George-Whitefield-Field-Preacher

300 GEORGE WHITEFIELD
The graceful figure which was familiar on many a common
and park and market- cross of England, which Londoners
knew so well as he rapidly walked their streets, and country
people recognised as he dashed along their lanes, attended by
a knot of brethren on horseback, in haste to meet some
mighty congregation, or rode slowly along, pondering his next
sermon or silently communing with God—that figure which
was associated with the godly young man who entranced and
awed his countrymen—was now changed, when he was forty-
two years old, into the heavy, corpulent, unwieldy form, which
several painters and engravers have preserved for us in their
likenesses of the great preacher. 1 The observation of the
common people who heard him gladly has pictured him in
happy lines, as they knew him in his earlier and in his later
days. It is the bold and active young preacher whom we see
when we hear him described by a poor man as one who
'preached like a lion.' It is the stout man of middle age
whom we see when another describes him as ' a jolly, brave
man, and sich a look with him.' 2 And no doubt his kindly
face and rounded form did make him seem ' a jolly, brave
' man ; but the truth is, that this change was owing wholly to
1 These likenesses were a great bugbear to him ; he especially disliked
that in which he is represented with his hands lifted above his head, an
attitude which he seldom assumed, and but for a moment. He used to
say that he should hate himself were he ' the sour-looking creature ' they
represented him to be. They all agree in painting him with a massive
chin and a large mouth, pinched tight at the corners, and long, flexible
lips, capable of expressing anything— the orator's lips.
2 The words are those of an aged Oxfordshire peasant, and were spoken
in answer to the question, whether he remembered Whitefield's appearance.
' Ay, sure,' said he, ' he was a jolly, brave man ; and what a look he had
when he put out his right hand thus, to rebuke a disturber as tried to stop
him, under the pear-tree. The man had been very threatening and noisy ;
but he could not stand the look. Off he rode, and Whitefield said,
" There he goes; empty barrels make most din." ' An American said he
was ' a cheery, a very cheery old gentleman.