needed on the subject of the legal settlement of the new
DORSET
have left that official 'deeply pondering.'
Wesley got back to London on September 8, and heard the news of the death of John Jane, whom we have met in the course of this history. *
On an exceeding hot day, after walking from Epworth to Hainton, he was attacked by fever.
He found refuge in Alice Shadforth's house.
Wesley was told that during his sickness "he talked of the things of God, and spent much time in prayer.'
On Friday, August 24, when he seemed to be recovering, he sat in the evening by the fireside.
About six o'clock he fetched a deep sigh, and never spoke more.
He lived until the same hour on Saturday.
Then, 'without any struggle, or any sign of pain, with a smile on his face, he passed away.'
His last words, spoken on the Friday, were, 'I find the love of God in Christ Jesus.'
It was a gentle sunset, and its light still lingers in the sky.
John Jane lived, like most of his fellow preachers, in habitual poverty.
All his clothes, if sold, were not thought to be sufficient to meet his funeral expenses.
The money found in his possession amounted to one shilling and four pence.
Southey, when recording John Jane's death, rises to an unusual height of eulogy.
Speaking of Wesley, he says, 'No founder of a monastic order ever more entirely possessed the respect, as well as the love and the admiration, of his disciples, or better understood their individual characters, and how to deal with each according to the measure of his capacity.
Where strength of mind and steadiness were united with warmth of heart, he made the preacher his counsellor as well as his friend ; when only simple zeal was to be found, he used it as his instrument as long as it lasted.'
Steadiness, and warmth of heart, and simple zeal were combined in John Jane; we do not wonder that Southey, when speaking of John Jane's poverty, was moved to say, 'St. Francis himself might have been satisfied with such a disciple.'* We think it probable that John Wesley, when he arrived in London, found a letter from John Nelson dated August 29,
1750.
When he read it he found that his advice was urgently needed on the subject of the legal settlement of the new preaching-house that was being built at Birstall.
The Birstall Chapel Case is well known to those who take an interest in the 1See John Wesley and the Methodist Socteties, 39, 40.
8 See ante, 100.
8 Life of Wesley, 303-304, Bohn's ed.