The works of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 15 (of 32)

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

PART II.

I. 1. IT is not my present design to touch on any particular opinions, whether they are right or wrong; nor on any of those smaller points of practice, which are variously held by men of different persuasions: but first, to point out some things which on common principles are condemned by men of every denomination, and yet found in all; and secondly, some wherein those of each denomination, are more particularly inconsistent with their own principles.

And, first, it is my design, abstracting from opinions of every kind, as well as from disputable points of practice, to mention such of those things as occur to my mind, which are on common principles condemned, and notwithstanding found, more or less, among men of every denomination.

2. But before I enter on this unpleasing task, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, by whatever love you bear to God, to your country, to your own souls; do not consider who speaks, but what is spoken. If it be possible, for one hour lay prejudice aside; give what is advanced a fair hearing. Consider simply on each head, Is this true, or is it false? Is it reasonable, or is it not? If you ask, “But in whose judgment?” I answer, in your own; I appeal to the light of your own mind. Is there not a faithful witness in your own breast? By this you must stand or fall. You cannot be judged by another man’s conscience. Judge for yourself by the best light you have. And the merciful God teach me and thee whatsoever we know not!

Now, as I speak chiefly to those who believe the scriptures, the method I propose is this, first, To observe what account is given therein of the Jews, the ancient church of God, inasmuch as all these things were written for our instruction, who say, we are now the visible church of the God of Israel. Secondly, To appeal to all who profess to be members thereof, to every one who is called a Christian, how far, in each instance, the parallel holds? And how much we are better than they?

3. First, I am to observe what account the scriptures give of the Jews, the ancient church of God. I mean, with regard to their moral character; their tempers and outward behaviour.

No sooner were they brought out of Egypt, than we find them murmuring against God, (Exodus xiv. 12.) Again, when he had just brought them through the Red Sea with a mighty hand and stretched out arm, (chapter xv. 24.) And yet again, quickly after, in the wilderness of Zin, your murmurings (saith Moses) are not against us, but against the Lord. (chapter xvi. 8.) Nay, even while he was giving them bread from heaven, they were still murmuring and tempting God, (chapter xviii. 2, 3.) and their amazing language at that season was, Is the Lord among us or not? (chapter xvii. 4.)

The same spirit they shewed, during the whole forty years, that he bore their manners in the wilderness: a solemn testimony whereof, Moses spake in the ears of all the congregation of Israel, when God was about to take him away from their head; They have corrupted themselves (saith he) their spot was not of his children; they are a perverse and crooked generation. The Lord led Jacob about; he instructed him; he kept him as the apple of his eye, (Deuteronomy xxxii. 5, 10.) He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields: then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation, (chapter v. 11, 13, 15.)

In like manner God complains long after this, Hear O heavens, and give ear, O earth! I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider. Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evil doers, children that are corrupters, have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel, (Isaiah i. 2, 3, 4.) Can a maid forget her ornaments, and a bride her attire? Yet my people have forgotten me, days without number, (Jeremiah ii. 32.)

4. And as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, so they had small regard to the ordinances of God. Even from the days of your fathers, (saith God by his prophets) ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them, (Malachi iii. 7.) Ye have said, it is vain to serve God; and, what profit is it that we have kept his ordinances? (verse 14.) Thou hast not called upon me, O Jacob, but thou hast been weary of me, O Israel: Thou hast not brought me my burnt-offerings, neither hast thou honoured me with thy sacrifices, (Isaiah xliv. 22, 23.) And so the prophet himself confesses, Thou meetest those that remember thee in thy ways—But there is none that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee, (Isaiah lxiv. 5, 7.)

5. But they called upon his name by vain oaths, by perjury and blasphemy. So Jeremiah, Because of swearing the land mourneth, (chapter xxiii. 10.) And though they say, the Lord liveth, surely they swear falsely, (chapter v. ♦2.) So Hosea, They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant: So Ezekiel, They say the Lord seeth us not, the Lord hath forsaken the earth. So Isaiah, Their tongue and their doings are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his glory. (chapter iii. 8.) They say, Let him make speed and hasten his work that we may see it, and let the counsel of the Holy One draw nigh and come that we may know it, (chapter v. 19.) And so Malachi, Ye have wearied the Lord with your words; ye say, every one that doeth evil, is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in them; and where is the God of judgment? (chapter ii. 17.)

6. And as they despised his holy things, so they prophaned his sabbaths, (Ezekiel xxii. 8.) Yea, when God sent unto them, saying, Take heed unto yourselves, and bear no burden on the sabbath day, neither do ye any work, but hallow ye the sabbath day, as I commanded your fathers:—Yet they obeyed not, neither inclined their ear, but made their neck stiff, that they might not hear nor receive instruction. (Jeremiah xvii. 21, 22, 23.)

Neither did they honour their parents, or those whom God from time to time appointed to be rulers over them. In thee (in Jerusalem, saith the prophet) they have set light by father and mother, (Ezekiel xii. 7.) And from the very day when God brought them up out of the land of Egypt, their murmurings, chiding, rebellion and disobedience; against those whom he had chosen to go before them, make the most considerable part of their history. So that had not Moses stood in the gap, he had even then destroyed them from the face of the earth.

7. How much more did they ♦afterwards provoke God, by drunkenness, sloth and luxury? They have erred through wine, (saith the prophet Isaiah) and through strong drink they are out of the way; (chapter xxviii. 7.) which occasioned those vehement and repeated warnings, against that reigning sin; Woe to the drunkards of Ephraim, them that are overcome with wine, (verse 1.) The drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under foot; (verse 3.) Woe unto them that rise up early that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them—But they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands, (chapter v. 11, 12.) Woe unto them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink; (verse 22.) Woe to them that are at ease in Zion,—that lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the Lambs out of the flock, and their calves out of the midst of the stall, that chaunt to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instrument of musick,—that drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments; but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph, (Amos vi. verses 1, 4, 5, 6.) Behold this (saith Ezekiel to ♠Jerusalem) was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom; fulness of bread and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, (chapter xvi. 49.)

8. From sloth and fulness of bread, lewdness naturally followed. It was even while Moses was with them, that the people began to commit whoredom with the ♦daughters of Moab: yea, of the daughters of Zion Isaiah complains, They walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, (chapter iii. 16.) And of his people in general God complains by Jeremiah, When I had fed them to the full, they assembled themselves by troops in the harlot’s houses. They were as fed horses in the morning, every one neighed after his neighbour’s wife, (chapter v. 7, 8.) They be all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men, (chapter ix. 2.) The land is full of adulterers, (chapter xxiii. 10.)

Yea, and some of them were given up to unnatural lusts. Thus we read, Judges xix. 22. The men of Gibeah, beset the house, wherein the stranger was, and beat at the door, and spake to the master of the house, saying, Bring forth the man that came into thine house, that we may know him. And there were also long after sodomites in the land, in the days of Rehoboam and of the following kings: The very shew of whose countenance witnessed against them, and they declared their sin as Sodom, they hid it not, (Isaiah iii. 9.)

9. This was accompanied with injustice in all its forms. Thus all the prophets testify against them, The Lord looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry, (Isaiah v. 7.) Thou hast taken usury and increase; thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbour by extortion—Behold, I have smitten my hand, at thy dishonest gain which thou hast made, (Ezekiel xxii. 12, 13.) The balances of deceit are in Jacob’s hand; he loveth to oppress, (Hosea xii. 7.) Are there not yet the scant measure that is abominable; the wicked balances, and the bag of deceitful weights? (Micah vi. 10, 11.) He that departeth from evil, maketh himself a prey, (Isaiah lix. 15.) And the Lord saw it, and it displeased him, that there was no judgment. The wicked devoureth the man, that is more righteous than he. They take up all of them with the angle, they catch them in their net, and gather them in their drag, (Habakkuk i. 13, 14, 15.) They covet fields and take them by violence, and houses, and take them away, (Micah ii. 2.) They pull off the robe with the garment, from them that pass by securely, (verse 8.) They have dealt by oppression with the stranger; they have vexed the fatherless and the widow, (Ezekiel xxii. 7.) The people of the land have used oppression and exercised robbery; and have vexed the poor and needy, yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully, (verse 29.) Their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands, (Isaiah lix. 6.) Judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off; for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter, (verse 14.)

10. Truth indeed was fallen, as well as justice. Every mouth, saith Isaiah, speaketh folly, (chapter ix. 17.) This is a rebellious people, lying children, (chapter xxx. 9.) Their lips have spoken lies and muttered perverseness. None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth; they trust in vanity and speak lies, (chapter lix. 3, 4.) This occasioned that caution of Jeremiah, Take ye heed every one of his neighbour, and trust ye not in any brother; for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbour will walk with slanders. And they will deceive every one his neighbour, and will not speak the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies, and weary themselves to commit iniquity, (chapter ix. 4, 5.)

11. And even those who abstained from these gross outward sins, were still inwardly corrupt and abominable. The whole head was sick, and the whole heart was faint; yea, from the sole of the foot even unto the head there was no soundness, but wounds and bruises, and putrifying sores, (Isaiah i. 5, 6.) All these nations (saith God) are uncircumcised; and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart, (Jeremiah ix. 26.) Their heart is divided, (Hosea x. 2.) They have set up their idols in their heart; they are all estranged from me thro’ their idols, (Ezekiel xiv. 3, 4.)

Their soul still clave unto the dust. They laid up treasures upon earth. From the least of them, saith Jeremiah, even unto the greatest, every one is given to ♦covetousness, (chapter vi. 13.) They panted after the dust of the earth, (Amos ii. 7.) They laded themselves with thick clay, (Habakkuk iii. 6.) They joined house to house, and laid field to field, until there was no place, (Isaiah v. 8.) Yea, they enlarged their desires as hell: They were as death and could not be satisfied, (Habakkuk ii. 5.)

12. And not only for their covetousness, but for their pride of heart were they an abomination to the Lord. The pride of Israel, saith Hosea, doth testify to his face, (chapter vii. 10.) Hear ye, give ear, saith Jeremiah, be not proud――Give glory to the Lord your God, (chapter xiii. 15.) But they would not be reproved; they were still wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight, (Isaiah v. 21.) and continually saying to their neighbour, Stand by thyself, come not near to me; for I am holier than thou! (Isaiah lxv. 5.)

They added hypocrisy to their pride. This people, saith God himself, draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their hearts far from me, (Isaiah xxix. 13.) They have not cried unto me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds, (Hosea vii. 14.) They return, but not to the Most High; they are like a deceitful bow, (verse 16.) They did but flatter him with their mouth, and dissemble with him in their tongue, (Psalms lxxviii. 36.) So that herein they only prophaned the holiness of the Lord. And this have ye done again, saith Malachi, covering the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and with crying out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more, (chapter ii. 11, 13.)

13. This God continually declared to those formal worshippers. That their outward religion was but vain. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices, saith the Lord? I am full of the burnt-offerings of rams, and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs or of he-goats. Bring no more vain oblations: Incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting――When you spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear, (Isaiah i. 11, 13, 15.) He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog’s neck, (chapter lxvi. 3.) When they fast, I will not hear their cry; and when they offer an oblation, I will not accept, (Jeremiah xiv. 12.) Go ye, serve your idols, if ye will not hearken unto me; but pollute ye my holy Name no more with your gifts, (Ezekiel xx. 39.)

14. Yet all this time were they utterly careless and secure; nay confident of being in the favour of God. They were at ease; they put far away the evil day, (Amos vi. 1, 3.) Even when God had poured his anger upon Israel, it set him on fire round about, yet he knew it not; It burned him, yet he laid it not to heart, (Isaiah xliii. 25.) A deceived heart had turned him aside, that he could not say, Is there not a lie in my right hand? (chapter xliv. 20.) So far from it, that at this very time they said, We are innocent, we have not sinned, (Jeremiah ii. 35, 37.) We are wise, and the law of the Lord is with us, (chapter viii. 8.) The temple of the Lord! the temple of the Lord are we. (chapter vii. 4.)

15. Thus it was that they hardened themselves in their wickedness. They are impudent children, saith God, and stiff-hearted, (Ezekiel ii. 4.) Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush, (Jeremiah iv. 15.) I have spread out my hand all the day to a rebellious people, that provoketh me to anger continually to my face, (Isaiah lxv. 2, 3.) They will not hearken unto me, saith the Lord, for all the house of Israel are impudent and hard-hearted, (Ezekiel iii. 7.) Since the day that their fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day, I have sent unto them all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them; yet they hearkened not unto me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck; they did worse than their fathers, (Jeremiah vi. 25, 26.)

They were equally hardened against mercies and judgments. When he gave them rain, both the former and the latter in his season; when he reserved unto them the appointed weeks of the harvest, filling their hearts with food and gladness, still none of this revolting and rebellious people said, Let us now fear the Lord our God, (Jeremiah v. 23, 24.) Nor yet did they turn unto him when he smote them, (chapter ix. 9, 13.) In that day did the Lord call to weeping and to mourning: and behold joy and gladness, eating flesh and drinking wine; let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die, (chapter xxii. 11, 12.) Although he consumed them, yet they refused to receive instruction; they made their faces harder than a rock—None repented him, but every one turned to his course, as a horse rusheth into the battle, (Jeremiah v. 3. chapter viii. 6.) I have given you want of bread in all your places, yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. I have also with-holden the rain from you when there were yet three months unto the harvest—I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: your gardens and your vineyards, the palmer worm devoured.—I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt; your young men have I slain with the sword—I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning; yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord, (Amos iv. 6‒11.)

16. In consequence of their resolution not to return, they would not endure sound doctrine, or those that spake it. They said to the seers, see not, and to the prophets, prophesy not unto us right things—Speak unto us smooth things—Cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us, (Isaiah xxx. 10, 11.) But they hated him that rebuked in the gate, and they abhorred him that spake uprightly, (Amos v. 10.) Accordingly, thy people, (saith God to Ezekiel) still are talking against thee, by the walls, and in the doors of the houses, (chapter xxxiii. 30.) And Amaziah the priest sent to ♦Jeroboam, king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words. Also Amaziah said unto Amos, Go flee thee away into the land of Judah, and prophesy there. But prophesy not again any more at Bethel, for it is the king’s chappel, and it is the king’s court, (chapter vii. 10, 12, 13.) From the same spirit it was that they said of Jeremiah, Come and let us devise devices against him—Come and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words, (chapter xviii. 18.) Hence it was that he was constrained to cry out, O Lord, I am in derision daily; every one mocketh me. Since I spake, the word of the Lord was made a reproach unto me, and a derision daily: For I heard the defaming of many, Fear on every side: Report, say they, and we will report it: All my familiars watched for my halting; saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him, (chapter xx. 7, 8, 10.) And elsewhere, Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife, and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury; yet every one of them doth curse me, (chapter xv. 19.)

17. But if a man walking in the spirit of falshood, do lie (saith the prophet Micah) saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and strong drink, he shall even be the prophet of this people, (chapter ii. 11.) And God gave them pastors after their own hearts: such were those sons of Eli, sons of Belial, who knew not the Lord, (1 Samuel ii. 12.) rapacious, covetous, violent men, (verses 14, 15, 16.) by reason of whom men abhorred the offering of the Lord, (verse 17.) who not only made themselves vile, (chapter iii. 13.) but also made the Lord’s people to transgress, (chapter ii. 24.) while they made themselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel, (verse 29.) Such were those of whom Isaiah says, The priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink; they are swallowed up of wine, (chapter xxviii. 7.) Come ye, say they, I will fetch wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink; and to-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant, (chapter lvi. 12.) Therefore (saith he) the Lord hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed your eyes: the prophets and the seers hath he covered; and the vision of all is become unto you, as the words of a book that is sealed, (chapter xxix. 10, 11.) Such also were those of whom he saith, His watchmen are blind, they are all ignorant; they are all dumb dogs; they cannot bark, sleeping, laying down, loving to slumber.

Greedy dogs, which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot understand. They all look to their own way, every one for his gain, from his quarter, (chapter lvi. 10, 11.)

Little better were those of whom the prophets that followed have left us so dreadful an account; Both prophet and priest are prophane; yea, in my house have I found their wickedness, saith the Lord. And from the prophets of Jerusalem, is prophaneness gone forth into all the land, (Jeremiah xxiii. 11, 15.) Her priests have violated my law, and have prophaned my holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and the prophane, and I am prophaned among them, (Ezekiel xxii. 26.) If I be a Father, where is mine honour; and if I be a master, where is my fear? Saith the Lord of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name, (Malachi i. 6.)

Yea some of them were fallen into the grossest sins. The company of priests, saith Hosea, commit lewdness: There is whoredom in Ephraim, Israel is despised, (chapter vi. 9, 10.) I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem (saith God by Jeremiah) an horrible thing; they commit adultery and walk in lies, (chapter xxiii. 14.)

18. And those who were clear of this, were deeply covetous. Who is there among you, that would shut the doors for nought? Neither do ye kindle fire on my altar for nought. I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord of hosts, (Malachi vi. 10.) The priests of Zion preach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money. Yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, is not the Lord among us? (Micah iii. 11.) Thus, saith the Lord, the prophets bite with their teeth, and cry peace: and he that putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him, (chapter iii. 5.) Therefore the word of the Lord came unto Ezekiel, saying, Prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, and say, Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves: Should not the shepherds feed the flocks? Ye eat the fat and ye cloath you with the wool; but ye feed not the flock. The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost, but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them. And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd, and they became meat to all the beasts of the field. Yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them, (chapter xxxiv. 1‒6.)

19. To the same effect do the other prophets declare, Ye are departed out of the way, ye have caused many to stumble.――Therefore have I also made you contemptible and base before all the people, (Malachi ii. 8, 9.) From the prophet even unto the priest, every one dealeth falsely. They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying Peace, Peace, when there is no Peace, (Jeremiah vi. 13, 14.) They prophesy lies in my name, (chapter xiv. 14.) They say still unto them that despise me, the Lord had said, ye shall have peace; and they say unto every man that walketh after the imagination of his own heart, no evil shall come upon you, (chapter xxiii. 17.) The prophets of Jerusalem strengthen the hands of the evil-doers, that none doth return from his wickedness, (verse 14.) They have seduced my people, and one built up a wall, and lo others daubed it with untempered mortar, (Ezekiel xiii. 10.) With lies they have made the hearts of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he shall not return from his wicked way, by promising him life, (verse 22.) Many pastors have destroyed my vineyard, they have trodden my portion under foot; they have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilderness, (Jeremiah xii. 10.) There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst of her, like a roaring lion, ravening the prey. They have devoured souls, (Ezekiel xxii. 25.) Thus saith the Lord, Feed the flock of the slaughter whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty, and they that sell them say, Blessed be the Lord, for I am rich; and their own shepherds pity them not, (Zechariah xi. 4, 5.)

II. 1. Such is the general account which the scriptures give of the Jews, the antient church of God. And since all these things ♦were written for our instruction, who are now the visible church of the God of Israel, I shall in the next place appeal to all who profess this, to every one who calls himself a Christian, how far in each instance the parallel holds? And how much we are better then they?

And first, were they discontented? Did they repine at the providence of God? Did they say, Is the Lord among us or not? When they were in imminent danger, or pressing want, and saw no way to escape? And which of us can say, I am clear from this sin: I have washed my hands and my heart in innocency? Have not we who judge others, done the same things? Murmured and repined times without number? Yea, and that when we were not in pressing want nor distressed with imminent danger? Are we not in general, (our own writers being the judges) have we not ever been from the earliest ages, a repining, murmuring, discontented people, never long satisfied either with God or man? Surely in this we have great need to humble ourselves before God; for we are in no wise better than they.

But Jeshuron forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation. And did not England too? Ask ye of the generations of old, enquire from the rising of the sun to the going down thereof, whether there was ever a people called by his name, which had less of God in all their thoughts? Who in the whole tenor of their behaviour shewed so light an esteem for the rock of their salvation?

Could there ever be stronger cause for God to cry out, Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! For hath he not nourished and brought us up as his children? And yet, how have we rebelled against him! If Israel of old did not know God; if his antient people did not consider; was this peculiar to them? Are not we also under the very same condemnation? Do we, as a people, know God? Do we consider him as God? Do we tremble at the presence of his power? Do we revere his excellent Majesty? Do we remember at all times, God is here! He is now reading my heart: he spieth out all my ways: there is not a word in my tongue but he knoweth it altogether: is this the character of us English Christians? The mark whereby we are known from the Heathen? Do we thus know God? Thus consider his power, his love, his all-seeing eye? Rather, are we not likewise a sinful nation, who have forgotten him days without number! A people laden with iniquity, continually forsaking the Lord, and provoking the Holy One of Israel.

2. There is indeed a wide difference, in this respect, between the Jews and us; they happened (if I may so speak) to forget God, because other things came in their way: but we design to forget him; we do it of set purpose, because we do not like to remember him. From the accounts given by Jeremiah, we have reason to believe, that when that people were most deeply corrupted, yet the greatest men in the nation, the ministers of state; the nobles and princes of Judah, talked of God sometimes, perhaps, as frequently as upon any other subject. But is it so among us? Rather, is it not a point of good-breeding to put God far away, out of our sight? Is he talked of at all among the great? The nobles or ministers of state in England? Among any persons of rank or figure in the world? Do they allow God any place in their conversation? From day to day, from year to year, do you discourse one hour of the wonders he doth for the children of men? If one at a gentleman or a nobleman’s table was to begin a discourse, of the wisdom, greatness, or power of God, would it not occasion (at least) as much astonishment, as if he had begun to talk blasphemy? And if the unbred man persisted therein, would it not put all the company in confusion? And what do you sincerely believe the more favourable part would say of him when he was gone? But that—“He is a little touched in his head!” or, “Poor man! he has not seen the world.”

You know, this is the naked truth. But how terrible is the thought to every serious mind! Into what a state is this Christian nation fallen! Nay the men of eminence, of fortune, of education! Would not a thinking foreigner, who should be present at such an interview, be apt to conclude, that the men of quality in England were atheists? That they did not believe there was any God at all; or, at best but an Epicurean God, who sat at ease upon the circle of the heavens, and did not concern himself about us worms of the earth? Nay, but he understands every thought now rising in your heart. And how long can you put him out of your sight? Only till this veil of flesh is rent in sunder. For your pomp will not then follow you. Will not your body be mingled with common dust? And your soul stand naked before God? O that you would now acquaint yourself with God, that you may then be cloathed with glory and immortality!

3. Did God complain of the Jews, Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them? And how justly may he make the same complaint of us? For how exceeding small a proportion do we find of those in any place who call themselves Christians, that make a conscience of attending them? Does one third of the inhabitants in any one parish throughout this great city, constantly attend public prayer and the ministry of his word, as of conscience towards God? Does one tenth of those who acknowledge it is an institution of Christ, duly attend the Lord’s supper? Does a fiftieth part of the nominal members of the church of England observe the fasts of the church, or so much as the forty days in Lent, and all Fridays in the year? Who of these then can cast the first stone at the Jews, for neglecting the ordinances of God?

Nay, how many thousands are found among us, who have never partook of the supper of the Lord? How many thousands are there, that live and die in this unrepented disobedience? What multitudes, even in this Christian city, do not attend any public worship at all? No, nor spend a single hour from one year to another in privately pouring out their hearts before God? Whether God meeteth him that remembereth him in his ways or not, is no concern of theirs: so the man eats and drinks, and dies as a beast dieth,

“Drops into the dark and disappears.”

It was not therefore of the children of Israel alone, that the messenger of God might say, There is none (comparatively) that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth himself up to take hold of thee.

4. Ye have heard, that it was said to them of old time, Because of swearing the land mourneth. But if this might be said of the land of Canaan, how much more of this land? In what city or town, in what market or exchange, in what street or place of public resort, is not the holy name whereby we are called taken in vain, day by day? From the noble to the peasant, who fails to call upon God, in this if in no other way? Whether can you turn, where can you go, without hearing some praying to God for damnation, either on his neighbour or himself? Cursing those, without either fear or remorse, whom Christ hath bought to inherit a blessing!

Are you one of these stupid, senseless, shameless wretches, that call so earnestly for damnation on your own soul? What if God should take you at your word? Are you able to dwell with everlasting burnings? If you are, yet why should you be in haste, to be in the lake of fire burning with brimstone? God help you, or you will be there soon enough, and long enough; for that fire is not quenched! But the smoke thereof ascendeth up, day and night, for ever and ever.

And what is that important affair, concerning which you was but now appealing to God? Was you calling God to record upon your soul, touching your everlasting salvation? No; but touching the beauty of your horse, the swiftness of your dog, or the goodness of your drink! How is this? What notion have you of God? What do you take him to be?

Idcirco stolidam præbet tibi vellere barbam Jupiter――?

What stupidity, what infatuation is this! Thus without either pleasure, or profit, or praise, to set at nought him that hath all power both in heaven and earth! Wantonly to provoke the eyes of his glory!

Are you a man of letters, who are sunk so low? I will not then send you to the inspired writers (so called: perhaps you disdain to receive instruction by them,) but the old, blind Heathen. Could you only fix in your mind the idea he had of God, (though it is not strictly just, unless we refer it to God made man) you would never thus affront him more,

Ἦ καὶ κυανέῃσιν ἐπ᾽ ὀφρύσι ♦νεῦσε Κρονίων·

Ἀμβρόσιαι δ᾽ ἄρα χαῖται ἐπεῤῥώσαντο Ἄνακτος

Κρατὸς ἀπ᾽ ἀθανάτοιο· μέγαν δ᾽ ἐλέλιξεν Ὄλυμπον.

Shall not the very Heathen then, rise up in judgment against this generation, and condemn it? Yea, and not only the learned Heathens of Greece and Rome, but the savages of America. For I never remember to have heard a wild Indian name the name of Sootaleicatee, (him that sitteth in heaven) without either laying his hand upon his breast, or casting his eyes down to the ground. And you are a Christian! O how do you cause the very name of Christianity to be blasphemed among the Heathen!

5. But is it light swearing only, (inexcusable as that is) because of which our land mourneth? May it not also be said of us, Though they say the Lord liveth, surely they swear falsely? Yea to such a degree, that there is hardly the like, in any nation under heaven; that almost every corner of the land is filled with wilful deliberate perjury.

I speak not now of the perjuries which every common swearer cannot but run into day by day. (And indeed common “swearing notoriously contributes to the growth of perjury. For oaths are little minded when common use has sullied them, and every minutes repetition has made them cheap and vulgar.”) Nor of those which are continually committed and often detected in our open courts of justice. Only with regard to the latter I must remark, that they are a natural consequence, of that monstrous, shocking manner, wherein oaths are usually administered therein: without any decency or seriousness at all; much less with that awful solemnity, which a rational Heathen would expect, in an immediate appeal to the great God of heaven.

I had once designed to consider all the oaths which are customarily taken by any set of men among us. But I soon found this was a work too weighty for me: so almost in infinitum are oaths multiplied in England: I suppose to a degree which is not known in any other nation in Europe.

What I now propose is, to instance only in a few, (but those not of small importance) and to shew, how amazingly little regard is had, to what is solemnly promised or affirmed before God.

6. This is done, in part, to my hands by a late author. So far as he goes, I shall little more than transcribe his words. (Mr. Disney’s First Essay, page 30.)

“When a justice of peace is sworn into the commission, he makes oath—‘That he shall do equal right to the poor and to the rich, after his cunning, wit and power, and after the laws and customs of the realm and statutes thereof made, in all articles in the king’s commission to him directed.’—What those articles are, you will find in the first assignavimus of the commission: ‘We have assigned you and every one of you, jointly and severally—to keep and cause to be kept, all ordinances and statutes, made for—the quiet, rule and government of our people, in all and every the articles thereof, according to the force, form and effect of the same, and to chastise and punish all persons, offending against any of them, according to the form of those statutes and ordinances.’ So that he is solemnly sworn to the execution of all such statutes, as the legislative power of the nation has thought fit to throw upon his care. Such are all those (among others) made against drunkenness, tipling, prophane swearing, blasphemy; lewd and disorderly practices, and prophanation of the Lord’s day. And it is hard to imagine how a justice of peace can think himself more concerned, to suppress riots or private quarrels, then he is to levy twelve pence on a prophane swearer, five shillings on a drunkard, ten shillings on the public house that suffers tipling, or any other penalty which the law exacts ♦on vice and immorality. The same oath binds him both to one and the other, laying an equal obligation on his conscience. How a magistrate, who neglects to punish excess, prophaneness and impiety, can excuse himself from the guilt of perjury, I do not pretend to know. If he reasons fairly, he will find himself as much forsworn, as an evidence who being upon his oath, to declare the whole truth; nevertheless conceals the most considerable part of it. And his perjury is so much the more infamous, as the ill example and effects of it will be mischievous.”

7. The same author (in the preface to his second essay) goes on:

“You, gentlemen of the grand juries, take a solemn oath, that you will diligently enquire, and true presentment make, of all such articles, matters and things as shall be given you in charge: as also, that you will (not only present no person for envy, hatred, or malice, but) not leave any unpresented, for fear, favour or affection. Now, are not the laws against immorality and prophaneness given you in charge, as well as those against riots, felony and treason? Are not presentment and indictment one method expresly appointed by the statutes, for the punishment of drunkenness and tipling? Are not houses of bawdry and gaming, punishable in the same courts, and consequently presentable by you? Is not the proclamation for the punishing of vice, prophaneness and immorality, always read before you as soon as you are sworn? And does not the judge of assize, or chairman of the bench, in the charge given immediately after the reading it, either recite to you the particular laws against such offences, or refer you for them to that proclamation? ’Tis plain from all this, that you are bound upon your oaths, to present all vice and immorality, as well as other crimes, that fall within your knowledge, because they are expresly given you in charge. And this you are to do, not only when evidence is offered before you by the information of others, but with regard to all such offences as you or any of you are able of your own personal knowledge to present: all which you have sworn to do impartially, without fear, favour, or affection.”

I leave it now with all reasonable men to consider, how few grand jurors perform this? And consequently, what multitudes of them, throughout the nation, fall under the guilt of wilful perjury!

8. The author proceeds, (page 8.) “I shall next address myself to you that are constables. And to you I must needs say, that if you know your duty, ’tis no thanks to us that are justices. For the oath we usually give you is so short, and in such general terms, that it leaves with you no manner of instruction in the particulars of the office to which you are sworn. But that which ought to be given you, recites part of your duty in the following words:

“You shall do your best endeavour, that rogues, vagabonds and night-walkers, be apprehended; and that the statutes made for their punishment, be duly put in execution: you shall have a watchful eye to such as shall keep any house or place where any unlawful game is used: as also to such as shall frequent such places, or shall use any unlawful game there or elsewhere. You shall present all and every the offences contrary to the statutes made to restrain the tipling in inns, alehouses, and other victualling houses, and for repressing of drunkenness. You shall once in the year, during your office, present all Popish recusants. You shall well and duly execute all precepts and warrants to you directed. And you shall well and duly, according to your knowledge, power and ability, do and execute all other things belonging to the office of a constable, so long as you shall continue therein.”

Upon this, “I would observe first, that actors of plays are exprest by name within the statute, to be taken up for vagabonds, and punished accordingly: and that though a statute of queen Elizabeth’s excepts such companies as have a licence under the hand and seal of a nobleman, yet a ♦later statute in the reign of king James I. has taken away that protection from them; by declaring, that from thenceforth no authority to be given by any peer of the realms, shall be available to free or discharge them from the pains and punishments of that former statute. Every constable therefore in those parishes, where any of these strolling players come, is bound by his oath, to seize upon, correct, and send them packing without delay.”

“The next part of your oath obliges you to keep a watchful eye, on such houses as keep and such persons as use unlawful gaming. The statute directs you weekly or at least monthly, to search within your liberties, all houses or places suspected of this offence, and upon discovering, to bring them to punishment. Upon this article I would observe, 1. That the law makes some allowance, for artificers, husbandmen, apprentices, labourers and servants, to play in Christmas, but at no other time of the year; and 2. That all sports and pastimes whatsoever are made unlawful upon the Lord’s day, by a statute of king Charles II. You are therefore bound upon oath, to bring to punishment such as are guilty of prophaning that day by any sports or pastimes whatsoever.”

“The following parts of your oath are, 1. That you shall present all and every the offences of tipling and drunkenness that come to your knowledge; 2. That you shall once in the year present all Popish recusants. Nay, and by the statute on which your oath is grounded, you are obliged once a year to present in session, all those within your parishes, who (not being dissenters) come not once in a month, at least, to church.” And 3. That you shall well and duly execute all precepts and warrants to you directed. I believe no constable will pretend to be ignorant of this. How is it then, that when we send out warrants, to levy on offenders for swearing, drunkenness, and the like, those warrants are so ill obeyed? Are you not sworn to execute these as well as any other, and that duly too, according to the tenor of your precept? Your precept tells you, you shall demand such a sum, and if the offender will not ♦pay, you shall levy it by distress of his goods: and if no distress can be taken, you are then only to set him in the stocks; otherwise you have no authority so to do: nor is the setting him in the stocks, when you might have distrained, any execution of your precept.”

“The last part of your oath is in general terms. That you shall well and duly according to your knowledge, power, and ability, do and execute all other things belonging to the office of a constable. I shall instance in some things which certainly belong to your office, because you, and none else, can do them. 1. A constable may, without a warrant, apprehend any persons, and carry them before a justice, who are driving carts, horses or cattle on the Lord’s day: 2. Such as he shall find at sports and pastimes on that day. 3. Such as he shall find tipling in public-houses; 4. Shopkeepers selling or exposing goods on the Lord’s day; and lastly, Such as he shall find drunk or blaspheming, or prophanely swearing or cursing.”

“Thus I have shewn you, in part, what belongs to your office: it is well, if according to the tenor of your oath, you duly, according to your knowledge and ability, do and execute all these things. But remember, that if you do not, if you neglect any of them, you are forsworn.”

Now let all men judge, how many constables in England are clear of wilful perjury!

9. “I will now (he goes on) address myself to church-wardens. Your oath is, ‘That you shall well and truly execute the office of a church-warden, for the ensuing year; and to the best of your skill and knowledge, present such persons and things, as are presentable, by the ecclesiastical laws of this realm.’ I shall set down only a few of these.”

“The statute of king James I. obliges you to present once a year, all monthly absenters from church.”

“The 90th canon enjoins you, first to admonish and then, if they reform not, to present, all your parishioners who do not duly resort to church on Sundays, and there continue the whole time of divine service. On this article observe. 1. That a person’s being absent from church, is ground sufficient for you to proceed. 2. That you are not only to present those who do not come to church, but also those that behave irreverently or indecently there, either walking about, or talking; all who do not abide there orderly and soberly, the whole time of service and sermon, and all that loiter away any part of that time in the church-yard or in the fields.”

“The 112th canon enjoins you, within 40 days after Easter, to exhibit to the bishop or his chancellor, the names of all above the age of sixteen, within your parish that did not receive the communion.”

“Other statutes oblige you to present drunkenness, tippling, and public houses suffering persons to tipple in them.”

“And the 109th canon binds you to present all manner of vice, prophaneness and debauchery, requiring you faithfully to present all and every the offenders in adultery, whoredom, drunkenness, prophane swearing, or any other uncleanness and wickedness of life.” It is therefore a part of that office to which you are solemnly sworn to present not only all drunkenness and tippling, but prophane swearing, lewdness, and whatsoever else is contrary to Christian piety. So that if you know any of your parishioners, be his quality or circumstances what they will, that is guilty of any of these, you are obliged to present him to the next visitation, or you are yourselves guilty of perjury. And the 26th canon expresses such an abhorrence of a church-warden’s neglect in this matter, that it forbids the minister, in any wise, to admit you to the holy communion, who (as the words of the canon are) having taken your oaths to present all such offences in your several parishes, shall notwithstanding your said oaths, either in neglecting or refusing to present, wittingly and willingly, desperately and irreligiously incur, the horrid guilt of perjury.”

And who is clear? I appeal to every minister of a parish, from one end of England to the other, how many church-wardens have you known, in twenty, thirty, forty years, who did not thus desperately and irreligiously incur, the horrid guilt of perjury?

10. I proceed to perjuries of another kind. The oath taken by all captains of ships, every time they return from a trading voyage, runs in these terms:

“I do swear, that the entry above written, now tendered and subscribed by me, is a just report of the name of my ship, its burthen, bulk, property, number and country mariners, ♦the present master and voyage: and that it doth farther contain a true account of my lading, with the particular marks, numbers, quantity, quality and consignment, of all the goods and merchandizes in my said ship, to the best of my knowledge; and that I have not broke bulk, or delivered any goods out of my said ship, since her loading in.

So help me God.”

These words are so clear, express, and unambiguous, that they require no explanation. But who takes this plain oath, without being knowingly and deliberately forsworn? Does one captain in fifty? Does one in five hundred? May we not go farther yet? Are there five captains of vessels now in London, who have not at one time or another, by this very oath, which they knew to be false when they took it, incurred the guilt of wilful perjury?

11. The oath which all officers of his Majesty’s customs, take at their admission into the office, runs thus:

“I do swear to be true and faithful in the execution, to the best of my knowledge and power, of the trust committed to my charge and inspection, in the service of his Majesty’s customs: and that I will not take or receive, any reward or gratuity, directly or indirectly, other than my salary, or what is or shall be allowed me from the crown, or the regular fees established by law, for any service done or to be done in the execution of my employment in the customs, on any account whatsoever. So help me God.”

On this it may be observed, 1. That there are regular fees, established by law, for some of these officers; 2. That the rest do hereby engage not to take or receive any reward or gratuity, directly or indirectly, other than their salary or allowance from the crown, on any account whatsoever.

How do the former keep this solemn engagement? They whose fees are established by law? Do they take those established fees and no more? Do they not receive any farther gratuity? Not on any account whatsoever? If they do, they are undeniably guilty of wilful perjury.

And do the latter take no fees at all? Do they receive no reward or gratuity, for any service done, or to be done, in the execution of their employment? Do they not take any money, directly or indirectly, on any account whatsoever? Every time they do receive either more or less, they also are flatly forsworn.

Yet who scruples either the one or the other? Either the taking a larger fee than the law appoints? Or the taking any fee, large or small, which is offered, even where the law appoints none at all?

What innumerable perjuries then are here committed, over and over, day by day! And without any remorse; without any shame! without any fear either of God or man!

12. I will produce but one instance more. The oath of one who votes for a member of parliament is this:

“I do swear, I have not received or had, by myself, or of any person whatsoever in trust for me, or for my use and benefit directly or indirectly, any sum or sums of money, office, place or employment, gift or reward, or any promise or security for any money, office, employment or gift, in order to give my vote at this election, and that I have not before been polled at this election. So help me God.”

We may observe here, 1. That this oath is taken, once in seven years (if ♦required) by all the freeholders, in every county throughout England and Wales, as well as by all the freemen in every city and borough-town: and 2. That hereby every voter swears, in words liable to no evasion, that he has not received, directly or indirectly, any gift or reward, or promise of any.

But (to pass over those godless and shameless wretches, who frequently vote twice at one election) how few are there, who can take this oath with a conscience void of offence? Who have not received, directly or indirectly, any gift or promise of any? No! have not you? If you have received nothing else, have not you received meat or drink? And did you pay for the meat or drink you received? If not, that was a gift; and consequently, you are as really perjured, as the man that has received an hundred pounds.

What melancholy prospect is then before us! Here are almost all the common people of any substance throughout the land, both in the city and country, calling God to record to a known, wilful falshood!

13. I shall conclude this head in the weighty words of the author before cited.

“Most of these, I am afraid, look upon their oaths as things of course, and little to be regarded. But can there be any thing in the world more sacred than an oath? Is it not a solemn appeal to God for your sincerity? And is not that very appeal an acknowledgment, that he will surely punish falshood? Nay farther, Is it not a calling down the vengeance of God upon yourselves if you are false? Do you not, by laying your hand upon the gospel, declare, that you hope for no salvation by Christ, if you perform not what you then promise, or, if what you then affirm, is not true? And do not the words, So help me God, sufficiently prove, that the intention of your oath is so? And that if you swear false, you are to expect no mercy from God, either in this world, or the next? And do you not personally and expresly give your consent to this heavy curse, by kissing the book? How then dare any of you to venture to play with so awful an engagement? Is it that you think the oath of a grand jury-man, or parish-officer,” (of a captain, an officer of the customs, or a voter in elections) “is not as sacred and binding as that of an evidence at the bar? What is it can make the difference? Both of them are equally appeals to God, and imprecations of his vengeance upon wilful perjury.”

14. If there be then a God that is not mocked, what a weight of sin lies on this nation? And sin of no common dye; for perjury has always been accounted one of the deepest stain. And how will any one attempt to excuse this? By adding blasphemy thereto? So indeed some have done; saying, like those of old, Tush, thou God carest not for it. The Lord seeth (i. e. regardeth) us not. The Lord hath forsaken the earth. He has left second causes to take their course, and man in the hand of his own counsel.

* How many are they who now speak thus? According to whose minute philosophy, the particular providence of God is utterly exploded, the hairs of our head are no longer numbered: And not only a sparrow, but a city, an empire may fall to the ground, without the will or care of our heavenly Father. You allow then only a general Providence. I do not understand the term. Be so kind as to let me know, what you mean by a “general providence, contradistinguished from a particular one?” I doubt you are at a loss for an answer; unless you mean some huge, unweildy thing, (I suppose, resembling the primum mobile in the ptolemaic system) which continually whirls the whole universe round, without affecting one thing more than another. I doubt this hypothesis will demand more proof, than you are at present able to produce; beside that it is attended with a thousand difficulties, such as you cannot readily solve. It may be therefore your wisest way for once to think with the vulgar, to acquiesce in the plain, scriptural account. This informs us, that although God dwelleth in heaven, yet he still ruleth over all: that his providence extends to every individual in the whole system of beings which he hath made: that all natural causes of every kind, depend wholly upon his will; and he increases, lessens, suspends or destroys their efficacy, according to his own good pleasure: that he uses preternatural causes at his will, the ministry of good or of evil angels: and that he hath never yet precluded himself from exerting his own immediate power, from speaking life or death into any of his creatures; from looking a world into being, or into nothing.

Thinkest thou then, O man, that thou shalt escape the judgment of this great God? O no longer treasure up unto thyself wrath, against the day of wrath! Thou canst not recall what is past; but now keep thyself pure, even were it at the price of all that thou hast; and acknowledge the goodness of God, in that he did not long since cut thee off, and send thee to thy own place.

15. The Jews of old were charged by God, with prophaning his sabbaths also. And do we Christians come behind them herein? (I speak of those who acknowledge the obligation.) Do we call the sabbath a delight, holy of the Lord, honourable? Not doing our own ways, not finding our own pleasure, nor speaking our own words? Do our man-servant and maid-servant rest thereon? And the stranger that is within our gates? Is no business, but what is really necessary, done within our house? You know in your own conscience, and God knoweth, that the very reverse of this is true.

But setting aside these things which are done as it were by stealth, whether by mean or honourable men; how many are they, in every city, as well as in this, who prophane the sabbath with a high hand? How many in this, that openly defy both God and the king, that break the laws both divine and human, by working at their trade, delivering their goods, receiving their pay, or following their ordinary business, in one branch or other, and wiping their mouths and saying, “I do no evil?” How many buy and sell on the day of the Lord, even in the open streets of this city? How many open or (with some modesty) half open their shops? ♦Even when they have not the pretence of perishable goods; without any pretence at all, money is their god, and gain their godliness.――But what are all these droves in the skirts of the town, that well nigh cover the face of the earth? Till they drop one after another into the numerous receptacles prepared for them in every corner. What are these to gain by prophaning the day of the Lord? Nothing at all. They drink in iniquity like water. Nay many of them pay for their sin; perhaps great part of what should sustain their family the ensuing week. I know not what is finding our own pleasure, or doing our own ways, if this is not. What then shall we plead in your excuse? That “many others do it as well as you?” Nay, number is so far from extenuating your fault, that it aggravates it above measure. For this is open war against God. And a whole army of you joins together, and with one consent, in the face of the sun, runs upon the thick bosses of his buckler.

16. It is once mentioned in the prophets, In thee (Jerusalem) they have set light by father and mother. But frequent mention is made of their setting light by their civil parents, of their murmurings and rebellions against their governors. Yet surely our boasting against them is excluded, even in this respect. For do not all our histories witness such a series of mutinies, seditions, factions and rebellions, as are scarce to be paralleled in any other kingdom, since the world began? And has not the wild, turbulent, ungovernable spirit of our countrymen, been continually acknowledged and lamented, (as abundance of their writings testify to this day) by the cool, rational part of the nation? Terrible effects whereof have been seen and felt, more or less, in every generation.

