Mr. Law's sentiments. Leaving you to think with how much justice I might descant here upon this line of the satiric poet,

Dat veniam corvis, vexat censura columbas:

I remain, Rev. and dear sir, yours, &c,

J. FLETCHER.

LETTER III.

HONOURED AND REVEREND SIR, We have seen how exceedingly commendable was Mr. Wesley's design in writing what you have extracted from his last Minutes; and how far from being unanswerable are the general objections which some have moved against them. Let us now proceed to a candid inquiry into the true meaning of the propositions. They are thus prefaced :—

"We said in 1744, We have leaned too much toward Calvinism. Wherein?"

This single sentence is enough, I grant, to make some persons account Mr. Wesley a heretic. He is not a Calvinist! And what is still more dreadful, he has the assurance to say that he has leaned too much toward Calvinism! This will sound like a double heresy in their ears; but not in yours, sir, who seem to carry your anti-Calvinistical notions farther than Mr. Wesley himself. He never spoke more clearly to the point of free grace than you do, page 85, of your sermons: "God," say you, "never left himself without witness, not only from the, visible things of the creation, but likewise from the inward witness, a spiritual seed of light sown in the soul of every son of man, Jew, Turk, or Pagan, as well as Christians, whose kindly suscitations whoever follows, will gladly perceive increasing gleams still leading farther on to nearer and far brighter advances, till at length a full and perfect day bursts forth upon his ravished eyes.” In this single sentence, sir, you bear the noblest testimony to all the doctrines in which Mr. Wesley dissents from the Calvinists. You begin with GENERAL REDEMPTION, and end with PERFECTION or, to use your own expression, you follow him "from the spiritual seed of light in a Turk," quite to the "full and perfect day, bursting forth upon the ravished eyes of the Pagan who follows the kindly suscitations" of Divine grace.

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And far from making man a mere machine, you tell us, page 140, "it is true that faith is the gift of God, but the exertion of that faith, when once given, lieth in ourselves." Mr. Wesley grants it, sir; but permit me to tell you that the word ourselves being printed in italics, seems to convey rather more anti-Calvinism than he holds; for he is persuaded that we cannot exert faith without a continual influence of the same Divine power that produced it; it being evident, upon the Gospel plan, that "without Christ we can do nothing." From these and the like passages in your sermons, I conclude, sir, that your charge of dreadful heresy does not rest upon these words, "We have leaned too much toward Calvinism." Pass we then to the next, in which Mr. Wesley begins to show wherein he has consented too much. to the Calvinists.

"I. With regard to man's faithfulness Our Lord himself taught

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us to use the expression. And we ought never to be ashamed of it. We ought steadily to assert, on his authority, that if a man is not faithful in the unrighteous mammon, God will not give him the true riches.'

Now, where does the heresy lie here? Is it in the word man's faithfulness? Is there so much faithfulness to God and man among professors, that he must be opposed by all good men who dares to use the bare word? Do real Protestants account "man's faithfulness" a grace of supererogation, and quoting Scripture a heresy? Or do they slight what our Lord recommends in the plainest terms, and will one day reward in the most glorious manner? If not, why are they going to enter a protest against Mr. Wesley because he is "not ashamed of Christ and his words before an evil and adulterous generation," and will not "keep back" from his immense flock any part of " the counsel of God," much less a part that so many professors overlook, while some are daring enough to lampoon it, and others wicked enough to trample it under foot?

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O, sir, if Mr. Wesley is to be cast out of your synagogue unless he formally recant the passage he has quoted, and which he says we are not to be ashamed of;" what will you do to the Son of God who spoke it? What to St. Luke who wrote it? And what to good Mr. Henry who thus comments upon it? "If we do not make a right use of the gifts of God's providence, how can we expect from him those present and future comforts which are the gifts of his spiritual grace Our Saviour here compares these; and shows that though our faithful use of the things of this world cannot be thought to merit any favour at the hand of God, yet our unfaithfulness in the use of them may be justly reckoned a forfeiture of that grace which is necessary to bring us to glory. And that is it which our Saviour shows, Luke xvi, 10–12, He that is unjust, unfaithful, in the least, is unjust, unfaithful also in much. The riches of this world are the less; grace and glory are the greater. Now, if we be unfaithful in the less, if we use the things of this world to other purposes than those to which they were given us, it may justly be feared we shall be so in the gifts of God's grace, that we will receive them also in vain, and therefore they will be denied He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much. He that serves God and does good with his money, will serve God and do good with the more noble and valuable talents of wisdom and grace, and spiritual gifts, and the earnests of heaven: but he that buries the one talent of this world's wealth, will never improve the five talents of spiritual riches."

