Page:The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A., late of Pembroke-College, Oxford, and Chaplain to the Rt. Hon. the Countess of Huntingdon (1771 Volume 2).djvu/246

 LETTER DCCXXXIX.

To Mr. C.

My dear Mr. C,     Exeter, Feb. 25, 1749.  YOUR last, with the inclosed, you may be sure gave me satisfaction, at the same time as they, I trust, humbled me before him, who will send by whom he will send. This post carries answers to the honourable women. I suppose that you will be pleased to find I am thus far in my return to London. O my friend, my friend, I come with fear and trembling. To speak to the rich and great, so as to win them to the blessed, is indeed a task. But wherefore do we fear? We can do all things through strengthening us. But why does Mr. C think it strange, that no-body can be found to help me in the country? Is it not more strange, that you should lie supine as it were, burying your talents in a napkin, complaining that you have nothing to do, and yet souls every where are perishing about you for lack of knowledge? Why do you not preach or print? At least, why do you not help me, or somebody or another, in a more public way? You are in the decline of life, and if you do not soon reassume the place, you are now, through grace, qualified for, you may lose the opportunity of doing so for ever. I write this in great seriousness. May the give you no rest, till you lift up your voice like a trumpet! Up, and be doing, and the will be with you. I can now no more, but inform you, that, willing, I am to be at Bristol next Tuesday, where letters on Wednesday morning may find, very dear Sir,  Yours most affectionately in, G. W.     LETTER DCCXL. To Mr. S.

Very dear Mr. S,     Exeter, Feb. 27, 1749.

I Am ashamed to think that your last kind letter has lain by so long unanswered; but journeying, preaching, and a multiplicity of other business has prevented me. I shall not carry on