CHAPTER XIII

QUAKERS IN LONDON AND ELSEWHERE

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ROM time to time, while on his travels, Wesley came in contact with members of the Society of Friends; and though he never favoured their sentiments, his acquaintance with some of these was greatly valued. He makes interesting references to them such as affords another insight into eighteenth-century life. even appears to us as though the subject of the Friends and their 'Meetings' in London was then invested with greater interest than can be the case in our times, became so many of their stations in the metropolis remained intact as they had come down from the heroic Puritan period. If we supplement Wesley's Diary with information contained in such a work as Messrs. Beck & Ball's London Friends' Meetings, we shall obtain a tolerably clear idea of the general outlook one hundred and fifty years ago.

The old meeting-houses of London and the near suburbs have, in many instances, left traces of their sites in streets and courts which are named after them. Take, for example, Quaker Street,

Spitalfields, so called after a meeting which once existed there, and which, being old enough to have been damaged by the Great Storm of 1703, had seen its best days, and was passing out of use in the early forties of the eighteenth century when Wesley was already earnestly engaged in itinerant service. The chief centre of all, Devonshire House, Bishopsgate, has of course a still more interesting history. The stately mansion of Devonshire House, with its spacious grounds, stood there. Its richly carved pillars, chimneypieces, and curiously wainscoted rooms, showed that the place was a princely residence in days when Queen Elizabeth is said to have been a visitor. Friends had rented two or three of the spacious rooms after their meeting at Bull and Mouth had been destroyed in the Great Fire. In the early years of the Methodist Revival, considerable alterations were made, and from that time to this, the Meeting' has grown into the present extensive establishment. There was also the Peel Meeting, situated near the ancient St. John's Gate at Clerkenwell-a quaint kind of place having many interesting memories. There were 'Meetings' in Southwark, as well as in the more near and distant suburbs. Thus, we shall not visit the severely plain but still pre-eminently attractive Quaker Meeting at Winchmore Hill without being reminded that the remains of Dr. Fothergill-to whose skilful treatment Wesley was so greatly indebted at the time of his serious breakdown in 1753-have lain there since 1780. In his day, this

Quaker physician was the chief of his profession in London, his practice at one time being worth £7000 a year. In his treatment of disease, Dr. Fothergill was a welcome contrast to the dangerous empirics who too often represented the medical science of his day. He also inherited certain seventeenth-century eccentricities; so that on one occasion, I believe, he walked along the Edinburgh High Street, his shoulders naked to the waist, to warn the people that God's vengeance would overtake them. The prescription he gave to Wesley, when he seemed to be recovering from the illness already referred to, was characteristic, and shows much of common-sense discernment, eg.: 'Dr. Fothergill told me plain I must not stay in town a day longer; adding, " If anything does thee good, it must be the country air, with rest, asses' milk, and riding daily." Thus we see that, on certain occasions, Wesley came came into direct contact with Friends, and had good reason to esteem them.

When he began his great work of itinerant preaching, Wesley met representative Quakers, and though he did not like disputations, he was always ready to converse with them in a friendly manner. One of his earliest adventures in this department occurred when he was on the road in the North, in March 1738: 'Being faint in the evening, I called at Altringham, and there lit upon a Quaker, well skilled in, and therefore (as I soon found) sufficiently fond of, controversy. After an hour spent therein (perhaps not in vain),