And yet another, entitled "Wesley's Apostasy," etc., in which occurs this verse, among others equally bad:
In vain for worse may Wesley search the globe,
A viper hatched beneath the harlot's robe;
Rome in her glory has no greater boast,
Than Wesley aims—to all conviction lost.
This may answer for the poets, though their number is nearly legion.
Artists employed their God-given powers in traducing Wesley and his people.
William Hogarth published a painting and engraving entitled "Credulity, Superstition, and Fanaticism, being a satire on Methodism."
Comedians, who are generally ready to lend themselves to any vile work, employed the stage to blacken the character of Wesley.
Samuel Foote, an actor, wrote a play entitled "The Minor, a Comedy," in which the Methodists were ridiculed and slandered.
Samuel Pottenger wrote a play entitled "The Methodist, a Comedy." Another was soon after produced—"The Hypocrite, a Comedy, as it was performed in the Theater Royal, Drury Lane."
Thus pulpit, press, pencil, and stage united to crush Wesley and his people. No means were left untried. Though they followed him through all his active ministerial life, yet the gates of hell did not and could not prevail against him and his work.