Susanna Wesley
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism. Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism.
Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
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130 SUSANNA WESLEY.<br />
so very difficult not to trust in, not to depend on it<br />
for support and happiness, that I do not know one<br />
rich man in the world with whom I would exchange<br />
conditions.<br />
" You<br />
'<br />
say, hope you have recovered your loss<br />
by fire long since.' No, and, it is to be doubted, never<br />
shall. Mr. <strong>Wesley</strong> rebuilt his house in less than<br />
one year, but nearly thirteen years are elapsed since<br />
it was burned, yet it is not half furnished, nor his<br />
wife and children half clothed to this day. It is true<br />
that by the benefactions of his friends, together with<br />
what he had himself, he paid the first ;<br />
but the latter<br />
is not paid yet, or, what is much the same, money<br />
which was borrowed for clothes and furniture is yet<br />
'<br />
unpaid. You go on :<br />
My brother's living of .300<br />
a year, as they tell me.' They, who ? I wish those<br />
who say so were compelled to make it so. It may<br />
be as truly said that his living is 10,000 a year as<br />
300. I have, Sir, formerly laid before you the true<br />
state of affairs. I have told you that the living was<br />
always let for 160 a year ;<br />
that taxes, poor assessments,<br />
sub-rents, tenths, procurations, synodals, &c.,<br />
took up nearly 30 of that moiety, so that there<br />
needs no great skill in arithmetic to compute what<br />
remains.<br />
" What we shall or shall not need hereafter God<br />
only knows, but at present there hardly ever was a<br />
greater coincidence of unprosperous events in one<br />
family than is now in ours. I am rarely in health,<br />
Mr. <strong>Wesley</strong> declines apace; my dear Emily, who in<br />
my present exigencies would greatly comfort me, is<br />
compelled to go to service in Lincoln, where she is<br />
a teacher in a boarding-school; my second daughter<br />
Sukey, a pretty woman, and worthy a better fate,
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