' Edited m 0:"""'t -v -y- Pel, Shell ,v A IJaiii Li'LibHISTORl- "' -• w»TlC-^*• ', -t:". I /U'lA^ THE WORLD'S EPOCH-MAKERS EDITED BY OLIPHANT SMEATON Wesley and Methodism By F. J. Snell Previous Volume in this Series : — Cranmer and The Reformation in England. By Arthur D. Innes, M.A. For complete List see end. THE WORLD'S EPOCH-MAKERS Wesley and Methodism By F. J. Snell, M.A. (Oxon.) Author of "The Fourteenth Century" (Periods of European Literature) " Dominum viriliter noli difEdere Exspecta ; age j ; noli discedere sed et animam ; corpus exponc constanter pro gloria Dei." — Imitatio Christ'i. Cited in an by H^edey eirenicon to>Jbe Clergy. New York. Charles Scribner's Sons 1900 ^'^ PREFACE What has been attempted in the present work ? Certainly, not a full and particular biography of John Wesley. He, it is true, is the central figure, and it is hoped that sufficient heed has been given to his personal actions and qualities to ensure a distinct, a recognisable, and—if only it might be ! — vivid portrait of that king of men. But a full and particular biography would call for more pages than go to compose the entire work. On the other hand, the aim has been something other than to string together a series of essays on various aspects of Methodism. While the writer has avoided Tyerman's method of strict chronological order —excellent though it is for some purposes—as involv- ing broken lights and insecure perspective, he has striven to mark the stages of Methodist evolution by treating in successive chapters characteristics of the movement, as they assumed exceptional importance at successive periods of Wesley's life. Naturally, however, my first care has been to pro- vide a fitting introduction for the man with whom the movement is inseparably associated. It may be, as Southey suggests, that, if Wesley had not existed, 250699 vi PREFACE another prophet would have arisen, that Methodism was in the air, and certain to take shape one way or another. That may be, but he who shaped Methodism was John Wesley; and if the movement was not an accident, neither was the man. Personalities are of secular growth. Long before Wesley appeared in the flesh, a thousand influences had been working to fashion his character and to steel his nerve. A biographer, however, can trace back those influences only a very little way. Wesley steps out of boyhood into University life, into the life of the world. His path is still dark. He has not found his mission. There follows an era of perturbation, which Bohler nearly but not quite ends, and W^esley begins to have inklings of his destiny. At this point it is natural to survey the spiritual con- ditions of his age and country. The remedy is next dealt with, and, after that, the scandal caused by its application. Then comes a statement of Wesley's special beliefs and of sundry controversies, occupying the early and middle periods of his larger ministry. The subject of organisation is reserved to the last, the matter having acquired peculiar interest in Wesley's age in relation to the Church of England, from which Methodism was slowly but surely drifting. If I have not been fastidious about the exact sequence of events, I have endeavoured to attain something like sequence of ideas—in other words, to record history philosophic- ally. I cannot lay claim to much original research, but, by way of preparation, I studied for myself the fourteen tomes of Wesley's Works, besides plentiful odd volumes of miscellaneous Methodist literature. PREFACE vii Recent numbers of the Wesleyan Methodist Magazine contain interesting and valuable papers by Mr. Telford and Mr. M'Cullagh, and I have to thank those very- competent writers for more than one useful hint. I have, of course, laid under contribution the stock biographies of Wesley, as is shown by frequent refer- in the text I have drawn on own ences ; and, lastly, my general reading for the purpose of illumination. F. J. SNELL. CONTENTS PAOK Feeface .. ....••«..V CHAPTER I KITH AND KIN Epwortli — Intellectual Parity — Puritan Antecedents — Dr. Annesley—John Wesley on the Puritans—The Enlistment of Samuel Wesley—Aristocratic Connections—The Annesleys— Lord Mornington and Charles Wesley— "Cyrus" and " "Aspasia"—Family Pride— "Old Jeffrey —Samuel Wesley as Parish Priest—The New Generation .... 