Could I in such distress my Gambold leave?
My gushing eyes the ready answer give.
Still must I weep o'er my departed friend,
Till all my sympathy above shall end.
There, only there, the rest from grief is given,
And God shall wipe away these tears in heaven.

Hail, happy souls, by mercy snatch'd away,
By Jesus taken from this evil day!
Kinchin, my earliest friend, than life more dear,
Thy sacred memory claims the pious tear.
Man cannot now estrange thy simple heart;
Join'd to the spirits of the just thou art,
And never more shalt from thy brethren part.
How swiftly here did thy kind Saviour move
Thy soul to rescue from a meaner love,
With jealous care thine innocence to save,
And caught thee from the bride-bed to the grave;
Summon'd the marriage-feast above to share,
And solemnize thy nobler nuptials there.

Thou too to thine eternal rest art gone,
O lovely Delamotte, my son, my son !
Swift as a fleeting shade, or short-lived flower,
Thy soul is fled beyond the' oppressors' power.
But didst thou not, ere yet the gulf was pass'd,
Look back, and make thy former love thy last?
Didst thou not for thy old companions mourn,
And pine, and wish, and languish to return?
Thy masters may thy dying words conceal,
But could not in their toils detain thee still.
Out of their reach thou art for ever gone,
The charm dissolved, again thou art our own,
O lovely Delamotte, my son, my son!

In reference to the Clergy, such as Gambold, Hall, and Stonehouse, who had renounced their connexion with the Church of England, and in a great measure retired from their public work, Mr. Charles Wesley says, with his characteristic warmth,

They saw the ship by many a tempest toss'd,
Her rudder broken, and her tackling lost,
Left her to sink without their helping hand,
Look'd to themselves, and basely 'scaped to land.
But shall I too the sinking Church forsake?
Forbid it, Heaven, or take my spirit back!
No, ye diviners sage; your hope is vain,

While but one fragment of our ship remain,
That single fragment shall my soul sustain.
Bound to that sacred plank, my soul defies

The great abyss, and dares all hell to rise,

Assured that Christ ON THAT shall bear me to the skies.

The details respecting the practical and speculative errors in the Moravian Church, at the time of its rise in England, are not introduced here with the design of perpetuating ancient feuds, but merely for the purpose of placing the history of Mr. Charles Wesley in its true light. It is but just to all the parties to state, that, in the subsequent years of his life, he was accustomed to speak of these evils as being temporary. He used to remark that, after these unhappy times, a decided improvement took place in the Moravian body; and he cultivated towards its members a kindly feeling to the end of his days. The evils complained of were introduced chiefly by Molther; and they were perpetuated for some time by Count Zinzendorf, whose theology, as he advanced in life, became more and more unsound, and his influence increasingly mischievous. He drew many aside from that godly simplicity in which they had walked. Indeed it is hardly possible to speak in terms too high of the Christian spirit of the Moravians who accompanied the Wesleys to Georgia, and of their brethren at Hernhuth, when Mr. John Wesley visited them to his great spiritual advantage. They were holy, cheerful, diligent, and devout; and their discipline was scarcely inferior to that of the apostolic churches.

Mr. John Wesley also, after his formal separation from the Moravian Church, cherished a profound respect for the sound members of that community. On the 1st of May, 1741, he says, "I went to a little love-feast which Peter Böhler made for those ten who joined together this day three years, to confess our faults one to another. Seven were present; one being sick, and two unwilling to come. Surely the time will return, when there shall be again

'Union of mind, as in us all one soul." "

The Wesleyan Connexion owes to the Moravian Brethren a debt of respect and grateful affection which can never be repaid. Mr. John and Charles Wesley, with all their excellencies, were neither holy nor happy till they were taught by

Peter Böhler, that men are saved from sin, its guilt, dominion, and misery, by faith in Christ; a faith which is the inspired gift of the Holy Ghost, exercised in a penitent state of heart, and immediately followed by the inward witness of God's adopting mercy. The application to themselves of this doctrine was with them the beginning of the Christian life, and the grand qualification for that ministry which was destined to turn the world upside down. Had they not been made acquainted with that master-truth of Christianity, they would never have been itinerant and field Preachers, nor have had companies of awakened sinners to form into religious societies. During the last hundred years this doctrine has ever been the most prominent subject of the Methodist ministry, in the United Kingdom, on the American Continent, and in the wide Mission field. The faithful, affectionate, and experimental inculcation of this doctrine has unquestionably been, under God, the great secret of the power and success of Methodist preaching. God, in the merciful dispensations of his providence, might indeed, by other means, have given the Wesleys a knowledge of this essential element of evangelic truth; but he did not. Peter Böhler was his honoured instrument of imparting this benefit to the brothers, and consequently to the millions of their spiritual children.

