“I am, etc.,
“George Whitefield.”[159]
This is a strange production, especially when read in the present day; but it was not unmeaning talk. Whitefield acted upon the principle propounded, and, at the time of his decease, twenty years afterwards, was the possessor of seventy-five slaves, in connection with his Orphan House plantations in the Georgian settlements.[160] His intention was good; but his warmest admirer will find it difficult to defend his action. We shall, hereafter, become acquainted with Wesley’s views, when the time arrives for noticing his “Thoughts upon Slavery”; suffice it to remark here, that they were in perfect accordance with his well known designation of the slave trade, in 1772,—“an execrable sum of all villanies.”
On August 19, Wesley and his wife set out for Cornwall. At Tiverton, he went to hear a sermon preached at the old church, before the trustees of the school; but “such insufferable noise and confusion he never saw before in a place of worship; no, not even in a Jewish synagogue. The clergy set the example, laughing and talking during great part both of the prayers and sermon.” The next day, he himself preached, when a mob, from Blundell’s school, came with horns, drums, and fifes, and created all the disturbance in their power. They seized a poor chimney sweeper (though no Maccabee, as the Methodists in Tiverton were called), carried him away in triumph, and half murdered him before he could escape from their cruel clutches. A short time after this, the mayor of Tiverton asked a gentleman whether it was not right, that the Methodists should be banished from the town. The gentleman recommended his worship to follow the counsel of Gamaliel to the Jews; upon which the furious functionary observed, that there was no need of any new religion in Tiverton. “There is,” said he, “the old church and the new church; that is one religion. Then there is parson K——’s at the Pitt meeting, and parson W——’s in Peter Street, and old parson T——’s at the meeting in Newport Street,—four ways of going to heaven already; enough in conscience; and if the people won’t go to heaven by one or other of these ways, by —— they shan’t go to heaven at all herefrom, while I am mayor of Tiverton.”[161]
Leaving the religious town of Tiverton, Wesley and his wife went to Taunton, where a mob of “boys and gentlemen” made so much noise, that he was obliged to desist from preaching in the street, and to finish his discourse in the meeting room; on issuing from which his congregation were furiously pelted with all sorts of missiles.
After spending a happy month in Cornwall, and preaching all the way to and fro, he got back to London on October 21, where, with the exception of a short excursion to Canterbury, he continued until the year was ended.
During this brief breathing time, Wesley began his second letter to Lavington, bishop of Exeter. “Heavy work,” says he, “such as I should never choose; but sometimes it must be done. Well might the ancient say, ‘God made practical divinity necessary, the devil controversial.’ But it is necessary: we must resist the devil, or he will not flee from us.”
He likewise entered into correspondence with his disabled itinerant, John Downes, whose health was failing, and who found it necessary to seek temporary retirement. He writes:—
“Some of the preachers do not adorn the gospel; therefore, we have been constrained to lay some of them aside; and some others have departed of themselves. Let us that remain be doubly in earnest. I entreat you, tell me without reserve, what you think of Charles Skelton. Is his heart with us, or is it not? How are you employed? from five in the morning till nine at night? For I suppose you want eight hours’ sleep. What becomes of logic and Latin? Is your soul alive and more athirst for God? You must carefully guard against any irregularity, either as to food, sleep, or labour. Your water should be neither quite warm, for fear of relaxing the tone of your stomach, nor quite cold. Of all flesh, mutton is the best for you; of all vegetables, turnips, potatoes, and apples, if you can bear them. I think it is ill husbandry for you to work with your hands, in order to get money; because you may be better employed. But, if you will work, come and superintend my printing. I will give you £40 for the first year; afterwards, if need be, I will increase your salary; and still you may preach as often as you can preach. However, come, whether you print, or preach, or not.”[162]
John Downes was a remarkable man. Wesley, in his Journal, gives several instances of his mathematical and mechanical talent, and considered him “by nature full as great a genius as Sir Isaac Newton.” He accepted Wesley’s proposal, and, at the age of fifty-two, after a long conflict with sickness, pain, and poverty, died a triumphant death in 1774.