Wesley Corpus

I mean, I could never, in virtue of that ordination, have exercised those powers at all; seeing I never was appointed to any single congregation, at least not till I went to Georgia. I answered, (3.) “For many years after I was ordained Priest, this limitation was never heard of. I heard not one syllable of it, by way of objection to my preaching up and down in Oxford or London, or the parts adjacent; in Glouces tershire or Worcestershire; in Lancashire, Yorkshire, or Lincolnshire. Nor did the strictest disciplinarian scruple suffering me to exercise those powers wherever I came.” You reply, “There is great difference between preaching occasionally, with the leave of the incumbents, and doing it constantly without their leave.” I grant there is; and there are objections to the latter, which do not reach the former case. But they do not belong to this head. They do not in the least affect this consequence,--“If every Priest, when ordained, is expressly limited, touching the exercise of the power then received, to that congregation to which he shall be appointed; then is he precluded by this express limitation from preaching, with or without the incumbent’s leave, in any other congrega tion whatever.” I answered, (4) “Is it not, in fact, universally allowed, that every Priest, as such, has a power, in virtue of his ordination, to preach in any congregation, where the Curate desires his assistance?” You reply to this by what you judge a parallel case. But it does not touch the restriction in question. Either this does, or does not, expressly limit the exercise of the powers conferred upon a Priest in his ordination to that congregation whereunto he shall be appointed. If it does not, I am not condemned by this, however faulty I may be on a thousand other accounts. If it does, then is every Priest condemned whoever preaches out of the congregation to which he is appointed. Your parallel case is this: “Because a man does not offend against the law of the land, when I prevail upon him to teach my children;” therefore “he is impowered to seize” (read, he does not offend against the law of the land in seizing) “an apart ment in my house, and against my will and approbation to conti nue therein, and to direct and dictate to my family!” (Page 11.) An exact parallel indeed!