THE “ATHENIAN GAZETTE.”—1690–1695.
In 1691 or thereabouts, Mr Wesley was appointed to the parish of South
Ormsby, a neat Lincolnshire village, about eight miles north-west of
Spilsby. It is pleasantly situated, and, in 1821, the parish, including
the adjoining hamlet of Kettlesby, contained thirty-six dwelling-houses,
and two hundred and sixty-one inhabitants, a population probably quite
equal to what it was in the days of Samuel Wesley. The church consists
of a tower, a nave, and a chancel, with a small chapel on the northern
side, and is dedicated to St Leonard.[39]
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Footnote 39:
_History of the County of Lincoln._
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This was no serious charge for a young clergyman of twenty-eight years
of age, and possessed of learning and ability like those of Samuel
Wesley; yet here, among his flock of two hundred men, women, and
children, he resided and faithfully laboured for about the next five
years. The living was obtained for him without any solicitation on his
part, by the Marquis of Normanby. Its emoluments were £50 a year, and a
house to live in.[40] The house was little better than a mud-built hut,
and Samuel Wesley in describing it and his own life in it, writes:—
“In a mean cot, composed of reeds and clay,
Wasting in sighs the uncomfortable day;
Near where the inhospitable Humber roars,
Devouring by degrees, the neighbouring shores.
Let earth go where it will, I’ll not repine,
Nor can unhappy be, while heaven is mine.”
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Footnote 40:
Mr Kirk says the living of South Ormsby now brings in more than five
times that amount.
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Here, in this miserable hovel, Wesley and his noble young wife resided.
Here five of their children were born, and here Wesley wrote some of the
most able works he ever published. Samuel Wesley was one of the rural
clergy, but differed widely from the great mass of his brethren, who are
thus described by Macaulay:—
“The rural clergyman, generally, began life as a young Levite, who every
day said grace, at the table of a coarse ignorant squire, in full
canonicals; and received, as pay, his board, a small garret, and ten
pounds a year. In fine weather, he was always ready for bowls; and in
rainy weather, for shovelboard. Sometimes he nailed up apricots, and
sometimes curried coach horses, and cast up farriers’ bills. He was
permitted to dine with the family; but was expected to content himself
with the plainest fare. A waiting woman was generally considered as the
most suitable help-meet for him. Quitting his chaplainship for a
benefice and a wife, he found he had only exchanged one class of
vexations for another. Often it was only by toiling on his glebe, by
feeding swine, and by loading dungcarts, that he could obtain daily
bread; nor did his utmost exertions always prevent the bailiffs from
taking his concordance and his inkstand in execution. It was a white day
on which he was admitted into the kitchen of a great house, and regaled
by the servants with cold meat and ale. His children were brought up
like the children of the neighbouring peasants. His boys followed the
plough, and his girls were sent out to service. Study he found to be
impossible, for the advowson of his living would hardly have sold for a
sum sufficient to purchase a good theological library; and he might be
considered as unusually lucky, if he had ten or twelve dog-cared volumes
among the pots and pans on his household shelves. It is true that at
that time (1685) there was no lack in the English Church of ministers
distinguished by abilities and learning; but these men were to be found,
with scarce a single exception, at the universities, at the great
cathedrals, or in the capital. Barrow had lately died at Cambridge, and
Pearson had gone thence to the Episcopal bench. Cudworth and Henry More
were still living there; South and Pococke, Jane and Aldrich were at
Oxford. Prideaux was at Norwich, and Whitby at Salisbury. In London were
Sherlock, Tillotson, Sprat, Wake, Jeremy Collier, Burnett,
Stillingfleet, Fowler, Sharp, Tennison, and Beveridge. Of these, ten
became bishops and four archbishops. Thus the Anglican priesthood was
divided into two sections—one trained for cities and courts, comprising
men familiar with all ancient and modern learning; men able to encounter
Hobbes or Bossuet at all the weapons of controversy; men who could, in
their sermons, set forth the majesty and beauty of Christianity with
such justness of thought, and such energy of language, that the indolent
Charles roused himself to listen, and the fastidious Buckingham forgot
to sneer; men with whom Halifax loved to discuss the interests of
empires, and from whom Dryden was not ashamed to own that he had learned
to write. The other section was destined to render humbler service. It
was dispersed over the country, and consisted chiefly of persons not at
all wealthier, and not much more refined, than small farmers or upper
servants. And yet, it was in these rustic priests, who derived their
scanty subsistence from their tithe sheaves and tithe pigs, and who had
not the smallest chance of ever attaining high professional honours,
that the professional spirit was strongest. Among those divines, who
were the boast of the universities, and the delight of the capital, a
party leaned towards constitutional principles of government, lived on
friendly terms with Presbyterians, Independents, and Baptists, would
gladly have seen a full toleration granted to all Protestant sects, and
would even have consented to make alterations in the Liturgy, for the
purpose of conciliating honest and candid Nonconformists. But such
latitudinarianism was held in horror by the country parson. He was,
indeed, prouder of his ragged gown than his superiors of their lawn and
of their scarlet hoods. The very consciousness that there was little in
his worldly circumstances to distinguish him from the villagers to whom
he preached, led him to hold immoderately high the dignity of that
sacerdotal office, which was his single title to reverence.”
We raise no objection to this graphic description of the country clergy
living about the time that Samuel Wesley was appointed to South Ormsby.
