Forty witnesses

Front matter

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Preface

THE object of this volume is not to set forth a doctrine, but to reveal a life. While it is recognized that all life must have a concrete expression, nevertheless, the book, when carefully read, will show the difficulty of uniformity in doctrinal statement, and, perhaps, the utter impossibility of the most devout minds agreeing upon the terminology and marks of deeper religious experiences especially. And yet the editor hopes that he has gathered into a convenient and compact shape data which will furnish some capable pen the material from which to write a truer philosophy of Christian experience than has yet appeared.

Among the purposes of the book are : (i) models of discriminating statements of experience ; (2) checks to extravagance in religious language ; (3) cautions against professing obtainments before they are reached ; (4) to show the easy possibility of losing the very highest graces, and (5) the wisdom of frank and open confession of serious lapses.

Sincerity is of more value than maintaining a doctrine. Pride is often thrust into souls easily ambitious for a doctrine, or profession, or mode of statement. What is more seductive than pride of opinion, and what more rigid than the vain-glorious

6 PREFACE.

maintenance of a position once gained, or thought to be gained ? These u witnesses " show how easy it must be for weaker minds to mistake their experiences ; how few, perhaps, have a broad view of what it means to be " perfect in love," and how many, in all probability, lapse very frequently from even the highest state of grace.

Moreover, the book will teach the folly, for any reason, of giving up seeking and preaching a state of grace plainly set forth in the Word, and logically demanded by every system of religion that strongly appeals to the intellect of the race.

Furthermore, the collective volume is unconsciously at war with bigotry and exclusiveness of doctrinal statement ; it especially teaches, u between the lines," charity toward the opinions and expressions of all men ; it recognizes that men are often better and truer than their statements, and also that men, very blunt and exact in definition, often succeed in winning souls, not so much because of their nice discriminations, as they may suppose, but in spite of them, and by virtue of their real goodness and downright earnestness. Few men ever clearly analyze, if indeed it be possible, the true secret of success in themselves or others. There is always large room for the influence of unconscious environments.

And yet, while the book teaches charity, the editor will regret exceedingly if his grouping of witnesses shall, in this age of excessive liberalism, tend to take any rigidity out of the back-bone of a spiritual church. Let no one be discouraged, but sweetly hold fast that whereunto he has attained;

PREFACE. 7

be not afraid to investigate the reasons for the hope he has within him ; reconstruct his spiritual building, if need be, and push upward until he domes in the perfection of love, the perfection of faith, the perfection of hope — a divine trinity in human experience — which the Scriptures clearly promise in this life.

While the book has not been made all that was intended, nevertheless it will be found scriptural, rich in clear statements, abounding in exact discriminations, and replete with sound sense, all of which will magnify its value and tend to promote the piety of the Church. Nearly all the "witnesses" are over fifty years of age, and some are past eighty. To encourage the children one little girl is admitted to the witness stand, a delicate and often dangerous thing to do before such an audience, but this unique experience could hardly be rejected. The reader will notice how many were converted in childhood or youth. It is also of interest to study the relation of epochs in the narration of experiences.

The witnesses were asked to write out of their hearts, and without an eye upon their dogmas or theology. Each one was asked to give a plain, straight-forward story, chiefly of the inner life, and without adornment. The following is an extract from a circular sent to them by the editor.

" Knowing with what relish people listen to the narration of personal experience, and with what zest thoughtful people read intelligent and discriminating accounts of the inner life, I have thought it wise to gather into a small compass testimonies to salvation from sin. The accounts of Christian

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experience in the religious press are not only ephemeral, but incomplete and inadequate. They seldom arrest the attention of the thoughtful. The very few attempts to meet this demand in book or pamphlet form have, so far as I have been able to learn, failed of their purpose largely, and, I venture to think, for apparent reasons. Such books and pamphlets have admitted argument, controversy, ' peculiar views/ or dreams and other matter, generally of doubtful expediency ; verbosity and religious cant have been indulged, together with other irrelevant matter. Moreover, there have been allowed the testimonies of witnesses immature, and incompetent, by reason of inability to correctly analyze and accurately express the phenomena of their experiences. It is my design to secure the testimonies of ripe, capable witnesses, living and dead, and, as far as possible, throw them against the theoretical and practical infidelity of the age. Recognizing, however, that the charm of all spiritual biography has ever been a complete salvation, and also remembering that every philosophy should be judged by its best exponents, I have chosen those witnesses whom I have understood to believe the Scriptures promise ' perfect love/ or* holiness' or a ' second experience' (as Miss Havergal calls it), and who also believe themselves at some time to have had this higher experience. I have it in mind to prevent, as far as may be, premature and superficial testimony, and to help correct and root out delusions and snares, as well as remove from the main vision all that is non-essential, irrelevant and dangerous to the doctrine and life of purity.

