Wesley Corpus

Although it is rather to be desired than expected that the general plan of modern education may be amended, yet a treatise on that subject, which was printed in England some years since, has not been without success. A few have dared to go out of the common road and to educate their children in a Christian manner; and some tutors of the University have trained up them under their care in a manner not unworthy of the primitive Christians. We have hardly heard in our country of any such thing as a Mission into Lapland. If the common accounts of the Laplanders are true, they are some of the lowest of the human species, raised not many degrees either in understanding or manners above the beasts of the field. Whoever, therefore, they are that undertake to form these into men and into Christians, they will have need of more than common measure both of understanding, faith, and patience. But, still, there is nothing too hard for God; and nothing impossible to him that believe. One thing, gentlemen, I am particularly surprised at in the account of the Society with which you favor me--that in Sweden men of rank, of quality, of eminence are not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; are not ashamed openly to espouse His cause and to give a public testimony that they believe the Bible. May the God whom you serve prosper all your endeavors for His glory and the public good. This is the sincere wish of, gentlemen, Your obliged and obedient servant. To the Earl of Dartmouth, Lord Privy Seal [36] LONDON, December 24, 1775. MY LORD,--The corrections made in Mr. Fletcher's papers which your Lordship was so kind as to make, as well as those made by the gentlemen who perused them, will prevent several objections.