590
which he guaranteed his own responsibility, and
when they were erected he set out upon a preaching
tour to collect funds for the purpose. This was the
more necessary, as, notwithstanding the number of
his audience, it had collected from liking to himself
rather than the sect to which he belonged, which
they knew nothing about, or regarded with Presby-
terian aversion, so that the only Independents of his
flock still continued to be nothing more than the
original three poor weavers. He therefore had re-
course to a preaching tour through some of the
principal cities and towns of Scotland for the col-
lection of funds, and was so successful that he was
enabled to clear the expenses both of church and
manse. Having thus surmounted the difficulty, he
settled down in this locality as a permanent charge,
and married a young lady, Miss Agnes Crichton, a
school-mistress in Irvine, whose tastes and character
corresponded with his own, and whose affections he
had engaged soon after his arrival in Kilmarnock.
During the five years of his residence and ministry
in that town, Mr. Campbell had no fewer than five
tempting calls for removal to other pastoral charges,
one of these being from Edinburgh, and another
from Dublin. His fame as an eloquent and effective
preacher had been widely diffused by his preaching
tour for the collection of building funds, in which he
had visited not only many parts in Scotland, but
also of Ireland and England. The whole five invi-
tations were rejected, but another which followed
could not be so briefly disposed of. While in
England collecting money for his manse and chapel,
he was invited to supply the pulpit of Hoxton
Chapel for six weeks during June and July, 1828.
He gladly accepted the call, and preached in that
large church to overflowing audiences with an ac-
ceptability seldom accorded by English congregations
to pulpit orators from the north; and this difference
is sufficiently explained by the intellectual tendencies
of the two nations. It is distinctly shown by Camp-
bell in the following words of a letter written at the
period. " A great preacher in Scotland might
utterly fail here. Excitement, excitement, effect,
effect, these are everything. Profound exposition
and accurate views of the gospel are nothing, or
next to nothing, with many. They care not to be
taught, but to be touched and moved." During his
stay in London he was almost overwhelmed with
preaching invitations, and had now become one of
the pulpit lions of metropolitan Dissenterism. On
his engagement with Hoxton Chapel having expired,
he returned to his flock at Kilmarnock: but his
admirers in London had not lost sight of him, and
soon after he received a formal invitation to supply
the services at the Tabernacle and Tottenham Court
Road Chapels, commencing his labours in the month
of October, and officiating during eleven Sundays—
an invitation with which he closed. Circumstances
had now occurred which in course of time were to
settle him permanently in London. The minister of
Tottenham Court Chapel, a man in his eighty-third
year, and one of the most popular preachers and
influential leaders of his communion, was the well-
known and justly celebrated Mr. Wilks. Feeling
that his end was approaching, and anxious that his
place should be adequately filled, he silently studied
the character of Mr. Campbell, and conceived him
everyway qualified for the succession. One trial of
this kind, among several, seemed to indicate such a
conclusion. Being in the pulpit, and too unwell to
continue the service, and learning that Campbell
was among his hearers, he sent to him a request
that he should preach, with which the other im-
mediately complied. When he stepped into the
vestry previous to ascending the pulpit, Mr. Wilks
joined him, and taking off his gown and bands in
silence, he put them on Mr. Campbell. The
Puritanism of the latter, which had never submitted
to such insignia, was somewhat startled; but con-
trolled by the fatherly and authoritative manner of
Mr. Wilks, he uttered no objection, but went thus
draped to the clerical duty of the day. The sermon
which he delivered on the spur of such an occasion
to an audience that filled the whole of that vast
building, was of such remarkable power that the
venerable Wilks had no cause to regret the in-
vestiture which he had symbolized with his robes of
office. On returning to the vestry the old man,
pointing to a chair which had belonged to the
celebrated Whitfield, said to Campbell, "That is
Moses' seat, sir; sit down." "If so," replied the
young man, "it is not for me, sir, but for yourself."
"Do what you are bid, sir," rejoined Mr. Wilks.
The result of all this was, that the minister and
managers were in favour of Campbell's succession to
Mr. Wilks; and as a touch of Presbyterianism still
lurked in the Scottish bones of Mr. Campbell, he
also obtained what he valued most of all—the
expressed wish or call of the congregation that he
should be their minister. Almost immediately after,
Mr. Wilks died, and Mr. Campbell entered into the
vacant charge.
On succeeding Mr. Wilks, it was as minister of
the Tabernacle, as Tottenham Court Road Chapel,
in consequence of a change in the disposal of the
property, was no longer an Independent place of
worship. At the Tabernacle, however, Mr. Camp-
bell, at his entrance, found several established usages
with which he could not conscientiously comply,
and these he set himself to remove with his wonted
firmness and decision. One of these was the practice
of kneeling at receiving the communion, which had
prevailed among a part of the congregation since the
days of Whitfield. Another was a frequent com-
munion service held as early as six o'clock in the
morning, to the great discomposure of family order
and comfort. A third was a prohibition by the
managers of the chapel for the minister to read any
portion of Scripture in the public religious services
of the chapel, under the plea that the people could
read the Bible for themselves at home. To these
and other obstacles which had been obstinately kept
up from the time of Whitfield, without any regard
to change of time or progress of improvement, Mr.
Campbell systematically opposed himself until he
had procured their abrogation. Still self-educating,
and making advances in various departments of
intellect, Mr. Campbell in 1831 combined author-
ship with preaching by becoming a contributor of
articles to the Patriot newspaper and the Eclectic
Review; and by this step he brought himself into
contact with several eminent literary characters, in
whose society and conversation he found the best
cure for that clerical exclusiveness which so often
mars the efficiency of our public teachers of religion.
It was in 1834 that the keenest and most im-
portant of Mr. Campbell's controversies commenced;
and it was not with opponents outside the Taber-
nacle, but a party composed of his own flock.
Dissatisfied with his reforms which he had intro-
duced into the church-service, and perceiving that
he was too well established in the affections of the
people to be removed, the managers abdicated, and
made over the lease of the chapel to certain men
who formed themselves into an oligarchy for its
future government. And sufficiently despotic it was,
for they arrogated to themselves the power not only
to choose a minister for the congregation, but to