The GOSPEL TRUTH

  Revival at Wilmington, Delaware

 

While laboring at New Lebanon the preceding summer, the Rev. Mr. Gilbert of Wilmington, Delaware, whose father resided in New Lebanon, came there on a visit. A very affecting incident had occurred in the revival at New Lebanon touching a brother of this Mr. Gilbert. This brother was very much disturbed--so much so that, being impenitent he finally left the place declaring, as I understood, that he would not return until the revival was over. He had been gone but a short time before they heard of his death, which, if I recollect right, had occurred in a tragic manner. Mr. Gilbert was very Old School in his theological views, but a good and earnest man. His love of souls overruled all sticklishness on nice questions of theological difference of opinion between him and myself. He heard me preach in New Lebanon, and saw the results; and he was very earnest that I should come that fall and aid him in Wilmington, Delaware. As soon as I could see my way clear to leave Stephentown, therefore, I went to Wilmington and engaged in labors with Brother Gilbert.

But before I cease speaking of Stephentown I should say, that both there and at New Lebanon the same means, and no other, were used that had been used and blessed in the revivals in central New York. The same Spirit of powerful and prevailing prayer was manifested there; the Word had the same prodigious power imparted to it by the Holy Ghost; and the conversions were of the same general type. The converts were clear, strong, zealous, and united. There was no appearance of heterodoxy among them, no tendency to fanaticism or anything objectionable that I ever perceived. I know not that any complaint was ever made in any quarter of there being anything disastrous or out of the way in those revivals. They were remarkably pure and powerful, and lasting in their results. If I recollect I received at one time about two hundred of the converts into the communion of the church. I shall never forget the interest taken by the young converts in the Miss Sackett of whom I have spoken. She seemed to be regarded by them with peculiar affection. They had known of her instrumentality in getting me to go there, and they had seen her earnest soul pouring itself out in every direction for their salvation. They clung to her and around her in a very affectionate manner. She was young, and unaffected and simple-hearted as a child. But she was overdone. Her strength soon began to fail; and she lived, I believe, but a few months after the revival closed. But as I said, I went to Wilmington, Delaware, and engaged with Brother Gilbert. I soon found that his teaching had placed the church in a position that rendered it impossible to promote a revival among them till their views could be corrected. They seemed to be afraid to make any effort, lest they should take the work out of the hands of God. They had the oldest of the Old School views of doctrine; and consequently their theory was that God would convert sinners in His own time; and that therefore to urge them to immediate repentance, and in short to attempt to promote a revival, was to attempt to make men Christians by human agency and in human strength, and thus to dishonor God by taking the work out of His hands. I observed also that in their prayers there was no urgency for an immediate outpouring of the Spirit, and that this was all in accordance with the views in which they had been educated.

It was plain that nothing could be done unless Brother Gilbert's views could be changed upon this subject. I therefore spent hours each day in conversing with him on his peculiar views. We talked the subject all over in a brotherly manner; and after laboring with him in this way for two or three weeks, I saw that his mind was prepared to have my own views brought before his people. The next Sabbath I took for my text, "Make to yourselves a new heart and a new spirit; for why will ye die?" I went thoroughly into the subject of the sinner's responsibility; and showed what a new heart was not, and what it was. I preached about two hours; and did not sit down till I had gone as thoroughly over the whole subject as very rapid speaking would enable me to do in that length of time. The congregation became intensely interested, and great numbers rose and stood on their feet in every part of the house. The house was crowded to its utmost capacity, and there were strange looks in the assembly. Some looked offended and disgusted, others intensely interested. Not unfrequently when I brought out strongly the contrast between my own views and the views in which they had been instructed, some laughed, some wept, some were manifestly angry; but I do not recollect that anyone left the house. It was a strange excitement. In the meantime Brother Gilbert shoved himself from one end of the sofa to the other behind me in the pulpit. I could hear him breathe and sigh, and could not help observing that he was himself in the greatest excitement. However I knew I had him, in his convictions, fast; but whether he would make up his mind to withstand what would be said by his people, I did not know. I was preaching to please the Lord, and not man. I thought at the time it might be the last time I would ever preach there; but thought that at all events I would tell them the truth, and the whole truth on that subject, whatever the result might be.

