other religious body; not excluding the Roman Catholic.

In what light, then, will the world of to-day care to recall this man who died a century since? Our England is very different from his. Our age is very unlike his. The French Revolution yawns, like a red-lipped gulf, between him and us.

The ideas of men as to government, as to domestic and social relations, as to commerce and international obligations, as to science, art, and recreation, have been revolutionized. Let any man inquire into the origin of the antislavery crusade, of cheap literature, of Sunday-schools, and elementary education; of our hospitals for the sick, and of our rescue and reformatory schools; and he will be surprised to find. that almost without exception these things which, from a social as well as a religious point of view, are the glory of the Victorian age, took their rise in that "enthusiasm of humanity," which sprang up with and in the revived religious life of the nation.

It was in 1838 that there came to Wesley that notable inward "experience" from which he dated a new life. It was whilst hearing one read Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans, that the great change came upon him. He describes it thus: "I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, 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; and I then testified openly to all there what I now first felt in my heart." A wonderful and blessed experience truly, which must make an epoch in the life of any man to whom it comes. Yet

this cannot be considered the commencement of Wesley's religious life. For ten years before this he, and the few associates who

were first nicknamed Methodists, had been striving to serve God as sincerely and strenuously as men could. And how did they go about it? They were all students

or graduates at the University of Oxford. They set themselves to live by rule. Each evening they met to review the day's work, and determine the work of to-morrow. Some of them regularly visited. and relieved the poor; some taught poor children in free schools; others tried to carry some gleams of light and hope into the parish workhouse.

At this time the poor-law system was only less disgraceful than the judicial system of the country, and there was no pretence of national education. Others visited. the prison, and out of their own slender resources, and by levying contributions from their friends, they provided books, medicines, and clothing for the half-starved prisoners. They paid debts, and thus released wretched men, who, under the foolish and wicked laws of the time, were shut up in the company of thieves and murderers, away from the families they should have maintained and the work they would have been glad to do. One cold winter's day a young girl whom these Methodists were educating called upon John Wesley. He saw she had on only a thin linen gown. Learning that she

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had and could have no other garment, he took from the walls of his room some of the pictures that hung there, and sold them, that he might give the poor lassie warm clothing. "It struck me," he says, will the Master say, 'Well done, good and faithful steward' ? Thou hast adorned thy walls with the money which might have screened this poor creature from the cold. O justice, O mercy! are not these pictures the blood of this poor maid ?" Many years after this Wesley con

fessed, in answer to a challenge, that when his income was £30 a year, he lived on £28 and gave away £2. When it was £60, he lived on £28 and gave away £32. When it became £90, he still made the £28 suffice, and gave away £62. And this system of holding all his property in trust for the poor and the wretched he continued through life. When an excise-officer, who had probably been stirred up to diligence by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, demanded d a return of his plate, thinking that the renowned Mr. Wesley must surely be rolling in wealth, he received, and, let us hope, digested, this laconic reply.

Sir, I have two silver spoons in London and two at Bristol, and I shall buy no more whilst so many poor lack bread." When Wesley lived and gave in this style, he was a Fellow of Lincoln College, a scholar, a clergyman, a gentleman. It would be interesting to know how many of the loud-voiced accusers of the churches to-day have ever done likewise.

When the Methodist movement under Wesley had taken shape its first habitat was the Foundry. This building, a disused Government ordnance factory, stood within a few yards of the present City Road Chapel. Here was a room, without pews, capable of holding about one thousand five hundred people. A room for smaller religious gatherings held about three hundred. Above this were rooms for Wesley himself, and adjacent was a house for the assistant preachers and servants. A portion of these rooms fitted with benches and desks for a free school. Remember that neither the National Society nor any other of our educational institutions was yet dreamed of. Another portion was fitted as a bookshop. Here were sold, at prices surprisingly low for the time, pub

was

lications of all kinds for the moral and intellectual benefit of the people.

The age of cheap literature. had not yet dawned when Wesley commenced these sales. Another portion of the building was fitted as a dispensary, where medicine and advice were given to the poor; for as yet few, if any, of our great hospitals or dispensaries had been founded. Wesley employed an experienced surgeon and a dispenser. Within five months more than five hundred patients were healed. Thus he anticipated our modern medical missions.

