would not have had the satisfaction of seeing the fruit of his death in the eternal salvation of one soul. Our preaching would then be vain, and all invitations for people to believe in him, would also be in vain.

But blessed be God, our Lord knew for whom he died. There was an eternal compact between the Father and Son. A certain number was then given him, as the purchase and reward of his obedience and death. For these he prayed, (John, xvii.) and not for the world. For these, and these only, he is now interceding, and with their salvation he will be fully satisfied.

I purposely omit making any farther particular remarks on the several last pages of your sermon. Indeed, had not your name, dear sir, been prefixed to the sermon, I could not have been so uncharitable as to think you were the author of such sophistry. You beg the question, in saying that God has declared, (notwithstanding you own, I suppose, some will be damned) that he would save all, i.e. every individual person. You take it for granted (for solid proof you have none) that God is unjust, if he passes by any; and then you exclaim against the horrible decree. And yet, as I before hinted, in holding the doctrine of Original Sin, you profess to believe that he might justly have passed by all.

Dear, dear sir! O be not offended! For Christ's sake, be not rash! Give yourself to reading. Study the Covenant of Grace. Down with your carnal reasoning Be a little child. And then, instead of pawning your salvation, as you have done in a late Hymn-Book, if the doctrine of Universal Redemption be not true; instead of talking of sinless perfection, as you have done in the Preface to that Hymn-Book, and making man's salvation depend on his own free-will, as you have in this sermon; you will compose a Hymn in praise of sovereign, distinguishing love. You will caution believers against striving to work a perfection out of their own hearts; and print another sermon the reverse of this, and entitle it, Free Grace indeed. Free, because not free to all; but free, because God may withhold or give it to whom and when he pleases.

Till you do this, I must doubt whether or not you know yourself. In the mean while, I cannot but blame you for censuring the clergy of our Church for not keeping to

their Articles, when you yourself, by your principles, positively deny the 9th, 10th, and 17th. Dear sir, these things ought not so to be. God knows my heart, as I told you before, so I declare again, nothing but a single regard to the honour of Christ has forced this Letter from me. I love and honor you for his sake; and, when I come to judgment, will thank you, before men and angels, for what you have, under God, done for my soul.

There, I am persuaded. I shall see dear Mr. Wesley, convinced of election and everlasting love. And it often fills me with pleasure, to think how I shall behold you casting your crown down at the feet of the Lamb; and, as it were, filled with a holy blushing for opposing the Divine Sovereignty in the manner you have done.

But I hope the Lord will shew you this before you go hence. O how do I long for that day! If the Lord should be pleased to make use of this Letter for that purpose, it would abundantly rejoice the heart of, dear and honored Your affectionate, though unworthy,

Sir,

Brother and servant in Christ,

GEORGE WHITEFIELD.

EXTRACTS

FROM MR. WHITEFIELD'S JOURNALS.

Bristol, Monday, July 9, 1740. On Thursday I receiv ed a letter from the Bishop of Gloucester, in which his Lordship affectionately admonished me, to exercise my authority I received in the manner it was given me. His Lordship being of opinion, that I ought to preach the gospel only in the congregation wherein I was lawfully ap pointed thereunto.

To-day I sent his Lordship the following Answer,

My Lord,

THE ANSWER.

"I thank your Lordship for your Lordship's kind Let ter. My frequent removes from place to place prevented my answering it sooner. I am greatly obliged to your Lordship, in that you are pleased to watch over my soul, and to caution me against acting contrary to the commission given me at Ordination. But if the commission we then receive, obliges us to preach no where but in that parish which is committed to our care, then all persons act contrary to their commission when they preach occasionally in any strange place.-And consequently, your Lordship equally offends when you preach out of your own Diocese. As for inveighing against the Clergy (without a cause) I deny the charge. What I say I am ready to make good whenever your Lordship pleases. Let those that bring reports to your Lordship about my preaching, be brought face to face, and I am ready to give them an answer.-St. Paul exhorts Timothy, not to receive an accusation against an Elder under two or three witnesses. And even Nicodemus could say, the Law suffered no man to be condemned unheard. I shall only add, that I hope your Lordship will inspect into the lives of your other Clergy, and censure them for being over remiss, as much as you censure me for being over righteous;