But did this spirit exist only in times past? Blessed be God, it is now restrained, it does not break out; but the traces thereof are still easy to be found. For whence springs this continual speaking evil of dignities? Of all who are at the helm of public affairs? Whence this speaking evil of the ruler of our people, so common among all orders of men. I do not include those whose province it is to inspect all the public administrations. But is not almost every private gentleman in the land, every clergyman, every tradesman; yea every man and woman that has a tongue, a politician, a settler of the state? Is not every carman and porter abundantly more knowing than the king, lords and commons together? Able to tell you all their foibles, to point out their faults and mistakes, and how they ought to proceed, if they will save the nation? Now all this has a natural, undeniable tendency to mutiny and rebellion. O what need have we above any nation upon earth, of his continual care and protection, who alone is able to rule the raging of the sea, and still the madness of the people!

17. But to proceed. Were there drunkards in Ephraim, mighty to drink wine, men of strength to mingle strong drink? And are there not in England? Are they not the growth of every county, city and town therein? ♦These do not indeed, or not often rise up early, that they may follow strong drink; and so continue till night, till wine inflame them. They have found a readier way! namely, to begin at night, and continue following their wine or strong drink till the morning. And what numbers are there of these throughout the land? Lost to reason and humanity, as well as to religion: so that no wonder they regard not the works of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands.

* Nor indeed have our drunkards need to continue from morning to night, until wine inflame them: seeing they have found a far more compendious method of casting aside all sense and reason, and disincumbering themselves of all remains, either of conscience or understanding. So that whatever work of darkness is speedily to be done, and that without any danger of being interrupted, either by fear, compassion or remorse, they may be in a few moments, by one draught as effectually qualified for it, as if they could swallow a legion of devils. Or, (if that be all their concern) they may, at a moderate expence, destroy their own body as well as soul, and plunge through this liquid fire, into that prepared for the devil and his angels.

* Friend! Stop! You have the form of a man still. And perhaps some remains of understanding. O may the merciful God lay hold of that! Unto him all things are possible. Think a little for once. What is it you are doing? Why should you destroy yourself? I could not use the worst enemy I have in the world, as you use yourself. Why should you murder yourself inch by inch? Why should you burn yourself alive? O spare your own body at least, if you have no pity for your soul! But have you a soul then? Do you really believe it? What, a soul that must live forever! O spare thy soul! Do not destroy thy own soul with an ♦everlasting destruction! It was made for God. Do not give it into the hands of that old murderer of men! Thou canst not stupify it long. When it leaves the body it will awake and sleep no more. Yet a little while, and it launches out into the great deep, to live, and think, and feel for ever. And what will chear thy spirit there, if thou hast not a drop of water to cool thy tongue? But the die is not yet cast. Now cry to God, and iniquity shall not be thy ruin.

18. Of old time there were also those that were at ease in Zion, that lay upon beds of ivory, and stretched themselves upon their couches, that ♦ate the lambs out of the flock, and calves out of the stall. But how inelegant were these ancient epicures! Lambs out of the flock, and calves out of the stall! Were these the best dainties they could procure? How have we improved, since Jeroboam’s time? Who can number the varieties of our tables; or the arts we have “To enlarge the pleasure of tasting?” And what are their couches, or beds of ivory, to the furniture of our apartments? Or their chains and bracelets, and mantles and changeable suits of apparel, to the ornaments of our persons? What comparison is there between their diversions and ours? Look at Solomon in all his glory; and yet may we not question, whether he was not an utter stranger to the pleasures of the chase? And notwithstanding his 40,000 horses, did he ever see a race in his life? He made gardens and orchards, and pools of water; he planted vineyards and built houses. But had he one theatre among them all? No. * This is the glory of later times. Or had he any conception of a ball, an assembly, a masquerade, or a ridotto? And who imagines that all his instruments of musick put together, were any more to be compared to ours, than his or his father’s rumbling Hebrew verses,

“To the soft sing song of Italian lays.”

In all these points our pre-eminence over the Jews, is much every way.

* Yea, and over our own ancestors, as well as theirs. But is this our glory, or our shame? Were Edward the third, or Henry the fifth to come among us now, what would they think of the change in their people? Would they applaud the elegant variety at the old Baron’s table? Or the costly delicacy of his furniture and apparel? Would they listen to these instruments of musick? Or find pleasure in those diversions? Would they rejoice to see the nobles and gentry of the land, lying at ease, stretching themselves on beds of down? Too delicate to use their own limbs, even in the streets of the city; to bear the touch of the people, the blowing of the wind, or the shining of the sun! O how would their hearts burn within them! What indignation, sorrow, shame must they feel, to see the ancient hardiness lost, the British temperance, patience and scorn of superfluities, the rough, indefatigable industry, exchanged for softness, idleness and fulness of bread! Well for them, that they were gathered unto their fathers, before this exchange was made!

19. To prove at large, that the luxury and sensuality, the sloth and indolence, the softness and idleness, the effeminacy and false delicacy of our nation are without a parallel, would be but lost labour. I fear, we may say, the lewdness too; for if the Jews, as the prophet speaks, assembled themselves by troops in the harlots houses, so do the English, and much more abundantly. Indeed, where is male chastity to be found? Among the nobility? Among the gentry? Among the tradesmen? Or among the common people of England? How few lay any claim to it at all? How few desire so much as the reputation of it? Would you yourself account it an honour or a reproach, to be ranked among those of whom it is said, These are they which are not defiled with women: for they are virgins? And how numerous are they now, even among such as are accounted men of honour and probity, who are fed as horses, every one neighing after his neighbour’s wife?

But as if this were not enough, is not the sin of Sodom too, more common among us than ever it was in Jerusalem? Are not our streets beset with those monsters of uncleanness, who burn in their lust one toward another, whom God hath given up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient? O Lord, thy compassions fail not: therefore we are not consumed.

20. Neither do we yield to them in injustice any more than uncleanness. How frequent are open robberies among us? Is not the act of violence even in our streets? And what laws are sufficient to prevent it? Does not theft of various kinds abound in all parts of the land, even tho’ death be the punishment of it? And are there not among us, who take usury and increase, who greedily gain of their neighbour by extortion? Yea, whole trades which subsist by such extortion, as was not named either among the Jews or Heathens? Is there not yet the scant measure, the wicked balances, and the bag of deceitful weights? Beside the thousand nameless ways of over-reaching and defrauding, the craft and mystery of every trade and profession. It were an endless task to descend to particulars, to point out in every circumstance, how not only sharpers and gamesters, (those public nusances, those scandals to the English nation) but high and low, rich and poor, men of character and men of none, in every station of public or private life, have corrupted themselves, and generally applaud themselves and count it policy and wisdom so to do: so that if gain be at hand, they care not, though justice stand afar off: so that he which departeth from evil, which cometh not into their secret, still maketh himself a prey; and the wicked still devoureth the man that is more righteous than he.

And what redress? Suppose a great man to oppress the needy? Suppose the rich grinds the face of the poor: what remedy against such oppression can he find in this Christian country? If the one is rich and the other poor, doth not justice stand afar off? And is not the poor under the utmost improbability, (if not impossibility) of obtaining it? Perhaps the hazard is greater among us, than either among Jews, Turks, or Heathens.

For example. Suppose a great man, with or without form of law, does wrong to his poor neighbour. What will he do? Sue his lordship at common law? Have the cause tried at the next sessions or assizes? Alas! Your own neighbours, those who know the whole case, will tell you, “You are out of your senses.” “But twelve good men and true will do me justice.” Very well: but where will you find them: men unbiassed, incapable of corruption, superior both to fear and favour, to every view whether of gain or loss? But this is not all; they must not only be good and true, but wise and understanding men. Else how easy is it for a skilful pleader to throw a mist before their eyes? Even supposing too the judge to be quite impartial, and proof against all corruption. And should all these circumstances concur, (of which I fear there are not many precedents) supposing a verdict is given in your favour, still you have gained nothing. The suit is removed into a higher court, and you have all your work to begin again. Here you have to struggle with all the same difficulties as before, and perhaps, many new ones too. However, if you have money enough, you may succeed: but if that fails, your cause is gone. Without money, you can have no more law; poverty alone utterly shuts out justice.

But, “cannot an honest attorney procure me justice?” An honest attorney! Where will you find one? Of those who are called exceeding honest attornies, who is there that makes any scruple.

1. To promote and encourage needless suits, if not unjust ones too?

2. To defend a bad cause, knowing it so to be:

By making a demur, and then withdrawing it:

By pleading some false plea, to the plaintiff’s declaration:

By putting in an evasive answer to his bill:

By protracting the suit, if possible, till the plaintiff is ruined:

3. To carry a cause not amounting to ten shillings into Westminster-hall, by laying it in his declaration as above forty:

4. To delay his own client’s suit knowingly and wilfully, in order to gain more thereby:

5. To draw himself the pleadings or conveyances of his client, instead of giving them to be drawn by able council:

6. To charge his client with the fees which should have been given to such council, although they were not given:

7. To charge for drawing fair copies, where none were drawn:

8. To charge fees for expedition given to clerks, when not one farthing has been given them;

9. To send his clerk a journey (longer or shorter) to do business with or for different persons; and to charge the horse-hire and expence of that journey to every person severally:

10. To send his clerk to Westminster, on the business of ten (it may be) or twenty persons, and to charge each of these twenty for his attendance, as if he had been sent on account of one only:

11. To charge his own attendance in like manner: and

12. To fill up his bill with attendances, fees, and term-fees, though his client is no whit ♦forwarder in his cause.

This is he that is called an honest attorney! How much honester is a pick-pocket?

But there is a magistrate whose peculiar office it is, to redress the injured and oppressed. Go then and make trial of this remedy; Go, and tell your case to the Lord Chancellor. Hold; you must go on regularly: you must tell him your case, in form of law, or not ♦at all. You must therefore file a bill in chancery, and retain a lawyer belonging to that court. “But ♠you have already spent all you have; you have no money.” Then I fear you will have no justice. You stumble at the threshold. If you have either lost or spent all, your cause is naught: it will not even come to a hearing. So, if the oppressor has secured all that you had, he is as safe as if you was under the earth.

* 21. Now what an amazing thing is this! The very greatness of the villainy makes it beyond redress!――But suppose he that is opprest, has some substance left, and can go through all the courts of justice, what parallel can we find among Jews, Turks, or Heathens, for either the delays or the expence attending it? With regard to the former, how monstrous is it, that in a suit relating to that inheritance, which is to furnish you and your family with food and raiment, you must wait month after month, perhaps year after year, before it is determined, whether it be yours or not? And what are you to eat, or to wear in the mean time? Of that the court takes no cognizance! Is not this very delay, (suppose there were no other grievance attending the English course of law) wrong beyond all expression? Contrary to all sense, reason, justice and equity? A capital cause is tried in one day, and finally decided at once. And, is the life less than meat? Or the body of less concern than raiment? What a shameless mockery of justice then, is this putting off pecuniary causes from term to term, yea, from year to year.

* With regard to the latter. A man has wronged me of a hundred pounds. I appeal to a judge for the recovery of it. How astonishing is it, that this judge himself cannot give me what is my right, and what evidently appears so to be, unless I first give, perhaps one half of the sum, to men I never saw before in my life!

22. I have hitherto supposed, that all causes when they are decided, are decided according to justice and equity. But is it so? Ye learned in the law, is no unjust sentence given in your courts? Have not the same causes been decided quite opposite ways? One way, this term, just the contrary, the next? Perhaps one way in the morning (this I remember an instance of) and another way in the afternoon. How is this? Is there no justice left on earth? No regard for right or wrong? Or have causes been puzzled so long, that you know not now, what is either wrong or right? What is agreeable to law, or contrary to it? I have heard some of you frankly declare, that it is in many cases next impossible to know, what is law, and what is not. So are your folio’s of law multiplied upon you, that no human brain is able to contain them: no; nor any consistent scheme, or abstract of them all.

But is it really owing to ignorance of the law, (this is the most favourable supposition) that so few of you scruple taking fees on either side, of almost any cause that can be conceived? And that you generally plead in the manner you do on any side of any cause? Rambling to and fro, in a way so abhorrent from common sense, and so utterly foreign to the question? I have been amazed at hearing the pleadings of some eminent council: and when it has fallen out that the pleader on the other side understood only the common rules of logic, he has made those eminent men appear, either such egregious knaves, if they could help it, or such egregious blockheads, if they could not, that one would have believed they would shew their face there no more.――Mean time, if there be a God that judgeth righteously, what horrid insults upon him are these! Shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord? Shall not my soul be avenged of such a nation as this!

23. There is one instance more of (I know not what to term it) injustice, oppression, sacrilege, which hath long cried aloud in the ears of God. For among men, who doth hear? I mean the management of many of those who are intrusted with our public charities. By the pious munificence of our fore-fathers, we have abundance of these, of various kinds. But is it not glaringly true, (to touch only on a few generals) that the managers of many of them, either 1. Do not apply the benefaction to that use for which it was designed by the benefactor, or 2. Do not apply it with such care and frugality, as in such a case are indispensably required: or 3. Do not apply the whole of the benefaction to any charitable use at all; but ♦secrete part thereof, from time to time, for the use of themselves and their families. Or, lastly, by plain, bare-faced oppression, exclude those from having any part in such benefaction, who dare (though with all possible tenderness and respect) set before them the things that they have done:

“Yet Brutus is an honourable man:

So are they all: all honourable men!”

And some of them, had in esteem for religion; accounted patterns both of honesty and piety! But God seeth not as man seeth. He shall repay them to their face. Perhaps, even in the present world. For that scripture is often still fulfilled, This is the curse that goeth forth over the face of the whole earth. I will bring it forth, saith the Lord of hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief, (such he is and no better, in the eyes of God, no whit honester than a highwayman) and it shall remain in the midst of the house, and shalt consume it, with the timber thereof, and the stones thereof.

24. And is not truth, as well as justice, fallen in our streets? For who speaketh the truth from his heart? Who is there, that makes a conscience of speaking the thing as it is, whenever he speaks at all? Who scruples the telling of officious lies? The varying from truth, in order to do good? How strange does that saying of the ancient fathers, found in modern ears, “I would not tell a lie, no, not to save the souls of the whole world.” Yet is this strictly agreeable to the word of God; to that of St. Paul in particular, if any say, let us do evil that good may come, their damnation is just.

But how many of us do this evil, without ever considering, whether good will come or no? Speaking what we do not mean, merely out of custom, because it is fashionable so to do? What an immense quantity of falshood does this ungodly fashion occasion day by day? For hath it not over run every part of the nation? How is all our language swoln with compliment? So that a well-bred person is not expected to speak as he thinks: we do not look for it at his hands. Nay, who would thank him for it? How few would suffer it? It was said of old, even by a warrior and a king, He that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight: But are we not of another mind? Do not we rather say, He that telleth not lies, shall not tarry in my sight? Indeed the trial seldom comes; for both speakers and hearers are agreed, that form and ceremony, flattery and compliment should take place, and truth be banished from all that know the world.

And if the rich and great have so small regard to truth, as to lie even for lying-sake, what wonder can it be that men of lower rank will do the same thing for gain? What wonder that it should obtain, as by common consent in all kinds of buying and selling? Is it not an adjudged case, that it is no harm to tell lies in the way of trade? To say, that is the lowest price which is not the lowest; or that you will not take what you do take immediately? Insomuch that it is a proverb even among the Turks, when asked to abate of their price, “What! do you take me to be a Christian?” So that never was that caution more seasonable than it is at this day, Take ye heed every one of his ♦neighbour, and trust ye not in any brother: for every brother will utterly supplant, and they will deceive every one his neighbour.

25. And as for those few who abstain from outward sins, is their heart right with God? May he not say of us also (as of the Jews) This people is uncircumcised in heart? Are not you? Do you then love the Lord your God, with all your heart, and with all your strength? Is he your God and your all? The desire of your eyes? The joy of your very heart? Rather, do you not set up your idols in your heart? Is not your belly your God? Or your diversion? Or your fair reputation? Or your friend? Or wife? Or child? That is plainly, do not you delight in some of these earthly goods, more than in the God of heaven? Nay, perhaps you are one of those grovelling souls that pant after the dust of the earth! Indeed who does not? Who does not get as much as he can? Who of those who are not accounted covetous, yet does not gather all the money he can fairly, and perhaps much more? For are they those only whom the world rank among misers, that use every art to increase their fortune? Toiling early and late, spending all their strength in loading themselves with thick clay? How long? Until the very hour when God calleth them; when he saith unto each of them, Thou fool! this night shall thy soul be required of thee! And whose shall those things be which thou hast prepared?

26. And yet doth not our pride, even the pride of those whose soul cleaves to the dust, testify against us? Are they not wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own conceit? Have not writers of our own remarked, that there is not upon earth a more self-conceited nation than the English; more ♦opinionated both of their own national and personal wisdom, and courage, and strength? And indeed, if we may judge by the inhabitants of London, this is evident to a demonstration: for, are not the very meanest of them able to instruct both the king and all his counsellors? What cobler in London is not wiser than the principal Secretary of State? What coffee-house disputer is not an abler divine than his Grace of Canterbury? And how deep a contempt of others is joined with this high opinion of ourselves? I know not whether the people of all nations are greater masters of dissimulation; but there does not appear in any nation whatever, such a proneness to despise their neighbour: to despise not foreigners only (near two thousand years ago they remarked Britannos hospitibus feros) but their own countrymen; and that very often for such surprising reasons, as nothing but undeniable fact could make credible. How often does the gentleman in his coach despise those dirty fellows that go a foot? And these, on the other hand, despise full as much those lazy fellows that loll in their coaches? No wonder then that those who have the form of godliness should despise them that have not: that the saint of the world so frequently says to the ♠gross sinner, in effect, if not in terms, Stand by thyself; come not near unto me; for I am holier than thou!

27. Yet what kind of holiness is this? May not God justly declare of us also, This people draw near me with their mouth, but they have removed their hearts far from me. They do but flatter me with their mouth, and dissemble with me in their tongue. Is it not so with you? When you speak to God, do your lips and your heart go together? Do you not often utter words by which you mean just nothing? Do not you say and unsay? Or, say one thing to God, and another to man? For instance, you say to God, Vouchsafe O Lord, to keep me this day without sin. But you say to man, this cannot be done; it is all folly and madness to expect it. You ask of God, that you may perfectly love him, and worthily magnify his holy name: but you tell man, there is no perfect love upon earth; it is only a madman’s dream. You pray God, to cleanse the thoughts of your heart, by the inspiration of his Holy Spirit. But you assure your neighbour, there is no such thing as inspiration now, and that none pretend to it but enthusiasts. What gross hypocrisy is this! Surely you think, there is no knowledge in the Most High. O be not deceived, God is not mocked. But whatsoever ye sow, that also shall ye reap!

28. Such at present is the religion of this Christian nation! So do we honour him by whose name we are called. And yet was there ever a nation more careless and secure? More unapprehensive of the wrath of God! How can a man more effectually expose himself to the ridicule of those who are esteemed men of understanding, than by shewing any concern, as if the judgments of God were hanging over our heads? Surely then a deceived heart hath turned us aside, that we cannot say, Is there not a lie in my right hand? Surely this our confidence is not of God: it is rather a judicial infatuation; a stupid insensibility; a deep sleep, the fore-runner of heavy vengeance.

“Ruin behind it stalks, and empty desolation.”

Surely never was any people more fitted for destruction! Impudent children are they, and stiff hearted. Are they ashamed when they have committed abomination? When they have openly prophaned the day of the Lord? When they have committed lewdness? Or when they have uttered such curses and blasphemies, as are not heard of among the Heathens? Nay, They are not at all ashamed, neither can they blush. And though God send unto them all his servants, rising up early and sending them, yet will they not hear; they ♦harden their neck: they do worse than their fathers.

What then can God do more for his vineyard which he hath not done? He hath long tried us with mercies, giving rain and fruitful seasons, filing us with the flour of wheat. But still this revolting and rebellious people say not, Let us now fear the Lord our God. Nay, they gave him no thanks for all his mercies; they did not even acknowledge them to be his gift. They did not see the hand of God in any of these things; they could account for them another way. O ye unwise, when will ye understand? Know ye not yet, there is a God that ruleth the world? What did ye see with your eyes? Was the race to the swift, or the battle to the strong? Have ye forgotten Dettingen already? Does not England know that God was there?—Or suppose your continuance in peace, or success in war, be the mere result of your own wisdom and strength; do ye command the sun and the clouds also? Can ye pour out or stay the bottles of heaven? But let it all be nature, chance, any thing—so God may have no hand in governing the earth!

* 29. Will his judgments bring us to a better mind? Do we hear the rod, and him that has appointed it? Let us observe: What fruit do we find in those who are even consumed by means of his heavy hand? Let any one that desires to be clearly satisfied herein, visit the hospitals of this city. Let him judge for himself, how the patients there receive God’s fatherly visitation; especially there, because mercy also is mixed with judgment; so that it is evident the Lord loveth whom he chasteneth. Go then into any ward, either of men or women, look narrowly from one end to the other: are they humbling themselves under the hand of God? Are they trembling under a sense of his anger? Are they praising him for his love? Are they exhorting one another, not to faint when they are rebuked of him? How do nine in ten of them spend the time, that important time from morning to evening? Why in such a manner, that you would not easily learn, from thence, whether they were Christians, Pagans or Mahometans.

* Is there any deeper distress than this to be found? Is there a greater affliction than the loss of health? Perhaps there is, the loss of liberty, especially as it is sometimes circumstanced. You may easily be convinced of this, by going into either Ludgate or Newgate. What a scene appears, as soon as you enter! The very place strikes horror into your soul. How dark and dreary! How unhealthy and unclean! How void of all that might minister comfort! But this is little, compared to the circumstances that attend the being confined in this shadow of death. See that poor wretch, who was formerly in want of nothing, and encompassed with friends and acquaintance, now cut off, perhaps by an unexpected stroke, from all the chearful ways of men; ruined, forsaken of all, and delivered into the hands of such masters, and such companions! I know not, if to one of a thinking, sensible turn of mind, there could be any thing like it on this side hell.

What effect then has this heavy visitation of God, on those who lie under it for any time? There is perhaps, an exception here and there; but in general, they are abandoned to all wickedness, utterly divested of all fear of God, and all reverence to man; insomuch, that they commonly go out of that school compleatly fitted for any kind or degree of villany, perfectly brutal and devilish, thoroughly furnished for every evil word and work.

30. Are our countrymen more effectually reclaimed, when danger and distress are joined? If so, the army, especially in time of war, must be the most religious part of the nation. But is it so indeed? Do the soldiery walk as those who see themselves on the brink of eternity? Redeeming every opportunity of glorifying God, and doing good to men, because they know not the hour in which their Lord will require their souls of them? So far from it, that a soldier’s religion is a by-word, even with those who have no religion at all; that vice and prophaneness in every shape reign among them without controul; and that the whole tenor of their behaviour speaks, Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.

Have those who are exposed to still more danger, the English sea-forces, more religion than those at land? It is said they were once remarkable for this: and it is certain Sir Francis Drake feared God, as did most of his commanders; and we have reason to believe, his marines and sailors too. But what shall we say of the navy that now is, more particularly of the ships of war? Is religion there? Either the power or the form? Is not almost every single man of war a mere floating hell? Where is there to be found more consummate wickedness, a more full, daring contempt of God, and all his laws, except in the bottomless pit? But here description fails: and the goodness of God endureth yet daily! But shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord? Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this? O that the prospect of national judgments may suffice! That we may remember ourselves, and turn unto the Lord our God, before his long-suffering mercy is at an end, and he pours out the vials of his wrath upon us!

But how small ground have we as yet to hope for this? For who will now suffer the word of exhortation? How few will endure sound doctrine, and the honest, close application of it? Do they not say unto the seers, see not; and unto the prophets, prophesy smooth things? And if a man will do thus, if he will sew pillows to all arm-holes, and cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before them; if he will prophesy of wine and strong drink, he shall even be the prophet of this people.

31. I am sensible, how nice a subject this is, and how extremely difficult it is so to speak, as neither to say too little nor too much, neither more nor less than the cause of God requires. I know also, that it is absolutely impossible, so to speak as not to give offence. But whosoever is offended, I dare not to be silent; neither may I refrain from plainness of speech: only I will endeavour to use all the tenderness I can consistently with that plainness.

In tender love then I ask, are there none among us (I speak to you, my brethren, who are priests and prophets of the Lord, set apart to minister in holy things, and to declare the word of the Lord) Are there none among us who commit lewdness, as did those by whom Israel was defiled? Hath not the Lord seen an horrible thing, in some of the prophets of this land also, even, that they commit adultery, and (to conceal it) walk in lies? God forbid that I should affirm this. I only propose (not maintain) the question. If there be such a wretch, I pray God to strike him to the heart, and to say, Thou art the man!

Are there none of you, like them, mighty to drink wine, men of strength to mingle strong drink? Yea, are there none, that err through strong drink, that are swallowed up of wine? Are there not found those who say, I will fetch wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink: and to-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant?

* Alas, my brother! Is this the voice of a minister of Christ? A steward of the mysteries of God? Suppose you find at any time trouble and heaviness, is there no help for you in your God? Is not the God whom you serve able to deliver you from any plague or trouble? Is the being drunk with wine a better relief, than the being filled with his Spirit? Do you not understand this? Do you not know the Lord? Take heed you do not destroy both your own soul and them that hear you! O beware! If you know not his love, fear his power! Make haste to flee from the wrath to come, lest he smite you with a curse great as your sin, and sweep you away from the face of the earth.

32. Can such as you be said, to honour or fear God, any more than those spoken of by Malachi? May not God complain, These priests have violated my law and prophaned my holy things? Yea, whensoever you presume with those unhallowed hands, to touch the mysteries of God: whensoever you utter his name or his word with those unhallowed lips! But is it on this account only that God may say, Both prophet and priest are prophane? May he not add, they have put no difference between the holy and prophane; therefore I am prophaned among them. For is it not so? Do you put a difference between the holy and prophane, him that feareth God, and him that feareth him not? Do you put an effectual difference between them, even in the most solemn office of our religion? At the table of the Lord, do you take care to separate the precious from the vile? To receive all those who (as you may reasonably believe) draw near with penitent hearts and lively faith, and utterly to reject those who testify against themselves, that they are without hope and without God in the world?

Nay, who dares repel one of the greatest men in his parish from the Lord’s table? Even tho’ he be a drunkard or a common swearer? Yea tho’ he openly deny the Lord that bought him? Mr. Stonhouse did this once. But what was the event? The gentleman brought an action against him, for the terror of all such insolent fellows, in succeeding times.

33. O my brethren, is it not for want of your making this difference, as well as for many other abominations that with regard to some among us, (how many God knoweth) that scripture is now also fulfilled. His watchmen are blind, they are ignorant, they are shepherds that cannot understand.—The Lord hath poured out upon them the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed their eyes; the prophets and the seers hath he covered. And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee; and he saith, I cannot; for it is sealed.

If you ask what those other abominations are? I will speak, in love and in the spirit of meekness. There are found among us covetous men, men who mind earthly things, who seek themselves and not Christ crucified, who love the world, and the things of the world: men in whom these words are still fulfilled, Who is there among you that would shut the doors for nought? Neither do ye kindle fire on my altar for nought. I have no pleasure in you saith the Lord of hosts. Yea, are there not those at this day, (O that I might be found to fear where no fear is!) who make themselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel? Are there not those, who now enlarge their desire as hell, who are as death and cannot be satisfied? Who, though they want neither food to eat nor raiment to put on, yet seek more and more preferment? Who are continually studying to join house to house, and to lay field to field? To grow rich in the service of that Master, who himself had not where to lay his head? Is it not to these that those dreadful words belong, enough to cause the ears of him that heareth to tingle, They are greedy dogs which never can have enough; they all look to their own way, (not the way of their Lord) every one for his gain, from his quarter.

Is it strange, if among these there should be some, who are cruel, oppressive men? Inasmuch as covetousness knows no mercy, nor can a lover of money be a lover of his neighbour. Have not some been known even to grind the face of the poor? To strip, rather than cloath the naked? Some, who while they cried out, as the horse-leech, Give, give, would take, if it was not given; like those of old who said, Thou shalt give it me now, and if not, I will take it by force: or those spoken of by Micah, The prophets bite with their teeth, and cry peace; and he that putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him. Very great is the sin of these men before the Lord. If there be ten such now in the land, may God smite them this day with terror and astonishment, that they may have no rest in their bones till their sin is done away!

34. Are you as watchful and zealous to gain souls, as those are to gain the gold that perisheth? Do you know by experience what that meaneth, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up? Or are you one of those watchmen who do not watch at all? Who neither know nor care when the sword cometh? Of whom the prophet saith, They are dumb dogs that cannot bark, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber.

* Can it be supposed, that such shepherds will feed the flock? Will give to every one his portion of meat in due season? Will these warn every man, and exhort every man, that they may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus? Will they take care to “know all their flock by name, not forgetting ♦the men-servants and women-servants?” Will they enquire into the state of every soul committed to their charge? And watch over each with all tenderness and long-suffering, as they that must give account? Marking how they either fall or rise? How these wax weary and faint in their mind; and those grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ? Who can do this, unless his whole heart be in the work? Unless he desire nothing but to spend and be spent for them; and count not his life dear unto himself, so he may present them blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus.

Can any shepherd do this (and if he do not, he will never give any account with joy) who imagines, he has little more to do, then to preach once or twice a week? That this is the main point, the chief part of the office, which he hath taken upon himself before God? What gross ignorance is this? What a total mistake of the truth? What a miserable blunder touching the whole nature of his office? It is indeed a very great thing, to speak in the name of God; it might make him that is the stoutest of heart tremble, if he considered, that every time he speaks to others, his own soul is at stake. But great, inexpressibly great as this is, it is perhaps the least part of our work. To seek and save that which is lost, to bring souls from Satan to God, to instruct the ignorant, to reclaim the wicked, to convince the gainsayer; to direct their feet into the way of peace, and then keep them therein; to follow them step by step, least they turn out of the way, and advise them in their doubts and temptations; to lift up them that fall, to refresh them that are faint, and to comfort the weak-hearted; to administer various helps, as the variety of occasions require, according to their several necessities: these are parts of our office; all this we have undertaken at the peril of our own soul. A sense of this made that holy man of old cry out, “I marvel if any ruler in the church shall be saved;” and a greater than him say, in the fulness of his heart, who is sufficient for these things?

34. But who is not sufficient for these things, for the taking care of a parish, though it contain twenty thousand souls, if this implies no more than the taking care to preach there, once or twice-a-week; and to procure one to read prayers on the other days, and do what is called the parish duty? Is any trade in the nation so easy as this? Is not any man sufficient for it, without any more talents either of nature or grace, than a small degree of common understanding? But O! what manner of shepherds are those, who look no farther into the nature of their office, who sink no deeper into the importance of it than this! Were they not such as these concerning whom the word of the Lord came unto Ezekiel, saying, Woe be to the shepherds that feed themselves: should not the shepherds feed the flock? Ye eat the fat, and ye cloathe you with the wool; but ye feed not the flock. The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken; neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost――And they were scattered, because there was no shepherd, and they became meat to all the beasts of the field. Yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them.

I conjure you, brethren, in the name of the Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, who hath bought them and ♦us with his own blood, apply this each to his own soul. Let every man look unto God, and say, “Lord, Is it I? Am I one of these idle, careless, indolent shepherds, that feed myself, not the flock? Am I one that cannot bark, slothful, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber? One of those who have not strengthened that which was diseased, neither healed that which was sick! Search me, O Lord, and prove me; try out my reins and my heart. Look well if there be any way of wickedness in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”

35. “Have I not, at least, healed the hurt of thy people slightly? Have I not said, Peace, peace, when there was no peace?”—How many are they also that do this? Who do not study to speak what is true, especially to the rich and great, so much as what is pleasing? Who flatter honourable sinners, instead of telling them plain, How can ye escape the damnation of hell? O what an account have you to make, if there be a God that judgeth the earth? Will he not require at your hands the blood of all these souls, of whom ye are the betrayers and murderers? Well spake the prophets of your fathers, in whose steps ye now tread. They have seduced my people, and one built up a wall, and another daubed it with untempered mortar. They strengthen the hands of the evil-doers, that none doth return from his wickedness. They prophesy lies in my name saith the Lord. They say unto them that despise me, ye shall have peace, and unto them that walk after the imagination of their own heart, no evil shall come upon you.

How great will your damnation be, who destroy souls, instead of saving them? Where will you appear, or how will you stand, in that great and terrible day of the Lord! How will ye lift up your head, when the Lord descends from heaven, in flaming fire, to take vengeance on his adversaries! More especially on those who have so betrayed his cause, and done Satan’s work under the banner of Christ! With what voice wilt thou say, “Behold me, Lord, and the sheep whom thou hadst given me, whom I gave to the devil, and told them they were in the way to heaven, till they dropped into hell?”

Were they not just such shepherds of souls as you are concerning whom God spake by Jeremiah, Many pastors have destroyed my vineyard, they have trodden my portion under foot; they have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilderness: By Ezekiel, There is a conspiracy of her prophets, like a roaring lion, ravening the prey, they have devoured souls: And by Zechariah, Thus saith the Lord, feed the flock of the slaughter, whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty; and they that sell them say, blessed be the Lord, for I am rich; and their own shepherds pity them not.

* 36. Is not this the real ground, the principal reason of the present contempt of the clergy? And long since was it assigned as such, by him who cannot lie. The same men of old, who made the Lord’s people to transgress, thereby made themselves vile. They were despised both as the natural effect, and the judicial punishment of their wickedness. And the same cause the prophet observes to have produced the same effect, many hundred years after this. Ye are departed out of the way saith the Lord; ye have caused many to stumble—therefore have I also made you contemptible, and base before all the people.

I have now, brethren, delivered mine own soul and in so doing, I have (as I proposed at first) used great plainness of speech, as not studying to please men, but the Lord. The event I leave to him in whose name I have spoken, and who hath the hearts of all men in his hand.

I have brought you heavy tidings this day, and yet I cannot but be persuaded, that some of you will not count me your enemy, because I tell you the truth. O that all of us may taste the good word which we declare! May receive that knowledge of salvation, which we are commanded to preach unto every creature, thro’ the remission of sins! My heart’s desire is, that all of us to whom is committed the ministry of reconciliation, may ourselves be reconciled to God, thro’ the blood of the everlasting covenant: that he may be henceforth unto us a God, and we may be unto him a people: that we may all know as well as preach, the Lord, from the least unto the greatest: even by that token, I am merciful to thy unrighteousness: thy sins I remember no more!

III. 1. I have hitherto spoken more immediately to those, who profess themselves members of the church of England. But inasmuch as I am a debtor also to those who do not, my design is now, to apply to them also; and briefly to shew, wherein (I fear) they are severally inconsistent with their own principles.

I begin with those who are at the smallest distance from us, whether they are termed Presbyterians or Independents. Of whom in general I cannot but have a widely different opinion, from that I entertained some years ago: as having since then conversed with many among them, in whom the root of the matter is undeniably found; and who labour to keep a conscience void of offence both toward God and toward man. I cannot therefore doubt, but every serious man, of either one or the other denomination, does utterly condemn all that inward as well as outward unholiness, which has been above described.

But do you, as a people, avoid what you condemn? Are no whoremongers or adulterers found among you? No children disobedient to their parents? No servants that are slothful or careless? That answer again? That do not honour their masters as is meet in the Lord? Are there none among you that censure or speak evil of the ruler of their people? Are there no drunkards, no gluttons, no luxurious men, no regular epicures, none whose belly is their God, who, as their fortune permits, fare sumptuously every day? Have you no dishonest dealers, no unfair traders, no usurers, or extortioners? Have you no liars, either for gain, or for good manners, so called? Are you clear of ceremony and compliment? Alas, you are sensible, in most if not all these respects, you have now small ♦pre-eminence over us.

How much more sensible must you be of this, if you do not rest on the surface, but enquire into the bottom of religion, the religion of the heart? For, what inward unholiness, what evil tempers are among us, which have not a place among you also? You likewise bewail that ignorance of God, that want of faith and of the love of God and man, that inward idolatry of various kinds, that pride, ambition and vanity, which rule in the hearts even of those who still have the form of godliness. You lament before God, the deep covetousness that eats so many souls as doth a gangrene; and perhaps are sometimes ready to cry out, help, Lord, for there is scarce one godly man left. Lay to thine hand: for the faithful are minished from the children of men!

2. And yet you retain the truth that is after godliness, at least, as to the substance of it. You own what is laid down in scripture, both touching the nature and condition of justification and salvation. And with regard to the author of faith and salvation, you have always avowed, even in the face of your enemies, that it is God which worketh in us, both to will and to do, of his good pleasure: that it is his Spirit alone who teacheth us all things, all we know of the deep things of God: that every true believer has an unction from the Holy One to lead him into all necessary truth: that because we are sons, God sendeth forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying Abba, Father; and that this Spirit, beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.

How is it then, my brethren (so I can call you now, although I could not have done it heretofore;) how is it, that the generality of you also are fallen from your stedfastness? In the times of persecution ye stood as a rock, tho’ all the waves and storms went over you. But who can bear ease and fulness of bread! How are you changed, since these came upon you! Do not many of you now (practically I mean) put something else, in the room of faith that worketh by love? Do not some of you suppose that gravity and composedness of behaviour, are the main parts of Christianity? Especially, provided you neither swear, nor take the name of God in vain. Do not others imagine, that to abstain from idle songs, and those fashionable diversions commonly used by persons of their fortune, is almost the whole of religion? To which if they add family prayer, and a strict observation of the sabbath, then doubtless all is well! Nay my brethren, this is well, so far as it goes: but how little a way does it go toward Christianity? All these things, you cannot but see, are merely external; whereas Christianity is an inward thing; without which the most beautiful outward form is lighter than vanity.

Do not others of you rest in conviction? Or good desires? Alas, what do these avail? A man may be convinced he is sick, yea deeply convinced, and yet never recover. He may desire food, yea with earnest desire, and nevertheless perish with hunger. And thus I may be convinced I am a sinner; but this will not justify me before God. And I may desire salvation (perhaps by fits and starts, for many years) and yet be lost for ever. Come close then to the point, and keep to your principles. Have you received the Holy Ghost; the Spirit which is of God, and is bestowed by him on all believers, that we may know the things which are freely given to us of God? The time is short. Do you experience now that unction from the Holy One? Without which you confess outward religion, whether negative or positive is nothing. Nay, and inward conviction of our wants is nothing, unless those wants are in fact supplied. Good desires also are nothing, unless we actually attain what we are stirred up to desire. For still, if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, whatever he desires, he is none of his. O my brother, beware you stop not short! Beware you never account yourself a Christian, no not in the lowest degree, till God hath sent forth the Spirit of Christ into your heart, and that Spirit bear witness with your spirit, that you are a child of God.

3. One step farther from us, are you who are called (though not by your own choice) Anabaptists. The smallness of your number, compared to that of either the Presbyterians, or those of the church, makes it easier for you to have an exact knowledge of the behaviour of all your members, and to put away from among you every one that walketh not according to the doctrine you have received.

But is this done? Do all your members adorn the gospel? Are they all holy as he which hath called us is holy? I fear not. I have known some instances to the contrary; and doubtless you know many more. There are unholy, outwardly unholy men, in your congregations also: men that prophane either the name or the day of the Lord; that do not honour their natural or civil parents; that know not how to possess their bodies in sanctification and honour; that are intemperate, either in meat or drink, gluttonous, sensual, luxurious; that variously offend against justice, mercy or truth, in their intercourse with their neighbour, and do not walk by that royal law, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

But how is this consistent with your leading principle, “That no man ought to be admitted to baptism, till he has that repentance whereby we forsake sin, and living faith in God, through Christ?”

For if no man ought to be admitted into a church or congregation, who has not actual faith and repentance, then neither ought any who has them not, to continue in any congregation. And consequently an open sinner cannot remain among you, unless you practically renounce your main principle.

4. I refer it to your own serious consideration, whether one reason, why unholy men are still suffered to remain among you, may not be this; that many of you have unawares put opinion in the room of faith and repentance? But how fatal a mistake is this? Supposing your opinion to be true, yet a true opinion concerning repentance is wholly different from the thing itself. And you may have a true opinion concerning faith all your life and yet die an unbeliever.

Supposing therefore the opinion of particular redemption true, yet how little does it avail toward salvation? Nay, were we to suppose, that none can be saved who do not hold it, it does not follow, that all will be saved who do. So that if the one proved a man to be in ever so bad a state, the other would not prove him to be in a good one. And consequently, whosoever leans on this opinion, leans on the staff of a broken reed.

Would to God that ye would mind this one thing, To make your own calling and election sure! That every one of you (leaving the rest of the world to him that made it) would himself repent and believe the gospel! Not repent alone (for then you know only the baptism of John) but believe and be baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire. Are you still a stranger to that inward baptism, wherewith all true believers are baptized? May the Lord constrain you to cry out, How am I straitened till it be accomplished! Even till the love of God inflame your heart, and consume all your vile affections. Be not content with any thing less than this! It is this loving faith alone which opens our way into the general church of the first-born, whose names are written in heaven! Which giveth us to enter within the veil, where Jesus our fore-runner is gone before us!

5. There is a still wider difference in some points, between us and the people usually termed Quakers. But not in these points. You, as well as we, condemn all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men; all those works of the devil which were recited above, and all those tempers from which they spring.

You ♦agree, That we are all to be taught of God; and to be led by his Spirit: that the Spirit alone reveals all truth, and inspires all holiness: that by his inspiration men attain perfect love, the love which purifies them as he is pure: and that through this knowledge and love of God, they have power to do always such things as please him; to worship God, a Spirit, according to his own will, that is, in spirit and in truth.

Hence you infer, That formal worship is not acceptable to God, but that alone that springs from God in the heart: you infer also, that they who are led by him, will use great plainness of speech, and great plainness of dress, seeking no outward adorning, but only the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.

I will look no farther now, than simply to ♦enquire, Whether you are consistent with these principles?

To begin with the latter: “He that is led by the Spirit will use great plainness of speech.”

* You would have said, “will use the plain language.” But that term leads you into a grand mistake. That term, “the plain language,” naturally leads you to think of one particular way of speaking; as if plainness of speech implied no more, than the use of that particular form.

* Alas! my brethren! Know ye not, that your ancestors designed this, only as a specimen of plain language? And is it possible that you should mistake the sample for the whole bale of cloth?

Consult the light God has given you, and you must see that plainness of speech does not lie in a single point, but implies an open, undisguised sincerity, a child-like simplicity in all we speak.

* I do not desire you to refrain from saying thou or thee. I would not spend ten words about it. But I desire you whenever you speak at all, to speak the truth, and nothing but the truth. I desire your words may always be the picture of your heart. This is truly plain language.

* Either do not pretend to plain speech at all, or be uniformly plain. Are you so? I pray, consider. Do you never compliment? I do not suppose you say, “Sir, your very humble servant.” But do you say no civil things? Do you never flatter? Do you not commend any man or woman to their face? Perhaps farther than you do behind their back. Is this plainness of speech? Do you never dissemble? Do you speak to all persons, high or low, rich or poor, just what you think, neither more nor less, and in the shortest and clearest manner you can? If not, what a mere jest is your plain language? You carry your condemnation in your own breast.

6. You hold also, That “he which is led by the Spirit, will use great plainness of dress, seeking no outward adorning, but only the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.”

And that, in particular, “he will leave gold and costly apparel, to those who know not God.”

* Now I appeal to every serious, reasonable man among you, Do your people act consistently with this principle? Do not many of your women wear gold upon their very feet? And many of your men use ornaments of gold? Are you a stranger to these things? Have you not seen with your eyes (such ♦trifles as will scarce bear the naming) their canes and snuff-boxes glitter, even in your solemn assembly, while ye were waiting together upon God? Surely, they are not yet so lost to modesty, as to pretend, that they do not use them by way of ornament. If they do not, if it be only out of necessity, a plain oaken stick will supply the place of the one, and a piece of horn or tin will unexceptionably answer all the reasonable ends of the other.

* To speak freely (and do not count me your enemy for this) you cannot but observe upon cool reflection, that you retain just so much of your antient practice, as leaves your present without excuse; as makes the inconsistency between the one and the other, glaring and undeniable. For instance: this woman is too strict a Quaker, to lay out a shilling in a necklace. Very well; but she is not too strict to lay out fourscore guineas in a repeating watch. Another would not for the world wear any lace, no, not an edging round her cap. But she will wear point; and sees no harm in it at all, though it should be of twelve times the price. In one kind of apron or handkerchief she dares not lay out twenty shillings; but in another sort, lays out twenty pounds. And what multitudes of you are very jealous, as to the colour and form of your apparel, (the least important of all the circumstances that relate to it) while in the most important, the expence, they are without any concern at all? They will not put on a scarlet or crimson stuff, but the richest velvet, so it be black or grave. They will not touch a coloured ribband; but will cover themselves with a stiff silk from head to foot. They cannot bear purple: but make no scruple at all of being cloathed in fine linen: yea, to such a degree, that the linen of the Quakers is grown almost into a proverb.

