persecuted by wicked and unreasonable men.' John Wesley
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Rs Conference it was recommended to be made in the classes at the Christmas visitation, and to be received at the following
March visitation.
It was to be applied ' to defray the expenses occasioned, 1. By building preaching-houses from the year
1740 to 1756; 2. By sending out Preachers who were able and willing to travel, but who could not provide themselves with necessaries ; 3. To support the Preachers, while labouring in the poor Circuits in England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland ;
4. To enable the Preachers to take the benefit of the Law when persecuted by wicked and unreasonable men.'
John Wesley wrote a strong letter of advice to the Societies explaining the objects and necessity of the yearly collection.
We may judge the urgency of the case when we note that the debts owing on the preaching-houses which had been erected amounted to nearly four thousand pounds—a serious sum at that time.'
When the Conference was over, John Wesley had to remain a week in Bristol, for his pertinacious complaint returned and he was disabled from work.
The prevailing idea that John Wesley was a man of extraordinary strength of body must be laid aside.
He did his wonderful work in spite of constantly recurring feebleness.
We have noticed some of the interruptions which laid him aside, but one of the members of the Wesley Historical Society, the late Rev. Richard Butterworth, made a special inquiry into this question.
After Mr.
Butterworth's death the result of his searches in Wesley's Journal and Diaries was published in the Proceedings of the Wesley Historical Society.
He found that, taking the year 1739 as his starting-point, and carrying his investigations down to 1790, there were notices of sixty-nine attacks of sickness in the books examined.
He says that the number would probably have to be increased if the whole of the Diary were discovered. * On September 7 John Wesley managed to get to London.
He proceeded to inquire into the condition of his ' temporal affairs.'
He kept his accounts with strictness, and continued the practice until nearly the end of his life.
Let us see what he says at this point.
'It is now about eighteen years since I began writing and printing books ; and how much in that time have I gained by printing?
Why, on summing up my accounts 1 Myles's Chronological History, 78-79.
Fourth ed.
3W.H.S. Proceedings, xiv. 162-165.
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I found that on March 1, 1756, the day I left London last, I had gained, by printing and preaching together, a debt of twelve hundred and thirty-six pounds.'
With the return of his strength he at once resumed his work.
On Sunday, October 10, he preached to a huge multitude in Moorfields on ' Why will ye die, O house of Israel?'
The service roused his enthusiasm.
He declared that field-preaching 'does the execution still; for usefulness there is none comparable toit.'
The rest of the year he remained in London, intent on doing good.
He met the preachers who were in town and read with them important books.
He cared for sick people.
He had been much impressed by Benjamin Franklin's Experiments and Observations on Electricity, first published in London in 1751.
In 1756 he determined to test the remedial value of electricity in certain cases.
On November 9 he procured an apparatus and tested its effects on some sick people.
In his Journal we find the following account of his experiment, noting the fact that the entry was made after the lapse of about three years:
Having procured an apparatus on purpose, I ordered several persons to be electrified, who were ill of various disorders ; some of whom found an immediate, some a gradual cure.
From this time I appointed, first some hours in every week, and afterward an hour in every day, wherein any that desired it might try the virtue of this surprising medicine.
Two or three years after, our patients were so numerous that we were obliged to divide them ; so part were electrified in Southwark, part at the Foundery, others near St. Paul's, and the rest near the Seven Dials.
The same method we have taken ever since ; and to this day, while hundreds, perhaps thousands, have received unspeakable good, I have not known one man, woman, or child, who has received any hurt thereby.
Before closing this volume there is a subject which must receive our attention.
It is impossible to overlook the fact that in 1756 there was a decided weakening of the association of John and Charles Wesley as itinerating evangelists.
We may go farther, and say that, at the end of the year, Charles Wesley practically retired from that form of Methodist work.
It will throw light on several questions if we watch him on what may be considered his last campaign.
We do not know why he set out on his long journey ; but it is not impossible that after the conversations in the Conference on the relations
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Re of the Methodists to the Church of England he may have thought if he went North his influence might check the tendency to separation which was so strong in Lancashire, Yorkshire, and Northumberland.
That our surmise is correct we think will be admitted if we follow him on his way.
Charles Wesley's published Journal closes with a long extract which extends from September 17 to November 5, 1756.
Let us look at a few of his entries.
On September 19 he was in Evesham.
He went to church morning and evening.
Between the services he visited three or four of the Society.
During this visitation he did a notable thing.
He found that the names of those whom he visited had been left off the Society Book, the reason being that they had not been able to attend the meetings, having been prevented by age and infirmity.
He wrote their names again in the book.
During his pastoral visits he did not forget 'to confirm the brethren in their calling ; that is, to live and die in the Church of England.'
Reaching Sheffield, he met the Society, and spoke plainly and lovingly to the members on the subject of ' continuing in the Church.'
Though many of them were Dissenters and predestinarians, none were offended.
In Leeds, after preaching, he plainly told the Society that ' there was no salvation out of the Church,' which caused some surprise.
He proceeded to explain that by the Church he meant 'the mystical body of Christ, or the company of faithful people.'
It would be a little difficult for the people to follow his explanation, but he tells us that they suffered the word of exhortation, and were even glad when he said unto them, ' Let us go into the house of the Lord.'
In Leeds, once more he introduced the subject, and tells us that the members of the Society ' were unanimous to stay in the Church, because the Lord stays in it, and multiplies His witnesses therein, more than any other
Church in Christendom.'
In Manchester he found that the Society, which had numbered two hundred, had been much reduced.
He met those who remained, and told them that ' of all the members of the Church of England the poor Methodists are most exposed, because serious, and therefore worth stealing ; and of all the Methodists those of Manchester were in the greatest danger, because the most unsettled and unadvisable.'
