A PACKET of old letters suggests many questions as to the writers, whom they have long survived. Nor is this curiosity diminished when one of the correspondents has achieved a world-wide fame, so that there is no portion of the globe where his name is not known. For then one desires to know who were the people whom he honoured with his friendship, and to scan the letters closely to see if they throw any new light upon the character of the writer. There are in existence seventeen letters written by John Wesley to a member of a family once well-known in the county of Durham. Originally there were thirty letters, as appears from the numbering of those which remain, but where the other letters are the writer does not know.[19] These seventeen letters, two of them being only copies of the originals, came into the possession of the Rev. Thomas Dale, Canon of St. Paul’s from 1843-70, and from him passed to his eldest son, the Rev. Thomas Pelham Dale (1821-92), at one time well-known as the Rector of St. Vedast in the city of London.[20] They were written to Miss Margaret Dale, second daughter of Edward Dale[21] of Tunstall, who, owing to the extinction (as it seems) of the elder branch of the family in the male line, was head of the family of Dale, first of Dalton le Dale, and then of Tunstall. This Edward Dale was the son of Thomas Dale by his wife Margaret, daughter and co-heiress of George Middleton of Silksworth. Through her Burke, who was far too amiable a genealogist to doubt the assertions of any one respecting his ancestors, however remote, traces the descent of Edward Dale from Gundreda, daughter of William the Conqueror. The curious will find the descent set out at length in Burke’s Royal Family, Pedigree XVI. Edward Dale married Eleanor, youngest of the three daughters of the Rev. John Lawrence, Rector of Bishop’s Wearmouth. Mr. Lawrence (1668-1732) was in his day a well-known writer on horticulture, and has, as a consequence, a niche in that temple of fame—the Dictionary of National Biography. It is related that when in 1721 he was appointed to the Rectory, he was so obnoxious to the principal inhabitants of his parish, owing to his Hanoverian proclivities, that when he was "reading himself in" the three chief landowners of the place—John Goodchild of Pallion, John Pemberton of Bainbridge Holme, and Thomas Dale of Tunstall—walked out of the church as a protest against his appointment.[22] By a kind of poetic justice, his three daughters married into the families of the three protesters. His eldest daughter married the above-named John Goodchild, his two younger daughters the sons and heirs of John Pemberton and Thomas Dale. Only unfortunately for the completeness of the tale, the two last marriages did not take place till after the death of John Lawrence.
By Eleanor Lawrence, Edward Dale had three daughters—Mary, Margaret, and Anne—and one son, also called Edward. He died when his eldest daughter was only eleven and his son still an infant.
Margaret Dale no doubt made the acquaintance of John Wesley through his devoted adherent, Margaret Lewen. Miss Lewen, the only child of Thomas Lewen of Kibblesworth, while still a girl of about twenty-two, was attracted by the preaching of John Wesley during his visit to the North in the year 1764. Wesley, in his famous "Diary," speaks of her as being "a remarkable monument of Divine mercy. She broke through all hindrances, and joined heart and hand with the children of God." She was "a pattern to all young women of fortune in England." Margaret Lewen was certainly exceedingly liberal. "In works of benevolence and Christian zeal, she cheerfully expended an ample income" (Stamp: Orphan House of Wesley, London, 1863). Wesley says she had about £600 a year "in her own hands." On one of his visits to the North she gave him a chaise and a pair of horses. Now, Margaret Lewen was very intimate with the Dale girls, and it was probably through her influence that they came into contact with the great preacher. Whether any letters were written to the other sisters is not known, but they can hardly have been so numerous or more intimate than those written to Margaret Dale.
The first letter extant is written from Portpatrick, and is dated June 1, 1765, when Margaret Dale was still two or three months short of twenty-one. It begins: "My Dear Miss Peggy," and ends, "I trust you will be happier every day; and that you will not forget, my Dear Sister, your Affectionate Brother, J. Wesley." The letter is occupied with spiritual counsels, and questions about her spiritual health. He inquires: "How far do you find Power over your Thoughts? Does not your imagination sometimes wander? Do those imaginations continue for any time?" It is clear, from Wesley’s next letter, written from Kilkenny, dated July 5, 1765, that Miss Peggy had found she was guilty of wandering thoughts, for the letter begins: "My dear Sister,—Altho’ it is certain the kind of Wandering Thoughts wch you mention, are consistent with pure Love, yet it is highly desirable to be delivered from yᵐ, because (as you observe) they hinder profitable thoughts." Miss Lewen is mentioned. "I hope Miss Lewen and you speak to each other, not only without Disguise, but without Reserve." The letter ends, "My Dear Sister, your affectionate Brother."