The Moravian Brethren are at present comparatively few in number; and yet their Missions, which are widely diffused through the heathen world, are carried on with exemplary zeal and patience. In supporting this noble enterprise of charity their sacrifices and privations must be great and painful. Few things, it is conceived, would be more becoming in itself, or more acceptable to the adorable Saviour and Head of all "the churches of the saints,”—or be a finer example of catholic love, in these days of bitter exclusiveness,—than a pecuniary contribution from the Wesleyan body in behalf of the Moravian Missions, as an acknowledgment of God's goodness in sending Peter Böhler so opportunely to England, when Mr. John and Charles Wesley were anxiously inquiring, "What must we do to be saved?" The writer of this narrative hopes that his Wesleyan brethren will give due attention to this suggestion; which is advanced with all deference and respect, but with great earnestness and sincerity.

CHAPTER IX.

We have already seen the part which Mr. Charles Wesley took in the controversies concerning predestination, and the nature of Christian ordinances as means of grace, which agitated the societies in London, Bristol, and Kingswood. In full concurrence with his brother, he steadily adhered to the doctrine of general redemption; and, with the exception of a momentary hesitation, occasioned by the smooth and self-pleasing representations of Mr. Hall, Gambold, and Stonehouse, he not only enforced the duties of religion with unflinching fidelity, but was an example of what he taught. There is a chasm in his journal from January 1st, to the 4th of April, 1741; when we find him at Bristol, Kingswood, and the vicinity, preaching with undiminished zeal and success. He did not return to London till the autumn. During the summer he paid three visits to Wales, not for the purpose of finding relaxation in its mountain scenery, but to minister the word of life to dying men.

Many were the spiritual children which he had in Bristol and its neighbourhood, whose improving piety and upright conduct he witnessed with gratitude, and who, he was pleased to believe, would be his joy and the crown of his rejoicing in the day of the Lord. He was now called to visit many of them on the bed of death, and to witness their departure from the toils and afflictions of mortality. Several of them died during his stay in Bristol; and their "latter end" was indeed such as to strengthen his conviction, that the conversions which had taken place in connexion with his ministry, and that of his fellow-labourers, were, as he had ever regarded them, "the work of God." The people died in the faith and hope of the Gospel, "looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life;" and their funerals, like those of the primitive Christians, were celebrated as solemn festivals, where tears of sorrow were mingled with tears of joy. The members of the society used to assemble in considerable numbers, and follow the remains of their departed

friends to the grave. Mr. Charles Wesley often attended; he composed hymns suited to the occasions, which he called upon the people to sing; and he addressed them on the subject of death and eternity. The civil authorities in Bristol were then remiss, and unfriendly to the Wesleys and their converts; so that when the Methodist funerals passed along the streets of that ancient and pious city, the mourners and their friends were pelted with mud and stones, by persons of "the baser sort," who knew that they could perpetrate the outrage with impunity. A few examples, selected from Mr. Charles Wesley's journal, will show the power of religion among the Methodists at this period.

"April 11th. I found a dying sinner rejoicing in God her Saviour. At the sight of me she cried out, O how loving is God to me! But he is loving to every man. He loves every soul as well as he loves mine.' Many like words she uttered in triumphant faith, and witnessed in death the universal love of Christ Jesus.

April 12th. To-day He called forth another of his dying witnesses the young woman whom at my last visit I left in utter despair. This morning she broke out into, 'I see, I see it now, that Jesus Christ died for me, and for all the world.' From that time she testified, with much assurance, that Christ gave his life a ransom for all. Some of her words to me were, 'Death stares me in the face; but I fear him not. He cannot hurt me;

'And Death may shake his dart in vain!'

Your report is true. God is love; pure love; love to every The Spirit which is in me tells me, that Jesus Christ

man.

died for me, and the whole world.'

"The next I saw was our brother S-,

'With joyful eyes, and look divine,

Smiling and pleased in death.'

He likewise had in himself the witness of God's allredeeming love; and could stake his soul upon the truth of it.

"April 20th. Returning from Baptist-mills, I heard that our sister Richardson had finished her course. My soul was filled with strong consolation, and struggled as it were to go