Persons," published, in 1753, in Vol. XXII. of the "Christian The "Thoughts on Christian Perfection" have been already noticed; and "Christian Instructions" contains nothing which deserves further mention. A quarter of a century had elapsed since Wesley set sail for America. With what results? To say nothing of the success of the labours of Whitefield and his coadjutors, Methodism had been introduced into almost every county of England and Ireland; ninety itinerant preachers were acting under Wesley's direction; also a much larger number of local preachers, leaders, and stewards; chapels had been built in London, Bristol, Kingswood, Newcastle on Tyne, Redruth, St. Just, St. Ives, Whitehaven, Gateshead, Sunderland, Teesdale, Colchester, Portsmouth, Whitchurch, Bacup, Bolton, Flixton, Liverpool, Epworth, Louth, Norwich, Kinley, Misterton, Coleford, Tipton, Wednesbury, Lakenheath, Salisbury, Bradford, Halifax, Hutton Rudby, Haworth, Leeds, Osmotherley, Stainland, Sheffield, York, Cardiff, Bandon, Cork, Dublin, Edinderry, Tullamore, Court Mattrass, Pallas, Castlebar, Waterford, and other places; and to these sacred edifices must be added scores, probably hundreds, of private houses, schools, barns, and rooms, which were regularly used as preaching places. In addition to all this, the Wesley brothers, John and Charles, had published about a dozen volumes and about thirty tracts and pamphlets of hymns and poetry; while Wesley himself had issued nine numbers of his Journal, about one hundred and thirty separate sermons, tracts, and pamphlets, and nearly seventy volumes of books, including his "Notes on the New Testament," his Sermons, and his "Christian Library." Can this be equalled, all things considered, in the same space of time, in the life of any one, in this or in any other age and nation of the world? We doubt it. Wesley began his career as a penniless priest; he was without patrons and without friends; magistrates threatened him; the clergy expelled him from their churches, and wrote numberless and 1 This list is taken, chiefly, from Myles's "Chronological History"; but it is far from being perfect. 1760 Age 57 1760 furious pasquinades against him; newspapers and magazines Age 57, reviled him; ballad singers, in foulest language, derided him; mobs assaulted, and, more than once, well-nigh murdered him; and not a few of his companions in toil forsook him and became his antagonists; and yet, despite all this, such were some of the results of the first five-and-twenty years of his unequalled public ministry. PART III. 1761. UPON PON the whole, the reign of the second George had been 1761 a prosperous one. Money was plentiful; waste lands Age 58 were cultivated; mines were opened; and the exports of the country doubled. But still, the population of England and Wales was only about six millions, one half of whom were living on barley and oaten cakes. Lord Holland was now at the zenith of his fame, a man of - distinguished talent, but a gambler, and of no fixed principles, either of religion or of morals. William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, was premier, his eye armed with lightning, and his lips clothed with thunder. Lord Bute was plotting to become his successor. Secker, the son of a Dissenter, had recently been made primate. Newton, soon afterwards bishop of Bristol, was publishing his Dissertations on the Prophecies. Lowth had given to the public his Lectures on Hebrew Poetry, and was rising into literary reputation. Beilby Porteus was a young man, just becoming popular. Kennicott was collecting sacred manuscripts. William Dodd was already the idol of the London populace. The learned and pious Horne was working his way to the see of Norwich; and Horsley, afterwards bishop of St. Asaph, had just been appointed to the rectory of Newington. Robert Robinson had recently commenced his ministry at Cambridge. Dr. Gill was publishing his ponderous folios of Calvinistic divinity. Towgood was educating young dissenting ministers; and Job Orton was writing his Exposition of the Scriptures. Shenstone, Akenside, Gray, Collins, and Goldsmith were among the chief poets of the period. John Harrison was completing the chronometer, which obtained him a parliamentary reward of £20,000. John Dollond was constructing telescopes; Thomas Simpson 1761 was lecturing on mathematics; and James Ferguson on stars. Age 58 James Brindley was executing the great Bridgewater canal; and Hogarth, Reynolds, and Gainsborough were making