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Thus speaks the honest commentator: and whoever charges him with legality or heresy therein, I must express my approbation by a shout of applause. Hail Henry! Hail Wesley! Ye faithful servants of the most high God. Stand it out against an Antinomian world! Hail ye followers of the despised Galilean! You "confess him and his words before a perverse generation, he will confess you before his Father and his angels." Let not the scoffs, let not the accusations even of good people, led by the tempter appearing as an angel of light, make you give up one jot or tittle of your Lord's Gospel. Though thousands should combine to brand you as legalists, Papists, heretics,

and anti-christs stand it out: Scripture, conscience, and Jesus are on your side. "Be not afraid of their terror, but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts." And when you shall have occupied a little longer, and been a little more abused by your mistaken companions, your master will come and find you employed in serving his family, and not in "beating your fellow servants." And while the unprofitable, unfaithful, quarrelsome servant is cast out, he will address you with a "well done good and faithful servants! Ye have been faithful over a few things; I will make you rulers over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord."

Excuse the length of this address: it dropped from me before I was aware, and, is the fruit of the joy I feel to see "the John Goodwin of the age," and the oracle of the Calvinists so fully agree to maintain the Christian heresy against the Antinomian orthodoxy. Nay, and you yourself are of the very same way of thinking. For you tell us (page 89) "that God so far approved of the advances Cornelius had made toward him," (by praying, and giving, as you had observed before, much alms to the people,) "under the slender light offered him; of his earnest desire of a still nearer and more intimate acquaintance with him; and of the improvements he had made of the small talent he had committed to him; that he was now about to entrust him with greater and far better treasures."

In the mouth of two such witnesses as Mr. Henry and yourself, Mr. Wesley's doctrine might be, established; but as I fear that some of our friends will soon look upon you both as tainted with his heresy, I shall produce some plain Scripture instances to prove, by the strongest of all arguments, matter of fact, that man's "unfaithfulness in the mammon of unrighteousness" is attended with the worst of consequences. You know, sir, what destruction this sin brought upon Achan, and by his means upon Israel and you remember how Saul's avarice, and his "flying upon the spoil of the Amalekites" cost him his kingdom, together with the Divine blessing. You will, perhaps, object that" they forfeited only temporal mercies." True, if they repented; but if their sin sealed up the hardness of their heart, then they lost all.

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I can, however, mention two who indisputably forfeited both spiritual and eternal blessings the one is the moral young man whose fatal attachment to wealth is mentioned in the Gospel. "Go," said our Lord to him, "sell all thou hast, give to the poor; come, follow me, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven." He was unfaithful in the "mammon of unrighteousness;" he would not comply with the proposal, and though "Jesus loved him," yet he stood firm to his word, he did not "give him the true riches." The unhappy wretch chose to have his good things in this world, and so lost them in the next.

The other instance is Judas. "He left all," at first," to follow Jesus;" but when the devil placed him upon the high mountain of temptation, and showed him the horrors of poverty and the alluring wealth of this world, covetousness, his besetting sin, prevailed again: and as he carried the bag he turned thief, and made a private purse. You know, sir, that "the love of money" proved to him "the root of all evil ;" and that on account of his "unfaithfulness in the mammon.of unrighteousness" our Lord not only did "not give him the true riches,"

but took his every talent from him, his apostleship on earth, and one of the twelve thrones which he had promised him in common with the other disciples.

Some, I know, will excuse Judas by fathering his crime and damnation upon the decrees of God. But we who are not numbered among real Protestants think that sinners are reprobated as they are elected, that is, says St. Peter, "according to the foreknowledge of God." We are persuaded that because God's knowledge is infinite he foreknows future contingencies; and we think we should insult both his holiness and his omniscience if we did not believe that he could both foresee and foretell that Judas would be unfaithful, without necessitating him to be so, that the Scriptures might be fulfilled. We assert, then, that as Jesus loved the poor covetous young man, so he loved his poor covetous disciple. For had he hated him, he must have acted the base part of a dissembler, by showing him for years as much love as he did the other apostles; an idea too horrid for a Christian to entertain, I shall not say of "God made flesh," but even of a man that has any sincerity or truth! Judas's damnation, therefore, and the ruin of the young man, according to the second axiom in the Gospel, were merely of themselves, by their unbelief and “unfaithfulness in the mammon of unrighteousness:" for "how could they believe," seeing they reposed their "trust in uncertain riches !"

