“Bristol, September 4, 1780.
“My dear Brethren,—Let the persons, who purpose to subvert the Methodist plan, by mixing men and women together in your chapel, consider the consequence of so doing. First, I will never set foot in it more. Secondly, I will forbid any collection to be made for it in any of our societies.
“I am, my dear brethren, your affectionate brother,
“John Wesley.”
Two more letters, now for the first time given to the public, will be welcome. They were addressed to Samuel Bradburn, who had been three years in Ireland, and was now to remove to Keighley.
“Near Bristol, September 16, 1780.
“Dear Sammy,—I wanted to have Betsy” [Mrs. Bradburn] “a little nearer me. And I wanted her to be acquainted with her twin soul, Miss Ritchie, the fellow to whom I scarce know in England. But I do not like your crossing the sea till your children are a little stronger. If there was stormy weather, it might endanger their lives. Therefore, it is better you should stay in Ireland a little longer. Athlone circuit will suit you well; and John Bredin may be at Keighley in your place.
“Now read over the minutes concerning the office of an assistant, and exert yourself as to every branch of it. I fear the late assistant neglected many articles; dispersing the books in particular.
“My love to Betsy. Let her love Molly Pennington for my sake.
“I am, etc., J. Wesley.”
“London, October 28, 1780.
“Dear Sammy,—I am glad you are safe landed at Keighley. You will find there
“There are many amiable and gracious souls in Cork; but there are few in the whole kingdom of Ireland to be named, (either for depth of sense or grace,) with many, very many persons in Yorkshire, particularly the west riding. Go to Betsy Ritchie, at Otley, and then point me out such a young woman as she in Ireland.
“I think lemonade would cure any child of the flux.
“Now be exact in every branch of discipline; and you will soon find what a people you are among.
“I am, with tender love to Betsy, dear Sammy, your affectionate friend and brother,
“John Wesley.”
The following letter, kindly supplied by the Rev. Thomas W. Smith, and now for the first time published, was addressed “To Mr. Valton, at the preaching house, in Manchester.” Oldham Street chapel was now in course of erection, and was opened by Wesley seven months afterwards.
“Bristol, October 1, 1780.
“My dear Brother,—I expected the state of Manchester circuit to be just such as you have found it. But the power of the Lord is able to heal them. I fear S. Mayers was left unemployed, because she loved perfection. If you find a few more of the same spirit, I believe you will find them employment. The accommodations everywhere will mend, if the preachers lovingly exert themselves. I am glad you take some pains for the new chapel. Our brother Brocklehurst will do anything that is reasonable.
“In one thing only, you and I do not agree; but, perhaps, we shall when we have prayed over it: I mean, the giving me an extract of your life. I cannot see the weight of your reasons against it. ‘Some are superficial.’ What then? All are not; brother Mather’s and Haime’s in particular. Add one to these; a more weighty one, if you can. You know what to omit, and what to insert. I really think you owe it (in spite of shame and natural timidity) to God and me and your brethren. Pray for light in this matter.
“I am, your affectionate friend and brother,
“J. Wesley.”
The next, though short, is not devoid of interest. For the first time, it was published in the Watchman newspaper, as recently as October 12, 1870; and was written on the same day as the foregoing one.
“Bristol, October 1, 1780.
“My dear Brother,—Joseph Bradford has been at the gate of death; but is now so far recovered, that he thinks to set out to-morrow morning, with me and his wife, for London.
“Mr. Brackenbury likewise seems to be better, with regard to his bodily health; but he is married! And I shall not be much disappointed if he soon takes leave of the Methodists.
“I am, your affectionate brother,
“J. Wesley.”
The following, which has not before been published, is kindly furnished by Charles Reed, Esq., M.P.
“London, November 3, 1780.
“My dear Brother,—Disorderly walkers are better excluded than retained; and I am well satisfied you will exclude no others. I am glad you have made a beginning at Trowbridge. If it be possible, say not one offensive word. But you must declare the plain, genuine gospel; and, sooner or later, God will give you His blessing.
“I am, your affectionate friend and brother,
“J. Wesley.”
Another, equally characteristic, was sent to Zechariah Yewdall, stationed in “Glamorganshire” circuit, which extended (from Llanelly in Wales to Calvert in Gloucestershire) above a hundred miles, and was traversed regularly every month. Mr. Yewdall was now in the second year of his itinerancy, and, at Monmouth, had met with brutal treatment.[374] The letter also refers to the principle involved in Mr. M‘Nab’s affair.
“London, December 3, 1780.
