Wesley spent the first two months of 1786 in London. He went to the House of Lords at the opening of parliament, and heard King George III. read the royal speech. He writes: “How agreeably was I surprised. He pronounced every word with exact propriety. I much doubt whether there be any other king in Europe, that is so just and natural a speaker.”

Wesley had a remarkable season at City Road. While preaching, the power of God came down; the preacher broke out in prayer; and the congregation burst into a loud and general cry.

Of his own religious feelings he wrote:

On February 26, Wesley set out, in a snowstorm, on a journey which occupied more than the next four months. His first halt was at Newbury, where he had “a large and serious congregation;” but where, he says, he passed such a night as he had not passed for forty years, his lodging room being as cold as the outward air. He writes: “I could not sleep at all till three in the morning. I rose at four, and set out at five.”

The next fortnight was spent at Bristol and in its vicinity. On Sunday, March 5, he went through an amount of labour which would have appalled most men half his age. “I read prayers,” says he, “and preached, and administered the sacrament to about five hundred communicants. At three, I preached in Temple church; at five in the New Room.”

Eight days later, he started off to Scotland, when the roads were blocked up with snow, and the weather intensely cold. More than a week was spent at Birmingham: during which he had another sacramental service, as large as that at Bristol; and preached at Madeley a funeral sermon for the sainted Fletcher, taking as his text Revelation xiv. 1–7.⁠[543] At Lane End, after it was dark, and in a piercingly cold wind, he says: “I was constrained to preach abroad; and none of us seemed to regard the weather, for God warmed our hearts.” At Burslem, in the same inclement season, the congregation was such, that the venerable preacher was obliged again to take his stand in the open air. After preaching at Congleton, Macclesfield, and other places, he came to Chapel-en-le-Frith, where a large number had been converted, but who needed discipline. He writes: “Frequently three or four, yea, ten or twelve, pray aloud all together. Some of them, perhaps many, scream all together as loud as they possibly can. Some use improper, yea, indecent, expressions in prayer. Several drop down as dead, and are as stiff as a corpse; but, in a while, they start up, and cry, ‘Glory! Glory!’ perhaps twenty times together. Just so do the French prophets, and very lately the jumpers, in Wales, bring the real work into contempt. Yet, whenever we reprove them, it should be in the most mild and gentle manner possible.”

At Bolton, he had, in his congregation, five hundred and fifty children, all scholars in the Methodist Sunday-school; and it was either now, or soon after, that he preached to them a sermon, from Psalm xxxiv. 11, in which he engaged to use no word of more than two syllables, and literally fulfilled his pledge.⁠[544]

His congregations throughout Lancashire, and the west riding of Yorkshire, were enormous, often compelling him to preach out of doors. His popularity was greater than ever. Churches were offered for his use; and accepted, at Haworth, Bingley, Heptonstall, Todmorden, Horsforth, and York. Persecution had ceased; and everywhere the Christian veteran was greeted with the welcomes of admiring and loving crowds.

Leaving York on the 8th of May, Wesley, for the first time, visited the town of Easingwold, where was a class of seventeen members, the leader of which was John Barber;⁠[545] and where a chapel had been built, costing £140, only half of which was paid.⁠[546] To open this was the object of Wesley’s visit.

He then proceeded to Scotland, where the Methodists were now really a distinct and separated church; for not only had Hanby, Pawson, and others been ordained, and invested with gown and bands, but sacraments were administered; and, while society tickets admitted to society meetings and the lovefeasts, circular metal tokens seemed to become the badge of church membership, having on one side the letters “M. C.,” and on the other the words, “Do this in remembrance of Me.” The tokens admitted the owners to the table of the Lord.

On the 1st of June, Wesley laid the foundation stone of a new chapel at Alnwick; and, on the following Sunday, preached three times out of doors, to vast congregations, at Gateshead and Newcastle.

