Sat 5 June 1742. I rode for Epworth. Before we came
thither I made an end of Madam Guyon’s Short Method of Prayer and Les Torrents
Spirituelles. Ah, my brethren; I can answer your riddle, now I have ploughed
with your heifer. The very words I have so often heard some of you use are not
your own, no more than they are God’s. They are only retailed from this poor
quietist, and that with the utmost faithfulness. O that ye knew how much God is
wiser than man! Then would you drop quietists and mystics together, and at all
hazards keep to the plain, practical, written Word of God.
It being many years since I had been in
Epworth before, I went to an inn in the middle of the town, not knowing
whether there were any left in it now who would not be ashamed of my
acquaintance. But an old servant of my father’s, with two or three poor women,
presently found me out. I asked her, ‘Do you know any in Epworth who are in
earnest to be saved?’ She answered, ‘I am, by the grace of God; and I know I am
saved through faith.’ I asked, ‘Have you then the peace of God? Do you know
that he has forgiven your sins?’ She replied, ‘I thank God, I know it well. And
many here can say the same thing.’
Sun. 6. A little before the service began I
went to Mr. Romley, the curate, and offered to assist him either by preaching
or reading prayers. But he did not care to accept of my assistance. The church
was exceeding full in the afternoon, a rumour being spread that I was to
preach. But the sermon on ‘Quench not the Spirit’ was not suitable to the
expectation of many of the hearers. Mr. Romley told them one of the most
dangerous ways of quenching the Spirit was by enthusiasm, and enlarged on the
character of an enthusiast in a very florid and oratorical manner. After sermon
John Taylor stood in the churchyard and gave notice as the people were coming
out, ‘Mr. Wesley not being permitted to preach in the church, designs to preach
here at six o’clock.’
Accordingly at six I came, and found such a
congregation as I believe Epworth never saw before. I stood near the east end
of the church, upon my father’s tombstone, and cried, ‘The kingdom of heaven is
not meats and drinks, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy
Ghost.’
At eight I went to Edward Smith’s, where
were many not only of Epworth, but of Burnham, Haxey, Owston, Belton, and other
villages round about, who greatly desired that I would come over to them and
help them. I was now in a strait between two, desiring to hasten forward in my
journey, and yet not knowing how to leave these poor bruised reeds in the
confusion wherein I found them. John Harrison, it seems, and Richard Ridley, had told them in express terms, ‘All the ordinances are man’s inventions; and
if you go to church or sacrament you will be damned.’ Many hereupon wholly
forsook the church, and others knew not what to do. At last I determined to
spend some days here, that I might have time both to preach in each town and to
speak severally with those in every place who had found or waited for
salvation.