I had endeavored to show that if man were as helpless as their views represented him to be, he was not to blame for his sins. If he had lost in Adam all power of obedience, so that obedience had become impossible to him, and that not by his own act or consent but by the act of Adam, it was mere nonsense to say that he could be blamed for what he could not help. I had endeavored also to show that in that case the Atonement was no grace, but really a debt due to mankind on the part of God for having placed them in a condition so deplorable and so unfortunate. Indeed the Lord had helped me to show up, I think, with irresistible clearness the peculiar dogmas of Old Schoolism and their inevitable results. When I was through I did not call upon Brother Gilbert to pray, for I dared not: but prayed myself that the Lord would set home the Word, make it understood, and give a candid mind to weigh what had been said, and to receive the truth and reject what might be erroneous. I then dismissed the assembly and went down the pulpit stairs, Brother Gilbert following me down. The congregation withdrew very slowly, and many seemed to be standing and waiting for something in almost every part of the house. The aisles were cleared pretty nearly; and the rest of the congregation seemed to remain in a waiting position as if they supposed they should hear from Brother Gilbert upon what had been said. Mrs. Gilbert, however, went immediately out and went home. As I came down the pulpit stairs, I observed a couple of ladies sitting on the left hand of the aisle through which we must pass, to whom I had been introduced, and knew they were particular friends and supporters of Brother Gilbert. I saw that they looked partly grieved, and partly offended, and greatly astonished. The first we came to, who was near the pulpit stairs, took hold of Brother Gilbert as he was following behind me, and said to him. "Mr. Gilbert, what do you think of that?" She spoke in a loud whisper. He replied in the same manner. "It is worth five hundred dollars." That greatly gratified me, and affected me very much. She replied "Then you have never preached the Gospel." "Well." said he. "I am sorry to say I never have." We passed along, and then the other lady said to him about the same things; and also he to her. That was enough for me: I made my way to the door and went out. Those that had gone out were standing many of them in front of the house discussing vehemently the things that had been said. As I passed along the streets going to Mr. Gilbert's, where I lodged, I found the streets full of excitement and discussion. The people were comparing views; and from the things that I heard, from the sentences that escaped from those that did not observe me as I passed along, I saw that the impression was decidedly in favor of what I had been saying.

When I arrived at Mr. Gilbert's his wife accosted me as soon as I entered by saying. "Mr. Finney, how dared you preach any such thing in our pulpit?" I replied, "Mrs. Gilbert, I did not dare to preach anything else; it is the truth of God." She replied: "Well, it is true that God was in justice bound to make an Atonement for mankind. I have always felt it, though I never dared say it. I believed that if the doctrine preached by Mr. Gilbert was true, God was under obligation, as a matter of justice, to make an Atonement; and to save me from those circumstances in which it was impossible for me to help myself, and from a condemnation which I did not deserve." Just at this moment Mr. Gilbert entered. "There!" said I, "Brother Gilbert, you see the results of your preaching here in your own family"; and then repeated to him what his wife had just said. He replied: "I have sometimes thought that my wife was one of the most pious women that I ever knew: and at other times I have thought that she had no religion at all." "Why!" I exclaimed, "she has always thought that God owed her, as a matter of justice the salvation provided in Christ: how can she be a Christian?" This was all said by each of us with the greatest solemnity and earnestness. Upon my making the last remark she got up and left the room. The house was very solemn; and for two days. I believe, I did not see her. She then came out clear, not only in the truth, but in the state of her own mind; having passed through a complete revolution of views and experience.

From this point the work went forward. The truth was worked out admirably by the Holy Spirit. Brother Gilbert's views became greatly changed; and also his style and mode of preaching, and manner of presenting the Gospel. So far as I know, until the day of his death his views remained corrected, and New School as opposed to the Old School views which he had before maintained. The effect of this sermon upon many of Mr. Gilbert's church members was very peculiar. I have spoken of the lady who asked him what he thought of it. She afterwards told me that she was so offended to think that all her views of religion were so overthrown, that she promised herself she never would pray again. She had been in the habit of so far justifying herself because of her sinful nature, and had taken in her own mind such views as I have represented Mrs. Gilbert as expressing, that what she had heard of my preaching on that subject had completely subverted her views, her religion and all. She remained in this state of rebellion, if I recollect right, for some six weeks before she would pray again. She then broke down, and became thoroughly changed in her view and religious experience. And this, I believe, was the case with a large number of that church.

In the meantime I had been induced to go up and preach for Brother Patterson, at Philadelphia, twice each week. I went up on the steamboat and preached in the evening, and returned the next day and preached at Wilmington; thus alternating my evening services between Wilmington and Philadelphia. By boat these cities were about forty miles apart. The work took so much effect in Philadelphia as to convince me that it was my duty to leave Brother Gilbert to carry on the work, under God, in Wilmington, while I gave my whole time to labor in the large city of Philadelphia.