PREFACE. 9

" In seeking testimony I therefore respectfully ask you to be careful, as a witness, to give very briefly the errors made in seeking salvation, mistakes, if any, in deciding when the work of regeneration and sanctification were respectively believed to be finished, and also a very true account of your experience in becoming established in holiness. I would, however, give all room for the personal direction of the Spirit in^ writing testimony. I do not question the divine unity which will appear in the apparent diversity of reports from holy people. A cast-iron uniformity is not desired. My earnest hope is to make the book an enduring spiritual classic in the literary clearness and strength of its testimonies, braced as well by the purity and power of the lives of the witnesses themselves.

EPITOME.

"(i.) A brief account of your conversion, giving the dates and places of your physical and spiritual births. State whether your conversion was instantaneous or gradual, clear or dim, calm or demonstrative.

" (2.) An account of your regenerate life ; your experience with the i carnal mind.'

" (3.) An account of your sanctification, or 'second experience,' stating whether it was gradual or instantaneous, quiet or emotional, whether you mistook earlier blessings for the completed work.

" (4.) A full, but concise account of your life of sanctification, your lapses, the causes thereof, the frequency perhaps, the difficulties and triumphs in becoming established in holiness. It seems to me

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there is great need of candid testimony at this point. Evident, open-faced, not too discreet frankness is always a great power in testimony. Who can read or hear the painful, tearful witness of ' a broken and contrite heart 9 without that melting sense of kinship which draws us closer to each other and to our sympathetic High Priest? God has not deemed it wise to cloak the evil deeds of Noah, David, Peter.

"(5.) No argument, exhortation or controversy.

" (6.) Give full dates throughout if possible.

" The book is not to be denominational. It is to be simply an apostolic experience meeting on paper. Witnesses will be sought from every Church. The Church and the world are certainly making a sad blunder when, as Dr. Daniel Steele suggests, they listen ' more attentively to the speculations of theorizers than to the declarations of witnesses attesting that Jesus is a complete

Saviour/ "

EDITOR.

Philadelphia, Pa., March 5, 1888.

Introduction

BY BISHOP FOSS.

r^OD'S way of making any truth mighty is by in- \ carnating it. In order to reveal himself to men and angels " The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory." To all eternity the truth will stand that " no man hath seen nor can see " the Almighty Father. The sole manifestation of him to any created being will always be through the God-man, " in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily."

Man is the great revelation of God. All honor to " God's word written ; " but the practically decisive revelation of God to the individual sinner is not usually through the Bible, but through some "living epistle/' The greatest truths in the Bible have been thrown down before men millions of times, and have been only as " pearls before swine/'

12 INTRODUCTION.

until quickened souls have picked them up, been transformed by them, and held them forth before the astonished gaze of men, gleaming with divine luster.

Of this truth the entire history of the Church affords no more striking illustration than the life of John Wesley. His fifteen years of legal bondage and earnest search were immensely valuable for the purpose of getting a great truth, long firmly held in a clear head, deeply imbedded in a hot heart. When, at the age of thirty-six, he felt his " heart strangely warmed," Methodism was born, and the way to heaven became plainer to all succeeding generations. His subsequent experience and teaching concerning " perfect love " brought in a new era for yearning, struggling, doubting disciples ; and the twin evangels of salvation now, and of salvation from all sin, sounded out more clearly than ever before, not only through all the branches of the Church he founded, but throughout all evangelical Christendom.

The great convincing proof of Christ's messiahship must always be in substance the same. He himself states it thus : u Go and show John again those things which ye do hear and see ; the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are

INTRODUCTION. 1 3

cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them." After this he said, " He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also ; and greater works than these shall he do." Those " greater works " can be none other than the spiritual miracles of raising and transforming dead souls ; and such miracles God has wrought by his modern apostles as truly as he healed the sick and raised the dead by the original twelve. Transformed lives, " new creatures," triumphant experiences, Saul-Pauls — these must in every age be the incontestable evidences of Christianity. Against such demonstration no form of skepticism, whether dug out of the rubbish of the past, or (if that be possible) born of some new development of Satanic genius, can possibly make permanent headway.

