VOLUME 1 — BOOK II — CHAPTER I
THE REVOLUTION AND METHODISM

Effect of the Revolution on Methodism — Providential Character of the Revolution — It was the Normal Consequence of the Colonial History of the Country — It was not at first Rebellion, but a Struggle for the Maintenance of the British Constitution — Chatham's Vindication of the Colonies — Effect of the War on Religion — Desertion of their Church by the English Clergy — Return of English Methodist Preachers — Sufferings of the Methodist Itinerants — Asbury's Integrity — Wesley's "Calm Address" to the Colonies — The Sarcasm of Junius — Wesley and Johnson — Wesley corrects his Opinion on the Colonial Question — He predicts the Success of the Americans — His Address to his American Preachers

The American Revolution was now impending and inevitable. It was to have a profound effect on Methodism, for American independence implied the independence of American Methodism. The latter virtually became independent at the breaking out of the war, and the constitution, which organized it into the "Methodist Episcopal Church," was to be adopted in about one year after the treaty of peace with Great Britain, and to precede the adoption of the Federal Constitution by about five years. The new Church was to be the first religious body of the country which should recognize, in its organic law, by a solemn declaration of its Articles of Religion, the new Republic; the first to pay homage, in the persons of its chief representatives, its first Bishops, to the supreme Magistracy.

The Revolution was the normal, the necessary, that is to say, the providential consequence of the geographical condition and colonial training of the American people. Territorially, these colonies were a vast empire, remote and defined from the rest of the civilized world, by an ocean whose waters stretched, between the two, from pole to pole. The country possessed resources for national prosperity unequaled in any other empire on the earth. In some of these resources, and those the most important for manufactures and commerce, it surpassed all other civilized nations combined. God never designed a people, in such circumstances, to be a perpetual dependency of a distant and less capable power. In the history of nations Providence means progress, and progress implies the necessary development of a people of superior capabilities, whether in race or in position, into superior relations with other nations.

The colonial training of the American people was, as we have seen, providentially correspondent with their destiny. Most of them had come to the new world for relief from religious oppressions or disabilities — Puritans and Quakers from England, Scotch Presbyterians from the north of Ireland, Palatines from the Rhine, Huguenots from France, Waldenses from Piedmont, Methodists from Ireland. It was impossible that such a people, when grown to social maturity, their settlements expanded to such contiguity that they blended, their various tongues nearly lost in a common language, should not become conscious of a community of interest in religious toleration and liberty, and a common hostility to the foreign system which had oppressed them and banished them from the homes of their fathers. They needed but to hear the tocsin [Oxford Dict. tocsin = an alarm bell or signal — DVM] of revolt sounded through the land, to rise and rend the remaining shreds of traditional attachments which connected them with the foreign world. And though this revolt was from the most liberal European government of the age, yet that government still retained ecclesiastical characteristics with which most of them had no sympathy, an Establishment to which most of them were hostile from ineradicable recollections of wrongs and sufferings, as well as from conscientious scruples. The hierarchy of Great Britain was to them a form of antichrist, and it was an integral part of the constitution of Great Britain. The religious ties of a people are their strongest social bond; the colonies, with local exceptions, had no longer any such ties with England, so far at least as its ecclesiastical system was concerned. Under that system their brethren, in the parent land, still suffered grievous disabilities. The "Five Mile Act," the "Conventicle Acts," the "Acts of Toleration," still imposed disparagements and oppressions which the American conscience could not but resent; for, however locally exempt from the execution of these obnoxious statutes, many of the Americans, being immigrants, had known their evil power, and had come from families and religious communions which still felt it. Down even till near half a century after the American Declaration of Independence, the Methodists, and other dissenters of England, struggled under these disabilities, interpreted by the judicial authorities in such manner as would have extinguished their chief religious powers had they not in 1810, chiefly under the leadership of Methodism, agitated the realm with remonstrances, and procured an act of Parliament which swept away the barbarous "Five Mile Act" and the "Conventicle Acts," and secured religious liberty, for the first time, to the British people. [1]

The colonial population had also, as has been shown, received a thorough military training preparatory for the war of Independence. Its almost incessant wars with the savages, and especially the two French wars, (1744—1748 and 1755-1763,) had made its militia veterans; and Europe was at last surprised to find them, at the outbreak of the Revolution, not only brave enough to challenge the hitherto invincible arms of England, but competent to defeat them.