Thus, sir, both the express declaration of our Lord, and the plain histories of the Scripture agree to confirm this fundamental principle in Christianity, that when God works upon man he expects faithfulness from man; and that when man, as a moral agent, grieves and quenches the Spirit that strives to make him faithful, temporal and eternal ruin are the inevitable consequence.

Thus far, then, the Minutes contain a great, evangelical truth, and not a shadow of heresy. Let us see whether the dreadful snake lurks under the second proposition.

"II. We have leaned too much toward Calvinism; (2.) With regard to working for life. This also our Lord has expressly commanded us. Labour (Epyards, literally, work) for the meat that endureth to everlasting life. And in fact every believer, till he comes to glory, works for as well as from life."

Here Mr. Wesley strikes at a fatal mistake of all Antinomians, many honest Calvinists, and not a few who are Arminians in sentiment, and Calvinists in practice. All these, when they see that man is by nature dead in trespasses and sins, lie easy in the mire of iniquity, idly waiting till, by an irresistible act of omnipotence, God pulls them out without any striving on their part. Multitudes uncomfortably stick here, and will probably continue to do so till they receive and heartily embrace that part of the Gospel which is now, alas! called heresy. Then shall these poor prisoners in giant Despair's castle find the key of their dungeon about them, and perceive that "the word is nigh them, yea, in their mouth and in their heart; stirring up the gift of God within them, and in hope believing against hope," they will happily "lay hold on eternal life, and apprehend," by the confidence of faith, "him that has apprehended them" by convictions of sin.

But now, instead of imitating Lazarus, who, when the Lord had

called him and restored life to his putrefying body, "came forth" out of his grave, though he was "bound hand and foot" these mistaken men indolently wait till the Lord drags them out, not considering that it is more than he has promised to do. On the contrary, he reproves by his prophet, those that "do not stir themselves up to lay hold on him;" and deciding the point himself, says, "Turn ye at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my Spirit upon you; because I called and ye refused, I stretched out my hands unto you, and no man regarded, I will.mock when your fear cometh."

Should you object," that the case is not similar, because the Lord gave life to the dead body of Lazarus, whereas our souls are dead in sin by nature." True, sir, by nature; but does not "grace reign" to control nature? And as by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so, by the righteousness of one, is not the free gift come upon all men to justification of life?" According to the promise made to our first parents, and of course to all men then contained in their loins, is not "the seed of the woman always nigh," both to reveal and "bruise the serpent's head?" Is not Christ "the light of men, the light of the world, come into the world? Shineth he not in the darkness of our nature, even when the darkness comprehends him not? And is not this "light the life," the spiritual "life of men?" Can this be denied, if the "light is Christ," and if "Christ is the resurrection and the life," who came that "we might have life, and that we might have it more abundantly?"

In this Scriptural view of free grace, what room is there for the ridiculous cavil that "Mr. Wesley wants the dead to work for life?" God, of his infinite mercy in Jesus Christ, gives to poor sinners, naturally dead in sin, a talent of free, preventing, quickening grace, which "reproves them of sin;" and when it is followed, of "righteousness and judgment." This, which some Calvinists call common grace, is granted to all without any respect of persons; so that even the poor Jew, Herod, if he had not preferred the smiles of his Herodias to the convincing light of Christ which shone in his conscience, would have been saved as well as John the Baptist; and that poor heathen, Felix, if he had not hardened his heart in the day of his visitation, would have sweetly experienced that Christ had as much tasted death for him as he did for St. Paul. The living light visited them; but they, not working while it was day," or refusing to "cut off the right hand," which the Lord called for, fell at last into that "night wherein no man can work; their candlestick was removed, their lamp went out." They quenched their "smoking flax," or, in other words, their talent unimproved was justly "taken from them." Thus, though once through grace they could work, they died while they lived; and so were, as says St. Jude, "twice dead," dead in Adam by that sentence, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die ;" and dead in themselves, by personally renouncing Christ the life, or rejecting the light of his convincing Spirit.

This being premised, I ask, Where is the heresy in this paragraph of the Minutes? Does it consist in quoting a plain passage out of one of our Lord's sermons ? Or in daring to produce in the original, under the horrible form of the decagrammaton, Epya2ed8e, that dread