Down with the kids

George Whitefield records a PS in one of his letters the persecution he received when he first preached in the fields:

I cannot help adding that several little boys and girls, who were fond of sitting around me on the pulpit while I preached and handed me people’s notes though they were ofte pelted with eggs and dirt, thrown at me – never once gave way; but on the contrary, every time I was struck, turned up their little weeping eyes, and seemed to wish they could receive the blows for me. God make them, in their growing years, great and living martyrs for him who, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, perfects praise.