7. Separation from the Church.

Mr. Wesley's clerical irregularity, and the tendency of his system to separation from the Church

ministry of men of eminent piety, and the preaching of the great doctrines of the Reformation; that the affections excited arose from the same principles and considerations; that the sorrow was sorrow for sin, that the joy was the joy of reconciliation with God, and that in the whole, whatever instruments were employed, the recognized agent was the Spirit of God:-that immoralities were renounced, neglected ordinances frequented, and that the majority in every case gave evidence in future life of the reality of the moral change effected in them. Some extravagancies, and some irregularities are adverted to in those accounts, which, like those occasionally occurring in Methodism, were partly avoidable, and partly unavoidable. For noise and disorder, I am far from being an advocate, but in none of these cases does their occasional occurrence prove that an extraordinary work in the hearts of men was not then carrying on by the Spirit of God. By the exercise of a firm discipline, then most of all to be exerted, they are to be, as far as possible, repressed, for the power of the work does not lie in them; and yet discipline, though firm, ought to be discriminating, for the sake of that real blessing with which at such seasons God is crowning the administration of his truth. It is a subject of little importance how the sophists of the world, or merely nominal Christians may regard these accounts. Under any form in which it can be presented to them, the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart will be an object of their hostility and contempt. But to those who believe that all means used for the conversion of men, depend entirely for their efficacy upon divine influences; who think themselves warranted from Scripture to conclude that these influences are sometimes vouchsafed in extraordinary degrees of efficacy; and that such effusions will distinguish the latter day, and be the great means of hastening its glories, these notices of "the days of the right hand of the Most High," "days of his power," days of the Son of Man," are at once supporting, encouraging, and instructive. In these doctrines, and in these facts, real Christians, of all professions, are deeply interested. Ought they not earnestly to pray for that influence from God, in which they all trust, more abundantly

of England, are subjects frequently adverted to by Mr. Southey. On these points the Biographer has,

to accompany the word of his grace, and especially in times of daring wickedness and infidelity like the present, when so many agents are at work for evil, without assuming to prescribe in what manner their prayers shall be answered? It is granted, that in all such seasons of powerful operation, enthusiasm, real enthusiasm has, in a few cases, sprung up. So it was in New England, during that extraordinary work, of which President Edwards published a narrative. How did that great divine (for so he was, whatever may be thought of his theological metaphysics, or his Calvinistic tenets,) act? He scrutinized the cases, and wrote his able book on "The Religious Affections," not to discourage what he knew, and had proved from its result to be the work of God; but to guard and cherish it. Enthusiasm springs from excess, and not defect; and where there is most of active and ardent piety, it will most frequently be produced in individuals of weak understanding, and sanguine feelings, not to mention the imitations of hypocrisy; and this has been the case in all the best periods of the Church of Christ. The worst effect of this has been to put ministers too much upon their guard against enthusiasm; so that both the genuine work of God, and the sovereignty of the Holy Spirit in his operations, have often been. undervalued. My humble opinion is, however enthusiastic I may be deemed, that in this country we have little to fear from enthu siasm. Our dangers lurk elsewhere. Enthusiasm is chiefly dangerous, when the Scriptures and religious truth are but little known, and religious discipline in churches but imperfectly organized. In this country, where the Bible is so extensively circulated, evangelical principles so generally implanted in the minds of men, and the apparatus of a regular and numerous ministry in all religious communities provided, every thing is under control; and what the cause of religion appears most to want, is the "power from on high.” Why should not all who love Zion, and their country with the best kind of patriotic attachment, pray for this, and wait the answer to their prayers-"until the Spirit be poured from on high, and the wilderness become a fruitful field." "If," says Dr. Gillies, a most respectable Scotch divine, from whose Historical Collections' most of the accounts I have adverted to will be taken, "before these late gracious visitations, prayer for such blessings was so much neglected that in some respects it may be said, the Lord was found of people who sought him not, and did wonderful things which they looked not for, may it not be hoped, if we seek his face, and that with all

however, discovered much more fairness than is usual with the assailants of Methodism. Full justice, indeed, is not done to Mr. Wesley's motives, for they were not fully within Mr. Southey's comprehension, and remarks occasionally occur, which might well have been spared; but our Author has more than once made a concession which greatly narrows the ground of debate on this subject.

