“MADELEY, _October 12, 1761_. “MY DEAR SIR,—You have always the goodness to encourage me, and your encouragements are not unseasonable; for discouragements follow one after another with very little intermission. Those which are of an inward nature are sufficiently known to you; but some others are peculiar to myself, especially those I have had for eight days past, during Madeley wake. “Seeing that I could not suppress these bacchanals, I did all in my power to moderate their madness; but my endeavours have had little or no effect. You cannot well imagine how much the animosity of my parishioners is heightened, and with what boldness it discovers itself against me, because I preached against drunkenness, shows, and bull-baiting. The publicans and maltmen will not forgive me. They think that to preach against drunkenness, and to cut their purse, is the same thing. “My church begins not to be so well filled as it has been, and I account for it thus: the curiosity of some of my hearers is satisfied, and others are offended by the word; the roads are worse; and if it shall ever please the Lord to pour His Spirit upon us, the time is not yet come. The people, instead of saying, ‘Let us go up to the house of the Lord,’ exclaim, ‘Why should we go and hear a Methodist?’ “I should lose all patience with my flock if I had not more reason to be satisfied with them than with myself. My own barrenness furnishes me with excuses for theirs; and I wait the time when God shall give seed to the sower and increase to the seed sown. In waiting that time, I learn the meaning of this prayer, ‘Thy will be done.’ “Believe me your sincere, though unworthy, friend, “J. FLETCHER.”[76] Footnote 76: Letters, 1791, p. 112. Fletcher’s faithful preaching offended the publicans, and, judging of his sermons in general by the following specimens, it is not surprising that his preaching offended others. The extracts are taken from a sermon delivered in the month of December 1761, and first published in the Dublin edition of the _Methodist Magazine_ for 1821 (pp. 249–258).[77] The text was, “Thou shalt speak My words to them, whether they will hear or whether they will forbear, for they are most rebellious” (Ezek. ii. 7). After challenging his congregation to assert their innocence, Fletcher proceeded:—