Surely you cannot be ignorant, that the sinfulness of fine apparel, lies chiefly in the expensiveness. In that it is robbing God and the poor: it is defrauding the fatherless and widow; it is wasting the food of the hungry, and with-holding his raiment from the naked, to consume it on our own lusts.

7. Let it not be said, that this affects only a few among you, and those, of the younger and lighter sort. Yes it does; your whole body: for why do you, who are elder and graver, suffer such things? Why do ye not vehemently reprove them? And if thy repent not, in spite of all worldly considerations, expel them out of your society? In conniving at their sin, you make it your own; you, especially who are preachers. Do you say, “They cannot bear it; they will not hear:” Alas, into what state then are ye fallen! But whether they will bear it or not, what is that to thee? Thou art to speak, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear. To say the very truth, I am afraid, you rather strengthen their hands in their wickedness. For you not only ¹do not testify against it in the congregation, but even sit at their table and reprove them not. Why then, thou also art one of the dumb dogs that cannot bark, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber.

I fix this charge upon every preacher, in particular, who saw a young woman, daughter to one of the Quakers in London, going to be married in apparel suitable to her diamond buckle, which cost a hundred guineas. Could you see this, and not call heaven and earth to witness against it? Then I witness against thee, in the name of the Lord, thou art a blind leader of the blind: thou strainest a gnat and swallowest a camel!

Verily the sin both of teachers and hearers, is herein exceeding great. And the little attempts toward plainness of apparel, which are still observable among you (I mean, in the colour and form of your cloaths, and the manner of putting them on) only testify against you, that you were once what you know in your hearts you are not now.

8. I come now to your main principle, “We are all to be taught of God, to be inspired and led by his Spirit. And then we shall worship him, not with dead form, but in spirit and in truth.”

These are deep and weighty words. But many hold fast the words, and are utterly ignorant of their meaning. Is not this an exceeding common case? Are not you conscious, abundance of your friends have done so? With whom the being taught of God and led by his Spirit, are mere words of course, that mean just nothing. And their crude and indigested accounts, of the things they did not understand, have raised that deep prejudice against these great truths, which we find in the generality of men.

Do some of you ask, “But dost thou acknowledge the inward principle?” I do, my friends: and I would to God every one of you acknowledged it as much. I say, all religion is either empty shew, or perfection by inspiration; in other words, The obedient love of God, by the supernatural knowledge of God: yea, all that which is not of faith is sin; all which does not spring from this loving knowledge of God; which knowledge cannot begin, or subsist one moment, without immediate inspiration: not only all public worship, and all private prayer, but every thought, in common life, and word and work. What think you of this? Do you not stagger? Dare you carry the inward principle so far? Do you acknowledge it to be the very truth? But alas! what is the acknowledging it? Dost thou experience this principle in thyself: What saith thy heart? Does God dwell therein? And doth it now eccho to the voice of God? Hast thou the continual inspiration of his Spirit, filling thy heart with his love, as with a well of water, springing up into everlasting life?

* 9. Art thou acquainted with the leading of his Spirit, not by notion only, but by living experience? I fear very many of you talk of this, who do not so much as know what it means. How does the Spirit of God lead his children, to this, or that particular action? Do you imagine, it is by blind impulse only? By moving you to do it, you know not why? Not so. He leads us by our eye, at least as much as by the hand; and by light as well as by heat. He shews us the way wherein we should go, as well as incites us to walk therein. For example. Here is a man ready to perish with hunger. How am I led by the Spirit to relieve him? First, by his convincing me, it is the will of God I should, and secondly by his filling my heart with love toward him. Both this light and this heat are the gift of God; are wrought in me by the same Spirit: who leads me, by this conviction as well as love, to go and feed that man. This is the plain, rational account of the ordinary leading of the Spirit. But how far from that which some have given!

* Art thou thus led by the Spirit to every good word and work? Till God ♦hath thereby made thy faith perfect? Dost thou know what faith is? It is a loving, obedient sight of a present and reconciled God. Now where this is, there is no dead form; neither can be, so long as it continues. But all that is said or done is full of God, full of Spirit and life and power.

10. But perhaps, as much as you talk of them, you do not know the difference between form and Spirit; or between worshipping God in a formal way, and worshipping him in spirit and in truth.

The Lord is that Spirit. The seeing and feeling and loving him is spiritual life. And whatever is said or done in the sight or love of God, that is full of spirit and life. All beside this is form, mere dead form; whether it be in our public addresses to God, or in our private; or in our worldly business, or in our daily conversation.

* But if so, how poor and mean and narrow have your views and conceptions been! You was afraid of formality in public worship. And reason good. But was you afraid of it no where else? Did not you consider, that formality in common life, is also an abomination to the Lord? And that it can have no place in any thing we say or do, but so far as we forget God? O watch against it in every place, every moment, that you may every moment see and love God: and consequently, at all times and in all places, worship him in Spirit and in truth.

My brethren, permit me to add a few words, in tender love to your souls. Do not you lean too much on the spirit and power which you believe rested upon your forefathers? Suppose it did! Will that avail you, if you do not drink into the same spirit? And how evident is this! That whatever you once were, ye are now shorn of your strength. Ye are weak and become like other men. The Lord is well nigh departed from you. Where is now the spirit, the life, the power? Be not offended with my plain dealing, when I beseech you who are able to weigh things calmly, to open your eyes and see multitudes even in the church, pursuing, yea and attaining the substance of spiritual life, and leaving unto you the shadow. Nay a still greater evil is before you: for if ye find not some effectual means to prevent it, your rising generation will utterly cast off the shadow as well as the substance.

11. There is an abundantly greater difference still, according to your own account, between us who profess ourselves members of the church of England, and you who are members of the church of Rome. But notwithstanding this, do you not agree with us in condemning the vices above recited? Prophaneness, drunkenness, whoredom, adultery, theft, disobedience to parents, and such like? And how unhappily do you agree with us in practising the very vices which you condemn?

And yet you acknowledge (nay and frequently contend for this with a peculiar earnestness) that every Christian is called to be zealous of good works, as well as to deny himself and take up his cross daily. How then do you depart from your own principles, when you are gluttons, drunkards or epicures? When you live at your ease, in all the elegance and voluptuousness of a plentiful fortune! How will you reconcile the being adorned with gold, arrayed in purple and fine linen, and faring sumptuously every day, with the denying yourself and taking up your cross daily? Surely while you indulge the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, and the pride of life, the excellent rules of self-denial that abound in your own writers, leave you of all men most inexcusable.

12. Neither can this self-indulgence be reconciled, with the being zealous of good works. For by this needless and continual expence, you disable yourself from doing good. You bind your own hands. You make it impossible for you to do that good which otherwise you might. So that you injure the poor in the same proportion as you poison your own soul. You might have cloathed the naked; but what was due to them, was thrown away on your costly apparel. You might have fed the hungry, entertained the stranger, relieved them that were sick or in prison. But the superfluities of your own table swallowed up that whereby they should have been profited. And so this wasting of thy Lord’s goods, is an instance of complicated wickedness; since hereby thy poor brother perisheth, for whom Christ died.

I will not recommend to you either the writings or examples of those whom you account hereticks, (although some of these, if you could view them with impartial eyes, might provoke you to jealousy.) But O! that God would write in your hearts the rules of self-denial and love, laid down by Thomas a Kempis! Or that you would follow both in this and in good works, that burning and shining light of your own church, the Marquis de Renty! Then would all who know and loved the Lord rejoice to acknowledge you as the church of the living God: when ye were zealous of every good word and work; and abstained from all appearance of evil: when it was hereby shewn that you were filled with the Holy Ghost, and delivered from all unholy tempers: when ye were all unblameable and unrebukable, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people, shewing forth to all Jews, infidels and hereticks, by your active, patient, spotless love of God and man, the praises of him, who had called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

13. Men and brethren, Children of the seed of Abraham, suffer me to speak a few words to you also; you who do not allow, that Messiah the Prince is already come and cut off. However you so far hear Moses and the prophets, as to allow, 1. That it is the inspiration of the Holy One, which giveth man understanding, and that all the true children of God are taught of God. 2. That the substance both of the law and the prophets, is contained in that one word, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and thy neighbour as thyself. ♦3. That the sure fruit of love is obedience, ceasing from evil, and doing good.

And do you walk by this rule? Have you yourselves that inspiration of the Holy One? Are you taught of God? Hath he opened your understanding? Have you the inward knowledge of the most High? I fear not. Perhaps you know little more, even of the meaning of the words than a Mahometan.

Let us go a little farther. Do you love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength? Can you say, Whom have I in heaven but thee; and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee? Do you desire God at all? Do you desire to have any thing to do with him, till you can keep the world no longer? Are you not content, so you enjoy the good things of earth, to let God stand afar off? Only calling upon him now and then, when you cannot well do without him. Why then you do not love God at all, tho’ you will sometimes condescend to use him. You love the world. This possesses your heart. This therefore is your God. You renounce the God of your fathers, the God of Israel; you are still uncircumcised in heart. Your own conscience bears witness, you in this no more hear Moses and the prophets, than you do Jesus of Nazareth.

14. From Moses and the prophets it has been shewn, that your forefathers were a faithless and stubborn generation; a generation which set not their hearts aright, and whose spirit cleaved not stedfastly unto God. And this you acknowledge yourselves. If you are asked, how is it that the promise is not fulfilled? Seeing the scepter is long since departed from Judah, why is not Shiloh come? Your usual answer is, “because of the sins of our fathers, God hath delayed his coming.” Have you then reformed from the sins of your fathers? Are you turned unto the Lord your God? Nay, do ye not tread in the same steps? Bating that single point of outward idolatry, what abomination did they ever commit, which you have not committed also? Which the generality of you do not commit still, according to your power? If therefore the coming of the Messiah was hindered by the sins of your forefathers, then by the same rule, your continuance therein will hinder his coming to the end of the world.

Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God is, that he would gather the outcasts of Israel. And I doubt not, but when the fulness of the Gentiles is come in, then all Israel shall be saved. But mean time, is there not great cause that ye should say with Daniel, O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of face, as at this day, to the men of Judah, and unto all Israel. O Lord, we have sinned, we have rebelled against thee, neither have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God. Yet O our God, incline thine ear, and hear; open thine eyes and behold our desolations; for we do not present our supplications before thee for our righteousnesses, but for thy great mercies. O Lord hear! O Lord forgive! O Lord, hearken and do! Defer not, for thine own sake; for thy city and thy people that are called by thy name.

15. I cannot conclude without addressing myself to you also, who do not admit either the Jewish or Christian revelation. But still you desire to be happy. You own the essential difference between vice and virtue; and acknowledge, (as did all the wiser Greeks and Romans) that vice cannot consist with happiness. You allow likewise that gratitude and benevolence, self-knowledge and modesty, mildness, temperance, patience and generosity, are justly numbered among virtues; and that ingratitude and malice, envy and ill-nature, pride, insolence and vanity, gluttony and luxury, covetousness and discontent, are vices of the highest kind.

Now let us calmly enquire, how far your life is consistent with your principles.

* You seek happiness. But you find it not. You come no nearer it with all your labours. You are not happier than you was a year ago. Nay, I doubt you are more unhappy. Why is this, but because you look for happiness there, where you own it cannot be found? Indeed, what is there on earth which can long satisfy a man of understanding? His soul is too large for the world he lives in. He wants more room.

Æstuat infelix augusto limite Mundi,

Ut brevibus clausus Gyaris, parvaque seripho.

He has already travelled through all which is called pleasure; diversions and entertainments of every kind. But among these he can find no enjoyment of any depth; they are empty, shallow, superficial things: they pleased for a while, but the gloss is gone: and now they are dull and tasteless. And what has he next? Only the same things again; for this world affords nothing more. It can supply him with no change. Go, feed again: but it is upon one dish still. Thus

Occidit miseros crambe repetita.

Yet what remedy under the sun!

* 16. The sounder judgment, the stronger understanding you have, the sooner are you sated with the world. And the more deeply convinced, all that cometh is vanity; foolish, insipid, nauseous. You see the foibles of men in so much clearer a light, and have the keener sense of the emptiness of life. Here you are, a poor, unsatisfied inhabitant of an unquiet world; turning your weary eyes on this side and on that side: seeking rest, but finding none. You seem to be out of your place: neither the persons nor things that surround you are such as you want. You have a confused idea of something better than all this; but you know not where to find it. You are always gasping for something which you cannot attain, no, not if you range to the uttermost parts of the earth.

But this is not all. You are not only negatively unhappy, as finding nothing whereon to stay the weight of your soul; but positively so, because you are unholy: you are miserable, because you are vicious. Are you not vicious? Are you then full of gratitude to him, who giveth you life and breath, and all things? Not so; you rather spurn his gifts, and murmur at him that gave them. How often has your heart said, God did not use you well? How often have you questioned either his wisdom or goodness? Was this well done? What kind of gratitude is this? It is the best you are master of. Then take knowledge of yourself. Black ingratitude is rooted in your inmost frame. You can no more love God, than you can see him; or than you can be happy without that love.

Neither (how much soever you may pique yourself upon it) are you a lover of mankind. Can love and malice consist? Benevolence and envy? O do not put out your own eyes. And are not these horrid tempers in you? Do not you envy one man, and bear malice or ill-will to another? I know you call these dispositions by softer names; but names change not the nature of things. You are pained that one should enjoy what you cannot enjoy yourself. Call this what you please, it is rank envy. You are grieved, that a second enjoys even what you have yourself; you rejoice in seeing a third unhappy. Do not flatter yourself: this is malice, venomous malice, and nothing else. And how could you ever think of being happy, with malice and envy in your heart? Just as well might you expect to be at ease, while you held burning coals in your bosom.

17. I intreat you to reflect, whether there are not other inhabitants in your breast, which leave no room for happiness there. May you not discover, through a thousand disguises, pride? Too high an opinion of yourself? Vanity, thirst of praise, even (who would believe it?) of the applause of knaves and fools? Unevenness or sourness of temper? Proneness to anger or revenge? Peevishness, fretfulness, or pining discontent? Nay, perhaps even covetousness.—And did you ever think, happiness could dwell with these? Awake out of that senseless dream. Think not of reconciling things incompatible. All these tempers are essential misery. So long as any of these are harboured in your breast, you must be a stranger to inward peace. What avails it you, if there be no other hell? Whenever these fiends are let loose upon you, you will be constrained to own,

“Hell is where’er I am: myself am hell;”

And can the supreme Being love those tempers, which you yourself abhor in all but yourself? If not, they imply guilt as well as misery. Doubtless they do. Only enquire of your own heart. How often in the mid career of your vice have you felt a secret reproof, which you knew not how to bear, and therefore stifled as soon as possible?

18. And did not even this point at an hereafter? A future state of existence? The more reasonable among you have no doubt of this; you do not imagine the whole man dies together: although you hardly suppose the soul, once disengaged, will dwell again in an house of clay. But how will your soul subsist without it? How are you qualified for a separate state? Suppose this earthly covering, this vehicle of organized matter, whereby you hold commerce with the material world, were now to drop off! Now, what would you do in the regions of immortality? You cannot eat or drink there. You cannot indulge either the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or the pride of life. You love only worldly things; and they are gone, fled as smoke, driven away for ever. Here is no possibility of sensual enjoyments; and you have a rellish for nothing else. O what a separation is this, from all that you hold dear! What a breach is made, never to be healed!

But beside this, you are unholy: full of evil tempers: for you did not put off these with the body. You did not leave pride, revenge, malice, envy, discontent behind you, when you left the world. And now you are no longer cheared by the light of the sun, nor diverted by the flux of various objects: but those dogs of hell are let loose to prey upon your soul, with their whole, unrebated strength. Nor is there any hope, that your spirit will now ever be restored to its original purity; not even that poor hope of a purging fire, so elegantly described by the Heathen poet some ages before the notion was revived among the doctrines of the Romish church

—Aliæ tenduntur inanes

Suspensæ ad ventos; aliis sub gurgite vasto

Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni—

Donec longa dies, exacto temporis orbe,

Concretam exemit labem, purumque reliquit

Æthereum sensum atque aurai simplicis ignem.

19. What a great gulph then is fixed between you and happiness, both in this world and that which is to come? Well may you shudder at the thought! More especially when you are about to enter on that untried state of existence. For what a prospect is this, when you stand on the verge of life, ready to launch out into eternity? What can you then think? You see nothing before you. All is dark and dreary. On the very best supposition, how well may you address your parting soul in the words of dying Adrian:

“Poor, little, pretty, fluttering thing,

Must we no longer live together?

And dost thou prune thy trembling wing,

To take thy flight thou know’st not whither?

Thy pleasing vein, thy hum’rous folly

Is all neglected, all forgot;

And pensive, wavering, melancholy,

Thou hop’st, and fear’st thou know’st not what.”

“Thou know’st not what!” Here is the sting, suppose there were no other. To be thou knowest not what? * Not for a month, or year, but thro’ the countless ages of eternity! What a tormenting uncertainty must this be? What racking unwillingness must it occasion, to exchange even this known vale of tears, for the unknown valley of the shadow of death?

“And is there no cure for this?” Indeed there is an effectual cure; even the knowledge and love of God. There is a knowledge of God which unveils eternity, and a love of God which endears it. That knowledge makes the great abyss visible; and uncertainty vanishes away. That love makes it amiable to the soul, so that fear has no more place! But the moment God says, by the welcome angel of death, “Come thou up hither!” She

“Claps the glad wing and towers away,

And mingles with the blaze of day.”

20. See ye not, what advantage every way, a Christian has over you? Probably the reason you saw it not before was, because you knew none but nominal Christians; men who professed to believe more (in their way of believing) but had no more of the knowledge or love of God than yourselves. So that with regard to real, inward religion, you stood upon even ground. And perhaps in many branches of outward religion, the advantage was on your side.

May the Lord, the God of the Christians, either reform these wretches, or take them away from the earth! That lay this grand stumbling-block in the way of those who desire to know the will of God!

O ye who desire to know his will, regard them not! If it be possible, blot them out of your remembrance.

They neither can nor will do you any good. O suffer them not to do you harm. Be not prejudiced against Christianity by those who know nothing at all of it. Nay, they condemn it, all real substantial Christianity; they speak evil of the thing they know not. They have a kind of cant word for the whole religion of the heart. They call it enthusiasm.

I will briefly lay before you the ground of the matter, and appeal to you yourselves for the reasonableness of it.

* 21. What a miserable drudgery is the service of God, unless I love the God whom I serve? But I cannot love one whom I know not. How then can I love God till I know him? And how is it possible I should know God, unless he make himself known unto me? By analogy or proportion? Very good. But where is that proportion to be found? What proportion does a creature bear to his Creator? What is the proportion between finite and infinite?

I grant, the existence of the creatures demonstratively shews the existence of their Creator. The whole creation speaks, that there is a God. But that is not the point in question. I know there is a God. Thus far is clear. But who will shew me what that God ♦is? The more I reflect the more convinced I am, that it is not possible for any of all the creatures, to take off the veil which is on my heart, that I might discern this unknown God; to draw the curtain back which now hangs between, that I may see him which is invisible.

This veil ♦or flesh now hides him from my sight. And who is able to make it transparent! So that I may perceive through this glass, God always before me, till I see him face to face.

I want to know this great God who filleth heaven and earth: who is above, beneath, and on every side, in all places of his dominion; who just now besets me behind and before, and lays his hand upon me. And yet I am no more acquainted with him, than with one of the inhabitants of Jupiter or Saturn.

O my friend, how will you get one step farther, unless God reveal himself to your soul?

22. And why should this seem a thing incredible to you? That God, a Spirit, and the Father of the Spirits of all flesh, should discover himself to your spirit, which is itself the breath of God, Divinæ Particula Auræ? Any more than that material things should discover themselves to your material eye. Is it any more repugnant to reason, that spirit should influence spirit, than that matter should influence matter? Nay, is not the former the more intelligible of the two? For there is the utmost difficulty in conceiving, how matter should influence matter at all: how that which is totally passive should act. Neither can we rationally account either for gravitation, attraction, or any natural motion whatsoever, but by supposing in all the finger of God, who alone conquers that vis inertiæ, which is essential to every particle of matter, and worketh all in all.

Now if God should ever open the eyes of your understanding, must not the love of God be the immediate consequence? Do you imagine you can see God without loving him? Is it possible in the nature of things? Si virtus conspiceretur occulis, said the old Heathen, mirabiles amores excitaret sui. How much more if you see him who is the original fountain, the great archetype of all virtue, will that sight raise in you a love that is wonderful, such as the gay and busy world know not of!

23. What benevolence also, what tender love to the whole of human kind, will you drink in, together with the love of God, from the unexhausted source of love? And how easy is it to conceive, that more and more of his image will be then transfused into your soul? That from disinterested love, all other divine tempers will, as it were naturally, spring? Mildness, gentleness, patience, temperance, justice, sincerity, contempt of the world; yea, whatsoever things are venerable and lovely, whatsoever are justly of good report.

And when you thus love God and all mankind, and are transformed into his likeness, then the commandments of God will not be grievous; you will no more complain, that they destroy the comforts of life. So far from it, that they will be the very joy of your heart; ways of pleasantness, paths of peace! You will experience here that solid happiness, which you had elsewhere sought in vain. Without servile fear or anxious care, so long as you continue on earth, you will gladly do the will of God here, as the angels do it in heaven. And when the time is come that you should depart hence, when God says, “Arise and come away,” you will pass with joy unspeakable out of the body, into all the fulness of God.

* Now does not your own heart condemn you, if you call this religion enthusiasm? O leave that to those blind zealots, who tack together a sett of opinions and an outside worship, and call this poor, dull, lifeless thing, by the sacred name of Christianity. Well might you account such Christianity as this, a mere piece of empty pageantry, fit indeed to keep the vulgar in awe, but beneath the regard of a man of understanding.

But in how different a light does it now appear? If there be such a religion as I have sketched out, must not every reasonable man see, there is nothing on earth to be desired in comparison of it?—But if any man desire this, let him ask of God: he giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not.

24. May you not ask, quite consistently with your principles, in some manner resembling this;

O thou Being of beings, thou cause of all, thou seest my heart; thou understandest all my thoughts. But how small a part of thy ways do I understand! I know not what is above, beneath, on every side. I know not my own soul. Only this I know, I am not what I ought to be. I see and approve the virtue which I have not. I do not love thee, neither am I thankful. I commend the love of mankind; but I feel it not. Thou hast seen hatred, malice, envy in my heart. Thou hast seen anger, murmuring, discontent. These uneasy passions harrow up my soul. I cannot rest, while I am under this yoke. Nor am I able to shake it off, I am unhappy, and that thou knowest.

Have compassion upon me, thou whose years do not fail! On me, who have but a short time to live. I rise up, and am cut down as a flower. I flee as it were a shadow. Yet a little while, and I return to dust, and have no more place under the sun.

Yet I know thou hast made my soul to live for ever. But I know not where; and I am unwilling to try. I tremble, I am afraid to go thither, whence I shall not return. I stand quivering on the edge of the gulph; for clouds and darkness rest upon it. O God! Must I go always “creeping with terrors, and plunge into eternity with a peradventure!”

O thou lover of men, is there no help in thee? I have heard (what indeed my heart cannot ♦conceive) that thou revealest thyself to those that seek thee, and pourest thy love into their hearts: and that they who know and love thee, walk through the shadow of death and fear no evil. O that this were so! That there was such an unspeakable gift, given to the children of men! For then might I hope for it. O God, if there be, give it unto me! Speak that I may see thee! Make thyself known unto me also in the manner that thou knowest! In any wise let me know thee and love thee, that I may be formed after thy likeness! That I may be love, as thou art love; that I may now be happy in thee; and when thou wilt, fall into the abyss of thy love, and enjoy thee through the ages of eternity!

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

PART III.

And when he came near, he beheld the city, and wept over it, saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! Luke xix. 41, 42.

I. 1. NOW, what can an impartial person think concerning the present state of religion in England? Is there a nation under the sun which is so deeply fallen from the very first principles of all religion? Where is the country, in which is found so utter a disregard to even Heathen morality? Such a thorough contempt of justice and truth, and all that should be dear and honourable to rational creatures?

What species of vice can possibly be named, even of those that nature itself abhors, of which we have not had, for many years, a plentiful and still increasing harvest? What sin remains either in Rome or Constantinople, which we have not imported long ago (if it was not of our native growth) and improved upon ever since? Such a complication of villainies of every kind, considered with all their aggravations, such a scorn of whatever bears the face of virtue, such injustice, fraud, and falshood: above all, such perjury, and such a method of law, we may defy the whole world to produce.

What multitudes are found throughout our land, who do not even profess any religion at all? And what numbers of those who profess much, and confute their profession by their practice? Yea, and perhaps by their exorbitant pride, vanity, covetousness, rapaciousness, or oppression, cause the very name of religion, to stink in the nostrils, of many (otherwise) reasonable men?

2. “However, we have many thousands still, of truly, virtuous and religious men.” Wherein does their religion consist? In righteousness and true holiness? In love stronger than death? Fervent gratitude to God? And tender affection to all his creatures? Is their religion, the religion of the heart? A renewal of soul in the image of God? Do they resemble him they worship? Are they free from pride, from vanity, from malice and envy; from ambition and avarice, from passion and lust; from every uneasy and unlovely temper? Alas, I fear neither they (the great part at least) nor you, know what this religion means; or have any more notion of it, than the peasant that holds the plough, of the religion of a Gymnosophist.

’Tis well if the genuine religion of Christ has any more alliance with what you call religion, than with the Turkish pilgrimages to Mecca, or the Popish worship of our Lady of Loretto. Have not you substituted in the place of the religion of the heart, something (I do not say equally sinful, but) equally vain, and foreign to the worshipping of God in spirit and in truth?――What else can be said even of prayer, (public or private) in the manner wherein you generally perform it? As a thing of course, running round and round, in the same dull track, without either the knowledge, or love of God? Without one heavenly temper, either attained or improved? O what mockery of God is this!

And yet even this religion, which can do you no good, may do you much harm. Nay, it is plain, it does: it daily increases your pride, as you measure your goodness by the number and length of your performances. It gives you a deep contempt of those, who do not come up to the full tale of your virtues. It inspires men with a zeal, which is the very fire of hell, furious, bitter, implacable, unmerciful; often to a degree that extinguishes all compassion, all good nature and humanity. Insomuch, that the execrable fierceness of spirit, which is the natural fruit of such a religion, hath many times, in spite of all ties, divine and human, broke out into open violence, into rapine, murder, sedition, rebellion, civil war, to the desolation of whole cities and countries.

Tantum hæc Religio potuit suadere malorum!

3. Now if there be a God, and one that is not a mere idle spectator of the things that are done upon earth, but a rewarder of men and nations according to their works, what can the event of these things be? It was reasonable to believe, that he would have risen long ago and maintained his own cause, either by sending the famine or pestilence among us, or by pouring out his fury in blood. And many wise and holy men have frequently declared, that they daily expected this; that they daily looked for the patience of God to give place, and judgment to rejoice over mercy.

4. Just at this time, when we wanted little of filling up the measure of our iniquities, two or three clergymen of the Church of England began vehemently to call sinners to repentance. In two or three years they had sounded the alarm, to the utmost borders of the land. Many thousands gathered together to hear them; and in every place where they came, many began to shew such a concern for religion, as they never had done before. A stronger impression was made on their minds, of the importance of things eternal, and they had more earnest desires of serving God, than they had ever had from their earliest childhood. Thus did God begin to draw them toward himself, with the cords of love, with the bands of a man.

Many of these were in a short time deeply convinced of the number and heinousness of their sins. They were also made throughly sensible of those tempers, which are justly hateful to God and man, and of their utter ignorance of God, and entire inability, either to know, love, or serve him. At the same time, they saw in the strongest light, the insignificancy of their outside religion: nay, and often confessed it before God, as the most abominable hypocrisy. Thus did they sink deeper and deeper into that repentance, which must ever precede faith in the Son of God.

And from hence sprung fruits meet for repentance. The drunkard commenced sober and temperate; the whoremonger abstained from adultery and fornication; the unjust from oppression and wrong. He that had been accustomed to curse and swear, for many years, now swore no more. The sluggard began to work with his hands, that he might eat his own bread. The miser learned to deal his bread to the hungry, and to cover the naked with a garment. Indeed the whole form of their life was changed. They had left off doing evil and learned to do well.

* 5. But this was not all. Over and above this outward change, they began to experience inward religion. The love of God was shed abroad in their hearts, which they continue to enjoy to this day. They love him, because he first loved us, and with-held not from us his Son, his only Son. And this love constrains them to love all mankind, all the children of the Father of heaven and earth, and inspires them with every holy and heavenly temper, the whole mind that was in Christ. Hence it is that they are now uniform in their behaviour, unblameable in all manner of conversation. And in whatsoever state they are, they have learned therewith to be content: insomuch that now they can in every thing give thanks: they more than patiently acquiesce, they rejoice and are exceeding glad, in all God’s dispensations toward them. For as long as they love God (and that love no man taketh from them) they are always happy in God. Thus they calmly travel on through life, being never weary nor faint in their minds, never repining, murmuring or disatisfied, casting all their care upon God, till the hour comes that they should drop this covering of earth, and return unto the great Father of Spirits. Then especially it is, that they rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. You who credit it not, come and see. See these living and dying Christians.

“Happy while on earth they breathe

Mightier joys ordain’d to know,

Trampling on sin, hell and death,

To the third heaven they go?”

Now if these things are so, what reasonable man can deny (supposing the scriptures to be true) that God is now visiting this nation, in a far other manner than we had cause to expect? Instead of pouring out his fierce displeasure upon us, he hath made us yet another tender of mercy: so that even when sin did most abound, grace hath much more abounded.

6. Yea, the grace of God which bringeth salvation, present salvation from inward and outward sin, hath abounded of late years in such a degree as neither we nor our fathers had known. How extensive is the change which has been wrought on the minds and lives of the people! Know ye not that the sound is gone forth into all the land? That there is scarce a city or considerable town to be found, where some have not been roused out of the sleep of death, and constrained to cry out, in the bitterness of their soul, What must I do to be saved? That this religious concern has spread to every age and sex; to most orders and degrees of men? To abundance of those in particular, who in time past, were accounted monsters of wickedness, drinking in iniquity like water, and committing all uncleanness with greediness.

7. In what age has such a work been wrought, considering the swiftness as well as the extent of it? When have such numbers of sinners in so short a time been recovered from the error of their ways? When hath religion, I will not say, since the reformation, but since the time of Constantine the Great, made so large a progress in any nation, within so small a space? I believe, hardly can either antient or modern history, supply us with a parallel instance.

* 8. Let understanding men observe also the depth of the work, so extensively and swiftly wrought. It is not a slight or superficial thing: but multitudes of men have been so thoroughly convinced of sin, that their bones were smitten asunder, as it were with a sword dividing the very joints and marrow. Many of these have been shortly after so filled with peace and joy in believing, that whether they were in the body, or out of the body, they could scarcely tell. And in the power of this faith they have trampled under foot, whatever the world accounts either terrible or desirable: having evidenced in the severest trials, so fervent a love to God, so invariable and tender a good-will to mankind, particularly to their enemies, and such a measure of all the fruits of holiness, as were not unworthy the apostolic age. Now so deep a repentance, so firm a faith, so fervent love and unblemished holiness, wrought in so many persons, within so short a time, the world has not seen for many ages.

9. No less remarkable is the purity of the religion which has extended itself so deeply and swiftly. I speak ♦particularly, with regard to the doctrines held by those, among whom it is so extended. Those of the church of England, at least, must acknowledge this. For where is there a body of people in the realm, who, number for number, so closely adhere to what our church delivers as pure doctrine? Where are those who have approved and do approve themselves more orthodox, more sound in their opinions? Is there a Socinian or Arian among them all? Nay, were you to recite the whole catalogue of heresies, enumerated by Bishop Pearson, it might be asked, who can lay any one of these to their charge?

Nor is their religion more pure from heresy, than it is from superstition. In former times, wherever an unusual concern for the things of God hath appeared, on the one hand, strange and erroneous opinions continually sprung up with it; on the other, a zeal for things which were no part of religion, as though they had been essential branches of it. And many have laid as great (if not greater) stress on trifles, as on the weightier matters of the law. But it has not been so in the present case. No stress has been laid on any thing, as though it were necessary to salvation, but what is undeniably contained in the word of God. And of the things contained therein, the stress laid on each, has been in proportion to the nearness of its relation, to what is there laid down as the sum of all, the love of God and our neighbour. So pure from superstition, so throughly scriptural is that religion, which has lately spread in this nation.

* 10. It is likewise rational as well as scriptural; it is as pure from enthusiasm, as from superstition. It is true, the contrary has been continually affirmed. But to affirm is one thing, to prove is another. Who will prove, that it is enthusiasm to love God? Even though we love him with all our heart? To rejoice in the sense of his love to us? To praise him, even with all our strength? Who is able, to make good this charge, against the love of all mankind? Or, laying rhetorical flourishes aside, to come close to the question, and demonstrate, that it is enthusiasm, in every state we are in, therewith to be content? I do but just touch on the general heads. Ye men of reason, give me a man, who setting raillery and ill names apart, will maintain this by dint of argument. If not, own this religion is the thing you seek; sober, manly, rational, divine: however exposed to the censure of those, who are accustomed to revile what they understand not.

11. It may be farther observed, the religion of those we now speak of, is entirely clear from bigotry. (Perhaps this might have been ranked with superstition, of which it seems to be only a particular species.) They are in no wise bigotted to opinions. They do indeed hold right opinions. But they are peculiarly cautious not to rest the weight of Christianity there. They have no such overgrown fondness for any opinions, as to think those alone will make them Christians, or to confine their affection or esteem to those who agree with them therein. There is nothing they are more fearful of than this, lest it should steal upon them unawares. Nor are they bigotted to any particular branch, even of practical religion. They desire indeed to be exact in every jot and tittle, in the very smallest points of Christian practice. But they are not attached to one point more than another: they aim at uniform, universal obedience. They contend for nothing trifling, as if it was important; for nothing indifferent, as if it were necessary; for nothing circumstantial, as if it were essential to Christianity; but for every thing in its own order.

12. Above all, let it be observed, that this religion has no mixture of vice or unholiness. It gives no man of any rank or profession, the least licence to sin. It makes no allowance to any person, for ungodliness of any kind. Not that all who follow after have attained this, either are already perfect. But however that be, they plead for no sin, either inward or outward. They condemn every kind and degree thereof, in themselves as well as in other men. Indeed, most in themselves; it being their constant care, to bring those words home to their own case, Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

* 13. Yet there is not found among them that bitter zeal, in points either of small or of great importance, that spirit of persecution, which has so often accompanied the spirit of reformation. ’Tis an idle conceit, that the spirit of persecution is among the Papists only: it is wheresoever the devil, that old murderer, works; and he still worketh in all the children of disobedience. Of consequence, all the children of disobedience, will on a thousand different pretences, and in a thousand different ways, so far as God permits, persecute the children of God. But what is still more to be lamented is, that the children of God themselves, have so often used the same weapons and persecuted others, when the power was in their own hands.

Can we wholly excuse those venerable men, our great reformers themselves, from this charge? I fear not, if we impartially read over any history of the reformation. What wonder is it then, that when the tables were turned, bishop Bonner or Gardiner should make reprisals? That they should measure to others (indeed good measure shaken together) what had before been measured to them? Nor is it strange, when we consider the single case of Joan Bocher, that God should suffer those (otherwise) holy men, archbishop Cranmer, bishop Ridley, and bishop Latimer, to drink of the same cup with her.

14. But can you find any tincture of this in the case before us? Do not all who have lately known the love of God, know what spirit they are of? And that the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them? Do they approve of the using any kind or degree of violence, on any account or pretence whatsoever, in matters of religion? Do they not hold the right every man has to judge for himself, to be sacred and inviolable? Do they allow any method of bringing even those who are farthest out of the way, who are in the grossest errors, to the knowledge of the truth, except the methods of reason and persuasion? Of love, patience, gentleness, long-suffering? Is there any thing in their practice which is inconsistent with this their constant profession? Do they in fact hinder their own relations or dependents from worshipping God according to their own conscience? When they believe them to be in error, do they use force of any kind, in order to bring them out of it? Let the instances, if there are such, be produced. But if no such are to be found, then let all reasonable men who believe the bible, own, that a work of God is wrought in our land: and such a work (if we survey in one view the extent of it, the swiftness with which it is spread, the depth of that religion which was so swiftly diffused, and its purity from all corrupt mixtures,) as it must be acknowledged, cannot easily be paralleled, in all these concurrent circumstances, by any thing that is found in the English annals, since Christianity was first planted in this island.

II. 1. And yet those who can discern the face of the sky, cannot discern the signs of the times. Yet those who are esteemed wise men do not know, that God is now reviving his work upon earth. Indeed concerning some of these the reason is plain; they know not, because they think not of it. Their thoughts are otherwise employed; their minds are taken up with things of quite a different nature. Or perhaps, they may think of it a little now and then, when they have nothing else to do; but not seriously, or deeply; not with any closeness or attention of thought. They are too much in haste to weigh the facts whereof we speak, and to draw the just inference therefrom: nor is the conviction which they may sometimes feel, suffered to sink into their hearts: but things that have a larger share in their affections soon destroy the very traces of it.

2. True it is, that there are some who think more deeply, who are accustomed to consider things from the foundation, and to lay circumstances together, that they may judge of nothing before they have full evidence: and yet even some of these appear to be in doubt, concerning the present work. Now, supposing it to be a work of God, how can this be accounted for? That they who so diligently inquire concerning it, do not know the time of their visitation? Perhaps, because of the deeply rooted prejudice which they brought with them to the enquiry; and, which still hanging on their minds, makes it scarce possible for them to form an impartial judgment. Perhaps, even a slight prepossession might occasion their stumbling on some of those rocks of offence, which by the wise permission of God, always did and always will attend any revival of his work. Nay, it may be, their very caution was carried to excess. They would not judge before they had such evidence as the nature of the thing would not admit, or at least, God did not see fit to give.

3. All this is very easy to conceive. But it may at first appear surprising, to find men of renown, men supposed to be endowed with knowledge, and with abilities of every kind, flatly, openly, peremptorily denying, that there has been any unusual work of God at all! Yea, a late eminent writer goes farther yet, accounts it an instance of downright Enthusiasm, to imagine, that there is any extraordinary work now wrought upon the earth.¹

It avails not to say, “no, he does not deny this, but he denies it to be the work of God”. This is palpably trifling: for the work under consideration, is of such a nature (namely, the conversion of men from all manner of sins, to holiness of heart and life) that if it be at any time wrought at all, it must be the work of God: seeing it is God alone and not any child of man, who is able destroy the works of the devil.

* Yet neither is this difficult to be accounted for, if we consider things more closely: for the same prejudice which keeps some in doubt, may easily be conceived so to influence others, as to make them wholly deny the work of God. And this it may do in several ways: it may either bring them to question the facts related, and hinder their endeavouring to be more fully informed; or prevent their drawing such inferences from those facts, as they would otherwise see to be plain and undeniable. Yea, and it will give ten-fold weight to the offences which must come, so as to over-ballance all evidence whatsoever.

4. This also may account for the behaviour of those, who not content to suspend their judgment, or to deny the work of God, go farther still, even to the length of contradicting and blaspheming. Nay, some of these have expressed a deeper abhorrence, and shewn a stronger enmity against this, than they were ever known to do against popery, infidelity, or any heresy whatsoever. Some have persecuted the instruments whom it pleased God to use herein, only not to the death: and others have treated in the same manner, all those whom they termed their followers. A few instances of this it may be proper to mention, out of very many which might be recited.

5. On the 20th of June, 1743, a great multitude of people gathered together, chiefly from Walsal, Darlaston and ♦Bilston, in Wensbury church yard, Staffordshire. They went from thence (when, by sounding a horn they had gathered their whole company together) to Mr. Eaton’s house, in the middle of the town, who was at that time constable. He went to the door with his constable’s staff, and began reading the act of parliament against riots; but the stones flew so thick about his head, that he was forced to leave off reading and retire. They broke all his windows, the door of his house, and a large clock in pieces. They went then to above fourscore houses, in many of which there were not three panes of glass left.

6. On June 20, 1743, John Baker, at the head of a large mob came to the house of Jonas Turner, at West-Bramwick near Wensbury, and asked him, “Whether he would keep from these men that went preaching about, and go to the church?” he answered, “I do go to the church. But I never see any of you ♦there.” Presently one Dan. Oniens with a great club, broke great part of the window at one blow. Others laid hold of him, and dragged him about sixty yards, before he could get loose from them. Afterwards they broke all his windows, and threw into the house abundance of stones, to break his goods.

About four in the afternoon they came to the house of widow Turner of West-Bramwick. They threw in bricks and stones so fast, that she was forced to open the door and run out among them. One of her daughters cried out, “My mother will be killed!” On which they fell to throwing stones at her. She ran into a neighbour’s house, but before she could shut the door, they broke the bottom off with a brick end. They followed her other daughter with stones, and one with a great stake. She ran into another house, much frightened, expecting to be murdered. The widow asked “How can you come and abuse us thus?” On which one came with a large club, and swore, “If she spoke another word, he would knock her on the head, and bury her in the ditch.” Then he went and broke all the glass that was left. The same they did to many of the neighbouring houses.

7. On the 19th of June, James Yeoman of Walsal, saw Mary Bird in her father’s house at Wensbury, and swore, “By G— you are there now; but we will kill you to-morrow.” Accordingly he came with a mob the next day; and after they had broken all the windows, he took up a stone, and said, “Now by G— I will kill you.” He threw it, and struck her on the side of the head. The blood gushed out, and she dropt down immediately.

“Another of them took Mr. Hands of Wensbury by the throat, swore he would be the death of him, gave him a great swing round, and threw him upon the ground. As soon as he rose, one Equal Baker gave him a blow on the eye, and knocked him down ♦again. In about half an hour the mob came to his house, and broke all the windows, except about twenty panes. The kitchen windows they cleared, lead, bars and all, broke the window-posts, and threw them into the house. The shop was shut up (he being an apothecary:) but they quickly broke all the pots and bottles in pieces, and destroyed all his medicines. They broke also the shelves and drawers in the shop to pieces, and many of his houshold goods.

8. On January 13, 1743‒4, the mob rose again at Darlaston, broke all the windows of all who followed this way (except two or three who bought themselves off) broke open several houses, and took what they liked, the people belonging to them being fled for their lives.

About the same time the Rev. Mr. E— came to Darlaston; and meeting some others at Thomas Forshew’s they drew up a writing, and Nicholas Winspur, the crier of the town, gave public notice, “That all the people of the society must come to Mr. Forshew’s, and sign it; or else their houses would be pulled down immediately.” It was to this effect, “That they would never read, or sing, or pray together, or hear these parsons any more.”

Several signed this through fear. They made every one who did, lay down a penny――“To MAKE THE MOB DRINK.”

9. About Candlemas, the wife of Joshua Constable, of Darlaston, was going to Wensbury, when a mob met her in the road, threw her down several times, and abused her in a manner too horrible to write. A warrant was procured for some of these. But one of them only was carried before Mr. G――, who came back and told his companions, the justice said, “That they might go home about their business.” On this the mob rose again, came to Joshua’s house, and destroyed all the necessary goods therein. They likewise broke and spoiled all his shop tools, threw the tiles off the roof of the house, and pulled down one room, the joist of which they carried away with them. All his gunlocks they took away; they tore in pieces all his wife’s linen, cut the bed and bedstead, so that it was good for nothing, and tore her bible and common-prayer book all to pieces. She and her husband retired to another house. But one telling the mob they were there, they swore “they would tear it down immediately, if the man let them stay any longer.” So they went out in the frost and snow, not knowing where to lay their head.

10. On Tuesday, January 31, 1743‒4, Henry Old came to John Griffiths’s house, saying, “If he did not leave following this way, he had a hundred men at his command, who should come and pull his house down.” Soon after he brought some with him; but the neighbours gave him money, and sent him away for that time.

Monday, February 6, between seven and eight at night, came part of the same company. Hearing them afar off, John and his wife fastened the door, and left the house. Some of the neighbours going in soon after, found them destroying all they could. Two chairs and several bundles of linen were laid upon the fire. After they had destroyed what they could, they loaded themselves with cloaths and meat, and went their way.

