already suffered in consequence of the freedom with which he had expressed his views, though he had written with far more caution, and acted with much more prudence, than I had done; and he no doubt felt, that if he could not, without so much difficulty, save himself, it would be vain to attempt to save another, who had spoken and written with so much more freedom, and acted with so much more independence. So the storm was left to rage and spend its fury on me.

I cannot give an account of all that followed during the last two years I spent in connection with the Church; it would make too long a story. But things got worse and worse as time passed on.

In 1840 I brought my Evangelical Reformer to a close. In the last number I declared my unchanged belief in the sentiments set forth in my article on Toleration, Human Creeds, &c." I also contradicted the reports that had been spread abroad by my enemies, to the effect that I had, at the preceding Conference, retracted certain expressions used in my writings with regard to justification, the witness of the Spirit, &c.; and censured the conduct of the ruling party in my case in very plain terms. I said, "If any of my opponents imagine that I have recanted a single sentence that I have published in this work, they are under some misapprehension. There is not a doctrine that I have inculcated in it that I do not still maintain. And I declare my full conviction that the resolutions which were passed in reference to me by the Ashton and Huddersfield Conferences were based in error, and that the proceedings of my opponents in this matter were uncalled for and unchristian.

My enemies at once decided on my expulsion. Their purpose was to cast me out at the following Conference, and Mr. Allin published a small tract in reply to my article on Human Creeds, to prepare the minds of the people for the intended measure. He published it just before Conference, when he supposed it would be impossible for me to prepare a reply before the Body assembled. I never saw it till the evening of Thursday, the day but one before that on which I was to leave home for the place where the Conference was to meet. But I wrote a reply the same night, and got it printed, and in less than

twenty-four hours it was circulating in every direction. I had been able to show that my opponent's arguments proved just the contrary of what they were brought forward to prove. I also showed that the views advocated in my article were the views of Mr. Kilham, the founder of the Body to which we all belonged, as well as the views of some of the best and ablest men that the Church

had ever produced. I gave quite a multitude of quotations justifying my article to the very letter. The effect was astounding. The people saw at once that I was right. My enemies were confounded. They were paralysed. And I was saved.

But it was only for a time. The contest had lasted so long, and had produced such a fearful amount of unhappy feeling between me and my opponents, that reconciliation and comfortable co-operation had become impossible. It could not be expected that a powerful party would rest content under a defeat; and it was not in me to give up my efforts to bring about a better state of things in the Connexion. And hence a renewal of the unhappy strife.

It is natural to suppose that my enemies would now be anxious to get rid of me, and would watch for a suitable occasion to cast me out; and my ideas of duty were such, that it was impossible for me long to refrain from giving them the opportunity they desired.

1. The early churches provided for their poor members. The Quakers, the Moravians, and the early Methodists did the same. This exercise of brotherly love is enjoined by Christ and His Apostles. I urged this duty on the church to which I belonged.

2. The travelling preachers had a fund, called the Beneficent Fund, for the support of superannuated preachers and preachers' widows. Some of the rules of this fund seemed to me to be antichristian, and I laboured to get them altered. I also recommended that there should be a fund for worn-out and needy local preachers.

3. Members of the churches mingled with drunkards, profligates, and infidels, in benefit societies, and many other associations. This seemed to me to be very objectionable, and plainly unscriptural, and I recommended that they should come out from such societies, and form associations for good objects among themselves.

4. Wesley had provided cheap books and pamphlets for his societies, and I urged the Conference to do the same for ours. I wrote letters to the Annual Committee, the representatives of the Connexion, showing that books published at eight or ten shillings a volume, could be supplied at one or one and sixpence. I reminded them of the fact that the Book-room had abundance of spare capital which might be profitably used in such a work, and I pointed out the advantages likely to result from the encouragement of thoughtful and studious habits among the people. I published a pamphlet on the subject, showing that the churches might almost monopolise the press, and become the teachers and the rulers of the nations. I said, "If the Church at large would do its duty, every dark place on earth might be visited, and the seeds of truth and righteousness sown in every part of the globe in a few years." With regard to our own Connexion I said, "Our Magazine and Book-room, which ought to be promoting the intellectual and religious improvement of the Connexion and the world, are doing just nothing at all, or next to nothing. The leading articles of the Magazine are among the dullest and most useless things ever printed. The Book-room, which has capital enough to publish thirty or forty new books a year, does not issue one.. An institution which ought to be filling the Connexion and the country generally with the light and blessings of Christianity, and which is capable of being made a blessing to the world at large, is allowed to 'stand there all the day idle.'