We believe it to be strictly accurate; and yet to all general rules
there are exceptions, and, in this instance, Samuel Wesley was one. It
is true that he was poor and pinched. It is quite possible that he
sometimes found it necessary to load his dungcart, plough his glebe, and
feed his swine; but Samuel Wesley was not the man to waste his time at
bowls and shovelboard; or to stoop to the indignity of being regaled, by
servants, with cold meat and ale, in the kitchen of the squire’s
forbidden hall. His children might be coarsely clad, but his boys never
followed the plough, nor did his girls go out to service. His fifty
pounds a year might afford him next to nothing to buy books; and yet,
somehow he read most of the best books in the English language. He was
most faithfully devoted to the service of the Church; but he was far too
great a man to think that the mere accidents of the sacerdotal office
were sufficient to raise him above his neighbours. He was a country
parson; but in learning, mental abilities, and the faithful discharge of
ministerial duties, he differed from his country brethren, and was not
unworthy to be ranked and associated with the greatest men at that time
flourishing in the universities, in cathedrals, and in the capital. He
might, like hundreds of others, have spent his time in agricultural
toils and village sports, but there was within him the stirring of a
high-born genius, which, wherever it exists, invariably impels its
possessor to rise above the mediocrity of the common herd, and to
attempt something honourable to the man who does it, and of service to
those on whose behalf he labours. Human humdrums have always been
inconveniently numerous, but Samuel Wesley was not one of them.
As already stated, he was the clergyman of an obscure village, with
about two hundred inhabitants. There was plenty of opportunity to live a
lazy life. He might have droned away his time, and wasted “the
uncomfortable day in sighs;” but, like all men of genius and of mark, he
could be happy only by being hard at work. His scanty income, and his
increasing family, might be one of the inducements which led him to
devote himself to literary labour; but had his income been even larger
than his necessities required, it is almost certain that he would have
pursued the same course of conduct; for, to a literary man, literary
labour is not merely toil, but likewise luxury.
Samuel Wesley’s first publication was the “Maggots,” already noticed.
His next undertaking was the _Athenian Gazette_, projected by his
brother-in-law, John Dunton, just before Wesley removed from London to
South Ormsby. The title of the new work was the “_Athenian Gazette; or,
Casuistical Mercury, Resolving all the Nice and Curious Questions
Proposed by the Ingenious_.” The _Gazette_ was published twice a week,
every Tuesday and Saturday, each number consisting of a single folio.
The first number made its appearance on Tuesday, March 17, 1691, and the
last on June 14, 1697. Each number was sold at one penny, and thirty
numbers, that is, sixty pages, made what was called a volume; and which,
stitched in marble paper, was sold for half-a-crown. In the first number
that was issued, seven questions are answered in the following order,
viz.:—1. Whether the torments of the damned are visible to the saints in
heaven? 2. Whether the soul is eternal, or pre-existent from the
creation, or contemporary with its embryo? 3. Whether every man has a
good and bad angel attending him? 4. Where was the soul of Lazarus for
the four days he lay in the grave? 5. Whether all souls are alike? 6.
Whether it is lawful for a man to beat his wife? 7. How came the spots
in the moon?
In an advertisement, at the end of No. 1, correspondents are requested
to send their questions, “by a penny post letter, to Mr Smith’s, at his
Coffee-house, in Stocks Market, in the Poultry.”
As already stated, thirty numbers made what was called a volume; but to
each of the first five volumes was attached a supplement, quite as large
as the volume itself, containing “the transactions and experiments of
the foreign virtuosos, and also their ingenious conferences upon many
nice and curious questions; together with an account of the design and
scope of most of the considerable books printed in all languages, and
the quality of the author, if known.”
Wesley and his friends were soon inundated with questions; so much so,
that in the preface to vol. ii., they say they have nearly four thousand
on hand unanswered; they also request that no obscene questions be sent,
for they are resolved not to answer them; nor riddles, for riddles are
of no use to the general public; nor anything else, the answer to which
may be a scandal to the Government, or an abuse to particular persons.
During the publication of the first six volumes, the _Athenian Gazette_
was issued only twice a week; but afterwards the numbers were published
every Monday, Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday, until the completion of the
nineteenth volume, when it was announced that, “as the coffee-houses
have the votes every day, and nine newspapers every week, the Athenian
Society propose to drop the publication of sheets four days a week, and
henceforth to publish the work in volumes quarterly. Thirty numbers, to
make volume xx., would be printed all together; but as soon as the glut
of news was a little over, the weekly numbers would again commence.”
Eight years after, in 1703, the old Athenian volumes being out of print,
“a collection of all the valuable questions and answers” was printed in
three volumes; and, in 1710, a fourth volume was added, as a supplement,
“being a collection of the remaining questions and answers in the old
_Athenian Gazettes_.” This work had a rapid sale, and, in 1704, a second
edition was published, with a dedication to the Earl of Ormond, written
by Mr Wesley.
The publication of the _Athenian Gazette_ first occurred to Dunton
whilst he was walking in St George’s Fields. The object of the work was
to receive and to answer questions in all departments of literature.
Finding assistance necessary, Dunton first engaged the services of
Richard Sault, a man who “was admirably well skilled in the
mathematics.” Then the ingenious Dr Norris generously offered his help
_gratis_; but refused to become a stated member of the Athenian Society.
The undertaking grew every week, and hundreds of letters poured in.
Dunton writes, “The impatience of our querists, and the curiosity of
their questions, obliged us to adopt a third member of Athens; and the
Rev. Samuel Wesley being just come to town, all new from the university,
and my acquaintance with him being very intimate, I easily prevailed
with him to embark himself with us. With this new addition, we found
ourselves to be masters of the whole design; and therefore we neither
lessened nor increased our number.”
The original “articles of agreement between Samuel Wesley, clerk,
Richard Sault, gent., and John Dunton, for the writing of the _Athenian
Gazette, or Mercury_, dated April 10, 1691,” may still be seen among
Dunton’s MSS. in the Bodleian Library.
When the _Athenian Gazette_ was fairly and fully launched, a rival
paper, entitled the _Lacedemonian Mercury_, was published by Brown &
Pate. This was a trifling and even profane performance. The sole purpose
of the writers “seemed to be to laugh and ridicule solidity and
seriousness out of the world.”[41] This aroused the ire and energies of
Wesley, Sault, and Dunton, and they succeeded in putting down the rival
and ungodly upstart. A little later, an attack was made upon their
publication, by Elkanah Settle, who brought out a play, entitled “The
New Athenian Comedy; containing the Politicks, Oeconomicks, Tacticks,
Crypticks, Apocalypticks, Stypticks, Scepticks, Pneumaticks,
Theologicks, and Dogmaticks of our most learned Society.” Settle was
born at Dunstable, in 1648, and was educated at Trinity College, Oxford.