It is their falling from their Articles, and not preaching the truth as it is Jesus, that has excited the present zeal of (whom they in derision call) the Methodist Preachers. Dr. Stebbing's Sermon, (for which I thank your Lordship) confirms me more and more in my opinion, that I ought to be instant in season and out of season. For to me, he seems to know no more of the true nature of Regeneration, than Nicodemus did when he came to Jesus by night. Your Lordship may observe, that he does not speak a word of Original Sin, or the dreadful consequences of our Fall in Adam, upon which the doctrine of the New-Birth is entirely founded. No; like other polite preachers, he seems to think, in the very beginning of his Discourse, that St. Paul's description of the wickedness of the Heathen is only to be referred to them of past ages. Whereas I affirm, we are all included as much under the guilt and consequences of sin as they were, and if any Man preach any other doctrine, he shall bear his punishment whosoever he be. Again, My Lord, the Doctor entirely mistakes us when we talk of the sensible operations of the Holy Ghost. He understands us just as those carnal Jews understood Jesus Christ, who, when our Lord talked of giving them that bread which came down from heaven, said, How can this man give us his flesh to eat? Indeed I know not that we do use the word sensible, when we are talking of the operations of the Spirit of God.— But if we do, we do not mean, that God's Spirit does manifest itself to our senses, but that it may be perceived by the soul, as really, as is any sensible impression made upon the body. But to disprove this the Doctor brings our Lord's allusion to the wind in the third of St. John, which is one of the best texts he could urge to prove it. For if the analogy of our Lord's Discourse be carried on, we shall find it amounts to thus much :--That although the operations of the Spirit of God can no more be accounted for, than how the wind cometh and whither it goeth; yet may they be as easily felt by the soul as the wind may be felt by the body. My Lord, indeed we speak what we know. But, says the Doctor, These men have no proof to offer for their inward manifestations." What proof, my Lord, does the Doctor require; would he have us raise dead bodies? Have we not done greater things than

these? I speak with all humility, has not God by our min istry raised many dead souls to a spiritual life. Verily, if men will not believe the evidence God has given that he sent us, neither would they believe though one rose from the dead. Besides, my Lord, the Doctor charges us with things we are entire strangers to, such as the denying men the use of God's creatures-encouraging abstinence, prayer, &c. to the neglect of the duties of our stations. Lord lay not this sin to his charge. Again, he says, 'I 'suppose Mr. Benjamin Seward to be a person believing in Christ, and blameless in his conversation, before what I call his conversion.' But this is a direct untruth.-For it was through the want of a living faith in Jesus Christ, which he now has, that he was not a Christian before, but a mere moralist. Your Lordship knows that our Article says, 'Works done without the Spirit of God, and true 'faith in Jesus Christ, have the nature of sin.' And such were all the works done by Mr. Benjamin Seward before the time mentioned in my Journal. Again, my Lord, the Doctor represents that as my opinion concerning Quakers in general, which I only meant of those I conversed with in particular. But the Doctor, and the rest of my Rever end Brethren, are welcome to judge me as they please.➡ Yet a little while, and we shall all appear before the great Shepherd of our souls. There, there my Lord, shall it be determined who are his true ministers, and who are only wolves in Sheep's clothing. Our Lord, I believe, will not be ashamed to confess us publicly in that dayI pray God we all may approve ourselves such faithful ministers of the New-Testament, that we may be able to lift up our heads with boldness. As for declining the work in which I am engaged, my blood runs chill at the very thoughts of it. I am as much convinced, it is my duty to act as I do, as that the sun shines at noon-day. I can foresee the consequences very well. They have already in one sense thrust us out of the Synagogues. By and by they will think it is doing God service to kill us.— But, my Lord, if you and the rest of the Bishops cast us out, our great and common Master will take us up.— Though all men should deny us, yet will not he.-And however you may censure us as evil doers, and disturbers of the peace, yet if we do suffer for our present way of