Wesley Corpus

Accordingly, he sent me, not long after, the manuscript of his three first Dialogues. I sent them back after some days, with a few inconsiderable corrections; but upon his complaining, “You are not my friend, if you do not take more liberty with me,” I promised I would; so he sent them again, and I made some more important alterations. I was not surprised at seeing no more of the copy, till I saw it in print. When I had read it, I wrote him my thoughts freely, but received no answer. On October 15, 1756, I sent him a second letter, which I here insert, that every impartial person may understand the real merits of the cause. I need only premise, that, at the time I wrote, I had not the least thought of making it public. I only spoke my private thoughts in a free, open manner, to a friend dear as a brother,-I had almost said to a pupil,--to a son; for so near I still accounted him. It is no wonder therefore, that “several of my objections,” as Mr. Hervey himself observes, “appear more like notes and memorandums, tl an a just plea to the public.” (Page 80.) It is true. They appear like what they are, like what they were originally intended for. I had no thought of a plea to the public when I wrote, but of “notes and memorandums to a private man.” DEAR SIR, October 15, 1756. A consider ABLE time since, I sent you a few hasty thoughts which occurred to me on reading the “Dialogues between Theron and Aspasio.” I have not been favoured with any answer. Yet upon another and a more careful perusal of them, I could not but set down some obvious reflections, which I would rather have communicated before these Dialogues were published. In the First Dialogue there are several just and strong observations, which may be of use to every scrious reader. In the Second, is not the description often too laboured? the language too stiff and affected? Yet the reflections on the creation, in the thirty-first and following pages, make abundant amends for this. (I cite the pages according to the Dublin edition, having wrote the rough draught of what follows in Ireland.) Is justification more or less than God’s pardoning and accepting a sinner through the merits of Christ?