Lyman Beecher once said — I am sure of the thought and almost of the exact words — " A heart on fire with the love of God is the greatest created power in the universe." But in order to such power the heart must not only feel that love, but be hot with it. Millions of church members on the dead level of dry orthodoxy and decent ceremonial observances and worldly living have less power than one man with a great idea burning in the core

14 INTRODUCTION.

of his heart— a Daniel, a Paul, a Luther, or a Judson.

"Ye are my witnesses," saith the Lord. The Church, which is Christ's body, has a testimony to offer concerning its Head and also concerning the life which continually flows from the head into all the members.

This book is a summary of such testimony from the lives of " Forty Witnesses," witnesses representing courses of life and ecclesiastical stand-points exceedingly diverse ; some having " a genius for godliness," and others furnishing material about as intractable as grace has ever conquered and transformed. It is highly instructive, then, to behold them all gathering round the world's Redeemer and with united voices proclaiming him " mighty to save," to " save to the uttermost," and " able to succor them that are tempted."

The freshness, frankness, individuality, variety, and generally undogmatic character of these experiences will, I am sure, make them practically helpful to many a dissatisfied and longing believer, and will, I think, have also a certain philosophic value, not, indeed, in settling the vexed questions relating to the theological definition of " the higher life," but in strongly emphasizing the truth that such

INTRODUCTION. 1 5

questions are altogether secondary to the possession of that life itself; and that

" The love of God is broader Than the measure of man's mind."

Go forth, ye <l Forty Witnesses." Pursue your shining way until it leads into the streets of gold. And God grant that your Beulah songs may quicken the steps of many a footsore pilgrim and help to augment the number of that triumphant multitude who shall stand before the throne of God, having 41 washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."

CYRUS D. FOSS.

Contents

PART F^IRST.

Denomination. Page.

Dougan Clark, M.D Friend. 19

PART SECOND. Professor Asa Mam an, LL.D Congregationalist. 223

Frances Ridley IIavergal Church of England. 237

Mary D. James Methodist. 245

Ethel Perkins " 260

Dwight L. Moody Congregationalist. 26S

Professor T. C. Upham, D.D M 271

Rev. Alfred Cookman Methodist. 2S3

Rev. J. O. Peck, D.D M 293

Phozbe Palmer " 299

I. Dougan Clark, M.d

T WAS born in Randolph County, North Carolina, <k> on the 17th of 5th month (May), 1828. I was educated at Haverford College, Pennsylvania, at which institution I graduated in 1852. I took the degree of Doctor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in 1861, and practiced my profession for about fifteen years. Since 1866 my residence has been at Richmond, Indiana.

My parents were both ministers in the Society of Friends. I had accordingly a birthright membership in that Church. I was carefully and tenderly brought up, and taught that I must fear the Lord and keep his commandments. The Scriptures were daily read in our family, and I soon learned to read and enjoy them for myself. The parental discipline which I received was strict, but kind and loving. I was to a great extent shielded from the temptations to gross sins to which many young people are exposed. I was from my very infancy a regular attender upon public worship, and in my earliest years I enjoyed hearing good preaching.

The chief things inculcated in the teaching and preaching of those days— I mean half a century ago, so far as the Friend's Church was concerned — were to mind and obey the light of God's Holy Spirit shining into the heart ; to be moral and upright and honest and truthful and good ; to do what duty required, and to obey God; and thus to work out salvation with fear and trembling.

It is true that Christ crucified was often spoken of as the sinner's hope of acceptance with God ; but the fact that the Spirit always testifies of Christ and draws men to him was too much lost sight of, and the necessity of an immediate and definite conversion was not clearly insisted upon.

I cannot point to the time when converting grace first reached my soul. I am quite sure that it was in very early life. I am certain that there were occasions every now and then, during my boyhood and youth and early manhood, when my soul was filled with the love of God ; when I was contrite before him ; when ljiy peace flowed as a river, and when I enjoyed what I now believe to have been the witness of the Spirit to my adoption and sonship.

A man can be alive even if he does not know when his birthday was, and so we may have the un-

DOUGAN CLARK, M.D. 21

mistakable signs of spiritual life without, in all cases, being able to point to the moment or the day when such life began. It is not so important to know the time as the fact of our conversion. But notwithstanding these things are so, yet I want to add right here that I do consider a definite, conscious conversion — to which the individual can point in all his subsequent life as the day of his birth into God's kingdom — to be an inestimable blessing and a glorious privilege. And where people are rightly instructed such conversions will be the rule, and any other kind the rare exception.