The people were in advance of the social condition of any European population of that period. They had become educated to self-government. In large portions of the country they had the best municipal systems then to be found on the earth; the maturest social order, managed throughout their cities, towns, and villages by themselves in "town meetings;" the least amount of pauperism and crime; the largest amount of popular intelligence, sustained by "common schools." Before the Revolution institutions for higher education had sprung up, from New Hampshire to Virginia; there were at least nine colleges and two medical schools, located at suitable intervals, in the most important colonies.

But, though thus morally as well as geographically severed from the parent land, and though the most farseeing minds could not fail to perceive the coming independence, the public mind was not rash; it retained many affectionate remembrances of England. The people were not rebels; during many years the struggle was not for independence, but for their long-conceded, yet now invaded rights as subjects of the British Constitution. The moral sense of the colonies would not have allowed them to revolt from that constitution had it been justly administered. But after the overthrow of the French power in North America and the Treaty of Paris in 1763, by which most of the continent came under British control; it became the persistent policy of the home government to reduce the chartered liberties of the colonies, to consolidate the provinces, and to extend over them the power of the crown in a manner which was not only unauthorized by their charters, but would not have been tolerated among the people of England themselves. For years the Board of Trade attempted intolerable impositions on the commercial enterprise of the colonies. The independence of the judiciary was invaded. The "Stamp Act," more than ten years before the revolt of the colonies, at last made a breach that never could be repaired. It was not so much the pecuniary oppression of this act that offended the people, but its violation of the established principle of English liberty, that British subjects cannot be taxed without their consent in Parliament. Taxation without representation was the grievance. The act was repealed in less than one year, for it was found impossible to enforce it; but with its abrogation Parliament still declared its own power to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever. The repeal of the act was not, therefore, a repeal of its oppressive principle. A year later another act of taxation was passed, but in three years this also was repealed, except the duty on tea; a single exception, however in itself unimportant, involved the fundamental question as really as a thousand or ten thousand; and the people, exasperated by continued oppression, not only refused to use tea, but burned it or threw it into the sea from the foreign ships in their harbors. Their forbearance had been long; they asked not a single new right, but the protection of the constitution; the most able statesmen of England, Pitt, Burke, Fox, and others, defended their claim as just. Pitt, now in the House of Peers as Lord Chatham, had said, "This resistance to your arbitrary system of taxation might have been foreseen from the nature of things and of mankind; above all from the Whiggish spirit flourishing in that country. The spirit which now resists your taxation in America is the same which formerly opposed Loans, Benevolences, and Ship-Money in England; the same which, by the 'Bill of Rights,' vindicated the English Constitution; the same which established the essential maxim of your liberties, that no subject of England shall be taxed but by his own consent. Let this distinction, then, remain forever ascertained: taxation is theirs, commercial regulation is ours. They say you have no right to tax them without their consent; they say truly. I recognize to the Americans their supreme, unalienable right to their property; a right which they are justified in the defense of to the last extremity." [2] The colonial assemblies sent to England memorials, entreaties, and eminent messengers, among whom was Franklin, pledging their loyalty to the throne and praying for relief; but new and still more oppressive measures were enacted, especially toward Massachusetts. Troops were dispatched to the colonies. The latter began to prepare to defend themselves; they met in Congress; they raised forces; their purpose was stern, but it was deliberate and conscientious. They were willing yet to avert the alternative of war, of disunion. The first Congress declared (1774) to England its willingness to endure the severe commercial grievances of the system of 1763, if only the constitutional right of the colonies be maintained. "You have been told that we are impatient of government and desirous of independency. These are calumnies. Permit us to be as free as yourselves, and we shall ever esteem a union with you to be our greatest glory and our greatest happiness. But if you are determined that your ministers shall wantonly sport with the rights of mankind; if neither the voice of justice, the dictates of law, the principles of the constitution, or the suggestions of humanity, can restrain your hands from shedding human blood in such an impious cause, we must then tell you that we will never submit to any ministry or nation in the world." [3] Such was the considerate but brave language of the representative assembly of the colonies, written by the purest statesman of modern times, John Jay. The city of London appealed to the king, sustaining the claim of the colonies and denouncing the policy of the government as an attempt of the Ministry to "establish arbitrary power over all America." But the clock of destiny was striking; the inevitable contest broke out in the year which we have now reached in the annals of American Methodism. Before the session of its next Conference blood was spilt at Concord and Lexington. The nation rose at once to arms. The possibility of reconciliation was gone forever, and the independent career of the new world began.

