Fletcher of Madeley

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[Illustration: John Fletcher]

FLETCHER OF MADELEY

BY BRIGADIER MARGARET ALLEN

THE SALVATION ARMY PRINTING WORKS,
ST. ALBANS.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I. AT THE CASTLE
II. IN THE MANOR HOUSE
III. EARLY ADVENTURES
IV. A SWEET GIRLHOOD
V. A NEW LIFE
VI. GIVEN UP TO THE FIGHT
VII. TURNED FROM HOME
VIII. THE TERN HALL TUTOR
IX. THE VICAR OF MADELEY
X. AN ALARMED PARISH
XI. THE VICAR'S SERMONS
XII. SCANTY ENCOURAGEMENTS
XIII. THE ORPHAN HOME
XIV. A SEEKER AFTER GOD
XV. SANCTIFIED LETTER-WRITING
XVI. AN UNFORTUNATE PURCHASE
XVII. THE COLLEGE OF TREVECCA
XVIII. A PEN OF POWER
XIX. FAILING HEALTH
XX. BY THE SHORES OF LAKE LEMAN
XXI. A WONDERFUL WEDDING
XXII. LIFE AT MADELEY
XXIII. "GOD IS LOVE!"
XXIV. EXTRACTS FROM FLETCHER'S LETTERS
XXV. EXTRACTS FROM FLETCHER'S WRITINGS

INTRODUCTION.

BY COMMISSIONER RAILTON.

There is a great difference between a red-hot man and a Red-hot
Library book. We have no desire at all to pander to the common idea of
our day that "it does not matter what you belong to," by any of these
books. Very little reflection will show anyone the immeasurable
distance between the sort of clergyman this book describes and the
mere leader of formalities holding a similar position in these days of
ease and self-satisfaction.

John Fletcher was a marvel, if viewed only on his bodily side. At a
time when clergymen had far more opportunity than they have even
to-day to retire into their own houses and do nothing for the world, he
pressed forward, in spite of an almost dying body, to work for God
daily, in the most devoted manner. That he was able to continue his
labours so long was simply by God's wonder-working mercy. We cannot
judge him because he remained in the strange position (for anyone who
cares about God or souls) in which he was found. No other sphere was
perhaps possible for him at that time. It must not, however, for that
reason be imagined that the Salvationist can conceive of a red-hot
life mixed with the reading of prayers out of a book, or the teaching
of any poor soul to turn to such heathenish folly.

We can gladly take whatever is red-hot out of such a life without
allowing ourselves to be poisoned in any respect whilst so doing. But
it seems necessary, at the very outset, to call attention to this,
lest at any time it should be argued that, after all, the Salvationist
life is no better, in our opinion, than the stiffest and most formal
specimen of Christianity.

About this fervent soul, whose wife was one of the few preaching women
of her century, there could have been little voluntary formality, and
if he was able to exist amidst the framing that others had set up for
him, it may be an encouragement to anyone who is shut out for a time
from the free, happy worship that God desires, and left with no
alternative but to be content with "Divine services" where God's
wishes are too often made of no effect by the arrangement of man.

But what will be the Salvationist's condemnation if, with all the
opportunities he has to cultivate the utmost freedom in prayer and
service, he never attains to that intimacy with God, that delight in
communion with Him, that power to force others into God's presence,
which John Fletcher's life discloses to us?

The mere thought of Fletcher, if you read these pages carefully, will
ever bring back to you an impression of nearness to God and
companionship with Him which is scarcely conceived of in our day
amongst the majority of those who ought to lead men to the Father. Do
not let us excuse ourselves for any lack of that communion which must
be His continual delight. If we prjde ourselves upon our repudiation
of forms of worship that men have invented, and glory in the
manifestations of Christ at the street corner and in the public-house,
to which we have become accustomed, let us take care that we do not
grieve Him by contentment with the general action of The Army or of
the Corps, or of the Brigade, in the absence of any close contact
between our own souls and God or the lost.

This book will be useless unless it brings us continually right up to
the personal questions which it is so eminently calculated to raise:
Am I on such terms with God as this man was? Can He equally reckon
upon my continual obedience and faithfulness? Is He sure to hear and
answer me also? Do I share with Him that agony for souls, that
inexhaustible pity and love which will never let one perish, for whom,
by any extremity of sacrifice, I can do anything? Do I breathe out the
breath of God upon those with whom I come in contact, making the world
feel that I have no harmony with any of its aims or inclinations, but
that I really belong to Heaven?