He began life by publishing two political pamphlets, which were publicly
burnt, on the accession of James II.[42] After this, he turned Tory,
wrote a poem on James’s coronation, and published an essay weekly on
behalf of James’s administration. He was called the city poet, because
he had a salary for writing a poem annually on the Lord Mayor’s day.
Afterwards he was reduced to such extreme poverty, that he was not only
obliged to write farces for Bartholomew fair, but to act in them
himself. In a farce, called St George and the Dragon, he acted the
dragon, a circumstance referred to by Dr Young in the following lines:—
“Poor Elkanah, all other changes past,
For bread, in Smithfield, dragons hiss’d at last,
Spit streams of fire, to make the butchers gape,
And found his manners suited to his shape.”
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Footnote 41:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. iv. p. 69.
Footnote 42:
Dryden’s _Mis. Works_, vol. i., notes, p. 67, 1760.
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Settle died in 1723, the author of ten tragedies, three operas, a
comedy, and a pastoral, all of which are now forgotten. His comedy was
written against Wesley, Sault, and Dunton; but Dunton says it “was a
poor performance, and failed in its design.”
The place where Wesley, Sault, and Dunton met respecting the affairs of
their united publication, was Smith’s Coffee-house, George Yard,
adjoining the Mansion House, and here, on one occasion, an incident
occurred, illustrative of Samuel Wesley’s character. In a box, at the
other end of the room, where Wesley and his two friends were met for
business, there were a number of gentlemen, including an officer of the
guards, who, in his conversation, swore most dreadfully. Wesley heard
the oaths of this foul-mouthed man, and, feeling excessively annoyed at
such disgraceful ribaldry, asked the waiter to bring him a glass of
water, and then, in a loud voice so as to be heard by every one present,
said, “Carry the water to that gentleman in the red coat, and desire him
to wash his mouth after his oaths.” No sooner were the words spoken,
than the irate officer started to his feet to chastise the bold young
parson. His friends, however, possessed of more sense and manners than
himself, seized him and said, “Nay, Colonel! you gave the first offence,
you know it is an affront to swear in the presence of a clergyman.” And
there for the present the matter ended; but, many years afterwards, when
Wesley was in London attending convocation, on going through St James’s
Park, a gentleman accosted him, and asked if he knew him. Wesley
answered in the negative, upon which the gentleman recalled to his
remembrance the scene in Smith’s coffee-house, and added, “Since then,
sir, I thank God I have feared an oath, and everything that is offensive
to the divine Majesty. I rejoice at seeing you, and cannot refrain from
expressing my gratitude to God and to you, that we ever met.” A word
spoken in season, how good is it!
It has been already stated that Wesley, Sault, and Dunton were the only
proprietors of the _Athenian Gazette_; but it is right to add that they
had, among their contributors, some of the distinguished writers of that
period.
Sault was, in some respects, a remarkable man. His literary attainments
were considerable, and his skill in mathematics great; but he proved
unfaithful to his wife, sunk into a state of extreme melancholy, and
wrote a paper, which, to a great extent, embodied his own experience,
and which he entitled, “The Second Spira, being a fearful example of an
Atheist, who had apostatised from the Christian religion, and died in
despair at Westminster, Dec. 8, 1692.” In this account, he speaks of
himself as having spent five years at the university. He then came to
London, and began to study law. He formed an acquaintance with
atheistical companions, and drank into their spirit. He was then taken
ill, and was visited by his friends. After this, follows an account of
his pretended bewailings of his past faithlessness. Once he knew the
mercies of God and tasted what they were; but now he had denied Christ,
and wished that he was in hell. He refused all sustenance; he groaned
and tossed, and said he knew himself sealed unto damnation. “Oh that I
was to broil,” he cried, “upon that fire for a thousand years, to
purchase the favour of God, and be reconciled to Him again! But it is a
fruitless wish! Millions of millions of years will bring me no nearer to
the end of my tortures than one poor hour. Oh eternity! eternity!” His
last words were, “Oh the insufferable pangs of hell and damnation.”
Sault sent this fictitious paper to Dunton, in a disguised hand, and
requested him to publish it as a truthful narrative. Dunton did so, and
in six weeks sold thirty thousand copies, at sixpence each. Afterwards,
it became known that the pamphlet was a piece of fiction, except so far
as it was a partial description of Sault’s own experience; for Dunton
tells us that a little before he received the narrative, “Sault was
under the severest terrors of conscience; and his despair and melancholy
made him look like some walking ghost.” Dunton several times heard him
muttering to himself, “I am damned! I am damned!” The publication of
“The Second Spira” created an immense sensation, and Dunton found it
necessary to publish the “Secret History of Mr Sault,” so as to clear
himself from the imputation of sham or fraud in giving to the public
such a narrative; and yet, it is a singular circumstance, that, nearly a
hundred years afterwards, John Wesley republished the greater part of
“The Second Spira” in his _Arminian Magazine_, without a single line of
explanation that the piece, though powerfully written, was almost
altogether false. Richard Sault ultimately removed to Cambridge, where
his ingenuity and his algebraic skill obtained for him a considerable
reputation. He died there in 1704, being supported in his last sickness
by the charity of the scholars. He was interred in St Andrew’s Church,
Cambridge; and a writer, who knew him, says, “his learning was as
universal as his sense of things was fine and curious.”