Thus considered, the American Revolution bore a moral character to which the American Methodists could not be indifferent. Neither they nor their native preachers were opposed to it, though the presence and controlling authority of their English missionaries held them somewhat in check and provoked against them public suspicion. War is always a crime on one side or the other of the contestants, and a crime of such contagious enormity that it is always demoralizing, temporarily, at least, to the communities which suffer from it, as well as to those who inflict it. The contemporaneous influence of the Revolution on the religious condition of the colonies was generally bad. Political and military events absorbed the public attention. Infidelity, especially through the influence of Thomas Paine, a conspicuous leader of the revolt, spread rapidly. [4] The colonial clergy of the English Church were mostly foreigners, and were loyal to the British Crown. We should not too readily condemn them for this fact. If their loyalty was a fault, it was a natural and pardonable consequence of their education. They quite generally deserted the country. We have seen that the first Legislature chosen by the people of Virginia established the Anglican Church, and that there was, the next year, a pastor for every six hundred of its population. We have seen also the Evangelical Virginian rector, Jarratt, writing to Wesley, as late as 1773, that the colony then had ninety-five parishes, all of which, except one, were supplied with clergymen. But he knew of but one, besides himself, who entertained evangelical sentiments, and the alarm of war was the signal for their general abandonment of their people. The historian of their Church in Virginia has recorded the fact in significant statistics. He says, "When the colonists first resorted to arms, Virginia, in her sixty-one counties, contained ninety-five parishes, sixty-four churches and chapels, and ninety-one clergymen. When the contest was over, she came out of the war with a large number of her churches destroyed or injured irreparably; with twenty-three of her ninety-five parishes extinct or forsaken, and of the remaining seventy-two, thirty-four were destitute of ministerial services; while of her ninety-one clergymen twenty-eight only remained, who had lived through the storm, and these, with eight others, who came into the state soon after the struggle terminated, supplied thirty-six of the parishes. Of these twenty-eight, fifteen only had been enabled to continue in the churches which they supplied prior to the commencement of hostilities, and thirteen had been driven from their cures by violence or want, to seek safety or comfort in some one of the many vacant parishes, where they might hope to find, for a time at least, exemption from the extremity of suffering. [5] It was this prostration of the English Church in the colonies that rendered necessary — providential, it may be said, without uncharitableness — the organization of the Methodist Episcopal Church, as we shall hereafter see.

