Wesley Corpus

With regard to your question, it is only (in other words), Is there any sin in a believer or, Are we not sanctified throughout when we are justified You have a full answer to this question, which has perplexed so many upright souls, in those two sermons wrote expressly on the head, The Repentance of Believers and Sin in Believers. [See Works, v. 144-70.] Read them carefully, and I believe you will want nothing more to confirm you in the truth. Nevertheless you do well in exhorting all that are justified to hold fast all they have received. And it is certain they need never lose either their love or peace or power till they are fully sanctified. Your affectionate brother. To Hannah Ball[12] SUNDERLAND, May 30, 1772. MY DEAR SISTER,--Do you not remember that fine remark in the Christian Instructions, 'Nothing is more profitable to the soul than to be censured for a good action which we have done with a single eye' [Christian Reflections, from the French, in Works (1773 ed.), p. 211, sect. 208. See Green's Bibliography, No. 295.] Mr. H[artly], then, may have profited you more than you thought. Oh, it is a blessed thing to suffer in a good cause! I was never more struck than with a picture of a man lying upon straw with this inscription, 'The true effigy of Francis Xavier, the apostle of the Indies, forsaken of all men, and dying in a cottage.' Here was a martyrdom, I had almost said, more glorious than that of St. Paul or St. Peter! O woman, remember the faith! Happy are you to whom it is given both to do and to suffer the will of God! It is by this means that He will confirm your soul against too great sensibility. It is then only too great when it hurts the body or unfits you for some part of your duty. Otherwise it is a blessed thing to sorrow after a godly sort. Whatever you read in the Life of Mr. De Renty and Gregory Lopez or the Experience of E. J. is for you. Christ is ready! all is ready! Take it by simple faith!--I am, my dear sister, Your affectionate brother. To Ann Foard NEWCASTLE, June 7, 1772.