Wesley Corpus

The consequence was, that he leaned more and more both to their doctrine and manner of preaching. At first, several of our Preachers complained of this; but, in the space of a few months, (so incredible is the force of soft words,) he, by slow and imperceptible degrees, brought almost all the Preachers then in the kingdom to think and speak like himself. These, returning to England, spread the contagion to some others of their brethren. But still the far greater part of the Methodist Preachers thought and spoke as they had done from the beginning. This is the plain fact. As to the fruit of this new manner of preaching, (entirely new to the Methodists) speaking much of the promises, little of the commands; (even to unbelievers, and still less to believers;) you think it has done great good; I think it has done great harm. I think it has done great harm to the Preachers; not only to James Wheatly himself, but to those who have learned of him,-David Trathen, Thomas Webb, Robert Swindells, and John Maddern: I fear to others also; all of whom are but shadows of what they were; most of them have exalted themselves above measure, as if they only “preached Christ, preached the gospel.” And as highly as they have exalted themselves, so deeply have they despised their brethren ; calling them “legal Preachers, legal wretches;” and (by a cant name) “Doctors,” or “Doctors of Divinity.” They have not a little despised their Ministers also, for “counte nancing the Doctors,” as they termed them. They have made their faults (real or supposed) common topics of con versation; hereby cherishing in themselves the very spirit of Ham; yea, of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. I think it has likewise done great harm to their hearers; diffusing among them their own prejudice against the other Preachers; against their Ministers, me in particular, (of which you have been an undeniable instance,) against the scriptural, Methodist manner of preaching Christ, so that they could no longer bear sound doctrine; they could no *- - -- longer hear the plain old truth with profit or pleasure, nay, hardly with patience.