Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy During the Early Years of the Revival The ten years from 1739 witnessed an extraordinary explosion in popular religion as a tidal wave of revival swept the British Isles.
At the start of this period the Wesley brothers were not regarded as pre-eminent leaders but were rather members of a small group of predominantly young Anglican clergymen who commenced an itinerant ministry at about the same time. Several of these men, such as Benjamin Ingham and George Whitefield, had been associated with the Wesleys in the holy club, but there were others who had no Oxford connection. In Wales, the curate of Llangeitho Daniel Rowland and the layman Howell Harris embarked on mass evangelism in 1735–6 before Whitefield and the Wesleys commenced field preaching and independently of them. Rowland and Harris owed their inspiration to the Anglican minister Griffith Jones who had preached in the open air as early as 1714. Further afield in New England, what Americans term the 'Great Awakening' started in 1734–5 with the work of the Congregationalist Jonathan Edwards, while in Germany the growth of Pietism paved the way for the widespread adoption of its particular brand of religious renewal in Britain and North America.
The fact that the first stirrings of revival were not confined to one place or orchestrated by a single individual or group helps to account for its rapid expansion from several points of local origin over a wide geographical area from Central Europe to the Eastern seaboard of North America. Historians continue to debate the diffuse origins of the Revival and the extent of the mutual influence and interaction of its various agents, but the important point to note here is that John and Charles Wesley were not its creators or its leading
44 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy lights in those very early years. By 1760 however, the brothers were firmly established as the principal exponents of Evangelical religion in Britain and Ireland and were advancing down a road that was to see
Wesleyan Methodism acknowledged as the Revival's most important legacy.
There were several keys to this personal success, such as organizational ability and preaching skills, but these features were not unique to the Wesleys. All the main branches of the Revival in Britain were built on the foundation of a highly effective preaching ministry.1 Nor was the system that the brothers imposed on their followers very much different in its fundamental character from that adopted by other Evangelical groups. The Wesleyans, Moravians, and Calvinistic
Methodists all developed on similar lines, relying to a considerable extent on the basic structure of society, and small cell group. The same organizational and worship terms occur across the Evangelical spectrum such as love feast, band, society, and 'preaching house', which helps to explain the eighteenth-century tendency to group all
Evangelicals together under the 'catch-all' term Methodist. It was only towards the end of the period that Methodism and Wesley became virtually synonymous. One facet that did set the Wesleys apart from their contemporaries was their unusually forceful leadership style. To their array of other talents was added an uncompromising and at times ruthless imposition of personal authority and this proved fundamental in the formation of a specific Wesleyan Methodist identity.
The brothers' exceptional drive enabled them to establish and lead a movement that by the end of their lives had overshadowed other
Evangelical groups in their native islands and was starting to spread across the rest of the English-speaking world.
At the same time as stamping their imprint on the Revival, the Wesleys also clashed with champions of their own denomination inimical to what was viewed as undisciplined and theologically dangerous enthusiasm. The troubled decade of the 1740s saw division between old friends and colleagues within Evangelical ranks and also with 1 The Moravians were opposed to an outdoor preaching ministry but were not averse to taking over societies established by that means. Podmore argues convincingly that the English Moravian Church in 1760 was almost entirely based on the pioneering efforts of just four field preachers. Colin Podmore, The Moravian Church in England,
1728–1760 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998), 97–9.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 45 Anglicans who reacted violently against this disturbing phenomenon.
The Wesleys were in the frontline of both these battles and were often not only the initiators of conflict, but the beneficiaries of it, as confrontation gave shape and definition to their movement and promoted its public image. This chapter will examine the part played by Charles and his brother in the controversies of these stormy but singularly fruitful years.
The three main bodies of British Evangelical opinion were represented by the Arminianism of the Wesleys, the Calvinist wing led chiefly by George Whitefield, and the Moravians, whose supporters included the Anglican ministers Benjamin Ingham and John Gambold. In looking at the differences that shattered Evangelical unity, it is necessary to detail some of the defining characteristics of these groups and the close albeit uncomfortable relationship between them.
THE MORAVIANS The Moravians were one of the driving forces behind the birth of the Revival in England, possessing an influence that far outweighed their numbers. In the words of one recent authority:
Without the Moravians, English Church history would have been very different. It was the influence of a Moravian, Peter Böhler, that prompted the heart-warming experience, which transformed John Wesley from a tortured
High-Church Oxford don into a revivalist leader, and it was from the Fetter Lane Society which Böhler founded that the Revival burst out in 1739.2
The Moravians or Unitas Fratrum as they are more properly termed originated in what is now Czechoslovakia as an offshoot of the fifteenth-century Hussite reformation. After centuries of persecution, they were driven from their homeland and in 1722 found a refuge on the German estate of the Lutheran Count Zinzendorf.3 Under his wing the demoralized refugees were organized into a new religious society with beliefs and practice that were influenced by Pietist concern with holy living coupled with a classic Lutheran emphasis on justification by faith.4 This does not appear to have marked a radical
2 Ibid. 1. 3 Ibid. 5–6. 4 Ibid. 16–17.
46 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy break with the Moravians' own religious past but rather represented in some measure a return to sixteenth-century practice.5 Imbued with confidence by their institutional reawakening, Moravian representatives made several visits to England between 1728 and 1737.6 Their intention was not the planting of congregations in Britain itself, but rather the establishment of fellowship with other Christians and to request permission to participate in the Georgia colony.
