Wesley Corpus

MY DEAR SISTER,--The subject on which we were lately talking requires to be a little farther explained. You cannot imagine what trouble I have had for many years to prevent our friends from refining upon religion. Therefore I have industriously guarded them from meddling with the Mystic writers, as they are usually called; because these are the most artful refiners of it that ever appeared in the Christian world, and the most bewitching. There is something like enchantment in them. When you get into them, you know not how to get out. Some of the chief of these, though in different ways, are Jacob Behmen and Madame Guyon. My dear friend, come not into their secret; keep in the plain, open Bible way. Aim at nothing higher, nothing deeper, than the religion described at large in our Lord's Sermon upon the Mount, and briefly summed up by St. Paul in the 13th chapter [of the First Epistle] to the Corinthians. I long to have you more and more deeply penetrated by humble, gentle, patient love. Believe me, you can find nothing higher than this till mortality is swallowed up of life. All the high-sounding or mysterious expressions used by that class of writers either mean no more than this or they mean wrong. O beware of them! Leave them off before they are meddled with. I had much satisfaction in your company when I saw you last. Be more and more filled with humble love. Yours most affectionately. To Mrs. Bennis[24] COLCHESTER, November 3, 1772. DEAR SISTER,--Your time was well bestowed at Waterford. Many, I doubt not, will remember it with thankfulness. But why this want of discipline in Limerick Whenever this is dropped, all is confusion: see that it be immediately restored. I should have been glad if you had prevailed on Captain Webb to pay me a visit in Limerick: he is a man of fire, and the power of God constantly accompanies his word. Poor Sister Harrison! I did not expect her to die in triumph. But we must leave her to her own Master. It seems to me that Mrs. Dawson gains ground. And I [love] her two lovely children. At every opportunity you would do well to speak a little to all three.