In other words, in 1768, three married Methodist ministers, and an unmarried one, cost the Barnard castle circuit about £109 8s. a year; or, including house rent, doctors’ bills, circuit horse, allowances for wives, conference expenses, and interest on borrowed money, about ten shillings and sixpence per minister per week. O tempora! O mores!
In his journey southwards, Wesley omitted visiting several of his preaching places in the north of Yorkshire. One of these was Helmsley, to which the following letter, by Dr. Conyers, refers.
“June 7, 1763.
“Reverend and dear Sir,—I have had information, from many hands, of your design of calling upon me at Helmsley, in your return from Scotland. I take this opportunity, frankly and freely, to declare to you, that my house and my heart are, and ever shall be, open to you. I presume our archdeacon will be with me, from Stokesley, on Wednesday evening, as he always takes a bed, and spends a night or two with me, when he is upon his visitation, which is at this place on Friday next. How far you may alter your design of preaching here, on that account, I leave to yourself. I speak this not out of fear; for I love you as I love my own soul: my only apprehension is, that he, being upon the spot, may shut my church doors against you. But if you only mean a friendly visit to me, I shall be glad to see you, let who will be here; and it will be the comfort of my heart, to have you preach to my flock in every room of my house, at any time when you come this way. As far as the doctrine you teach has come to my knowledge, I know not one part to which I could not subscribe, both with hand and heart.
“I am, reverend and dear sir, your affectionate friend and servant in Christ,
“Richard Conyers.”[527]
On the 13th of June, Wesley came to Epworth, where, while he was preaching, “a kind of gentleman” hired a company of boys and a drunken man to disturb the congregation. The boys shouted; the drunkard, as well as he could articulate, bawled ribaldry and nonsense; and the gentleman, with a French horn, did his utmost in blowing blasts of discord; but, despite the hubbub, the congregation quietly listened to the preacher’s sermon.
From Epworth, Wesley proceeded to Doncaster, Leeds, Dewsbury, and Manchester. While at Manchester, he paid his first visit to Matthew Mayer, at Portwood Hall, near Stockport, now a young man twenty-three years of age, a Methodist of about four years’ standing, but who had found peace with God only a few months before. In conjunction with John Morris, he had established weekly prayer-meetings at Davyhulme, Dukinfield, Ashton under Lyne, and other places, in one of which John Whitehead, the biographer of Wesley, was converted. Wesley invited young Mayer to accompany him to Birmingham, which invitation was accepted; and thus commenced a remarkable career of earnest and successful preaching, which lasted fifty years. Matthew Mayer never became, in the common sense of the designation, an itinerant preacher; and yet he itinerated tens of thousands of miles; and there are few towns, or even large villages, in Cheshire, Staffordshire, Derbyshire, the south of Lancashire, or the west of Yorkshire, in which there were not numerous living witnesses of the Divine, converting power that attended his preaching. Matthew Mayer was one of the most remarkable local preachers that Methodism has ever had. He died in 1814, and Joseph Benson went all the way from London to Lancashire, in the depth of winter, purposely to preach his funeral sermon.
Wesley left Stockport on the 20th of June, and reached the metropolis four days afterwards. Finding that the ferment, arising out of Thomas Maxfield’s separation, still continued, he resolved to remain in London until after his conference had met.
Unfortunately, no explicit record of the proceedings of this conference exists. It is known that the first edition of what are called “The Large Minutes” was published in 1753. A second edition, containing the added legislation of the last ten years, was issued in 1763. Comparing the two, we find the following decisions arrived at during the interval between the dates just mentioned.