The Moravians found a warm welcome in Britain where their proud Protestant lineage and experience of recent persecution aroused a mixture of respect and sympathy. There were also developments in London in which the Moravians themselves could show a keen fraternal interest. The Anglican religious societies pioneered years before were focal points of grass-roots spirituality, and their concern with personal holiness represented common ground with the German visitors. Also, several former Oxford Methodists were active as ordained Anglican ministers in and around the city.7 These men brought with them from university their own experience of a pietistic pursuit of Godliness nourished by deep meditation in small groups.
Present in the capital were several ingredients of revival, for which the Moravians were to provide a catalyst.
Moravian influence over the Wesleys is well known. The first encounter occurred during the voyage to Georgia where the Germans' humility, seriousness, and faith made a deep impact on John Wesley.8
Charles's first impressions are more difficult to gauge as his extant journal begins only in March 1736 and he makes little mention of the Moravians until his return home from America at the end of that year.
In London on 19 January 1737 Charles met Count Zinzendorf and four days later was introduced to Bishop Nitschman.9 In the weeks
5 'Zinzendorf came across accounts of the discipline and practices of the Unitas Fratrum by Comenius (1592–1670) ...and discovered similarities with the system he had established.' Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 6.
7 In addition to the Wesleys themselves who were frequent visitors after their return from North America, Thomas Broughton was the curate of the Tower and George Whitefield served a curacy in London for two months in 1736. Ibid. 35.
8 For example, JWJ, 25 January 1736. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xviii. Journals and Diaries I, 1735–1738, ed. Reginald Ward and Richard Heitzenrater
(Nashville: Abingdon, 1988), 142–3.
9 CWJ, 19 and 23 January 1737.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 47 that followed he was involved in discussions concerning the Moravian role in the Georgia colony;10 inevitably, he also conversed with the Germans on spiritual matters and was struck by their piety and the atmosphere of their worship.11
The Wesley brothers came increasingly under German Pietist influence in the months leading up to their conversions. They had returned from North America full of self-doubt and were unusually susceptible to outside influence. After his own arrival back in England in February 1738, John had several meetings with the Moravian Peter Böhler and his preaching began to feature typical Pietist themes such as justification and the new birth.12 Charles was also introduced to Böhler and on 20 February 1738 started to help his new friend to learn English.13 Through such contacts Charles was drawn deeper into Moravian spirituality and came to accept the importance of salvation by faith alone, although he was initially reluctant to accept any critique of his own spiritual state.14 On 11 May he had his first encounter with John Bray, who was in Charles's words 'a poor ignorant mechanic who knows nothing but Christ'.15 Bray was to be the agent of Charles's conversion and while he was not formally a Moravian, was very much guided by their beliefs. It is not surprising therefore that Charles's conversion on 21 May 1738 was expressed in terms that Moravians would have expected from their own converts:
'I saw that by faith I stood; by the continual support of faith, which kept me from falling though of myself I am ever sinking into sin.'16
John Wesley's more famous Aldersgate experience followed a few days later and the language used to describe that event is again indicative of Moravian influence.17
Several weeks before these conversions, another significant event took place, namely the founding of the Fetter Lane congregation. This came about when several members of London's religious societies
10 For example, CWJ, 1 February 1737.
11 'I was present at their public services, and thought myself in a quire of angels', CWJ, 23 January 1737.
12 Rack, Reasonable Enthusiast, 138. 13 CWJ, 20 February 1738.
14 'Some time ago I had taken leave of P. Böhler, confessed my unbelief and want of forgiveness, but declared my firm persuasion that I should receive the atonement before I died.' CWJ, 11 May 1738.
15 Ibid. 16 CWJ, 21 May 1738.
17 Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 42.
