Young Wesley remained at the Free School, Dorchester, until he was fifteen years of age. For some time past, his father had been dead. His mother was a widow, and was poor. The boy, as he himself tells us, “was almost fit for the university,” but the difficulty was to find means to send him there. Like his father, and his two grandfathers, he was evidently intended for the Christian ministry; but, considering the treatment which all the three had experienced at the hands of the Episcopal party, it is scarcely probable that their youthful descendant would, at this early period of, his history, feel a wish to enter the ministry of the Established Church. His father and his grandfathers, though they had all been the occupants of Church livings, were, so far as Episcopacy and the use of the Liturgy are concerned, Dissenters; and there can be no question, that, as a boy fifteen years of age, his sympathies were with them.
But, had it been otherwise, there was little prospect of a youth like him being able to become a minister of the Established Church. To become such, he must receive Episcopal ordination; and to receive that, he must go to the university: but to go there was impossible, for he was without money, and was without Episcopal friends to send him.
His Dissenting friends showed him kindness. Without any application being made to them, either by his mother or by himself, they sent him, at their own cost, to London, for the purpose of being entered at one of their private academies, and of being trained for the Dissenting ministry. He tells us that Dr G. had the care of one of the most considerable of these seminaries, and had promised him tuition; but, on his arrival in London on the 8th of March 1678, he found that Dr G. was just deceased, and so his hope for a time was thwarted.
He was now sent to a grammar-school, where his progress was such, that the master wished him to proceed to the university, and actually promised him a handsome subsistence there. At this crisis, his Dissenting friends again came forward. He was a youth of promise; and, for their own sake, as well as out of respect for his dead father, they were unwilling to have him wrested from them.
At this time, a fund existed, raised by the collections and subscriptions of a certain Dissenting congregation, for the purpose of meeting cases like that of young Wesley. Out of this fund, he was granted an exhibition of £30 a year; and was sent to Mr Veal’s academy at Stepney. Wesley says that his relatives considered the offer of the Dissenters to possess greater advantages than the offer which was made to him by the master of the grammar-school to send him to the university, but in what respect it was considered more advantageous we are left to guess.
Edward Veal, the principal of the Stepney Academy, was, in the first instance, a student of Christ’s Church College, Oxford, and afterwards of Trinity College, Dublin. He was ordained at Winwick, in Lancashire, August 14, 1657. When he left Ireland, he brought with him a testimonial of his being “a learned, orthodox minister, of a sober, pious, and peaceable conversation; who, during his abode in the college, was eminently useful for the instruction of youth, and whose ministry had been often exercised in and about the city of Dublin with great satisfaction to the godly, until he was deprived of his fellowship for nonconformity to the ceremonies imposed in the Church, and for joining with other ministers in their endeavours for a reformation.” This testimonial was signed by seven respectable ministers, one of whom was the celebrated Stephen Charnock, at that time exercising his ministry in Dublin, and residing in the house of Sir Harry Cromwell. On leaving Ireland, Edward Veal became chaplain to Sir William Waller, in Middlesex, and afterwards settled as a Nonconformist minister at Wapping, and likewise opened the academy at Stepney. He died June 6, 1708, aged seventy-six. Four of his sermons are published in the “Morning Exercises.” Dunton says he “was an universal scholar, and a man of great piety and usefulness. His principles were very moderate. He assisted in preparing for the press the posthumous works of Stephen Charnock;” and wrote the annotations on the Epistle to the Ephesians, published in the Commentary of Matthew Poole.
Samuel Wesley was a student in Mr Veal’s academy for about the space of two years, during which his tutor read to him a course of lectures on Logic and Ethics. He was now eighteen years of age; and, as he himself tells us, “was a dabbler in rhyme and faction, and had already printed several things with the Party’s” (the Dissenters) “imprimateur.” His patrons were evidently satisfied with his behaviour and his progress, for, before the two years spent at Veal’s academy had expired, he received an additional bonus of £10 per annum from the hands of Dr O(wen,) who encouraged him in the prosecution of his studies, and advised him to have a particular regard to critical learning.
Mr Veal was so annoyed and prosecuted by the neighbouring magistrates that he broke up his academy, and relinquished the office of a tutor. In consequence of this, young Wesley was again cast afloat, and he was now recommended to the academy of Mr Charles Morton, of Newington Green, where he remained until the summer of 1683.
Charles Morton, M.A., of Wadham College, Oxford, was a descendant from an ancient family at Morton, in Nottinghamshire, the seat of T. Morton, secretary to King Edward III. He was born about the year 1626. His father was rector of Pendavy, (Pendene-Vau?) in Cornwall; and his two brothers, also, were ministers. When about fourteen years of age, his grandfather, who was a stanch royalist, sent him to Oxford, where he was exceedingly studious, and, at the same time, zealous for the rites and ceremonies of the Established Church. He now began, however, to apply himself seriously to the controversy between the Prelatists and the Puritans; and, after mature reflection, joined himself to the latter. While a fellow of the college, he was highly esteemed by Dr Wilkins on account of his mathematical genius. This was no small honour, for Wilkins was the brother-in-law of Oliver Cromwell, was the warden of Wadham College, and, in after years, became the founder of the Royal Society, and, in 1668, was raised to the see of Chester. Morton began his ministry in Oxford, and here for several years he lived as a Conformist. After his ejectment by the Act of Uniformity, he resided in a small tenement of his own in the parish of St Ives, and preached privately to a few people in a neighbouring village. Having sustained a large loss by the great fire of London, he removed thither to watch over his affairs. Several of his friends prevailed with him to open an academy at Newington Green. Here he had many pupils, who became exceedingly useful both in Church and State. Scores of young ministers, as well as many others who were eminent for scholarship, were educated by him. He was in all respects an excellent man; but this failed to save him from persecution. During the time that young Wesley was his pupil, he was obliged to leave his school and to hide himself. Wesley writes: “He had once before been excommunicated, and a capias issued out against him, on which he was taken. But while in custody of an officer, in whose house he was kept previous to being sent to prison, the officer died; and there being none to detain him, he returned home again. He was now in danger of a second capias, on which he used the mediation of my Lady R. to get some respite, and sent his sister several times to London House on the same errand. My Lord of L. promised him all reasonable favour if he would leave Newington Green and his employment; but he could not suffer him to continue in that, because it was so much to the detriment and prejudice of the Established Church, and so much an affront to the laws and universities. This threat caused Mr Morton to abscond some time at a friend’s, absenting himself from us, and leaving the senior pupils to instruct the junior.” After about twenty years’ continuance in the office of a tutor, he was so harassed with legal processes from the Bishops’ Court that he was obliged to relinquish his academy; and, in 1685, two years after Samuel Wesley left him to go to the Oxford University, he went to America, where he was chosen pastor of a church at Charleston, and became vice-president of Harvard College. Here he died in 1697, at the age of about seventy-one. He was a man of a sweet natural temper, and of a generous public spirit, an indefatigable friend, pious, learned, ingenious, useful, and beloved by all who knew him. He published nearly twenty treatises and other works,—all of them, however, compendious, for he was an enemy to large volumes, and used to say, “A great book is a great evil.”
Dunton states, that his “high character led many of the persecuted Nonconformists to join him in America. He was the very soul of philosophy, the repository of all arts and sciences, and of the Graces too. His discourses were not stale or studied, but always new; high, but not soaring; practical, but not low. His memory was as vast as his knowledge. He was as far from ignorance as from pride; and, if we may judge of a man’s religion by his charity, he was a sincere Christian.”