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LIFE OF THE REV. JOHN WESLEY.

the more effectually secures them, from all inward, solid virtue. How choice a factor for Hell is this! Destroying more souls than any Deist in the Kingdom! I could not have blamed St. Chrysostom, if he had only said, "Hell is paved with the skulls of such Christian priests."

13. I must be short on what remains. You suppose the impression made on men's minds by this irregular way of preaching, is chiefly owing to the force of novelty." I believe it was to obviate this very supposition, that my preaching has so rarely made any impression at all, till the novelty of it was over. When I had preached more than six-score times at this town, I found scarce any effect: Only that abundance of people heard, and gaped and stared, and went away much as they came. And it was one evening, while I was in doubt, if I had not laboured in vain, that such a blessing of God was given, as has continued ever since, and I trust will be remembered unto many generations.

You ascribe it likewise in part to "a natural knack of persuasion." If either by a natural or an acquired power of persuasion, I can prevail upon sinners to turn to God, am I to bury even that talent in the earth? "No: But try if you cannot do more good in a college or in a parish." I have tried both, and I could not do any substantial good, either to my pupils or my parishioners. Among my parishioners in Lincolnshire, I tried for some years: But I am well assured, I did far more good to them, by preaching three days on my father's tomb, than I did by preaching three years in bis pulpit.

But you "know no call I have to preach up and down, to play the part of an Itinerant Evangelist." Perhaps you do not. But I do; I know, God hath required this at my hands. To me, his blessing my work, is an abundant proof, although such a proof as often makes me tremble. But is there not pride or vanity in my heart?" There is; yet this is not my motive to preaching. I know, and feel that the spring of this is a deep conviction, that it is the will of God, and that were I to refrain, I should never hear that word, "Well done, good and faithful servant :”—But "Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness, where is weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth.”

REV. SIR,

LETTER VIII.

To the Rev. Mr. John Wesley.

You make some question, whether my last was not wanting in that seriousness, which was required in so awful an inquiry as, Whether we dwell in the eternal glory of God, or in the everlasting fire prepared for the Devil, and his angels? Truly this is so awful a subject, that I should think all pleasantry here quite out of place: But was that the subject of our enquiry? How much then was I mistaken, when I took it to be no more than this, Whether Mr. Wesley is not wrong in his notions about the Perceptibility of Inspiration, and his deviations from established order? Now, if you think to blend these two inquiries together, as if they were convertible, it will be impossible for me to receive it with that seriousness, which you seem to expect. Do not so profusely fling about everlasting fire, nor throw out such frequent hints, that all who dispute your nostrums, are mere ignorants, condemners of all God's children, and consequently children of the Devil. If I am in this bad state, you pray God, I may say from my heart, "Lord, what I know not teach thou me." Sir, your petition is granted; for (in whatsoever state I am), that is my daily prayer, and was so, perhaps, before you were born: For many years I have implored the assistance of God's good Spirit, in the impartial search of truth, in which I have ever begged to be preserved at the expense of friends, relations, country, and all that I hold near and dear to me in this world. This, you allow, is much better than to canonize my own ignorance, which whether I do, or not, I cannot say, because I do not at all understand the meaning of that phrase. But I am sure I do not condemn all (or any of) God's children of idiotism and madness, but I leave that to those, whose schemes require it to be allowed, that many of God's children do not continue in sound mind and memory.

2 N 3

2. Sir, whilst you are pleased to submit to the equality of a disputant, you should not pronounce sentence ex cathedra. Who it is that mistakes his own ignorance, for the only knowledge and wisdom, is not as yet decided; and till it is, I should esteem it a rude begging the question, to throw that imputation upon you, though it were cloaked under the charitable prayers of —— “ God help your ignorant head," or "the Lord correct your damnable error, and snatch you from hell-fire." The softest prayers may be so contrived as to suggest the rudest things, even that one's antagonist is a brand of hell. This may move terror in children, but pity only in men of sense. Let me therefore once more intreat you, to be more sparing of this manner, at least in your Appeals to men of reason and religion.

3. And if this debate is to go any farther, I must insist upon your keeping your temper, and upon your bearing with patience your adversary's supposing himself in the right, and you in the wrong; he does but suppose so, and therefore keeps himself open to conviction, whenever you shall be able to offer it. Whenever it comes, he will receive it gladly; and if it never comes, he must then conclude you in an error, but such an error, as no way shakes his opinion of your being a reasonable, sincere, and good man. Instead of anathematizing you, or devoting you to Hell, he hopes to meet you in the blessed regions of Heaven. Now, preserve but the same candour for him, that he retains for you, and then this our friendly debate, may be a friendly debate to the end of the chapter.

