We shrink from the task of so closely annexing to such a stanza, the first, and by far the least objectionable, lines of the ribald poem of “The Serpent and the Fox”; but historical fidelity compels us.

Then follows a conversation, in which Wesley proposes to burn the Calvinists in Smithfield, as Bonner once burnt the protestants, and the devil promises, that, while Wesley shall be exalted “with state” to heaven’s “third storey,” all the Whitefields and Hills shall be “turned back from the gate.”

Quantum sufficit! of Rowland Hill, both in prose and verse. What had Wesley to say to all this? In his journal he writes: “1777, June 26—I read the truly wonderful performance of Mr. Rowland Hill. I stood amazed! Compared to him, Mr. Toplady himself is a very civil, fair spoken gentleman! June 27—I wrote an answer to it; ‘not rendering railing for railing’ (I have not so learned Christ); but ‘speaking the truth in love.’”

Wesley’s reply was a penny tract of 12 pages, 12mo, with the title, “An Answer to Mr. Rowland Hill’s Tract, entitled, ‘Imposture Detected.’” He begins as follows: “In the tract just published by Mr. Rowland Hill, there are several assertions which are not true. And the whole pamphlet is wrote in an unchristian and ungentlemanly manner. I shall first set down the assertions in order, and then proceed to the manner.” This is the strongest language Wesley uses. Indeed, he writes as though Hill’s pamphlet amused him rather than otherwise. Some of his friends, however, were not so lenient. Thomas Olivers rushed to the rescue, with his characteristic fire, and unmercifully put into the hands of the public a sixpenny “Rod for the Reviler”; and Matthew Goodenough, a mechanic, of Bishopsgate Street, published “A Letter to Mr. Rowland Hill,” 12mo, 21 pages, in which he tells “the reviler” that he had used a vindictive style of which a chimney sweep might properly be ashamed; and, from his malign spirit and rude manner of attacking Mr. Wesley, he might be mistaken for the chief of Billingsgate. Hill, as a preacher, is taunted with ranting, and roaring, and squealing, and bawling, and twisting, and twirling himself about like a merryandrew; and is told that, though “a Pelagian Methodist stinks,” it was a comfort that the name of Rowland Hill was “an odoriferous perfume, a charming nosegay, diffusing its fragrance wherever it appears, and sweetly and effectually extinguishing the fœtid exhalations of Pelagian ordure!”

Not only in the Welsh cobbler, but in the Bishopsgate mechanic, Rowland met with an Oliver; but, like a beaten bull dog, was not satisfied. He at once issued another octavo pamphlet of 45 pages, entitled, “A Full Answer to the Rev. J. Wesley’s Remarks,” etc., in which he humbly apologises for using too strong language in his former pamphlet; and yet, with a strange inconsistency, commits the same fault in this. Wesley is again accused of “pompous falsehood,” “barefaced untruth,” “ungodly craft,” “of calumniating the living, and traducing the dead.” “For full thirty years, Wesley had been travelling towards Trent, and was now got to his journey’s end”; while Fletcher—​poor Fletcher, apparently dying of consumption—​had “published, at the end of his third volume, a most horrible manifesto, in language almost blasphemous, and had forged my brother’s name” (Sir Richard Hill), “and mine, at the conclusion of it.”

But here we must leave this doughty warrior, to whom the very name of Wesley was what a scarlet cloak is to an infuriated bull. Some will object to the reviving of these disgraceful reminiscences. Our reiterated answer is, that, without them, it is impossible for the reader rightly to estimate the character of Wesley. If they reflect dishonour on Rowland Hill, we cannot help it. Rowland Hill was a public man, and, like all other public men, he must be content to pay a public penalty for his public crimes. Unfortunately, this is not the last we shall hear of him.

Besides those already mentioned, Wesley published, in 1777⁠—

1. The sermon he preached, on April 21, at the laying of the foundation stone of City Road chapel. 12mo, 47 pages.

2. An Extract from his Journal, from September 2, 1770, to September 12, 1773. 12mo, 119 pages.

3. “A Short Account of the Death of Elizabeth Hindmarsh,” a native of Alnwick, “who died September 6, 1777, in the twenty-first year of her age.” 12mo, 12 pages.

4. “Thoughts upon God’s Sovereignty.” 12mo, 11 pages.

5. “A Sermon, preached November 23, 1777, in Lewisham Church, before the Humane Society.” 12mo, 24 pages.