Wesley Corpus

201 work, either by a present contribution, or by subscribing what they could pay, on the first of January, February, or March. Mon. 5.--My scraps of time this week I employed in setting down my present thoughts upon a single life, which, indeed, are just the same they have been these thirty years; and the same they must be, unless I give up my Bible. Thur. 8.--At ten (and so every morning) I met the Preachers that were in town, and read over with them the “Survey of the Wisdom of God in the Creation.” Many pupils I had at the University, and I took some pains with them: But to what effect? What is become of them now? How many of them think either of their Tutor or their God? But, blessed be God! I have had some pupils since, who well reward me for my labour. Now “I live;” for “ye stand fast in the Lord.” Mon. 12.--I retired to Hoxton, to answer what was personal in the letters ascribed to Mr. Hervey. How amazing is the power of prejudice! Were it not for this, every one who knew him and me would have cried out with indignation, “Whatever Mr. W. was, none can commend or excuse Mr. H. Such bitterness he ought not to have shown to his most cruel enemy; how much less to the guide of his youth; to one he owns to have been his ‘father and his friend l’” Monday, 19, and the other afternoons of this week, I took up my cross, and went in person to the principal persons in our society, in every part of the town. By this means, within six days, near six hundred pounds were subscribed toward the public debt; and what was done, was done with the utmost cheerfulness. I remember but one exception: Only one gentleman squeezed out ten shillings, as so many drops of blood. Sat. DECEMBER 1.--M. B. gave me a farther account of their affairs at Leytonstone. It is exactly Pietas Hallensis in miniature. What it will be, does not yet appear. Tues. 4.--I made a little excursion to Colchester. Satur day, 8. I saw one who, many years ago, was a “minister of God to us for good,” in repressing the madness of the people, --Sir John Gonson, who was near fifty years a Magistrate, and has lived more than ninety.