He

but he went on, from village to village, for three years, and then for the first time met with Whitefield. had thus been used by God to prepare the way for the preaching of the Methodists, and both Whitefield and Wesley found many souls awakened, and ready to receive the Gospel. Two other Welshmen also began to preach over the country—a young clergyman, Daniel Rowlands, and Howel Davies. They met with every kind of illtreatment, and seem to have become quite used to the showers of stones, dirt, eggs, dead dogs, and dirty water which were lavished upon them wherever they went. “During it all," says Howel Harris, "I was happy in my soul, and could cheerfully stand as a mark for them." I hope you will not forget these faithful servants of God.

During this autumn of 1739 a great sorrow befell the Wesley family. Samuel died suddenly at Tiverton, in Devonshire. Sad to say, he had only about three weeks before written to his mother, to tell her how grieved he was to hear that she now approved of the strange notions of John and Charles, and to entreat her to leave off going to the open-air preaching. There was, however, some reason to hope that a few days before

he died he had been led to see that his brothers were right, but we cannot tell certainly whether he ever received the gospel into his heart, so as to be saved. He had, however, been a dutiful son, and a great help in many ways to his family, and his mother felt his loss bitterly.

CHAPTER XVIII.

IT would be an endless history were I to attempt to tell you, one by one, of all the journeys taken by John Wesley for preaching the gospel from this time forward. He seems seldom to have spent more than a week or two in the same place; but for some time his journeys were chiefly between London and Bristol, stopping at places on the road, or going some distance out of the direct road, in order to preach. The year 1740 was thus spent. He sometimes rode on horseback, sometimes walked, and occasionally we hear of his travelling in what he calls " a machine," which was a sort of stagecoach. This was, however, only on rare occasions. Whilst at Bristol, he would take the opportunity of going

into Wales, generally for about six days.

Whitefield

was, meanwhile, in America. It was during the year 1740 that several of the Methodists began to preach and teach truths of which Wesley did not approve. One of them, Mr. Cennick, wrote to Whitefield to ask him what he thought on these matters, for Mr. Cennick felt that he ought to preach what he knew to be true, displeasing as it was to Mr. Wesley, and he wished to know whether Whitefield also thought him wrong. Whitefield, however, fully approved of Mr. Cennick's preaching, and this grieved John Wesley very much. The matters about which they differed were chiefly two. John Wesley believed that a man, after being saved, could again be lost, by his own carelessness and neglect of prayer, or of obedience to God. He also believed, on the other hand, that a saved man could attain such complete victory over sin that it might at last be entirely rooted out of him, and nothing be left in him but what was perfect and holy. This he called attaining "perfection." Whitefield and Cennick, on the other hand, said that salvation was entirely God's work from beginning to endthat God had chosen His own people before the world was made that He saved them because He loved them

-that although no dependence could be put in them, God could be depended upon to keep them safe for ever. That, moreover, He gave to them everlasting life, and that everlasting life lasts for ever. That they should never perish, and that none should be able to pluck them out of His hand. They said that if their safety and continuance in faith depended in any degree upon themselves, they not only might be, but certainly would be lost at last; but that He who had begun the good work in them, would assuredly carry it on and complete it, for "whatsoever God doeth, it is for ever."

With regard to perfection, they said, that whilst it is true the believer has power over sin, there is always in him, as long as he is down here, the sin over which he has power; and that "if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." More than that, "if we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar, and His word is not in us." But the very fact that we have power against sin leaves us without excuse when we do sin, so that as we go on we learn the more deeply to feel how sinful our natural hearts always are, and we condemn ourselves the more, the more we know not only God's love and grace in forgiving

us, but also His great power working in us, the power of the Holy Ghost, which leaves no room for the excuse, "I could not help it." Moreover, the more we know of Christ, so as to be able to compare ourselves with Him, the more we learn how far short we fall in our conduct from that perfect standard,-the only standard God will allow.

If you take the trouble to look into the bible, you will see that in these matters John Wesley was in the wrong. It may be that the immense amount of preaching which filled up so much of his time, and the many journeys he took, left him often but a little while in the day to study the Word of God. He sometimes read whilst he rode on horseback; but he could not always have either a good horse or a good road, and would then have to give up his book, and attend to his journey. Besides which, he never seems to have entirely got rid of the teaching of Thomas à Kempis, and of other books of the same sort. We often see that people suffer in their bodies, even whilst living year after year on wholesome food, if, during their childhood, they have eaten many unwholesome things. So it is with reading. The bad books we read when young, even if we see afterwards they were wrong, leave an evil