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presbyter by the same bishop, while serving in one of his father's two little parishes, called Wroote. In 1729, at the urgent request of Dr. Morley, Rector of Lincoln, he returned to his tutorial duties at Oxford, where he remained for six years. Irreligious opinions were abroad in the country and even amongst the clergy. Three undergraduates had been expelled for Deism; a learned, conscientious, and religious teacher such as Wesley was much needed.

At the close of the previous century the well-known "Societies for the Reformation of Manners" had sprung up in various places for the correction of profligacy, ignorance, and irreligion. Robert Nelson was was one of their warmest supporters. The foundation of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge in 1699, in which he shared, was part of this movement. One of these societies existed at Oxford, chiefly amongst undergraduates. It was sometimes called the "Godly Club," sometimes the Sacramentarian." 66 Whitefield, then

a servitor at Pembroke, seeing the members forcing their way through a ridiculing crowd to take Communion at St. Mary's, joined them. Until John Wesley's return from Lincolnshire, his brother Charles was the most prominent

member. John was now chosen leader. They were from twenty to thirty in number; they received the Communion every Sunday, and during the week took opportunities for visiting the poor, the workhouse, the gaol, the school, and for engaging in other works of charity. John limited his personal expenditure to £30 a year, and his hours of sleep to five, rising every morning at 4 a.m. Among other nicknames the term "Methodist" was applied to this society, from its strictness in observing the rules and rubrics of the Church; and the word has remained as the proper legal designation of that vast and world-wide society which was founded by the club's two most prominent members.

About this time (1732) he wrote his sermon on the Eucharist, which he republished fifty years later, and in a letter to his mother defined his view on the subject: disavowing transubstantiation and consubstantiation, he held a union of God with the believer in that sacrament, the manner of the union being a mystery. At this time he also became personally acquainted with William Law. "His philosophy and theology," says Dr. Rigg, were permanently elevated and enriched through the

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familiarity which he had gained with some at least of the writers to whom Law had introduced him, as well as through the direct influence of Law himself."

The family wishing the father to resign and John to be appointed Vicar of Epworth, he wrote to his father explaining that his opportunities for evangelistic work were greater at Oxford than in a small country parish; and on consulting the Bishop, the Bishop replied: "It doth not seem to me that at your ordination you engaged yourself to undertake the cure of any parish, provided you can as a clergyman better serve God and His Church in your present or some other station." The father having died, Dr. Burton of Corpus, who had long taken an interest in the colony of Georgia, asked John and Charles to go there as mission clergy. In 1735 they started under the leadership of General Oglethorpe, Charles going as the General's secretary, John for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, which had been founded thirty-four years before. The brothers were just the rising, eager, conscientious, self-denying, able young Churchmen who would be selected.

On board the ship were thirty German

Moravian emigrants, headed by their bishop, Nitschmann, and bringing their wives and families. Wesley was struck by their Christian conduct, simplicity of mind and life, and by the contrast between their fearless calm in an awful storm and the shrieks of the English. In their discipline, obedience, courage, fidelity, earnestness, and singleness of heart, he found people whose conversation was in heaven. He began to learn German, and longed to see more of the Moravians.

1

Their station was Savannah in Georgia, and the mission was not successful. The Wesleys were unworldly and precise, destitute of tact, firm even to obstinacy, and at that time unfit for rough work on uncultivated soil." They insisted on immersion in baptism; they required sponsors to be communicants; they refused Communion to those who had received either irregular or lay baptism, and to those who had sent no previous notice; they divided the usual old-fashioned morning service into separate portions. These pedantries pedantries gave universal Charles quickly returned to England. But a climax

offence.

John remained another year.

1 Urlin, p. 30.

came when he refused Communion to a young person who had jilted him. The enraged father embodied all the accumulated complaints in an accusation of twelve counts, which he brought before the local court. Nothing was done; but Wesley found the position intolerable, and in November 1737 determined to return to England. At this time he was in a state of morbid

depression at his failure. A frightful storm at sea brought home to him the fear of death. He even dreaded that he did not possess true Christian faith.

Landing at Deal at the end of the year, he joined Charles in London, and sought out the Moravians in the metropolis.

May 1738 was a memorable month for the brothers. They made the acquaintance of Peter Bohler, an earnest young Moravian immigrant, whom Law described as "an extraordinary good young man," who impressed them with his views, and added so greatly to their spiritual fervour that the effect seemed like a second and more real conversion. The principal point was that living faith is always given in a moment, and that its recipient is conscious of a great and vital change, without which consciousness he is no true Christian. Law, when consulted,

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