1751.

1751
Age 48

THE year upon which we are now entering was one of vast anxiety and trouble, and, of course, like previous years, was characterized by unceasing activity on the part of the great chiefs of the Methodist movement. Charles Wesley was from four to five months in London, about the same in Bristol, and spent the rest in an important visit to the numerous societies in the midland counties and the north of England. Whitefield gave the first two months of the year to the metropolis, the next three to the west of England and to Wales, more than two to Ireland and Scotland, and then, in August, set sail for America. Wesley himself spent eight months in itinerancy, and the rest in London.

Moravianism was more than ever a vexata quæstio. Whitefield, in a letter dated March 30, 1751, remarks:—“I doubt not but there are many holy souls among the Moravians; but their not preaching the law, either as a schoolmaster to show us our need of Christ, or as a rule of life, after we have closed with Him, is what I can in nowise concur with. These their two grand mistakes, together with their unscriptural expressions in their hymns, and several superstitious fopperies lately intruded among them, make me think they are sadly departed from the simplicity of the gospel.”[108]

A friend, writing to Wesley, at the commencement of the year, observes:—

“No doubt God had wise ends in permitting the Unitas Fratrum to appear, just as the people of God began to unite together; but we cannot fathom His designs. Very probably we should have been now a very different people from what we are, had we had only our own countrymen to cope with. We should then have set the plain gospel of Christ against what is palpably another gospel. But this subtle poison has more or less infected almost all among us. We would put gospel heads on bodies ready to indulge unholy tempers. Although as a society we stand as clear of joining with the Beast as any other, yet we have not purged out all his leaven; the antinomian leaven is not yet cast out. All our preaching at first was pointed at the heart; and in almost all our private conversation, ‘Do you feel the love of God in your heart? Does His Spirit reign there? Do you walk in the Spirit? Is that mind in you which was in Christ?’ were frequent questions among us. But while these preachers to the heart were going on gloriously in the work of Christ, the false apostles stepped in, laughed at all heart work, and laughed many of us out of our spiritual senses; for, according to them, we were neither to see, hear, feel, nor taste the powers of the world to come, but to rest contented with what was done for us seventeen hundred years ago. ‘The dear Lamb,’ said they, ‘has done all for us; we have nothing to do, but to believe.’ Here was a stroke at the whole work of God in the heart! And ever since, this German spirit has wrought among us, and caused many to rest in a barren, notional faith, void of that inward power of God unto salvation.”

One of the Moravians themselves, who had been the physician in one of their religious houses, and had also been a preacher among them both at home and abroad, and who, with his wife, still attended their services, informed Wesley of his own knowledge of sensual abominations practised by the brethren and sisters at Leeds and Bedford, which, though referred to in Wesley’s Journal, we shall not pollute our pages by printing. No wonder, after Wesley had committed the man’s statement to writing, and had submitted it to him for his own correction, he should exclaim in a burst of sorrowful indignation, “Was there ever so melancholy an account? and what is human nature! How low are they fallen, who were once burning and shining lights, spreading blessings wherever they came!”

Wesley has oft been blamed for speaking far too harshly of his old Moravian friends; but those who blame him are either ignorant of facts like those alluded to above, or they wickedly wink at their existence. Moravianism in England, in 1751, had become, to a great extent, a luscious morsel of antinomian poison; and it was a painful knowledge of this distressing fact, which led Wesley to adopt the course he did.

One pamphlet, published at the close of 1750, has not been mentioned, though there is little doubt that Wesley was its author. His name does not appear; but that was not unusual, for many of his tracts and pamphlets were printed without his name, or with his initials only. The preface is dated “London, October 2, 1750,” though Wesley then had retired for a month to Kingswood, for the purpose of writing books. The style is his to a nicety, and the most incredulous will find it difficult to doubt that Wesley was the writer. The pamphlet was not published in his own edition of his collected works in 1771; but that is not conclusive evidence against its authenticity, for other pamphlets were similarly omitted, as, for instance, his “Extract of Zinzendorf’s Discourses,” seventy-eight pages, and his Zinzendorf’s Hymns, twelve pages. Its title is as follows: “The Contents of a Folio History of the Moravians, or United Brethren, printed in 1749, and privately printed and sold under the title of ‘Acta Fratrum Unitatis in Anglia,’ with suitable remarks. Humbly addressed to the Pious of every Protestant Denomination in Europe and America. By a Lover of the Light. London: 1750.” 12mo, 60 pages. On the title page there is the following text:— “While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption.”

Rightly to understand the merits of this peculiar and now extremely scarce publication, it is necessary to look back upon the Moravian history of the previous five years.

As early as 1746, Zinzendorf was anxious to have the Moravians legally acknowledged by the British parliament, and to secure for them a legal standing. To accomplish this, he, with effrontery worthy of a better cause, made friends with Potter, the archbishop of Canterbury; with Sherlock, bishop of London; with Thomas Penn, the proprietor of Pennsylvania; and with General Oglethorpe, governor of Georgia. He succeeded in bringing the cause of the Brethren before the king’s privy council, and, in 1747, contrived to get an act through parliament, exempting the Moravians, in British North America, from taking oaths. But even this was not enough to satisfy Zinzendorf’s ambition. In this act there was only a tacit and indefinite acknowledgment of his church. He wished for more, and, in order to get it, agreed with his friends to petition that the Moravians in England might have the same exemption, as those in the American colonies; and that they should have the further privilege of not bearing arms. The petition stated, that the Brethren were descended from the ancient Bohemian and Moravian church; that, in their doctrinal views, they followed the Augsburg Confession of 1530, and the synod of Berne in 1532; that they consisted of the threefold union of Moravians, Lutherans, and Reformed, or, in other words, the three principal sections of the protestant church; that their proper ecclesiastical title was “Unitas Fratrum”; and that, in support of these pretensions, they could adduce, before a parliamentary committee, not fewer than one hundred and thirty-five different documents.

Strangely enough, a committee of the House of Commons was appointed, with Oglethorpe for its chairman. The report of the committee was read and ordered to be printed; and Oglethorpe was commissioned to draw up a bill, founded upon the report presented, and to bring it before the house. The bill passed the House of Commons on the 18th of April, 1749. On being introduced into the House of Lords, the lord chancellor objected to almost every line of it; and especially against the power vested in Zinzendorf, as the Advocatus Fratrum, in ecclesiastical matters,—a power authorising him, though a foreigner, to enjoin upon the bishops and ministers of the Church of England to give certificates, that the parties holding them were members of the Unitas Fratrum, which certificates the British authorities were to accept as legal. Zinzendorf, in a conversation with Lord Halifax, had said: “Against the will of the king, I would not like to press the matter; but a limitation of the act I will not accept. Everything or nothing! No modifications!” This was German swagger. Finding the lord chancellor earnest in his objection, he was fain, rather than lose his bill, to leave out the words which put the bishops and clergy of the Church of England beneath his power, and proposed the following as a substitute: “that the verbal declaration of the individual, together with the certificate of a bishop or minister of the Brethren, shall be sufficient proof of membership.” With this alteration, the bill became law, on the 12th of May, 1749. By this act of parliament, Zinzendorf gained the following points:—

1. The Unitas Fratrum were acknowledged as an ancient protestant episcopal church.

2. Those of its members, who scrupled to take an oath, were exempted from doing so on making a declaration in the presence of Almighty God, as witness of the truth.

3. They were exempted from acting as jurymen.

4. They were exempted from military service, in the American colonies, under reasonable conditions.[109]

This was a singular episode in Moravian history. Zinzendorf was proud of it; and well he might. It was scarcely fifteen years since the Moravians first set foot in England. They had been torn by faction, and persecuted by furious mobs. Their tenets, in many instances, were far from orthodox. Many of their practices were silly and objectionable. Their hymns and literature were loathsomely luscious, and familiarly irreverent. Their leader, though a German noble, and, upon the whole, benevolent and devout, was ambitious and overbearing, if not insane; and yet, the British parliament had already given them not only a legal standing, but an ecclesiastical cognomen of their own selecting, and had granted them exemptions, which they had no right to claim. How was this? We can hardly tell; but a German sat on the British throne, and his court, to a great extent, was a German court.

A few months after the Moravian bill was passed by parliament, Zinzendorf had put to the press, in his own private printing office, a folio volume, entitled “Acta Fratrum in Anglia,” containing (1) all the past public negotiations in England; (2) an exposition of the doctrine, liturgy, and constitutions of the Brethren’s congregations. This was the “folio history,” of which the pamphlet, that we have attributed to Wesley, professes to give the “contents.” The following are a few of the writer’s running observations.

“The absurdities of this history are fairly confuted by only repeating them.” Referring to the expression, “blood and wounds theology,” he asks,—“Is this honouring the name and sacrifice of the glorious Son of God? O count! art thou wiser, or more inspired, than Paul or Peter? If thou art not, surely thou art lost in thine own greatness, and swallowed up in the delusions of the devil.” (Page 38.)

“Here follows a dark apology for their enigmatical jargon, in which they say, ‘The people who pick up and pervert our practical phrases incur a terrible guilt thereby.’ 1. The much greater part of their phrases are altogether unintelligible to any but themselves, and therefore none but some of themselves can pervert them. 2. Those phrases that have a little common sense in them are so encumbered with nonsense and error, that it is hardly possible not to reprove them, which I suppose is called perverting them.” (Page 43.)

