“Poor harmless Wesley, let him write again; Be pitied in his old heroic strain; Let him in reams proclaim himself a dunce, And break a dozen stationers at once.” Mr Wesley, as we have seen, was an enthusiastic, an almost idolatrous, admirer of Queen Mary and of Archbishop Tillotson; and some writers have been pleased to intimate that this arose from special favours which her Majesty and the archbishop had shown him. This is an unwarranted and unworthy insinuation. It cannot be denied that Wesley received kindness from the queen; but there is no evidence to show that he was indebted to Tillotson for any favour whatever. Wesley himself declares, in a letter to be given hereafter, that because he dedicated his “Life of Christ” to Queen Mary, the queen gave him the Epworth living. He never asked for it. “It was proffered and given without his ever having solicited any person, and without his ever expecting, or even once thinking of such a favour.” He adds, “The favours which our blessed queen was pleased to bestow on me, after she had read my book, were as far beyond my expectation as my desert.”[98] ----- Footnote 98: Wesley’s _Answer to Palmer_. ----- There is no doubt that all this is substantially correct; though it involves a discrepancy in dates, which it is hard to reconcile. Wesley says that it was through the queen that he obtained Epworth living; and yet he was not inducted into that living until two years after the queen was dead. The probability is that the queen made some arrangement that Wesley should be the next presentee to Epworth benefice; and, after her decease, the arrangement was carried out. Be that as it may, it is an unquestioned fact, that Wesley was indebted to the kindness of Queen Mary; but it is an unwarrantable imputation to say that it was because of this that he used such excessive flattery in Queen Mary’s Elegy. We find the same extravagant praises used concerning her in the very book which led to the Epworth living being given; thereby showing that Wesley was a most warm admirer of the queen before he received any of her royal kindnesses. After having lauded the virgin mother of our Saviour, he adds:— “And after thee, oh full of charms and grace! Let our great Mary fill the second place! For other queens long mayst thou look in vain, Others like her, to fill thy glorious train. Humble like thee, like thee of royal line, Her soul to Heaven submiss, and bow’d like thine! Heaven, which immaculate her form design’d, As a fit mansion for so fair a mind. Which gave her eyes, that love and awe inspire, And cheer the world like the sun’s vital fire. Oh may they on my humble labours shine, With their kind influence gild each happy line! Endue with purer forms the coarser ore, And stamp it bullion, though ’twas dross before.”[99]