received; but adds, he thought it most prudent not to repeat grievances. When he was at Charlestown, Mr. Garden acquainted him with the ill-treatment Mr. Wesley had met with, and assured him that were the same arbitrary proceedings to commence against him, he would defend him with life and fortune. These testimonies, of persons so respectable, and capable of knowing all the circumstances of the affair, coincide with the general tendency of the statement above given; and with candid persons must do away all suspicions with regard to the integrity of Mr. Wesley's conduct. During his voyage to England, Mr. Wesley entered into a close and severe examination of himself, and recorded the result with the greatest openness. January 8, 1738, in the fulness of his heart he writes thus: "By the most infallible of proofs, inward feeling, I am convinced, 1. Of unbelief; having no such faith in Christ, as will prevent my heart from being troubled. 2. Of pride, throughout my life past: inasmuch as I thought I had, what I find I have not. 3. Of gross irrecollection; inasmuch as, in a storm I cry to God every moment; in a calm not. 4. Of levity and luxuriance of spirit-appearing by my speaking words not tending to edify; but most, by my manner of speaking of my enemiesLord save, or I perish! Save me, 1. By such a faith as implies peace in life and death. 2. But such humility, as may fill my heart from this hour forever, with a piercing, uninterrupted sense, Nihil est quod hactenus feci, that hitherto I have done nothing. 3. By such a recollection as may enable me to cry to thee every moment. 4. By steadiness, seriousness, ourort, sobriety of spirit, avoiding as fire, every word that tendeth not to edifying, and never speaking of any who oppose me, or sin against God, without all my own sins set in array before my face."

January 13. They had a thorough storm. On the 24th, being about 160 leagues from the land's end, he observes, his mind was full of thought, and he wrote as follows: "I went to America to convert the Indians; but oh! who shall convert me? Who is he that will deliver me from this evil heart of unbelief? I have a fair summer religion; I can talk well, nay, and believe myself while no danger is near; but let death look me in the face, and my spirit is troubled. Nor can I say, to die is gain!

'I have a sin of fear, that when I've spun

My last thread, I shall perish on the shore!'

"I think verily if the gospel be true, I am safe-I now believe the gospel is true. I show my faith by my works, by staking my all upon it. I would do so again and again a thousand times, if the choice were still to make. Whoever sees me, sees I would be a Christian. Therefore are my ways not like other men's ways. Therefore I have been, I am, I am content to be, a by-word, a proverb of reproach. But in a storm I think, what if the gospel be not true; then thou art of all men most foolish-O who will deliver me from this fear of death? What shall I do? Where shall I fly from it?" &c. These reflections on his own state, evince the *Robert's Narrative of the Life of Mr. George Whitefield, page 56.

↑ Ibid. page 58.

deepest consciousness that he had not attained the privileges of a true believer in Christ: though he diligently sought them in the practice of every moral and religious duty, according to the best of his knowledge. This would naturally suggest some defect in the principle on which he performed these duties. The next day, therefore, Jan. 25, he took a review of his religious principles on a few important points; and in a private paper wrote as follows:

1. "For many years I have been tossed about by various winds of doctrine. I asked long ago, 'What must I do to be saved?' The Scripture answered, keep the commandments, believe, hope, love; follow after these tempers till thou hast fully attained, that is, till death: by all those outward works and means which God hath appointed, by walking as Christ walked.

2. "I was early warned against laying, as the Papists do, too much stress on outward works, or on a faith with works; which, as it does not include, so it will never lead to true hope or charity. Nor am I sensible, that to this hour I have laid too much stress on either; having from the very beginning valued both faith and the means of grace, and good works, not on their own account, but as believing God, who hath appointed them, would by them bring me in due time to the mind that was in Christ.

3. "But before God's time was come, I fell among some Lutheran and Calvinist authors, whose confused and indigested accounts, magnified faith to such an amazing size, that it quite hid all the rest of the commandments. I did not then see, that this was the natural effect of their overgrown fear of Popery: being so terrified with the cry of merit and good works, that they plunged at once into the other extreme. In this labyrinth I was utterly lost; not being able to find out what the error was; nor yet to reconcile this uncouth hypothesis, either with Scripture or common sense.