On the 5th of June, he set out southwards. Pursuing his usual route, he came to Hull, a fortnight afterwards, and, at the vicar’s invitation, preached twice to immense crowds “in one of the largest parish churches in England.” The next day, he rode seventy-six miles, and preached at Malton, Pocklington, and Swinfleet. “Sufficient,” says he, “for this day was the labour thereof; but still I was no more tired than when I rose in the morning.” Can such a fact as this be paralleled? The day after, he preached at Crowle, and Epworth; and the next day after that, at Scotter, Brigg, and Grimsby. At Louth, for the first time, he saw the people “affected.” At Gainsborough, his old friend, Sir Nevil Hickman, was dead; but he made the yard of his house his preaching place. On Saturday and Sunday, June 24 and 25, he preached at New Inn, Newark, Retford, Misterton, Overthorpe, and Epworth, six times, at six different towns, in two days, the preacher himself eighty-three years of age!

He writes: “1786, June 30—I turned aside to Barnsley, formerly famous for all manner of wickedness. They were then ready to tear any Methodist preacher to pieces. Now not a dog wagged his tongue. I preached near the market place to a large congregation; and, I believe, the word sunk into many hearts; they seemed to drink in every word. Surely God will have a people in this place.”

Wesley might well speak of the brutal wickedness of Barnsley. Three years before, a man resolved to murder Henry Longden, ran up to him while preaching, aimed a blow which would probably have been fatal, but Longden leaped aside, and providentially escaped.⁠[547] On another occasion, Jeremiah Cocker, while preaching in the market place, was pulled down, dragged through the streets, and pelted with rotten eggs, one of which had a dead gosling in it. Cocker applied to the vicar of Sheffield for protection; the rioters were committed for trial at the Rotherham sessions; but were acquitted, on the ground that, though the preacher was licensed to preach, the spot he chose was not licensed as a preaching place! Here John Barber, a few months before Wesley’s visit, was saluted with a shower of stones, was seriously hurt, and was rescued by a friendly quaker, who lived in “Barnsley Folly.” At another time, a mob, of some hundreds, assembled with cows’ horns, drums, and other noisy instruments, and most effectually prevented the preacher being heard. Mr. Raynor, a currier, having lent his house for preaching, the Barnsley roughs made a bonfire at the door, compelled the congregation to seek egress by some other way, and pelted them most mercilessly with filth of the foulest kind. Such are specimens of the treatment received by the poor Methodists in Barnsley, between the years 1780 and 1786. The society was small, not numbering a dozen members; and they had no preaching room, except Raynor’s house, till about 1792, when Alexander Mather secured a small chamber over a weaver’s shop in Church Street.⁠[548]

From Barnsley, Wesley went to Sheffield, where he selected as his text, “It is high time to awake out of sleep”; and an anonymous hearer sent him a letter, saying, that he could remember nothing that he said, except that “rising early was good for the nerves!” Here he spent several days, held the quarterly meeting and a lovefeast, administered the sacrament to six or seven hundred persons, visited Wentworth House, baptized Joseph Benson’s infant daughter,⁠[549] and was Mr. Holy’s guest. After preaching, crowds were wont to follow him to his hospitable lodging; the streets were lined, and the windows of the houses thronged with eager but respectful gazers, Wesley all the while emptying his pockets in scattering gifts among the poor. A vast concourse of people assembled on the green, at the front of Mr. Holy’s house; Wesley walked into the midst of them, knelt down, and asked God to bless them. The place became a Bochim; the crowd wept and literally wailed at the thought of losing him; he prayed again; and then darted into Mr. Holy’s dwelling, and hid himself.⁠[550] What a contrast to the reception given to his brother in 1743!

His visit to Wentworth House has been mentioned. It is a curious fact, but attentive readers of Wesley’s journal will easily perceive, that, as Wesley grew older, he took far more interest in visiting scenes of beauty and historic buildings than he did in the earlier parts of his illustrious career. How to account for this, we know not; but so it was.

Tradition says, that Wesley was accompanied by Mr. Birks, of Thorpe, and that, when they were leaving, Mr. Birks asked Mr. Hall, the steward, if it would be agreeable for Mr. Wesley to pray with the family before he left. Permission was courteously given; the household were summoned; and Wentworth House was none the worse for the prayer which the arch Methodist offered beneath its roof.