The same day public notice was given at Walsal, by a paper fixt up there, “That all who designed to assist in breaking the windows, and plundering the houses of the Methodists at Wensbury, should be ready at ten o’clock, the next morning, on the Church-hill.”

11. The next morning, February 7, (being Shrove-Tuesday,) about half an hour after ten, great numbers of men were gathered together on the Church-hill. Thence they marched down, some armed with swords, some with clubs, and some with axes. They first fell upon Benjamin Watson’s house, and broke many of the tiles, and all the windows. Next they came to Mr. Addinbrook’s, broke a fine clock, with many of his goods, and stole all the things they could carry away. The next house was Jane Smith’s, whose windows they broke, with what little goods she had. The next was Mr. Bird’s, where they destroyed every thing they found, except what they carried away; cutting the beds in pieces, as they did all the beds which they could any were find. Thence they went to Mr. Edge’s house; he was ill of a fever; so, for a sum of money, they past it over. The next house was Mr. Hand’s. They broke all his counters, boxes and drawers, and all (except some bedsteads) that axe or hammer could break. They spilt all his drugs and chymical medicines, and stole every thing they could carry, even all his and his wife’s wearing apparel, beside what they had on.

12. Mr. Eaton’s house was next. They broke all his windows, and all his inside doors in pieces, cut the lead off his house, destroyed or stole whatever they could lay their hands on. Some gentlemen offered to stop them, if he would sign a paper implying, “That he would never hear those parsons more.” But he told them, “He had felt already what a wounded conscience was; and by the grace of God he would wound his conscience no more.”

After they had done at Mr. Eaton’s, they plundered several other houses in Wensbury and West Bramwick. It is scarce possible to describe the outrages they committed. Only they left them they plundered alive.

While they were plundering John Turner’s house, he waded thro’ the brook, to try if he could save some of his goods, which one David Garington was carrying away. Upon which Garington told him, “It would be the same here as it was in Ireland, for there would be a massacre very quickly. And he wished it was now.”

13. About eleven o’clock, Sarah, the wife of John Sheldon, being told the mob was coming to her house, went and met them at the gate. She asked John Baker, their captain, “What they were come for?” He answered, “If she would have nothing to do with these people, not a penny worth of her goods should be hurt.” She made no reply. Then they broke the door open, and began breaking and plundering the goods. ♦One coming out with a fire shovel, she begged him, “not to take it away.” He swore if she spoke another word, he would “beat her brains out.”

John Sheldon was this while helping Thomas Parkes to hide his goods, though he knew by the noise they were breaking his own to pieces. Between two and three he came to his house with William Sitch. William asked Sarah, how she did? Saying, “For his part, he took joyfully the spoiling of his goods.” She answered, that, “seeing so much wickedness, she could not rejoice; but she blessed God she could bear it patiently, and found not the least anger in her.” John Sheldon seeing the spoil they had made, smiled and said, “Here is strange work.” His wife told him, “if she had complied with their terms, not one penny-worth would have been hurt.” He replied, “That if she had complied to deny the truth, and he had found his goods whole on that account, he should never have been easy as long as he lived; but he blessed God that she had rather chosen to suffer wrong.”

I believe every reasonable man will allow, that nothing can possibly excuse these proceedings: seeing they are open, bare-faced violations both of justice and mercy, and of all laws divine and human.

III. I suppose no Protestant will undertake to defend such proceedings, even toward the vilest miscreants. But abundance of excuses have been made, if not for opposing it thus, yet for denying this work to be of God, and for not acknowledging the time of our visitation.

Some alledge, that the doctrines of these men are false, erroneous and enthusiastick: that they are new, and unheard of till of late: that they are Quakerism, Fanaticism, Popery.

This whole pretence has been already cut up by the roots! It having been shewn at large, that every branch of this doctrine, is the plain doctrine of scripture, interpreted by our own church. Therefore it cannot be either false or erroneous, provided the scripture be true. Neither can it be enthusiastick, unless the same epithet belongs to our articles, homilies and liturgy. Nor yet can these doctrines be termed new, no newer, at least, then the reign of queen Elizabeth; not even with regard to the way of expression, or the manner wherein they are proposed. And as to the substance, they are more antient still; as antient not only as the gospel, as the times of Isaiah, or David, or Moses, but as the first revelation of God to man. If therefore they were unheard of till of late, in any that is termed a Christian country, the greater guilt is on those, who as ambassadors of Christ, ought to publish them day by day.

Fanaticism, if it means any thing at all, means the same with Enthusiasm, or religious madness, from which (as was observed before) these doctrines are distant as far as the east from the west. However, it is a convenient word to be thrown out, upon any thing we do not like; because scarce one reader in a thousand, has any idea of what ♦it means. If any part of this doctrine is held by the Quakers, there is the more reason to rejoice. I would to God they held it all: though the doctrine itself, would be neither better nor worse for this.

Popery in the mouth of many men means just nothing: or at most, “Something very horrid and bad.” But Popery, properly speaking, is The distinguishing doctrines of the church of Rome. They are summed up in the twelve articles which the council of Trent added to the Nicene creed. Now who can find the least connexion between any of these, and the doctrines whereof we are speaking?

2. Others alledge, “Their doctrine is too strict. They make the way to heaven too narrow.” And this is in truth the original objection, (as it was almost the only one for some time) and is secretly at the bottom of a thousand more, which appear in various forms. But do they make the way to heaven any narrower, than our Lord and his apostles made it? Is their doctrine stricter than that of the bible? Consider only a few plain texts. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy mind, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength.—For every idle word which men shall speak, they shall give an account in the day of judgment.――Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatever ye do, do all to the glory of God. If their doctrine is stricter than this, they are to blame. But you know in your conscience, it is not. And who can be one jot less strict, without corrupting the word of God? Can any steward of the mysteries of God be found faithful, if he change any part of that sacred depositum? No. He can abate nothing, he can soften nothing. He is constrained to declare to all men, “I may not bring down the scripture to your taste. You must come up to it, or perish for ever.”

3. This is the real ground of that other popular cry, concerning “the uncharitableness of these men.” Uncharitable are they? In what respect? Do they not feed the hungry and clothe the naked? No, that is not the thing. They are not wanting in this. But they are so uncharitable in judging! They think none can be saved, but those of their own way. They damn all the world beside themselves.

* What do you mean? “They think none can be saved, but those of their own way.” Most surely they do. For as there is but one heaven, so there is but one way to it; even the way of faith in Christ, (for we speak not of opinions, or outward modes of worship) the way of love to God and man, the highway of holiness. And is it uncharitable, to think or say, That none can be saved, but those who walk in this way? Was he then uncharitable, who declared, He that believeth not shall be damned? Or he that said, Follow holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord? And again; Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, yet, if I have not (ἀγάπην) charity, love, all this profiteth me nothing.”

“But they damn all, you say, beside themselves.” Damn all! What kind of word is this? They damn no man. None is able to damn any man, but the Lord and judge of all. What you probably mean by that strange expression is, they declare that God condemns all, beside those who believe in Jesus Christ, and love him and keep his commandments. And so must you also, or you sin against God, and your neighbour, and your own soul. But is there any uncharitableness in this? In warning sinners to flee from the wrath to come? On the contrary, not to warn a poor, blind, stupid wretch, that he is hanging over the mouth of hell, would be so inexcusable a want of charity, as would bring his blood upon our own head.

4. But there is no room for dispute, touching these doctrines in general, seeing our Lord gives you so plain a rule, by which you may easily and infallibly know, whether they be of God. The tree is known by its fruit, either therefore make the tree good, and its fruit good; or else, make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt. (Matthew xii. 33.) Now what fruit does the tree before us bring forth? Look and see; believe your own eyes and ears. Sinners leave their sins. The servants of the devil become the servants of God. Is this good or evil fruit? That vice loses ground, and virtue, practical religion, gains? O dispute no more. Know the tree by its fruit. Bow and own the finger of God.

But many, who own these doctrines to be of God, yet cannot be reconciled to the instruments he hath made use of. A very common exception taken against these is (and was from the beginning) “That they are so young.” Therefore (abundance of men have readily inferred) “This work cannot be of God.”

Perhaps they are not so young as you conceive. Mr. Whitefield is now upwards of thirty; my brother is thirty-seven years of age. I have lived above forty-two years. And a gentleman in Cornwall, for whom I often preach, has the merit of having lived threescore and seventeen years.

But, supposing the antecedent true, what a consequence is this? What shadow of scripture have you to support it? Doth not God send by whom he will send? And who shall say to him, What dost thou? “These are too young; send elder men.” What shadow of reason? Is it not possible, that a person of thirty or forty may have as true a judgment in the things of God, and as great a blessing attending his preaching, as one of fifty or fourscore?

I wish you would explain yourself a little on this head:

Scire velim, verbo, pretium quotus arroget annus?

How old do you require a man to be, before God should have leave to speak by his mouth?――O my brethren, who could have believed any serious man would once have named such an argument as this? Seeing both scripture and reason teach, that God herein giveth account to none of his ways. But he worketh by whomsoever he will work; he sheweth mercy by whom he will shew mercy.

* 6. “But there are only a few young heads,” I cannot but observe here, what great pains have been taken, what diligence shewn, to make and to keep them few. What arts have not been used, to keep back those of the clergy in particular, who have been clearly convinced from time to time, that they ought to join hearts and hands in the work? On this occasion, it has been accounted meritorious, to say all manner of evil of us falsely: to promise them whatever their hearts desired, if they would refrain from these men: and, on the other hand, to threaten them with heavy things, if ever they went among them more. So that how fully soever they were convinced, they could not act according to their conviction, unless they could give up at once all thought of preferment, either in church or state; nay, all hope of even a fellowship, or poor scholarship, in either university. Many also have been threatened, that if they went on in this way, what little they had should be taken from them. And many have, on this very account, been disowned by their dearest friends and nearest relations. So that there was no possibility the number of these labourers should ever be increased at all, unless by those who could break through all these ties, who desired nothing in the present world, who counted neither their fortunes, nor friends, nor lives, dear unto themselves, so they might only keep a conscience void of offence toward God and toward men.

7. But what do you infer from their fewness? That because they are few, therefore God cannot work by them? Upon what scripture do you ground this? I thought it was the same to him, to save by many or few. Upon what reason? Why cannot God save ten thousand souls by one man, as well as by ten thousand? How little, how inconsiderable a circumstance is number before God? Nay, is there not reason to believe, that whensoever God is pleased to work a great deliverance, spiritual or temporal, he may first say, as of old, The people are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hands? May he not purposely chuse few as well as inconsiderable instruments, for the greater manifestation of his own glory? Very few, I grant, are the instruments now employed: yet a great work is wrought already. And the fewer they are by whom this large harvest hath hitherto been gathered in, the more evident must it appear to unprejudiced minds, that the work is not of man, but of God.

8. “But they are not only few, but unlearned also.” This is a grievous offence; and is by many esteemed a sufficient excuse, for not acknowledging the work to be of God.

The ground of this offence is partly true. Some of those who now preach are unlearned. They neither understand the antient languages, nor any of the branches of philosophy. And yet this objection might have been spared, by many of those who have frequently made it: because they are unlearned too (though accounted otherwise.) They have not themselves the very thing they require in others.

* Men in general are under a great mistake with regard to what is called “The Learned World.” They do not know, they cannot easily imagine, how little learning there is among them. I do not speak of abstruse learning; but of what all divines, at least of any note, are supposed to have viz. The knowledge of the tongues, at least Latin, Greek and Hebrew, and of the common arts and sciences.

* How few men of learning, so called, understand Hebrew? Even so far as to read a plain chapter in Genesis? Nay, how few understand Greek? Make an easy experiment. Desire that grave man, who is urging this objection, only to tell you the English of the first paragraph that occurs in one of Plato’s dialogues? I am afraid we may go farther still. How few understand Latin? Give one of them an epistle of Tully, and see how readily he will explain it, without his dictionary. If he can hobble through that, it is odds but a georgick in Virgil, or a satire of Persius sets him fast.

* And with regard to the arts and sciences: How few understand so much as the general principles of Logick? Can one in ten of the clergy (O grief of heart!) or of the masters of arts in either university, when an argument is brought, tell you even the mood and figure wherein it is proposed? Or compleat an Enthymeme? Perhaps, you do not so much as understand the term: supply the premiss which is wanting, in order to make it a full categorical syllogism. Can one in ten of them demonstrate a problem or theorem in Euclid’s Elements? Or define the common terms used in metaphysicks? Or intelligibly explain the first principles of it? Why then will they pretend to that learning, which they are conscious to themselves they have not? Nay, and censure others who have it not, and do not pretend to it? Where are sincerity and candour fled?

* It will easily be observed, that I do not depreciate learning of any kind. The knowledge of the languages is a valuable talent; so is the knowledge of the arts and sciences. Both the one and the other may be employed to the glory of God, and the good of men. But yet I ask, Where hath God declared in his word, that he cannot, or will not make use of men that have it not? Has Moses, or any of the prophets affirmed this? Or our Lord? Or any of his apostles? You are sensible all these are against you. You know the apostles themselves, all except St. Paul, were ανδρες αγραμματοι και ιδιωται· common, unphilosophical, unlettered men.

9. “What! Then you make yourselves, like the apostles.” Because this silly objection has so often been urged, I will for once spend a few words upon it, though it does not deserve that honour. Why, must not every man, whether clergyman, or layman, be in some respects like the apostles, or go to hell? Can any man be saved, if he be not holy, like the apostles? A follower of them, as they were of Christ? And ought not every preacher of the gospel, to be in a peculiar manner like the apostles, both in holy tempers, in exemplariness of life, and in his indefatigable labours for the good of souls? Woe unto every ambassador of Christ, who is not like the apostles in this! In holiness; in making full proof of his ministry; in spending and being spent for Christ! We cannot and therefore we need not be like them, in working outward miracles. But we may and ought, in working together with God for the salvation of men. And the same God who was always ready to help their infirmities, is ready to help ours also. He who made them workmen that needed not to be ashamed, will teach us also rightly to divide the word of truth. In this respect likewise, in respect of his having help from God, for the work whereunto he is called, every preacher of the gospel is like the apostles. Otherwise he is of all men most miserable.

* 10. And I am bold to affirm, that these unlettered men, have help from God for that great work, the saving souls from death; seeing he hath enabled, and doth enable them still, to turn many to righteousness. Thus hath he destroyed the wisdom of the wise, and brought to nought the understanding of the prudent. When they imagined they had effectually shut the door, and locked up every passage, whereby any help could come to two or three preachers, weak in body as well as soul; who they might reasonably believe would humanly speaking, wear themselves out in a short time: when they had gained their point by securing (as they supposed) all the men of learning in the nation; he that sitteth in heaven laughed them to scorn, and came upon them by a way they thought not of. Out of the stones he raised up those who should beget children to Abraham. We had no more foresight of this than you. Nay, we had the deepest prejudices against it: until we could not but own, that God gave wisdom from above to these unlearned and ignorant men; so that the work of the Lord prospered in their hand, and sinners were daily converted to God.

Indeed in the one thing which they profess to know, they are not ignorant men. I trust there is not one of them who is not able to go thro’ such an examination, in substantial, practical, experimental divinity, as few of our candidates for holy orders, even in the university (I speak it with sorrow and shame, and in tender love) are able to do. But oh! what manner of examination, do most of those candidates go through? And what proof are the testimonials commonly brought (as solemn as the form is wherein they run) either of their piety or knowledge, to whom are intrusted those sheep, which God hath purchased with his own blood!

11. “But they are laymen. You seem to be sensible yourself, of the strength of this objection. For as many as you have answered, I observe you have never once so much as touched on this.”

I have not. Yet it was not distrust of my cause, but tenderness to you which occasioned my silence. I had something to advance on this head also: but I was afraid you could not bear it. I was conscious to myself, that some years since, to touch this point, was to touch the apple of my eye. And this makes me almost unwilling to speak now; lest I should shock the prejudices I cannot remove.

* Suffer me, however, just to intimate to you some things, which I would leave to your farther consideration. The scribes of old, who were the ordinary preachers among the Jews, were not priests; they were not better than laymen. Yea, many of them were incapable of the priesthood, being of the tribe of Simeon, not of Levi.

Hence probably it was, that the Jews themselves never urged it as an objection to our Lord’s preaching (even those who did not acknowledge or believe, that he was sent of God in an extraordinary character) that he was no priest after the order of ♦Aaron. Nor indeed could be; seeing he was of the tribe of Judah.

Nor does it appear, that any objected this to the apostles. So far from it, that at Antioch in Pisidia, we find the rulers of the synagogue sending unto Paul and Barnabas, strangers just come into the city, saying, men and brethren, if ye have any word of exhortation for the people, say on, Acts xiii. 15.

If we consider these things, we shall be the less surprized at what occurs in the 8th chapter of the Acts: At that time there was a great persecution against the church, and they ♦were all scattered abroad: (i. e. all the church, all the believers in Jesus) throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. (verse 1.) therefore they that were scattered abroad, went every where preaching the word, (verse 4.) Now, what shadow of reason have we to say, or think, that all these were ordained before they preached?

12. * If we come to later times; was Mr. Calvin ordained? Was he either priest or deacon? And were not most of those whom it pleased God to employ in promoting the reformation abroad, laymen also? Could that great work have been promoted at all in many places, if laymen had not preached? And yet how seldom do the very Papists urge this, as an objection against the reformation? Nay, as rigorous as they are in things of this kind, they themselves appoint, even in some of their strictest orders, that “if any lay-brother believes himself called of God, to preach as a missionary, the superior of the order, being informed thereof, shall immediately send him away.”

* In all protestant churches it is still more evident, that ordination is not held a necessary prerequisite of preaching: for in Sweden, in Germany, in Holland, and, I believe, in every reformed church in Europe, it is not only permitted but required, that before any one is ordained, (before he is admitted even into deacon’s orders, wherever the distinction between priests and deacons is retained) he should publickly preach a year or more ad probandum facultatem. And for this practice, they believe they have the authority of an express command of God: Let these first be proved: then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless, 1 Timothy iii. 10.

23. “In England, however, there is nothing of this kind; no layman permitted to speak in public.” No! Can you be ignorant, that in an hundred churches they do it continually? In how many (particularly in the West of England) does the parish-clerk read one of the lessons? (In some he reads the whole service of the church, perhaps, every Lord’s day) and do not other laymen constantly do the same thing, yea, in our very cathedrals? Which being under the more immediate inspection of the bishops, should be patterns to all other churches.

Perhaps it will be said, “But this is not preaching.” Yes, but it is, essentially such. For what is it to preach, but præedicare verbum Dei? To publish the word of God? And this laymen do all over England; particularly under the eye of every bishop in the nation.

Nay, is it not done in the universities themselves? Who ordained that singing-man at Christchurch? Who is likewise utterly unqualified for the work, murdering every lesson he reads? Not even endeavouring to read it as the word of God but rather as an old song? Such a layman as this, meddling at all with the word of God, I grant is a scandal to the English nation.

* To go a step farther.――Do not the fundamental constitutions of the university of Oxford, the statutes, even as revised by archbishop Laud, require every batchelor of arts, nine in ten of whom are laymen, to read three public lectures in moral philosophy, on whatever subject he chuses? My subject, I well remember, was, The LOVE of God. Now, what was this but preaching?

* Nay, may not a man be a doctor of divinity even in Oxford, tho’ he never was ordained at all? The instance of Dr. Atwell, (late) rector of Exeter college, is fresh in every one’s memory.

These are a few of the considerations that may readily occur to any thinking man on this head. But I do not rest the cause on these. I believe it may be defended a shorter way.

14. * It pleased God by two or three ministers of the church of England, to call many sinners to repentance: who, in several parts, were undeniably turned from a course of sin, to a course holiness.

The ministers of the places where this was done, ought to have received those ministers with open arms: and to have taken them who had just begun to serve God, into their peculiar care; watching over them in tender love, lest they should fall back into the snare of the devil.

Instead of this, the greater part spoke of those ministers, as if the devil, not God had sent them. Some repelled them from the Lord’s table: others stirred up the people against them, representing them even in their public discourses, as fellows not fit to live; papists, hereticks, traitors; conspirators against their king and country.

And how did they watch over the sinners lately reformed? Even as a leopard watcheth over his prey. They drove some of them also from the Lord’s table; to which till now they had no desire to approach. They preached all manner of evil concerning them, openly cursing them in the name of the Lord. They turned many out of their work; persuaded others to do so too, and harrassed them all manner of ways.

The event was, that some were wearied out, and so turned back to their vomit again. And then these good pastors gloried over them, and endeavoured to shake others by their example.

15. * When the ministers by whom God had helped them before, came again to those places, great part of their work was to begin again; if it could be begun again; but the relapsers were often so hardened in sin, that no impression could be made upon them.

What could they do in a case of so extreme necessity? Where so many souls lay at stake?

No clergyman would assist at all. The expedient that remained was, to find some one among themselves, who was upright of heart, and of sound judgment in the things of God: and to desire him to meet the rest as often as he could, in order to confirm them, as he was able, in the ways of God, either by reading to them, or by prayer, or by exhortation.

God immediately gave a blessing hereto. In several places, by means of these plain men, not only those who had already begun to run well, were hindered from drawing back to perdition; but other sinners also, from time to time were converted from the error of their ways.

This plain account of the whole proceeding, I take to be the best defence of it. I know no scripture which forbids making use of such help, in a case of such necessity. And I praise God who has given even this help to those poor sheep, when their own shepherds pitied them not.

“But does not the scripture say, no man taketh this honour to himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron?” Nor do these. The honour here mentioned is the priesthood. But they no more take upon them to be priests then to be kings. They take not upon them to administer the sacraments, an honour peculiar to the priests of God. Only according to their power, they exhort their brethren, to continue in the grace of God.

“But for these laymen to exhort at all, is a violation of all order.”

What is this order of which you speak? Will it serve instead of the knowledge and love of God? Will this order rescue those from the snare of the devil, who are now taken captive at his will? Will it keep them who are escaped a little way, from turning back into Egypt? If not, how should I answer it to God, if rather than violate I know not what order, I should sacrifice thousands of souls thereto? I dare not do it. It is at the peril of my own soul.

Indeed if by order were meant, true Christian discipline, whereby all the living members of Christ are knit together in one, and all that are putrid and dead, immediately cut off from the body: this order I reverence; for it is of God. But where is it to be found? In what diocese? In what town or parish, within England or Wales? Are you rector of a parish? Then let us go no farther. Does this order obtain there? Nothing less. Your parishioners are a rope of sand. As few (if any) of them are alive to God; so they have no connection with each other, unless such as might be among Turks or Heathens. Neither have you any power to cut off from that body, were it alive, the dead and putrid members. Perhaps you have no desire: but all are jumbled together without any care or concern of yours.

It is plain then, what order is to be found is not among you, who so loudly contend for it, but among that very people whom you continually blame, for their violation and contempt of it. The little flock you condemn is united together in one body, by one spirit: so that if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it, if one be honoured, all rejoice with it. Nor does any dead member long remain; but as soon as the hope of recovering it is past, it is cut off.

Now suppose we were willing to relinquish our charge, and to give up this flock into your hands; would you observe the same order, as we do now, with them and the other souls under your care? You dare not: because you have respect of persons. You fear the faces of men. You cannot: because you have not overcome the world. You are not above the desire of earthly things. And it is impossible you should ever have any true order, or exercise any Christian discipline, till you are wholly crucified to the ♦world, till you desire nothing more but God.

Consider this matter, I intreat you, a little farther. Here are thirty thousand persons (perhaps somewhat more) of whom I take care, watching over their souls as he that must give ♦account. In order hereto it lies upon me (so I judge) at the peril of my own salvation, to know not only their names, but their outward and inward states, their difficulties and dangers. Otherwise how can I know either how to guide them aright, or to commend them to God in prayer? Now if I am willing to make these over to you, will you watch over them in the same manner? Will you take the same care (or as much more as you please) of each soul as I have hitherto done? Not such curam animarum as you have taken these ten years in your own parish. Poor empty name! Has not your parish been in fact, as much a sine cure to you as your prebend? Oh what account have you to give to the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls!

18. There is one more excuse for denying this work of God, taken from the instruments employed therein: that is, “That they are wicked men.” And a thousand stories have been handed about to prove it.

But you may observe, their wickedness was not heard of, till after they went about doing good. Their reputation for honesty was till then unblemished but it was impossible it should continue so, when they were publickly employed in testifying of the world, that its deeds were evil. It could not be but the scriptures should be fulfilled. The servant is not above his master. If they have called the master of the house beelzebub, how much more them of his houshold?

* Yet I cannot but remind considerate men, in how remarkable a manner the wisdom of God has for many years guarded against this pretence, with respect to my brother and me in particular. Scarce any two men in Great-Britain, of our rank, have been so held out, as it were, to all the world; especially of those who from their childhood had always loved and studiously sought retirement. And I had procured what I sought, I was quite safe, as I supposed, in a little country town, when I was required to return to Oxford, without delay, to take the charge of some young gentlemen, by Dr. Morley, the only man then in England to whom I could deny nothing. From that time both my brother and I (utterly against our will) came to be more and more observed and known, till we were more spoken of, than, perhaps, two so inconsiderable persons ever were before in the nation. To make us more publick still, as honest madmen at least, by a strange concurrence of providences overturning all our preceding resolutions, we were hurried away to America. However, at our return from thence, we were resolved to retire out of the world at once; being sated with noise, hurry and fatigue, and seeking nothing but to be at rest. Indeed for a long season, the greatest pleasure I had desired, on this side eternity was

Tacitum Sylvas inter reptare salubres,

Quærentem quicquid dignum sapiente bonoque.

And we had attained our desire. We wanted nothing. We looked for nothing more in this world, when we were dragged out again, by earnest importunity, to preach at one place and another, and another, and so carried on, we knew not how, without any design but the general one, of saving souls, into a situation, which had it been named to us at first, would have appeared far worse than death.

* 19. What a surprising apparatus of Providence was here! And what stronger demonstrations could have been given, of men’s acting from a zeal for God, whether it were according to knowledge or no? What persons could, in the nature of things, have been (antecedently) less liable to exception, with regard to their moral character, at least, than those the all-wise God hath now employed? Indeed I cannot devise what manner of men could have been more unexceptionable on all accounts. Had God endued us with greater natural or acquired abilities, that very thing might have been turned into an objection. Had ♦we been remarkably defective, it would have been matter of objection, on the other hand. Had we been dissenters of any kind, or even low-church men, (so called) it would have been a great stumbling-block in the way of those who are zealous for the church. And yet had we continued in the impetuosity of our high-church zeal, neither should we have been willing to converse with dissenters, nor they to receive any good at our hands. Some objections were kept out of the way, by our known contempt of money and preferment: and others, by that rigorous strictness of life, which we exacted, not of others, but ourselves only. Insomuch, that twelve or fourteen years ago, the censure of one who had narrowly observed us, (me, in particular) went no farther than this;

“Does John beyond his strength persist to go,

To his frail carcase literally foe?

Careless of health, as if in haste to die,

And lavish time t’ insure eternity!”

So that upon the whole, I see not what God could have done more in this respect which he hath not done. Or what instruments he could have employed in such a work, who would have been less liable to exception.

20. Neither can I conceive how it was possible to do that work, the doing of which, we are still under the strongest conviction, is bound upon us at the peril of our own souls, in a less exceptionable manner. We have, by the grace of God, behaved not only with meekness, but with all tenderness towards all men; with all the tenderness which we conceived it was possible to use, without betraying their souls. And from the very first, it has been our special care, to deal tenderly with our brethren the clergy. We have not willingly provoked them at any time; neither any single clergyman. We have not sought occasion to publish their faults; we have not used a thousand occasions that offered. When we were constrained to speak something, we spake as little as we believed we could, without offending God: and that little, though in plain and strong words, yet as mildly and lovingly as we were able. And in the same course we have steadily persevered (as well as in earnestly advising others to tread in our steps) even though we saw that with regard to them, by all this we profited nothing; though we knew we were still continually represented as implacable enemies to the clergy, as railers against them, as slanderers of them, as seeking all opportunities to blacken and asperse them. When a clergyman himself has vehemently accused me of doing this, I bless God he could not provoke me to do it. I still kept my mouth as it were with a bridle, and committed my cause to a higher hand.

21. The truth is, you impute that hatred to us, which is in your own breast. (I speak not this of all the clergy; God forbid! But let it fall on whom it concerns.) You, it is certain, have shewn the utmost hatred to us, and in every possible way: unless you were actually to beat us (of which also we are not without precedent) or to shoot us through the head. And if you could prevail upon others to do this, I suppose you would think you did God service. I do not speak without ground. I have heard with my own ears such sermons, (in Staffordshire particularly) that I should not have wondered if as soon as we came out of the church, the people had stoned me with stones. And it was a natural consequence of what that poor minister had lately heard, at the bishop’s visitation: as it was one great cause of the miserable riots and outrages which soon followed.

It is this, my brethren, it is your own preaching, and not ours, which sets the people against you. The very same persons, who are diverted with those sermons, cannot but despise you for them in their hearts: even those who on your authority believe most of the assertions which you advance. What then must they think of you, who know the greatest part of what you assert to be utterly false? They may pity and pray for you; but they can esteem you no other, than false witnesses against God and your brethren.

22. “But what need is there (say even some of a milder spirit) of this preaching in fields and streets? Are there not churches enough to preach in?” No, my friend, there are not; not for us to preach in. You forget: we are not suffered to preach there; else we should prefer them to any places whatever. “Well, there are ministers enough without you.” Ministers enough, and churches enough; for what? To reclaim all the sinners within the four seas? If there were, they would all be reclaimed. But they are not reclaimed. Therefore it is evident, that there are not churches enough. And one plain reason why, notwithstanding all these churches, they are no nearer being reclaimed is this; they never come into a church; perhaps not once in a twelve-month, perhaps not for many years together. Will you say (as I have known some tender hearted Christians) “Then it is their own fault; let them die and be damned.” I grant it is their own fault. And so it was my fault and yours, when we went astray, like sheep that were lost. Yet the Shepherd of souls sought after us, and went after us into the wilderness. And oughtest not thou to have compassion on thy fellow-servants, as he had pity on thee? Ought not we also to seek, as far as in us lies, and to save that which is lost?

* Behold the amazing love of God to the outcasts of men! His tender condescention to their folly! They would regard nothing done in the usual way. All this was lost upon them. The ordinary preaching of the word of God, they would not even deign to hear. So the devil made sure of these careless ones. For who should pluck them out of his hand? Then God was moved to jealousy, and went out of the usual way to save the souls which he had made. Then over and above what was ordinarily spoken in his name, in all the houses of God in the land, he commanded a voice to cry in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord. The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel.

* 23. Consider coolly, if it was not highly expedient, that something of this kind should be? How expedient, were it only on the account of those poor sinners against their own souls, who (to all human appearance) were utterly inaccessible every other way? And what numbers of these are still to be found, even in or near our most populous cities? What multitudes of them were some years since, both in Kingswood, and the fells about Newcastle? Who, week after week, spent the Lord’s day, either in the ale-house, or in idle diversions, and never troubled themselves about going to church, or to any publick worship at all? Now, would you really have desired that these poor wretches should have sinned on, till they dropt into hell? Surely you would not. But by what other means was it possible they should have been plucked out of the fire? Had the minister of the parish preached like an angel, it had profited them nothing; for they heard him not. But when one came and said, “Yonder is a man preaching on the top of the mountain,” they ran in droves to hear what he would say. And God spoke to their hearts. It is hard to conceive any thing else which could have reached them. Had it not been for field-preaching, the uncommonness of which was the very circumstance that recommended it, they must have run on in the error of their way, and perished in their blood.

* 24. But suppose field-preaching to be in a case of this kind, ever so expedient, or even necessary, yet who will contest with us for this province?――May we not enjoy this quiet and unmolested? Unmolested, I mean by any competitors.—For who is there among you, brethren, that is willing, (examine your own hearts) even to save souls from death at this price? Would not you let a thousand souls perish, rather than you would be the instrument of rescuing them thus? I do not speak now with regard to conscience, but to the inconveniencies that must accompany it. Can you sustain them, if you would? Can you bear the summer sun to beat upon your naked head? Can you suffer the wintry rain or wind, from whatever quarter it blows? Are you able to stand in the open air, without any covering or defence, when God casteth abroad his snow like wool, or scattereth his hoar-frost like ashes? And yet these are some of the smallest inconveniencies which accompany field-preaching. Far beyond all these, are the contradiction of sinners, the scoffs both of the great vulgar, and the small; contempt and reproach of every kind; often more than verbal affronts, stupid, brutal violence, sometimes to the hazard of health, or limbs, or life. Brethren, do you envy us this honour? What I pray, would buy you to be a field-preacher? Or what, think you, could induce any man of common sense, to continue therein one year, unless he had a full conviction in himself, that it was the will of God concerning him.

* Upon this conviction it is (were we to submit to these things on any other motive whatsoever, it would furnish you with a better proof of our distraction, than any that has yet been found) that we now do, for the good of poor souls, what you cannot, will not, dare not do. And we desire not that you should; but this one thing, we may reasonably desire of you: do not increase the difficulties which are already so great, that without the mighty power of God, we must sink under them. Do not assist in trampling down a little handful of men, who for the present stand in the gap, between ten thousand poor wretches and destruction, till you find some others to take their places.

* 25. Highly needful it is, that some should do this, lest those poor souls be lost without remedy. And it should rejoice the hearts of all who desire the kingdom of God should come, that so many of them have been snatched already from the mouth of the lion, by an uncommon (though not unlawful) way. This circumstance therefore is no just excuse, for not acknowledging the work of God. Especially, if we consider, that whenever it has pleased God to work any great work upon the earth, even from the earliest times, he hath stept more or less out of the common way: whether to excite the attention of a greater number of people, than might otherwise have regarded it; or to separate the proud and haughty of heart, from those of an humble, child-like spirit; the former of whom he foresaw, trusting in their own wisdom, would fall on that stone and be broken; while the latter, enquiring with simplicity, would soon know of the work, that it was of God.

26. “Nay (say some) but God is a God of wisdom. And it is his work, to give understanding. Whereas this man is one of them, and he is a fool. You see the fruits of their preaching.” No, my friend, you don’t. That is your mistake. A fool very possibly he may be. So it appears by his talking, perhaps writing too. But this is none of the fruits of our preaching. He was a fool before ever he heard us. We found and are likely to leave him so. Therefore his folly is not to be imputed to us, even if it continue to the day of his death. As we were not the cause, so we undertake not the cure of disorders of this kind. No fair man therefore can excuse himself thus, from acknowledging the work of God.

Perhaps you will say, “He is not a natural fool neither. But he is so ignorant! He knows not the first principles of religion.” It is very possible. But have patience with him, and he will know them by and by. Yea, if he be in earnest to save his soul, far sooner than you can conceive. And in the mean time, neither is this an objection of any weight. Many when they begin to hear us, may, without any fault of ours, be utter strangers to the whole of religion. But this is no incurable disease. Yet a little while and they may be wise unto salvation.

Is the ignorance you complain of among this people (you who object to the people more than to their teachers) of another kind? Don’t they “know, how in meekness to reprove or instruct those that oppose themselves?” I believe what you say: all of them do not: they have not put on gentleness and long-suffering. I wish they had: pray for them that they may; that they may be mild and patient toward all men. But what if they are not? Sure you do not make this an argument that God hath not sent us? Our Lord came, and we come, not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance: passionate sinners, (such as these whereof you complain) as well as those of every other kind. Nor can it be expected they should be wholly delivered from their sin, as soon as they begin to hear his word.

* 27. A greater stumbling-block than this is laid before you, by those that say and do not. Such I take it for granted will be among us, although we purge them out as fast as we can: persons that talk much of religion, that commend the preachers, perhaps are diligent in hearing them: it may be, read all their books, and sing their hymns; and yet no change is wrought in their hearts. Were they of old time as lions in their houses? They are the same still. Were they (in low life) slothful or intemperate? Were they tricking or dishonest? Over-reaching or oppressive? Or did they use to borrow and not pay? The Ethiopian hath not changed his skin. Were they (in high life) delicate, tender, self-indulgent? Were they nice in furniture or apparel? Were they fond of trifles, or of their own dear persons? The Leopard hath not changed her spots. Yet their being with us for a time proves no more, than that we have not the miraculous discernment of spirits.

* Others you may find, in whom there was a real change. But it was only for a season. They are now turned back, and are two-fold more the children of hell than before. Yet neither is this any manner of proof, that the former work was not of God. No, not though these apostates should, with the utmost confidence, say all manner of evil against us. I expect they should. For every other injury hath been forgiven, and will be to the end of the world. But hardly shall any one forgive the intolerable injury, of almost persuading him to be a Christian. When these men therefore who were with us, but went out from among us, assert things that may cause your ears to tingle, if you consider either the scripture, or the nature of man, it will not stagger you at all. Much less will it excuse you, for not acknowledging the work in general to be of God.

* 28. But to all this it may possibly be replied, “When you bring your credentials with you, when you prove by miracles what you assert, then we will acknowledge that God hath sent you.”

What is it you would have us prove by miracles? That the doctrines we preach are true? This is not the way to prove that: (as our first reformers replied to those of the church of Rome, who, you may probably remember, were continually urging them with this very demand). We prove the doctrines we preach, by scripture and reason: and, if need be, by antiquity.

What else is it then we are to prove by miracles?

Is it, 1. That A. B. was for many years without God in the world, a common swearer, a drunkard, a sabbath-breaker?

Or, 2. That he is not so now?

Or, 3. That he continued so till he heard us preach, and from that time was another man? Not so. The proper way to prove these facts, is by the testimony of competent witnesses: and these witnesses are ready, whenever required, to give full evidence of them.

Or would you have us prove by miracles,

4. That this was not done by our own power or holiness? That God only is able to raise the dead, those who are dead in trespasses and sins? Nay, if you hear not Moses and the prophets and apostles on this head, neither would you believe tho’ one rose from the dead.

It is therefore utterly unreasonable and absurd to require or expect the proof of miracles, in questions of such a kind, as are always decided, by proofs of quite another nature.

29. “But you relate them yourself.” I relate just what I saw, from time to time: and this is true, that some of those circumstances seem to go beyond the ordinary course of nature. But I do not peremptorily determine, whether they were supernatural, or no? Much less do I rest upon them, either the proof of other facts, or of the doctrines which I preach. I prove these in the ordinary way; the one by testimony, the other by scripture and reason.

“But if you can work miracles when you please, is not this the surest way of proving them? This would put the matter out of dispute at once, and supersede all other proof.”

You seem to lie under an entire mistake, both as to the nature and use of miracles. It may reasonably be questioned, whether there ever was that man living upon earth, except the man Christ Jesus, that could work miracles when he pleased. God only when he pleased, exerted that power, and by whomsoever it pleased him.

But if a man could work miracles when he pleased, yet is there no scripture authority, nor even example for doing it in order to satisfy such a demand as this. I do not read, that either our Lord, or any of his apostles, wrought any miracle on such an occasion. Nay, how sharply does our Lord rebuke those who made a demand of this kind? When certain of the scribes and of the pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee; (Observe, this was their method of answering the strong reasons whereby he had just proved the works in question to be of God.) He answered and said to them, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign. But there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas, Matthew xii. 38, 39. An evil and adulterous generation! Else they would not have needed such a kind of proof. Had they been willing to do his will, they would, without this, have known that the doctrine was of God.

* Miracles therefore are quite needless in such a case. Nor are they so conclusive a proof as you imagine. If a man could and did work them, in defence of any doctrine, yet this would not supersede other proof. For there may be τερατα Ψευδους lying wonders, miracles wrought in support of falshood. Still therefore his doctrine would remain to be proved, from the proper topicks of scripture and reason. And these even without miracles are sufficient. But miracles without these are not. Accordingly our Saviour and all his apostles, in the midst of their greatest miracles, never failed to prove every doctrine they taught, by clear scripture and cogent reason.

30. I presume, by this time you may perceive the gross absurdity, of demanding miracles in the present case: seeing one of the propositions in question, (over and above our general doctrines) viz. “That sinners are reformed,” can only be proved by testimony: and the other, “this cannot be done but by the power of God,” needs no proof, being self-evident.

“Why, I did once myself rejoice to hear, (says a grave citizen, with an air of great importance) that so many sinners were reformed, till I found they were only turned from one wickedness to another: that they were turned from cursing or swearing, or drunkenness, into ♦a no less damnable sin ♣that of schism.”

Do you know what you say? You have, I am afraid, a confused huddle of ideas in your head. And I doubt, you have not capacity to clear them up yourself; nor coolness enough, to receive help from others.

However I will try. What is schism? Have you any determinate idea of it? I ask ♦the rather, because I have found, by repeated experiments, that a common English tradesman receives no more light, when he hears or reads, “This is schism,” than if he heard or read

Bombalio, stridor, clangor, taratantara, murmur.‏

Honest neighbour, don’t be angry. Lay down your hammer, and let us talk a little on this head.

You say, “We are in the damnable sin of schism, and therefore in as bad a state as adulterers or murderers.”

I ask once more, What do you mean by schism? “Schism! Schism! Why, it is separating from the church.” Ay, so it is. And yet every separating from the church to which we once belonged, is not schism. Else you will make all the English to be schismatics, ♦by separating from the church of Rome. “But we had just cause.” So doubtless we had: whereas schism is a causeless separation from the church of Christ. So far so good. But you have many steps to take before you can make good that conclusion, that a separation from a particular national church, such as the church of England is, whether with sufficient cause or without, comes under the scriptural notion of schism.

However, taking this for granted, will you aver in cool blood, that all who die in such a separation, that is, every one who dies a Quaker, a Baptist, an Independent, or a Presbyterian, is as infallibly damned as if he died in the act of murder or adultery? Surely you start at the thought! It makes even nature recoil. How then can you reconcile it to the love that hopeth all things?

31. But whatever state they are in, who causelessly separate from the church of England, it affects not those of whom we are speaking; for they do not separate from it at all.

You may easily be convinced of this, if you will only weigh the particulars following.

1. A great part of these went to no church at all, before they heard us preach. They no more pretended to belong to the church of England, than to the church of Moscovy. If therefore they went to no church now, they would be no farther from the church than they were before.

2. Those who did sometimes go to church before, go three times as often now. These therefore do not separate from the church. Nay, they are united to it more closely than before.

3. Those who never went to church at all before, do go now at all opportunities. Will common sense allow any one to say, that these are separated from the church?

4. The main question is, Are they turned from doing the works of the devil, to do the works of God? Do they now live soberly, righteously, and godly, in the present world? If they do, if they live according to the directions of the church, believe her doctrines, and join in her ordinances: with what face can you say, that these men separate from the church of England?

32. But in what state are they whom the clergy and gentry (and perhaps you for one) have successfully laboured to preserve from this damnable sin of schism? Whom you have kept from hearing these men, and separating from the church?

Is not the drunkard that was, a drunkard still? Enquire of his poor wife and family. Is not the common swearer still horribly crying to God for damnation upon his soul? Is not the sinner in every other kind, exactly the same man still? Not better at least, if he be not worse, than he was ten years ago.

Now consider, 1. Does the church of England gain either honour, or strength, or blessing, by such wretches as these calling themselves her members? By ten thousand drunkards, or whoremongers, or common swearers? Nay ought she not immediately to spew them out? To renounce all fellowship with them? Would she not be far better without them than with them? Let any man of reason judge.

2. Is the drunkard’s calling himself of the church of England, of any more use to him, than to the church? Will this save him from hell, if he die in his sin? Will it not rather increase his damnation?

3. Is not a drunkard of any other church, just as good as a drunkard of the church of England? Yea, is not a drunken Papist as much in the favour of God, as a drunken Protestant?

4. Is not a cursing, swearing Turk, (if there be such an one to be found) full as acceptable to God, as a cursing, swearing Christian?

Nay, 5. If there be any advantage, does it not lie on the side of the former? Is he not the less inexcusable of the two? As sinning against less light?

O why will you sink these poor souls deeper into perdition, than they are sunk already? Why will you prophesy unto them peace, peace; when there is no peace? Why, if you do it not yourself, (whether you cannot, or will not, God knoweth) should you hinder us from guiding them into the way of peace?

33. Will you endeavour to excuse yourself, by saying, “There are not many who are the better for your preaching: and these by and by will be as bad as ever; as such and such an one is already?”

I would to God I could set this in a just light? But I cannot. All language fails.

God begins a glorious work in our land. You set yourself against it with all your might; to prevent its beginning where it does not yet appear, and to destroy it wherever it does. In part you prevail. You keep many from hearing the word that is able to save their souls. Others who had heard it, you induce to turn back from God, and to list under the devil’s banner again. Then you make the success of your own wickedness an excuse for not acknowledging the work of God! You urge “That not many sinners were reformed! And that some of those are now as bad as ever!”

