Wesley Corpus

To his Father Date: June 11, 1731. Source: The Letters of John Wesley (1731) Author: John Wesley --- Our walk was not so pleasant to Oxford as from it, though in one respect it was more useful; for it let us see that four- or five-and-twenty miles is an easy and safe day's journey in hot weather as well as cold. We have made another discovery too, which may be of some service: that it is easy to read as we walk ten or twelve miles; and that it neither makes us faint, nor gives us any other symptom of weariness, more than the mere walking without reading at all. Since our return our little company that used to meet us on a Sunday evening is shrunk into almost none at all. Mr. Morgan is sick at Holt; Mr. Boyce is at his father's house at Barton; Mr. Kirkham must very shortly leave Oxford, to be his uncle's curate; and a young gentleman of Christ Church, who used to make a fourth, either afraid or ashamed, or both, is returned to the ways of the world, and studiously shuns our company. [They got back to Oxford on May 12. See letter of June 26, 1734.] However, the poor at the Castle have still the gospel preached to them, and some of their temporal wants supplied, our little fund-rather increasing than diminishing. Nor have we yet been forced to discharge any of the children which Mr. Morgan left to our care: though I wish they too do not find the want of him; I am sure some of their parents will.