4. "The English writers, such as Bishop Beveridge, Bishop Taylor, and Mr. Nelson, a little relieved me from these wellmeaning, wrong-headed Germans. Their accounts of Christianity, I could easily see to be, in the main consistent both with reason and Scripture. Only when they interpreted Scripture in different ways, I was often much at a loss. And again, there was one thing much insisted on in Scripture, the unity of the church, which none of them, I thought, clearly explained, or strongly inculcated.

5. "But it was not long before Providence brought me to those, who showed me a sure rule of interpreting Scripture; viz. Consensus Veterum: Quod ab omnibus, quod ubique, quod semper creditum.' At the same time they sufficiently insisted upon a due regard to the one church, at all times, and in all places. Nor was it long before I bent the bow too far the other way: 1. By making Antiquity a co-ordinate, rather than sub-ordinate, rule with Scripture. 2. By admitting several doubtful writings, as undoubted evidences of Antiquity. 3. By extending Antiquity too far, even to the middle or end of the fourth century. 4. By believing more practices to have been universal in the ancient church, than ever were so. 5. By not considering that the decrees of one provincial synod, could bind only that province; and that the decrees of a general synod, only those provinces whose representatives met

therein. 6. By not considering, that the most of those decrees were adapted to particular times and occasions; and consequently when those occasions ceased, must cease to bind even those provinces.

ac

6. "These considerations insensibly stole upon me, as I grew ad quainted with the mystic writers: whose noble descriptions of union with God, and internal religion, made every thing else appear mean, flat and insipid. But in truth they made good works appear so too; yea, and faith itself, and what not? These gave me an entire new view of religion; nothing like any I had before. But alas! it was nothing like that religion which Christ and his apostles lived and taught. I had a plenary dispensation from all the commands of God: the form ran thus, 'Love is all; all the commands beside, are only means of love: you must choose those which you feel are means to you, and use them as long as they are so.' Thus were all the bands burst at once. And though I could never fully come into this, nor contentedly omit what God enjoined; yet, I know not how, I fluctuated between obedience and disobedience. I had no heart, no vigor, no zeal in obeying; continually doubting whether I was right or wrong, and never out of perplexities and entanglements. Nor can I at this hour give a distinct account, how, or when, I came a little back toward the right way: only my present sense is this-all the other enemies of Christianity are triflers: the mystics are the most dangerous of its enemies. They stab it in the vitals; and its most serious professors are most likely to fall by them. May I praise Him who hath snatched me out of this fire likewise, by warning all others, that it is set on fire of hell,"

The censure Mr. Wesley has here passed on the Lutheran, the Calvinist, and mystic writers, is abundantly too severe. I apprehend, Mr. Wesley did not at this time, understand either the Lutheran, or Calvinist writers on the article of faith. He acknowledges after his return to England, that he did not at first understand the Moravian doctrine of faith, which, I believe, differed but little from that held in the Lutheran Church.-What the moderate mystics have said on the union of the soul with God, is in general excellent, and better said by them, than by most other writers. It must indeed be owned, that they do not sufficiently insist on the atonement and mediation of Christ, as the only foundation of a sinner's union with God: nor do they always explain and enforce the scriptural method of attaining it.

January 29. They once more saw English land: and Feb. 1, Mr. Wesley landed at Deal; where he was informed Mr. Whitefield had sailed the day before, for Georgia. He read prayers, and explained a portion of Scripture to a large company at the inn; and on the third arrived safe in London.

CHAPTER IV.

GIVING SOME ACCOUNT OF MR. WESLEY, FROM FEBRUARY, 1738, TILL APRIL, 1739, WHEN HE BECAME AN ITINERANT AND FIELD

PREACHER.

