George-Whitefield-Field-Preacher

6o
GEORGE WHITEFIELD
' civility ' shown to the new chaplain ; and the principal part
of the conversation was upon the place of his settlement.
The magistrates were as diplomatic as civil ; for it was resolved
that the place should be Frederica, where a house and
tabernacle were to be built for him—then they themselves
would not run the risk of any trouble with him—but that
he ' should serve at Savannah, when, and as long as he
pleased.' Thus they avoided raising a contention with him,
by not arbitrarily sending him away from the principal place.
They had evidently learned the secret of conceding for the
sake of getting ; but, in the present case, their caution was
needless.
The ship-fever had not quite left Whitefield when, with his
usual promptness, he arranged the plan of his work and made
a beginning. His first week in Savannah was spent in con-
finement, and, on the second Sunday, his attempt to officiate
broke down before he reached the second service ; but on
the following Tuesday he was out at his pastoral work, and
made a call on Tomo Chici, the Indian king, who had refused
to become a Christian, on the ground that Christians were
such bad wretches. There can be no doubt, however, that
he had no fitness, though much zeal, for preaching to the
Indians.
For oratory there was little scope in Georgia, where a
congregation of one or two hundred persons was the largest
that could be mustered ; but there was ample room for
industry, for humility, for gentleness, and for self-denial ; and
Whitefield, by his assiduous cultivation of these graces, showed
that he cared more for charity than for the gift of speaking
' with the tongues of men and of angels.' Oratory was nothing
to him as an art ; it was supremely valuable as a talent to
be used for his Lord, an instrument by which hearts might be
drawn to the cross. He went among the villages, like a