Until I had reached middle life my Christian experience was very unsteady and unsatisfactory. God was wonderfully good to me ; but the carnal mind was very strong and ever struggling against the movings of the Spirit. So I was up and down, one day on the house-top, the next in the cellar ; sinning and repenting, backsliding and returning; at times growing in grace and at times almost losing my faith and my hope. I was a Christian, but not a healthy one. Still, upon the whole, I can say, to the glory of Jesus my Saviour, that during those years, by his grace, I did make considerable progress in the divine life. The old man— the strong man— was mostly kept in bonds. The struggle was often severe and protracted ; but when I trusted in Jesus he gave me the victory.

When I was about thirty years of age my attention was first called, distinctively and intelligibly, to the subject of holiness as an actual, obtainable experience. This was from a perusal of the Interior Life, by the Late Professor Upham.

But it required many years for me to grasp the subject experimentally and practically. I made consecrations again and again — written and verbal — but somehow they did not stand the test. I struggled and prayed, and often got the victory; but I was not delivered.

When nearly forty years of age I began to speak, not infrequently, in Friends' meetings as a minister. I only felt just call enough to justify me in opening my mouth ; and, without deciding whether the Lord really intended to make a minister of me or not, I thought it safest to attend to present openings and opportunities to speak for Him as they occurred. It was comparatively only a short time before my monthly meeting gave its official sanction to my ministry by " recording " me as a minister of the Gospel. And still I was interested in the subject of holiness, and still I was desiring it, and still I was not enjoying it.

At length, in the 12th month (December), 1871, while attending a series of meetings at a Friends' church in Ohio, in which Brother David B. Updegraff was taking part, and acting under his advice, I arose in a large assembly and stated my sense of my own unworthiness and weakness ; but that relying

DOUGAN CLARK, M.D. 23

wholly upon Christ I did there and then reckon myself dead indeed unto him and alive unto God through Jesus Christ my Lord.

I had now committed myself publicly. While I knew that I could not make myself dead to sin I felt as if the responsibility was now laid upon Jesus. What I reckoned in faith he could make real and true. There was no very marked feeling for several hours. I held on by faith to my confession. Then came peace — full, quiet, calm ; not rapture, nor ecstasy, but " All the silent heaven of love ; " and this continued almost without intermission during my waking hours for several weeks.

Now, what did I get ?

Answer: 1. A clean heart; I was baptized with the Holy Ghost, and my heart was purified by faith.

2. Perfect love.

3. The endowment of power ; for whatever spiritual power I have been possessed of since, either for winning sinners to Christ or bringing believers to entire sanctification by consecration and faith in Jesus, I date it from that blessed day and hour.

How has it been with me since ?

There have been failures on my part, but God has kept me wonderfully. There have been great and exceedingly subtle temptations — angel-of-light temptations — but Jesus has carried me through. There have been great trials and fearful sorrows, greater, I believe, than the average Christian, or even the average holiness man, is called upon to endure ; but Jesus sustains and keeps and consoles. There has been a good deal of blessed service for him, both in preaching and writing, and a good many souls testify to having been blessed and brought into the light and experience of holiness through my instrumentality — with pen or tongue. I wish the number was manifold greater, as it might have been if I had been wholly the Lord's from my youth ; but I can rejoice now when others preach and write better than I, and are the means of gathering in hundreds where I bring units.

And on this 19th of February, 1887, I do still testify that by the grace of God I am reckoning myself dead to sin; and I have a sure confidence that now the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth me from all sin, and that I have received, and now have, the gift of the Holy Ghost. Praise the Lord !

D. CLARK.

Richmond, Ind., Second Month, Nineteenth Day, 1887.

II

DAVID B. UPDEGRAFF.

T WAS born near Mount Pleasant, Ohio, on the 23d <i of August, 1830. I cannot doubt that I was solemnly given to God from my birth by pious parents. My infant lips were taught to pray, and when I said,

" Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep,"

I really expected him to do it. My young heart was not a stranger to the gracious visitations of the Spirit of God, and was often melted by the power of his love. But as I grew up I grew in sinfulness and in rebellion against God. Though mercifully preserved from many sins of a gross and disgraceful character, I was often in great distress of soul because of those I did commit. At such times I would earnestly repent in secret and cry unto God for mercy. Many covenants were thus made and often, though not always, broken. The covenants, prayers, restraints and instructions of faithful parents were not lost upon me. After being settled in life I renewed my covenants with God, and sought to do right because it was right. I was a birthrightmember of the Church and was " zealous toward

