till three o'clock we spent in prayer, that evil might contrary to act of Parliament. This is a convenbe prevented, and the lion chained. Then news was ticle.' I answered, 'Sir, the conventicles mentioned brought us that the colliers were returned in peace. in that act (as the preamble shows) are seditious They had walked quietly into the city, without sticks meetings. But this is not such. Here is no shaor the least violence. A few of the better sort of dow of sedition. Therefore it is not contrary to them went to the mayor and told their grievance; that act.' He replied, 'I say it is. And beside, then they all returned as they came, without noise your preaching frightens people out of their wits." or disturbance. All who saw it were amazed. No-Sir, did you ever hear me preach?' 'No.' 'How thing could more clearly have shown the change then can you judge of what you never heard?' wrought among them than this conduct on such an Sir, by common report. Common report is occasion. "I found afterwards that all our colliers enough.' 'Give me leave, sir, to ask, Is not your to a man had been forced away. Having learned of name Nash?' 'My name is Nash.' 'Sir, I dare Christ not to resist evil, they went a mile with those not judge of you by common report. I think it is who compelled them, rather than free themselves not enough to judge by.' Here he paused a while, by violence. One man, the rioters dragged out of and having recovered himself, asked, 'I desire to his sick bed, and threw him into the fish pond. Near know what this people come here for? On which twenty of Mr. Willis' men they had prevailed on, one replied, Sir, leave him to me. Let an old by threatening to fill up their pits, and bury them woman answer him.' 'You, Mr. Nash, take care alive if they did not come up and bear them com- of your body. We take care of our souls, and for pany."-"It was a happy circumstance that they the good of our souls we come here.' He replied forced so many of the Methodist colliers to go with not a word, but walked away. them; as these, by their advice and example, restrained the savage fury of the others. This undoubtedly was the true cause why they all returned home without making any disturbance." To a gentleman who requested some account of what had been done in Kingswood, Mr. John Wesley wrote the following statement: 6 "As I returned, the street was full of people, hurrying to and fro, and speaking great words. But when any of them asked, ' Which is he?' and I replied, 'I am he,' they were immediately silent. Several ladies following me into Mr. Merchant's house, the servant told me, there were some wanted to speak with me. I went to them, and said, 'I be"Few persons have lived long in the west of Eng-lieve, ladies, the maid mistook; you only wanted land who have not heard of the colliers of Kings- to look at me.' I added, "I do not expect that the wood, a people famous, from the beginning hi- rich and great should want either to speak with me therto, for neither fearing God nor regarding man: or to hear me, for I speak the plain truth; a thing so ignorant of the things of God, that they seemed you hear little of, and do not desire to hear.' A but one remove from beasts that perish, and there- few more words passed between us, and I retired."* fore utterly without the desire of instruction, as well as without the means of it. "Many, last winter, used tauntingly to say of Mr. Whitefield, 'If he will convert heathens, why does not he go to the colliers of Kingswood?' In the spring he did so. And as there were thousands who resorted to no place of public worship, he went after them into their own wilderness, to seek and save that which was lost.' When he was called away others went into the highways and hedges, to compel them to come in.' And, by the grace of God, their labor was not in vain. The scene is already changed. Kingswood does not now, as a year ago, resound with cursing and blasphemy. It is no more filled with drunkenness and uncleanness, and the idle diversions that naurally lead thereto. It is no longer full of wars and fightings, of clamor and bitterness, of wrath and envyings. Peace and love are there. Great numbers of the people are mild, gentle, and easy to be entreated. They do not cry, neither strive;' and hardly is 'their voice heard in the streets,' or indeed in their own wood, unless when they are at their usual evening diversion, singing praise unto God their Saviour." At this time Mr. Wesley visited Bath, where the celebrated Beau Nash, then lord of the ascendant in that city, attempted to confront the field-preacher. "There was great expectation at Bath, of what a noted man was to do to me there: and I was much entreated not to preach; because no one knew what might happen.' By this report I also gained a much larger audience, among whom were many of the rich and great. I told them plainly, the Scripture had concluded them all under sin, high and low, rich and poor, one with another. Many of them seemed to be not a little surprised, and were sinking apace into seriousness, when their champion appeared, and, coming close to me, asked by what authority I did these things. I replied, By the authority of Jesus Christ, conveyed to me by the (now) archbishop of Canterbury, when he laid his hands upon me, and said, 'Take thou authority to preach the gospel.' He said, 'This is After visiting London, and preaching to vast multitudes in Moorfields, on Kennington Common, and other places, some of whom were strangely affected, and many effectually awakened to a sense of sin. In October, Mr. Wesley had a pressing invitation to Wales, where, although the churches were shut against him, he preached in private houses, and in the open air, often during sharp frosts, and was gladly received by the people. "I have seen," says he, "no part of England so pleasant, for sixty and seventy miles together, as those parts of Wales I have been in; and most of the inhabitants are indeed ripe for the gospel. I mean, if the expression seems strange, they are earnestly desirous of being instructed in it; and as utterly ignorant of it they are as any Creek or Cherokee Indians. I do not mean they are ignorant of the name of Christ; many of them can say both the Lord's prayer and the belief; nay, and some, all the catechism; but take them out of the road of what they have learned by rote, and they know no more (nine in ten of those with whom I conversed) either of gospel salvation, or of that faith whereby alone we are saved, than Chicali or Tomo Chachi. Now what spirit is he of who had rather these poor creatures should perish for lack of knowledge than that they should be saved, even by the exhortations of Howell Harris, or an itinerant preacher? The word did not fall to the ground. Many repented, and believed the gospel. And some joined together to strengthen each other's hands in God, and to provoke one another to love and to good works." About this time he stated his doctrinal views in perhaps as clear a manner, though in a summary form, as at any period subsequently: "A serious clergyman desired to know in what points we differed from the church of England. I answered, To the best of my knowledge, in none; the doctrines we preach are the doctrines of the church of England, indeed the fundamental doc trines of the church clearly laid down both in her prayers, articles, and homilies. "He asked, 'In what points then do you differ from the other clergy of the church of England?' I answered, In none from that part of the clergy who adhere to the doctrines of the church; but from that part of the clergy who dissent from the church (though they own it not) I differ in the points following: "First, They speak of justification, either as the same thing with sanctification, or as something consequent upon it. I believe justification to be wholly distinct from sanctification, and necessarily antecedent to it. "Secondly, They speak of our own holiness or good works as the cause of our justification; or that for the sake of which, on account of which, we are justified before God. I believe, neither our own holiness nor good works are any part of the cause of our justification; but that the death and righteousness of Christ are the whole and sole cause of it, or that for the sake of which, on account of which, we are justified before God. "Thirdly, They speak of good works as a condition of justification, necessarily previous to it. I believe, no good work can be previous to justification, nor, consequently, a condition of it; but that we are justified (being till that hour ungodly, and therefore incapable of doing any good work) by faith alone; faith, without works; faith, though producing all, yet including no good works. "Fourthly, They speak of sanctification, or holiness, as if it were an outward thing; as if it consisted chiefly, if not wholly, in these two points: 1. The doing no harm: 2. The doing good, as it is called; that is, the using the means of grace, and helping our neighbor. "I believe it to be an inward thing, namely, 'the life of God in the soul of man; a participation of the divine nature; the mind that was in Christ;' or, 'the renewal of our heart after the image of Him that created us.' London, and spent upwards of a month among them, occupied at intervals in the same attempt. His efforts being fruitless, he read to them the following paper: "About nine months ago, certain of you began to speak contrary to the doctrine we had till then received. The sum of what you asserted is this: 1. That there is no such thing as weak faith: that there is no justifying faith, where there is ever any doubt or fear; or where there is not, in the full sense, a new, a clean heart. 2. That a man ought not to use those ordinances of God, which our church terms means of grace, before he has such a faith as excludes all doubt and fear, and implies a new, a clean heart. 3. You have often affirmed, that to search the Scriptures, to pray, or to communicate, before we have this faith, is to seek salvation by works; and till these works are laid aside, no man can receive faith. "I believe these assertions to be flatly contrary to the word of God. I have warned you hereof again and again, and besought you to turn back to the law and to the testimony. I have borne with you long, hoping you would turn. But as I find you more and more confirmed in the error of your ways, nothing now remains but that I should give you up to God. You that are of the same judgment, follow me."