Brother James Patterson, with whom I first labored in Philadelphia, held the views of theology then held at Princeton Theological Seminary, since known as the theology of the Old School Presbyterians. But he was a godly man, and cared a great deal more for the salvation of souls than for nice questions about ability and inability, or any of those points of doctrine upon which the Old and New School Presbyterians differ. His wife held the New England views of theology: that is, she believed in a general as opposed to a restricted Atonement, and agreed with what was called New England orthodoxy as distinguished from Princeton orthodoxy. It will be remembered that at this time I belonged to the Presbyterian church myself. I had been licensed and ordained by a presbytery composed mostly of men educated at Princeton. I have already related the struggle that I had with some of the members of that presbytery, and especially with my theological teacher, the Rev. George W. Gale. I have also said that when I was licensed to preach the Gospel, I was asked whether I received the Presbyterian Confession of faith as containing the substance of Christian doctrine. I replied that I did so far as I understood it. But not expecting to be asked any such question I had never examined it with any attention, and I think I had never read it through. In my controversy with Brother Gale we had made no use of a Confession of faith: it was with the views of Princeton that I supposed myself to be combating him on certain points. However, when I read the Confession of faith and pondered it, I saw that although I could receive it, as I now know multitudes of Presbyterians do, as containing the substance of Christian doctrine as taught in the Bible, yet that there were several points upon which I could not put the same construction that was put on them at Princeton: and I accordingly, everywhere gave the people to understand that I did not accept that construction of the Confession of faith; or at any rate, if that was the true construction of the Confession of faith upon those points, I entirely differed from it. I suppose that Brother Patterson understood this before I went to labor with him, as when I took that course in his pulpit he expressed no surprise. Indeed, he did not at all object to it.

The revival took such powerful hold in his congregation as greatly to interest him; and as he saw that God was blessing the Word as I presented it, he stood firmly by me, and never in any case objected to anything that I advanced. Sometimes when we returned from meeting Mrs. Patterson would smilingly remark: "Now you see, Mr. Patterson, that Mr. Finney does not agree with you on those points upon which we have so often conversed." He would always, in the greatness of his Christian faith and love, reply: "Well, the Lord blesses it." The interest became so great that our congregations were packed at every meeting. One day Brother Patterson said to me: "Brother Finney, if the Presbyterian ministers in this city find out your views, and what you are preaching to the people, they will hunt you out of the city as they would a wolf." I replied: "I cannot help it. I can preach no other doctrine; and if they must drive me out of the city, let them do it and take the responsibility. But I do not believe that they can get me out."

However, the ministers did not take the course that he predicted by any means; but nearly all of them received me to their pulpits. When they learned what was going on at Brother Patterson's church, and that many of their own church members were greatly interested, and many of their own congregation stirred up, they invited me to preach for them: and if l recollect right, I preached in all of the Presbyterian churches except that of Arch Street. There were a great many wonderful cases of conversion connected with the revival in Philadelphia, and many cases of extreme bitterness on the part of individual opposers. I have said that I met Mr. Nettleton in New York in the fall after the New Lebanon Convention, and that he had come there to publish his letters. I was then on my way to Wilmington, and spent a few days with my friends in New York. Mr. Nettleton did publish his letters, and they were immediately sent and circulated in Philadelphia. This was no doubt intended to forestall my labors there. I suppose that in some instances opposition was encouraged by those letters: yet I recollect that they reacted upon Brother Nettleton in that city. When they were read, people said: "Why! if Mr. Finney is wrong, Mr. Nettleton is the great and leading offender; for he has held these same views, and used these measures for many years. Why is he now condemning the course of Mr. Finney? We had better hear Mr. Finney for ourselves."

Philadelphia was at that time a unit, almost, in regard to the views of theology held at Princeton. Rev. Dr. Skinner held to some extent what have since been known as New School views; and differed enough from the tone of theology round about him to be suspected by the Presbyterian churches about him as not altogether sound in the sense in which they understood orthodoxy. I have ever regarded it as a most remarkable thing, that so far as I know my orthodoxy did not prove a stumbling block in that city, was not openly called in question by any of the ministers or churches that I heard of. I preached in the Dutch church to Dr. Livingston's congregation; and I found that he sympathized with my views, and encouraged me with all his influence to go on and preach the preaching that the Lord had bidden me. I did not hesitate everywhere and on all occasions, to present my own views of theology, and those which I had everywhere presented to the churches. Brother Patterson was himself, I believe, greatly surprised that I met with no open opposition from the ministers or churches on account of my theological views. Indeed, I did not present them at all in a controversial way, but simply presented them in my instructions to saints and sinners in a way so natural as not, perhaps, to excite very much attention except to discriminating theologians. But many things that I said were new to the people. For example, one night I preached on this text: "There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time." This was a sermon on the Atonement, in which I took the views that I have always held of its nature and of its universality: and stated as strongly as I could those points of difference between my own views and those that were held by limited Atonement theologians. This sermon attracted so much attention, and excited so much feeling, that I was urged to preach on the same subject in other churches. But the more I preached upon it, the more desirous people were to hear: and the excitement became so general that I preached on that subject seven different evenings in succession in as many different churches. I heard of no open opposition to the views which I presented; and this was to me, and to Brother Patterson, a very remarkable fact.

It would seem that the people had heard much said against what was called Hopkinsianism; the two great points of which were that man ought to be willing to be damned for the glory of God and that God was the author of sin. In preaching I sometimes noticed these points, and took occasion to denounce Hopkinsianism, and said that they appeared to have too much of it in Philadelphia. That their great neglect in attending to the salvation of their souls looked very much as if they were willing to be damned; and that they must hold that God was the author of sin, for they maintained that their nature was sinful. This I turned over and over, and these two points I dwelt upon. I heard again and again that the people said: "Well, he is no Hopkinsian." Indeed I felt it my duty to expose, and found it necessary to expose, all those hiding places of sinners, and to hunt them out from under those peculiar views of orthodoxy in which I found them entrenched. The revival spread, and took a powerful hold. All our meetings for preaching and prayer, and meetings for inquiry, were crowded. There were a great many more inquirers than we could well attend to. It was late in the fall before I took my lodgings in Philadelphia, and I continued to labor on there without any intermission until about the first of August the next summer.

I have said that there were some cases of very bitter opposition on the part of individuals. I recollect that in one case, a man whose wife was very deeply convicted in view of the situation of her soul, was so enraged that he came in and took his wife out of meeting by force. Another case I recollect as a very striking one, of a German whose name I cannot now recollect. He was a tobacconist. He had a very amiable and intelligent wife; and was himself, as I afterwards found when I became acquainted with him, an intelligent man. He was, however, a skeptic, and had no confidence in religion at all. His wife, however, came to our meetings, and became very much concerned about her soul; and after a severe mental struggle of many days, she was thoroughly converted. As she attended meetings very frequently, and became very much interested, it soon attracted the attention of her husband, and he began to oppose her being a Christian. He was a man, as I learned of hasty temper, and a man of athletic frame, and of great resolution and fixedness of purpose. As she became more and more interested his opposition increased, till finally he forbade her attending meetings any more. She then called to see me, and asked my advice with regard to what course she should take. I told her that her first obligation was to God; that she was undoubtedly under obligation to obey His commands, even if they conflicted with the commands of her husband; and that while I advised her to avoid giving him offence if she could help it and do her duty to God, still in no case to omit what she regarded as her duty to God for the sake of complying with his wishes as an infidel. I told her that as he was an infidel his opinions on religious subjects were not to be respected, and that she could not safely follow his advice. She was well aware of this. He was a man that paid no attention to religion at all except to oppose it. In accordance with my advice she attended the meetings as she had opportunity, and got instructions; and she soon got into the liberty of the Gospel, had great faith and peace of mind, and enjoyed much of the presence of God. This highly displeased her husband, and he finally went so far as to threaten her life if she went to meeting again. She had so frequently seen him angry that she had no confidence that he would fulfil his threat. She told him calmly that whatever it cost her, her mind was made up to do her duty to God; that she felt it her duty to avail herself of the opportunity to get the instruction she needed; and that she must attend those meetings whenever she could do it without neglecting her duty to her family.

