provoke) one of such children in my name, receiveth me. But John answered saying, Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and we forbad him, because he follow eth not with us. Forbid him not, said Jesus,

for there is no man who can do a miracle in my name, that can lightly speak evil of me." Festus himself, though a poor heathen, will disapprove of such a step. "It is not the manner of the Romans, says he, to deliver any man to die," (or to insist on his publicly giving up his reputation, which in some cases is worse than death) "before that he who is accused, have the accusers face to face, and have licence to answer for himself concerning the crime laid against him." The lordliness of your procedure, Sir, even exceeds, in one respect, the severity of the Coun cil of Constance; where poor Jerome of Prague had leave to plead his own cause, before he was obliged to acknowledge himself an heretic, and make a formal recantation of the propositions he had advanced.

Besides, how could you suppose, Sir, that Mr. W. and the Preachers who shall assem ble with him, are such weak men, as tamely to acknowledge themselves heretics upon your ipse dixit? Suppose Mr. W. took it in his head to convene all the Divines that disapprove the extract of Zanchius, to go with him in a body to Mr. Toplady's chapel, and demand a formal recantation of that performance, as heretical; yea, to insist upon it, before they had "measured swords or broken a pike together;" would not the translator of Zanchius from the ramparts of Common Sense deservedly laugh at him, and ask whether he thought to frighten him by bis protests, and bully him into orthodoxy?

O Sir, have we not fightings enough without, to employ all our time and strength? Must we also declare war, and promote fightings within? Must we catch at every opportunity to stab one another, because the livery of truth which we wear is not turned up in the same manner? What can be more cruel than this? What can be more cutting to an old Minister of Christ, than to be traduced as a dreadful heretic, in printed letters sent to the best men in the land, yea, through all England and Scotland, and signed by a person of your rank and piety: To have things that he knows not, that he never meant, laid to his charge, and dispersed far and near? While he is gone to a neighbour ing kingdom, to preach Jesus Christ, to have his friends prejudiced, his foes elevated, and the fruit of his extensive ministry at the point of being blasted? Put yourself in his place, Sir, and you will see that the wound is deep and reaches the very heart.

I can apologize for the other Real Protestants. Some are utter strangers to polemic divinity; others are biassed by Calvinism; and one, whose name is used, never saw your circular letter till it was in print.

But

what can I say for you, Sir? Against hope I must believe in hope, that an unaccountable panic influenced your mind, and deprived you for a time of the calmness and candour which adorn your natural temper. If this is the case, may you act with less precipitancy for the future. And may the charity that hopeth all things, believeth all things, does not provoke, and is not provoked, rule in our hearts and lives. So shall the Heathen world drop their just objections against our unhappy divisions, and once more be forced to cry out, See how these Christians love! And so shall we give over trying to disturb or pull down a part of the church of Christ, because we dislike the colour of the stones with which it is built; or because our fel low-builders cannot pronounce Shibboleth just as we do.

One word more about Mr. W. and, I have done. Of the two greatest, and most useful Ministers I ever knew, one is no more. The other, after amazing labours, flies still with unwearied diligence through the three kingdoms, calling sinners to repentance, and to the healing fountain of Jesu's blood. Though oppressed with the weight of near seventy years, and the care of near thirty thousand souls, he shames still, by his unabated zeal, and immense labours, all the young Minis ters in England, perhaps in Christendom. He has generally blown the gospel trump, and rode twenty miles, before most of the professors who despise his labours have left their downy pillow. As he begins the day, the week, the year, so he concludes them, still intent upon extensive services for the glory of the Redeemer, and the good of souls. And shall we lightly lift up our pens, our tongues, our hands against him? No, let them rather forget their cunning. If we will quarrel, can we find no body to fall out with, but the Minister upon whom God puts the greatest honour?

