By a curious coincidence he had only a few years before preached
the sermon when Colenso was consecrated in Westminster Abbey, and
one passage in it may be cited as showing the preacher's gift of
prophecy both hortatory and predictive. Wilberforce then said to
Colenso: "You need boldness to risk all for God--to stand by the
truth and its supporters against men's threatenings and the
devil's wrath;... you need a patient meekness to bear the galling
calumnies and false surmises with which, if you are faithful, that
same Satanic working, which, if it could, would burn your body,
will assuredly assail you daily through the pens and tongues of
deceivers and deceived, who, under a semblance of a zeal for Christ,
will evermore distort your words, misrepresent your motives, rejoice
in your failings, exaggerate your errors, and seek by every poisoned
breath of slander to destroy your powers of service."[[355]]
Unfortunately, when Colenso followed this advice his adviser became
the most untiring of his persecutors.
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