One Sabbath evening, when he found she was going to meeting he renewed his threat that if she went he would take her life. She told me afterwards that she had no thought that it was anything but a vain threat. She calmly replied to him that her duty was plain; that there was no reason why she should remain at home at that time but simply to comply with his unreasonable wishes; and that to stay at home under such circumstances would be entirely inconsistent with her duty to God and to herself. She therefore went to meeting. When she returned from meeting she found him in a great rage. As soon as she entered the door he locked it after her and took out the key, and then drew a dagger and swore he would take her life. She ran up stairs. He caught a light to follow her. The servant girl, being frightened, blew out the light as he passed by her. This left them both in the dark. She ran up and through the rooms in the second story, found her way into the kitchen and down the cellar. He could not follow her in the dark, and she got out of the cellar window and went off to a friend's and spent the night. Taking it for granted that he would be ashamed of it before morning, she went home early, and went into the house and found things in the greatest disorder. He had broken some of the furniture, and acted like a man distracted. He again locked the door as soon as she was fairly in the house, and drawing a dagger he threw himself upon his knees and held up his hands, and took the most horrible oath that he would then take her life. She looked at him with astonishment and fled. She ran up stairs, but it was light and he followed her. She ran from room to room till finally she entered the last, from which there was no escape. She turned around and faced him. She threw herself upon her knees as he was about to strike her with his dagger, and lifted up her hands to heaven and cried for mercy upon herself and upon him. At this point God arrested him. She said he looked at her for a moment, dropped his dagger, and fell upon the floor and cried for mercy himself. He then and there broke right down, confessed his sins to God and to her, and begged God, and begged her, to forgive him. Of course she did forgive him, and I trust God forgave him. From that moment he was a wonderfully changed man. He became one of the most earnest Christian converts. He was greatly attached to myself; and some year or two after, as he heard that I was to come to Philadelphia in a certain steamboat, he was the first man in Philadelphia that met and greeted me. I received him and his wife into the church before I left Philadelphia, and baptized their children. I have not seen or heard from them for many years.

But while there were individual cases of singular bitterness and opposition to religion arising out of false views, still I was not annoyed or hindered by anything like public opposition as I had been by Dr. Beecher and Mr. Nettleton. The ministers behaved kindly; and in no instance that I recollect, did they speak publicly, if indeed they did privately, against the work that was going on. The number of converts must have been very great. After preaching in Brother Patterson's church for several months, and more or less in nearly all the Presbyterian churches in the city, it was thought best that I should take up a central position, and preach steadily in one place. In Race Street there was a large German church, the pastor of which was a Mr. Helfenstine. The elders of the congregation, together with their pastor, requested me to occupy their pulpit. That was then, I think, the largest house of worship in the city. In that church I continued to preach statedly for many months. It was always crowded, and it was said it seated three thousand people when the house was packed and the aisles were filled. I had an opportunity to preach to a great many Sabbath School teachers. Indeed it was said that the Sabbath School teachers throughout the city generally attended my ministry. About midsummer of 1829[1828--Ed.] I left for a short time and visited my wife's parents in Oneida County, N.Y., and then returned to Philadelphia and labored there until about midwinter. I do not recollect exact dates, but think that in all I labored in Philadelphia about a year and a half. In all this time there was no abatement of the revival that I could see. The converts became numerous in every part of the city, so numerous that I never had any knowledge, nor could I form any just estimate of their number. I never had labored anywhere where I was received more cordially; and where Christians, and especially converts, appeared better than they did there. There was no jar or schism among them that I ever knew of, and I never heard of any disastrous influence resulting from that revival. In a great city converts may be greatly multiplied, and yet you cannot estimate the greatness of the revival, as you could in a small town where you are acquainted with all the inhabitants.

There were a great many very interesting facts connected with this revival. I recollect that a young lady, who was the daughter of a Baptist minister of the Old School stamp, attended my ministry at Mr. Patterson's church, and became awfully convicted. Her convictions were so deep that she finally fell into a most distressing despair. She told me that she had been taught from her childhood by her father, that if she was one of the elect she would be converted in due time; and that until she was converted and her nature changed by the Spirit of God, she could do nothing for herself but to read her Bible and pray for a new heart. When she was quite young she had been greatly convicted of sin, but had followed her father's instruction, had read her Bible and prayed for a new heart, and thought that was all that was required of her. She waited to be converted, and thus for evidence that she was one of the elect. In the midst of her great struggle of soul on the subject of her salvation, something had come up relative to the question of marriage; and she promised God that she never would give her hand in marriage to any man till she was a Christian. When she made the promise she said that she expected God would very soon convert her. But her convictions passed away. She was not converted, and still that promise to God was upon her soul, and she dared not break it.

When she was about eighteen years of age a young man proposed to make her his wife. She consented, but as that vow was upon her she could not consent to be married until she was a Christian. She said they greatly loved each other, and he urged her to consent to be married without delay. But without telling him her real reason, she kept deferring it from time to time. She thus put him off from time to time for some five years, if I recollect right, waiting for God to convert her, and hoping that it would take place. Finally, in riding out one day the young man was thrown from a carriage and instantly killed. This aroused the enmity of her heart against God. She accused God of dealing hardly with her. She said that she had been waiting for Him to convert her, and had been faithful to her promise not to get married until she was converted; that she had kept her lover for years waiting for her to get ready, and she had been waiting for God to convert her, and now behold! God had cut him off, and she was still unconverted.