Among the principal contributors to the _Athenian Gazette_ were Daniel
Defoe, already sketched, Dr Norris, Nahum Tate, Dean Swift, Sir William
Temple, and Mrs Rowe.[43]
John Norris was born at Collingborne-Kingston, in Wiltshire, in 1657,
and died at Bemerton, in the same county, in 1711. He was educated first
in Winchester School, and afterwards in the same college, at Oxford, as
that which Samuel Wesley entered. He was elected Fellow of All Souls’
College, and, shortly after Wesley left Oxford, he was presented to the
rectory of Newton St Loe, and, two years later, to that of Bemerton. He
was a pious, learned, and ingenious man, but had a tincture of
enthusiasm in his nature, which led him to imbibe the principles of the
idealists in philosophy and of the mystics in theology. A late writer
says of him, “In metaphysical acumen, in theological learning, and in
purity of diction, Dr Norris acknowledges no superior. He carries the
whole circle of the sciences in his head, and piety and religion
illustrate all his actions. Never was any question proposed by ingenious
malice or curiosity, but, with the utmost readiness and facility, he
gave not only fair and amusing ideas of it, but full and most evident
demonstrations. He was good, great, and learned; and a worthy companion
of so great a man as Samuel Wesley.”[44] His greatest work is “The
Theory of the Ideal World,” but, besides that, he published several
others.
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Footnote 43:
It has been said that Matthew Wesley was a member of the Athenian
Society; but, after a careful examination of the evidence alleged in
proof of this, I strongly doubt it.
Footnote 44:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. iv. p. 26–7.
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Nahum Tate was poet-laureate to King William III. He was born in Dublin
in 1655, and educated in the Dublin University. On coming to London, he
fell into pecuniary difficulties, from which he was relieved by the Earl
of Dorset. He was the author of nine dramatic pieces, and of a variety
of miscellaneous poems, now deservedly forgotten. His name is
principally known by his version of the Psalms, generally affixed to the
Liturgy of the Church of England, and in the composition of which he was
assisted by Dr Brady.
Jonathan Swift, another of the Athenian contributors, was a marvellous
mortal. One of his earliest poetical productions was a commendatory poem
of 307 lines sent to the Athenian Society. Dryden read it, and said,
“Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet.” Dr Johnson says that this
unfortunate remark caused Swift to regard Dryden with malevolence to the
end of life. His “Tale of a Tub,” “Gulliver’s Travels,” and other works
are too well known to need description. He was a man of amazing genius,
but never ought to have been a priest. During his residence in Dublin
University, he incurred no less than seventy penalties for
irregularities; and, in the last year of his residence, his academical
degree was suspended, and he was sentenced to ask public pardon of the
junior dean for insolence. In his personal habits he was scrupulously
nice; and yet there are passages in his writings almost as gross as his
pen could make them. As an author, he is perhaps not surpassed for
originality, and it has been said of him that he never borrowed a
thought from any man. In some matters he was ludicrously penurious. Once
when going from Sir William Temple’s to his mother’s, he travelled the
whole distance on foot, except when the violence of the weather drove
him into stage waggons; and, at nights, put up at penny lodgings, where,
to secure himself from filth, he hired clean sheets for sixpence; and
yet with all this he can hardly be called a man of avarice, for he seems
to have saved only that he might have the more to give. Three years
before his death, he became insane, and sunk into a lethargy, in which
he remained speechless for a year. He left the greater part of his
fortune to an hospital for lunatics and idiots. He died in 1744. The
pranks and puns of Jonathan Swift, Dean Of St Patrick’s, are endless.
The common people received him everywhere with profound respect; and
upon one occasion, he made a laughable experiment on the public belief
in his authority. A number of the people having assembled round the
deanery to see an eclipse, Swift became tired of their commotion, and
directed the town crier to make proclamation, that the eclipse was
postponed, by command of the Dean of St Patrick’s, which had the effect
of dispersing the assembled star-gazers.
Sir William Temple was a frequent contributor to the _Athenian Gazette_.
This eminent statesman was a pupil of the learned Dr Hammond, his
maternal uncle. As an author, he was pleasing and popular, his style
being long regarded as a model of grace and elegance. He died at Moor
Park, in 1698, where, in accordance with his will, his heart was buried
in a silver box under the sun-dial, opposite to a window where he had
been accustomed to contemplate and admire the works of nature; while his
body was privately interred in Westminster Abbey.
The last contributor, we mention, was Mrs Rowe, who supplied “a variety
of inimitable poems.” “She was,” says Dunton, “the richest genius of her
sex. She knew the purity of our tongue, and conversed with as much
briskness and gaiety as she wrote. Her style is noble and flowing, and
her images vivid and shining.” Mrs Rowe, at this time, was not more than
twenty years of age; but she had cultivated music, painting, and poetry
from her childhood. She afterwards studied French and Italian, and
enjoyed the friendship of some of the most eminent literati of her day.
She died in 1737, and, shortly after her death, Dr Isaac Watts published
her “Devout Exercises of the Heart.” A year or two afterwards, appeared
her miscellaneous works, in prose and verse, in two volumes octavo.
These were the principal writers who assisted Samuel Wesley, Richard
Sault, and John Dunton in the publication of their _Athenian Gazette_.
The history of the Athenian Society was afterwards written by Charles
Gildon, and published in a folio of thirty-six pages. Gildon was a
native of the same county as Samuel Wesley, and about the same age. He
was educated at Douay for a popish priest, but, not liking the priestly
office, he plunged into dissipation, and added to his financial
embarrassments by an imprudent marriage at the age of twenty-three.
Necessity obliged him to turn author, and he produced a variety of works
in prose and verse. He died in 1723. Pope gave him a place in his
“Dunciad;” but Dunton says he was well “acquainted with the languages,
and wrote with a peculiar briskness which the common hacks could not
boast of.”
