METHODISM AT THE FOUNTAIN.
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THE LIFE OF CHARLES WESLEY. Comprising a Review of his Poetry, and Sketches of the Rise and Progress of Methodism, with Notices of Contemporary Events and Characters. By Thomas Jackson. New-York, 1844.
This is a reprint of a London work, although it does not so appear on the title-page. We have lately read it in connection with another very interesting book, Clarke’s “Memoirs of the Wesley Family,” and have been led to far deeper interest in this great stream of religious thought and feeling by a nearer approach to its fountain-head.
The world at large takes its impression of the Wesleys from Southey. A humbler historian has scarce a chance to be heard beside one so rich in learning and talent. Yet the Methodists themselves are not satisfied with this account of their revered shepherds, which, though fair in the intention, and tolerably fair in the arrangement of facts, fails to convey the true spiritual sense, and does not, to the flock, present a picture of the fields where they were first satisfied with the food of immortals.
A better likeness, if not so ably painted, may indeed be found in chronicles written by the disciples of these great and excellent men, who, as characters full of affection no less than intellect, need also to be affectionately, no less than intellectually, discerned, in order to a true representation of their deeds and their influence.
The books we have named, and others which relate to the Wesleys, are extremely interesting, apart from a consideration of the