4. To proceed then. I can very patiently hear your reply to what I said, of a number of unsent persons preaching about the kingdom; you have heard of but two, and no more; but I have heard of twice that number in one county, and of many more in other counties of this kingdom. I myself never saw but one; he prayed for you and your brother by name; and besides much smooth, undigested nonsense, preached up heresy, even that worst of heresies, (as not striking at the branches, but the whole root of Holiness at once,) I mean Antinomianism. I was soon after told that I should see this preacher no more, for that he was committed to the county gaol, upon his own confession, for horse-stealing. Now, how many such preachers, or such horsemen, are gone forth

in the kingdom, is not at all material to my argument, which is as well illustrated by one example, as by a thousand.

5. Whether the irregulars shall never join any state-faction?Whether they are not more liable to sedition than the regularly ordained Clergy?—Whether the Civil War, and the Destruction of Church and State, was God's vengeance for the persecution of those holy good men, the Puritans?—Whether you, without the study of physic, can cure more hundreds in four months, than the ablest Students in Physic can cure in as many years? And whether Dr. B. and Dr. G. (whom I know not) are such wicked num-skulls, as are fit to pave Hell withal?—All these things, to shorten our debate, I shall pass untouched. I must only observe, that much the greater part of the few Clergy, with whom I have the pleasure to be acquainted, are as averse to dead form, and as zealous for inward solid virtue, as you, or any one living can be: Though they cannot take the liberty of gaining attention by irregular bold strokes, as never having yet had any call from the pulpit to the

tombs.

6. That you caught attention by such bold strokes as preaching on tombs and mountains, I hope I might tell you without contradiction, because I had it from yourself, and you had told me so in express terms: Nay, you now confirm this, whilst you attempt to deny it, for many gapers and starers came to hear you from your first appearance at Newcastle, though you had preached above six-score times before you perceived you had made much impression. But you perceived the impression much sooner at Epworth, where the novelty and oddity of a son's preaching on his father's tomb, had more effect in three days, than preaching in his pulpit had in three years. Is not this plainly declaring, that the effect was owing to the novelty, and to the novelty only? For here was the same preacher, the same hearers, and surely the same God to influence, (unless it were to be profanely said, that there is one God of the church, and another stronger influencing god of the church-yard,) so that the only difference between preaching in the pulpit and on the tomb was this, that the former, being customary, made little impression; whilst the latter, from its strangeness, caught much attention. You may fancy, perhaps, that you have a Divine call thus to catch attention; but

other clergymen are sure they have no such thing, and therefore hold themselves obliged to forbear the novelty of preaching on tombs, as much as the singularity of preaching on their heads.

7. There are three ways in which the Holy Spirit may be said to bear witness. (1st.) By external, miraculous, sensible attestations, (as by an audible voice from Heaven, by visible signs, wonders, &c.) Or (2ndly.) By internal, plainly-perceptible whispers ("Go not into Macedonia, Go with these men. Join thyself to this Chariot," &c.) Or Lastly, By his standing testimony in the Holy Scriptures. In all these three senses, St. Paul and the other Apostles might truly say- The Spirit beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.' If external miraculous Powers, and internal prophetic Inspiration, both continued in the days of Ignatius and Polycarp; then they might too truly assert the same thing in all the three senses. But if in the days of Origin and Chrysostom, external miraculous Powers had ceased, whilst internal prophetic Inspiration still remained; then they could not truly use the same phrase, but in the two last senses. Lastly, if, in the days of St. Bernard, both miracles and prophecy had entirely ceased; then he could not truly use the expression, but in the last sense only. If Bernard (who was somewhat enthusiastically given) yet insisted that he had still plainly-perceptible whispers, it would be natural for his neighbours to call on him to shew either that it should be so by scripture, or that it was so by facts. If for the former he produced Rom. viii, 16, the answer was easy, "You attempt to decide controversies by the very controverted Texts." If for the latter, he produced variable facts, to-day asserted, to-morrow doubted, and the day following denied; then it is evident, the whispers were not so plainly-perceptible as was asserted, or that they were not the whispers of Him in whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning. The spirit of man, and his fancies or opinions may vary, but the Spirit of God, and his facts cannot. You may be fully of opinion to-day, that the Scriptures are of God, and doubt of that tomorrow, and so vary your opinion a thousand times: But what is this to the purpose? We were speaking not of man's opinions, but of God's facts. Turn this to fact, and see how you will like it. If God tells you to-day, that the Scriptures are true; can you