me to supply for you a few Lord’s days, and take the earliest opportunity of sending you an answer. I write very reluctantly, for I know not what answer to send you; it would suit my mind better to wait and think. I wish to be guided aright by the great Head of the church. In the first place, I feel my insufficiency and ignorance so great, which makes me fear that I shall come in vain, if I do come…I sometimes am very low in my mind about my standing in grace, and lower still about my preaching. Everything seems to be against me. I have to tell my hearers that it is presumption in me to stand up in the blessed Lord’s name. I have no stones to throw at Gideon, for his unbelief. Every mark and evidence of a true minister seems to be against me, though I am seldom without one, which is, passing through evil report; for such scandalous reports are circulated, without the least foundation; which makes me think that the father of lies is an open enemy of mine. But I would say with David, ‘Let them curse, but bless thou, O Lord.’ I trust that evil reports may prove cautions, for we need continually hearing, ‘Take heed,’ ‘Beware.’ I feel myself as vile as ever they can represent me, and therefore must contend, from heartfelt experience, that salvation is all of grace. I travel so much in mire and darkness, which keeps me from running into head notions much. I murmur that I am kept so ignorant, and that I know so little, and can open so little of the word of God; but still I feel it a mercy to be even in such hardness of heart and such confusion, rather than slipping into the pits of heady notions. Many talk about Christ, and the doctrines of grace, who are strangers to the power of godliness; and what an awful thing it is to have a name to live, and to be dead. I desire to know Christ, but I want the blessed Spirit to lead me to that knowledge; for anything short of that glorious and powerful teaching must fade away in the time of trial. I find the work of the ministry a most trying work, and I often feel desirous of giving it up, if I could do so honourably; but, having put my hand to the plough, I through mercy continue to this day. The Lord at times encourages me in my own soul, and sometimes I hear of the word being blessed through me; but I wonder how it can be so, feeling so full of sin and various abominations. I meet with very few who are enjoying much in their own souls, and when I meet with any who boast much about an assurance of faith, I generally question how they got at it.
“The devil is a very great deceiver, and we have very deceitful hearts; so we need not be so very much surprised to find so many puffed up with vain notions. May we ever encourage those who have life and feeling, but may we be kept from bolstering up professors in false hopes and false joys…
“May the Lord bless and prosper you, and may the friends be enabled to pray that I may come with the blessed Lord’s sanction.”
The next was by my father, “God is Love,” signed “A Lover of Zion:”
“Beloved of the Lord, It is your blessedness to prove, by the divine teaching of God the Holy Ghost, that God is Love, eternal, immutable love. This precious truth you will not deny; but then you may often struggle under very deep depression of spirit and heartrending groans, lest you should not be interested in this glorious Three-One God of love. It is not enough for you to hear that God is love, nor to believe it as a most blessed truth, nor to say he loved David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul, &c., nor to look round you and say, concerning others, he loved them, or, he loved you, or, he loved thee. No; your heart thirsts to say, feelingly to say, he loved me. You feel that vital godliness is personal, and to you it matters but little, as it respects your own comfort, who he loved, or how greatly he loved them, if he do not love you. The vehement desire of your heart is, that the blessed Jehovah, by the mighty power of the Holy Ghost, would speak this precious truth to your heart: ‘Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.’ It will not do for you to be told that you must simply believe, do your duty, and be decidedly pious, and then God will love you; this ground you have proved to be boggy, and have been necessitated to flee from it, and cry, ‘Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter; I did mourn as a dove; mine eyes fail with looking upward. O Lord, I am oppressed; undertake for me.’ The Lord has given you faith to believe that ‘they that are in the flesh cannot please God;’ and that however fair a show they may make in the flesh, it is but a show, leaving them destitute of vital godliness. Christ’s kingdom is not of this world; for the kingdom of God is righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost; and this kingdom must be set up in the heart, not in word merely, but in power, and that power the power of God: ‘For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance.’ Therefore, having eyes to see the emptiness of a mere duty religion, nothing short of an enjoyment of the power of Christ’s religion in your heart can satisfy you. For this you hunger, thirst, and pant; and even when you dare not say, ‘The Lord is my God,’ still nothing but Christ and his blood and obedience brought home to your conscience, by the power of the Holy Ghost, can give you rest; but when Christ and his complete salvation is enjoyed, with solemn pleasure you can then say, ‘He loved me, and gave himself for me’; and, as the glorious effect of vital union to Christ, by a living faith in him, you can, in some measure, trace the almighty love of God the Father in your election, of God the Son in your redemption, and of God the Holy Ghost in his quickening, enlightening, teaching, sanctifying, anointing, and sealing power, and with solemn joy say, ‘This God is my God for ever and ever; he will be my guide even unto death;’ and as the blessed Spirit leads you on, you can enter a little into the nature of the undivided love of the glorious Three-One God, and see that the love of each dear Person is of the same nature and extent; so that all that the Father loved and chose in Christ, the Son loved and redeemed from their sins: ‘Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works;’ and all that the Son redeemed, the blessed Spirit loves, quickens, teaches, and sanctifies: ‘For such were some of you; but ‘O the blessedness of this precious but, when brought home to the heart—’but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God;’ and the whole nor any part of this is neither by works of righteousness which ye have done, nor according to your works, ‘but according to Jehovah’s own purpose and grace, which was given you in Christ before the world began.’ Therefore, your salvation, in all its bearings, is of rich, free, discriminating love. God grant that you may daily live as becomes creatures so highly favoured, showing forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Trials you may have, yea, you must have: for it is the settled purpose of God that ‘through much tribulation ye must enter the kingdom.’ But this is all in love, and everlasting love is still sure; and this blessed God of love has engaged to succour, support, and defend you. Your light, as it respects the manifestation of it, may not always be as the morning when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds, nor the blessed graces of the Spirit spring up in your souls like the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain. Clouds and darkness may surround the Lord, hiding his glory from your view, and in your feelings you may be very, very dark, and very, very barren. But your dear God of love will not forsake you; new covenant mercies are still sure, everlastingly sure; for ‘unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness;’ and ‘to this man will I look that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.’
“God almighty enable you to trust in him at all times, and that he may direct your hearts into his love, and into Himself as Love, and into the patient waiting for of Christ, is the prayer of
Yours to serve in the gospel of his grace.”
In the same No., that is the first, a series of letters, under the head, “A Saint Indeed,” was commenced. The letters were addressed to my father, and written by the late Mrs. Ann Sturton, mother of Mr. John Sturton, of Peterborough. I feel that I must give the first letter, whether or not I hereafter give any more; merely premising that the “Saint” referred to was the late Mr. James Martin, who resided at Godrnanchester, and at whose house my father stayed when supplying in that part:
“My dear Friend, for Jesus’ sake, Being informed that you wished to hear if any change took place in the health of our much-esteemed friend and brother Martin, and he also wishing you should be made acquainted with his present state, I have this day promised him I will write to you for him.
“Soon after you left these parts he went to the waters, and upon his return he thought himself much improved in his health. But this was of short duration; for it pleased his covenant God, who has been a very present help to him in this trouble, to afflict him with a brain-fever delirium, at times arising to a very distressing height, except when he spoke of the things of God, and then he appeared to be himself, was sweetly supported in his soul, and gave a blessed testimony to the Lord’s faithfulness and power. He is now improving in his health, though still very weak and low, and has had near forty leeches applied, besides bleeding in the arm and perpetual blistering. His mind is considerably more composed, though he occasionally discovers much excitement, and we hope, in answer to many prayers, he may be restored to the church of Jesus Christ below. I said to him, ‘Well, my dear friend, what shall I say to Mr. Gadsby for you?’ He replied, ‘Tell him I love him dearly, and have long felt my heart united to him. Tell him I am a happy man! For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain! Here I lie, waiting my Father’s will; whether my time is long or short, I am satisfied!’ Shortly after, he added, ‘What is dying? It is only going home!’ Then sweetly smiled, and again said:
“‘Strangers into life we come!
Dying is but going home!’
The love and blood of Jesus enjoyed appears to fill his soul to the brim, and I think a little more would be too much for his poor, weak, tender frame to bear. At his earnest request, my dear husband and I went to see him before this afternoon service. I remained with him the afternoon, and I believe our hearts felt a sweet bedewing from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his power, which seemed to fill the room, making it a little sacred spot. I persuaded him to close his eyes and try to sleep a little, for he only slept three hours last night. He rested about a quarter of an hour, and then began again to make his boast in the dear Friend of sinners, particularly speaking of his finished work, and frequently was melted to tears, telling me they were only tears of joy, which he would suppress if he could. I said, ‘Don’t, my dear Sir, try to suppress them; they will relieve your feelings; let them flow; they proceed from the most blessed feelings the mind is capable of on this side glory.’ He said, ‘I will, I will weep to the praise of the mercy I’ve found!’
“These are only a few out of the many precious things that have this day dropped from his lips. So much of heaven on earthly ground I have never before witnessed. He is certainly apparently mending in health; but I cannot help thinking, from his humility of soul, his happy looks, and sweet enjoyment of Jesus, together with his warm affection to all the saints, that his end is at hand; and, if so, his sun is indeed setting with such rays of glory surrounded as are only now and then witnessed in Zion.
