his singing mostly alone, as the Scotch did not know the Methodist hymns or tunes. One of his hearers proposed to become his precentor, after the Kirk custom, and "lead the psalms." Taylor supposed it was an act of Christian compassion, and the experiment proceeded very well for a time, but he was surprised at last by a bill from his precentor for "thirteen shillings fourpence, which was just fourpence a time." Taylor dismissed him and the Scotch psalms together, and began again to sing the Methodist melodies, "the people liking them right well." They soon became fa miliar, and have never since ceased to be heard in Glasgow.

A few stout mobs and downright persecutions would have suited the evangelist better than these vexatious trials; but though he was perplexed he could not be discouraged. H continued to preach in the streets night and morning till the November weather rendered it impossible. Throngs gath ered to hear him, to scent out his heresy if for no other purpose; but some were awakened and converted, and at last the obstinate opposition gave way so far that when no longer able to preach abroad a room was provided for his meetings, and furnished by his hearers with seats and a pulpit. His labors now began to yield fruit; his friends continually increased; the Methodist Society of Glasgow was formed, and Methodism founded there, never, he trusted, to be overthrown, however feebly it had to struggle against the formidable odds which still encompassed it. It is a curious fact, however, that not till the society had increased to forty or fifty members did any one inquire how he was maintained. They then asked him if he had an estate, or supplies from England. "I told them," he says, "I had neither; but having sold my horse, I had made what little I had go as far as I could. I then explained our custom to them. I told them of the little matter we usually received from our people. The poor souls were much affected, and they very liberally supplied my wants, as also those that came after me." He labored mightily with them during the ensuing winter, and left them in the spring with

seventy members. He had fought a good fight, and he had also kept his faith, for during the severest period of his suf ferings a new kirk was opened in Glasgow, an influential member of which appreciated his fine talents, and offered to settle him as its pastor with a good salary. "It was," he says, "honor and credit on the one hand, and hunger and contempt on the other;" but to accept it appeared a "betrayal of the trust which was reposed in him" by his brethren. The sentiment of honor was higher among these noble men than honor itself.

Such were Thomas Taylor's "adventures" in Glasgow;13 such the history of the origin of Methodism in that city. He went elsewhere in Scotland, laboring for some years with similar trials and success. At Edinburgh he preached usually in the "Octagon" in the morning, and on Castle Hill in the evening. Between Edinburgh and Glasgow he formed a circuit, including Burrowstounness, Linlithgow, Falkirk, and Kilsyth. Thomas Olivers and other itinerants came to his help, and through many obstacles made some progress.14

After Taylor's partial success in Glasgow the Methodist itinerants penetrated to the Highlands, and at his next visit Wesley preached at Inverness, where a society was formed which continues to this day. His reception was now cordial

13 So Southey not unjustly calls them. He refers to them with his usual invidiousness, but with evident admiration of the heroic Methodist.

14 During fifty-five years did Taylor pursue his itinerant ministrations in Scotland, England, Wales, and Ireland, encountering mobs, founding societies, and enduring all kinds of hardships. He was a thorough disciplinarian, a great economist of time, an indefatigable student, and a powerful preacher. He was among the first, if not the first after Wesley's death to introduce the sacraments among the Methodists, and to break away from the disadvantageous custom till then strictly maintained among their societies, (except in London, where Charles Wesley officiated as a Churchman,) of never assembling during "Church hours" on the Sabbath. He was nearly eighty years old when he died, honored and beloved as a veteran throughout the connection. In a sermon a short time before his decease he raised his venerable form in the pulpit, and said with great emphasis: "I should like to die like an old soldier, sword in hand.” He was soon after found dead in his chamber. Montgomery's well-known ode, “Servant of God, well done," etc., was writter on his death.

VOL. I.- -27

everywhere, and his "High-Churchism" had so far relaxed that he “laid aside his last portion of bigotry," 15 and shared in the communion of the Lord's Supper at the West Kirk, Edinburgh. At a subsequent visit the magistrates of Perth and Arbroath conferred upon him the freedom of those cities. In 1769 the Methodist preachers pushed their labors with much energy among the Highlanders. Alexander MacNab, followed by Duncan Wright, formed many classes. Wright reacquired the Erse language, and traveled over the country preaching from town to town three times a day in houses, and usually once a day in the open air. "Though by this means," he writes, "I had many an aching head and pained breast, yet it was delightful to see hundreds of them attending with streaming eyes, and attention still as night, or to hear them in their simple way singing the praises of God in their own tongue. If ever God said to my heart, Go, and I will be with thee, it was then. I extol the name of my adorable Master that my labors were not in vain. How gladly would I have spent my life with these dear souls.”

