“March 27, 1764.
“Dear Sir,—I thank you for your remarks on that bad performance of the Bishop of Gloucester, which undoubtedly tears up, by the roots, all real, internal religion. Yet, at the same time, I cannot but bewail your vehement attachment to the mystic writers: with whom I conversed much for several years, and whom I then admired, perhaps, more than you do now. But I found, at length, an absolute necessity of giving up either them or the Bible. So, after some time, I fixed my choice, to which I hope to adhere to my life’s end. It is only the extreme attachment to these, which can account for the following words (in your Defence): ‘Mr. Wesley does, in several parts of his Journals, lay down some marks of the new birth, not only doubtful, but exceptionable; as particularly where persons appear agitated or convulsed, under the ministry; which might be owing to other causes rather than any regenerating work of God’s Spirit.’
“Is this true? In what one part of my Journals do I lay down any doubtful, much less exceptionable, marks of the new birth? In no part do I lay down those agitations or convulsions as any mark of it at all; nay, I expressly declare the contrary, in those very words which the bishop himself cites from my Journal. I declare, ‘these are of a disputable nature; they may be from God; they may be from nature; they may be from the devil.’ How is it, then, that you tell all the world, ‘Mr. Wesley lays them down in his Journals, as marks of the new birth’?
“Is it kind? Would it not have been far more kind, suppose I had spoken wrong, to tell me of it in a private manner? How much more unkind was it, to accuse me, to all the world, of a fault which I never committed!
“Is it wise thus to put a sword into the hand of our common enemy? Are we not both fighting the battle of our Lord, against the world, as well as the flesh and the devil? And shall I furnish them with weapons against you, or you against me? Fine diversion for the children of the devil! And how much more would they be diverted, if I would furnish my quota of the entertainment, by falling upon you in return! But I bewail the change in your spirit. You have not gained more lowliness or meekness since I knew you! Oh beware! You did not use to despise any one. This you have gained from the authors you admire. They do not express anger towards their opponents, but contempt, in the highest degree. And this, I am afraid, is far more antichristian, more diabolical, than the other. The God of love deliver you and me from this spirit, and fill us with the mind that was in Christ! So prays, dear sir, your still affectionate brother,
“John Wesley.”[593]
Five years after this, Wesley published the thirteenth number of his Journal, in which the following entry occurs.
“1764, February 5.—I began Mr. Hartley’s ingenious ‘Defence of the Mystic Writers.’ But it does not satisfy me. I must still object—1. To their sentiments. The chief of them do not appear to me to have any conception of church communion. Again: they slight not only works of piety, the ordinances of God, but even works of mercy; and yet most of them, yea, all that I have seen, hold justification by works. In general, they are ‘wise above what is written,’ indulging themselves in many unscriptural speculations. I object—2. To their spirit. Most of them are of a dark, shy, reserved, unsociable temper; and are apt to despise all who differ from them, as carnal, unenlightened men. I object—3. To their whole phraseology. It is both unscriptural, and affectedly mysterious. I say, affectedly; for this does not necessarily result from the nature of the thing spoken of. St. John speaks as high and as deep things as Jacob Behmen. Why then does not Jacob speak as plain as he?”
It has been already stated, that Mr. Hartley was, not only a mystic, but a millenarian; and we feel it right to add, that his “Paradise Restored,” making 356 pages, octavo, is, by far, the most sober, sensible, scriptural, and learned work on the millennium that it has been our lot to read. He professes to show “the great importance of the doctrine of Christ’s glorious reign on earth with His saints”; and maintains that “it was typified in many of the Levitical institutes; was foretold and described in numberless places by the inspired prophets; was made the subject of many precious promises in the gospel; was delineated in the Revelation of St. John; and was received as an apostolical doctrine by the primitive Christians, according to the testimony of several of the ancient fathers,” as St. Barnabas, St. Hermas, Justin Martyr, Irenæus, Tertullian, Origen, and Lactantius. He further argues, that the doctrine received the sanction of the Council of Nice, called by Constantine the Great, and composed of bishops from all parts of the Christian world; and that it is embodied in the Catechism of King Edward VI., which was revised by English bishops, and published, by royal authority, in the last year of King Edward’s reign.
His arguments, to illustrate the importance of the doctrine, are, to say the least, exceedingly ingenious and able, but far too elaborated to be condensed in a work like this. His theory is substantially the same as that of the millenarians of the present day; without, however, many of the minute whimsies which foolish and fanatical people attach to it. Having, as he thinks, established his doctrine, Mr. Hartley proceeds to answer objections; and concludes with a chapter on “the signs of the times.”