Meanwhile the latter was relieved, by the Revolution, of its foreign missionaries and of foreign control. It was launched upon the tide of events to be managed by native men, except one, Asbury, whose far-seeing wisdom and generous sympathy with the colonial cause, if they could not at first completely counteract his British loyalty, so far qualified it as to restrain him from any rash concession to it, and kept him in the country, till the providential course of events fully revealed to him his duty to remain with the infant Church, and at last to recognize heartily the liberation of the colonies as the beneficent will of God. The imitation of the example of the Anglo-American clergy, by the Anglo-American Methodist preachers, brought severe suffering upon the Methodist ministry generally. "They had," says one of them, who witnessed their afflictions, "almost insupportable difficulties, violent oppositions, bitter persecutions, and grievous sufferings to endure. So many of the preachers being Englishmen, and Wesley, who was considered the founder and chief ruler of the Methodist societies, being in England, and known to be loyal to his king, and of course unfriendly to the American measures, occasioned jealousies and suspicions that the Methodists were, politically, a dangerous people. Also the moral views and the conscientious scruples of the people called Methodists, not being favorable, on general principles, to the spirit and practice of war, on this ground also, the temper of the times, combining with other prejudices and passions of the day, excited jealousies which occasioned an evil report or alarm that the Methodists, preachers and people, were opposed to the American Revolution. However untrue or incorrect these inferences were, yet nevertheless, perhaps, some of the Methodists were to blame. I do not hesitate to admit the improper conduct of some. I feel no disposition to conceal that a few of the preachers were imprudent and reprehensible in some things, and gave too much cause for such suspicions. Rodda, in particular, acted improperly, and left the country under circumstances unfavorable to his reputation, and hurtful to the cause of religion. Captain Webb also did not act so well as he ought to have done. Rankin likewise had spoken so freely and imprudently on public affairs as to excite the jealous fear that his influence would be dangerous to the American cause. So it was that the way of the preachers on every side was almost hedged up; and for a considerable time it was with the utmost difficulty, and at the greatest risk of personal safety, that they could travel and preach at all." [6]

Asbury, however, is acquitted of any such blame by this contemporaneous authority. The conduct of his English coadjutors, we are assured, was "considered by him exceptionable and unjustifiable." "When the times were about the worst, Asbury and Shadford agreed to make it a matter of fasting and prayer for direction, in their straits and difficulties, what to do; whether to stay in the country, or return to England. Shadford concluded that he had an answer to leave the country and return to England; but Asbury, who received an answer to stay, replied, 'If you are called to go, I am called to stay; so here we must part.' Accordingly they parted, to meet no more on earth. — From that moment he made America his country and his home. He resolved to abide among us, and at the risk of all, even of life itself, to continue to labor and to suffer with and for his American brethren. Oppositions, reproaches, and persecutions rushed in against them from every quarter like a tempest. During the whole period of conflict and danger his manner of life was irreproachable. His prudence and caution as a man and a citizen, his pious and correct deportment as a Christian and a minister, were such as to put at defiance the suspicious mind and the tongue of slander. They were never able to substantiate any allegation, or the appearance of a charge against him, that was incompatible with the character of a citizen, a Christian, or a faithful minister of the Gospel. He never meddled with polities; but in those days of suspicion and alarm, to get a preacher or a society persecuted it was only necessary to excite suspicion, sound the alarm, and cry out 'Enemies to the country!' or 'Tories!' "