Whose fault is this? Is it ours? Or your own? Why have not thousands more been reformed? Yea, for every one who is now turned to God, why are there not ten thousand? Because you and your associates laboured so heartily in the cause of hell; because you and they spared no pains, either to prevent or to destroy the work of God! By using all the power and wisdom you had, you hindered thousands from hearing the gospel, which they might have found to be the power of God unto salvation. Their blood is upon your heads. By inventing, or countenancing, or retailing lies, some refined, some gross and palpable, you hindered others from profiting by what they did hear. You are answerable to God for these souls also. Many who began to taste the good word, and run the way of God’s commandments, you, by various methods, prevailed on to hear it no more. So they soon drew back to perdition. But know, that for every one of these also, God will require an account of you in the day of judgment.

34. * And yet, in spite of all the malice, and wisdom, and strength, not only of men, but of principalities and powers, of the rulers of the darkness of this world, of the wicked spirits in high places; there are thousands found, who are turned from dumb idols, to serve the living and true God. What a harvest then might we have seen before now, if all who say, they are on the Lord’s side, had come, as in all reason they ought, to the help of the Lord against the mighty? Yea, had they only not opposed the work of God, had they only refrained from his messengers; might not the trumpet of God have been heard long since in every corner of our land? And thousands of sinners in every county been brought to fear God and honour the king?

Judge of what immense service we might have been, even in this single point, both to our king and country. All who hear and regard the word we preach, honour the king for God’s sake. They render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, as well as unto God the things that are God’s.――They have no conception of piety without loyalty; knowing the powers that be, are ordained of God. I pray God to strengthen all that are of this mind, how many soever they be. But might there not have been at this day, an hundred thousand in England, thus minded more than are now? Yea verily; even by our ministry had not they who should have strengthened us, weakened our hands.

35. Surely, you are not wise! What advantages do you throw away! What opportunities do you lose? Such as another day you may earnestly seek, and nevertheless may not find them. For if it please God to remove us, whom will you find to supply our place? We are in all things your servants for Jesus sake; tho’ the more we love you, the less we are loved. Let us be employed not in the highest, but in the meanest; and not in the easiest, but the hottest service. Ease and plenty we leave to those that want them. Let us go on in toil, in weariness, in painfulness, in cold or hunger, so we may but testify the gospel of the grace of God. The rich, the honourable, the great, we are thoroughly willing (if it be the will of our Lord) to leave to you. Only let us alone with the poor, the vulgar, the base, the outcasts of men.—Take also to yourselves the saints of the world: but suffer us to call sinners to repentance; even the most vile, the most ignorant, the most abandoned, the most fierce and savage of whom we can hear. To these we will go forth in the name of our Lord, desiring nothing, receiving nothing of any man (save the bread we eat, while we are under his roof) and let it be seen whether God has sent us. Only let not your hands, who fear the Lord, be upon us. Why should we be stricken of you any more?

IV. 1. Surely ye are without excuse, all who do not yet know the day of your visitation! The day, wherein the great God, who hath been forgotten among us, days without number, is arising at once to be avenged of his adversaries, and to visit and redeem his people. Are not his judgments and mercies both abroad? And still, will ye not learn righteousness? Is not the Lord passing by? Doth not a great and strong wind already begin to rend the mountains, and to break in pieces the rocks before the Lord? Is not the earthquake also felt already? And a fire hath begun to burn in his anger. Who knoweth what will be the end thereof? But at the same time, he is speaking to many in a still, small voice. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear, lest he be suddenly destroyed, and that without remedy!

2. What excuse can possibly be made for those, who are regardless of such a season as this? Who are at such a crisis, stupid, senseless, unapprehensive; caring for none of these things? Who do not give themselves the pains to think about them, but are still easy and unconcerned? What! can there ever be a point, on which it more behoves you to think? And that with the coolest and deepest attention? As long as the heaven and the earth remain, can there be any thing of so vast importance, as God’s last call to a guilty land, just perishing in its iniquity!

You, with those round about you, deserved long ago to have drank the dregs of the cup of trembling: yea, to have been punished with everlasting destruction, from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. But he hath not dealt with you according to your sins, neither rewarded you after your iniquities. And once more he is mixing mercy with judgment. Once more he is crying aloud, Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel; and will you not deign to give him the hearing? If you are not careful to answer him in this matter. Do you still shut your eyes, and stop your ears, and harden your stubborn heart?――Oh beware, lest God laugh at your calamity, and mock when your fear cometh!

3. Will you plead, that you have other concerns to mind? That other business engages your thoughts? It does so indeed; but this is your foolishness; this is the very thing that leaves you without excuse.—For what business can be of equal moment? The mariner may have many concerns to mind, and many businesses to engage his thoughts: but not when the ship is sinking. In such a circumstance (it is your own) you have but one thing to think of. Save the ship and your own life together! And the higher post you are in, the more deeply intent should you be on this one point. Is this a time for diversion? For eating and drinking, and rising up to play? Keep the ship above water. Let all else go and mind this one thing!

4. Perhaps you will say, “So I do. I do mind this one thing, how to save the sinking nation. And therefore now I must think of arms and provisions. I have no time now to think of religion.” This is exactly as if the mariner should say, “Now I must think of my guns and stores. I have no time now to think of the hold.” Why man, you must think of this, or perish. It is there the leak is sprung. Stop that, or you and all your stores will go together to the bottom of the sea.

Is not this your very case? Then, whatever you do, stop the leak: else you go to the bottom! I do not speak against your stores. They are good in their kind; and it may be well they are laid in.――But all your stores will not save the sinking ship, unless you can stop the leak. Unless you can some way keep out these floods of ungodliness, that are still continually pouring in, you must soon be swallowed up in the great deep, in the abyss of God’s judgments. This, this is the destruction of the English nation. It is vice, bursting in on every side, that is just ready to sink us into slavery first, and then into the nethermost hell.――Who is a wise man, and endued with knowledge among you? Let him think of this. Think of this, all that love your country, or that care for your own souls. If now especially you do not think of this one thing, you have no excuse before God or man.

5. Little more excuse have you, who are still in doubt concerning this day of your visitation. For you have all the proof that you can reasonably expect or desire, all that the nature of the thing requires. That in many places, abundance of notorious sinners are totally reformed, is declared by a thousand eye and ear-witnesses, both of their present and past behaviour. And you are sensible, the proof of such a point as this must, in the nature of things rest upon testimony. And that God alone is able to work such a reformation, you know all the scriptures testify. What would you have more? What pretence can you have, for doubting any longer? You have not the least room to expect or desire any other, or any stronger evidence.

I trust, you are not of those who fortify themselves against conviction; who are “resolved they will never believe this.” They ask, “who are these men?” We tell them plainly: but they credit us not. Another and another of their own friends is convinced, and tells them the same thing. But their answer is ready, “Are you turned methodist too?” So their testimony likewise goes for nothing. Now how is it possible these should ever be convinced? For they will believe none but those who speak on one side.

6. Do you delay fixing your judgment, till you see a work of God, without any stumbling-block attending it? That neither is yet nor ever will. It must needs be, that offences will come. And scarce ever was there such a work of God before, with so few as have attended this.

When the reformation began, what mountainous offences lay in the way, of even the sincere members of the church of Rome? They saw such failings in those great men, Luther and Calvin! Their vehement tenaciousness of their own opinions; their bitterness toward all who differed from them; their impatience of contradiction and utter want of forbearance, even with their own brethren.

But the grand stumbling-block of all, was, their open avowed separation from the church; their rejecting so many of the doctrines and practices, which the others accounted the most sacred; and their continual invectives against the church they separated from, so much sharper than Michael’s reproof of Satan.

Where there fewer stumbling-blocks attending the reformation in England? Surely no, for what was Henry the Eighth? Consider, either his character, his motives to the work, or his manner of pursuing it! And even king Edward’s ministry we cannot clear, of persecuting in their turns, yea and burning hereticks. The main stumbling-block also still remained, viz. open separation from the church.

7. Full as many were the offences that lay in the way of even the sincere members of the church of England, when the people called Quakers first professed, that they were sent of God to reform the land. Whether they were or no, is beside our question: it suffices for the present purpose to observe, that over and above their open, avowed, total separation from the church, and their vehement invectives against many of her doctrines, and the whole frame of her discipline: they spent their main strength in disputing about opinions and externals, rather than in preaching faith, mercy, and the love of God.

In these respects, the case was nearly the same when the Baptists first appeared in England. They immediately commenced a warm dispute, not concerning the vitals of Christianity, but concerning the manner and time of administering one of the external ordinances of it. And as their opinion hereof totally differed from that of all the other members of the church of England, so they soon openly declared their separation from it, not without sharp censures of those that continued therein.

8. The same occasion of offence was, in a smaller degree, given by the Presbyterians and Independents: for they also spent great part of their time and strength, in opposing the commonly received opinions, concerning some of the circumstantials of religion; and for the sake of these, separated from the church.

* But I do not include that venerable man, Mr. Philip Henry, nor any that were of his Spirit, in this number. I know they abhorred contending about externals. Neither did they separate themselves from the church. They continued therein, till they were driven out, whether they would or no. I cannot but tenderly sympathize with these; and the more, because this is, in part, our own case. Warm men spare no pains, at this very day, to drive us out of the church. They cry out to the people, wherever one of us comes, “A mad dog, a mad dog!” If haply we might fly for our lives, as many have done before us. And sure it is, we should have complied with their desire, we should merely for peace and quietness have left the church long before now, but that we could not in conscience do it. And it is on this single motive, it is for conscience sake, that we still continue therein; and shall continue, (God being our helper) unless they by violence thrust us out.

9. * But to return. What are the stumbling-blocks in the present case, compared to those in any of the preceding?

We do not dispute concerning any of the externals or circumstantials of religion. There is no room; for we agree with you therein. We approve of, and adhere to them all; all that we learned together when we were children, in our catechism or common prayer-book. We were born and bred up in your own church, and desire to die therein. We always were, and are now, zealous for the church; only not with a blind, angry zeal. We hold, and ever have done, the same opinions, which you and we received from our forefathers. But we do not lay the main stress of our religion on any opinions, right or wrong: neither do we ever begin, or willingly join in any dispute concerning them. The weight of all religion, we ♦apprehend, rests on holiness of heart and life. And consequently, wherever we come, we press this with all our might. How wide then is the difference between our case and the case of any of those that are above-mentioned? They avowedly separated from the church: we utterly disavow any such design. They severely, and almost continually, inveighed against the doctrines and discipline of the church they left. We approve both the doctrines and discipline of our church, and inveigh only against ungodliness and unrighteousness. They spent great part of their time and strength in contending about externals and circumstantials. We agree with you in both; so that having no room to spend any time in such vain contention, we have our desire of spending and being spent, in promoting plain practical religion. How many stumbling-blocks are removed out of your way? Why do not you acknowledge the work of God?

10. If you say, “Because you hold opinions which I cannot believe are true:” I answer, Believe them true or false; I will not quarrel with you about any opinion. Only see that your heart be right toward God, that you know and love the Lord Jesus Christ; that you love your neighbour, and walk as your master walked, and I desire no more. I am sick of opinions: I am weary to bear them. My soul loaths this frothy food. Give me solid and substantial religion. Give me an humble, gentle lover of God and man; a man full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy: a man laying himself out in the work of faith, the patience of hope, the labour of love. Let my soul be with these Christians, wheresoever they are, and whatsoever opinion they are of. Whosoever thus doth the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.

11. Inexcusably infatuated must you be, if you can even doubt whether the propagation of this religion be of God! Only more inexcusable are those unhappy men, who oppose, contradict, and blaspheme it.

How long will you stop your ears against him, that still crieth, Why persecutest thou me? It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks; for a man to contend with his Maker. How long will you despise the well-known advice of a great and learned man, Refrain from these men, and let them alone. If this work be of man, it will come to nought. But if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it. And why should you be found even to fight against God? If a man fight with God, shall he prevail? Canst thou thunder with a voice like him? Make haste. Fall down. Humble thyself before him. Lest he put forth his hand and thou perish!

12. How long will you fight under the banner of the great enemy of God and ♦man? You are now in his service: you are taking part with the devil against God. Even supposing there were no other proof, this would undeniably appear, from the goodly company among whom you are enlisted, and who war one and the same warfare. I have heard some affirm, that the most bitter enemies to the present work of God, were Pharisees. They meant, men who had the form of godliness, but denied the power of it. But I cannot say so. The sharpest adversaries thereof whom I have hitherto known (unless one might except a few honourable men, whom I may be excused from naming) were the scum of Cornwall, the rabble of Bilston and Darlaston; the wild beasts of Walsal, and the turnkeys of Newgate.

13. Might not the very sight of these troops, shew any reasonable man, to what general they belonged? As well as the weapons they never fail to use; the most horrid oaths and execrations, and lawless violence, carrying away as a flood whatsoever it is which stands before it: having no eyes, nor ears, no regard to the loudest cries of reason, justice or humanity. Can you join heart or hands with these any longer? With such an infamous, scandalous rabble-rout, roaring and raging, as if they were just broke loose, with their captain Apollyon, from the bottomless pit? Does it not rather concern you, and that in the highest degree, as well as every friend to his king and country, every lover of peace, justice and mercy, immediately to join and stop any such godless crew, as they would join to stop a fire just beginning to spread, or an inundation of the sea?

14. If, on the contrary, you join with that godless crew, and strengthen their hands in their wickedness, must not you, in all reason, be accounted, (like them) a public enemy of mankind? And indeed such must every one appear, in the eye of unprejudiced reason, who opposes directly or indirectly, the reformation of mankind. By reformation I mean, the bringing them back (not to this or that system of opinions, or to this or that sett of rites and ceremonies, how decent and significant soever: but) to the calm love of God and one another, to an uniform practice of justice, mercy and truth. With what colour can you lay any claim to humanity, to benevolence, to public spirit, if you can once open your mouth, or stir one finger, against such a reformation as this?

* ’Tis a poor excuse to say, “O, but the people are brought into several erroneous opinions.” It matters not a straw, whether they are or no; (I speak of such opinions as do not touch the foundation) it is scarce worth while to spend ten words about it. Whether they embrace this religious opinion or that, is no more concern to me, than whether they embrace this or that system of astronomy. Are they brought to holy tempers and holy lives? This is mine, and should be your enquiry: since on this, both social and personal happiness depend; happiness, temporal and eternal. Are they brought to the love of God and the love of their neighbour? Pure religion and undefiled is this. How long then will you darken counsel, by words without knowledge? The plain religion now propagated is LOVE. And can you oppose this, without being an enemy to mankind?

15. No; nor without being an enemy to your king and country: especially at such a time as this. For however men of no thought may not see and regard it, or hectoring cowards may brave it out, it is evident to every man of calm reflection, that our nation stands on the very brink of destruction. And why are we thus, but because the cry of our wickedness is gone up to heaven? Because we have so exceedingly, abundantly, beyond measure, corrupted our ways before the Lord. And because to all our other abominations we have added, the open fighting against God; the not only rejecting, but even denying, yea, blaspheming his last offers of mercy; the hindering others who were desirous to close therewith; the despitefully using his messengers, and the variously troubling and oppressing those who did accept of his grace, break off their sins, and turn to him with their whole heart.

16. I cannot but believe, it is chiefly on this account, that God hath now a controversy with our land. And must not any considerate man be inclined to form the same judgment, if he reviews the state of public affairs, for only a few years last past? I will not enter into particulars. But, in general, can you possibly help observing, that whenever there has been any thing like a public attempt, to suppress this new sect, (for so it was artfully represented) another and another public trouble arose. This has been repeated so often, that it is surprising any man of sense can avoid taking notice of it. May we turn at length to him that smiteth us, hearing the rod and him that appointeth it! May we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, before the great deep swallow us up!

17. Just now, viz. on the 4th of this instant, December, the Rev. Mr. Henry Wickham, one of his Majesty’s justices of peace for the west-riding of Yorkshire writes an order

To the constable of Kighley, commanding him, “to convey the body of Jonathan Reeves, (whose real crime is, the calling sinners to repentance) to his Majesty’s gaol and castle of York: suspected (said the precept) of being a spy among us, and a dangerous man to the person and government of his Majesty King George.”

God avert the omen! I fear this is no presage either of the repentance or deliverance of our poor nation!

18. If we will not turn and repent, if we will harden our hearts, and acknowledge neither his judgments nor mercies; what remains but the fulfilling of that dreadful word, which God spake by the prophet Ezekiel: Son of man when the land sinneth against me, by trespassing grievously; then will I stretch forth my hand upon it, and break the staff of the bread thereof.――Though these three men, Noah, Daniel and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls. Or if I bring a sword upon the land, and say, “Sword, go through the land:”――Or if I send a pestilence into that land, and pour out my fury upon it in blood:――Though Noah, Daniel and Job were in it, as I live, saith the Lord God, they shall deliver neither son nor daughter; they shall but deliver their own souls by their righteousness, chapter xiv. verses 13, 14, 17, 19, 20.

Yet behold, therein shall be left a remnant, that shall be brought forth, both sons and daughters.—And ye shall be comforted concerning the evil that I have brought upon Jerusalem.—And ye shall know that I have not done without cause, all that I have done in it, saith the Lord God. Verses 22, 23.

London,

December 18, 1745.

A Plain ACCOUNT of the

People called METHODISTS.

In a LETTER to the

Reverend Mr. PERRONET

Vicar of Shoreham, in KENT.

[Written in the YEAR 1748.]

Rev. and dear Sir,

1. SOME time since you desired an account of the whole œconomy of the people commonly called Methodists. And you received a true, (as far as it went) but not a full account. To supply what I think was wanting in that, I send you this account: that you may know not only their practice, on every head, but likewise the reasons whereon it is grounded, the occasion of every step they have taken, and the advantages reaped thereby.

2. But I must premise, That as they had not the least expectation at first, of any thing like what has since followed, so they had no previous design or plan at all, but every thing arose just as the occasion offered. They saw or felt some impending or pressing evil, or some good end necessary to be pursued. And many times they fell unawares on the very thing, which secured the good, or removed the evil. At other times they consulted on the most probable means, following only common sense and scripture: Tho’ they generally found, in looking back, some thing in Christian antiquity likewise, very nearly parallel thereto.

I. 1. About ten years ago, my brother and I where desired to preach, in many parts of London. We had no view therein, but so far as we were able (and we knew God could work by whomsoever it pleased him) to convince those who would hear, what true Christianity was, and to persuade them to embrace it.

2. The points we chiefly insisted upon were four: First, That orthodoxy or right opinions is, at best, but a very slender part of religion, if it can be allowed to be any part of it at all: that neither does religion consist in negatives, in bare harmlessness of any kind; nor merely in externals, or doing good, or using the means of grace, in works of piety (so called) or of charity: that it is nothing short of, or different from The mind that was in Christ, The image of God stampt upon the heart, Inward righteousness attended with the peace of God, and, Joy in the Holy Ghost. Secondly, That the only way under heaven to this religion, is to repent and believe the gospel, or (as the apostle words it) Repentance towards God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Thirdly, That by this faith, He that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, is justified freely by his grace, through the redemption which is in Jesus Christ. And lastly, That being justified by faith, we taste of the heaven to which we are going: we are holy and happy: we tread down sin and fear, and sit in heavenly places with Christ Jesus.

3. Many of those who heard this, began to cry out, that we brought strange things to their ears: that this was doctrine which they never heard before, or, at least, never regarded. They searched the scriptures, whether these things were so, and acknowledged the truth as it is in Jesus. Their hearts also were influenced as well as their understandings, and they determined to follow Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

4. Immediately they were surrounded with difficulties: all the world rose up against them: neighbours, strangers, acquaintance, relations, friends, began to cry out amain; “Be not righteous overmuch: why shouldst thou destroy thyself? Let not much religion make thee mad.”

5. One and another and another came to us, asking, What they should do? Being distressed on every side, as every one strove to weaken, and none to strengthen their hands in God. We advised them, “Strengthen you one another. Talk together as often as you can. And pray earnestly, with and for one another, that you may endure to the end, and be saved.” Against this advice we presumed there could be no objection; as being grounded on the plainest reason, and on so many scriptures, both of the old Testament and new, that it would be tedious to recite them.

6. They said, “But we want you likewise to talk with us often, to direct and quicken us in our way, to give us the advices which you well know we need, and to pray with us, as well as for us.” I asked, Which of you desire this? Let me know your names and places of abode. They did so. But I soon found, they were too many for me to talk with severally so often as they wanted it. So I told them, “If you will all of you come together, every Thursday, in the evening, I will gladly spend some time with you in prayer, and give you the best advice I can.”

7. Thus arose, without any previous design on either side, what was afterwards called, a society: a very innocent name, and very common in London, for any number of people associating themselves together. The thing proposed in their associating themselves together was obvious to every one. They wanted to flee from the wrath to come, and to assist each other in so doing. They therefore united themselves “in order to pray together, to receive the word of exhortation, and to watch over one another in love, that they might help each other to work out their salvation.”

8. “There is one only condition previously required, in those who desire admission into this society, A desire to flee from the wrath to come, to be saved from their sins.”

They now likewise agreed, that as many of them as had an opportunity, would meet together every Friday, and spend the dinner hour in crying to God, both for each other, and for all mankind.¹

9. It quickly appeared, that their thus uniting together, answered the end proposed therein. In a few months the far greater part of those who had begun to fear God, and work righteousness, but were not united together, grew faint in their minds, and fell back into what they were before. Mean while the far greater part of those, who were thus united together, continued striving to enter in at the strait gate, and to lay hold on eternal life.

10. Upon reflection, I could not but observe, this is the very thing which was from the beginning of Christianity. In the earliest times, those whom God had sent forth, preached the gospel to every creature. And the οἱ ἀκροαταὶ, the body of hearers, were mostly either Jews or Heathens. But as soon as any of these were so convinced of the truth, as to forsake sin and seek the gospel of salvation, they immediately joined them together, took an account of their names, advised them to watch over each other, and met these κατηχούμενοι (catechumens, as they were then called) apart from the great congregation, that they might instruct, rebuke, exhort, and pray with them, and for them, according to their several necessities.

11. But it was not long before an objection was made to this, which had not once entered into my thought. “Is not this making a schism? Is not the joining these people together, Gathering churches out of churches.”

It was easily answered, if you mean only Gathering people out of buildings called churches, it is. But if you mean, dividing Christians from Christians, and so destroying Christian fellowship, it is not. For 1st, These were not Christians before they were thus joined. Most of them were barefaced Heathens. 2. Neither are they Christians, from whom you suppose them to be divided. You will not look me in the face and say they are. What! Drunken Christians? Cursing and swearing Christians? Lying Christians? Cheating Christians? If these are Christians at all, they are devil Christians (as the poor Malabarians term them.) 3. Neither are they divided any more than they were before, even from these ♦wretched devil Christians. They are as ready as ever to assist them, and to perform every office of real kindness towards them. 4. If it be said, “But there are some true Christians in the parish, and you destroy the Christian fellowship between these and them.” I answer, That which never existed, cannot be destroyed. But the fellowship you speak of never existed. Therefore it cannot be destroyed. Which of those true Christians had any such fellowship with these? Who watched over them in love? Who marked their growth in grace? Who advised and exhorted them from time to time? Who prayed with them and for them, as they had need? This, and this alone is Christian fellowship: but alas! Where is it to be found? Look east or west, north or south: name what parish you please. Is this Christian fellowship there? Rather are not the bulk of the parishioners a mere rope of sand? What Christian connection is there between them? What intercourse in spiritual things? What watching over each others souls? What bearing of one anothers burdens? What a mere jest is it then, to talk so gravely, of destroying what never was? The real truth is just the reverse of this: we introduce Christian fellowship where it was utterly destroyed. And the fruits of it have been peace, joy, love, and zeal for every good word and work.

II. 1. But as much as we endeavoured to watch over each other, we soon found some who did not live the gospel. I do not know, that any hypocrites were crept in; for indeed there was no temptation. But several grew cold, and gave way to the sins which had long easily beset them. We quickly perceived, there were many ill consequences of suffering these to remain among us. It was dangerous to others; inasmuch as all sin is of an infectious nature. It brought such a scandal on their brethren, as exposed them to what was not properly, the reproach of Christ. It laid a stumbling-block in the way of others, and caused the truth to be evil spoken of.

2. We groaned under those inconveniences long, before a remedy could be found. The people were scattered so wide in all parts of the town, from Wapping to Westminster, that I could not easily see, what the behaviour of each person in his own neighbourhood was. So that several disorderly walkers did much hurt, before I was apprised of it.

3. At length, while we were thinking of quite another thing, we struck upon a method for which we have cause to bless God ever since. I was talking with several of the society in Bristol, concerning the means of paying the debts there; when one stood up and said, “Let every member of the society give a penny a week till all are paid.” Another answered, “But many of them are poor, and cannot afford to do it.” “Then, said he, put eleven of the poorest with me, and if they can give any thing, well. I will call on them weekly, and if they can give nothing, I will give for them as well as for myself. And each of you call on eleven of your neighbours weekly: receive what they give, and make up what is wanting.” It was done. In a while, some of these informed me, “they found such and such an one did not live as he ought.” It struck me immediately. “This is the thing; the very thing we have wanted so long.” I called together all the leaders of the classes, (so we used to term them and their companies) and desired, that each would make a particular enquiry, into the behaviour of those whom he saw weekly. They did so. Many disorderly walkers were detected. Some turned from the evil of their ways. Some were put away from us. Many saw it with fear, and rejoiced unto God with reverence.

4. As soon as possible, the same method was used in London and all other places. Evil men were detected, and reproved. They were borne with for a season. If they forsook their sins, we received them gladly: if they obstinately persisted therein, it was openly declared, that they were not of us. The rest mourned and prayed for them, and yet rejoiced, that as far as in us lay, the scandal was rolled away from the society.

5. It is the business of a leader

I. To see each person in his class, once a week at the least: in order,

To enquire how their souls prosper?

To advise, reprove, comfort or exhort, as occasion may require;

To receive what they are willing to give, toward the relief of the poor.

II. To meet the minister and the stewards of the society, in order

To inform the minister of any that are sick, or of any that are disorderly and will not be reproved;

To pay to the stewards what they have received of their several classes in the week preceding.

6. At first they visited each person at his own house: but this was soon found not so expedient. And that on many accounts, 1. It took up more time, than most of the leaders had to spare. 2. Many persons lived with masters, mistresses or relations, who would not suffer them to be thus visited. 3. At the houses of those who were not so averse, they often had no opportunity of speaking to them but in company. And this did not at all answer the end proposed, of exhorting, comforting or reproving. 4. It frequently happened, that one affirmed what another denied. And this could not be cleared, without seeing them together. 5. Little misunderstandings and quarrels of various kinds, frequently arose among relations or neighbours; effectually to remove which, it was needful to see them all face to face. Upon all these considerations it was agreed, that those of each class should meet all together. And by this means, a more full enquiry was made, into the behaviour of every person. Those who could not be visited at home, or no otherwise than in company, had the same advantage with others. Advice or reproof was given as need required; quarrels made up, misunderstandings removed. And after an hour or two spent in this labour of love, they concluded with prayer and thanksgiving.

7. It can scarce be conceived, what advantages have been reaped from this little prudential regulation. Many now happily experienced that Christian fellowship, of which they had not so much as an idea before. They began to bear one anothers burthens, and naturally to care for each other. As they had daily a more intimate acquaintance with, so they had a more endeared affection for each other. And speaking the truth in love they grew up into him in all things, who is the head, even Christ: from whom the whole body, fitly joined together, and compacted by that which every joint supplied, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, increased unto the edifying itself in love.

8. But notwithstanding all these advantages, many were at first extremely averse to meeting thus. Some, viewing it in a wrong point of light, not as a priviledge (indeed an invaluable one) but rather a restraint, disliked it on that account, because they did not love to be restrained in any thing. Some were ashamed to speak before company. Others honestly said, “I don’t know why; but I don’t like it.”

9. Some objected, “there were no such meetings, when I came into the society first. And why should there now? I don’t understand these things, and this changing one thing after another continually.” It was easily answered. ’Tis pity but they had been at first. But we knew not then either the need or the benefit of them. Why we use them, you will readily understand, if you read over the rules of the society. That with regard to these little prudential helps we are continually changing one thing after another, is not a weakness or fault (as you imagine) but a peculiar advantage which we enjoy. By this means we declare them all to be merely prudential, not essential, not of divine institution. We prevent so far as in us lies, their growing formal or dead. We are always open to instruction; willing to be wiser every day than we were before and to change whatever we can change for the better.

10. Another objection was, “there is no scripture for this, for classes and I know not what.” I answer, 1. There is no scripture against it. You cannot shew one text which forbids them. 2. There is much scripture for it, even all those texts which enjoin the substance of those various duties whereof this is only an indifferent circumstance, to be determined by reason and experience. 3. You seem not to have observed, that the scripture in most points, ♦gives only general rules: and leaves the particular circumstances to be adjusted, by the common sense of mankind. The scripture (for instance) give that general rule, Let all things be done decently and in order. But common sense is to determine on particular occasions, what order and decency require. So in another instance, the scripture lays it down, as a general, standing direction, Whether ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. But it is common prudence which is to make the application of this, in a thousand particular cases.

11. “But these said another, are all man’s inventions.” This is but the same objection in another form. And the same answer will suffice for any reasonable person. These are man’s inventions. And what then? That is: they are methods, which men have found, by reason and common sense for the more effectually applying several scripture rules, couched in general terms, to particular occasions.

12. They spoke far more plausible than these, who said, “the thing is well enough in itself. But the leaders are insufficient for the work. They have neither gifts nor graces for such an employment.” I answer, 1. Yet such leaders as they are, it is plain God has blessed their labour. 2. If any of these is remarkably wanting in gifts or grace, he is soon taken notice of and removed. 3. If you know any such, tell it to me, not to others, and I will endeavour to exchange him for a better. 4. It may be hoped, they will all be better than they are, both by experience and observation, and by the advices given them by the ministers every Tuesday night, and the prayers (then in particular) offered up for them.

III. 1. About this time, I was informed, that several persons in Kingswood, frequently met together at the school, and (when they could spare the time) spent the greater part of the night, in prayer, and praise, and thanksgiving. Some advised me to put an end to this; but upon weighing the thing throughly, and comparing it with the practice of the antient Christians, I could see no cause to forbid it. Rather, I believed, it might be made of more general use. So I sent them word, “I designed to watch with them, on the Friday nearest the full moon, that we might have light thither and back again.” I gave public notice of this, the Sunday before, and withal, that I intended to preach; desiring, they and they only would meet me there, who could do it without prejudice to their business or families. On Friday abundance of people came. I began preaching between eight and nine; and we continued till a little beyond the noon of night, singing, praying and praising God.

2. This we have continued to do once a month ever since, in Bristol, London, and Newcastle, as well as Kingswood. And exceeding great are the blessings we have found therein: it has generally been an extreamly solemn season; when the word of God sunk deep into the heart, even of those who till then knew him not. If it be said, “this was only owing to the novelty of the thing (the circumstance which still draws such multitudes together at those seasons) or perhaps to the awful silence of the night.” I am not careful to answer in this matter. Be it so: however, the impression then made on many souls, has never since been effaced. Now allowing, that God did make use either of the novelty or any other indifferent circumstance, in order to bring sinners to repentance, yet they are brought. And herein let us rejoice together.

3. Nay, may I ♦not put the case farther yet? If I can probably conjecture, that either by the novelty of this antient custom, or by any other indifferent circumstance, it is in my power to save a soul from death, and hide a multitude of sins: am I clear before God if I do it not? If I do not snatch that brand out of the burning?

IV. 1. As the Society increased, I found it required greater care to separate the precious from the vile. In order to this, I determined, at least once in three months, to talk with every member myself, and to inquire at their own mouths, as well as ♦knowledge of their leaders and neighbours, whether they grew in grace and in the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ? At these seasons I likewise particularly enquire, Whether there be any misunderstanding or differences among them? That every hindrance of peace and brotherly love, may be taken out of the way.

2. To each of those, of whose seriousness and good conversation, I found no reason to doubt, I gave a testimony under my own hand, by writing their name on a ticket prepared for that purpose: every ticket implying as strong a recommendation of the person to whom it was given, as if I had wrote at length, “I believe the bearer hereof to be one that fears God and works righteousness.”

3. Those who bore these tickets (these Σύμβολα or Tesseræ, as the antients termed them; being of just the same force with the ἐπιστολαί συστατικαί, commendatory letters mentioned by the apostle) wherever they came, were acknowledged by their brethren, and received with all chearfulness. These were likewise of use in other respects. By these it was easily distinguished when the society were to meet a-part, who were members of it and who not. These also supplied us with a quiet and inoffensive method, of removing any disorderly member. He has no new ticket, at the quarterly visitation; (for so often the tickets are changed) and hereby it is immediately known, that he is no longer of the community.

V. The thing which I was greatly afraid of all this time, and which I resolved to use every possible method of preventing was, a narrowness of spirit, a party-zeal, a being streightened in our own bowels; that miserable bigotry, which makes so many so unready to believe, that there is any work of God but among themselves. I thought it might be a help against this, frequently to read, to all who were willing to hear, the accounts I received from time to time, of the work which God is carrying on in the earth, both in our own and other countries, not among us alone, but among those of various opinions and denominations. For this I allotted one evening in every month. And I find no cause to repent my labour. It is generally a time of strong consolation to those who love God, and all mankind for his sake: as well as of breaking down the partition walls, which either the craft of the devil, or the folly of men has built up: and of encouraging every child of God to say, (O when shall it once be?) Whosoever doth the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.

VI. 1. By the blessing of God upon their endeavours to help one another, many found the pearl of great price. Being justified by faith, they had peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ. These felt a more tender affection than before, to those who were partakers of like precious faith: and hence arose such a confidence in each other, that they poured out their souls into each other’s bosom. Indeed they had great need so to do: for the war was not over, as they had supposed. But they had still to wrestle both with flesh and blood, and with principalities and powers: so that temptations were on every side: and often temptations of such a kind, as they knew not how to speak in a class: in which persons of every sort, young and old, men and women, met together.

2. These therefore wanted some means of closer union: they wanted to pour out their hearts without reserve, particularly with regard to the sin which did still easily beset them, and the temptations which were most apt to prevail over them. And they were the more desirous of this, when they observed it was the express advice of an inspired writer, Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed.

3. In compliance with their desire, I divided them into smaller companies; putting the married or single men, and married or single women together. The chief rules of these bands, (i. e. little companies: so that old English word signifies) run thus:

In order to confess our faults one to another, and pray one for another that we may be healed, we intend,

“1. To meet once a week, at the least;

2. To come punctually at the hour appointed;

3. To begin with singing or prayer;

4. To speak each of us in order, freely and plainly, the true state of our soul, with the faults we have committed in thought word or deed, and the temptations we have felt, since our last meeting:

5. To desire some person among us (thence called a Leader) to speak his own state first, and then to ask the rest in order, as many and as searching questions as may be, concerning their state, sins and temptations.”

4. That their design in meeting might be the more effectually answered, I desired all the men-bands to meet me together every Wednesday evening, and the women on Sunday; that they might receive such particular instructions and ♦exhortations, as from time to time might appear to be most needful for them: that such prayers might be offered up to God, as their necessities should require: and praise returned to the Giver of every good gift, for whatever mercies they had received.

5. In order to increase in them a grateful sense of all his mercies, I desired that one evening in a quarter, all the men in band; on a second, all the woman would meet; and on a third, both men and women together; that we might together eat bread (as the antient Christians did) with gladness and singleness of heart. At these Love-feasts (so we termed them, retaining the name, as well as the thing, which was in use from the beginning) our food is only a little plain cake and water. But we seldom return from them, without being fed not only with the meat which perisheth, but with that which endureth to everlasting life.

6. Great and many are the advantages which have ever since flowed, from this closer union of the believers with each other. They prayed for one another, that they might be healed of the faults they had confessed: and it was so. The chains were broken: the bands were burst in sunder, and sin had no more dominion over them. Many were delivered from the temptations, out of which till then they found no way to escape. They were built up in our most holy faith. They rejoiced in the Lord more abundantly. They were strengthened in love, and more effectually provoked to abound in every good work.

7. But it was soon objected to the bands (as to the classes before) “These were not at first. There is no scripture for them. These are men’s works, man’s building, man’s invention.” I reply, as before, these are also prudential helps, grounded on reason and experience, in order to apply the general rules given in scripture according to particular circumstances.

8. An objection much more boldly and frequently urged, is that “all these bands are mere popery.” I hope I need not pass a harder censure on those (most of them at least) who affirm this, than that they talk of they know not what, they betray in themselves the most gross and shameful ignorance. Do not they yet know, that the only popish confession is, the confession made by a single person to a priest? (And this itself is in no wise condemned by our church; nay, she recommends it in some cases) whereas, that we practice, is, the confession of several persons conjointly, not to a priest, but to each other. Consequently, it has no analogy at all to popish confession. But the truth is, this is a stale objection, which many people make against any thing they do not like. It is all popery out of hand.

VII. 1. And yet while most of these who were thus intimately joined together, went on daily from faith to faith: some fell from the faith, either all at once, by falling into known, wilful sin; or gradually, and almost insensibly, by giving way in what they called little things; by sins of omission, by yielding to heart sins, or by not watching unto prayer. The exhortations and prayers used among the believers, did no longer profit these. They wanted advice and instructions suited to their case; which as soon as I observed I separated them from the rest, and desired them to meet me a-part on Saturday evenings.

2. At this hour, all the hymns, exhortations and prayers, are adapted to their circumstances: being wholly suited to those, who did see God, but have now lost the light of his countenance: and who mourn after him, and refuse to be comforted, till they know he has healed their back-sliding.

3. By applying both the threats and promises of God, to these real (not nominal) penitents, and by crying to God in their behalf, we endeavoured to bring them back to the great Shepherd and Bishop of their souls: not by any of the fopperies of the Roman church, although in some measure countenanced by antiquity. In prescribing hair-shirts, and bodily austerities, we durst not follow even the antient church: although we had unawares, both in dividing οἰ πιστοὶ the believers from the rest of the society, and in separating the penitents ♦from them, and appointing a peculiar service for them.

VIII. 1. Many of these soon recovered the ground they had lost. Yea, they rose the higher for their fall: being more watchful than ever, and more meek and lowly, as well as stronger in the faith that worketh by love. They now out-ran the greater part of their brethren, continually walking in the light of God, and having fellowship with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ.

2. I saw it might be useful to give some advices to all those, who thus continued in the light of God’s countenance, which the rest of their brethren did not want, and probably could not receive. So I desired a small number of such as appeared to be in this state, to spend an hour with me every Monday morning. My design was, not only, to direct them, how to press after perfection; to exercise their every grace, and improve every talent they had received; and to incite them to love one another more, and to watch more carefully over each other: but also to have a select company, to whom I might unbosom myself on all occasions, without reserve: and whom I could propose to all their brethren as a pattern of love, of holiness, and of good works.

3. They had no need of being incumbered with many rules; having the best rule of all in their hearts. No peculiar directions were therefore given to them: excepting only these three.

First, let nothing spoken in this society, be spoken again. (Hereby we had the more full confidence in each other.)

Secondly, Every member agrees, to submit to his minister in all indifferent things.

Thirdly, Every member will bring once a week, all he can spare toward a common stock.

4. Every one here has an equal liberty of speaking, there being none greater or less than another. I could say freely to these, when they were met together, ye may all prophesy one by one (taking that word in its lower sense) that all may learn, and all may ♦be comforted. And I often found the advantage of such a free conversation, and that in the multitude of counsellors there is safety. Any who is inclined so to do, is likewise incouraged, to pour out his soul to God. And here especially we have found, that the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

IX. 1. This is the plainest and clearest account I can give of the people, commonly called Methodists. It remains only, to give you a short account, of those who serve their brethren in love. ♦These are leaders of classes and bands (spoken of before) assistants, stewards, visitors of the sick, and school-masters.

2. In the third part of the appeal, I have mentioned, how we were led to accept of lay-assistants.

Their office is, in the absence of the minister.

1. To expound every morning and evening:

2. To meet the united society, the bands, the select society, and the penitents once a week.

3. To visit the classes once a quarter.

4. To hear and decide all differences:

5. To put the disorderly back on trial, and to receive on trial for the bands or society:

6. To see that the stewards, the leaders, and the school-masters faithfully discharge their several offices:

7. To meet the leaders of the bands and classes weekly, and the stewards, and to overlook their accounts.

X. 1. But long before this, I felt the weight of ♦a far different care, namely, care of temporal things. The quarterly subscriptions amounted, at a mean computation, to above three hundred pounds a year. This was to be laid out, partly in repairs, partly in other necessary expences, and partly in paying debts. The weekly contributions fell little short of eight pounds a week; which was to be distributed as every one had need. And I was expected to take thought for all these things: but it was a burthen I was not able to bear. So I chose out first, one, then four, and after a time, seven as prudent men as I knew, and desired them to take the charge of these things upon themselves, that I might have no incumbrance of this kind.

2. The business of these stewards is

To manage the temporal things of the society:

To receive the subscriptions and contributions:

To expend what is needful from time to time;

To send relief to the poor:

To keep an exact account of all receipts and expences;

To inform the minister if any of the rules of the society are not punctually observed;

To tell the preachers in love, if they think any thing amiss, either in their doctrine or life.

3. The rules of the stewards are,

1. Be frugal. Save every thing that can be saved honestly.

2. Spend no more than you receive. Contract no debts.

3. Have no long accounts. Pay every thing within the week.

4. Give none that asks relief, either an ill word or an ill look. Do not hurt them, if you cannot help.

5. Expect no thanks from man.

4. They met together at six every Thursday morning: ♦consulted on the business which came before them: sent relief to the sick, as every one had need, and gave the remainder of what had been contributed each week, to those who appeared to be in the most pressing want. So that all was concluded within the week; what was brought on Tuesday, being constantly expended on Thursday. I soon had the pleasure to find, that all these temporal things, were done with the utmost faithfulness and exactness. So that my cares of this kind were at an end. I had only to revise the accounts, to tell them, if I thought any thing might be amended, and to consult how deficiencies might be supplied from time to time. For these were frequent and large, (so far were we from abundance) the income by no means answering the expences. But that we might not faint, sometimes we had unforeseen helps, in times of the greatest perplexity. At other times we borrowed, larger or smaller sums. Of which the greatest part has since been repaid. But I owe some hundred pounds to this day. So much have I gained by preaching the gospel!

XI. 1. But it was not long before the stewards found a great difficulty, with regard to the sick. Some were ready to perish, before they knew of their illness. And when they did know, it was not in their power, (being persons generally employed in trade) to visit them so often as they desired.

2. When I was apprized of this, I laid the case at large before the whole society: shewed, how impossible it was, for the stewards to attend all that were sick in all parts of the town: desired the leaders of classes would more carefully enquire, and more constantly inform them, who were sick: and asked, “Who among you is willing as well as able, to supply this lack of service?”

3. The next morning, many willingly offered themselves. I chose six and forty of them, whom I judged to be of the most tender, loving spirit; divided the town into twenty-three parts, and desired two of them to visit the sick in each division.

4. It is the business of a visitor of the sick,

To see every sick person within his district thrice a week;

To enquire into the state of their souls, and advise them, as occasion may require;

To enquire into their disorders, and procure advice for them;

To relieve them, if they are in want;

To do any thing for them, which he (or she) can do;

To bring in his accounts weekly to the stewards.¹

Upon reflection, I saw how exactly in this also, we had copied after the primitive church. What were the antient deacons? What was Phebe the deaconess, but such a visitor of the sick?

5. I did not think it needful to give them any particular rules, beside those that follow:

1. Be plain and open in dealing with souls;

2. Be mild, tender, patient:

3. Be cleanly in all you do for the sick;

4. Be not nice.

6. We have ever since had great reason to praise God, for his continued blessing on this undertaking. Many lives have been saved: many sicknesses healed, much pain and want prevented or removed. Many heavy hearts have been made glad; many mourners comforted. And the visitors have found from him whom they serve, a present reward for all their labour.

XII. 1. But I was still in pain for many of the poor that were sick: there was so great expence, and so little profit. And first, I resolved to try, whether they might not receive more benefit in the hospitals. Upon the trial, we found, there was indeed less expence: but no more good done than before. I then asked the advice of several physicians for them: but still it profited not. I saw the poor people pining away, and several families ruined, and that without remedy.

2. At length I thought of a kind of desperate expedient. “I will prepare, and give them physick myself.” For six or seven and twenty years, I had made anatomy and physic the diversion of my leisure hours: though I never properly studied them, unless for a few months, when I was going to America, where I imagined I might be of some service to those who had no regular physician among them. I applied to it again. I took in to my assistance an apothecary, and an experienced surgeon: resolving at the same time, not to go out of my depth; but to leave all difficult and complicated cases, to such physicians as the patients should chuse.

