ply. From that time, till he graduated, a single crown was all the assistance he received from his friends. He composed exercises for those who had more money than learning; and he gave instruction to those who wished to profit by his lessons; and thus by great industry, and great frugality, he not only supported himself, but had accumulated the sum of ten pounds fifteen shillings, when he went to London to be ordained. Having served a curacy there one year, and as chaplain during another on board a king's ship, he settled upon a curacy in the metropolis, and married Susannah, daughter of Dr. Annesley, one of the ejected ministers:

No man was ever more suitably mated than the elder Wesley. The wife whom he chose was, like himself, the child of a man eminent among the

lows is that of the depositor sometimes, but more usually that of his tutor or friend. Crabb was dean of the college when Westley entered. "The Pauper Scholaris was the lowest of the four conditions of members not on the foundation, as the annexed table, copied from one prefixed to the caution book, shews:

Summæ 1. Commensalium) 1. Sociorum............£6.
tradendæ

admissorum ad

scire. 3. Pauperum Scholarium

"I understand that some of these poor scholars were servitors, but not all.

"There seems reason to suspect that Dec. 22. 1686, in the first entry of return, should be 1685; for otherwise Samuel Westley will appear to have had two cautions in at once; and from the state of his finances this is peculiarly improbable."

The name is spelled Westley with a t, in these entries, and in his own signature.

non-conformists, and, like himself, in early youth she had chosen her own path: she had examined the controversy between the Dissenters and the Church of England with conscientious diligence, and satisfied herself that the schismatics were in the wrong. The dispute, it must be remembered, related wholly to discipline; but her enquiries had not stopt there, and she had reasoned herself into Socinianism, from which she was reclaimed by her husband. She was an admirable woman, of highlyimproved mind, and of a strong and masculine understanding, an obedient wife, an exemplary mother, a fervent Christian. The marriage was blest in all its circumstances: it was contracted in the prime of their youth: it was fruitful; and death did not divide them till they were both full of days.

* “There is nothing I now desire to live for (says Mrs. Wesley in a letter to her son Samuel, dated Oct. 11. 1709,) but to do some small service to my children; that, as I have brought them into the world, I may, if it please God, be an instrument of doing good to their souls. I had been several years collecting from my little reading, but chiefly from my own observation and experience, some things which I hoped might be useful to you all. I had begun to correct and form all into a little manual, wherein I designed you should have seen what were the particular reasons which prevailed on me to believe the being of a God, and the grounds of natural religion, together with the motives that induced me to embrace the faith of Jesus Christ; under which was com prehended my own private reasons for the truth of revealed religion; and because I was educated among the Dissenters, and there was something remarkable in my leaving them at so early an age, not being full thirteen, I had drawn up an account of the whole transaction, under which I had included the main of the controversy between them and the established church, as far as it had come to my knowledge, and then followed the reasons which had determined my judgement to the preference of the Church of England. I had fairly transcribed a great part of it, but before I could finish my design, the flames consumed both this and all my other writings.”

They had no less than nineteen children; but only three sons and three daughters seem to have grown up; and it is probably to the loss of the others that the father refers in one of his letters, where he says, that he had suffered things more grievous than death. The manner in which these children were taught to read is remarkable: the mother never began with them till they were five years old, and then she made them learn the alphabet perfectly in one day on the next they were put to spell and to read one line, and then a verse, never leaving it till they were perfect in the lesson.

Mr. Wesley soon attracted notice by his ability and his erudition. Talents found their way into public less readily in that age than in the present; and therefore, when they appeared, they obtained attention the sooner. He was thought capable of forwarding the plans of James II. with regard to religion; and preferment was promised him if he would preach in behalf of the king's measures. But instead of reading the king's declaration as he was required, and although surrounded with courtiers, soldiers, and informers, he preached boldly against the designs of the court, taking for his text the pointed language of the prophet Daniel, "If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thy hand, O king! But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." When the Revolution was effected, Mr. Wesley was the first who wrote

in its defence: he dedicated the work to Queen Mary, and was rewarded for it with the living of Epworth, in Lincolnshire. It is said that if the queen had lived longer he would have obtained more preferment. His wife differed from him in opinion concerning the Revolution, but as she understood the duty and the wisdom of obedience, she did not express her dissent; and he discovered it a year only before King William died, by observing that she did not say Amen to the prayers for him. Instead of imitating her forbearance, he questioned her upon the subject, and when she told him she did not believe the Prince of Orange was king, he vowed never again to cohabit with her till she did. In pursuance of this unwarrantable vow he immediately took horse and rode away; nor did she hear of him again, till the death of the king, about twelve months afterwards, released him from his rash and criminal engagement. John was their first child after this separation.

In the reign of Queen Anne Mr. Wesley's prospects appeared to brighten. A poem which he published upon the battle of Blenheim pleased the duke of Marlborough, and the author was rewarded with the chaplainship of a regiment. A farther and better reward was held out to his expectations; and he was invited to London by a nobleman who promised to procure him a prebend. This the Dissenters, with whom he was engaged in controversy, were at that time powerful enough to prevent. No enmity is so envenomed as that of religious faction. The Dissenters hated Mr. Wesley cordially, because

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they looked upon him as one who, having been born in their service, had cast off his allegiance. They intercepted his preferment: they worked him out of his chaplainship, and brought several other very severe sufferings upon him and his family." During the subsequent reign the small living of Wroote was given him, in the same county with Epworth.

John, his second son, the founder of the Methodists, was born at Epworth on the 17th of June 1703. Epworth is a market-town in the Lindsay division of Lincolnshire, irregularly built, and containing at that time in its parish about two thousand persons. The inhabitants are chiefly employed in the culture and preparation of hemp and flax, in spinning these articles, and in the manufactory of sacking and bagging. Mr. Wesley found his parishioners in a profligate state; and the zeal with which he discharged his duty in admonishing them of their sins, excited a spirit of diabolical hatred in those whom it failed to reclaim. Some of these wretches twice attempted to set his house on fire, without success: they succeeded in a third attempt. At midnight some pieces of burning wood fell from the roof upon the bed in which one of the children lay, and burnt her feet. Before she could give the alarm, Mr. Wesley was roused by a cry of fire from the street little imagining that it was in his own house, he opened the door, and found it full of smoke, and that the roof was already burnt through. His wife being ill at the time, slept apart from him, and in a separate