I shall not affect to say what would have been the state of the church of England under the uncontrolled operation of all the causes of moral deterioration, and civil strife, to which I have adverted; or what hold that church would have had upon the people at this day, if the spirit of religion had not been revived in the country, and if, when ancient prejudices were destroyed or weakened by the general spread of information among men, no new bond between it and the nation at large had been created. But if, as I am happy to believe, the national church has much more influence and much more respect now than formerly; and if its influence and the respect due to it are increasing with the increase of its evangelical clergy, all this is owing to the existence of a stronger spirit of piety and in producing that, the first great instruments were the men whose labours have been mentioned in the preceding pages. Not only has the spirit which they excited improved the religious state of the church, but it has disposed the great body of religious people, not of the church, to admire and respect those numerous members of the establishment, both clergymen and laics, whose eminent piety, talents, and usefulness, have done more to abate the prejudices arising from different views of churchgovernment, than a thousand treatises could have effected, however eloquently written, or ably argued.

It may also be asked, Who are the persons whom the Methodists have alienated from the church? In this too, the church writers have laboured under great mistakes. They have "alienated" those, for the most part, who never were, in any substantial sense, and never would have been of the church. Very few of her pious members have at any time been separated from her communion by a connexion with us; and many who became serious through the Methodist ministry, continued attendants on her services, and observers of her sacraments. This was the case during the life of Mr. Wesley, and in many instances is so still; and when an actual separation of a few persons has occurred, it has been much more than compensated by a return of others from us to the church, especially of opulent persons, or their children, in consequence of that superior influence which an established

church must always exert upon people of that class. For the rest, they have been brought chiefly from the ranks of the ignorant and the careless; persons who had little knowledge, and no experience of the power of religion; negligent of religious worship of every kind, and many of whom, but for the agency of Methodism, would have swelled the ranks of those who are equally disaffected to church and state. If such persons are not now churchmen, they are influenced by no feelings hostile to the institutions of their country.

Such considerations may tend to convey more sober views on a subject often taken up in heat :-that they will quite disarm the feeling against which they are levelled is more than can be hoped for, considering the effects of party spirit, and the many forms of virtue which it simulates. However, it is nothing new for the Methodists to endure reproach, and to be subject to misrepresentations. Perhaps something of an exclusive spirit may have grown up amongst us in consequence; but, if so, it has this palliation, that we are quite as expansive as the circumstances in which we have ever been placed could lead any reasonable man to anticipate. It might almost be said of us, "Lo, the people shall dwell alone." The high churchman has persecuted us because we are separatists; the high Dissenter has often looked upon us with hostility, because we would not see that an establishment necessarily, and in se, involved a sin against the supremacy of Christ; the rigid Calvinist has disliked us because we hold the redemption of all men; the Pelagianized Arminian, because we contend for salvation by grace; the Antinomian, because we insist upon the perpetual obligation of the moral law; the moralist, because we exalt faith; the disaffected, because we hold that loyalty and religion are inseparable; the political tory, because he cannot think that separatists from the church can be loyal to the throne; the philosopher, because he deems us fanatics; whilst semi-infidel liberals generally exclude us from all share in their liberality, except it be in their liberality of abuse. In the mean time, we have occasionally been favoured with a smile, though somewhat of a condescending one, from the lofty churchman; and often with a fra

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ternal embrace from pious and liberal Dissenters: and if we act upon the principles left us by our great founder, we shall make a meek and lowly temper an essential part of our religion: and, after his example, move onward in the path of doing good, through "honour and dishonour, through evil report and good report," remembering that one fundamental principle of Wesleyan Methodism is

ANTI-SECTARIANISM AND A CATHOLIC SPIRIT.

To return, however, to Mr. Wesley: Among the censures which have been frequently directed against him, are his alleged love of power, and his credulity. The first is a vice; the second but a weakness; and they stand therefore upon different grounds.