48 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy began to meet for the purpose of fellowship. On 1 May 1738, it was decided on Böhler's advice to form a new group consisting of certain select members including John Wesley.18 Rules and worship practices were adopted based on Moravian models, such as the band, the love feast, and an emphasis on mutual confession.19 The Fetter Lane Society represented a grafting of Moravian practices onto a predominantly Anglican membership and constituted an important halfway point in the evolution of what became
As harmonious as relations appeared to be in the summer of 1738, the roots of division can be detected. The Wesley brothers accepted certain Moravian teachings and were impressed by aspects of their organization, but they remained Anglican clergymen and unaccustomed to play a secondary role in spiritual matters to foreigners and laymen. Suspicion and resentment of outside influence quickly surfaced. Ironically, the fact that the Germans did not exercise direct control of the Fetter Lane congregation exacerbated the situation, as some of their English followers started to interpret doctrine in a more extreme fashion than the Moravians themselves. Early in 1739, a section of the society started to display tendencies to separation from the Church of England and Charles Wesley felt constrained to warn against any such move.20 At the end of April there was an outbreak of lay preaching, inspired by the argument of the layman
John Shaw in favour of the priesthood of all believers, and within a short space of time the Fetter Lane Society experienced its first schism.21
Concurrent with these developments was the emergence of a serious theological difference. The Moravians taught that those without faith should refrain from striving for it as this could impede the workings of the Holy Spirit: excessive prayer, Bible reading, and even regular Communion should therefore be avoided. People should instead remain 'still' and wait for the gift of faith.22 Again, certain members at Fetter Lane took this doctrine to an extreme, influenced by the teachings of the French Prophets whose charismatic practices
18 Heitzenrater, Wesley and the People Called Methodists, 79.
19 Rack, Reasonable Enthusiast, 141. 20 CWJ, 28 February 1739.
21 Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 53. 22 Ibid. 60.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 49 were gaining supporters in London's volatile religious atmosphere.23
To the Wesleys, stillness was a denial of the function of the Church and raised the spectre of antinomianism; the situation was not helped when the Bishop of London warned them on this specific point.24
The controversy led ultimately to the Wesleys leaving Fetter Lane with their supporters in July 1740.25
Theological differences apart, it is debatable how long the Moravians and the Wesleys could have worked in close collaboration. The Germans were hostile to the concept of active evangelism, particularly the practice of open-air preaching,26 and this fundamental difference in approach must in time have led to a parting of the ways. It is also difficult to escape the conclusion that John Wesley's inability to tolerate rivals had a part to play. He was critical of the Moravians as early as September 1738,27 and the following month German visitors to Fetter Lane commented on his 'reserved and secretive' reaction to them.28
In the aftermath of the division, Moravian attempts at rapprochement were rejected, despite their acceptance that the Fetter Lane leadership had been at fault.29 In March 1741 Charles referred to his brother's ambition; 'Are you not afraid lest they [the Moravians] should eclipse your own glory, or lessen your own praise?'30 Despite this criticism, his own alienation from the Germans and their English supporters had kept pace with that of his brother. On 7 January 1739
Charles expressed discontent at some of the 'orders which Bray etc were imposing on the society'.31 He was particularly concerned by some of the mystical leanings of his Fetter Lane associates—on 11
December 1738 he carried out an impromptu exorcism of a convert 23 The French Prophets began to urge abstention from Communion on those who had received the gift of faith, which was certainly something the Moravians did not teach. Ibid. 62–3.
24 CWJ, 21 February 1739.
25 Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 70. 26 Ibid. 54.
27 JW to the Moravians, Published copy letter [27–8] September 1738. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xxv. Letters I, 1721–1739, ed. Frank Baker (Oxford: Clarendon, 1980), 566–7.
28 Quoted by Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 44.
30 CW to JW, Published copy letter [10 March 1741]. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley xxvi. 53.
31 CWJ, 7 January 1739.
50 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy to the French Prophets32 and the following month tried to persuade his fellow clergyman George Stonehouse to 'throw away his mystics'.33
The fact that he objected to trends within the Fetter Lane membership on a point that was of particular concern to him shows that he was not simply falling into line with John. The question of public lay ministry was also raised several times, with Charles and John vehemently opposed to lay administration of the Sacraments.34
The Wesley brothers were quickly outgrowing their original Evangelical circle. They were preaching in the open air by the spring of 1739 and before the end of that year opened the New Room in Bristol and commenced work on the Foundery in London. The astonishing success of this public ministry would have reinforced their natural leanings towards an independent course. The Moravians had in effect outlived their usefulness, although it should also be said that the brothers retained admiration for aspects of the Unitas
GEORGE WHITEFIELD AND THE ARMINIAN–CALVINIST SPLIT Theological differences and a considerable element of personal rivalry were also at the centre of the conflict between the Wesleys and their old friend George Whitefield. This particular division, even more than the split with the Moravians, was one of the defining moments in Methodist history. In its aftermath the Revival as a mass movement divided and the Wesleys emerged from Whitefield's shadow. It also illustrates in clear fashion the brothers' ruthless handling of real or potential rivals.
