“But were these or those of ever so excellent a spirit, you conversed with them too long. One had need to be an angel, not a man, to converse three or four hours at once, to any purpose. In the latter part of such conversation, we shall doubtless lose all the profit we had gained before.

“But have you not a remedy for all this in your hands? In order to have truly profitable conversation, may you not select persons clear both of Calvinism and antinomianism? not fond of that luscious way of talking, but standing in awe of Him they love; who are vigorously working out their salvation, and are athirst for full redemption, and every moment expecting it, if not already enjoying it? It is true, these will generally be poor and mean, seldom possessed of either riches or learning, unless there be now and then a rara avis in terris: a Miss March, or Betty Johnson. If you converse with these, humbly and simply, an hour at a time, with prayer before and prayer after, you will not complain of the unprofitableness of conversation, or find any need of turning hermit.

“As to the conference, at Worcester, on lay preaching, do not you observe almost all the lay preachers--(1) Are connected with me? and--(2) Are maintainers of universal redemption? Hinc illæ lacrymæ! These gentlemen do not love me, and do love particular redemption. If these laymen were connected with them, or if they were Calvinists, all would be well. Therefore, I should apprehend you will have two things to do:--1. Urge the argument, the strength of which I believe is in the Second Appeal, and, above all, in the Letter to a Clergyman. 2. Apply to the conscience, ‘You do not love Mr. Wesley enough: you love your opinions too much; otherwise this debate would never have arisen: for it is undeniable, these quacks cure whom we cannot cure, they save sinners all over the nation. God is with them, and works by them, and has done so for near these thirty years. Therefore, the opposing them is neither better nor worse than fighting against God.’

“I am your ever affectionate brother,

“JOHN WESLEY.”[7]

One more letter may be introduced, before we turn to Wesley’s journal. At the beginning of 1768, a third son was born to Charles Wesley, and it was naturally the wish of such a father, that one of his three sons might become a minister of Christ,--a wish, however, that was not realised. Wesley alludes to this, and to the yearly collections and other things, in the following to his brother, showing that Charles either seldom attended conference, or, if he did attend, took little interest in its financial matters.

“LONDON, January 15, 1768.

“DEAR BROTHER,--Six or seven hundred pounds is brought to a conference: of which five hundred at least pays the debt.[8] Then extraordinary demands are answered. How much remains for law? I am now near £300 out of pocket, which I borrowed to pay Mr. Pardon. When I receive some more from Newcastle, I will send it to Bristol; probably very soon.

“It is highly probable, one of the three will stand before the Lord. But, so far as I can learn, such a thing has scarce been for these thousand years, as a son, father, grandfather, atavus, tritavus, preaching the gospel, nay, and the genuine gospel, in a line. You know, Mr. White, sometime chairman of the Assembly of Divines, was my grandmother’s father.

“Look upon our little ones at Kingswood as often as you can. A word from you will be a quickening to them. Oh how many talents are we entrusted with. We have need to gird up the loins of our mind, and run faster the small remainder of our race. ‘One thing!’--let us mind one thing only; and nothing great or small, but as it ministers to it! Peace be with you and yours! Adieu!

“JOHN WESLEY.”[9]

Wesley’s first journey from London, in 1768, was on the 18th of February, to Chatham. Methodism of some sort had existed here for a considerable time. As early as 1751, the Gentleman’s Magazine relates, that a man and his wife at Chatham, both of them being Methodists, had hanged themselves; and that, in order to prove the man a lunatic, his friends produced, to the coroner’s jury, the New Testament, on a roll of paper, which the man had written with his blood.[10]

Wesley writes: “Thursday, February 18--Having been importunately pressed thereto, I rode through a keen east wind to Chatham. About six in the evening, I preached at the barracks, in what they call the church. It is a large room, in which the chaplain reads prayers, and preaches now and then. It was soon as hot as an oven, through the multitude of people; some hundreds of whom were soldiers; and they were ‘all ear,’ as Mr. Boston says, scarcely allowing themselves to breathe. Even between five and six the next morning, the room was warm enough. I suppose upwards of two hundred soldiers were a part of the audience. Many of these are already warring a good warfare.”