“I must conclude. My husband unites with me in Christian love to you. Hope you will write to our beloved friend. If his life be spared (which God grant, if his blessed will, it may), I know he would value a letter from you greatly. So do write directly.
“Farewell! May God bless you in your own soul, both at home and abroad, in the house and the church.”
For some time after I commenced the magazine, it was far from paying its current expenses, as I have already stated; but this never gave me the slightest uneasiness; for I was continually receiving accounts of its usefulness, and of the blessing it was made to the Lord’s family. The first account of this kind that I received was of two sisters, dairy farmers in Cheshire. They had been brought up to attend the parish church, and, indeed, had never attended any other place. The Lord had shown them their state as sinners, and they could join heartily in that part of the service wherein they called themselves miserable sinners, as well as in some other parts; but with “the parson” (I use their own words) they were altogether at variance. So far from his being a miserable sinner, his sermons seemed always to contradict the prayers. He often called at their little farm, and they had frequent disputes with him. They felt sure he was wrong; but they knew not how to put him right, for they were sure they were wrong also. He often told them they should not be so gloomy, or the consequences might be serious; and they feared they would be; that is, that their minds would become affected. Well, one Saturday, when they had been at the Manchester market with their eggs, butter, &c. (which market they attended every Saturday), as they were going along Shudehill, on their way to make some purchases, they saw on an old book-stall some pamphlets that said on them, “The Gospel Standard; or, Feeble Christian’s Support.”
[This was the original title of the magazine. By what means the latter line was first omitted I have not the slightest recollection. It must have been, as we often say, by “an accident,” and subsequently lost sight of.]They looked at each other, and both wondered what the Gospel standard could mean. However, they bought all the man had, only a few numbers, and began to read them as soon as they could after they reached home. The Address they told me they could not understand; but when they read the piece, “The Blessedness of the Hungry,” &c., their hearts and their eyes were opened. They saw “wondrous things,” and their hearts leaped for joy. They showed the magazines to “the parson,” making sure he would rejoice with them. But instead of that, when he saw the publisher’s name, he said, “O! This is that Gadsby’s! He is an Antinomian!” and so on; which perfectly astonished them, as they knew nothing about Antinomianism. They only knew they had found what they had long felt their need of. They called upon me on the following Saturday, related to me the above circumstances, and purchased several other little things.
[My place of business was then in Newall’s Buildings, Manchester. The premises have been recently pulled down for the new Exchange. On Saturday afternoons numbers of persons, dairy farmers, market gardeners, &c., from the country, when they had sold out, called upon me to purchase magazines, &c.; and on Tuesday mornings, manufacturers, dealers, and others from the neighbouring towns did the same, Tuesday being the manufacturers’ market day. The farmers never stopped long, being anxious to get home; but sometimes my friendly Tuesday visitors stopped so long that I was obliged at last to put up a notice in my counting-house: “Call upon a man of business in business hours on business only,” &c. and when they wanted to go into a long story about their own affairs, or the affairs of others, or their chapel, or their Sunday school, I had to say to them, “Now, come here at one o’clock, go with me to dinner (I lived a mile and a third away), and then we can have a chat; but my men and my business generally must have my personal attention during business hours.” I had thus sometimes three or four with me to dinner, and was seldom alone on Tuesdays. Indeed, my wife says she never knew how many to prepare for until she saw us coming along the road.]The next account which I had of the magazine being made a blessing was from a person who resided at Wilmslow, about 12 miles from Manchester. He was tall and well proportioned, but had only one eye. He was amongst the Wesleyans; and when his class-leader was explaining various points to him and telling him what he ought to do, his only answer was, “If yo’re reet, Awm wrung.” (If you are right, I am wrong.) He also was in the habit of coming to the Manchester market, and by some means or other which I do not now remember, met with the “G. S.;” and, as he told me when he called upon me, he soon was led to see both where he was and where his class-leader was. He purchased my father’s “Everlasting Task for Arminians,” and his “Perfect Law of Liberty,” the latter of which I have no hesitation in saying is the best work extant on the Law and the Gospel, the Bible alone excepted; and he took with him some copies of the magazine for sale, putting them in his window; which caused quite a stir. He also subsequently told me he had made good use of the two little works mentioned.
I have been asked if the Mr. Martin referred to in the letters, “A Saint Indeed,” was the Mr. Martin referred to in Huntington’s works; and I learn from Mr. Sturton that he was not.
I feel disposed to occupy this paper entirely with extracts from Mrs. Sturton’s letters to my father respecting Mr. Martin. Mrs. Sturton, as I have previously said, was the mother of Mr. John Sturton, now of Peterborough.
“My dear Friend, for Jesus’ sake, I have this morning received your kind letter. I have no difficulty whatever in reading your letters, and shall consider your correspondence a favour, whenever your time will allow you to write to us.
“Our dear brother Martin is alive in every respect but to the world, and to that he is as dead as a living man can be. I have never myself witnessed in any one such a settled peace as he is favoured with. At his particular wish, I spent the whole of last Wednesday with him, and never shall I forget the day. Jesus was indeed with us, and a sweet bedewing from the sacred Spirit, I believe, we mutually felt. Nothing but Christ and him crucified is his theme; nor do I think ten minutes, except while we took our meals, were spent through the day but on the dear Redeemer, and his precious love made known by the Holy Spirit. Of the Holy Ghost’s work he is blessedly tenacious, and often said to me, ‘The reason I love your company so much is because I feel sure, while I am talking with you, that you have tasted, and felt, and handled the good word of life;’ and believe me, my dear friend, I feel it no small mercy to have so much regard as he expresses, from a dear saint of God, living so near the throne as he is. He has lost his eyesight, but nothing moves him. In speaking of the sweet manifestation of the love of God to his soul, he said, ‘I have been so favoured, not once, nor twice, but over, and over, and over again; and now the Lord has taken my sight; and I say, Amen, amen! If he will restore it, I shall rejoice; but if not, here am I, Lord; do with me as thou wilt.’ He farther said, ‘Jesus is my constant theme.’ I replied, ‘Yes, Sir, that will do for your morning and evening song.’ He said, ‘Ah! It will. I awake with it in the morning, and when I lie down at night I say, Here I am, Lord, made willing to be disposed of as thou wilt. For me to live is Christ, to die is gain unspeakable gain, everlasting gain. You can’t think how I anticipate the day when I shall see his face, and never, never sin; and I think the time is drawing near.’ I said, ‘Have you any particular reason, my dear friend, for thinking so?’ He replied, ‘Only my own feelings.’ I said, ‘Do you feel as if you were on the very threshold of heaven?’ He replied, ‘I do, Mrs. Sturton; I really do! A few more setting suns, and we shall see him as he is; and then we’ll try which of us can sing the loudest; won’t we?’ I said, ‘We will, Sir.’ ‘Ah,’ he rejoined, ‘but I shall sing the loudest of all the choir of all the choir!’
“His hands have been so paralyzed as to be quite useless; but now he can take a biscuit, and eat it, of himself. With the exception of such a trifle as that, Sally has to feed him like a child. I suppose his mind is in that sweet state that his attention cannot be gained to any worldly affairs; but with this, I, of course, have no concern. On spiritual matters, he is quite collected, and I really do feel it a little heaven below to be in his room. His medical attendant says he is better in health. He can sit up a whole day, and take a little meat comfortably, eating what is given him; but would never, I think, ask for meat or drink, if it were not given him.
“Now, my dear brother (Mr. Gadsby), I have filled my letter about our much-esteemed friend. He expressed his love to you in much warmth, last Wednesday; and added, ‘Perhaps I may yet see him again under my roof; but if not, I shall meet him in glory.’ When he gave me your letter to him, I read it to him again. He wept, and I could scarcely read it to him for tears. O the union the dear saints of God feel to each other, for his sake in whom the union stands! Well; a little longer, and all the saints of God shall meet around the throne. Hail, happy day!
“October,1829.”
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“Mr. M. favoured me with your last letter to him, and truly precious it was to us. I can truly say, I found it a word in season, and my whole heart and soul join with you in your remarks: ‘What an indescribable blessing it is that such filth as we are by nature are brought, under the glorious unction of God the Holy Ghost, to see and feel that the Lord is our portion, life, light, bliss, and blessedness for ever and ever.’ O my dear friend! filth indeed we are. For myself, I must say, I feel my vileness more and more, and as if I could creep into the dust under a sense of my defilement and nothingness; and with dear Mr. M., did feelingly add my ‘Amen’ to that part of your valued letter where you say, ‘Let men talk of their duty-faith, moral obligations, &c.; let my dear Lord but favour me to hold glorious intercourse with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, and I am satisfied. They are welcome, heartily welcome, to all their creature goodness,’ &c.
“I have been much profited by the conversation of Mr. M. My faith has appeared to get fresh strength in the faithfulness of the Lord Jehovah. In our brother’s experience, we have had another proof of the reality of the religion of Jesus Christ, that it is not a cunningly-devised fable, but what will do to live and die by. Never had I such views of the emptiness of all things below as I have had in his room. I have felt thankful that he has wished to have me so often with him, for such a testimony for Jesus I never before witnessed, nor can I ever forget the seasons we have had. I have often longed for you to rejoice with us. This I know, you have done, though at a distance; but, had it been the Lord’s will, I could have rejoiced for you to have been present.
