The works of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 07 (of 32)Wesley, John
Religion
The works of the Rev. John Wesley, Vol. 07 (of 32)
Wesley, John
Methodist Church; Theology -- Early works to 1800; Theology -- History -- 18th century
bring heaven into us, or drive hell out of us. O _Britain, Britain_,
think that the Son of God saith unto thee, as he said, _O Jerusalem,
Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children, as a hen
gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold,
your house is left unto you desolate._ And now let me say, what aileth
thee, O _British_ earth, that thou _quakest_, and the foundations
of thy churches that they _totter_? Just _that same_ aileth thee, as
ailed _Judah_’s earth, when the divine Saviour of the world, dying on
the cross, was _reviled_, _scorned_, and _mocked_, by the inhabitants
of _Jerusalem_; then the _earth quaked, the rocks rent_, and the sun
refused to give its light. Nature again declares for God, the earth
and the elements can no longer bear our sins: _Jerusalem_’s doom for
_Jerusalem_’s sin, may well be feared by us. O ye miserable _pens_ dipt
in _Satan_’s ink, that dare to publish the folly of believing in Jesus
Christ, where will you hide your guilty heads when nature dissolved,
shall shew you the rainbow, on which the crucified Saviour shall sit in
judgment, and every work receive its reward? O tremble! ye _apostate_
sons, that come out of the schools of Christ, to fight _Lucifer_’s
battles, and do that for him, which neither he, nor his legions can
do for themselves. Their inward pride, malice and rage against God,
and Christ, and human nature, have no _pens_ but yours, no _apostles_
but you. They must be forced to work in the dark, to steal privately
into impure hearts, could they not beguile you into a fond _belief_,
that you are _lovers_ of truth, _friends_ of reason, _detectors_ of
fraud, great _genius_’s, and _moral philosophers_, merely, because ye
blaspheme Christ, and the gospel of God. Poor deluded souls, rescued
from hell by the blood of Christ, called by God to possess the thrones
of fallen angels, permitted to live only by the mercy of God, that
ye may be born again, my heart bleeds for you. Think, I beseech you,
in time, what mercies ye are trampling under your feet. Say not that
reason, and your intellectual faculties, stand in your way; that these
are the _best gifts_ which God has given you, and that these suffer you
not to come to Christ. All this is as vain a pretence, and as gross a
mistake as if ye were to say, that you had nothing but your _feet_ to
carry you to heaven. For your _heart_ is the best and greatest _gift_
of God to you; it is the highest, greatest, and noblest _power_ of your
nature; it forms your whole life, be what it will; all evil and all
good comes from it; your heart alone has the key of life and death;
it does all that it will; reason is but its _play-thing_, and whether
in time or eternity, can only be a _mere beholder_ of the _wonders_ of
happiness, or _forms_ of misery, which the right or wrong working of
the heart has caused.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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