Page:The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A. (1771 Vol 1).djvu/111

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wise to you and dear Mrs. S——. I hope she is yet in the land of the living, and that she, yourself, and your son, are daily preparing for eternity. I pray God sanctify your whole spirits, souls, and bodies, and reward you for all kindnesses shewn to, dear Sir,

 Your unworthy brother and servant in Christ, G. W.


LETTER CIV. To the Rev. Mr. T.


Reverend and dear Sir, Philadelphia, Nov. 10, 1739.

SHALL I promise and not perform? God forbid. When I saw you first at Cardiff, it rejoiced my heart to hear what God had done for your soul. You was then under some displeasure of your rector, if I mistake not, for speaking the truth as it is in Jesus. Ere now, I hope dear Mr. T. has had the honour of being quite thrust out. Rejoice, my dear brother, and be exceeding glad, for thus was our Lord and Saviour served before you. Naked therefore follow a naked Christ. Freely you have received, freely give. If you preach the gospel, you shall live of the gospel. Though you go out without scrip or shoe, yet shall you lack nothing. Rather than you shall want, ravens, those birds of prey, shall be commanded to feed you. It is a blessed thing to live upon God. Did ever any trust in him and was forsaken? No; search the generations of old, climb up into heaven if you can, and all with one consent will declare,

The Lord their pasture did prepare,
And fed them with a shepherd's care.

I, though hell-deserving, am a living witness of his good providence; having nothing, I possess all things; he has fed me with the kidneys of wheat, and commanded some one or another to sustain me whithersoever I was sent on his errand. Jesus is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. If we go forth in the spirit of the first apostles, we shall meet with apostolical success. And never was there more occasion for the revival of such a primitive spirit. Alas, the life, the power