It has been usual for writers of Mr. Southey's class, to represent Mr. Wesley as having early formed the project of making himself the head of a sect; and to consider every part of his conduct as regulated by a pre-conceived plan of ultimate separation from the Church. Were this established, it would be difficult to reconcile many of his proceedings with strict sincerity, and his character must consequently have suffered. This opinion is, however, entirely unsupported; and so strong, indeed, is the contrary evidence, that those who have most violently assaulted Mr. Wesley on this ground, must have been wholly unacquainted with his history, or too bigotted to read it with impartiality. Mr. Southey, indeed, in his sketch of the Life and Character of Mr. Wesley, in "The Correspondent" for 1817, appears hastily to have given sanction to this opinion; but whether from the instruction he derived from a review of that article in the Methodist Magazine, or that his researches have since been

6

our heart, we shall find that we seek not his face in vain, and that he never was, and never will be, a barren wilderness, nor a land of darkness,' to them that look for him ?"

As the extracts I have referred to would swell this note to too great a length, they are inserted in an Appendix.

more careful, he now yields to the truth of the case, and admits, that though the measures Mr. Wesley adopted tended to a separation from the Church, they were taken by him "in good faith;" that they arose out of "the circumstances in which he was placed, one step bringing on another;" and that in the outset of his career, he had no intention of placing himself in opposition to the Church of England. This concession renders it unnecessary to go into a defence of the sincerity of Mr. Wesley's attachment to the Church; and I shall, therefore, say nothing on this subject, except that that sincerity was sufficiently put to the test. In the Church he met with little but hostility, and even persecution, through a great part of his life; yet no resentment, which it might be natural sometimes to feel, shook his attachment to her institutions, or abated the earnestness of his prayers for her welfare.

But though Mr. Southey allows that the measures of Mr. Wesley were taken "in good faith," he contends that he could not but "foresee" that their inevitable tendency was to separation. In order to meet this question, it is necessary to consider Mr. Wesley's views and circumstances in three marked periods of his public life.

The first period is the commencement of his itinerant ministry at home. Mr. Southey is right in representing it as Mr. Wesley's object, to revive the spirit of religion' in the Church of England. To this he thought himself called, at least by circumstances; for this he commenced, and continued his labours; and his ultimate success is a stronger

presumption than any Mr. Southey can bring against it, that he did not mistake his call. We may be thought enthusiastic; but judging from the results pendant upon that determination, we choose rather to explain his not accepting his father's living at Epworth by a providential interposition, than to adopt the solution of his Biographer, who, if Divine interfernece be omitted, is never at a loss for a reason to supply its place. Mr. Wesley on that occasion was neither indifferent to the opinions of his friends, nor to the "interest of his mother and sisters;" but in no great step does he appear ever to have acted without a clear conviction of duty; and, if Providence designed him to fill a larger sphere than the parish of Epworth, such a conviction in this case was not likely to be permitted. If there be any truth in providential interposition, it is to be looked for precisely in those circumstances in which Mr. Southey seems most anxious to exclude it, the circumstances which form the turning points of our future designation in life.

How far Mr. Wesley's early attempts to do good beyond the sphere of a parish, and to revive scriptural doctrines, and the spirit of piety in the church, of which he was a member and a clergyman, deserve to be referred to "ambition;""a restless spirit which had not yet found its proper sphere;" a mind not easily brought into subordination to the controul of ecclesiastical discipline; and other similar motives which Mr. Southey either considers as the primary principles under which Mr. Wesley acted, or which he resorts to, in order to qualify and deteriorate those higher motives the existence of which