Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/309

 would have been a more distinguished musician had his father accepted the offer to educate him in the Chapel Royal, where he would have grown up in a musical atmosphere unattainable at Bristol.



WESLEY, JOHN (1703–1791), evangelist and leader of methodism, fifteenth child and second surviving son of (1662–1735) [q. v.], was born at Epworth Rectory, Lincolnshire, on 17 June 1703. The day and month rest on his own testimony (Westminster Mag. 1774, p. 181), the year is deduced from his father's certificate of his baptism (, Memorials of the Wesley Family, 1876, p. 329). Through his father he was descended from (1533?–1605) [q. v.], primate of Ireland; his more immediate ancestry, on both sides of the house, was nonconformist. Though baptised John Benjamin (his parents having lost infant sons of those names), his second name was never in use. His early education from the age of five was under his mother, whose methods were exacting; a single day was allowed for learning the alphabet. His rescue from the fire (9 Feb. 1708–9) at Epworth Rectory fixed itself in his mind as a work of divine providence. He was early noted for firmness of character and for his reflective turn, his father remarking that ‘our Jack’ would do nothing (non etiam crepitare) ‘unless he could give a reason for it.’ At eight years old he was admitted to the communion. On the nomination of his father's patron,, first duke of Buckingham and Normanby [q. v.], one of the governors, he was admitted (28 Jan. 1713–14) on the foundation of the Charterhouse school, London. At this time he wrote his surname ‘Westley.’ His morning run (by his father's order) thrice round the Charterhouse green strengthened his constitution. For some years he fared ill; the younger boys, robbed of rations by the seniors, had to make shift with bread. The story is told in a pamphlet of 1792 that the usher [q. v.] of the ‘Pantheon’ remonstrated with him for associating with his juniors whom he harangued, and got the answer ‘Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven.’ To his absence at school during the mysterious disturbances (1716–1717) at Epworth rectory we owe the minute accounts of this affair, supplied by members of the family in satisfaction of his curiosity; in the ‘Arminian Magazine’ (October–December 1784) he maintained the supernatural character of the occurrences. His brother Samuel, then head-usher at Westminster school, writes of him (1719) as a good scholar and ‘learning Hebrew’ (, i. 381).

On 24 June 1720 (, i. 19) he was elected scholar of Christ Church, Oxford; he matriculated on 18 July, when his age is given as 16. Just before going up, he was introduced to [q. v.], whom he found ‘as tall as a maypole and as fine as an archbishop.’ He relates, with great contempt, Sacheverell's advice to him, being ‘a very little fellow,’ to ‘go back to school’ (, Anecdotes of the Wesleys, 1870, p. 82). He was a diligent and sprightly student, much pinched for money. In a letter (17 June 1724) to his brother Samuel he gives a specimen of his English versifying, a trifle from the Latin on Cloe's ‘favourite flea’ (Westminster Mag. ut sup.). The perusal of the ‘Essay of Health and Long Life,’ 1724, by George Cheyne [q. v.], about which he writes to his mother (1 Nov. 1724), fixed his lifelong principle of spare and temperate diet, to the improving of his health. He graduated B.A. in 1724. Till the following year he had apparently no thought of taking orders. He writes (Journal, May 1738) that his father pressed him to do so. When he had decided for this vocation his mother warmly approved, though ‘your father and I seldom think alike’ (letter of 23 Feb. 1724–5), and advised his applying himself to ‘practical divinity’ as ‘the best study for candidates for orders.’ He was much influenced by writers who inculcated ‘the religion of the heart,’ but he used them with discrimination. He read the ‘Imitatio Christi’ in Stanhope's version, and was ‘very angry at Kempis for being too strict’ (in 1735 he published a revised edition of this version). Taylor's ‘Holy Living and Dying’ struck him as inculcating a false humility. He found difficulties in the Anglican article on predestination and in the excluding clauses of the Athanasian creed. His home correspondence on these topics is interesting as showing his resort to his mother's counsel, and her abhorrence of rigid Calvinism. On 19 Sept. 1725 he was ordained deacon by (1674?–1747) [q. v.], then bishop of Oxford. His first sermon was preached (16 Oct.) at South Leigh, near Witney, Oxfordshire. John Morley (d. 1731), rector of Lincoln College, used influence for his election (17 March 1726) as fellow; this was a tribute to his high character, his facility in argument, and his classical taste. His father writes with pride,