FROM

THE

MILLENNIAL HARBINGER.

SERIES III.

VOL. IV.	B E T H A N Y, OCTOBER, 1847.	NO. X.

      My dear Clarinda--FROM Leicester to London, a hundred miles by rail-road, June 25th, I had a pleasant ride, at not more than forty miles an hour. I was met at the depot in London by brethren Wallis of Nottingham, Davis of Mollington, and sister Whalley of [552] London, who carried me forthwith in a cab to 33, Surry street, on the Strand, to a very comfortable suite of rooms prepared for us by sister Whalley. I had the company of brother Wallis for two or three days till brother Henshall arrived. On Lord's day, the 27th, I met with the brethren at their house in Elstree street, and delivered to them an address in the forenoon on the first day of the week and its institutions. In the evening, I addressed quite a considerable auditory in the Alvetian Rooms, near the University of London. On Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday evenings, I addressed very attentive congregations in the Mechanics' Institute. Each of these discourses was followed up with interrogatories by the audience. Numerous questions were propounded, and the spirit of investigation and discussion seemed to be fully awaked and intent on eliciting truth. Some six or seven public confessions of faith were made at the close of a single speech; but the parties seemed to know no community with which to unite. Our brethren in London being only some seventy persons, do not occupy a very large meeting-house, as you know. They are, though generally poor and occupying humble stations of life, a very much devoted and excellent little community, but scarcely known amongst the hundreds or thousands of London. Indeed, what are they, or could they be, among more than two millions of people living in one city! Only think of all Virginia living in one city, and then imagine how little known, and of how little influence must any one congregation be! Having heard you speak of the worth, the spirituality, and devotion of this little community, I need not expatiate on their excellencies. Still I felt in London as one seeking to build a house without any foundation laid, and so did my auditories. Indeed, I was publicly asked did I not intend to build a church in London, or was there one existing to which those who were confessing their faith could be united. It was alleged that many believed what I preached, and although disgusted with all the forms of sectarianism existing in London, they could not be baptized into a community, nor unite with any one until they knew and approved it. I could not but, as publicly, approve their prudence and consistency, and recommend to them the forming of an acquaintance with the infant community now existing, of which I promised them a more particular account at another time.

      On the next Lord's day I delivered three discourses--one to our brethren, and two to the public assembled in the Alvetian Rooms. On the Monday and Tuesday evenings following, I occupied the Unitarian meeting-house, which was generously tendered by the [553] proprietors. Here we were again interrogated on sundry matters and speeches were made by a Unitarian and a Roman Catholic taking exceptions to my discourses, of which I cannot now speak particularly. We had, indeed, the concurrence of the great majority present in this part of the city. On Wednesday evening I addressed another portion of the city in the house of the General Baptists. There meets, under the care of Elder Burns, a large congregation in the west of London. I found Elder Burns a very intelligent and catholic brother in his views and efforts. He is said to be an interesting, and, indeed, "a brilliant and sparkling preacher," and of great power with the community. Himself and his truly Christian and amiable consort called on me the other day, and informed me that his brethren at some recent conference had appointed himself and another brother to visit their brethren in America. He will start in a few days. I gave him some information as to his interrogatories concerning his route and way of travelling in the United States. He will likely pass through Wheeling to the West, or rather on his way from Washington City to the Lakes, and thence to New England. I invited him to call and see you at Bethany, and hope he may do so. He will pass that way in August or September, before I can return home.

      On Thursday evening, I delivered a discourse in the pulpit of Dr. Cox, of London. He is what they call a Regular or Particular Baptist, and is at the head of the denomination in London, if not in England. He and Dr. Hoby made a tour through the United States, and published a volume on the occasion of it, in which he somewhat misrepresented us. But to make amends for it he gave me a very kind invitation to preach for him; which, of course, I did. I had a very attentive hearing on the part of his congregation and the public; and after addressing them on the mystery of godliness, especially on the justification of the Messiah by the Holy Spirit, I had a very kind expression of thanks from him for my discourse, as well as from others present. This, by the way, is quite a common occurrence in this city. Many persons have been pleased, at my different meetings, to address me as though discharging a duty before we parted, in such words as these: "Sir, I may never see you again, and on bidding you farewell I must thank you for the edification I have received on the present occasion;" or, "from your labors in this city." And sometimes it is added, "I would wish to join a church that would carry out your principles; for, sir, I am weary of sectarianism."

      Dr. Cox was disabused of the unfavorable impressions made on his [554] mind by some of our warm Baptist friends in his tour through Virginia, Kentucky, and Cincinnati. Our interview, indeed, was every way pleasant and agreeable, and we separated with mutual affection and esteem.

      In this city, as in other places, I have had a very favorable hearing from the Scotch Baptists. The prejudices occasioned by the unpropitious course of our late friend Elder William Jones, have very much died away amongst his friends. Indeed, his church in London gently died away under his too dogmatic and rather acrimonious administration. He had, like other men eminent in their day, his virtues and his frailties. He always, in private, expressed kind feelings towards me, and became more reconciled than he had once been. A note handed me from one of his most intimate friends, which I enclosed in a letter to your mother, still farther explains the causes of his rather eccentric course towards me. I hope it will arrive safely and be published. Of Elder Jones, as respects his labors, I can only say, they were eminently great, and I believe very useful. He was a second edition of Archibald M'Lean, neither enlarged nor improved. Of his frailties and his virtues I will only say, in the inimitable language of Gray--

      The Scotch Baptists must certainly unite with our brethren in England and Scotland. They can show no good reason for their position, and they are reasonable men. They, and indeed all the Baptists of Great Britain are obliged to intercommunicate with our brethren. The metaphysics that have alienated them from each other and from us, are of the doubtful gender at best; and all must confess they are too ethereal for aliment to those who "dwell in houses of clay and whose foundation is in the dust." A human being will as soon become ruddy, and of a plethoric countenance by star-gazing, standing on the peak of Teneriffe, or on the apex of mount Chimborazo, as by sipping at the purest fount of metaphysical theology ever opened in North or South Britain--on this side or on that of the Trent or of the Tweed. Christianity has its milk and its honey, its water and its wine, its marrow and its fatness; but it deals neither in gaseous nor ethereal entities or abstractions. But of the prospects of things amongst all the communities of this island, I will speak at a more convenient season.

