So do thousands besides," says he. "But I write for those who judge of books, not by the quantity, but by the quality, of them; who do not ask how long, but how good, they are. I spare both the reader's time and my own, by couching the sense in as few words as I can.” * All his Prefaces are homilies, or "Appeals to Men of Reason and Religion." Dr. Rutherford said, "It is a fundamental principle in the Methodist school, that all who come into it must renounce their reason.” "Sir," said Wesley, "are you awake? Unless you are talking in your sleep, how can you utter so gross an untruth? It is a fundamental principle with us, that to renounce reason is to renounce religion; that religion and reason go hand in hand; and that all irrational religion is false religion.” + “The assumed ignorance," says Mr. Jackson,‡ "of Mr. Wesley's societies has often been the subject of allusion, and illiberal remark: but the fact is that the greater part of the common people were left with scarcely any knowledge either of religion, or letters. He taught them not only the nature of Christian piety, but made provision for their intellectual improvement. To explain and enforce practical godliness was his great concern; but, in subordination to this, he laboured to excite a taste for elegant literature,' and fine poetry; and when some objected to Prior's "Henry and Emma,” inserted in the second volume of the "Arminian Magazine," he admitted that it was not strictly religious, but maintained that it was one of the finest poems in the English tongue, both for sentiment and language; "and whoever," said he, can read it without tears, must have a stupid, unfeeling heart." 66 Mr. Wesley not only created an appetite for knowledge, but very early supplied persons in comparative poverty with the means of obtaining it; so that more than a century ago § (1745) the books published by John and Charles Wesley consisted of sixty-five publications, sold either singly, or bound in fifteen volumes. City-Road, January 31st, 1847. THOMAS MARRIOTT. BRUSSELS DURING THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO. I was awakened in the middle of the night by confused noises in the house and running up and down stairs. I listened attentively, but heard no sound of voices, and soon all was quiet. I then concluded the persons who resided in the apartments on the second floor, over my head, had returned home late, and I tried to fall asleep again. I succeeded; but I was again awakened at about five o'clock in the morning, Friday, 16th June, by the sound of a bugle-horn in the Marché aux Bois. I started up, and opened the window but I only perceived some straggling soldiers, hurrying in different directions, and saw lights gleaming from some of the chambers in the neighbourhood; all again was soon still, and my own dwelling in profound silence; and therefore I concluded there had been some disturbance in exchanging sentinels at the various posts, which was already appeased; and I retired once more to my pillow, and remained till my usual hour. I was * Wesley's Works, vol. xiv., p. 376. + Ibid., p. 367. Preface to Wesley's Works, p. 14. § As appears from a Catalogue now before me. finishing, however, a letter for my best friend, when my breakfast was brought in, at my then customary time of eight o'clock; and, as mistakes and delays and miscarriages of letters had caused me much unnecessary misery, I determined to put what I was then writing in the post myself, and set off with it the moment it was sealed. In my way back from the Post-office, my ears were alarmed by the sound of military music, and my eyes equally struck with the sight of a body of troops marching to its measured time. But I soon found that what I had supposed to be an occasionally passing troop, was a complete corps; infantry, cavalry, artillery, bag and baggage, with all its officers in full uniform, and that uniform was black. This gloomy hue gave an air so mournful to the procession, that, knowing its destination for battle, I contemplated it with an aching heart. On inquiry, I learned it was the army of Brunswick. How much deeper yet had been my heart-ache had I foreknown that nearly all those brave men, thus marching on in gallant though dark array, with their valiant royal chief at their head, the nephew of my own King, George the Third, were amongst the first destined victims of this dreadful contest, and that neither the chief nor the greater part of his warlike associates would, within a few short hours, breathe again the vital air! My interrogations were answered with brevity: yet curiosity was all awake and all abroad; for the procession lasted some hours. Not a door but was open, not a threshold but was crowded, and not a window of the many-windowed Gothic, modern, frightful, handsome, quaint, disfigured, fantastic, or lofty mansions that diversified the large market-place of Brussels, but was occupied by lookerson. Placidly, indeed, they saw the warriors pass: no kind greeting welcomed their arrival; no warm wishes followed them to combat. Neither, on the other hand, was there the slightest symptom of dissatisfaction; yet even while standing thus in the midst of them, an unheeded, yet observant, stranger, it was not possible for me to discern, with any solidity of conviction, whether the Belgians were, at heart, Bourbonists or Bonapartists. The Bonapartists, however, were in general the most open; for the opinion on both sides, alike with good will and with ill, was nearly universal that Bonaparte was invincible. Still, I knew not, dreamt not, that the campaign was already opened; that Bonaparte had broken into La Belgique on the 15th, and had taken Charleroi ; though it was news undoubtedly spread all over Brussels except to my lonely self. My own disposition, at this period, to