nently qualified, after he had officiated as Head Usher for about twenty years.

Being disappointed of the Mastership at Westminster, we need not wonder that the scene of his labours had no longer any attractions for him; he was, therefore, easily persuaded to accept the Head Mastership of the Free School at Tiverton, in Devonshire, and he held the situation until his death.

Mr. Samuel Wesley was a very high churchman, and considered the conduct of his brother John and Charles, on their return from America, as little better than rank enthusiasm. The points on which he differed from them were the powerful effects produced under their preaching, such as fits, convulsions, falling down, groans, the sudden convictions and instantaneous conversions, together with the professions of those who were so converted. He held all who were thus affected, or who made such professions, to be "hypocrites, enthusiasts, fanatics, shallow-pates, and madmen." In a letter to his brother John, he says, "your followers fall into agonies, I confess it. They are freed from them after you have prayed over them, granted. They say it is God's doing, I own they say so. Dear brother where is your occular demonstration, where indeed is the rational proof? Their living well afterwards may be a probable and sufficient argument that they believe it themselves; but it goes no further. I must ask a few more questions. Did these agitations ever begin during the use of any collects of the Church? or during the preaching of any sermon that had been preached within consecrated walls without that effect, or during the inculcating any other doctrine besides that of your new birth?" To these questions the Methodists might easily answer, that the collects of the Church were never designed to be the instruments of awakening the profligate: they are intended for the worship of the church, the people of God, who come to perform their devotions to their heavenly father. To awaken those who, as the Sacred Scriptures express it, are dead in trespasses and sins, requires strong and suitable addresses, varied according to circumstances and occasions.

In this controversy the strong ground is that taken by Bishop LavingIt is quite certain that John Wesley conceived that these instantane

ton.

ous

ous conversions*, accompanied with groans, and shrieks, was a supernatural revelation of the power of God accompanying his ministry. Now if it could be proved, as it most undoubtedly can, that these extravagances were nothing new; and that such scenes had been acted over and over again, by those whom Wesley himself considered as under the influence" of a strong superstition," such a method of treating the subject must have shewn him, if any thing could, the preposterous folly of his suppositions,—that his groaning and thunderstruck hearers were affected by any supernatural agency, or that they were shewing any thing more than the usual and ordinary disease of an excitable nervous constitution, under similar circumstances. To this opinion John Wesley and the more enlightened of his followers came afterwards; and to which more rational mode of considering the subject, Bishop Lavington's book might in no small degree contribute. For says, Dr. Adam Clarke, "we do not consider these circumstances as at all essential, for we find in numerous cases the instantaneous work effected without them. They are neither looked for, sought for, nor encouraged. They are adventitious circumstances, in most cases of their occurrence unavoidable, for the very reason that Mr. John Wesley himself gave. 'How easy' says he, ‘is it to suppose that a strong, lively, and sudden apprehension of the heinousness of sin, of the wrath of God, the bitter pains of eternal death, should affect the body as well as the soul during the present laws of vital union: should interrupt or disturb the ordinary circulations, and put nature out of her

course.'

This cannot, however, possibly be reconciled with the notion so strongly maintained to his brother Samuel, that, on such occasions, the power of God came mightily amongst them; and the falling down, &c. were the visible effects of it.

Mr. Samuel Wesley ended his days at Tiverton, in 1739, in the forty ninth

* A very late instance of this I will give you. While we were praying at a society here, on Tuesday the first instant, the power of God, so I call it, came so mightily among us, that one, and another, and another, fell down as thunderstruck,

Letter to Samuel Wesley, May 10th, 1739.

ninth year of his age. It is said of him by those who knew him well, that he possessed an open and benevolent temper. He considered it a duty to help every body whom he could, so that the number and continual success of his good offices were astonishing even to his friends. From the time he became Usher in Westminster School, he divided his income with his parents and family; and through him principally were his brothers John and Charles maintained at the University. His wit was keen, and his sense strong. As a poet he stands entitled to a very distinguished niche in the temple of fame. He was a member of the Philosophical Society at Spalding; and gave to their museum an amulet that had touched the heads of the three kings of Cologne, whose names were in black letters thereon.

JOHN WESLEY, M. A.

JOHN WESLEY, the celebrated founder of the people called Methodists, was the second son of the Rector of Epworth. He was born there on the seventeenth of June, in the year 1703.

