“I perceive, verba fiunt mortuo; so I say no more about your coming to London. Here stand I; and I shall stand, with or without human help, if God is with us. That story of Thomas Maxfield is not true. But I doubt more is true than is good. He is a most incomprehensible creature. I cannot convince him, that separation is any evil; or, that speaking in the name of God, when God has not spoken, is any more than an innocent mistake. I know not what to say to him, or do with him. He is really mali caput et fons.”[507]
A fortnight after this, Wesley wrote as follows to the Countess of Huntingdon.
“March 20, 1763.
“My Lady,—By the mercy of God, I am still alive, and following the work to which He has called me, although without any help, even in the most trying times, from those of whom I might have expected it. Their voice seemed to be rather, ‘Down with him, down with him; even to the ground.’ I mean (for I use no ceremony or circumlocution) Mr. Madan, Mr. Haweis, Mr. Berridge, and (I am sorry to say it) Mr. Whitefield. Only Mr. Romaine has shown a truly sympathising spirit, and acted the part of a brother. As to the prophecies of these poor wild men, George Bell and half-a-dozen more, I am not a jot more accountable for them than Mr. Whitefield is, having never countenanced them in any degree, but opposed them from the moment I heard them; neither have these extravagances any foundation in any doctrine which I teach. The loving God with all our heart, soul, and strength, and the loving all men as Christ loved us, is, and ever was, for these thirty years, the sum of what I deliver, as pure religion and undefiled. However, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved! The will of the Lord be done!
‘Poor and helpless as I am,
Thou dost for my vileness care,
Thou hast called me by Thy name,
Thou dost all my burdens bear.’
“I am, your ladyship’s servant for Christ’s sake,
“John Wesley.”[508]