• 
• 
• 
• 

Introduction

In spite of stiff opposition from his congregation at Trinity Church, Cambridge, Charles Simeon preached an evangelical gospel. His zeal caused unsympathetic trustees to lock him out of his own church building a few times but also produced a crop of evangelical graduates at nearby Cambridge University, men who became notable churchmen, chaplains, and missionaries. Simeon had too much faith to allow himself to be restricted merely to stiff and formal performance of his priestly duties. On this day, March 8, 1780, he confided to his diary,