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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
Wesley was the bishop of his diocese , and his diocese was the whole kingdom , wherever Methodism gained a footing . In feet , he was more than a bishop , for a bishop has his superior , but in spiritual matters Wesley had none ; he was the autocrator , supreme , and alone the governor of priest and people . To the office of preaching he called whom he chose—had him to do as he chose , ( the alternative was well known , ) enduring no demur , much less rivalry . To the people he gave , as befits a sovereign prince , the constitution which seemed good to him ; he gave laws as one who had a right to dictate ; on all occasions of discipline or legislation , he spoke as one who was de jure as well as de facto the sole arbiter of his people ' s lot . A striking , and a somewhat forcible , instance of his self-conceit , and his attachment to the exercise as well as the possession of power , occurs in what may be called the chamber scene . In a retired apartment he assumed the office of a bishop , and ordained , with episcopal ordination , three preachers for America , ( one of these presbyters made a bishopyj and
three for Scotland . Another cause of the unlimited power with which he ruled the priesthood that were under him is to be found in the disparity in respect of education and rank in life between himself and those whom he called to the office of Christian instructors . They were , with a very few exceptions , ignorant men , utterly destitute of education , and bringing to their work only a knowledge of the Scripture and a strong infusion of fanaticism . Such persons must have felt their insignificance when compared with their leader—a man of no ordinary attainments , of no ordinary talents . Besides , considerable knowledge and mental activity and strength were essential not only to rule the body at large , but in the arrangement and maintenance of many minor particulars . These requisites no one possessed but Wesley himself , and , therefore , all the more important acts were his . In consequence , his power was every where felt , and by every leading event increased and confirmed .
The assistants of John Wesley were not only ignorant but poor . By the call which he gave them they were raised in society , their comforts increased , and their ambition awakened , A sense of this would keep them depressed in the presence of their lord , and a wish to retain their newly-acquired advantages and opportunities render them obedient to him whose breath could unmake as it had made them , and send them back , as it did some , to toil with their hands to earn their daily bread . When these opportunities of gaining power were united with Wesley's determination to be aut Caesar aut nihil , it is not a matter of surprise that his success was great , and
that his followers looked upon him ( to use the words of one of them ) u as their chief pastor under Christ . " Being master of the priests , he became thereby , if in no other way , master of the people . He was Dominus Dominorum — the ruler of the rulers . Each preacher was hie functionary , himself obedient to his will , and securing the obedience of others ; securing it because on this condition he held his office , and because the more
obedient the people were to the sovereign , the more so would they be to his representatives . But that which chiefly gave Mr . Wesley his power over the people remains to be mentioned . He became the sole proprietor of all the chapels built during his life-time . This he was enabled to do by the ignorance and poverty of his early converts . The first ** preaching-house " was built in Bristol . This he settled on eleven feoffees ; but as he saw on reflection that such a settlement would trench on his power , he destroyed the deed ; in the words of an authorized history of the Methodists , " he
Untitled Article
JVesleg gets Possession of the Places of Worship . 296
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1830, page 295, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2584/page/7/
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