to sleep. If any one, whose character he trusted, told him a strange story, he listened to it eagerly and received it with implicit faith. His journal is full of accounts of trances, supernatural recoveries, miraculous sights, marvellous deliverances; and he finds time to record these, and to ask for further news of them with an insatiable appetite. In this respect his journal wears a motley dress, and, in the midst of serious narratives and pathetic histories, these stories* come up, ever and anon, in the gravest scenes, like the Jester in Lear, provoking a smile. Epilepsy, fits, and madness, he attributed to diabolical agency, and in witchcraft he was a firm believer. But these, the eccentricities of a strong character, were mixed with a breadth and kindliness of spirit which draw us to him. Turn from these his reveries to the short, shrewd, kind† letters, of which he wrote so many; we are not surprised to find that John Wesley was a man of many friends. His readiness to sympathize with others, his watchfulness over them, his faithful yet playful affection, are not often to be found in this cold, hard, world. No wonder that these qualities drew men to him.. When we remember how these letters were written, by one who was always in the saddle, in the pulpit, in the council-room, preaching, journeying, adjusting, a * Journal, Vol. ii. pp. 425, 399; iii. pp. 140, 141, &c. universal law-giver, superintendent, and missionary, on whom the care of all the churches, and the management of the complex machinery fell, we perceive how earnest and honest was his friendship. To him each correspondent seemed a special friend. His health, spirits, prospects, comfort, occupy his thoughts, and he has a prescription* (for he was a great doctor,) and a rule for every imaginable difficulty or disease of every one of his innumerable associates. True it is, that for whims and follies his character had no room, and that morbid fantasy or narrow bigotry found no echo in that strong mind and large heart. One of his followers became enamoured of Mystic writers on Religion. Wesley thus disposes of that class of writers :-" This is in reality not an excellence, but a capital defect. I avoid, I am afraid of, whatever is peculiar either in the experience or the language of any one. I desire nothing, I will accept of nothing but the common faith and the common salvation." Writing to another person he says, "It is undoubtedly our privilege to rejoice evermore with a calm, still, heartfelt joy. Nevertheless this is seldom long at one stay. Many circumstances may cause it to ebb and flow. This therefore is not the essence of religion, which is no other than humble,† gentle, patient, love. *Letters, Vol. xiii. pp. 43, 93, 94, 105; xii. p. 320, &c. This is what he called perfection; a phrase unguarded, and which led to much abuse. p. 54. I do not know whether these are not included in that one word, resignation." Again to another, "Desire nothing different in nature from love. There is nothing higher in earth or heaven. Whatever Mr. speaks of, which seems to be higher, is either natural or preternatural enthusiasm." "If I have plain Scripture or plain reason for doing a thing, well: I wish to be, in every point, great or small, a Scriptural rational Christian." Revelations, gifts of tongues, and prophecies, when imagined or affected by any of his disciples, he put down and cast aside without hesitation.* Adherence to duty, devotion to the work of our station, humility, and patience, he presses as the signs of religion.‡ Orthodoxy, without morality, he could not abide. "Permit me,” he says to a clergyman, "Sir, to speak exceeding plainly; are you not an orthodox man? Perhaps there is none more so in the diocese. If it be true that you frequently drink to excess, you may have orthodoxy, but you can have no religion. If when you be in a passion you call your brother "Thou fool," you have no religion at all. If you even curse, and take the name of God in vain, you can have no other religion than that of orthodoxy, a religion of which the devil and his angels may have full as much as you.”§ * Vol. xiii. p. 69. Journal iii. p. 125. Ibid. pp. 25, 37, 44, 45, 51; xii. p. 280. § Vol. xiii. p. 204. In fact Wesley's mind was of that texture which fixes on the leading principles of action, and passes by all that is subordinate. His sympathies were wide as mankind, and included those from whom he differed, the Roman Catholic, the heretic,* and the Pagan. All persons, even if in error, so that they were fervent, he esteemed; mere knowledge of truth he held of little account. "We may die," he says, "without the knowledge of many truths, and yet be carried into Abraham's bosom; but if we die without love what will knowledge avail? Just as much as it avails the devil and his angels. I will not quarrel with you about any opinion, only see that your heart be right towards God, that you know and love the Lord Jesus Christ, that you love your neighbour, and walk as your Master walked, and I desire no more. I am sick of opinions; I am weary to bear them. My soul loathes this frothy food. Give me solid and substantial religion: Give me an humble, gentle love of God and man; a man full of mercy and good faith, without partiality and without hypocrisy a man laying himself out in the work of faith, the patience of hope, the labour of love. Let my soul be with these Christians wheresoever they are.” † : This breadth and kindliness of temper must always be * Pelagius. Servetus, and Firmin, he speaks of with affection. Works, Vol. xiii. p. 200. Southey, ii. p. 192. remembered when we trace the features of Methodism.* The doctrines of Assurance and Perfection were Wesley's errors, held by him with his usual tenacity, and widely adopted on his authority. These have to be reckoned up against Methodism. But on the other side must be set the bold and clear statement of truth which the preaching of the Wesleys contained. It is seldom that men who recover a great truth do not run into excess. Perhaps the English Reformation is the solitary exception. Even Lutheranism, to which we owe so much, fell into error; and Quakerism, which gave us back another truth, also went astray. Still in passing judgment on Methodism we may recal the words of one, whose judgment was without bias, that, of all the collective systems of religion which have succeeded each other for ten centuries,† "providentially suited to the existing circumstances, and all answering a useful purpose, of these I am inclined to think, John Wesley's has been the very best." * The doctrine of perfection was one of Wesley's fantasies. The old Moravian, Spangenberg, had conclusively disposed of it, (Southey, i. p. 351.) "There is no higher state than that I have described. You are in a very dangerous error. You know not your own hearts. You fancy your corruptions are taken away, whereas they are only covered. Inward corruption never can be taken away till our bodies are in the dust." Or, as Boehler expressed it, "Sin will and must always remain in the soul. The old man will remain till death. The old nature is like an old tooth: you may break off one bit, and another, and another; but you can never get it all away. The stump will stay as long as you live, and sometimes will ache too." † Alexander Knox's Remains, i. p. 77. |