used in condescension to human weakness, by way of adapting the subject of the mysterious workings of God's providence to human capacities. He held therefore that God punishes no one. All evil, according to his creed, originates either from matter, or from the free-will of man; and if there be suffering, it is not that God wills it, but that he permits it, (for the sake of a greater overbalance of good that could not otherwise possibly be produced,) as the necessary consequence of the existence of an inert instrument like matter, and the imperfection of creatures less pure than himself. Upon his system, all beings will finally be happy. He utterly rejects the doctrine of the Atonement, and ridicules the supposition that the offended justice of the One Perfect Supreme Being requires any satisfaction. His theory is that man, by withdrawing himself from God, had lost the divine life in his soul, and that all communication between him and his Maker was nearly lost. In order to remedy this, in order in some mysterious way to re-open an intercourse between the Deity and the soul of man; and finally, in order to afford the soul a more near and, as it were, sensible perception of its Maker, the Second Person in the Trinity became man. Law alleges that St. Paul, when he speaks of Redemption was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself. adds, had the Almighty required an atonement, the converse of this proposition would have been the truth, and the phrase would have been reconciling Himself to the world.

says, God

Now, he

The narration of the Fall of Man he regards as an allegory. He believes that the first human being was a creature combining both sexes in its own perfect nature, and possessing an infinite capacity of happiness: the Fall, he thinks, consisted, not in tasting of any forbidden fruit, but in turning from God as the sole source of joy, and in a sensual desire for a second self. And in support of this notion he adduces the text, And God made man of the dust of the earth male and female created he them, a text which occurs before the formation of the woman is mentioned.

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Had it not been for this fault, Law supposes that the human race would have increased in number as much as it has done, by a certain delegated power which would have enabled man to create others after his own image.

These whimsies, which Law derived from Jacob Behmen, are entirely confined to his two tracts entitled "The Spirit of Love," and "The Spirit of Prayer, or The Soul rising out of Time into the Riches of Eternity.” Whatever inference may be drawn from them with regard to his judgement, or his sanity, as a practical religious writer, (in which character he exclusively appears in his "Serious Call" and his "Christian Perfection,") there are few men whose writings breathe a more genuine spirit of gospel love, and whose sentiments and mode of inculcating them, at once simple and manly, appeal more forcibly to the heart.

NOTE XIV. Page 96.

He insisted upon baptizing Children by Immersion.

WESLEY Would willingly have persuaded himself that this practice was salutary, as well as regular. His Journal contains the following entry at this time.

“Mary Welch, aged eleven days, was baptized according to the custom of the first Church and the rule of the Church of England, by immersion. The child was ill then, but recovered from that hour."

NOTE XV. Page 98.

Members of the New Colony.

THE following curious passages are extracted from that part of Wesley's Journal which relates to his abode in Georgia.

"I had a long conversation with John Reinier, the son of a gentleman, who being driven out of France on account

of his religion, settled at Vevay in Switzerland, and practised physic there. His father died while he was a child. Some years after he told his mother he was desirous to leave Switzerland, and to retire into some other country, where he might be free from the temptations which he could not avoid there. When her consent was at length obtained, he agreed with the master of a vessel, with whom he went to Holland by land; thence to England, and from England to Pennsylvania. He was provided with money, books, and drugs, intending to follow his father's profession. But no sooner was he come to Philadelphia, than the captain, who had borrowed his money before, instead of repaying it, demanded the full pay for his passage, and under that pretence seized on all his effects. He then left him in a strange country, where he could not speak to be understood, without necessaries, money, or friends. In this condition he thought it best to sell himself for a servant, which he accordingly did, for seven years. When about five were expired, he fell sick of a lingering illness, which made him useless to his master, who after it had continued half a year, would not keep him any longer, but turned him out to shift for himself. He first tried to mend shoes, but soon after joined himself to some French Protestants, and learned to make buttons. He then went and lived with an Anabaptist; but soon after hearing an account of the Moravians in Georgia, walked from Pennsylvania thither, where he found the rest which he had so long sought in vain.”

"In 1733, David Jones, a saddler, a middle-aged man, who had for some time before lived at Nottingham, being at Bristol, met a person there; who, after giving him some account of Georgia, asked whether he would go thither? adding, his trade (that of a saddler) was an exceeding good trade there, upon which he might live creditably and comfortably. He objected his want of money to pay his pas

6

sage, and buy some tools which he should have need of The gentleman told him, he would supply him with that, and hire him a shop when he came to Georgia, wherein he might follow his business, and so repay him as it suited his convenience. Accordingly to Georgia they went; where, soon after his arrival, his master (as he now styled himself) sold him to Mr. Lacy, who set him to work with the rest of his servants in clearing land. He commonly appeared much more thoughtful than the rest, often stealing into the woods alone. He was now sent to do some work on an island, three or four miles from Mr. Lacy's great plantation. Thence he desired the other servants to return without him, saying, he would stay and kill a deer. This was on Saturday. On Monday they found him on the shore, with his gun by him, and the fore-part of his head shot to pieces. In his pocket was a paper book, all the leaves thereof were fair, except one, on which ten or twelve verses were written; two of which were these, (which I transcribed thence, from his own hand-writing.)

'Death could not a more sad retinue find,

Sickness and Pain before, and Darkness all behind!

Among the remarkable persons in this young colony, Dr. Nunes, a Jewish physician, ought to be remembered: for he used to say with great earnestness, "That Paul of Tarsus was one of the finest writers I have ever read. I wish the thirteenth chapter of his first letter to the Corinthians were written in letters of gold: and I wish every Jew were to carry it with him wherever he went." "He judged," says Wesley, " (and herein he certainly judged right,) that this single chapter contained the whole of true religion. It contains whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely: if there be any virtue, if there be any praise,' it is all contained in this."- Vol. X. p. 156.

The first journal contains a curious story, which Wesley relates not upon hearsay, but from his own knowledge. "A servant of Mr. Bradley's sent to desire to speak with me. Going to him I found a young man ill, but perfectly sensible. He desired the rest to go out, and then said, 'On Thursday night, about eleven o'clock, being in bed, but broad awake, I heard one calling aloud," Peter! Peter Wright!" and looking up, the room was as light as day, and I saw a man in very bright clothes stand by the bed, who said, "Prepare yourself; for your end is nigh;" and then immediately all was dark as before.' I told him, the advice was good, whencesoever it came.' In a few days he was recovered from his illness: his whole temper was changed as well as his life; and so continued to be, till after three or four weeks he relapsed and died in peace."

NOTE XVI. Page 166.

The Light of Christ shining in different Degrees under different Dispensations.

UPON this point there is a curious coincidence of opinion between Wesley, and one who if they had been contemporaries would have been a far more formidable antagonist than any that ever grappled with him in controversy. "I have often," says South, "been induced to think that if we should but strip things of mere words and terms, and reduce notions to realities, there would be found but little difference (so far as it respects man's understanding) between the intellectus agens asserted by some philosophers, and the universal grace, or common assistances of the Spirit, asserted by some divines (and particularly by John Goodwin, calling it the Pagan's debt and dowry); and that the assertors of both of them seem to found their several assertions upon much the same ground; namely, upon their apprehension of the, natural impotence of the soul of man, immersed in matter, to raise itself to such spiritual