Wesley Corpus

In 1730 I began to be Jhomo unius libri; * to study (comparatively) no book but the Bible. I then saw, in a stronger light than ever before, that only one thing is needful, even faith that worketh by the love of God and man, all inward and outward holiness; and I groaned to love God with all my heart, and to serve Him with all my strength. “January 1, 1733, I preached the sermon on the Circumcision of the Heart; which contains all that I now teach concerning salvation from all sin, and loving God with an undivided heart. In the same year I printed, (the first time I ventured to print any thing,) for the use of my pupils, ‘A Collection of Forms of Prayer;’ and in this I spoke explicitly of giving ‘the whole heart and the whole life to God.” This was then, as it is now, my idea of Perfection, though I should have started at the word. “In 1735 I preached my farewell sermon at Epworth, in Lincolnshire. In this, likewise, I spoke with the utmost clearness of having one design, one desire, one love, and of pursuing the one end of our life in all our words and actions. “In January, 1738, I expressed my desire in these words: O grant that nothing in my soul May dwell but thy pure love alone ! O may thy love possess me whole, My joy, my treasure, and my crown | Strange flames far from my heart remove, My every act, word, thought be love : “And I am still persuaded this is what the Lord Jesus hath bought for me with his own blood. “Now, whether you desire and expect this blessing or not, is it not an astonishing thing that you, or any man living, should be disgusted at me for expecting it; and that they should persuade one another that this hope is ‘subversive of the very foundations of Christian experience? Why then, whoever * A man of one book.-EDIT. 214 REv. J. weslEY’s [May, 1765. retains it cannot possibly have any Christian experience at all. Then my brother, Mr.