-"I then," adds Mr. Wesley," without saying any thing more, withdrew, as did eighteen or nineteen of the society." Those who continued to adhere to him then met at the foundry, the whole number amounting to about seventy-two. The Moravian teacher Molther appears to have been the chief author of the novel opinions objected to by Mr. Wesley, whom however Peter Bohler thought Mr. Wesley misunderstood; which was not likely, as Mr. Charles Wesley mentions the same things in his journal. Towards the Moravian church at large, Mr. Wesley continued to feel an unabated affection; but as he was never a member of that church, and maintained only a kind of co-fraternity with those of "Lastly, They speak of the new birth as an out- them who were in London, when these became inward thing; as if it were no more than baptism, fected with novel opinions, his departure from them, or, at most, a change from outward wickedness to with such as were of the same mind as himself, and outward goodness, from a vicious to what is called were also members of the church of England, was a virtuous life. I believe it to be an inward thing; a step of prudence and of peace. From a convera change from inward wickedness to inward good-sation which he had with Count Zinzendorf a short ness; an entire change of our inmost nature from time afterwards, and which he has published, it the image of the devil, wherein we are born, to the would seem that a refined species of Antinomianimage of God; a change from the love of the crea-ism had crept in amongst the Moravians; and that ture to the love of the Creator, from earthly and sensual to heavenly and holy affections; in a word, a change from the tempers of the spirits of darkness to those of the angels of God in heaven. "There is therefore a wide, essential, fundamental, irreconcilable difference between us: so that if they speak the truth as it is in Jesus, I am found a false witness before God. But if I teach the way of God in truth, they are blind leaders of the blind." Disputes having arisen between the Methodists and Moravians, who still formed one society at Fetter-Lane, Mr. Wesley returned to London. Over this society he professed to have no authority, and, as it appeared, had but little influence. Various new doctrines of a mystical kind, which he thought dangerous, had been introduced by several of the teachers; and it seems he foresaw a separation from them to be inevitable, for he had taken a place near Moorfields, which had been used as a foundry for casting cannon; and on this visit he preached in it to very numerous congregations. He was on this and other visits to London unsuccessful in settling the disputes which had arisen in the society; and in June, 1740, he again came to * Journal. the count was at that time by no means a teacher of the class of Peter Bohler. But, to affirm with Zinzendorf that there is nothing but imputed righteousness, and to reject inherent righteousness; to insist upon all our perfection being in Christ, and to deny the Christian perfection or maturity which believers derive from Him-was not in accordance with the Moravian church, appears from the following extract from the authorized exposition of their doctrines by Spangenberg, which, as the perversions of these "wrong-headed men" have been mentioned, it would be unjust to the body of Moravians to withhold: "Although this faith, which is so peculiar to all the children of God, that whoever has it not is no child of God, does no outward wonders and signs, raises none from the dead, removes no mountains, yet it does and performs other things, which are of much greater importance. What are those things? Answer: We through faith attain to the enjoyment of that which Christ hath by his sacrifice purchased for us. We are, (1.) Through faith in Jesus Christ made free from the dominion of sin. Paul says, Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law, but under grace,' Roin. vi. 14. 'All those who believe in Jesus Christ are freed bers of these societies, provided they held their doctrinal views and disciplinary prepossessions in peace and charity. The sole object of the union was to assist the members to "make their calling and election sure," by cultivating the religion of the heart, and a holy conformity to the laws of Christ. These rules bear the signature of John and Charles Wesley. from the curse and condemnation of the law; they | to charitable offices, and to the observance of the obtain forgiveness of sins, become the adopted chil-ordinances of God. Churchmen or dissenters, walkdren of God, and are sealed with the Holy Ghost. ing by these rules, might become and remain memThese are they, then, who are made free from the dominion of sin, because they are under grace. Now when they are thus exhorted, 'Let not sin reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof; neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin,' &c. Rom. vi. 12, 13; they cannot say, O that is impossible for us; we are but sinful men: the flesh is weak, and the like. For they have Jesus Christ, who saveth his people from their sins; they have a Father in heaven, who heareth their prayer and supplication. The Holy Ghost dwells in their hearts, and strengthens them in all that is good. If they therefore do but rightly make use of the grace wherein through faith they stand, then sin can have no dominion over them. This is exactly what John says, 1 epist. iii. 9, Whosoever is born of God, doth not commit sin,' (he doth not let sin reign, or have dominion in his mortal body, that he should obey it in the lusts thereof,) 'for his seed remaineth in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.' That is, his heart will comply with no such thing; for he loves our Saviour, being a child of God, and a partaker of the Holy Ghost."