The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1874-12-04
JOHN WESLEY.
me injustice BiOgraphers Have Done TO
the Father OF nIethOdism.


| thousands, and the tall spires of its
churches and schools greet the eve in
almost every city and village in America.
while its numbers and strength in the
Old World are such az to command
consideration and respect from its
former bitter assailants and despisers.
| Could the old crusader against the pride
| and folly and wickedness of an hundred
and fifty years ago be permitted to come
again in the flesh and behold the grand
| results of the mission work he began in
the wilds of Georgia, he would doubt
less be filled with surprise and rapture
somewhat akin to that experienced by
St John after he had availed himself
OF free press and gazed upon the won
de1ful glOries of the New Jerusalem.
Without asserting or Directing to the
peculiar faith and teachings of this
sect, it Will be admitted that history, in
its record of the different religious
creeds and systems, chronicles no par
aliel that Will contrast to the organiza-
ton, growth, and achievements of the
Methodist Episcopal church. And vet,
even while the great apostle was strug-
gllng to nurture and preserve the feeble
life of his new doctrine il it's infancy,
he encountered trials and fluctuations
other than those arising in his spiritual
field OF labor. While sweating under
the burden of the cross that bore the
legends of holiness, purity, and charity,
and crying aloud to fallen men and
women to turn from their wickedness
and be saved, he was at the same time
the unhappiest of men. Misery and
despair were in his soul i; anguish and
remorse followed him through the long
days, and the dreary nights brought
him no rest. Singing and striving with
holy fervencY to do the work of his
Master with clean thoughts and a white
soul concentrating all his gifts and en-
eTgies in the grand resolve to build mp
tabernacle of the Lord in which man
kind could learn the way to eternal
happiness and peace, he was beset in his
path by temptations which, when not
resisted, have their inevitable sequence
in misery and torment. His was like
the experience of other men in similar
positions. It is the same story of
temptations, weakness and suffering.
Yet, unlike many other men, it seems
John Wesley did not go to ruin in con-
sequence of his sins and indiscretions
nor does it appear that the subsequent
prospects or final success of his church
were seriously impaired by his actions.
Abraham Lincoln uttered a we'll
known truth when he remarked to his
friend Herndon, that few biographers
gave the real facts in a great mans
life; that the writer thereof is too apt
to make panegyric instead of a history,
presenting and dwelling upon al the
good deeds performed by his hero, and
CLOSING over or secreting his foibles
and weaker characteristics. So it has
been with the biographers of John
Wesley, with perhaps one exceptional
more recent life written by Tyerman.
Not one tells the true story of his rela-
tions with the several women who be-
came connected with his life, and who,
beyond doubt, cast q baleful shadow
upon his career.
In early life Wesley formed resoiu-
ton of celibacy, and determined that
his future career should be one of self
denial, labor, and homelessness. He
published an essay entitled "Tkoughts
on Single Life" extoliing that stateas
the privilege, if not the duty, of all
who were capable of receiving it, aud
three years after, in a public hymn,
which is clearly autobiographical, ex-
pressed himself as follows:
have no sharer of my heart
To rob my Savior of a part
And desecrate the whole;
Only betrothed to Christ am I
And wait His coming from the sky
To wed my happy soul"
But it seems he did not long persist
in this resolve. During his ministry in
Georgia he formed deep attachment"
to a Miss Sophia Hopkey, niece of the
chief magistrate of the colony. The
earlier biographies of Wesley represent
the sffair as involving a conspiracy on
the part of the young lady and her
friends against the reputation and virtue
of the youthful ascetic. Things grew
to such state that his friends inter
posed Wesley showed stubbornness,
but consented to an investigation by
conference, composed of his Moravian
friends and advisers, who decided that
he should abandon the woman, without
even consuming him for his conduct.
A few months after, Miss Hopkey was
married to Mr.. Williamson. Being a
devout member of the church, she pre-
scented herself at the Lords table, when
Wesley publicly refused to administer
to her the sacrament. The grounds of
bis refusal have never been involved in
much doubt, though the consequences
Odium and persecution that he was
finally compelled to shake the dust of
Georgia from his feet, and seek a newer
field.
Not long after this occurrence, his
friends heard that he was engaged to
Mrs. Grace Murray, a young widow
who had nursed him in a short illness,
and who was actually accompanying
him in his ministerial travels through
the country. This young woman had
been brought up as a maid servant, and
was person of small education, though
of great attraction, and fsrvent con-
vert to Methodism. From the accounts
of this affair, il would seem that she
completely entangled Wesley in her
ne, and held him in her coils with great
adroitness. Grace, though fair to look
uLon, was internally a great fraud.
Had she lived in this age of the world,
trained amid the gushing influences of
modern fashionable society, she would
no doubt have proved a brilliant repre-
sentative girl of the period. For a
long time she kept Wesley under her
influence, and the scandal assuming
larger proportions, Charles Wesley,
brother to the apostle, strove to crush
it. This he succeeded In doing, after
exertirg himself for months, and using
considerable diplomacy. John yielded,
and met the lady to say farewell. He
took her by the band, drew her TO him,
kissed her, and said: "Grace Murray,
you have broken my heart" Then and
there they changed the relation they
had so long borne to each other. The
preacher again took up the cross of self
sacrifice, and went to his work with
sad heart, chewing the bitter cud of
disappointment until he gave signs of
greatly broken health. A week or two
after, Grace was married to an inferior
sutton. She and Wesley did not meet
again for thiIty-nine years. She long
CutIived her husband; and when in
London she came to hear her son preach
IN Moorfelds, she met her venerable
lover-lover still, apparently, for the
interview is described as affecting.
Henceforth they saw each other no
more, and Wesley never again mention