The two gentlemen under whose care Samuel Wesley was placed in London were men of learning, of piety, and of general excellence; and well would it have been if he had had no worse advisers than these; but he writes: “Some of their (the Dissenters) gravest, eldest, and most learned ministers encouraged me in my silly lampoons, both on Church and State. They gave me subjects, and furnished me with matter; some of them transcribed my writings, and several of them revised and corrected them before they were printed.” Wesley began to write his “silly lampoons” soon after he came to London. Some of his first squibs were thrown at a worthy man, who deserved more respectful treatment, both from him and some others. The Rev. Thomas Doolittle, whom he wantonly attacked, was a man of distinguished merit. Born at Kidderminster in 1630, and educated in the College of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, he was, for nine years, the incumbent of the parish of St Alphage, London. After being ejected by the Act of Uniformity, he opened a boarding school, and, though against the law, a meeting-house in Bunhill Fields. Here he preached to a numerous congregation, and had many seals to his ministry, until at length, on a Saturday, at midnight, the train bands came to arrest him; but he managed to escape. Next morning, while another person was preaching for him, the soldiers rushed into the chapel, and the officer, addressing the preacher, shouted, “I command you, in the king’s name, to come down.” The preacher replied, “I command you, in the name of the King of kings, not to disturb His worship, but to let me go on.” The officer ordered his men to fire. The undaunted preacher clapped his hand upon his heart, and said, “Shoot, if you please; you can only kill the body.” Great confusion followed, in the midst of which the brave-hearted preacher escaped; but Doolittle’s pulpit was pulled to pieces, and the doors of his meeting-house were fastened, and were branded with the king’s broad arrow. After this Doolittle opened a private academy at Islington, where, among other distinguished pupils, he had the care of Matthew Henry, the author of the most practical Commentary on the sacred Scriptures ever published; and also of Edward Calamy, the well known writer of the “Nonconformists’ Memorials.” It was at this time that Mr Doolittle published his work entitled, “The Lord’s Last Sufferings,” and prefixed to it a copy of Greek verses. Doolittle’s academy at Islington, and Veal’s at Stepney, seem to have been sworn enemies to each other, and eagerly longed for an opportunity to display their prowess in academic conflict. For want of a more proper subject, they made the verses, prefixed to Doolittle’s book, the occasion of the clash of arms; and, as young Wesley was already “celebrated for his vein at poetry,” he took, as Dunton tells us, a prominent part in a skirmish, which seems to have been wantonly begun, and not too honourably carried on. The squibs which Wesley published are