John Wesley: Friend of the People by Oscar Sherwin

In his fresh and penetrating treatment of John Wesley the man and his work, Professor Sherwin has written an unusual account of the most amazing figure in England of the eighteenth century ... John Wesley taught liberty, equality, fraternity long before the French Revolution. Methodism was a religion of the common people, a movement of and by the poor ... Instead of ready welcome this preacher of repentance and faith, equal opportunity, good will, and brotherhood met (from People, Aristocracy, Press) ugly and clamorous and riotous receptions. Oscar Sherwin has vividly recreated the mob scenes. With significant acuteness the author examines the missionary aspects of Wesleyanism: prison reform, insistence on social duties, the stewardship of property, abhorrence of press gangs and of bribery and corruption in public life, the compelling agitation against slavery and "that execrable sum of all villainies", the slave trade. Less generally known, even forgotten, are two further aspects which Professor Sherwin stresses: Wesley's vital efforts in public health (he started on of the first dispensaries in England and wrote an immensely popular book on health) and his pioneering educational work among the masses.