God according to the perfect manner of the law of my fathers." I certainly did " fear the Lord," and was a "servant" under the law that " gendereth to bondage " for many years. But I had not " received the adoption of a son" In March, 1864, I made this full discovery. The Gospel of God came to me with great power. I met the test of public confession of sins and my need of the Saviour. It was a hard struggle, for I was proud and stubborn ; but I was determined to yield myself to God, and did it. My spiritual conflict was somewhat protracted, but it came to an end in the silent watches of the night, and I had " peace with God." His Spirit witnessed with my spirit that I was his child. I was at once a glad and willing witness to the reality of justification by faith and the birth of the Spirit. I loved to tell of the power of Jesus to save and of the gladness he had put into my heart. But, first neglect, then disobedience, then waywardness interfered with my Christian life. Chastening and suffering from the hand of the Lord was followed by restoration of soul. Then a more conscious and definite consecration of my service to the blessed Saviour. I had longed to see God glorified in the salvation of souls and the enlargement of the Church. Some years had passed since I had found the liberty of the sons of God ; but I saw that few were being brought into the kingdom. To be sure, I was only a business man, and utterly averse to the idea of being a minister. I greatly desired to serve both God and men, but in a quiet and unobtrusive way. The Church was laying a little work upon me, from which I shrank with a deep sense of unfitness. I felt it far more than I could understand it. But as the Lord opened the door I stepped in, and soon began to learn what real loyalty to God was to cost, and that if led by the Spirit of God, and according to his word, reproaches and other like blessings, promised by the Saviour, would become a reality. I had always regarded these rather as a consequence of blunders made by people who could not manage to keep out of them. There were a good many people who gave me trouble ; but as I learned more of myself I discovered one " old man " who gave me more trouble than all the others, and he was a member of my " own household/' " His deeds " had been put off, and truly there was " no condemnation/' yet when " I would do good " he was present with me. And he was there to " war against the law of my mind," with a resolute purpose to " bring me into captivity to the law of sin." If he succeeded even partially I was humbled and grieved, and if he did not I was in distress with fear lest he might. The Lord taught me by some special providences, and I began to understand more clearly how that " the law was weak through the flesh." I hated pride, ambition, evil tempers and vain thoughts ;

but I had them for all of that, and they were a part of me. Not as acts to be repented of and forgiven, but dispositions lying behind the acts, and promptings thereto, natural to the old man and inseparable from his presence in my being. I began to ask God, with a measure of faith, to " cast him out." Along with this desire there came a great " hunger and thirst " to be " filled with all the fullness of God." I longed for a " clean heart and a constant spirit." In such an attitude of soul I attended a social meeting for conference and prayer on a memorable evening early in September, 1869. As I went upon my knees it was with the resolute purpose of " presenting my body a living sacrifice to God." Such were my relations with him that I saw a new light and a new privilege in entire consecration, and set about it with great delight. But I speedily found myself in the midst of a severe conflict. There passed quickly before me the obstacles in the way, and the " things to be suffered for Jesus' sake." The misapprehensions, suspicions, and revilings of carnal professors, as well as the conflicts with the world, the flesh, and the devil. And they were not the exaggerations of fancy, either; selfishness, pride and prejudice joined forces and rose in rebellion, while the " old man " pleaded for his life. But I could not, would not draw back. " Vile affections " were resolutely nailed to the cross, and those things that " were gain to me " — denominational standing, family, business, friends, possessions, time, talent and reputation — were irrevocably committed to the sovereign control and disposal of my Almighty Saviour. With my all upon the altar I had no sooner reckoned myself " dead indeed unto sin and alive unto God " than the " Holy Ghost fell " upon me. Instantly I felt the melting and refining fire of God permeating my whole being. I had entered into rest, I was nothing and nobody, and glad that it was forever settled that way. It was a conscious luxury to get rid of ambitions and self-will, and have my heart cry out for nothing but the will of God. I was deeply conscious of his presence and of his sanctifying work. It was not an effort to realize that I loved the Lord with all my heart and mind and strength, and my neighbor as myself. The inmost calm and repose in God, of that time, that day, that hour, was a wonder to me then, and it continues to be so still. It was, and it is, the u peace of God that passeth understanding." The witness of the Spirit to entire sanctification was as clear and unmistakable to my own soul as it was in the experience of justification. I have had abundant time and occasion in the nearly nineteen years that have passed, to scrutinize and test the reality and nature of the work wrought then, and perpetuated since by the power of the Holy Ghost. In and of myself I am neither holier nor stronger than before.