She had learned that the young man was a Universalist; and now she was greatly interested to believe that Universalism was true, and would not believe that God had sent him to hell; and if He had sent him to hell, she could not be reconciled to it at all. Thus she had been warring with God for a considerable time before she came to our meetings, supposing that the blame of her not being converted was chargeable upon God and not upon herself. When she heard my preaching and found that all her refuges of lies were torn away, and saw that she should have given her heart to God long before, and all would have been well, she saw that she herself had been entirely to blame, and that the instructions of her father on all those points had been entirely wrong; and remembering as she did how she had blamed God, and what a blasphemous attitude she had maintained before Him, she very naturally despaired of mercy. I reasoned with her and tried to show her the long-suffering of God, and encouraged her to hope, to believe, and to lay hold upon eternal life. But her sense of sin was so great that she seemed unable to grasp the subject, and sunk down deeper and deeper into despair from day to day. After laboring with her a great deal I became greatly distressed about her case. As soon as meeting was out she would come and follow me home with her despairing complaints, and would exhaust me by appeals to my sympathy and Christian compassion for her soul.

After this state of things had continued for many weeks, one morning she called upon me in company with an aunt of hers, who had become greatly concerned about her, and who thought her on the very verge of a desperate insanity. I was myself of the opinion that it would result in that if she would not believe. Catharine--for that was her name--came into my room in her usually despairing way; but with a look of wildness in her face that indicated a state of mind that was unendurable: and at the moment I think it was the Spirit of God that suggested to my mind to take an entirely different course with her from what I had ever taken.

I said to her: "Catharine, you profess to believe that God is good." "Oh yes!" she said, "I believe that." "Well, you have often told me that His goodness forbids Him to have mercy on you--that your sins have been so great that it would be a dishonor to Him to forgive you and save you. You have often confessed to me that you believed that God would forgive you if He wisely could; but that your forgiveness would be an injury to Him, to His government, and to His universe, and therefore He cannot forgive you." "Yes," she said, "I believe that." I replied: "Then your difficulty is that you want God to sin, to act unwisely and injure Himself and the universe for the sake of saving you." She opened and set her large blue eyes upon me, and looked partly surprised and partly indignant. But I proceeded: "Yes! you are in great trouble and anguish of mind because God will not do wrong; because He will persist in being good whatever may become of you. You go about in the greatest distress of mind because God will not be persuaded to violate His own sense of propriety and duty, and save you to His own injury and that of the entire universe. You think yourself of more consequence than God and all the universe; and cannot be happy unless God makes Himself unhappy, and everybody else, in making you happy." I pressed this upon her. She looked with the utmost astonishment at me, and after a few moments she submitted. She seemed to be almost instantly subdued like a little child. She said: "I accept it. Let God send me to hell if He thinks that is the best thing to be done. I do not want Him to save me at His own expense and at the expense of the universe. Let Him do what seemeth Him good." I got up instantly and left the room; and to get entirely away from her I went out and got into a carriage and went off riding. When I returned she had gone of course: but in the afternoon she and her aunt returned to declare what God had done for her soul. She was filled with joy and peace, and one of the most submissive, humble, beautiful converts that I almost ever saw.

Another young lady, I recollect--who was by the by a very beautiful girl, perhaps twenty years old--called to see me under great conviction of sin. I asked her, among other things, if she was convinced that she had been so wicked that God might injustice send her to hell. She replied in the strongest language: "Yes! I deserve a thousand hells." She was gaily, and I think richly, dressed. I had a very thorough conversation with her, and she broke down in heart and gave herself to Christ. She was a very humble, broken-hearted convert. I learned that she went home and gathered up a great many of her artificial flowers and ornaments, with which she had decked herself, and of which she was very proud, and passed through the room with them in her hand. They asked her what she was going to do with them. She said she was going to burn them up. Said she. "I will never wear them again." "Well," they said to her, "if you will not wear them you can sell them; don't burn them." But she said: "If I sell them to anybody else they will be as proud of them, and as vain of them, as I have been myself; I will burn them up." And she actually put them into the fire.

