[149] There was also published, at this period, a smartly written rebuke of Toplady, and a defence of Wesley, entitled, “A Letter to the Rev. Mr. Augustus Toplady, written in great part by himself, relative to part of his printed Letter to the Rev. Mr. John Wesley.” 8vo, 21 pages. [150] Manuscript letter. [151] As a curiosity, and as tending to show that, in this season of excitement, all men were not Wesley’s enemies, we give an extract from a review of this section of Wesley’s Journal, published in _Lloyd’s Evening Post_, for January 20, 1772:--“In this interval, between May 27, 1765, and May 5, 1768, this zealous and truly laborious missionary of the Methodists, who seems to consider the three kingdoms as his parochial cure, twice traverses the greater part of Ireland and Scotland, from Londonderry to Cork, from Aberdeen to Dumfries, visiting and confirming the churches, besides making a progress, chiefly on horseback (in many places more than once), through great part of Wales, and almost all the counties in England, from Newcastle to Southampton, from Dover to Penzance. Those who expect to find in this Journal only the peculiar tenets of Methodism will be agreeably disappointed, as they are intermixed with such occasional reflections on men and manners, on polite literature, and even on polite places, as prove that the writer is endued with a taste well cultivated both by reading and observation; and above all with such a benevolence and sweetness of temper, such an enlarged, liberal, and truly protestant way of thinking towards those who differ from him, as clearly show that _his heart_, at least, is right, and justly entitle him to that candour and forbearance, which, for the honour of our common religion, we are glad to find he now generally receives.” 1772. Age 69 Wesley’s first journey from London, in 1772, was on the 16th of January, when he came to Luton, and preached in the parish church. The friendly clergyman, who gave him this permission, was the Rev. Mr. Copleston, whose son afterwards became a Methodist local preacher, and was driven from Luton by the iron hand of persecution, and then, after preaching for a while at St. Albans, introduced Methodism into Leighton Buzzard, where he died, in 1835, at the age of seventy, having been an earnest Methodist more than fifty years.[152]