This same high authority draws a dark picture of the sufferings of the Methodist ministry during these trying times. "I shall," he says, "principally confine myself to Maryland, my native state, where I was best acquainted, and where probably their sufferings were as great, perhaps greater, than in any other state. The prejudices of the people ran high, and some of the laws, to meet the exigencies of the times, were hard and oppressive; some of the rulers and civil officers appeared disposed to construe every apparent legal restriction with rigor against the Methodists. Some of the preachers were mulcted [Oxford Dict. mulct v. tr. extract money from by fine or taxation, deprive by fraudulent means. n. a fine. — DVM] or fined, and others were imprisoned, for no other offense than traveling and preaching the Gospel; and others were bound over in bonds, and heavy penalties, and sureties, not to preach in this or that county. Several were arrested and committed to the common county jail; others were personally insulted and badly abused; some were beaten with stripes and blows nigh unto death, and carried their scars down to the grave. Our aged and much respected Garrettson, now sitting among us, knows the truth of these statements, for he was himself one of the sufferers. He was, for preaching the Gospel, committed to prison in one county; and severely beaten and wounded, even to the shedding of blood, nigh unto death, in another. In giving a further view of those trying scenes and times of distress, I will briefly state a few particular cases, to show what our first preachers had to endure and suffer while planting the Gospel among us. In the city of Annapolis, the capital of the state, Jonathan Forrest and William Wren, and I believe two or three others, were committed to jail; three of the men who were principally concerned in taking up and committing Wren afterward became Methodists, among whom was one of the magistrates who signed the mittimus for his commitment. I knew them well, and shall never forget the serious and solemn time when Wren and myself, with the man who arrested him, dined at the magistrate's house after they joined the Methodists. In Prince George County a preacher was shamefully maltreated by a mob; 'honored,' according to the cant of the times, 'with tar and feathers.' In Queen Anne, Joseph Hartley was bound over in penal bonds of five hundred pounds not to preach in the county. In the same county Freeborn Garrettson was beaten with a stick by one of the county judges, and pursued on horseback till he fell from his horse and was nearly killed. In Talbot County, Joseph Hartley was whipped by a young lawyer, and was imprisoned a considerable time. He used to preach, during his confinement, through the grates or window of the jail to large concourses of people on Sabbath days. They frequently came from ten to fifteen miles to hear him, and even from other counties. His confinement produced a great excitement, and God overruled it for good to the souls of many. Christ was preached, and numbers embraced religion. Even his enemies at length were glad to have him discharged. In Dorchester, Caleb Pedicord was whipped and badly hurt upon the public road; he carried his scars to the grave. In the same county Garrettson was committed to jail. In Caroline a preacher was taken up in a lawless manner and put into the custody of the sheriff to be taken to jail; but there was no mittimus for his commitment, nor any legal cause for his detention; however, the sheriff prudently received him into his care and protection from the rage of his enemies, and after giving him a hospitable entertainment in his own house let him go. In the same county Joseph Foster was brought before the court, and thrown into troubles, expenses, and costs. We might, perhaps, with propriety notice some other cases in different counties and states, both North and South, of the sufferings both of preachers and members; but time would fail. From these brief sketches some tolerably correct though faint idea may be formed of what our first preachers had to endure, and how great were their conflicts. They spent their all — their time, their blood, their lives — to win souls to Christ. Under all these embarrassing and perplexing circumstances the preachers, with Asbury at their head, went on, publicly and privately, in their indefatigable labors. They counted all things but loss, and their lives not dear to themselves, so that they might gain Christ, win souls, and finish the ministry and work committed unto them. The Lord was with them as they passed through the fires and the waters; he gave them grace sufficient for the evil days. They saw the pleasure of the Lord prosper in their hands; many were awakened and converted. The wilderness and the solitary places were glad, the parched ground became springs of water, and the desert blossomed as the rose. I lived then as a spectator and a witness; I stand as a witness yet, and probably am able to bear testimony."

These troubles were exasperated by the publication of Wesley's "Calm Address" to the colonies, copies of which appeared in America. Junius satirized him as actuated by a sordid motive, as "having one eye upon a pension, the other upon heaven." Wesley's characteristic disregard of money renders the charge ridiculous to all who are familiar with his history. He was now one of the most conspicuous men of England; hardly any public interest or question escaped his attention. He was in the habit of publishing incessantly abridged or cheap books for his numerous people; it is probable that no ecclesiastical personage of the realm swayed a wider influence over the masses on questions involving, directly or indirectly, religious interests; and the question of the loyalty of the colonies seemed to him to involve gravely the prospects of Christianity in the new world. The government knew him too well to approach him with overtures of preferment, or other reward. To Fletcher, who wrote in defense of his "Calm Address," it offered promotion; but that saintly man replied, "I only want more of the grace of God." Wesley's error, in this publication, afforded him a signal advantage at last; the opportunity, in the same year, of frankly correcting himself, and of acknowledging the right of the colonies in their stern quarrel. His "Calm Address" was, in fact, but a reproduction, in a cheap form, of the pamphlet of his friend Dr. Johnson, entitled "Taxation no Tyranny." His relations with the "great moralist" were intimate. Johnson revered him, and delighted in his company. [7] It was Johnson's influence that led him into the error of this publication, for he had entertained a different view of the question till he read Johnson's pamphlet. [8] Though in his brief reproduction of the essay he made no allusion to Johnson, the latter felt himself highly complimented by the publication, and returned the compliment in one of his most polished paragraphs. [9]

