The Co-Pastorate

It is with a trembling hand that I commence this chapter; the most fervent language of aflfection, veneration, and gratitude would fail to convey the impression which Mr James’s magnanimous conduct towards myself has engraved for ever on my memory and heart.

To record the innumerable acts of kindness and proofs of generous confidence, which are instantly recalled when I review the pleasant years during which I was permitted to share his anxieties and labours, is impossible. And not a solitary act or word or look can be remembered which inflicted — even on the quick sensibilities of a youth just escaped from six years of college seclusion, and unacquainted with the ways of men — the slightest transient pain.

In this chapter I shall venture, for the sake of my own congregation, to give many details in reference to the history of the relation between Mr James and myself, in which strangers will feel little interest; should another edition of this “Life” ever be called for, many of these may be cancelled. It will also be necessary, in order to do full justice to the nobleness of Mr James’s character and the tenderness of his sympathy, to insert, without mutilation, letters which no inferior consideration could have induced me to place before the public*

* Samuel Palmer’s prefatory advertisement to Job Orton’s interesting letters may serve to protect me from censure: —” The publication of the following letters to the Editor may need an apology,

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LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMEii.

Though it was not till towards the close of his ministry that Mr James became anxious to share with another the responsibilities of the pastorate, he had twice or thrice sought and obtained some relief from the pressure of his general ministerial work by securing an assistant. In the year 1813 he was released by the church from the obligation to preach three times on the Sunday, and allowed a fixed annual sum to enable him to provide supplies for the afternoon. Mr Berry, formerly resident tutor at Homerton College, and subsequently to that, pastor of the Independent Church at Camberwell, who was residing in Birmingham in consequence of ill health, being able to preach once in the day, became permanent afternoon preacher, and his services proved very acceptable to the congregation. When the new chapel was about to be opened, he resigned his engagement, that Mr James might obtain an assistant who would be able to give him more help in the visitation of the sick, and the superintendence of the numerous institutions which gather round every vigorous Christian Church.

Mr Adams of West Cowes in the Isle of Wight was chosen for the vacant position, and came to Birmingham in January 1819.

since so many parts of them relate to his own personal concerns. Being apprehensive of incurring censure on this ground, I have been doubtful, as matters of this kind are inseparably interwoven with the greater part of this correspondence, whether it were not most advisable to suppress the whole. And yet, upon repeated and the most impartial reviews of what I had selected and transcribed, many things appeared full as interesting as most in the preceding letters, so that I thought the suppression of them would diminish the value of the publication; and to some of my friends it might appear a false delicacy, if, after printing so many letters of my correspondent addi-essed to other persons, I should present them with none which I had received from him myself. Nor was this merely my own opinion. Though 1 have left out many passages which appeared the most likely to be objected against on the above ground, some readers will probably think that others are retained which prudence and delicacy would have suppressed. Possibly this may, in some instances, be the case; but different persons will judge differently on the same particulars. As to myself, I cannot but apprehend that, in general, those articles which are the most personal, are capable of being applied to some useful purpose, especially by my yoimger brethren, whose situations and circumstances may be similar to what mine were at the time the letters were written; and that others may profit by the ojiinion, the advice, the approbation, and even the censures of my worthy friend — the last of which I as readily inserted as either of the former.”

Mr Adams, “holy Adams” as he was universally called, was a very singular, as well as a veiy excellent man.

The following sketch of him is extracted from a letter written by Mr James to the Rev. Thomas Mann, and inserted by him in his Memoir of Mr Adams, published in 1849: * —

“It is now nearly five-and-forty years since I became acquainted -with this saintly man, and I have still a vivid recollection of the impression produced by his appearance and conversation when I first saw him. While a student under Dr Bogue, at Gosport, who had also been his tutor, I visited Winchester with some of my fellow-students to take out our licence at the quarter sessions as preachers of the gospel, which was then reqvdred by law. We were received “nith the most affectionate cordiahty by Mr Adams at his humble lodgings, and made welcome to such hospitalities as his means enabled him to afford. It was impossible not to be impressed with his peculiarity of manner and with his indifference to the ordinary circumstances of neatness and comfort; but I, felt that I was in the presence of a man who seemed to belong less to this I world than to the region of unsulhed purity, and who was less fitted to converse with the inhabitants of earth than with the spirits of just men made perfect. His conversation turned upon the object of om visit, and I M eU remember with what devout earnestness he endeavoured to impress upon us the solemnity of the oath which we were about to take, in order to a legal quahfication for our office, as dissenting ministers. As long as I was imder his roof it seemed to me as if I were in company with one of the hohest men I had ever conversed vdih; and yet jver all this there was a certain air of uncouthness, which, but for his aninent sanctity, would have occasionally called up a feeHng approach-Jig the ludicrous. From that hoiu- my mind was made up as to the iaracter of Mr Adams. I knew him at once, and all my subsequent icquaintance only served to deepen and confirm my first impressions of lis distinguished excellence and great peculiarity.

“During my residence at Gosport I saw him occasionally, and also leard him preach and pray. His prayers struck me more than his emions — their unction was rich, and there seemed to be on his mind uch a reverential awe of God, blended with so much fihal confidence, hat I thought I had never heard anything like it before. The students 11 had the same opinion of him, and even they who were most disposed lie at his eccentricities were checked by a sense of his most extrary piety.

inoir of the Rev. Kichard Adams, of the New Forest, by Thomas Mann. 1., Ward & Co., 1849.

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“After leaving Gosport I saw little of Mm, except at the missionary meetings in London, when it appeared to me as if both his pecuharitiea and his sanctity had kept pace together in their growth. The emotions of his devout mmd at these seasons and scenes of religious excitement were often too strong to be repressed, and he evinced by his looks and gestures that his soul was in more intimate communion with God than with the multitudes by which he was at that moment surrounded, but from which he was abstracted in a world of his own. His feeUngs were so far visibly and variously expressed under the influence of what was going on as not unfrequently to assume the air of the grotesque, and, in some persons who did not know him, to lead to the supposition that he was a person of disordered reason.

“I little supposed at that time I should ever stand in a relation to him which would make me so much more intimately acquainted with him. Being in want of an afternoon preacher and general assistant, my attention was directed, I forget by what means, to Mr Adams. This was now thirty years ago, when he must have been about five-and-forty years of age. His first sermon produced a very considerable impression, as did his prayers also. The people also felt as if a man of no ordinary piety had come among them. It was not talent — genius — elegance; it was something higher than all these, — it was holiness — unction — spiritual power. But it is a little singular he never seemed to rise to the height of that discourse afterwards. It is true, his time of preaching was the afternoon, which is always a most unfavourable time for preachers, and especially for those who depend for the success of their discourses more upon the state of the heart than the power of their intellect or the previous preparation of their discourses. His preaching did not prove attractive. Whatever was the cause, he could not, as he told me, do justice to himself. His discourses were rather loose and rambling, though always spiritual and devout, and by no means devoid of thought, for he was an excellent theologian.

“His intercourse with the people, particularly those more eminent for piety and the poor, was much enjoyed, and proved very edifying. His usefulness, however, lay chiefly with those who had been recently brought under concern about religion. Thus his services were invaluable, not only in leading inquirers to a more intimate acquaintance with Divine truth, but in giving them a more clear insight into their own hearts. How gladly and how thankfully would I still avail myself of the services of such skill in that most difficult of all pastoral avocations — the dealing with inquirers after salvation, and candidates for church fellowship! Persons who had been under his training were always likely to be clear in their knowledge of the truth, and deep in their experience of the power of religion.

“It is almost needless to add I had the most entire confidence in his fideUty as an assistant — I mean in his unwearied endeavours to promote my comfort, usefulness, and harmony with my flock. He was in this respect as far from selfishness as I can conceive a human heart to be in this world of imperfection. He forgot himself in his labours for me. I knew that wherever he was and whatever he was doing he was doing all he could to raise me in the estimation of the church. It would seem as if he knew not, by experience, the meaning of the words envy and jealousy. If any other man than John the Baptist ever used, In sincerity and satisfaction, the expression, ‘He must increase, but I must decrease,’ it was this humble saint of the IMost High God.

“In his concern for my usefulness he would often point out what appeared to him to be deficiences and faults in my sermons, both as to matter and manner; but it was done in such a kind, modest, and unassuming way, that instead of ofi’endiug me it always increased my afi’ection for him, and as he was generally correct in his criticisms, inspired me with confidence in his judgment.

“Mr Adams’s piety, as is evident from all this, was of an unusual elevation. Devotion was his element. He entered more deeply than any one I ever knew into the meaning of that sublime and expressive phrase, ’ communion with God.’ I am sure I speak truly when I say that, besides frequent days of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, he spent hours every day in pouring out his heart to God in secret. His piety, however, led to some irregularity of habit. If his heart were enlarged in morning devotion he would give scope to his feelings, regardless of the progress of the hour, and would thus keep breakfast waiting for him at his lodgings to an inconvenient lateness; or if a sudden impulse came upon his mind, he would rise in the middle of the breakfast and retire for prayer, leaving the meal unfinished sometimes for hours. All this was Tong, and fitted him more to be a hermit than a member or society.

“In him devotion was united with the greatest tenderness of conscience I ever knew, and with the greatest regard, even in little things, for the comfort of his fellow-creatures. It will, perhaps, appear ludicrous to some, but it seems to illustrate his conscientious benevolence, to say, that if there were orange-peel or a stone in the path which would be likely to occasion a fall to any one, he would be sure to displace it. If there were a cellar- window in an insecure state, and which would endanger the passers by, he would go in and expostulate, but always in the most gentle mannei-, with the owner or occupant of the house. As

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

another illustration of the tenderness of his conscience, I may mention the following facts. While he was in Birmingham he was robbed of some money by a fellow-lodger or servant. He informed me of the fact, and mentioned the name of the individual whom he had suspected of being the pUferer. I thought nothing more about the matter, but about a year, or it may be more, after he had left our town, I received a letter from him, informing me that he had lately been spending a day of fasting, examination, and prayer, and had been making dUigent search after any sins of heart and conduct which, through inadvertence at the time, had escaped his notice, and which, therefore, had never been confessed and repented of. In the course of his self-scrutiny he had recollected the suspicions he had entertained of his feUow-lodger being the thief who had robbed him, and the mention of his suspicions to mc. Now, as he had no positive evidence that the money was taken by this individual, he considered that this was a sin against that law of charity which ’ thinketh no evil,’ and having confessed it to God, he could not be easy till he acknowledged it to me. Having mentioned the circumstance also to the person who was the occupant of the house, he was at the trouble of writing another letter to him on the same subject and for the same purpose; and I am certain that if he could have conceived that the suspected person had ever been made acquainted with his opinion concerning him, there is no language of concession and humiliation he would not have been wilKng to employ in expressing his sorrow for having cast such an imputation upon him. It must be recollected that he had not subsequently obtained evidence to prove that his suspicions were groundless — on the contrary, there was still strong probabihty that they were well founded; his idea was, that in the absence of positive proof of guilt it was a sin to think evil of another, and especially to speak it. Many will, no doubt, be inclined to smile at this moral fastidiousness; but who that acknowledges the authority of conscience will not admire this instance of entire subjection to its control 1 How sensitive and delicate must have been that conscience which shrank with pain from so slight a touch of iniqiuty as that I have just narrated! How different a world shoidd we live in, and how much holier a Church should we witness, if all men were as anxious as this eminent Christian thus to maintain a conscience void of offence both towards God and man! Another instance of his scrupulosity I remember. He once had in his possession a five-pound note issued by a provincial bank that had failed. He went, with other persons in similar circumstances, to prove his debt. Being called upon to make oath, which was then the law in reference to bank debts, he considered it too light a matter to be accompanied by the solemnity of an oath, and chose rather to suffer the loss of the

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dividend than ojBfend the delicacy of Ms moral perceptions by obtaining it in this way. Now, we may be of opinion that Ms scruples were groundless, but still we cannot but be struck with the seK-denying morality which would sacrifice his little all, for such it probably was, rather than retain it at what he considered the expense of religious principle. Should it be supposed, as it will be, no doubt, by some, that Mr Adams’s conscientiousness was in excess, this, in an age when a depth of it must be mentioned as one of the things that are wanting to give beauty and power to the Chiistian profession, may well be excused.