From Sheffield, Wesley proceeded, by way of Belper and Derby, to Ilkestone. This was his first and last visit to the last mentioned town, and the circumstances connected with it are worth relating. For many years, the only Methodist in Ilkestone had been a poor old woman. The preachers preached, but, apparently, without effect. At length, the old woman died, and John Crook resolved to preach a funeral sermon. A large congregation assembled at the front of a public house. Mr. Crook stood upon a stone used by travellers for mounting horses. The sermon was worthy of the Methodist apostle of the Isle of Man; and, at its close, the preacher received a message from the vicar of the parish, requesting him to wait upon him next morning. John went, and was received with kindness. “Sir,” said the clergyman, “I heard you preach last night with pleasure; in what college were you educated?” “I never attended college,” was the answer. “Sir,” rejoined the vicar, “I have heard many of the heads of our universities preach, but I never heard a defence of our establishment equal to yours. You are welcome to my pulpit next Sunday.” Crook replied, that he was not ordained; and proposed that, instead of preaching within the church, he should preach at the church’s door. The proposal was accepted; the vicar published from the pulpit the intended service; the itinerant selected as his text, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; he that believeth not shall be damned;” under that sermon, the priest was deeply convinced of sin, and next Sunday told his congregation, that he was an earnest seeker of salvation; he learnt that Crook was one of Wesley’s preachers, and sent to Wesley an invitation;⁠[551] and here, on Thursday July 6, we find him. He writes: “Though the church is large, it was sufficiently crowded. The vicar read prayers with great earnestness and propriety; I preached; and the people seemed all ear. Surely good will be done in this place; though it is strongly opposed both by the Calvinists and Socinians.”

Good was done. Among Wesley’s hearers was a joiner, Richard Birch. Wesley’s discourse reached his heart. He was converted; and, finding that there was in the town a class of four Methodists, he became the fifth; and, before the year expired, he and his friends built a chapel.

Wesley arrived in London, after an absence of nearly twenty weeks, on July 13. Four days were spent in town, and then he started off again to Bristol, for the purpose of holding his annual conference. He writes:

Separation from the Church was again the great question of the day. From the above extract, taken from his journal, it is evident, that Wesley was more than apprehensive that such a separation would occur subsequent to his decease; but it is equally evident, that he was glad to have it postponed till then. In an unpublished letter to Thomas Taylor, dated February 21, 1786, he writes: “The wise bishop Gibson once said, ‘Why cannot these gentlemen leave the Church? Then they could do no more harm.’ Read ‘no more good,’ and it would have been a truth. I believe, if we had then left the Church, we should not have done a tenth of the good which we have done. But I do not insist upon this head. I go calmly and quietly on my way, doing what I conceive to be the will of God. I do not, will not, concern myself with what will be done when I am dead. I take no thought about that. If I did, I should probably shut myself up at Kingswood or Newcastle, and leave you all to yourselves.”

“I love the Church,” said Wesley to his brother, in letters written during the spring of 1786, “as sincerely as ever I did; and I tell our societies everywhere, ‘The Methodists will not leave the Church, at least while I live.’” “Eight or ten preachers, it is probable (but I have not met with one yet), will say something about leaving the Church, before the conference. It is not improbable many will be driven out of it where there are Calvinist ministers.”

Such were Wesley’s wishes, and such were his apprehensions. Wesley expected eight or ten of his preachers to bring the business before conference. This was done by Dr. Coke, who had returned from his episcopal tour in the United States. Mr. Pawson writes:

This debate seems to have issued in the adoption of a document, which Wesley drew up three days before the conference met.

Considering the character of not a few of the ministers of the Church of England in 1786; remembering the number of pulpits from which were preached Arianism, and especially Calvinism, both of which the Methodists considered “pernicious doctrines”; and, further, bearing in mind, the scanty provision made by the Established Church for the great populations, these concessions, in reference to having Methodist services in church hours, were really much more extensive than, at first sight, appears.