“As to ordinances, the Unitas Fratrum have ‘baptism, with a covenant water certainly impregnated with the blood of Christ’; and the Lord’s supper, which they call ‘a partaking of the corpse of our Saviour, at receiving which, they prostrate themselves in awe of His tremendous majesty.’ I cannot once imagine, they have any design to promote popery; but, O count! don’t you see, that these expressions might have been used by Ignatius Loyola, in honour of holy water and his wafer god?” (Page 44.)

“Their thoughts on marriage are dark and mysterious. They call it, ‘an holy mystery, a sacramentum magnum.’ And by their own account, their hymns on this subject are not fit to be read by any that attach bad ideas to bad expressions; but say they, ‘We hold forth chaste matter under usual and express words.’ O ye dreamers! When will ye hold forth nothing but what is taught by God and the holy Scriptures? Why do you choose to express yourselves as if taught in the school of Ignatius Loyola?” (Page 45.)

“Will you receive advice, ye Unitas Fratrum? Then, for the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ, appear to the world clothed in the robes of innocency and truth. Lay aside your darkness, and bring all your words to light. If you have any meaning, reveal it for the good of souls; if you have no meaning, call yourselves anything but Christians.” (Page 50.)

Attached to the pamphlet is a postscript addressed to those of the Unitas Fratrum, who once were Methodists. The following is an extract:—

“Is not your doctrine dull, flat, and insipid? Does it not come from a floating imagination? Is not its chief aim to fill the mind with ideas of the Lamb’s heart? of soaking and melting in blood? of playing near, and creeping into the side-hole? of pretty, happy sinnership? of beating the little sinner on the bill when he has been naughty? and of a thousand such strange, unheard of absurdities? Your doctors, by playing with words, and jingling soft sounds, may delight the fancy; but whoever they are that look for sense, must miss of edification.” (Page 57.)

Such are fair specimens of the short critiques of the curious “contents” of Zinzendorf’s folio history of the “Acta Fratrum in Anglia.” It is painful to have to record quarrels among old friends and brethren; but facts are too serious to be blinked for an author’s private pleasure. As a sort of counterpoise to this unpleasantness, we subjoin an extract from a letter, addressed to Wesley, by Cennick, at this time the most laborious and successful Moravian preacher in the sister island.

“Dublin, June 25, 1751.

“My dear Brother,—Yesterday I received yours, and assure you, I am sincere in my desires and proposals of speaking and writing freely to each other; and wish heartily, that Christians conferring together had hindered the making that wide space between us and you. Perhaps He that maketh men to be of one mind in a house, may nevertheless, in our days, begin the gathering together in one the people of God that are scattered abroad. I think, if I could see the dawn of that gracious day, I would wish no more, but be content to labour myself to death, and finish my pilgrimage with a cheerfulness inexpressible. Till then, as long as people in many things think differently, all must be allowed their Christian liberty; and though some may remove from you to us, or from us to you, without becoming bitter, and with upright views to please our Saviour, I can see no harm in it. I really love the servants and witnesses of Jesus in all the world. I wish all to prosper. I salute Mrs. Wesley; and assure you, I am your affectionate loving brother,

“John Cennick.”[110]

This is very beautiful, especially remembering the past and present days. Wesley entitles the letter, “Sincere professions of Christian love.” They do Cennick credit, and were grateful to the heart and mind of Wesley.

Cennick’s letter concludes with a salutation to Mrs. Wesley; and we must now refer to another painful subject—Wesley’s marriage.[111] This took place in the month of February. The exact day is doubtful. Wesley says it was a few days after February 2. The Gentleman’s Magazine has the following in its list of marriages: “February 18.—Rev. Mr. John Wesley, Methodist preacher, to a merchant’s widow in Threadneedle Street, with a jointure of £300 per annum”; and the London Magazine: “February 19.—Rev. Mr. John Wesley, to Mrs. Vazel, of Threadneedle Street, a widow lady of large fortune.” The large fortune consisted of £10,000, invested in three per cent. consols, and was wholly secured to herself and her four children.[112]

Charles Wesley seems to have been introduced to her in July, 1749, at Edward Perronet’s, and describes her then as “a woman of sorrowful spirit.” Mr. Moore remarks, that Mrs. Vazeille (her proper name), from all that he had heard of her from Wesley, and from others, seemed at the time to be well qualified for her new position. “She appeared to be truly pious, and was very agreeable in her person and manners. She conformed to every company, whether of the rich or of the poor; and had a remarkable facility and propriety in addressing them concerning their true interests.”[113] Mr. Watson observes, that “she was a woman of cultivated understanding, as her remaining letters testify; and that she appeared to Mr. Wesley to possess every other qualification, which promised to increase both his usefulness and happiness, we may conclude from his having made choice of her as his companion.” Mr. Jackson says: “Neither in understanding nor in education was she worthy of the eminent man to whom she was united; and her temper was intolerably bad. During the lifetime of her first husband, she appears to have enjoyed every indulgence; and, judging from some of his letters to her, which have been preserved, he paid an entire deference to her will. Her habits and spirit were ill adapted to the privations and inconveniences which were incident to her new mode of life, as the travelling companion of Mr. John Wesley.”[114] Hampson remarks: “The connection was unfortunate. There never was a more preposterous union. It is pretty certain that no loves lighted their torches on this occasion; and it is as much to be presumed, that neither did Plutus preside at the solemnity. Mrs. Wesley’s property was too inconsiderable, to warrant the supposition that it was a match of interest. Besides, had she been ever so rich, it was nothing to him; for every shilling of her fortune remained at her own disposal; and neither the years, nor the temper of the parties, could give any reason to suppose them violently enamoured. That this lady accepted his proposals, seems much less surprising than that he should have made them. It is probable, his situation at the head of a sect, and the authority it conferred, was not without its charms in the eyes of an ambitious female. But we much wonder, that Mr. Wesley should have appeared so little acquainted with himself and with human nature. He certainly did not possess the conjugal virtues. He had no taste for the tranquillity of domestic retirement: while his situation, as an itinerant, left him little leisure for those attentions which are absolutely necessary, to the comfort of married life.”[115] Dr. Whitehead writes: “Mr. Wesley’s constant habit of travelling, the number of persons who came to visit him wherever he was, and his extensive correspondence, were circumstances unfavourable to that social intercourse, mutual openness and confidence, which form the basis of happiness in the married state. These circumstances, indeed, would not have been so very unfavourable, had he married a woman who could have entered into his views, and have accommodated herself to his situation. But this was not the case. Had he searched the whole kingdom, he would hardly have found a woman more unsuitable in these respects, than she whom he married.”[116]

From the first, Charles Wesley felt the strongest aversion to his brother’s marriage. Why? Mr. Jackson suggests, that this could not proceed from any feeling of personal or family dislike to Mrs. Vazeille (which we somewhat doubt); nor from any repugnance to the marriage state, for he himself was eminently happy in that relation; but because he believed that, by this means, Wesley’s labours would be confined within the same comparatively narrow circle, as his own, and, as a consequence, many of the Methodist societies, for want of oversight, would become Independent churches; a wide separation from the national establishment would ensue, and the kingdom be deprived of that extensive reformation which the brothers had hoped by God’s blessing to effect.

Probably there is some truth in this; but we still incline to the opinion, that Charles Wesley’s dislike to the marriage was, at least, partly owing to a disapprobation of his brother’s choice. In 1750, Charles took her on a fortnight’s visit to his wife’s relations at Ludlow; and, on her return to London, he and his Sally, for eight or nine days, were guests of Mrs. Vazeille herself. Charles was a keen discerner of personal character,—perhaps much more than his brother was,—and must have seen some of the faults which afterwards became more apparent, and to which, at subsequent periods, he so frequently refers.

At all events, on February 2, a fortnight before the marriage, he writes as follows: “My brother told me he was resolved to marry. I was thunderstruck, and could only answer, he had given me the first blow, and his marriage would come like the coup de grace. Trusty Ned Perronet followed, and told me, the person was Mrs. Vazeille! one of whom I had never had the least suspicion. I refused his company to the chapel, and retired to mourn with my faithful Sally. I groaned all the day, and several following ones, under my own and the people’s burdens. I could eat no pleasant food, nor preach, nor rest, either by night or by day.”

On the same day, Wesley himself wrote: “Having received a full answer from Mr. Perronet, I was clearly convinced, that I ought to marry. For many years, I remained single, because I believed I could be more useful in a single than in a married state. And I praise God, who enabled me so to do. I now as fully believed that, in my present circumstances, I might be more useful in a married state.”

This is a curious entry. Can it be true that, up to this day, Wesley had not proposed marriage to Mrs. Vazeille? that Vincent Perronet’s letter brought him to a decision? that he acquainted his brother as soon as he had made up his mind? and that all the courtship preceding his marriage was really of not more than fifteen or sixteen days’ continuance? If so, no wonder that this, like most hasty marriages, was so unfortunate.