“In that branch of religion which has special reference to what is called Temper our dear friend stood pre-eminent above most. His was indeed ’ the meekness and gentleness of Christ.’ His kindness, long-suffering, and forbearance was such that I am not quite sure he would have killed a wasp that stung him, or have killed a dog that had bitten him. I cannot imagine the amount of provocation which woidd have excited him to anger or have inflamed him to passion. I never once saw him, on any occasion, perturbed in the smallest degree with wrath, nor do I recollect ever hearing him speak evil of any one, in the ordinary meaning of that expression. Malice was quenched in benevolence. His desire to do good was ever thoughtful, inventive, and active, though his efforts were not always, perhaps, judicious. He usually kept some halfpence in his pockets for the rehef of beggars, who never appealed to him in vain. The boon of charity was always accompanied by some lesson of piety. I have seen him stand in the streets, and, in a few sentences, preach the gospel to a mendicant, whose eye, perhaps, would be more fixed on the halfpenny than his ear was on the homily the good man was dehvering. No matter that: he had discharged his duty, — had spoken a word for the Master he loved to serve, and had preached a short sermon to a poor sinner, who would in all probability hear one nowhere else.

“Mr Adams, as may well be imagined, was singularly qualified to carry consolation to the chamber of sickness, and other scenes of suffering humanity. There was a kindness in his looks, a tenderness in his tone, an aptness in his words, which was well adapted to soothe and comfort the children of woe. Yet he was so drawn out in compassion as sometimes to weary the patient by the length, not only of his prayers, but of his visits; nor was this the only complaint I sometimes heard of him, for he sometimes forgot the hour, and made his entrance when the friends were preparing to go to rest.

“Our dear friend, as all who knew him will bear testimony, was a cheerful and happy man, and could allow the quiet, cahn, and peaceful smile to relax into laughter, occasionally loud, but always somewhat

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

grave. There was neither gloom nor melancholy about hiin, though oftentimes an air of deep solemnity.

“His personal habits were not to be commended as regards external appearance. His extreme absence of mind led him to neglect too much his dress, and to be sometimes otherwise too indifferent abou, himself. During his residence in this town, some friends, perceiving that he had no outer covering except a shabby old cloak, provided for him a new great coat, which was neat, graceful, and becoming. I never saw it on his back but once, and what became of it, and why it was laid aside, I know not. WMle residing in Hampshire, long after his leaving Birmingham, I have been told a lady of wealth and piety was fond of his society as a man of eminent reUgion, and used to invite him to her religious parties, for the sake of his expositions of the Scriptures, and his prayers; but he often came -with such utter neglect of personal apparel, that she provided him with a new suit of clothes, in order that he might make a better appearance in her drawing-room. He came once or Uvice in the new clothes, but, to her great dismay and displeasure, she saw him enter one day in his old suit, and being asked why he had not put on the dress the lady had given him, he really did not know the condition in which he then stood before her, but supposed he was then clad in the new habiliments. The fact is, a poor necessitous man had begged a coat of him, and he had given away the new instead of the old one without being aware of it. It is not improbable that m some such way as this the new surtout given him at Birmingham had disappeared.

“In reviewing the character of Mr Adams, then, while I am entirely convinced he was one of the holiest, if not the holiest man I ever knew, I am still of opinion there was a tinge of monachism about him, and a kind of pietism that fitted him more for the cloister than for the pulpit. His eccentricities hung like a thin cloud over his excellences; and though it could not conceal them, yet somewhat dimmed, at least to public observation, their brightness, and hindered their effect upon others. Many men with less than one-half of his intense devotion, are abundantly more useful. He seemed more fitted for communion with God than with man: more adapted to hold intercourse with the church, or, I should rather say, with the better portion of it, than with the world; meaning, by that expression, to convey the idea that there are many professors of religion in whom the spirit of the gospel is so low, and the spirit of the world so predominant, that among them this eminent saint would have found himself as little at home in his own feeUngs, as he would have been found welcome to theirs.

“The last time I saw our friend was in the autumn of 1845, at Southampton, whither, having heard I was to preach there, he had come to meet me. He appeared not so much altered as I had expected to find him, considering the years which had elapsed since I last saw him. He greeted me with the same affection, and I looked at him with the same veneration, as we had long cherished towards each other. He seemed to enjoy the sermon, which was delivered in Mr Adkins’s chapel; and -with the same respectful fidelity as he had used in former years, he begged me, to use his own words, to preach it somewhere with a little more explicit introduction of the divinity of the Saviour, which he thought the subject admitted of. We had some very delightful communion at the house of a friend; and thus terminated our intercourse for ever upon earth.

“I shall ever hold the name and memory of Richard Adams in affectionate and grateful remembrance. How much of the undeserved and unexpected success which God, in His sovereignty, has been pleased to crown my very imperfect services in His Church, I owe to his prayers, I know not — that I shared largely in his intercessions I am sure — and if the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much, T may conclude that his were supplications which*? Grod delighted to honour.”

Mr Adams continued h Birmingham about four years, and then returned to the Isle of Wight After a short interval, he was succeeded by a student from one of the London colleges, who remained only a few months, turned out badly, and ultimately went to America. For more than twenty years Mr James discharged, without assistance, the duties of his large and oppressive pastorate; but becoming conscious of the increase of physical infirmities, and anticipating with a constant and almost morbid dread their iapid development and aggravation, he repeatedly declared to his people his desire for a colleague who might, after his retirement or death, become his successor.

In 1847, a student was received into Spring-Hill College, to whom, from the commencement of his studies, Mr James manifested great kindness. In the early days of the youth’s religious history, the “Anxious Inquirer” had rendered him too important a service for hira to be without grateful affection for its author; but through his previous associations he had caught the distrust with which Mr James’s Nonconformity was then regarded by some extreme Anti-State-Churchmen, and he seldom went to Mr

LIFE OP JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

James’s Saturday dinner without coming into very definite and vigorous though friendly controversy with his kindly and venerable host.

After a few months, reports reached Mr James which made him fear that his young friend was in danger of drifting away from evangelical truth into scepticism or heresy; and one Saturday he sent a note to the college requesting me — for I cannot longer tell the story in the third person — to come alone that afternoon to dine with him. I wondered what would be the explanation of this. At dinner there was as much freedom and cordiality on his part as usual, perhaps more. After dinner, he asked me to walk up-stairs with him into his study. As soon as we sat down, he drew his chair to the front of the fire, and bringing his great face close to mine he said, “Mr Dale, may I speak plainly to you?” “As plainly as you like, sir,” was the reply. Then came out what he had heard, and what he feared. I answered him very frankly, and, as he might have justly thought, somewhat presumptuously; but, instead of reminding me of my youth, and the crudeness of my intellectual condition, he talked with me as familiarly and freely about the points on which we difli’ered, as though he had been a lad of my own age; with far greater toleration, indeed, of what he thought my mistakes, than a lad of my own age would probably have manifested.

He was chairman of the Board of Education, and some of his practical recommendations to which I demurred he might have authoritatively enforced, but with admirable patience and wisdom he never passed beyond simple argument and advice. Though his counsels, I am sorry to say, failed to influence me, the discovery which I made that afternoon of the simplicity and generosity of his temper, and his genuine and deep concern for what he believed to be my spiritual and intellectual perils, eflfected a complete revolution in my feeUngs towards him; from that time, though it was only gradually that I came to feel his power, I venerated his goodness, and felt that in any trouble he would be a most faithful friend.

A year and a half afterwards, at the close of the long vacation in 1849, Mr James wrote to me to say he was very unwell, and that he wished me to come down from London to preach for him on the following Sunday morning. Not having entered the theological class, and, therefore, never having heard any lectures on preaching, I was surprised by his letter, but came down, preached on the Sunday morning, and was his guest for two or three days. After supper on Sunday evening, we sat talking for a couple of hours about preaching; one of us with the ardent hopfulness with which the greatest of all human callings is not unfrequently anticipated, the other with the solemnity produced by the memory of many years of ministerial responsibility, but brightening often into a most genial sympathy with the sanguine enthusiasm of youth.

He explained, with characteristic simplicity and frankness, the principles by which he had been guided in the structure of his sermons, and threw out many suggestions on the art of preaching, which seemed to me at the time very valuable for their good sense and practical wisdom. The details of the conversation have faded from my memory; two things only can I remember -sith any distinctness, — the warmth and animation with which, in responding to some vehement expression of my sense of the nobleness and glory of the preacher’s vocation, he said that a passion for preaching was a sure pledge of success; and the earnestness with which he spoke of “usefulness,” as the one great end which a minister should propose to himself in all his labours.

Kather more than a year after this, he begged me to listen to “no hint or solicitation about settling with a congregation, without first consulting him and, in November 1851, he wrote me the following note: —

“Edgbastox, November 11, 1851.” My dear Sie, — I shall be obliged to you for a sermon next Sabbath, but I cannot yet say whether it ■«t11 be in the morning or evening.

“I now touch upon a more serious subject. Do you remember, that many months ago I requested you not to hearken to any hiut or sohdtation about settling M-ith a congregation till you had spoken to me? Perhaps you would conclude that I had some intention, not expressed in a suggestion so vague and general, but certamly implied. If so, your impression was correct. I had. I really meant, that provided all went on at college as had hitherto been the case, I should like, after

LIFE OF JOHN AKGELL JAMES,

the present year of your studies was finished, to have your occasional help at Carr’s Lane, without altogether breaking up your college life. So that by the end of another year you might be AvhoUy, if you saw fit, an assistant to me.