“Nov. 23, 1829.”
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“Our dear brother Martin has received your valuable letter; he kindly sent it to us on the Lord’s day evening; we had been confined at home by weather, or rather by roads. I had felt much deadness in my soul; no access to God, no light into his word, no cheering ray from his throne; but your letter was quite a refreshing cordial; a sweet quickening power did indeed attend the reading of it, so that I had quite a heart-warming, and I am sure the Lord was with you while composing it, and hope he will soon pay you another such a precious visit, and that you may be again willing to communicate to us. Our friend is getting on well in his health; his toe is so well that he came down stairs again on Christmas day; he is still happy in the Lord. I spent yesterday afternoon with him. Generally some one passage of the Word seems to rest particularly on his mind; he was much impressed yesterday with, ‘You hath he quickened.’ His faculties and memory fail exceedingly, so that, from what his housekeeper says, his poor mind appears at times reduced to childhood; but he is a father in spiritual things. His case is the most remarkable we ever heard of. I believe his mind is too weak to state any one doctrine of his faith, and yet the very marrow and fatness of all the doctrines of free and sovereign grace are richly enjoyed in his soul. O! My dear brother, how I see in him, and admire, the difference between a real child of God, however marred his intellect through bodily infirmity, and the empty trash of the day, which arrogates to itself the name of religion. It makes me, with all my heart, which God knows, long, and desire, and beg, and pant after more real heart-work, more of Christ in my heart, the hope of glory; nothing but this will stand free a religion that lives under trials, and stands firm when friends, yea, when heart and flesh fail. Mr. Martin particularly desires his love to you, and thanks for the poetry; he says he does not know when he shall be able to write to you himself, but loves to hear from you, and begs I will acknowledge your letters for him. He is desirous of having me with him, and says he has more enjoyment in conversing with me than any other friend. For this I am thankful, as it has been a great blessing to my soul. Owing to his weakness of mind, his conversation is very simple; I mean, godly simplicity, the same thing often repeated; but after a few words respecting his health, on going in, then Jesus, dear Jesus, is all his theme, and the fullest confidence expressed of interest in him. He said, ‘Whom have I in heaven but Jesus? and there is none upon earth I desire besides him. I won’t have it altered to there is none in comparison of him. O no; there is none I desire besides him; he is my all in all;’ then said, ‘There are no ifs, no peradventures, in God’s creed, so there are none in mine.
‘”All is settled,
And my soul approves it well.”
And I added my hearty ‘Amen’ to his.
“December 28, 1829.”
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“Such an unctuous power attends his simple statements of the happiness of his soul, the love and faithfulness of his God, the blood and righteousness of the sin-bearing Saviour, as often melts me to tears, deadens my heart to the world, and makes me at times long to be with Jesus, in a way I never knew before Mr. M.’s affliction, for I never could feel as if I could leave my dear husband and family; and on this account I have often called in question the reality of enjoyments, because in them I did not want to leave all and go to Jesus. The Lord teaches me by little and little, first one lesson and then another, and a stupid scholar I have ever been. Mr. Hardy (of Leicester, who had been visiting them) described me last Sunday morning when he said some of God’s children were like narrow-necked bottles, that could not take in much at once; if the milk was not dropped in a little at a time, much would go beside, and little in. Still, blessed be God, I have such a good hope of being a vessel of mercy that millions of worlds, with all they contain, would be trash when compared therewith. Mr. Hardy desires me to present his brotherly love to you.
“Feb. 27, 1830.”
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“I was truly glad to receive your letter, and found it a very sweet word of refreshment to my spirit. I have read it over many times, and never without some unctuous feelings towards our dear, almighty, sin-bearing Saviour. O what a favour, while in this wilderness of misery and woe, to be indulged with communion with those who are of the same blood-redeemed family, who know our language, understand our exercises, both in the light and in the dark, having travelled through the same paths. What am I, a poor worm, vile and sinful, and more and more sensible of it, that the Lord should incline any of his children to commune with me by the way, and particularly his own sent servants, who declare those things they have tasted, and felt, and known under the power of God the Holy Ghost? My soul would bless the Lord for his goodness, and all within me would praise his holy name. I do think there is as much difference between the true ministers of Christ and all others as between a man who can describe places and situations from maps, or globes, and another who has really travelled the ground over, felt the briers and thorns of the road, and tasted the fruit of the land, endured the scorching sun, and embraced the rock for want of a shelter. O for more of the real life and power of godliness, more of Christ made known and enjoyed in the church, collectively and individually.
“Our dear brother M. has been so much better as to be able to go again to the house of the Lord, and once more to sit down with us around our Father’s board, to remember the dying love of cur sin-atoning, law-fulfilling Jesus. Last Lord’s day he was not so well, and was not out; but we found him still as firmly fixed as ever in his mind on the Bock of Ages, very blessedly stayed on God…Paul besought the Lord thrice for the removal of the thorn in his flesh, but when those precious words, ‘My grace is sufficient for thee,’ were spoken to him, we do not read that he besought any more. I had a comfortable time last Lord’s day morning in hearing Mr. S. from, ‘We beseech you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.’ While he spoke how poor sinners were reconciled to God’s way of saving them, the Spirit did indeed witness with my spirit that, though once an enemy, he hath reconciled me to God by the death of his Son, and not only made me willing to be saved in God’s way by the merits of another, but my whole heart does rejoice and glory in his salvation who is mighty to save. My soul joins your language in one of your hymns:
“‘Mighty to save! He saves from hell;
A mighty Saviour suits me well.’
“April 16, 1830.”
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The next letter, dated June 2, 1830, contained an invitation from the church at Godmanchester to my father to supply for them on his way to London; and it would appear that he complied, as the next refers to the visit. It would also appear that Mr. M. had been so much better as to take “an airing:”
“Soon after you left us he was thrown out of his gig, through the pony falling. His face was a good deal lacerated, but he had now quite recovered from the effects of his fall. I asked him how he felt at the time of the accident. He said he thought he was going home, and it did not matter how. Since then lie has had two attacks of inflammation in the brain; but the Lord has again raised him. In the midst of all, Jesus is the theme of his heart and the boast of his tongue. And so he is ours; for, my dear friend, what other name will do poor sinners any good? So vile, so unworthy, I deeply feel myself, that I never more should lift up my head, was it not for the finished work of our adorable Jesus.
“I think I told you that after some dark weeks of sorrowful desertion the Lord darted a cheering ray of light into my soul, while they were pinging at the meeting those precious lines of yours:
“‘The cause of love is in himself;
Then let his saints rejoice!’
And indeed I did feel it a favour, this being the case, that all my wretched depravity can never turn his heart of love way. Though I am thoroughly out of love with myself, your morning discourse at Godmanchester was blessedly confirming, and strengthening to my faith; and while you were describing how Jesus was ‘acceptable to his brethren,’ he came into my heart in the power of his own Spirit, and an acceptable visitor he was; and you will believe me when I say how I welcomed him! None but they who have mourned an absent God know the blessedness of renewed love tokens.
“Nov. 18, 1830.”
But I must come to the close:
“Our mutually-beloved friend and brother M. has received his dismission from this vale of tears. His happy spirit took its flight to the mansions of bliss about twenty minutes past throe, last Wednesday. He was only ill (that is, worse than usual) from Tuesday, the 19th. On the Friday I had some comfortable conversation with him. He was extremely low, but his confidence remained unshaken in his covenant God. On the Lord’s day, we, and several other friends, visited him again. He spoke, or rather replied to us, in the most blessed manner on the love and faithfulness of Jesus. Well may the poet say,
“‘When most we need his helping hand,
This Friend is always near.’
“On the 26th, we received information that our dear brother was dying, and having promised that, if I should survive him, I would witness his last testimony for Jesus, in whom we had often rejoiced together, I went, and found him engaged with the last enemy. When I spoke to him, he said, ‘Ah, ah! Glad you’re come.’ I said, ‘Are you still happy in the Lord Jesus?’ He replied, ‘Yes, indeed I am.’ I said, ‘The Lord will not forsake you in this time of need.’ He replied, ‘Never, never.’ He was very low, and spoke with difficulty, not being able to swallow to relieve his throat. Therefore we spoke but little to him, dropping now and then a word. About eleven o’clock, I said, ‘My dear friend, these are trying moments, but Jesus has promised to be with you.’ He replied, ‘He is.’ I said, ‘Do you feel his sweet presence, now flesh and heart are failing?’ He replied, ‘I do.’ I said, ‘This rejoices me indeed. Let us praise him once more together.’ He exerted himself, as if he would sing, and said seve- ral times, ‘Halle halle ‘ I said, ‘Do you mean Hallelujah?’ He replied, ‘Yes.’ Towards morning, as the perspiration was wiped from his face, I said, ‘Jesus went through all this before you, and for your sake.’ He said, ‘Yes.’ Sometime after, I remarked to him that he would arrive home before me. He said, ‘I hope I shall.’ After this there was a long solemn silence, all our eyes being fixed on him. He smiled, and S. said, ‘I believe he will go off with a smile.’ He said, ‘I shall, after a while.’ These were his last words.