Gildon tells us that the whole design of the Athenian Society was “not
only to improve knowledge in divinity and philosophy, in all their
parts, as well as philosophy in all its latitude, but also to commend
this improvement to the public in the best method that can be found out
for instruction. In their Gazettes may be found the marrow of what great
authors have writ on curious subjects. The society have set learning in
so fair a light, that, won with its beauty, every one must with
eagerness embrace it. All the knotty points of philosophy, divinity,
mathematics, &c., are formed into queries by the inquisitive, and
answered by the society, who are not only men of parts, but also
industrious to the highest degree. They are men of sense, and piety, and
patience. Horace never had half the fatigue with the poetaster, as they
must have had with both male and female impertinencies. One
correspondent wishes to know whether any two men have the same number of
hairs on their heads; another wishes to know whether it be lawful to eat
black puddings; and another whether the devil takes a human form in
foreign countries. There are hundreds of such questions asked and
answered. Indeed queries came in so fast, that in the third number of
the _Gazette_ the public were requested to send no more till those
already sent had received replies.”
Gildon then proceeds to give an account of the principal contributors.
Of Samuel Wesley he says, “He was a man of profound knowledge, not only
of the Holy Scriptures, of the councils, and of the fathers, but also of
every other _Art_ that comes within the number of the _liberal_. His
zeal and ability in giving spiritual directions were great. With
invincible power he confirmed the wavering, and confuted heretics.
Beneath the genial warmth of his wit, the most barren subject became
fertile and divertive. His style was sweet and manly, soft without
satiety, and learned without pedantry. His temper and conversation were
affable. His compassion for the sufferings of his fellow-creatures, was
as great as his learning and his parts. Were it possible for any man to
act the part of a universal priest, he would certainly deem it his duty
to take care of the spiritual good of all mankind. In all his writings
and actions, he evinced a deep concern for all that bear the glorious
image of their Maker; and was so apostolical in his spirit, that pains,
labours, watchings, and prayers were far more delightful to him than
honours to the ambitious, wealth to the miser, or pleasures to the
voluptuous.” Such, in substance, is Gildon’s character of Wesley. He
adds, “It were to be wished that a great many of the clergy would have
him in view, as a sure direction of their behaviour, since an imitation
of his practical virtues would confute the profane enemies of that
sacred body, by the most prevalent of arguments, _example_.”
Gildon was doubtless well acquainted with Wesley; and hence such a
testimony is too important to be omitted.
It is impossible, in a work like this, to give a full idea of the vast
and varied learning embodied in these old _Athenian Gazettes_. Error is
confuted, and superstitions and follies ridiculed. Many of the most
perplexing questions in divinity are discussed with great ability.
Philosophy is handled with equal excellence. All sorts of questions
relating to metaphysics, astronomy, mathematics, law, anatomy, and, even
love and courtship, are answered with consummate care. It cannot be
denied, that the work contains things which would now be deemed gross
and indelicate; but some allowance must be made, on the ground that the
literary tastes of the people were, at that time, widely different from
what they are at present; and, it must also be observed further, that,
in the articles bearing upon divinity, history, poetry, and natural
philosophy, (upon all of which subjects Samuel Wesley may be presumed to
have written,) there is not a line offensive to good taste, though, of
course, opinions are expressed which may fairly be disputed.
Dr Adam Clarke writes, respecting the _Athenian Oracle_, “No reader can
peruse them, (the volumes,) without profit; for although the authors
submitted to answer questions of little or no importance, yet the work
at large contains many things of great value. When I was little more
than a child, an odd volume of the _Athenian Oracle_, lent me by a
friend, was a source of improvement and delight; and now I consult this
work with double interest, knowing the well-nerved hand, by which at
least one-third of it was composed.”
We cannot state, with certainty, what articles in the _Athenian
Gazettes_ were written by Samuel Wesley; but, as he was the only
clergyman in the Athenian Society, it may fairly be presumed that he
answered all, or nearly all, the questions relating to divinity and to
church history. He was also a poet, and there cannot be a doubt that
many of the poetical pieces were likewise the productions of his genius.
In the indices of the _Athenian Oracle_, there is a list of about 2800
questions, and of these about 900 refer to theology and the history of
the Church; so that it is not unreasonable to suppose, that one-third of
the Athenian questions were answered by Mr Wesley. The following is a
selection, and will tend to show the difficulties with which he
courageously grappled:—
“1. Has every man an angel to attend him? 2. What was the cause of the
fall of angels? 3. When did angels receive their first existence? 4. On
what day did Adam fall? 5. Was Adam a giant? 6. Who was the first
founder of Atheism? 7. What became of the ark after the flood? 8. Did
the fall of Adam cause any alteration in his body? 9. Did Adam sin more
than once? 10. What number of angels fell? 11. In what sense could
angels eat? 12. Are there nine orders of angels? 13. How high was
Babel’s tower? 14. Of what sort of matter will glorified bodies consist?
15. What language was spoken by Balaam’s ass? 16. Can the day of
Christ’s nativity be found out? 17. Who was Cain’s wife? 18. What mark
did God fix upon Cain? 19. Why was Christ not baptized till He was
thirty years of age? 20. Are the torments of the damned visible to the
saints? 21. Is the devil corporeal? 22. Does the devil know our
thoughts? 23. Can the devil generate? 24. Why is not the name of God
mentioned in the Book of Esther? 25. Have dead friends any concern for
those alive? 26. Shall we know friends in heaven? 27. Are the ghosts
that appear the souls of men? 28. Are the punishments of hell equal? 29.
Who is the author of the Book of Job? 30. What language did our first
parents speak in Paradise? 31. Were there any men before Adam? 32. Was
Moses the author of the Pentateuch? 33. Why was man not made incapable
of sinning? 34. Shall negroes rise at the last day? 35. Whither went the
waters of Noah’s flood? 36. Did Peter and Paul use notes when they
preached? 37. How is the prescience of God consistent with man’s free
agency? 38. Was extempore prayer a primitive custom? 39. Are the
marriages of Quakers lawful? 40. Whether would you choose to be a Quaker
or a Papist? 41. Is repentance acceptable without sackcloth and ashes?