“I confide this to your own bosom. Say not a word about it to any

one. But at some convenient season we will talk it over —

Yours faithfully,

“J. A. Ja:lies.”

The proposal, though it did not startle me quite as much as it would have done but for his previous very emphatic request that I would not commit myself to any engagement without consulting him, occasioned me great perjDlexity. I had come to regard Mr James with great affection and respect, and felt it would be a great honour and haypiness to lighten his labours and to commence my ministry under the guidance of his experience and wisdom. But this settlement at Carr’s Lane, as soon as my college course was over — it had then nearly two years to run — wovdd cross some of my most cherished plans; it had been my intention to study in Germany for a few sessions after leaving Spring- Hill; this would have to be abandoned. Like most students, I had my visions of the kind of congregation to which it was my ambition to minister, and those visions were very unlike the reality which now seemed inevitable. The movement to evangelise the irreligious masses of our manufacturing population was at that time gathering great strength, and supposing my vocation lay in that dii-ection, my scheme was to find a small congregation of poor people in the heart of a manufacturing district, and to make it the pivot and centre of an active system of evangelistic labour among the surrounding myriads of working people; this dream, too, had to be abandoned, and it was abandoned very reluctantly.

No choice, however, seemed left me, and so, during my last year at college, it was arranged that I should preach for Mr James on the first Sunday morning of every month, and occasionally at other times. To this arrangement he refers in a note written to me in September 1852, when the college session was just beginning.

“Edgbaston, September 17, 1852.

“My deab Sir, — I believe you perfectly understood the proposal I made to you for your future services at Carr’s Lane — to preach during the last year of your studies every Sunday morning -when the Lord’s Supper is administered, and as often as I may require additional help, i.e., on Wednesday evenings, and at other times on the Sabbath — of

course, asking moderate demands I do not -wish to interfere

with your preparation for the master’s degree — to vrhich your reading

must be most directed during the year I would carry on my

classical studies, were I in your place, with great diligence. Try to be a good and accurate scholar. I deem this of great importance. Your course of reading for the degree will not only furnish much knowledge in philosophy, but be an admirable mental discipline. But take care of your health. Don’t overdo it. Attend to exercise. I forgot to ask if you smoked. If you have contracted this habit, I beseech you to break it. To me it appears of so much importance that it would tend to disturb our intercourse if you were addicted to this habit. You are not so far committed to it, even if you have begun it, as to find it difficult to destroy the pipe. You can have but little idea with what disgust and loathing it is regarded by many of our people, to whom your company would be less pleasing if you carried this habit with you.

“May I suggest a hint as to your delivery 1 Yoirr voice is musical, your flow of language easy and elegant, jowv style good; but both manner and matter a little too equable. It is the flow of a river, graceful, and somewhat majestic; but it wants the occasional rush, rapid and cataract, more elevation occasionally, more impassioned intonation, more solemn point and appeal You can be a very good speaker. We do much by pathos, by heart as well as head. Feeling, if I have any -power at all, has constituted no small share of it.

“As you win have to preach often to the same people, I hope this will not interfere with your preparation for the degree. I do not by any means wish that it should..... — Yours affectionately,

“J. A. James.”

The next letter was written in answer to some inquiries of mine suggested by impressions, inaccurate as they proved to be, which I had received concerning IMr James’s plans for the future from a gentleman with whom he had been conversing about his intentions: —

“Edgbaston, May 30, 1 853.” My dear Sir, — As I do not receive was letters on Sundays, I had

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not read yours of Saturday when I saw you yesterday, or I might have then alluded generally to its contents, though they require a more lengthened reply and more extended explanation than I could have given during the few minutes we were together in the vestry.

“First of all, let me say that I approve, admire, and commend the frankness with which you have expressed your views on several points. Candour and explicitness should characterise our whole conduct towards each other in the important relation in which we now stand, and I therefore thank you for your communication, and beg that in future the same open-heartedness may guide your whole behaviour towards me, and I shall avail myself of the same privilege of friendship of placing before you anything that strikes me as requiring explanation or alteration. Ingenuousness is the best security, as it is the truest expression of sincere and hearty friendship.

“Your letter affords me the opportunity of laying before you what I ought to have done before, — my whole object, purpose, and plan in reference to my future connexion with you. I seemed to take it for granted that you knew all about it, for what has been long our intention to do we are apt to suppose is already done. I have ever wished to help my people in the selection of my successor, that they might not, after my death, or when I am incapable of the duties of the pastorate, be left to the hazard of a schism and division in the exercise of their choice. Yet observing how often a co-pastorate had proved a source of uneasiness both to the ministers and the churches, I hesitated about a step of such importance. My hopes, however, prevailed above my fears when I saw the budding excellences of your talents and disposition, and after much and earnest prayer to God, I determined to try the experiment. I thought I saw in you one who, without servility or forgetfulness of what was due to himself, would regard me with some of the respect and deference as well as affection due from a son to a father, one who would not be a suspicious, jealous, and sensitive stickler for the last and least punctilio of his rights. All I have seen and heard confirms me in the conviction that in this view of you I have not mistaken your character. To carry out my purpose, you will recollect I proposed to you that you should come for a year as my assistant, to preach once for me on the Sabbaths when the Lord’s Supper is administered; and on other occasions when wanted, leaving you still at college to pursue your studies till the end of your curriculum. I stated that I would go no further in the way of positive engagement, but that if your services continued to prove acceptable, I should then more fully engage you as my assistant for another year. I am not quite sure whether I ever till now explicitly informed you what services I should require of you during the second year. These I will mention presently. As the expiration of the first year was to determine whether our relationship should proceed further, so the expiration of the second was to determine the same thing. The second is a kind of probation, both for you and me to ascertain whether we can, with mutual assent and consent, and consent of the church, and with entire confidence of all parties, come into the co-pastorate. The expiration of the second year will, if I live so long, bring me to my jubilee, when, if our way be clear, it is my intention to share the pastorate with j’ou, or, if we should not see fit to come together, -with some one else. But in order to prevent all collision between two co-ordinate powers, it appears to me that the plan of Dr Cox of Hackney is a very wise and good one. He has invited Mr Katterns, who is not a young man, to be his co-pastor, at ’ the same time reserving to himself the presidency at the church meet- ’ ings, and I believe the Lord’s Table, except when he invites Mr Katterns to take his place, which, of course, he sometimes does. And he also considers that his voice in all church matters is to be considered next to the New Testament, the ultima lex for guiding the decisions of the church. This is not for the sake of power but of peace, to shut out the occasion of contest between the two pastors. The younger one may well consent to this, considering that it cannot be long before he will not only be supreme, but alone.

“Well, now, we are about to enter upon the second year of our engagement, and my proposal for that year is to divide the services of each Sabbath, alternating between the morning and evening, and the same as to the week-day service; i.e., he who preaches on the morning of one Sabbath preach on the evening of the next, and he who preaches one Wednesday evening be silent the next j and each to take the whole day when the other is out, either occasionally for a single Sabbath, or I during their annual excursion. All this must, of course, depend upon I the approbation and decision of the church. You must also relieve me from Bible classes, attention to the schools, and some portion of the

I visitation of the sick, burials, and marriages And now, my dear

young friend, I have told you all that is in my heart towards you — all? No, not all, for I cannot do this. I cannot tell you how much and how earnestly I pray for you, how deeply solicitous and how tremblingly anxious I am for you — for your piety, your soundness of sentiment, your usefulness, your happiness. The hope that you may suit me and my church is indeed a blessed one. It would be wormwood and gall to I my cup if anything should disappoint my expectations concerning you. No father ever felt more soUcitous about a child of promise on which his heart was set than I do about you. It is a matter about which we should both be incessant and importunate in prayer: a matter on which the serenity of my evening and the brightness of your morning of Ufe

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

depend; and in which the comfort and respectability of both are involved: and not only so, but also the peace and prosperity of a large and at present flourishing church. Oh, let us be devout, and carry it to God. Let us be jealous, not indeed of each other, but of ourselves. I am anxious, but I am hopeful. I am sure the weKare of the church lies very, very near my heart. I can still live and labour for it, or, if God wills it, I can die for it; but I can neither live happily nor die comfortably if its peace be disturbed or its prosperity be destroyed or even hindered, ilay God bless you with all -wisdom and grace, and make you and keep you a holy, devoted, successful minister of the New Covenant many years after the hand which pens these lines shall have ‘lost its cuiming,’ and shall have given itseK in fellowship to the worms of the earth! — Your affectionate friend, and as yet your pastor,

“J. A. Jajies.”

My college course ended in June 1853, and at the church meeting previous to the first Sunday in July, the church was requested to sanction my appointment as assistant minister. Among Congregationalists the assistant minister is only a private member of the church, who aids the pastor in certain kinds of ministerial duty; he may not have been ordained; in many churches, custom would prevent him presiding at the Lord’s Supper or administering baptism. He has no pastoral authority; he is not chosen or appointed by the church, but by the pastor whom he assists. Though, however, he occupies no recognised office, it is obviously required by the spirit and principles of Congregationalism, that the church should be invited to express its opinion on his appointment; and hence the resolutions which were forwarded by Mr James with his letter of July the 2d. The resolutions themselves it is unnecessary to insert.

The letter dated July the 14th was in answer to my acceptance of the invitation; that of July the 27th was written just as he was leaving home, and immediately before my work in Birmingham was to commence; that of August the 23d was written from INIr Henderson’s of Park, near Glasgow; and the last of this series was written in answer to a desponding letter of mine, written to him while I was away from Birmingham for a few days in February 1854.

“Edgbastos, July 2, 1S53.

“My dear YOUJfG Bkother, — I now forward you a copy of the resolutions which were passed at the church meeting last evening; and it will be to you, as it was to us, matter of most fervent praise that they all passed not only itnammoiisli/, but most cordially.

“The reading of this document can convey to you but an inadequate idea of the feeling of the churcL / send you the letter of what was done; the spirit cannot be thus forwarded, — all hearts were full to overflo■ing. Is it not of God? Is it not a token for good? Have we not been led thus far by the Divine head of the Church? And may we not take encouragement from this, to hope that He will make our path as plain for the future as He has for the past; and that our course will be as plainly radicated at the close of the second year as it has been at the close of the first 1 Surely you must be encouraged by the thought that, out of such a church, numbering now above nine hundred members, not one opposing hand was lifted up, not one dissentient voice threw in a discord to the general harmony. I see in all this an answer to the intensely fervent prayer which I have, without ceasing, presented to God. And now, my dear brother, may you come in the fulness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ! May your mind be rightly directed in the answer you give to me! I can anticipate but one reply. You have already, I am sure, carried this matter to Him whose blessing alone can make anything we do profitable to ourselves or glorious to Himself. StUl invoke His direction and benediction. May He who sent forth His seraphim to pmify the lips of the prophet, and to prepare him first to receive and then deliver the message of the Lord, purify your mind and heart to know and fulfil His coimsel!