This brief period was a curious episode in Wesley’s history. Four days after he told his brother that he “was resolved to marry” he strangely enough “met the single men” of the London society, “and showed them on how many accounts it was good for those who had received that gift from God, to remain ‘single for the kingdom of heaven’s sake;’ unless where a particular case might be an exception to the general rule.” His intention was to set out five days after this, on his journey to the north; but, on the day before he purposed starting, his feet slipped on the ice, in crossing London Bridge, and he fell with great force, the bone of his ankle lighting on a stone, and one of his legs being severely sprained. A surgeon bound up the leg; and, with great difficulty, he proceeded to Seven Dials, where he preached. He attempted to preach again, at the Foundery, at night; but his sprain became so painful, that he was obliged to relinquish his intention; and, at once, removed to Threadneedle Street, where Mrs. Vazeille resided; and here he spent the seven days next ensuing, “partly,” he says, “in prayer, reading, and conversation, and partly in writing a Hebrew grammar, and Lessons for Children.” During this brief period of enforced retirement, when he had purposed to be far on his way to the north of England, the tete-a-tete unexpectedly issued in a marriage. The accident occurred on Sunday, February 10; on the Sunday following, he was “carried to the Foundery, and preached kneeling,” not being yet able to stand; and, on the next day, or, at most, the day after that, cripple though he was, he succeeded in leading Mrs. Vazeille, a widow, seven years younger than himself, to the hymeneal altar, and was married. On the Monday (February 18) he was still unable to set his foot to the ground. On the Tuesday evening, and on the Wednesday morning, he preached kneeling. This was an odd beginning,—the bridegroom crippled, and, instead of making a wedding tour, preaching on his knees in London chapels. A fortnight after his marriage, being, as he says, “tolerably able to ride, though not to walk,” he set out for Bristol, leaving his newly married wife behind him. Here he held a five days’ conference with his preachers, who had assembled from various parts, and says: “My spirit was much bowed down among them, fearing some of them were perverted from the simplicity of the gospel; but the more we conversed, the more brotherly love increased. I expected to have heard many objections to our first doctrines; but none appeared to have any: we seemed to be all of one mind, as well as one heart. I mentioned whatever I thought was amiss, or wanting, in any of our brethren. It was received in a right spirit, with much love, and serious earnest attention; and, I trust, not one went from the conference discontented, but rather, blessing God for the consolation.”

The conference being ended, he returned to London on March the 21st, and, six days afterwards, set out for Scotland, and inserted in his journal what, perhaps, was a sly hit at his brother Charles: “I cannot understand how a Methodist preacher can answer it to God, to preach one sermon, or travel one day less, in a married than in a single state. In this respect surely, ‘it remaineth, that they who have wives be as though they had none.’”

Was there ever a marriage like John Wesley’s? It was one of the greatest blunders he ever made. A man who attains to the age of forty-eight, without marrying, ought to remain a bachelor for life, inasmuch as he has, almost of necessity, formed habits, and has acquired angularities and excrescences, which will never harmonize with the relationships and duties of the married state. Besides, if there ever was a man whose mission was so great and so peculiar as to render it inexpedient for him to become a benedict, Wesley was such a man. His marriage was ill advised as well as ill assorted. On both sides, it was, to a culpable extent, hasty, and was contracted without proper and sufficient thought. Young people entering into hurried marriages deserve and incur censure; and if so, what shall be said of Wesley and his wife? They married in haste, and had leisure to repent. Their act was, in a high degree, an act of folly; and, properly enough, to the end of life, both of them were made to suffer a serious penalty. It is far from pleasant to pursue the subject; but perhaps it is needful. In a world of danger like this, we must look at beacons as well as beauties. Let us then, as far as is possible, see the results of this hasty and ill judged marriage, and then have done with it.

One necessary consequence was the resignation of Wesley’s fellowship, which he sent, on the 1st of June, to the following effect;—“I, John Wesley, fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford, do hereby spontaneously and freely resign whatever rights I possess in the aforesaid society, to the rector and fellows of the same: wishing to all and each of them perpetual peace and every species of felicity in Christ.”

Another result was a painful quarrel with his brother. It is true, this was not of long continuance; for, on March 22, they met together, and had free and full explanations, and were reconciled to each other.[117] So they said, and yet it is a fact, that, for years afterwards, there seemed to be a shyness and a want of perfect confidence between them. Charles pitied the misfortune of his brother; but never attempted to excuse his folly. Towards his brother’s wife, he found it difficult to maintain, at all times, the semblance of courteous conduct. Nine days after the marriage, he kissed her, and assured her he was reconciled to her and his brother. In the month of May following he says: “I met my sister in Bristol, and behaved to her as such. I showed her, both at my own house, and the houses of my friends, all the civility in my power.” A month later, he found her in tears, heard her complaints against her husband, and professed love, pity, and a desire to help her. Serious quarrels, however, ensued after this, between her and Charles, and when Wesley thought himself dying, in December 1753, he made it his request to his wife and to his brother, to forget the past; which, says the latter, “I readily agreed to, and once more offered her my service in great sincerity.” A year or two later, the following significant sentences occur in Charles’s letters to his wife: “I called, two minutes before preaching, on Mrs. Wesley, at the Foundery; and, in all that time, had not one quarrel.”[118] Again: “I hope Mrs. Wesley keeps her distance. If malice is stronger in her than pride, she will pay you a mischievous visit. Poor Mr. Lefevre laments that he cannot love her. Blessed be God, I can, and desire to love her more.”[119] In 1766, he describes her as “quite placid and tame,” and desires his Sally to be courteous to her without trusting her.[120] Charles’s friendship for his sister-in-law was down to freezing point, and his wife’s seems to have been lower still.

What concerning Wesley himself? His wife’s money soon became a trouble; and at no time was a benefit. Within two months after his unhappy marriage, we find him writing to his friend Blackwell, asking him to render his assistance in settling her affairs; and adding: “She has many trials, but not one more than God knows to be profitable to her. I believe you have been, and will be, a means of removing some. If these outward incumbrances were removed, it might be a means of her spending more time with me; which would probably be useful as well as agreeable to her.”[121]

Mrs. Wesley seems to have accompanied her husband in his long northern journey, undertaken a few weeks after they were married. She, also, went with him into Cornwall, in the month of August following. Again, in March 1752, she, and one of her daughters, shared all the adventures, privations, and roughnesses of another three months’ journey to the north of England.[122] On the way, while at Epworth, Wesley wrote as follows to Mr. Blackwell: “April 16, 1752.—My wife is, at least, as well as when we left London: the more she travels, the better she bears it. It gives us yet another proof, that, whatever God calls us to, He will fit us for. I was, at first, a little afraid, she would not so well understand the behaviour of a Yorkshire mob; but there has been no trial; even the Methodists are now at peace throughout the kingdom.”[123] Before the month was ended, Wesley and his wife had mobbing to their hearts’ content.

Hitherto, their married life, if not ecstatic, had not been absolutely miserable. Things, however, were soon altered. On November 3, 1752, Vincent Perronet wrote as follows to Charles Wesley: “I am truly concerned that matters are in so melancholy a situation. I think the unhappy lady is most to be pitied, though the gentleman’s case is mournful enough. Their sufferings proceed from widely different causes. His are the visible chastisements of a loving Father; hers, the immediate effects of an angry, bitter spirit; and, indeed, it is a sad consideration, that, after so many months have elapsed, the same warmth and bitterness should remain.”[124]

This was within a year and three quarters of the time when the marriage ceremony was performed. Four months later, she again went with Wesley to the north and to Scotland. Indeed, up to the year 1755, she seems, generally speaking, to have been his travelling companion; but, in the autumn of that year, there was a change. Wesley then went to Cornwall without her, and, while there, sent a packet of letters to Charles Perronet. The packet came into the hands of his jealous wife; most unwarrantably she opened it, and, finding a few lines addressed to Mrs. Lefevre, fell into a furious passion.[125] Ever after, there was little else than a succession of connubial storms. In February, 1756, Wesley wrote to Sarah Ryan: “Your last letter was seasonable indeed. I was growing faint in my mind. The being continually watched over for evil; the having every word I spoke, every action I did, small and great, watched with no friendly eye; the hearing a thousand little, tart, unkind reflections, in return for the kindest words I could devise—

‘Like drops of eating water on the marble,

At length have worn my sinking spirits down.’

Yet I could not say, ‘Take Thy plague away from me;’ but only, ‘Let me be purified, not consumed.’[126]

We have here a painful discovery of the consuming sorrows of Wesley’s domestic life. No doubt, there were faults on his side as well as on the side of his twitting wife. No one, for instance, will for a moment attempt to justify his writing, in the terms just quoted, to Sarah Ryan, his Bristol housekeeper, who, however pious after her conversion, lived a most disreputable life before it. This was, to say the least, supremely foolish; but still it was not sufficient to justify his wife’s subsequent cruel and almost insane behaviour. In another letter to Sarah Ryan he writes as follows:—

“January 27, 1758.

“My dear Sister,—Last Friday, after many severe words, my wife left me, vowing she would see me no more. As I had wrote to you the same morning, I began to reason with myself, till I almost doubted whether I had done well in writing, or whether I ought to write to you at all. After prayer, that doubt was taken away. Yet I was almost sorry I had written that morning. In the evening, while I was preaching at the chapel, she came into the chamber where I had left my clothes, searched my pockets, and found the letter there, which I had finished, but had not sealed. While she read it, God broke her heart; and I afterwards found her in such a temper as I have not seen her in for several years. She has continued in the same ever since. So I think God has given a sufficient answer, with regard to our writing to each other.”[127]

We think nothing of the kind; and again regret his writing such a letter, on such a subject, to such a woman. His motives and his end were unquestionably pure; but the act itself cannot be defended. His wife was jealous, cruelly jealous, and he ought to have avoided what was likely to feed and increase her passion.