By inference, rather than directly, this life is a tremendous
confirmation of the old faith. John Fletcher gained all he had because
he believed the Bible just as it stands. He knew from his own
experience and from daily intercourse with Him that the promises it
contains come direct from the mouth of God, and not from the "sublime
imagination" of some Jew poet, as the contemptible deceivers of our
day would have us believe. If there were any delusion about that old
Book, then John Fletcher was one of the most pitiful specimens of a
degraded superstition this world ever contained. But where, amongst
all the applauded doubt-preachers of our day, is there to be found a
man of love and prayer and power approaching to this one?

Do not let us be discouraged as to the possibility of a life as holy
as this amidst the circumstances of our rushing warfare. John Fletcher
was, after all, only a thorough disciple of Him who had not where to
lay His head. None of us are called to live amidst denser crowds, more
hurry, worry, or contention of any sort than was the daily lot of our
Heavenly Master. This book would draw us farther from Him, not nearer,
if it only made us thirst for retirement and stillness, for hours of
meditation or privacy. It is, not the imitation of Fletcher, but the
imitation of Christ to which these pages are meant to call us. Most of
us may never possess many of the charming traits of this most refined
gentleman. We may perhaps suit God's purposes amidst the rough crowd
all the better for that. But, depend upon it, close intercourse with
the Nazarene is as possible amidst the throngs of London, or Glasgow,
or New York, or Madras, as it was in the alleys of Jerusalem or
Capernaum, and intimacy with Jesus is, after all, the one thing
needful for every disciple.

But whoever is red-hot will ceaselessly be thinking and planning for
the worst; that is to say, not only for those commonly called the
worst, whose wild career of sin strikes all decent people with horror,
but for the far more seriously in danger, who turn their very religion
into a form or an amusement, and care nothing for any real intercourse
with God. These are the people perhaps most difficult of all to get
at, the people whom we shall never be likely to make any impression
upon unless we combine with the greatest possible activity an
intensity of spiritual heat and power of which we suppose Fletcher was
one of the grandest specimens the world ever had. Do not let us resent
or run away from any reproach as to our own comparative coldness and
inefficiency which this story may bring to us. How much better to
writhe and be aroused under any such reproofs now than only to awake
to them when life is slipping away! Alas! for the readers who shall
close this book without resolving to be as holy and useful as God
commands us all to be!

LONDON, _April_, 1905.

THE LIFE OF JOHN FLETCHER.

CHAPTER I.

AT THE CASTLE

In the nursery of a fine old Swiss castle, on the shores of Lake
Leman, stood a small boy of seven, confronted by his white-capped
nurse.

"You are a naughty boy!" she exclaimed. "Do you not know that the
devil is to take away all naughty children?"

The little fellow opened wide his clear, truthful eyes, into which
there crept a deepening look of trouble--trouble rather than fear; big
tears rolled down his pinafore, and when tucked away for the night,
Jean Guillaume De La Fléchère crept out of his cosy cot, sank upon his
knees, and began the first real prayer of his life: "O God, forgive
me!" Nor would he be interrupted until the inward sense of pardon
comforted his sorrowing little heart. Many years later he described
this time as the shedding abroad of the love of God within him.

Colonel De La Fléchère's family mansion commanded as fine a view of
Swiss scenery as could be found in the neighbourhood. "Hill and dale,
vineyards and pastures, stretched right away to the distant Jura
mountains. At a few paces from the château was a terrace overlooking
Lake Leman, with its clear blue waters and its gracefully curved and
richly-wooded bays. On the right hand, at a distance of fifteen miles,
was Geneva, the cradle of the Reformation in Switzerland; on the left,
Lausanne and the celebrated Castle of Chillon. High up in the heavens
were Alpine peaks, embosoming scenes the most beautiful; and not far
away was Mont Blanc, 'robed in perpetual and unsullied snow.'"
(Tyerman.)

In this earthly paradise the little Jean received his first
unconscious training, breathing not only the clear mountain air into
his lungs, but a no less important atmosphere of refinement, of
culture, and of nobility into his mental and moral being.

