Just at this juncture, Wesley drew up and printed, at Dublin, under date “July 10, 1771,” a clear and logical exposition of the doctrines set forth in the minutes, which he doubtless circulated among his preachers and friends. At the top of the first page of one of the copies, he requested Miss Bishop, of Bath, not to “show it before conference,” adding, “if the Calvinists do not, or will not understand me, I understand myself; and I do not contradict anything I have written these thirty years. Poor Mr. Shirley’s triumph will be short.”[137] Wesley’s views were the same as Perronet’s. What were Charles Wesley’s, and what part was taken by him in this momentous controversy? The biographer of the Countess of Huntingdon would have his readers to believe, that Charles disapproved of his brother’s letter to her ladyship; that he would reprove him for it; and, that he preferred peace above all things.[138] It might be so; we have no means of gainsaying it. It is doubtful whether he attended the conference in Bristol; in fact, almost certain that he did not. Hence the following, addressed to him only three days before the commencement of its sittings. “KINGSWOOD, _August 3, 1771_. “DEAR BROTHER,--I will not throw away Thomas Rankin on the people of London. He shall go where they know the value of him. “We cannot put out what we never put in. I do not use the word ‘merit.’ I never did, neither do I now, contend for the use of it. But I ask you, or any other, a plain question: and do not cry, Murder; but give me an answer. What is the difference between ‘_mereri_,’ and ‘to deserve’? or between ‘deserving,’ and ‘_meritum_’? I say still, I cannot tell. Can you? Can Mr. Shirley, or any man living? In asking this question, I neither plead for merit, nor against it. I have nothing to do with it. I have declared a thousand times, there is no goodness in man till he is justified; no merit, either before or after; that is, taking the word in its proper sense: for in a loose sense ‘meritorious’ means no more than ‘rewardable.’ “As to reprobation, seeing they have drawn the sword, I throw away the scabbard. I send you a specimen. Let fifteen hundred of them be printed as soon as you please.[139] “Nothing was ever yet expended out of the yearly collection, without being immediately set down by the secretary. I never took a shilling from that fund yet. “What you advise with regard to our behaviour toward our opposers exactly agrees with my sentiments. I am full of business, as you may suppose. So adieu! “JOHN WESLEY.”[140]