Remembering the confidential and warm friendship that had existed between Fletcher and the Countess of Huntingdon and her nephew, Walter Shirley, it must be admitted that these “expostulations” were pungent; but they were provoked by the arrogance of the offenders. It is true, as already stated, that, on the evening before Wesley’s Conference assembled, her ladyship and Shirley wrote letters to Wesley containing half-hearted apologies for their “arbitrary way of proceeding” in the “Circular Letter.” “It must be acknowledged,” said Shirley, “that, upon the whole, the Circular Letter was too hastily drawn up and improperly expressed; and, therefore, for the _offensive expressions_ in it, we desire we may be hereby understood to make every suitable submission to you, Sir, and to the gentlemen of the Conference.”[244] The apology was proper; but it was not sufficient. The “Circular Letter,” branding Wesley as a dreadful heretic, had been sent to a large number of “principal persons, both clergy and laity,” throughout the three kingdoms; whereas the letters of the Countess and her nephew were private ones, addressed only to Wesley and his preachers. Moreover, the apology was accompanied with a threat. Footnote 244: Shirley’s “Narrative.” “I cannot but wish,” wrote Shirley, “that the recantation of the Circular Letter may prevail as an example for the recantation of the ‘Minutes.’ If I should be unhappily disappointed in this respect, I shall feel myself bound in conscience to yield my public testimony against such doctrines as these, which appear to me subversive of the _fundamentals_ of Christianity.”[245] Footnote 245: Shirley’s “Narrative.” And, once more, the apology, such as it was, was sent too late, for Fletcher had already written his “Vindication” of Wesley’s “Minutes;” the manuscript had been sent to Wesley, and Wesley had revised it, and committed it to the press. The war was begun, and we must follow it to its termination, _so far as Fletcher is concerned_; for it is impossible, in a work like this, to notice _all_ the pamphlets that were published. Those who wish for further information may turn to the “Life and Times of Wesley.” CHAPTER IX. _SECOND CHECK TO ANTINOMIANISM_ 1771.