How these young worthies are now to be disposed of, or how they will dispose of themselves, as it was not so much as hinted that they had the least connection with me, is not my business to inquire. But surely such an expulsion as this, cannot deter them from pursuing their preparations for their ministerial calling: friends they cannot want, because “he is faithful who hath promised, that whosoever forsaketh father or mother, houses or lands, for his sake or the gospel’s, he shall have an hundred fold in this life, with persecution, and in the world to come life everlasting.” But if any act so dastardly, as to make unscriptural concessions, or be terrified by unscriptural, and therefore mere bruta fulmina, if they were of trades before, the sooner they return again to their trades the better: for it is to be feared, such cowards would only make a trade of the ministry if they were admitted into the church, and the fewer of such kind of tradesmen our church is troubled with, the safer she will be.
But what a mercy is it, reverend Sir, that we live under a free government, under a King whose royal grandfather repeatedly declared (and he was as good as his word through a long and glorious reign) that there should be no persecution in his time; under a King who in his first most gracious and never to be forgotten speech from the throne, gave his people the strongest assurances “that it was his fixt purpose, as the best means to draw down the divine favour on his reign, to countenance and encourage the practice of true religion and virtue, and maintain the toleration inviolable.”
That both students and common people will be in danger of being tempted by such violent proceedings, to put themselves under the act of toleration, may easily be foreseen: and it may as easily be guessed, how such treatment will necessarily discourage serious people from sending their sons to the university, at least to the university of Oxford; and at the same time will furnish them with a new argument for entering their youth in some of our dissenting academies, where they will be in no danger, it is presumed, of being expelled for singing hymns, speaking a little now and then in a religious society, or using extempore prayer.
Alas! alas! in what a disadvantageous point of light, must all concerned in such an extraordinary stretch of university-discipline stand, among all foreign universities whatsoever? In what point of light it will be viewed by our ecclesiastical superiors at home, a very little time will discover. Nay, it is to be feared, the discovery is made already: for by a letter dated so lately as March 29, it appears that a certain venerable society “on account of some circumstances that have lately happened (probably the circumstances of a late expulsion) are under a necessity of coming to a resolution, to accept of no recommendation for persons to go abroad as missionaries, but such as have had a literary education, and have been bred up with a design to dedicate themselves to the ministry.” This resolution seems to be taken, in order the better to prevent any of these cast-outs, or any other laymen, however otherwise well qualified and recommended, from applying to the society for holy orders, that they may be employed and sent abroad as missionaries. But to what a sad dilemma will many serious persons be hereby reduced? They must not, by such resolutions it seems, be allowed to be lay-preachers, and yet if sent by their friends to the university to pursue their studies, in order that they may be regularly and episcopally ordained, if they sing hymns, pray extempore, or give a word of exhortation in a religious society, though entirely made up of the members of the established church, they must be ipso facto expelled for so doing. O tempora! O mores! If matters proceed in this channel, of what stamp, Reverend Sir, may we not suppose, our future missionaries to the islands and continent will be? To my certain knowledge, all of them are not looked upon as very burning and shining lights already. But if what little light of true religion some may have, is to be thus damped by acts of expulsion before they leave the university, and even this little light, as far as lies in the power of man, is to be thus turned into total darkness, how great must that darkness be! Surely it must be worse than Egyptian darkness; a darkness that will be most deplorably felt by all true lovers of our common salvation both at home and abroad.
You need not be apprized, Reverend Sir, that a design for the establishment of episcopacy in our islands and plantations, hath been long upon the tapis; and that it hath been, in part at least, the subject of annual sermons for several years last past. No longer ago than in the year 1766, the present Bishop of Landaff insisted upon the necessity and expediency of it in the most explicit manner; nay, his Lordship carries the matter so far, as to assure us that this point, the establishment of episcopacy, being obtained, “the American church will go out of its infant state; be able to stand upon its own legs, and without foreign help support and spread itself: and then this society will have been brought to the happy issue intended.” Whether these assertions of his Lordship, when weighed in a proper balance, will not in some degree be found wanting, is not for me to determine. But supposing the reasoning to be just, and his Lordship’s assertions true, then I fear it will follow, that a society, which since its first institution hath been looked upon as a society for propagating the Gospel, hath been all the while rather a society for propagating Episcopacy in foreign parts: and if so, and if it ever should appear, that our Right Reverend Archbishops and Bishops do in the least countenance and encourage the unscriptural proceedings at Edmund-Hall, how must it increase the prejudices of our colonists, both in the islands and on the continent, against the establishment of episcopacy! That persons of all ranks, from Quebec down to the two Floridas, are at this time prejudiced, and more than prejudiced against it, is very notorious; but how will the very thought of the introduction of Lords Bishops even make them shudder? if their Lordships should think proper to countenance the expulsion of such worthy and truly religious students, whilst those who have no religion at all perhaps, may not only meet with countenance, but approbation and applause.
Besides, if such proceedings should be continued, (which God forbid!) what little credit may we suppose will hereafter be given to future university-testimonials, that the bearers of them have behaved studiously, soberly, and piously; and how must we in time be put under a disagreeable necessity of having a new, or at least of altering some part of our present most excellent ordination-office? As it now stands, one of the questions proposed to every candidate for holy orders runs thus: “Do you trust that you are inwardly moved by the holy ghost?” But if all students are to be expelled that sing hymns, pray extempore, attend upon, or expound a verse now and then, in a religious church of England society, should it not rather, Reverend Sir, be worded thus, namely, “Do ye trust that ye are NOT inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to take upon you the office and administration of the church?”
You will excuse this freedom, Reverend Sir.
Agitur de vitâ et sanguine turni.
Love to God, love to mankind in general, and love to that university, that alma mater where I had the honour of being educated, and, what is infinitely more, where I had the happiness of receiving the witness of the Spirit of God in my heart, all together constrain me.
The news of these young mens expulsion hath made, and will make the ears of all who have heard, or shall hear of it, to tingle: and therefore if some do not speak, and use great plainness of speech too, the very stones would, as it were, cry out against us. In respect to myself, Reverend Sir, I hope, that in taking the freedom of troubling you with this, I do not justly incur the censure of acting as a busy-body in other mens matters. For, whatever other pretences may be made, such as disqualification in respect to learning, age, the being of trades, &c. &c. &c. (Nugæ tricæque calendæ) it is notorious and obvious to all intelligent persons, that the grand cause of these young mens expulsion was this, namely, that they were either real or reputed Methodists. An honour this indeed, unwittingly put on Methodists, whoever or whatever they be; since scarce any now-a days can pray extempore, sing hymns, go to church or meeting, and abound in other acts of devotion, but they must be immediately dubbed Methodists. I say, dubbed Methodists; for it is not a name given to them by themselves, but was imposed on them by some of their fellow students and contemporaries in the university.