Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-r6qrq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T09:43:23.673Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘The Bane of Industry’? Popular Evangelicalism and Work in the Eighteenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

John Walsh
John Walsh*
Affiliation:
Jesus College, Oxford
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

“Work while it is day; the night cometh wherein no man can work’: John Wesley’s liking for John 9.4 will not surprise a modern student of evangelical history. That there was a Weberian elective affinity between Methodism and diligence has become something of a truism among sociologists examining the cluster of values comprising the Protestant ethic and social historians probing the psychological roots of industrialization in England. Thanks to a famous chapter in E. P. Thompson’s Making of the English Working Class, countless students perceive Methodism primarily as an agency of time-work discipline, internalizing a gospel of work in the pre-industrial labourer and recasting him, by way of the fiery mould of a conversion experience, into the submissive factory worker.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 37: The Use and Abuse of Time in Christian History , 2002 , pp. 223 - 241
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 2002

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 The Letters of J. Wesley, ed. Telford, J., 8 vols (London, 1931), 6: 74 Google Scholar.

2 Thompson, E. P., The Making of the English Working Class (London, 1963); idem, Time, work discipline, and industrial capitalism’, P&P, 38 (Dec. 1969), pp. 86–9 Google Scholar.

3 Four Letters taken from the Weekly History (Edinburgh, 1743), p. 18.

4 The Works of John Wesley, volume 25: Letters, I, 1721–1739, ed. Baker, F. (Oxford, 1980), p. 223 Google Scholar. This excellent but as yet incomplete edition of the letters is cited in this one instance because it corrects an error in the Telford edition used elsewhere.

5 The Works of J. Wesley, ed. Jackson, T., 14 vols (London, 1872) [hereafter Wesley, Works], 13:230Google Scholar.

6 Ibid., 7: 31; 8: 129, 274. Other Methodist groupings had similar rules: see, for example, The History, Constitution, Rules and Confession of the Calvinistic Methodists of Wales (London, 1827), p. 48.

7 Wesley, Works, 11: 439.

8 Ibid., 6: 510.

9 The Poetical Works of J. and C. Wesley, ed. Osborn, G., 13 vols (London, 1868–72), 1: 172 Google Scholar.

10 The Arminian Magazine [hereafter AM], 9 (1786), p. 396.

11 The Lives of the Early Methodist Preachers, ed. Telford, J., 5 vols, 3rd edn (London, 1866), 2: 288.Google Scholar

12 Smith, B., Methodism in Macclesfield (London, 1875), p. 214.Google Scholar

13 AM, 39 (1806), p. 27; Wesley Banner, 2 (1850), p. 114.

14 Wesley, J., Journal, ed. N. Curnock, 8 vols (London, 1938), 4: 417, 5: 30, 82; Wesley, Works, 7: 289–90 Google Scholar.

15 The Norwich Mercury, 18 Jan. 1752.

16 Burder, H. F., The Life of the Revd. G. Burder (London, 1833), p. 41 Google Scholar.

17 Wesley, Journal, 3: 240.

18 T. Balguy, Discourses (Winchester, 1785), pp. 59–60; Thomas, J., Two Letters to the Rev. T Coke (London, 1777), p. 9; Boyer, A. et al., The Political State of Great Britain, 56 (1738), pp. 145–6.Google Scholar

19 Tailfer, P. et al., A True and Historical Narrative of the Colony of Georgia (Charleston, SC, 1741). p. 41 Google Scholar.

20 Furniss, E. S., The Position of the Labourer in a System of Nationalism (Boston, 1920)Google Scholar.

21 Mandeville, B. de, The Fable of the Bees, ed. Kaye, F. B., 2 vols (Oxford, 1924), 1: 302.Google Scholar

22 Trapp, J., The Nature, Sin and Folly of being Righteous Overmuch, 2nd edn (London, 1739), pp. 4, 7–8.Google Scholar

23 Church, T., An Explanation and Defense of the Church of England (London, 1739), p. 54 Google Scholar.

24 An Earnest Appeal to the Publick (London, 1739), p. 10.

25 Clayton, R., The Religion of Labour: a Sermon (Dublin, 1740), p. 20 Google Scholar.

26 A Letter to a Country Gentleman on the Subject of Methodism (Ipswich, 1805), pp. 29, 33.

27 [ Seymour, A. H. C.], The Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon, 2 vols (London, 1844), 1: 92 Google Scholar.

28 The Gentleman’s Magazine, 9 (1739), p. 257, quoting Common Sense, 19 April 1739.

29 Memoirs of the Life of Sir John Clerk of Penicuik, ed. J. M. Gray, Publications of the Scottish History Society, 13 (Edinburgh, 1892), p. 248.

30 Earnest Appeal to the Pubtick, p. 8.

31 Fellowes, R., Religion without Cant (London, 1801), p. 31.Google Scholar

32 Letter to a Country Gentleman, pp. 29–30.

33 White, J., A Letter to a Gentleman dissenting from the Church, 2nd edn (London, 1745), p. 98 Google Scholar.

34 Free, J., Rules for the Discovery of False Prophets (London, 1758), p. 29 Google Scholar; Barratt, G., Recollections of Methodism in Lincoln (Lincoln, 1866), p. 75 Google Scholar.