While Wesley and his fellow-laborers were thus extending their cause in all the land, they were called to bear, dur ing the present decade, not a few adversities which were severer than any local inhospitalities or mobs. The societies were in many places distracted by disputes respecting the propriety of dissent from the national Church. Members who had joined them from among Dissenters, especially, could not approve Wesley's extreme loyalty to the Establishment, which still disowned and often persecuted his measures and his people, and such members had the peculiar in convenience of being under the necessity of going for the sacraments back to the sects which they had left, or to the Church, which many of them had never attended. Some of his preachers, tired out by his persistence in this question able policy, deserted him to take charge of independent churches, where they could maintain their self-respect as genuine ministers of the Gospel by administering the sacraments

15 Coke and Moore's Wesley, III, 2.

to their hearers, and in not a few places discontented Methodists resorted to their ministry.

He was called also to mourn over the death of some of his most esteemed fellow-laborers. In 1762 the eccentric but indefatigable and useful Grimshaw died in the peace of the Gospel. Wesley felt deeply his loss, and devotes several pages of his Journal to an affectionate notice of him- more than to the death of any other one of his friends. "In sixteen years," says Wesley, "he was only once suspended from his labor by sickness, though he dared all weathers upon the bleak mountains, and used his body with less compassion than a merciful man would use his beast. His soul at various times enjoyed large manifestations of God's love, and he drank deep into his Spirit. His cup ran over, and at some seasons his faith was so strong, and his hope so abundant, that higher degrees of spiritual delight would have overpowered his mortal frame." Besides his unusual labors in his own parish, he preached about three hundred times a year in other places. He fell at last a victim to his pastoral labors during an epidemic fever. His old friend Jeremiah Robertshaw, a veteran Methodist preacher, approached him on his death-bed; "God bless you, Jerry," he said; “I will I will pray for you as long as I live, and if there is praying in heaven I will pray for you there also.” "I am as happy as I can be on earth,” he declared to another, "and as sure of glory as if I were in it." "Here goes an unprofitable servant," were his last and characteristic words. It would have been impossible for such a man not to have thrown himself, soul and body, into the Methodist movement. A loyal Churchman, he was imbued nevertheless with the catholic spirit of Methodism, While driving about his circuits, like a horseman on the field of battle, he co-operated with all good men who came upon his track. “I love Christians," he used to say, “true Christians of all parties; I do love them, I will love them, and none shall make me do otherwise."

"I

66

At his own request his remains were carried to the resi

420

HISTORY OF METHODISM.

dence of his son at Ewood, a parish of Halifax, where they were followed by a vast and weeping procession to Luddenden church. According to his dying wish, the mourning crowd sang as they bore his corpse along on the highway. Venn preached his funeral sermon in the churchyard, as the mul titude could not be accommodated in the church. He re peated it the next day at Haworth, where thousands assem bled from all the neighboring country, and wept as at the death of a parent. Romaine lamented him in an eloquent funeral discourse at St. Dunstan's, in London. Both Calvinistic and Arminian Methodists universally felt that a prince and a great man had fallen in Israel.16

In 1764 died John Manners, a humble laborer who had spent five years of great usefulness in the lay ministry. Wesley said that he seemed expressly raised up for the extraordinary revivals of 1760, 1761, and 1762. During these three years he preached in Dublin, amid a religious interest seldom or never equaled in that city. He was not eloquent, but rather rude in speech, yet he labored with his might, and walked intimately with God. "The way is quite clear," he said, as he descended into the valley and shadow of death. 'My soul is at liberty." 17

66

The next year Alexander Coates, the oldest lay preacher then in the Connection, departed to his rest, venerable with years and usefulness. He had preached about a quarter of a century. His pulpit talents are said to have been very extraordinary; he was exceedingly popular, and his conversation" wonderfully pleasant and instructive." He always called Christ his "Master." He was one of

16 He left an only son, who, notwithstanding his strict religious education at Wesley's school in Kingswood, became a drunkard. He revered, however, the example of his parent's piety. While riding home drunk on the old circuit horse of his deceased father, he used to say, "Once thou carried a saint, but now thou carriest a devil." Such recollections and the many prayers that ascended for him at last prevailed. He repented with bitter anguish, and died exclaiming, "What will my father say when he sees that I have got to heaven?"

17 Myles's Chronological History of the Methodists, chap. 4.