“The (Popish) Priest at Madeley is going to open his Mass-house, and I have declared war on that account last Sunday, and propose to strip the Whore of Babylon, and expose her nakedness to-morrow. All the Papists are in a great ferment, and they have held meetings to consult on the occasion.” An odour now hangs and will hang about the name of Fletcher, and turning to his example for encouragement, amid the more sterile tracts of labour, the weary and desponding will get refreshed. As mountains pierce the clouds and bring down rains upon the parched and shrivelled plains, so men now and then tower high above their fellows, and privileged with a greater significance, sunned and bathed in a purer light, they become a medium of it to others. It was so with Fletcher. In his presence men of coarser mould and ruder habits, as well as those distinguished for their attainments, felt the force and purity of his life. It has taken the Church of which he was so distinguished a member nearly a whole century to come up to plans by which he extended the sphere of his usefulness: we mean those outdoor meetings, cottage-lectures, Scripture readings, catechisings, and similar means whereby in every corner of the parish he contrived to stir men up and to create among them a concern for their higher interests. These are his words:— “Soon after coming to Madeley, I have frequently had a desire to exhort in Madeley Wood and Coalbrookdale, two villages of my parish, but I have not dared to run before I saw an open door. It now, I think, begins to open, as two small societies of twenty persons have formed themselves in those places.” But for a large soul like Mr. Fletcher’s the parish even is too limited, and we find accordingly that he gathered a small society sixteen miles off, riding that distance in order to preach at five o’clock in the morning two or three times a-week. Of course a man could not do this without treading on someone’s toes. It was the way to get opposition, and he got it. The churchwardens, clergy, archdeacon, bishop, and magistrates were dead against him. Magistrates threatened him and the whole of his flock with imprisonment; and the bishop preached against him before his brethren at the general visitation. He writes to Charles Wesley—“A young clergyman who lives at Madeley Wood, where he has great influence, has openly declared war against me by pasting on the church-door a paper, in which he charges me with rebellion, schism, and being a disturber of the public peace. He puts himself at the head of the gentlemen of the parish (as they term themselves), and supported by the recorder of Wenlock he is determined to put in force the Conventicle Act against me. A few weeks ago the widow who lives in the Rock Church and a young man who read and prayed in my absence were taken up.” He tells us he appeared at Wenlock and bearded the justices, who denounced him as a Jesuit!