“It is a solemn crisis in the history of us both. I tnist we feel it to be so. My prayers are intensely earnest that it may be for God’s glory and the good of the church, as well as for our mutual comfort. I feel it to be an explicit and unambiguous notification to myself of the approximating close of my ministry. I seem to be entering on the last stage of my journey, and deeply serious do I feel in these circumstances. Of course, the ministry never can appear in such a light as when the greater part of it is ldewed as past.

“May you set out with these impressive contemplations!

“Before we see each other, I may perhaps offer a few suggestions in reference to your future course. In the mean time, I am sure I need not entreat you to be much in prayer for the Divine unction to rest upon you. I hope we shall often pray together, and help each other to cultivate a spirit of deep devotion.

“I congratulate you on your success at the university examination. When Henry ^lartyn, whose memoir I recommend to you, came out of 2 G

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAJIES.

the Senate House with the honour of senior wranglership, his reflection was, ‘I am surprised now to find what a shadow I have grasped.’ May you have an equally deep impression of the vanity of earthly things! It is the knowledge you have acquired, rather than the honour of getting it, that is to be chiefly valued.

“I hope you are getting health by your vacation, and that you will come home strong to labour. I am going to preach to-morrow twice from 1 Thess. v. 25, (‘Brethren, pray for us.’) This is to follow up the

pledge of the church given last evening — Yours afi’ectionately,

“J. A. James.”

“Caer’s Lane, July 14, 1853.” My dear young Brother, — I received your two letters, the one addressed to myself, and the other to the church, and am thankful to our heavenly Father for their contents. I had little doubt of your acceptance of an invitation which, without any presumptuous attempt to pry into the secrets of Omniscience, or to interpret the will of God by events accordant with our wishes, may, I think, be considered as sent by Him as well as by us. In this case I think we may say that vox populi is vox Dei. It is a rare occurrence that so large a church should be so perfectly and cordially unanimous, and must be as great a satisfaction to your mind, in the decision to which you have come, as it is to mine. You wUl very naturally suppose that I must feel some solemnity, which, though unmixed with suspicion or misgiving, cannot be unaccompanied with soHcitude in thus sharing with another the labours of my pulpit and the afl’ections of my people. There is, however, as little of this in my heart as can ever be expected in any simUar case. My first dependence for our entire good understanding is upon Him, who has both our hearts in His keeping, and next, upon the kindness, frankness, and amiableness of your disposition, together, of course, with those Christian graces which the great Sanctifier has ■RTought in you. Our piety is the surest g-uardian of our peace. The more we are baptized with the Spirit of holy love to Him, who is Himself light and love, the less likely shall we be ever to come into a state of ahenation and contention. Seraphs in heaven ever walk together and are agreed. May we approach them in the fervour of their love and purity! then we shall also come near to them in their unbroken harmony. 0 my brother, it is in this we are all most wanting. Our principal defects as ministers he chiefly in our character as Christians. We should be all better preachers, and better pastors, if we were hoher men. And it is my hope and my prayer, that the intercourse which you and I may hold, may improve us both, and help to keep up the divine life within us. I am myself deeply sensible how far short we all are in this respect.

A minister’s heart should, so far as human instrumentality goes, be the central fire of the church. I have no doubt you have found it the most difficult thing you had to do at college to keep up the spiritual pulse in good and healthful tone. Aiistotle, Locke, and Cousin afford small helps to faith, hope, and love. Yet they will assist you in dealing with human intellects. You enter upon your ministerial career with advantages of this kind, of which I knew very little at the outset of life. I had but a small capital to begin with, but I have contrived to work it well One thing I did possess, and have retained, and that is a clear understanding of the object of the ministry. ‘They watch for souls as they that must give account ’ has been my motto; and a constant aim at conversion, in the good old Puritan meaning of that term, has been my aim. I very early read ‘Baxter’s Reformed Pastor,’ and I moulded my preaching after that model I have always considered that a minister does as much by his heart as he does by his head. If mind is moved by mind, heart is moved by heart. True it is that the converse is also a fact, heart is moved by mind, and mind led by the heart. A cold intellectuality — a mere scientific mode of preaching will do little good. My ‘Anxious Inquirer ’ is but an embodiment of my preaching. And how marvellously has God honoured that ■unpretending work! Now, it may be supposed that what reaches the soul through the eyes, will also reach it thi’ough the ear. I am sure it is the gospel in all its fulness, earnestly, feelingly, but powerfully preached, that God will bless for the conversion of souls. Don’t imagine I am writing a lecture, I am only giving you my ministerial experience. You know me and my congregation, and know that through God’s most surprising grace, I have done something, and this is how I have done it. And then I have been enabled to keep hold of the hearts of the people, by my own heart being much she-wn to them in all my intercourse -with them. They knew I loved them, and love begets love. Indeed, it is this which I sometimes think has led me into a degree of familiarity which I would ad-vise you to restrain. My tendency is to too much openness and frankness. My affability has perhaps degenerated into an undignified freeness of manner. I would not be lordly, reserved, stately. I would not assume either the odour of sanctity, or the pomp and air of officiality; but if I were to go over life again, I should be a little more reserved. My kindness should not be less fervent, nor my affability less easy and gentle; but they should be more restrained and elevated. Akin to this, I have permitted my cheerfulness, to which I am naturally prone, to partake of a little too much facetiousness. I don’t think I ever approached the character of a jester. Broad farce and buffoonery I ever condemned in others, and avoided in myself; but I have been somewhat more jocose than I now

LIFE OP JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

quite approve. Not that I do not like and approve a good laugh — I enjoy it; but it has sometimes trenched on seriousness. If the deacons must be ’ grave,’ surely the bishop should be aiiMvog — a word that signifies dignity. And now I mention these things that you might give them due consideration, and if they strike you with any force as applicable to me, to profit by them. A cheerful man, you and I, and all Christians, as well as all Christian ministers, ought to be. Nothing spectral should be in us.

“As to my habits in my intercourse with my people, these have been somewhat restrained. I have abstained from evening parties, as I deemed them most profitless to myself and others.

“To sit three hours in mere chit-chat, or hearing young ladies play on the piano and sing, was a waste of time I could not endure. I never supped out except at the Book Society Meetings, and then I invariably left at half-past ten. Nor have I been in the habit of frequenting dinner parties. I do not like this meal away from my own table many times in one year. Perhaps I have erred in being too little with my people. This, however, is to err on the right side. No one could ever call me a gossiping minister. Many, I am persuaded, make themselves too familiar with their people in this way. A dignified reserve is better than a jocular familiarity. By these means I have, through God’s blessing, I believe, maintained the respect as well as the affections of my people. If I do not mistake you, your danger will he on the side of mine.

“You win, I am sure, take all this in good part as coming from one who is jealous over you with a godly jealousy

“This has been written at several times, for I am very busy. — Yours very truly, J. A. James.”

“Edgbaston, July 27, 1853.” My dear young Brother, — I have just written a sermon to be preached on Sabbath morning next, fi’om 1 Cor. xvi. 10, 11, [’ Now, if Timotheus come, see that he may be with you ■nathout fear: for he worketh the work of the Lord, as I also do. Let no man therefore despise him; but conduct him forth. in peace, that he may come unto me: for I look for him with the brethren; ‘] with what reference I need not say, and it has been followed by an intense prayer founded on Rom. xv. 29. May the exhortation to the church be felt and followed by them, and the petition to God be answered in the letter and spirit of it! You are aware, of course, that you are expected to enter on your ministry at Carr’s Lane on Sabbath week, and that you are looked to for the whole service for the time of my absence, both Sabbath-days and week-days. This, I am aware, is a hard service, but the God whom you serve will help you in it, and through it. You are coming to a people who are prepared to receive you, and w lio will welcome you to their pulpit. Much prayer, I am quite sure, will go up to God for you. There is little ground for the fear mentioned in the text, yet I have thought it not unreasonable to require for you a warm-hearted, confidential reception. You may return to us, therefore, full of confidence both in God and His people.

“* I have this day been looking out for lodgings for you, and have found what, I think, will suit you, in Francis Street, that is the street just opposite !Mr Keep’s house, leading into Monument Lane; but, of course, nothing is determined upon till you come. Were I at home I would wish you to come at once to my house; and if you have not provided for your reception, and will let me know, I will procure some friendly Gains to take you in until you have determined for yourself. .... — Yours affectionately,

“J. A. James.”

“Park, Glasgow, Aur/ust 23, 1853.

“My deak young Beother, — I have lately led so rambling a life, and have been so perpetually in locomotion, that I have had but Kttle opportunity for corresponding with any one, or I possibly might have forwarded you a few lines before this. It is true I have but little to communicate, beyond the information that I have had a most agreeable journey from the outset to the present moment. The sojourn with Mr Backhouse at Scarborough, and the rambles with him and my son around the ruined abbeys of Yorkshire were delightfid. I am now confined to the house by the first day’s rain I have had since I left home, and this gives me leisure for writing up my correspondence.

“Yesterday was fine, when we had a glorious view of the mountains round Loch Long and Loch Lomond. I forget whether you have seen Scotland, li you have not, you have a great treat before you; and if you have, the repetition of a former enjoyment. I am aware the surprise and novelty of a first view of fine scenery can never be repeated; but the quiet, calm, minute gratification resulting from it is ever new and ever fresL I confess to so much delight, that I am somewhat fearful occasionally of being too sensuous, and stopping in the vestibule of the temple of God without passing on by faith to the Adytum, the Holy of Holies, where the God of grace reigns upon the mercy-seat between the Chembim. And, after all, it is not from the sublime or beautiful of nature the soul derives her sustenance, or her highest enjoyment. Not a ray of mercy beams upon the dark and troubled conscience, not a whisper of consolation is heard by the broken or contrite heart.

! * I let this passage stand, as it is an illustration of the minute and kind attentions which, through the whole time of our connexion, Mr James was constantly hewing me. — Ed.

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAJIES.

“I hope you have found this initiation into the duties of office, if not easy, yet not oppressive. I am aware it was not wading into the waters of the sanctuary when they were only ankle-deep, but plunging into them when they were even to the louis.

“I learn nothing but satisfaction with your labours, and am glad to hear that, as the best proof of the pleasure of the people in hearing you, the congregations are good. I am more and more convinced that the substantial verities of DiAane revelation, are the most direct and surest way to the alfection, the esteem, and the confidence of the people. This I know from experience, as well as by report. I do not say it in the way of boasting, nor from an impulse of vanity, but in order to bear witness to the truth of the assertion I have just made, — the kindness and respectful, almost reverential, attention I receive, astonishes and humbles me; and I cannot but perceive it is a tribute, not so much to talent, for I am not above multitudes of my brethren in this respect, and far, very far below many of them, but to supposed usefulness. The ‘Anxious Inquirer’ has sent my name eveiywhere before me, and prepares everywhere the kind of reception I have alluded to. There is a species of sanctity in this reception to which I have little claim, a most exaggerated idea of my usefulness, but still this exists. Oh, is there, can there be anything comparable with this? How much better than adulation and flattering compliments! One look, one word, one smile, which says, I owe you something, for my soul’s welfare is worth volumes of mere encomiastic language. May you, my dear brother, have much of this!

“I have been thinking much in what way you may be useful to the young men of the congregation. It has occurred to me that by another year you could form a class, distinct from and above the Brotherly Society, and take them through some course of study, perhaps of a somewhat metaphysical character, such as mental philosophy, or ‘Butler’s Analogy,’ for which your education has peculiarly fitted you. I should like you to share with me attention to inquirers. It has often occurred to me that we do not individualise our hearers sufficiently. There is too much collective teaching, and not enough of class instruction. Impressions die away for want of being fostered and deepened by private and personal intercourse. In the earher period of my ministerial career I was very deficient in this part of my duty, but have endeavoured to supply the deficiency in more recent times. You will also do much to estabHsh yourself in the afiections of the people by visiting the sick. Here I have been wanting in niy later years, which may be accounted for, if not excused, by my being engaged so much in public business and authorship. It has occurred to me whether a certain portion of the town might not be assigned to you as your particular charge.

“I have been considering the case of the Lozells. As regards the Sabbath, the arrangement is ah-eady settled between us, but nothing has been said of the week-day services. To give the cause all the advantages we can secure for it, I think it desirable to have one service which might combine both prayer-meeting and sermon, i.e., an address, which might be held simultaneously with Carr’s Lane Wednesday evening service, and which I would share with you, taking it alternately.

“However, this may not be thought necessary when we come to consider matters more maturely. I ill converse with Ir “Williams on the subject. We cannot commence our labours there tUl the second Sabbath in September, in consequence of the Lord’s Supper; and it just occurs to me that on the days of the Supper it will always be necessary for me to preach in the morning, or else we must get a supply for the Lozells from the college.

“I am glad to hear you have found lodgings in Frederick Street, though, as I do not know at what house you have obtained them, I must send this to my own residence, and direct it to be forwarded to you. May the good Lord abundantly bless you. — Yours very truly,

“J. A. James.”

“Edgbastox, Fehrumy 4, 1854.

“My dear Brother, — I am glad to learn that this temporary’ suspension of home duties and the recreative influence of agreeable society have contributed to restore your health and spirits, and that you have the prospect of returning ’ strong to labour.’

“Your complaints of a want of apparent usefulness, while I am sorry that there should be in your estimation any ground for them, please me much, because I see by them what way the mind points. It is, my dear friend, a good sign, and seems to me to indicate a coming blessing. It would be a portent of no equivocal nature if you were satisfied with large, attentive, and applauding congregations, and with the universal esteem and regard of the whole church, while, at the same time, there were no proofs of usefulness in the way of conversion. Here, as it strikes me, is the low ambition of many young ministers — to be contented with an admiring crowd. But do- not be discomraged. There may be seed germinating that does not yet appear above ground. I am often of the same mind with yourself, and am ready to think I am doing little in bringing sinners to the Saviour. I beUeve that, so far as

preaching goes, Mr converts more souls than I do. How is this ]

I will teU you. He dwells more upon elementary truths than we do.

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

He preaches the law in its spirituality and extent to produce conviction of sin, and the gospel in its fulness and freeness for pardon. He commends himself to every man’s conscience. We are afraid of being thought to deal in old truths. I sometimes am ready to think I have lost the power of getting at the conscience I once had. I must go back again to regeneration, justification, and all the truths that cluster round these central doctrines; and I mean to do so. When you come back I will shew you a book I have got from America.* I wish to preach at the Lozells next Sunday evening, to go on with the lecture on Joseph. *.... — Yours most truly,

“J. A. James.”

At the close of the year’s assistantship, it was determined, at Mr James’s suggestion and request, that the church should be convened to consider the expediency of inviting the assistant minister to the co-pastorate. As I was away from home, he communicated to me the result of this meeting in the following letter: —

“Edgbaston, July n, 1854.

“My dear Brother, — Mr Wright, I find, has anticipated me in communicating the joyful result of last night’s church meeting; but as he gave no details, I am sure the communication of them will be as deUghtful for you to receive as it is to me to make. I have rarely sat down to the writing of a letter with such thankfulness as I do to this.

“I preached twice last Sabbath with immediate reference to the church meeting, and the momentous purpose for which it was called. The morning discourse was founded on Acts xiv. 23, [’ And when they had ordained them elders in every church, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they believed,’] and was a right down Nonconformist sermon to vindicate our practice in the popular choice of our ministers. In the evening I preached from Phil, ii. 1, 2, [’ If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, fulfU ye my joy, that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind,’] endeavouring to shew the importance of harmony in a church, and how much and for what reasons it contributed to the joy of its pastor. On Monday evening the deacons met for tea, and arranged the proceedings of the evening. The weather was most unpropitious, as it poured with rain. But the enthusiasm of the church was not to be extinguished by torrents; it was actuated by a love that many waters could not quench. As the choice depended upon numbers, it was arranged that for the more expeditious and facile method of taking them, the brethren should all sit together on the right hand side * Spencer’e Pastoral Sketches. of the desk,^” and for the first time perhaps in the history of the church the two sexes were divided, and appeared in their separate array. It was rather a curious as well as novel, and, on the part of the sex, rather a tantalising concern. After my prayer and address, the first business was the counting, to ascertain if the numbers came wdthin the prescription of the deed; for if it did not, the business would have been immediately arrested, and the meeting postponed to collect a larger number. We felt, of course, some Uttle solicitude on this point, but a few minutes relieved us of this; and when it was announced that more than two-: thirds of the male members were present, a sense of joy lifted up the whole church, and many turned towards each other with a look and a nod of silent but expressive congratulation. Mr Phipson, as senior I deacon, then read the first and most important resolution, to invite you i as co-pastor. His speech was tender, and not too long. He was followed by Mr Cocks. I then put the resolution. In an instant up flew a little forest of hands and arms, for the brethren were not content with lifting up the former, but, to give emphatic expression to their sufi’rages, held up their arms, and seemed to me to give their hands a shake, as if to say, ‘Let that be taken for the lifting up of our hearts, our whole hearts.’ Then came the call for the negative, if any. I looked round; not a hand was to be seen. I could not refrain the manifestation of deep emotion, and after littering an audible sentence of thanksgiving to God, sat down mastered by my feelings. That God should have so united the hearts of nearly a thousand members, for the women voted with their souls though they were not allowed to do so with their bodies in the choice of a pastor, must, I think, be taken as bearing out the vox populi, vox Dei. Yes, my brother, we cannot interpret it otherwise than that our choice is God’s choice. While thus absorbed in my own feelings, I heard a burst of song spontaneously uttered by the church in the doxology.

“The other resolutions were all passed with equal unanimity — not a single negative given to any one of them during the whole evening.

“Then came the afiixing the signatures to the document, and not a man left the place tiU he had recorded his name as well as given his vote for you,

“Never was there such a church meeting before. It was full to overflowing with holy joy and thanksgiving. After it was over many gathered round me to express their congratulations, and well they might. Oh, how many prayers that meeting answered, how many anxieties it relieved, how many hopes it excited! And now, my dear

* By the custom of the Carr’s Lane Church, only the male members vote; and a certain proportion of the whole number must unite, to make the election of a minister valid. — Ed.

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

brother, what say you to this 1 Does it not cause gratitude and love to our adorable Lord 1 Does it not fill your heart with thanksgiving and your mouth with praise 1

“You need not be told that I invite you to be my co-pastor. If you do, I relieve your anxiety by saying, ‘Come and labour with me in the gospel of Christ. Come and be the evening star of my life. Come and help me amidst that growing weakness which I must soon expect. And may our good Lord bring you in the fulness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ!’

“I cannot enlarge as I am just going off to Tamworth, and have been hindered nearly all the morning from writing, and have now written so fast and so badly that I am afraid you will not be able to read what I have written — I am affectionately yours,

“J. A. James.”

Whether he had forgotten that he had preached on 1 Cor. xvi. 10, 11 on my election to the assistantship, I cannot tell; however, he preached on the same text again on my election to the co-pastorate; and I know that the tone and spirit of all he said of nie in private sustained his public expression of affection and confidence.

From the commencement of the co-pastorate he never took for granted my consent to any of his own plans about the action of the church or the management of any of its institutions, but invariably waited till we had discussed them together. In committees, and in conferences on questions of public interest, when the weight of his judgment had almost silenced those who differed from him, it was not unfrequently my ill-fortune to feel obliged to state distinctly and fully the reasons against the course he proposed; and I never feared that this would irritate or annoy him, for he did not imagine that our mutual friendliness was to be maintained by concealment and compromise. At one time, in a series of sermons on the Epistle to the Romans, I happened to express opinions on an important theological subject, seriously out of harmony with those held by many members of the church and congregation, and not absolutely identical with his own. It would have been foolish and impertinent to seek an occasion for the statement of doctrinal views with which I knew he did not coincide; but when the occasion came it did not seem right to shelter the discrepancy by silence or evasion. He was not ignorant of the disturbance and alarm which these sermons excited, and though substantially my opinions were not very unlike those held by himself, our modes of stating them greatly diflfered. His conduct, through that time of disquietude, was singularly noble. Without compromising his own convictions, the whole of his personal influence was exerted to soothe and tranquillise the agitation and excitement. I cannot omit to mention, that, through his own request and by his own act, the sum devoted by the church to the support of its ministers was divided equally between us when the co-pastorate began; and that gi-adually his own pastoral income was diminished, and that of his colleague increased, until at his death the elder minister received from the church less than one-half the amount that was received by the younger. To the close of his life not a passing shadow clouded the kindliness of our mutual relations; and if any wish to know how it was that we worked together so happily, I can give a very definite and satisfactory reply.

In his heart of hearts, the aged minister loved and trusted his younger colleague — was his generous, unflinching champion against all suspicion and unjust censure — was ingenious in his devices to secure for him public respect and honour — was open and frank in the private discussion of questions on which they disagreed — never suggested, because he never supposed, that the authority of his own age, reputation, and experience could justify him in requiring the younger minister to sacrifice or trifle with his convictions of truth or duty. In one word, Mr James had a noble, generous temper, and in all his conduct towards me, there was never the faintest trace of suspicion or selfishness.

The letter dated March 1, 1855, was written to me while away on my wedding tour; those dated May 28 and June 2, 185G, were written in answer to a letter written to him from Ireland during my annual holiday, the contents of which are sufficiently indicated by the replies they elicited. The letter from Hastings was written to me when he was away from home in the summer of 1856.