A few days after this she called on me and said that she had, in passing through the market, I think that morning, observed a very richly dressed lady in the market. Her compassions were so stirred that she went up to her and asked if she might speak to her. The lady replied that she might. She said to her, "My dear Madam, are you not proud of your dress? And are you not vain, and neglecting the salvation of your soul?" She said that she herself burst into tears as she said it, and told the lady a little of her own experience, how she had been attached to dress, and how it had well-nigh ruined her soul. "Now," said she, "you are a beautiful lady, and are finely dressed--are you not in the same state of mind that I was in myself?" She said the lady wept, and confessed that that had been her snare: and she was afraid that her love of dress and society would ruin her soul. She confessed that she had been neglecting the salvation of her soul, because she did not know how to break away from the circle in which she moved. The young lady wanted to know if I thought she had done wrong in what she said to the lady. I told her No! that I wished all Christians were as faithful as she: and that I hoped she would never cease to warn her own sex against that which had so nearly ruined her own soul.

In the spring of 1829[1828--Ed.], when the Delaware was so high, the lumbermen came down with their rafts from the region of the high land where they had been getting the lumber out during the winter. At that time there was a large tract of country along the northern region of Pennsylvania, called by many "the lumber region," that extended along up toward the head waters of the Delaware river. Many persons were engaged in getting out lumber there summer and winter. Much of this lumber was floated down in the spring of the year, when the water was high, to Philadelphia. They would get out their lumber when the river was low: and when the snow went off, and the spring rains came on, they would throw it into the river and float it down to where they could build rafts, or otherwise embark it for the Philadelphia market. Many of the lumbermen were raising families in that region, and there was a large tract of country there at that time unsettled and unoccupied except by these lumbermen. They had no schools, and at that time had no churches or religious privileges at all. I knew a minister who told me he was born in that lumber region; and that when he was twenty years old he had never attended a religious meeting, and did not know his alphabet.

These men that came down with lumber attended our meetings, and quite a number of them were hopefully converted. They went back into the wilderness and began to pray for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and to tell the people around them what they had seen in Philadelphia, and to exhort them to attend to their salvation. Their efforts were immediately blessed, and the revival began to take hold and to spread among those lumbermen. It went on in a most powerful and remarkable manner. It spread to such an extent that in many cases persons would be convicted and converted who had not attended any meetings, and who were almost as ignorant as heathen. Men who were getting out lumber and were living in little shanties there alone, or where two or three or more were together, would be seized with such conviction that it would bring them into such a state as would lead them to wander off and inquire what they should do, and they would be converted, and thus the revival spread. There was the greatest simplicity manifested by the converts. An aged minister who had been somewhat acquainted with the state of things, related to me as a specimen of what was going on there the following fact. He said one man in a certain place, had a little shanty by himself where he slept nights, and was getting out his shingles during the day. He began to feel that he was a sinner, and his convictions increased upon him until he broke down, confessed his sins, and repented: and that the Spirit of God revealed to him so much of the way of salvation that he evidently knew the Savior. But he had never attended a prayer meeting, or heard a prayer that he recollected of, in his life. His feelings became such that he finally felt constrained to go and tell some of his acquaintances, that were getting out lumber in another place, how he felt. But when he arrived he found that they felt, a good many of them, just as he did; and that they were holding prayer meetings. He attended their prayer meetings and heard them pray, and finally prayed himself: and this was the form of his prayer: "Lord, You have got me down, and I hope You will keep me down. And since You have had so good luck with me, I hope You will try other sinners."

I have said that this work began in the spring of 1829[1828--Ed.]. In the spring of 1831 I was at Auburn again. Two or three men from this lumber region came there to see me, and to inquire how they could get some ministers to go in there. They said that not less than five thousand people had been converted in that lumber region: that the revival had extended itself along for eighty miles, and there was not a single minister of the Gospel there. I have never been in that region; but from all I have ever heard about it, I have regarded that as one of the most remarkable revivals that occurred in this country. It was carried on so independently of the ministry, among a class of people so ignorant as relates to all scholarship; and yet so clear and wonderful were the teachings of God, that I have always understood the revival was remarkably free from fanaticism, or wildness, or anything that was objectionable. I may have been misinformed in some respects, but report the matter as I have understood it. "Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth!" The spark that was struck into the hearts of those few lumbermen that came to Philadelphia, spread over that forest, and resulted in the salvation of a multitude of souls.

