Introduction
The Antobiograpliical Fragment found among the papers of the late JoKN” AyoF.T.L James was commenced in the autumn of 1858, and laid aside before the end of the year.
Let the reader imagine himself in a square room of moderate dimensions, comfortably furnished but without ostentation, a blazing fire on the hearth, the dark heavy curtains drawn, and candles lit for an evening’s work The wall on your left is covered with engravings of well-knowoi ministers: you will recognise at once the majestic form and the ardent gaze of Dr M’All, the most brUliant of modern preachers; the quaint, kindly countenance of William Jay; the rugged face of Chalmers; and the robust form and ample brow of Robert Hall, who in genius and scholarship, vigour of judgment and splendour of imagination, surpassed them all. Facing you are two large oil-paintings, one on each side of the fire-place; that on the right is an early portrait of Mr James, the other, of his second wife, who has been dead now for seventeen years. Two or three other faces which are dear to the old man writing at the table, look down upon him from above the mantelpiece; and on a bracket fastened to the opposite wall stands the bust of his tutor, Dr Bogue.
There is a couch on one side of the fire, and on it there lies one whose sufferings, protracted through many weary years, have had much to do with her father’s sanctity. Now and then, as he looks up from his writing to speak a kind word to his child, you see in his countenance a massive strength and a winning gentleness, the simplicity of childhood blended with manly shrewdness and no-LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.
bility. The mouth was made for eloquence; the broad and amyle chest below is what you like to see in a popular orator. His eyes are of the light blue so uncommon now in England, and brighten as he speaks till they shed a positive illumination over his face. But the light passes away, and he turns again to the page before him, writing swiftly and yet surely, hardly ever pausing for a word or turning back to cancel or correct. He writes like one who has written much, and who has small anxiety about the refinements of literary art. If he can make his meaning clear, if his sentences run smoothly, and are tolerably accurate and vigorous, he is satisfied. And now, having shewn you the writer, I leave you for a time to the manuscript which is growing rajoidly under his hand. It is the record of his long and laborious life.
Autobio- I have been many times solicited to prepare for posthumous giaphicai. piyga^jQy yjj autobiography. To this I have many, and, as they appear to myself, strong and well-grounded objections. I am quite aware that on some accounts, most men are their best and most competent memoriahsts, provided they have preserved, as life went on, the matter of which such a history should be composed, and have suflScient courage and honesty, and freedom both from false shame and self-love, to write the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth concerning themselves and others; and at the same time enough of candour, perspicacity, and discrimination in judging of events and characters with which they have been mixed up. Nor ought I to omit as another qualification for an interesting and instructive autobiography, a consciousness on the part of the writer that his life is of sufficient importance to be committed to record.
Of many of these pre-requisites I am deficient.
1. I have never kept a diary. I now regret this, for although I should not have had many things partaking of the marvellous, or strikingly novel and interesting to relate, yet in a public life of fifty-three years, and carried on in a rather public situation, some occurrences must have happened which would have furnished subjects of information and reflection which would, had they been
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recorded at the time, have been worth notice. I was led to this Autobioneglect partly by a constitutional indolence; partly by what yp*”*^*^ considered, incorrectly, want of time; but perhaps still more by a fear of being tempted to write imder the influence of self-love what was hardly a faithful transcript of the events that occurred, I thought I could hardly trust myself as a narrator of what belonged to myself. I feared that I should be tempted to write for the eyes of others, and thus give features and a colouring to the portrait which were not in the original
Now, in default of a diary, I do not think recollections, called up at perhaps a late period of life, can be a full and faithful narration. Many things necessary to give completeness to the account must be wanting; the links of events were so delicate that they were hardly perceived at the time, and must be altogether invisible when looked for at a subsequent period. Impressions made at the time are evanescent, and cannot be recalled; opinions then entertained are forgotten. A traveller should, and usually does, note down scenes and opinions as he goes along. So it should be with him who woidd write a history of himself, a narration of his travels through life. This I have never done, and therefore cannot pretend to prepare what deserves to be called an autobiography.
2. My life has had little variety of incident. I have had few changes of situation, and a limited range of adventure. I have lived fifty-three years in the same town, have been all the time connected with the same church, and have resided all this while, with the exception of one year, in the same house. True, had I kept a diary, and been purposely observant of passing events, I might have found material enough to suggest much profitable remark, although I have not been called out to strange adventures, to only one or two controversies, and to no picturesque situations, line has been a life of great uniformity, with the exception of domestic troubles. My ministerial life has been singularly monotonous; happily the monotone was a joyful one. I have had no quarrels with my flock, no divisions in my church, no change from one town or chuich to another. No pastor ever had less of
LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.
Autobio- all this. As in general history, so in a more private life, war and gidphical. g^jjg rather than peace furnish the stirring, startling, engrossmg themes of a narrative. Moreover, though I have had a good share of publicity, and of what is called popularity, I have not been summoned as by a trumpet-call to occupy posts of difficulty, importance, or danger.