I then proposed, as a means of stimulating the Book Committee and the Editor of the Magazine to greater activity, that I and my friends should be allowed to publish a periodical, and to establish a Book-room, at our own expense. The proposal was not only rejected, but even treated as a capital offence.

5. I had laboured hard against the infidel socialists, lecturing against them in almost all the large towns in the kingdom, and I was, to a great extent, the means of breaking up their societies. But my contests with those infidels made me more sensible of the necessity of abandoning all irrational additions to Christ's doctrine, and of having nothing to defend but the beautiful and bene

ficent principles of pure unadulterated Christianity. Hence I became still less of a sectarian in my belief, and more and more of a simple Christian, and I laboured to promote a stricter conformity to the teachings of Christ among ministers and Christians generally.

6. I wrote against the waste of God's money by professing Christians in luxurious living and vain show, and exhorted the rich to employ their surplus wealth in doing good.

7. That it might not be said that I received pay from the church for doing one kind of work while I employed a portion of my time in doing others, I gave up my salary, and refused to receive anything from the circuit in which I was stationed, except what was given me as a free-will offering.

8. I withdrew from the preachers' benefit society, resolved, in case of sickness or old age, to trust for a supply of my wants to the providence of God.

9. I recommended the Connexion to pay off all the chapel debts, and prepare itself for more vigorous and extensive aggressions on the kingdom of darkness.

All these things increased the anxiety of my opponents to get me out of the ministry; but they would probably have failed to give them the power to accomplish their object, if I had gone no farther. But I believed it my duty to take another step.

10. It was the custom in the Body to which I belonged, to baptise children in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. This form of words was understood by me to imply that infant baptism was commanded by God in Scripture. This, however, I doubted, and I declined to use the words when naming or baptising children. I had no objection to name children, to pray for them, or even to sprinkle them; but I could not use an expression in a sense in which I did not think it strictly true. This emboldened my enemies to attempt my expulsion without more ado, and this time they adopted measures calculated to ensure success. They issued circulars on the subject to the ministers and to the leading and influential laymen. They called secret meetings. They employed a variety of means which seemed to me and my friends to savour more of Popish

tyranny than of Christian discipline. At length Conference came, and I was called to account. The charges

against me were—

1. That I had denied the divine appointment of baptism, and refused to administer the ordinance.

2. That I had denied the divine appointment and present obligation of the Lord's Supper.

3. That I had declared myself opposed to the Beneficent Fund.

4. That I had announced the formation of a book establishment, thereby engaging in worldly pursuits, contrary to rule, and by this means opposing the best interests of the Book-room.

I. What I pro

None of those charges were correct. posed to do with regard to the supply of books, was no more worldly business than preaching was, or selling the publications of the Connexion. The object was not profit, but extended usefulness. 2. I had not declared myself opposed to the Beneficent Fund, but had simply proposed the improvement of its rules, and the extension of its operations. 3. I had not denied either the divine appointment or present obligation of the Lord's Supper. 4. Nor had I denied the divine appointment of baptism, but only declared my belief that water baptism, though a becoming rite under the Christian dispensation, was the baptism of John, and absolutely binding only under his intermediate dispensation.

The two latter charges were not pressed, and even the second was speedily given up, the one on baptism only remaining. This was pressed, and as my views on the subject were deemed intolerable, I was expelled.

There was a fearful display of bad feeling on the part of many of my opponents. And no little pressure was brought to bear on those who were opposed to extreme measures. It was a time of terrible trial to those who showed themselves my friends. The height to which the excitement against me rose can hardly be made intelligible to my readers of the present day. I regarded the proceedings of my opponents from beginning to end, as dishonourable, unjust, and cruel. "They have gone," said I, in my account of the proceedings of the Conference, "they have gone in opposition to every dictate