This was the last conference at which Charles Wesley was present. At its conclusion, he preached from his favourite text, “I will bring the third part through the fire;” and told the congregation, that, after the death of himself and his brother, there would be a split among the Methodists, and not more than a third part of the preachers and of the people would remain faithful to the Established Church. Upon these, however, God would pour out His Spirit more abundantly than ever, and His work would prosper in their hands. “This,” said he, “was the case with the Moravians when Count Zinzendorf died. So it was when Mr. Whitefield was removed; and thus it will be with the Methodists.”⁠[553]

Before the conference was concluded, Charles Wesley wrote as follows to the Rev. Mr. Latrobe, Moravian minister in London:

Other matters were debated at the conference of 1786. The old rules respecting the windows, doors, and pews of chapels were to be strictly observed and kept; and no assistant was to allow collections for a new chapel, “till every step had been taken to secure it, on the conference plan, by a trust deed, a bond, or sufficient articles of agreement.” And Wesley concluded by giving the following advices to the preachers. (1) To re-establish morning preaching, in all large towns, at least; and to exert themselves in restoring the bands, and the select societies. (2) Always to conclude the service in about an hour. (3) Never to scream. (4) Never to lean upon, or beat the Bible. (5) Wherever they preached, to meet the society. (6) Not to go home at nights, except in cases of the utmost necessity. (7) Never to preach funeral sermons, but for eminently holy persons, to preach none for hire, and to beware of panegyric, particularly in London. (8) To hold more lovefeasts. (9) To introduce no new tunes; to see that none sing too slow, and that the women sing their parts; and to exhort all to sing, and all to stand at singing, as well as to kneel at prayers. (10) To let none repeat the last line, unless the preacher does. And, (11) To inform the leaders, that every assistant is to change both the stewards and the leaders when he sees good; and that no leader has power to put any person either into or out of the society.

Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and Antigua were now Methodist circuits, and had, unitedly, nine itinerant preachers, and 2179 members of society. These were Methodist missions, though not designated such. And here let it be remarked, that the Methodist Missionary Society was really founded in 1784. Where is the proof of this?

The following is an exact copy of a printed document, kindly lent by the Rev. G. Mather, and addressed, by Dr. Coke, to “The Rev. Mr. Fletcher, at Madeley, near Shiffnal, Cheshire.”

Such was the first Methodist missionary report ever published. On the third page of the folio sheet, from which the above is taken, is the following in manuscript.

A few months after the above report was sent to Fletcher, Coke set sail to America, and returned only in time to attend the English conference of 1785. Henceforward, Christian missions absorbed his time and energies.

It is a well known fact, that Warren Hastings was the first governor general of India; and that, in 1786, his celebrated trial was commenced, and was protracted for nearly eight years, during which one hundred and forty days were spent in its prosecution. Space forbids further remarks concerning this great event; but the excitement created in England by the affairs of India had, doubtless, something to do with the following correspondence between Dr. Coke and a gentleman in that country. Coke had written to him as early as 1784, respecting the establishment of missions in India, and now his correspondent replied. He sympathises with Coke’s proposal, but foresees the arduous character of the undertaking. He writes: “The leading features in the character of the Mahommedans are pride and cruelty, treachery and love of power; and those of the Hindoos, abject servility, cunning, lying, dishonesty, and excessive love of money.” “Humanly speaking, the probabilities of converting either the Hindoos or Mahommedans appear to be very small.” Reasons are assigned for this, showing the writer to be a well informed and accomplished man. He proceeds to say: “The difficulties are great; greater it may be, in some respects, than were those of the first preachers among the freer and more polished people of the Roman empire. Nevertheless, the same Divine power that then made a few obscure, and, for the most part, unlearned men, triumph over the united resistance of the spiritual, secular, and carnal powers of this world, remains unchanged.”

Coke answered this long and able letter, on January 25, 1786, and said:

For want of means, India had to be abandoned; but, in the month of March, Coke issued “An Address to the Pious and Benevolent, proposing an annual subscription for the support of Missionaries in the Highlands and adjacent Islands of Scotland, the isles of Jersey, Guernsey, and Newfoundland, the West Indies, and the provinces of Nova Scotia and Quebec;” to which was prefixed the following letter by Wesley.

Coke commenced his Address as follows.

He then explains the openings in the places already mentioned. The address is dated March 13, 1786.⁠[557]

In this way, Methodist missions were fairly started; and, on September 24, 1786, Coke set sail, with Messrs. Hammet, Warrener, and Clarke; Warrener being intended for Antigua; and Clarke and Hammet for Newfoundland.⁠[558]

Messrs. Garretson and Black were already labouring in Nova Scotia, and, to them, Wesley addressed the following letters.