42. Is the soul of man pre-existent? 43. When was the surplice first
instituted? 44. How do spirits speak? 45. Whether is the soul by
traduction or infusion? 46. Which was the greatest sin before the flood?
47. Why is sprinkling in baptism more lawful than dipping? 48. Will
souls be equally happy in heaven? 49. Was Socinianism in St John’s time?
50. What is the sin against the Holy Ghost? 51. Was there any shipping
before the days of Noah? 52. When the soul leaves the body does she not
put on another that is more subtle? 53. Whither went the ten tribes? 54.
What do the Urim and Thummim signify? 55. Should women sit promiscuously
with men at church? 56. Are there any absolute decrees? 57. Was not
Abraham the first institutor of public schools? 58. Was not the creation
of the world occasioned by the fall of Lucifer? 59. When do children
begin to commit actual sin? 60. Do children suffer for the sins of
parents? 61. Is dancing lawful? 62. What are Gog and Magog? 63. Are the
torments of hell eternal? 64. Where is hell? 65. Was Melchisedec Christ,
an angel, or a man? 66. Is it possible to live without the commission of
sin? 67. Is the world eternal? 68. How far did the benefits of our
Saviour’s death extend? 69. If Christ suffered for all men, how do you
expound John xvii. 9? 70. Will the earth be destroyed or refined? 71. Is
a Dissenter a schismatic? 72. What is that faith without which there is
no salvation? 73. Can faith be attained without the assistance of grace?
74. Does God universally pardon on condition of believing? 75. How shall
infants and deformed persons rise at the day of judgment? 76. May a man
who has taken holy orders lay aside his calling? 77. Does a regenerate
man commit sin? 78. Is it possible to fall finally from a state of
grace? 79. Is baptism a means of regeneration? 80. Did Christ actually
descend into hell? 81. Do the English come from the seed of Abraham? 82.
Is heaven promised to a certain number? 83. Is there any certainty of
salvation in this life? 84. Was it the will of God to create the world
from all eternity?”
These are about a tenth part of the biblical and theological questions
answered by Samuel Wesley in the _Athenian Gazette_, and are given here
for a twofold purpose; first, to suggest to youthful readers topics to
think about; and secondly, to show the difficulties courageously
encountered by Samuel Wesley, and the curious and daring character of
his studies.
It would not be difficult to gather from the answers to the nine hundred
biblical and theological questions in the _Athenian Gazette_, the
principal points of Mr Wesley’s creed. The longest theological articles
are those levelled against the Baptists and the Quakers. One piece
alone, written against the former, fills nearly fifty pages of the
_Athenian Oracle_; and against the latter there are several articles,
showing that the Lincolnshire rector was no ardent admirer of the
broad-brimmed followers of George Fox. They are charged with
intolerance, enthusiasm, silliness, and with holding dangerous opinions
and detestable doctrines. A Quaker, in fact, was a mischievous and
troublesome compendium of all sorts of heresies. Samuel Wesley, as a
rule, was generous and liberal in his sentiments respecting others; but
some sects and parties, at the close of the seventeenth century, were so
fanatical, bigoted, bitter, and offensive, that he found it difficult to
regard them with the same fraternal feelings with which he regarded
Christian brotherhoods in general.
With one or two exceptions, the theological and religious views of
Samuel Wesley were as Scriptural and as sound as the standard of
Methodist teaching contained in the well-known Sermons and Notes of his
son John. There may be a difference of phraseology between the father
and son, but their doctrines are _substantially_ the same. Our space
forbids lengthened quotations; but perhaps the following extracts from
the _Athenian Oracle_ will not be unacceptable, as containing statements
of Scripture doctrines, and as tending to exhibit the opinions of Mr
Wesley on some of the most important verities of the Christian religion,
and on some of the most interesting points of ecclesiastical polity.
Samuel Wesley was a firm believer in the authenticity of the Holy
Scriptures. He contends that the Bible now used “is the same that was
written by the apostles and prophets,” and that, because they were
“inspired by the Spirit of God,” the Bible “is the very Word of
God.”[45]
-----
Footnote 45:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 260. 2d Edition.
-----
He also had an unshaken faith in the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. He
argues that it “is impossible for a man to invent fuller or clearer
expressions for the proof of anything in question than the evangelist St
John” employs in favour of the doctrine of Christ’s divinity. After
adducing evidence of this, he concludes, with an air of conscious
triumph, “When I see all this answered, without straining it into
perfect incongruous nonsense, I promise to turn Socinian.”[46] “The
Arians,” says he,[47] in another place, “in some of their confessions of
faith, did grant that the Son was from all eternity, by such an
emanation from the Father as that whereby the light proceeds from the
sun; but yet contended for a moment’s difference between their
existence—the Son receiving His, as they think, from the Father; whereby
they unavoidably fell into the same absurdity which other pretenders to
reason have since done—that, I mean, of a _made_ God, or a _subordinate_
Supreme.” Language like this is unmistakable. Samuel Wesley was no
dubious hesitator between two opinions. While yet a youth in Mr Morton’s
academy, he had been disgusted with the Socinian, Biddle; and, a few
years later, he was the means of extricating one of the finest of
intellects from Socinian meshes; for his own wife, Susanna Wesley, who,
while a girl in her father’s house, had reasoned herself into the
Socinian creed, acknowledges it as one of the great mercies of her life,
that, she was “married to a religious orthodox man, and by him was first
drawn off from the Socinian heresy.”
-----
Footnote 46:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 418.
Footnote 47:
In Notes to his _Life of Christ_, p. 221.
