I have no artistic talent; and if I had, I should not employ it in writing biographies. In such publications I am only desirous to see the man, not the artist’s drapery. I want to know his doings, sayings, and sufferings, rather than to read philosophic discourses concerning them. My aim, therefore, from first to last, has been to let Fletcher speak for himself. His Letters are invaluable; the man who can read them without being profited is greatly to be pitied. The extracts from his sermons show how the first Methodists used to preach. The chapters respecting the Calvinian controversy may, to some readers, be somewhat dry, but they could not be omitted, because that controversy was the great event in Fletcher’s life, and hastened his death. Besides, it was by his publications on this subject that he rendered service to Wesley and the Methodist movement, which neither Wesley himself nor any other of Wesley’s friends could have furnished. I have refrained from discussing the truths which Fletcher’s pen defended; but I have said enough to indicate what the doctrines were which created Methodism, and which alone can perpetuate its spiritual life and power. The portrait of Fletcher is taken from an exceedingly scarce engraving, in the Methodist Museum, at Centenary Hall, London. I think I may say, without exposing myself to the charge of arrogance or conceit, that, in this volume, the reader will find all the facts of any importance that are known concerning Fletcher, and that here, more than in any previous publication, is illustrated the intellectual and saintly character of one of the holiest men that ever lived. L. TYERMAN. STANHOPE HOUSE, CLAPHAM PARK, S.W. _October 7, 1882._ GENERAL CONTENTS --- INTRODUCTION. PAGE Wesley requests Fletcher to be his successor—Others who might have been designated 1–3 CHAPTER I. FROM FLETCHER’S BIRTH TO HIS COMING TO ENGLAND IN 1752. Parentage—Birthplace—Early piety—Remarkable deliverances from danger—-Education at Geneva—Removed to Lentzburg—Wishes to be a soldier 4–9 CHAPTER II. FROM HIS COMING TO ENGLAND TO HIS ORDINATION, 1752–1757. Arrives in London-Admitted to Mr. Burchell’s school—Becomes tutor to sons of Thomas Hill, Esq.—Letter to his brother Henry—Introduced to Methodists—His conversion—A millenarian—A Catechumen—Acquaintance with Mr. Vaughan—Richard Edwards, his class-leader—Letters to Wesley—His ordination 10–27 CHAPTER III. FROM HIS ORDINATION TO HIS SETTLEMENT AT MADELEY, 1757–1760.