* Behold the amazing love of God to the outcasts of men! His tender condescention to their folly! They would regard nothing done _in the usual way_. All this was lost upon them. The _ordinary_ preaching of the word of God, they would not even deign to hear. So the devil made sure of these careless ones. For who should pluck them out of his hand? Then God was moved to jealousy, and went _out of the usual way_ to save the souls which he had made. Then over and above what was ordinarily spoken in his name, in all the houses of God in the land, he commanded a voice to cry in the wilderness, _Prepare ye the way of the Lord. The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel._
* 23. Consider coolly, if it was not highly expedient, that something of this kind should be? How expedient, were it only on the account of those poor sinners against their own souls, who (to all human appearance) were utterly inaccessible every other way? And what numbers of these are still to be found, even in or near our most populous cities? What multitudes of them were some years since, both in _Kingswood_, and the fells about _Newcastle_? Who, week after week, spent the Lord’s day, either in the ale-house, or in idle diversions, and never troubled themselves about going to church, or to any publick worship at all? Now, would you really have desired that these poor wretches should have sinned on, till they dropt into hell? Surely you would not. But by what other means was it possible they should have been plucked out of the fire? Had the minister of the parish preached like an angel, it had profited them nothing; for they heard him not. But when one came and said, “Yonder is a man preaching on the top of the mountain,” they ran in droves to hear what he would say. And God spoke to their hearts. It is hard to conceive any thing else which could have reached them. Had it not been for _field-preaching_, the uncommonness of which was the very circumstance that recommended it, they must have run on in the error of their way, and perished in their blood.
* 24. But suppose _field-preaching_ to be in a case of this kind, ever so _expedient_, or even _necessary_, yet who will contest with us for _this province_?――――May we not enjoy this quiet and unmolested? Unmolested, I mean by any competitors.――For who is there among you, brethren, that is willing, (examine your own hearts) even to save souls from death at this price? Would not _you_ let a thousand souls perish, rather than you would be the instrument of rescuing them thus? I do not speak now with regard to conscience, but to the inconveniencies that must accompany it. Can _you_ sustain them, if you _would_? Can you bear the summer sun to beat upon your naked head? Can you suffer the wintry rain or wind, from whatever quarter it blows? Are you able to stand in the open air, without any covering or defence, when God casteth abroad his snow like wool, or scattereth his hoar-frost like ashes? And yet these are some of the smallest inconveniencies which accompany _field-preaching_. Far beyond all these, are the contradiction of sinners, the scoffs both of the great vulgar, and the small; contempt and reproach of every kind; often more than verbal affronts, stupid, brutal violence, sometimes to the hazard of health, or limbs, or life. Brethren, do you envy us _this honour_? What I pray, would _buy you_ to be a _field-preacher_? Or what, think you, could induce any man of common sense, to continue therein one year, unless he had a full conviction in himself, that it was the will of God concerning him.
* Upon this conviction it is (were we to submit to these things on any other motive whatsoever, it would furnish you with a better proof of our _distraction_, than any that has yet been found) that _we_ now do, for the good of poor souls, what you cannot, will not, dare not do. And we desire not that you should; but this one thing, we may reasonably desire of you: do not increase the difficulties which are already so great, that without the mighty power of God, we must sink under them. Do not assist in trampling down a little handful of men, who for the present stand in the gap, between ten thousand poor wretches and destruction, till you find some others to take their places.