There are some circumstances respecting the succeeding Memoirs which require explanation, and others which need statement.
"If these Memoirs were written by the late Dr. Clarke, how happens it that they speak in the third person, and appear as though composed by an intimate friend?" -- The third person was assumed in order to obviate an unpleasant appearance of egotism which Autobiography must always assume, more or less offensive, according to the skill of the Narrator. In this, Dr. Clarke did but follow the example of other great names, and availed himself of a disguise, previously made known to the Readers, that the mere Individual might not be perpetually obtruding himself upon their notice: the attention being fixed upon the passing events and described feelings, the Author temporarily forgotten, the judgment may be thus formed, not from the bias of Dr. Clarke's felt presence, but from the facts as recorded in the Narrative:-- a mask which gives courage but conceals no feature.
Various members of his family, as well as some of his most intimate friends, frequently and urgently pressed Dr. Clarke to publish, or prepare for publication, a Memoir of himself; stating that this would be the only effectual mode of preventing false or weak productions being palmed upon the world as faithful Memoirs. To all representations, however, he remained deaf, till one day a friend came and told him, "he had received sure information of a Life of him being even then in preparation; that all his Conversations had been taken down, all his Letters treasured up, all his observations noted, with the view of being embodied when the anticipated event should take place to call them into public being; that little discretion would be used in selecting; since, the object being gain, all would be published which would sell; and that even were some conscience shown, still there was no judgment to direct; but indiscreet zeal, or the hope of 'ungodly gains' would slay his fame in the house of his friend." * Dr. Clarke felt the force of such observations, and the next morning when he came down to breakfast, he said to his friend, "I have been up long before day, and have written several quarto sheets of my very close and small writing as a commencement of the history of my early life." This he continued, at various short intervals, till be brought it down to a period beyond which no inducement or solicitation could persuade him to proceed, "My early life" [much in this manner he would speak] "no one can know; nor can any one describe my feelings and God's dealings with my soul, some of which are the most important circumstances in my life, and are of most consequence to the religious world:-- these I have now secured, and placed in their proper light: -- what therefore others could neither have known nor described so truly as I, are here prevented from being lost:-- my public life many have known, and it is before the world; if it be of importance, there will be found some who will transmit its events to posterity; and being passed before the eyes of all men, should there be misrepresentations, there will necessarily be plenty who can correct them: at any rate, I have done what I feel to be the most important part; for the rest, there are ample materials; and, as the living will, in all probability, write of the dead, let my survivors do their part. -- Nothing shall ever induce me to write the history of that portion of my life when I began to acquire fame, and great and learned men saw fit to dignify with their acquaintance, and to bestow honors and distinctions on, a Methodist Preacher. In this resolution he never for a moment wavered, and hence there was no more of his Life written by himself than what is contained in the present volume.