The hearer would not think of the plan of the sermon, when listening to a passage like the following: "My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me? - Forsaken! cried the deserted Saviour. Angels caught the dismal accents. Forsaken! forsaken! the sad and astonished choir replied. Surely all heaven was, at that dreadful moment, emptied of its inhabitants. Surely, not angels only, but the spirits, likewise, of just men made perfect (who had been saved on the credit of that great sacrifice which was now offering up) started from their thrones and dropped their crowns; quitted, for a while, the abodes of bliss, and, with pensive admiration and drooping wings, hovered round the cross of their departing Lord."1 Toplady was, without doubt, a capable preacher, a faithful and useful minister. One passage, in which he gives his own experience in the preparation for the pulpit, ought not to be omitted. It is in the Essay on the various Fears to which God's People are liable. "There are seasons of personal dryness and darkness, when fear, like an armed man, assaults the faith and liveliness of God's ambassadors. They are, perhaps, at a loss even for a subject to preach from. All resources seem to be shut up. They flit, in their own minds, from text to text, and for a long time can fix on none. They cry, in secret: Lord, how can we spread the table for thy people, except thou bring the venison to our hands? Or, with the disciples of old: Whence shall we have bread for the multitude here in the wilderness? The dear people flock to the word, as doves to their windows; and we, alas! have little or nothing to feed them with. At such times of doubt and barrenness, cast yourself at large upon God, and distribute the word as you are enabled. In all probability, the fishes and the loaves will increase in your hands, and God will administer bread enough and to spare. To the glory of the Divine faithfulness, I say it, that for my own part, some of my happiest pulpit opportunities have been when I have gone up the stairs with trembling knees and a dejected spirit; nay (twice or thrice in my life-time), when I have been so far reduced as to be unable to fix on a text until the psalm or hymn was almost over. These are not desirable trials; but they redound, however, to the praise of him who hath said, Without me ye can do nothing."" He aimed, in his preaching, to produce immediate effect upon his hearers. This he expected to accomplish by presenting the doctrines of grace—leaving morality to follow as a result of a change of heart. He watched constantly for ▲ III. 82. 2 III. 374. the manifestation of true religious principle in the conduct of those committed to his care. The evidence of a change of heart, he thought must necessarily be given in the lives and characters of those who were truly regenerate; and such evidence could generally be apprehended without mistake. The prominent idea of the revival of 1740, in this country, has been said to be, that the new birth is an ascertainable change. This idea was constantly in the mind of Mr. Toplady; he insists upon it largely; and had he lived in this country, would probably have witnessed in his own congregation a thorough revival of religion. He certainly would not have failed to preach the doctrines which Edwards preached; he would not have feared excitements, if we may judge from his admiration of the character and labors of Whitefield; and he would have made searching appeals to the consciences of his hearers, if he had enforced publicly such sentiments as the following: "The elect may, through the grace of God, attain to the knowledge and assurance of their predestination to life; and they ought to seek after it." 2 After enumerating several arguments in proof of election, he adds: "To all which frequently accedes the immediate testimony of the Divine Spirit, witnessing with the believer's conscience that he is a child of God." He says, again, that we may judge (with caution and charity) others as we judge ourselves. In judging of his own religious condition, he says (after various arguments drawn from the Scriptures) that, with him, there is an immediate answer, stronger than demonstration. He refers to his acceptance with God, with such confidence that the passages, taken alone, might justly be considered arrogant; but, taken with the marks of humility in which the works abound, there is nothing offensive. His confidence arose from an impression which he considered the immediate suggestion of the Holy Spirit. Such impressions were not confined to his personal experience, as a redeemed sinner. He trusted them in his active Christian la2 V. 256. 8 Ibid. 1 Tracy's "Great Awakening," Preface, page ix. bors. They seem almost to have been reduced to a system, as they arose in connection with his preparation for the pulpit. He calls them "Saturday-Assurances." "Assurances they are, indeed: so clear, positive, and satisfactory, I never knew them once fail, or deceive my trust. I have often been dejected and fearful at the approach of a Sabbath on which I was to minister publicly; and God has frequently been better to me than my unbelieving fears; but, on those happy days when previous assurances have been given of his help and presence on the Sunday following, those assurances have always been made good. The Lord never once disappointed my hope, when he has said previously to my soul," I will be with thee.”1 Speaking of suggestions of this character, he says: "To many, all this would appear as the most palpable enthusiasm ; and there was a time when I myself should have thought so too. But blessed be God, the Comforter, I know what it is to enjoy some degree of communion with the Father, and the Son by him and exclusive of this inward λeyxos, which is, to myself, equivalent in point of mental satisfaction to ten thousand demonstrations. My experience of this kind, considered even in the most rational view, cannot, I am persuaded, be justly counted enthusiastic, or the offspring of an heated imagination." The rational grounds of his confidence are "6 a powerful sweetness," "commanding weight," "satisfactory clearness," "perfect consistency with the promises of Scripture," the fact that his "mind is absolutely passive" on such occasions, as much as the body in hearing another speak; and the agreement of events with the assurances.' As would be inferred from the passages just quoted, Toplady was a man of strong feelings. That susceptibility must have been lively which presented these impressions with so much of reality. His nervous excitability was greater than it would otherwise have been, because of constant ill health. His intellect was rapid and clear. He was, in his natural temper, unsuspicious, frank, and ingenuous. These characteristics will indicate something of his feelings as developed in different circumstances. Towards his Maker, he exercised a child-like confidence. In his judgment of himself, he was humble and modest; towards his friends, he was amiable and affectionate, yet, in case of provocation, he was haughty and contemptuous towards his opponents. This last trait 1 I. 70, of the Memoirs. 2 I. 54, of the Memoirs. was exhibited, to a disgraceful extent, in his controversy with Wesley. He was impatient because others did not see as he saw; he was provoked, needlessly, by Wesley's representation of his views; he despised Wesley's followers, and all their movements. Wesley's ability he rather unwillingly admits. It would be easy to quote pages of scurrilous and abusive language; but one or two specimens will be enough, if it be understood that the same spirit pervades most of his writings addressed to the Methodists. We should add, however, that such a temper is not displayed elsewhere. He says, himself, that Mr. Wesley is the only man he ever attempted to castigate as justice required, and then he fell somewhat short of the mark he regrets he was not more severe. He regrets, then, the mildness of such language as this: "I do not expect to be treated by Mr. John Wesley with the candor of a gentleman, or the meekness of a Christian; but I wish him, for his reputation's sake, to write and act with the honesty of an heathen."1 "A tract (Toplady's, on Predestination) whose publication has raised the indignant quills of more than one Arminian porcupine. Among those enraged porcupines, none has hitherto bristled up so fiercely as the high and mighty Mr. John Wesley. He even dipped his quills in the ink of forgery on the occasion; as Indians tinge the points of their arrows with poison." Wesley had compared God, as viewed by the Calvinists, to Tiberias. Toplady finds that Samuel Hoord, in 1633, did the same thing, and comments thus : "Not content with assaulting the living, he [Wesley] even rifles the dead; and, rather than not rifle at all, robs them of their very blasphemies.”* The following soliloquy he puts into the mouth of Wesley : "I have been in danger, myself, of believing that St. Paul says true, when he declares that God hath mercy on whom he will have mercy. How precious was the shilling, and above all how lucky was the throw, which convinced me of St. Paul's mistake!" He calls Wesley a liar, a “lying saint,"" insidious," a teacher of doctrines which are, like the "necromantic 2 V. 428. 1 V. 343. 3 Wesley sometimes made use of the lot, to discover the will of God. 72 VOL. XIII. No. £2. soup," out of which "witchcraft itself would strive in vain" to bring anything worth knowing. The man who could conduct himself thus towards an opponent, seems to us guilty of meanness, ungenerous, and a stickler for little things. Yet it would not be just to say these were his traits of character; nor did he know that there was any want of refinement in his expressions. While saying that Mr. Wesley was "the lamest, the blindest, and the most self-contradictory waster of ink and paper," etc., he could say (in reference to Luther's language to the Pope), "I by no means approve of his violence and coarseness." It is strange that a man of prudence and self-respect should allow himself to use such language; but observation will show that it is not so strange that the feelings here expressed should, in many cases, rise in men constitutionally irritable. If we remember that, in religious controversies, the zeal is holy, the severity conscientious, we shall see that it is an explicable fact that a man who could make use of language so harsh, should express himself, again, with a flow of devout and mellow feeling, worthy of being preserved as a manifestation of Christian experience, and of being sung as the united utterance of all the church on earth: "When languor and disease invade Sweet to look back and see my name Sweet to look forward, and behold Sweet in the confidence of faith To trust his firm decrees; The sentiment of the last stanza is a favorite one. He says, from our dependence on God, the natural inference is, that, 1 I. 79. 2 VI. 429. |