He was devoted to his mother, who could never say he wilfully
disobeyed her. One day, however, she deemed him lacking in reverence
for her, because, when rebuking a member of the family over-sharply,
John turned upon her a long look of evident reproof. She promptly
boxed his ears, but was more than mollified when the boy lifted his
clear eyes to hers, brimful of tenderness, and said simply, "Mother,
when I am smitten on one cheek, and especially by a hand I love so
well, I am taught to turn the other also."

It was not priggishness, but submissive affection, and she read it
aright.

CHAPTER II.

IN THE MANOR HOUSE.

In the château at Nyon Jean De La Fléchère was keeping his tenth
birthday (September 12th, 1739). Away in old England the Lord of the
Manor of Leytonstone, Essex, was giving his first caresses to a tiny
baby girl, later to be known as little Mary Bosanquet, and forty years
later still as the wife of the saintly John Fletcher, Vicar of
Madeley.

Mary was but a four-year-old baby when she received her first definite
conviction that God hears and answers prayer. She was a timid little
maiden, and the greatest comfort she had in the world was the fact
that she possessed a real Father in Heaven, strong, mighty, and
willing to protect and help her. Sunday evenings in Forest House--as
the Bosanquet mansion was called--were devoted to the children. On
those occasions Mary's father taught her sister and herself the Church
catechism. At five years old his youngest daughter asked questions
concerning true Christians according to the Word of God, which might
well have encouraged evasion on the part of her parent. She reasoned
out everything told her; but her eager and earnest questions being so
constantly put carelessly by, gave her childish mind the impression
that the Bible did not mean all it said, therefore a sensible person
would make due allowance for its threatenings.

As this thought began to take well hold of Mary, a Methodist girl
entered the household as nurse, whose conversations with the children
were a great enlightenment to them both.

In a year or two the nurse left them, but not before she had implanted
in little Mary's mind the truth that it was not being united to any
church or people which would save her, but that she must be converted
through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that the fruits of
believing in Him as a personal Saviour would be power to love and
serve God with a holy heart. That was excellent, but it had not been
so explained to the child that she could understand the process either
of "faith" or of "conversion." The result was perplexity.

Not a few children in bygone days have had to suffer long Sunday
afternoon agonies over the harrowing pictures of Foxe's "Book of
Martyrs," this being then considered a profitable and bracing Sabbatic
"exercise" for hundreds of sensitive little ones whose dreams were
haunted, and whose waking hours in the dark were rendered terrific by
vivid imaginings of racked, tortured, and burning saints. Mary was one
of these. Yet so troubled was her little heart over the ungrasped
subject of faith that one day, while gazing upon these fearful
pictures, she exclaimed to herself, "Oh! oh! I do think it would be
easier to _burn_ than to _believe!_"

Mary seems to have been busy with these thoughts for nearly two years.
She had not passed her eighth birthday when we find her sitting by
herself for "a good think," and wondering "_What_ can it mean to
have faith in Jesus?"

Vexed with the mystery of the subject, her childish soul rose in
rebellion against God for having chosen so hard a way into salvation,
and she exclaimed aloud--

"Oh, if I had to die a martyr, I could do it; or give away all I have,
I could do that; or when I grow up to have to be a servant, that
would be easy; but I shall never, never, _never_ know how to
believe!"

Two lines of an old hymn drifted instantly through her mind--

Who on Jesus relies, without money or price,
The pearl of forgiveness and holiness buys.

It was the light she needed. The Spirit of Love had taken pity upon
the little girl. From that moment the plan of salvation was clear to
her, and she cried out--

"I do, I do rely on Jesus; yes, I _do_ rely on Jesus; and God
counts me righteous for all He has done and suffered, and hath
forgiven all my sins!"

She felt that a great weight had been lifted from her heart. Before
this it seemed that everything in the world was easier than to
believe, now it appeared the simplest plan God could have devised. Had
there been but a kindly and understanding person near to whom Mary
could talk freely, she might have been a happy, trusting little
Soldier of Jesus from that hour, but there was no one to help her into
the sunshine of a child's daily faith and love and service, and
religion became to her rather a subject for morbid thought. Terribly
afraid of sin, not understanding temptation, wholly uninstructed how
to get victory over her temper and other failings, she grew
discouraged, and feared she had sadly grieved God. With all this shut
up in her soul, perhaps it was no wonder that her mother should
sometimes exclaim: "That girl is the most perverse creature that ever
lived; I cannot think what has come to her."

CHAPTER III.