-----
Samuel Wesley, like his son John, was a moderate Arminian. He fearlessly
repudiates the doctrines of election and reprobation. “We cannot,” says
he, “be satisfied by any of those scriptures which are brought for that
purpose, that there is any such _election_ of a _determinate number_ as
either puts a force on their _natures_, and _irresistably_ saves them,
or absolutely excludes all the rest of mankind from salvation. We think
there is no one place in the Holy Scriptures which proves that so many
men, and no more, were _irresistably determined_ to everlasting
salvation.”[48] He believed that “God predestinated those to salvation
whom He foresaw would make a good use of His grace, resolving to damn
only such as He foresaw would continue impenitent.”[49] He maintains
that “God made man upright, and a free agent, and that God’s prescience
presides over man’s free agency, but doth not overrule it, by saving man
whether He will or no, or by damning him undeservedly.”[50] “God
necessitates no evil action, yet He foresees all. If God tempts no man
to evil, much less does He necessitate. Indeed, were He to do this, the
nature of man would be destroyed, the proposal of rewards and
punishments would be ironical, preaching would be vain, and faith also
vain. If you ask us to reconcile all the differences arising out of the
doctrines of God’s prescience and man’s free agency, we promise to do it
when philosophers can solve the incommensurability of matter, and twenty
other phenomena, and make them agree with demonstrations which appear
diametrically opposite unto them. In the meantime, let us think soberly
and modestly, as becomes us in these matters. Let every one enjoy his
own sense, so he makes not God the author of sin, and let us all cry
out, ‘How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding
out.’”[51]
-----
Footnote 48:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 178.
Footnote 49:
_Ibid._, vol. ii. p. 111.
Footnote 50:
_Ibid._, vol. i. p. 58.
Footnote 51:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. ii. p. 101.
-----
Mr Wesley believed in the doctrine of universal redemption; in other
words, that Jesus Christ “atoned so far for the sins of all mankind as
to make them in a salvable condition, or to repair the ruins which were
made by the first Adam, which is plain from Rom. v. 12, 18, &c.”[52]
“God really wills the salvation of all men, as far as is consistent with
the liberty of man and His own purity and justice;” and He “has also
used all the necessary means for our salvation;” “He offers pardon of
all sin, and right to life in Christ, to all men without exception, on
condition of believing and acceptance.”[53]
-----
Footnote 52:
_Ibid._, vol. iii. p. 531.
Footnote 53:
_Ibid._, p. 260.
-----
He further believed that no man can do an “action properly and perfectly
acceptable to God by his own natural abilities, abstracted from the
assistance of God’s Spirit, but by His common assistance he may pray,
abstain from sin, and practise duty; and, if he continues in these good
actions, he will have still more aid, and go on to perfection.”[54]
-----
Footnote 54:
_Ibid._, p. 531.
-----
Respecting the doctrines of justification and justifying faith, Mr
Wesley writes: “Forgiveness of sins is, at least, included in
justification, nay, is the main part, if not the whole thereof. It may,
without violence, be reckoned a convertible term with it. Our sins being
pardoned, our being esteemed righteous by God, our justification through
our Saviour’s merits, we think are but the same thing in different
expressions.”[55] “By God’s justifying a sinner, is meant His looking
upon us and treating us as just and innocent persons, although before we
stood guilty of heinous sins, and thereupon liable to grievous
punishments.”[56] “We are saved by the merits of Christ Jesus; for His
sake, not our own; and this we look upon to be the same, in other words,
as Christ’s imputed righteousness.”[57] “We are justified, or accepted
with God, as a means, by faith, or a true belief of what God reveals,
and by trusting in His mercy, through His Son.”[58] “But then this very
faith must be justified by works, as Abraham’s was, for it would have
been in vain for him to have pretended he had believed God’s promise to
him, had he not, in obedience to His command, also offered up his son
Isaac.”[59] That faith, without which there is no salvation, “is a
steady belief of all that God reveals, especially in the gospel,
particularly that Jesus is the Messiah, or Saviour of the _world_, and
that He will save _me_, if I _depend_ on Him, and _obey_ His
commands.”[60] No follower of John Wesley holds the doctrine of
justification by faith more clearly, or more firmly, than did John
Wesley’s noble-minded father.
-----
Footnote 55:
_Ibid._, vol. iv. p. 140.
Footnote 56:
_Ibid._, vol. i. p. 455.
Footnote 57:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 455.
Footnote 58:
_Ibid._
Footnote 59:
_Ibid._, p. 456.
Footnote 60:
_Ibid._, vol. iii. p. 531.
-----
The new birth, writes the clear-headed and thoroughly orthodox young
clergyman, “is that particular aid of God’s Holy Spirit, which works an
entire change in the mind, and turns men from evil to good, being a new
principle of action in them.”[61]
-----
Footnote 61:
_Ibid._, p. 460.
-----
It is a remarkable fact, not generally known, that Samuel Wesley was a
Millenarian. The Rev. William Lindsay Alexander, in an elaborate article
in the “Encyclopædia Britannica” gives the following as the chief tenets
of the Millenarian creed:—“That Jerusalem is to be rebuilt, the temple
to be restored, and sacrifice again offered on the altar; that this city
is to form the residence of Christ, who is to reign there in glory with
all His saints for a thousand years; that, for this purpose, there shall
be a resurrection of all the pious dead, that none of the Saviour’s
followers may be absent during His triumph; that, at the close of the
thousand years, they shall all return to heaven, and the world be left
to Satan and his followers for a season; and that then the general
resurrection and last judgment shall take place, and the history of the
world be brought to a close.” In vol. iv. of the _Athenian Gazette_, the
No. for October 17, 1691, is entirely occupied by a Millenarian article,
which had been specially advertised on the Tuesday previous, and the
following extract will show substantially the opinions held by Samuel
Wesley:—“We believe, as all Christians of the purest ages did, that the
saints shall reign with Christ on earth a thousand years; that this
reign shall be immediately before the general resurrection, and after
the calling of the Jews, the fulness of the Gentiles, and the
destruction of Antichrist, whom our Saviour shall destroy by the
_brightness of His coming_, and _appearance in heaven_; that at the
beginning of this thousand years shall be the first resurrection,
wherein martyrs and holy men shall rise and reign here in spiritual
delights in the New Jerusalem, in a new heaven and new earth, foretold
by the holy prophets.” After this statement of his belief follows an
able article on the same subject, but it is scarce within the province
which we have prescribed for ourselves, to attempt either to refute or
to establish the truth of it.
