Such were the findings of his foes and of his friends: the only difference, as to fact, between the majority of thirty-two and the minority of twelve, is that which relates to Mrs. Williamson and Nathaniel Polhill. The minority declare that it is not true that Mr. Wesley did _several times_ privately force his conversation to Sophia Williamson after her marriage; and that they have good reason to believe that it is not true that he refused to read the burial service over Nathaniel Polhill, because, at the time of the burial, he was absent from Savannah. All the other alleged facts are admitted, but are also justified. How did Wesley meet the indictments? On September 2, the day after they were presented and were read to the people, he appeared in court, and spoke to this effect:—“As to nine of the ten indictments against me, I know this court can take no cognisance of them, they being matters of an ecclesiastical nature. But that concerning my speaking and writing to Mrs. Williamson is of a secular nature; and this, therefore, I desire may be tried here where the facts complained of were committed.”[213] In this Wesley was unquestionably right. His conduct as a priest of the Church of England might be, as it doubtless was, arrogant, foolish, offensive, intolerant; but the petty magisterial court at Savannah had no more right to try him for his high church practices than an Old Bailey judge and jury have to try the half-fledged papistical rectors, curates, and incumbents, who are playing such fantastic tricks in the Protestant churches of old England at the present day. They had a right to try him on the matter mentioned by himself, inasmuch as it was alleged that Mrs. Williamson had been injured in her character, and, on that account, her husband demanded damages to the extent of £1000. Wesley was prepared to answer this indictment, and moved for an immediate hearing; but the court evaded his request, and postponed the hearing to its next sitting. From September 1, when the indictments were first presented, to the end of November, when Wesley made known his intention to return to England, he seems to have attended not fewer than seven different sittings of the court, asking to be tried on the charge affecting the character of Mrs. Williamson; but all to no purpose. The fact is, Mr. and Mrs. Williamson, after having stabbed him, were about to set sail to England,[214] and their contemplated absence was made a pretext for not proceeding with the trial. There can be little doubt that the whole affair was as the twelve jurors believed, a device of Thomas Causton, to gratify his spite, and, by annoyances, to drive Wesley from the colony.