Our Elijah has lately been translated to heaven. Grey-headed Elisha is yet awhile continued upon earth. And shall we make a hurry and noise, to bring in railing accusations against him with more success? While we pretend to a peculiar zeal for Christ's glory, shall the very same spirit be found in us, which made his persecutors say, he hath spoken blasphemy, (or heresy) what need we any farther witnesses? Shall the sons of the Prophets, shall even children in grace and knowledge, openly traduce the venerable Seer and his abundant labours? When they see him run upon his Lord's errands shall they cry, not,-Go up thou bald head, but, Go up thou heretic? O Jesus of Nazareth, thou rejected of men, thou who wast once called a deceiver of the people, suffer it not; lest the raging Bear of persecution come suddenly out of the wood upon those sons of discord, and tear them in pieces! And suppose a Noah, an old Preacher of

How natural is it for him to tremble, lest by missing the intended vein, and pricking an unseen artery, he should have done irrepa rable mischief, instead of an useful operation.

But while you do me the kindness of pub. lishing those passages, permit me, Sir, to do Mr. Wesley the justice of informing him, I had also written to Mr. Ireland, that "whether my letters were suppressed or not, the Minutes must be Vindicated, that Mr. W. owed it to the Church, to the real Protestants, to all his Societies, and to his own aspersed character; and that after all, the controversy did not seem to me, 'to be so much whether the Minutes should stand, as whether the Antinomian gospel of Dr. Crisp should prevail over the practical gospel of Jesus Christ.

I must also, Sir, beg leave to let my vindicated friend know, that in the very letter where I so earnestly entreated Mr. Ireland to stop the publication of my letters to you, and offered to take the whole expense of the impression upon myself though I should be obliged to sell my last shirt to defray it, I added that, "If they were published, I must look upon it as a necessary evil or misfortune;" which of the two words I used I do not justly recollect: a misfortune for you and me, who must appear inconsistent with the world: : you Sir, with your Sermons: and I with my Title-page; and nevertheless necessary to vindicate misrepresented truth, defend an eminent Minister of Christ, and stem the torrent of Antinomianism.

It may not be improper also, to observe to you Sir, that when I presented Mr. Wesley with my Vindication, I begged he would correct it, and take away whatever might be unkind or too sharp: urging that though I meant no unkindness, I was not a proper judge of what I had written under peculiar ly delicate and trying circumstances, as well as in a great hurry; and did not therefore dare to trust either my pen, my head, or my heart. He was no sooner gone, than I sent a letter after him, to repeat and urge the same request; and he wrote me word, he had expunged every tart expression." If he has, (for I have not yet seen what alterations his friendly pen has made,) I am reconciled to their publication: and that he has, I have reason to hope from the letters of two judicious London friends, who calmed my fears, lest I should have treated you with unkind

ness.

One of them says, I reverce Mr. Shirley for his candid acknowledgement of his hastiness in judging. I commend the Calvin ists at the Conference for their justice to Mr. Wesley, and their acquiescence in the declaration of the Preachers in connexion with him. But is that declaration, however dispersed, a remedy adequate to the evil done, not only to

Mr. Wesley, but to the cause and work of God? Several Calvinists in eagerness of malice had dispersed their calumnies through the three kingdoms. A truly excellent person herself, in her mistaken zeal, had represented him as a Papist unmasked, an Heretic, an Apostate. A Clergyman of the first reputation informs me, a Poem on his Apostacy is just coming out. Letters have been sent to every serious Churchman and Dissenter through the land, together with the gospel Magazine. Great are the shoutings, and now that he lieth, let him rise up no more! This is all the cry. His dearest friends and children are staggered, and scarce know what to think. You, in your corner, cannot conceive the mischief that has been done and is still doing. But your letters in the hand of providence, may answer the good ends you proposed by writing them. You have not been too severe to dear Mr. Shirley, moderate Calvinists themselves being judges; but very kind and friendly to set a mistaken man right, and probably to preserve him from the like rashness as long as he lives. Be not troubled therefore, but cast your care upon the Lord."

My other friend says, "Considering what harm the circular letter has done, and what an useless satisfaction Mr. Shirley has given by his vague acknowledgment, it is no more than just and equitable, that your letters should be published."

Now, Sir, as I never saw that Acknowledgment, nor the softening corrections made by Mr. Wesley in my Vindication; as I was not informed of some of the above-mentioned particulars when I was so eager to prevent the publication of my letters; and as I have reason to think, that through the desire of an immediate peace, the festering wound was rather skinned over than probed to the bottom; all I can say about this publication is, what I wrote to our common friend, namely, that "I must look upon it as a NECESSARY evil."