The following is a somewhat startling opinion respecting the future
state of the righteous and wicked:—“They shall both arise equally
immortal, and diversified in nothing but their last sentence. We shall
then see not by receiving the visible species into the narrow glass of
an organised eye; we shall then hear without the distinct and curious
contexture of the ear. The body then shall be all eye, all ear, all
sense in the whole, and every sense in every part. In a word, it shall
be all over a common sensorium; and being made of the purest æther,
without the mixture of any lower or grosser element, the soul shall, by
one undivided act, at once perceive all that variety of objects which
now cannot, without several distinct organs, and successive actions or
passions, reach our sense. Every sense shall be perfect; the ear shall
hear everything at once throughout the spacious limits both of heaven
and hell, with a perfect distinction, and without confounding that
_anthem_ with this _blasphemy_; the eye shall find no matter or
substance to fix it; and so of the other senses. The reason of this is
plain and convincing; for, if the bodies of the just and unjust were not
thus qualified, they could not be proper subjects for the exercise of an
eternity, but would consume and be liable to a dissolution, or to new
changes. Hence we assert, that every _individual person in heaven and
hell_ shall hear and see all that passes in either state; these to a
more extensive aggravation of their tortures, by the loss of what the
other enjoy; and those to a greater increase of their bliss, in escaping
what the others suffer.”[62]
-----
Footnote 62:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 3.
-----
Such are some of the chief theological views that were entertained by
Samuel Wesley. Others might be added, but space forbids. He has been
almost invariably represented as holding the principles of the High
Church party; but nothing can be more unfounded than this. He preferred
the Church of England to any other Church, and thought its doctrines,
rituals, and devotions the best in existence. But where is the
Methodist, or the Independent, or the Baptist, but what thinks and feels
exactly the same respecting the ecclesiastical system to which he
adheres? The man that does not prefer his own Church to any other Church
is a man without principle; yea, a man whose principle is bad; for, in
matters of supreme importance, he is adhering to a system of
ecclesiastical doctrine and discipline, not because he thinks it the
best, but to serve some other purpose—mercenary, mean, and miserable.
Samuel Wesley thought the Church of England the best; but he was not the
narrow-minded and little-hearted bigot to unchurch other churches, and
deny that so far from being equally good, they were not good at all.
Hear what he says on both subjects:—
“The _doctrine_ of the Church of England we entirely embrace, otherwise
we could not be Christians. We are ready to subscribe to her Articles,
taking all of them, as we are verily persuaded, in the same sense which
the compilers intended. For her _discipline_, we believe the
_essentials_ of it—_Liturgy_ and _Episcopacy_—are agreeable to the
primitive pattern and the Word of God. For her _rituals_ and
_devotions_—we are sure they are the most perfect and pure that any
Church in the world now enjoys, and dare almost add, or ever did. There
are not two _passages_ in them, which we would desire to have changed;
though, should the authority and wisdom of Church and State think fit to
make any alterations as to words and smaller circumstances, for the sake
of peace and union, we should think it our duty, modestly and gladly to
submit.”[63] Wesley’s opinion of the clergy may be gathered from the
following:—“It is not strange that, among so considerable a body of men,
there should be found some who extremely disgrace their character, and
are highly unworthy; but it is notorious, that all possible care is now
taken that the clergy should lead such lives as they are obliged to by
solemn vow and promise; and it is known that those who do not, are not
so soon preferred as perhaps they might have been in former reigns. With
some exceptions, the clergy of England are at this time as considerable
a body, both for piety and learning, good preaching and good living, as
any in the world, or perhaps, as any that have lived here in any age of
the Church since the apostles. Of all those country parishes with which
we are acquainted, we cannot, in fifty or threescore parishes, think of
above three or four, who disgrace their character. So far from it, the
pulpits are filled with sober and ingenious men, good preachers, and
good livers.”[64]
-----
Footnote 63:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. i. p. 165.
Footnote 64:
_Athenian Oracle_, vol. iii. p. 382.
-----
So much in reference to his opinion of the Church and its ministers. We
add two quotations about dissent:—“A Christian Church becomes not more
or less Christian by being national; but if a National Church agrees in
doctrine with the doctrine of Christ, and Dissenters agree in doctrine
with the National Church, neither of them are schismatics from the
Church of Christ.”[65] And again: “There is no real difference betwixt
the Church of England and the Presbyterians as to the manner of worship
and preaching. They are really one as to fundamentals; and any one so
persuaded, may with a safe conscience communicate with either. Let those
that keep up the partition wall, take heed lest they are thereby
excluded out of the bond of charity, which makes all of one mind, and
partakers of the same privileges.”[66]
This is scarce the language of a High Churchman, consigning Dissenters
to the uncovenanted mercies of Almighty God. Samuel Wesley was of a
temperament too painstaking, too ardent, and too sincere, to be a
latitudinarian; but, at the same time, he was too good and too great a
man to be a bigot.
-----
Footnote 65:
_Ibid._, p. 97.
Footnote 66:
_Ibid._, p. 76.
-----
Before leaving the _Athenian Gazette_, it may be added that its writers
acted in great harmony, and nothing was published by any one which had
not the approval of all. They held meetings regularly at stated times,
chose a moderator, and determined controversial points by a majority of
votes. If any member happened to be absent, he had to send, except in
some particular cases, his papers for the approbation of his
friends.[67] The project was a great success. It rose superior to all
the opposition of its opponents, Anabaptists, Quakers, Usurers, and
Lacedemonians; and gained from the nation increasing, and almost general
applause.[68]
-----
Footnote 67:
_Ibid._, vol. iv. p. 76.
Footnote 68:
_Ibid._, p. 67–73.
-----