10. “A Serious Answer to Dr. Trapp’s Four Sermons on the Sin, Folly, and Danger of being Righteous Overmuch. Extracted from Mr. Law.” 12mo, 48 pages. This production of the genius, piety, and pen of William Law was as grand a piece of writing as can be found in the English language. It is somewhat remarkable, however, that Wesley, in republishing that part of it which contains Law’s account of the ground of the Christian religion, should have put into the hands of his Methodist readers the author’s mystical views concerning the primeval kingdom of Lucifer and his angels, and the results of their rebellion and ruin. It is true, that Wesley, in a foot note, observes: “This is the theory of Jacob Behmen, but quite incapable of proof;” but then, in the same note, he says that, though the theory “is not supported by Scripture, it is, notwithstanding, probable.”
Of course, by republishing the writings of other men, Wesley made their sentiments his own, except in cases to which he himself makes objection. On this ground, we give the two extracts following. The first will help to exhibit one of the guiding principles of Wesley’s life; the other will show his estimate of the office and the use of human learning.
Addressing the younger clergy, he remarks: “Lay this down as an infallible principle, that an entire, absolute renunciation of all worldly interest, is the only possible foundation of that virtue which your station requires. Without this, all attempts after an exemplary piety are vain. Detest therefore, with the utmost abhorrence, all desires of making your fortunes, either by preferments or rich marriages, and let it be your only ambition to stand at the top of every virtue, as visible guides and patterns, to all that aspire after the perfection of holiness.”
The other extract is not of trifling importance. “Human learning is by no means to be rejected from religion; but if it is considered as a key, or the key, to the mysteries of our redemption, instead of opening to us the kingdom of God, it locks us up in our own darkness. God is an all-speaking, all-working, all-illuminating essence, possessing the depths of every creature according to its nature; and when we turn from all impediments, this Divine essence becomes as certainly the true light of our minds here, as it will be hereafter. This is not enthusiasm, but the words of truth and soberness; and it is the running away from this enthusiasm, that has made so many great scholars as useless to the church as tinkling cymbals, and Christendom a mere Babel of learned confusion.”
11. “The Manners of the Ancient Christians, extracted from a French Author.” 12mo, 24 pages. The French author, from whose works this was taken, was the renowned Claude Fleury, the associate of Bossuet and Fenelon; the preceptor of the Dukes of Burgundy, Anjou, and Berry; the friend of Louis XIV.; the author of an Ecclesiastical History, the fruit of thirty years of devoted study; a man of great learning and simplicity, of high integrity, and ardent piety; who died in 1723, at the age of 83.
12. “A Roman Catechism, faithfully drawn out of the allowed writings of the Church of Rome. With a Reply thereto.” 12mo, 79 pages. This was a republication of a work bearing the following title: “A Catechism truly representing the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome, with an Answer thereunto. By a Protestant of the Church of England. London: 1686.” 12mo, 104 pages. On one page is the catechism, and on the opposite page the answer, throughout. Wesley neglects to acknowledge that the pamphlet was not an original production; and it has improperly been placed in the last edition of his collected works.
13. “A Letter to a Roman Catholic.” 12mo, 12 pages. Its object is to mollify the papist, by showing, that he and the protestant equally hold most of the great truths of the Christian religion; and that they therefore ought to live in peace and love. Wesley writes: “O brethren, let us not still fall out by the way! I hope to see you in heaven. And if I practise the religion above described, you dare not say I shall go to hell. You cannot think so. None can persuade you to it. Your own conscience tells you the contrary. Then, if we cannot as yet think alike in all things, at least, we may love alike. Herein we cannot possibly do amiss.”
14. “Minutes of Several Conversations between the Rev. Messrs. John and Charles Wesley and others.” Dublin: 1749.
15. It was also in this, or in a former year, that Wesley published his threepenny tract, entitled, “An Extract of the Life and Death of Mr. John Janeway,” a young man of remarkable piety, who died at the age of twenty-three, in the year 1657.
16. “A Christian Library. Consisting of Extracts and Abridgments of the Choicest Pieces of Practical Divinity which have been published in the English Tongue. In Fifty Volumes. By John Wesley, M.A., Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. Bristol: printed by Felix Farley.”