“And yet, when I consider how many excellent Christians are contained in Mr. Wesley’s Societies, whom I love as my own soul, and to whom I have frequently given promises of my assistance and labours, how will it grieve me to be constrained to withdraw from them, whom I so much honour and respect.”
Rowland Hill proceeds to say, that “hitherto he had declined having the least share in the late contentions.” He was at Bristol in 1771, when Mr. Shirley and his friends invaded Wesley’s Conference, but he refused to join them, and left the city, for, he remarks, “Peace I love, but controversy I hate.” He continues:—
“Upon my return to Bristol, I saw your first publication.[[268]] As I dearly loved your character, I read it with great prejudice in your favour; but still, the tartness of the style, as well as the bad doctrine it contained, concerned me; but, as I plainly perceived your intention was to make the ‘Minutes’ speak as much Gospel as possible, though I was sorry for the performance, I felt a loving pity for the author. About the same time, I called upon Mr. Wesley, then in Bristol, and, in strong terms, expressed to him my concern about his ‘Minutes.’ He told me that he looked upon the whole of them as truth, and that he should vindicate them as such.
“Still my determination was to appear in no open separation from Mr. Wesley; hoping that time would soften the edge of the dispute, and restore calmness and composure among contending parties; but your second publication[[269]] compels me to believe that to be neutral any longer will be criminal. You have now done sufficient to darken every gleam of hope of future tranquillity, by publishing such doctrine, and in such a spirit, as has kindled no small flame in the religious world.”
No doubt Rowland Hill was perfectly sincere when he said he hated controversy, and loved peace; and yet, such is the tendency of polemical writing, Rowland Hill and his brother Richard became the principal fomentors of this controversial warfare.
Having given what he calls “a simple narration of facts,” Mr. Rowland Hill proceeds to say:—
“I will now make some strictures principally upon your last performance. This I pray God I may be enabled to do with meekness and judgment. I know there is no argument in banter, nor conclusion in sarcasm, nor divinity in a sneer: such weapons I wish totally to discard; they are pitiful even for the world, but they are scandalous when used by a Christian. I hate such feeble aids, and will scorn to use them; they would defile my soul, and stab the cause I mean to maintain. The meek and dove-like disposition of Christ, I humbly hope will teach me, while I write, to pity, not to abuse, the mistaken; and meekly to deliver my sentiments, without having recourse to the low arts of slander and reflection.”
Rowland Hill had good intentions; but whether he fulfilled them will be seen in the succeeding extracts.
“After having first dressed up Mr. Shirley according to your own fancy, and branded him with the opprobrious name of Antinomian, you place him at the head of a set of monsters invented by yourself; and, after having thus raised a hideous and unthought-of ghost, you remand it to the shades by your own spells and incantations of banter and contempt.”
“After having said so much as to place us in a manner even amongst murderers, on account of our principles of grace, it really shocks and almost disheartens me from following you any further. I will, therefore, now omit reminding you of the numberless sneers, taunts, and sarcasms, which so dreadfully decorate the whole of your performance; they are nothing better than the infernal terms of darkness; it is hateful to transcribe them; let darkness be their doom.”