silence and retirement was too congenial with the taciturn habits of my hosts to be by them counteracted; and they suffered me, therefore, to return to my home as I had quitted it, with a mere usual and civil salutation; while themselves and their house were evidently continuing their common avocations with their common composure. Surely our colloquial use of the word "phlegm " must be derived from the character of the Flemings. The important tidings now, however, burst upon me in sundry directions. The Princess d'Henin, Colonel de Beauford, Madame de Maurville, the Boyd family, all, with the intelligence of the event, joined offers of service, and invitations to reside with them during this momentous contest, should I prefer such protection to remaining alone at such a crisis. What a day of confusion and alarm did we all spend on the 17th; in my heart the whole time was Trèves! Trèves! Trèves! That day, and June 18th, I passed in hearing the cannon! What indescribable horror to be so near the field of slaughter! such I call it, for the preparation to the ear by the tremendous sound was soon followed by its fullest effect, in the view of the wounded, the bleeding martyrs to the formidable contention that was soon to termi nate the history of the war. And hardly more afflicting was this disabled return from the battle, than the sight of the continually pouring forth readyarmed and vigorous victims that marched past my windows to meet similar destruction. Accounts from the field of battle arrived hourly; sometimes directly from the Duke of Wellington to Lady Charlotte Greville, and to some other ladies who had near relations in the combat, and which, by their means, were circulated in Brussels; and at other times from such as conveyed those amongst the wounded Belgians, whose misfortunes were inflicted near enough to the skirts of the spots of action, to allow of their being dragged away by their hovering countrymen to the city,-the spots, I say, of action, for the far-famed battle of Waterloo was preceded by three days of partial engagements. During this period, I spent my whole time in seeking intelligence, and passing from house to house of the associates of my distress, or receiving them in mine. [The writer then goes on to describe the state of the town during the days of the battle, the rumours, the anxiety, the hopes and fears, the attempted flights and the enforced returns, the suspense, perplexities, and desolations of that terrible time.] The dearth of any positive news from the field of battle, even in the heart of Brussels, at this crisis, when everything that was dear and valuable to either party was at stake, was at one instant nearly distracting in its torturing suspense to the wrung nerves, and at another insensibly blunted them into a kind of amalgamation with the Belgic philosophy. At certain houses, as well as at public offices, news, I doubt not, arrived; but no means were taken to promulgate it; no gazettes, as in London, no bulletins, as in Paris, were cried about the streets; we were all left at once to our conjectures and our destinies. The delusion of victory vanished into a merely passing advantage, as I gathered from the earnest researches into which it led me; and evil only met all ensuing investigation; retreat and defeat were the words in every mouth around me! The Prussians, it was asserted, were completely vanquished on the 15th, and the English on the 16th, while on the day just past, the 17th, a day of continual fighting and bloodshed, drawn battles on both sides left each party proclaiming what neither party could prove-success. It was Sunday; but church service was out of the question, though never were prayers more frequent, more fervent. Form, indeed, they could not have, nor union, while constantly expecting the enemy with fire and sword at the gates. Who could enter a place of worship, at the risk of making it a scene of slaughter? But who also, in circumstances so awful, could require the exhortation of a Priest, or the example of a congregation, to stimulate devotion? No! in those fearful exigencies, where, in the full vigour of health, strength, and life's freshest resources, we seem destined to abruptly quit this mortal coil, we need no spur, all is spontaneous; and the soul is unshackled.-From the Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay. PRIMITIVE IRON-WORKS IN SOUTH AFRICA. RODE with Livingston to see the iron-works of the Bakatlas, and found them well worthy a visit. The construction and management of the apparatus, which, as might be expected, was of a most primitive and simple order, was as follows:- An oval hole, about six feet long, two feet deep, and two feet broad, was divided in the centre by a clay kiln, some three feet high. In this kiln successive layers of charcoal and iron ore (the oxide of iron dug in the adjacent hills) were placed. Two men sat in the holes, one on either side the kiln, and each held in his hand two goat-skin bellows, the nozzles of which were made of horns, and inserted in holes at the base of the kiln. By means of these a continuous blast was kept up. The bellows were merely leathern bags, made to open and close at their mouths by two parallel bits of stick, like the mouth of a carpet-bag. A circular fence enclosed the whole from public view; for these works are kept secret from all but the initiated, and the forging art is confined to certain families: even Moseleli, their King, has been refused an insight into them. White men are supposed already to understand the art, and, when attended by a Missionary, are readily admitted. Four parts of the ore, at least, are wasted in the ash: the remainder, consisting of pure metal, is wrought into form with stone hammers and anvils. Tubal-Cain must have made greater proficiency in the art. The smiths are very superstitious, and use many herbs as charms, or medicine for the iron," during their labour. Simple, however, as is this process, the original discovery that the ore could, by the medium of fire, be made available to the service of man, is singular amongst men living so entirely in a state of nature. Hoes, knives, spears, hatchets, &c., are thus manufactured. A whole day's work does not yield more than a few pounds of iron, and it is only during one or two months in the year that it is lawful to work. The rocks here are trap, porphyry, schist, and sandstone, and the ore is found at the junction of the igneous and aqueous rocks.