As to the love of power, it may be granted that, like many minds who seem born to direct, he desired to acquire influence; and, when he attained it, he employed his one talent so as to make it gain more talents. If he had loved power for its own sake, or to minister to selfish purposes, or to injure others, this would have been a great blemish; but he sacrificed no principle of his own, and no interest or right of others, for its gratification. He gained power, as all great and good men gain it, by the very greatness and goodness with which they are endowed, and of which others are always more sensible than themselves. It devolved upon him without any contrivance; and when he knew he possessed it, no instance is on record of his having abused it. This is surely virtue, not vice, and virtue of the highest order. The only proof attempted to be given that he loved power, is, that he never devolved his authority over the societies upon others; but this is capable of an easy explanation. He could not have shared his power among many, without drawing up a formal constitution of church-government for his societies, which would have amounted to a formal separation from the church; and it would have been an insane action had he devolved it upon one, and placed himself, and the work he had effected, under the management of any individual to whom his societies could not stand in the same filial relation as to himself. He, however, exercised his influence by aid of the counsel of others; and allowed the free discussion of all prudential matters in the confe

rence. Had he been armed with legal power to inflict pains and penalties, he ought to have distrusted himself, as every wise and good man would do, and to have voluntarily put himself beyond the reach of temptation to abuse what mere man, without check, can seldom use aright. This I grant; but the control to which he was subject was, that the union of his societies with him was perfectly voluntary, so that over them he could have no influence at all but what was founded upon character, and public spirit, and fatherly affection. The power which he exercised has descended to the conference of preachers; and, as in this case, his has been often very absurdly complained of, as though it were parallel to the power of civil government, or to that of an established church, supported by statutes and the civil arm. But this power, like his, is moral influence only, founded upon the pastoral character, and can exist only upon the basis of the confidence inspired by the fact of its generally just and salutary exercise among a people who neither are nor can be under any compulsion.

On the charge of credulity, it may be observed, that Mr. Wesley lived in an age in which he thought men in danger of believing too little, rather than too much, and his belief in apparitions is at least no proof of a credulousness peculiar to himself. With respect to the "strange accounts" which he inserted in his magazine, and strange indeed some of them were, it has been falsely assumed that he himself believed them entire. This is not true. He frequently remarks, that he gives no opinion, or that "he knows not what to make of the account," or that "he leaves every one to form his own judgment concerning it." He met with those relations in reading, or received them from persons deemed by him credible, and he put them on record as facts reported to have happened. Now, as to an unbeliever, one sees not what sound objection he can make to that being recorded which has commanded the faith of others; for as a part of the history of human opinions, such accounts are curious, and have their use. It neither followed, that the editor of the work believed every account, nor that his readers should consider it true because it was printed.

It was for them to judge of the evidence on which the relation stood. Many of these accounts, however, Mr. Wesley did credit, because he thought that they stood on credible testimony; and he published them for that very purpose, for which he believed they were permitted to occur, to confirm the faith of men in an invisible state, and in the immortality of the soul. These were his motives for inserting such articles in his magazine; and to the censure which has been passed upon him on this account, may be opposed the words of the learned Dr. Henry More, in his letter to Glanville, the author of "Sadducismus Triumphatus :" "Wherefore let the small philosophic Sir Toplings of this present age deride as much as they will, those that lay out their pains in committing to writing certain well-attested stories of apparitions, do real service to true religion and sound philosophy; and they most effectually contribute to the confounding of infidelity and Atheism, even in the judgment of the Atheists themselves, who arc as much afraid of the truth of these stories as an ape is of a whip, and therefore force themselves with might and main to disbelieve them, by reason of the dreadful consequence of them, as to themselves." It is sensibly observed by Jortin, in his remarks on the diabolical possessions in the age of our Lord, that " one reason for which Divine Providence should suffer evil spirits to exert their malignant powers at that time, might be to save a check to Sadducism among the Jews, and Atheism among the Gentiles, and to remove in some measure these two great impediments to the reception of the gospel." For moral uses, supernatural visitations may have been allowed in subsequent ages; and he who believes in them, only spreads their moral the farther by giving them publicity. Before such a person can be fairly censured, the ground of his faith ought to be disproved, for he only acts consistently with that faith. This task would, however, prove somewhat difficult.

Mr. Wesley was a voluminous writer; and as he was one of the great instruments in reviving the spirit of religion in these lands, so he led the way in those praiseworthy attempts which have been made to diffuse useful information of every kind, and to smooth the path of