Ryle on Whitefield

J.C. Ryle in his book Christian Leaders (1869) writes about how the clergy in England responded to the preaching of George Whitefield:

"The clergy, with a few honourable exceptions, refused entirely to countenance this strange preacher. In the true spirit of the dog in the manger, they neither liked to go after the semi-heathen masses of population themselves, nor liked anyone else to do the work for them . . . The plain truth is, that the Church of England of that day was not ready for a man like Whitefield. The Church was too much asleep to understand him, and was vexed at a man who would not keep still and let the devil alone."