      On Friday evening, the 9th, I addressed the Sceptics, or Socialists in their Hall of Debate, on the great question, Has God ever spoken to man? Having understood the character of this community [555] by the representations of all parties in London, I stipulated on their invitation to address them, that, should they propound any questions to me when I had finished, they should he such as would grow out of my discourse, and that to such only would I respond. We had, indeed, a crowded house. Without any understanding from me, they had announced in hand-bills a public discussion after my sermon. I finished a little before 10 o'clock at night. I gave an opportunity to propose any question growing out of the premises. I sat down under the most deafening peals of clapping, as if in Drury Lane or Covent Garden Theatres.

      One gentleman arose and observed that, for his part, he did not believe there was any God, and that I ought to have taken that for my subject before discussing the question, "Had God ever spoken to man." He did not believe in miracles, nor that miracles could prove there was a God. It must be proved from reason--aye, from REASON! In a few minutes he exploded. Another more violent spirit, simultaneously with myself, arose as soon as he sat down, contending that he, too, must be heard, and that before I responded to the gentleman who had preceded him. Some gentleman sceptic had, by the Socialists, been appointed to the chair. During much boisterous and uproarious behaviour on the part of the assembly, very like that of Ephesus about the goddess Diana, I succeeded in holding to my erect position; and being limited in time, I only observed that I did not before know that this literary school had not yet decided whether there was a God; and that having formed a better opinion of them, I had chosen a theme more honorable to them than that which the gentleman proposed. Again I observed, that it would be impossible to prove to him that there was a God, as he had insinuated it could not he proved a priori, and had also plainly declared that miracles could not prove it to him. His case, then, was hopeless. When any one assumes that the universe gives no proof of its origin, that if it had an Author or Creator, he must be demonstrated without his works; that design cannot evince a designer; nor the universe, design; such a one is clearly beyond the pale of reason, and not to be reasoned with. To originate the idea of a Creator, is one thing; but the idea being communicated to us, to sustain and demonstrate it from the things seen around us, is, by all sound reasoners, regarded as fairly within the compass of human reason. But that not being the subject of our discourse, and the objections being therefore, wholly irrelevant, my address not being at all assailed, I observed that I should not occupy the attention of the audience till something came legitimately before me; I wished, however, to know whether I was [556] expected to respond to every one that chose to occupy the attention of the assembly.

      Immediately on sitting down, another orator arose, and, with great violence of manner, assailed, not what I had said, but what I had not said; and, after the manner of a tangent, flew off into a low, vulgar, scurrilous tirade against "the atrocious character of the Bible and the God of the Bible." I sat patiently enduring the most shocking blasphemy against the Book of God's grace and mercy until about 11 o'clock, while amidst the plaudits and the hisses of the auditory, the orator still likely to become more and more grossly turgid in scoffs and derisions against the book of man's redemption, I took my hat and with a few friends departed.

      On the next day, I learned that near about midnight, after this ebullition ceased, a vote of thanks for my address was unanimously tendered to me by the members of the Literary Hall; and so the matter ended.

      On Lord's day, the 11th, the church met in the Alvetian Rooms, in the presence of a larger assembly than it was accustomed to address, to which meeting the public had been invited to witness the order of the house in their meeting for worship. After Elder Black had received two of those I had immersed during the week into the church, I proceeded to address the brethren on portions of the fourth and fifth chapters of the second epistle to the Corinthians. Again, in the afternoon, brother Henshall heard and answered questions on various subjects in the same house; and in the evening I delivered there my last discourse in London to a very attentive audience, on a part of the eleventh chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians. Some baptized persons of other denominations, present, on parting with me said, that they would endeavor to form an acquaintance with our brethren in London; and that if they liked them as well as what they heard from me, they would unite with them, and give the cause their entire support.

      I have yet much to say of London and of England, and something of Paris and of France, under the various aspects which they exhibit to me; but I must reserve my remarks to another opportunity.--Meantime, having returned to England in time for the last July steamer for Boston, I mail these communications from this city. Having visited Cambridge, I leave for Oxford to-day. Brother Henshall is well, and labors sometimes with me and sometimes in other fields by himself. He sends his love to all who know him at Bethany. I derive much pleasure from his company. He never fails to [557] interest his auditories, and is much esteemed and beloved by all who form his acquaintance.

      The brethren held a tea-party in the church yesterday evening in anticipation of our leaving to-day. I did not enjoy much of the meeting. In the morning when setting sail from Boulogne in France to Folkestone in England; the distance being only 29 miles across the English Channel, and the day being very beautiful and warm, I expected to be in London, some 100 miles distant, by 3 o'clock; but owing to the very great inequality of temperature in the air and water, immediately a very dense fog and withal a good breeze arose, and we sailed in the dark as to our course, and consequently failed to meet the train from Dover to London at the appointed time. I did not find the brethren till 9 o'clock at night. We had, indeed, a short but a very pleasant interview, and commending each other to the Lord, we took the parting hand, never expecting again to meet on this side the Jordan. May the Lord preserve us all to his eternal kingdom!

[The Millennial Harbinger, Third Series, 4 (October 1847): 552-558.]