This was Wesley’s first visit to Chatham; but not his last. From the beginning, he had loved soldiers, and, to the end, it was always a pleasure to preach to them.

On March 6, he set out on his long northern journey, which occupied the next five months. A few jottings respecting it may be acceptable.

At Gloucester, a “noisy and mischievous mob” had been “taken in hand and tamed by an honest magistrate.” Cheltenham was “a quiet, comfortable place,” despite the “rector and the anabaptist minister.” At Worcester, the difficulty was, where to preach, no room being large enough to contain the people, and it being too cold for them to stand in the open air. At length, a friend offered the use of his barn, which “was larger than many churches.” “Nothing,” says Wesley, “is wanting here but a commodious house.” Such a house was built four years afterwards,[11] and lasted till 1812, when good old James M‘Kee Byron and the Worcester Methodists were mad enough to build another costing upwards of £8000, the great bulk of which was left to be paid by their successors.[12]

At Evesham, Wesley preached in the parish church; and was announced, by the vicar, to do the same at Pebworth; but “the squire of the parish” interposed an interdict, and therefore he preached in the open air.

At Birmingham, the tumults, of so many years’ continuance, were “now wholly suppressed by a resolute magistrate.” Here Wesley met “with a venerable monument of antiquity, George Bridgins, in the one hundred and seventh year of his age, still able to walk to preaching, and retaining his senses and understanding tolerably well.”

On Sunday, March 20, Wesley preached at West Bromwich, where a small society of about twenty persons had been kept together by Francis Asbury, a native of a neighbouring parish, but afterwards the Methodist bishop of the United States.

Five years before, at Wolverhampton, the mob had levelled the Methodist meeting-house to the ground, and four young fellows concerned in the outrage had been sent to prison;[13] but now, says Wesley “all was quiet: only those who could not get into the house made a little noise for a time; and some hundreds attended me to my lodging; but it was with no other intent than to stare.”

Wesley pronounces Newcastle under Lyme “one of the prettiest towns in England.” Though it was extremely cold, the largeness of the congregation constrained him to preach in the open air; “a more attentive or better behaved congregation” he “scarce ever saw.” Sixteen years later, Newcastle had a society of one hundred and nine members, the leaders of whom were John Glynn, William Bayley, Robert Keeling, and Thomas Bamfield.[14]

At Burslem, on March 25, he opened the new chapel; and, at Congleton, had “an elegant, yet earnestly attentive congregation,” the behaviour of the society having won the approbation of all the people in the town, except “the curate, who still refused to give the sacrament to any who would not promise to hear the Methodist preachers no more.”

For nine years past, the Methodists had been wont to meet in a room provided by Dr. Troutbeck, behind his own residence; and here they had been subjected to the same sort of outrages that most towns in the kingdom thought it their duty to commit upon the Methodists. Drums were beaten to disturb their services; dogs were let loose in their congregations; and rotten eggs and filth were often hurled at them in plentiful profusion; but, by their godly behaviour, they had outlived all this, and now had a galleried chapel, capable of containing about four hundred persons.

Wesley spent Sunday, March 27, at Macclesfield, where he preached to “thousands upon thousands.” A few years before, George Pearson and Elizabeth Clulow had opened a preaching house, which would hold forty people, and which, to prevent ejectment, they secured to themselves for forty years. “Ah, George!” said Mrs. Clulow, when they first went into it, “we shall never be able to fill the place; why, it will hold forty folk;” to which Mr. Pearson replied, “I’ll warrant you; hold up your heart.” The result was as George predicted. In a month the room was crammed, and a hole was cut through the chamber floor, so that the preacher might, at the same time, address those above as well as those below. Soon after this, Mr. Ryles gave ground and materials for a chapel, on condition that Mrs. Clulow would pay the workmen their wages for building it. This was done in 1764, and now, in 1768, Methodism in Macclesfield was fairly started.[15]