Note 173 — REV. JAMES HERVEY, M.A., THE LITERARY PARISH-PRIEST. (continued 2)

Mr. Thompson, though not an Oxford Methodist, had begun to preach the Methodist doctrine of salvation by faith, and had received Charles Wesley, with open arms, at St. Gennys. He had allowed the branded itinerant to preach twice in his parish church, and had kept him company on a preaching excursion to Penryn, Gwennap “Pit,” and other places. In Mr. Bennet’s Church, at Tresmere, a strange scene had been witnessed. Charles Wesley was the preacher, and, on his declaring, that, by “harmless diversions,” he had been “kept dead to God, asleep in the devil’s arms, secure in a state of damnation for eighteen years,” Mr. Merriton, one of his travelling companions, added aloud, “And I for twenty-five;” “And I,” cried Mr. Thompson, “for thirty-five;” “And I,” said Mr. Bennet, “for above seventy.” This was quite enough to expose Thompson to the ecclesiastical anger of the bishop of the diocese.