The day of Lexington and Concord struck Europe with surprise, and gave a new and stern argument, on the question, to thoughtful Englishmen. Wesley saw its significance at once. Waiting but one day, after the arrival of the news, he wrote to Lord North and the Earl of Dartmouth, severally, an emphatic letter. "I am," he said, "a High-Churchman, the son of a High-Churchman, bred up from my childhood in the highest notions of passive obedience and non-resistance, and yet, in spite of all my long-rooted prejudices, I cannot avoid thinking these, an oppressed people, asked for nothing more than their legal rights, and that in the most modest and inoffensive manner that the nature of the thing would allow. But waiving this, I ask, Is it common sense to use force toward the Americans? Whatever has been affirmed, these men will not be frightened, and they will not be conquered easily. Some of our valiant officers say that 'two thousand men will clear America of these rebels.' No, nor twenty thousand, be they rebels or not, nor perhaps treble that number. They are strong; they are valiant; they are one and all enthusiasts; enthusiasts for liberty, calm, deliberate enthusiasts. In a short time they will understand discipline as well as their assailants. But you are informed 'they are divided among themselves.' So was poor Rehoboam informed concerning the ten tribes; so was Philip informed concerning the people of the Netherlands. No; they are terribly united; they think they are contending for their wives, children, and liberty. Their supplies are at hand, ours are three thousand miles off. Are we able to conquer the Americans suppose they are left to themselves? We are not sure of this, nor are we sure that all our neighbors will stand stock still." [10]

In this same year Wesley wrote important advice to his American preachers. "You were never in your lives," he said, "in so critical a situation as you are at this time. It is your part to be peacemakers: to be loving and tender to all; but to addict yourselves to no party. In spite of all solicitations, of rough or smooth words, say not one word against one or the other side. Keep yourselves pure; do all you can to help and soften all; but beware how you adopt another's jar. See that you act in full union with each other: this is of the utmost consequence. Not only let there be no bitterness or anger, but no shyness or coldness between you. Mark all those that would set one against the other. Some such will never be wanting. But give them no countenance; rather ferret them out, and drag them into open day." [11]

These counsels were sent to them in time for their next annual assembly. Following them faithfully, they passed through the trying period with unexpected prosperity. While the contest arrested the progress of all other religious bodies, the Methodists, with but occasional and slight declensions, advanced rapidly during most of the time of the war.

