"Sir, Mr. Fletcher was a luminary--_a luminary_, did I say? He was a _sun!_ I have known all the great men for these fifty years, but I have known none like him. I was intimately acquainted with him.... I never heard him say a single word which was not proper to be spoken, and which had not a tendency to minister grace to the hearers.... Never did I hear Mr. Fletcher speak ill of anyone. He would pray for those who walked disorderly, but he would not publish their faults." Little wonder that both saint and sinner loved this Christly man! CHAPTER XX. BY THE SHORES OF LAKE LEMAN. Unaware of the sickness of her saintly friend (whom she had not met for fifteen years), Miss Bosanquet was one day extremely startled to be asked, "Do you know that Mr. Fletcher is dying?" She at once began to entreat the Lord for him, and while upon her knees received the assurance of James v. 15: "The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up." Just at that time the Methodist Conference was held in Bristol, and Fletcher, who had returned to the ceaseless care of Mr. Ireland near by, was one day assisted by him into the assembly. A letter written by one who was present gives an interesting picture of the scene:-- "The whole assembly stood up as if moved by an electric shock. Mr. Wesley rose, _ex cathedrâ_, and advanced a few paces to receive his highly-respected friend and reverend brother, whose visage seemed strongly to bode that he stood on the verge of the grave, while his eyes, sparkling with seraphic love, indicated that he dwelt in the suburbs of Heaven.... He addressed the Conference, on their work and his own views, in a strain of holy and pathetic eloquence, which no language of mine can adequately express. The influence of his spirit and pathos seemed to bear down all before it....He had scarcely pronounced a dozen sentences before a hundred preachers, to speak in round numbers, were immersed in tears.... Mr. Wesley, in order to relieve his languid friend from the fatigue and injury which might arise from a too long and arduous exertion of the lungs through much speaking, abruptly kneeled down at his side, the whole congress of preachers doing the same, while, in a concise and energetic manner, he prayed for Mr. Fletcher's restoration to health, and a longer exercise of his ministerial labours. Mr. Wesley closed his prayer with the following prophetic promise, pronounced in his peculiar manner, and with a confidence and emphasis which seemed to thrill through every heart--'HE SHALL NOT DIE, BUT LIVE, AND DECLARE THE WORKS OF THE LORD?'" This prophecy was afterwards blessedly fulfilled.