At the close of the year 1857, I was invited to become the pastor of the church assembling in Cavendish Street Chapel, Manchester, and on many accounts had a very strong persuasion

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAJIES.

that my usefulness there would be greater than at Can’s Lane. After much agitating reflection, I went away from home to give the question a more quiet and thoughtful investigation than was possible while I was in daily contact with Mr James and the members of Carr’s Lane Church. I finally determined to place before Mr James himself my reasons for believing that the claims of Manchester preponderated, and to trust the decision to his own judgment. His two letters, dated December 2-i and December 26 ]857, conveyed me his decision, and determined my course.

The letter on ministerial assistants to Dr Fletcher was written, I believe, about the year 1830; but as it affords important illustration of the views Mr James then held on the subject of this chapter, it has been reserved for insertion here.

“Edgbaston, March 1, 1855.

“My dear Friend and Brother, — I had been waiting with some degree of impatience for intelligence from you, having till your letter arrived no answer to give to the numerous inquiries which were made concerning you and yours.

“I need scarcely say how large a portion of my family and personal devotions was given to the subject of your union on the day of its formation, or how sincerely I now congratulate you on the event so interesting to all the feelings of your heart, so important to your future happiness and usefidness in life. I hope and believe that you have not now to search for evidence that nothing is a matter of indifference to me that concerns you. Your marriage is an occurrence in which not only you and the object of your dearest earthly affections have a stake, but I also, and the whole church of which you are one of the pastors. We have, however, confidence first of all in God, that His grace will be so richly bestowed upon you as not to allow the cares and comforts of domestic life to damp your ardour in the discharge of the functions of the still higher relation in which you stand to Christ and His church; and then we have confidence in you, that the most assiduous and dehghtful attention you pay to the comfort of her you have chosen to be the companion of your pilgrimage ld]l not make you less watchful for the salvation of immortal souls. Much prayer has gone up to the fountain of wisdom and grace that you may give fujl proof of your fitness to rule the church of God by the discreet and holy manner in which you govern your own household. Our example, both in our individual and domestic conduct, is kno-mi, and must be influential for good or evil. Our households should be patterns for the flock. The apostle’s language in 1 Timothy iii. seems to imply all this. In going through life I have endeavoured to bear this in recollection; and though I could have lived in somewhat more showy and expensive style, I have chosen rather to be known for a dignified simplicity. I have marked the tendency of the age to indulge a taste for a little more worldly conformity than I thought compatible with the Christian profession, and I have determined that I would abstain from even the appearance of this evil. In this I was nobly sustained by both my wives — women of considerable pi-operty, of tolerably high connexion, of sound sense, of sincere piety and patrician bearing. I owe much, very much, to both these excellent women. Their prudence was exemplary, never obtruding themselves on the congregation, never demanding deference, though it was conceded to them, and never backward to give their influence to all that was holy, benevolent, and useful Fifty years hence, when hoavy -n-ith age, and crowned with the honours of saintly piety and ministerial usefulness — when ripening for heaven amidst the respect and affection of your friends on earth, may it be granted to you to speak of that dear young woman whom Providence has placed at your side, as I now speak of those whom I have had and lost; with this difference, however, that you may have to bear this testimony to herself, living and sharing with you the fruits of a pious old age, while I am permitted only to bear my testimony to the memory, of departed excellence.

“And now to one or two topics of your letter. You say nothing about the indisposition with which you left Birmingham; therefore I hope, despite of the weather, you have lost this.

“I think your choice of Cambridge and Oxford as objects of interest during your journey, was a wise one. These can be seen when the country is wrapped in the wintry sheet of snow, or bound in the icy chains of frost. I am glad you heard Xewman HaU, and I am not soixy you learned from him, if nothing eke, the advantage in honuletics of announced divisions of discourse. What you say is very true, that they often break the force of an address. This, however, depends on their nature and mmiber. If they are conjunctive and not cZisjunctive, they aid the memory without materially weakening the effects of the sermon at the time. Besides, the mental capacity of the audience should also be taken into account. An overwhelming majority of our congregations consist of persons who, if they are to travel through a sermon at all, and not to lose their way on a plain, which has neither roads nor milestones, must travel by the easy stages of these divisions. Still an occasional deviation from this plan introduces variety of manner. I think it judicious and useful sometimes to expoimd according to the Scotch method of lecturing, verse by verse — sometimes to extract the essence

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

of a passage and dilate upon it with great breadth; but aa a general rule, divisions are the most useful style of preaching. I think I told you that one of the best educated members of our church once complained of your deficiency in this, and said for want of it he could not carry away so much of your sermons as he could wish. Mr Jay, in his autobiography, has some useful remarks on this

“And now a little about myself. I went through the two sermons with as much ease as I did before my iQness, although one of them was a funeral sermon for Mr Lee, which occupied nearly an hour. I am getting on, or rather Hudson is, with the book very fast. I have received from Mr Bolton, Mr Jay’s son-in-law, a copy of a fimeral sermon for Dr Spencer, the author of which gives a most striking account of him, and which will enrich my little volume. I have looked over again ‘The Whistling Thinker,’ and shall take it in.

“And now, may God preserve you and your bride during the remainder of your journey, and may you return strong to labour in the work of saving souls. My kindest regards to Mrs Dale. — Yours most affectionately,

“J. A- James.”

“Edgbaston, May 28, 1856.” My dear Friend, — .... Well, now to your letter. First of all, I am thankful you have had a pleasant voyage and reception. It is well you went over on Saturday, and not on Sunday, for we had quite a hurricane on the latter. I think the excursion will do you more good than my London journey did me. I took a sad cold, and was veiy unweU on Monday; but preached on Sunday evening, and returned next day. I have been improving all the week. Mr Scales preached for me on Sunday evening, and Mr Barker takes next Sunday morning. But I am getting off from you to myself. You were in one of my gloomy moods when you -wTote your letter, or perhaps I had better and rather say you were passing through the searching and purifying fire, under the observing eye of the great Kefiner. I am not surprised by these mental conflicts, nor grieved by them. Perhaps you needed them; and, indeed, we need not say ’ perhaps,’ for it is certain, or else you would not have had them. Few young men have set sail on their ministerial voyage with a smoother sea, a fairer wind, or fuller sails. If there has not been splendid success in the way of conversion, there has been general acceptance. You have heard no complaints — you have witnessed no neglects — you have felt no chilling indifference towards you. Your congregations have equalled if not excelled mine, and that when you were expected in the pulpit. Nothing, then, can have discouraged you but the lack of direct conversions by your ministry. But have not I equal cause to be disheartened? Are not the instances of your success equal to mine? yea, are they not more numerous? Besides, does either of us know yet what really exist? I am, while I write, thus condemning myself, for there are times when I am ready to think my usefulness is over, and that I may almost as well give up. And herfe let me say, perhaps we have both been too anxious about results — too anxious on our own account. Is our anxiety for Christ, for souls, or for ourselves? I have lately thought in reading the New Testament, that the apostles do not seem to have perplexed themselves so much about success as taking the right means to obtain it. To preach and to make known Christ was their aim, and they seem to think they had done a great work when they had done this. May we not both learn something here? I beUeve we may. This comforted the apostle. ‘We are a sweet savour of Christ unto God, both in them that are saved and in them that perish’ It is a great thing to diifuse this odour. Let our sermons, our conversation, our whole character and conduct, be scented with this perfume, and we may be sure of acceptance and favour with God.

“Now, my good friend, let me expostulate with you on your supposition that you could be as usefxil for Christ in secular life as in the office of the Christian ministry. How could such an idea find lodgment for a moment in your mind? That Christian laymen may be very useful in the cause of religion, cannot be questioned, and that many of them do far more good than some preachers, is quite clear. But, then, let us not make the comparison between men of distinguished talent out of the ministry and of no talent in it. Oar inquiry should be, whether men gifted to be preachers by voice, manner, talent, and piety, as ministers, are not blessed with powers and opportunities for usefulness, that far exceed those of almost any laymen whatever. Tou are one of those who are adapted and qualified for the work of the pulpit; and you may well ask in what sphere of activity could you be so well employed for Christ and His Church as that which you now occupy. But against all this you reply the paucity of instances of success which have attended your labours. To your reply I bring as mine, what I have said in a former part of my letter. It is really too soon yet for you to ascertain the degree of your success, or the defect of it.. “Let me now ask if you could make your sermons a little more telling — if you could add to the efficiency of your public services. Two things have sometimes occurred to me. Your prayers want a little more simplicity, and to be a little more petitionary. They are too much in the style of elaborate and elegant compositions. “We all might learn something from the dignity and simplicity of the Church of England. Then, as to your sermons. There is in you what I have

LIFE or JOHN ANGELL JAME3.

often felt to be in me, a certain land of — I hardly know how to pnt it in a positive form, and I must therefore adopt a negative one — a want of solemnity.

“We preach on high, sacred, and momentous topics of religion in much the same tone, manner, and spirit, as we should do on any secular topics. It seems to me we approach what is light and flippant in manner. Then we are not sufficiently textual. We also need a little more of the experimental, the sesthetic. We preach too little to the heai’t. Our sermons are too religiously scientific, or rather too scientifically reUgious. You want also a little more pathos. In your comparitive seclusion, your ’ retreat,’ your season of reflection and self-examination, you may turn over all these ideas and suggestions. You are made for the pulpit, and in the pulpit you must remain; and you will not easily find a pulpit to which you are more suited, or where you will be more welcome, than that in Carr’s Lane Chapel. Continue your attachment to evangelic truth, both as that which will promote your own personal growth in piety, and your success in the ministry, and you have nothing to fear excepting from your own fears. Watch against a liberalism, to which, I think, you have some little tendency, and see what in every case of great moral renovation, either in particular ages and churches, or in the long period of the Church’s Idstory, God has blessed for the conversion of souls; and there is before you, if God spares your life, a long career of comfort and usefulness in His vineyard. * You see how long a letter I have written to you;’ but do not suppose I shall always thus tax your time, your patience, and, I may add, your labour in deciphering what I have written — Yours afi’ectionately,

“J. A. James.”

“Edgbaston, jtine 2, 1856.” My dear Friend, — On reading again your letter, there appear to me some matters on which I did not appropriately touch, or touch at all, in my reply to it. I particularly refer now to that part of it in which you speak of your difficulty in maintaining that glow of intense earnestness which you deem essential to right ministerial work. Now, it is impossible, with the view I entertain of the object of our ministry, that I should for a moment attempt to lessen in your estimation the really awfid weight of responsibiUty that lies on one whose business it is to save souls from eternal ruin. I do think with you that we ought ever to maintain a solemn and intense ardour for their salvation. I wonder / or any one can be so easy as we are with such destinies intrusted to our care. It seems to me sometimes as if the weight of our ministry ought to be felt by us as a pressure of which we could never

4S1

rid ourselves. But then, shall I deem myself disqualified and give up the pursuit of the object, because my fervour is not equal to my sense of obligation and my -nishes? Certainly not. My business is to mouru and seek to supply my deficiency — yet to go on. Is it not the same as regards our personal salvation? Does it not seem sometimes as if, with such an object as eternal salvation before us, we should be in an incessant glow of zeal, love, hope, joy? Yet we are not. AndshaUwe on that account give up the pursuit, because we feel our pursuit so far below what it should be?