“My dear Brother,—You mistake one thing. It is I, not the conference, (according to the twelfth rule,) that station the preachers; but I do it at the time of the conference, that I may have the advice of my brethren. But I have no thought of removing you from the Glamorganshire circuit; you are just in your right place. But you say, ‘Many of the people are asleep.’ They are; and you are sent to awaken them out of sleep. ‘But they are dead.’ True; and you are sent to raise the dead. Good will be done at Monmouth[375] and Neath in particular. Where no good can be done, I would leave the old, and try new places. But you have need to be all alive yourselves, if you would impart life to others. And this cannot be without much self denial.
“I am, dear Zachary, your affectionate brother,
“John Wesley.”[376]
After the conference at Bristol was concluded, Wesley set out for Cornwall. Some time before this, Sir Harry Trelawney, a student of Christ Church, Oxford, had become a zealous revivalist, and had begun to preach at West Looe, where, in 1777, he became the pastor of a congregation of his own raising, and which worshipped in a meetinghouse fitted up at his own expense. The novelty of the proceeding, and the rank of the preacher, created great excitement. Sir Harry, the descendant of one of the seven bishops who were committed to the Tower in the reign of James II., was made the hero of a witty book, written by a clergyman of the Church of England, and entitled, “The Spiritual Quixote; or the History of Geoffry Wildgoose, Esq.” 3 vols., 12mo: 1773. The preaching baronet vindicated his nonconformity in “A Letter addressed to the Rev. Thomas Alcock, Vicar of Runcorn.” For a time, the Rev. John Clayton was his assistant, but, in 1778, removed to the Weigh House congregation, in London. Soon after, Sir Harry returned to Oxford; procured ordination in the national establishment; was made a country rector in the west of England; whilst his chapel at West Looe was ignominiously changed into a house for converting barley into malt. He died in 1834.
It was about the time of Wesley’s visit to Cornwall, that he wrote the subjoined letter. Sir Harry had been a Calvinist, and had been patronised by the Countess of Huntingdon’s connexion; but, having renounced his Calvinian tenets, he was now regarded with disfavour. Some communication had passed between him and Wesley on the subject; Wesley knew his danger; and wrote to him as follows.
“For a long time, I have had a desire to see you, but could not find an opportunity. Indeed, I had reason to believe my company would not be agreeable; as you were intimate with those who think they do God service by painting me in the most frightful colours. It gives me much satisfaction to find, that you have escaped out of the hands of those warm men. It is not at all surprising, that they should speak a little unkindly of you too in their turn. It gave me no small satisfaction to learn from your own lips the falsehood of their allegation. I believed it false before, but could not affirm it so positively as I can do now.
“Indeed, it would not have been without precedent, if from one extreme you had run into another. This was the case with that great man, Dr. Taylor. For some years, he was an earnest Calvinist; but, afterwards, judging he could not go far enough from that melancholy system, he ran, not only into Arianism, but into the very dregs of Socinianism.
“You have need to be thankful on another account likewise; that is, that your prejudices against the Church of England are removing. Having had an opportunity of seeing several of the churches abroad, and having deeply considered the several sorts of Dissenters at home, I am fully convinced, that our own Church, with all her blemishes, is nearer the scriptural plan than any other in Europe.
“I sincerely wish you may retain your former zeal for God; only, that it may be a zeal according to knowledge. But there certainly will be a danger of your sinking into a careless, lukewarm state, without any zeal or spirit at all. As you were surfeited with an irrational, unscriptural religion, you may easily slide into no religion at all; or into a dead form, that will never make you happy either in this world, or in that which is to come.
“Wishing every spiritual blessing, both to Lady Trelawney and you,
“I am, dear sir, your affectionate servant,
“John Wesley.”[377]
Wesley, at the end of August, returned to Bristol, and here he spent the month of September. He then set out for London, which he reached on October 7. A week later he made a tour to Tunbridge Wells, and other towns in Kent. After this, we find him, as usual, visiting the societies in Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire, and Bedfordshire. The last month of the year was chiefly employed in London. He read to the society, and explained, the Large Minutes of conference, recently published; and wrote: “I desire to do all things openly and above board. I would have all the world, and especially all of our society, see not only the steps we take, but the reasons why we take them.” He visited Lord George Gordon in the Tower. He went with some of his friends to the British Museum. He wrote his well known sermon on “This is the true God and eternal life,” fully establishing the doctrine which Joseph Benson, at the conference, had been accused of denying—the Divinity of Christ.[378] He likewise wrote his “Thoughts upon Jacob Behmen,” allowing the Teuton to be a good man, but charging him with propounding “a crude, indigested philosophy, supported neither by Scripture, nor reason, nor anything but his own ipse dixit;” and with using “language that was never used since the world began, queerness itself, mere dog Latin.” “None,” says Wesley, “can understand it without much pains, perhaps not without reading him thrice over. I would not read him thrice over on any consideration. (1) Because it would be enough to crack any man’s brain to brood so long over such unintelligible nonsense; and (2) because such a waste of time might provoke God to give me up to a strong delusion to believe a lie.”[379]
Wesley concludes the year with the following entry in his journal. “Sunday, December 31—We renewed our covenant with God. We had the largest company that I ever remember; perhaps two hundred more than we had last year. And we had the greatest blessing. Several received either a sense of the pardoning love of God, or power to love Him with all their heart.”
