CHAPTER XXXI.
Back in London.—Mr. John and Mr. Charles go visiting.—Too much for one.—Talking matters over.—The first Methodist Conference.—No time to be in a hurry.—What early rising can do.—First tract distributors.—A big district.—Boarding schools 150 years ago.—Dreadful rules.
E have been travelling all over England with Mr. Wesley, now I think we must go back to London with him. The society there was still the largest in the country: in the year I am writing about (1744), they had one thousand nine hundred and fifty members. Mr. Wesley very much wished to visit every one of these members, and asked his brother Charles to go with him. They started their visiting at six o'clock every morning, and did not leave off till six o'clock at night.
Six o'clock a.m. seems a funny time to call and see any one, does it not? But you see people used to get up at four or five in the morning in those days, and used to go to bed at eight, so it was not really such a funny time as it seems.
Though Mr. John and Mr. Charles started so early and worked so late, it took them a long, long time to visit all those 1950 members, and when they had finished, Mr. Wesley realised for the first time how his work had grown. He saw it was impossible, even with his brother's help, to manage all the preachers and all the members scattered over the country, when even the work in London was more than he could undertake alone. He thought about this a great deal, and then he asked four clergymen and four of his helpers, or what we should call local preachers, to meet him and his brother at the Foundry, to talk things over and decide what ought to be done. These gentlemen accepted his invitation, and there, on that eventful Monday in June, 1744, the first Methodist Conference met; and from that time up to the present, no year has passed but Methodist preachers and helpers have gathered together to make plans and talk business.
I am sure you must all have heard of the Wesleyan Methodist Conference, which is now held every July or August in some one or other of the large towns of England. This first conference was opened with solemn prayer and a sermon by Mr. Charles Wesley; then all the difficulties of the work were talked over, and arrangements made for the future. Mr. John Wesley presided, and for forty-six years after, at every conference, their beloved leader and head took the chair at this annual gathering.
You will think that what with travelling and preaching, and looking after his helpers, and visiting the members, Mr. Wesley could not find time for much else. But it is always the busiest people who have the most time. As I told you before, Mr. Wesley began his days very early, getting up at four o'clock; and by doing this every morning for sixty years, he managed not only to preach, and read, and visit, but also to write a great many books, and thousands of tracts—one of his books was called "Lessons for Children." Many of the tracts were about swearing and Sabbath-breaking, and printed on the outside were the words, "Not to be sold, but given away"; and he and his preachers used to carry them in their pockets and give them to the people they passed on the roads.
Another reason why Mr. Wesley had more time than most people was, because he
NEVER WASTED A MINUTE,
and though he did so much work, he was never in a hurry. He used to say, "I have no time to be in a hurry." Hurry you know does not always mean speed; when things are done in a hurry they are often only half done, and have to be done all over again.
You remember how the miners at Kingswood collected money and built a school for their children. Well, about ten years afterwards, another school was built at Kingswood for the children of the travelling preachers. These preachers had not much time to look after their families themselves, being so much away from home, and they wanted their boys and girls to be taught to read their Bibles and to learn to love Jesus. They had some dreadfully strict rules at this boarding school, which my readers would not have liked at all, and which I am afraid the children there did not like either, for I have heard that some of the boys ran away. They had to go to bed every night at eight o'clock, and what was worse, get up every morning at four. Then every little boy and girl, unless they were poorly, had to fast every Friday, that is, they were not allowed to have anything to eat all day until three o'clock. But I had better not tell you any more of these dreadful rules, only you may be very thankful that you are living in these days, when you have much better times than the boys and girls who lived 150 years ago.
