Christian Leaders of the Last Century — J. C. Ryle
The seventh spiritual hero of the last century to whom I wish to direct the attention of my readers, is one better known than several of his contemporaries. The man I mean is Henry Venn, for some time Vicar of Huddersfield, in Yorkshire, and afterwards Vicar of Yelling, in Huntingdonshire. He is the only English minister of the eighteenth century whom I consider worthy to be ranked with the six whose memoirs I have already put together; namely: Whitefield, Wesley, Grimshaw, Romaine, Rowlands, and Berridge. These seven men appear to me, in some respects, to stand alone in the religious history of England a hundred years ago. Beside them, no doubt, there were many others of eminent grace and gifts. But none attained to the degree of the first seven.
One reason why Henry Venn is better known than many of his day, is the excellence of the only biography of him. Few men certainly have been so fortunate in their biographers as the evangelical Vicar of Huddersfield. In the whole range of Christian memoirs, I know few volumes so truly valuable as the single volume of “Henry Venn’s Life and Letters.” In fact, almost the only fault I find with the book is one which is most rare in a biography—it is too short!
Another reason why Henry Venn’s name is so well known to English evangelical Christians, is the happy circumstance that he left behind him children who followed him “even as he followed Christ.” His son, and his son’s sons, have all been thoroughly like-minded with him. For more than a century there has never been lacking a minister of his name within the pale of the Church of England, to preach the same doctrine which he preached in the pulpit of Huddersfield. The name of “Venn” has consequently never ceased to be before the public. When Whitefield and Wesley and Berridge were laid in their graves, they left no sons “to keep their name in remembrance,” however numerous their spiritual children may have been. But the family-name of Venn has been so much in men’s mouths for three generations, that there are few English Christians who are not acquainted with it.
While, however, I fully admit that Henry Venn’s name is well known in this country, I cannot help thinking that there is much confusion in men’s minds as to the period of his ministry, and the time when he died. Some, I know, are in the habit of speaking of him as a contemporary of Scott, and Cecil, and Simeon. Even a writer like Sir James Stephen, in an article contributed to the Edinburgh Review, speaks of him as the “last of four evangelical fathers,” of whom Scott, Newton, and Milner were the first three! All these ideas about Venn are totally inaccurate. The authors of them, I suspect, confound Henry Venn with his son John Venn of Clapham. Henry Venn belonged to an earlier generation, and was well known and popular long before Newton, or Scott, or Cecil, or Simeon, or Milner, were ever heard of.
To class him with these good men is an entire mistake. His true place is with Whitefield, and Wesley, and Grimshaw, and Rowlands, and Romaine, and Berridge. These were the men by whose side he labored. These were the men with whom he must be ranked. To clear up Henry Venn’s true history, and to convey some correct information about the main facts of his life and ministry, is the object that I set before me in the present memoir. Once for all, I wish it to be understood that the men I undertake to write about in this work are men of the last century. The men of the present century are men that I purposely leave alone.
Henry Venn was born at Barnes, in Surrey, on the 2nd of March 1724—within twenty-one years of the birth of John Wesley. He was the descendant of a long line of clergymen, reaching downwards in unbroken succession from the time of the Reformation. William Venn died vicar of Otterton, Devonshire, in 1621. Richard Venn, his son, succeeded him at Otterton; and after suffering greatly for his steadfast adherence to the Church of England in the Commonwealth times, died quietly in possession of his living. After him, his son, Dennis Venn, died vicar of Holberton, in Devonshire, in 1691. And finally his son, Richard Venn, rector of St. Antholin’s, in the City of London, was the father of the subject of this memoir. These facts are full of interest. At the present day the name of Venn has appeared for seven generations in the clergy list of the Church of England!
Henry Venn’s father is said to have been “an exemplary and learned minister, very zealous for the interests of the Church of England, and remarkable for great liberality towards the poor, and especially towards distressed clergymen.” Richard Venn died at the early age of forty-eight, when his son Henry was only fifteen years old.
The facts recorded about Henry Venn, as a boy, are few, but interesting. They are enough to show that from his earliest childhood he was a “thorough” and decided character, and one who never did anything by halves. In fact, Dr. Gloucester Ridley was so struck with his energy of character when young. that he said, “This boy will go up Holborn, and either stop at Ely Place (then the London palace of the Bishop of Ely), or go on to Tyburn!” (the place where criminals were hanged). The following three anecdotes will show what kind of a boy he was. I give them in his son’s own words: