eyes were upon him, and though it would be out of order for a Methodist local preacher to fight, it was neither pleasant nor profitable to be so publicly called a coward and a sneak. Nevertheless, John was not long planning a course of procedure. He laid aside both hammer and chisel; rose and approached "the giant," and quickly seizing that celebrity by the belt he wore, lifted the man from the ground as though he had been some truant boy. "The giant" while struggling in mid-air received a salutary shaking until it suited John's convenience to set him again on the ground, and to allow him to walk off, cowed and humbled, amid the shouts and laughter of the spectators. After this "last battle" of John Nelson, numbers of men, then employed in raising Finsbury Square, were prompted by curiosity to attend the Foundry to hear for themselves what a stone-mason could find to say whose Herculean strength supplied him with such ready means of silencing "The Essex Giant." Finding it necessary to leave the Foundry, the London Methodists began collecting funds for a new chapel. They also petitioned the city authorities for a grant of freehold land, to be held on lease, near their old quarters. The land was granted as desired, on condition that the proposed building should be hidden by houses, as it was supposed that a Methodist meeting-house would be neither an ornament nor a credit to the vicinity. This restriction was subsequently set aside. The first stone of the new chapel was laid in the presence of thousands of spectators on a wet day-April the 21st, 1777; and John Wesley, standing upon the stone, preached to the patient multitude from the words: "According to this time, it shall be said, What hath God wrought?" Wesley also opened the building on November the 1st in the year following. Such are examples of the zeal of one while employed in the highest service in which man can engage. Throughout his long life he literally refused to be rich in worldly goods. Living contentedly on sixty pounds a-year, he found no difficulty in answering the excise officers, who having heard that he was wealthy, demanded a return of his plate-"I have two silver spoons at London and two at Bristol. I shall not buy any more whilst so many poor want bread." Indeed, the poverty of the brothers Wesley must appear remarkable to this money-loving age. Because John had only himself to support, after his wife voluntarily forsook him, he was enabled to afford occasional assistance to the more needy Charles-more needy on account of his dependants. A friend of the Methodist movement allowed Charles the use of a house, rent free, in Chesterfield-street, and there in March, 1788, the poet, in that extreme weakness which sometimes precedes death, lay, dictating to his daughter those sweet lines,— "In age and feebleness extreme, "Dear brother," wrote John, "You must go out every day or die. Do not die to save charges. You certainly shall not want anything as 66 long as I live." To another, John also wrote, concerning Charles, Carry Dr. Whitehead to him, whether my brother consents or not. Get him outdoor exercise if possible. Let him be electrified, not shocked, but filled with electric fire." When Charles died, a few days subsequently, his family possessed no means wherewith to provide a respectable funeral, and so the money was necessarily begged from sympathising friends. Said one simple woman, on hearing that Charles Wesley was no more, "Who will write poetry for us now?" Many contemporary outsiders were of opinion that Methodism would collapse at the death of its Founder; and in the unseemly disputes which immediately followed Wesley's decease, such prophets probably supposed that they descried the beginning of the end. Wesley was unhappy in his executors. Left to the care of three of his friends, all that were valuable of the great preacher's papers were detained by Dr. Whitehead, who appears to have supposed that because his mediocre funeral sermon for Wesley commanded a large sale, a biography would be proportionately valuable. In the meantime, other persons threw together in a month what they were pleased to called a memoir of their late leader, and ultimately, Dr. Whitehead returned the manuscripts to the ministers' house in the City-road. At head-quarters, where we might reasonably have supposed that such treasures would have been guarded with religious care, a deplorable fate awaited them. There was then lodging with the other evangelists a simpleton, of the name of Pawson, who, on finding that certain of Wesley's remains, among them a curiously annotated copy of Shakespeare-were not "to edification," ie., were not divinity, used them for lighting fires, and otherwise destroyed them! Why Mr. Pawson was not carried before the magistrates at the ensuing sessions, to answer for his folly, or at least, why he was not reprimanded by the Conference, we are not informed. From the days of Wesley until the twentieth year of the nineteenth century, a strange custom was observed at City-road chapel in the five o'clock a.m. service. This service was conducted by the ministers located in the preachers' house, each individual being required to take the duty in turn. When Dr. Bunting was a young beginner, his experience included a share of these early morning exercises and from what we learn we are led to doubt the profit of such services. Thus Jabez Bunting wrote, in 1803: "I was unfortunate this morning: I did not rise, for I did not wake, after daylight appeared, until halfpast five o'clock. The man promised to call me at half-past four, but did not. I never before committed such a slothful blunder, sleeper as I am. However, it does not appear to have been of much consequence: they seem to have been accustomed to such disappointments for some years; so that when Mr. Taylor preached yesterday, and informed them that they might expect me this morning, Mr. Lovelace, an old wornout barrister, could not help expressing his belief that now there would be a revival in London, for there had been little good done since the morning preaching had been discontinued, and that the abandonment of this practice was the true cause of the present war. I counted the congregation as they came out (for they held a prayer-meeting) and found them just twenty-one; but this was an extraordinary number, nearly one-half of whom were drawn to the chapel by their curiosity to : hear the new preacher. Mr. Taylor could not scold me for my sleepiness, for he himself was overtaken in the same fault last Friday. September 21st, I was up in time; but when I came to the doors found them so curiously and so variously locked, barred, and chained, that I could not for the life of me open any one of them. In order to save my character, I called through the gates to Dr. Hamilton, who was waiting my appearance, and desired him to begin the service. September 27th, I again began my sermon to eight persons, and again mustered thirteen at the conclusion. This seems to be the ne plus ultra, beyond which the attractions of my morning eloquence cannot avail." But among the many interesting episodes in the history of Methodism which have occurred at City Road Chapel, one of the most memorable was the last sermon preached by Dr. Adam Clarke in the old sanctuary. It was a pleasant and enjoyable time, because neither the preacher nor the auditors were aware that they should meet on earth no more. Dr. Clarke being extremely popular, an intimation that he would preach on any given occasion always drew together an immense crowd. Whether reasonably, or unreasonably, the doctor hated reporters; and so, prior to this March Sunday in 1832, he expressed a hope that no reporter would be allowed to enter the chapel. To exclude these gentry, however, from an assembly of two thousand persons was manifestly an impossibility; and a specimen of the hated species crept in somehow, to hand down to posterity a record of the proceedings. It was a striking scene. The commentator was equal to the occasion, and his handsome form and white hair gave additional dignity to the divine of threescore years and ten. The sermon being a special one, on behalf of the Royal Humane Society, the preacher closed by making an appeal for the funds of so useful an agency, by narrating an episode in his own life—a narrow escape from drowning. He told the audience how that once, when Adam Clarke was a young man, he was out on one of his father's mares, and how, on coming to a certain river, both rider and mare were carried away by the swollen current. The mare escaped safely to land; the rider sank! Then the astonished congregation listened to a description of a person's experience in drowning. The sensations, as the speaker remembered them, were exquisitely delightful. Wave upon wave of green came and went, pleasant objects were everywhere observable around, and the sweet vision was only dispelled, and pain only ensued, when efforts were made to restore animation by those who dragged his dying body from the flood. After the conclusion of this scene in the sanctuary, we see the chapel yard, and also the street, thronged with the lingering multitude of the commentator's admirers, and only by remembering that it is the Sabbath are the people restrained from shouting and cheering. Shaking hands with as many as he is able, the good doctor passes onward, and steps into the pony-carriage which is waiting to convey him to his home. Little do the delighted people imagine, as the vehicle moves rapidly away, and the last vibration of the rattling wheels is heard in the distance, that City Road Chapel and City Road congregation have seen the last, so far as earth is concerned, of Dr. Adam Clarke. At midnight, on the 26th of August following, he died of cholera. In walking about London, one may find a becoming recreation in investigating nooks and corners, and in searching out spots and houses which are interesting on account of hallowed remembrances. One likes, moreover, to discover that such and such characters lived here, and conducted business there-characters for whose names and deeds we seek in vain in the most comprehensive history of London. Thus, on walking along Paternoster Row, we may halt before the wellknown "56," being well aware that certain interesting old structures must have been removed to clear an area for that same imposing emporium. It may interest some reader to know that in making way for "56" a "54" was removed, and in "54" lived, in the earlier years of this century, one William Baynes, a lover of City Road Chapel, and whose remains lie in the cemetery attached to the sanctuary. Baynes was a very godly, as well as a very able, bookseller