this "religious movement of the eighteenth century called Methodism ?" It was not a new dogmatic phase of Protestantism. They err who would interpret its singular history by its theology. Its prominent doctrine of justification by faith was the prominent doctrine of the Reformation. Its doctrines of the "witness of the Spirit" and of "sanctification" had been received, substantially, if not with the verbalism of Methodism, by all the leading Churches of Christendom.* Wesley, Fletcher, and Sellon appealed to the standards of the Anglican Church in support of their teachings in these respects. Wesley taught no important doctrine which is not authorized by that Church, unless it be what is called his Arminianism. But even this was dominant in the Anglican Church in certain periods of its history. He interpreted its apparently Calvinistic Article by the history of the Articles, and, with many eminent authorities, denied it a strictly Calvinistic significance. Arminianism prevailed in the English Church under the Stuarts. Sancroft, Barrow, Burnet, South, Chillingworth, Cudworth, Bull, More, Hammond, Wilkins, Tillotson, Stillingfleet, were Arminians.† The "Theological Institutes of Episcopius," says an author, but eighteen years before the birth of Wesley, "were generally in the hands of our students of divinity in both universities as the best system of divinity that has appeared." Arminianism had spread, "as is well known, over much of the Protestant regions of Europe. The Lutheran Churches came into it; and in England there was a predisposing bias in the rulers of the Church toward the authority of the primitive fathers, all of whom before the age of Augustine, and especially the Greek, are acknowledged to have been on that side which promoted the growth of this Batavian Theology."§ Arminianism had been tried, then, but with no such results as accompanied it under Methodism. If it be replied that its legitimate influence had been neutralized by the latitudinarian errors associated with it by many of the English divines mentioned, and by its great continental representatives, Grotius, Causabon, Vossius, *On the general Acceptance of the doctrine of Assurance by the Churches of the Reformation, see Sir William Hamilton's "Discussions on Philosophy," etc., p. 508. London. Hallam, "Literature of Europe," vol. ii, p. 287, American edition. § Hallam, vol. ii, p. 43. Le Clerc, Wetstein, and innumerable others, yet it had been taught with evangelical purity by Arminius himself and his immediate associates, but with no such power as attended Methodism. In fine, none of the important doctrines taught by Wesley and his followers were peculiar to them. That their theology was necessary to their system, of course, cannot be denied; but, we repeat, it was not peculiar to the system. It had existed, every one of its essential dogmas, in the general Church, without the remarkable efficacy of Methodism. Calvinistic Methodism was powerful alike with Arminian Methodism in the outset, and failed at last only by the failure of its ecclesiastical methods. Methodism differed from other religious bodies, in respect to theology, chiefly by giving greater prominence, more persistent inculcation to truths which they held in common, particularly to the doctrines of Justification by Faith, Assurance, and Sanctification. These were the current ideas of Methodist Theology, but they were rendered incandescent by the spirit, and effective by the methods of Methodism. In these two facts-the spirit, and the practical system of Methodism-inheres the whole secret, if secret it may be called, of its peculiar power. The "Holy Club" was formed at Oxford in 1729, for the sanctification of its members. The Wesleys there sought personal purification by prayer, watchings, fastings, alms, and Christian labors among the poor. George Whitefield joined them for the same purpose; he was the first to become "renewed in the spirit of his mind;" but not till he had passed through a fiery ordeal, till he had spent "whole days and weeks prostrate on the ground in prayer," "using only bread and sage tea" during "the forty days of Lent, except on Saturdays and Sundays." He became morbid in his spiritual earnestness; he lost the power of memory at times; he "selected the coarsest food, wore patched raiment, and uncleaned shoes, and coarse gloves." He prayed "till the sweat ran down his face, under the trees, far into the winter's nights;", but he escaped at last his ascetic delusions, and was saved "by laying * Professor Stuart, of Andover, says, (Creed, etc., of Arminius, Biblical Repository, vol. i,) "Let the injustice, then, of merging Pelagius and Arminius together no more be done among us, as it often has been." "Most of the accusations of heresy made against him [Arminius] appear to be the offspring of suspicion, or of a wrong construction of his words." hold on the cross by a living faith;" receiving "an abiding sense of the pardoning love of God, and a full assurance of faith." He was hooted at and pelted with missiles in the streets by his fellow-students, but was preparing meanwhile to go forth a herald of the new "movement:" a preacher of Methodism in both hemispheres; the greatest preacher, it is probable, in popular eloquence, of all the Christian ages. John and Charles Wesley continue the ineffectual ascetic struggle, poring over the pages of the "Imitatione," and the "Holy Living and Dying;" in all things "living by rule;" fasting excessively; visiting the poor and the prisoner. They find no rest to their souls, untroubled, as yet, by any dogmatic question, but seeking only spiritual life. Wesley proposes to himself a solitary life in the "Yorkshire dales;" "it is the decided temper of his soul." His wise mother interposes, admonishing him prophetically "that God had better work for him to do." He travels some miles to consult " a serious man." "The Bible knows nothing of solitary religion," says this good man, and Wesley turns about with his face toward that great career