Such labours were onerous; but, whilst his time must have been greatly occupied with his daily duties, his benevolent heart would not permit him to live wholly to himself. He was not only ambitious to raise himself, but he likewise yearned to benefit others; and, it is a remarkable coincidence, that the objects of his sympathy were exactly of the same class as those who, forty-five years afterwards, were visited and helped by his sons, John and Charles, and the other Oxford Methodists. Notwithstanding the weightiness of his college work, and the lightness of his college purse, he found time to visit the poor wretched inmates of Oxford Gaol, and gladly relieved them as far as he was able. Writing to his two sons, in 1730, when they had begun, of their own accord, to visit the same prison house, he says:—“Go on, in God’s name, in the path to which your Saviour has directed you, and that track wherein your father has gone before you! For when I was an undergraduate at Oxford I visited those in the castle there, and reflect on it with great satisfaction to this day. Walk as prudently as you can, though not fearfully, and my heart and prayers are with you.”[24] ----- Footnote 24: Wesley’s Works, vol. i., p. 7. ----- When Samuel Wesley had spent about eighteen months at the university King Charles II. died, and James II. succeeded him. A few months afterwards, Oxford was honoured with a visit from this papistical monarch, and an event happened which exercised an important influence on Wesley’s subsequent career. One of the historians of Methodism has said, it is a remarkable fact that, though Samuel Wesley had “the piety and persecutions of his father and grandfather in his memory, and though the condition and tendencies of the court were open to his inspection, he was very much attached to the interests of King James.” This statement rests entirely on the testimony of Dr A. Clarke, who says, “His son John has been heard to state that at first his father was very much attached to the interests of James.” It is deferentially submitted whether this is strictly true. It is scarce likely that a young man of intelligence, scholarship, and honour, like Samuel Wesley; a young man whose father and grandfather had been ejected from their churches, and hunted to their graves by the myrmidons of Stuart perfidy; and a young man, whose entire life had been spent in the society and schools of those who hated, and had just cause to hate, the Stuart dynasty; we say it is scarce likely that such a young man would feel either much attachment, or any attachment at all, to a despotic and royal traitor like the one just mentioned. But, be that as it may, the occurrence which happened at Oxford, and which is about to be related, exercised an important influence on Samuel Wesley’s subsequent behaviour.