Happy, happy old man! “I do not remember,” said he, only nine days before the year 1780 was ended, “I do not remember to have felt lowness of spirits for one quarter of an hour since I was born.”[380]
It only remains to notice Wesley’s publications in 1780; and this shall be done as briefly as possible. His letters on popery, his revised minutes of the conferences, and his Thoughts upon Behmen, have been already mentioned. Besides these, there were—
1. “Directions for Renewing our Covenant with God.” 12mo, 23 pages.
2. “Reflections on the Rise and Progress of the American Rebellion.” 12mo, 96 pages.
3. “The History of Henry, Earl Moreland.” Abridged. 2 vols., 12mo.
It has been already stated, that this was a novel, written by Mr. Brooke, and originally published, in five vols., in 1766, with the title, “The Fool of Quality.” Dr. Adam Clarke once stated, that Mr. Brooke’s nephew declared to him, that, “with the exception of a few touches of colouring, everything in the book was founded in fact—even the very incidents were facts.”[381] This might be so; but still the colouring made the work a fiction; and that an old evangelist, like Wesley, bordering on fourscore years of age, should revise, abridge, publish, and circulate a novel, has always been a perplexity to a certain section of Wesley’s admirers. John Easton, one of his itinerants, belonged to these. After John had very freely condemned the conduct of his great leader, Wesley proposed to him the following interrogations in reference to three of the personages in this remarkable book.
Wesley.—“Did you read Vindex, John?”
Easton.—“Yes, sir.”
W.—“Did you laugh, John?”
E.—“No, sir.”
W.—“Did you read Damon and Pythias, John?”
E.—“Yes, sir.”
W.—“Did you cry, John?”
E.—“No, sir.”
W., lifting up his eyes, and clasping his hands, exclaimed: “O earth—earth—earth!”[382]
Whatever may be thought and said on the general subject of novels and novel reading, all must admit, that “Henry, Earl Moreland,” is one of the most unexceptionable ever published. Wesley writes:
“I recommend it as the most excellent in its kind, that I have seen, either in the English or any other language. The lowest excellence therein is the style, which is not only pure in the highest degree, not only clear and proper, every word being used in its true genuine meaning, but frequently beautiful and elegant, and, where there is room for it, truly sublime. But what is of far greater value is the admirable sense, which is conveyed herein: as it sets forth in full view most of the important truths, which are revealed in the oracles of God. And these are not only well illustrated, but also proved in an easy, natural manner: so that the thinking reader is taught, without any trouble, the most essential doctrines of religion.
“But the greatest excellence of all in this treatise is, that it continually strikes at the heart. It perpetually aims at inspiring and increasing every right affection. And it does this, not by dry, dull, tedious precepts, but by the liveliest examples that can be conceived: by setting before your eyes one of the most beautiful pictures, that was ever drawn in the world. The strokes of this are so delicately fine, the touches so easy, natural, and affecting, that I know not who can survey it with tearless eyes, unless he has a heart of stone. I recommend it, therefore, to all those who are already, or desire to be, lovers of God and man.”
The whole of this is strictly accurate; and if this is not enough to justify Wesley in the eyes of faultfinders, like earthy John Easton, the task of doing so must be abandoned as a hopeless one. Besides, it may be added, that, if Wesley sinned, his successors copied his example; for, twenty-two years after Wesley’s death, the conference book-room published a fourth edition of the novel which Wesley first published in 1780.
4. “A Collection of Hymns for the use of the People called Methodists.” 12mo, 520 pages.
Up to this period, the hymns and the books used in Methodist congregations had been endlessly varying; now Wesley issued a book which, with slight alterations, has been used from that time to this; and prefixed the preface which has been read by millions; and from which, therefore, we must content ourselves with quoting only the concluding hint, which is far more needed now than even when first published.
