JEFFREY'S ATTIC ROOM, WHENCE THE MYSTERIOUS NOISES CAME.
These unexplained noises in the Epworth rectory found their counterpart in what was known a little earlier as "New England witchcraft," and in our times as the Rochester and Hidsville knockings in 1848, which have ripened into modern Spiritualism, which, if real, is satanic.
There is but little doubt that these remarkable occurrences at his Epworth home made a deep and lasting impression on John Wesley's mind and life. There was ever present to his mind the reality of an invisible world, and he was convinced that satanic as well as angelic forces were all about us, both to bless and to ruin us if permitted to do so by Him who rules all the world.
CHAPTER V.
ORIGIN OF THE HOLY CLUB.
It was while he was a member of Lincoln College that that unparalleled religious career of Mr. Wesley, which has always been regarded as the most wonderful movement of modern times, began. "Whoever studies the simplicity of its beginning, the rapidity of its growth, the stability of its institutions, its present vitality and activity, its commanding position and prospective greatness, must confess the work to be not of man, but of God."
The heart of the youthful collegian was profoundly stirred by the reading of the Christian Pattern, by Thomas à Kempis, and Holy Living and Dying by Jeremy Taylor. He learned from the former "that simplicity of intention and purity of affection were the wings of the soul, without which he could never ascend to God;" and on reading the latter he instantly resolved to dedicate all his life to God. He was convinced that there was no medium; every part must be a sacrifice to either God or himself. From this time his whole life was changed. How much he owed under God to these two works eternity alone will reveal. Law's Call and Perfection greatly aided him.
A little band was formed of such as professed to seek for all the mind of Christ. They commenced with four; soon their number increased to six, then to eight, and so on. Their object was purely mutual profit. They read the classics on week days and divinity on the Sabbath. They prayed, fasted, visited the sick, the poor, the imprisoned. They were near to administer religious consolation to criminals in the hour of their execution. The names of these remarkable religious reformers were: John and Charles Wesley, Robert Kirkham, William Morgan, George Whitefield, John Clayton, T. Broughton, B. Ingham, J. Harvey, J. Whitelamb, W. Hall, J. Gambold, C. Kinchin, W. Smith, Richard Hutchins, Christopher Atkinson, and Messrs. Salmon, Morgan, Boyce, and others.