between the clergy and laity was the refult. Mr. Wesley was indicted; and the following warrant, copied by himfelf into his journal, was iffued. "GEORGIA. SAVANNAH. ff. "To all constables, tything men, and others "whom these may concern. "You and each of you are hereby required "to take the body of John Wesley, clerk, &c. " &c. &c. Signed, Th. Chriftie." Tuesday, the ninth," fays Mr. Wefley, "Mr. Jones, the conftable, carried me before "Mr. Bailiff Parker and Mr. Recorder. My "anfwer to them was-that the giving or re fufing the Lord's fupper being a matter "purely ecclefiaftic, I could not acknowledge "their power to interrogate me upon it."* If Mr. Wefley, then, thought himself justifiable in pleading the clerical privilege, let him not blame the fathers of Conftance, for declaring their right to punish with ecclefiaftical cenfures and degra dation, one of their own fubjects, in fpite of any fafe-conduct granted by the civil power; especially at a time when this fuperiority over their own clergy, was confirmed to the bishops by the laws of the empire, with which Sigifmund * See this whole affair in Mr. Wefley's Journal of the year 1737, p. 43. Bristol printed by Felix Farley. could could no more difpenfe at that time, than James the fecond could in his. "But," fays Mr. Wefley, "fure Hufs would "not have come to Conftance, had he forefeen "the confequence." That regarded himself. Obftinate perfons feldom think themselves in error. Strange inftances of this obftinacy can be met with in the trials of the regicides: fome of whom declared, at the hour of death, that they gloried in having a hand in the king's death, and would chearfully play over the fame tragedy. We have a more recent inftance of this obftinacy, in one of Mr. Wesley's martyrs. Scarcely could the Proteftant clergyman prevail. on one of the rioters, who had been very active in plundering the city of London, last year, to take the blue cockade out of his hat, in going to the gallows. He cried out that he died a martyr to the Proteftant religion. We have daily inftances of people giving themselves up to take their trial, who are difappointed, without any imputation on their judges. Jerome of Prague, who maintained the fame error with Hufs, came to Conftance, after his confrere's execution. The council fent him a a fafe-conduct, with this express claufe: "falvo "jure concilii "-referving to the council its right to judge you. He came and the council judged and punished him with degradation, as it had had done with regard to Hufs; and left him to the fecular arm as Calvin, queen Elizabeth, and king James I. did to the heretics whom their confiftories and bifhops had judged and found guilty of heretical pravity. "But was not "the emperor Sigifmund cruel in putting those "two men to death?" It is not his lenity or cruelty that we examine. I only vindicate myself and the Catholic Church from a flanderous doctrine. He was not more cruel for putting feditious men, one of whom had committed wilful murder, to death, than Proteftant fovereigns who doomed old women to the flake, for a kind of gibberish about the incarnation. My fentiments on that fubject I have explained. Jerome of Prague's coming to the council, shews that it did not violate faith with John Hufs. Neither doth any one accuse the council of violating faith with Jerome. They were both more obftinate than Mr. Wefley, who ran away from the bailiffs of Georgia, and would not return to them. In this he followed Sancho's maxim: Many go to the market for wool, that come "home fhorn." ARTHUR O'LEARY. |