“After this he sank very fast, and it was evident communion with the saints below was finally closed; hut, for the sake of further confirmation of this, before I left I said to him, ‘Farewell, my friend, till I see you again with all the chosen seed, on the glorious resurrection morning.’ He took no notice. Thinking he might not hear, I repeated, ‘Farewell.’ But all was solemn silence. Our fellowship on earth was ended.
“At nine o’clock I returned home, but the conflict lasted till the time already named. ‘Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.’
“His remains, by his own desire, are to be deposited under his own seat in the meeting-house.
“July 29, 1831.”
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The meeting-house is one at which the late Mr. William Brown was pastor for some years, until he was compelled to remove to Brighton on account of his health. Mr. Godwin is now the pastor. May his valuable life be long spared to the Lord’s people, if the Lord’s will!
The following is a copy of the tablet referred to in Mrs. Sturton’s letter. Mr. Godwin kindly, at my request, copied it for me: “In memory of John and James Martin. James Martin died July 27th, 1881, aged 48. John Martin died October 21st, 1841, aged 74. They loved the Lord who first loved them, under the sweet influence of whose almighty grace they both lived and died in the precious faith of God’s elect.”
Mr. Godwin has also furnished me with the following further particulars:
“The first part of the chapel was built by the father of the late James and John Martin, and was not then a place of truth. A minister named Freeman went to preach in it during the time of James and John Martin, and they (James and John) gave the ground to build the other part of the chapel.
“About that time Mr. Freeman was led into the truth in a sweet way and manner, and then the chapel was made into a Strict Baptist church. This was in 1815.”
At the head of every No. will be seen a reference to several passages of scripture. These passages were originally put in full; but afterwards, to gain room, we omitted the text and merely gave the references. The passages were intended to set forth, in some measure, the doctrines we advocated.
A few remarks on the first passage, Matt. 5:6, by my father, I gave in April. I now give my father’s remarks on the second passage, 2 Tim. 1:9:
“Here we find salvation stated before calling by grace; and, indeed, if we take a proper view of the subject, it was so in the mind and purpose of God. God the Father saved, or secured, the elect in Christ before the foundation of the world. Hence, Jude says, ‘Sanctified by God the Father;’ that is, set apart by God the Father, as the people of his holy choice, and so made the special care and charge of Christ: ‘According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love; having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.’ And though the elect fell, with the rest of mankind, in Adam the first, they never fell as considered in Christ; but, as the Holy Ghost says by Jude, they were ‘preserved in Christ Jesus;’ and in God’s own time they are called.
‘It is the believer’s blessedness that each glorious person in the Godhead has a glorious hand in his salvation. God the Father saved, chose, sanctified, or set him apart, in Christ, before the world was; God the Son took humanity into union to his personal Godhead, and thus became incarnate, lived a holy life, suffered, bled, died a solemn death, rose again from the dead, ascended up on high, having led captivity captive, and is now exalted at the right hand of the Father, ever living to make intercession for him. Thus Christ has meritoriously saved the elect by his life, obedience, death, resurrection, exaltation, and intercession; as it is written, ‘ He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.’ Thus the blessed Redeemer ‘was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification;’ and, bless his precious name, he has been the destruction of death, hell, and sin. The gloriously blessed God-Man Mediator ‘gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.’ So that, before the world was, the church was saved purposedly by God the Father; in time, meritoriously by the God-Man Mediator, who now lives above to make intercession for them; and, in the day of God’s power, they are saved manifestatively and vitally, by the ‘washing of regeneration, and the renewing of the Holy Ghost.’
“Now, not a particle of this is either for, or according to, their works; for it is ‘not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us;’ or, as our text has it, ‘Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works.’
“What an indescribable mercy it is that salvation is of the Lord; yea, that God himself, as the God of Zion, is our salvation. Blessed, triumphant faith, under the sweet power and unction of God the Holy Ghost, can at times sweetly sing, ‘Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song, he also is become my salvation.’ This salvation contains a complete deliverance from every foe and soul-damning danger, and it is a complete salvation to every real good. We have all spiritual blessings in Christ, all bliss and blessedness secured in him; for it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell. He is full of grace and truth; and of his fulness we receive, and grace for grace. All things are the real believer’s, for he is Christ’s, and Christ is God’s; and, as I said before, this glorious salvation is all of grace, not of works, lest any man should boast.
“Now, my text says, ‘Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling.’ This call is the solemn, soul-quickening, heart-rending call of a holy God; not a mere call to hear the word preached, nor to attend upon public means; many are called to these things whom God never chose in Christ; but this is a holy calling from death to life, from darkness to light, from the power of sin and Satan to the living God. This call makes the sinner feel his own guilty and ruined condition as a sinner against a holy God. He is called to see sin in the light of God’s countenance, and to feel its awful plague, and tremble before God on the account of it; and he is called to feel that his case is too desperate for him to help his own soul. The more he tries and toils, the deeper he sinks in a feeling sense of his own ruin and misery. Help himself! He finds he can as soon create a world as do it. Therefore, with heartrending groans, he is called to cry, ‘God be merciful to me, a sinner!’ But he is effectually called to feel and see the emptiness of creature goodness, and to thirst for the living God; nor will anything short of Christ, and a full and free salvation by and in him, satisfy his quickened soul. Hope deferred often makes his heart sick; but still the divine power by which he is called keeps him to the point, and the issue shall prove that he is called to have fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ, with his love, blood, sufferings, and obedience; to hold sweet converse with him, as his own Lord and Redeemer; and sweetly say, ‘My Beloved is mine, and I am his.’ For ‘ God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.’ All the blessings couched in this glorious, endearing character, God has called the real believer to the fellowship of; and, in the Lord’s own time, he shall share in the sweet enjoyment of them.
“O the wonders of God’s love to his people! Come, poor sin-oppressed, guilt-smitten, law-wrecked, world-despised, Satan-hunted, self-condemned, heart-tortured, self-loathing sinner, hope thou in the Lord; for, with all thy fears and faintings, misgivings, staggerings, stumblings, sighings, and groanings, by and by thy dear Lord will manifestatively put his arms of everlasting love under thee, and say, ‘Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon; look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Herrnon, from the lions’ dens, from the mountains of the leopards. Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes, with one chain of thy neck. How fair is thy love, my sister, my spouse! How much better is thy love than wine, and the smell of thine ointments than all spices!’ Thus the real Christian is called to be made partaker of Christ’s holiness, and to hope in him as the God of hope; yea, to believe in him as the glorious Resurrection and the Life; and in the end feelingly to say, ‘O Lord, thou art my God, and I will praise thee.’ He is called to receive a full and free pardon through the blood of the Lamb, and to feel the soul-cleansing efficacy of that blessed fountain. In a word, he is called to hope in Christ, believe in Christ, trust in Christ, glory in Christ, teem out all his complaints unto Christ, confess with abhorrence his vileness to Christ, and supplicate his throne for daily grace and mercy; to live for Christ, and to live to Christ, and to be daily concerned to honour and glorify him in this world. Christ dwells in him, and he dwells in Christ, and they are manifestatively one. Holiness is his delight, and sin is his burden. His sweetest and most heavenly moments are when he can hold intercourse with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, when the world drops its charms, and God is all and in all. He is, in the Lord’s own time, called to feel that Christ has made him free, and he is free indeed; and with holy solemnity he exclaims, (What, then! Shall I sin that grace may abound? God forbid! Shall I sin because I am not under the law, but under grace? God forbid!’ Thus, he is called with a holy calling, by a holy God, to holy things; and at last he shall be called to heaven, when it shall be fully made manifest that he is called to a holy end.
“A few more struggles, poor burdened believer, and thou shalt see all is well. Expect no good from corrupt nature. God has called thee to feel that in thy flesh dwells no good thing. Why look for the living in such a dead, corrupt mass? God help thee to flee to, rest upon, and live in Christ. Thou art called to be partaker of his holiness, not thy fleshly works, but to flee from them, and daily to twine round and hang upon Christ. There may thy soul be stayed, for in him thou art complete, and no- where else.
“Well, this salvation, and this holy calling, are not according to our works, but according to God’s purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. Salvation, in all its bearings, is according to God’s own purpose and grace, secured in Christ before time. Thanks be to God for that. All we feel and fear, all our sins and woes, all our darkness and deadness, loathsomeness and vileness, cannot alter God’s purpose and grace, which is secured in Christ. Remember, poor, tried, tempted, tossed-about sinner, it is of God’s grace, yea, God’s purposed grace. Thy miseries tend to prove that this glorious salvation, this holy calling, are just what thou needest just suited to thee; and it is God’s own purpose to call thee to the sweet participation of them. They are thine by the solemn pur- pose and free-grace grant of a covenant God; and each glorious Person in the one undivided Jehovah takes pleasure in putting thee in possession of it. The time will come when thy Lord will say to thee, ‘Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate; but thou shalt be called Hephzibah, and thy land Beulah; for the Lord delighteth in thee; and thy land shall be married. For as a young man marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee; and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee;’ ‘The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.’ The glorious marriage of the Lamb and his wife will very soon be consummated in everlasting bliss and blessedness, and ‘blessed are they which are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’
“That the Lord may from day to day be graciously pleased to grant to his saved, called children much of his presence and love, is the prayer of,” &c.