3. I gave notice of this to the society: telling them, that all who were ill of chronical distempers (for I did not care to venture upon acute) might, if they pleased, come to me at such a time: and I would give them the best advice I could, and the best medicines I had.

4. Many came: (and so every Friday since:) among the rest was one William Kirkman, a weaver, near Old-Nichol Street. I asked him, “What complaint have you?” “O sir, said he, a cough, a very sore cough. I can get no rest day nor night.” I asked “How long have you had it.” He replied, “About threescore years: it began when I was eleven years old.” I was nothing glad, that this man should come first; fearing our not curing him, might discourage others. However I looked up to God and said, “Take this three or four times a day. If it does you no good, it will do you no harm.” He took it two or three days. His cough was cured: and has not returned to this day.

5. Now let candid men judge, does humility require me to deny a notorious fact? If not, Which is vanity? To say, I by my own skill, restored this man to health? Or to say, God did it by his own almighty power? By what figure of speech this is called, boasting, I know not. But I will put no name to such a fact as this. I leave that to the Rev. Dr. Middleton.

6. In five months, medicines were occasionally given, to above five hundred persons. Several of these I never saw before; for I did not regard, whether they were of the society, or not. In that time seventy-one of these, regularly taking their medicines, and following the regimen prescribed (which three in four would not do) were entirely cured, of distempers long thought to be incurable. The whole expence of medicines during this time, was (nearly) forty pounds. We continued this ever since, and by the blessing of God, with more and more success.

XIII. 1. But I had for some years observed many who, although not sick, were not able to provide for themselves, and had none who took care to provide for them: these were chiefly feeble, aged widows. I consulted with the stewards, bow they might be relieved? They all agreed, if we could keep them in one house, it would not only be far less expensive to us, but also far more comfortable for them. Indeed we had no money to begin. But we believed He would provide, who defendeth the cause of the widow. So we took a lease of two little houses near: we fitted them up, so as to be warm and clean. We took in as many widows as we had room for, and provided them with things needful for the body: toward the expence of which I set aside, first, the weekly contributions of the bands, and then all that was collected at the Lord’s supper. It is true, this does not suffice: so that we are still considerably in debt, on this account also. But we are persuaded, it will not always be so; seeing the earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof.

2. In this (commonly called, The Poor House) we have now nine widows, one blind-woman, two poor children, two upper servants, a maid and a man. I might add four or five preachers. For I myself, as well as the other preachers who are in town, diet with the poor, on the same food, and at the same table. And we rejoice herein as a comfortable earnest, of our eating bread together in our father’s kingdom.

3. I have blessed God for this house, ever since it began: but lately much more than ever. I honour these widows; for they are widows indeed. So that it is not in vain, that without any design of so doing, we have copied after another of the institutions of the apostolic age. I can now say to all the world, “Come, and see, how these Christians love one another!”¹

XIV. 1. Another thing, which had given me frequent concern, was the case of abundance of children. Some their parents could not afford to put to school. So they remained like a wild ass’s colt. Others were sent to school, and learned, at least, to read and write: but they learned all kind of vice at the same time: so that it had been better for them to have been without their knowledge, than to have bought it at so dear a price.

2. At length I determined, to have them taught in my own house; that they might have an opportunity of learning to read, write, and cast accompts (if no more) without being under almost a necessity of learning heathenism, at the same time. And after several unsuccessful trials, I found two such school-masters as I wanted: men of honesty, and of sufficient knowledge; who had talents for, and their hearts in the work.

3. They have now under their care, near sixty children: the parents of some pay for their schooling, but the greater part, being very poor, do not; so that the expence is chiefly defrayed by voluntary contributions. We have of late cloathed them too, as many as wanted. The rules of the school are these that follow:

First, No child is admitted under six years of age:

Secondly, All the children are to be present at the morning sermon:

Thirdly, They are at school from six to twelve, and from one to five:¹

Fourthly, They have no play-days:

Fifthly, No child is to speak in school, but to the masters:

Sixthly, The child who misses two days in one week, without leave, is excluded the school.

4. We ♦appointed two stewards for the school also. The business of these is,

To receive the school subscriptions, and expend what is needful;

To talk with each of the masters weekly;

To pray with, and exhort the children twice a week:

To enquire diligently, whether they grow in grace and in learning, and whether the rules are punctually observed:

Every Tuesday morning, in conjunction with the masters, to exclude those children that do not observe the ♦rules:

Every Wednesday morning, to meet with, and exhort their parents, to train them up at home in the ways of God.

5. An happy change was soon observed in the children, both with regard to their tempers and behaviour. They learnt reading, writing, and arithmetic swiftly; and at the same time they were diligently instructed, in the sound principles of religion, and earnestly exhorted to fear God, and work out their own salvation.

XV. 1. A year or two ago, I observed among many a distress of another kind. They frequently wanted, perhaps in order to carry on their business, a present supply of money. They scrupled to make use of a pawn-broker: but where to borrow it they knew not. I resolved to try if we could not find a remedy for this also. I went (in a few days) from one end of the town to the other; and exhorted those who had this world’s goods, to assist their needy brethren. Fifty pounds were contributed. This was immediately lodged in the hands of two stewards: who attended every Tuesday morning, in order to lend to those who wanted, any small sum, not exceeding twenty shillings, to be repaid within three months.

2. It is almost incredible, but it manifestly appears from their accounts, that with this inconsiderable sum two hundred and fifty have been assisted, within the space of one year. Will not God put it into the heart of some lover of mankind, to increase this little stock? If this is not lending unto the Lord, what is? O confer not with flesh and blood, but immediately,

“Join hands with God, to make a poor man live.”¹

3. I think, Sir, now you know all, that I know of this people. You see the nature, occasion and design, of whatever is practised among them. And I trust, you may be pretty well able to answer any questions, which may be asked concerning them: particularly by those, who enquire concerning my revenue, and what I do with it all?

4. Some have supposed, this was no greater than that of the bishop of London. But others computed, that I received eight hundred a year from Yorkshire only. Now if so, it cannot be so little as ten thousand pounds a year, which I receive out of all England!

5. Accordingly a gentleman in Cornwall (the rector of R――) extends the calculation pretty considerably. “Let me see, said he: two millions of Methodists: and each of these paying two-pence a week.” If so I must have eight hundred and sixty thousand pounds (with some odd shillings and pence) a year.

6. ♦A tolerable competence! But be it more or less, it is nothing at all to me. All that is contributed or collected in every place, is both received and expended by others: nor have I so much as the Beholding thereof with my eyes. And so it will be, till I turn Turk or Pagan. For I look upon all this revenue, be it what it may, as sacred to God and the poor: (out of which, if I want any thing, I am relieved, even as another poor man.) So were originally all ecclesiastical revenues, (as every man of learning knows.) And the bishops and priests used them only, as such. If any use them otherwise now, God help them!

7. I doubt not, but if I err in this, or any other point, you will pray God to shew me his truth. To have a conscience void of offence toward God and toward man is the desire of,

Reverend and dear Sir,

Your affectionate brother and servant,

JOHN WESLEY.

THE

Nature, Design, and General Rules,

OF THE

UNITED SOCIETIES,

In London, Bristol, Kingswood, ♦Newcastle upon Tyne, &c.

1. IN the latter end of the year 1739, eight or ten persons came to me in London, who appeared to be deeply convinced of sin, and earnestly groaning for redemption. They desired (as did two or three more the next day) that I would spend some time with them in prayer, and advise them how to flee from the wrath to come; which they saw continually hanging over their heads. That we might have more time for this great work, I appointed a day when they might all come together, which from thenceforward they did every week, namely on Thursday, in the evening. To these, and as many more as desired to join with them (for their number increased daily) I gave those advices from time to time which I judged most needful for them; and we always concluded our meeting with prayer suited to their several necessities.

2. This was the rise of the United Society, first in London, and then in other places. Such a society is no other than “A company of men having the form and seeking the power of godliness, united in order to pray together, to receive the word of exhortation, and to watch over one another in love, that they may help each other to work out their salvation.”

3. That it may the more easily be discerned, whether they are indeed working out their own salvation, each society is divided into smaller companies, called classes, according to their respective places of abode. There are about twelve persons in every class; one of whom is stiled The Leader. It is his business,

1. To see each person in his class, once a week at least; in order

To enquire how their souls prosper.

To advise, reprove, comfort or exhort, as occasion ♦may require;

To receive what they are willing to give, toward the relief of the poor.

2. To meet the minister and the stewards of the society once a week; in order

To inform the minister of any that are sick, or of any that walk disorderly, and will not be reproved:

To pay to the stewards what they have received of their several classes in the week preceding; And

To shew their account of what each person has contributed.

4. There is one only condition previously required in those who desire admission into these societies, A desire to flee from the wrath to come, to be saved from their sins: But, wherever this is really fixed in the soul, it will be shewn by its fruits. It is therefore expected of all who continue therein, that they should continue to evidence their desire of salvation,

First, By doing no harm, by avoiding evil in every kind; especially, that which is most generally practised. Such is

The taking the name of God in vain;

The profaning the day of the Lord, either by doing ordinary work thereon, or by buying or selling:

Drunkenness, buying or selling spirituous liquors; or drinking them (unless in cases of extreme necessity:)

Fighting, quarreling, brawling; brother going to law with brother; returning evil for evil, or railing for railing: the using many words in buying or selling:

The buying or selling uncustomed goods:

The giving or taking things on usury: i. e. unlawful interest:

Uncharitable or unprofitable conversation; particularly speaking evil of magistrates or of ministers:

Doing to others as we would not they should do unto us:

Doing what we know is not for the glory of God: As

The putting on gold and costly apparel:

The taking such diversions as cannot be used in the name of the Lord Jesus:

The singing those songs, or reading those books, which do not tend to the knowledge or love of God:

Softness, and needless self-indulgence:

Laying up treasures upon earth:

Borrowing without a probability of paying; or taking up goods without a probability of paying for them.

5. It is expected of all who continue in these societies, that they should continue to evidence their desire of salvation,

Secondly, By doing good, by being in every kind, merciful after their power; as they have opportunity, doing good of every possible sort, and as far as is possible to all men;

To their bodies, of the ability which God giveth, by giving food to the hungry, by cloathing the naked, by visiting or helping them that are sick, or in prison.

To their souls, by instructing, reproving or exhorting all they have any intercourse with: trampling under foot that enthusiastick doctrine of devils, that “we are not to do good, unless our heart be free to it.”

By doing good especially to them that are of the houshold of faith, or groaning so to be; employing them preferably to others, buying one of another; helping each other in business; and so much the more, because the world will love its own, and them only.

By all possible diligence and frugality, that the gospel be not blamed.

By running with patience the race that is set before them, denying themselves, and taking up their cross daily; submitting to bear the reproach of Christ, to be as the filth and off-scouring of the world; and looking that men should say all manner of evil of them falsely for the Lord’s sake.

6. It is expected of all who desire to continue in these societies, that they should continue to evidence their desire of salvation,

Thirdly, By attending upon all the ordinances of God: Such are

The publick worship of God;

The ministry of the word, either read or expounded;

The supper of the Lord;

Family and private prayer;

Searching the scriptures; and

Fasting or abstinence.

7. These are the General Rules of our Societies; all which we are taught of God to observe, even in his written word, the only rule, and the sufficient rule both of our faith and practice. And all these we know his Spirit writes on every truly awakened heart. If there be any among us who observe them not, who habitually break any of them, let it be made known unto them who watch over that soul, as they that must give an account. We will admonish him of the error of his ways: We will bear with him for a season. But then if he repent not, he hath no more place among us. We have delivered our own soul.

JOHN WESLEY,
CHARLES WESLEY,

May 1, 1743.

MINUTES

OF SOME LATE

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Rev. Mr. WESLEYS, and Others.

Conversation the First.

MONDAY, 25th of June, 1744.

THE following persons being met at the Foundery, John Wesley, Charles Wesley, John Hodges, rector of Wenvo, Henry Piers, vicar of Bexley, Samuel Taylor, vicar of Quinton, and John Meriton, after some time spent in prayer, the design of our meeting was proposed, namely to consider,

1. What to teach,

2. How to teach, and

3. What to do? i. e. How to regulate our doctrine, discipline and practice.

We began with considering the doctrine of justification: the questions relating to, with the substance of the answers given thereto, were as follows.

Q. 1. What is to be justified?

A. To be pardoned, and received into God’s favour, into such a state, that if we continue therein, we shall be finally saved.

Q. 2. Is faith the condition of justification?

A. Yes; for every one who believeth not is condemned; and every one who believes is justified.

Q. 3. But must not repentance and works meet for repentance go before this faith?

A. Without doubt: if by repentance you mean conviction of sin; and by works meet for repentance, obeying God as far as we can, forgiving our brother, leaving off from evil, doing good, and using his ordinances according to the power we have received.

Q. 4. What is faith?

A. Faith in general is, a divine, supernatural elenchos of things not seen; i. e. of past, future, or spiritual things: it is a spiritual sight of God and the things of God.

First, a sinner is convinced by the Holy Ghost, “Christ loved me and gave himself for me.”—This is that faith by which he is justified or pardoned, the moment he receives it. Immediately the same Spirit bears witness, “Thou art pardoned: thou hast redemption in his blood.”—And this is saving faith, whereby the love of God is shed abroad in his heart.

Q. 5. Have all Christians this faith? May not a man be justified and not know it?

A. That all true Christians have such a faith as implies an assurance of God’s love, appears from Romans viii. 15. Ephesians iv. 32. 2 Corinthians xiii. 5. Hebrews viii. 10. 1 John iv. 10. and v. 19. And that no man can be justified and not know it, appears farther from the nature of the thing. For faith after repentance is ease after pain, rest after toil, light after darkness. It appears also from the immediate, as well as distant fruits thereof.

Q. 6. But may not a man go to heaven without it?

A. It does not appear from holy writ that a man who hears the gospel, can: (Mark xvi. 16.) whatever a Heathen may do. Romans ii. 14.

Q. 7. What are the immediate fruits of justifying faith?

A. Peace, joy, love, power over all outward sin, and power to keep down inward sin.

Q. 8. Does any one believe, who has not the witness in himself, or any longer than he sees, loves, obeys God?

A. We apprehend not; seeing God being the very essence of faith; love and obedience the inseparable properties of it.

Q. 9. What sins are consistent with justifying faith?

A. No wilful sin. If a believer wilfully sins, he casts away his faith. Neither is it possible he should have justifying faith again, without previously repenting.

Q. 10. Must every believer, come into a state of doubt, or fear, or darkness? Will he do so, unless by ignorance, or unfaithfulness? Does God otherwise withdraw himself?

A. It is certain, a believer, need never again come into condemnation. It seems, he need not come into a state of doubt, or fear, or darkness: and that (ordinary at least) he will not, unless by ignorance, or unfaithfulness. Yet it is true, that the first joy does seldom last long: that it is commonly followed by doubts and fears; and that God frequently permits great heaviness, before any large manifestation of himself.

Q. 11. Are works necessary to the continuance of faith?

A. Without doubt; for a man may forfeit the free gift of God, either by sins of omission, or commission.

Q. 12. Can faith be lost, but for want of works?

A. It cannot but through disobedience.

Q. 13. How is faith made perfect by works?

A. The more we exert our faith, the more it is increased. To him that hath, shall be given.

Q. 14. St. Paul says, Abraham was not justified by works. St. James, He was justified by works. Do they not contradict each other?

A. No: 1. Because they do not speak of the same justification. St. Paul speaks of that justification, which was when Abraham was 75 years old, above 20 years before Isaac was born: St. James of that justification, which was when he offered up Isaac on the altar.

2dly. Because they do not speak of the same works: St. Paul speaking of works that precede faith: St. James, of works that spring from it.

Q. 15. In what sense is Adam’s sin imputed to all mankind?

A. In Adam all die, i. e. 1. Our bodies then became mortal. 2. Our souls died, i. e. were disunited from God. And hence, 3. We are all born with a sinful, devilish nature. By reason whereof, 4. We are children of wrath, liable to death eternal. Romans v. 18. Ephesians ii. 3.

Q. 16. In what sense is the righteousness of Christ imputed to all mankind, or to believers?

A. We do not find it expresly affirmed in scripture, that God imputes the righteousness of Christ to any: although we do find, that faith is imputed to us for righteousness.

That text, “As by one man’s disobedience all men were made sinners, so by the obedience of one, all were made righteous,” we conceive means, by the merits of Christ, all men are cleared from the guilt of Adam’s actual sin.

We conceive farther, that through the obedience and death of Christ, 1. The bodies of all men become immortal after the resurrection. 2. Their souls receive a capacity of spiritual life: And 3. An actual spark or seed thereof. 4. All believers become children of grace, reconciled to God, and 5. Made partakers of the divine nature.

Q. 17. Have we not then unawares leaned too much towards Calvinism?

A. We are afraid we have.

Q. 18. Have we not also leaned towards Antinomianism?

A. We are afraid we have.

Q. 19. What is Antinomianism?

A. The doctrine which makes void the law through faith.

Q. 20. What are the main pillars hereof?

A. 1. That Christ abolished the moral law:

2. That therefore Christians are not obliged to observe it:

3. That one branch of Christian liberty, is liberty from obeying the commandments of God:

4. That it is bondage, to do a thing, because it is commanded, or forbear it because it is forbidden:

5. That a believer is not obliged to use the ordinances of God or to do good works:

6. That a preacher ought not to exhort to good works: not unbelievers, because it is hurtful; not believers, because it is needless.

Q. 21. What was the occasion of St. Paul’s writing his epistle to the Galatians?

A. The coming of certain men amongst the Galatians, who taught, Except ye be circumcised and keep the law of Moses ye cannot be saved.

Q. 22. What is his main design therein?

A. To prove, 1. That no man can be justified or saved by the works of the law, either moral or ritual, 2. That every believer is justified by faith in Christ without the works of the law.

Q. 23. What does he mean by “the works of the law?” Galatians ii. 16, &c.

A. All works which do not spring from faith in Christ.

Q. 24. What by being under the law? Galatians iii. 23.

A. Under the Mosaic dispensation.

Q. 25. What law has Christ abolished?

A. The ritual law of Moses.

Q. 26. What is meant by liberty? Galatians v. 1.

A. Liberty, 1. From that law; 2. From sin.

On TUESDAY Morning, June 26. was considered.

THE doctrine of sanctification: with regard to which the questions asked, and the substance of the answers given were as follows.

Q. 1. What is it to be sanctified?

A. To be renewed in the image of God in righteousness and true holiness.

Q. 2. Is faith the condition, or the instrument of sanctification?

A. It is both the condition, and instrument of it. When we begin to believe, then sanctification begins. And as faith increases, holiness increases, till we are created anew.

Q. 3. What is implied in being a perfect Christian?

A. The loving the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our mind, and soul, and strength, Deuteronomy vi. 5, 30, 6. Ezekiel xxxvi. 25‒29.

Q. 4. Does this imply, that all inward sin is taken away?

A. Without doubt: or how could we be said to be saved from all our uncleannesses? ♦v. 29.

Q. 5. Can we know one who is thus saved? What is a reasonable ♦proof of it?

A. We cannot, without the miraculous discernment of Spirit, be infallibly certain of those who are thus saved. But we apprehend, these would be the best proofs which the nature of the thing ♦admits. 1. If we had sufficient evidence of their unblameable behaviour, preceding 2. If they gave a distinct account of the time and manner wherein they were saved from sin, and of the circumstances thereof, with such sound speech as could not be reproved. And

3. If upon a strict enquiry afterwards from time to time, it appeared that all their tempers and words and actions were holy and unreprovable.

Q. 6. How should we treat those who think they have attained this?

A. Exhort them to forget the things that are behind, and to watch and pray always, that God may search the ground of their hearts.

WEDNESDAY, June 27.

WE began to consider points of discipline: with regard to which the questions asked, and the substance of the answers given were as follows.

Q. 1. What is the church of England?

A. According to the 20th article, the visible church of England is, the congregation of English believers, in which the pure word of God is preached, and the sacraments duly administered.

(But the word church is sometimes taken in a looser sense, for “a congregation professing to believe.” So it is taken in the 26th article, and in the 1st, 2d, and 3d chapters of the Revelation.)

Q. 2. Who is a member of the church of England?

A. A believer, hearing the pure word of God preached, and partaking of the sacraments duly administered, in that church.

Q. 3. What is it to be zealous for the church?

A. To be earnestly desirous of its welfare and increase: of its welfare, by the confirmation of its present members, in faith, hearing, and communicating: and of its increase, by the addition of new members.

Q. 4. How are we to defend the doctrine of the church?

A. Both by our preaching and living.

Q. 5. How should we behave at a false, or railing sermon?

A. If it only contain personal reflections, we may quietly suffer it: if it blaspheme the work and Spirit of God, it may be better to go out of the church. In either case, if opportunity serve, it would be well to speak or write to the minister.

Q. 6. How far is it our duty to obey the bishops?

A. In all things indifferent. And on this ground of obeying them, we should observe the canons, so far as we can with a safe conscience.

Q. 7. Do we separate from the church?

A. We conceive not: we hold communion therewith, for conscience sake, by constantly attending both the word preached, and the sacraments administered therein.

Q. 8. What then do they mean who say, “you separate from the church?”

A. We cannot certainly tell. Perhaps they have no determinate meaning: unless, by the church they mean themselves, i. e. that part of the clergy who accuse us of preaching false doctrine. And it is sure we do herein separate from them, by maintaining that which they deny.

Q. 9. But do you not weaken the church?

A. Do not they who ask this, by the church mean themselves? We do not purposely weaken any man’s hands. But accidentally we may, thus far: they who come to know the truth by us, will esteem such as deny it, less than they did before.

But the church, in the proper sense, the congregation of English believers, we do not weaken at all.

Q. 10. Do you not entail a schism on the church? i. e. Is it not probable, that your hearers after your death, will be scattered into all sects and parties? Or that they will form themselves into a distinct sect?

A. 1. We are persuaded the body of our hearers will even after our death remain in the church, unless they be thrust out.

2. We believe notwithstanding, either that they will be thrust out, or that they will leaven the whole church.

3. We do, and will do, all we can, to prevent those consequences, which are supposed likely to happen after our death.

4. But we cannot with a good conscience neglect the present opportunity of saving souls while we live, for fear of consequences which may possibly or probably happen, after we are dead.

Conversation the Second.

Bristol, TUESDAY, August 1, 1745.

THE following persons being met together at the New-Room, in Bristol; John Wesley, Charles Wesley, John Hodges, Thomas Richards, Samuel Larwood, Thomas Meyrick, Richard Moss, John Slocombe, Herbert Jenkins, and Marmaduke Gwynne:

It was proposed to review the minutes of the last conference with regard to justification. And it was asked.

Q. 1. How comes what is written on this subject to be so intricate and obscure? Is this obscurity from the nature of the thing itself? Or, from the fault or weakness of those who have generally treated of it?

A. We apprehend this obscurity does not arise from the nature of the subject: but, perhaps, partly from hence, that the devil peculiarly labours to perplex a subject of the greatest importance: and partly from the extreme warmth of most writers who have treated of it.

Q. 2. We affirm faith, in Christ is the sole condition of justification. But does not repentance go before that faith? Yea, and (supposing there be opportunity for them) fruits or works meet for repentance?

A. Without doubt they do.

Q. 3. How then can we deny them to be conditions of justification? Is not this a mere strife of words? But is it worth while to continue a dispute on the term condition?

A. It seems not, though it has been grievously abused. But so the abuse cease, let the use remain.

Q. 4. Shall we read over together Mr. Baxter’s aphorisms concerning justification?

A. By all means: which were accordingly read. And it was desired, that each person present would in the afternoon consult the scriptures cited therein, and bring what objections might occur the next morning.

FRIDAY, August 2. The question was proposed.

Q. 1. IS a sense of God’s pardoning love absolutely necessary to our being in his favour? Or may there be some exempt cases?

A. We dare not say, there are not.

Q. 2. Is it necessary to inward and outward holiness?

A. We incline to think it is.

Q. 3. Is it indispensably necessary to final salvation? Suppose in a Papist? Or, a Quaker? Or, in general, among those who never heard it preached?

A. Love hopeth all things. We know not how far any of these may fall under the case of invincible ignorance.

Q. 4. But what can we say of one of our own society, who dies without it, as J. W. at London?

A. It may be an exempt case (if the fact was really so.) But we determine nothing. We leave his soul in the hands of him that made it.

Q. 5. Does a man believe any longer than he sees a reconciled God?

A. We conceive not. But we allow there may be infinite degrees in seeing God: even as many as there are between him who sees the sun, when it shines on his eye-lids closed, and him who stands with his eyes wide open, in the full blaze of his beams.

Q. 6. Does a man believe any longer than he loves God?

A. In no wise. For neither circumcision or uncircumcision avails, without faith working by love.

Q. 7. Have we duly considered the case of Cornelius? Was not he in the favour of God, when his prayers and alms came up for a memorial before God? i. e. Before he believed in Christ?

A. It does seem that he was, in some degree. But we speak not of those who have not heard the gospel.

Q. 8. But were those works of his, splendid sins?

A. No; nor were they done without the grace of Christ.

* Q. 9. How then can we maintain, that all works done before we have a sense of the pardoning love of God, are sin? And, as such, an abomination to him?

A. The works of him who has heard the gospel, and does not believe, are not done as God hath willed and commanded them to be done. And yet we know not how to say, that they are an abomination to the Lord in him who feareth God, and from that principle, does the best he can.

Q. 10. Seeing there is so much difficulty in this subject, can we deal too tenderly with them that oppose us?

A. We cannot; unless we were to give up any part of the truth of God.

Q. 11. Is a believer constrained to obey God?

A. At first he often is. The love of Christ constraineth him. After this, he may obey, or he may not; no constraint being laid upon him.

Q. 12. * Can faith be lost, but through disobedience?

A. It cannot. A believer first inwardly disobeys, inclines to sin with his heart: then his intercourse with God is cut off, i. e. His faith is lost. And after this, he may fall into outward sin, being now weak, and like another man.

Q. 13. How can such an one recover faith?

A. By repenting and doing the first works, Revelation ii. 5.

Q. 14. Whence is it that so great a majority of those who believe fall more or less into doubt or fear?

A. Chiefly from their own ignorance or unfaithfulness: often from their not watching unto prayer: perhaps sometimes from some defect, or want of the power of God in the preaching they hear.

Q. 15. Is there not a defect in us? Do we preach as we did at first? Have we not changed our doctrines?

A. 1. At first we preached almost wholly to unbelievers. To those therefore we spake almost continually, of remission of sins through the death of Christ, and the nature of faith in his blood. And so we do still, among those who need to be taught the first elements of the gospel of Christ:

2. But those in whom the foundation is already laid, we exhort to go on to perfection: which we did not see so clearly at first; although we occasionally spoke of it from the beginning.

3. Yet we now preach, and that continually, faith in Christ, as the prophet, priest and king, at least, as clearly, as strongly, and as fully as we did six years ago.

Q. 16. Do we not discourage visions and dreams too much? As if we condemned them toto genere.

A. We do not intend to do this. We neither discourage nor encourage them. We learn from Acts ii. 19, &c. to expect something of this kind in the last days. And we cannot deny, that saving faith is often given in dreams or visions of the night: which faith we account neither better nor worse, than if it came by any other means.

Q. 17. Do not some of our assistants preach too much of the wrath, and too little of the love of God?

A. We fear they have leaned to that extreme; and hence some of their hearers may have lost the joy of faith.

Q. 18. Need we ever preach the terrors of the Lord to those who know they are accepted of him?

A. No; it is folly so to do: for love is to them the strongest of all motives.

Q. 19. Do we ordinarily represent a justified state so great and happy as it is?

A. Perhaps not. A believer walking in the light, is inexpressibly great and happy.

Q. 20. Should we not have a care of depreciating justification, in order to exalt the state of full sanctification?

A. Undoubtedly we should beware of this: for one may insensibly slide into it.

Q. 21. How shall we effectually avoid it?

A. When we are going to speak of entire sanctification, let us first describe the blessings of a justified state, as strongly as possible.

Q. 22. Does not the truth of the gospel lie very near both to Calvinism and Antinomianism?

A. Indeed it does: as it were, within a hair’s breadth. So that it is altogether foolish and sinful, because we do not quite agree, either with one or the other, to run from them as far as ever we can.

* Q. 23. Wherein may we come to the very edge of Calvinism?

A. In ascribing all good to the free grace of God: 2. In denying all natural free will, and all power antecedent to grace; and 3. In excluding all merit from man; even for what he has or does by the grace of God.

Q. 24. Wherein may we come to the edge of Antinomianism?

A. 1. In exalting the merits and love of Christ. 2. In rejoicing evermore.

Q. 25. Does faith supersede (set aside the necessity of) holiness or good works?

A. In no wise. So far from it, that it implies both, as a cause does its effects.

About ten, we began to speak of sanctification: with regard to which, it was inquired;

Q. 1. WHEN does inward sanctification begin?

A. In the moment we are justified. The seed of every virtue is then sown in the soul. From that time the believer gradually dies to sin, and grows in grace. Yet sin remains in him; yea, the seed of all sin, till he is sanctified throughout in spirit, soul and body.

Q. 2. What will become of a Heathen? A Papist, a church of England man? If he dies without being thus sanctified?

A. He cannot see the Lord. But none who seeks it sincerely, shall or can die without it: though possibly he may not attain it, till the very article of death?

Q. 3. Is it ordinarily given till a little before death?

A. It is not, to those that expect it no sooner, nor consequently ask for it, at least, not in faith.

Q. 4. But ought we to expect it sooner?

A. Why not? For although we grant, 1. That the generality of believers, whom we have hitherto known, were not so sanctified till near death. 2. That few of those to whom St. Paul wrote his epistles were so at the time he wrote. 3. Nor he himself at the time of writing his former epistles. Yet this does not prove, that we may not to-day.

Q. 5. But would not one who was thus sanctified be incapable of worldly business?

A. He would be far more capable of it than ever, as going through all without distraction.

Q. 6. Would he be capable of marriage?

A. Why should he not?

Q. 7. Should we not beware of bearing hard on those who think they have attained?

A. We should. And the rather, because if they are faithful to the grace they have received, they are in no danger of perishing at last. No, not even if they remain in luminous faith, (as some term it) for many months or years: perhaps till within a little time of their spirits returning to God.

* Q. 8. In what manner should we preach entire sanctification?

A. Scarce at all to those who are not pressing forward. To those who are, always by way of promise: always drawing, rather than driving.

Q. 9. How should we wait for the fulfilling of this promise?

A. In universal obedience: in keeping all the commandments, in denying ourselves, and taking up our cross daily. These are the general means which God hath ordained for our receiving his sanctifying grace. The particular are, prayer, searching the scripture, communicating and fasting.

Conversation the Third.

TUESDAY, May 13, 1746.

THE following persons being met at the New Room in Bristol: John Wesley, Charles Wesley, John Hodges, Jonathan Reeves, Thomas Maxfield, Thomas Westell, and Thomas Willis, It was inquired:

Q. 1. Can an unbeliever (whatever he be in other respects) challenge any thing of God’s justice?

A. Absolutely nothing but hell. And this is a point which we cannot too much insist on.

Q. 2. Do we empty men of their own ♦righteousness, as we did at first? Do we sufficiently labour, when they begin to be convinced of sin, to take away all they lean upon? Should we not then endeavour with all our might to overturn their false foundations?

A. This was at first one of our principal points. And it ought to be so still. For, till all other foundations are overturned, they cannot build upon Christ?

Q. 3. Did we not then purposely throw them into convictions? Into strong sorrow and fear? Nay, did we not strive to make them inconsolable? Refusing to be comforted?

A. We did. And so we should do still. For the stronger the conviction, the speedier is the deliverance. And none so soon receive the peace of God, as those who steadily refuse all other comfort.

Q. 4. Let us consider a particular case. Was you, Jonathan Reeves, before you received the peace of God, convinced, that notwithstanding all you did, or could do, you was in a state of damnation?

J. R. I was convinced of it, as fully as that I am now alive.

♦Q. 5. Are you sure that conviction was from God?

J. R. I can have no doubt but it was.

Q. 6. What do you mean by a state of damnation?

J. R. A state, wherein if a man dies he perisheth for ever.

Q. 7. How did that conviction end?

J. R. I had first a strong hope that God would deliver me: and this brought a degree of peace. But I had not that solid peace of God, till Christ was revealed in me.

Q. 8. But is not such a trust in the love of God, tho’ it be as yet without a distinct sight of God, reconciled to me thro’ Christ Jesus, a low degree of justifying faith?

A. It is an earnest of it. But this abides, for a short time only: nor is this the proper Christian faith.

Q. 9. By what faith were the apostles clean, before Christ died?

A. By such a faith as this; by a Jewish faith. For the Holy Ghost was not then given.

Q. 10. Of whom then do you understand those words—(Isaiah l. 10.) Who is there among you that feareth the Lord? That obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light?

A. Of a believer under the Jewish dispensation: one in whose heart God hath not yet shined, to give him the light of the glorious love of God, in the face of Jesus Christ.

Q. 11. Who is a Jew (inwardly)?

A. A servant of God: one who sincerely obeys him out of fear. Whereas a Christian (inwardly) is a child of God; one who sincerely obeys him out of love. But was not you sincere before Christ was revealed in you?

J. R. It seemed to me that I was in some measure.

Q. 12. What is sincerity?

A. Willingness to know and do the whole will of God. The lowest species thereof seems to be faithfulness in that which is little.

* Q. 13. Has God any regard to man’s sincerity?

A. So far, that no man in any state can possibly please God without it: neither indeed in any moment wherein he is not sincere.

Q. 14. But can it be conceived that God has any regard to the sincerity of an unbeliever?

A. Yes, so much, that if he persevere therein, God will infallibly give him faith.

Q. 15. What regard may we conceive him to have, to the sincerity of a believer?

A. So much, that in every sincere believer he fulfils all the great and precious promises.

Q. 16. Whom do you term a sincere believer?

A. One that walks in the light, as God is in the light.

Q. ♦17. Is sincerity the same with a single eye?

A. Not altogether. The latter refers to our intention: the former to our will or desires.

Q. 18. Is it not all in all?

A. All will follow persevering sincerity. God gives every thing with it; nothing without it.

* Q. 19. Are not then sincerity and faith equivalent terms?

A. By no means. It is at least as nearly related to works as it is to faith. For example; who is sincere before he believes? He that then does all he can: he that, according to the power he has received, brings forth fruits meet for repentance. Who is sincere after he believes: he that, from a sense of God’s love, is zealous of all good works.

Q. 20. Is not sincerity what St. Paul terms a willing mind? ἡ προθυμία? 2 Corinthians viii. 12.

A. Yes: if that word be taken in a general sense. For it is a constant disposition to use all the grace given.

* Q. 21. But do we not then set sincerity on a level with faith?

A. No. For we allow a man may be sincere, and not be justified, as he may be penitent, and not be justified: (not as yet) but he cannot have faith, and not be justified. The very moment he believes he is justified.

Q. 22. But do we not give up faith, and put sincerity in its place, as the condition of our acceptance with God?

A. We believe it is one condition of our acceptance, as repentance likewise is. And we believe it a condition of our continuing in a state of acceptance. Yet we do not put it in the place of faith. It is by faith the merits of Christ are applied to my soul. But if I am not sincere, they are not applied.

Q. 23. Is not this that going about to establish your own righteousness, whereof St. Paul speaks, Romans x. 4?

A. St. Paul there manifestly speaks of unbelievers, who sought to be accepted for the sake of their own righteousness. We do not seek to be accepted for the sake of our sincerity; but through the merits of Christ alone. Indeed, so long as any man believes, he cannot go about (in St. Paul’s sense) to establish his own righteousness.

* Q. 24. But do you consider, that we are under the covenant of grace? And that the covenant of works is now abolished?

A. All mankind were under the covenant of grace, from the very hour that the original promise was made. If by the covenant of works you mean, that of unsinning obedience made with Adam before the fall: no man, but Adam, was ever under the covenant: for it was abolished before Cain was born. Yet it is not so abolished, but that it will stand, in a measure, even to the end of the world, i.e. If we do this, we shall live; if not, we shall die eternally: if we do well, we shall live with God in glory: if evil, we shall die the second death. For every man shall be judged in that day, and rewarded according to his works.

Q. 25. What means then, To him that believeth his faith is counted for righteousness?

A. That God forgives him that is unrighteous as soon as he believes, accepting his faith instead of perfect righteousness. But then observe, universal righteousness follows, though it did not precede faith.

Q. 26. But is faith thus counted to us for righteousness, at whatsoever time we believe?

A. Yes. In whatsoever moment we believe, all our past sins vanish away. They are as though they had never been, and we stand clear in the sight of God.

TUESDAY, Ten o’Clock.

MR. Taylor of Quinton, and T. Glascot, being added, it was inquired,

Q. 1. Are not the assurance of faith, the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and the revelation of Christ in us, terms nearly of the same import?

A. He that denies one of them, must deny all; they are so closely connected together.

Q. 2. Are they ordinarily, where the pure gospel is preached, essential to our acceptance?

A. Undoubtedly they are; and as such, to be insisted on, in the strongest terms.

* Q. 3. Is not the whole dispute of salvation by faith or by works, a mere strife of words?

A. In asserting salvation by faith, we mean this; 1. That pardon, (salvation begun) is received by faith, producing works. 2. That holiness (salvation continued) is faith working by love: 3. That heaven (salvation finished) is the reward of this faith.

If you who assert salvation by works, or by faith and works, mean the same thing (understanding by faith, the revelation of Christ in us, by salvation, pardon, holiness, glory) we will not strive with you at all. If you do not, this is not a strife of words: but the very vitals, the essence of Christianity is the thing in question.

Q. 4. Wherein does occur doctrine now differ from that we preached when at Oxford?

A. Chiefly in these two points: 1. We then knew nothing of that righteousness of faith, in justification; nor 2. Of the nature of faith itself, as implying consciousness of pardon.

Q. 5. May not some degree of the love of God, go before a distinct sense of justification?

A. We believe it may.

Q. 6. Can any degree of sanctification or holiness?

A. Many degrees of outward holiness may: yea, and some degree of meekness, and several other tempers which would be branches of Christian holiness, but that they do not spring from Christian principles. For the abiding love of God cannot spring, but from faith in a pardoning God. And no true Christian holiness can exist, without that love of God for its foundation.

Q. 7. Is every man, as soon as he believes, a new creature, sanctified, pure in heart? Has he then a new heart? Does Christ dwell therein? And is he a temple of the Holy Ghost?

A. All these things may be affirmed of every believer, in a true sense. Let us not therefore contradict those who maintain it. Why should we contend about words?

Conversation the Fourth.

TUESDAY, June 16, 1747.

THE following persons being met at the Foundery:

John Wesley, Charles Wesley, and Charles Manning, vicar of Hayes: Richard Thomas Bateman, rector of St. Bartholomew’s the Great, Henry Piers, Howell Harris, and Thomas Hardwick, It was inquired,

Q. 1. Is justifying faith, a divine assurance, that Christ loved me and gave himself for me?

A. We believe it is.

Q. 2. What is the judgment of most of the serious dissenters concerning this?

A. They generally allow, that many believers have such an assurance: And

That it is to be desired and prayed for by all:

But then they affirm,

That this is the highest species, or degree of faith:

That it is not the common privilege of believers: consequently, they deny that this is justifying faith, or necessarily implied therein.

Q. 3. And are there not strong reasons for their opinion? For instance: If the true believers of old had not this assurance, then it is not necessarily implied in justifying faith:

But the true believers of old had not this assurance.

A. David, and many more of the believers of old, undeniably had this assurance. But even if the Jews had it not, it would not follow, that this is not implied in Christian faith.

Q. 4. But do you not know, that the apostles themselves had it not, till after the day of Pentecost?

A. The apostles themselves had not the proper Christian faith, till after the day of Pentecost.

Q. 5. But were not those Christian believers, in the proper sense, to whom St. John wrote his first epistle? Yet to these he says, chapter v. verse 13. These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

A. This does not prove, that they did not know they had eternal life, any more than that they did not believe. His plain meaning is, “I have written unto you, that you may be the more established in the faith.” Therefore it does not follow from hence, that they had not this assurance: but only, that there are degrees therein.

Q. 6. But were not the Thessalonians true believers? Yet they had not this assurance: they had only a good hope. 2 Thessalonians ii. 16.

A. The text you refer to, runs thus: Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God, even our Father, which hath loved us, and given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace: comfort your hearts and establish you, in every good word and work. This good hope does not exclude, but necessarily implies a strong assurance of the love of God.

Q. 7. But does not St. Paul say even of himself, 1 Corinthians iv. 4. I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified?

A. He does not say of himself here, that he was not justified: or, that he did not know it: but only, that though he had a conscience void of offence, yet this did not justify him before God. And must not every believer say the same? This therefore is wide of the point.

Q. 8. But does he not disclaim any such assurance in those words, 1 Corinthians i. 3. I was with you in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling.

A. By no means. For these words do not imply any fear either of death or hell. They express only a deep sense of his utter insufficiency for the great work wherein he was engaged.

Q. 9. However, does he not exclude Christians in general from such an assurance, when he bids them work out their salvation with fear and trembling? Philippians ii. 12.

A. No more than from love; which is always joined with filial fear and reverential trembling.

And the same answer is applicable to all those texts which exhort a believer to fear.

Q. 10. But does not matter of fact prove, that justifying faith does not necessarily imply assurance? For can you believe that such a person as J. A. or E. V. who have so much integrity, zeal, and fear of God, and walk so unblameably in all things, is void of justifying faith? Can you suppose such as these to be under the wrath and under the curse of God? Especially if you add to this, that they are continually longing, striving, praying for the assurance which they have not?

A. This contains the very strength of the cause: and inclines us to think, that some of these may be exempt cases. But however that be, we answer:

1. It is dangerous to ground a general doctrine on a few particular experiments.

2. Men may have many good tempers, and a blameless life (speaking in a loose sense), by nature and habit, with preventing grace; and yet not have faith and the love of God.

3. It is scarce possible for us to know all the circumstances relating to such persons, so as to judge certainly concerning them.

4. But this we know, If Christ is not revealed in them, they are not yet Christian believers.

Q. 11. But what will become of them then, suppose they die in this state?

A. That is a supposition not to be made.

They cannot die in this state. They must go backward or forward. If they continue to seek, they will surely find righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. We are confirmed in this belief by the many instances we have seen, of such as these finding peace at the last hour. And it is not impossible, but others may then be made partakers of like precious faith, and yet go hence without giving any outward proof of the change which God hath wrought.

Conversation the Fifth.

WEDNESDAY, 17.

Q. 1. HOW much is allowed by our brethren who differ from us, with regard to entire sanctification?

A. They grant, 1. That every one must be entirely sanctified, in the article of death:

2. That till then, a believer daily grows in grace, comes nearer and nearer to perfection:

3. That we ought to be continually pressing after this and to exhort all others so to do.

Q. 2. What do we allow them?

A. We grant, 1. That many of those who have died in the faith, yea, the greater part of those we have known, were not sanctified throughout, not made perfect in love, till a little before death:

2. That the term, “sanctified,” is continually applied by St. Paul, to all that were justified, were true believers:

3. That by this term alone, he rarely (if ever) means, saved from all sin:

4. That consequently, it is not proper to use it in this sense, without adding the word “wholly, entirely,” or the like:

5. That the inspired writers almost continually speak of or to those who are justified; but very rarely, either of or to those, who were wholly sanctified:

6. That consequently, it behoves us to speak in public almost continually of the state of justification: but more rarely, in full and explicit terms, concerning entire sanctification.

Q. 3. What then is the point wherein we divide?

A. It is this: Whether we should expect to be saved from all sin, before the article of death?

Q. 4. Is there any clear scripture promise of this? That God will save us from all sin?

A. There is. Psalm cxxx. 8. He shall redeem Israel from all his sins.

This is more largely exprest in the prophesy of Ezekiel: Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean; from all your filthiness and from all your idols will I cleanse you—I will also save you from all your uncleannesses, chapter xxxvi. verse 25. 29. No promise can be more clear. And to this the apostle plainly refers in that exhortation, Having these promises, let us cleanse ourselves, from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. 2 Corinthians vii. 1. Equally clear and express is that antient promise, The Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul. Deuteronomy xxx. 6.

Q. 5. But does any assertion answerable to this, occur in the new Testament?

A. There does, and that laid down in the plainest terms. So St. John iii. 8. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. The works of the devil, without any limitation or restriction: but all sin is the work of the devil. Parallel to which is that assertion of St. Paul, Ephesians v. 25, 27. Christ loved the church and gave himself for it—that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.