which was to make his history a part of the history of his country and of the world. "Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord," is the cry of his spirit; but he still finds it not. "I am persuaded," he writes, "that we may know if we are now in a state of salvation, since that is expressly promised in the Holy Scriptures to our sincere endeavors, and we are surely able to judge of our own sincerity." Taylor's 'Holy Living and Dying" teaches him utter purity of motive; "instantly he resolves to dedicate all his life to God; all his thoughts, and words and actions; being thoroughly convinced there is no medium." The dedication is made, but the light does not come. The two brothers determine to seek it in the wilderness of the new world-to "forsake all," become missionaries to the colonists and savages, and perish in obscurity, if need be, for their souls. They accompany Oglethorpe to Georgia, and on the voyage they witness the joyous faith of Moravian peasants and artisans in the perils of storms; they are convinced that they themselves have no such faith. They question the Moravians, and get improved views of the spiritual life, but still grope in the dark. They learn more from the Moravian missionaries in the colonies, but sink into deeper anxiety. They preach and read the Liturgy every day to the colonists, and teach their children in schools. They fast much, sleep on the ground, refuse all food but bread and water." John goes barefooted to encourage the poor children who had not shoes. The colonists recoil from their severities, and they return to England defeated. In sight of Land's End John writes in his journal: "I went to America to convert Indians, but O, who shall convert me? who is he that will deliver me from this evil heart of unbelief?" On arriving in England he again writes: "This then have I learned, in the ends of the earth, that I am 'fallen short of the glory of God.' I have no hope but that, if I seek, I shall find Christ." "If," he adds, " it be said that I have faith, for many such things have I heard from many miserable comforters, I answer, so have the devils a sort of faith, but still they are strangers to the covenant of promise. The faith I want is a sure trust and confidence in God, that through the merits of Christ my sins are forgiven, and I reconciled to the favor of God." The Moravians meet him again in London, where they maintain several religious society meetings in private houses. Both the Wesleys, turning away from St. Paul's, Westminister Abbey, the dead Churches, seek light from heaven in these humble assemblies. They become the associates of Peter Böller, a Moravian preacher. John Wesley cleaves to him. "February 7th, 1738-a day much to be remembered," writes the troubled inquirer when he first meets Böhler; "I did not willingly lose an opportunity of conversing with him." The Moravian expounds to him faith, justification by faith, sanctification by faith; he begins to "see the promise, but it is afar off." He attends a Moravian meeting and hears Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans read: the truth breaks upon his mind; "I felt," he writes, "my heart strangely warmed; I felt I did trust 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." Charles Wesley three days before had experienced the same change; "I now," he writes, "found myself at peace with God. I went to bed still sensible of my own weakness; I humbly hope to feel more and more so; yet confident of Christ's protection." Such is "regeneration," according to Methodism; such the first great truth of its proclamation to the world. The next month John Wesley preaches "Salvation by faith" before the University of Oxford. He has begun his career. The Churches of London are startled by his preaching; by no new truth, but the emphasis and power with which he declares old and admitted truths of the Anglican theological standards, the "new birth," the "witness of the Spirit," and, subsequently, the doctrine of "sanctification," a doctrine which, as taught by Wesley, is in accordance with the highest teachings of the Anglican Church, " is," says a strict churchman, "essentially right and important; combining, in substance, all the sublime morality of the Greek fathers, the spiritual piety of the Mystics, and the divine philosophy of our favorite Platonists. Macarius, Fenelon, Lucas, and all their respective classes, have been consulted and digested by him, and his ideas are essentially theirs." His doctrine of faith seemed like a new truth to the apathetic formalism of the Church, but it was the doctrine of its Homilies and of its best theologians.† He The genius of Methodism was, then, evangelical life, and in theology, its chief concern was with those doctrines which are essential to personal religious life. "What was the rise of Methodism?" asked Wesley in his conference of 1765. answered, "In 1729 my brother and I read the Bible; saw inward and outward holiness therein; followed after it and incited others so to do. In 1737 we saw this holiness come by faith. In 1738 we saw we must be justified before we are sanctified. But still holiness was our point; inward and outward holiness. God then thrust us out to raise a holy people." Whitefield had startled the metropolitan Churches before Wesley's arrival, and, flaming with apostolic zeal, had left for Georgia, the vessel which bore him passing in the channel that which brought Wesley; but he soon returned, and now the Methodistic movement began in good earnest. Its apostles were excluded from the pulpits of London and Bristol; they took the open field, and thousands of colliers and peasants stood weeping around them. They invaded the fairs and merry-makings of Moorfields and Kennington Common; ten, * Knox: Bishop Webb's Thirty Years' Correspondence," Letter xix. "I ventured to avow it, as my conviction, that either Christian faith is what Wesley here describes, or there is no proper meaning in the word." Coleridge: Note to Southey's Life of Wesley, chap. xx. |