Wesley Corpus

Alas, Sir! your friends will not thank you for this. You have broke their heads sadly. Is no man of the Church, let him pretend what he will, who differs from her in point of doctrine? Au ! obsecro; cave diveris /* I know not but you may stumble upon scandalum magnatum : + But stay; you will bring them off quickly. “A truly good man may scruple signing and swearing to Articles, that his mind and reason cannot approve of.” But is he a truly good man who does not scruple signing and swearing to Articles which he cannot approve of ? However, this doth not affect us; for we do not differ from our Church in point of doctrine: But all do who deny justification by faith; therefore, according to you, they are no members of the Church of England. “‘Methodist Preachers, you allow, ‘practise, sign, and swear whatever is required by law; a very large concession; “but the reserves they have are incommunicable and unintel ligible. Favour us, Sir, with a little proof of this; till then I must plead, Not Guilty. In whatever I sign or swear to, I have no reserve at all. And I have again and again com municated my thoughts on most heads, to all mankind; I * Stop, I beseech you, and beware of what you say.-EDIT. * Libel on persons of exalted rank.-EDIT. Jan. 1761.] JOURNAL. 37 believe intelligibly; particularly in the “Appeals to Men of Reason and Religion.’ “But, “if Methodism, as its professors pretend, be a new discovery in religion: This is a grievous mistake; we pretend no such thing. We aver it is the one old religion; as old as the Reformation, as old as Christianity, as old as Moses, as old as Adam. “‘They ought to discover the whole ingredients of which their nostrum is composed; and have it enrolled in the public register, to be perused by all the world. It is done. The whole ingredients of Methodism, so called, have been dis covered in print over and over; and they are enrolled in a public register, the Bible, from which we extracted them at first. ‘Else they ought not to be tolerated. We allow it, and desire toleration on no other terms. “Nor should they be suffered to add or alter one grain different from what is so registered. Most certainly.