of the old school. On commencing business he signed a solemn covenant with God, in which he declared his wish to live and work entirely to his Maker's glory. As the friend of Adam Clarke, Baynes published many of the Doctor's works. On first coming to London, the future publisher was engaged in the cloth trade; but through indulging a taste for purchasing old books, he soon relinquished the woollen business, and established himself as a bookseller in the "Row," and was styled by Dr. Adam Clarke "the best old bookseller in London." At length Baynes was overtaken by what proved to be his last illness, and the great Wesleyan divine walked over to Paternoster Row to see the sinking patient, whom in health he had for so long respected. Finding the old publisher in "a glorious state of preparation for death," the Doctor cried out : "Brother Baynes, you have the start of me!" Here, then, was a tradesman who admirably combined business tact with the Christian graces. While the bookseller was eminently elevated to God, and sought the promotion of God's glory, Dr. Clarke could say of him, "Baynes knows a book or a curiosity at a glance, without being acquainted with its exact character, and I have rarely ever found him deceived in his estimate of what he judged to be intrinsically good." Thus the old sanctuary rejoices in its many historical reminiscences, and we close this article by making one more reference. In the days which immediately followed the founding of Methodism, the itinerant preachers whose salaries amounted to some sixteen pounds a year only, were naturally encouraged by finding entertainers who could afford to supply them with refreshment and shelter on Sundays. Many hospitable people were found who delighted to invite as their guests the men who nobly bore the burden and heat of the day in their Master's vineyard. One rendezvous, where the evangelists were ever welcome, was the house of a tradesman, situated nearly opposite Bishopsgate Church. There, Sabbath by Sabbath, the itinerants received good cheer and benefited by lively society. "We dined to-day," says Jabez Bunting, writing in his early days, "with Mr. and Mrs. Hovatt, Mr. Storey, and Mr. Whitefield, at Mr. Rankin's; a very pleasant party. I had been closely employed from half-past four till half-past one, and my mind was fagged, and I was disposed to be melancholy; but Mrs. Hovatt's lively conversation entertained me in spite of myself. I have not laughed so much since I came to London. However, I think it was not unreasonable nor injurious. Mr. Taylor sang for us some delightful Scotch tunes, and after prayer we parted as merry as Christians need to be." Mr. Stevenson has completed a laborious task in having so fully written the history of the cathedral of Methodism; and his labour will be appreciated by a wide circle of readers. Many of our author's details are extremely interesting, about half of his book being devoted to biographical notices of those whose remains are interred in City Road graveyard. This book may be read with pleasure by members of all denominations, and Wesleyans in particular will prize it for many years to come. We have one question to ask the biographers of eminent men: Why should pleasant pages be encumbered by "Mr." so many times repeated, as an appendage to great names. The latest biographer of Whitefield has not offended in this respect. Why others should not follow a good example, and so avoid repetition, we cannot divine. Does not the founder of Methodism carry weight enough to appear in history as JOHN WESLEY? A certain index-maker once earned Dr. Johnson's lasting contempt by what appeared to be a very trivial circumstance. This poor man was employed in indexing the " Lives of the Poets," and on coming to the author of " Paradise Lost," he seems to have supposed that so great a man merited a little extra distinction, and hence the lexicographer's chagrin on seeing the poet entered as "Milton, Mr. John." We compliment great men by not associating their names with what to ordinary people may be real distinction. The Romish Church will honour certain of her votaries by canonization; but in the instance of a real hero of the cross, "Saint Paul" is neither so becoming nor so honourable as "Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ." THAT Worldliness. BY PASTOR J. M'LELLAN, EDINBURGH. HAT worldliness is a reprehensible thing all professed Christian. readily admit. The Bible is replete with dissuasions from it, Every one is familiar with such words as these:-"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the worlds the love of the Father is not in him." "Be not conformed to this world." "The friendship of the world is enmity with God: whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God." But notwithstanding all this the evil continues to exist, and is, we fear, at the present moment appallingly rampant in many of our churches. What renders effectual dealing with it extremely difficult is that people generally appear to have but very inadequate ideas as to what it really consists in; and consequently it is often felt that whatever our private opinions regarding men may be, we cannot, without an apparent breach of charity, so bring the charge home to any man in particular as that we could look at him in the face and say, "Thou art the man." By |
