After giving Whitefield this hearty welcome, Moody urged him for a sermon. The preacher hesitated, on account of his illness, but "good old Mr. Moody" did not give him the benefit of his own favorite maxim, "When you know not what to do, you must _not_ do you know not what." Whitefield preached, and immediately went to Portsmouth, where he preached the same evening, November 6, for Mr. Fitch, and was to have preached again the next morning, but was too ill, and deferred it till the afternoon. In the mean time, as he wrote, "My pains returned; but what gave me most concern was, that notice had been given of my being engaged to preach. I felt a divine life, distinct from my animal life, which made me, as it were, laugh at my pains, though every one thought I was taken with death. My dear York physician was then about to administer a medicine. I on a sudden cried out, 'Doctor, my pains are suspended; by the help of God, I will go and preach, and then come home and die.' With some difficulty I reached the pulpit. All looked quite surprised, as though they saw one risen from the dead. I indeed was as pale as death, and told them they must look upon me as a dying man, come to bear my dying testimony to the truths I had formerly preached to them. All seemed melted, and were drowned in tears. The cry after me, when I left the pulpit, was like the cry of sincere mourners when attending the funeral of a dear departed friend. Upon my coming home, I was laid upon a bed on the ground, near the fire, and I heard them say, 'He is gone.' But God was pleased to order it otherwise. I gradually recovered." In another account he himself says, "In my own apprehension, and in all appearance to others, I was a dying man. I preached--the people heard me--as such. The invisible realities of another world lay open to my view. Expecting to launch into eternity, and to be with my Master before the morning, I spoke with peculiar energy. Such effects followed the word, I thought it was worth dying for a thousand times. Though wonderfully comforted within at my return home, I thought I was dying indeed.... Soon after, a poor negro woman would see me. She came, sat down upon the ground, and looked earnestly in my face, and then said, 'Massa, you just go to heaven's gate, but Jesus Christ said, Get you down, get you down; you must not come here yet; but go first, and call some more poor negroes.' I prayed to the Lord, that if I was to live, this might be the event."