Binding: Clothbound Publisher: Banner of Truth ISBN# : 9780851514604
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Description :
When John Newton, ex-sea captain and, as yet, unsuccessful candidate for the Church of England ministry, finished his first book (an autobiography) in 1762 there was no ready publisher. Any thought that he was destined to become one of the best-known authors of his age would have been as fantastic as the past thirty-seven years of his life. But in both cases the improbable came about. Installed as the Curate of Olney, Buckinghamshire, in 1764, Newton there laid his reputation as an evangelical writer, preeminently by his published
Letters and by the
Olney Hymns (including, 'How sweet the name of Jesus sounds', 'Glorious things of thee are spoken', and 'Amazing grace'). Before the end of his subsequent pastorate at St Mary, Woolnoth, London (1780-1807), his writings were prized around the world from America to Australia. The nineteenth century saw a number of rival editions of his
Complete Works , but it is the edition from which the present is reprinted (which includes his
Letters to a Wife ) which has the best claim to that title.loved rather than admired, it is for this reason. Conformity to Christ is the one subject upon which all his themes finally focus ('It will not be a burden to me at the hour of death that I have thought too highly of Jesus, expected too much from him myself, or laboured too much in commending and setting him forth to others'). Not surprisingly, Alexander Whyte could write: 'For myself, I keep John Newton on my selectest shelf of spiritual books: by far the best kind of books in the whole world of books.'"In few writers are Christian doctrine, experience and practice more happily balanced than in the author of these letters, and few write with more simplicity, piety and force." --C. H. Spurgeon "It was Newton's goodness rather than his greatness that rendered him so especially attractive--the abundance of the grace of God that was in him. In this respect he was pre-eminent, justifying the eulogy of William Jay who speaks of him as one of the most perfect instances of the spirit and temper of Christianity he ever knew. Some men excel in one virtue more than another. But Newton's character was beautiful in its entireness. It rested on a solid foundation--the initial Christian grace of humility, and of this grace he was a most striking example. He never for a moment forgot that by the grace of God he was what he was." --Josiah Bull