George Whitefield was a younger contemporary of the Wesleys at Oxford and a fellow member of the holy club. He began his meteoric rise to fame in 1736 when sermons preached during a short-lived curacy in London, some on the Pietist theme of the 'New Birth',
32 CWJ, 11 December 1738. 33 CWJ, 2 January 1739.
34 CWJ, 17 April 1739.
35 Podmore, The Moravian Church in England, 75–8.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 51 caused a major stir.36 No stranger to controversy, Whitefield found himself barred from many pulpits after his return from Georgia in December 1738.37 The roots of this hostility can be traced back to his earlier London ministry, the popularity of which had aroused jealousy on the part of other clergymen:38 his high-profile fund-raising for charity schools and the Georgia poor also provoked suspicion of his integrity in certain quarters.39 Whitefield should bear part of the blame for the bad feeling that he inspired. In the preface to his printed fellow clergymen would start to preach more like him and 'that they would not, out of a servile fear of displeasing particular persons, fail to declare the whole will of God'.40 This statement from a minister who was only in his early twenties caused quite a few hackles to rise and is an early example of the insensitivity amounting to spiritual arrogance that was to be a feature of many Evangelicals, including the Wesleys. Whitefield's popularity reached even greater heights after he preached in the open air for the first time in February 173941 and within a few months his sermons were attracting crowds of up to ten thousand.42
Just as the Moravians inspired the Wesleys to pursue their own spiritual path, so Whitefield was the prime mover in pushing the brothers towards a mass ministry. John and Charles preached their first open-air sermons in England after observing Whitefield at first hand and he introduced them to audiences in and around Bristol and London. He also placed his societies under John Wesley's direction prior to his return to North America in August 1739.43 How close the three evangelists were in the early years of the Revival is revealed by the testimony of lay converts—letters from the period 1739–
40 regularly refer to hearing the Wesleys and Whitefield preach in relatively quick succession. For example, Mary Ramsey of London heard Whitefield for the first time on 2 June 1739, after which 36 Arnold Dallimore, George Whitefield; The Life and Times of the Great Evangelist of the 18th Century Revival, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1970), i. 104–5 and 124.
37 Ibid. 218–19. 38 Ibid. 134–6.
39 'Some called me a spiritual pick-pocket and others thought I used some kind of charm to get the people's money.' Quoted ibid. 135.
40 Quoted ibid. 134. 41 Ibid. 254–6. 42 Ibid. 263.
52 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy she regularly attended his sermons; she heard John Wesley on 4 September that same year and periodically thereafter; and she first attended on Charles Wesley's preaching at an unspecified date in February or March 1740. As Ramsay said, 'I can but admire the wisdom of God in seeing how he sends out the labourers one after the other.'44
Whitefield's ardent recommendation of the Wesleys is also mentioned in the primary sources. In a letter of 24 May 1742 Mary
Thomas recalled hearing Whitefield preach three years earlier at Rose Green in Bristol and his referring to 'one coming after him whose shoe laces he was not worthy to unloose':45 John Wesley is not specifically named in the letter although other sources make the identification certain.46 One might almost say that the Wesleys entered mass evangelism on Whitefield's coat-tails and at the very least they benefited from close association. It is important to note that at this early stage in the Revival, Whitefield was without doubt its principal exponent in England. The subsequent eclipse of his reputation by that of John Wesley was the product of a combination of factors that included the older man's superior powers of organization, his focus on a national as opposed to a transatlantic ministry and the tendency of some historians to concentrate on Wesley to the virtual exclusion of his contemporaries.47
Despite the close personal ties between the three men, the first stirrings of controversy were not slow to appear. The fundamental difference was theological in nature, with coal heaped upon the flames by the Wesleys' forcefulness. Whitefield was a proponent of the Calvinist doctrine of predestination, which at its most fundamental stated that God saved only a part of mankind, termed 'the elect'. Whitefield argued that holiness was a mark of election and that because we do not know the identity of these chosen few, the Christian message must be made available to all. The Wesleys held
44 Mary Ramsay to CW, MS letter, 4 June 1740 (MCA: EMV 13).
45 Mary Thomas to CW, MS letter, 24 May 1742 (MCA: EMV 128).
46 Dallimore, George Whitefield, i. 274.
47 'Wesley and his biographers never really did him [George Whitefield] justice and indeed tended to obscure the fact, very obvious in contemporary accounts, that Whitefield and not Wesley was seen by the public as the real leader of the movement at this stage.' Rack, Reasonable Enthusiast, 191.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 53 the diametrically opposing view that salvation is freely offered to everyone and that each individual ultimately has the choice of heaven or hell. In their teaching of this doctrine, the brothers followed in the footsteps of the Dutch theologian Jacob Arminius (1560–1609), which is why the Wesleys and their followers were sometimes termed
'Arminian' Methodists. The brothers were extremely hostile to Whitefield's doctrine of 'election', claiming that its logical conclusion was the invalidation of preaching, as the elect are predetermined. This dispute became the great theological battleground of the Revival, one that divided families and destroyed friendships.