I have been an author as well as a pastor and preacher, and have met with more acceptance in my works than I had any reason to expect, and in one instance have been granted a degree of success, I mean in reference to the “Anxious Enquirer,” which is as marvellous as it was unlocked for, a more extended notice of which may be expected further on, when I come to speak of my books. Still these works are all practical, and contain no profound theology — nothing to give me a high place among divines, commentators, or critics.
3. I never indulged a taste nor possessed a faculty for epistolary correspondence. My letters have been mostly on ecclesiastical business, and brought back only letters of the same kind. My portfolio contains no affluence of this sort. I cannot furnish original communications from illustrious men. I have had little to do with such. I never was ambitious or solicitous to get introduced to such. I was conscious of the limited nature of my education, and my want of conversational powers, and the narrow range of my reading. I knew that I was a practical rather than a speculative or imaginative man, and I remained pretty much in my own sphere. I have, of course, known nearly all the great men of the various bodies of Nonconformists of ray day, and have had occasional intercourse with them; but the only one with whom I kept up constant correspondence was the late Dr Fletcher of Stepney, who was my particular friend. I was too busy, or thought myself so, to enter largely on this mode of communication between man and man.
4. The character of ray mind being eminently and unalterably practical, I have never had either the taste or the ability for metaphysical speculation or theological profundities, and therefore I have nothing to record in this way. I am neither philosopher nor critic, and can give no emendations of difficult or doubtful pas- Autohio-
. graphicaL
sages, and no new theories of particular texts on general doctrines. I cannot add to the stock of sacred literature, or enlarge the stores of any who are well read in divinity, and, in default of fact and incident, supply suggestive thoughts and impulsive reflection. I feel as if I could start no mind upon a new track of investigation or career of discovery. No glimpses of previously undiscovered truth have visited my mind. I lack the powers of invention, and have no originality.
What have I therefore to record which would interest other minds in reading? I have been a mere plodding, working husbandman, using old implements with some industry and following old methods with a kind of dogged perseverance and considerable success. I set out in my ministry, even when a student, with the idea of usefulness so deeply imprinted on my heart, and so constantly present to my thoughts, that I could never lose sight of it long together: and I mean usefulness of one kind — that is, the direct conversion of souls. I have perhaps been in danger, and I now feel it, of restricting that idea within too narrow a circle. There are various kinds of usefulness. He is eminently useful who writes a defence of our holy religion against the cavils of infidelity, or a commentary upon a portion of Scripture, or a clear statement of Christian doctrine, or a valuable criticism on some disputed passage, or a religious tract, or anything else connected with divine truth. The priesthood of letters are eminently useful. The press is one of the two main pillars of the temple of truth. So in the conversion of souls, though the pulpit is the main instrument in effecting this, yet the tract distributor, the Sunday-school teacher, the Bible reader, are all useful and every person should study his talents, his means, and his opportunities for usefulness. In reference to myself, however, I meant usefulness in the way of direct conversion of souls.
In consequence partly of this, partly of a want of hterary ambition, and partly also of a want of vigorous application to study, by which to build on the very slender foundation laid in my very deficient college education, I never reached to such eminence of attain-LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.
Autoipio- ment as would enable me to do anything beyond my own line of practical teaching. On all these accounts, therefore, I have ever felt that there could be little done by me in the decline of life in the way of autobiography, that would interest and instruct the public; yet I have thought I might do something in this way, that would be valuable to my’children. What I have here written respecting ai(iobiography, will in some measure apply also to a biography written by another hand. My own opinion is, that we have too much of this species of literature. Too much I mean of an ordinary kind. Even of the most distinguished men, biographical memorials are often too diffuse. It is too commonly thought, that a great man’s history must necessarily have a very great book.
Of the lesser lights, even of the sanctuary, many might be permitted to pass away without any more permanent memorial than the stone which is placed over their tomb, and the love and veneration of those who have profited by their labours. How few biographies of any kind live in the use of those for whom they are intended! Some few attain to the honour of a kind of sacred classic; the rest are read, perhaps — and then are quietly entombed on the shelf. Now, there is nothing in my life that could exempt a memorial of me from this lot, and therefore I do not at all desire, what probably no one will think of writing, a published biography. I believe, without vanity I may say it, that my life has been in some measure a useful one, but even that has been in a very common method of procedure. I have been no comet in the solar system of Christianity, but one of the planets revolving in the attraction, and reflecting a little of the light of the Sun of righteousness. No one could say more about me than that for fifty years I was the pastor of one church, preached the gospel, wrote some bocks, and was honoured of God to save many souls, and all this with a very slender stock of secular learning. Most thankful do I feel that this can be said of me. And now, in the review of my life, and the anticipation of eternity, I feel more pleasure and more gratitude for this, than if I had attained to the highest niche in the temple of literary or scientific fame.