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The Exeter Times-Advocate, 1930-02-20, Page 6I 4 WVBSDAY*, 1WBUABY 20, 19;)0 jjF ...............'.'J...'L..'.""!1'"?11.1 " Is a ijmiOow flavow Japfc Tea "SI mi 0 ‘Fresh feom the gardens* Trivitt Rector Speaks on John Wesley The fifth of the series of sermons On great British preachers was de livered in Trivitt Memorial Church on last .Sunday night week. The sub ject chosen was John Wesley, and for sheer interest it was perhaps the xnost remarkable discourse of tho series yet delivered. The preacher Began by describing an imaginary visit to England; and in such a visit sa pilgrimage to Oxford " University should be part of the itinerary? Why? Because it was not only of the ■ oldest universities in Europe, it was ih'lso one of the nerve-centres of Eng* -■ Msh spiritual life. The four great re- . Mgious forces of Oxford University were Wolsey, Laud, WesleyNewtoan. Wolsey wae the outstanding eccles iastical figure in England, on the very eve of the Reformation. His mva fall synchronised with the crash- ■of the religious system he represent- jed. Laud was perhaps ' a greater purely 'spiritual .force than Wolsey; But he was even a greater ecclesias tical disaster than the Tudor Cardi nal. Newman was a far greater and finer spiritual force than either of them, hut Newman had not ns yet fully entered into nis own; this 30th Century will decide whether the strange genius of Littlemore is the greatest purely spiritual force in English religious history. John Wes ley was perhaps the most immed iately successful of them all. He was far -and away the most, dominating force 'in England throughout ' the Eighteenth century; he? founded a religious- organization within the English: church which has developed into a separate ecclesiastical body of its own; and his. memory is rever enced by millions of English-speak ing people all the world 'over. A study of Wesley’s career yvill well repay all Anglicans today. . t Church of England The Church of England in the early part of the Eighteenth,century was spiritually almost as dead- as a door nail. There was only one tiling on which her leading dignataries .seemed to be ip possession'of a united mind —and that was their dread and hat red.-of “enthusiasm.” The Church of England is the most.unenthusias- tic religious Communion'in Christen- r >1 I I] Every Bell' Telephone is a Long Distance Station it :e a not ariJI you Calling |by IWMBfB saves fme Telling the operator the NUM BER you wan n a long-distance call, whether y^i.ask for a speci fic person or jr “anyone there” |gives you a qigtker connection. you do ndgknow the NUM- Srmation” and she p for you. Then of the NUMBER : avoid delay next W-It wl pay u — both in time and ^Loney-^to keep a list handy of thWong Instance NUMBERS you frs y call. 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'rn'itoini W..W ’ CUt-BBING BATES WITH OTHER I’ERIODICALS MAY BE HAD OX APPLICATION Times-Advocate and The Farmers’ Advocate ................. Times-Advocate and The Family Herald & Weekly* Star Times-Advocate and The Canadian. Countryman Times-Advocate and The Saturday Night ........................ Times-Advocate and The Saturday livening Post ......... nfew new >k THE EXETER TIMES-ADVOCATE dom,. no juuimsmcrable number vi Anglican church goers might be des cribed. as ecclesiastical icebergs; and you might as well try to set fire to an Arctic iceberg in mid-ocean with a common lueif^r match as try to kindle into enthusiasm the typical steady “sober” Anglican. Such a, religionist is so ecclesiastically sober that it is impossible for him ever to became spiritually drunk! In the first decades of the Eighteenth ceji- tury England was spiritually in the Ice, Age. The one 'great; qualifica tion for ecclesiastical promotion in those days was to stand on the right side of poliics—to be able to spell Whig with a capital “W” -and Tory with a small “t.” The Hanoverian regime had thrown the full weight of its deadly incubus upon England; and le graced inanity before monarch whose* intelligence was in- cupablo of appreelutlng ftnytliing outside “hot punch and fat women.” Such, a church fully deserved the set' of bishops and higher clergy which it then .possessed. The Engislr people had become weary of civil wai;s and religious struggles and dynastic' con flicts; they wanted peace; and-the only peace their established -church could give them-7—the only peace it did give them—was*’the peace of the ecclesiastical graveyard. ; Sermons were read—Or rather, droned—frpm the pulpits which made calm meh' furious and. wise men insane. How did the people at large react* to this grotesque parody of religious teach ing? Many of them became frankly Pa gan in their manner of living1; they "became unscrupulous in their deal ings. with one another; and as for the purity of their political principles ‘-^-well an Italian somersaulter of the fifteenth century might be described its virtuous when compared* with some of the political politics. Crown and Court and Church were all -alike; German boors wore - seated on the English * throne, political iknaves thronged the English court, and. re ligious dead-heads filled many Of the highest offices in the English Church. And it was into an Eng land that suffered from those mul titudinous diseases that John Wesley ■was born.