I am glad, Sir, you do not direct your letter to Mr. Olivers, who was so busy in publishing my Vindication; for by a letter I have just received from Bristol, I am informed he did not hear how desirous I was to call it in, till he had actually given out before a whole congregation, it would be sold. Besides, he would have pleaded with smartness, that he never approved of a patched up peace, that he bore his testimony against it, at the time it was made, and had a personal right to produce my arguments, since both parties refused to hear his at the Conference.

If your letter is friendly, Sir, and you print it in the same size with my Vindication, I shall gladly buy 101. worth of the copies, and order them to be stitched with my Vindication, and given gratis to the purchasers of it: as well to do you justice, as to convince

the pleasure of thus showing you how sin cerely I am, Rev, and dear sir, your obedient servant, JOHN FLETCHER.

Madeley, 11th Sept. 1771.

First Letter.

HON. AND REV. SIR,

I cordially thank you for the greatest part of your Narrative. It confirms me in my hopes, that your projected opposition to Mr. Wesley's Minutes proceeded in general from zeal for the Redeemer's glory and as such a zeal, though amazingly mistaken, had certainly something very commendable in it, I sincerely desire your Narrative may evidence your good meaning, as some think my Vindication does your mistake.

In my last private letter I observed, Rev. Sir, that if your Narrative was kind, I would buy a number of copies, and give them gratis to the purchasers of my book, that they might see all you can possibly produce in your own defence, and do you all the justice your proper behaviour at the Conference deserves. But as it appears to me there are some important mistakes in that performance, I neither dare recommend it absolutely to my friends, nor wish it in the religious world the full success you desire.

I do not complain of its severity; on the contrary, considering the sharpness of my Fifth Letter, I gratefully acknowledge it is kinder than I had reason to expect. But permit me to tell you, Sir, I look for justice to the scriptural arguments I advance in defence of Truth, before I look for kindness to my insignificant person, and could much sooner be satisfied with the former than with the latter alone. As I do not admire the fashionable method of advancing general charges without supporting them by parti cuiar proofs, I shall take the liberty of pointing out some mistakes in your Narrative, and by that means endeavour to do justice to Mr. Wesley's Declarations, your own Sermons, my Vindication, and above all, to the cause of practical religion.

Waving the repetition of what I said in my last touching the publication of my Five Letters to you, I object first to your putting a wrong colour upon Mr. Wesley's Declaration. You insinuate or assert that he, and fifty-three of the Preachers in Conference with him, gave up the doctrine of justification by works in the day of judgment. It

appears, say you, from their subscribing the Declaration, notwithstanding Mr. Oliver's remonstrances, that they do not maintain a second justification by works.

Surely, Sir, you wrong them. They might have objected to some of Mr. Oliver's expressions, or been displeased with his readiness to enter the lists of dispute; but certainly so many judicious and good men could never so betray the cause of practical religion, as tamely to renounce a truth of that importance. If they had, one step more would have carried them full into Dr. Crisp's eternal justification, which is the very centre of Antinomianism: and without waiting for the return of the next Conference, I would bear my legal testimony against their antinomian error. Mr. Wesley I reverence as the greatest minister I know, but would not follow him one step farther than he follows Christ. Were he really guilty of rejecting the evangelical doctrine of a second justification by works, with the plainness and honesty of a Suisse, I would address him, as I beg you would permit me to address you.

I. Neither you, Rev. Sir, nor any divine in the world, have, I presume, a right to blot out of the sacred records those words of Jesus Christ, St. James, and St. Paul : "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life.""Not every one that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that does the will of my Father."-"Be ye therefore doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves."-" For as we are under the law to Christ."-"Not the hearers of the law shall be just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified."-Every man's work shall be made manifest: For the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is;" His every word shall undergo the severest scrutiny: "I say unto you, [O how many will insinuate the contrary!] that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgement; for by thy words shalt thou [then] be justified, and by thy words shalt thou [then] be condemned."