* Not only Antinomian errors, but mystic notions of ceasing from ordinances, and waiting for faith in stillness, greatly prevailed also among the Moravians in London, at this time, and were afterwards carried by them into many of the country Methodist societies in Yorkshire, Derbyshire, and other places. Of the effect at Nottingham, Mr. Wesley gives a curious account in his Journal for June, 1743: "In the afternoon we went on to Nottingham, where Mr. Howe received us gladly. At eight the society met, as usual. I could not but observe, 1. That the room was not half full, which used, until very lately, to be crowded within and without. 2. That not one person who came in used any prayer at all; but every one immediately sat down, and began either talking to his neighbor, or looking about to see who was there. 3. That when I began to pray, there appeared a general surprise, no one offering to kneel down, and those who stood, choosing the most easy, indolent posture which they conveniently could. I afterwards looked for one of our hymn books upon the desk, (for I knew Mr. Howe had brought one from London,) but both that and the Bible were vanished away. And in the room lay the Moravian hymns, and the Count's sermons."+ That incautious book, Luther on the Galatians, appears to have been the source of the Antinomianism of the Moravians; and their quietism they learned from Madame Guion, and other French mystic writers. The Methodist society, as that name distinguishes the people who to this day acknowledge Mr. Wesley as their founder under God, was, properly speaking, as a society specially under his pastoral charge, collected in this year, (1740,) at the chapel in Moorfields, where he regularly preached, and where by the blessing of God, upon his and Mr. Charles Wesley's labors, the society rapidly increased. For this, and for the societies in Bristol, Kingswood, and other parts, he, in 1743, drew up a set of rules, which continue in force to the present time, and the observance of which was then, and continues to be, the condition of membership. They are so well known as to render it unnecessary to quote them. It may only be observed, that they enjoin no peculiar opinions, and relate entirely to moral conduct, + Journal. Exposition, pp. 215, 216. Mr. Wesley's mother about this time began to attend his ministry. She had been somewhat prejudiced against her sons by reports of their "errors" and "extravagancies;" but was convinced, upon hearing them, that they spoke "according to the oracles of God." There is an interesting entry in Mr. Wesley's journal respecting this venerable woman: 'September 3, I talked largely with my mother, who, told me, that, till a short time since, she had scarce heard such a thing mentioned as the having forgiveness of sins now, or God's Spirit bearing witness with our spirit. Much less did she imagine, that this was the common privilege of all true believers. "Therefore,' said she, 'I never durst ask for it myself. But two or three weeks ago, while my son Hall was pronouncing those words, in delivering the cup to me, The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given for thee; the words struck through my heart, and I knew God for Christ's sake had forgiven me all my sins.' "I asked, whether her father (Dr. Annesley) had not the same faith; and whether she had not heard him preach it to others. She answered, 'He had it himself, and declared a little before his death, that for more than forty years, he had no darkness, no fear, no doubt at all of his being accepted in the Beloved.' But that, nevertheless, she did not remember to have heard him preach, no, not once, explicitly upon it; whence she supposed he also looked upon it as the peculiar blessing of a few, not as promised to all the people of God."* The extraordinary manner in which some persons were frequently affected under Mr. Wesley's preaching, as well as that of his coadjutors, now created much discussion, and to many gave great offence. Some were seized with trembling; others sunk down and uttered loud and piercing cries; others fell into a kind of agony. In some instances whilst prayer was offered for them, they rose up with a sudden change of feeling, testifying that they had "redemption through the blood of Christ, even the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." Mr. Samuel Wesley, who denied the knowledge of the forgiveness of sins, treated these things, in a correspondence with his brother, alternately with sarcasm and serious severity, and particularly attacked the doctrine of assurance. In this controversy, Mr. John