“Many gentlemen have done my brother and me (though without naming us) the honour to reprint many of our hymns. Now they are perfectly welcome so to do, provided they print them just as they are. But I desire they would not attempt to mend them; for they really are not able. None of them is able to mend either the sense or the verse. Therefore, I must beg of them one of these two favours: either to let them stand just as they are, to take them for better for worse; or to add the true reading in the margin, or at the bottom of the page; that we may no longer be accountable either for the nonsense or for the doggerel of other men.”
5. Wesley’s only other publication, in 1780, was his Arminian Magazine, 8vo, 683 pages.[383] The work contains Goodwin’s Paraphrase on Romans ix.; an extract from Bird’s “Fate and Destiny, inconsistent with Christianity;” lives of Armelle Nicolas and Gregory Lopes; short accounts of Thomas Lee, Alexander Mather, John Haime, Thomas Mitchell, Thomas Taylor, Thomas Hanson, Thomas Hanby, and John Mason. There are about fifty valuable letters; and about seventy poetic pieces. Also Wesley’s “Thought on Necessity,” and “Thoughts upon Taste.”
To enlarge concerning these is superfluous. The volume was quite equal to the former ones; though Wesley confesses, that the portraits were not yet such as he desired; and declares, that he will have better, or none at all.
FOOTNOTES:
[356] Methodist Magazine, 1781, p. 295.
[357] Methodist Magazine, 1781, p. 352.
[358] As a specimen of popish jesuitry, it may be added, that O’Leary’s Remarks upon Wesley’s Letter were first printed in six successive numbers of the Freeman’s Journal; but were afterwards reprinted in London with the following title, “Mr. O’Leary’s Remarks on the Rev. Mr. Wesley’s Letter in Defence of the Protestant Associations in England, to which are prefixed Mr. Wesley’s Letters.” This was a popish deception, intended, no doubt, to cast upon Wesley the odium incurred by the Protestant Association during the Gordon riots. The truth is: (1) Wesley had not written more than a few lines in defence of the appeal of that Association. (2) His two replies to O’Leary, published in the Freeman’s Journal, were suppressed in O’Leary’s pamphlet. (3) A spurious letter was inserted, and palmed on the public as genuine, which Wesley declared was not his, and one which he had never seen before O’Leary printed it.—(Methodist Magazine, 1781, p. 295.)
[359] Methodist Magazine, 1853, p. 785.
[360] Manuscript.
[361] Methodist Magazine, 1853, p. 786.
[362] Banning’s Memoirs (private circulation).
[363] Wesley’s Works, vol. xii., p. 379.
[364] Jackson’s Life of C. Wesley, vol. ii., p. 327.
[365] Minutes of Methodist Conferences in America.
[366] Wesley’s Works, vol. xii., p. 137.
[367] Whitehead’s Life of Wesley, vol. ii., p. 392.
[368] Dr. Coke, a young man of thirty-three, displayed, at this period, a fussy officiousness, which scarcely redounded to his honour. He wrote to Bradburn, to the effect, that he suspected that he also was an Arian; though it was only four years before, that Thomas Taylor, at the London conference, had blamed Bradburn for “preaching too much on the Divinity of Christ, and for being too warm against the Arians.” (“Memoirs of Bradburn,” p. 225.) In an unpublished letter, addressed to Bradburn, and dated October, 1779, Wesley asks: “Is there any truth in the report that John Hampson has converted you to Arianism?”
[369] Benson’s Life, by Macdonald, p. 108.
[370] Wesley’s Works, vol. xii., p. 137.
[371] Manuscript letters.
[372] Methodist Magazine, 1845, p. 117.
[373] Minutes, 1780.
[374] Methodist Magazine, 1795, p. 268.
[375] Wesley’s words were verified. At Monmouth Mr. Yewdall was mobbed by a bellowing rabble; but the society increased one third.
[376] Wesley’s Works, vol. xiii., p. 10.
[377] Whitehead’s Life of Wesley, vol. ii., p. 395.
[378] Methodist Magazine, 1781, p. 189.
[379] Wesley’s Works, vol. ix., p. 491.
[380] Methodist Magazine, 1781, p. 185.
[381] Everett’s Life of Clarke.
[382] Ibid.
[383] I am not quite sure of this. In 1780, a 12mo tract of 12 pages was published with the following title:—“Jesus, altogether Lovely: or, a Letter to some of the Single Women of the Methodist Society. London: Printed by R. Hawes; and sold at the New Chapel, in the City Road; and at the Rev. Mr. Wesley’s Preaching Houses, in town and country. 1780.” The letter is dated, “Hoxton, March 10, 1763.” It enforces chastity, poverty, and obedience; and is written in a style strongly resembling Wesley’s.