XIX. DISM. felt the want of pulpits; thus, also, he had con- CHAP. demned lay-preaching, until it appeared that very few clergymen were disposed to become his METHOfollowers. Slowly, and reluctantly, did he agree that laymen should go round and preach, though not to minister. These were, for the most part, untaught and fiery men, drawn from the loom or the plough by the impulse of an ardent zeal; but not unfrequently of strong intellect, and always of unwearied exertion. Their inferiority to Wesley in birth and education made them only the more willing instruments in his hands; their enthusiasm, it was hoped, would supply every deficiency; and it was found easier, instead of acquiring learning, to contemn it as dross. Their sermons, accordingly, had more of heat than of light, and they not unfrequently ran into extremes, which Wesley himself cannot have approved, and of which it would be easy, but needless, to multiply extraordinary instances. Their rules were very strict; they were required to undergo every hardship, and to abstain from every innocent indulgence, as, for example, from snuff.* But their organization was admirable. Directed by Wesley, as from a common centre, they were constantly transferred from station to station, thus affording to the people the excitement of novelty, and to the Preacher the necessity of labour. The Conference, which assembled once every year, and consisted of preachers selected by Wesley, was his Central Board or "Let no preacher touch snuff on any account. Show the "societies the evil of it." Minutes of Conference, Aug. 1765. CHAP. Administrative Council, and gave weight and authoXIX. rity to his decisions. Every where the Methodists METHO- were divided into classes, a leader being appointed to every class, and a meeting held weekly, when admonitions were made, money contributed, and proceedings reported. There were also, in every quarter, to be Love Feasts, -an ancient institution, intended to knit still closer the bands of Christian brotherhood. Whenever a member became guilty of any gross offence, he was excluded from the Society, so as to remove the Methodists as much as possible from the contagion of bad example, and enable them to boast that their little flock was without a single black sheep. It would be difficult even in the Monastic orders to display a more regular and well-adapted system. Like those Monastic orders the Methodists might still have remained in communion with the Church of their country; but in later life Wesley went several steps further, and took it upon him to ordain Ministers, and even Bishops, for his brethren in America. Yet with all this, Wesley never relinquished, in words at least, his attachment and adherence to the Church of England. On this point, his language was equally strong from first to last. We find, in 1739: "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.”* In 1766, he says: "We are not Dissenters from * Journal, September 13. 1739. "the Church, and will do nothing willingly which CHAP. "tends to a separation from it...... Our service 66 XIX. DISM. "is not such as supersedes the Church-service: METHO-` we never designed it should.”* And in December, 1789, only a few months before his death: "I never had any design of separating from the "Church: I have no such design now. . . . . I de"clare, once more, that I live and die a member of "the Church of England, and that none who re"gard my judgment or advice will ever separate "from it."+-But, as we have seen, the conduct of Wesley did not always keep pace with these intentions, and his followers have departed from them far more widely. Several, who joined the Methodists from other sects, brought with them an unfriendly feeling to the Church; several others, who would have shrunk with horror from any thing called schism, were less shocked at the words Dissent or Separate Connexion; for of course when the name is changed, the thing is no longer the same! Yet even in the present times an eminent Methodist observes, that, although the relation to the Church has greatly altered since the days of Wesley, dissent has never been formally professed by his persuasion, and that "it forms "a middle body between the Establishment and "the Dissenters." + * Minutes of Methodist Conferences, August, 1766. ↑ See Wesley's Works, vol. xv. p. 248. Mr. Watson's Observations on Southey's Life, p. 138. and DISM. СНАР. None of Wesley's tenets were, as he believed, at XIX. variance with the Church of England. His faMETHO- Vourite doctrines were what he termed the New Birth, Perfection, and Assurance. It is not my intention to entangle myself or my readers in the mazes of controversy; and I shall therefore only observe, that Wesley at his outset pushed these doctrines to a perilous extreme; but that, when his fever of enthusiasm had subsided to a healthy vital heat, he greatly modified and softened his first ideas. He still clung, however, to the same words, but gave them a narrower meaning; so that once, when defending his views on Perfection to Bishop Gibson, the Prelate answered: "Why, Mr. Wesley, "if this is what you mean by Perfection, who can "be against it?"-But unhappily the multitude is incapable of such nice distinctions, and apt to take words in their simple and common meaning. These doctrines, in a wider sense, soon became popular, for they gratified spiritual pride, which is too often the besetting sin of those who have no other. The object of Wesley was, as he avowed it, not to secede from the Church of England, not to innovate upon its doctrines, but to infuse new life and vigour into its members. It becomes, therefore, an important question, how far, at this period, the clergy may be justly charged with neglect, or the people with indifference. And if we consult writers the most various in their views and feelings and opinions on most other points, we shall find them XIX. DISM. agree in lamenting the state of religion in that age. CHAP. Bishop Burnet, in the conclusion of his History, in 1713 entirely acquits the Clergy of any scandalouS METHOfaults; but complains that their lives, though decorous, were not exemplary. "I must own," he says, "that the main body of our Clergy has always "appeared dead and lifeless to me, and instead of 66 66 animating one another, they seem rather to lay "one another to sleep..... I say it with great "regret, I have observed the Clergy in all the places through which I have travelled — Papists, Lutherans, Calvinists, and Dissenters; but of "them all, our Clergy is much the most remiss in "their labours in private, and the least severe in "their lives." These are the words of a Whig; the testimony of a Tory Prelate is equally strong. In 1711, Atterbury drew up a representation of the State of Religion, which was presented by the Convocation to the Queen. This Memorial complains of "the manifest growth of immorality and "profaneness,"" the relaxation and decay of the discipline of the Church;" and observes, that "a due regard to religious persons, places, and things, hath scarce in any age been more "wanting."* My third witness shall be the eminent Dissenting Minister, Dr. Calamy, who, while endeavouring to prove that his sect had not decreased in numbers in 1730, admits, "But at the See Atterbury's Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 327-349. |