Can you say, Sir, that the justification

mentioned by our Lord in this passage, is the same as that which St. Paul speaks of as the present privilege of all believers, and has no particular reference to the day of judgment mentioned in the preceding sentence? Or will you intimate our Lord does not declare we shall be justified in the last day by works, but by words? Would this evasion be judicious? Do not all professors know that words are works in a theological sense; as being both the signs of the workings of our hearts, and the positive works of our tongues? Will you expose your reputation as a Divine, by trying to prove, that although we shall be justified by the works of our tongues, those of our hands and feet shall never appear for or against our justification? Or will you insinuate that our Lord recanted the legal sermons written Mat. v. and xii? If you do, his particular account of the day of Judgment, chap. xxv., which strongly confirms and clearly explains the doctrine of our second justification by works, will prove you greatly mistaken, as will also his declaration to St. John above forty years after, "Behold I come quickly, and my reward is with me, to give to every man as his work, [not faith] shall be."

O if faith alone turns the scale of justifying evidence at the bar of God, how many bold Antinomians will claim relation to Christ, and boast they are interested in his imputed righteousness! How many will say with the foolish virgins," Lord! Lord! we are of faith, and Abraham's children: In thy name we publicly opposed all legal professors, traduced their teachers as enemies to thy free grace; and to do thee service made it our business to expose the righteousness, and cry down the good works of thy people; therefore Lord! Lord! open to us! But alas! far from thanking them for their pains, without looking at their boasted faith, he will dismiss them with a "Depart from me, ye that work iniquity!" As if he said:

Depart, ye that made the doctrine of my atonement a cloke for your sins, or sewed it as a pillow under the arms of my people, to make them sleep in carnal security, when they should have worked out their salvation with fear and trembling. You profess to know me, but I disown you. My sheep I know them that are mine I know: The seal of my holiness is upon them all: the motto of it ("let him that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity,") is deeply engraven on their faithful breasts,-Not on yours, Ye carnal, ye sold under sin.

"And why called ye me-Lord! Lord! and did not do the things which I said? Why did you even use my righteousness as a breast-plate, to stand it out against the word of my righteousness; and as an engine to break both tables of my law, and batter down my holiness? Your heart condemns you, ye sinners in Zion! Ye salt without savour!

Ye believers without charity! And am not I greater than your heart? And know I not your works? Yes, I know that the love of God is not in you, for you despised one of these my brethren. How could you think to deceive me, the Searcher of hearts and Tryer of reins? And how did you dare to call yourselves by my name? As if you were my people? my dear people, mine elect? Are not all my peculiar people partakers of my holiness, and zealous of good works? Have not I chosen to myself the man that is godly, and protested that the ungodly shall not stand in judgment, nor sinners, (though in sheep's clothing) in the congregation of the righte ous? And say I not to the wicked, Lo ammi, though he should have been one of my people, Thou art none of my people now, what hast thou to do with taking my covenant into thy mouth? You denied me in works, and did not wash your hearts from iniquity in my blood; therefore according to my word, I deny you in my turn, before my Father and his holy angels. Perish your hope, ye hypocrites! And utter darkness be your portion, ye double-minded! Let fearfulness surprise you, ye tinkling cymbals ! Let the fall of your Babels crush you, ye towering profes sors of my humble faith! Fly, ye clouds without water; ye chaff, fly before the blast of my righteous indignation! Ye workers of iniquity! Ye Satans transformed into angels of light!

II. Nor is our Lord singular in his doc. trine of justification or condemnation by works in the day of judgment. If it is an heresy, the Patriarchs, Prophets, and Apostles are as great Heretics as their Master. Enoch, quoted by St. Jude, prophesied that when the Lord shall come to execute judg ment upon all men, he will convince the ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds and hard speeches. This conviction will no doubt be in order to condemnation; and this condemnation will not turn upon unbelief, but its effects, ungodly deeds and hard speeches. Solomon confirms the joint testimony of Enoch and St. Jude where he says, "He that knoweth the heart shall render to every man according to his works:" and again, "Know O young man, that for all these things, for all thy ways, God shall bring thee into judgment.'

St. Paul, the great champion for faith, is peculiarly express upon this 'anti-Crispian doctrine. The Lord, says he, "in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, will render to every man according to his deeds; to them that continue in well doing,-here is the true perseverance of the saints! Eternal life! Indignation upon every soul of man that does evil, and glory to every man that worketh good; for there is no respect of persons with God.-We shall all appear before the Judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things