He challenged them to show him one Methodist who had ever prospered by turning Dissenter.
He asked the members
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what would become of them when his brother died—whether they would not then be scattered and broken in twenty sects, old and new.
To prevent this he advised them, among other remedies, to go constantly to church and sacrament.
We may say that throughout the whole of this tour Charles Wesley continued these exhortations to the Methodist Societies.
By word of mouth and by letters he entreated the Methodists to remain in the Church of England.
There can be no doubt of the enthusiasm of Charles Wesley for the Established Church.
It made him blind to the fact of the immense debt England owes to the Nonconformists.
In addition, he did not realize the strength of the current that was bearing away so many of the Methodist people from the Church of England.
We cannot think that he was satisfied with the results of his visit to the North.
When he got back to Bristol, on November 6, 1756, he must have thought it a pleasant place of refuge.
He settled there for many years, and left the unclaimed wildernesses outside to his brother and his workers.
John Wesley accepted his fate.
With his comrades, he went out to break up the fallow ground, to sow the seed, and to reap and store the harvest.
1 Journal of Charles Wesley, ii. 114-139.
INDEX Abbey, Rev. Charles J., his English Ardnurcher (Ireland), 62 Arian preacher, 325 Armagh, Archbishop of [Dr. Boulter], Church and its Btshops (17001800), 17, 34 Absolute Election, 166, 241-2 Accidents to John Wesley, 11, 195, 281; to Charles Wesley, 188-9 Acomb, York, 18, 23-4, 87, 230 Act, Conventicle (1670), 179-80; against Papists, 47; of Uniformity (1662), 179, "2245
Revenue, 66; Riot (1714), 13; Toleration (1689), 56-9, 119, 179, 289, 301-2 Adams, Father Thomas, ex-popish Priest [Peter of Alcantara Adams] of Osmotherley, 18-20, 230 Administration of Sacraments, 38, 93,
Armagh, See of (A.D.
a) Aeon (A.D.
445), 72, 73 Arnold, Dr., of Rugby, 282 Articles of Religion of Church of England, Thirty-nine (1562), 95; and of Methodist Episcopal Church of America, 95 Ashwood Dale (Derbyshire),
Ashworth, Richard, of Bolton, 223 Assistants, 29, 38, 80-2, 89, 147-8, 1534,210.
See HELPERS Assizes at York, 97, 115, 227 Association of the Wesley brothers as 225, 291-2 Advertisement of Wesley against Preachers asking for money, 99; against Wheatley, 279 Agreements between Preachers, (1751) itinerating evangelists gradually weakened until Charles Wesley settled in Bristol (November, 1756), 206, 211, 226, 257, 259-61, 308, 310, 331-3 Assurance, Doctrine of, 36, 239 Athlone (Ireland), 49, 62-4, 69-70, 72-4, 87, 243, 255 Atlantic Ocean, 72 Atmore, Rev. Charles (1759-1826), his 210-11, (1752) 216, 226 Aix-la-Chapelle, Peace of (1748), 125,
Alder, Mr., of Athlone, 69 Aldrich's Logic, 85, 137 Algebra, 83, 85 Alleine, Joseph, his Form of Covenant Methodist Memortal (1801), 99, 211, 276, 293 Attendance at Class, 156, 332 Augustine of Hippo (354-430), his Confesstons, 83; his Works, 85 Auricular Confession, 176 Aurora Borealis (1750), 169 'Autocracy' of Wesley; Theory of so-called must be relinquished, 152-3, 289-90 Avon, River, 181"
Service, 97-8 Allendale (Northumberland), 142-3 Allowances to Preachers and their wives, 128, 151, 156, 209, 242-4, 247, 256 Allwood, William, Local Preacher (1753), 250 Ali Saints' Day at West Street, 127 Almost Christian, The, Wesley's Sermon, 163 Alnmouth (Northumberland),
Alnwick (Northumberland), 98-9, 201, ' Awake, Thou that Sleepest'
; Wesley's Sermon on, 163 Aykroyd, Mrs., of Harrogate, 165 Charles 249, 251 Ambleside (Westmoreland), 201 America, 303-6, 308 American Methodists, 73 Anne, Queen, Reign of (1702-14), 324 Annesley, Dr.
Samuel, father of Susanna Wesley, 275 Annual Return of Members (1748), 88, Bailiffs of Savannah, 120 Baily, Rev. Richard, Vicar of Wrangle, 212-4 Bakewell (Derbyshire), 112, 224 Baldock, Nicholas, of York, 301 Baldwin, Rev. John, of Chester, 237 Bale, Rev. Dr. John (1495-1563), 283 Balleine, G.
R., his History of the Evangelical Pariy tn Church of England, 274 Ballingarrane—Palatine settlement in (1749), 154 4, Answer (Grimshaw) to White's Sermon, 120-1 Anti-Methodist Publications (Green), 133"
Antinomianism, 241 :
Antoninus, Marcus Aurelius (121-180), Ireland, 73, 243, 324 Ballyboy (Ireland), 87 Band Meetings, 224, 242; and Tickets, 38, 242 Bands, 38, 110, 154, 233 Bangor (Ireland), 51 Bangor (Wales), 329 Bank House Farm at Bagslate, near his Meditations, 197 Apostolic Fathers, 85, 96 os Appeal to Men of Reason and Religion, An Earnest (John Wesley) (1743),
A Farther (1745-6), 17, 148 Appeals to Courts of Law, 228 Appointment of Preachers, Power of, Rochdale (Lancs.), 226 Bannister, John [Richard], captain of Colne Mob, 103-5 Baptisths, 71 Baptists, 12, 43, 326 Barnabas (Acts iv. 36), 273
Archaeological Institute, 282 Architecture, 31, 72-3, 93, 135, 323-4