Wesley attaches no weight whatever to these outward agitations; but contends that he is bound to believe the profession made by many, who had been so affected, of an inward change, because that had been confirmed by their subsequent conduct and spirit. On the subject of assurance, the disputants put forth their logical acuteness; but the result appears to have been upon the whole instructive to the elder brother: whose letters soften considerably towards the close of the dispute. Mr. Samuel Wesley died in the following November. The circumstances to which he objected, although he knew them only by report, and was too far removed from the scene to be an accurate judge, have since that time furnished ample subject for serious or satirical animadversion to many * Journal. writers, and to none more than to Dr. Southey.* A few general remarks upon this point may not therefore be here out of place. By this writer it is affirmed, that great importance was attached by Mr. Wesley to those emotions, and bodily affections, which occasionally occurred; and that the most visionary persons, and those who pretended ecstacies, dreams, &c. were, at least in the early part of his ministry, the objects of his special respect, as eminently holy and favored. This is so far from the fact, that it is difficult to meet with a divine whose views of religion are more practical and definite. He did not deny that occasionally "God," even now, "speaketh in a dream, in a vision of the night," and that he may thus "open the ears of men to instruction, and command them to depart from iniquity;" he believed that, in point of fact, many indisputable cases of this kind have occurred in modern times; and in this belief he agreed with many of the wisest and best of men. He has recorded some cases of what may be called ecstacy, generally without an opinion of his own, leaving every one to form his own judgment from the recorded fact. He unquestionably believed in special effusions of the influence of the Holy Spirit upon congregations and individuals, producing powerful emotions of mind, expressed in some instances by bodily affections; and he has furnished some facts on which Dr. Southey has exercised his philosophy, with a success, probably, more satisfactory to himself, than convincing to his readers. But that any thing extraordinary, either of bodily or mental affection, was with Mr. Wesley, at any time of his life, of itself, deemed so important as to be regarded as a mark of superior piety, is a most unfounded assumption. Those of his sermons which contain the doctrines which he deemed essential; his notes on the New Testament; and the rules by which every member of his societies was required to be governed, are sufficiently in refutation of this notion. In them no reference is made to any thing visionary as a part, however small, of true religion; unless, indeed, all spiritual religion, changing the heart, and sanctifying the affections, be thought visionary. The rule of admission into his societies was a desire to fly from the wrath to come," but then the singerity of this was to be evidenced by corresponding "fruits" in the conduct; and on this condition only, further explained by detailed regulations, all of them simple and practical, were the members to remain in connection with him. These rules are the standing evidence, that, from the first formation of the Methodist societies, neither a speculative nor a visionary scheme of religion was the basis of their union. Had Mr. Wesley placed religion, in the least, in those circumstances, he would have set up a very different standard of doctrine in his sermons; and the rules of his societies would have borne an equivocal and mystic character. Whitefield, in almost all places where they went. Thousands in the course of a few years, and of those too who had lived in the greatest unconcern as to spiritual things, and were most ignorant and depraved in their habits, were recovered from their vices, and the moral appearance of whole neighborhoods was changed. Yet the effects were not without precedent even in those circumstances in which they have been thought most singular and exceptionable. Great and rapid results of this kind were produced in the first ages of Christianity, but not without "outcries," and strong corporeal as well as mental emotions, nay, and extravagancies too. By perversion, even condemnable heresies arose, and a rank and real enthusiasm: but will any man from this argue against Christianity itself; or asperse the labors and characters of those holy men who planted its genuine root in Asia, Africa, and Europe? Will he say, that as, through the corrupt nature of men, evil often accompanies good, one is to be confounded with the other, and that those great evangelists were the authors of the evil because they were the instruments of the benefit? Even in the decline of true piety in the church of Christ, there were not wanting holy and zealous ministers to carry out the tidings of salvation, to the barbarous ancestors of European nations; and strong and effectual impressions were made by their faithful and powerful preaching, upon the savage multitudes who surrounded them, accompanied with many effects similar to