Both the above were addressed to Garretson; the following was sent to Black.

Wesley’s correspondence is so vast, that selection is difficult; but two or three other letters, written in 1786, may be given here. The first was sent to Mr. Lawrence Frost, of Liverpool, with a request that it might be handed to the mayor, and has not been previously published. One of Wesley’s preachers had been interrupted while preaching to a large multitude, near the old Fishstones, and Wesley wrote to the chief magistrate as follows.

The letter was effectual. Ever afterwards, the constables were civil, and wisely let the Methodists alone.

William Simpson was one of Wesley’s itinerants, and, at this time, was assistant in the Thirsk circuit, where he had to contend with troubles somewhat different to those at Liverpool, but for which Wesley prescribed as sharp a remedy. In the month of November, he wrote him as follows.

We must now return to Wesley’s journal. A week after the conclusion of the Bristol conference, he set sail for Holland, accompanied by Messrs. Broadbent and Brackenbury. There he mingled with many Christian friends; gave many Scripture expositions in private houses; saw many scenes of beauty; and employed all his leisure hours in writing. On September 5, he returned to London, where he spent two days in preaching and answering letters; and then set off to Bristol, where he continued till September 26, when he got back to London, and naively wrote: “I now applied myself in earnest to the writing of Mr. Fletcher’s life, having procured the best materials I could. To this I dedicated all the time I could spare, till November, from five in the morning till eight at night. These are my studying hours; I cannot write longer in a day without hurting my eyes.” We should think not! Fifteen hours a day of unintermitting labour in the case of a man eighty-three years of age! “Once or twice,” he wrote on December 12, “Once or twice, I have been a little out of order this autumn; but it was only for a day or two at a time. In general, my health has been better for these last ten years, than it ever was for ten years together since I was born. Ever since that good fever, which I had in the north of Ireland, I have had, as it were, a new constitution. All my pains and aches have forsaken me, and I am a stranger even to weariness of any kind. This is the Lord’s doing, and it may well be marvellous in all our eyes.”⁠[563]

At the beginning of October, he went on a preaching excursion to Chatham and Sheerness. Then he set off to Norfolk; and, on his way back to town, preached Mrs. Shewell’s funeral sermon at Barnet. At this period, the father of the late Rev. Dr. Leifchild was the chief Methodist in Barnet, and the doctor himself a little boy. “Upon arriving,” wrote this distinguished minister, “he drove to my father’s house; and, when the door of his carriage was opened, he came out arrayed in his canonicals. Childlike, I ran to lay hold of him, but my father pulled me back; upon which, extending his hand, he said: ‘Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.’”

The next five weeks were spent in London, partly in preaching, partly in meeting classes, and partly in writing Fletcher’s Life. The only holiday he took was a trip to Hampton Court, which he pronounced “the finest palace the king of England had”; but even this was scarcely a holiday, for he preached at Wandsworth on his way back to town. He had a brush with the Deptford Methodists, who urgently requested to be allowed to have service in the Methodist chapel at the same time as there was service in the church. “It is easy to see,” he writes, “that this would be a formal separation from the Church. We fixed both our morning and evening service, all over England, at such hours as not to interfere with the Church; with this very design,—that those of the Church, if they chose it, might attend both the one and the other. But to fix it at the same hour is obliging them to separate either from the Church or us; and this I judge to be, not only inexpedient, but totally unlawful for me to do.” This style of reasoning can only be harmonized with the enactments of the previous conference, on the supposition that the Church minister at Deptford was not such as Wesley then described.

Wesley concluded the year by preaching from, “Set thy house in order,” and, among other things, strongly exhorted the people to make their wills.

Except the Life of Fletcher, 12mo, 227 pages, Wesley seems to have published nothing, in 1786, but his Arminian Magazine, 8vo, 688 pages.

The volume bears the same character as previous ones. There are again six original sermons by Wesley: the Church; Divine Providence; Schism; Friendship with the World; Visiting the Sick; and the Eternity of God. The sermon on the Church was a sermon for the times; and, remembering the agitation among the Methodists on the subject of separation, an extract here will not be out of place.