“MY DEAR BROTHER,--Now the hurry of conference is over, I get a little time to write. When I chose you to be steward in Dublin, you both loved and esteemed your preachers; but I find you have now drunk in the whole spirit of Pat. Geoghegan. O beware! You are exceedingly deceived. By this time, I should be some judge of man; and if I am, all England and Ireland cannot afford such a body of men, number for number, for sense and true experience, both of men and things, as the body of Methodist preachers. Our leaders in London, Bristol, and Dublin are by no means weak men. I would not be ashamed to compare them with a like number of tradesmen in every part of the three kingdoms. But I assure you, they are no more than children compared to the preachers in conference, as you would be thoroughly convinced, could you but have the opportunity of spending one day among them. Mr. Jaco will make a fair trial whether he can supply Dublin alone; if he cannot, he shall have another to help, for he must not kill himself to save charges. But I dare not stint him to £20 a year. He will waste nothing; but he must want nothing. You will make his stay among you, in every respect, as comfortable as you can. “I am your affectionate brother, “JOHN WESLEY.”[170] No sooner was the conference ended, than Wesley again started on his itinerancy of mercy. On his way to Burslem, his chaise broke down; but, notwithstanding his disease, rather than disappoint the people, he mounted a horse and rode two-and-twenty miles, arriving just in time for preaching. On reaching Trevecca, on August 14, he met his old friend, Howel Harris, who, while almost all others of his class had imbibed the most bitter feelings, still remained faithful. “I have borne,” said the honest Welshman, “with these pert, ignorant young men, vulgarly called students, till I cannot, in conscience, bear any longer. They preach barefaced reprobation, and so broad antinomianism, that I have been constrained to oppose them to the face, even in the public congregation.” This was no great compliment to the students of the Countess of Huntingdon, especially as coming from a Calvinist. Wesley, almost as an apology, adds to this: “It is no wonder that they should preach thus. What better can be expected from raw lads, of little understanding, little learning, and no experience?” It is pleasing to add, that Howel Harris was not the only one of Whitefield’s friends who still stood true to Wesley, though differing from his views. Hence the following, addressed to him by Cornelius Winter. “BRECON, _August 10, 1772_.