“Oh that I now the rest might know,
Believe and enter in!
Now, Saviour, now, the power bestow,
And let me cease from sin!
Remove this hardness from my heart,
This unbelief remove;
To me the rest of faith impart,
The sabbath of Thy love!”
The question here raised is not whether Wesley’s doctrine be true, or whether it be false; but simply when he began to preach it. He says, from the beginning; Dr. Whitehead says otherwise. He writes: “Though Mr. Wesley had so long held the doctrine of Christian perfection, he had not always held, that this state of mind might be attained in one moment; much less, that a person might attain it in his novitiate; nor do I know, that there were any professors of it before 1760, except when death was approaching.”[685]
Who will decide this question? It is full of interest, and is not without importance.