On his arrival in England, he made some reflections on his own state of mind, and on the effects of his visit to America. "It is now," says he, "two years and almost four months, since I left my native country, in order to teach the Georgian Indians the nature of Christianity but what have I learned myself in the mean time? Why, what I the least of all suspected, that I who went to America to convert others, was never myself converted to God. I am not mad, though I thus speak; but I speak the words of truth and soberness; if haply some of those who still dream, may awake and see, that as I am, so are they, &c."-He observes however, "Many reasons I have to bless God-for my having been carried into that strange land, contrary to all my preceding resolutions. Hereby I trust he hath in some measure humbled me and proved me, and shown me what was in my heart. Hereby I have been taught to beware of men. Hereby God has given me to know many of his servants, particularly those of the church of Hernhuth. Hereby my passage is open to the writings of holy men, in the German, Spanish, and Italian tongues. All in Georgia have heard the word of God: some have believed and began to run well. A few steps have been taken towards publishing the glad-tidings both to the African and American heathens. Many children have learned how they ought to serve God, and to be useful to their neighbor. And those whom it most concerns, have an opportunity of knowing the state of their infant colony, and laying a firmer foundation of peace and happiness to many generations."

Mr. Wesley here supposes, that he was not converted to God, because he had not that faith which delivered him from the fear of death, and gave him victory over all sin, inward or outward. He does not seem to have any immediate reference to that notion of faith which he afterwards espoused and taught; for as yet he did not understand it. When the first Journal, in which this is said, was printed in his Works, in 1774, he doubted whether the severe sentence he here pronounced upon himself, was just. This ought not to be charged on Mr. Wesley, as a contradiction, but as a change in his opinion. This is certainly commendable, when an increase of knowledge gives a man sufficient reason for so doing. In 1774, he believed, that when he went to America, he had the faith of a servant, though not of a son.* Though he was far from being singular in making this distinction, yet the propriety of it has been doubted, or rather denied. It is of some importance in christian experience that the subject should be understood, and therefore it deserves to be examined.

The distinction is founded on what the Apostle has said, Rom.

* See the Errata to the 26th volume of his Works,

viii. 15, and further illustrated and coufirmed, Gal. iv. 1-7. Mr. Wesley observes in a note on Rom. viii. 15, that, " The Spirit of bondage, here seems directly to mean, those operations of the Holy Spirit, by which the soul on its first conviction, feels itself in bondage to sin, to the world, to satan, and obnoxious to the wrath of God." He has printed a sermon on the same text, in which he explains it in the same way. He was not singular in this interpretation, as might easily be shown from respectable authority. But, though it be most true, that a person under conviction for sin, is in a state of bondage and fear, it does not follow that this is the direct meaning of the Apostle, or that the distinction between a servant and a son of God, ought to be immediately fixed on this foundation. Many among the most learned and pious persons in the christian church, have understood the spirit of bondage to fear, as referring to that servile spirit, or spirit of servitude, which the whole Mosaic economy tended to produce. And this seems most agreeable to the tenor of the Apostle's discourse, and most comformable to his grand design of establishing and illustrating the truth and excellency of the gospel, as a more perfect dispensation of mercy and favor from God.

We must not however suppose, that, because the faithful under the Old Testament, had a spirit of bondage to fear, they were not therefore children of God; or that they had not the spirit of God. In every age of the world, since the first promise of a Redeemer, those who have placed their confidence in the mercy of God, manifested through a promised Saviour, have become children of God, heirs of the heavenly inheritance, and experienced some degree of divine grace. But under the Mosaic dispensation, the faithful themselves, were children held in a state of servitude, which produced fear, rather than filial confidence, or the spirit of adoption, crying Abba, Father. The reason of this was, the nature of that economy under which they lived, which was wonderfully adapted to the state of the Israelites in that age of the world, and only preparatory to the introduction of a more perfect dispensation of the Divine favor.

The Mosaic economy, taking it in a loose and general sense, may be considered in three points of view, corresponding to the ends it was intended to answer. The first view of it, regards those laws it contained, which related only to external things, and were merely literal or carnal, as the Apostle calls them. The intention of these was, to separate the whole body of the people from idolatry, and all mixture with other nations: to preserve the worship of the true God in the world: to make the Israelites the depositaries of the promises, prophecies, and the whole word of God: and to keep their own tribes and families distinct: that as the Messiah was to descend, according to the flesh, from the seed of Abraham, the tribe of Judah, and the family of David, his introduction into the world might be more strongly marked, the prophecies concerning him be distinctly fulfilled, and his character be clearly ascertained. These laws required no more than a mere external obedience, the

* See Doddridge; and Pole's Synopsis.

+ Heb. vii. 16; ix. 10.