The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1878-01-11
JOHN WESLEY AND wITcEcaAFT.
What He Said, aud What Re Did Not
say-He Never Saw A Spirit.

To the Editor of the New York Sun.
Mr.. ID. Winder, of Wyoming, Ohio,
in an article in the American Spirit
ual Magazine Up 301. makes John
Wesley, the founder of MethOdism,
ay:
"On Friday, July 3, l was sitting at
dinner, when | thought / heard some
one coming along the passage. !
looked about and saw my aunt, Mar
garet Scott, of New Castle, standing at
my back. On Saturday had "A letter
informing me that she died that
day"
The quotation can be found in Wes-
Ieys works (LOndon edition, vol. iv.,
p 369), but the words are Elizabeth
HObsOn's, and not WeSley'S, Her
narrative fills twelve pages of the book,
and the following is Il verbatum copy
Of.wlIat Wesley said concerning it Up.
357 s.:
"Wednesday May 25 176SJ, and
the two following days, being at Sun
derland, l took down, from one who
feared God from her infancy, one of
the strange5t accounts | ever read.
AMI yet / can find no pretence To dis
believe it. The well-knOwn character
of the person excludes all suspicion of
fraud, and the nature of the circUm-
stances themselves excludes the pos
sibility of a delIIsiOn. 1t is true there
are several of them which l do not
comprehend. But this is with me a
very slender objection. For what is
it which | do not comprehend. even
of the things see daily ? Truly not
'The smallest grain of sand, or spire
of grass
! know not how the one grows, nor
how the particles of tine other cOhere
together. What pretense have |, then,
to deny well-attested facts because /
cannot comprehend them?
at is true, likewise, that the Eng
Iish, in general, and indeed, most of
the men of learning in Europe, have
given up all accounts of witches and
apparitiOns as mere old wives fables.
/ ann sorry for it, and / willingly take
this opportunity of entering my solemn
protest against the violent cOmpli-
ment which so many that believe the
Bible pay to those who dO not believe
ii. ! owe them no such service. |
take knowledge that these are ut the
bottom Of the outcry which has been
raised, and with such insolence spread
throughout the nation, in direct OppO-
eitiOn not only to the Bible, but to the
suffrage of the wisest and best men in
knew whether Christians know it or
not that the giving up of witchcraft
j, in effect, giving up the Bible. And
they know, on the other hand, that if
bui one account Of intercourse Of men
with separate spirits he admitted their
whole castle in the air Deism, A!he-
ism, Mnterialism) falls to the ground
l know no reason, therefore, why we
should suffer this weapon to be
rYFREtlcd out of our hands.
Indeed, there are numerous ar
4.tmcnts Eesides which album
dainty coBfGtR their vain imagina-
tons. But we need not he hooted
out OF one; neither reason or religion
requires this.
cone of the capital objections Ga all
these accounts, which | have known
urged over and over, j. this: "Did you
ever SEE ah aIpayition yourself! Nc;
nor did l ever see a DIurder, Yeti be-
lievc there i sucii a thing; yea, and
that i'm one place or another there j. Il
IBGrtler committedcvcry day. There
fore J i.an not, H. a reasonable man,
deny tha fact, although L never saw it,
and perhaps never may. The testimo-
py Of uneXcegfiJpqble witnesses fully
convinces me both Of tlc one and the
other" "S. II. e."