On the Church.

ON THE CHURCH:

IN

A LETTER TO THE REV.——.

———

REVEREND SIR, PLYMOUTH-DOCK, August 19, 1785.

I WILL tell you my thoughts with all simplicity, and wait for better information. If you agree with me, well; if not, we can (as Mr. Whitefield used to say) agree to disagree.

For these forty years I have been in doubt concerning that question: “What obedience is due to heathenish Priests and mitred infidels?” I have from time to time proposed my doubts to the most pious and sensible Clergymen I knew. But they gave me no satisfaction; rather they seemed to be puzzled as well as are. Some obedience I always paid to the Bishops, in obedience to the laws of the land. But I cannot see, that I am under any obligation to obey them farther than those laws require. It is in obedience to those laws, that I have never exercised in England the power which I believe God has given me. I firmly believe, I am a scriptural Episkopov, as much as any man in England or in Europe. (For the uninterrupted succession I know to be a fable, which no man ever did or can prove.) But this does in nowise interfere with my remaining in the Church of England; from which I have no more desire to separate than I had fifty years ago. I still attend all the ordinances of the Church; at all opportunities. And I constantly and earnestly desire all that are connected with me so to do. When Mr. Smyth pressed us to “separate from the Church,” he meant, “Go to church no more.” And this was what I meant seven and twenty years ago, when I persuaded our brethren, “Not to separate from the Church.” But here another question occurs, “What is the Church of England?” It is not “all the people of England.” Papists and Dissenters are no part thereof. It is not all the people of England except Papists and Dissenters. Then we should have a glorious Church indeed! No; according to our Twentieth Article, a particular church is “a congregation of faithful people,” (caetus credentium, the words in our Latin edition,) “among whom the word of God is preached, and the sacraments duly administered.” Here is a true logical definition, containing both the essence and the properties of a church. What then, according to this definition, is the Church of England? Does it mean “all the believers in England (except the Papists and Dissenters) who have the word of God and the sacraments duly administered among them?” I fear this does not come up to your idea of “the Church of England.” Well, what more do you include in that phrase? “Why, all the believers that adhere to the doctrine and discipline established by the Convocation under Queen Elizabeth.” Nay, that discipline is well-nigh vanished away, and the doctrine both you and I adhere to.

All those reasons against a separation from the Church in this sense, I subscribe to still. What then are you frighted at? I no more separate from it now, than I did in the year 1758. I submit still (though sometimes with a doubting conscience) to mitred infidels. I do indeed vary from them in some points of doctrine, and in some points of discipline; by preaching abroad, for instance, by praying extempore, and by forming societies; but not a hair’s breadth further than I believe to be meet, right, and my bounden duty. I walk still by the same rule I have done for between forty and fifty years. I do nothing rashly. It is not likely I should. The high-day of my blood is over. If you will go hand in hand with me, do. But do not hinder me, if you will not help. Perhaps, if you had kept close to me, I might have done better. However, with or without help, I creep on. And as I have been whither to, so I trust I shall always be,

Your affectionate friend and brother,

JOHN WESLEY.