Wesley and his wife, however, were again united, but were far from being happy. So things proceeded till 1771. “On one occasion, she seized his letters and other papers, and put them into the hands of such as she knew to be his enemies, that they might be printed, as presumptive proofs of illicit connections.” She even interpolated letters which she had intercepted, so as to make them bear a bad construction, and then read them to different persons in private, for the purpose of defaming him. In one or two instances, she published interpolated or forged letters in the public prints.[128] She accused Charles Wesley of idleness, and declared that, for years, his dearest Sally had been John Wesley’s mistress. Charles danced with rage at this imputation cast upon his wife; but his Sally calmly smiled, and said, “Who will believe my sister now?”[129] Frequently she would drive a hundred miles to observe who was in the carriage with her husband on his entering a town. Sometimes her passions hurried her into outrage and indecency. More than once, she laid violent hands upon his person, and tore his hair.[130] “Jack,” said John Hampson, senior, to his son, “I was once on the point of committing murder. Once, when I was in the north of Ireland, I went into a room, and found Mrs. Wesley foaming with fury. Her husband was on the floor, where she had been trailing him by the hair of his head; and she herself was still holding in her hand venerable locks which she had plucked up by the roots. I felt,” continued the gigantic Hampson, who was not one of Wesley’s warmest friends, “I felt as though I could have knocked the soul out of her.”[131]

Other statements of the same character might be multiplied; but we are aweary of this painful subject. “Fain,” writes Southey, “would she have made him, like Marc Antony, give up all for love; and, being disappointed in that hope, she tormented him in such a manner, by her outrageous jealousy and abominable temper, that she deserves to be classed in a triad with Xantippe and the wife of Job, as one of the three bad wives.”

In the midst of all this, Wesley, on one occasion, wrote her as follows:—

“I cannot but add a few words: not by way of reproach, but of advice. God has used many means to curb your stubborn will, and break the impetuosity of your temper. He has given you a dutiful but sickly daughter; He has taken away one of your sons; another has been a grievous cross, as the third probably will be. He has suffered you to be defrauded of much money; He has chastened you with strong pain. And still He may say, ‘How long liftest thou up thyself against Me?’ Are you more humble, more gentle, more patient, more placable than you were? I fear, quite the reverse; I fear, your natural tempers are rather increased than diminished. O beware, lest God give you up to your own heart’s lusts, and let you follow your own imaginations!

“Under all these conflicts, it might be an unspeakable blessing, that you have a husband who knows your temper and can bear with it; who, after you have tried him numberless ways, laid to his charge things that he knew not, robbed him, betrayed his confidence, revealed his secrets, given him a thousand treacherous wounds, purposely aspersed and murdered his character, and made it your business so to do, under the poor pretence of vindicating your own character—who, I say, after all these provocations, is still willing to forgive you all, to overlook what is past, as if it had not been, and to receive you with open arms; only not while you have a sword in your hand, with which you are continually striking at me, though you cannot hurt me. If, notwithstanding, you continue striking, what can I, what can all reasonable men think, but that either you are utterly out of your senses, or your eye is not single; that you married me only for my money; that, being disappointed, you were almost always out of humour; and that this laid you open to a thousand suspicions, which, once awakened, could sleep no more?

“My dear Molly, let the time past suffice. As yet, the breach may be repaired. You have wronged me much, but not beyond forgiveness. I love you still, and am as clear from all other women as the day I was born. At length, know me, and know yourself. Your enemy I cannot be; but let me be your friend. Suspect me no more, asperse me no more, provoke me no more. Do not any longer contend for mastery, for power, money, or praise. Be content to be a private insignificant person, known and loved by God and me. Attempt no more to abridge me of my liberty, which I claim by the laws of God and man. Leave me to be governed by God and my own conscience. Then shall I govern you with gentle sway, and show that I do indeed love you, even as Christ the church.”[132]

This is a manly, noble, loving letter, and ought to have produced a good effect; but on January 23, 1771, he wrote: “For what cause I know not, my wife set out for Newcastle, purposing ‘never to return.’ Non eam reliqui: non dimisi: non revocabo.”

Her reason for repairing to Newcastle may be found in the fact that, two years previously, her daughter, Miss Vazeille, had been united in marriage to Mr. William Smith, a distinguished and highly influential member of the Orphan House society.[133] Wesley’s next visit to the northern metropolis did not take place till the month of May, 1772, when differences were once again made up; and, on his return to Bristol, his wife came back with him.[134] This, however, was but a patched up peace. One of Wesley’s letters to his wife has just been given; and now is added one from his wife to him.

“London, May 31, 1774.

“My Dear,—Your laconic letter from Edinburgh, May 18, would have seemed strange if I had not known you. Honest John Pawson makes it his business to slander me wherever he goes, saying: ‘Mrs. Wesley has several hundred pounds in her hands belonging to Mr. Wesley, but how he will ever get it from her, I know not, except he puts her to trouble for it, for I do not believe there is a more covetous minded woman in the world than she is.’ In this way, he, and J. Allen, and your old quondam friend, Mary Madan, did all they could to render my life bitter while at Bristol. Mary Madan, the very day you set off from Bristol, said, ‘I hope Mrs. Wesley is not to stay here till Mr. Wesley returns, for, if she does, this society will be quite ruined.’ There were many high words between her and some of the stewards, the night I and Mr. Lewis came from setting you out of town. It was true, I had a horse, but in this I soon was made to see and feel her power, for whenever I wanted to ride, she would contrive to send the man out on some trifling thing or other, so that I have been fourteen days together without riding at all; and when I did, I was sure to be lectured by your man telling me he had enough to do for Mr. Charles Wesley and Mrs. Madan. As I could not use my horse there, and Mr. Lewis telling me Mr. Charles Wesley wanted him to hire one for the man to ride by the side of their carriage, and that it would save the society a guinea if I would lend my horse instead of their hiring one, I said, ‘with all my heart.’ But I was soon informed by your brother, that the London stewards would not like my horse to go; that he must have three there himself; and that a subscription was proposed to buy the third. It was no hard matter to find how I was circumstanced. As I could get no one to ride with me, I did not care to put you to the expense of keeping my horse; so I sold it. So that evil is removed. The next must be myself. Then the Methodists must be a pure people, when the troubler of their happiness and peace is removed. My dear friend, let me beg of you for God’s sake, for your own sake, put a stop to this torrent of evil that is poured out against me. It is cruel to make me an offender for defending myself. If you or any others have anything to lay to my charge, let it be proved. I desire to be open to conviction; but, surely, I have a right to do justice to myself, when I have it in my power. The trials and persecutions I have met with lately, were they accompanied with any degree of guilt, would make me of all creatures most miserable; but, bless God, He has hitherto kept me from a prey to my enemies; though I am often tempted to fear I shall not hold out any longer, as I am a poor, weak woman, alone against a formidable body.

“I am your affectionate wife,

“M. Wesley.”[135]

The letter, from which the above is copied, refutes Mr. Watson’s assertion, that “Mrs. Vazeille was a woman of cultivated understanding”; and confirms Mr. Jackson’s statement, that “neither in understanding nor education was she worthy of the eminent man to whom she was united.” Without altering the sense, we have been obliged to revise both the orthography and syntax of the letter, in order to make it at all fit to appear in print. Mrs. Wesley was evidently a woman of no education, beyond the ability to read and write. Perhaps no better description of her character, as a woman and a wife, can be furnished than what is patent in the peevish, petulant, murmuring, miserable letter just given. Here we leave her, simply adding that, after being Wesley’s wife for a little more than thirty years, she died at the age of seventy-one, on October 8, 1781.[136] Wesley, at the time, was in the west of England; but writes, on October 12, as follows: “I came to London, and was informed that my wife died on Monday. This evening she was buried, though I was not informed of it till a day or two after.” Her fortune, which, by losses and by fraud, had been reduced from ten to five thousand pounds, she bequeathed to her son; and left her husband nothing but a ring.[137] The epitaph on her tombstone describes her as “a woman of exemplary piety, a tender parent, and a sincere friend”; but is wisely silent concerning her conduct as a wife.

Perhaps more than enough has been already said. It must be remembered, however, that John Wesley’s marriage affected and tinged thirty years of his public life. It was one of the gravest events in his chequered history; and, on this ground, it deserves attention. Wesley was not faultless. He married too hurriedly to know the character of the woman whom he made his wife; and he would have acted more wisely if he had refrained from writing religious letters to female members of his society, of whom his wife was jealous. This is all that can be fairly alleged against him. No one will venture to affirm, that he was wanting in affection; and no one can successfully accuse him of treating his wife with coldness and reserve. Charles, a keen judge of character, declared that nothing could surpass his brother’s patience in bearing with his perverse and peevish spouse. Several of his letters to her, written after their marriage, have been preserved; and display the tenderest affection, and justify the opinion that, had it been his happiness to be married to a woman that was worthy of him, he would have been one of the most loving husbands that ever lived. The truth is, John Wesley’s wife was scarcely sane. Mr. Jackson writes: “Scores of documents in her handwriting attest the violence of her temper, and warrant the conclusion, that there was in her a certain degree of mental unsoundness.” This is the most merciful view that it is possible to take of her strange behaviour. In no respect was she a helpmeet for him. As a rule, she was a bitter, unmitigated curse. At home, she was suspicious, jealous, fretful, taunting, twitting, and often violent. Abroad, when itinerating with him, it too generally happened, that nought could please her. “The weather was either intolerably cold, or insufferably hot. The roads were bad, and the means of conveyance, unbearable. The people, by whom they were accommodated, were unpolite and rude; the provisions were scanty, or ill prepared; and the beds were hard, and the covering not sufficient.”[138] Such were the whinings of a woman who began life as a domestic servant. Her husband was a gentleman and a scholar, but was almost an utter stranger to the comforts of wedded life. In lieu of them, he had annoyances, which, to most men, would have been intolerable; and it is no mean proof of the genuine greatness of his character, that during this protracted domestic wretchedness of thirty years’ continuance, his public career never wavered, nor appeared to lose one jot of its amazing energy. “He repeatedly told me,” writes Henry Moore, “that he believed the Lord overruled this painful business for his good; and that, if Mrs. Wesley had been a better wife, he might have been unfaithful in the great work to which God had called him, and might have too much sought to please her according to her own views.”[139]

We must now return to the year 1751. Five weeks after his marriage, Wesley set out for the north of England. He spent Sunday, March 31, at Birmingham, where he warned the society against idle disputes and vain janglings; and was “obliged to preach abroad, the room not being able to contain half the congregation.” He writes: “O how is the scene changed here! The last time I preached at Birmingham, the stones flew on every side. If any disturbance were made now, the disturber would be in more danger than the preacher.”