A short time before their difference in opinion became public in the spring of 1739 Whitefield was expressing concern over what he rightly perceived to be a gathering storm in relations with his old friends and college mentors. In a letter to the layman James Hutton,
John Wesley reported: our brother Whitefield here [Bristol], and our brother Chapman since, had conjured me to enter into no disputes, least of all concerning predestination, because this people were so deeply prejudiced for it. The same was my own inclination. But this evening [23 April] I received a long letter ...charging me roundly with 'resisting and perverting the truth as in Jesus' by preaching against God's decree of predestination. I had not done so yet, but I questioned whether I ought not now to declare the whole counsel of God.48
This formed the background to arguably the most important sermon that John Wesley ever preached, namely that on 'Free Grace', delivered in Bristol on 29 April 1739. In this work, Wesley launched a blistering attack on predestination, describing it as blasphemy for its representation of 'the most Holy God as worse than the devil; as both more false, more cruel, and more unjust'.49 Without naming Whitefield,
Wesley declared his intention to 'join issue with every asserter of it'50 and pressed the matter further by publishing the sermon just a few weeks later.51 It is indicative of Wesley's insensitivity that he saw nothing wrong in joining Whitefield in open-air preaching in London,
48 JW to James Hutton and the Fetter Lane Society, Published copy letter, 30 April 1739. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xxv. 639.
49 John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, iii. Sermons III, 71–114, ed. Albert Outler (Nashville: Abingdon, 1986), 555.
50 Ibid. 556. 51 Ibid. 542.
54 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy six weeks after he had described his friend's views as blasphemy.52
Whitefield, who was apparently unaware of events in Bristol,53 expressed pleasure at introducing his 'honoured and revered friend' to a large crowd at Blackheath.54
After Wesley's return to Bristol, Whitefield learned of the sermon on 'Free Grace' and wrote what could be considered in the circumstances a mild letter of protest.55 During his absence in North
America, he continued to plead with Wesley to avoid controversy,56 but his supporters in England were not so reluctant to take up the gauntlet. The talented lay preacher John Cennick emerged as the champion of the Calvinist wing of the Revival in Whitefield's absence.
He clashed with the Wesleys in public57 and after a period of rising tension, abandoned his connection with the brothers in March
Charles's views on predestination were perfectly in accord with those of his brother,59 and the role that he played in the controversy was no less significant. In his journal, he testifies to his own forbearance60 and regret at controversy61 yet failed to acknowledge the connection between his opponents' anger and the content of his own sermons. These included a particularly controversial effort preached on the occasion of the death of the Calvinistic Methodist
William Seward in 1740. Charles took the opportunity provided by 52 JWJ, 14 June 1739. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xix. 69.
53 Dallimore, George Whitefield, i. 315.
54 George Whitefield, George Whitefield's Journals (London: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1960), 288.
55 'I hear, Honoured Sir, that you are about to print a sermon against predestination. It shocks me to think of it! What will be the consequences but controversy?
If people ask my opinion, what shall I do?...Silence on both sides will be best. It is noised abroad already that there is a division between you and me, and my heart within me is grieved.' Quoted by Dallimore, George Whitefield, i. 315.
56 Ibid. 571–4. 57 For example, CWJ, 4 November 1740.
58 JWJ, 6 March 1741.
59 For example, 'who can stand before envy, bigotry and predestination?' CWJ, 30 60 'Had a Conference in K. [Kingswood] with Mr Cennick and his friends but could come to no agreement, though I offered entirely to drop the controversy if he would.'
CWJ, 2 December 1740.
61 'I acknowledged the Grace given to our dear Brother [Howell] Harris and excused his estrangement from me through the wickedness of his Counselors.' CWJ,
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 55 Seward's martyrdom at the hands of anti-Methodist rioters to speak with 'unfeigned concern of our dear departed brother' and also to preach universal redemption62—a conjunction that the dead hero would have found highly objectionable. In public statements and private conversations, Charles made perfectly clear his views, referring to predestination as 'the snare of the fowler'63 and its advocates as 'miserable comforters'.64 This willingness of the Wesleys to provoke, and often initiate, heated debate while blaming the opposition for the consequences, was a character trait that is only recently beginning to be recognized.65
The development of the relationship between Charles and Whitefield is interesting. His comments about his old friend in the first months of the Revival are invariably warm66 and as late as September
1740, his letters to Whitefield remained cordial despite the prevailing tension,67 but as the dispute intensified, Charles became hostile. In January 1741, Charles told his brother 'If [George Whitefield] has declared against the truth, G W will come to nothing. Therefore leave him.'68 This was written before Whitefield's return from North
America after an absence lasting eighteen months and was not therefore based on a personal encounter. Charles's hostility did not lessen after Whitefield's return to England following his triumphant North
American preaching tour. He complained to John that their former close associate was not to be trusted and that he had preached predestination in front of what Charles considered a Wesleyan congregation69—apparently unable to recognize that this kind of provocation was precisely what the brothers had been doing for some time.
A letter written to John in September 1741 illustrates the volatility of Charles's temperament:
Do you know the value of souls, precious immortal souls, yet trust them within the sound of predestination? ...To trust [George Whitefield] while the wound he has made is yet unclosed ...Stop the plague just now, or it will be too late. Send me word first post that you have warned our flock from 62 CWJ, 28 October 1740. 63 CWJ, 28 May 1741.
