“You have a multitude of names to bear on your breast, and mention with your lips, when you approach the throne of grace in the beneficent exercise of intercession; but none, I am sure, has more need of such an interest in your supplications, none can more highly esteem it, or more earnestly desire it, than, dear sir, your obliged and affectionate humble servant, “JAMES HERVEY.”[184] It is a curious fact, that, Hervey possessed and cherished the friendship of the two greatest Dissenters of the age, Doctor Doddridge and Dr. Watts; and, that, the hymns of the latter, even in his lifetime, were sung in the service of an established church. For eight years, Wesley had been an itinerant preacher, and had encountered an unparalleled amount of violent opposition. There had been a temporary estrangement between him and Whitefield, on Calvinistic doctrines; but the two were now as warmly attached to each other as ever. Methodism, meanwhile, had been established in all directions; and, in this very year, 1747, had been introduced into Ireland. Brutal were the persecutions from which the poor Methodists still had to suffer; but their truth was mighty and triumphant. Hervey had taken no part in the great movement of the Wesleys and Whitefield; but he had not opposed it. Indeed, it had his sympathy and prayers. His old friends occupied one sphere of Christian usefulness; he, according to his ability, occupied another. Hence the following, addressed to Wesley:— “WESTON, NEAR NORTHAMPTON, _December 30, 1747_. “DEAR SIR,—With pleasure I received, and with gratitude acknowledge, the favour of your two letters. That which bears the date of November 21, I should have answered long ago, had I not been retarded by the following reason: “I was desirous to give a proof of my love for your person and of my reverence for your conduct, somewhat more substantial than the bare profession of my pen. My bookseller is, this week, to pay a sum of money for a second impression of my two little pieces of devotional meditation, which I lately ventured to publish, and which God has vouchsafed to honour with acceptance. This is to be received by my brother, in Miles’s Lane, at whose house, if you please to call, he will, in my name, present you with five guineas, which I beg of you to accept, as a token of that affectionate and grateful esteem which I bear to my ever-valued friend; and distribute among the indigent or distressed members of that Divine Benefactor, who died for us both.[185] “Assure yourself, dear sir, that I can never forget that tender-hearted and generous Fellow of Lincoln, who condescended to take such compassionate notice of a poor undergraduate, whom almost everybody condemned, and for whose soul no man cared.