At Dudley, Wesley was welcomed by a “dismal screaming.” At Wednesbury, the work had been injured by “doubtful disputations.” The predestinarians had not come near the place while persecution lasted; but, “when all was calm, they poured in on every side, and bereaved us of our children.” The society was reduced from three hundred members to seventy, all of whom were weak and lifeless.[140] Throughout the whole neighbourhood, “the classes were miserably shattered by the sowers of strange doctrines,”—baptists and others included.

Arriving at Bolton on the 10th of April, Wesley went to a barber to be shaved. “Sir,” said the man of lather, “I praise God on your behalf. When you were at Bolton last, I was one of the greatest drunkards in the town; but I came to listen at the window, God struck me to the heart, and twelve months ago I was converted.”

Here Wesley was also introduced to a clergyman, who deserves a passing notice. The vicar of Chipping, a village about ten miles north of Preston, was the Rev. J. Milner. Up to the present, Wesley and Milner had never met, though a warm friendship existed between them. Milner had written to Wesley in the most loving terms, and had become a subscriber to his “Christian Library.” He had embraced Wesley’s doctrines; and, as a consequence, most of the neighbouring clergy had cast him off; and all manner of evil was spoken concerning him. Writing to Wesley, in 1750, Milner says: “Twice I have had the pleasure of seeing Mr. Ingham. There is a great deal of amiable sweetness in his whole behaviour. I have often wished, that he was disentangled from the Moravians, and cordially one with you in promoting the interests of the gospel. The last time I saw him, he was employed in reconciling two of the Brethren. He allows you incomparably the preference for prudence; but says you have not done Count Zinzendorf justice. At first, I looked upon the difference as that betwixt Paul and Barnabas, which was a furtherance to the gospel of Christ; but since I knew more of the doctrine of the still Brethren, I have not had the same favourable opinion of them. Yet, I cannot help thinking Mr. Ingham happy; but may some good providence bring you speedily together; for surely, such souls must glow at meeting, and all unkindness fly at first sight.”[141]

Wesley accompanied Milner to his vicarage at Chipping, which, henceforth, became one of his favourite haunts. In 1752, Milner allowed him to occupy his church; and, for this, was brought before the bishop. Milner told his lordship the story of the Bolton barber, and then descanted on the grand society of Christian worshippers at Newcastle. The bishop talked about order; but Milner replied he had nowhere seen so little order as in the bishop’s own cathedral, where the children took no notice of the preacher, and the choristers rudely talked, and thrust one another with their elbows. He added, that there certainly was need of some one to call them back to the doctrines of the Reformation; for he knew not a single clergyman, in the whole of Lancashire, “that would give the Church’s definition of faith, and stand to it.”[142]

Having spent the night with Milner, Wesley and he proceeded, “over more than Welsh mountains,” to Whitehaven, which they reached on Saturday, April 13. At the pressing request of Joseph Cownley, Wesley had preached here in September, 1749, and had formed a society. He now found two hundred and forty persons meeting in class; and, among the whole, there was only one who ever missed the class without absolute necessity. On Saturday, April 20, he and his clerical friend Milner arrived at the Orphan House, at Newcastle, where they found the society “loving, simple, and zealous of good works.”

On Monday morning following, Wesley, for the first time, set out for Scotland. This was in compliance with the wish of Captain (afterwards Colonel) Gallatin, who was then quartered at Musselburgh; and who, together with his Christian lady, showed the Wesleys the sincerest friendship to the end of life. Twenty-seven years after this, Wesley wrote: 1778, December 18.—I called upon Colonel Gallatin. But what a change is here! The fine gentleman, the soldier, is clean gone; sunk into a feeble, decrepit old man; not able to rise from his seat, and hardly able to speak.” He died soon after, and Charles Wesley evinced his respect for his memory, by composing a beautiful hymn on the occasion, in which he speaks of him as his “bosom friend,” and as “gentle, generous, and sincere.”

Wesley, accompanied by Christopher Hopper, arrived at Musselburgh on April 24. He says, he had no intention to preach in Scotland; nor did he imagine, that there were any that desired he should. A crowd, however, collected in the evening, and “remained as statues from the beginning of the sermon to the end.” Next day, he rode to Edinburgh, which he describes as “one of the dirtiest cities he had ever seen,” Cologne itself not excepted. He returned to dinner, and preached again at six; and “used great plainness of speech,” which was “received in love.” After preaching, one of the bailies of the town, with one of the elders of the kirk, begged he would stay with them awhile, and promised they would fit him up a preaching place. His other arrangements prevented him complying with this courteous request; but, in lieu of this, he offered them the services of Hopper. For a fortnight, Hopper preached night and morning, to large congregations, who heard with great attention; many were cut to the heart; several were joined together in a small society; and thus Methodism gained a footing across the border.[143] Other preachers followed; but the results were small. In the month of August next ensuing, Charles Wesley, who was then at Newcastle, wrote: “I had much discourse with a brother from Scotland, who has preached there many weeks, and not converted one soul. ‘You may just as well preach to the stones,’ he added, ‘as to the Scots.’ Yet, to keep my brother’s word, I sent William Shent to Musselburgh.”

It is clear, that Charles Wesley was not flushed with hope of Methodist success among the Scots. Whitefield, also, said to Wesley himself: “You have no business in Scotland; for your principles are so well known, that, if you spoke like an angel, none would hear you; and, if they did, you would have nothing to do but to dispute with one and another from morning to night.” To this Wesley subsequently answered: “If God sends me, people will hear. And I will give them no provocation to dispute; for I will studiously avoid all controverted points, and keep to the fundamental truths of Christianity. And if any still begin to dispute, they may; but I will not dispute with them.”[144] Whitefield, however, was not satisfied. In a letter to the Countess of Huntingdon, dated Edinburgh, July 30, 1751, he adds: “I have been to Musselburgh to see Captain Gallatin and his lady. They hold on. Mr. Wesley has been there, and intends setting up societies, which I think imprudent.”[145]

From the first, men have doubted whether Methodism had a mission to the Scots. Even as late as the year 1826, Dr. Adam Clarke, not the least sanguine of men, wrote: “I consider Methodism as having no hold of Scotland, but in Glasgow and Edinburgh. If all the other chapels were disposed of, it would be little loss to Methodism; and a great saving of money, which might be much better employed.”[146] Wesley, however, as we shall find hereafter, was successful; and, had his preachers and successors adhered to the principle adopted by himself, the results would probably have been far greater than what they are. Perhaps he never had the popularity in Scotland that Whitefield reached; but his work has proved to be more lasting. The one formed a denomination of his own; the other wrought with churches already in existence, and the fruit of his labours was lost in theirs. Though Methodism across the Tweed has never had the same success as it has had in England, yet it would be untrue to say, that its efforts have been a failure. Besides, there have been causes for the difference. In England, Wesley and his assistants found the masses ignorant; in Scotland they had to battle with, a partially enlightened prejudice. In England, the great body of the people were without a creed; in Scotland, the people were creed-ridden. In England, the itinerant plan was not objected to; in Scotland, it has always been a bugbear. Still, one cannot but lament, that the success has not been greater; and we strongly incline to think, that the reasons just assigned are not sufficient to account for the sad defect. Wesley went, not to oppose and to abuse Calvinism, but to preach fundamental truths. If others would dispute, he would not. Truth, not controversy, is the means of converting men. Besides, is it not a fact, that Methodism has sometimes been tampered with, in order to adapt it, forsooth, to Scotch taste and prejudice? This was not Wesley’s way. “What can be done to increase the work of God in Scotland?” he asked. “Answer:—1. Preach abroad as much as possible. 2. Try every town and village. 3. Visit every member of the society at home.”[147] “The way to do them good in Scotland,” he wrote nine years before his death, “is to observe all our rules at Inverness, just as you would at Sheffield; yea, and to preach the whole Methodist doctrine, as plainly and simply as you would in Yorkshire.”[148]

On returning from Musselburgh to Newcastle, Wesley preached at Berwick, to a large congregation, in the midst of a piercing wind; also at Alnwick cross; and at Alemouth, where he found the largest congregation he had seen in all Northumberland.