Another illustration of the keenness of his eye for all social questions is seen by the establishment of a loan society. Wesley begged £50, and the stewards appointed for the purpose attended every Tuesday morning to make small leans without interest, repayable within three months. A vast number of the honest, but hard-pressed poor were helped; and in some cases the momentary assistance enabled them ultimately to achieve great prosperity. Óne of these was Lackington, afterwards the great publisher, who retired from business with a large fortune. This variety of ingenious but wellcalculated benevolence does not indicate a man who had no thought for the present life of the human beings around him. Rather it shows how a benevolent heart, filled with a commanding love to God, must needs expend itself in all helpful activities for man. Wesley was, in fact, not only the most remarkable evangelist of his age, but was the pioneer of free education, of cheap literature, and of medical missions.

In a remarkable passage, printed in 1747, Wesley indicates clearly the source and standard of his religious opinions. "I want to know one thing-the way to heaven; how to land safe on that happy shore. God himself has

condescended to teach the way; for this very end He came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. O give me that book! At any price give me the Book of God! I have it here is knowledge enough for me. Let me be homo unius libri-a man of one book."

But Wesley was not a slave of Bible-literalism, nor did he turn away with the devotee's morbid self-distrust from commerce with the mighty minds of the world's literature. In fact, he was an omnivorous reader. He read in eight or nine languages. He devoured everything from the pondorous folio to the fugitive pamphlet or fly-sheet. "On his road to Bristol he read over Quintus Curtius.'" In riding to Leeds he "read Dr. Hodge's account of the plague in London." On the way to Holyhead he "read over Statius' Thebais,' and wondered one man should write so well and so ill." In 1750 he wrote "A Short French Grammar." Waiting for the tide, "he sat down in a little cottage for three or four hours, and translated Aldrich's Logic." He compares, critically, Prior and Pope; and reads with lively interest such new books as were then the sensation of the moment, e.g., " Johnson's Visit to the Hebrides," and Ossian's "Fingal." But the keenness and variety of his intellectual appetite is surprising when we find him snatching time to read Short's "History of Tea," and the "Life of Mrs. Bellamy." After Wesley's death, a copy of Shakespeare's works, annotated throughout in Wesley's neat handwriting, was found by one of the good men who had to administer his affairs. Unlike his great master, either in perception or breadth, the good man burnt the volume! "O what a loss was here!"

As author, editor, and publisher, Wesley showed a corresponding

quickness in recognizing what was valuable in a wide expanse of literature. He wished to bring the treasures of literature within the reach of the people at large. He poured forth from the press, during fifty years, a constant stream of publications. In addition to his own journals, sermons, and controversial pamphlets, he published, as "The Christian Library," a large collection of religious literature, in which were represented writers of many Christian communions. But he also published grammars of at least five languages, many volumes of poetry, several books on various departments of science, a popular book on medicine, in which he strongly recommends the use of electricity in nervous and some other disorders ; and at least one novel (" Henry, Earl of Moreland"), at which some of the sterner spirits amongst his followers shook their heads. Indeed the catalogue of the publications which he wrote or edited, or sanctioned, would occupy many pages of this magazine. He was

in fact the pioneer of our modern popular and cheap literature.

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All this surely shows that though Wesley was a man of one book," recognizing and loyally obeying the imperial authority of the Book of books, he was no narrowminded precisian, but had his eyes wide open to all that was occurring in the great world of literature.

How far did Wesley recognize the duty of Christian citizenship? With his overshadowing and overmastering sense of the nearness and importance of eternity, did he advise his people to abstain from all participation in public affairs? On the contrary, both by his own action, and by frequent public utterances, he showed that he held a man's duty to the State to be a part of his duty to God. Frequently he published brief tracts. bearing upon questions which at

the moment occupied the attention of the people.

"A Word to a Freeholder" illustrates at once his interest in public affairs, and some aspects of public life at that period of our history. To the freeholder-the voter, almost the only voter of that day he says: "What are you going to do? to vote for a Parliament man? I hope, then, you have taken no money. If you are guilty already-stop, go no farther, it is at the peril of your soul! Will you sell your country? Will you sell your own soul ?" Good words these, and doubtless needed much in those ante-reform and ante-ballot days; and, it would seem, not quite unneeded even

now.

It

A century ago the Temperance Movement, as we now know it, was not born. Beer was the Englishman's universal beverage. With this he got stupidly drunk. came on the table as tea and coffee do now. With spirits the Englishman of that day got furiously drunk. Wine was the beverage with which the gentlemen of that day got regularly and respectably drunk. Against the spirit drinking of the day Wesley uttered unwavering protest. Indeed, his language, written in the calmness. of the study, and printed after all due consideration, is terrible in its condemnation of all who profited by the frightful prevalence of this evil. His printed sermon on the use of money contains the following prophet-like denunciation:

"Therefore we may not sell anything which tends to impair health. Such is eminently all that liquid fire, commonly called drams, or spirituous liquors. It is true, these may have a place in medicine; they may be of use in some bodily disorders; although there would rarely be occasion for them were it not for the unskilfulness of the practitioner. Therefore, such as prepare and sell them only for this end may keep their conscience

clear. But who are they? Who prepare them only for this end? Do you know ten such distillers in England? Then excuse these. But all who sell them in the common way to any that will buy, are poisoners general. They murder his Majesty's subjects by wholesale, neither does their eye pity or spare. They drive them to hell like sheep. And what is their gain? Is it not the blood of these men? Who, then, would envy their large estates and sumptuous palaces? A curse is in the midst of them; the curse of God cleaves to the stones, the timber, the furniture of them! The curse of God is in their gardens, their walks, their groves; a fire that burns to the nethermost hell! Blood, blood is there; the foundation, the floor, the walls, the roof, are stained with blood! And canst thou hope, O man of blood, though thou art clothed in scarlet and fine linen, and farest sumptuously every day'; canst thou hope to deliver down thy fields of blood to the third generation? Not so; for there is a God in heaven: therefore, thy name shall soon be rooted out. Like as those whom thou hast destroyed body and soul, 'thy memorials shall perish with thee!'"

Wesley died before the French Revolution had uttered to the world its message either of horror or of hope. But already Wesley's eye perceived the danger of vast wealth accumulating in few hands. whilst the multitude could scarce exist. His utterances on the duties and responsibilities of wealth were therefore frequent, and very bold. His own theory was very simple and intelligible. Get all you can, save all you can, give all you can." Industry, thrift, generosity and these in their highest degree, would counterbalance and correct and complete each other.

Against the slave trade his indignation burnt with a fierce flame. The phrase he applied to it-“ the execrable sum of all villainies has become proverbial. But he omitted no opportunity of denouncing it, and this at a time. when the great body of the richer Englishmen were bound to it by strongest ties of interest, of custom, and of prejudice.

Only four days before his death, at the patriarchal age of eightynine, he wrote with his own now trembling hand the following letter to Wilberforce. The hand trembled-not the heart, the will, or the faith. These were strong and brave as ever against all the evil which men do to each other and before God.

"London, February 26, 1791. "DEAR SIR,

"Unless the divine power has raised you up to be as Athanasius contra mundum, I see not how you can go through your glorious enterprise in opposing that execrable villainy which is the scandal of religion, of England, and of human nature. Unless God has raised you up for this very thing, you will be worn out by the opposition of men and devils. But if God be for you, who can be against you? Are all of them together stronger than God? O be not weary in well-doing. Go on, in the name of God and in the power of His might, till even American slavery (the

vilest that ever saw the sun) shall vanish away before it. 'Dear sir,

"Your affectionate servant,

"JOHN WESLEY."

First and chief in Wesley's life was the purpose to call men to repentance and faith. But the religious life which he advocated and promoted was one which cannot exile itself from the common life and common needs of mankind. Rather it claims as Christian, and puts a higher meaning into the old saying: "Nihil humani a me alienum puto." It recognizes that if a man would win and enjoy. heaven, he must bring the very spirit of Christ into the life of earth, devoting himself to Christ's service by serving, everywhere and always, the poor, the suffering, the downcast, and the downtrodden for Christ's sake. And is not this exactly the religion that is wanted. to-day-The Sunday Magazine.

"Well, bless the Lord for saving sinners!" Babe Baxter exclaimed one evening as she came out and sat on the porch by my side, untying the strings of her white sunbonnet, and letting it fall back on her shoulders. "I never told you about the Floating Bethel, did I ? Well, last April, soon after I got religion, old Brother Hunter, over

In the western part of Kentucky is an exceedingly primitive town which, through the preaching of the pioneer Methodist missionaries, was, a few years ago, ascene of very remarkable religious experiences. Almost every household was brought under the influence of divine grace, and very many, unlearned in the lore of this world but wise in the knowledge of God, felt called upon to preach the glad tidings of the salvation which they themselves enjoyed. The accompanying sketch is reprinted from the book, "Stories of a Sanctified Town."

at Sandersville, heard me talk at meeting here at the Station about how bad I wanted to work for the Lord and save souls, and the next week he wrote for me to come and go down the Ohio and the Mississippi with the Floating Bethel. Brother Hunter he's just eat up with zeal, and he had went about and raised money for the Lord, and bought the bottom of an old boat cheap, and mended it up, and built two stories and a steeple on it, and named it the Floating Bethel; and he said he was going to carry the Gospel into waste. places, and convert the world.

"Well, of course, I just rejoiced and more than blessed the Lord for the chance to go, and I got ready and rode over to Sanders