[261] Wesley’s Works, vol. viii., p. 334.
[262] The sermon was addressed to the second regiment of foot guards, who, to the beat of the drum, marched to the chapel, with the Commander of the garrison at their head.
[263] William Wogan was born in 1694; and, after being educated at Westminster and Oxford, entered the army. In 1718, he married Catherine Stanhope, of the family of the Earls of Chesterfield. He died at Ealing in 1758. He was a Millennarian, but attended the daily service of the Church of England, and advocated a strict attention to the Church’s rubrics.—“Private Journal and Literary Remains of Dr. Byron.”
[264] A recent Bishop of the Church of England, on perusing this manuscript letter, wrote: “It is a very interesting document, and leads to many reflections. Mr. Broughton’s day, and the day of his once friend Wesley, were more important in the history of our Church than many are willing to believe. They disturbed, but they taught; and they led others to think and teach. Whatever might be their errors, it was not for the careless and thoughtless and the ignorant to be their judges. It might be for the best that Whitefield would not take the advice in this letter; but the affectionate strain is peculiarly pleasing, and the pious union between two persons, who differed on some points, may be a lesson that need not be lost even in our own day.”
[265] On this occasion, Broughton administered the Sacrament, and prayed.
[266] Gentleman’s Magazine, 1741, p. 387.
[267] A pet name.
[268] In the life of Venn, Broughton is called “Mr. Bryan Broughton, Secretary to the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.” This is a mistake. There was a Mr. Bryan Broughton; but he was not the man whom the author meant.
[269] This was a most unaccountable and barbarous murder. The lady was the wife of Captain Dalrymple. The wretched youth had lived in the service of his master and mistress for the last five years. In the full confession that he made, he stated, he had no dislike to the unfortunate lady, and he murdered her, not from malice or for plunder, but solely at the instigation of the devil. The details of the deed are too revolting to be here recited. Suffice it to say, the murder was committed “of Wigmore Street, Cavendish Square,” on March 25, 1746; and, that, exactly a month afterwards, “Matthew Henderson was carried in a cart from Newgate, and executed at the end of New Bond Street. He went to the place of execution in a white waistcoat, drawers, and stockings. Two clergymen, one of the Church of England, and the other of the Church of Scotland, prayed with him, in the cart, for a considerable time. His body was carried from the gallows, and hung in irons, on a common, about five miles from London, on the Edgware Road” (London Magazine, 1746).
[270] A fourth edition of this pamphlet was published in 1763.