"In the accounts of good men which I have read, I have observed that the writers of them have been partial. They have given us the bright, but not the dark side of their character. This, I think, proceeded from a kind of pious fraud, lest mentioning persons' faults should encourage others in sin. It cannot, I am sure, proceed from the wisdom which cometh from above. The sacred writers give an account of their failings as well as their virtues. Peter is not ashamed to confess that, with oaths and curses, he thrice denied his Master; nor do the Evangelists make any scruple of telling us, that out of Mary Magdalene Jesus Christ cast seven devils. "I have, therefore, endeavoured to follow their good example. I have simply told what I was by nature, as well as what I am by grace. I am not over cautious as to any supposed consequences, since none can be hurt by these but such as hold the truth in unrighteousness. To the pure all things will be pure. "As I have often wished, when in my best frames, that the first years of my life might be put down as a blank, and had no more in remembrance, so I could almost wish now to pass them over in silence. But as they will, in some degree, illustrate God's dealings with me in my riper years, I shall, as I am able, give the following brief account of them." After this exordium, which the reader will find useful in interpreting what follows, Whitefield proceeds with the first section of his autobiography. "I was born in Gloucester, in the month of December, 1714. [My father and mother kept the Bell Inn. The former died when I was two years old; the latter is now alive, and has often told me how she endured fourteen weeks' sickness after she brought me into the world; but was used to say, even when I was an infant, that she expected more comfort from me than any other of her children. This, with the circumstance of my being born in an inn, has been often of service to me in exciting my endeavours to make good my mother's expectations, and so follow the example of my dear Saviour, who was born in a manger belonging to an inn. "My very infant years must necessarily not be mentioned; yet, I can remember such early stirrings of corruption in my heart, as abundantly convinces me that I was conceived and born in sin,--that in me dwelleth no good thing by nature, and that if God had not freely prevented me by His grace, I must have been for ever banished from His presence.]