Wesley Collected Works Vol 8
| Author | John Wesley |
|---|---|
| Type | treatise |
| Year | None |
| Passage ID | jw-wesley-collected-works-vol-8-413 |
| Words | 392 |
If you walk by this rule, continually endeavouring to know
and love and resemble and obey the great God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, as the God of love, of pardoning mercy;
if from this principle of loving, obedient faith, you carefully
abstain from all evil, and labour, as you have opportunity, to
do good to all men, friends or enemies; if, lastly, you unite
together, to encourage and help each other in thus working
out your salvation, and for that end watch over one another
in love, you are they whom I mean by Methodists. The First general advice which one who loves your souls
would earnestly recommend to every one of you is: “Con
sider, with deep and frequent attention, the peculiar circum
stances wherein you stand.”
One of these is, that you are a new people: Your name is
new, (at least, as used in a religious sense,) not heard of, till
a few years ago, either in our own or any other nation. Your
principles are new, in this respect, that there is no other set
of people among us (and, possibly, not in the Christian world)
who hold them all in the same degree and connexion; who so
strenuously and continually insist on the absolute necessity of
universal holiness both in heart and life; of a peaceful, joyous
love of God; of a supernatural evidence of things not seen; of
an inward witness that we are the children of God; and of the
inspiration of the Holy Ghost, in order to any good thought,
or word, or work. And perhaps there is no other set of people,
(at least, not visibly united together,) who lay so much and yet
no more stress than you do on rectitude of opinions, on out
ward modes of worship, and the use of those ordinances which
you acknowledge to be of God. So much stress you lay even
on right opinions, as to profess, that you earnestly desire to
have a right judgment in all things, and are glad to use every
means which you know or believe may be conducive thereto;
and yet not so much as to condemn any man upon earth,
merely for thinking otherwise than you do; much less, to
imagine that God condemns him for this, if he be upright and
sincere of heart.