“You did right in excluding from our society so notorious an offender. You have now a providential call to stand in the gap between the living and the dead. Fear nothing. Begin in the name of God, and go through with it. If only six will promise you to sin no more, leave only six in society. But my belief is, a hundred and fifty are now clear of blame; and, if you are steady, a hundred more will amend. You must, at all events, tear up this evil by the roots. The ‘Word to a Smuggler’ should be read and dispersed. And secure your fellow labourers, that you may all speak one thing. Go on, for God is with you! Not only the assistant, but every preacher, is concerned to see all our rules observed. I desire brother Rhodes will give no tickets, either to those who have not constantly met their classes, or to any that do not solemnly promise to deal in stolen goods no more. He and you together may put a stop to this crying sin. If any leader oppose, you see your remedy; put another in his place. Nay, if he does not join heart and hand; for ‘he that gathereth not with you scattereth.’ The ‘Word to a Smuggler’ is plain and home, and has done much good in Kent. Taking opium is full as bad as taking drams. It equally hurts the understanding, and is, if possible, more pernicious to the health, than even rum or brandy. None should touch it, if they have the least regard either for their souls or bodies.”[259] The year 1776 was a period of great national distress; and, yet, it was now that Wesley started his scheme for the erection of Methodism’s cathedral, the chapel in City Road. Who will write a history of London Methodism? or, which would be more popular, who will give the Methodists a monograph of the memories of Wesley’s “new chapel” in City Road? Much might be said of the episcopal chapel in West Street, Seven Dials, of which Wesley obtained a lease, and which he opened on the 29th of May, 1743, as a Methodist meeting-house, and which was so occupied until 1798, when it was superseded by the purchase of another episcopal chapel, which then stood on part of the site of the present Methodist chapel in Great Queen Street.[260] Then there was the venerable chapel in Spitalfields, erected by the French protestants, and used by Wesley long before that in City Road was built, but which, _horresco referens!_ has given place to the brewery of Truman, Hanbury & Co.; and there is likewise its successor, also originally a French protestant church, and still used for Methodist services, a chapel which has recently had dark days of adversity, but which is rich in religious memories, and has witnessed many a marvellous revival of the work of God. There is Chelsea, whose first Methodist meeting place was an upper room in the house of an elderly woman, Mrs. Day, who resided in Royal Hospital Row; and its next, one of the dancing rooms in the celebrated Ranelagh Gardens, for which a rent was paid of ten