Having spent a week at Newcastle and among the neighbouring societies, he set out, on the 6th of May, for the south of England. At Stockton, a few angry people “set up a dismal scream” as he was entering the town; but he found that, “by means of a plain, rough exhorter, the society had been more than doubled since he was there before.”[149]

On May 7, he came to York, where was a small society of about half-a-dozen members, with Thomas Staton as their leader, and a room in Pump Yard for their meeting place. From York, Wesley rode to Epworth, where he found “a poor, dead, senseless people; at which,” says he, “I did not wonder, when I was informed (1) That some of our preachers there had diligently gleaned up and retailed all the evil they could hear of me; (2) that some of them had quite laid aside our hymns, as well as the doctrine they formerly preached; (3) that one of them had frequently spoke against our rules, and the others quite neglected them.”

From Epworth, Wesley rode back to Leeds, where he preached “in the walls” of a new chapel; and then held a conference with about thirty of his preachers, particularly inquiring about “their grace, and gifts, and fruit; and found reason to doubt of one only.” Two days after, on the 17th of May he “preached in the new house at Birstal, already too small for even a week day’s congregation.” And then, “after a few days more spent among the neighbouring societies, he returned, by easy journeys, to the metropolis.”

To add to his anxieties, Kingswood school was now in trouble. Three years before, it had been begun with twenty-eight scholars, six masters, and six servants. Wesley had written grammars of the English, French, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin languages, and had printed many other books for the use of the pupils. Soon, however, the maid servants began to quarrel. The masters, also, failed to answer Wesley’s expectations. One of them was rough and disobliging; another was honest and diligent, but his person and his manner made him contemptible; a third was grave and weighty in his behaviour, but the children were set against him; and a fourth, instead of restraining the boys from play, played with them. Four or five of the larger boys grew wicked, and the others became “wilder and wilder, till all their religious impressions were worn off.” The result of the whole was,—the establishment on Kingswood Hill was now, at the end of three years, reduced to two masters, two servants, and eleven children; but Wesley writes: “I believe all in the house are, at length, of one mind; and trust God will bless us in the latter end, more than in the beginning.”

Another trouble, awaiting Wesley, on his return from the north of England, was the scandal occasioned by the sin of James Wheatley. This unhappy man had been a Methodist itinerant preacher since the year 1742. At the beginning of his public labours, he was diligent and useful; but, while in Ireland, he unfortunately became acquainted with certain Moravians of the antinomian creed, and practically, at least, embraced their principles. Wesley says, that Wheatley was never “clear in the faith, and perhaps not sound. According to his understanding was his preaching,—an unconnected rhapsody of unmeaning words, like Sir John Suckling’s

‘Verses, smooth and soft as cream,

In which was neither depth nor stream.’”

Wesley asserts, that it was a reproach to the Methodist congregations, that Wheatley became a most popular preacher. Yet so he did; and, though several of the itinerants in Ireland complained both of his doctrine and manner of preaching, it is a fact that, in the space of a few months, he brought almost all the preachers in that kingdom to think and to speak like himself.[150] Robert Swindells and others were exalted above measure, and imagined that they, and they only, preached Christ, and Christ’s gospel. Their brethren, who differed from them, were despised, and were ignominiously branded with the cognomen of “legal preachers,” and “legal wretches.” In this way, James Wheatley’s preaching had been disastrous. Then again, as early as 1749, he had become headstrong and troublesome. Charles Wesley writes: “1749, June 14.—I threw away some advice on an obstinate preacher, James Wheatley; for I could make no impression on him, or in any degree bow his stiff neck.” “He is gone to the north expressly contrary to my advice. Whither will his wilfulness lead him at last?” Two years after this, Wesley calls him “that wonderful self-deceiver and hypocrite.” Why? In June, 1751, Richard Pearce, and Mrs. Silby, of Bradford, in Wiltshire, gave Charles Wesley to understand, that Wheatley had been guilty of indecent behaviour. Charles at once went to Bradford, and took down, from the lips of seven females, their charges against Wheatley. This document was read to Wheatley at Bristol; and, on June 25, the two Wesleys brought him to Bearfield, face to face with two of his principal accusers. He cavilled at a few circumstances, but allowed that the substance of what was said was true. He was taken to Farley, where five other women gave to Wesley’s wife the same statements which they had made to Charles. Wesley persuaded Wheatley to retire for a season from the itinerant work; but it was labour lost. He professed to be penitent; but he extenuated what he was not able to deny, and as constantly accused others as excused himself; saying, many had been guilty of “little imprudences” as well as he. He pleaded guilty to the charges brought against him; but justified himself, and basely tried to implicate his brethren. To screen himself, he traduced all the preachers; and, in doing this, told palpable untruths. Ten of the preachers in the west of England were brought before him; and each, in succession, demanded to know the sin with which Wheatley could charge him. “The accuser,” says Charles Wesley, “was silent, which convinced us of his wilful lying.” The result of the whole was his suspension, which ended in expulsion,—the first act of the kind since Methodism had been founded. The following paper was put into his hands.

“June 25, 1751.

“Because you have wrought folly in Israel, grieved the Holy Spirit of God, betrayed your own soul into temptation and sin, and the souls of many others, whom you ought, even at the peril of your own life, to have guarded against all sin; because you have given occasion to the enemies of God, whenever they shall know these things, to blaspheme the ways and truth of God:

“We can in nowise receive you as a fellow labourer, till we see clear proofs of your real and deep repentance. Of this you have given us no proof yet. You have not so much as named one single person, in all England or Ireland, with whom you have behaved ill, except those we knew before.

“The least and lowest proof of such repentance which we can receive is this: that, till our next conference (which we hope will be in October), you abstain both from preaching and from practising physic. If you do not, we are clear; we cannot answer for the consequences.

“John Wesley,
Charles Wesley.”

This was the first judicial sentence pronounced upon a culprit Methodist preacher. For some weeks, Wheatley went from house to house, justifying himself, and condemning Wesley and his brother for the action they had taken. He then proceeded to Norwich, where he was unknown. Reaching the gates, he gave the bridle to his horse, and was taken to one of the public inns. Before the door he observed a soldier, and, by the soldier, was introduced to a small company of serious people, who were known in Norwich by the name of puritans. He began to preach out of doors. Thousands, who had been notorious for all kinds of profaneness and irreligion, ran to hear him. Nearly two thousand of them were united together in Christian fellowship. The change in the city was most marvellous. A temporary building was erected on Timber Hill, in imitation of the one erected for Whitefield in Moorfields, and was called the Tabernacle. Meanwhile, however, a Jacobite party, commonly called the “Hell Fire Club,” a lawless fraternity who met at the Blue Bell on Orford Hill,[151] in conjunction with the papists and protestants of the city, began to oppose the growing reformation. The windows of Wheatley’s Tabernacle were smashed in pieces, and the chapel itself unroofed. Wheatley was stripped, and dragged to one of the bridges for the purpose of being drowned, but was mercifully rescued by the mayor. Horns were blown; and fireworks, dirt and stones were hurled in all directions at his followers. Some were scorched with fire; others wounded; and others had arms and legs violently broken. A plan was laid to convey the preacher to a mud pit, ten or twelve feet deep, and there to suffocate him. One day, the mob went in procession through most of the streets of Norwich, with a mock burial of the preacher, having upon his coffin the inscription—“Antichrist, Enthusiasm, Imposture, Blasphemy, and Schismatic.” They paraded twice through the Bell Yard, where the Hell Fire Club was kept; then walked three times round a fire in the castle ditch; and then, with mock solemnity, committed the coffin to the flames, and the preacher to the devil. Mrs. Overton and her daughter were beaten, had their eyes plastered up with clay, and their house filled with filthy water. Mr. Standen was left speechless; and numbers more had to be put under the surgeon’s care. On one occasion, the mob stuck a lamb upon a pole, and carried it through the streets, blasphemously crying, “Behold the Lamb of God!” They crowned a man with thorns, and scourged him, calling him by the holy name of Jesus. They carried about a picture, alleging it was the Holy Ghost, and cursed it as they went. Men, women, and children were maimed without mercy. One poor creature, big with child, died of the kicks and bruises she received; another young woman was dragged into the street, and was treated by brute after brute in a manner too shocking to relate, until she was carried home insensible, and with little hopes of living.[152] Two letters, published in the Gentleman’s Magazine for 1752, and dated respectively, Norwich, February 19, and March 22, state that, for several months, the city had been disturbed and alarmed by the violent proceedings of an enraged populace, on account of their taking offence “at some encouragement given by the magistrates to Mr. Wheatley, a Welsh cobbler, lately turned Methodist preacher.” “On the 12th of January he had three constables to guard him; but the mob beat both him and them, and so covered them with mud that they could hardly be recognised. They went to his Tabernacle, broke the pulpit and windows, pulled down the seats, and untiled and destroyed a great part of the edifice. The mayor and swordbearer read the proclamation, to which the rioters responded, ‘Church and king! down with the meetings!’” It was alleged that Wheatley, by the number of his religious services, was the occasion of great numbers of both men and women neglecting their occupations; and that, as a consequence, the workhouse was filled, and the parishes burdened with helpless children. Wheatley, it is said, came to the town without a groat in his pocket, but was now receiving from ten to twelve guineas every week. He had been a noted bad liver; but now was well dressed, in a grey coat and black under habit, like a clergyman. His dear hearers, who regarded him as a holy inspired preacher, were roughly treated; for the populace, when meeting them, called out, “Bah! bah!” in reference to their being his own dear lambs; and, at a recent election of a coroner, had trundled some of them down the Castle Hill, and afterwards pumped on one, and wounded several others.

