Wesley Corpus

4. When you warned me against ‘excess of zeal,’ I did not say this was not my weak side, that it was not one weakness to which I am exposed. My words were: ‘I am always in danger of this; and yet I daily experience a far greater danger of the other extreme.’ I do. I am to this day ashamed before God that I do so little to what I ought to do. But this you call ‘over-done humility,’ and suppose it to be inconsistent with what occurs in the ninety-third and ninety-fourth paragraphs of the Earnest Appeal. [See Works, viii. 38-9.] I believe it is not at all inconsistent therewith: only one expression there is too strong -- ‘all his time and strength’; for this very cause ‘I am ashamed before God.’ I do not spend all my time so profitably as I might, nor all my strength; at least, not all I might have, if it were not for my own lukewarmness and remissness, if I wrestled with God in constant and fervent prayer.