EARLY ADVENTURES.

From the bathing-place of Nyon château a slim, tall lad shot out into
the blue water, as much at home there, evidently, as he had been while
racing on the terrace. His long hair was bound by a strong ribbon,
which the active movements of the swimmer at length loosened. In some
unexplainable manner the ribbon caught and wound itself about the
boy's feet, tying his head to his heels, and rendering a full stroke
impossible. With all his might he struggled and tore, but the bond
only grew tighter. He was in deep water, no help within call, and the
awful thought came that there, in the budding of his bright young
life, he must be cut off and die a helpless prisoner. He stayed his
struggles, almost paralysed at the thought, and that instant the
ribbon gave way and he recovered himself.

Nor was that his only narrow escape from death in the same lake. Five
miles from the shore a rocky island reared its head.

"It would be a fine feat to swim there from land," said young Fletcher
to four of his companions. They agreed, and the five set forth.
Fletcher and one other lad succeeded in reaching the island, but found
its smooth cliffs sank so steeply into the water that there was no
possibility of climbing them. Despairingly they swam around the islet
again and again, finding at last a bare foothold to which they clung
until a boat fetched them off. The other three could swim but half the
distance to the island, and would have sunk exhausted had not a
passing boat picked them up.

A third time young Fletcher narrowly escaped drowning; on this
occasion it was in the Rhine, where the river is wide and very rapid.
The current swept him far from home, nor could he land for the sharp
rocks on either hand. At length he was flung violently against one of
the piles of a powder mill, lost consciousness, and disappeared,
rising again on the other side of the mill (according to an onlooker,
who took out his watch) _twenty minutes after_ his head had
vanished beneath the water. Surely a guardian angel accompanied Jean
De La Fléchère in all his earthly wanderings!

Although a good rider and practised swimmer, the life of this young
fellow was not by any means wasted in athletics and sport; he studied
hard to prepare himself for the University of Geneva, succeeding most
brilliantly. His extraordinary diligence, no less than his striking
ability, distinguished him among the other students, and he bore off
first prizes with ease, studying early and late that he might acquire
the knowledge he loved. After leaving the University he gave himself
to the acquirement of the German language, and studied Hebrew and
higher mathematics.

All this he did with the idea of becoming a minister of the Gospel,
but the more he thought about the burden which he would assume by so
doing, the less he felt able for his suggested task.

"Go into the army, Fletcher," pleaded some of his friends, and it was
not long before he turned the power of his clear brain to work upon
military engineering. He became very keen on his chosen profession,
and at the time when Portugal was despatching troops to Brazil,
Fletcher hied himself to Lisbon, gathered together a company of young
Englishmen, accepted a Captain's commission, and agreed to sail upon a
certain day in the Portuguese Service.

His father, Colonel De La Fléchère, refused to sanction the step, or
to supply him with the money he requested for the enterprise.

"I will go without it," he resolved, and counted the hours to the
sailing of the man-o'-war.

A day or two before the appointed date a maid, who was serving him
with breakfast, clumsily dropped the tea-kettle upon his leg, scalding
him so severely that he had to take to his bed. While there the ship
sailed, and in view of Fletcher's later life, it is a striking fact
that she was never heard of again.

Though desperately disappointed, Fletcher was as keen as ever on
becoming a soldier. He returned to Nyon, and, to his unbounded
delight, learned that his uncle had procured him a commission in the
Dutch Service, of which he was a Colonel.

Eagerly he made his way to Flanders, grudging the days of travel which
kept him out of his ambition. Bent though he was in rough-hewing his
way according to his desire, Providence was surely shaping for him an
end other than he planned. On his arrival Fletcher found that peace
was concluded; his soldiering capabilities were no longer required.
Almost immediately his uncle died, and the door into the military
profession seemed closed to him for ever.

CHAPTER IV.

A SWEET GIRLHOOD

Mary Bosanquet grew into sweet and graceful girlhood. "It is time she
saw the world," decided her mother, and forthwith preparations were
made for her to accompany the family, who were to spend three gay
months in Bath. She dressed and danced as did the rest, but in the
very ball-room found herself thinking, "If I only knew where to find
the Methodists, or any who would show me how to please God, I would
tear off all my fine things and run through the fire to them. If ever
I am my own mistress I will spend half the day in working for the
poor, and the other half in prayer."