- , anted Anglican divines dis- their calling hud insulted hu nt large by falling prostrate the first of the Georges—a muinvd u bachelor, if for no other reason than that of sympathy for your life-long matrimonial troubles, lint he chose, when enough to have more unto himself a wife- from you, Susannah, night. She led him the lif and yet she could not succeed in making him as miserable as herself. Was it your influence, Suannah, that enabled him to saint under the gent? hp was old sense, to take . as different, as day is from d a dog; live the life of a abuse of a terma* Con versionWesley’s 'sley’s next was that of a missionary ministerial exper- in w ience Georgia, where his Hig'h Church in tolerance and general all-around tactlessness made him as agreeably welcome as holy water in hell. No one shed a tear—no one even pre tended to—when he left Georgia for England a few years, later. He re turned to England a broken and dis- cour.aged man; his -only pleasant piemories of Georgia being some asin-. 'ine recollections of the womanly graces, of the nurse who helped him through an illness back to health. All his life long Wesley was suscep tible to the charms of women and he was constantly being imposed upon by them; i the more completely fhey were able to fool him. However on his return to England' he—happily for himself .—forgot the ladies for a time.; It was nflt the'flashing glances of wo men that worried- him now, His whole religious position bothered him; like Newman a hundred years later lie was on his “Anglican death bed,” though lie knew it not. His soul, was actually in danger; and Wesley was 'a man who always de sired to have his soul in the safe keeping >o£ God. In this mood he happened to fall in with a German Moravian 'preacher named Peter Bohler. In this mood he attended a Moravian religious meeting in Al dergate' .Street in London. Tho date was May'24, 1738. Some one was reading from Luther’s preface to .tlie Epistle to the Galatians as Wesley entered houS'e. What folk easy to understand any In lie his duo a Was this tu nappen again? Was Wesley to became another Hugh Peters^ more intolerant than Popo and more cruel than any quisition? Was the liberty claimed .to blaze and rant at own sweet will and pleasure^ to end in -his exercising worse than illiterate tyranny over the Church of England? When did Cranmer or Jewel qr Latimer deliver such sermons as those which Wesley flung forth from his pulpits? The bishops became alarmed; the clergy worked themselves up into a white rage, The church was in the ’most terrible of all dangers—not from, English Deism ,oJ’ -French Infidelity, but from that wild Moravian enthus iasm which had made the ordinary good'-n'a’tured stupidity of’English ’religion a -sort of compound of Span ish zeal and Mahometan madness; a thing to make Archdeacons shiver in their shoes and Bishops almost die of apoplexy! 5Vhs it right that this escaped lunatic should have the op portunity—almost the privilege-—of tainting with his own madness tho' ordinary, Anglican worshipper from an Anglican pulpit? No—a thou sand times, no! He was .an intruder in those pplpits, he had no more.busi ness’in them than Gay Fawkes, had to be, in, the 'cellar under the House■ indeed the older lie grew u. /,'//;■ 1 7 „ 7, „a fhnv nhlV^ ^O1'd«- Out Witllhim OUt Of tllOSG. pupits!—and if lie will not go out of them with his free will lot him go out of them against it! -And: soon the word' was passed from rectory to rectory that Wesley was ..not to bo allowed to preach prom the pulpits of the Church of -England.. It was a disastrous diciSion—both for the An glican church and for “the people Called Methodist.” . write so sensibly or intelligently on. Ireland before? There is a wisdom in some of Wesley’s remarks oy Ire* land that would do credit to Bishop Berk el y. Church of Enghiml and MethmUstfi!