those which attended the preaching of the Wesleys and Whitefield; but all who went on these sacred missions were not enthusiasts; nor were all the conversions effected by them a mere exchange of superstitions. Such objectors might have known that like effects often accompanied the preaching of eminent men at the reformation, and that many of the Puritan and Non-conformist ministers had similar successes in large districts in our own country. They might have known that, in Scotland, and also among the grave Presbyterians of New England, previous to the rise of Methodism, such impressions had not unfrequently been produced by the ministry of faithful men, attended by very similar circumstances; and they might have been informed that, though on a smaller scale, the same results have followed the ministry of modern missionaries of different religious societies in various parts of the world. It may be laid down as a principle established by fact, that, whenever a zealous and faithful ministry is raised up, after a long spiritual death, the early effects of that ministry are not only powerful, but often attended with extraordinary circumstances; nor are such extraordinary circumstances necessarily extravagancies because they are not common. If there be an explicit truth in Scripture, it is, that the success of the ministry of the gospel, in the conversion of men, is the consequence of divine influence; and That cases of real enthusiasm occurred at this if there be a well ascertained fact in ecclesiastical and subsequent periods is indeed allowed. There are story, it is, that no great and indisputable results of always nervous, dreamy, and excitable people to this kind have been produced, but by men who have be found; and the emotion which was produced acknowledged this truth, and have gone forth in among those who were really so "pricked in the humble dependence upon that promised co-operaheart," as to cry with a sincerity equal to that tion contained in the words, "And lo, I am with which was felt by those of old, "What shall we do you always, even to the end of the world." This fact, to be saved?" would often be communicated to such equally striking and notorious, is a strong confirmpersons by natural sympathy. No one could be ation that the sense of the sacred oracles on this blamed for this, unless he had encouraged the ex-point, was not mistaken by them. The testimony citement for its own sake, or taught the people to regard it as a sign of grace, which most assuredly Mr. Wesley never did. Nor is it correct to represent these effects, genuine and factitious together, as peculiar to Methodism. A great impression was made by the preaching of the Wesleys and Mr. • Life of Wesley. of the word of God is, that, as to ministerial suc- it then be supposed, (no great presumption indeed,) that Christians have quite as good a foundation for these opinions, as others can boast for that paltry philosophy, by which they would explain the effects produced by the preaching of holy and zealous ministers in different ages; and we may conclude that such effects, as far as they are genuine, are the result of divine influence; and, when numerous and rapid, of a divine influence specially and eminently exerted, giving more than ordinary assistance to the minds of men in their religious concerns, and rendering the obstinate more inexcusable by louder and more explicit calls. Of the exaccompanied such visitations, it may be said, that if some should be resolved into purely natural causes, some into real enthusiasm, and (under favor of our philosophers) others into satanic imitation, a sufficient number will remain, which can only be explained by considering them as results of a strong impression made upon the consciences and affections of men, by an influence ascertained to be divine, though usually exerted through human instrumentality, by its unquestionable effects upon the heart and life. Nor is it either irrational or unscriptural to suppose, that times of great national darkness and depravity, the case certainly of this country at the outset of Mr. Wesley and his colleagues in their glorious career, should require a strong remedy; and that the attention of a sleeping people, should be roused by circumstances which could not fail to be noticed by the most unthinking. We do not attach primary importance to secondary circumstances; but they are not to be wholly disregarded. The Lord was not in the wind, nor in the earthquake, nor in the fire, but in the "still small voice;" yet that "still small voice" might not have been heard, except by minds roused from their inattention by the shaking of the earth, and the sounding of the storm. the evidence of Scripture, and further confirmed by fact, it may follow, and that in perfect conformity with revelation, that such influence may be dispensed in different degrees at different periods. That it was more eminently exerted at the first establishment of Christianity, than at some other periods, is certain; and that not only in extraordinary gifts, (for though these might awaken attention and silence unbelief, we have the evidence of Scripture history to prove, that miracles cannot of themselves convert men from vice,) but in