And to the same effect is his assertion in the 8th of the Romans, (verse 3, 4.) God sent his Son—that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, walking not after the flesh but after the Spirit.

Q. 6. Does the new Testament afford any farther ground, for expecting to be saved from all sin?

A. Undoubtedly it does, both in those prayers and commands which are equivalent to the strongest assertions.

Q. 7. What prayers do you mean?

A. Prayers for entire sanctification; which were there no such thing, would be mere mockery of God. Such, in particular, are 1. Deliver us from evil; or rather, from the evil one. Now when this is done, when we are delivered from all evil, there can be no sin remaining. 2. Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word: that they all may be one, as thou Father art in me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: I in them and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one. John xvii. 20, 21, 23.

3. I bow my knees unto the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ—that he would grant you—that ye being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, ♦and depth, and height: and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that he might be filled with all the fulness of God. Ephesians iii. 14, 16‒19. 4. The very God of peace sanctify you wholly. And I pray God, your whole spirit, soul, and body, be preserved blameless, unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Thessalonians v. 23.

Q. 8. What command is there to the same effect?

A. 1. Be ye perfect as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Matthew vi. ultima.

2. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. Matthew xxii. 37. But if the love of God fill all the heart, there can be no sin there.

Q. 9. But how does it appear, that this is to be done before the article of death?

A. First, from the very nature of a command, which is not given to the dead, but to the living.

Therefore, Thou shalt love God with all thy heart, cannot mean, Thou shalt do this when thou diest, but while thou livest.

Secondly, from express texts of scripture:

1. The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men; teaching us, that having renounced (ἀπειπάμενοι) ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world: looking for――the glorious appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity; and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. Titus ii. 11‒14.

2. He hath raised up an horn of salvation for us—to perform the mercy promised to our fathers; the oath which he sware to our father Abraham, that he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hands of our enemies, should serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life. Luke i. verse 69, &c.

Q. 10. Is there any example in scripture of persons who had attained to this?

A. Yes. St. John and all those of whom he says in his first epistle, chapter iv. verse 17. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world.

Q. 11. But why are there not more examples of this kind, recorded in the new Testament?

A. It does not become us to be peremptory in this matter. One reason might possibly be, Because the apostles wrote to the church, while it was in a state of infancy. Therefore they might mention such persons the more sparingly, least they should give strong meat to babes.

Q. 12. Can you shew one such example now? Where is he that is thus perfect?

A. To some who make this enquiry, one might answer, If I knew one here, I would not tell you. For you do not enquire out of love. You are like Herod. You only seek the young child, to slay it.

But more directly we answer, There are numberless reasons, why there should be few (if any indisputable) examples. What inconveniences would this bring on the person himself, set as a mark for all to shoot at? What a temptation would it be to others, not only to men who knew not God, but to believers themselves? How hardly would they refrain from idolizing such a person? And yet, how unprofitable to gain-sayers? For if they hear not Moses and the prophets, Christ and his apostles, neither would they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.

Q. 13. Suppose one had attained to this, would you advise him to speak of it?

A. Not to them who know not God. It would only provoke them to contradict and blaspheme: nor to any without some particular reason, without some particular good in view. And then they should have an especial care, to avoid all appearance of boasting.

Q. 14. Is it a sin, not to believe those who say they have attained?

A. By no means, even though they said true. We ought not hastily to believe, but to suspend our judgment, till we have full and strong proof.

Q. 15. But are we not apt to have a secret distaste to any who say, They are saved from all sin?

A. It is very possible we may; and that on several grounds: partly from a concern for the honour of God, and the good of souls who may be hurt, yea, or turned out of the way, if these are not what they profess: partly from a kind of implicit envy at those who speak of higher attainments than our own: and partly from our slowness and unreadiness of heart, to believe the works of God.

Q. 16. Does not the harshly preaching perfection tend to bring believers into a kind of bondage, or slavish fear?

A. It does. Therefore we should always place it in the most amiable light, so that it may excite only hope, joy, and desire.

Q. 17. Why may we not continue in the joy of faith even till we are made perfect?

A. Why indeed? Since holy grief does not quench this joy: since even while we are under the cross, while we deeply partake of the sufferings of Christ, we may rejoice with joy unspeakable.

Q. 18. Do we not discourage believers from rejoicing evermore?

A. We ought not so to do. Let them all their life long, rejoice unto God, so it be with reverence. And even if lightness or pride should mix with their joy, let us not strike at the joy itself (this is the gift of God) but at that lightness or pride, that the evil may cease and the good remain.

Q. 19. Ought we to be anxiously careful about perfection? Least we should die before we have attained?

A. In no wise. We ought to be thus careful for nothing, neither spiritual nor temporal.

Q. 20. But ought we not to be troubled, on account of the sinful nature which still remains in us?

A. It is good for us to have a deep sense of this, and to be much ashamed before the Lord. But this should only incite us, the more earnestly to turn unto Christ every moment, and to draw light, and life, and strength from him, that we may go on, conquering and to conquer. And therefore, when the sense of our sin most abounds, the sense of his love should much more abound.

Q. 21. Will our joy or our trouble increase, as we grow in grace?

A. Perhaps both. But without doubt our joy in the Lord will increase as our love increases.

Q. 22. Is not the teaching believers to be continually poring upon their inbred sin, the ready way to make them forget that they were purged from their former sins?

A. We find by experience, it is; or to make them under-value, and account it a little thing: whereas indeed (though there are still greater gifts behind) this is inexpressibly great and glorious.

MINUTES

OF SEVERAL

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Reverend Messieurs
JOHN and CHARLES WESLEY, and Others.

June 25, 1744, &c.

IT is desired, that all things be considered as in the immediate presence of God:

That we may meet with a single eye, and as little children, who have every thing to learn:

That every point which is proposed, may be examined to the foundation:

That every person may speak freely whatever is in his heart:

And that every question which may arise, should be throughly debated and settled. Mean time let us all pray for a willingness to receive light, to know of every doctrine, whether it be of God.

Q. 1. How may the time of this conference be made more eminently a time of watching unto prayer?

A. 1. While we are conversing, let us have an especial care, to set God always before us:

2. In the intermediate hours, let us visit none but the sick, and spend all the time that remains in retirement:

3. Let us therein give ourselves to prayer for one another, and for a blessing on this our labour.

Q. 2. How far does each of us agree to submit to the judgment of the majority?

A. In speculative things each can only submit, so far as his judgment shall be convinced:

In every practical point each will submit, so far as he can without wounding his conscience.

Q. 3. Can a Christian submit any farther than this, to any man, or number of men upon earth?

A. It is plain he cannot, either to bishop, convocation or general council. And this is that grand principle of private judgment, on which all the reformers proceeded; “Every man must judge for himself; because every man must give an account of himself to God.”

* Q. 4. What may we reasonably expect to ♦believe God’s design in raising up the preachers called Methodists?

A. To reform the nation, particularly the church; to spread scriptural holiness over the land.

Q. 5. What was the rise of Methodism, so called?

A. In 1729, two young men reading the bible, saw they could not be saved without holiness, followed after it, and incited others so to do. In 1737 they saw, holiness comes by faith. They saw likewise, that men are justified before they are sanctified: but still holiness was their point.

God then thrust them out, utterly against their will, to raise an holy people. When Satan could no otherwise hinder this, he threw Calvinism in the way; and then Antinomianism, which strikes directly at the root of all holiness.

Then many of the Methodists growing rich, became lovers of the present world. Next they married unawakened or half-awakened wives, and conversed with their relations. Hence worldly prudence, maxims, customs, crept back upon them, producing more and more conformity to the world.

Hence followed gross neglect of relative duties, especially education of children. And this is not easily cured by the preachers. Either they have not light, or not weight enough. But the want of both may in some measure be supplied, by publicly reading the sermons every where, particularly the fourth volume.

Q. 6. Is it advisable to preach in as many places as we can, without forming any societies?

A. By no means: we have made the trial in various places; and that for a considerable time. But all the seed has fallen as by the way-side: there is scarce any fruit of it remaining.

Q. 7. But what particular inconveniencies do you observe, where societies are not formed?

A. These among others; 1. The preachers cannot give proper instructions and exhortations to those that are convinced of sin: 2. They cannot watch over one another in love; nor, 3. Can the believers bear one another’s burdens, and build up each other in faith and holiness.

Q. 8. Where should we endeavour to preach most?

A. 1. Where we (Clergymen) are permitted to preach in a church; 2. Where there is the greatest number of quiet and willing hearers; 3. Where there is most fruit.

Q. 9. Is field-preaching then unlawful?

A. We conceive not. We do not know that it is contrary to any law either of God or man.

Q. 10. Have we not used it too sparingly?

A. It seems we have: 1. Because our call is, To save that which is lost. Now we cannot expect such to seek us. Therefore we should go and seek them. 2. Because we are particularly called, by going into the highways and hedges (which none else will) to compel them to come in. 3. Because that reason against it is not good. “The house will hold all that come.” The house may hold all that come to the house, but not all that would come to the field.

The greatest hindrances to this you are to expect from the rich, or cowardly, or lazy Methodists. But regard them not, neither stewards, leaders, nor people. Whenever the weather will permit, go out in God’s name into the most public places, and call all to repent, and believe the gospel; every Sunday in particular: especially in the old societies, least they settle upon their lees.

Q. 11. Ought we not diligently to observe, in what places God is pleased at any time to pour out his Spirit more abundantly?

A. We ought, and at that time to send more labourers than usual into that part of the harvest.

Q. 12. What is a sufficient call to a new place?

A. 1. An invitation from a serious man, fearing God, who has an house to receive us: 2. A probability of doing more good by going thither, than by staying longer where we are.

Q. 13. How often shall we permit strangers to be present, at the meeting of the society?

A. Let every other meeting of the society, in every place, be strictly private; no one stranger being admitted, on any account or pretence whatsoever. On the other nights we may admit them with caution; but not the same persons above twice or thrice. In order to this, see that all in every place shew their tickets before they come in. If the stewards and leaders are not exact and impartial herein, employ others who have more resolution.

Q. 14. May a relapser into gross sin, confessing his fault, be re-admitted into the society?

A. Not as a member, till after three months: but he may be permitted to stay as a stranger.

Q. 15. How may the leaders of classes be made more useful?

A. 1. Let each of them be diligently examined concerning his method of meeting a class.

2. Let us recommend to all the following directions;

1. Let each leader carefully inquire, how every soul in his class prospers? Not only, how each person observes the outward rules, but how he grows in the knowledge and love of God.

2. Let the leaders converse with all the preachers, as frequently and as freely as possible.

3. Let every leader come into the room on Tuesday, as soon as the service is ended, and then sit down, and commune with God in his heart till the preacher comes in.

4. Let no leaders go out till the preacher goes.

5. Let every leader bring a note of every sick person in his class.

Q. 16. Can any thing farther be done, in order to make the meeting of the classes lively and profitable?

A. 1. Let the leaders frequently meet each other’s classes.

2. Let us observe, which leaders are most useful to those under their care. And let these meet the other classes as often as possible.

3. Frequently making new leaders.

Q. 17. How can we farther assist those under our care?

A. 1. By closely examining them at each visitation:

2. By meeting the married men and women together, on the first Sunday, after the visitation; the single men and women apart, on the two following.

3. By instructing them at their own houses.

What unspeakable need is there of this? The world say, “The Methodists are no better than other people.” This is not true. Yet it is nearer the truth, than we are willing to imagine.

For, 1. Personal-religion, either toward God or man, is amazingly superficial among us.

I can but just touch on a few generals. How little faith is there among us? How little communion with God? How little living in heaven, walking in eternity, deadness to every creature? How much love of the word, desire of pleasure, of ease, of praise, of getting money?

How little brotherly love? What continual judging one another? What gossipping, evil-speaking, tale-bearing? What want of moral honesty? To instance only in a few particulars:

What servants, journeymen, labourers, carpenters, bricklayers, do as they would be done by? Which of them does as much work as he can? Set him down for a knave that does not.

Who does as he would be done by, in buying and selling, particularly in selling horses? Write him knave that does not. And the methodist-knave is the worst of all knaves.

2. Family religion is shamefully wanting, and almost in every branch.

And the Methodists in general will be little better, till we take quite another course with them. For what avails public preaching alone, though we could preach like angels?

I heard Dr. Lupton say, my father, visiting one of his parishioners, who had never missed going to church for forty years, then lying on his death-bed, asked him, “Thomas, where do you think your soul will go?” “Soul! soul!” said Thomas: “Yes: do not you know what your soul is?” “Aye surely,” said he: “Why, it is a little bone in the back, that lives longer than the rest of the body.” So much Thomas had learned by constantly hearing sermons, yea and exceeding good sermons, for forty years!

We must instruct them from house to house; till this is done, and that in good earnest, the Methodists will be little better than other people.

Can we find a better method of doing this than Mr. Baxter’s? If not, let us adopt it without delay. His whole tract, intitled, Gildos Salvianus, is well worth a careful perusal. A short extract from it I have subjoined. Speaking of this visiting from house to house, he says, page 351.

♦“We shall find many difficulties both in ourselves and in the people

“1. In ourselves there is much dulness and laziness: so that there will be much ado to get us to be faithful in the work.

“2. We have also a base man-pleasing temper, which makes us let men perish, rather than lose their love, and let them go quietly to hell, lest we should anger them.

“3. Some of us have also a foolish bashfulness. We know not how to begin, or to speak plain. We blush to speak for Christ, or to contradict the devil, or to save a soul.

“4. Our interest stops our mouths, and makes us unfaithful in the work of Christ.

“5. But the greatest hindrance is, weakness of faith: so our whole motion is weak, because the spring of it is weak.

“6. Lastly, we are unskilful in the work. How few know how to deal with men, so as to get within them, to win upon them, and suit all our discourse to their several conditions and tempers; to choose the fittest subjects, and follow them with an holy mixture of seriousness, and terror, and love, and meekness, and evangelical allurements?”

And we have as many difficulties to grapple with in our people.

1. Too many of them will be unwilling to be taught, till we conquer their perverseness by the force of reason, and the power of love.

2. And many are so dull, that they will shun being taught, for fear of shewing their dulness. And indeed you will find it extremely hard to make them understand the very plainest points.

3. And it is still harder, to fix things on their heart, without which all our labour is lost. If you have not therefore great seriousness and fervency, what good can you expect? And when all is done, it is the Spirit of grace, he alone, who must do the work.

4. And when we have made some impressions upon their hearts, if we look not after them, they will soon die away.

But as great as this labour of private instruction is, it is absolutely necessary. For after all our preaching, many of our people are almost as ignorant as if they had never heard the gospel. I study to speak as plain as I can; yet I frequently meet with those who have been my hearers for many years, who know not, whether Christ be God or man; or, that infants have any original sin. And how few are there, that know the nature of repentance, faith and holiness? Most of them have a sort of confidence, that Christ will justify and save them, while the world has their hearts, and they live to themselves. And I have found by experience, that one of these has learned more from an hour’s close discourse, than from ten years public preaching.

And undoubtedly this private application is implied in those solemn words of the apostle; I charge thee before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing, preach the word, be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all long-suffering and doctrine.

This is likewise necessary to the greater glory of God, by the fuller success of the gospel. O brethren, if we could generally set this work on foot in all our societies, and prosecute it skilfully and zealously, what glory would redound to God thereby? If the common ignorance were thus banished, and our vanity and idleness turned into the study of the way of life, and every shop and every house busied in speaking of the word and works of God: surely God would dwell in our habitations, and make them his delight.

And this is necessary to the welfare of our people, many of whom neither believe nor repent to this day. Look round about, and see how many of them are still in apparent danger of damnation! And how can you walk, and talk, and be merry with such people, when you know their case? Methinks when you look them in the face, you should break forth into tears, as the prophet did when he looked upon Hazael, and then set on them with the most vehement and importunate exhortations. O then, for God’s sake, and for the sake of poor souls, bestir yourselves, and spare no pains that may conduce to their salvation.

What cause have we to bleed before the Lord this day, that have so long neglected this great and good work? That have been preachers so many years, and have done so little by personal instructions for the saving of mens souls? If we had but set on this work sooner, how many more might have been brought to Christ? And how much holier and happier might we have made our societies before now? And why might we not have done it sooner? There were many hindrances in the way: and so there are still, and always will be. But the greatest hindrance was in ourselves, in our dulness and littleness of faith and love. O that God would throughly humble us, and cause us to bewail our own neglects; that we may not think it enough to lament the sins of others, while we overlook our own!

But it is objected, 1. This course will take up so much time, that we shall have no time to follow our studies.

I answer, 1. Gaining knowledge is a good thing; but saving souls is a better. 2. By this very thing you will gain the most excellent knowledge of God and eternity. 3. But you will have abundant time for gaining other knowledge too, if you spend all your mornings therein. Only sleep not more than you need; talk not more than you need; and never be idle, nor triflingly employed. But 4. If you can do but one, either follow your studies or instruct the ignorant; let your studies alone; I would throw by all ♦the libraries in the world, rather than be guilty of the perdition of one soul.

It is objected, II. “The people will not submit to it.” If some do not, others will gladly. And the success with them may be so much as to repay all our labour. O let us herein follow the example of St. Paul. 1. For our general business, Serving the Lord with all humility of mind. 2. Our special work, Take heed to yourselves, and to all the flock. 3. Our doctrine, Repentance toward God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. 4. The place and manner of teaching, I have taught you publickly, and from house to house. 5. The object and internal manner, I ceased not to warn every one, night and day, with tears. This it is that must win souls and preserve them. 6. His innocency and self-denial for the advantage of the gospel, I have coveted no man’s silver or gold. 7. His patience, Neither count I my life dear unto myself. And among all our motives, these should be ever before our eyes: 1. The church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood. 2. Grievous wolves shall enter in: yea, of your ownselves shall men arise speaking perverse things. Write all this upon your hearts, and it will do you more good than twenty years study of lower things.

We may, 1. Every preacher, take an exact catalogue of those in society, from one end of each town to the other. 2. Go to each house, and give, with suitable exhortation and direction, the “instructions for children.” 3. Be sure to deal gently with them, and take off all discouragements as effectually as you can. See that the children get these by heart. Advise the grown persons to see that they understand them. And enlarge upon and apply every sentence as closely as you can. And let your dealing with those you begin with, be so gentle, winning and convincing, that the report of it, may move others to desire your coming. True, it is far easier to preach a good sermon, than to instruct the ignorant in the principles of religion. And as much as this work is despised by some, I doubt not but it will try the parts and spirits of us all. So archbishop Usher; “Great scholars may think it beneath them to spend their time in teaching the first principles of the doctrine of Christ. But they should consider, that the laying the foundation skilfully, as it is matter of the greatest importance in the whole building, so it is the master-piece of the wisest builder: according to the grace of God, which is given unto me, as a wise master-builder, I have laid the foundation, saith the great apostle. And let the wisest of us all try whenever we please, we shall find, that to lay this ground-work rightly, to make an ignorant man understand the grounds of religion, will put us to the ♦trial of our skill.”

Perhaps in doing this, it may be well,

1. After a few loving words spoken to all in the house, to take each person singly into another room, where you may deal closely with them, about their sin and misery and duty. Set these home, or you lose all your labour. At least let none be present but those who are quite familiar with each other.

2. Hear what the children have learned by heart.

3. Choose some of the weightiest points, and try by farther questions how they understand them. As, “do you believe you have sin in you? That you was born in sin? What does sin deserve? What remedy has God provided for guilty, helpless sinners?”

4. Often with the question, suggest the answer. As, “What is repentance?” Sorrow for sin, or a conviction that we are guilty, helpless sinners? “What is faith?” A divine conviction of things not seen?

5. Where you perceive they do not understand the stress of your question, you must lead them into it by other questions. So I have asked some, “How do you think your many and great sins will be pardoned?” They answer, “By repenting and mending my life,” and never mention Christ. I ask farther, “But do you think your amendment will make satisfaction for ♦your past sins?” They will answer, “We hope so, or else we know not what will.” One would think now, these had no knowledge of Christ at all. And indeed, some have not. But others have, and give such answers only because they do not understand the scope of the question. Ask them farther, “Can you be saved without the death of Christ?” They immediately say, “No.” And if you ask, “What has he done or suffered for you?” They will say, “He shed his blood for us,” and profess, “they trust in that for salvation.” But many cannot express even what they have some conception of, nay, can scarce learn, when expressions are put into their mouths. With these you are to deal exceeding tenderly, lest they be discouraged.

6. If you perceive them troubled that they cannot answer, step in yourself, and take the burden off them: answering that question yourself; and then do it throughly and plainly, and make a full explication of the whole business to them.

7. Thus, when you have tried their knowledge, proceed to instruct them yourself, according to their several capacities. If a man understand the fundamentals, fall on what you perceive he most needs, either explaining further some doctrine of the gospel, or some duty, or shewing the necessity of something he neglects, as may be most edifying to him. If it be one that is grosly ignorant, give him a short recital of the Christian religion in the plainest words. And if you perceive he understands not, go over it again till he does, and if possible fix it in his memory.

8. Next, inquire into his state, whether convinced, or unconvinced, converted or unconverted. Tell him, if need be, what conversion is. And then renew and inforce the inquiry.

9. If you perceive he is unconverted, your next business is, to labour with all your skill and power, to bring his heart to a sense of his condition. Set this home with a more earnest voice than you spoke before; for if you get not to the heart, you do nothing.

10. Conclude all with a strong exhortation, which should contain two parts; 1. The duty of the heart, in order to receive Christ; 2. The avoiding former sins, and constantly using the outward means. And here be sure, if you can, to get their promise, to forsake sin, change their company, and use means. And do this solemnly; reminding them of the presence of God, that hears their promises, and will expect the performance.

11. Before you leave them, engage the head of each family to call all his family every Sunday, before they go to bed, and hear what they can rehearse, and so continue till they have learned the instructions perfectly. And afterwards take care, that they do not forget what they had learned.

12. Speak differently, according to the difference of them you have to deal with, as they are dull and obstinate, or timerous and tender. Be as plain as possible to those of weak capacities, and give them scripture-proof for all you say.

Q. 18. How shall we prevent improper persons from insinuating themselves into the society?

A. 1. Give tickets to none till they are recommended by a leader, with whom they have met three months on trial:

2. Give notes to none but those who are recommended by one you know, or till they have met three or four times in a class:

3. Give them the rules the first time they meet.

Q. 19. How can we add a proper solemnity to the admission of new members?

A. 1. In all large towns, admit new members into the bands only at the quarterly love-feast, following the visitation: 2. Read the names of the men to be admitted the week before: 3. Admit into the society, only on the Sunday following the quarterly visitation: 4. Read the names of those to be admitted, on the Sunday evening before: 5. Then also let the names of those be read, who are excluded from the society.

Q. 20. Should we insist every where on the band-rules? Particularly, that relating to ruffles?

A. By all means. This is no time to give any encouragement to superfluity of apparel. Therefore give no band-tickets to any in England, Scotland, or Ireland, till they have left them off.

In order to this, 1. Read in every society the “thoughts concerning dress.” 2. In visiting the classes, be very mild, but very strict. 3. Allow no exempt cases, not even of a married woman: better one suffer than many.

To encourage meeting in band. 1. In every large society, have a love feast quarterly for the bands only: 2. Never fail to meet them apart from the society, once a week: 3. Exhort all believers to embrace the advantage: 4. Give a band-ticket to none, till they have met a quarter on trial.

Q. 21. Have those in band left off snuff and drams?

A. No. Many are still enslaved to one or the other. In order to redress this, 1. Let no preacher touch either on any account: 2. Strongly dissuade our people from them: 3. Answer their pretences, particularly those of curing the cholic, or helping digestion.

Q. 22. Do we observe any evil which has lately prevailed among our societies?

A. Many of our members have lately married with unbelievers, even such as were wholly unawakened. And this has been attended with fatal consequences. Few of these have gained the unbelieving wife or husband. Generally they have themselves either had an heavy cross for life, or entirely fallen back into the world.

Q. 23. What can be done to put a stop to this?

A. 1. Let every preacher take occasion publicly to inforce the apostle’s caution, Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers.

2. Let it be openly declared in every place, That he who acts contrary to this, will be expelled the society:

3. When any such is expelled, let an exhortation be subjoined, dissuading others from following that bad example:

4. And let all be exhorted, to take no step in so weighty a matter, without first advising with the most serious of his brethren.

Q. 24. Ought any woman to marry without the consent of her parents?

A. In general, she ought not. Yet there may be an exception. For if, 1. A woman be under a necessity of marrying: If, 2. Her parents absolutely refuse to let her marry any Christian: then she may, nay ought to marry without their consent. Yet even then a Methodist-preacher ought not to marry her.

Q. 25. Do not sabbath-breaking, dram-drinking, evil-speaking, unprofitable conversation, lightness, gaiety or expensiveness of apparel, and contracting debts without sufficient care to discharge them, still prevail in several places? What method can we take to remove these evils?

A. 1. Let us preach expresly and strongly on each of these heads: 2. Read the sermon upon evil-speaking, in every society: 3. Let the ♦leaders closely examine, and exhort every person to put away the accursed thing: 4. Let the preacher warn the society in every place, that none who is hereafter guilty can remain with us: 5. In order to give them clearer views of the evil of these things, let every preacher recommend to every society, and that frequently and earnestly, the reading the books we have published, preferable to any other. And when any new book is sent to any place, let him speak of it in the public congregation: 6. Extirpate smuggling, buying or selling uncustomed goods, out of every society: particularly in Cornwall, and in all sea-port towns. Let no person remain with us, who will not totally abstain from every kind and degree of it: and after admonishing him, silence every local preacher who speaks in defence of it. Speak tenderly, but earnestly and frequently of it, in every society near the coasts: and read to them and disperse diligently among them “The Word to a Smuggler.” 7. Extirpate bribery, receiving any thing, directly or indirectly, for voting in any election, Shew no respect of persons herein, but expel all who touch the accursed thing. Let this be particularly observed at Grimsby and St. Ives. Largely shew in every society the wickedness of thus selling our country. Do the same thing in private conversation. And read every where “The Word to a Freedholder,” and disperse it with both hands: and in public and private inlarge on œconomy, as a branch of religion.

Q. 26. What shall we do to prevent scandal, when any of our members become bankrupt?

A. Let two of the principal members of the society be deputed to examine his accounts. And if he has not kept fair accounts, or has been concerned in that base practise of raising money by coining notes (commonly called the bill-trade) let him be immediately expelled ♦from the society.

Q. 27. What is the office of a Christian minister?

A. To watch over souls, as he that must give account.

Q. 28. In what view may we and our helpers be considered?

A. Perhaps as extraordinary messengers, designed by God to provoke others to jealousy.

Q. 29. What is the office of an helper?

A. In the absence of a minister, to feed and guide the flock: in particular,

1. To expound every morning and evening: (But N. B. He is never, in any place, to begin later in the evening than seven o’clock, except in harvest-time.)

2. To meet the united society, the bands, the select society, and the penitents, every week:

3. To receive on trial for the society and bands, and to put the disorderly back on trial:

4. To meet the leaders of the bands and classes weekly, and the stewards, and to overlook their accounts.

Let every preacher be particularly exact in the morning preaching, and meeting the leaders.

Q. 30. What are the rules of an helper?

A. 1. Be diligent. Never be unemployed a moment. Never be triflingly employed. Never while away time: neither spend any more time at any place than is strictly necessary.

2. Be serious. Let your motto be, Holiness to the Lord. Avoid all lightness, jesting and foolish talking.

3. Converse sparingly and cautiously with women: particularly with young women in private.

4. Take no step toward marriage, without first acquainting us with your design.

5. Believe evil of no one: unless you see it done, take heed how you credit it. Put the best construction on every thing. You know the judge is always supposed to be on the prisoner’s side.

6. Speak evil of no one: else your word especially would eat as doth a canker. Keep your thoughts within your own breast, till you come to the person concerned.

7. Tell every one what you think wrong in him, and that plainly, and as soon as may be, else it will fester in your heart. Make all haste to cast the fire out of your bosom.

8. Do not affect the gentleman. You have no more to do with this character, than with that of a dancing-master. A preacher of the gospel is the servant of all.

9. Be ashamed of nothing but sin: not of fetching wood (if time permit) or of drawing water; not of cleaning your own shoes, or your neighbours.

10. Be punctual. Do every thing exactly at the time. And in general, do not mend our rules, but keep them: not for wrath, but for conscience sake.

11. You have nothing to do but to save souls. Therefore spend and be spent in this work. And go always, not only to those that want you, but to those that want you most.

12. Act in all things, not according to your own will, but as a son in the gospel. As such, it is your part to employ your time in the manner which we direct: partly in preaching and visiting from house to house; partly in reading, meditation and prayer: above all, if you labour with us in our Lord’s vineyard, it is needful that you should do that part of the work which we advise, at those times and places, which we judge most for his glory.

* Q. 31. What general method of employing our time would you advise us to?

A. We advise you, 1. As often as possible to rise at four. 2. From four to five in the morning, and from five to six in the evening, to meditate, pray and read partly the scripture with the notes, partly the closely practical parts of what we have published. 3. From six in the morning to twelve (allowing an hour for breakfast) to read in order, with much prayer, bishop Pearson on the creed, Mr. ♦Boehm’s and Nalson’s sermons; and the other books which we have published in prose or verse.

Q. 32. Should our helpers follow trades?

A. This is an important question: therefore it will be proper to consider it throughly. The question is not, whether they may occasionally work with their hands, as St. Paul did: but whether it be proper for them to keep shop and follow merchandize. Of those who do so at present it may be observed, they are unquestionably upright men. They are men of considerable gifts. We see the fruit of their labour, and they have a large share in the esteem and love of the people. All this pleads on their side, and cannot but give us a prejudice in their favour. Three of these urge necessity for doing this: One that he may help his aged father; another that he may maintain his wife; a third that he may keep his children; a fourth does not plead any necessity, but a desire of doing more good. One answered J. O. “If you cannot help your father without trading, and if the societies either cannot or will not, I will allow him what you allow him now. So this necessity is at an end.” To Ja. O. it was answered, “Your wife wants nothing yet. It is not likely she ever will. You have money beforehand. So your necessity is not yet begun.” To R. R. “You do not want now. When you do want any thing for your children, you shall have it. So here is no necessity.”

As to the second plea, doing more good, it was inquired, is it not doing evil that good may come? Is not the thing in question both evil in itself (for us) and evil in its consequences? First, Is it not (with regard to travelling preachers) evil in itself? Is it well consistent with that scripture, 2 Timothy ii. 4. No man that warreth, (takes on him the profession of a soldier, as we eminently do) entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; plainly referring to the Roman law, which absolutely forbad any soldier to follow any other profession. Is it well consistent with that word, Give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to teaching: meditate on these things, give thyself wholly to them? 1 Timothy iv. 13, 15. Can we be said to give ourselves wholly to these things, if we follow another profession? Does not our church, in her office of ordination, require every minister to do this? If they do not the more shame for them. But this plainly shews, what both they and we ought to do. We indeed more particularly; because God has called us to provoke them to jealousy, to supply their lack of service to the sheep that are as yet without shepherds, and to spend and be spent therein. We above all; because every travelling preacher solemnly professes to have nothing else to do, and receives his little allowance for this very end, that he may not need to do any thing else, that he may not be entangled in the things of this life; but may give himself wholly to these things.

Secondly, Is it not evil in its consequences? Have not some ill consequences appeared already? And is there not the greatest reason to apprehend that still worse would follow? We are concerned to give no offence, either to Jew or Gentile, or to the church of God. But this has already offended, not only many of the world, but many of our own brethren. Many of the preachers in particular have been much grieved: yea and those most, who were most alive to God. Now the beginning of offence, “is as when one letteth out water:” who can gather it up again? They are grieved the more, because they apprehend this would be an increasing evil. For where will it stop? If one preacher follows trade, so may twenty; so may every one. And if any of them trade a little, why not ever so much? Who can fix how far he should go? Therefore we advise our brethren who have been concerned herein, to give up all, and attend to the one business. And we doubt not but God will recompense them an hundred fold, even in this world, as well as in the world to come.

It is true, this cannot be done on a sudden. But it may between this and the next conference. And even as to the drops that many sold, if their wives sell them at home, well: but it is not proper for any preacher to hawk them about. It has a bad appearance. It does not well suit the dignity of his calling.

Two years after, it was agreed by all our brethren, that no preacher who will not relinquish his trade of buying and selling, or of making and vending pills, drops, balsams, or medicines of any kind, shall be considered as a travelling preacher any longer: and that it shall be demanded of all those preachers, who have traded in cloth, hardware, pills, drops, balsams, or medicines of any kind, at the next conference, whether they have ♦entirely left it off, or not?

* Q. 33. Why is it, that the people under our care are no better?

A. Other reasons may concur; but the chief is, because we are not more knowing and more holy.

Q. 34. But why are we not more knowing?

A. Because we are idle. We forget the very first rule, “Be diligent. Never be unemployed a moment. Never be triflingly employed. Never while away time: neither spend any more time at any place than is strictly necessary.”

I fear there is altogether a fault in this matter: and that few of us are clear. Which of you spends as many hours a day, in God’s work, as you did formerly in man’s work? We talk,—or read history, or what comes next to hand.

We must, absolutely must, cure this evil, or give up the whole work.

But how? 1. Read the most useful books, and that regularly and constantly. Steadily spend all the morning in this employ, or at least five hours in twenty-four.

“But I read only the bible.” Then you ought to teach others to read only the bible, and by parity of reason, to hear only the bible. But if so, you need preach no more. Just so said George Bell. And what is the fruit? Why now, he neither reads the bible, nor any thing else.

This is rank enthusiasm. If you need no book but the bible, you are got above St. Paul. He wanted others too. Bring the books, says he, but especially the parchments, those wrote on parchment.

“But I have no taste for reading.” Contract a taste for it by use, or return to your trade.

“But different men have different tastes.” Therefore some may read less than others; but none should read less than this.

“But I have no books.” I will give each of you, as fast as you will read them, books to the value of five pounds. And I desire the assistants will take care, that all the large societies provide The Christian Library, or at least the notes on the new Testament, for the use of the preachers.

2. In the afternoon follow Mr. Baxter’s plan: Then you will have no time to spare: none for learning Latin or Greek, or Hebrew: you will have work enough for all your time. Then likewise no preacher will stay with us, who is as salt that has lost its savour. For to such, this employment would be mere drudgery. And in order to it, you will have need of all the knowledge you can procure.

The sum is. Go into every house in course, and teach every one therein. Young and old, if they belong to us, to be Christians inwardly and outward!y.

Make every particular plain to their understanding. Fix it in their memory. Write it on their heart. In order to this, there must be line upon line, precept upon precept. I remember to have heard my father asking my mother, “How could you have the patience, to tell that blockhead the same thing, twenty times over?” She answered, “Why, if I had told him but nineteen times, I should have lost all my labour.” What patience indeed, what love, what knowledge is requisite for this?

Q. 34. In what method should we instruct them?

A. Read, explain, inforce,

1. The rules of the society:

2. Instructions for children:

3. The fourth volume of sermons:

4. Philip Henry’s method of family prayer.

Over and above: where there are ten children in a society, spend at least an hour with them twice a week. And do this, not in a dull, dry, formal manner, but in earnest, with your might.

“But I have no gift for this.” Gift or no gift, you are to do it, else you are not called to be a Methodist-preacher. Do it as you can, till you can do it as you would. Pray earnestly for the gift, and use the means for it; particularly studying the childrens tracts.

Q. 35. Why are not we more holy? Why do not we live in eternity? Walk with God all the day long? Why are we not all devoted to God? Breathing the whole spirit of missionaries?

A. Because we are enthusiasts: looking for the end, without using the means.

To touch only upon two or three instances.

Do you rise at four? Or even at five, when you do not preach?

Do you fast once a week? Once a month? Do you know the obligation, or benefit of it?

Do you recommend the five o’clock hour for private-prayer? Do you observe it? Do not you find, that any time is no time?

O let us all stir up the gift of God that is in us! Let us no more sleep, as do others: But whatsoever our hand findeth to do, let us do it with our might!

Q. 36. Who is the assistant?

A. That preacher in each circuit, who is appointed from time to time to take charge of the societies, and the other preachers therein.

Q. 37. How should an assistant be qualified for this charge?

A. By walking closely with God, and having his work greatly at heart; by understanding and loving discipline, ours in particular; and by loving the church of England, and resolving not to separate from it.

Q. 38. What is the business of an assistant?

A. 1. To see that the other preachers in his circuit behave well, and want nothing: 2. To visit the classes quarterly in each place, regulate the bands, and deliver new tickets: 3. To keep watch-nights and love-feasts: 4. To take in, or put out of the bands or society: 5. To hold quarterly meetings; and therein diligently to enquire both into the spiritual and temporal state of each society. 6. To take care that every society be duly supplied with books, and that the money for them be constantly returned. 7. To send from every quarterly meeting a circumstantial account to London of every remarkable conversion, and of every one who dies in the triumph of faith. 8. To take exact lists of his societies every Easter, and bring them to the next conference. 9. To meet the married men, the married women, the single men, and the single women, in the large societies once a quarter. 10. To see that every society have a private room, and a set of the library or the notes for the helper, and, 11. To travel with me, if required, once a year, through the societies in his circuit.

Q. 39. Ought we to insist upon our rule, that no preacher print any thing without your approbation?

A. Undoubtedly. And whoever does it for the time to come, cannot take it ill, if he is excluded from our connection. Let every one take this warning, and afterwards blame none but himself.

Q. 40. But has the office of an assistant been throughly executed?

A. No; not by one assistant out of three. For instance. Every assistant ought, 1. To “see that the other preachers behave well.” But who has sent me word, whether they did or no? 2. “To visit the classes, regulate the bands, and deliver tickets quarterly.” How few have done this? 3. Love-feasts for the bands have been neglected. 4. Nor have persons been regularly taken in, and put out of the bands. 5. I fear, many of the quarterly meetings are formal, not spiritual. 6. The societies are not half supplied with books, not even with Kempis, Instructions for Children and Primitive Physic, which ought to be in every house. And why should not each of you do like William Pennington? Carry books with you through every round: exert yourselves in this. Be not ashamed. Be not weary. Leave no stone unturned. 7. How few accounts have I had, either of remarkable deaths, or remarkable conversions? 8. How few exact lists have we received of the societies? Take more time, and more pains in preparing them. 9. Who of you has met the married and single men and women once a quarter, even in the largest societies? 10. You have not provided a private room every where for the preacher: nor a bed to himself: neither the library, for want of which, some still read trash. Till this can be done, let there be immediately in every place, at least the Notes and the tract on Original Sin.

Q. 41. Are there any other advices which you would give the assistants?

A. Several. 1. Take a regular catalogue of your societies, as they live, in house-row. 2. Leave your successor a particular account of the state of the circuit. 3. See that every band-leader have the rules of them. 4. Vigorously, but calmly, inforce the rules concerning ruffles, drams, snuff, and tobacco. When any person is admitted into the society, even good breeding requires him to conform to the rules of that society. The same you should inforce in Scotland as England. The Scots will hear reason as well as the English. 5. As soon as there are four men or women believers in any place, put them into a band. 6. Every where insist on decency and cleanliness. Tell them cleanliness is next to godliness. 7. Suffer no love feast to last above an hour and half; let not one duty interfere with another, and stop all breaking the cake with one another. That silly custom was introduced by James Wheatley, and creates much confusion. And, 9. inform all the people from time to time, that none should remove from one society to another, without a sufficient reason; and that those who desire to remove are to acquaint you with their reasons, and to have a certificate in these words (else they will not be received in other societies.) “A. B. the bearer, is a member of our society in M――, I believe he has a sufficient cause for removing.” 10. In every place, exhort those who were brought up in the church to continue therein. And in visiting the classes, ask every one, “Do you go to church as often as ever you did?” Set the example yourself: and immediately alter every plan that interferes therewith: so that every preacher may attend the church, at least two Sundays out of four.

Is there not a cause? Are we not unawares by little and little sliding into a separation from the church? O remove every tendency thereto with all diligence. 1. Let all our preachers go to church. 2. Let all the people go constantly; and, 3. Receive the sacrament at every opportunity. 4. Warn all against niceness in hearing, a great and prevailing evil. 5. Warn them also against despising the prayers of the church. 6. Against calling our society a church or the church. 7. Against calling our preachers ministers, our houses meeting houses, (call them plain preaching houses.) 8. Do not license them as such: the proper form of a petition to the judge or justice is, “A. B. desires to have his house in C――, licensed for public worship.” 9. Do not license yourself till you are constrained, and then not as a Dissenter, but a Methodist preacher. It is time enough when you are prosecuted, to take the oaths. And by so doing you are licensed.

Q. 42. But are we not Dissenters?

A. We are irregular, 1. By calling sinners to repentance, in all places of God’s dominion. 2. By frequently using extemporary prayer. Yet we are not Dissenters in the only sense which our law acknowledges: namely, persons who believe it is sinful to attend the service of the church: for we do attend it at all opportunities. We will not, dare not separate from the church, for the reasons given several years ago. We are not Seceders, nor do we bear any resemblance to them. We set out upon quite opposite principles. The Seceders laid the very foundation of their work in judging and condemning others. We laid the foundation of our work, in judging and condemning ourselves. They begin every where, with shewing their hearers, how fallen the church and ministers are. We begin every where, with shewing our hearers, how fallen they are themselves.

And as we are not dissenters from the church now, so we will do nothing, willingly, which tends to a separation from it. Therefore let every assistant immediately so order his circuit, that no preacher may be hindered from attending the church, more than two Sundays in the month. Never make light of going to church, either by word or deed. Remember Mr. Hook, a very eminent and zealous papist. When I asked him, “Sir, What do you for public worship here, where you have no Romish ♦service?” He answered, “Sir, I am so fully convinced, it is the duty of every man to worship God in public, that I go to church every Sunday. If I cannot have such worship as I would, I will have such worship as I can.”

But some may say, “Our own service is public worship.” Yes, in a sense: but not such as supercedes the church service. We never designed it should: we have an hundred times professed the contrary. It pre-supposes public prayer, like the sermons at the university. Therefore I have over and over advised, “use no long prayer, either before or after sermon.” Therefore I myself frequently use only a collect, and never inlarge in prayer, unless at intercession, or on a watch-night, or on some extraordinary occasion.

If it were designed to be instead of church service it would be essentially defective. For it seldom has the four grand parts of public prayer. Deprecation, petition, intercession and thanksgiving. Neither is it, even on the Lord’s day, concluded with the Lord’s supper.

The hour for it on that day, unless where there is some peculiar reason for a variation, should be five in the morning as well as in the evening. Why should we make God’s day the shortest of the seven?

But if the people put ours in the room of the church service, we hurt them that stay with us, and ruin them that leave us. For then they will go no where but lounge the sabbath away, without any public worship at all.

I advise therefore all the Methodists in England and Ireland, who have been brought up in the church, constantly to attend the service of the church, at least every Lord’s day.

Q. 43. Are all our preachers merciful to their beasts?

A. Perhaps not. Every one ought, not only to ride it moderately, but also to see with his own eyes his horse rubbed, fed and bedded.

* Q. 44. Do we sufficiently watch over our helpers?

A. We might consider those that are with us as our pupils: into whose behaviour and studies we should therefore make a particular enquiry every day.

Should we not frequently ask each, Do you walk closely with God? Have you now fellowship with the Father and the Son? At what hour do you rise? Do you punctually observe the morning and evening hour of retirement? Do you spend the day in the manner which we advise? Do you read the books we advise, and no other? Do you fast as often as your health will permit? Do you converse seriously, usefully and closely? Do you pray before, and have you a determinate end in every conversation?

To be more particular:

Do you use all the means of grace yourself, and inforce the use of them on all persons?

They are either instituted or prudential.

I. The instituted are,

1st, Prayer; private, family, public: consisting of deprecation, petition, intercession, thanksgiving.

Do you use each of these constantly (at set times) and fervently?

Do you use private prayer every morning and evening? If you are your own master, at five in the evening, and the hour before or after morning preaching?

Do you forecast wherever you are, how to secure these hours?

Do you avow it every where?

Are you resolute herein?

Do you call your family together at five?

Do you ask every where, 1. Have you family prayer? 2. Do you retire at five o’clock?

II. Searching the scripture, by,

1. Reading: constantly, some part of every day, and at all vacant hours; regularly, all the new Testament (at least) and the Lessons for Children in order; carefully, with the Notes, seriously, deliberately, with much prayer preceding, accompanying and following: fruitfully, immediately practising what you learn there?

What other books do you read? Is it wise to read any, till you have read our tracts, and the Christian Library?

Do you give the morning to reading, writing and prayer?

2. Meditating: at set times? How? By bishop Hall’s, or Mr. Baxter’s rule? How long?

3. Hearing: constantly? Every morning?

Humbly? Uncritically, devoutly?