“May I suggest that the present state of your mind is not all its own mere weakness, but is either the efi”ect of Satanic influence seekuig to embarrass, to discourage, and to weaken you; or else, which I would fain hope is the case, the effect of God’s Holy Spirit deepening your sense of obligation, and elevating your desires and aims. Perhaps, also, there may be in you a little too much of the subjective in religious experience — a tinge of mysticism which turns away the eye of the mind from the great objective realities of our faith. I have sometimes thought your mind is still struggling with unacknowledged, perhaps almost unsuspected, doubts on some points of dogmatic theology; and I do not think your Unitarian association likely, though it is professedly only a Uterary one, to be of service to you. Not that I suspect you of heterodoxy, or tending to it. But it is probable that in yom- earnest inquiry after truth, and your anxiety to examine all that can be said against it, you are giving to the difiiculties and objections that can be brought against it more weight than really belongs to them. Your mind is so strongly analytical, that you are likely to see difficulties where others who possess less of this power are at ease in their conclusions. The class of authors you have been lately reading ought not to be passed over. Maurice, and Jowett, and others of that school, should be known — well known, and studied by oiu: strong-minded youilg ministers. But this requires great firmness in established opinions to withstand the seductions of the error, which is set forth by their genius with no inconsiderable attraction of logic and rhetoric. I ■«ish that with them you would read Howe, Baxter, and some parts of Owen, among the ancients, and Fuller, Wardlaw, and Chalmers, among the moderns. I know that among most of our young men there is an extreme aversion to go in the ruts; but is there not also a danger of getting off the rails 1 There is a richness and fidness of Divine truth in the old writers, which, with all their antiquated style and scholastic technicalities, and somewhat narrow views, the moderns lack. And, oh! their devotion — their communion with God — their sustained and elevated piety! This, this is what we want — this is our deficiency. We cannot live upon our own public services — and these are so frequent 2h

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

and SO urgent as to leave us little time for anjrthing else. I hope by the time you get this you will have lost some of your groundless apprehensions of unfitness for the ministry. I believe the dread of wzfitness is just God’s own method of producing a greater fitness: and that your Irish journey will prove to have been the means of inestimable benefit to your own personal godliness and your ministrations to the people of our joint charge.

“Let me now mention a subject which has long pressed heavily upon my mind, and which has been this morning brought before me by our friend Phipson, and that is, the want of pastoral visitation. Some murmurs now and then are borne to me by those who have intercourse with the people of their being neglected. They expected that with two pastors they should be better shepherded. Now, to a certain extent their expectations should be realised — but to the full measure of their minds it is impossible.

“With a church of more than a thousand members, scattered over the whole exi3anse of this large and continually-extending town, it is impossible to devote much time and attention to individuals. And, moreover, how little do the members care to visit each other! Still there is some reasonable ground for complaint, which we must endeavour to meet. The church is neglected by us, and we must try to make up our deficiency. I can hardly think that our various institutions, classes, public business, and a variety of other matters, can be admitted as any excuse for neglecting the church committed to our care. Nor do the deacons and the superintendents of the districts do their duty. All are wanting. And all must be stirred up to greater diligence. On your return we will talk over this matter a’fresh, and see whether our organisation cannot be improved — Yours affectionately,

“J. A. James.”

“Hastings, Awjnst 11, 1856.” My deae Friend, — .... A neat and really elegant place has been erected [here], which is now occupied by Mr GriSin, late of Manchester, whom I heard preach last Sabbath morning, when he gave us one of the best sermons of the be.st kind of preaching I have heard for a long time. I esteem it a privilege, I assure you, to have heard two discourses of this sort since I left home. The other was by Mr Raleigh,* at Union Chapel, Islington. I am more than ever convinced that this is the kind of preaching which is wanted in the present day — a combination of the intellectual, doctrinal, experimental, and practical — sermons coming from the head through the heart, or from the heart * Then of Glasgow, now of Canonbury. through the head. It is the old substance with new accidents — the matter of the past age in the style of the present. I wish we had a great deal more of it. I do not think our present race of preachers take sufficiently into account the importance of the heart — I mean their own heart — as an aid in the production of effect. From the heart to the heart is the great canon. Our hearers love to feel as well as to think; and a great many of them, I am sorry to say, are more desirous

to feel than to think

“I am going to preach to-morrow evening to the thoughtful and impressed but undecided hearer, and expect, if the weather be fine, a large congregation. I am more and more bent on the conversion of souls. I do not seem as if I had any business in the pulpit if I forget this. My mission always has been, and I believe will be to the last, to reach the unconverted. I believe this is also your aim. Never give it up. I know we are both a little discouraged, sometimes, we do not accomplish it in a greater degi-ee at Carr’s Lane. StUl let us go on. God will not leave us without His testimony to the propriety of such an aim. And then we are at the head of a great piece of machineiy, which is accomplishing this end in some measure through our means

“Edgbaston, December 24, 1857.

“My very dear Friend, — Your welcome letter has lifted a load from my heart, to be replaced by another. I have just risen from my knees to bless God (which, in fact, I did also the first moment after I had read this disclosure of your heart and decision of your judgment) for His great kindness to me and my church in retaining you amongst us. How great has been my anxiety He best knows to whom it has been expressed morning, noon, and night. Think not, however, that I am now altogether free from it, for that other load which I now am conscious of is the solicitude I feel lest, as you have intrusted the decision to me, I should do that which at any future time you should see cause to regret. That the balance of probabilities of usefulness lies on the side of Birmingham, all things taken into account, I have no doubt-The first consideration, I know, is your connexion with Carr’s Lane. This takes precedence of all matters in judging of your duty. It is not, of course, for me to limit the power and resources of the Almighty, and say He could not find for us another man whom He coidd enable to bear the weight and promote the prosperity of our church; but I may and do say, I know not the man who is more likely to do so than yourself. The late decision was not obtained by my influence, nor that of the deacons, but was the free expression of the churcL

“I have not time to enter into a consideration of your candid, impartial, and -vsise comparison of the two situations. I will enter more

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

fully into them when we meet and talk over the matter. I have had a business of importance, which called me out soon after I received your letter, and have had since then to put a few thoughts together for a sermon to-morrow morning. I must, therefore, refer only to the proposal you make of abiding by my own decision. My only ground of shrinking from this is lest my own wishes should so bias my judgment as to prevent my seeing in its true light the evidence that lies on the side of Manchester. I tremble lest I should so determine as that in promoting my own comfort, and even in thinking I was promoting yours, I should so advise as to keep you from a more successful and more happy career of ministerial labour. If, therefore, you refer it to me, I most heartily say, ‘Stay with us.’ If, however, it would be more satisfactory to you to have the opinion of those brethren whose minds are not Liable to the same warping influences as mine, I will lay

the matter before them. My mind is made up

“Abounding thanks to you, my dear friend, for your generous consideration of my comfort; but I should be sorry if that had more weight than belongs to it upon your decision, but it will certainly bind me closer to you than ever. But again I say, shall you, come what will, be satisfied, in looking back upon the present state of the case, with leaving it to my decision 1 Will you not be ready to say, if anything should happen, now altogether unlikely — ‘I wish others besides, not so interested and partial as Mr James, had been called in? ‘If you can leave it with me, under God’s influences, it is decided, and you are stni what I have prayed you might be — my co-pastor for a little while, and the pastor of Carr’s Lane Church soon. — Yours most affectionately,

“J. A. James.”

“My Study and Oratory, December 26, 1857.” My deae Fkiend, — I have again read your letter, and have again also prayed that I might be able to give such a deUverance upon its contents as shall be for God’s glory, your guidance in the way you should go, and the good of the cause of Christ at large, as well as the welfare of the church at Carr’s Lane. Perhaps you will, in consequence of subsequent events, attach less weight to the perfectly unanimous vote of the church at your election to the co-pastorate than at one time you woidd have done; but whatever little disturbance there was of that unanimity at one time, it has of late all but entirely returned, and in very many quarters the attachment of the people is stronger than even in the ardour of their first love. This / consider should have great weight, and go far to satisfy you, as well as me, that you are where the Divine Master would have you be. This returning and all but universal confidence seems to have come at a time when it may be almost regarded as an intimation of His -wiLL

“Next to this, I place the avowed strong feeling of reciprocal attachment of your oviTi mind and heart to the church. Had there been anything of even incipient alienation from us, any diminution even of former regard, any consciousness that your labours “were losing that power which cordial affection for the object of them cannot faU to impart, in that case I should not hesitate to say that you would be likely to be more useful at Manchester than at Birmingham. But nothing of this kind exists. The first love is still the first love increased.

“I honour you for pausing in those circumstances, and asking, not where can I be most comfortable as a man? but most useful as a minister? You had so much to attract you and to attach you to your present situation, that it could be nothing but a question of duty which would lead you to ask, ‘Ought I to leave it? ‘I am far more desirous that this matter should be decided by the judgment and the conscience, and not merely by the heart.

“I still could almost have wished I had called in the judgment of brethren whose names you mentioned,* more, however, for the reasons I have already specified than for anything else. One of them, Dr Bedford, I have considted; to him I read your letters, and he without hesitation said I ought to take the responsibility upon myself, and immediately decide the matter the way I do. Before, however, I do this, I will refer to one or two points you have laid before me.

“The gist of the difficulty in your mind lies in two things. First, a doubt of the adaptation of your style of preaching to our congregation, and a supposition that it is better suited to a Manchester audience. I am most decidedly and firmly of opinion that the habitudes of thought in the two congregations are very much the same — that what will suit one will suit the other. I believe that those you have been accustomed to preach to, and who are likely to be your future hearers, are as to their tastes and capacity precisely what the Manchester people are. If you can please the one, you can as surely please the other. This will strictly apply to your remarks on your natural tendency to dwell on ’ docti-inal subjects.’ I am quite sure the congregation at Carr’s Lane will not object to sound doctrine; and though in one or two points which came out in your exposition of the Bomans there was a little

I had said in my letter, that while personally I should have no hesitation in accepting his own decision as absolute and final, he might, if he shrank from the responsibility of determining the question alone, lay it before the Rev. Dr Bedford, late of Worcester, the Rev. R. D. Wilson, then of Wolverhampton, now of Birmingham, and the Rev. D. K. Shoebotham of Dudley.

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

difference of theological sentiment to what I hold, they do not touch the substance or core of evangelical truth, and form in my view no valid reason why you should not continue the pastor of Carr’s Lane Church. You speak of your tendency to ’ speculative preaching.’ In the modified sense in which I understand that word as used by you, and interpreting it by the recollection of four years’ listening to your sermons, I do not see anything in that which induces me to shrink from the responsibility of advising you to remain in Birmingham. I have heard no speculations which I thought unwarrantable in a public teacher of God’s truth. I have often been much struck with the practical manner in which you have treated doctrinal subjects, and the power of your hortatory and appUcatory appeals to the conscience....