The articles on the third, fourth, and fifth passages were by myself. I have since often wondered at my assurance, and have really blushed at my forwardness. “Only to think,” I have sometimes said to myself, “that, so long ago (now nearly 36 years), I should have been so daring!” But I was then in the full enjoyment of gospel liberty, and equally full of zeal; and I had no more doubt, as I state in my Autobiography, that I should be a minister, and a most deeply-taught one too, excelling even my dear father (O what presumption!) than I had of my existence. But the Lord taught me differently. I painfully learnt the truth of what my father says in one of his “Nazarine’s Songs:”
“Young Christians oft please their vain minds
With wonders they hope to perform;
But soon they come limping behind,
Their courage all fail’d in a storm.”
And I am now as well persuaded that I never shall be a minister as I then was that I should be; nay, better persuaded; for my former conviction, I believe, arose from pride, while my present one is sincerely grounded on a deep sense of my absolute unfitness. So deep is this sense that I shrink from even engaging in prayer out of my own house; and I have never engaged in prayer in public without trembling and being thrown into a violent perspiration. But though the Lord has not blessed me with a special gift for the ministry or public prayer, I trust I may without presumption say he has made me unflinching in defence of the truths which, in the hands of the blessed Spirit, are the stay of my soul.
It must not be understood that I am ashamed of the doctrines advocated in the said articles. The doctrine of Election and all the grand and glorious truths connected with it are as dear to me now as they were when I wrote upon the subject. As dear to me, did I say? Yes, ten times more so. I have had a life of changes; of afflictions, of trials, of temptations; of wanderings in thought, word, and deed, and of renewed manifestations of Christ’s pardoning and redeeming love to my soul. And the longer I live the more I feel my wretched heart striving to fall in with the abominable suggestions of the great adversary. (And O, dear Lord, what would be the result?) Where, then, should I be, were it not for Election? Of this I am persuaded, that no man living feels himself more indebted to God’s sovereign grace than I do. Though, through abounding mercy, I have never been left to fall into what are called the grosser sins of human nature, yet this preservation is, on the one hand, as much an act of God’s grace as his pardoning mercy is on the other; for I know to my grief that I have it all within, not the seeds merely, as is sometimes said, but the very root. But I am forgetting myself.
Then as to the article on Baptism. Though I see much in it that I would fain withdraw, yet I believe the piece, as a whole, is unanswerable. Some of my dearest friends after the Spirit are not Baptists; but that does not cause me to love them the less, though I earnestly wish they could see as I see. What man, whether Baptist or not, with the grace of God in his heart, can read Huntington’s “Contemplations on the God of Israel,” and not feel his very soul knit to the writer? Next to my own dear father, there was no man’s ministry ever made so useful and dear to me as that of the late William Nunn, of St. Clement’s, Manchester, and the late Henry Fowler, of Grower Street. But I am a Baptist for all that, and hope never to compromise my principles. If there were two of the Lord’s children equally dear to me, I would cleave to both if I could; but if circumstances really compelled me to give up one, I would hold fast to the one who was of the same faith and order as myself. And if I were a minister, and there were two places of truth in one town, the one a Baptist and the other not, I certainly should not think of aiding the latter while the former required my services, even though the latter might be far more respectable.
[I have often thought it remarkable that my youngest sister should have been set at liberty under the ministry of Mr. Nunn and not under that of my father. In the account which was given of her in October, 1858, it was stated that after being tempted to put an end to her existence, and going on for about two years in deep distress of soul, she heard Mr. Nunn from the text: “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?” When she was enabled to respond, “Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee;” and she often spoke of the blessedness of that sermon. After the appearance of that obituary, I had several letters, including one from Mr. Philpot and another from the late Mr. Peake, of Oakham, whose memory is dear to many as well as to myself, saying how much the account had been blessed. Mr. Nunn’s body was interred in All Saints’ churchyard, Oxford Road, Manchester, not far from that of my father in the Rusholme Road cemetery. I have several times stepped aside to look upon the tomb of the former on my way to gaze again upon that of the latter. The latter, the registrar assures me, has been visited by thousands of persons.]I had not thought of giving any more of my father’s writings out of the magazine than those already given, but of at once coming to our connexion with Mr. M’Kenzie and Mr. Philpot. And this for two reasons: 1, Because I thought I had, in this respect, exhausted Vol. I., and because many copies of the subsequent volumes are in existence more than of Vol. I., and I did not wish to repeat them; and, 2, Because I seem to have made up my mind, if time and opportunity be given me, to issue a little work exclusively of Short Pieces and Letters by my father, and of Extracts from his Sermons; by adopting which course no one will be compelled to purchase what he has already in his possession. It is true I have other works in hand, which I have not yet been able to finish; but I hope to give this the preference, as being far more likely to be made a blessing to the Lord’s people than anything I can write.
A friend has, however, directed my special attention to my father’s reply to “A Broken-Hearted Sinner,” in the Dec. No., Vol. I., which I had overlooked.
In the Nov. No., under the head, “The Pool of Bethesda,” I find the following: “Through your valuable ‘Standard,’ an impotent body, who is hungry and thirsty, and whose soul, at times, fainteth within her for a ray of hope in the manifestation of an interest in a precious Redeemer’s blood, is desirous of having a few words from ‘A Lover of Zion,’ on Jn. 5:7. Does he, as a valiant soldier of truth, who has experienced the workings of God the Holy Spirit upon his own soul, think it possible for a poor, weak, feeble sinner to come to that pool, waiting there for the moving of the waters, who is walking in darkness and having no light, and who, feelingly a dog, would gladly eat of the crumbs which fall from the children’s table; and living and dying iii that state, does he think there is any hope for such a soul?”
Then, in the Dec. No., is the answer:
“Dear Friend, I apprehend that an explanation of John 5:7, would not enter into your real desire, because the disease of the impotent man there referred to was not of a spiritual, but of a natural kind. Nevertheless, there are some things connected with his case which may very properly be brought forward to illustrate the methods of God’s grace to his people; for, though he had lain at the pool for a very long time, yet he was not cured by the pool, but by the almighty, sovereign word and power of the Lord. And so some of God’s people lay at the pool of outward means, with a grievous disease of sin and guilt, and lay there a long time. Sometimes, perhaps, they hope this or the other means will prove a cure; but the disease still remains, yea, rather increases than otherwise, and they often fear they shall die in their sins at last. Very frequently they think of giving it up as a lost matter, or a desperate case, thinking the Lord will not stoop to relieve. But though the Lord appears to put them back, he still secretly keeps them to the point, panting for mercy, longing for a cure; and at length is graciously pleased to send his word by the power of the Holy Ghost, and heal them (Ps. 107:20); and this most frequently at a time, and in a way they little expected.
“If, my dear friend, I understand you aright, you wish to know whether a poor, impotent, hungry, and thirsty sinner, whose soul, at times, fainteth within her for a ray of hope in the manifestation of an interest in a precious Redeemer’s blood, who is waiting on the Lord in the means of grace, yet walking in darkness and having no light, feeling herself a dog, and one which would gladly eat of the crumbs that fall from the Master’s table, can, after all, die in her sins; or whether such a character can exist, and yet be dead in trespasses and sins. Now, in reply, let me tell you, if you have truly described your case, I have no hesitation in saying, No—I believe it is not possible for such a character to be dead in sin. But we will for a moment attempt to try it by the word of God. To be impotent, spiritually, I consider, is to be so far made alive by the Holy Ghost as to feel the awful disease of sin, yet so feeble and weak as to be without power to help oneself, and to be really made to feel that such is the disease that no natural medicine can heal it; so that we are ready to fear the grievous wound is incurable. (Jer. 30:12, 13.) All our sighs, and groans, and cries, only tend, according to our then feelings, to sink us deeper in our miseries; for it is as though the Lord said, ‘ Why criest thou for thine affliction? Thy sorrow is incurable for the multitude of thine iniquity; because thy sins are increased, I have done these things unto thee.’ Thus the poor soul imagines that his case is desperate. But mark the wonders of God’s grace! When all other lovers and all nature fail, the dear Lord brings health and cure: ‘For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the Lord.’ Bless his precious name, the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. While the self-righteous pharisee goes dancing about, gallant-like, with the laurels of his own imaginary piety and goodness, God brings his own family to feel that all flesh is grass, and that all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field, which withereth and fadeth away, when the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it; and his blessed Majesty gives power to the faint, and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. The lame take the prey; and it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. The Lord’s poor worms Jacob may have a thousand fears and faintings too, for hope deferred maketh the heart sick; but deliverance shall come: ‘For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee. Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel; I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. Behold, I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth; thou shalt thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills as chaff. Thou shalt fan them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the whirlwind shall scatter them; and thou shalt rejoice in the Lord, and shalt glory in the Holy One of Israel.’ He satisfieth the longing soul with good things, while the rich he sendeth empty away.