This was rough treatment; but Wheatley had been well schooled, and, in the midst of all, continued firm. His courage and his success ultimately turned the tide in his favour; and, in April, 1752, steps were taken to erect for him one of the largest chapels in the city. For a time, this was supplied by him, and Cudworth, and Robinson, afterwards the noted Socinian minister at Cambridge.

Space forbids our following the history of James Wheatley further; except to say, that, in 1754, he again disgraced himself; and the judge of the ecclesiastical court at Norwich, before whom his case was tried, on February 4, 1756, declared him to be “a lewd, debauched, incontinent, and adulterous person; and stated, he had committed the crimes of adultery, fornication, and incontinence, to the great scandal of good men, and the pernicious example of others; and, that he (the judge) decreed, that the said Wheatley be enjoined a public penance, to be performed in a linen cloth, with a paper pinned to his breast, denoting his crime; and, that he further pay the costs of his prosecution.”[153]

For a time, poor Wheatley was obliged to leave the kingdom. He then returned to Norwich, and preached to his “dear lambs” for several years, after which he lost his voice, and went to Bristol, where he was suddenly seized, in a barber’s shop, with a violent fit of coughing, and expired. John Pawson, who knew him, and from whose manuscript letters this is taken, adds: “He was one of the greatest mysteries that ever bore human shape. Such a degree of hypocrisy hardly ever lodged in a human heart before.”

The detected immorality of James Wheatley, and his accusation of other preachers, led Wesley and his brother to determine upon instituting a more strict inquiry into the life, and behaviour of the preachers in connection with them.

It was now twelve years since Methodism was fairly founded. During that period, eighty-five itinerants had, more or less, preached and acted under Wesley’s guidance. Of these, one (Wheatley) had been expelled; six, Thomas Beard, Enoch Williams, Samuel Hitchens, Thomas Hitchens, John Jane, and Henry Millard, had died in their Master’s work; ten, for various reasons, had retired; and sixty-eight were still employed, namely:—

Of this number, two were expelled, viz. Thomas Williams in 1755, and William Fugill in 1768; and forty-one left the itinerancy; thus leaving only twenty-five of the sixty-eight preachers employed in 1751, who died in the itinerant work. Several of those who left became clergymen of the Church of England, some Dissenting ministers, and some, on account of failing health or for domestic reasons, entered into business, but lived and died as local preachers. There is, however, another fact too notable to be omitted, namely, that, of the forty-one preachers who relinquished the itinerancy, six resigned in 1751, six in 1752, and twelve within four years after that.[154] This was a serious sifting; but the searching examinations of 1751, and the sacramental disturbances of the next five years, account for it.

As already stated, the case of James Wheatley led the Wesleys to resolve upon a thorough inquiry into the character and creed of all their preachers. The office fell upon Charles; and, for that purpose, he started for Leeds on June 28. He preached and visited all the societies on the way. At Worcester, the mob, with faces blacked, some without shirts, and all in rags, began to curse and swear, and sing lewd songs, and throw dust and dirt over both the preacher and his congregation, till they were covered from head to foot, and almost blinded.

The conference, for inquiry, was opened at Leeds, on September 11. It consisted of about a dozen preachers and three clergymen, and was begun by singing a hymn, which Charles Wesley seems to have composed for the occasion, and a few stanzas of which are here subjoined.

“Arise, Thou jealous God, arise,

Thy sifting power exert,

Look through us with Thy flaming eyes,

And search out every heart.

Our inmost souls Thy Spirit knows,

And let Him now display

Whom Thou hast for Thy glory chose,

And purge the rest away.

The apostles false far off remove,

Thy faithful labourers own,

And give us each himself to prove,

And know as he is known.

Do I presume to preach Thy word

By Thee uncalled, unsent?

Am I the servant of the Lord,

Or Satan’s instrument?

I once unfeignedly believed

Myself sent forth by Thee;

But have I kept the grace received,

In simple poverty?”

Twelve verses of this searching hymn were sung; its author, the president, prayed; and then stated his views, freely and fully, concerning the qualifications, work, and trials of Methodist preachers. No immediate action was taken, except that poor William Darney, who had just published his “Collection of Hymns, in four parts,” was refused admittance, and was told, that unless he abstained, in future, “from railing, begging, and printing nonsense,” he should be expelled. The conference lasted but a day, and seems to have passed but one resolution. “We agreed,” writes Charles Wesley, “to postpone opinions till the next general conference, and parted friends.”[155]

Charles Wesley, however, accomplished the work assigned him by his brother, more by private inquiry than by public conference. Robert Swindells he found inclined to Calvinism, but teachable; David Tratham was a confirmed predestinarian;[156] and John Bennet’s theological principles were doubted.

Wesley’s suspicions and anxieties were, at this period, quite equal to his brother’s. He had heard that Charles Skelton, and J. C. (?Joseph Cownley) “frequently and bitterly railed against the Church”; he declared, that “idleness had eaten out the heart of half their preachers, particularly those in Ireland”; and he requested his brother to give them their choice, “Either follow your trade, or resolve, before God, to spend the same hours in reading, etc., which you used to spend in working.” He counselled, that the young preachers should not be checked without strong necessity; and said, that, in the process of sifting, he should prefer grace before gifts. They must deal, not only with disorderly walkers, but with triflers, the effeminate, and busybodies. In a letter to a friend, dated August 21, he wrote: “I see plainly the spirit of Ham, if not of Corah, has fully possessed several of our preachers. So much the more freely and firmly do I acquiesce in the determination of my brother, ‘that it is far better for us to have ten, or six preachers, who are alive to God, sound in the faith, and of one heart with us and with one another, than fifty of whom we have no such assurance.’”

Towards the end of the year, Wesley and his brother conferred with their confidential adviser, the Rev. Vincent Perronet, and then drew up and signed the following agreement.

“With regard to the preachers, we agree—

“1. That none shall be permitted to preach in any of our societies, till he be examined, both as to grace and gifts; at least, by the assistant, who, sending word to us, may, by our answer, admit him a local preacher.

“2. That such preacher be not immediately taken from his trade, but be exhorted to follow it with all diligence.

“3. That no person shall be received as a travelling preacher, or be taken from his trade, by either of us alone, but by both of us conjointly, giving him a note under both our hands.

“4. That neither of us will re-admit a travelling preacher laid aside, without the consent of the other.

“5. That, if we should ever disagree in our judgment, we will refer the matter to Mr. Perronet.

“6. That we will entirely be patterns of all we expect from every preacher; particularly of zeal, diligence, and punctuality in the work; by constantly preaching and meeting the society; by visiting yearly Ireland, Cornwall, and the north; and, in general, by superintending the whole work, and every branch of it, with all the strength that God shall give us. We agree to the above written, till this day next year, in the presence of Mr. Perronet.

“John Wesley,
Charles Wesley.”[157]

This was a momentous epoch in Methodist history. The Wesleys were well aware, that pulpits mould pews. “Like priest, like people,” is a proverb not older than it is true. Perhaps, we cannot do better than conclude the matter with an extract from a long letter, which Wesley wrote to a friend, just before the year was ended.

“London, December 20, 1751.

“My dear Friend,—I think the right method of preaching is this. At our first beginning to preach at any place, after a general declaration of the love of God to sinners, and His willingness that they should be saved, to preach the law, in the strongest, the closest, the most searching manner possible.

“After more and more persons are convinced of sin, we may mix more and more of the gospel, in order to beget faith, to raise into spiritual life those whom the law hath slain. I would not advise to preach the law without the gospel, any more than the gospel without the law. Undoubtedly, both should be preached in their turns; yea, both at once, or both in one. All the conditional promises are instances of this. They are law and gospel mixed together.

“In this manner, not only my brother and I, but Mr. Maxfield, Nelson, James Jones, Westall, and Reeves, all preached at the beginning. By this preaching, it pleased God to work those mighty effects in London, Bristol, Kingswood, Yorkshire, and Newcastle. By means of this, twenty-nine persons received remission of sins, in one day, at Bristol only; most of them, while I was opening and enforcing our Lord’s sermon on the mount. In this manner, John Downes, John Bennet, John Haughton, and all the other Methodists, preached, till James Wheatley came among them. The change he has introduced has done great harm to David Tratham, Thomas Webb, Robert Swindells, and John Maddern; all of whom are but shadows of what they were. It has likewise done great harm to hearers as well as preachers, diffusing among them a prejudice against the scriptural, Methodist manner of preaching Christ, so that they can no longer hear the plain old truth, with profit or pleasure, nay hardly with patience. The ‘gospel preachers,’ so called, corrupt their hearers, and they vitiate their taste. They feed them with sweetmeats, till the genuine wine of the kingdom seems quite insipid to them. They give them cordial upon cordial, which make them all life and spirit for the present; but, meantime, their appetite is destroyed, so that they can neither retain nor digest the pure milk of the word.

“According to the constant observations I have made, in all parts both of England and Ireland, preachers of this kind spread death, not life, among their hearers. This was the case when I went last into the north. For some time before my coming, John Downes had scarce been able to preach at all; the three others, in the round, were such as style themselves ‘gospel preachers.’ When I came to review the societies, with great expectation of finding a vast increase, I found most of them lessened by one third. One was entirely broken up. That of Newcastle was less by a hundred members than when I visited it before; and, of those that remained, the far greater number, in every place, were cold, weary, heartless, and dead. Such were the blessed effects of this gospel-preaching! of this new method of preaching Christ.