64 CWJ, 23 July 1741. 65 John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, iii. 542–3.
66 CWJ, 4 August 1739.
67 CW to George Whitefield, MS letter, 1 September 1740 (MCA: DDCW 6/34).
68 CW to JW, MS letter [10 January 1741] (MCA: DDCW 1/11).
69 CW to JW, MS letter [16–17 March 1741] (MCA: DDCW 1/12).
56 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy going to hear the Other Gospel? O how you are outwitted ...renounce your credulity, and [George Whitefield] till he renounces reprobation ...Send me word, I say, by next post ...or I shall on the first preaching night renounce
[George Whitefield] on the housetop!70
During the twelve months that followed, Whitefield complained in writing to John of his brother's obstructive tactics, which included arranging worship events at the same time that Whitefield was preaching in the vicinity.71 On another occasion, Charles refused
Whitefield's offer of assistance in administering Communion and brusquely warned the messenger, not to listen to Whitefield preach.72
Later in life, Charles was referred to as a 'rough worker' when dealing with opposition;73 that this aspect of his personality was apparent from the very beginning of his Evangelical ministry is clear from examination of these first disputes with the Calvinists.
John did not annotate Whitefield's letters of complaint, nor did he apparently take issue with Charles, leading to the assumption that he supported his brother's actions. Charles's aggression has been portrayed as forming a contrast to his brother, who tended to exude an aura of mild yet principled reason,74 but it appears that both
Wesleys were equally ruthless. John's reluctance to curb his impetuous brother's 'rough work' provides a glimpse into the political side of his character and one is faced with the possibility that it suited John to allow Charles to confront their rivals. For a later example of his
Machiavellian touch, one can cite his willingness to stand back and allow Charles to take on the chief responsibility for disciplining the preachers, despite the damage to his brother's popularity that he must have known would result. Charles's iron fist might have made the stronger impression on Methodist scholarship, but that should not distract attention from what lay inside John's velvet glove. In this
70 CW to JW, MS letter [28 September 1741] (MCA: DDCW 1/13).
71 George Whitefield to JW, Published copy letter, 21 December 1742. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xxvi. 97–9.
72 George Whitefield to JW, Published copy letter, 11 March 1742. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xxvi. 74.
73 Quoted by Baker, John Wesley and the Church of England, 178.
74 'Wesley's emotional temperament ...seemed to be a miracle of calm, controlled serenity.' Rack, Reasonable Enthusiast, 540.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 57 respect as in so many others, they formed equal halves of an effective partnership.
Was Charles justified in acting with what appears to have been a mixture of theological and personal animosity? Certainly, the dispute evoked very strong reactions on both sides: Charles's journal records several instances of his being subjected to verbal abuse by his opponents,75 while Whitefield felt constrained in 1741 to respond to the Wesleys in print.76 Predestination was a fundamental issue, one on which there could in reality have been no long-term compromise within a single Evangelical movement. The Anglican Church had traditionally contained Arminians and Calvinists within its ranks, but in the first half of the eighteenth century their differences did not tend to be aired before unlettered crowds eager for the Word of God in all its aspects; the Methodist societies on the other hand, demanded clarification from their leaders and the resulting polarization led inevitably to division.
As fierce as the Calvinists could be in defence of their principles, it has to be said that the Wesleys appear to have taken the initiative in making public the differences. They showed little hesitation in attacking their opponents and resorting to tactics that were on occasion of questionable morality. These included John Wesley sending a copy of his printed sermon on Free Grace to Alexander Garden, Whitefield's main opponent in North America.77 Whitefield was drawn into the controversy but with apparent reluctance; he urged
Wesley to desist from provocation78 and tried to enlist the support of at least one mutual friend to the same end.79 The sentiments he expressed towards the brothers on a personal level were invariably friendly, even in the face of their rather obvious antagonism.80
The fact that their friendship managed to survive in the long term 75 For example, CWJ, 25 May 1741.
76 George Whitefield, A Letter to the Reverend Mr John Wesley, in answer to his 77 Dallimore, George Whitefield, i. 579. 78 Ibid. 571–2. 79 Ibid. 571.
80 'I love you most tenderly, and wish the work of our Saviour may prosper much in your hands. I mentioned your success in the north at our last letter-day, and prayed most earnestly for you.' George Whitefield to JW, Published copy letter, 21 December
1742. John Wesley, The Works of John Wesley, xxvi. 97.
58 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy was due in large measure to Whitefield's willingness to forgive and forget.
