The confessionalist has a just sense of merit in the professors of more than one calling. Mr. Baxter, famous for his book, denominated " A Shove to heavya-s-d Christians," when he first went to Kidderminster, we are told, met not with but a handful of people who were religious, yet he left it abounding in pious followers of Jesus. The confessionalist owns that, in all probability, had he never heard the Methodists preach, he should have been at this time a poor, ragged, dirty cobbler, peeping out from under a bulk, with a snuffy nose and long beard; for it was by their preaching that he was taught to call upon God for his grace, to enable him to turn from his vicious course of life, and through which he became a christian. These people have been too much reproved on their zeal. Zeal is one ingredient of genuine religion. Religion itself has to do not so much with the understanding as the heart. Some of the most exalted sensibilities belong to it. Views of eternal bliss, and joy, and happiness will stretch out the imagination to the very verge of fanaticism. The higher parts of devotion have a similar tendency. Besides, the religious exercises of the Methodist are more continuous, more intense, more glowing than those, perhaps, of any other known sect. All their hymns rise to the fervor of the psalmist himself. This is a circumstance of enthusiasm. Others, the reader will easily imagine. But if they are renowned for the ardor of their zeal, the same people are likewise, in most of their lyrical compositions, eminent for justness of sentiment and purity and accuracy of expression. This hymn, which they sing in all their chapels, is a fine production, we believe, of the muse of Wesley. Christ, from whom all blessings flow, Hear us, who thy nature share, Who thy mystic body are: Closer knit to thee, our Head, Move and actuate, and guide: All the Wesleys were men of genius. John was an excellent scholar; and Charles was inferior to few in the middling ranks of literature. The confessionalist has a vindication of lay preaching. In that vindication there is nothing remarkable. Mr. Wesley's character and life are next vindicated. Only as he has been unjustly and insidiously traduced, Mr. Wesley need not to be vindicated. The confessionalist, however, naturally enough, is the warm panegyrist, as well as advocate of Mr. Wesley, and of the generality of Mr. Wesley's people. The Methodists are, upon the whole, well informed on the subject of religion. Mr. Lackington has never met with any who were better. Some ignorant and unprincipled, no doubt, have got in from time to time among them no sect has ever been wholly immaculate; no sect can be wholly pure. Good and bad there are, and there ever will be of all denominations, and people, and tongues. Mr. Wesley's care of his flock was exemplary. None went astray, without many warnings. How he formed his societies of classes, marked him for one of large understanding and enlightened benevolence. He convoked his ministers; and pointing out to them the advantages that would result from frequency of privately meeting, he distributed his congregations into classes, each to be known by its distinctive ticket of admission to its own body. This had the effect desired. Private meetings, in the actual spirit of brotherly love and charity, of good-will, not only to themselves, but to their neighbours and the world, (those principles which ever distinguish the true Methodist,) -those meetings in classes now regularly took place, to which may be attributed the extensive influence and stable government of that celebrated people.--The classes originated in London, in March, 1742. From Mr. Wesley's own account of the rise and progress of his institution, we learn that he appointed several earnest, sensible men to meet him, to whom he showed the great difficulty he had long found of knowing the people who desired to be under his care. After much discourse they all agreed there could be no better way to come to a sure knowledge of each person than to divide them into classes, under the inspection of those in whom he could confide. "This was the ori 1 gin of classes in London, for which," observes the holy man, "I can never sufficiently praise God, the unspeakable usefulness of the institution having ever since been more and more manifest." The person appointed to watch these classes was called the leader of that class to which he received his appointment. Mr. Wesley called the leaders together, and desired that each would make a particular enquiry into the behaviour of those he saw weekly. They did so; and many disorderly walkers were detected. Some were turned from the evil of their ways; and some put out of the society. And the rest saw it with fear, and rejoiced in God with reverence. At first the leaders visited each person at their own house; but this was soon found inexpedient. It required more time than the leaders had to spare. Many persons lived with masters, mistresses, or relations, where they could not be visited. And where misunderstandings had arisen between persons in the same class it was more convenient to see them face to face. On these, and some other considerations, it was agreed, that each leader should meet his class all together, once a week, at a time and place most convenient for the whole. He begun and ended the meeting with singing and prayer; and spent about an hour in conversing with these persons, one by one. By this means, a more full enquiry was made into the behaviour of every person; advice or reproof was given as need required; misunderstandings were removed; and brotherly love promoted. It can scarce be conceived what advantages have been reaped from this little prudential regulation. Many experienced that Christian fellowship, of which they had not so much as |