Wesley Corpus

25.--I rode to Shronill, and preached at twelve to the largest congregation I have ever seen there. Thence we crossed the country to Kilfinnan. I had hardly begun to speak, when a young person, a kind of a gentleman, came, and took great pains to make a disturbance. Mr. Dancer mildly desired him to desist; but was answered with a volley of oaths and a blow. One of the town then encountered him, and beat him well. But the noise preventing my being heard, I retired a few hundred yards, with the serious part of the congregation, and quietly finished my discourse. Tues. 26.--I went on to Cork, and on Thursday, 28, to Bandon. This evening I preached in the House; the next, in the main street: But the wind was so high and so cold, that none either could or would bear it but those who really desired to save their souls. I judged the House would hold these: So the next evening I preached within; and when the benches were removed, it held the greatest part of the congre gation: And those who could not get in heard tolerably well, either at the doors or windows. Sunday, 31. We had most of them again at seven; and I took my leave of them with much satisfaction, after having strongly enforced, “To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” I would fain have preached abroad at Cork in the evening, but the wind and rain would not permit. Two years ago I left above three hundred in the society; I find an hundred and eighty-seven. What has occasioned so considerable a reduction? I believe the real cause is this:-- Between two and three years ago, when the society was nearly as low as it is now, Thomas Taylor and William June, 1767.] JOURNAL. 281 Pennington came to Cork. They were zealous men, and sound Preachers; full of activity, and strict in discipline, without respect of persons. They set up meetings for prayer in several places, and preached abroad at both ends of the city. Hearers swiftly increased; the society increased; so did the number both of the convinced and the converted.