Wesley Corpus

2. If by “righteousness” be meant “the con duct of the whole to particulars,” then it cannot consist in the gentleness of Church authority; unless Church Govern ors are the whole Church, or the Parliament the whole nation. 3. If by “truth” be meant “the conduct of the whole, and of particulars to one another,” then it cannot possibly con sist in orthodoxy or right opinion. For opinion, right or wrong, is not conduct: They differ toto genere. If, then, it be orthodoxy, it is not “the conduct of the governors and governed toward each other.” If it be their conduct toward each other, it is not orthodoxy. Although, therefore, it be allowed that right opinions are a great help, and wrong opinions a great hinderance, to reli gion, yet, till stronger proof be brought against it, that pro position remains unshaken, “Right opinions are a slender part of religion, if any part of it at all.” (Page 160.) “(As to the affair of Abbé Paris, whoever will read over with calmness and impartiality but one volume of Monsieur Mont geron, will then be a competent judge. Meantime I would just observe, that if these miracles were real, they strike at the root of the whole Papal authority; as having been wrought in direct opposition to the famous Bull Unigenitus.)” (Page 161.) Yet I do not say, “Errors in faith have little to do with religion; ” or that they are “no let or impediment to the Holy Spirit.” (Page 162.) But still it is true, that “God, generally speaking, begins his work at the heart.” (Ibid.) Men usually feel desires to please God, before they know how to please him. Their heart says, “What must I do to be saved?” before they understand the way of salvation. But see “the character he gives his own saints ‘The more I converse with this people, the more I am amazed. That God hath wrought a great work is manifest, by saving many sinners from their sins. And yet the main of them are not able to give a rational account of the plainest principles of religion.’” They were not able then, as there had not been time to instruct them. But the case is far different now. Again: Did I “give this character,” even then, of the people called Methodists, in general?