Letters 4 and 5 are missing. The next, numbered 6, is dated from London, November 6, 1765. Peggy has a fixed idea that she will not live beyond the age of three and twenty. Wesley, in this letter, asks many questions about this conviction. He wants to know when it began, and whether it continues the same, whether her health is better or worse. The subject is continued in the next letter, written December 31 in the same year. This letter begins "My dear Peggy," and ends, "I cannot tell you how tenderly I am, my Dear Sister, your affectionate Brother, J. Wesley."
Wesley had evidently a tender paternal regard for the girl. He was in 1765 sixty-two years of age, fifteen years older than her father would have been if he had survived. Peggy was mistaken in her conviction. She did not actually die till November, 1777, when she had completed her thirty-third year, so she was just ten years out. Letter 9, written April, 1766, from Manchester, contains nothing of interest. Numbers 10 and 11 are unfortunately missing. Number 12 shows that Peggy desired to go to Leytonstone, where there was a considerable colony of Wesleyans, and whither perhaps Margaret Lewen had already gone. Wesley was very anxious she should not go. "I am afraid," he writes, "if you go to Laton-Stone you will give up Perfection. I mean by placing it so high, as I fear none will ever attain. I know not one in London that has ever largely conversed with Sally Ryan, who has not given it up, that is, with regard to their own Experience. Now this, I think, would do you no good at all. Nay, I judge, it wou’d do you much hurt: it would be a substantial Loss. But I do not see how you cou’d possibly avoid that loss, without a free intercourse with me, both in Writing and Speaking. Otherwise I know and feel, I can give you up, tho’ you are exceeding near and dear to me. But if you was to be moved from your Stedfastness that wᵈ give me pain indeed. You will write immediately to, my Dear Peggy, your Affectionate Brother, J. Wesley."
The next two letters are missing, so that we do not know if Peggy obeyed John Wesley or no, though from the tone of the next letter it seems probable that she did so. The next letter is dated November 7, 1766. Margaret Lewen had died at Leytonstone, October 30. By her will, dated November 21, 1764, she left many legacies to various Methodist good works, and to John Wesley £1,000, and her residuary estate to be applied as he should "think fit for the furtherance of the Gospel." She left Mary Dale £1,000, and to her sisters Margaret and Ann Dale, £100 apiece. Her father threatened to dispute the will, and the matter was compromised by the surrender to him of the residuary estate.
John Wesley refers to Margaret Lewen’s death in the fifteenth letter: "How happy it is to sit loose to all below! Just now I find a paper on wch is wrote (in Miss Lewen’s hand), ‘March 24, 1762, Margaret Dale, Ann Dale, Margaret Lewen, wonder in what state of life they will be in the year 1766.’ How little did any of you think at that time that she would then be in Eternity: But she now wonders at nothing and grieves at nothing." He ends: "And sure neither Life nor Death shall separate you from, my Dear Sister, your Affectionate Brother, J. Wesley."
In the eighteenth letter—the sixteenth contains nothing of especial interest, the seventeenth is missing—Wesley speaks of his followers at Newcastle: "Those you mention are Israelites indeed to whom you will do well to speak with all freedom. A few more in Newcastle are of the same spirit: Altho’ they are but few in whom ye Gold is free from dross. I wish you could help poor Molly Stralliger. I am often afraid for her lest she shᵈ be ignorant of Satan’s devices, and lose all that God had wrought in her."
The twentieth letter we give in full, not because it is more interesting than the other letters, but because it has not before appeared in public print.[23] The other letters will be found in the Life and Letters of Thomas Pelham Dale, by his daughter, Helen Pelham Dale, published by George Allen, 1894. The whereabouts of this letter was not then known, but it has since been unearthed from a collection of autographs made by a connection of the family. Possibly the other missing letters may be in other collections. The letter is dated from Athlone, June 19, 1767: "My dear Peggy, By conversing with you, I should be overpaid for coming two or three hundred miles round about. But how it will be I know not yet. If a ship be ready for Whitehaven, then I shall arrive at Whitehaven or Newcastle, otherwise I must sail for Holyhead or Chester. I hope you now again find the increased witness that you are saved from sin. There is a danger in being content without it, into which you may easily reason yourself. You may easily bring yourself to believe there is no need of it, especially while you are in an easy and peaceful state. But beware of this. The Witness of Sanctification as well as of Justification, is ye privilege of God’s Children, and you may have the one always clear as well as ye other if you walk humbly and closely with God. In what state do you find your mind now? Full of Faith and Love? Praying always? Then I hope you always remember my Dear Peggy, Your affectionate Brother, J. Wesley."