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named, he exclaims: O that God would write in your hearts the rules of self-denial and love laid down by Thomas à Kempis; or that you would follow, in this and in good works, the burning and shining light of your own Church, the Marquis of Renty. (1). Then would all who know and love the truth, rejoice to acknowledge you as the Church of the living God.' (2).

At the first rise of Methodism in Oxford, A. D. 1729, John Wesley and his companions were plain, serious, Church-of-England-men, assiduous and methodical in praying, reading, fasting, and other good works. What they practised themselves, they preached to others both in England and in America; till becoming intimate with the Moravian brethren, and particularly with Peter Bohler, one of their elders, John Wesley, 'became convinced of unbelief, namely, a want of that faith whereby alone we are saved.' (3). Speaking of his past life and ministry, he says: I was fundamentally a. Papist, and knew it not (4).' Soon after this persuasion, namely, on May 24, 1739, Going into a Society

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(1) His life is written in French, by Père St. Jure, a Jesuit, and abridged in English by J. Wesley.

(2) In his Popery Calmly Considered, p. 20, Wesley writes: I firmly believe that many members of the Church of Rome have been holy men, and that many are so now.' He elsewhere says, Several of them (Papists) have attained to as high a pitch of sanctity, as human nature is capable of arriving at.

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(3) Whitehead's Life of John and Charles Wesley, vol. ii. p. 68.

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(4) Journal, A.D. 1739.-Elsewhere Wesley says: what a work has God begun since Peter Bohler came to England! such a one as shall never come to an end, till heaven and earth pass away.'

in Aldersgate Street,' he says, 'whilst a person was reading Luther's Preface to the Romans, about a quarter before nine, I felt my heart strangely warmed: I felt I did trust in Christ, in Christ alone for salvation, and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.' (1)

What were, now, the unavoidable consequences of a diffusion of this doctrine among the people at large? Let us hear them from Wesley's most able disciple and destined successor, Fletcher of Madeley. 'Antinomian principles and practices,' he says, 'have spread like wildfire among our Societies. Many persons, speaking in the most glorious manner of Christ, and their interest in his complete salvation, have been found living in the greatest immoralities. -How few of our Societies, where cheating, extorting, or some other evil hath not broke out, and given such shakes to the Ark of the Gospel, that, had not the Lord interposed, it must have been overset! (2) I have seen them who pass for believers, follow the strain of corrupt nature; and when they should have exclaimed against Antinomianism, I have heard them cry out against the legality of their wicked hearts, which, they said, still suggested that they were to DO something for their salvation.' (3) How few of our celebrated

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(1) Vide Whitehead, vol. ii. p. 79. In a letter to his brother Samuel, John Wesley says: by a Christian I mean one who so believes in Christ, that death hath no dominion over him, and in this obvious sense of the word I was not a Christian till 24th of May, last year. Ibid, 105. (2) Checks to Antinom, vol. ii. p. 22. (3) Ibid. vol. ii. p. 200.

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pulpits, where more has not been said for sin than against it!' (1). The same candid writer, laying open the foulness of his former system, charges Richard Hill, Esq., who persisted in it, with maintaining that, 'Even adultery and murder do not hurt the pleasant children, but rather work for their good.' (2) 'God sees no sin in believers, whatever sin they commit. My sins might displease God; my person is always acceptable to him. Though I should outsin Manasses, I should not be less a pleasant child, because God always views me in Christ. Hence, in the midst of adulteries, murders, and incests, he can address me with: Thou art all fair, my love, my undefiled, there is no spot in thee.' (3) It is a most pernicious error of the schoolmen to distinguish sins according to the fact and not according to the person. Though I blame those who say; let us sin that grace may abound; yet adultery, incest, and murder, shall, upon the whole, make me holier on earth and merrier in heaven'. (4)

(1) Checks to Antinom. p. 215.

(2) Fletcher's Works, vol. iii. p. 50. Agricola, one of Luther's first disciples, is called the founder of the Antinomians. These hold that the faithful are bound by no law, either of God or man, and that good works of every kind are useless to salvation; while Amsdorf, Luther's pot-companion, taught that they are an impediment to salvation. Mosheim's

Eccles. Hist. by Maclaine, vol. iv. p. 35. p. 328, Eaton, a Puritan, in his Honeycomb of Justification, says: 'Believers ought not to mourn for sin, because it was pardoned before it was committed.' (3) Fletcher, vol. iv. p. 97.

(4) Quoted by Fletcher.

the Church, p. 82.

See also Daubeny's Guide to

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These doctrines and practices, casting great disgrace on Methodism, alarmed its founder. He therefore held a synod of his chief preachers, under the title of A Conference, in which he and they unanimously abandoned their past fundamental principles, in the following confession which they made. Quest. 17. Have we not, unawares, leaned too much to Calvinism? Ans. We are afraid we have. Ques. 18. Have we not also leaned too much to Antinomianism? Ans. We are afraid we have. Quest. 20. What are the main pillars of it? Ans. 1. That Christ abolished the moral law: 2. That Christians therefore are not obliged to observe it: 3. That one branch of Christian liberty is liberty from observing the Commandments of God,' &c. (1) The publication of this retractation, in 1770, raised the indignation of the more rigid Methodists, namely, the Whitfieldites, Jumpers, &c., all of whom were under the particular patronage of Lady Huntingdon : accordingly her Chaplain, the Hon. and Rev. Walter Shirley, issued a circular letter by her direction, calling a General Meeting of her connexion, as it is called, at Bristol, to censure this dreadful heresy, which, as Shirley affirmed, injured the very fundamentals of Christianity.' (2)

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Having exhibited this imperfect errors, contradictions, absurdities, impieties, and immoralities, into which numberless Christians, most of them, no doubt, sincere in their belief, have fallen, by pursuing phantoms of their imagination for Divine Illuminations, and adopting a supposed,

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(1) Apud Whitehead, p 213. Benson's Apology, p. 208. (2) Fletcher's Works, vol. ii. p. 5. Whitehead. ingale's Portraiture of Methodism, p. 463.

immediate, and personal Revelation, as the Rule of their Faith and Conduct, I would request any one of your respectable Society, who may still adhere to it, to reconsider the self-evident maxim laid down in the beginning of this letter; namely: That cannot be the Rule of Faith and Conduct, which is liable to lead us, and has led very many well-meaning persons, into error and impiety: I would remind him of his frequent mistakes and illusions respecting things of a temporary nature; then, painting to his mind the all-importance of ETERNITY, that is, of happiness or misery inconceivable and everlasting, I would address him in the words of St. Augustin: What is it that you are trusting to, poor, weak soul, and blinded with the mists of the flesh: what is it you are trusting to?'

LETTER VII.

To JAMES BROWN, Esq. &c.

OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.

DEAR SIR,

J. M.

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I HAVE just received a letter from Friend Rankin of Wenlock, written much in the style of George Fox, and another from Mr. Ebenezer Topham of Broseley. They both consist of objections to my last letter to you, which they had perused at New Cottage; and the writers of them both request, that I would address whatever answer I might give them, to your Villa.

Friend Rankin is sententious yet civil: he asks, 1st, Whether Friends at this day and in past

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