“If the above be really your case, you have abundant cause to be thankful. You are just suited to Christ, and Christ is just suited to you. A more blessed fit cannot be pointed out, nor a more blessed match made, than a glorious Jesus and you being brought rnanifestively together in one sweet bond of covenant love, by the precious power and energy of God the Holy Ghost. He shall glorify Christ, and shall glorify the saints in Christ. You are, you say, feelingly impotent; Christ is the great Physician, that brings health and cure, without money or price. Bless his adorable name, with his own stripes he heals us. But perhaps you may say, ‘I am such a sinner.’ So was David; but a feeling sense of it made him cry, ‘Lord, be merciful unto me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against thee.’ ‘He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.’ Were his people not a diseased people, he would not be a suited healer; but one part of the sweet song of the psalmist was, that the Lord forgave all his iniquities, and healed all his diseases. And if you really be a hungry and thirsty sinner, that is, one that is thirsting for God, the living God, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, you shall, in God’s own time, eat the flesh, and drink the blood, of the blessed Redeemer; for he is the bread of God and the water of life. ‘He will pour water [the water of life] upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground.’ lHe that believeth on me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.’ But mind, the disciples did not receive this blessing immediately that the promise was made, but they had to wait for it, and met with many perplexing disappointments before they experienced the promise in the power of it. Their dear Lord was put to cruel tortures, even in their presence; was crucified, and buried, and all their hope appeared almost to be buried too. Nevertheless, it was through this dark, strange, mysterious method that the promise was to be fulfilled; and after the resurrection of their dear Lord, the blessing was fully made manifest at the day of Pentecost. It is the privilege of the poor sinner to wait patiently for the Lord; for the Lord will not be hurried; he makes no better haste than good speed; for ‘the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie; though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.’ Our ever glorious and blessed Christ came both to seek and to save that which was lost; and he is such a precious Saviour that he is all a sinner can need, law require, justice demand, or God give. This is God’s unspeakable gift; and his glorious Majesty gives this Gift of gifts to those who have no worth or worthiness in themselves, entirely without money or price.
“‘The poorer the wretch, the welcomer here.’
‘But thou hast not called upon me, O Jacob; but thou hast been weary of me, O Israel. Thou hast not brought me the small cattle of thy burnt offerings; neither hast thou honoured me with thy sacrifices. I have not caused thee to serve with an offering, nor wearied thee with incense. Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast thou filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices; but thou hast made me to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities. I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.’ Wonder, O heavens, and be astonished, O earth, for the Lord hath done it! Here we have a description of wretches, without anything to recommend them to God, nay, worse than that, they have made God to serve with their sins, and wearied him with their iniquities, yet matchless grace blots out all their transgressions, freely and fully, for the Lord’s own name’s sake. Come, poor broken-hearted sinner, put the Lord in remembrance of such a gracious declaration. Plead with him for his name’s sake; he will surely hear thee, and answer thee in mercy. God’s name, in the full blaze of its glory, is in Christ. There all its honours harmonize, and rest for ever; and with him the Father is well pleased. May you be well pleased with him too, and daily plead him at the divine footstool; for whatsoever ye ask in the blessed name of Jesus, he will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
“Are you indeed a broken-hearted sinner? Are you indeed hungering and thirsting after righteousness? Are you indeed feelingly a dog? Does your soul indeed faint within you for a ray of hope? Then you are a blessed character. God’s word cannot be true, and you perish in your sins. When the Lord the Spirit has opened the heart of a sinner, and, as it were, broken it in pieces, discovering to the sinner the filth and loathsomeness of its contents, and brought him to tremble at the word of God, and to be a stench in his own nostrils, and to abhor himself before the Lord, crying feelingly, ‘Behold, I am vile,’ he will never forsake him, but will accomplish the work he has begun. A broken and a contrite heart God will not despise. A poor, broken- hearted sinner appears to have more of the attention of Jehovah, and to be more his special care and charge than all the works of nature put together: ‘For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the Lord; but’ but what? Why, as if the Lord were about to say, But my eye of special grace, care, and favour is fixed elsewhere ‘but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.’ Yes, bless his precious name, he not only looks to him, but dwells with him; not merely to look on, but to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
“The blessed Lord of the house is both anointed and sent for the express purpose of binding up the broken-hearted. Poor, broken-hearted sinners may and will find that they often walk in darkness, and appear to have no light; but from whence do they discover the loathsomeness of their disease? How came they to hunger, and thirst, and pant for a ray of hope in the precious Redeemer’s blood, &c.? This cannot be in a mind which is at enmity to God; and the carnal, unrenewed mind is enmity to God; and enmity to God cannot produce a desire after the sweet enjoyment of him, and a panting for the manifestations of his love. This springs from the life and light of God, and, in the Lord’s own time, it shall be more fully made manifest. Clouds and darkness are sometimes round about the Lord, and we cannot perceive him. ‘Unto the upright, there ariseth light in darkness.’ But if the upright were never in darkness, there could not arise light unto them in darkness. One promise of the Lord to his people is, he ‘will make darkness light before them.’
“The Lord enable thee, poor, broken-hearted sinner, by faith and in feeling, to use the language of Micah; ‘Therefore I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me. Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy. When I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me.’
“I will conclude this epistle in the language of the Lord by Isaiah: ‘Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light? let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God.’ If anything I have written be made a blessing to you, or to any other poor, broken-hearted sinner, may the Lord enable us to give him the glory.”
Perhaps some may say they see nothing new in the pieces I have given or even in the extracts from the letters respecting Mr. Martin. They hear the same things continually from the pulpits, and read them over and over again in the pieces and obituaries of the “Standard.” Doubtless that is so. But suppose the Lord had not raised up Huntington in the South and my father in the North, but left religion in the state in which it then was and had for some time been, and suppose the “Gospel Standard,” with the writings of Mr. Philpot and others, had not been owned and blessed, could you have heard or read them then? At the time the Lord raised up the first two named, true religion had so greatly fallen that, though there might be some who preached the doctrines, there were few, if any, who preached them in an experimental way, with the dew and savour of the Holy Spirit. There was little or no distinction made between those who held the doctrines in their judgments merely and those who, having been condemned in their consciences as breakers of God’s holy law, in thought, word, and deed, lost and ruined apparently beyond hope, felt their need of those doctrines, and realized the soul-humbling and Christ-glorifying power of them in their hearts. Had it not been for those men having been raised up, aided by those in immediate connexion with them, such as Bourne, Brook, Vinall, &c. (to whom I may add Hawker), on the one hand, and Warburton, Brown, Kershaw, &c., on the other, all now gone to glory, and for this magazine having been owned of God in the promulgating and defending of those truths, all would now have seemed new. Dr. Owen’s works were lying dormant; Bishop Hall’s were known to few; and even New- ton’s seemed almost forgotten. We hear some most dear and highly-esteemed men still in the flesh, and we often hear the same old blessed truths with new power; but, strictly speaking, we hear only what has been preached or written before, whether of doc- trine, experience, or practice.
I must not be understood here as meaning that our ministers preach only what they have read. God forbid! If they have been taught in the same school, they must have learnt the same lessons; but the writings of good men who have gone before them must have been the means, in the Lord’s hands, of instructing them in the way of the Lord more perfectly, as was the case with Aquila and Priscilla with Apollos. I dare not say there are none who profess the same doctrines we profess who preach other men’s sermons, and whose sermons spring from memory, not from grace. On the contrary, I believe there are; just as amongst the Evangelicals there are some who preach Simeon’s sermons, and as amongst the general Dissenters there are some who preach Spurgeon’s. But I cannot help looking upon such men as impostors, especially when other parts of their conduct will not bear scrutiny; and I would sooner relinquish my labours to-morrow than publish their names amongst the supplies; and when such are made manifest I will, be offended who may, strike their names out.
None but the guilty will be offended at these remarks, though I freely admit they are not of a very edifying nature; but those only who have the conducting of a magazine can know what the conductors have to endure.
I have only to add that I do not know of one whose name now appears in this magazine to whom these remarks refer.
I hope next month to introduce Mr. M’Kenzie and Mr. Philpot.
In April, 1835, Mr. Philpot wrote his famous letter to the Provost of Worcester College, resigning his Fellowship of that college and seceding from the Church of England. The same month and year Mr. M’Kenzie, who had stood high amongst the Independents at Preston, and was superintendent of their Sunday school, was prohibited from speaking in the school-room, and the following month was “excommunicated as a member for preaching the doctrines of grace.” In his “Fragments of Experience,” he says, “I was convicted in my soul of sin and guilt about the latter end of 1832, or beginning of 1833. I laboured and struggled hard for heaven by works, and was in hard bondage, both in soul-experience and in my judgment, till about July, 1834. I joined the Independents, Sept. 1st, 1833; and was appointed the superintendent of their Sunday school, Jan. 12th, 1834. About July, 1834, my eyes were opened to see the doctrines of grace and God’s method of salvation; that eternal life was the gift of God through the righteousness of Jesus Christ. This gave great relief to my mind, as I was grossly ignorant of the doctrines of grace, and even of the meaning of the word grace, thinking the only way to heaven was by making my soul fit for heaven by holy devotions, holy works, and holy frames and feelings. At this time I also saw that the characters spoken of in Matt. 5:3-11 represented the feelings of souls changed by the grace of God. These characters I found to be a true and exact description of my feelings, which greatly comforted and encouraged me. I began publicly to speak a little about the doctrines of grace, and the characters and felt experience of quickened souls, about the month of Nov., 1834. The first passage I spoke from was Jn. 3:3-8; and the first text I ventured to take was Isa. 62:12. I was excluded speaking in the Independent school-room in April, 1835, and was excommunicated as a member on May 12th, 1835, for holding and preaching the doctrines of grace. After this I spoke occasionally for the Particular Baptists, meeting in a room in Cannon Street, was baptized at Black-burn, on the first Lord’s day in Sept., 1835, and united with the church at Preston at the same time. I preached occasionally for them till the first Lord’s day in May, 1836, when I was appointed by the church to be their regular minister. Preached in the Institution room, Cannon Street, till Dec. 4th, 1837, and entered on Vauxhall Road Chapel, Dec. 11th, 1837.”
