Wesley Corpus

143, 146) which are next recited lay before me, a venerable old Clergyman calling upon me, I asked him, “Sir, would you advise me to publish these strange relations, or not?” He answered, “Are you sure of the facts?” I replied, “As sure as that I am alive.” “Then,” said he, “publish them in God’s name, and be not careful about the event.” The short of the case is this: Two young women were tor mented of the devil in an uncommon manner. Several serious persons desired my brother and me to pray with them. We, with many others, did; and they were delivered. But where, meantime, were the “exorcisms in form, according to the Roman fashion ?” I never used them : I never saw them: I know nothing about them. “Such were the blessings which Mr. W. distributed among his friends. For his enemies he had in store the judgments of Heaven.” (Page 144.) Did I then ever distribute, or profess to distribute, these? Do I claim any such power? This is the present question. Let us calmly consider the eight quotations brought to prove it. 1. “I preached at Darlaston, late a den of lions. But the fiercest of them God has called away, by a train of surprising strokes.” (Ibid.) But not by me: I was not there. 2. “I preached at R., late a place of furious riot and persecution; but quiet and calm, since the bitter Rector is gone to give an account of himself to God.” (Page 145.) 3. “Hence we rode to T-n, where the Minister was slowly recovering from a violent fit of the palsy, with which he was struck immediately after he had been preaching a virulent sermon against the Methodists.” (Page 145.) 4. “The case of Mr. W n was dreadful indeed, and too notorious to be denied.” (Ibid.) 5. “One of the chief of those who came to make the disturbance on the first instant hanged himself.” (Page 146.) 6. “I was quite surprised when I heard Mr. R. preach; that soft, smooth, tuneful voice, which he so often employed to blaspheme the work of God, was lost, without hope of recovery.” (Ibid.) 7. “Mr. C. spoke so much in favour of the rioters, that they were all discharged.