His life has been so well written by Dr. John Whitehead and Dr. Soutbey, that I shall confine myself to a short sketch of his career, such as may be sufficient to enable the reader to understand that part of it which is connected with Epworth, and which I shall narrate more at large.

When John Wesley was nearly six years old, a severe conflagration took place, by which the Parsonage House and all their property was destroyed, the family scarcely escaping with their lives; for a few minutes only elapsed between the first alarm of fire and the falling of the house. This calamity took place on the ninth of February, 1709, between the hours of eleven and twelve at night. It was discovered by some sparks falling from the roof upon the bed, where one of the children lay (Ketty), which burnt her feet; she immediately ran to the chamber of her parents, just when her father heard the cry of fire in the street. He alarmed the family, who,

when

when they got into the hall, found themselves surrounded with flames, and the roof just on the point of falling in. When the street door was opened the north-east wind drove the flames inwards with such violence that Mrs. Wesley alone forced her way through. Mr. Wesley and the children escaped through the back windows, and by the garden door. As he was helping the children out, he heard one of them cry out miserably for help in the nursery, and then it was discovered that John had been left behind. The father finding it impossible to get near him, for the stairs being then on fire would not bear his weight, he knelt down, commended the child's soul to God, and left him as he thought to perish in the flames. Mr. John Wesley says*, "I believe it was just at the time when they thought they heard me cry that I waked: for I did not cry, as they imagined, until it was afterwards. I remember all the circumstances as well as if it were yesterday. Seeing the room was very light, I called the maid to come and take me up; but none answering, I put my head out of the curtains, and saw streaks of fire on the top of the room. I got up and ran to the door, but could get no farther, all the floor beyond it being in a blaze. I then climbed upon a chest which stood near the window; one in the yard saw me, and proposed running to fetch a ladder: another answered, there will not be time; but I have thought of another expedient,-here, I will fix myself against the wall, lift a light man, and set him on my shoulders. They did so, and he took me out of the window. Just then the roof fell: but it fell inward, or we had all been crushed at once, When they brought me into the house where my father was, he cried out, "Come, neighbours, let us kneel down! let us give thanks to God! he has given me all my eight children; let the house go, I am rich enough! The next day, as he was walking in the garden, and surveying the ruins of his house, he picked up part of a leaf of his Polyglot Bible, on which just these words were legible, Vade, vende omnia quæ habes, et attolle crucem, et sequere me." John Wesley remembered this providential deliverance through life with the deepest gratitude. In reference to

it,

* Armenian Magazine.

"The

it, he had a house on fire engraved as an emblem under one of his portraits, with these words for the motto, "Is not this a brand plucked out of the burning*." It had the same effect on the mind of his mother. In the private meditations which were found among her papers, was one in which she expressed in prayer her intention to be more particularly careful of the soul of this child, which God had so mercifuly preserved, that she might instil into him the principles of true religion. "Lord," she said, "give me grace to do it sincerely and prudently, and bless my attempts with good success. peculiar care which was thus taken of his education, the habitual fervent piety of both his parents, and his own surprising preservation, at an age when he was perfectly capable of remembering all the circumstances, combined to foster in the child that disposition, which afterwards developed itself with such force, and produced such important effects; and which caused the celebrated William Law to exclaim, on an interview which he had with him when a young man, "Sir, I perceive, you would fain convert the world." All the children of this remarkable family received the first rudiments of learning from their mother; and it does not appear that the boys were sent to any school in the country. In 1714, John was placed at the Charter House, and became distinguished for his diligence and progress in learning. At the age of seventeen he was elected to Christ Church, Oxford, and was then the very sensible and acute collegian, a young fellow of the finest classical taste, and of the most liberal and manly sentiments. His perfect knowledge of the classics gave a smooth polish to his wit, and an air of superior elegance to his compositions. In this year, 1724, Mr. Wesley began to think of entering Holy Orders, which appeared to his serious mind a step of the utmost importance, so that he became more serious than usual, and applied himself with more attention to subjects of divinity. He was ordained Deacon, on Sunday, the 10th September, 1725, by Dr. Potter, Bishop of Oxford. In the following year he was elected Fellow of Lincoln College.

His parents now invited him to spend some time with them in the country. Accordingly he left Oxford in April, and stayed the whole summer at Epworth and Wroot. In September he returned to Oxford, and resumed his usual

* See page 171.