Some persons may call all this chance; but I view it as a most remarkable providence that, just at the very time that it was put into my heart to arrange for commencing this magazine, two men who were subsequently to take so invaluable a part in its management should be called out, simultaneously as I may say, from the people with whom they had so long stood connected. Of Mr. M’Kenzie I had never heard, and I had only heard of Mr. Philpot in an indirect way. Mr. Tiptaft was supplying for my father in the autumn of 1834, and often visited me at my office. [The first sermon Mr. Tiptaft preached in my father’s chapel was from Ps. 107:8. “Well I remember that sermon and the power that attended it.] One morning I gave him a letter which was addressed to my care for him. “O!” he exclaimed, “it is from my friend Philpot! I have no doubt the Lord will ere long bring him out; and I shall be glad to see his Reasons for coming out, as he says my Fifteen Reasons are very poor.” When Mr. P. Had come out, I wrote to him, asking him if he would lend a helping hand in the publishing of the magazine. He replied he was too much engaged to think of it; but if he did help, it would be in writing the Reviews. He, however, wrote several short pieces before he wrote a Review. I believe the first Review that he wrote was of “Warburton’s Mercies,” in April, 1838. In this Review, after speaking of the blessing which had attended and would attend Huntington’s writings, he says, “May a similar blessing rest upon the work which we are now noticing. There is a power in a gracious experience which can be felt, but not described. It carries with it a divine impress, and bears stamped upon it a heavenly character. It is a two-edged sword that cuts two ways at once, entering at the same stroke into the conscience of living souls and cutting to pieces the hypocrisy of rotten hearts. There never was a time when decisive preaching and writing were more needed. The veil of profession has become spread over the church, and under this covering thousands of self-deceived, Satan-deluded wretches are crouching in security; and it is to be feared that too many of God’s children are stretching themselves on a bed too short, and wrapping themselves up in this covering too narrow; and, by thus making a confederacy with those who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter, are cutting out terrible work for a death-bed.”
Some of the other Reviews were written by my father, some by Mr. M’K., and some by myself; but for the more part, after this, they were written by Mr. Philpot.
I firmly believe that many of Mr. Philpot’s Reviews would be read with interest by those who have not seen them; but, as I wish to terminate my “History” in the next No., I shall pass them by.
I believe the first little work Mr. P. ever wrote was his “Heir of Heaven.” This was reviewed by my father in May, 1837.
From this Review I extract the following:
“The sermon contains the effusions of a heart deeply taught of God…At the same time that it sets forth the “footsteps of the flock,” “walking in darkness,” it clearly points out the false hopes of high-sounding professors, who have the doctrines of the gospel in their heads and on their tongues, but to whose hearts it has never been communicated by the power of the Holy Ghost. In his preface to the second edition the author says, ‘Many, I believe, of its readers would have been better pleased if I had laid down my pen at page 31, and contented myself with drawing the first portrait only.’ We are not exactly of this number, as we think error ought to be exposed in all its bearings. Nevertheless, we do frankly confess that we think a little more expression of the glory of Christ; of what God, in his rich grace, has made his people in Christ, and what they derive from Christ; and of the way in which the Holy Spirit draws them from self to Christ, would have been an additional glory to the discourse. Still, we consider the work well calculated for much good in this day of blasphemy and rebuke.”
This Review greatly hurt Mr. P.’s mind, and he wrote rather sharply about it. In one letter he said, “You will find I can hit the ‘Standard’ as hard as I have hit.” To this I replied, in a perfectly friendly way, and in a like spirit he received the remark, “I have no doubt you can; for I believe it is as impossible for you to write without hitting somebody, as it is for me to keep from biting my finger nails.”
[Many, very many times after this, years and years after, when Mr. P. Saw me biting my finger nails, he would say, “Not quite so bad, Mr. John, as your finger nails.” And once, when looking at my portrait, in which I am represented as having a copy of the “Gospel Standard” in my hand, and letters with the initials W. G., J. M’K., and J. C. P., under my hand, he turned round and said, “No, Mr. John! We are not quite under your thumb!”]But in after years he more than once said to me, “I have often thought your father was right.” Indeed, there is no doubt that in Mr. P.’s earlier writings, before he experienced the liberty of the gospel, there was more wounding than healing, more of the old man of sin than the new man of grace, more of the bondage of Sinai than of the glories of Christ, more of cutting than of binding up. But O! How different in after life! What a wonderful gift, what superabounding grace! He was no copyist. His writings were as original as were those of Huntington or my father, and full of the unction and power of the Holy Ghost, as thousands can testify.
I do not know the exact time when I was first introduced to Mr. M’K., and when he enlisted in the “Gospel Standard” service; but I believe it was early in 1836. In the church books at my father’s chapel at Manchester there is an entry, July 1st, 1836, that he (Mr. M’K.) should be asked to supply on Aug. 28th; but he preached there on a Tuesday evening some weeks prior to this, and slept at my house. From that time a union existed between us that was never even ruffled, and which I humbly trust will never be dissolved.
[Mr. M’Kenzie was what is called a traveling Scotchman, going from place to place with his pack on his back. He was well educated, as most Scotch are, and had a considerable knowledge of medicine; and I knew of some cases in which his medical skill was blessed to the recovery of the patients after their medical attendants had given them up. He was universally respected as a man and a tradesman; but after he was led to see his state as a sinner it was reported that he had gone mad. On one occasion, when he turned into a roadside house to get his dinner, as was his wont when on his rounds, a person present said to the landlord, “What a sad thing that so good a young man should have gone mad! Is it true Well,” replied the landlord, “there he is; you can ask him.” In announcing from the pulpit that he (Mr. M’K.) would, if the Lord permitted, preach on the following Tuesday evening, my father gave the above anecdote, adding, “If you come and hear him, you can judge for yourselves whether the man is mad or not; but from all I can hear of him, I wish, if it were the Lord’s will, you had all such a madness.”]Either at that time, or goon afterwards, I commenced sending him the communications received. He examined them, and divided them into three classes: 1, Good; 2, Moderate; 3, Rejected. No. 1 I used first, and if I had not sufficient I selected from No. 2, to make up. This continned to the time of his death, when Mr. Philpot kindly undertook the task. He, however, did not send any Nos. 2 or 3, but only No. 1; and of these he was very sparing; and I was often, to the very last, distressed for want of No. 2.
I have already spoken of the great blessing that the “Gospel Standard” has been made to the church of God. I may be excused if I mention one or two minor matters, and not very minor either. And first, to say nothing of the Lancashire distress, for which we raised £2000, see the thousands of pounds that, through its instrumentality, have been raised for the Aged Pilgrims’ Friend Society, and the number of the dear children of God who have, in consequence, been made comparatively comfortable in their declining years, receiving the benefit of its funds. And next, look at my father’s Selection of Hymns, to which so many Christians refer on their dying beds. When the copyright of that Selection came into my hands, I advertised it on the wrapper of the magazine, and there was soon an increased demand for it. This led me, not only to reduce the price, but to add a Supplement, prepared mainly by my father. Subsequently, at the request of Mr. Philpot, I added Hart’s hymns, and again subsequently, and again at Mr. P.’s request, the second Supplement, reducing the price again at the same time. This could not have been done, humanly speaking, had it not been for the “G. S.” At first the book contained only 670 hymns, now 1130, and may be had for less than half its original price.
One thing has often struck me as remarkable, that amongst the many obituaries which have been given in the magazine, scarcely any two of the subjects of those obituaries were set at liberty by the application of the same passages of scripture or the same verses of hymns. This displays a diversity of experience and a genuineness of expression which is most remarkable.
In Feb., 1838, Mr. Philpot wrote some remarks on a sermon entitled “The Supreme Dominion of Jehovah,” by Mr. Nunn, of St. Clement’s Church, Manchester. These remarks were very severe, containing such sentences as these: “A man who talks in this way knows nothing experimentally of either law or gospel, and can never spiritually have felt the one or the other;” “A man who talks so can never have felt spiritual convictions;” and so on. My father did not approve of this. I can, as it were, see him now, sitting in his rush-bottomed wooden-arm chair, attentively listening while I read the piece, now and then smiling, and at last exclaiming—”Poor dear man! If Nunn had not been in the Church, this would never have been written.” And at first he objected to the insertion of the article, as he highly esteemed Mr. Nunn; but at last he said, “Let it go. It will do for him (Mr. P.) to reflect upon by and by.” And most assuredly he (Mr. P.) did reflect upon it, and more than once referred to it with regret.
