The life and times of the Rev. John Wesley, M.A., founder of the Methodists. Vol. 2 (of 3)Tyerman, L. (Luke)
History
The life and times of the Rev. John Wesley, M.A., founder of the Methodists. Vol. 2 (of 3)
Tyerman, L. (Luke)
Methodism; Wesley, John, 1703-1791
not being yet able to stand; and, on the next day, or, at most, the
day after that, cripple though he was, he succeeded in leading Mrs.
Vazeille, a widow, seven years younger than himself, to the hymeneal
altar, and was married. On the Monday (February 18) he was still unable
to set his foot to the ground. On the Tuesday evening, and on the
Wednesday morning, he preached kneeling. This was an odd beginning,—the
bridegroom crippled, and, instead of making a wedding tour, preaching
on his knees in London chapels. A fortnight after his marriage, being,
as he says, “tolerably able to ride, though not to walk,” he set
out for Bristol, leaving his newly married wife behind him. Here he
held a five days’ conference with his preachers, who had assembled
from various parts, and says: “My spirit was much bowed down among
them, fearing some of them were perverted from the simplicity of the
gospel; but the more we conversed, the more brotherly love increased.
I expected to have heard many objections to our first doctrines; but
none appeared to have any: we seemed to be all of one mind, as well as
one heart. I mentioned whatever I thought was amiss, or wanting, in any
of our brethren. It was received in a right spirit, with much love,
and serious earnest attention; and, I trust, not one went from the
conference discontented, but rather, blessing God for the consolation.”
The conference being ended, he returned to London on March the 21st,
and, six days afterwards, set out for Scotland, and inserted in his
journal what, perhaps, was a sly hit at his brother Charles: “I cannot
understand how a Methodist preacher can answer it to God, to preach one
sermon, or travel one day less, in a married than in a single state.
In this respect surely, ‘it remaineth, that they who have wives be as
though they had none.’”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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