— Methuen's Wanderings in South Africa. 66 SUDDEN DEATH. (To the Editor of the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine.) ALONG with most of your readers, I am persuaded, I read with much profit the impressive anecdote of a case of sudden death, in your last Magazine, together with the beautiful verses, in relation to a similar occurrence, by Edmeston. The poet does certainly place before the reader the subject in its most pleasing aspect; and the almost natural effect of the whole would be, that at first, and for the present, there would be the desire expressed in one of the lines, "So would I die!" And yet, is this a desire which subsequent reflection would confirm? By two devotional works of high character, two different answers seem to be given. In the Litany, placed by the Anglican Church in her Book of Common Prayer, there is the wellknown petition,-" From battle, and murder, and from sudden death, good Lord, deliver us!" While, in the Wesleyan congregational HymnBook, which, from its universal and constant use, might almost be termed liturgical, I find the verse, "O that without a lingering groan I may the welcome word receive; Losing sight of the lovely tinting of Mr. Edmeston's picture, the natural shrinking from dying would not be unlikely, in the pious mind, to produce such a desire as I have mentioned. I have heard Christians, whose piety has evidently been deep as well as sincere, say, that they had no fear of death, but they had a fear of dying. With conscientious sincerity, timidity is sometimes connected; and this, added to that instinct of nature which draws back from dissolution,-dissolution not natural to man as man, but which is, however now overruled by divine grace, the punishment of sin,-easily leads to such a result. At the same time, I ought to say, that I have usually observed that these very Christians have generally found, when actually called to die, that the grace of the Lord Jesus was most sufficient for them their bed of death has furnished a scene of delightful and animated triumph. So that it might be said to all such persons, "Leave the future to God. Live to him now, and be satisfied with the sure anticipation of the presence of the Great and Good Shepherd in the valley and shadow of death, when you are brought to it. You shall have dying grace for dying times." It is evident, however, that only in the heart, through diligence and watchfulness, ever kept right with God, can such a desire, with any degree of propriety, be cherished. I lay no stress on the repentance deferred to a dying hour. Still, it is not for us, even though we wish to impress the sinner, to limit the fathomless-often to us the mysteriousmercy of God. But, in cases of sudden death, for this there is no opportunity. So, also, where there has been declension; and (might I not say?) even where this has not been the case, but where there has been large engagement in duty, the proximate object of which has been this present state. There seems to me to be something grand in beholding even a Christian warrior, a standard-bearer, desisting from the labours of the militant host of God's elect, and solemnly addressing himself to the immediate task of severance from the world, and direct preparation for the mysteries of eternity, awful, though radiant with hope. Mr. Edmeston's pictorial verse is truly beautiful; but no description of the last hours of a good man ever impressed me more than the graphic delineation of those of Mr. Watson, furnished in Mr. Jackson's admirable "Life." A mind too large for the earthly tabernacle (I could almost say, for earth itself) feels that it is called to pass into the infinite expanse of immortality,—the worm to leave its hole, and enter into the full light of present Deity. Does not this seem a fitting close for a life spent in seeking to call mortal, and yet undying, man to the recognition of those greatest of truths,-God, heaven, and eternity? What is the gloomy, though pompous, mockery of "lying in state," to that affecting view of mortality about to be swallowed up of life, beheld in Madeley vicarage, when the dying Fletcher, an unearthly light beaming on his countenance, was seen on his last bed of living repose, saying or signing, "God is love," by his mourning parishioners, passing by his bedroom-door, and taking a final leave of their beloved Pastor? And I think of Wesley, too; the wheels of weary life gradually standing still, while he was surrounded by those who could no longer retain their "father' with them, cheered in their sorrow by the glorious testimony,-" The best of all is, God is with us!"-rejoicing, though they wept that his voice was failing in death, that "his last trembling accents whispered praise." Who that was privileged to be there, would have left that scene of religious grandeur to witness the imposing pageantry of an ancient Roman triumph, or of a modern coronation ? But, if I may again use the word, not on that which is pictorial in death is the specific desire to be fixed. In death, as life, the great object of the soul must be God. The rule of Christian duty embraces dying as well as |