Not long after this Mary's sister visited a friend who declared
herself recently converted, and in her house Mary found her longed-for
help and counsel--"the greatest comfort of my life," as she expressed
it.

Association with this Mrs. Lefevre, who died when Mary was seventeen,
led the girl to declare to her father that she desired to lead a
better life than one of mere amusement, begging him to allow her to be
left at home when the family visited the theatre and other scenes of
gaiety. The opposition she met with was trying, but it served to
strengthen her for the career which was to open to her in later life.

It was natural that Mary's friends should wish her to marry, but at
the time when this was first put before her she heard Mrs. Crosby (one
of Wesley's helpers) speak upon the necessity of holiness and the joy
of a life fully devoted to God. With the gentleman who was striving to
win her affections life would never have been the sacred thing Mary
desired for herself, she therefore gave up all thought of marriage,
began to dress plainly, and waited for God to show her _His_ way.

CHAPTER V.

A NEW LIFE.

Checked in his military ardour, John Fletcher turned his thoughts
again to study. His linguistic powers were great; it was to him a
cheerful distraction to join a party of students who were proceeding
to England to become familiar with the language.

At the first English inn at which they stayed Fletcher showed that
simple confidence in his brother-man which so distinguished his later
life by trusting a strange Jew with all his money for the purpose of
changing it into English coin. His fellow-students exclaimed, "You
will never see another crown of it!" but whether or not that quality
in Fletcher which always expected the very best from a man worked
salvation in this case as in many another, certain it is that the Jew
returned with the £90 intact.

For eighteen months Fletcher studied English at a school in
Hertfordshire, and afterwards became tutor to the two sons of a Member
of Parliament named Hill.

He little knew then how important a link in the providential chain was
that appointment. Up to this time, although he had deeply appreciated
religion, had read his Bible and prayed much, using any leisure he
could gain between his ordinary studies for the research of prophecy
and the perusal of devotional books, yet he lacked any experience of
living union with God; joy in Christ was an unknown bliss; the "peace
which passeth all understanding" was unrevealed to him. To his brother
Henry he thus described his condition:--

"My feelings were easily excited, but my heart was rarely affected,
and I was destitute of a sincere love to God, and consequently to my
neighbour. All my hopes of salvation rested on my prayers, devotions,
and a certain habit of saying, 'Lord, I am a great sinner; pardon me
for the sake of Jesus Christ!' In the meantime I was ignorant of the
fall and ruin in which every man is involved, the necessity of a
Redeemer, and the way by which we may be rescued from the fall by
receiving Christ with a living faith. I should have been quite
confounded if anyone had asked me the following questions: 'Do you
know that you are dead in Adam? Do you live to yourself? Do you live
in Christ and for Christ? Does God rule in your heart? Do you
experience that peace of God which passeth all understanding? Is the
love of God shed abroad in your heart by the Holy Spirit?'"

A vivid dream concerning the Day of Judgment was used to arouse him,
and for some days he was so depressed and harassed in mind that he
could not settle to any occupation for long together. Sunday arrived;
no teaching demanded his mental application; he wandered listlessly
from place to place, miserable and dejected. At length he sat down to
copy some music. The door opened and in walked the butler, an old
servant of the family, and a countryman of Fletcher's. For a moment he
paused, then approaching the tutor, said firmly, but respectfully:--

"Sir, I am surprised that you, who know so many things, should forget
what day this is, and that you should not be aware that the Lord's Day
should be sanctified in a very different manner."

The man was a true Christian, deeply humble, and full of zealous love
for God. The knowledge of many things he had borne patiently for
Christ, coupled with the strange power with which he spoke, smote the
tutor with a sense of his own shortcomings, and made him exclaim to
his own heart, "I am not renewed in the spirit of my mind, and without
this the death of Christ will not avail for my salvation!"

Not long after this Mr. Hill went up to London to attend Parliament,
accompanied by his tutor and family. On the road they stayed for a
meal and to change horses at St. Albans, and Fletcher went for a brisk
walk through the streets to stretch his limbs.

The horses were put to, but the tutor did not appear. After some delay
the post-chaise drove off, a horse being left in readiness for the
tutor to mount and ride after them. When in the evening he overtook
the party, Mr. Hill enquired why he stayed behind. He replied, "As I
was walking I met with a poor old woman, who talked so sweetly of
Jesus Christ that I knew not how the time passed away."

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