WIDESPREAD OPPOSITION AND THE ANGLICAN REACTION Additional evidence of the brothers' combative instincts comes from a number of primary sources arising from events during the 1740s. One such manuscript documents the activities of the Anglican minister
Benjamin Ingham, another former member of the holy club and Moravian sympathizer. In this detailed and unpublished account of the Revival's first decade, Ingham's associate William Batty explicitly links the Wesleys with controversy and division as exemplified by the following extracts:
In July 1742 the Moravian united brethren came into Yorkshire, and some time after, John Wesley at the request of John Nelson and then there began to be differences and division in Yorkshire as well as in London.81
[William] Darney now began to introduce Mr Wesley's preachers in opposition to BI [Benjamin Ingham]...so that frequently when [William] Batty had preached at Roughlee on a Sunday at 2, they preached in the other end of the house when the meeting broke up.82
The work of the Lord would have prospered better in this country [Lincolnshire] had not J. Wesley made separation ...83
It was not just Evangelicals who felt the cutting edge of the Wesley character; in 1766, Samuel Newton, the Congregational minister in Norwich, complained bitterly that 'for more than twenty years ...Methodism has thinned your auditories [and] broke in upon the order of your churches'.84
81 [William Batty], MS 'Church History collected from the memoirs and journals of the Rev. Mr Ingham and the Labourers in connection with him', 14 July 1779 (MCA:
82 Ibid. 12–13. 83 Ibid. 12.
84 Quoted by Cyril Jolly, The Spreading Flame: The Coming of Methodism to Norfolk (Dereham: [Cyril Jolly], c.1970), 23.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 59 One might argue that documents such as the Ingham manuscript were written from a broadly anti-Wesley perspective and should therefore be treated with caution, but statements by the brothers' allies paint a similar picture. Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, wrote to John Wesley on 24 October 1741 that Charles had taken a step that would certainly meet with John's approval, namely 'his declaring open war with [the Moravians]'.85 This underlines the point that Charles no less than his brother was in the thick of the fight and indeed seemed to relish the challenge. The impression given from a variety of sources from differing viewpoints is that the appearance of the Wesleys and their preachers was often akin to the arrival of a succession of stormy petrels.
The Wesleys' fellow clergymen also had occasional cause to regret the turbulent brothers' offers of assistance. In 1742 Charles was invited by the churchwarden of Wednesbury in Staffordshire to evangelize the parish.86 The vicar Edward Eggington was initially welcoming and entertained John Wesley when he visited in January 1743.87
Within three months however, Eggington had turned hostile after the Wesleyan itinerant Robert Williams preached a highly inflammatory dicers and carders, some blind guides and cannot see, some dumb dogs and will not bark. It might be better if all dumb ministers were hanged up in their church.'88 On 15 April 1743 John Wesley was again in Wednesbury and listened to Eggington preach what he termed a 'wicked sermon ...delivered with ...bitterness of voice and manner'.89 In his journal, Wesley acknowledges Williams's 'inexcusable folly' in provoking the minister, but made no reference in his published account of the Wednesbury riots to the circumstances that contributed to the outbreak.90 The anti-Methodist disturbances that erupted in the parish and adjacent townships between May 1743 and 85 Selina Hastings to [JW], MS letter, 24 October 1741 (MCA: Folio of Letters of the Countess of Huntingdon, 1).
86 Charles Goodwin, 'Vile or Reviled? The Causes of the Anti-Methodist Riots at Wednesbury between May, 1743 and April, 1744 in the Light of New England
Revivalism', Methodist History, 35:1 (October 1996), 17–18.
87 Ibid. 19–20. 88 Ibid. 20. 89 Ibid.
90 John Wesley, Modern Christianity Exemplified at Wednesbury and other adjacent places in Staffordshire (Newcastle upon Tyne: printed by John Gooding, 1745).
60 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy March 1744 were among the most violent in the annals of British The provocative actions of the Wesleys and their preachers came as a shock to their contemporaries. Despite the brothers' repeated declarations of Anglican allegiance, they thought nothing of preaching in other ministers' parishes, introducing new worship forms and indulging in public criticism of the Church and its clergy. In contrast to the quietly rebellious Parish Puritans and Nonjurors of fifty years before, the Evangelicals flaunted their defiance of Church of England mores in the most public fashion, while at the same time claiming to be good sons of Mother Church. This contradictory conduct by Evangelical Anglicans provoked considerable anger from within their own denomination expressed in a flood of anti-Methodist literature. Many of these publications were attacks on the enthusiasm that Methodist preaching inspired and which was so reminiscent of the destructive sectarianism that had turned English society upside down a hundred years before. In 1741, the Bishop of Lichfield addressed his clergy on the subject:
I cannot think it improper to obviate the contagion of those enthusiastical pretensions that have ...betrayed whole multitudes either into an unreasonable presumption of their salvation, or into melancholy, if not desponding opinions ...Enthusiasm indeed, when its false pretensions are detected, in the course of things is very apt to create infidelity; and infidelity is so shocking a thing.91
An angry letter of May 1740 from a layman reinforced very vividly the same point that some Christians regarded Methodism as nothing less than an abomination:
Lord Jesus's cause ...constrains me to speak ...to cry aloud against these lying dreamers, who cause his people to err & thereby to pervert their ways; these false dissembling hypocrites, who by falling into divers strange postures, & their frightful shrieks and groans, & other ridiculous gestures, would make the world sensible, that the work of conversion is manifestly wrought upon their souls.92
91 [Richard Smalbroke], A Charge deliver'd to the reverend the clergy in several parts of the Diocese of Lichfield and Coventry in a triennial visitation of the same in 1741
(London: printed for J. and P. Knapton, 1744), 1–2.
