History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

As a writer his work speaks for him. His reputation must have been very high, or he would not
have been unanimously selected as the biographer of Wesley. Its accuracy is not denied; he is
censured for the use he made of his trust, and in violation, as his opponents assert, of his obligations.
His trusts were numerous; physician to both the Wesleys and their families to the exclusion of all
others; he was made by Wesley's Will, jointly with Dr. Coke and Henry Moore, trustee of all his
books and all his manuscripts; the use of the private diary of Charles Wesley and the manuscripts
of the Wesley family; the confidence office preachers, executors, and friends in appointing him
preacher at his funeral and writer of his biography.
As to the manner in which he discharged his duty as biographer, let him witness first for himself.
"I determined to write not only the life of Mr. Wesley, but a 'History of Methodism,' with the utmost
impartiality to describe the things as they have been, and as they are, without the false coloring the
spirit of a party will always give a history." The London Analytical Review spoke in the highest
terms of both the volumes: "The narrative bears the marks of accuracy and fidelity." The London
Critical Review and the British Critic to the same effect. Dr. Adam Clarke says, "Of all these [other
biographies] Dr. Whitehead's claims the preference." Watson, Jackson, and Southey all commend
it, though it is quite probable that the latter never saw other than the spurious edition issued after
Whitehead's decease, printed in Dublin, garbled and expurgated of all the matter objectionable to the
Conference party — a proof, however, of its popularity as a biography and the demand for it. It was
a great outrage, however, upon a deceased author's rights, not as to copyright only, but the
misrepresentation it carried with it of the author's views.
The controversy with Coke, Moore, and the Conference may now be considered. The gist of it is
that, by the Will of Wesley, Coke, Whitehead, and Moore were made his literary executors. Coke
and Moore deferred to Whitehead in the preparation of the biography, and all the papers were placed
in his custody for this purpose. There are three points: the compensation to Whitehead for the work;
the right of judgment in the preparation of the work for the press; the right of the possession and use
of the manuscripts, when it came out. The parties could not agree as to the second point. As to the
first point, much has been asserted by Moore to impugn Whitehead, but it must all be set aside in
the face of the fact that Whitehead offered "to give the in the whole profits of the work, if they
desired it in order to put and end to the difference," but it was declined. As to the second, the
Conference party insisted that they "required" that Whitehead should publish nothing but "what
should be approved by a committee of the preachers." Whitehead affirms "that he offered to read the
manuscripts to them as friends, and consult them on particular parts of Wesley's life, but insisted on
the right to use his own judgment if on any point they could not agree. "This difference was,
however, irreconcilable. The third point is essentially involved in the second. Whitehead affirms that
the manuscripts once "delivered to him unconditionally" for the purpose of the biography Moore
declares that they were delivered "under an express stipulation that they should be examined
according to the Will of Wesley, previously to any of them being published." The parties here are
at such variance that the veracity of one or the other seems involved. But need it be resorted to?
Rather let it he assumed that there was an error for two reasons. First, Whitehead acknowledges that,
after the papers were delivered to him unconditionally, Coke and Moore changed their minds on that
subject. Did Moore forget this fact? Second, the probability of it. Whitehead's statement was made
while the facts were fresh, in the constructive presence of his opponents and without contradiction