- To the ever-recurring question—a Did- Wesley wish the “people milled Methodists” to-leave the communion of the Church of England and an independent • denominatlo their own, the only answer' seems to meet all the actual f history is “yes and m form n„ ofi "that? cis oft Wesley himself was a decided Anglican and High Churchman. He had no de* sire to leave the Church of Englund himself. His brother was even « stronger than he in his Anglican Churchmanship. Hut if this is so, why did the separation take place?, Well, the separation does not seem to have ocurred formally while -both the Wesleys lived- But when John, Wesley died the disintegrating- forces of Methodism made it in^" possible for the “people called Meth-* odists” to remain permanently in this. Church of .England aS their spiritual home,* ‘True, there were many in the Church of England who would have ’welcomed them there, but it is- to >be fejared that there were stijl more'in the Church, of England wlifli would be-pleased to see the Moth©* dists drift away altogether. And ia, a short time dissensions broke, out amongst the (Methodists themselves* The best proof that there is a real ‘vitality in Methodist Christianity is to he found in the fact that in spite*’ of its divisions Methodism has growth to- be a world-force in religious life. Could such a religious force be kept permanently within the ecclesiastical borders of the Church of England?.' There will of course be various ans wers to this 'question. And it is , rather-futile at this late hour of the day to try.and solvp.the rather bar ren problem of-who really is to blame for the separation. Both .sides I suppose are to blame more' or less. But be the blame where it may, it has been a real misfortune to Eng lish-speaking Christianity that the' Anglicans and the Methodists have- not been able to pull together. After, all, they both have had a common.' origin; and those who remember; The Separation j Yes; it WAS a disastrous decis ion. Wesley could not keep hisimouth Mint; he had to open it. -Whore could he open it?- An open ‘'under standing with Dissent, an' open al liance with Dissenters, at that time would have-ruined all his prospects. He was' puzzled by the dilemma in which' he found himself. Not iso George Whitefield. For that Angli can cleric—younger than Wesley— had already given promise of great preaching powers, and for the mom- the Tittle Moravian nieeting- What followed is not very J. But Wesley ever afterwards- maintained thdt there and then he had become a child of heaven—though ’ he had hitherto taught that he had never made a child of heaven at his baptism. I ■doubt, if the matter was ever satis factorily explained even by ‘.Wesley himself; but to make a long story short, from that day forth he deter mined to preach”, the plain old re ligion of the Church of England” 'in a way in certainly Anglicans liis day. new it really were- 'lines) in general agreement with the Thirty-Nine Articles of the'Church of England. But.did any noteworthy Anglican divines and' preachers of iiefore put upon those Articles' the (Moravian interpretation of spiritual life which Wesley had picked up from Peter Bohl er?- Martin Luther never was* an Anglican; and he con tradicted himself so often during his theological career that not even the most patient 'German study joined to the most brilliant French lucidity gould make head or tail of some of ;his “wild and- whirling” pronounce ments.. ^Carlyle had not yet been born; and even Carlyle is not always successful in his “eludication” of German ideas. And are we to under stand that Wesley who, whatever his abilities may have been, never took- the trouble to become a master in lit- fature, was able to graft this luxur iant Moravian theology on the sober and somewhat cold Protestantism of England? A short time after this ^udden and- starting conversion of Wesley he and the Moravians had drawn their swords against each other in open war. The Moravians then 'charged Wesley with both mis understanding and misrepresenting theni; a charge of course which Wes- fey l’lated denied. - They broke off i’ll religious communion with each'1 otlie^—the puiiil ran away as far and AS fast as he could from his teachers: skill :'.