“On the other hand, when, in my return, I took an account of the societies in Yorkshire, chiefly under the care of John Nelson, one of the old way, I found them all alive, strong, and vigorous of soul, believing, loving, and praising God their Saviour; and increased in number from eighteen or nineteen hundred, to upwards of three thousand. These had been continually fed with wholesome food. From the beginning they had been taught both the law and the gospel. ‘God loves you; therefore love and obey Him. Christ died for you; therefore die to sin. Christ is risen; therefore rise in the image of God. Christ liveth evermore; therefore live to God, till you live with Him in glory.’

“So we preached; and so you believed. This is the scriptural way, the Methodist way, the true way. God grant we may never turn therefrom, to the right hand or to the left.

“I am, my dear friend, your ever affectionate brother,

“John Wesley.”[158]

It has been already stated, that Whitefield embarked for America in the month of August. Before sailing, he penned a letter, an extract from which will be read with some surprise.

“Bristol, March 22, 1751.

“Reverend and very dear Sir,—Thanks be to God, that the time for favouring the colony of Georgia seems to be come. Now is the season for us to exert our utmost for the good of the poor Ethiopians. We are told, that even they are soon to stretch out their hands to God; and who knows but their being settled in Georgia may be overruled for this great end? As for the lawfulness of keeping slaves, I have no doubt, since I hear of some that were bought with Abraham’s money, and some that were born in his house. I also cannot help thinking, that some of those servants mentioned by the apostles in their epistles were, or had been, slaves. It is plain, that the Gibeonites were doomed to perpetual slavery; and, though liberty is a sweet thing to such as are born free, yet to those who never knew the sweets of it, slavery perhaps may not be so irksome. However this be, it is plain, to a demonstration, that hot countries cannot be cultivated without negroes. What a flourishing country might Georgia have been, had the use of them been permitted years ago! How many white people have been destroyed for want of them, and how many thousands of pounds spent to no purpose at all? Though it is true, that they are brought in a wrong way, from their own country, and it is a trade not to be approved of, yet as it will be carried on whether we will or not, I should think myself highly favoured if I could purchase a good number of them, in order to make their lives comfortable, and lay a foundation for breeding up their posterity in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I had no hand in bringing them into Georgia, though my judgment was for it, and I was strongly importuned thereto; yet, I would not have a negro upon my plantation, till the use of them was publicly allowed by the colony. Now this is done, let us diligently improve the present opportunity for their instruction. It rejoiced my soul, to hear that one of my poor negroes in Carolina was made a brother in Christ. How know we but we may have many such instances in Georgia? I trust many of them will be brought to Jesus, and this consideration, as to us, swallows up all temporal inconveniences whatsoever.

“I am, etc.,

“George Whitefield.”[159]

This is a strange production, especially when read in the present day; but it was not unmeaning talk. Whitefield acted upon the principle propounded, and, at the time of his decease, twenty years afterwards, was the possessor of seventy-five slaves, in connection with his Orphan House plantations in the Georgian settlements.[160] His intention was good; but his warmest admirer will find it difficult to defend his action. We shall, hereafter, become acquainted with Wesley’s views, when the time arrives for noticing his “Thoughts upon Slavery”; suffice it to remark here, that they were in perfect accordance with his well known designation of the slave trade, in 1772,—“an execrable sum of all villanies.”

On August 19, Wesley and his wife set out for Cornwall. At Tiverton, he went to hear a sermon preached at the old church, before the trustees of the school; but “such insufferable noise and confusion he never saw before in a place of worship; no, not even in a Jewish synagogue. The clergy set the example, laughing and talking during great part both of the prayers and sermon.” The next day, he himself preached, when a mob, from Blundell’s school, came with horns, drums, and fifes, and created all the disturbance in their power. They seized a poor chimney sweeper (though no Maccabee, as the Methodists in Tiverton were called), carried him away in triumph, and half murdered him before he could escape from their cruel clutches. A short time after this, the mayor of Tiverton asked a gentleman whether it was not right, that the Methodists should be banished from the town. The gentleman recommended his worship to follow the counsel of Gamaliel to the Jews; upon which the furious functionary observed, that there was no need of any new religion in Tiverton. “There is,” said he, “the old church and the new church; that is one religion. Then there is parson K——’s at the Pitt meeting, and parson W——’s in Peter Street, and old parson T——’s at the meeting in Newport Street,—four ways of going to heaven already; enough in conscience; and if the people won’t go to heaven by one or other of these ways, by —— they shan’t go to heaven at all herefrom, while I am mayor of Tiverton.”[161]

Leaving the religious town of Tiverton, Wesley and his wife went to Taunton, where a mob of “boys and gentlemen” made so much noise, that he was obliged to desist from preaching in the street, and to finish his discourse in the meeting room; on issuing from which his congregation were furiously pelted with all sorts of missiles.

After spending a happy month in Cornwall, and preaching all the way to and fro, he got back to London on October 21, where, with the exception of a short excursion to Canterbury, he continued until the year was ended.

During this brief breathing time, Wesley began his second letter to Lavington, bishop of Exeter. “Heavy work,” says he, “such as I should never choose; but sometimes it must be done. Well might the ancient say, ‘God made practical divinity necessary, the devil controversial.’ But it is necessary: we must resist the devil, or he will not flee from us.”

He likewise entered into correspondence with his disabled itinerant, John Downes, whose health was failing, and who found it necessary to seek temporary retirement. He writes:—

“Some of the preachers do not adorn the gospel; therefore, we have been constrained to lay some of them aside; and some others have departed of themselves. Let us that remain be doubly in earnest. I entreat you, tell me without reserve, what you think of Charles Skelton. Is his heart with us, or is it not? How are you employed? from five in the morning till nine at night? For I suppose you want eight hours’ sleep. What becomes of logic and Latin? Is your soul alive and more athirst for God? You must carefully guard against any irregularity, either as to food, sleep, or labour. Your water should be neither quite warm, for fear of relaxing the tone of your stomach, nor quite cold. Of all flesh, mutton is the best for you; of all vegetables, turnips, potatoes, and apples, if you can bear them. I think it is ill husbandry for you to work with your hands, in order to get money; because you may be better employed. But, if you will work, come and superintend my printing. I will give you £40 for the first year; afterwards, if need be, I will increase your salary; and still you may preach as often as you can preach. However, come, whether you print, or preach, or not.”[162]

John Downes was a remarkable man. Wesley, in his Journal, gives several instances of his mathematical and mechanical talent, and considered him “by nature full as great a genius as Sir Isaac Newton.” He accepted Wesley’s proposal, and, at the age of fifty-two, after a long conflict with sickness, pain, and poverty, died a triumphant death in 1774.

During the year 1751, Wesley was more than usually occupied. First of all, there was his hasty and unhappy marriage. This was followed by the case of Wheatley. Then, there was the not unneeded sifting of his preachers, both itinerant and local. And added to all this, there was the preparation for his “Christian Library”; eleven volumes of which were published in 1751. But, according to our wont, we conclude the chapter with a complete list of the year’s publications.

1. “Thoughts upon Infant Baptism. Extracted from a late writer.” 12mo, 21 pages. This is a summary of the arguments commonly used to vindicate the practice of baptizing children. Those who have doubts on the subject would do well to read Wesley’s tract. We know of no publication, that, in so small a compass, states the arguments so clearly and so conclusively.

2. “A Short Hebrew Grammar.” 12mo, 11 pages.

3. “A Short Greek Grammar.” 12mo, 80 pages.

4. “A Short French Grammar.” 12mo, 35 pages.

Of course these were designed for the use of Kingswood school. On the subject of languages, Wesley writes: “The Greek excels the Hebrew as much in beauty and strength as it does in copiousness. I suppose no one from the beginning of the world wrote better Hebrew than Moses. But does not the language of St. Paul excel the language of Moses, as much as the knowledge of St. Paul excelled his? I speak this, even on supposition, that you read the Hebrew, as I believe, Ezra, if not Moses, did, with points; for if we read it in the modern way, without points, I appeal to every competent judge, whether it be not the most equivocal.”[163] It is a curious fact, that Wesley advised no one above twenty years of age to think of learning Greek or Latin, on the ground that he could then employ his time abundantly better.[164] French he considered to be “the poorest, meanest language in Europe,” and “no more comparable to the German or Spanish, than a bagpipe is to an organ.”[165]

5. “Serious Thoughts upon the Perseverance of the Saints.” 12mo, 24 pages. This was a timely production, and, though concise, is written with much calmness and ability. Wesley admits, that both sides of the question are attended with great difficulties,—difficulties such as unassisted reason is unable to remove; and, therefore, says he, “let the living oracles decide. If these speak for us, we neither seek nor want further witness.” He clearly shows, that Calvinists constantly avail themselves of two fallacies. “1. They perpetually beg the question by applying, to particular persons, texts which relate only to the church in general; and some of them only to the Jewish church and nation, as distinguished from all other people. 2. They take for granted, as an indisputable truth, that whatever our Lord speaks to, or of His apostles, is to be applied to all believers.”

6. Eleven volumes of the “Christian Library,” from Vol. II. to Vol. XII. inclusive, and making altogether three thousand two hundred and fifty 12mo printed pages.

Vol. II. contains a continuation of John Arndt’s “True Christianity.” Vols. III. to VI., inclusive, are occupied with an abridgment of Fox’s Book of Martyrs; and Vols. VII. to XII. with extracts from the works of Bishop Hall, Robert Bolton, Dr. Preston, Dr. Sibbes, Dr. Goodwin, William Dell, and Dr. Manton.