35 Buller, J., A Reply to Mr Wesley’s Address to the Clergy (Bristol, 1756), pp. 25–6.Google Scholar

36 Letter to a Country Gentleman, p. 41.

37 The True Character of Mr Whitefield (London, 1739), p. 17.

38 W. Cobbett, Cobbett’s Political Register, 35 (27 Jan. 1820).

39 Scholes, J., Edward Whitehead (Bolton, 1889), p. 18.Google Scholar

40 Graves, R., The Spiritual Quixote, ed. C. Tracy (London, 1967), p. 235 Google Scholar. See The Works of G. Whitefield, 6 vols (London, 1771–2), 5: 370: ‘I have offered you salvation on as cheap terms as you could desire.’

41 Green, J., The Principles and Practices of the Methodists Considered (London, 1760), p. 25 Google Scholar.

42 Toplady, A. M., The Works of Augustus Toplady, 6 vols (London, 1794), 6: 422.Google Scholar

43 Foote, S., The Minor. A Comedy, 2nd edn (London, 1760), p. 90 Google Scholar.

44 Clapham, S., How far Methodism is Conducive to the Interests of Christianity (Leeds, 1794), pp. 16–17 Google Scholar.

45 Law, W., A Practical Treatise upon Christian Perfection (London, 1726), p. 72.Google Scholar

46 Wesley, Works, n: 207.

47 Whitefield, Works, 5: 302–3.

48 For a modern comment on the ‘calling’ see E. Morgan, The Puritan Family, pbk edn (New York, 1966), pp. 66–78.

49 [C. Fleury], Tlie Manners of the Antient Christians, extracted from a French Author [by J. Wesley] (Bristol, 1749), p. 13.

50 Wesley (ed. Telford), Letters, 8: 238.

51 Minutes of the Methodist Conferences (London, 1833.), 1: 10.

52 Wesley, Works, 7: 31.

53 AM, 18 (1795), p. 124.

54 Truro, Cornwall County Record Office, X210: Anna Reynalds, Diary for 6 Jan. 1817.

55 Manchester, John Rylands University Library, Methodist Archives, Lamplough Collection: MS letter of W. Smith to J. Benson, 24 June 1793.

56 AM, 25 (1802), p. 348.

57 The Efficacy of Faith exemplified: a Memoir of W. Carvosso (London, 1836), p. 61.

58 Wesley (ed. Telford), Letters, 5: 257.

59 The Works of T. Scott, 5 vols (Buckingham, 1805–8), 4: 369. See too Newton, J., Works, 6 vols (London, 1808–9), 2:571 Google Scholar.

60 Huntington, W., Works, 20 vols (London, 1811), 1: 132.Google Scholar

61 A Narrative of the Travels and Voyages ofCapt. A. Landers (London, 1813), p. 11.

62 Edinburgh, New College, W. McCulloch MSS: ‘Examination of Persons under Spiritual Concern at Cambuslang during the Revival in 1741–2’, 1: 112.

63 T. Coke, The Life of J. Wesley (London, 1792), p. 468.

64 Manchester, John Rylands University Library, Methodist Archives, NAM PLP 17.42.2: J. Burgess to J. Bunting, 3 March 1824. See D. Luker, ‘Cornish Methodism, Revivalism and popular belief (Oxford University D.Phil, thesis, 1988), pp. 42, 309–10.

65 W. Gibson, The Year of Grace (London, 1860), p. 45; D. Jenkins, The Agricultural Community in South-West Wales (Cardiff, 1971), p. 235.

66 West, F. W., Memoirs of Jonathan Savitte of Halifax, 4th edn (London, 1857), p. 3 Google Scholar.

67 AM, 17 (1794), p. 650.

68 Bourne, H., History of the Primitive Methodists to the Year 1823 (Bemersley, 1835), p. 5 Google Scholar; D. Valenze, Prophetic Sons and Daughters (Princeton, NJ, 1985), p. 84.

69 Lackington, J., Memoirs (London, 1792), p. 220.Google Scholar

70 Welch, E., ed., Two Calvinistic Methodist Chapeb (London, 1975), pp. 14–15.Google Scholar

71 Wesley, Journal, 4: 79.

72 An Account of the Revd. J. Fawcett (London, 1818), p. 12.

73 Methodist Magazine, 31 (1808), p. 128.

74 Bretherton, F., Early Methodism in Chester (Chester, 1903), p. 268 Google Scholar.

75 AM, 2 (1779), pp. 129–30.

76 AM, 8 (1785), pp. 197–8.

77 Robinson, R., Posthumous Works (Harlow, 1812) p. 284.Google Scholar

78 Minutes of Conferences, I: 51, 94.

79 Wood, J., Directions to the Methodist Class Leaders 2nd edn (London, 1804), pp. 10, 14–15 Google Scholar.

80 Cobbett’s Political Register, 3 5 (27 Jan. 1820).

81 Taylor, Adam, A History of the General Baptists, 2 vols (London, 1818), 2: 58–9 Google Scholar; Daniell, W., Warminster Common (Warminster, 1850), p. 103 Google Scholar; W. Jessop, An Account of Methodism in Rossendale (Manchester, 1880), p. 86; D. M. Evans, Christmas Evans (London, 1863), p. 136.

82 Wesley, Works, 8: 356.

83 AM, 22 (1799), p. 490; 8 (1785), pp. 197–9; An Account of T. Hawkes (St Albans, 1817), p. 11; Lackington, Memoirs, p. 259.

84 C. Atmore, The Methodist Memorial (Bristol, 1801), pp. 423–4.