1 CHAPTER II FIRST-FRUITS Boyhood—At the Charterhouse— Interview with Dr. Sachererell —Fellow of Lincoln — University Manners — The Name "Methodist" — The Holy Club — A Family Difference- Colonisation of Georgia—The Wesleys' Missionary Enterprise —A Great Storm—Intercourse with the Moravians—Rough Quarters—The Hopkey Affair 24 CHAPTER III APOSTLESHIP The Fear of Death— Peter Bohler—Justification by Faith—John Gambold—Hell—Methodist Type of Conversion—Wesley and Manzoni Compared—24th May 1738—Rudeness toWilliam Law—Montaigne's Three Orders—The Church of England— Adventures of Bishop Wilson—Non-Residence—Dissent— Religion at Zero—The Apostle of England—Visit to Germany 49 ix X CONTENTS CHAPTER IV LOVE AND DEATH PAOB Glad Tidings—Love-Feasts —Suggestions of the Enemy—Real Methodist Love — George Whitefield — Girl's Clothes- Glamour of the Stage—Whitefield as Servitor—Conversion— Ordination — At Dummer — Popularity — Embarkation for '* America—Bishop Lavington—Cant—Methodist Brides"— Elisabeth Wallbridge—Sydney Smith on Methodism—The " Methodist " Confessional 82 CHAPTER V SCANDAL OF THE CROSS Difficulties and Dangers—Harmless Bishops—Field- Preaching— ** At Kingswood— Extraordinary Circumstances" —Causes— Posture of the Clergy—A Sermon and its Eff'ects—Wesley's " • ' Journalese — Fury of Dissent — Brutal Conduct to Methodist Women—Methodist Valour—"No Popery!"— Methodism and the Fashionable World—Humphry Clinker —The King of Bath 107 CHAPTER VI MIRACLES AND MYSTERIES Middleton's Free Enquiry—A Mediaeval Miracle—An Eighteenth - Century Miracle — "Methodism Displayed" — Wesley on — on Enthusiasm—A Parallel from Plato — Miracles —Wesley — — Sortilege Karlstadt —and Bell Quietism and— Methodism— Christian Perfection Renan's Philosophy— Amusements Collision with the Moravians—Courtships Marriage . 151 CHAPTER VII THE NEW DISSENT Out of Place—Charity—Principles of Methodism and the Refor- mation Contrasted—Wesley no Sectary—Early Aspirations — and Constituents of Methodism— of the Character — — —Origin — Class-Meeting— Precedents Lay-Preachers— Education— Hymnology Methodism— in America Ordinations— Episcopal Resentment Wesley in Old Age Death and Burial—A Man 193 WESLEY AND METHODISM CHAPTER I KITH AND KIN — Intellectual — Puritan — Epwortli — Parity Antecedents— Dr. Annesley John Wesley— on the Puritans The Enlistment of Samuel Wesley Aristocratic Connections—The Annesleys " " — Lord Mornington and Charles Wesley— Cyrus and "Aspasia"—Family Pride—"Old Jeflfrey "—Samuel Wesley as Parish Priest—The New Generation. Lincolnshire, that paradise of graziers, owns no more fertile region than the "low levels," with their rich " " brown loam, of the Isle of Axholme. The word isle in this, as in other English place-names,—the Isle of Athelney, the Isle of Dogs, etc.,—is reminiscent of earlier times and vanished conditions. Already in the seventeenth century the skill and patience of a Danish financier had succeeded in transforming the king's chase. The malarial swamp had been witched into smiling pastures. The country had ceased to be "drowned" by the swelling Trent. Axholme, how- ever, was still an isle. It was a river-isle, a Meso- potamia, moated (as the Laureate has it) by Idle, and -'*'^' •i' WESLEY -AND METHODISM — Don, and Torn, and— Trent, quite comedy names, when you think of it, and the old Bykers dyke, knitting stream to stream. The metropolis of the isle is the little market-town of Epworth, peopled by some two thousand souls, and perched on a gentle slope. The church—nave, aisle, chancel, tower—is a cynosure for neighbouring eyes, but the representative pilgrim will turn, perhaps, first of all to the parsonage, the cradle of Methodism, the home of a family of genius. 'Twas in 1696 that the Rev. Samuel Wesley entered on the living of Epworth,—given to him posthumously, as it were, by good Queen Mary.—and took possession of the rectory house. Not an imposing structure, it was built throughout of wood and plaster, had a thatch roof, and contained only seven rooms of any size. But, poor as it was, the house may have been an improve- ment on the mean cot, composed of reed and clay, wherewith Samuel Wesley and Susanna, his wife, had been forced to content themselves at South Ormsby. It may be questioned if in all Lincolnshire there could have been found an instance of more perfect mating than was offered by this worthy pair, and that whether we think of taste and mental vigour, or simply of family tradition and inherited station. Wife and husband drew their chief, and well-nigh their sole, happiness from the rigid performance of is to some duty. That may stand for taste. Duty minds what art or music is to others—the object of warm devotion and of infinite refinements. The rector of Epworth was at once a wit, a poet, " and a scholar. His versified Life of Our Lord Jesus or Christ" pleased Queen Mary amazingly, Epworth KITH AND KIN 3 would never have acquired Samuel Wesley. Pope knew him well, and Pope, writing to Swift, observes, " I call him what he is—a learned man." Earlier he had honoured Wesley by coupling him with Watts in the Bunciad. Pope, however, became sensible of the injustice, and in the revised edition of the poem the names of both divines were discreetly expunged. Mrs. Wesley was not a classic, but on her devolved the education, in the widest sense, of her many children. For her own purpose she raised [pedagogy to a science; and her methods of instruction were brilliantly reflected in the careers of, at least, two of her sons.