The Revolution prepared them, it has been said, for their organization as a distinct denomination, and opened before them that career of success which at last advanced them to the van of the Protestantism of the nation. It may indeed be affirmed that American Methodism was born, and passed its whole infancy, in the invigorating struggle of the Revolution. In the year (1760) in which Embury and his fellow Palatines arrived, the Lords of Trade advised the taxing of the colonies, and the agitations of the latter commenced. The next year James Otis, the "morning star" of the Revolution, began his appeals in Boston for the rights of the people. The following year the whole continent was shaken by the royal interference with the colonial judiciary, especially at New York; and Otis attacked, in the Massachusetts legislature, the English design of taxation as planned by Charles Townshend. Offense followed offense from the British ministry, and surge followed surge in the agitations of the colonies. The year preceding that in which the John Street Church was formed is memorable as the date of the Stamp Act; the Church was founded amid the storm of excitement which compelled the repeal of the act in 1766 — the recognized epoch of American Methodism. The next year a new act of taxation was passed which stirred the colonies from Maine to Georgia, and "The Farmer's Letters," by John Dickinson of Pennsylvania, appeared — the foundation rock of American politics and American statesmanship. In two years more the Massachusetts legislature "planned resistance." Samuel Adams approved of making the "appeal to heaven" of war — and British ships and troops were ordered to Boston. The first Annual Conference of American Methodism was held in the stormy year (1773) in which the British ministry procured the act respecting tea, which was followed by such resistance that the ships bringing that luxury were not allowed to land their cargoes in Philadelphia and New York, were only allowed to store them, not to sell them, in South Carolina, and were boarded in Boston harbor and the freight thrown into the sea. In the next year the Boston Port Bill inflamed all the colonies; "a General Congress" was held; Boston was blockaded; Massachusetts was in a "general rising;" then came the year of Lexington, and Concord, and Bunker Hill, introducing the "War of Revolution," with its years of conflict and suffering. Thus Methodism began its history in America in the storm of the Revolution; its English missionaries were arriving or departing amid the ever increasing political agitation; it was cradled in the hurricane, and hardened into vigorous youth, by the severities of the times, till it stood forth, the next year after the definitive treaty of peace, the organized "Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States of America." Its almost continual growth in such apparently adverse circumstances is one of the marvels of religious history. In 1776 it was equal, in both the number of its preachers and congregations, to the Lutherans, the German Reformed, the Reformed Dutch, the Associate Church, the Moravians, or the Roman Catholics. [12] At the close of the war it ranked fourth or fifth among the dozen recognized Christian denominations of the country. During the war it had more than quadrupled both its ministry and its members.

In less than a month after the conflicts of Lexington and Concord, while the whole country resounded with the din of military preparations, the little company of American itinerants wended doubtfully their way again to Philadelphia, for their third annual Conference, In due time we shall meet them there.

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ENDNOTES

1 History of the Religious Movement, etc., iii, p. 200.

2 Bancroft vii, p. 198.

3 Bancroft, vii, p. 148.

4 Paine's chief work, "The Age of Reason," was published later, but his opinions were generally circulated.

5 Hawks' Contributions, etc., p. 153.

6 Cooper on Asbury, p. 80.

7 See Hist. of the Relig. Movement, etc., ii, pp. 129, 200. "He talks well," said Johnson to Boswell; "I could converse with him all night."

8 Wesley's Preface to the second edition. Works, vol. vi. Am. Ed.

9 "I have thanks likewise to return you for the addition of your important suffrage to my argument on the American question. To have gained such a mind as yours may justly confirm me in my own opinion. What effect my paper has upon the public I know not; but I have no reason to be discouraged. The lecturer was surely in the right who, though he saw his audience slinking away, refused to quit the chair while Plato stayed." — Gentleman's Magazine, 1797, p. 455, and Boswell's Johnson, anno 1776. Wesley's inveterate opponent, Toplady, assailed him, for this use of Johnson's essay, as a plagiarist, in a virulent pamphlet entitled "An old Fox Tarred and Feathered." In his second edition Wesley gave Johnson full credit.

10 Smith's Hist. of Wes. Meth., i, p. 726. Hist. of the Relig. Movement, etc., ii, p 130. Bancroft, vii, 345. I am happy to acknowledge, in behalf of the Methodist community, their obligations to Mr. Bancroft, who, when this important document was brought under his notice, had the candor to qualify by it his former allusions to Wesley, though in order to do so it was necessary to cancel one or more of his stereotype plates. He inserts a large extract from the letter in the sixth edition of his seventh volume. The Methodist denomination will congratulate itself that its venerated founder is thus, almost for the first time in civil history, fairly represented in respect to this question, and that this justice has been accorded in a work which, by its remarkable merits, will be as immortal as its theme.

11 Bangs, i, 115.

12 Compare Minutes of 1776 with Baird's estimate, p. 210, note.

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