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GEORGIA AND GEORGIANS 129
field's idea; and Chatham Academy was projected, which took over the
educational work of Bethesda. The latter, for some time, retained an
interest in the school property in Savannah, but eventually relinquished
'it and then seemingly passed out of existence, until finally revived by
the Union Society: an organization only ten years younger thaii
Bethesda. Planned upon non-sectarian lines, it existed for practical
benevolence; and, in 1854, the board of managers of the Union Society,
purchasing 125 acres of the Bethesda estate, erected buildings thereon
for the orphans under its charge, and removed them thither. Ever since
then the prosperity of the institution has been continuous and unbroken.
EECOLLEOTIONS OF GEORGE WHITEMELD.—Urged by the letters of Wesley, the
Key. George Whitefield resolved to answer his call for help, and go over to his
assistance in Georgia. This young gentleman, born in an inn, of humble but worthy
parents, was early left fatherless, and thrown upon resources so slender as scarcely
to give him support. At school his talents for oratory were very nearly turned towards
the drama; but, at the age of fourteen, he persuaded his mother to take him from,
school and, putting on his blue apron, "washed mops and cleaned, gowns" in his
mother's tavern. Learning accidentally from a Pembroke servitor that, by aid of
such a menial office, he could go through college with small means and having already
made himself a good scholar in the classics, he hastened when eighteen years of age
to Oxford, and, by the aid of £10 borrowed from a friend to defray the expenses of
entering, he was admitted as a servitor in Pembroke College; where he was soon,
drawn towards the religious club of which the Wesleys were leaders. * * *
He chose the worst food, wore mean apparel, often knelt under the trees of Christ
Church walk until he was benumbed with cold, and passed Lent in such rigorous
fastings, that, by Easter, he had to be under a physician for weeks. * * *
Ordained, June 20, 1736, at the age of twenty-one, to the office of deacon in the
Church of England, he commenced his clerical life with six guineas and one sermon;
but soon called to officiate in London, he there began to exhibit the marvelous elo
quence, for which in after years he was much noted.
Crowds flocked to hear him preach. Never before in. England had so young a
clergyman produced such wonderful effects. The churches could not contain the
multitudes. His renunciation of honors and preferments at home that he might
devote himself to the spiritual wants of a feeble colony abroad, combined with his
bold oratory to beget an interest in the young divine which many lordly prelates
might have coveted in vain. Yet in the midst of this tide of popular applause, we
find him preserving his piety, his humility and his unswerving zeal. He left London,
December 28, 1737, and, "in the strength of God as a poor pilgrim,'' went on board
the Whittaker to embark for Georgia. He took with him, however, one friend,
Mr. James Habersham, who, in opposition to the views of his uncle and guardian,
resolved to cast his lot among the people where Whitefield was to labor. The
ship in which the two friends sailed was a transport employed to convey part of
General Oglethorpe's regiment to Georgia; but it was nearly a month before it was
out to sea, being detained by head-winds; and in the meantime Wesley had returned
to England.—Wm. Bacon Stevens, M. D., D. D., in History of Georgia, Vol. I.
His congregations were immense, filling valleys or covering hills; and the whole
evangelical dissent of England still feels his power. With the Countess of Hunting
don, he founded the Calvinistie Methodism of Great Britain; but such was the moral
unity of both parties, the Arminian and the Calviuistie, that the essential unity of
the general Methodist movement was maintained. Whitefield crossed the Atlantic
thirteen times and journeyed incessantly through the colonies, from Georgia to Maine,
like a '' flame of fire.'' The Congregational churches of New England, the Presby
terians and the Baptists of the Middle States, and the mixed colonists of the South,
are largely indebted to the impulse received from his powerful ministrations. The
great awakening under Edwards had not only subsided before Whitefield's arrival,
but had reacted. Whitefield restored it. Though he did not organize the results