This license to the curacy must not be confounded with his appointment, more than three years afterwards, to the vicarage of Madeley. Fletcher has no history as curate of Madeley. The appointment was in fact a nominal one, for it is tolerably certain that he exercised no spiritual function whatever in Madeley for at least two years after his ordination. The title to orders was probably given to him by the Rev. Rowland Chambre, then Vicar of Madeley, at Mr. Hill's request, with the understanding that the curacy should be only nominal. The position of chaplain and tutor in Mr. Hill's family, though not furnishing a legal title to orders, would be considered equivalent to a cure of souls. The fact that he was ordained deacon and priest on two consecutive Sundays, the customary interval of a year being dispensed with, may be ascribed either to the influence of Mr. Hill, or of Wesley himself; or it may be taken as proof that his character was admittedly high, and that in his examination or interviews with the bishop, he had shown himself exceptionally well qualified, both intellectually and morally.
His connexion with Mr. Hill's family drew to its close. It did not afford him the sphere for Christian work that he desired, ind involved him in occasional embarrassments and difficulties. Mr. Hill was uniformly kind, but he feared that the scandal of Methodism attaching to his tutor would injure him at the next election. The neighbouring clergy for the most part fought shy of Fletcher, so that he had few opportunities of preaching in their churches. But the one compensation for these restrictions was found in the devout retirement he loved so well. He writes to Wesley: "The will of God be done: I am in His hands; and if He does not call me to so much public duty, I have the more time for study, prayer, and praise." He seems to have been conscious that it was a time of discipline and preparation with him, and until the indications of God's will were plain, he would not seek release from a position where the providence of God had placed him.
Meanwhile, as his tutorship became less and less satisfactory as a vocation, his connexion with the Methodists opened up to him new labours and new friendships. Immediately upon his ordination Fletcher was drawn into the full stream of the Revival, and brought into active association with its leaders. His very first ministerial act, on the day that he was ordained priest, was to assist Wesley in the administration of the Lord's supper at Snowsfields chapel; and from that time he frequently read prayers and preached in the Methodist chapels in London. He made the acquaintance of Charles Wesley and Whitefield, of the Countess of Huntingdon, of Berridge, Vicar of Everton, of Thomas Walsh, and of some of the devout women who were not least among the glories of early Methodism, including Mary Bosanquet, who, many years afterwards, became his wife. By these and others Fletcher was received with no common welcome. Wesley himself wrote in his "Journal," "When my bodily strength failed, and none in England were able and willing to assist me, He sent me help from the mountains of Switzerland, and a helpmeet for me in every respect; where could I find such another?" A little later the Countess of Huntingdon wrote to a friend: "I have seen Mr. Fletcher, and was both pleased and refreshed by the interview. He was accompanied by Mr. Wesley, who had frequently mentioned him in terms of high commendation, as had Mr. Whitefield, Mr. Charles Wesley, and others, so that I was anxious to become acquainted with one so devoted, and who appears to glory in nothing, save in the Cross of our Divine Lord and Master."