pictures almost breathe. Macklin, Foote, and Garrick were the idols of the pleasure loving world. These are a few of the distinguished men who lived and flourished at the commencement of the reign of King George III. Perhaps we are justified in saying that, from this period, literature in England became more than ever a distinct profession. Persons of all ranks, including ladies like Madame D'Arblay, Mrs. Hannah More, Miss Seward, and Mrs. Barbauld, turned authors. Johnson poured forth his sonorous eloquence. Burke issued his brilliant pamphlets. Adam Smith wrote his Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations; and Reid, his Essays on the Intellectual Powers; Campbell, his Dissertations on Miracles; Robertson, his Histories; and Gibbon, his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Other distinguished names belonging to the last thirty years of Wesley's life might be mentioned,-as Blair the rhetorician, Sir William Jones the linguist, Herschel the astronomer, Hutton the geologist, Hunter the anatomist, Banks the naturalist, Cook the navigator, Howard the philanthropist; Crabbe, Rogers, and Burns the poets; Watt the engineer, Arkwright the cotton spinner, Wedgwood the potter, Wyatt the architect, and Bruce the traveller. England was awaking into unwonted life. It is impossible, in a work like this, to give even the barest outline of the great political events of the first thirty years of the reign of George III. War committed fearful havoc. Politics were in bitterest confusion. The Earl of Bute, cold, stiff, and unconciliating, was the subject of numberless caricatures, lampoons, and squibs. The popularity of Pitt, the patriot minister, was partially obscured with mists and clouds, while his friends and partisans extolled him in the highest terms of eulogy. The Duke of Newcastle, after occupying a seat in the English cabinet for five-and-thirty years, had to retire, in comparative poverty, to the dreary mansion of an ex-minister. Terrible were the contentions in parliament, respecting the American rebellion, the stamp act, and other England from 1760 to 1791. 395 matters. The political horizon was alarmingly threatening, and the period was almost a continuous thunderstorm. In a moral point of view, the state of the nation was deplorable. Wesley had, under God, begun a reformation; but that was all. The upper and the middle classes were revelling in luxury; the poor often were in a state of starvation. Wilkes, Lord Sandwich, Sir Francis Dashwood, and other fashionable rakes, were notoriously living in the worst private excesses, and in Palace Yard were indulging in all the frowsy indecencies of the Dilettante club, and at Medmenham Abbey were practising the mysteries, obscenities, and mockeries of the Hell Fire club of the Duke of Wharton's days. Warburton, bishop of Gloucester, declared that "the blackest fiend in hell would not keep company with Wilkes on his arrival there"; and yet, mournful to relate, Wilkes was the popular hero of the London populace. The sabbath was the day for routs among the nobility and gentry; and political ministers, foreign and domestic, being too busy on other days, gave their grand entertainments on this. Gambling, though not so rampant as it had been, was still a prevailing vice. Rakes were plentiful. Seeing life meant keeping all sorts of company; drinking much, and appearing great; swearing in fashionable language, and singing licentious songs; the being impious in morals and wanton in debaucheries; learned in obscenity and skilled in wickedness; spending the night at Vauxhall or Ranelagh; and then reeling through the streets, at early dawn, like a beau of the first magnitude, breaking windows and wrenching knockers; and, at last, finishing a drunken frolic in being carried, either home or to the lock up, speechless, senseless, and motionless. Reckless extravagance was general. The mansions, furniture, tables, equipages, gardens, clothes, plate, and jewels of the nobility were as gorgeous as wealth could make them. Young tradesmen had their country houses, drove their carriages, and, to a ruinous extent, left the management of their business to their servants. Dress was ludicrously expensive. The upper classes indulged in their brocades, laces, velvets, satins, and silver tassels; and even the sons of mechanics sported their gold buttons, high quartered shoes, scarlet waistcoats, and doeskin breeches. But, perhaps, the most absurd of all was the ladies' powdered 1761 Age 58 |