Ingham, as well as Wesley, visited Hernhuth, where he spent a fortnight, and was “exceedingly strengthened and comforted by the services and conversation of the Brethren. Towards the end of the year, he returned to England.” It is a curious fact that Wesley and Ingham were not the only Oxford Methodists who began to associate with the Moravians. On the first day of the year 1739, we find not fewer than seven of the Oxford brotherhood—the two Wesleys, Ingham, Whitefield, Westley Hall, Kinchin, and Hutchins,—present at a Moravian lovefeast in Fetter Lane, respecting which Wesley writes:— “About three in the morning, as we were continuing instant in prayer, the power of God came mightily upon us, insomuch that many cried out for exceeding joy, and many fell to the ground. As soon as we were recovered a little from the awe and amazement at the presence of His Majesty, we broke out with one voice, ‘We praise Thee, O God; we acknowledge Thee to be the Lord.’”[77] This was a memorable beginning of what will ever be a memorable year in the history of the Methodistic movement. Four days afterwards, the same clergymen, joined by Mr. Seward, had a conference at Islington, and, without effect, tried to prevail on Charles Wesley to settle at Oxford. Whitefield writes:— “We continued in fasting and prayer till three o’clock, and then parted, with a full conviction that God was about to do great things among us. O that we may be any way instrumental to His glory! O that He would make us vessels pure and holy, meet for such a dear Master’s use!”[78] The men evidently were willing to be used in any way which Providence might appoint; and their conviction of the coming of great events was not falsified. On Ingham’s return to Osset, his native place, he renewed his labours, and preached in most of the churches and chapels about Wakefield, Leeds, and Halifax. Private religious meetings also were greatly multiplied. Large numbers of persons were convinced of sin, and were converted. It was pre-eminently a day of divine visitation. The clergy, however, instead of rejoicing at an enlargement of the work of God, were envious and malignant; and, at a Church congress, held at Wakefield, June 6, 1739, Ingham was prohibited from preaching in any of the churches in the diocese of York; and was thus placed in the same position as Wesley had been compelled to occupy in London. Both were ordained clergymen, and both longed to preach the gospel of God their Saviour; but both were without a church of their own, and both were now uniformly shut out of the churches of others. What Wesley began to do at Bristol, Kingswood, and elsewhere, Ingham began to do in Yorkshire. Village greens, the public streets, fields, barns, cottages, and houses of all descriptions became his preaching places; and, such was the divine power which attended his ministry, that not fewer than forty religious societies were formed.