I found Brother Patterson to be one of the truest and holiest men that I have ever labored with. His preaching was quite remarkable. He preached with great earnestness, but there was no connection often in what he said--or very little connection--with his text. He has often said to me: "When I preach, I preach from Genesis to Revelations." He would take a text, and after making a few remarks upon it, or perhaps none at all, some other text would be suggested to him upon which he would make some very pertinent and striking remarks, and then another text: and thus his sermons were made up of pithy and striking remarks upon a great number of texts as they arose in his mind. He was a tall man, of striking figure and powerful voice. He would preach with the tears rolling down his cheeks, and with an earnestness and pathos that was very striking. It was impossible to hear him preach without being impressed with a sense of his intense earnestness and his great honesty. I only heard him preach occasionally: and when I first did so was pained, thinking that such was the rambling nature of his preaching that it could not take effect. However, I found myself mistaken. I found that notwithstanding the rambling nature of his preaching, his great earnestness and unction fastened the truth on the hearts of his hearers; and I think I never heard him preach without finding that some persons were deeply convicted by what he said. He always used to have a revival of religion every winter up to the time when I labored with him. I think he told me he had had a revival every winter for fourteen winters in succession.

He had a praying people. When I was laboring with him I recollect that for two or three days, at one time, there seemed to be something in the way. The work seemed to be in a measure suspended, and I began to feel alarmed lest something had grieved the Holy Spirit. One evening at prayer meeting while this state of things was becoming manifest, one of his elders arose and made a confession. He said: "Brethren, the Spirit of God has been grieved, and I have grieved him. I have been in the habit," said he, "of praying for Brother Patterson, and for the preaching, on Saturday night until midnight. This has been my habit for many years, to spend Saturday night till midnight in imploring the blessing of God upon the labors of the Sabbath. Last Saturday night," he continued, "I was fatigued, and omitted it. I thought the work was going on so pleasantly and so powerfully, that I might indulge myself, and go to bed without looking to God for a blessing on the labors of the Sabbath. On the Sabbath," said he, "I was impressed with the conviction that I had grieved the Spirit; and I saw that there was not the usual manifestation of the influence of the Spirit upon the congregation. I have felt convicted ever since; and have felt that it was my duty to make this public confession. I do not know," said he, "who beside myself has grieved the Spirit of God; but I am sure that l have done so."

I have spoken of Brother Patterson's orthodoxy. When I first began to labor with him I felt considerably tried, in some instances, with what he would say to convicted sinners. For example: the first meeting for inquirers that we had, the number in attendance was very large. We spent some time in conversing with individuals, and moving around from place to place giving instructions. The first I knew Brother Patterson arose, and in a very excited manner said: "My friends, you have turned your faces Zionward, and now I exhort you to press forward." He went on in an exhortation of a few moments, in which he made distinctly the impression that they were now in the right way; and that they had only to press forward as they were doing then, and they would be saved. His remarks pained me exceedingly; for they seemed to me to make a self-righteous impression--to make them think that they were doing very well, and doing their duty: and it they continued to do their duty, as they were then doing, and would press forward, they would be saved. This was not my view of their condition at all; and I felt in trouble, pained to hear such instructions given, and perplexed with the question how I should counteract it. However, as soon as he sat down or perhaps I should say at the close of the meeting when, according to my custom, I summed up the results of our conversation and made an address to them, I alluded to what Brother Patterson had said; and remarked that they must not misunderstand what he had said. That what he had said was true of those that had really turned to God, and set their faces Zionward by giving their hearts to God. But they must not think of applying this to those of them who were convicted, and had not yet repented, believed, and given their hearts to God. That instead of their faces being turned Zionward, they were really turning their backs upon Christ yet; that they were still resisting the Holy Spirit; that they were still in the way to hell. That every moment they resisted they were waxing worse and worse; and that every moment they remained impenitent, without submission, repentance, and faith, they were sinning against greater light. The Lord gave me a very clear view of this subject.

Brother Patterson listened with the greatest possible attention. I never shall forget with what earnestness he looked at me, and with what interest he saw the discriminations that I made. I kept on in my address until I could see, and until I felt, that the impression made by what Brother Patterson had said had not only been corrected, but that a great pressure was bearing upon them to immediately submit. I then called upon them to kneel down, and then and there commit themselves forever to the Lord; renouncing all their sins, and giving themselves up to the disposal of sovereign goodness, with faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. I explained to them as plainly as I could the nature of the Atonement, and the salvation presented in the Gospel. I then prayed with them, and have reason to believe that a great number of them were converted on the spot. After this I never heard anything from Brother Patterson that was at all objectionable, or trying to my feelings, in giving instruction to inquiring sinners. Indeed I found him remarkably teachable, and his mind open to just discriminations. He seemed particularly quick to get hold of those truths that needed to be presented to inquiring sinners; and I presume to the day of his death he never again presented such a view of the subject as the one to which I have alluded, that at the time distressed me so much. I respect and reverence his very name. He was a lovely Christian man, and a faithful minister of Jesus Christ.

 

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