James Burgess to Arthur Clegg, Manchester, 7 February [179]9.

Dear Sir

   Ever since You gave your very friendly and beneficial assistance in ye sale of my timber at Milhouses I have retained a gratefull sense of the greatness of ye favor & the chearful manner in which you confer’d it, have also waited for an opportunity of making something more than a mere verbal acknowledgment of it.  Consequently I here with send you gratuitously some small fruit of my ministerial labours since declining nature & a thorn in the flesh disabled me for stated pulpit work.  As my life has been prolong’d & my faculties continued in some degree far beyond what I or any of my acquaintances expected, and finding that the spiritual life within has not in this last period of my life decayd with ye decays of my outward man but rather the contrary; I have been as diligent in my good Master’s work, (according to my lesser abillities [sic]) as I was when I had a whole flock of Christ’s sheep to tend & feed.  When my lungs & lips faild me both head heart and hand have been for the most part employd in the delightful work of the ministry.  And tho’ after I retird into private life I have been often sollicited to strike into trade I could never reconcile my unwilling mind unto it: much less to resemble my successor at Hatherloe who I find has made shift to join ye sacred calling of ye minster with ye worldly calling of a cotton Tradesman (tho he has no child).  But indeed religion, I have been informed, runs very low at Hatherloe.  During my Ministry there we had a very full Congn of hearers, besides four prayer meetings of men, and one of women.  But ye introduction of instrumental music, which had neither New Testament precept or precedent threw ye Congn into Confusion & drove away their Minister; & I believe a general deadness prevaild & diminution succeeded &c.

   The Exposition and Select Meditations, which you was so obliging as to subscribe for, were all, excepting about three, soon passd off.  The like quick sale my next piece had.  What will be ye fate of this my last publication which I now make a present of to you time will discover, but not during my own life time.  For, excepting a Sum sent to the Printer of the Evangelical Magazine at L—n & two shops in your town, ye chief part are to be reservd to ye time of my interment, when a smallish number are to be given by way of dole to the pious poor of those congrs where I oftenest officiated during my ministry.  I shall only add that this my last piece has now an addition which is not in any of those few already sent to Booksellers; indeed it was not added before last week   It bears this title A Prospect of near approching [sic] death prompts the author to gird on his Xan Armor.   That part I lately transcribd from my diary of experiences which I have kept above 50 years.

P.S. If after a perusal of this Book you so far approve of it as to think it may be useful to some of your religious Friends I shall be beholden unto you to lend or recommend [sic] it to ym to become subscribers to it, & to permit me to reap ye profits which Booksellers claim.  I take the price to be very moderate viz 1s-10 merely.   I now find both head & hand fail me in writing, (which I need not wonder at, because in my 80th year) I must abruptly conclude with my best respects to you & Mrs Clegg—As your Friend Ed. Clegg sent for me to visit him, ye latter visit was to day when I found him weakening apace; but quite sensible, thankful for prayer & religious advice.  His attendants informed me yt there is a great alteration in him for ye better.   Farewell

                                                   J. Burgess      Feb. 7 ‘9

Text: Eng. MS. 369, fol. 21, John Rylands University Library of Manchester.  This letter appears in Nightingale, but numerous changes have been made and the P.S. has been left out. It was written sometime the emergence of the Evangelical Magazine, which first appeared in 1793. The Cleggs of Manchester maintained a Baptist identity for some time. In 1804 Arthur Clegg, Esq., of Manchester, most likely Burgess’s correspondent in the above letter, subscribed £3 to the Baptist Missionary Society. See Benjamin Nightingale, Lancashire Nonconformity; Or, Sketches, Historical and Descriptive, of the Congregational and Old Presbyterian Churches in the County. Churches of Manchester, Oldham, Ashton, etc. 6 vols. (Manchester: John Heywood, [1890–1893]), vol. 3, p. 327.