92 Anonymous to the 'Ministers called Methodists', MS letter, 31 May 1740 (MCA:
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 61 Other critics focused their attention on the wayward nature of Evangelical churchmanship and in the process tried to place distance between the Anglican Church and this new group of religious firebrands. Bishop Edmund Gibson in his 1744 tract Observations upon the Conduct and Behaviour of a Certain Sect, usually distinguished by the name of Methodists was swift to point out the irregularities of Methodist practice with regard to preaching, Communion, and worship. He tartly observed that 'the Leaders of these people would act a far more consistent and uniform part, if they would either renounce communion with the Established Church, or oblige themselves and their followers to have a greater regard to the rules and orders of it'.93
The point should be stressed that not all Anglicans were opposed to the Methodists. Sympathy for the Wesleys and Whitefield extended all the way up the Church hierarchy94 and this division within Anglican ranks contributed to the confused and troubled relationship between the Church of England and its Evangelical children. The Anglican–
Methodist issue became a running sore and posed an ever-deepening dilemma as the years passed and the Wesleys' movement put down roots in towns and villages throughout the land.
The combative stance exhibited by the brothers in their dealings with fellow Evangelicals, Dissenters, and Anglicans was in part at least a product of the conviction that they were engaged in a battle for souls, for the success of which they would answer before the throne of God. Their strenuous Evangelical empire-building should be viewed against this mindset. In addition to founding their own societies, they took over groups established by others, thereby promoting the Wesleyan movement's rapid and sometimes undisciplined expansion.
The case of William Darney is a good illustration of this strategy at work; Darney was an illiterate pedlar and a pioneer of the Revival in Lancashire and Yorkshire, founding a large number of societies.95 In 1747 he placed himself and his followers under the Wesleys' control,
93 [Edmund Gibson], Observations upon the Conduct and Behaviour of a Certain Sect, usually distinguished by the name of Methodists (London: ?printed by E. Owen,
94 For example, John Potter, Archbishop of Canterbury between 1737 and 1747, was sympathetic towards the Wesleys. Baker, John Wesley and the Church of England,
95 J. W. Laycock, Methodist Heroes in the Great Haworth Round 1734 to 1784 (Keighley: Wadsworth 1909), 39–44.
62 Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy considerably strengthening the movement's presence in what was to become a Methodist heartland.96 There was never any question of authority being shared as a result of such takeovers—John Wesley was insistent that he and his brother knew what was best for the Methodist movement and that preachers and people alike were under his personal charge.
The Wesleys were not the only Evangelicals to indulge in controversy or take over societies founded by others. The wider Methodist scene in the 1740s was characterized by shifting alliances and bitter disputes interspersed with regular attempts to unite in a common cause. The brilliant lay preacher John Cennick for example was affiliated at different times during one five-year period with the Wesleys, the Calvinists and the Moravians. Evangelicals of every theological stamp shared the conviction that they were doing God's will and this lent their ministry a sharp edge and tendency towards independent action. If the Wesleys were in the long term more successful than their contemporaries in building an Evangelical denomination out of this fluid and volatile mix, part of the explanation lies in their superior qualities of leadership and uncompromising attitude.
In their disputes with the Moravians, Whitefield, and indeed virtually everyone on the contemporary religious scene, it could be argued that the Wesleys were simply clear-sighted. For the Revival to take root, it needed strong leadership, which they were able to provide; it also required a doctrine and a structure, and again, they were swift to fill the gap. There was, however, a less positive side to their forcefulness and one could even argue that John Wesley consciously set out to displace his rivals; even the most charitable interpretation is that he could always find a reason why he should be in charge. Charles in his own way was equally domineering. He might have willingly abrogated first place in the Methodist hierarchy to John, but there was no doubt in his mind as to who should sit at his brother's right hand. As long as these two remarkable men worked in concert, they formed an unstoppable partnership: old friendships and spiritual mentors were not allowed to stand in the way of the imposition of their authority over the Methodist movement. It is true that their calling was a high one and their leadership produced inestimable benefit but there was a less
96 Laycock, Methodist Heroes, 53.
Cooperation, Conflict, and Controversy 63 praiseworthy side of their characters, one which Methodist historians have been reluctant to point out. This is of particular significance to any in-depth examination of Charles, for the aspect of his nature that produced the heroic period of his ministry in the 1740s was also at the root of the later troubled relations with his brother and the preachers.
His fierce resilience, uncompromising stands for principle's sake, and personal charisma were to be turned against the man who had once been his closest friend and colleague.