Wesley Corpus

Mon. 25.--I began reading that excellent book, “The Gospel Glass,” to the morning congregation; a method which I find more profitable, for *¢ instruction in righteousness,” than any other manner of preaching. Tues. 26.--I began reading over, with the preachers that were in town, Mr. Pike’s Philosophia Sacra. [Sacred Philosophy.] It contains the marrow of Mr. Hutchinson’s philosophy clearly and modestly proposed; but upon a close examination, I found the proofs were grievously defective. I shall never receive Mr. Hutchinson’s creed, unless ipse dixit [authority] pass for evidence. Sat. 30.--I yielded to importunity, and spent. an hour with poor Mr. V , who was awakened and found peace in attending our preaching, and soon after turned Quaker. I did wonder at it once, but I do not now. One so full of himself might turn Papist or Mohammedan. Monday, November 1, was a day of triumphant joy, as All Saints’ Day generally is. How superstitious are they who scruple giving God solemn thanks for the lives and deaths of his saints ! Tues. 9.--Having procured an apparatus on purpose, I ordered several persons to be electrified, who were ill of various disorders ; some of whom found an immediate, some a gradual, cure. From this time I appointed, first, some hours in every week, and afterward an hour in every day, wherein any that desired it, might try the virtue of this surprising medicine. ‘Two or three years after, our patients were so numerous that we were obliged to divide them: so part were electrified in Southwark, part at the Foundery, others near St. Paul’s, and the rest near the Seven Dials: the same method we have taken ever since ; and to this day, while hundreds, perhaps thousands, have received unspeakable good, I have not known one man, woman, or child, who has received any hurt thereby: so that when I hear any talk of the danger of being electrified, (especially if they are medical men who talk so,) I cannot but impute it to great want either of sense or honesty. Be , el ae Dec. 1756. ] REV. J. WESLEY’S JOURNAL. 619