Carefully? With prayer before, at, after?

Fruitfully? Immediately putting in practice?

Have you a new Testament always in your pocket?

(See that the Notes are in every society. Explain them to the congregation.)

III. The Lord’s supper. Do you use this,

At every opportunity? With due preparation?

That is, with solemn prayer? With careful self-examination? With deep repentance suited thereto? With earnest and deliberate self-devotion?

Do you in communicating discern the Lord’s body?

Do you afterward retire, not formally, but in earnest?

IV. Fasting: God led us to this at Oxford. And he led all of you to it, when you first set out.

How often do you fast now? Every Friday? In what degree?

V. Christian conference.

Are we convinced, how important, and how difficult it is to order our conversation right?

Is it always in grace? Seasoned with salt? Meet to minister grace to the hearers?

Do we not converse too long at a time? Is not an hour at a time commonly enough?

Would it not be well to plan our conversation beforehand? To pray before and after it?

II. Prudential means we may use either as common Christians, as Methodists, as preachers, or as assistants.

1. As common Christians. What particular rules have you, for avoiding evil? Doing good? Growing in grace? What arts of holy living?

2. As Methodists; Do you never miss any meeting of the society? Neither your class, or band?

3. As preachers: Do you meet every society weekly? Also the leaders? And bands, if any?

Do you visit the sick? And the well? Instructing masters and parents? And in all relative duties?

4. As assistants: Do you fill up and regulate the bands wherever you come? Diligently enquire into the state of the books, and do all you can to propagate them? Keep watch-nights once a month? And love-feasts? With one twice a year, for all the society?

Do you visit every society once a quarter, and regulate all things therein?

Do you take a regular catalogue of your societies at least once a year?

Do you write me an account of all the defects of the common preachers, which you cannot yourself cure?

These means may be used without fruit. But there are some means which cannot. Namely, watching, denying ourselves, taking up our cross, exercise of the presence of God.

1. Do we steadily watch against the world, the devil, ourselves? The besetting sin?

2. Do you deny yourselves every useless pleasure of sense? Imagination? Honour? Are you temperate in all things? To take one instance, in food? Do you use only that kind and that degree, which is best both for the body and soul? Do you see the necessity of this?

Do you eat no flesh suppers? No late suppers? These naturally tend to destroy bodily health.

Do you eat only three meals a day? If four, are you not an excellent pattern to the flock?

Do you take no more food than is necessary at each meal? You may know if you do, by a load at your stomach: by drowsiness, or heaviness, and in a while, by weak or bad nerves.

Do you use only that kind, and that degree of drink which is best both for your body and soul?

Do you drink water? Why not? Did you ever? Why did you leave it off? If not for health, when will you begin again? To day?

How often do you drink wine or ale? Every day? Do you want or waste it?

3. Wherein do you take up your cross daily? Do you chearfully bear your cross (whatever is grievous to nature) as a gift of God, and labour to profit thereby?

4. Do you endeavour to set God always before you? To see his eye continually fixt upon you? Never can you use these means, but a blessing will ensue. And the more you use them, the more will you “grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Q. 45. What can be done in order to a closer union of our helpers with each other?

A. 1. Let them be deeply convinced of the want there is of it at present, and the absolute necessity of it.

2. Let them pray for an earnest desire of union.

3. Let them speak freely to each other.

4. When they meet, let them never part without prayer.

5. Let them beware how they despise each other’s gifts.

6. Let them never speak slightingly of each other in any kind.

7. Let them defend one another’s characters in every thing, to the utmost of their power: And

8. Let them labour in honour each to prefer the other before himself.

Q. 46. How shall we avoid popularity? We mean such esteem or love from the people, as is not for the glory of God?

A. 1. Earnestly pray for a piercing sense of the danger there is, and the sinfulness of it.

2. Take care how you ingratiate yourself with any people, by slackness of discipline:

3. Or by any method which another preacher cannot follow.

4. Warn the people among whom you are most, of esteeming or loving you too much.

5. Converse sparingly with those who are particularly fond of you.

Q. 47. How often should our helpers preach?

A. Not more than twice a day, unless on a Sunday, or some extraordinary occasion.

Q. 48. Which is the best general method of preaching.

A. 1. To invite. 2. To convince. 3. To offer Christ. 4. To build up: and to do this in some measure in every sermon.

Q. 49. Are there any smaller advices relating to preaching, which might be of use to us?

A. Perhaps these, 1. Be sure to begin and end, precisely at the time appointed.

2. Endeavour to be serious, weighty, and solemn in your whole deportment before the congregation.

3. Always suit your subject to the audience.

4. Choose the plainest texts you can.

5. Take care not to ramble from your text, but keep close to it, and make out from it what you take in hand.

6. Beware of allegorizing or spiritualizing too much.

7. Take care of any thing aukward or affected, either in your phrase, gesture or pronunciation.

8. Tell each other, if you observe any thing of this kind.

9. Sing no hymns of your own composing.

10. Without a pressing reason, do not pray above eight or ten minutes (at most) without intermission.

11. It would be well for every young preacher, frequently to exhort, without taking any text: and for every one, young or old, frequently to read and inlarge upon a portion of the Notes.

Q. 50. What sermons do we find by experience to be attended with the greatest blessing?

A. 1. Such as are most close, convincing, searching. 2. Such as have most of Christ. 3. Such as urge the heinousness of mens living in contempt or ignorance of him.

Q. 51. But have not some of us been led off from practical preaching, by (what was called) preaching Christ?

A. Indeed we have. The most effectual way of preaching Christ, is to preach him in all his offices, and to declare his law, as well as his gospel, both to believers and unbelievers.

Q. 52. Do we now all preach strongly and closely, concerning both inward and outward holiness?

A. It would be well, if we were more frequently and more largely to insist upon it in all its branches.

Q. 53. Do we insist enough on practical religion in general? And in particular, on relative duties? Using the means of grace? Private prayer? Self-denial? Fasting? Seriousness?

A. It seems most of us have been wanting here. Let us take care to supply this defect for the future.

Q. 54. How shall we be assured that no preacher will ever disappoint a congregation?

A. Ask every one, 1. Do you see the great sin, and fatal consequences of it? 2. Will you break a limb rather than wilfully break your word herein? 3. If you do, can you blame us, for not employing you any more?

Q. 55. How shall we guard against formality in public worship? Particularly in singing?

A. 1. By preaching frequently on that head. 2. By taking care to speak only what we feel. 3. By choosing such hymns as are proper for the congregation; generally hymns of prayer or praise, rather than descriptive of particular states. 4. By not singing too much at once; seldom more than five or six verses: 5. By suiting the tune to the nature of the hymn: 6. By often stopping short and asking the people, “Now! Do you know what you said last? Did you speak no more than you felt? Did you sing it as unto the Lord; with the spirit and with the understanding also?”

Q. 56. What can be done to make the people sing true?

A. 1. Learn to sing true yourselves. 2. Recommend the tunes every where. 3. If a preacher cannot sing himself, let him choose two or three persons in every place to pitch the tune for him.

Q. 57. What is it best to take just after preaching?

A. Lemonade; candied orange peel, or a little soft, warm ale. But egg and wine is downright poison.

Q. 58. How shall we try those who think they are moved by the Holy Ghost to preach?

A. Inquire, 1. Do they know God as a pardoning God? Have they the love of God abiding in them? Do they desire and seek nothing but God? And are they holy in all manner of conversation? 2. Have they gifts (as well as grace) for the work? Have they (in some tolerable degree) a clear, sound understanding? Have they a right judgment in the things of God? Have they a just conception of salvation by faith? And has God given them any degree of utterance? Do they speak justly, readily, clearly? 3. Have they fruit? Are any truly convinced of sin and converted to God by their preaching?

As long as these three marks concur in any one, we believe he is called of God to preach. These we receive as sufficient proof, that he is moved thereto by the Holy Ghost.

Q. 59. But how shall we know, whether they concur or not, in any particular person?

A. 1. If he is near us, we will talk with him on the preceding heads and hear him preach.

2. We will desire him to write down or relate the reasons, why he thinks he is called of God thereto.

3. We will examine those who seem to be convinced of sin, or converted to God by his preaching.

4. If he is at a distance, we will desire the assistant to do this: and to inquire, what is the judgment of his brethren concerning him.

Q. 60. What method may we use in receiving a new helper;

A. A proper time for doing this, is at a conference after solemn fasting and prayer.

Every person to be admitted is then to be present, and each of them may be asked,

* “A. B. Have you faith in Christ? Are you going on to perfection? Do you expect to be perfected in love in this life? Are you groaning after it? Are you resolved to devote yourself wholly to God and his work? Do you know the Methodist-plan? Have you read the plain account? The appeals? Do you know the rules of the society? Of the bands? Do you keep them? Do you take no snuff? Tobacco? Drams? Do you constantly attend the church and sacrament? Have you read the minutes? Are you willing to conform to them? Have you considered the twelve rules of a helper? Especially the first, tenth, and twelfth? Will you keep them for conscience-sake? Are you determined to employ all your time in the work of God? Will you preach every morning and evening? Endeavouring not to speak too long (an hour in the whole) or too loud? Not lolling with your elbows? Have you read the rules of action and utterance? Will you meet the society, the bands, the select society, and the leaders in every place? Will you diligently and earnestly instruct the children, and visit from house to house? Will you recommend fasting, both by precept and example?”

We may then receive him as a probationer, by giving him the minutes of the conference inscribed thus,

To A. B.

“You think it your duty to call sinners to repentance. Make full proof hereof, and we shall rejoice to receive you as a fellow-labourer.

“Observe, You are not to ramble up and down, but to go where the assistant directs, and there only.”

Let him then read and carefully weigh what is contained therein, and see whether he can agree to them, or not.

If he can, let him come to the next conference; where, after examination, fasting and prayer, he may be received into full connection with us, by giving him the minutes inscribed thus:

“So long as you freely consent to, and earnestly endeavour to walk by these rules, we shall rejoice to acknowledge you as a fellow-labourer.”

Mean time, let none exhort in any of our societies without a note of permission from the assistant. Let every exhorter take care to have this renewed yearly. And let every assistant rigorously insist upon it.

Q. 61. How can we provide for worn-out preachers?

A. Those that can preach a little may be supernumerary preachers where there is most need. As for those who cannot preach at all.

1. Let every travelling preacher contribute half a guinea yearly at the conference.

2. Let every one when first received as a travelling preacher, pay one guinea.

3. Let this be lodged in the hands of the stewards approved of by the majority of the preachers.

4. The present stewards are Joseph Cownly and John Murlin.

5. Out of this let provision be made, first for the worn-out preachers, then for the widows and children of those that are dead.

6. Every worn-out preacher shall receive at least ten pounds a year.

7. Every widow of a preacher shall receive yearly during her widowhood, (if she wants it) a sum not exceeding ten pounds.

8. Every child left by a preacher shall receive once for all, a sum not usually exceeding ten pounds.

9. But none is intitled to any thing from this fund, till he has subscribed two guineas.

10. Nor any person from the time he ceases (unless worn-out) to be a travelling preacher:

11. Nor any who neglects paying his subscription for four years together.

12. Let every preacher, who does not bring or send his subscription to the conference, be fined two shillings and sixpence.

13. This fund is never to be reduced to less than an hundred pounds.

14. Let a committee be chosen to see these rules duly executed. The present committee are

Peter Jaco, John Pawson, Duncan Wright, Daniel Bumstead, Thomas Hanby, Thomas Olivers, Robert Roberts, John Helton, Alexander Mather, Christopher Hopper, Thomas Johnson.

15. Let an exact account of all receipts and disbursements be produced at the conference.

Q. 62. How may the wives of the travelling preachers be provided for?

A. If a preacher marries hand-over head, he must provide for himself. As to the rest, we cannot but observe many inconveniencies have arisen, from the present method of providing for the wives of the preachers. Those who are most proper for several places, cannot be sent thither because they are married. And if they are sent, the people look upon them with an evil eye, because they are burdened by their families. In order to remedy these inconveniencies, let it be considered, 1. What each circuit can contribute: 2. How many wives are to be provided for: (their children are provided for where they are.) 3. By what circuits? By this means whether the preachers in any particular circuit are married or single, it makes no difference: so that any preacher may be sent to any circuit without any difficulty.

Q. 63. How many circuits are there now?

A. Four and thirty in England, ten in Ireland, three in Wales, two in Scotland, and three in America.

Q. 64. Are our preaching-houses safe?

A. Not all: for some of them are not settled on trustees. Several of the trustees for others are dead.

Q. 65. What then is it to be done?

A. 1. Let the surviving trustees choose others without delay. 2. Let those who have debts on any of the houses, give a bond to settle them, as soon as their debt is paid.

Q. 66. In what form may an house be settled?

A. In the following:

“This indenture made between B. Heap, of Manchester, in the county of on the one part, and Thomas Philips, hatter, &c. on the other part, witnesseth, that in consideration of five shillings, lawful money of Great-Britain, by the said T. P. ♦to the said B. H. truly paid, before the sealing and delivery hereof (the receit whereof the said B. H. doth hereby acknowledge) and for divers other considerations him thereunto moving, the said B. H. hath granted, bargained and sold; and by these presents doth grant, bargain and sell unto the said T. P. &c. their heirs and assigns for ever, all that lately erected house or tenement, with the yard thereunto adjoining, situate near the upper end of Market-street Lane, in Manchester aforesaid, now in the tenure or occupation of T. Woolfinden, together with all the ways, drains, walls, and privileges to the said premises, or any part thereof appertaining, as the same were purchased of S. Hope, of Manchester aforesaid, bricklayer, before the said house or tenement was built; and all the profits thereof, and all the right, title, and interest, in law and equity. To have and to hold the said house or tenement, yard and other premises, to the said T. P. &c. their heirs, and assigns for ever: nevertheless upon special trust and confidence, and to the intent, that they and the survivors of them, and the trustees for the time being, do and shall permit J. Wesley, late of Lincoln College, Oxford, clerk, and such other persons as he shall from time to time appoint, and at all times, during his natural life, and no other persons, to have and enjoy the free use and benefit of the said premises; that the said J. Wesley, and such other persons as he appoints, may therein preach and expound God’s holy word: and after his decease, upon farther trust and confidence, and to the intent that the said trustees and the survivors of them, and the trustees for the time being, do and shall permit Charles Wesley, late of Christ Church College, Oxford, clerk, and such other persons as he shall from time to time appoint, during his life, and no others, to have and enjoy the said premises for the purposes aforesaid: and after his decease, upon farther trust and confidence, and to the intent that the said T. P. &c. or the major part of them, or the survivors of them, and the major part of the trustees of the said premises, for the time being, shall from time to time, and at all times for ever thereafter, permit such persons as shall be appointed at the yearly conference of the people called Methodists, in London, Bristol or Leeds, and no others, to have and enjoy the said premises, for the purposes aforesaid: Provided always, that the said persons preach no other doctrine than is contained in Mr. W.’s notes upon the New Testament, and four volumes of sermons: provided also, that they preach in the said house at least one evening in every week, and at five o’clock on each morning following: and upon farther trust and confidence, that as often as any of these trustees, or of the trustees for the time being shall die, or cease to be a member of the society, commonly called Methodists, the rest of the said trustees, or of the trustees for the time being, as soon as conveniently may be, shall and may choose another trustee, or trustees, in order to keep up the number of nine trustees for ever. In witness whereof the said B. H. hath hereunto set his hand and seal the day and year first above written.”

In this form the first proprietors of the house are to make it over to five, seven or nine trustees.

Q. 67. But is this form a safe one? Should we not have the opinion of a council upon it?

A. I think this would be throwing money away 1. Because this form was drawn up by three eminent counsellors: but, 2. It is the way of almost every lawyer, to blame what another has done. Therefore you cannot at all infer, that they think a thing wrong because they say so. 3. If they did in reality think it wrong, this would not prove that it was so. 4. If there was (which I do not believe) some defect therein, who would go to law with the body of Methodists? 5. And if they did, would any court in England put them out of possession? Especially when the intent of the deed was plain and undeniable.

Q. 68. Is any thing farther advisable with regard to building?

A. 1. Build all preaching houses, if the ground will admit, in the octagon form. It is best for the voice, and on many accounts more commodious than any other. 2. Let the roof rise only one third of the breadth: this is the true proportion. 3. Have enough windows and doors; and let all the windows be sashed, opening downward. 4. Let there be no tub-pulpit; but a square projection, with a long seat behind. 5. Let there be no backs to the seats, which should have isles on each side, and be parted in the middle by a rail running all along, to divide the men from the women.

Q. 69. Is there nay exception to the rule, “Let the men and women sit apart?”

A. In those galleries where they have always sat together, they may do so still. But let them sit apart every where below, and in all new-erected galleries.

Q. 70. What can be done, to make the Methodists sensible of the excellency of Kingswood school?

A. I. Let every assistant read the following account of it yearly in every society. II. Let every preacher earnestly exhort all parents, that are able to send their children thither, and be at the pains to answer all their objections, and refute all the lies they may have heard about it.

1. The wisdom and love of God have now thrust out a large number of labourers into his harvest; men who desire nothing on earth but to promote the glory of God, to save their own souls, and them that hear them. And those to whom they minister spiritual things, willingly minister to them of their carnal things; so that they have food to eat and raiment to put on, and are content therewith.

2. A competent provision is likewise made for the wives of married preachers. These also lack nothing; having a weekly allowance, over and above for their little children; so that neither they nor their husbands need be careful about many things, but may wait upon the Lord without distraction.

3. Yet one considerable difficulty lies on those who have boys, when they grow too big to be under their mother’s direction. Having no father to govern and instruct them, they are exposed to a thousand temptations. To remedy this, we have a school on purpose for them, wherein they have all the instruction they are capable of, together with all things needful for the body, clothes only excepted. And it may be, if God prosper this labour of love, they will have these too shortly.

4. In whatever view we look upon this, it is one of the noblest charities that can be conceived. How reasonable is the institution? Is it fit that the children of those who leave wife, home, and all that is dear, to save souls from death, should want what is needful either for soul or body? Ought not we to supply what the parent cannot, because of his labours in the gospel? How excellent are the effects of this institution? The preacher eased of this weight, can the more chearfully go on in his labour. And perhaps many of these children may hereafter fill up the place of those that shall rest from their labours.

5. It is not strange therefore, considering the excellence of this design, that Satan should have taken much pains to defeat it: particularly by lies of every kind, which were plentifully invented and handed about for several years. But truth now prevails, and its adversaries are put to silence. It is well known that the children want nothing; that they scarce know what sickness means; that they are well instructed in whatever they are capable of learning; that they are carefully and tenderly governed; and that the behaviour of all in the house, elder and younger is as becomth the gospel of Christ.

6. But the expence of such an undertaking is very large; so that although we have at present but thirteen or fourteen poor children, we are continually running behind, notwithstanding the yearly subscription made at London and Bristol. The best means we could think of at our late conference to supply the deficiency is once a year to desire the assistance of all those in every place who wish well to the work of God; all who long to see sinners converted to God, and the kingdom of Christ set up in all the earth.

7. All of you, who are thus minded, have an opportunity now of shewing your love to the gospel. Now promote, as far as in you lies, one of the noblest charities in the world. Now forward, as you are able, one of the most excellent designs that ever was set on foot in this kingdom. Do what you can to comfort the parents, who give up their all for you, and to give their children cause to bless you. You will be no poorer for what you do on such an occasion. God is a good pay-master. And you know, in doing this you lend unto the Lord: in due time HE shall pay you again.

Q. 71. But how can we keep it out of debt, which never was done yet?

A. Let a collection be made for it the Sunday before or after Midsummer, in every preaching-house, great and small, throughout England, Scotland, and Ireland.

Q. 72. How may we raise a General fund?

A. By a yearly subscription to be proposed by every assistant when he visits the classes at Christmas, and received at the visitation following.

To this end he may then read and enlarge upon the following hints in every society.

1. Within these twelve or fifteen years several of our brethren in various parts, having no room which would contain the congregation, by the advice of the preachers have built houses for preaching, capable of containing the usual number of hearers: but this has necessarily involved them in large debts. Their debt at Halifax, for instance, amounted two or three years ago to two hundred pounds: that at Leeds to more than three hundred pounds: that at Manchester to three hundred and fifty pounds: that at Liverpool to four hundred pounds. So that the whole debt contracted by building was, I apprehend, little short of four thousand pounds. This the societies to whom those houses belong, are by no means able to pay: but the whole body of Methodists joining together can do it without inconvenience. Only let them chearfully exert on so pressing an occasion the ability which God hath given them.

2. But there is a greater difficulty than this. Where there are houses, there are not preachers. Though the harvest is plenteous, the labourers are few. And what can we do for supply? We cannot purchase them for money: we cannot hire, or make them. God alone can do this. And he has in some measure done it already. In several parts of England there are local preachers, who have both gifts and graces equal to those of most itinerants. “Why then do they not travel?” They are willing so to do: but they are afraid of bringing a scandal upon the gospel; because, they have contracted debts, which, though very small, they are not yet able to pay. So they are bound hand and foot: but shall we suffer this? Shall we not set them at liberty? We cannot buy a preacher for ten thousand pounds: but we may release one for ten or twelve. Can any money be better bestowed? Let us, in the name of God, send these labourers into his harvest? Men who desire only to give their bodies, souls, time, all, for him that was given for us.

3. But still how shall we send them into those parts, where they are most of all wanted? Suppose the northwest of Ireland, and the north of Scotland? Many are willing to hear: but not to bear the expence. Nor can it as yet be expected of them: stay till the word of God has touched their hearts, and then they will gladly provide for them that preach it. Does it not lie upon us, in the mean time, to supply their lack of service? To raise a general fund, out of which from time to time that expence may be defrayed? By this means, those who willingly offer themselves may travel thro’ every part, whether there are societies or not, and stay wherever there is a call, without being burdensom to any. Thus may the gospel, in the life and power thereof, be spread from sea to sea. Which of you will not rejoice to throw in your mite to promote this glorious work?

4. It is true, when want of money to defray the expence is removed, another hindrance will often arise. Satan will stir up his trusty servants, to fight lest his kingdom be destroyed. But is there no way to quell riotous mobs, even when magistrates will not do their duty? There is one and only one way: move the king’s-bench for an information against them. This is a way which has never failed us yet: no, not in a single instance. The only objection is the expence. A suit in the king’s bench usually costs fifty or sixty pounds. But if we all join hand and heart together, cannot we make this easy too? Cannot we raise a common stock, which shall suffice for this as well as for the preceding purposes? By the blessing of God we can. And who would not gladly contribute toward it?

5. Let then every member of our society in England; once a year, set his shoulder to the work; contributing more or less as God has prospered him, at the Lady-day visitation of the classes. Let none be excluded from giving something, be it a penny, a half-penny, a farthing. Remember the widow’s two mites! And yet those who are able to give shillings, crowns, and pounds, do it willingly. The money contributed will be brought to Leeds, Bristol, or London, at the ensuing conference. Two-thirds of it at least will be allotted for those public debts which call the loudest. The rest will be partly employed in setting at liberty such local preachers as are tied down by small debts: partly reserved for propagating the gospel, where there are none to bear the expences of the preacher.

6. Men and brethren, help! Was there ever a call like this, since you first heard the gospel-sound? Help to relieve your companions in the kingdom of Jesus, who are prest above measure. “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.” Help to send forth able, willing labourers into your Lord’s harvest: so shall ye be assistant in saving souls from death, and hiding a multitude of sins. Help to spread the gospel of your salvation into the remotest corners of the kingdom, till “the knowledge of our Lord shall cover the land, as the waters cover the sea.” Help to deliver the poor out of the hand of the oppressor, to procure them the blessings which we enjoy: so shall it appear to ourselves, and all men, that we are indeed one body, united by one spirit: so shall the baptized Heathens be yet again constrained to say, “See how these Christians love one another.”

The money received is to be brought by the assistants to the next conference.

Q. 73. But notwithstanding all that has been contributed and paid, we are still six thousand nine hundred and fifty eight pounds in debt. So that we gain no ground. What can be done? How can we prevent the increase of debt?

A. By putting an absolute stop to all building for the ensuing year. Let no new house be built, no addition or alteration made in any old one, unless the proposers thereof can and will defray the whole expence of it.

Q. 74. What can be done in order to pay the old debt?

A. 1. Give a note to each assistant, specifying the debts, toward which the money collected in each circuit next year is to be paid.

2. Let each assistant encourage the people in each place, like those in Birmingham, to make a push toward paying off their own debt.

3. Let whatever is contributed in any single place, which is in debt, pay that as far as it will go.

But even this method being found ineffectual, it was agreed at the conference in 1771. To change the yearly subscription into a weekly one.

Q. 75. What is the safest way of leaving a legacy for any charitable purpose?

A. To leave it absolutely to a person they can confide in.

Q. 76. What is the method wherein we usually proceed in our conferences?

A. We inquire

1. What preachers are admitted?

Who remain on trial?

Who are admitted on trial? And

Who desist from travelling?

2. Who act as assistants this year?

3. Are there any objections to any of the preachers? (who are named one by one.)

4. How are the preachers stationed this year?

5. What numbers are in the society?

6. What is the Kingswood collection?

7. What is contributed towards the debt?

8. How was this expended?

9. What is contributed toward the preachers fund?

10. What demands are there upon it?

11. How many preachers wives are to be provided for?

12. By what societies?

13. Where and when may our next conference begin?

* Q. 77. What power is it which you exercise over both preachers and people?

A. Count Zinzendorff loved to keep all things close. I love to do all things openly. I will therefore tell you all I know of the matter, taking it from the very beginning.

1. In November 1738, two or three persons, who desired to flee from the wrath to come, and then seven or eight more came to me in London, and desired me to advise and pray with them. I said, “If you will meet on Thursday night, I will help you as well as I can.” More and more then desired to meet with them, till they were increased to many hundreds. The case was afterwards the same at Bristol, Kingswood, Newcastle, and many other parts of England, Scotland, and Ireland. It may be observed the desire was on their part, not mine. My desire was to live and die in retirement. But I did not see that I could refuse them my help, and be guiltless before God.

Here commenced my power, namely, a power to appoint when, and where, and how they should meet: and to remove those whose lives shewed, that they had no desire to flee from the wrath to come. And this power remained the same, whether the people meeting together were twelve, twelve hundred, or twelve thousand.

2. In a few days some of them said, “Sir, we will not sit under you for nothing. We will subscribe quarterly.” I said, “I will have nothing, for I want nothing. My fellowship supplies me with all, and more than I want.” One replied, “Nay, but you want one hundred and fifteen pounds to pay for the lease of the Foundery. And likewise a large sum of money will be wanting to put it in repair.” On this consideration I suffered them to subscribe. And when the society met, I asked, “Who will take the trouble of receiving this money, and paying it where it is needful?” One said, “I will do it, and keep the account for you.” So here was the first steward. Afterwards I desired one or two more to help me as stewards, and in process of time a greater number.

Let it be remarked, it was I myself, not the people, who chose these stewards, and appointed to each the distinct work wherein he was to help me, as long as I desired. And herein I began to exercise another sort of power, namely, that of appointing and removing stewards.

3. After a time a young man came, T. Maxfield, and said he desired to help me as a son in the gospel. Soon after came a second, Thomas Richards, and a third, Thomas Westel. These severally desired to serve me as sons, and to labour when and where I should direct. Observe, These likewise desired me, not I them. But I durst not refuse the assistance. And here commenced my power, to appoint each of these, when, where and how to labour; that is, while he chose to continue with me: for each had a power to go away when he pleased: as I had also to go away from them, or any of them, if I saw sufficient cause. The case continued the same, when the number of preachers increased. I had just the same power still, to appoint when, and where, and how each should help me, and to tell any, if I saw cause, “I do not desire your help any longer.” On these terms, and no other, we joined at first: on these we continue joined. But they do me no favour in being directed by me. It is true, “My reward is with the Lord.” But at present I have nothing from it but trouble and care, and often a burden I scarce know how to bear.

4. In 1744 I wrote to several clergymen, and to all who then served me as sons in the gospel, desiring them to meet me in London, to give me their advice concerning the best method of carrying on the work of God. They did not desire this meeting, but I did, knowing that in a multitude of counsellors there is safety. And when their number increased, so that ♦it was neither needful nor convenient to invite them all, for several years I wrote to those with whom I desired to confer, and these only met at the place appointed; till at length I gave a general permission, that all who desired it might come.

Observe, I myself sent for these of my own free choice; and I sent for them to advise, not govern me. Neither did I at any of those times divest myself of any part of that power above described, which the providence of God had cast upon me, without any design or choice of mine.

What is that power? It is a power of admitting into and excluding from the societies under my care; of choosing and removing stewards, of receiving or not receiving helpers; of appointing them when, where and how to help me; and of desiring any of them to meet me when I see good. And as it was merely in obedience to the providence of God, and for the good of the people, that I at first accepted this power, which I never sought, nay an hundred times laboured to throw off, so it is on the same considerations, not for profit, honour or pleasure, that I use it at this day.

5. But several gentlemen are much offended at my having so much power. My answer to them is this.

I did not seek any part of this power: it came upon me unawares. But when it was come, not daring to bury that talent, I used it to the best of my judgment.

Yet I never was fond of it. I always did, and do now bear it as my burden: the burden which God lays upon me, and therefore I dare not yet lay it down.

But if you can tell me any one, or any five men, to whom I may transfer this burden, who can and will do just what I do now, I will heartily thank both them and you.

6. But some of our helpers say, “This is shackling freeborn Englishmen;” and demand a free conference; that is, a meeting of all the preachers, wherein all things shall be determined by most votes.

I answer: it is possible after my death something of this kind may take place. But not while I live. To me the preachers have engaged themselves to submit, to “serve me as sons in the gospel.” But they are not thus engaged to any man, or number of men besides. To me the people in general will submit. But they will not yet submit to any other.

It is nonsense then to call my using this power, “Shackling freeborn Englishmen.” None needs to submit to it unless he will: so there is no shackling in the case. Every preacher, and every member, may leave me when he pleases. But while he chooses to stay, it is on the same terms that he joined me at first.

“But this is arbitrary power; this is no less than making yourself a Pope.”

If by arbitrary power you mean a power which I exercise single, without any collegues therein, this is certainly true: but I see no hurt in it. Arbitrary in this sense is a very harmless word. If you mean, unjust, unreasonable, or tyrannical, then it is not true.

As to the other branch of the charge, it carries no face of truth. The Pope affirms that every Christian must do all he bids, and believe all he says, under pain of damnation. I never affirmed any thing that bears any, the most distant resemblance to this. All I affirm is, “The preachers who choose to labour with me, choose to serve me as sons in the gospel.” And “the people who choose to be under my care, choose to be so on the same terms they were at first.”

Therefore all talk of this kind is highly injurious to me, who bear this burden merely for your sakes. And it is exceeding mischievous to the people, tending to confound their understandings, and to fill their hearts with evil-surmisings and unkind tempers towards me: to whom they really owe more, for taking all this load upon me, for exercising this very power, for shakling myself in this manner, than for all my preaching put together. Preaching twice or thrice a day is no burden to me at all; but the care of all the preachers and all the people, is a burden indeed!

Q. 78. What can be done in order to the future union of the Methodists?

A. On Friday, August 4, 1769, Mr. Wesley read in the conference the following paper.

1. IT has long been my desire, that all those ministers of our church, who believe and preach salvation by faith, might cordially agree between themselves, and not hinder, but help one another. After occasionally pressing this in private conversation, wherever I had opportunity, I wrote down my thoughts upon this head, and sent them to each in a letter. Out of fifty or sixty to whom I wrote, only three vouchsafed me an answer. So I gave this up. I can do no more. They are a rope of sand; and such they will continue.

2. But it is otherwise with the travelling preachers in our connection: you are at present one body. You act in concert with each other, and by united counsels. And now is the time to consider what can be done, in order to continue this union? Indeed, as long as I live, there will be no great difficulty: I am, under God, a centre of union to all our travelling, as well as local preachers.

They all know me and my communication. They all love me for my work’s sake: and therefore, were it only out of regard to me, they will continue connected with each other. But by what means may this connection be preserved, when God removes me from you?

3. I take it for granted, it cannot be preserved, by any means, between those who have not a single eye. Those who aim at any thing but the glory of God, and the salvation of men: who desire, or seek any earthly thing, whether honour, profit, or ease, will not, cannot continue in the connection; it will not answer their design. Some of them, perhaps a fourth of the whole number, will procure preferment in the church. Others will turn independents, and get separate congregations, like John Edwards and Charles Skelton. Lay your accounts with this, and be not surprised if some you do not suspect be of this number.

4. But what method can be taken to preserve a firm union between these who choose to remain together?

Perhaps you might take some such steps as these:

On notice of my death, let all the preachers in England and Ireland, repair to London within six weeks.

Let them seek God by solemn fasting and prayer.

Let them draw up articles of agreement, to be signed by those who choose to act in concert.

Let those be dismissed who do not choose it, in the most friendly manner possible.

Let them choose, by votes, a committee of three, five, or seven, each of whom is to be moderator in his turn.

Let the committee do what I do now: propose preachers to be tried, admitted, or excluded: fix the place of each preacher for the ensuing year, and the time of the next conference.

5. Can any thing be done now, in order to lay a foundation for this future union? Would it not be well, for any that are willing, to sign some articles of agreement before God calls me hence? Suppose something like these:

“We, whose names are underwritten, being thoroughly convinced of the necessity of a close union between those whom God is pleased to use as instruments in this glorious work, in order to preserve this union between ourselves, are resolved, God being our helper.

“I. To devote ourselves entirely to God; denying ourselves, taking up our cross daily, steadily aiming at one thing, to save our own souls, and them that hear us.

“II. To preach the old Methodist doctrines, and no other, contained in the minutes of the conferences.

“III. To observe and enforce the whole Methodist discipline, laid down in the said minutes.”

Q. 79. What can be done in order to revive the work of God where it is decayed?

A. 1. See that no circuit be at any time without preachers. Therefore let no preacher, who does not attend the conference, leave the circuit at that time on any pretence whatever. This is the most improper time in the whole year. Let every assistant see to this, and require each of these to remain in the circuit till the new preachers come.

Let not all the preachers in any circuit come to the conference.

Let those who do come, set out as late as possible, and return as soon as possible.

2. Be more diligent in field-preaching. The want of preaching abroad, and of preaching in new places, has greatly damped the work of God.

3. Wherever we have a large preaching-house at one end of a great town, let us preach abroad at the other end of it, every Sunday morning at least.

4. Be more diligent in morning-preaching, wherever you can have twenty hearers.

5. Be more active in dispersing the books: particularly the sermon on the Good Steward, on In-being Sin, the Repentance of Believers, and the Scripture Way of Salvation. Every assistant may give away small tracts. And he may beg money of the rich to buy books for the poor.

6. Let every preacher strongly insist upon practical religion and relative duties: but in such a manner as to keep Christ continually in view.

7. Exhort the leaders of bands to speak to those with them in the closest manner possible.

8. Encourage all at the public meeting of the bands to speak with all openness and simplicity.

9. Let a fast be observed in all our societies on the last Friday in September, and on the Friday after New Year’s Day, after Lady-day, and after Midsummer-day.

10. Wherever you can, use intercession on Friday, and recommend fasting both by precept and example.

11. Be conscientiously exact in the whole Methodist discipline. And that you may understand it, read over carefully The plain account of the people called Methodists, and the several Minutes of the CONFERENCES.

12. Beware of formality in singing, or it will creep in upon us unawares. Is it not creeping in already, by those complex tunes, which it is scarce possible to sing with devotion? Such is “Praise ye the Lord ye blessed ones:” such the long quavering hallelujah annexed to the morning song-tune, which I defy any man living to sing devoutly. The repeating the same word so often, (but especially while another repeats different words, the horrid abuse which runs through the modern church music) as it shocks all common sense, so it necessarily brings in dead formality, and has no more of religion in it than a Lancashire hornpipe. Beside that, it is a flat contradiction to our Lord’s command, “Use not vain repetitions.” For what is vain repetition, if this is not? What end of devotion does it serve? Again, Do not suffer the people to sing too slow. This naturally tends to formality, and is brought in by those who have very strong, or very weak voices. Is it not possible, that all the Methodists in the nation should sing equally quick? Why should not the assistant see that they be taught to sing in every large society? And do this in such a manner, as to obviate the ill effects which might otherwise spring therefrom?

13. Which of us “fasts every Friday in the year?” Which of us fasts at all? Does not this shew the present temper of our minds, (though not of all) soft and unnerved? How then can we advance the work of God, though we may preach loud and long enough? Here is the root of the evil. Hence the work of God droops; few are convinced, few justified, few of our brethren sanctified! Hence more and more doubt, if we are to be sanctified at all till death: I mean sanctified throughout, saved from all sin, perfected in love. * That we may all speak the same thing, I ask once for all, Shall we defend this perfection or give it up? You all agree to defend it; meaning thereby, as we did from the beginning, salvation from all sin, by the love of God and our neighbour filling the heart. The Papists say, “This cannot be attained till we have been a sufficient time in purgatory.” The Dissenters say, “Nay, it will be attained as soon as the soul and body part.” The old Methodists said, “It may be attained before we die: a moment after is too late.” Is it so or no? You are all agreed, we may be saved from all sin before death. The substance then is settled. But as to the circumstance, is the change instantaneous or gradual? It is both one and the other. From the moment we are justified, there may be a gradual sanctification or a growing in grace, a daily advance in the knowledge and love of God. And if sin cease before death, there must in the nature of the thing be an instantaneous change. There must be a last moment wherein it does exist, and a first moment wherein it does not. But should we in preaching insist on both one and the other? Certainly we must insist on the gradual change; and that ♦earnestly and continually. And are there not reasons why we should insist on the instantaneous also? If there be such a blessed change before death, should we not encourage all believers to expect it? And the rather, because constant experience shews, the more earnestly they expect this, the more swiftly and steadily does the gradual work of God go on in their souls. The more watchful they are against all sin, the more careful to grow in grace, the more zealous of good works, and the more punctual in their attendance on all the ordinances of God: whereas just the contrary effects are observed, whenever this expectation ceases. They are saved by hope, by this hope of a total change saved with a gradually increasing salvation. Destroy this hope, and that salvation stands still; or rather decreases daily. Therefore whoever would advance the gradual change in believers, should strongly insist upon the instantaneous.

* 14. But how far from ♦entire sanctification are we still? The religion of the Methodists in general, is not internal, at least, not deep, universal, uniform; but superficial, partial, uneven. And what pains do we take to make it otherwise? Do we visit from house to house, according to the plan laid down in the minutes? Have you done this? Mr. Colley begun. But he is gone to paradise. And who has trod in his steps? What hinders? Want of time? Only (as William Pennington said) spend half the time in this visiting, which you spend in talking uselesly, and you will have time enough. Do this, particularly in confirming and building up believers. Then, and not till then, the work of the Lord will prosper in your hands.

15. But what can we do for the rising generation? Unless we can take care of these, the present revival of religion will be res unius ætatis: it will last only the age of a ♦man. Who will labour herein? Let him that is zealous for God and the souls of men begin now.

“1. Spend an hour a week with the children in every large town; whether you like it or no.

“2. Talk with them every time you see any at home.

“3. Pray in earnest for them.

“4. Diligently instruct and vehemently exhort all parents, at their own houses.

“5. Preach expresly on education, particularly at Midsummer, when you speak of Kingswood.”

* 16. Let every preacher read carefully over the life of Mr. Brainerd. Let us be followers of him, as he was of Christ, in absolute self-devotion, in total deadness to the world, and in fervent love to God and man. We want nothing but this. Then the world and the devil must fall under our feet.

17. 1. Let us keep to the church. Over and above all the reasons that were formerly given for this, we add another now from long experience, they that leave the church leave the Methodists. The clergy cannot separate us from our brethren, the dissenting ministers can and do. Therefore carefully avoid whatever has a tendency to separate men from the church. In particular, preaching at any hour which hinders them from going to it. Let every assistant look to this.

2. Let all the servants in our preaching-houses go to church on Sunday morning at least.

3. Let every preacher go always on Sunday morning, and when he can in the afternoon. God will bless those who go on week days too, as often as they have opportunity.

18. Take heed to your doctrine.

We said in 1744, “We have leaned too much toward Calvinism.” Wherein?

1. With regard to man’s faithfulness. Our Lord himself taught us to use the expression. And we ought never to be ashamed of it. We ought steadily to assert, on his authority, that if a man is not faithful in the unrighteous mammon, God will not give him the true riches.

2. With regard to working for life. This also our Lord has expresly commanded us. Labour—♦ἐργάζεσθε, literally, work for the meat that endureth to everlasting life. And in fact every believer, till he comes to glory, works for as well as from life.

3. We have received it as a maxim, that “a man is to do nothing, in order to justification:” nothing can be more false. Whoever desires to find favour with God, should cease from evil, and learn to do well. Whoever repents, should do works meet for repentance. And if this is not in order to find favour, what does he do them for?

Review the whole affair.

1. Who of us is now accepted of God?

He that now believes in Christ, with a loving obedient heart.

2. But who among those that never heard of Christ?

He that feareth God, and worketh righteousness, according to the light he has.

3. Is this the same with “he that is sincere?”

Nearly, if not quite.

4. Is not this “salvation by works?”

Not by the merit of works, but by works, as a condition.

5. What have we then been disputing about for these thirty years?

I am afraid, about words.

6. As to merit itself, of which we have been so dreadfully afraid: we are rewarded, according to our works, yea, because of our works. How does this differ from for the sake of our works? And how differs this from secundum merita operum? As our works deserve? Can you split this hair? I doubt, I cannot.

7. The grand objection to one of the preceding proportions, is drawn from matter of fact. God does in fact justify those, who by their own confession, neither feared God nor wrought righteousness. Is this an exception to the general rule?

It is a doubt, whether God makes any exception at all. But how are we sure, that the person in question never did fear God and work righteousness? His own saying so is not proof: For we know, how all that are convinced of sin, undervalue themselves in every respect.

8. Does not talking of a justified or a sanctified state, tend to mislead men? Almost naturally leading them to trust in what was done in one moment? Whereas we are every hour and every moment pleasing or displeasing to God, according to our works? according to the whole of our inward tempers, and our outward behaviour.

19. Lastly, We must needs visit from house to house, were it only to avoid idleness. I am afraid, we are idle still. Do we not loiter away many hours in every week? Try yourselves. Keep a diary of your employment but for a week, and then read it over. Idleness cannot consist with growth in grace. Nay, without exactness in redeeming time, it is impossible to retain even the life you received in justification.

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The works of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 15 (of 32)

The Works of the
Rev. John Wesley, M.A.

THE

CONTENTS

Of the Fifteenth Volume.

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

A Plain ACCOUNT of the

People called METHODISTS.

THE

Nature, Design, and General Rules,

OF THE

UNITED SOCIETIES,

In London, Bristol, Kingswood, ♦Newcastle upon Tyne, &c.

MINUTES

OF SOME LATE

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Rev. Mr. WESLEYS, and Others.

MINUTES

OF SEVERAL

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Reverend Messieurs
JOHN and CHARLES WESLEY, and Others.

The CHARACTER of a

METHODIST.

A short HISTORY of

METHODISM.

ERRATA, Volume XV.

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The works of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 15 (of 32)

The Works of theRev. John Wesley, M.A.

THECONTENTSOf the Fifteenth Volume.

A farther APPEAL To MEN of REASON and RELIGION.

A farther APPEAL To MEN of REASON and RELIGION.

A Plain ACCOUNT of the People called METHODISTS.

THENature, Design, and General Rules, OF THEUNITED SOCIETIES,In London, Bristol, Kingswood, ♦Newcastle upon Tyne, &c.

MINUTES OF SOME LATECONVERSATIONS,Between the Rev. Mr. WESLEYS, and Others.

MINUTES OF SEVERALCONVERSATIONS, Between the Reverend Messieurs JOHN and CHARLES WESLEY, and Others.

The CHARACTER of aMETHODIST.

A short HISTORY ofMETHODISM.

ERRATA, Volume XV.

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE

The Works of the
Rev. John Wesley, M.A.

THE

CONTENTS

Of the Fifteenth Volume.

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

A farther APPEAL

To MEN of

REASON and RELIGION.

A Plain ACCOUNT of the

People called METHODISTS.

THE

Nature, Design, and General Rules,

OF THE

UNITED SOCIETIES,

In London, Bristol, Kingswood, ♦Newcastle upon Tyne, &c.

MINUTES

OF SOME LATE

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Rev. Mr. WESLEYS, and Others.

MINUTES

OF SEVERAL

CONVERSATIONS,

Between the Reverend Messieurs
JOHN and CHARLES WESLEY, and Others.

The CHARACTER of a

METHODIST.

A short HISTORY of

METHODISM.