To the Monthly Reviewers Date: LONDON, September 9, 1756. GENTLEMEN, For a considerable time I have had a desire to trouble you with a few fines; but have been prevented, partly by a variety of other business, partly by the small probability of your impartially considering what was said. I will, however make the trial. If you can read candidly, well; if not, it is but a little labor lost.

The question I would propose is this: Is it prudent, is it just, is it humane, to jumble whole bodies of people together and condemn them by the lump Is it not a maxim now almost universally received that there are good and bad in every society Why, then, do you continually jumble together and condemn by the lump the whole body of people called Methodists Is it prudent (just to touch even on so low a consideration) to be constantly insulting and provoking those who do you no wrong and had far rather be your friends than your enemies Is it consistent with humanity to strike again one who gives no provocation and makes no resistance Is it common justice to treat with such contempt as you have done in the last month's Review those who are by no means contemptible writers Be persuaded, gentlemen, to give yourselves the pains of reading either Mr. Herbert's 'Providence,' Wesley was familiar with Herbert, six of whose poems he had turned into hymns for his Hymn-Book published in Charlestown: O sacred Providence, who from end to end, Strongly and sweetly movest! shall I write, And not of Thee, through whom my fingers bend, To hold my quill Shall they not do Thee right (The Temple) or the verses which Norris entitles 'The Meditation' John Norris (1657-1711), Rector of Bemerton, English Platonist and poet, an idealist of the purest type, sustained by the loftiest inspiration. Professor Sorley says (Cambridge History of English Literature, viii. 348) that 'he was the only English writer of note who adopted the views of Malebranche. He had thought out one may even say he had lived the theory for himself.' Mr. Osmond thinks 'The Meditation,' 'though perhaps a better piece of work technically, is more morbid and low-toned than "The Prophet"' (Mystical Poets of the English Church, p. 228). See letter of March 14.; and you will find them scarce inferior either in sense or language to most compositions of the present age. To speak more freely still: where is the justice of coupling the hymns of Methodists and Moravians together Lay prejudice aside, and read with candor but the very first hymn in our first Hymn-Book Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1739.

To speak more freely still: where is the justice of coupling the hymns of Methodists and Moravians together Lay prejudice aside, and read with candor but the very first hymn in our first Hymn-Book Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1739. These lines are from the opening poem, 'Eupolis Hymn to the Creator,' by Samuel Wesley, Rector of Epworth.; and then say whether your prose is not as nearly allied to John Bunyan's as our verse to Count Zinzendorf's. As probably you have never seen the books which you condemn, I will transcribe a few lines:- Thee, when morning greets the skies With rosy cheeks and humid eyes; Thee when sweet declining day Sinks in purple waves away; Thee will I sing, O Parent Jove, And teach the world to praise and love. Yonder azure vault on high, Yonder blue, low, liquid sky, Earth, on its firm basis placed, And with circling waves embraced, All Creating Power confer, All their mighty Maker bless. Thou shak'st all nature with Thy nod; Sea, earth, and air confess the God: Yet does Thy powerful hand sustain Both earth and heaven, both firm and main. The feathered souls that swim the air, And bathe in liquid ether there; The lark, precentor of their choir, Leading them higher still and higher, Listen and learn; the angelic notes Repeating in their warbling throats: And, ere to soft repose they go, Teach them to their lords below. On the green turf, their mossy nest, The evening anthem swells their breast. Thus, like Thy golden chain from high, Thy praise unites the earth and sky. O ye nurses of soft dreams, Reedy brooks, and winding streams; Or murmuring o'er the pebbles sheen, Or sliding through the meadows green, Or where through matted sedge you creep, Traveling to your parent deep; Sound His praise by whom you rose, That Sea which neither ebs nor flows. O ye immortal woods and groves, Which the enamored student loves; Beneath whose venerable shade, For thought and friendly converse made, Famed Hecadem, old hero, lies, Whose shrine is shaded from the skies And, through the gloom of silent night, Projects from far its trembling light; You, whose roots descend as low As high in air your branches grow, Your leafy arms to heaven extend, Bend your heads, in homage bend; Cedars and pines that wave above, And the oak beloved of Jove!

Now, gentlemen, can you say, between God and your own souls, that these verses deserve the treatment you have given them I think you cannot. You are men of more understanding. You know they are not contemptible. If any of you will strike a real blot, if you will point out even in public (though that is not the most obliging way) anything justly reprovable in our writings, probably we shall acknowledge and correct what is amiss at least, we shall not blame you. But every impartial man must blame that method of proceeding which neither consists with justice nor humanity. Perhaps you may say you have been provoked. By whom 'By Mr. Romaine.' I answer, I am not Mr. Romaine William Romaine (1714-95) was appointed lecturer at St. Dunstan's-in-the-West in 1749, assistant morning preacher at St. George', Hanover Square, 1750-6, Curate of St Olave's, Southwark, 1756-9; Rector of St. Anne's Blackfriars, 1766-95. He was a frequent visitor at Benjamin Ingham's and one of the leading Calvinistic clergy of his time.; neither am I accountable for his behavior. And what equity is this One man has offended you: therefore you fall upon another. Will it excuse you to say, 'But he is called by the same name' especially when neither is this his own name, but a term of derision. Gentlemen, do to others as you would have them do to you: then you will no more injure one who never offended you (unless this offend you, that he does ready believe Jesus Christ to be God over all, blessed for ever); then you will not return hatred for goodwill, even to so insignificant a person as