At Oxford, Whitefield was thrown into amusing perturbation by an event which might have been expected to secure his warm approval. Charles Kinchin, one of the most zealous of the Oxford Methodists, was Rector of Dummer and Fellow and Dean of Corpus Christi College. Greatly to Whitefield's distress of mind, Kinchin had resolved to declare himself a Dissenter. He had left the college, intended to resign his living, and purposed, as soon as he was really converted, to become an itinerant preacher.[191] Whitefield himself was already an itinerant, either by necessity, or choice, or both; and yet he seems to have been ridiculously horrified at the probability of Kinchin following his example. He writes:-- "The step taken by Mr. Kinchin gave me a great shock. For I knew what dreadful consequences would attend a needless separation from the Established Church. For my own part, I can see no reason for my leaving the Church, however I am treated by the corrupt members and ministers of it. I judge of the state of a church, not from the practice of its members, but its primitive and public constitutions; and so long as I think the Articles of the Church of England are agreeable to Scripture, I am resolved to preach them up without either bigotry or party zeal." [191] See "The Oxford Methodists," pp. 220-223. Already Hervey, another of the Oxford Methodists, had written to Kinchin a letter, of more than a dozen printed octavo pages,[192] and had strongly and lovingly entreated him not to leave the Church. Whitefield wrote to the same effect. His letter is thoroughly characteristic, and abbreviation would injure it. [192] Ibid. "OXON, _April 22, 1739_. "DEAREST MR. KINCHIN,--Just now I have received the blessed sacrament, and have been praying for you. Let me exhort you, by the mercies of God in Christ Jesus, not to resign your parsonage till you have consulted your friends in London. It is undoubtedly true that all is not right when we are afraid to be open to our dear brethren. "Satan has desired to sift you as wheat. He is dealing with you as he did with me some years ago, when he kept me in my closet near six weeks, because I could not do anything with a single intention. So he would have you not to preach till you have received the Holy Ghost in the full assurance of it; and that is the way never to have it at all. God will be found in the use of means; and our Lord sent out His disciples to preach _before_[193] they had received the Holy Ghost in that most plentiful manner at the day of Pentecost. [193] The italics are Whitefield's own. This was odd doctrine for him to teach! It must always be remembered, however, that Whitefield was a warm-hearted preacher,--never a learned, logical theologist.