“the plain old religion of the Ghiirch” England” was preached witli A Moravian accent—though the .Mor avians themselves declared that part the accent ^at least was unintelligible, to them. Nevertheless, there |s good reason to believe that in all essential matters the religion which ■ noW 4)o^txn to toncli tmcT preach wris a religion that would hot be utterly disowned but at least largely’ accepted- by tlie Sixtennth Century Reformers of the Church bf England. ■’’Tfie Bishops arid Wesley j! Wesley was a frill-orbed priest of tlie Church of’England when he un derwent this sudden and almost inexplicable conversion in Aldersgate Street, And lie was not the man to' keep Ahb/newS of his conversion to. himself. He pulpits; and Preached, his HiS hearers) what result? dreaded in the Church -of England as ‘Enthusiasm”. BiShopS, dhans, arqh- deacbns, rectors and cu’ratea"still had A vivid remembrance of those days rhien Cromwell's seidiery, with flaming swords in their hands and inote flaming tbxts In their months, Fad nsttrped the pulpits of the Angli can Church, torn the Brayer Book into fragments, and- driven the faith ful old worsippers out into the cold. ent hi. any rate was'more popular that common origin should try to* bridge the gulf somehow. John Wesley has long been in his grave;! the bishops who opposed him so bit terly and perhaps so unfairly have also long been in their graves; the fierce .controversies have long been burned into ashes; but the Anglicans and the Methodists are still living—I living let us hope not “to bite and. devour one another,” but to help ex tend the Kingdom of Ghd upon eartlf And when they both set themselves resolutely to the extension of that Kingdom the memories of old bitter controversies will gradually fade away and finally die. A Last Word .. There is not space here to deal with Wesley’s place in history. Nor is there space, to deal with his re markable ability as' a religions or ganizer. Nor is there space to en large upon his extraordinary influ- ' ence over individuals and crowds. . He was more practical than cloqu- ent as a preacher. He had not Whitefield’s fire; but such fire as lari had burned longer than Whitefield’s. He was, taking him as a whole, a good man as '’’well as. a great man;! he may have been the spiritual father of the Methodist Church, but he was also the spiritual son -of the Anglican. John Wesley was ..tire John Henry Newman of thb , Eigh teenth Century. Whatever he .may; be elsewhere, he* is—or should a bridge between Anglicans Methodists in Canada; and I that this .sermon of mine to-night may help somewhat towards building* of that bridge. thau Wesley with the powers that be of Anglicanism. But’ Whitefield had done an incredible thing. He had harangued twenty thousand miners in the open air at Kingswood, harangued. them until their tears made white Streams, run down their black faces, harangued them until many of .them fell to the ground in vidlent religious convulsions. Here was .-something terrible! A priest of the Church of England belching forth religious rhetoric in the open air!; was' isni. than land come to if this madness con tinued? And what would happen to the Church of England if, after hav-' ing escaped the perils of Popery, It was to be swept from the face of the earth by the madness of Methodism? It is to be hoped that the Bishops and the higher Anglican clergy pray ed fervently at this crisis. But it is to be feared that they did not pray at all—for the niadness which they now presented to the world out-topped the madness of the Methodists them selves. Where the Methodists went crazy in a .skull cap the Anglicans went crazy in' a high hat. And there -is no insanity so insane as which strides through the. world high hat. Wesley’s Preaching' Tours Wesley followed Whitefield into the open air. He, too, had his thou sands to listen to him. At no time of his career was he a preacher com pared with Whitefield; but. lie had what Whitefield never possessed—• the ability to organize men as, one unit for a ‘great purpose. Soon there were little Methodist societies hero and there throughout the South of England. The. chief centres of Methodist preaching were London and Bristol. But they soon spread to Newcastle and the North. Wes ley crossed the Tweed, and had his first unluc’ky experience with .the Presbyterians of Scotland. Did he dream, then, that at a, future day in the far-off ..land of Canada—then and for several years, afterwards under French rule—“the simple children of John Wesley would out wit the shrewd children -of John- Kriox’ own this even land times that when he wrote about Ireland he did not write exactly like a fool. So many English asses have brayed their’impressions of Ireland into the Worlds listening eat that it is a re lief to learn that ^o.brt- Wesloy at least was not a two-legged donkey. His .attitude < toward tho Irish Ro man Catholics-'was- creditable- and almost commendable, I-IU "shrewd criticisms of that Eighteenth '(<en- tury. theological wonder-—-the Angli can Protestant Establishment in Ire land—-can bo appreciated even now, Macatilay may have borrowed' some of liis erneifying "siii'casms on the Anglican Estdbiishmeiit In 'Ireland from the Irish entries in Wesley's ''Journal?' When1 did ah TOirgllsh- mari> even 