It was not, however, until 1858 that Mr. P. publicly acknowledged, not that there was any change in his views of truth; by no means; but that he had been more deeply led into the truth, and learnt, in the Holy Spirit’s school, to speak and write in a way much more savourily and with less severity. But he never gave the least quarter to error of any description. If a man “daubed with untempered mortar,” which was a favourite expression of his; if he preached part free grace and part simple or duty faith, or called upon the unregenerate not to “go on and on until it was too late,” but to “flee to their Saviour,” he spared him not. “Truth, even in the letter,” said he, “appears withered to a skeleton.”
In May, 1858, in a Review of the Correspondence of Mr. Chamberlain, of Leicester, Mr. P. says: “To judge of the ministry of a man of God, it is neither sufficient nor fair to take one part or period of his preaching. It must be viewed as a whole. What he was in youth, when full of life, warmth, and zeal; what he was after a longer, deeper experience, when greater maturity of life and a riper judgment had softened what might have been harsh, without impairing its strength and faithfulness: what he was in declining years, when much family affliction was added to bodily infirmity, and, as a shock in its season, he was being prepared for the heavenly garner. No due estimate can be formed of a minister’s grace and gifts, power and life, usefulness and acceptability to the church of God, by taking him only at one portion of his ministerial career. Take, as an instance, those two eminent servants of God, Mr. Gadsby and Mr. Warburton. We only knew them personally after they had been many years labouring in the vineyard. What Mr. Gadsby was when he first went to Manchester, what Mr. Warburton was when he first settled at Trowbridge, were both quite different from what each was thirty or forty years after, not different in doctrine, not different in experience, not different in any one vital point of the truth of God; but different, as in nature a man of sixty differs from a man of thirty. Bodily powers decline, the mind becomes less active, youthful zeal is, in a good measure, cooled, and all this change exercises an influence on both the man and his ministry. Would it not be unfair, then, to take a man of God at his first entrance upon the work, and say, ‘What this man now is, he ever shall be; I form my judgment of him from what he now is, and I do not mean to alter my opinion of him, whatever he may hereafter be, or however he may himself alter? He is a boy now, and a boy he always shall be.’ But view the opposite extreme. Take the same man forty or fifty years afterwards. He is now an old man, with many of the weak- nesses and infirmities of old age. You hear him now. ‘He is an old man,’ you say, ‘and always was an old man.’ Now take him at another period, in middle life, when naturally and spiritually he is in his prime, his youthful zeal moderated, his judgment matured, his experience enlarged, but the infirmities of old age not yet come on. Will you now say, ‘I have him at last, just as I would have; he never was young; he never shall be old; he always was, he always shall be in my mind just what he is at this present moment?’ But would this be fair any more than before? He might still lack much of what was beautiful in youth, when his bow abode in strength and the fresh dew rested on his tabernacle; he might still lack the softened tone and affection, the gentleness and meekness of old age. Is it not, then, unfair to take any one portion by itself; and must we not, if possible, take the whole of a man’s ministry, from first to last, before we are in a position to form a right judgment upon it?”
I must remind my readers that I am writing a history of the “Gospel Standard.” A history requires faithfulness. Affection would hide from itself all blemishes in its object, and inveil it with superhuman perfection; but history is obliged in truthfulness to notice those human imperfections attending the greatest and best of characters.
In April, 1838, was Mr. Philpot’s celebrated reply to “A Few Wretched Men.” These persons, in the preceding No., had complained of some re- marks by Mr. P. in his “Answer to the Question, ‘What is it that Saves a Soul?'” They considered that he had cut away all their “evidences;” but he contended that he had cut away only fleshly ones. I have been asked by a friend in the ministry to give the piece in full; but I must pass over it. I may, however, observe that it caused a great sensation throughout the churches, and an increased demand for the magazine, the circulation of which, from that time, went on for a number of years steadily increasing.
The first “Address” that I can positively assert was written by Mr. P. was the one for 1840; and this is so excellent that were it not that probably Mrs. Philpot may, if spared and encouraged, publish a volume of Mr.P.’s “Addresses,” I would give it here. I perceive that in this Address, p. 3, Mr. P. says: “The work (the “G. S.”) Was not commenced, nor is it continued, as a matter of pecuniary advantage, but as a vehicle of spiritual profit for the family of God.”
Never was a truer sentence written. Again, after stating that if our pages contain “unsavoury pieces,” though the editors get the blame, yet that the fault rests with our correspondents for not sending us better, the Address goes on: “The parsons, we know, love to keep all their choice bits for their own congregations, but we would say even to them, ‘We can give you a larger congregation than any you can preach to. We have some thousands of readers, and our little work travels where your voice cannot come. But pray don’t send us fag-ends of sermons, and what you have preached all the sweetness and savour out of. Send us something warm and fresh out of your heart; and don’t sit down on the Monday to write out the cut and dry divisions and subdivisions of the Sunday. We want the showbread warm, not dry and mouldy, like that which came out of the sacks of the Gibeonites.'”
“If spiritual hearers in bondage to a letter-preacher have, through us, seen his leanness, good has been done. If men and works of truth have become wider known, profit has been communicated. If a bond of union amongst experimental people throughout England has been originated or continued through us, good has been effected. If secret encouragement has been given, through us, to champions of truth, if we have ever blown the coals or turned the grindstone so as to give their spiritual weapons a better temper or a keener edge, our publication has not been issued in vain. And if truth in our pages has stirred up and made manifest enemies, if that which has been crushed has broken out into a viper, and if experimental and heaven-sent ambassadors have been more widely separated from doctrinal preachers of the letter, our correspondents have not written, nor we published in vain. But we need every encourgement to keep our heads above water, and in the strength and name of the Triune God of Israel do we hope still to continue our publication.”
After Mr. M’Kenzie’s death, Mr. Philpot had full command of the body of the magazine, but I persistently retained that of the wrapper, without which, I honestly believe, the magazine could not have met current expenses, seeing the quantity of matter I was then giving.
[Some account of Mr. M’Keuzie’s last days may be found in the “G. S.” for Oct., 1849. See also his “Fragments of Experience.” He was interred at Vauxhall Road chapel, Preston, the pastor over which is now and has for many years been, Mr. Thomas Howarth.]One year, during my absence in the East, the wrapper being neglected, the circulation fell from 9,000 to 7,000; but on my return, and resuming my post, it rose speedily again to 9,000, and gradually to 10,000.
With one exception, when some busy-bodies caused Mr. P. to believe various sorts of nonsense, Mr. P. and I worked amicably together. I have before me now a letter, dated Jersey, March 5, 1857, which was sent to Mr. P., in which the writer said he was informed that Mr. Gadsby sometimes rejected pieces that he (Mr. P.) had selected; but Mr. P. gave this a direct contradiction, and sent me the letter, with a copy of his reply.
It is true also that for some time Mr. P. and I differed as to the names of supplies to be inserted, he thinking that the list ought to be confined to men well known, while I thought we ought not to refuse any who were accepted by the churches known to us. In one case I confess I was wrong. We had a sharp contention about one name, Mr. P. objecting to it, while, from personal friendship, I defended the party; but subsequent events have made me hang down my head for very shame, and I hope never again to be left to allow personal friendship to interfere with manifest duty, Names may be omitted, and friends who know nothing of the circumstances, or the antecedents of the parties, may think we judge harshly; but we alone are responsible.
That the publishing of the names of supplies has been made an incalculable blessing, none will be bold enough to deny, and the ministers have every encouragement to send their names. True, some boast, yea, make a boast, that they never do send their names; but there may be far more pride in this than in those who do send; just as there would be more pride, as my late dear friend M’Kenzie once said, in a man wearing a rope to his watch instead of a gold chain. Others, I believe, hold back from a wrong view of the matter, and too much diffidence, trembling to parade, as they think, their ministerial engagements. These make no boast of withholding.
One thing more and I have done. In my “Memoirs of Hymn Writers and Compilers,” I give a brief history of the “Gospel Magazine,” which was the first religious periodical ever published in England, so far as is known. In that brief history I show that Toplady and other good men were formerly connected with the work; and this gives it a peculiar interest. So, though there may not have been anything particularly edifying in this history of the “Gr. S.,” after generations will know who were its editors up to near the close of the year 1869, and what have been its peculiar features.
It may be argued the Strict and Particular Baptist churches of the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries were at their strongest when they remained independent congregations, unaffiliated with Magazines and Societies. This strength was lost during the latter half of the 19th century when the churches clamored around favorite periodicals and regional associations. Although the Magazines were largely responsible for creating a party-spirit and culpable for stirring up needless controversy, they nevertheless contain many valuable resources which may prove a blessing for this generation. Although they differed on various points of doctrine, they invariably held to high views of sovereign grace, denouncing as heresy the pernicious teachings of Andrew Fuller. The majority of Strict and Particular Baptist churches during the 18th and 19th centuries were Hyper-Calvinists.
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