sanctifying energy, without which the heart is never brought to yield to the authority and will of God in its choice and affections. That in various sub-traordinary circumstances which have usually sequent periods, there have been special dispensations of favor to nations, with reference to the improvement of their moral state, is clear from a fact which cannot be denied, that eminently holy and gifted men have been raised up at such periods, for the benefit of the countries and the age in which they appeared, from whose exertions they have derived the highest moral advantages. For the reasons we have given, we cannot refer the appearance of such men to chance, nor the formation of their characters to the circumstances and spirit of "stirring times." We leave these conclusions to the philosophy of the world; and recognize in the appearance of such instruments, the merciful designs and special grace of Him "who worketh all and in all." But the argument is, that if such men have really been the instruments of "turning many to righteousness," and that if the principles of our religion forbid us to believe that this can be done by any gifts or qualities in them, however lofty; then, according to the Scripture doctrine, they were "workers together with God," and the age in which they labored was distinguished by a larger effusion of the Holy Spirit upon the minds of men. Why this should occur at one time more eminently than at another, we pretend not to say; but even this notion, so enthusiastic probably to many, is still in If, however, no special and peculiar effusion of conformity to the word of God, which declares that divine influence on the minds of many of Mr. Wes"the wind bloweth where it listeth," and that the ley's hearers be supposed; if we only assume the influence of the Holy Spirit, like the atmosphere, exertion of that ordinary influence which, as we is subject to laws not ascertainable by man; and if have seen, must accompany the labors of every this effusion of his influence argue especial, though minister of Christ to render them successful in serv undeserved favor to particular nations and ages, ing men, the strong emotions often produced by the this is not more difficult to account for than that, preaching of the founder of Methodism might be at some periods and places, men of eminent useful- accounted for on principles very different from those ness should be sent into the world, when they do adopted by many objectors. The multitudes to not appear in others, which being a mere matter of whom he preached were generally grossly ignorant fact, leaves no room for cavil. This view, like- of the gospel; and he poured upon their minds a wise, accords with what the Scriptures teach us to flood of light; his discourses were plain, pointed, expect as to the future. For the accomplishment earnest, and affectionate; the feeling produced was of the sublime consummation of the divine coun- deep, piercing, and in numberless cases such as we sels, agents of great efficiency and qualifications, have no right, if we believe the Bible, to attribute we believe, will from time to time appear; but our to any other cause than that inward operation of hope does not rest on them, but on Him only who has God with his truth which alone can render human explicitly promised to "pour out his Spirit upon all means effectual. Many of those on whom such imflesh," at once to give efficiency to instruments in pressions were made retired in silence, and nurturthemselves feeble, however gifted, and so "to ordered them by reflection. The "stricken deer" hasthe unruly wills and passions of men," that they tened into solitude, there to bleed, unobserved by may be subdued and sanctified by the truth. If such all but God. This was the case with the majority; effusions of divine influence be looked for, and on for visible and strong emotions were the occasional, such principles, as the means of spreading the and not the constant results. At some seasons, inpower of Christianity generally, we may surely be- deed, effects were produced, which, on Christian lieve it quite accordant both with the spirit and let- principles, we may hesitate not to say, can only be ter of Scripture, that the same influence should often accounted for on the assumption that the influence be exerted to preserve and to revive religion; and was both divine and special; at others, the impresthat if nations, already Christian, are to be the instru- sion was great, but yet we need assume nothing more ments of extending Christianity, not in name only, than the ordinary blessing of God which accompabut in its spirit and sanctity into all the earth, they nies "the word of his grace," when delivered in the should be prepared for this high designation by the fulness of faith and love, in order to account for it special exercise of the same agency turning them But beside those who were silently pierced, and from what is merely formal in religion to its reali- whose minds were sufficiently strong to command ties, and making them examples to others, of the pu- their emotions, there were often many of a class not rifying grace of the gospel of God our Saviour. Let accustomed to put such restraints upon themselves. |