'though! afflicted with Moravian religious enthusiasm, ever We sley’s Early Bays He was born in 1703 at the Fac tory of Epworth. His father was an Anglican clergyman who possessed more than his usual share of the hu man ills that’ flourish among these creatures. Wesley the sire was a,’ Tory and a High Churchman, -who could almost believe that .a drop of Charles the First’s blood would liq uefy like that of Saint Januarius of Naples, and who would fight the en emies of fiaeheverell in Hell, “and when Hell was frozen, would again fight them on the ice.” John the son might be described as- having been influenced by High Church principles all his life—indeed many of his acts which angered and still anger some decided High Church men were performed under a High Church impulse! He was educated partly at home und partly at school, and in due course plowed his way through the terms of Oxford Uni versity. While at Oxford, he fell in with a number of godly young men of about his own age; and for a brief period it looked as if the Tratorian Movement would be born a century ahead of its time. The “Holy Club” was jeered at and scoffed at; its members regarded- as lunatics—at large; buV’tlioy still held on their, way with a Sublime disregard of. con- sequences like the English column when attacking at Fontenoy. Ostra cism and persecution only -made them stand more firmly than ever bjr their ■ principles, Wesley was. or dained to the priestliood of the Church of England-and was' for a' brief period curate to his own father in the parish of Epworth. FJis mother was perhaps the most extraordinar ily intelligent woman of her da£ She had originally been a Dissenter, but at the age'of twelve “had re'ad. her self” into the Church of England! And im, the Church of England, she 1 remained. She was a iwonran of Sp'artan simplicity in all things— most of all in her religion.-., Sihe .had nineteen .children,'and she cared for her numerous brood- with All the steady’industry and easy grace of a barnyard lien. Her husband was not of much help to her in raising her big family. - Lfke/most minis ters he had no practical knowledge of business; he, was one of .those clerics who shpuld have remained a bachelor and washed and"ironed his own shirts. An hour in* the kitchen would have done more permanent good than a week in tho’study. How- over, he decided to marry; arid he met a woman idiotic enough to say “yes” to his proposal. Often qiid* of ten he led both Her and hijh§el£ into a hole, out of enough things! ligorifte In/his life was dedicated to his service^ overlooking with wifely £raco arid motherly solicitude his fooleries Oil those’ numerous occasions: when; he liad succeeded in .making an ass of himself.Foor Su^anhah 'Wesley! You are the everlasting motitiihent to the good iritentiorig and bad theol*. logy of ah amazing* lihsbahd. Your son John should Always have re* but she always pulled him it. She was evdn ”,tactful to submit, to him* iin .all She ha& really more intel in her little toe than he had Whole body; but,her Whole ■ whicli that .religion was never interpreted by the divines and preachers of Wesley’s new religion—if was (in its main had access to 'Anglican from those pulpits lie jiew and (to many of strahge ’theology, With Nothing then Whs SO a It was wprsc than Popery. It almost as bad as MAhpinetan- It was indescribably... worse infidelity. What ?.would, Eng- ’<> in the United Church? “Journal” 1 fascinating crossed the -he crossed ; and it is that in he—- and hope the A 1 Two Jews were travelling in aii auto/.when,‘ without warning they*' were held up by a ‘bandit, who steppe ed out on. the road about fifty feefc in front of'.them with a gun in each' hand. Ope of the Jews sensed the, situation instantly^ He hurriedly/ pulled a roll of ..hills out of his po cket and turned.,. tto his friend:' “Here, Ikey, is deft fifty dollars vofi I owe you.” Passing the Buck His throws no light on speculation, • He Irish .Sea to Ire- it in all forty-two pleasant to know, Telephone Operator* "Had a Serious Nervous Breakdown! Miss Rena Shields, Owen Sound, OnlU writes:—ZII am a telephone operatoS and a few months ago I had a veifjM serious nervous broakdowih l' nMy nerves;.were no badiYeould nofj sleep at nighty and I had a great desJtj of pain in my’hcart.- ,.t. tried sdycml medicines/ but didl'i not^ get muck relief until, a friend A" I only took one- box* and part of; the second, arid li .am Very thankful! X ’took them as ij &ow sleep aoundlx; and havo ho mon»' pain a in my heart0 w Brice, 50 cents a box at all druggists; and dealers, or mailed direct on receipt df price by Tho T# Milbttra Co,, Ltd., Toronto^ Ont advised mo to. try