“So much, then, for my views of your adaptation to the meridian of Birmingham. Here you have acquired a name and a weight, which I doubt not you would soon do in Manchester, and start perhaps with some advantages which as a young man just come from college you did not have

“Looking at all these matters, my dear friend, can you hesitate on the question, which is the sphere in which you are most likely to serve, not the interests of a single congregation, but of a whole denomination, and thus the cause of Christ? Ji you are at a loss, and I believe this to be the case, and the reason of your hearkening at all to the invitation from Manchester, I am not. As I said in my last letter, I say also in this. My mind is made up. I believe you will be serving Christ better by remaining. I still say, if it will satisfy you more for me to consult the three brethren you have named, I will do it. But great as is the responsibility I incur, I take it up and recommend you to remain where you are, as my beloved co-pastor of the church in Carr’s Lane. — Your affectionate friend and loving brother,

“J. A. James.”

TO THE EEV. DR FLETCHER,

ON THE EXPEDIENCY AND DESIRABLENESS OP MINISTERIAL ASSISTANTS TO THE PASTORS OF LARGE ANE WEALTHY CHUECHES.

“Birmingham, October 28.” My dear Friend, — I have reflected much and often, since I saw you, upon the subject of our conversation relative to your -wishes of obtaining an assistant; and the more I have thought upon the matter, the deeper and steadier are my convictions of the utility, and, I may add, the necessity of the plan. I will give you my views of its advantages, and then meet the objections to it Avliich may be founded upon conjectural and anticipated evils.

“The ADVANTAGES are so numerous that they require classification, in order to be adequately enumerated. The first class is composed of such as affect yourself. Your health would be benefited by being relieved from the necessity of ever preaching three times on the Sabbath, which I presume you are sometimes obliged to do, as things are. Three pubUc services in one day may do very well, and be borne without injury, in small places, and even in large ones, where men have iron constitutions and sinews of brass, but your place is large and your frame delicate and sensitive. And then there are seasons of indisposition, in which, as a sermon delivered at such a time is a dreadful expenditure of strength, more than ten discourses preached in good health, you ought to be relieved, and your people ought to be most willing to submit to the sacrifice. To preach under bodily infirmity in a house where a whisper may be heard almost to the extremity may be harmless in most cases; but in these circumstances to address fifteen hundred or two thousand people is to throw two shovelfuUs of earth at once out of a man’s grave. Your pastoral avocations are, of course, in proportion to the extent of your church, which is always very large, and they make an incessant and ever-wearing demand upon your strength; and, in addition, your extra-ecclesiastical services in the way of visiting the sick and aiding the operations of the Chiistian Instmction Society, altogether produce an amount of exertion which should be shared with you by some able-bodied and able-minded assistant. Few churches are yet sufficiently aware of the value of a good minister, to be willing to prolong his life and usefulness at a little cxiicnse of property and a little occasional sacrifice of mental gratification.

“2. Consider next the advantage it would be to your church. In those seasons when indisposition or absence from home renders it necessary that a supply should be procured, and often at a short notice, here would be one at hand, who could either occupy the pulpit himself, or exchange with some neighbouring minister. The trouble of procuring help in such cases is often very considerable, and even then but indifferent aid can be sometimes obtained. But it should also be remembered that the sick, the poor, and the afilicted of every class would be by this means much better attended to, the young and the anxious inquirers after eternal life would have more enlarged opportunities of instruction. Even in the quietude of past ages of the church, when no public institutions, or ahnost none, demanded and shared a pastor’s time and attention, and he was left all at leisure for attending to the state of his flock, it was but a very inadequate portion of practical care that he could give to each of three or four hundi’cd membei-s. How much less, amounting to scarcely any, can he give to them now, when hardly a day or an evening occurs in a week of

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

■wliich, in the metropolis or in large towns, he must not give a large portion to the public. Who will venture to say that it is his duty to withdraw from societies on which the world’s welfare so much depends 1 And yet, if he do not withdraw, he must support them vrith time taken from his flock. I am myself the pastor of a large church in a large town,” and I find myself frequently in a most painful conflict between the claims of the public and those of my church, and am often reduced to the strait of neglecting one or the other.

“3. I may very properly state next, the advantage which would be derived bt, the public. Home operations, or exertions for the benefit of our own teeming, and, alas! it must be added, immoral population, are assuming a prominence and importance altogether new, in consequence of the rise and progress of the Christian Instruction Society. Help is much wanted for this valuable scheme. I would not exclude the agency of the laity, for this is the life’s blood of the plan, but I would give a more regular and a healthier circulation, by the introduction of clerical influence. Without watchfulness and care, that which is really a great good, may become a great evil. Many will not be content merely with running to and fro that knowledge may be increased, but will ascend unsent, and in some instances unqualified, into the pulpit, or that which leads to it. Would it not tend to check this evil, and, at the same time, do great good, if we had a number of young ministers employing their talents on the Sabbath-day, when not occupied in their own places of worship, in preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ in the dark places of our cities and large towns? How many churches

THERE ARE IN LONDON, LARGE ENOUGH AND RICH ENOUGH TO EMPLOY

SUCH! Is it not to be deplored, that in a city where such myriads are perishing for lack of knowledge, and where the places of worship are so inadequate for the population, a single house of God should be shut up any part of the day? There are, perhaps, twenty churches at least, in the metropolis, which could support a young minister who could preach once a day for them, and twice a day for the Christian Instruction Society. What an amount of good might be expected from such efforts as these! Here, also, is so much added to the moral machinery of the day, to the committees of Bible associations, tract societies, Sunday schools, &c. We are told there are too many ministers educated, and yet London alone is supposed to contain seven hundred thousand souls who go to no place of worship, and, indeed, have none to go to. Ye rich and large churches, I appeal to you in the name of Christ, and on behalf of these crowds of neglected immortals! Consider my proposal. Do not throw it aside, with a sneer, as one of the visionary speculations of an active and enterprising age, or the mere theory of a speculative and restless imagination.

“4. The advantage of such a plan would not be inconsiderable to the assistant ministers themselves. However well our Dissenting colleges may be conducted, and however great might be the benefits of a literary kind which the students may reap within their walls, there are certain kinds of knowledge, or rather of wisdom, not to be gathered in academic bowers. The scholar, the philosopher, the writer, the controversiaUst, even the preacher and the expositor, may be formed there, but not the pastor. His character can be formed, or, at any rate, formed well, only by observation and experience. A man of extraordinary knowledge of human nature, of instinctive habits of prudence, perspicacity, and government, may at once be fitted to pass from the secluded shades of scholastic pursuits to the chair of presidency in a Christian Church; but not so the multitude. How many of our ministers, who are acceptable as preachers, fail as pastors! This is the rock on which they sjjlit. And who can wonder, when they consider that many have passed from the humblest occupations to the college, and from the college to the rule of a church. Would it not be of vast and incalculable advantage to such ministers, unskilled as they necessarily must be in the art of government, to serve as assistants to a judicious pastor for two or three years, and thus have an opportunity of learning by observation, before they attempt to learn by exjierience, which in important matters is always hazardous, how a reUgious society should be conducted’? Our settled and matured pastors would thus become the tutors of pastors, and prepare for the churches a race of men, of whom it would be said, as it was of David, ‘So he fed them according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skUfiihiess of his hands.’ Something of this kind is much wanted in the formation and completion of the ministerial character; and it is inconceivable of what service our senior brethren might be in this way to their juniors.

“5. If this be correct, our churches and the whole denomination woidd participate in the benefits of the scheme. For my own part, I am jealous for the respectability of the Dissenting body, and not only so, but am also fearful. I have many apprehensions, and they are principally founded upon an incompetent ministry. Incompetent, not in consequence of any fault or defect of our tutors, not for a want of learning, but in consequence of rash, untried, youthful minds, who know not how to rule the Church of God. It is beyond description painful to see how, in some cases, the peace of our churches is not only put in peiil, but actually destroyed by the want of aptness to govern which is evinced by the raw academic, who, with whatever store of Greek, or mental philosophy, or bibhcal criticism he might have left the college, was deficient m that which tutors cannot supply, — a knowledge

LIFE OF JOHN ANGELL JAMES.

of human nature, or a habit of sound discretion. Prudence, where it is wanting in the original constitution of the character, is rarely suppUed except by our being placed in a situation where we have it constantly before our eyes, and thus catch it by imitation.

“The American churches, amongst other things in which they excel us, are before us in the plan now recommended. Many of their pastors in the large cities and towns have assistants, with a view, not only to the aid they may give, but to the improvement they may receive.

“But it is time to meet and answer objections.

“1. It is expensive. I recommend it only to large and affluent churches, such, my dear friend, as yours, to which the sum of a hundred a-year can be no object.

“2. It may expose the church to the danger of schism and strife, vexation and irritation in the election of the assistant minister. In answer to which, I remark, that the church should not elect the individual, but leave this entirely to their pastor, who, of course, will take care not to elect any one that would be unacceptable to his people. On every account it is best for the society not to entangle itself with two ministers. The pastor should engage and dismiss his own assistant, by which means incipient mischief may be at any time stopped.

“3. Might not the assistant become at length a rival with the pastor in the affections of his people 1 Such a thing is possible in any case, even in yours, my friend, who have as little ground for apprehension as any man living; but it is only just possible, certainly not in obable Besides, I do not contemplate a permanent settlement of any one assistant, because then one part of the object would be defeated. Three years would be long enough, or two, for a young man to be in this subordinate situation, and he may then look out for a pastorship.

“4. Would it not be a temptation to a pastor to leave his pulpit more than he otherwise would do? Not if he be a wise man or devoted minister. He should give his assurance that this shall not be the case, and with his word his people should be contented. Moreover, should he faU at any time into and under this temptation, a respectful hint given by the deacons woidd correct the evil.

“5. Young men could not be found. This cannot be proved but by experiment. If there be the superabundance of ministers in the present day which has been talked of, the presumption hes on the side of supposing that there would be no difficulty on this head. The churches in London have peculiar advantages from their vicinity and easy access to our two largest colleges. I am aware that this is an age when there is no lack of self-supposed maturity, and even precocity, on the part of young men for public stations, both civil and sacred, but I do believe there are not wanting a goodly number who, like the young and eloquent Apollos, would be thankful to sit at the feet of some Aquila, to be taught the way of ruling the Church of God more perfectly.

“My views are now before you, my dear friend. Make what use ot them you jilease; and should you think them at all Ukely to be serviceable, you have my full permission to forward this letter for insertion in the Congregational Magazine. If it should catch the attention of any of my brethren, and lead to practical results, or to discussion, I shall be glad. I am convinced of the utility of the scheme, and am anxious to see it reduced from theory to practice. — I remain yours most truly,

“J. A- James.”